Civilization IV: the thread [Archive]

Readman

11-01-2010, 05:45 AM

Does anyone else play this game?

To kick off discussion, what's your favourite:

Civilisation China/Egypt/Persia
Wonder Stonehenge. It's very useful in early expansion, and it's very good for getting a religion if your Civ doesn't start with 'Mysticism' (it produces a Great Prophet, which you can use to snap-research Code of Laws or Theology and get Confucianism or Christianity respectively). Less useful if you start with Mysticism.
Unit Axeman/Rifleman/Infantry. All of them represent a massive leap forward. If you get any of them before your opponents, then you are a force to be reckoned with. I do most of my conquering in the turns straight after I get to Rifling.
Method of Victory In all of my years of playing Civ games, I've only conquered the world once. Most of the time I get there by building a spaceship.

Other notes - has anyone ever played a game where there's more than one Islamic civilisation? By the time Divine Right gets researched, everyone already has a religion so it never seems like there's any point.

Silverwolf

11-01-2010, 06:33 AM

I really didn't play this game enough, I played through most of a moderate sized campaign then got distracted by Galactic Civilizations II (which is like Civ but in space, woo!)

I'd get it again but im sick to death of my ISP forwarding me copyright infringement emails. Plus I don't have the patience for TBS's that much anymore (although I still love them to bits)

JC Henderson

11-01-2010, 07:23 AM

I am a big fan of the cultural victory. Get as many religions as possible discovered, use my special people to build the respective temples and go nuts with the culture meter.

aubergine

11-01-2010, 08:26 AM

I'm hopelessly addicted to Civilisation Revolution on iPhone, without really comprehending why. It's broken in so many ways yet keeps me up at night, need to delete it I think.

Readman

11-01-2010, 08:45 AM

I am a big fan of the cultural victory. Get as many religions as possible discovered, use my special people to build the respective temples and go nuts with the culture meter.

I've gotta try this some time. Do you just get religions, or do you also spam out as many Wonders as you can?

Azzaman

11-01-2010, 01:02 PM

Ha, last time I tried a cultural victory I ended up sh*tting off every other civ and they invaded.

Great game. I like the mongols, the early horse unit they get are great for rushes.

Readman

29-01-2010, 11:15 AM

Back at uni, so I've been playing this a shitload recently.

But I'd barely played it for like 18 months beforehand or something, so I'm still pretty crap and having difficulty at Monarch level.

My early strategy is roughly:

- Go all-out for four cities (2 commerce, 1 GP farm, 1 production) and then build them up for a bit, before continuing to expand at a slower rate.
- I use standard improvements.
- Depending on the Civ I start with (I randomise it), I either go for Bronze Working or a Religious tech (if I start with Mysticism). If I'm near a bunch of clams/fish/crabs, I'll also prioritise Fishing.
- The only early Wonder I ever attempt is Stonehenge, unless I have the stone resource in which case I'll try for the Pyramids as well.

This strategy works well on Prince, but I'm just getting clobbered on Monarch. Any ideas?

Serenity

02-02-2010, 01:05 PM

Just gotten back into it again myself. This game eats away a lot of hours of my life.

ElPresidente

02-02-2010, 01:56 PM

Still crying that I had to give up my opportunity to interview Sid Meier in Baltimore about the next Civ game. :(

Serenity

02-02-2010, 02:49 PM

Why did that occur? :(

Readman

02-02-2010, 05:58 PM

Tell him to stop porting it for the console kiddies and get onto making Civ V.

Lazlow

02-02-2010, 06:24 PM

And tell him, next time make units to scale... and don't have knights whacking down attack helicopters >_>

Readman

02-02-2010, 06:37 PM

That's seriously never happened to me in Civ 4.

Azzaman

02-02-2010, 07:27 PM

That only happens to me when it's 4 units of knights vs the choppers. I can kinda rationalise it though. Eventually a choopers gotta land and refuel/reload, I guess 4000 knights could take down a few choppers when they land.

Readman

02-02-2010, 07:37 PM

Look at Vietnam. Even if you are completely technologically outclassed, it's still possible to take out some of your enemy.

But, again, it's never happened to me in Civ4. And, tbh, hasn't really happened to me consistently in any game except Civ1. But that game did have serious scaling issues. Eg. a Spearman was STR2, a tank was STR8.

Surgeon.

02-02-2010, 09:13 PM

It still kinda bothered me that other countries would keep such obsolete units after they were clearly outdated. Would have been nice if they upgraded with the times.

Readman

02-02-2010, 09:17 PM

ElPresidente

03-02-2010, 08:03 AM

Broken yes but one of the reasons Civ II has such a fond place in my heart. :P

Why did that occur? :(

Couldn't get the time off work. It was late notice (these things often are) and I had too many big projects on the go at my day job so I had to give up a free trip to the states to meet one of my gaming heroes. No really... I'm okay with it. Not jealous of he who got to go in my place at all.

*bawl*

:P

immol8

03-02-2010, 11:40 AM

I've gotta try this some time. Do you just get religions, or do you also spam out as many Wonders as you can?

Just completed a culture victory with the Hatshepsut. Get as many religions in your 3 best cities as you can, then their respective monasteries. Send missionaries to your other cities so they can build temples so you can build the cathedral-type structures. +50% culture boost woo. Industrious helps crank out wonders, go pacifism for more great people (especially artists). Won it before I got to the modern age.

Almighty Beanchild

03-02-2010, 04:55 PM

I like Civ2 where you could get Leonardo's Workshop as a wonder and all of your units would automatically upgrade when a new tech became available (in Civ2, you couldn't upgrade units, you had to disband them and manually build new ones so it was a completely broken wonder).

They fixed it for 3, Leonardo's Workshop just halved the cost of upgrading. 3 has always been my favourite, love those Ottomans.

Beinkasaurus Rex

03-02-2010, 06:40 PM

It still kinda bothered me that other countries would keep such obsolete units after they were clearly outdated. Would have been nice if they upgraded with the times.

Hey, Australia doesn't upgrade with the times =O

Readman

09-02-2010, 07:54 AM

ElPresidente

09-02-2010, 08:48 AM

Got my first culture victory yesterday (Prince difficulty).

Took me longer to do than I should have - didn't win until 1920, which I blame on forgetting to change the culture slider until the mid 19th-century.

That and your insistence on high pants and silly hats for your populace didn't catch on until 1918.

Readman

09-02-2010, 05:30 PM

High pants work. You would be amazed how much better you look if you move from wearing your pants at waist to just a few inches higher. You look slimmer, you have a better legline and the pants 'hang' better.

Also, just got a Spaceship victory. Woohoo!

JimmyKane

09-02-2010, 07:00 PM

I've done military, space and culture victories before.

I suck at it though, never really get past "noble (I think)" difficulty >_>

Readman

09-02-2010, 07:24 PM

I used to play on Monarch difficulty, but I'm on Prince at the moment (that's where I got those last two victories).

Gonna play as Rome and go for a world conquest this time I think.

Azzaman

09-02-2010, 07:26 PM

Readman

10-02-2010, 07:29 AM

They'll see how good I look with higher pants and want to copy me!

Seriously, though, you don't have to wear them 1920s-style, but formal pants, khakis, etc. aren't jeans and they aren't designed to sit at the same place place on your body as jeans are. Once again, casual clothing ruins a generation of dressers.

JimmyKane

10-02-2010, 06:52 PM

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Serenity

10-02-2010, 07:44 PM

Bloody Mongolians got Fascism in like 400AD on Warlord. What the eff.

JimmyKane

10-02-2010, 07:58 PM

Haha Great People rush?

Readman

10-02-2010, 08:44 PM

Bloody Mongolians got Fascism in like 400AD on Warlord. What the eff.

Haha, how does that happen? It would have to be one helluva great people rush...

Serenity

10-02-2010, 10:23 PM

Haha Great People rush?

I'd say so, not that I was really paying attention. Here I am, kicking butt, only two civilisations discovered though; thinking I'm going well with all of the religions discovered. Suddenly it's like, Kublai Khan has adopted Police State and I'm all like what the hell mate...Within the next 10 turns, he's declared war on me.

Readman

10-02-2010, 10:36 PM

Gonna go out on a limb here and say that rather than a militaristic civilization researching all the way up to a modern-day technology by 200AD on the second easiest setting, it's probably more likely that he built the Pyramids which consequently gave him access to all government types.

Serenity

10-02-2010, 10:53 PM

Actually, I thought I noticed that...Also it's the 3rd easiest ;)

ElPresidente

19-02-2010, 06:04 AM

http://www.civilization5.com/

Hexagons! F-Yes!

Still... the knowledge I could have already played some of this. *grrr* :P

Silverwolf

19-02-2010, 06:37 AM

http://www.civilization5.com/

Hexagons! F-Yes!

Still... the knowledge I could have already played some of this. *grrr* :P

Sweet!

Azzaman

19-02-2010, 07:38 AM

Those screenshots look outstanding. Can't wait :D

Silverwolf

19-02-2010, 08:40 AM

Those screenshots look outstanding. Can't wait :D

I know, aren't those hexagons amazing?!

Lazlow

19-02-2010, 08:40 AM

So is it going to have decent combat, or still go with the whole turn based tabletop thing they've been doing?

Surgeon.

19-02-2010, 09:28 AM

Civ 5?

I guess I'll just quit work now.

So is it going to have decent combat, or still go with the whole turn based tabletop thing they've been doing?

Civilization is turn based . . . this is not a bad thing.

Lazlow

19-02-2010, 09:45 AM

Not saying it is, I just have a preference for RT. it's the lack of tactics and tabletop nature of it that bugs me more.

Readman

19-02-2010, 09:53 AM

Gonna have to fork out for a computer upgrade.

Readman

19-02-2010, 10:19 AM

So is it going to have decent combat, or still go with the whole turn based tabletop thing they've been doing?

The production team has canvassed including a combat map before (I think I read it gets discussed every time a new Civ is being developed) and always rejected.

If you wanted to move to more tactical combat (btw, if you want tactical combat then RTS is definitely not the way to go), then there are other things you can do short of moving to a combat map screen. Eg. making combat 'stack vs. stack' rather than 'unit vs. unit'.