Civilization IV / old versions of Civ - discussion and memories thread

Anything to do with games at all.
User avatar
Herdanos
Go for it, Danmon!
Joined in 2008
AKA: lol don't ask
Location: Bas-Lag

PostRe: Civilization IV / old versions of Civ - discussion and memories thread
by Herdanos » Fri Jan 29, 2016 1:04 pm

Kanbei wrote:
Kanbei wrote:Started playing Civ 4 again because of this thread. Always play on easier difficulties because I'm a sucker. Doing a 24 civ world map as Mother Russia. Expanded my empire as far east as I could before turning round and am now attacking Western Europe so I can have a gate way to the Americas. The Romans and Germans have already felt my wrath! Next up is the French and then the Celts.


Declared war on France but they got the Chinese involved, made the Celts my vassals and set all my forces east. Managed to get a few of their cities but I wasn't properly prepared for an eastern invasion, luckily they capitulated quickly and now the Chinese are mine :nod:


It's great fun isn't it :wub:

I'm currently doing more reading about Civ than playing Civ.
I think some of my errors have already become apparent to me.

For starters, I usually started as a random civ. And then recently with random civs & leaders but not tied to one another. But it seems that these have a huge bearing on what kind of game you should play, and how easy / difficult certain approaches will be.

Also I set my workers to automate but I never considered their improvements would be mostly useless and on tiles I'm not using. I should be micromanaging my cities rather than just letting them do their thing.

I don't know the tech tree well so I've been going for the shortest or recommended techs each time.

And I usually just settle where I spawn and try and rush through the early game as there doesn't seem to be much about it. Now I see I am wrong.

I'm trying to learn more. Looking at it bit by bit to build up a knowledge. Just started a game as Spain. (Definitely not going to cheat!) I think I've founded in a good spot. Settled on turn 2, on a hill tile, near a mountain, the coast and some good resources. I think the map spawned me in a corner so I've done OK considering it might have been a bad spot. Got Buddhism thanks to starting with Mysticism (I think that's right) so I've adopted that and will try and push it to get me some diplomacy & hopefully money down the line.

Been researching the civ & leader combos and it seems that for the type of game I usually play (not overly aggressive, military for defence not attack, expand by culture and diplomacy, win victories on culture, time or diplomacy) perhaps the best starting combo would be Pericles and Holy Roman Empire. Going to try that next. Then perhaps experiment with Peter & China which should also be a good combo for me.

Generating Real Conversations About Digital Entertainment
User avatar
Dowbocop
Member ♥
Joined in 2008

PostRe: Civilization IV / old versions of Civ - discussion and memories thread
by Dowbocop » Fri Jan 29, 2016 2:31 pm

Pun. wrote:Maodi Arabia.

:lol:

My first game of Civ was the original, played on my sister's friend's PC. I picked the Zulus and called myself Papa Shango after the WWF wrestler. I was only about 10 and I was absolutely gooseberry fool. Not much has changed since, I'm still terrible at Civ, but that doesn't stop me loving them!

There's a lot of talk about the militaristic side here, but I don't really go in for that at all. I'm much more of a "garrisoner" so I can have fun on the research and space race side.

I think I have Civ 5 but I don't think I've actually played it a huge amount, it coincided with a busy period in my life. I should hopefully have some time now though...

User avatar
OrangeRKN
Community Sec.
Joined in 2015
Location: Reading, UK
Contact:

PostRe: Civilization IV / old versions of Civ - discussion and memories thread
by OrangeRKN » Fri Jan 29, 2016 3:09 pm

Pun. wrote:Also I set my workers to automate but I never considered their improvements would be mostly useless and on tiles I'm not using. I should be micromanaging my cities rather than just letting them do their thing.


This x100

You should also be micromanaging the assignment of tiles to work in each city, it can make a massive difference. I tend to focus on food early on with new settlements and then switch over to more of a production focus as it grows. Which tiles you assign for a city to work should inform which tiles you improve, and vice-versa. There is no point improving a tile if you aren't working it, unless it gains you access to a resource. You should also be careful in road building as you can easily bleed money due to upkeep. You get a bonus from cities linked by a road, so a good trick is to have several workers all at once help build a road. That way you can quarter the time it takes to complete a road link and massively reduce the initial cost of building it (that's a quarter less time to spend extra money on road upkeep before making it back from the linked city bonus).

Image
Image
orkn.uk - Top 5 Games of 2023 - SW-6533-2461-3235
User avatar
False
COOL DUDE
Joined in 2008

PostRe: Civilization IV / old versions of Civ - discussion and memories thread
by False » Fri Jan 29, 2016 3:12 pm

I lost literal days at a time to this way back when.

Regarding the multiplayer, generally the threat of imminent annihilation wasnt really there in most of the games I played because everybody plays with the long game in mind. If you are playing with friends then you all just do your own thing until you start butting borders or running out of resources. Early game total war strategies might work but the risk is so high and the opponent so much more dangerous in a human game that I just never really saw it happen. A victory on one front means you will lose the other in no time at all to another player and then you are on the back foot.

As a game to drop in and out of I think I prefer the complete Civ V even though I wasnt fussed at the start.

Image
User avatar
OrangeRKN
Community Sec.
Joined in 2015
Location: Reading, UK
Contact:

PostRe: Civilization IV / old versions of Civ - discussion and memories thread
by OrangeRKN » Fri Jan 29, 2016 3:33 pm

Super early war is a great tactic I find whenever I play with friends, as long as you are close by to another civ, although I don't remember how well this works with pre civ 5. The objective shouldn't be to wipe anyone out or to take any cities (and by super early war I mean everyone will only have one city). The objective should be to cripple the other player to give yourself an early advantage that you can capitalise on. The other player will most likely have their one or two warrior units a fair distance from their city exploring (as you rightly should do), which often means they are left with a city near undefended. This is the perfect opportunity to capture a worker and pillage any tile improvements, preventing them from working the tiles, repairing them or improving any more. It also gains you a worker to double the speed of your own tile improvements. This can be devastating, as the other player can be left with a super unproductive city with a crippled growth rate, so they have to waste several turns building a new worker and several more turns reversing the damage, all while you race ahead. Keep your unit nearby to probe at them with and they will be forced to either bring back their units that are out exploring to defend, denying them any more ruins or exploration, or build a new unit in the city (which will prolong getting a worker and their recovery even moreso).

Worker capturing and settler capturing is probably the easiest and most effective aggressive tactic in the early game I think. No need to waste your own time and resources building up your own army - you can do a ton of damage with a single unit on a hit and run.

Against human opponents I basically avoid large scale confrontations and instead just capitalise on opportunities to steal workers or settlers, or to pillage their tile improvements. Much less risk to myself, and they probably won't go any further to respond than killing the one or two units causing the damage. After all, escalating it to a full blown conflict would be just as risky for them as it would be for me to start one in the first place :lol:

Image
Image
orkn.uk - Top 5 Games of 2023 - SW-6533-2461-3235
User avatar
False
COOL DUDE
Joined in 2008

PostRe: Civilization IV / old versions of Civ - discussion and memories thread
by False » Fri Jan 29, 2016 3:36 pm

Fair points. Hit and run would be effective. My focus tends to be getting a good start and remaining as quiet as possible for as long as possible, so I generally avoid war for as long as feasible.

Image
User avatar
That
Dr. Nyaaa~!
Dr. Nyaaa~!
Joined in 2008

PostRe: Civilization IV / old versions of Civ - discussion and memories thread
by That » Sat Jan 30, 2016 12:17 am

The danger with OrangeRakoon's strategy is that, if someone stole my worker on turn 2, I would stop thinking about winning or losing and dedicate the entirety of the rest of the game to making them as miserable as possible.

Image
User avatar
False
COOL DUDE
Joined in 2008

PostRe: Civilization IV / old versions of Civ - discussion and memories thread
by False » Sat Jan 30, 2016 12:59 am

Also a very good point.

Image
User avatar
OrangeRKN
Community Sec.
Joined in 2015
Location: Reading, UK
Contact:

PostRe: Civilization IV / old versions of Civ - discussion and memories thread
by OrangeRKN » Mon Feb 01, 2016 9:34 am

Karl wrote:The danger with OrangeRakoon's strategy is that, if someone stole my worker on turn 2, I would stop thinking about winning or losing and dedicate the entirety of the rest of the game to making them as miserable as possible.


Can confirm has happened to me before :lol:

We both lost horribly, they literally dedicated themselves to making nothing but units and constantly throwing them at me. It was upsetting.

Image
Image
orkn.uk - Top 5 Games of 2023 - SW-6533-2461-3235
User avatar
Kanbei
Member ♥
Joined in 2008
Location: Belfast

PostRe: Civilization IV / old versions of Civ - discussion and memories thread
by Kanbei » Mon Feb 01, 2016 10:18 am

Kanbei wrote:
Kanbei wrote:Started playing Civ 4 again because of this thread. Always play on easier difficulties because I'm a sucker. Doing a 24 civ world map as Mother Russia. Expanded my empire as far east as I could before turning round and am now attacking Western Europe so I can have a gate way to the Americas. The Romans and Germans have already felt my wrath! Next up is the French and then the Celts.


Declared war on France but they got the Chinese involved, made the Celts my vassals and set all my forces east. Managed to get a few of their cities but I wasn't properly prepared for an eastern invasion, luckily they capitulated quickly and now the Chinese are mine :nod:


Might as well keep updating. Made sure that I have enough forces in the east in case of any assault. Sent ships to South America to see if it had been settled on yet, luckily there was only a couple small civ cities had been established so I am now very quickly taking over the continent. Once I have control of the South I will prepare a North American invasion force. Don't really have any interest in Scandinavia but conquering them (and then Britain and Ireland) will allow me to have a 2 front invasion so will start moving my troops over there soon enough.

User avatar
Hypes
Member
Joined in 2009
Location: Beyond the wall

PostRe: Civilization IV / old versions of Civ - discussion and memories thread
by Hypes » Mon Feb 01, 2016 10:28 am

Installed and played some Civ 4 because of this. Was the English but began surrounded by the Mongolians and Americans. Did too much exploring and not enough settling at the beginning and was quickly in trouble. Managed to get the Americans to die first though.

Tried the tutorial to learn things and have got far but I have a giant Sid Meir stuck on my screen and he won't go away.

User avatar
Herdanos
Go for it, Danmon!
Joined in 2008
AKA: lol don't ask
Location: Bas-Lag

PostRe: Civilization IV / old versions of Civ - discussion and memories thread
by Herdanos » Mon Feb 01, 2016 10:34 am

I played some of the game on a harder difficulty over the weekend. I lost hours and hours of my life. :lol: I'm Isabella as Spain and the game has spawned me right in a corner. I managed to found five cities but beyond that I was hemmed in by other civs who all appear to have formed a Hindu alliance while I'm running Buddhism like a sucker. Anyway, I raised an army and took on Pacal (Maya) to try and break through and gain some territory. I took the city immediately south to me but that's all I've managed and pushing on for other cities has just wiped my army out completely. I'm doing all I can, running slavery to push out units rapidly and sending them to the front but they just got wiped out and other civs kept declaring war on me too. I'm falling behind in the overall score so I scrapped it, sued for peace and settled my army in the new city, I might push on again later but the amount of time it's taken and the actual lack of progress hasn't been as satisfying as I hoped - it's more just frustrating than anything else. Playing around with the WorldBuilder and the cheats has also lost its appeal now that I've done that on some other saves so I think I'll play on the lower difficulty levels next time as I was enjoying that more. Might play the Rhye's and Fall mod to see what that's like, I've heard good things.

Generating Real Conversations About Digital Entertainment
User avatar
That
Dr. Nyaaa~!
Dr. Nyaaa~!
Joined in 2008

PostRe: Civilization IV / old versions of Civ - discussion and memories thread
by That » Mon Feb 01, 2016 2:00 pm

Started an easy game of Civ V (sorry Dan) yesterday. I decided to experiment with a quick game on a huge map -- not a combination I usually go for! It was fun. Was playing Rome, got to about 1000 AD, managed to completely eliminate the Zulus who spawned to my south (no racist). Legion and ballistae are a pretty good early game combination. Lots of room for expansion still on the huge map, and there's still a whole other continent to explore yet.

Image
User avatar
Herdanos
Go for it, Danmon!
Joined in 2008
AKA: lol don't ask
Location: Bas-Lag

PostRe: Civilization IV / old versions of Civ - discussion and memories thread
by Herdanos » Mon Feb 01, 2016 2:14 pm

Karl wrote:Started an easy game of Civ V (sorry Dan) yesterday.


You're an evil evil bastard.

I'm kidding of course, it's great to see Civ discussion of all kinds in the thread! :D I definitely think the easier difficulties make for more fun games. My inevitable attrition with Isabella isn't going to be much fun for me I reckon, and I don't fancy the slog. Perhaps playing a more focused game on a harder difficulty level would help me improve for multiplayer games, but I don't foresee any of those happening so I'm going to switch back down and just enjoy the scenarios. :)

Generating Real Conversations About Digital Entertainment

Return to “Games”

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: Bertie, Christopher, DarkRula, ITSMILNER, OldSoulCyborg, poshrule_uk, Red 5 stella, Robbo-92, Squinty and 360 guests