for Civ4

[annoyed]

oops, meant to quote the first paragragh ffrom coracles entry. sorry

[Kindbud]

Originally posted by Falconius
I agree with annoyed. I'm somewhat annoyed myself over this settler diarhea problem.

What I find MOST annoying about it is that all the AI civs do it, no matter who they are. There's no variety to the AI's gameplay aside from military aggression levels and the use of UUs. In Civ I and II, the different Civs had different priorities. Some were expansionists (cranking out settlers), some were militarists (cranking out military units), some were perfectionists (cranking out city improvements). In Civ III, they are all expansionists, which has effectively killed the variety of the gameplay.

Now I know this was done so that the human players who used the ICS strategy would be countered. But what about the rest of us who preferred to use a variety of other tactics? Now we are forced to play the way the ICS players always played, and the way the AI plays now. Sorry, but this has become tiresome, especially on larger maps. On a large map, you spend endless hours churning out settlers just to keep up with the number of cities being built by the AI civs. Is this supposed to be fun?

I agree completely! I rarely played Civ 2 on the hardest levels because I enjoyed the game as an empire building experience against the other A.I.'s. Not to see how many cities I could eventually control but race to build the wonders and run the tech tree. I liked those damn movies - especially Leonardo's Workshop which had cool music. I would go to war when I had a neighbor nipping at my border etc. I liked building my cities up. Basically I enjoyed the game playing as a human perfectionist - roads, railroads, improved tiles, etc... I KNOW that ins't gonna appeal to a lot of players but it worked for me. Since the AI didn't rush settlers I didn't have to rush settlers.

All of that would be really cool to me in Civ III because the one problem with my style was that as I got really good I would be able to generate HUGE sums of cash in the end stage (and sometimes the middle stage) so with the spy I could simply buy other empires then mop the capital. No way to do that in Civ III.

Maybe I'm just a micromanagement junkie... Anyway it seems that although Civ III has several ways to achieve victory, the only sure way is conquest. I have never been close to scoring a cultural victory. I think a diplomatic win is fairly possible but war always trumps...

[NeoStar]

Hopefully this hasn't been mentioned...

Bring back the cheat mode in Civ4. One could create interesting situations in their games once you got bored of playing them normal.

I remember in Civ2 being able to make all kinds of crazy situations - like giving the weakest civ a few nukes

[khyron]

Originally posted by Coracle


I agree!

Months ago someone did a mod on a real world map with actual start positions. They put the Aztecs, Zulus, and Iroquois in also BUT WITHOUT the ability to create certain improvements. So, when the other civs got there these were relatively backwards people, although they had a lot of towns. I forget the name of it, but hopefully now with scenarios someone can do an even better job.

It made for an interesting game.

I bet that actually was. I'll rummage around for it, but if you ever happen to remember what it was called, let us know.

I'm sitting here imagining a scenario like that, but that also makes use of triggers...nothing really specific comes to mind, but I'm sure you get the idea.

That's my wish for Civ 4. Scenario triggers. (Someone please hit me if I've forgotten that they will be in PTW. I'm pretty sure they aren't. Maybe I just need to go to bed. )

[TacticalGrace]

Originally posted by Ksim3000

Quote:

Originally posted by TacticalGrace I think that the barbarians should be made more powerful. If they had more powerful units, either by giving them regulars and vets later in the ame or by giving them more advanced units like swordsman, and they cam in increasing numbers

I would rather have the Barbarians like what they are at the moment. If they were made any stronger and had larger numbers, It would be such a pain especially while sending Settlers out to find new resources.

that's the point... at the moment settling is too easy and so happens too fast

[Galvatron]

The only wish I have is:

Please create an understandable AI. Even in Civ III the AI cheats like mad and their behaivour against the human is still overly aggressive.

[SABRA]

Originally posted by Trip
Yes it may be long 'time-wise', but most people care more about gameplay value. And he's right... the world gets revealed far too quickly. How could they fix this? Well, aside from a larger map, I'm not really sure.

Indeed a larger map of somewhere like 300-320 X 300-320 would fix this problem .

[Grumbold]

The best way to slow down exploration and expansion would be to link it to tech. An ancient unit stepping outside the cultural ZoC would have say 4 turns to return or die. So new cities would have to be built close to the current ones (no border setting and then backfilling.) Later tech would allow increasing number of turns spent outside your cultural zone and the same would apply to ships. Diplomatic communication with nations the other side of the world should not be allowed.

Barbarians could be represented by minor civs with limited abilities, say no more than 3 cities and only ancient tech. If you were really pushing this, you could make every civ the same until the number of players reaching the mediaeval age was reached, then the other nations would be locked in barbarism. Since nearby players could trade techs, the chances for one continent to evolve many civilisations while another languishes in barbarism increases.

[Wormwood]

[QUOTE] Originally posted by annoyed
. I wish more randomn events besides disease in flood plain was insituted, and that these events would apply to AI also.


I miss the chance for civil war from Civ 2...I like the idea of natural disasters. Perhaps earthquakes that could damage roads and destroy city improvements, or volcano eruptions that level cities built near mountains and kill units. This could also be a way to create new islands out in the ocean. Maybe even forest fires, though that might be graphically heavy, and as long as game turns last, it wouldn't make sense to have 20 year long fires. Flooding is another option; it can remove tiles near the coast and rivers, and destroy city improvements. Or the odd meteor strike...

[realpolitic]

Originally posted by Galvatron
The only wish I have is:

Please create an understandable AI. Even in Civ III the AI cheats like mad and their behaivour against the human is still overly aggressive.

To keep the AI under control, just pay off a few nations to beat up the first nations that attack you, I can often can get several neighbors to fight them for my World Maps, which also make it easier to establish trade routes.

[kimmygibler]

"Originally posted by Trip
Yes it may be long 'time-wise', but most people care more about gameplay value. And he's right... the world gets revealed far too quickly. How could they fix this? Well, aside from a larger map, I'm not really sure."

Easy, make units require more support costs the further they are from their home city. Or if there is no "home city" concept I guess it could be distance from capital or distance from closest city. In the early game the cost could be extremely high making exploration very expensive. This would stop the ai especially from just sending hundreds of random ships randomly around the map.

[TacticalGrace]

The idea of "supply lines" is a good one, whether based on HP loss outside national boundaries or support costs based on distance from a friendly city.

The explorer unit could be made immune to these effects, thus making it a valuable unit. Ships should be more resistant to these effects.