Dammit! I forgot to turn off the cultural victory thingie. I really just wanted a spaceship win.
Well, anyway, here's my 2 cents on PTW so far. Admittedly not much as far as 2 cents go but what the hell...
I didn't want a culture victory and thought I had little chance of it...I didn't get any of the early wonders...well except for the Great Library. The AI beat me to the punch with all of 'em. (as the Iroqious at warlord level...yeah, I know, I suck) It wasn't until the GL that I could even keep up with the AI. I was surrounded by mostly jungle so I had to make a lot of workers to clear it, instead of military forces.
When a civ is destroyed do they continue in the game as long as one unit escapes? The english were swallowed whole by the Americans and ceased to exist. But the egyptians were also crushed by the combined might of the Americans and the Greeks but continued in the diplomacy screen til the endgame. I couldn't find ONE egyptian city on the map (and they had none listed in the diplomacy screen) but Cleo was still around and even forged alliances with other civs.
I thought that the new civs would be a little different. Given the fact that most of us only know the name Hannibal as a great military leader (or a character on the A-Team) the carthaginians were laid back. The never even lifted a sword against me, though I expected them to attack any moment. (unlike civ2 where the carthaginians were my hated enemy....and hey, wasn't Hannibal a black guy?) The only other new civs in my game were the arabs, the spanish and the mongols. The mongol leader is ugly, the spanish leader looks kinda like Alanis Morrisette and the arabs didn't bother me until they joined an alliance with the zulus forcing me to take some of their cities.
Its both refreshing and kind of boring when the other civs don't get mad.....I mean, I took a lead in technology in the middle ages and once I got to the industrial age I ran with it. Every so often I'd trade a lesser advance to a rival but only to make them pay me some money per turn and to get some luxuries. That seemed to placate them. I thought that my lead would really piss the AI off so I made sure my borders were well guarded. It was a bit of a let down when they didn't do anything. (after the culture victory I kept playing and started a war just to get it out of my system.) I didn't actually want a war, but I got bored for a bit.
Though the AI has toned it down they still build cities in your territory a lot. The Celts....oops forgot about them...built a city amidst mine just to claim some iron. Amazing it didn't flip
to me even though it was surrounded by my higher culture.
All in all it was a lot of fun...but I'd enjoy your thoughts on the game. Hey the only way to learn is through discussion.
