Questions, Questions, Questions :)

[Volker]

Now that I found a Fourm that Answers Questions, boy do I have alot of them Im a super Newb to this, so please bare with me. I want to buy the game but I gotta tell my dad whats it like before he goes and buys it.

Ok..heh

1. Do you name your own Cities? Or does the Computer do it?

2. How is War done, I dont understand how you use the units, do you build masses of them, or does 1 unit mean theirs like ## Number of Men to it.

3. How long can 1 game last?

4. Im planning on running mainly Hotseat games with my dad and I, and 6 A.I. Civs. Will this be a good game? Can my Dad make Allys with A.I. Civs and go to war with me? Can he and I join forces and attack the A.I.?

5. And Lastly....Could you maybe type out a Story or Summery of one of your "good" games, so I can read it to my dad, so he understands the game.


I really want him to buy the game. The first step is getting him to buy Civ 3, then PTW, but I think we can get both soon anyway.

Thank you, thank you, and Thank you, the game looks to be loads of fun.

[Stuie]

Originally posted by Volker
1. Do you name your own Cities? Or does the Computer do it?

Either. The computer gives each city a name from a list of cities unique to the Civ you are playing. You can change the names is you so choose.

2. How is War done, I dont understand how you use the units, do you build masses of them, or does 1 unit mean theirs like ## Number of Men to it.

It is abstracted to the point where one unit attacks/defends at a time. This may sound simplistic, but once you get going there's some real depth to it. There are some exceptions to the above, such as artillery gets a free shot at any unit attacking the stack in which the arty is located. As for building "masses" of units, it's personal preference. I keep a smaller military that is general prepared to fight one major war while maintaining a good defence of the homeland.

3. How long can 1 game last?

Depends on the size of the map and how much micro-management you're into. My longest was over 60 hours, but that was on a huge map with 24 civs.

4. Im planning on running mainly Hotseat games with my dad and I, and 6 A.I. Civs. Will this be a good game? Can my Dad make Allys with A.I. Civs and go to war with me? Can he and I join forces and attack the A.I.?

Yes to all of the above.

5. And Lastly....Could you maybe type out a Story or Summery of one of your "good" games, so I can read it to my dad, so he understands the game.

Check the story forum, and check some of the other threads around here. People tend to start story telling in order to illustrate points made in connection with thread topics.

Now if only my sons were old enough to play Civ3! Right now I'm break them in on some Tonka Truck game... that's fun, too.

[vondrack]

Originally posted by Volker
1. Do you name your own Cities? Or does the Computer do it?

You do, but the computer suggests names, so you do not have to think them up if you do not feel like doing so. With PtW, you name individual units, too.

Originally posted by Volker
2. How is War done, I dont understand how you use the units, do you build masses of them, or does 1 unit mean theirs like ## Number of Men to it.

It is much more like chess, where every piece is quite important (and abstract). Some units in Civ3 might be able to hold hundreds of men, others look like a single vehicle... depends on your imagination. But the war conduct is much more like chess than like RTS games. You move every single unit separately and often spend some time thinking before moving one tile to the right...

Originally posted by Volker
3. How long can 1 game last?

Like 10-50 hours, I'd say, depends on settings.

Originally posted by Volker
4. Im planning on running mainly Hotseat games with my dad and I, and 6 A.I. Civs. Will this be a good game? Can my Dad make Allys with A.I. Civs and go to war with me? Can he and I join forces and attack the A.I.?

Yes, you can do that, cooperating with or against AI civs. I have never tried a hotseat game myself, but I'd think that if your dad is willing to play, it might be a very interesting game (try asking a guy using the nick of player1 - AFAIK, he plays a lot of hotseat games).

Originally posted by Volker
5. And Lastly....Could you maybe type out a Story or Summery of one of your "good" games, so I can read it to my dad, so he understands the game.

Go to the Civ3-Stories forum, you should find what you need there.

Originally posted by Volker
I really want him to buy the game. The first step is getting him to buy Civ 3, then PTW, but I think we can get both soon anyway.

Thank you, thank you, and Thank you, the game looks to be loads of fun.

Crossing my fingers for you!
The game definitely is loads of fun!



EDIT: Darn, Stuie was typing faster...

[FNBrown]

Originally posted by Volker
Now that I found a Fourm that Answers Questions, boy do I have alot of them Im a super Newb to this, so please bare with me. I want to buy the game but I gotta tell my dad whats it like before he goes and buys it.

Ok..heh

1. Do you name your own Cities? Or does the Computer do it?

Answered above. Note that with the editor, you can also modify the list of suggested city names. This is kinda handy, especially if you want to make sure your hometown always shows up in the suggested names queue, or if you're making your own Civ (via the editor) and want to name the cities it generates.

2. How is War done, I dont understand how you use the units, do you build masses of them, or does 1 unit mean theirs like ## Number of Men to it.

Each unit is likely meant to represent a standard "company" of men, but is illustrated in the game by a single "unit" icon. Units can have from one to five "hit points." Conscript (drafted or found via goody hut) units start with two hit points, regularly built units start with three, and units built in a city with a barracks are "veteran" with four hit points. Any unit can earn promotions all the way up to "Elite" status (5 hit points) by success in combat. Elite units have a small chance of generating a Great Leader every time they win in combat, too, but that's another thread entirely. Generally speaking, you want to go to war with as many units as possible. I can typically capture an AI city in the ancient era with a strike force of 4-5 archers (swordsmen are better, if you can get them) and I usually protect them with a spearman.

3. How long can 1 game last?

How long do you have to play it? This depends on a lot of factors, including the map size, number of Civs, may layout, your playing style (builder or warmonger?) and your victory condition. Ten hours total gametime is not unusual. Longer is possible, as is shorter. A hotseat game will take longer, as a human Civ moves slower than an AI civ.

4. Im planning on running mainly Hotseat games with my dad and I, and 6 A.I. Civs. Will this be a good game? Can my Dad make Allys with A.I. Civs and go to war with me? Can he and I join forces and attack the A.I.?

This is great fun. I play hotseat games with my wife all the time. We typically gang up together against the hapless AI civs, which works out OK, because she's more of a casual gamer than I am. But, yes, either of you could compel the AI to go to war with you against each other.

5. And Lastly....Could you maybe type out a Story or Summery of one of your "good" games, so I can read it to my dad, so he understands the game.

The stories thread is pretty good about this... many of them include screen shots, and most have "fictionalized" a lot of prose to fill in the gaps to make a turn-by-turn game summary a lot more interesting.

I really want him to buy the game. The first step is getting him to buy Civ 3, then PTW, but I think we can get both soon anyway.

Thank you, thank you, and Thank you, the game looks to be loads of fun.

Just be sure to download the patches as soon as you get the game. Out of the box, they're kinda ugly - the exception being the Civ3 "Game of the year" edition, which comes with the latest patch pre-installed.

[Stuie]

Originally posted by Volker
I really want him to buy the game. The first step is getting him to buy Civ 3, then PTW, but I think we can get both soon anyway.

This may be obvious, but just in case... you can only play hot seat using the PTW expansion.

[Purple]

In persuading your dad, you could mention that the game includes information on the civilizations and historical discoveries and events, which is an educational bonus.

[Brizey]

Something else for your dad: show him these forums, especially the strategy forum. He will be impressed by the depth and maturity of the discussions.

Civ is the deepest widely played computer game, period.

[Kingof the Apes]

And if you want some good strategies to wipe your dad out quickly, try the Strategy forum

Really great articles there.

[Willem]

Originally posted by Volker

3. How long can 1 game last?

As long as you want it to basically. Officially, the game ends in the year 2050. But you can still keep playing after that time, you just don't get any more points added to your overall score. Or if you want a short game, PTW has a number of other victory options that will allow for something a bit less "epic".

The default game is 540 turns. In PTW you can increase that to 1000.

[Willem]

Originally posted by FNBrown

Each unit is likely meant to represent a standard "company" of men, but is illustrated in the game by a single "unit" icon.

Not any more! Check out this thread at CivFanatics:

Multiple Unit Graphics

[Datajack Franit]

1. There's a city list for every civilization in the game, giving you hints for every one you build..

ex. you build a city and the computer suggests: Dresden. You may not like the name as your city is on the sea and for the sake of geography you'd rather call it Hamburg- I always do that because I found really stupid building Berlin in the desert or Frankfurt in the jungle

2. Every unit counts as 1 only- think about it as a regiment of warriors, bowmen, horsemen but always and only one unit will represent them.

ex. Defending a city with 1 or 10 warriors is the same, but of course the difference is that the single warrior will disappear and the attacker will invade its square- it there are several units on the same square, then at a certain point the computer will automatically design a unit with a higher rank to defend. To destroy 10 warriors you will need 10 warriors as well or more, and so on

3. Depends- I suggest you to start playing with standard maps with no more than 5 opponents, in order of getting some experience

4. Of course. Remember that the computer AI can backstab you, while the human friend- as your father- will not, and of course humans are better in planning wars than a computer

5. Of course read the story forum

[bongo]

Why do you want to buy both civ3 and PTW if you don't own any of them already? I would guess that PTW would be enough as it gives you the hotseat option.

[Willem]

You need to have Civ III in order to play PTW. It's not a stand alone program.