Civilization 5

Lafortezza

I played Civ4 BTS for the first time in almost a year recently and it's still such an amazing game. Add a few mods and it simply blows Civ5 out of the water in terms of simple strat fun and replayability.

The biggest problem I have with Civ5 is that once you play a few leaders and play to win most of the different victory conditions then you have played all the variations on offer. Every subsequent game just feels boring and repetitive.

Balmed Out

I think theres a lot thats good in civ5 but the AI is absolutely useless.I mean when you start building a space ship or your allied with most sity states and a un election called wouldnt you think theyd at least try to attack. Also the whole embarking thing, lack of airports and ease of the diplomatic win are annoying.

Sephiroth_dude

Balmed Out wrote: »

I think theres a lot thats good in civ5 but the AI is absolutely useless.I mean when you start building a space ship or your allied with most sity states and a un election called wouldnt you think theyd at least try to attack. Also the whole embarking thing, lack of airports and ease of the diplomatic win are annoying.

I thought the A.I was improved in the last patch no?really must give this another go,haven't played it in weeks

Maximilian

Sephiroth_dude wrote: »

I thought the A.I was improved in the last patch no?really must give this another go,haven't played it in weeks

It's improved but not quite there yet. In fairness, Civ4 was a mess when it first came out as well. I still have hope for this yet. If they at least put pbem into it & allow proper turn based multiplay rather than simultaneous turns, then all is forgiven.

Maximilian

Pitboss & Hotseat coming in the next patch according to 2kGreg. Finally.

The only details I have for you right now is that Pitboss and Hotseat will be coming in a free update. The second I have any sort of ETA or better details I will definitely scream it from the rooftops for everyone to hear, but unfortunately that day is not today.

Maximilian

February patch notes are up here. No mention of pitboss/pbem/hotseat, which is troubling. some interesting changes though.

The upcoming patch will contain some significant balance adjustments to Civ V. We thought it would be a good idea to give everyone a quick run-down on our thoughts behind these changes and a look at what further balance work lies ahead….

This February patch comes at a great time for making balance changes; The five months since Civ V’s release has given us time to analyze reports of dominant strategies and implement and test deeper changes that will better balance the game in several key areas.

Working with our “Frankenstein” gameplay test group, we have been looking closely at the tradeoffs between building a Wide empire (one with lots of smaller cities sprawling across the map) and a Tall empire (one with just a few highly populous, highly productive cities). With this patch you’ll see a number of changes to the economic side of the game to bring these two play styles in closer balance with each other. City spacing, building effects and the Liberty and Tradition policy trees are where the most extensive changes have occurred. We’re now seeing games where a Tall empire can match or even exceed a Wide one in production and science output even deep into the game.

We wanted to improve the effectiveness of buildings. We also wanted to improve how cities interact with the map. Adjustments to terrain have increased production, while buildings that modify production have been adjusted in tune with these changes. You’ll find many buildings to be easier to build, with extra benefits, especially if you’ve settled near beneficial terrain and resources. We've continued to make improvements to pacing, diplomacy, turn times, the AI, and other aspects of the game.

With future patches we’ll continue to iterate through Civ V systems and fine tune the balance of each one. So far we’ve already identified combat, multiplayer, late-game policies, wonders and civilization-unique bonuses as additional areas that will benefit from this sort of attention. And as this journey progresses we promise to keep an ear to the ground for other areas the Civilization community may want us to address. Continued collaboration between community, our gameplay testers, and the development team will be nothing but a win for Civ V.

ENGINE
Significant turn time improvements.
Invisible Rivers now display correctly. This caused many issues because the player could not see some rivers, like fresh water showing up in strange places, unit movement suddenly shortened, etc.. Basically, there were certain rivers that did not display where forks occurred, etc.

USER INTERFACE
Add combat summary when a city bombards a unit
Add a new diplomatic status "Denouncing" that displays on the turn that an AI civ is denouncing the player
Embarked units no longer look like they have 500 strength
User warned if about to declare war on a city state that is under protection of a major power

GAMEPLAY
Taper off benefit of excess food when building settlers
City-States now recognize when a road is connected for their road-connection quest.
Golden Ages now provide +20% production per city rather than +1 hammer per tile

STRATEGIC AI
Prevent AI from building too many AA units
Don't allow CSs to build Manhattan Project
AI calculation of enemy military might are tweaked based on size of enemy gold reserve
AI calculation of enemy power now takes into account promotions

DIPLOMATIC AI
Avoid cascades of denunciations against a single player. AI now uses its own current friendliness level with a given power to determine how much weight to place on a denunciation against that power.
Denunciations expire after 50 turns
Declarations of Friendship expire after 50 turns

MODDING
Added support for policies that provide culture from kills
Added support for policies that provide extra culture from cultural improvements
Added support for policies that provide extra embarked movement
Added support for policies that provide free Great People
Online Panel now displays TOTAL downloads for a mod and not just the downloads for that specific version.
When you click on a mod in the online browser, you may now use a dropdown to select a previous version.
Added Line Control for modders to use when creating graphs, etc.

MULTIPLAYER
Can now use DLC civilizations in multiplayer
Added Ring, Skirmish and Ancient Lake maps to MP.

BUG FIXES
Clear up cases where diplomatic status could show as "Friendly" even after that AI power has denounced the player.
Fix situations where AI demeanor and verbiage didn't match friendliness level shown in diplomatic status string.
Additional bug fixes and tweaks.

BALANCE CHANGES

Game Rules
Cities must now have three or more tiles in between them (1 more tile than before), unless separated by a sea/coast tile.
Cities now only get 1 free production and 0 free gold (1 less in both cases)
Trade routes get bonus gold based on population of capital; formula changed a bit so minimal gold received for hooking up very small cities
Bonus production from excess food (used when building settlers) tapers off if excess is 3 or more.
Allied maritime city states provide 3 food per turn to the capital, not 4
Balance pass on production and maintenance costs throughout the game.

Buildings
Aqueduct added (entirely new building). 40% of Food is carried over after a new Citizen is born.
Palace boosted to 3 gold and 3 production
Granary gives bonus 1 food for Wheat/Banana Deer; cost reduced
Market and Bazaar provide 2 gold (as well as +25%)
Workshop provides 2 production (bonus reduced to +15% but affects ALL production); cost increased
Windmill now has a +15% production modifier (for buildings only) and provides 2 production
Stable gives bonus 1 production for Sheep/Cattle/Horse and can be built with Sheep or Cattle; cost reduced
Lighthouse gives bonus 1 food for Fish; cost reduced
Ironworks dropped to 8 production (but earlier in tech tree now)
Factory requires Workshop; add 3 production but boost now just 25%; has 1 more specialist slot (now 2)
Nuclear and Solar Plants now require Factory but increase to production is now 35% and provide 4 production themselves; these two now mutually exclusive
Hospital adds 5 food (but no longer retains food), requires Aqueduct
Forge adds +1 production to each source of Iron
Reduced Armory maintenance to 2 gold
Reduced Colosseum happiness to 3, and reduced maintenance to 2 gold
Reduced Theatre happiness to 4
Reduced Monastery maintenance to 0 gold
Reduced Garden maintenance to 1 gold
Reduced Observatory maintenance to 0 gold
Reduced Opera House culture to 4, and reduced maintenance to 2 gold
Removed the Great Person Point from Public School

Specialist Adjustments
Temple -1 Artist
Mud Pyramid Mosque -1 Artist
Opera House +1 Artist
Bank -1 Merchant
Satraps Court -1 Merchant
Stock Exchange +1 Merchant
Observatory -1 Scientist
University +1 Scientist
Garden -1 Artist
Laboratory -1 Scientist
Public School +1 Scientist

Improvements/Routes
Production bonus from Railroads reduced to 25%
Removed 1 extra gold from Mine on Gems, Gold, Silver, Marble.
Fishing Boats give 1 food, not gold.
Fishing Boats give 1 gold with Compass.
Camps on Deer give production instead of food .
Remove 1 extra food from Sugar plantations.
Trading Post gold reduced from 2 to 1 (increases back to 2 when hit Economics).
Trading Post & Camp gold increases by 1 with Economics.
Lumbermill production increases by 1 with Scientific Theory (moved up from Steam Power).
Mine & Quarry production increases by 1 with Chemistry.
Plantation & Pasture food increases by 1 with Fertilizer.
Well & Offshore Platform boosted to 3 production (from 1).
Academy increased to 6 Science.
Landmark increased to 6 Culture.
Manufactory increased to 4 Production.

Policies
Tradition: Culture border expansion discount in cities placed on Tradition branch opener. Discount increases over the course of the game. Also grants +3 Culture in the capital.
Aristocracy: Wonder bonus reduced by 5% to 20%.
Legalism: Provides a free Culture building in your first 4 cities.
Oligarchy: Garrisoned units cost no maintenance, and cities with a garrison gain +100% ranged combat strength.
Landed Elite: +15% Growth, and +2 Food per city.
Monarchy: +1 Gold and -1 Unhappiness for every 2 Citizens in your capital.
Liberty: +1 culture per turn in every city.
Collective Rule: Settler production increased by 50%, and a free Settler appears near the capital.
Citizenship: Worker construction rate increased by 25%, and a free Worker appears near the capital.
Representation: Each city you found will increase the cost of your next Policy by 33% less. Also starts a Golden Age.
Order: Reduce Order production bonus to 15%.
Meritocracy: +0.5 Happiness for each city connected to the capital, and a free Great Person of your choice appears near the capital.

Resources
Fish reduced to 1 food (but can be boosted back to 2 with Lighthouse)
Marble boosts wonder production by 20%, down from 25%

Technologies
Scaled up tech costs throughout the game (slight change for early eras; close to double for Modern)
Move Lumbermills up to Construction
Move Bridge Building back to Engineering
Move Ironworks to Machinery

Units
Workboat cost increased
Settler cost increased by 25%

Wonders
Colossus no longer goes obsolete
Angkor Wat now provides a 25% discount for the costs (both culture and gold) to gain plots empire-wide.

Civ Unique Bonuses
Reduce Chu-ko-nu from 10 to 9 ranged strength
Doubled culture from kills for Aztecs
Krepost now provides a 25% discount for the costs (both culture and gold) to gain plots in the city.
Paper Maker only provides 2 gold but no longer requires any building maintenance

Map Generation Changes
Increased Oil quantity per resource.
Minimum Uranium is now 2.
Cut Deer Appearance in Arctic regions.
Adjusted Sheep placement so it is more spread out.
Decreased Wheat appearance in Plains.
Increases Cow appearance overall, including adding up to 2 Cow tiles to heavy grass start positions.

Maximilian

Asked about pitboss/hotseat and got this reply from 2KGreg:

This is pretty much the final list. It's subject to change slightly but nothing major like gigantic new features.

Sad Panda

Gonzovision

Significant turn time improvements.

Happy

youcancallmeal

gonzovision wrote: »

Happy

+1
Haven't played in a few weeks now because it just got unplayable toward end game. When is this patch out does anyone know?

Rev Hellfire

Maximilian wrote: »

Sad Panda

That's two sad pandas, I guess Civ5 will be remaining on the shelf for some time to come.

Maximilian

youcancallme>al wrote: »

+1
Haven't played in a few weeks now because it just got unplayable toward end game. When is this patch out does anyone know?

All 2KGreg would say is this month - no specific date.

ButcherOfNog

Booooooooo!

BULLER

Sweet, more improvements!
Disappointed we'll have to wait longer for hotseat multiplayer but Greg said its definately on their list so I'm happy.

BULLER

Scaled up tech costs throughout the game (slight change for early eras; close to double for Modern)


About time! Definately flew through the late stages of the game way too fast before.

TheChrisD

Invisible Rivers now display correctly.

Thank **** that's fixed. I've had too many games with an invisible river that pretty much forced me to border it with Roads so I would realise it was there.

I wonder how the economics of the game will change with all these production changes. An extra production to the Palace will make a very clear difference in the very early game, particularly for the first Wonder rush, as will the hit to Aristocracy.

Also surprised it took so long to fix the CS connecting road bug.

Also, major overhaul to the Tradition Social Policy branch. Hopefully when it comes into effect, old save games won't suddenly find themselves massively changed (I know I have two leftover saved games which I had to stop because of the CS road bug).


EDIT: Just noticed it's 40% off on Steam this weekend. Don't know if you can still get it cheaper than €30 somewhere else, but it might be a good time to pick it up if you haven't already.

youcancallmeal

I wonder did they fix the bug where stealth bombers wouldn't get promotions? I used to promote my bombers up to a good level then upgrade them to Stealth Bombers. Stealth bomber with city siege level 3 is absolutely lethal!

Gonzovision

Some February patch that was..... :rolleyes:

Maximilian

I think they've been infected by Valve Time.

TheChrisD

Well, they still have a few hours, right? I know TF2 updates have come out 3-4am...

EDIT: Guess it mightn't be until Thursday...

Gonzovision

Update released. Haven't tried it myself yet.

TheChrisD

'bout damn time.

/me runs giddily to Civ 5

ShaneU

143 mb patch and it says it's going to take 4 hours? I have a 20mb connection ffs

Changed to London and it downloaded instantly :rolleyes:

ShaneU

Cities are almost impossible to capture early on now, great :rolleyes:

TheChrisD

ShaneU wrote: »

Cities are almost impossible to capture early on now, great :rolleyes:

Actually, I think that was the last patch that caused that. Although the new Oligarchy doesn't help the situation much!

While I'm glad to be able to get back to two of my saved games I had to stall due to the CS road bug, I think I'm going to have to start afresh, particularly as there are so many core changes, especially to Tradition/Liberty, as well as the production changes, you'd really need to start a new game to get an idea of their real potential.

Balmed Out

later turn time is a lot faster then it uesd to be.

Dave_The_Sheep

Balmed Out wrote: »

later turn time is a lot faster then it uesd to be.

You mean the AI turn time? That's bloody good news... That used to do my head in.

BULLER

Yep, late game turn times are dramatically faster for me. Not that I had a problem with it before.
Not sure about all the new balancing yet though.

TheChrisD

Even the early game turn time turnaround is vastly improved from before. Haven't gotten far enough in a new game to experience late-game times - nor have I tried a Huge (12 Civ/24CS) game yet, that will be the real test.

Gonzovision

1920 playing on huge map with maximum civs and city states and it's fine. I was waiting a few minutes at this stage before.

BULLER

Has anyone noticed a difference with the policy balancing. Liberty seems on par with Tradition now. Which tree do you go for? Obviously I pick Honour if I'm going striaght out conquering (no need for settlers).

TheChrisD

I still tend to go for both, seeing as I've never really been a big fan of the later-stage policy tracks like Rationalism, Freedom or Autocracy.

But they both still have their place. Tradition is still good for a civ that is very "capital city"-centric, seeing as you give the capital +3 Culture, +1 Gold for every 2 citizens, and have half the unhappiness per citizen there (or 0 rather if playing as India!). Whereas Liberty is still best for a civ with loads of cities, since it gives them all +1 Culture and +1 Production. Taking the starting track of both is also a viable strategy for +4 Culture in the capital to hurriedly expand borders and to set the stage for more policies quicker. Also that free Great Person for Meritocracy is a big thing. But Tradition now has the benefit of giving +2 Food everywhere and +15% growth though, possibly meaning you now need one less Maritime City State?

youcancallmeal

Very happy with the performance improvements. The diplomacy screens in particular are MUCH quicker now! I used to have to wait around 5-10 seconds before I could click on one of the buttons even with the animation turned off.

BULLER

Polynesia civilization and maps were added yesterday as DLC. Bought it off steam for 3 euro. Comes complete with Hawiian tropical music, their unique stones wonder and fat belly warriors. A nice addition!

Balmed Out

is it any good? I got the new world one and thought it was crap.

compaqlaptop1

Got this game and thought it was absolute sh*te. One unit per tile is crap and really has terrible knock on effects for the overall gameplay as is detailed in this article posted by someone earlier on this thread - http://www.garath.net/Sullla/Civ5/whatwentwrong.html

Takes absolutely ages to build anything, I hear that that is by design so that armies only consist of very few units to prevent the map clogging up because of 1UPT. Whatever the case, I could not be arsed sitting around clicking 'next turn' 37 times for a frigging barracks or catapult to build.

Have you guys ever played civ II? I dont know how anyone who experienced that masterpiece could like civ V.

BULLER

Balmed Out wrote: »

is it any good? I got the new world one and thought it was crap.

It wasnt great. I find the best scenario's are on the civfanatics website. There's no amazingly good WW2 scenario out yet and I always love them so I've taken it upon myself to make one. I'm using the civII scenario as a template as it was epically fun!

compaqlaptop1 wrote: »

Got this game and thought it was absolute sh*te. One unit per tile is crap and really has terrible knock on effects for the overall gameplay as is detailed in this article posted by someone earlier on this thread - http://www.garath.net/Sullla/Civ5/whatwentwrong.html

Takes absolutely ages to build anything, I hear that that is by design so that armies only consist of very few units to prevent the map clogging up because of 1UPT. Whatever the case, I could not be arsed sitting around clicking 'next turn' 37 times for a frigging barracks or catapult to build.

Have you guys ever played civ II? I dont know how anyone who experienced that masterpiece could like civ V.

I've been playing civ since civII aswell and I think you're being a tad irrational!

You can accelerate production if you want to, there's hundreds of mods out. Is that your only quelm? That detailed article is more the most part a load of BS and also outdated.
The 1UPT system was the best thing that ever happened to civ, eliminating "stacks of doom".
I could expand in greater detail but im tired and going to bed now.. :P

By the way have you read any actual professional reviewers reviews of the game on the major websites?
Here's one:
http://www.gamespot.com/pc/strategy/civilizationv/review.html
...and that was before the major patches and fixes.

There's another big patch coming out soon to so keep an eye out; the features of it are on the 2k forums.

ShaneU

I hate what the recent patches have done to this game, it's got to the point where I don't even consider domination victories, why did they think it's a good idea for it to be possible to defend a city with one archer against a catapult and 5 horseman. The cities heal far too quickly between turns, it's just farcical. Far too much effort that could be spent towards getting one of the far easier victory conditions.

BULLER

ShaneU wrote: »

I hate what the recent patches have done to this game, it's got to the point where I don't even consider domination victories, why did they think it's a good idea for it to be possible to defend a city with one archer against a catapult and 5 horseman. The cities heal far too quickly between turns, it's just farcical. Far too much effort that could be spent towards getting one of the far easier victory conditions.

I dont have any problems getting domination victory, but that said I dont play on the hardest difficulty.
You know you can turn off the other victory conditions and leave domination and conquest?!

Though I've started to shift more towards playing scenario's like WW2 and shizzle now rather than new games.

grizzly

Great, been looking forward to this – hotseat update coming in July.

Balmed Out

sounds good but I cant see the girlfriend A) wanting to or Having the ability to give me a decent game after a few months training.

Dave_The_Sheep

Balmed Out wrote: »

sounds good but I cant see the girlfriend A) wanting to or Having the ability to give me a decent game after a few months training.

Keep her around for a bit longer. After two or three years or intensive training she'll be acceptable.

BULLER

Really hope hotseat is implemented well. I remember in Civ2 you couldnt see the other players moves so it was very confusing at the start of every turn...

BULLER

Greetings from the Civ V team! Another couple of months have passed, and the team has been busy continuing to refine and improve the game based on your feedback. Aside from the already-announced additions of Hot-Seat and Replays, an entire balance pass has been integrated into the game. New features, gameplay systems, and Diplomacy modifiers have all been added. AI refinements continue as well, and the AI is now better than ever at challenging the player. As we move into summer, we’ll continue to bring new and exciting additions to Civ V, including improvements to Multiplayer, and other core areas of the game. Your continued engagement and feedback is what drives the team to keep working, and to make Civ V everything that our fans expect, and for that, we thank you.

Some massive changes to balance of the game. And replay maps and graphs screens are added

To answer my previous posts question regarding implementation; hot-seat will have full animations. Delirah!

Full list of changes:
(there's a lot!)
http://forums.2kgames.com/showthread.php?108900-June-July-Patch-Notes

Rev Hellfire

to make Civ V everything that our fans expect

Well they can start with the pbem they promised.

ShaneU

They've nerfed a lot of the wonders, defense structures are going to be rubbish as well.

BULLER

ShaneU wrote: »

They've nerfed a lot of the wonders, defense structures are going to be rubbish as well.

They've also buffed a lot of wonders! Most people have agreed that city's were too hard to capture at the start of the game. Wall's defence adds 4 instead of 5 strenth, hardly making them rubbish!
The happyness changes are the biggest issue I have, it will make the game much more challenging.

As for pbem, 2k greg has said theyre working on it and it's nearly ready. It's half implemented with the saves in this patch anyway. The next big patch after this will revamp the multiplayer entirely. Cant wait to play hot-seat

cherryghost

Wouldn't hotseat be something similar to pbem?

Maximilian

Going from the patch notes, it would seem pbem, like we play civ4 over at darkkeep.com, will be possible after this patch. Fingers crossed anyway.

TheChrisD

More happiness nerfing. Not sure I like, but then again I managed to win a game with 163 overall happiness not too long ago...

Research agreement nerfing was definitely needed. They were way too powerful giving the full tech.

Quicker to set up Railroads, much appreciated

Am actually glad to see a drop in city defense. They were actually quite tough to crack, even when under constant assault by three melee units and two siege units

Damn, I thought Harbours were finally generically useful, turns out they just become mini-Seaports as well, with Seaports now requiring them and nerfed too

"Barracks, Armory, Military Academy and Krepost now provide experience to all units trained." Thank christ. It was always annoying that only land units got the boost, especially since I generally play Small Continents or Archipelago where navy rules supreme.

The Social Policy finishers are an interesting touch, and adds some more depth to the tracks as well. Mertiocracy is back to it's former glory (:)), no longer gives a GP, which moves to the finisher. Honour's got quite a buff.

"Destroyers no longer start with extra sight.
Extra Sight promotions are now lost with upgrade (Caravel)." Dammit, dammit, dammit. There go my huge-LOS scouting Destroyers :mad:

Ironclad upgrade to Battleship now, eh? That opens them up to early use...

Maximilian

didn't notice the barracks thing - very welcome. although I will miss my uber recon destroyers too.