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CiV (Demo) is out

ChristofferC

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If you declare war on an AI you immediately get the tech from the research agreement and all resource trades are canceled but you keep the gold. This is pretty abusable -.-
 
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ChristofferC said:
If you declare war on an AI you immediately get the tech from the research agreement and all resource trades are canceled but you keep the gold. This is pretty abusable -.-

I'm 90% sure you don't keep the gold, but yeah its pretty damn abusable. I can imagine a civ with lots of gold (lol stacking trading post boosts and spamming them everywhere) keeping 2 civs at 1 weak city, gifting gold and getting the equivalent of 1 Great Scientist that unlocks a random tech every 5 turns. This is certainly a bug though and will probably be fixed.

Gold in general is too abusable. Buy City states to get ridiculous amounts of food and culture. Buy research agreements with everyone under the sun. Buy units instantly anywhere, and with the ridiculous defending bonus you only really need to buy 1 unit unless its 10v1 odds. Then later you buy the ridiculous policy that makes all of your tradeposts give huge amounts of research and the game is pretty much over.
 

RK47

collides like two planets pulled by gravity
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Dead State Divinity: Original Sin
Yeah, the way Research Pacts work now makes very little sense. I don't think this is the way it should be. For Trade pacts perhaps it'll work, both sides invest gold per turn and gain back a lump sum plus interest (10-20%).

For Techs, it's just too overpowered. You could leap frog ridiculously high if you know how to blanket the low tech ones just right so you get the high end ones. What's more, the incentive to keep the lowbies alive and just feeding them gold to initiate Research Pacts is just plain exploiting. I kept doing that by giving them a lump sum loan and in exchange they repay it in installments. I lost 50-60 gold on top of the pact cost, but who cares? It's a cheap tech-jump.
 

ChristofferC

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Sorry, I worded it a bit poorly. If you trade a resource for a lump sum of gold with a civ and then go to war with that civ you get the resource back and you keep the gold.
 
Unwanted

RaXz

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I looked foward to Civ5, usually I buy the new Civ when it hits the shelves. But now I ain't even bothered to just download it, I haven't played the demo either. It just looks like shit, and just with Total War they took a turn were the AI has difficulty of handling it. But I really can't count myself suprised with all the streamline nonsense today.

I'll just wait and see if it becomes a fully fledged Civ in a couple of years, in the meantime I'll be playing Civ4 and SMAC.
 

Malakal

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ChristofferC said:
Sorry, I worded it a bit poorly. If you trade a resource for a lump sum of gold with a civ and then go to war with that civ you get the resource back and you keep the gold.

Stalin called, he wants his Ribbentrop-Molotov pact back, he gave You resources and You invaded him anyway.

See, its not without precedence.
 
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In civ 4 civs get a +4 % research bonus on a tech for each known civ that knows said tech already. Is there anything like that in civ 5?
 

Malakal

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herostratus said:
In civ 4 civs get a +4 % research bonus on a tech for each known civ that knows said tech already. Is there anything like that in civ 5?

And how would You check that seeing as You dont know how many civs know any selected tech? I could check if tech costs change but its nothign sure as it is adjusted for number of cities IIRC.
 

Grunker

RPG Codex Ghost
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There is streamlining and there is streamlining (I guess by saying that I already lose KKK, since streamlining in and of itself has become such a negative buzzword). We hate streamlining when it's "remove features to make easier" but we like it when it's "remove features that aren't used." Complexity is only good if it adds something worthwhile, right? The 4% is only relevant in a game if you game it - that is, know it, use it actively (by befriending CIVs with the right techs) and so on.

What I'm trying to say is: For me, at least, that "feature" of cIV was in excess. Not because it would be too complicated to use, but because you already focused on contacting CIVs for a variety of other reasons.
 

MapMan

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I don't know how to play this game lol. Its 1500 AD and Im still fighting with pikemen. I wanted a science win so I hoped to expand a little on untaken land and cooperate with other civs. Instead I get betrayed by everyone around. First, they want a pact of cooperation, I give them free shit and few turns later they bombard me with shitloads of units. This applies to every civ I met. It's like they know I'm a Pole and they need to betray me to keep historical accuracy. Is the key to victory abusing flaws of the game? Spamming trade posts, city states as a source of food and culture? Or simply making a few strong units and steamrolling through enemies claiming their shit?
 
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ChristofferC said:
Sorry, I worded it a bit poorly. If you trade a resource for a lump sum of gold with a civ and then go to war with that civ you get the resource back and you keep the gold.

Yeah, it makes sense that it works that way but the AI just falls for it every time. Same thing with trading a lump sum of gold for a continued payment, just declare war the next turn and you have free gold.
 

Malakal

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MapMan said:
I don't know how to play this game lol. Its 1500 AD and Im still fighting with pikemen. I wanted a science win so I hoped to expand a little on untaken land and cooperate with other civs. Instead I get betrayed by everyone around. First, they want a pact of cooperation, I give them free shit and few turns later they bombard me with shitloads of units. This applies to every civ I met. It's like they know I'm a Pole and they need to betray me to keep historical accuracy. Is the key to victory abusing flaws of the game? Spamming trade posts, city states as a source of food and culture? Or simply making a few strong units and steamrolling through enemies claiming their shit?

Quick guideline to what enemy AIs hate:
-settling near them or close borders in general (as in history You can expect conflicts with most Your neighbors) - to avoid that try cultural expansion
-having too little strenght = easy target
-being too strong = stop him before he gets out of our league
-agressive city-states alliances with cities near them (threat I guess)

To be friendly with AI have a strong defensive force and cooperate with them, especially research pacts work well. But in the end war is inevitable due to broken agression. Go for natural borders.

Map generation is SO mucg better now. Mountain ranges and peninsulas, maps look nice and are quite defensible often. Use it.
 

MapMan

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Ok, and how do I generally progress faster? Because theres no way I will reach any kind of victory before 2050 (especially scientific when im barely in renesaince at 1500 AD)?
 

spectre

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Depends on your difficulty, non military wins above Prince are tough if not impossible without some cheese. Yeah, it really is totally impossible to avoid combat in CIv 5.

First and foremost: don't neglect your military. Weapons needn't be up to date, but be sure to train them on barbarians and weak neighbours. After you promote them to Drill III (or the other promotion), you unlock the good stuff, which allows you to attack many times per turn, autoheal every tyrn, additional range and no line of sight penalties for ranged units.

Wars are easy (and good for you), just wait for them on the hills, weaken them with projectiles, then mop up with cavalry or infantry. After you slaughter the initial vawe, the AI will sue for peace, but this is when the fun starts. Go to their cities, burn the countryside (for nice income). city bombardment is actually a blessing - it doesn't do much harm on hills and you get exp for each time you are fired at.

If you insist on going peaceful, don't. Your neighbours will become more and more cocky, sometimes you need to show them their place by burning down half of their cities. Think of it as vermin control while you build your own utopia.

Unfortunately, diplomacy in CIv 5 is fucked up like that, its hard to maintain good relationships, strong civs will become hostile, just so, weak civs will be easily wiped out before you know it, but if you side with the weak and they grow too strong eventually, they'll start biting you.

Don't neglect City States - these are the only guys who you can play peacefully with. Not counting the bonuses, allied CS make for a nice buffer if they're between you and other civs.
 

Malakal

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Research = population. And since population levels increase INCREDIBLY slow in bigger cities simply settle more smaller cities (5-10 size). Dont worry about overcrowding if You want to avoid pissing off AIs, size 10 cities can be set up two for the price of one big. Then do a lot of research agreements (target weaker AIs as to not give boost to stronger ones) and run a lot of scientist specialists (two avaiable in libraries, they generate 6 science and great scientists - use them to instantly research expensive techs).

Tile improvements for good science are farms - they elt You keep more scientist specialists.

For ULTIMATE research either go for a lot of territory or unlock civics that decrease food cost for specialists and give +2 science for each. Late game one scientist gives 5 science, costs 1/2 happiness and 1 food only. Imbalanced...
 

MapMan

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Shall I actually capture cities or just fuck their shit up and back off? Or maybe raze some cities down, push him back to capital?
 

Malakal

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MapMan said:
Shall I actually capture cities or just fuck their shit up and back off? Or maybe raze some cities down, push him back to capital?

Puppets are good since they cost less unhappiness. OTOH they build RETARDED buildings (prioritize armories and harbors while ignoring marketplaces or banks...). To avoid going bankrupt because of them I always use workers to build trading posts EVERYWHERE around puppets so they dont have enough hammers to build anything quickly. Then they generate gold and science at negligble costs.

Or simply raze them. Better yet SELL them to AIs, they pay insane money for those cities. 3+k plus 2-3 resources is not uncommon.
 

spectre

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I generally just pillage and back off, but it only works if you start early. If they eexpanded a lot, then I push them back to the capital, pillaging all the cities I don't raze just to be sure they got the message.

Capturing isn't worth it, generally. You'll need to build courthouses which are expensive as fuck. Only worth it if you see some nice wonders there.

Otherwise, puppets are better if you just want some buffer, they cost you upkeep maintenance, but may be razed at will. If you insist on having a city at that particular spot, keep a spare settler around.


EDIT:
Better yet SELL them to AIs, they pay insane money for those cities. 3+k plus 2-3 resources is not uncommon.
This. Also, don't ever get tricked by the AI when it surrenders half of its empire to you during peace talks. This will royally fuck your empire happiness.
 
Self-Ejected

ScottishMartialArts

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Has anyone had the AI team up against them?

In my previous game (Babylon, King, Pangaea, Standard, Science-Victory), I started pulling way ahead in research about turn 250 or so. By 300 I was well into the modern era while everyone else was in the Renaissance. My medium sized-empire was nestled in between huge Russian and Ottoman empires, and I noticed that they were building huge armies. Expecting them to attack, I upgraded my small army into Mech Infantry. Although I only had about 8 units, that was plenty to handle armies of musketmen and cannons. Russia attacked, and I fought them off, pushed on and quickly demolished their empire. Then about 5 turns after Russia breathed its last, the Ottomans finally attacked. By then I had used all my uranium to get 4 Giant Death Robots (hehe) which quickly demolished his riflemen and artillery. I killed off the last Ottoman city 2 or 3 turns before my spaceship finished.

What the hell? Shouldn't the AI try to team up on me with this one? Had I had to deal with both the Ottomans and the Russians at the same time, they actually would've slowed me down considerably, if not posed a major and serious threat. As it was, they attacked separately and were defeated in detail. All this made me realize that I've yet to see the AI form alliances amongst itself. Has anyone seen it yet?
 

Malakal

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I was declared on by four (out of five) different AI empires in my Russian emperor game as soon as I got to be the first one in score. Declarations by at least two AIs are also very common, I had multiple examples. Actually rarely if ever do I get attacked by just one civ.

So yes, AI does gang on You. But not very effectively...
 

Grunker

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My very first game I was leading by ALOT of victory points. Finally China and America teamed up, raped me, and taught me the value of defensive units in ciV. Had it happen a couple of other games, of course then I raped them instead.

So yeah, it happened to me at least.
 
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ScottishMartialArts said:
Has anyone had the AI team up against them?

3 at once when I apparently started expanding too fast for their taste. I wasn't close to anyone's borders (no on ever complained), but they just didn't like me having so many cities. So the moment I laid down my next one, three declarations in one turn.
 

Raghar

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Currently building a GDR to attack Chinesse, after they all declared war against me because I attacked French.

2-3 BB, 1 CG, 2 bombers, missile artilery, tank, and one surviving mechanized infantry are mauling French.

1 GDR, 1 artillery, bomber, and paratroopers supported by one DD, and SSN are devastating Aztecs and Egyptians.

So far I try to win before inflation would get me.

So AI teams up fairly readily, just inflation is larger problem than the resource starved AI.
 
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Grunker said:
My very first game I was leading by ALOT of victory points. Finally China and America teamed up, raped me, and taught me the value of defensive units in ciV. Had it happen a couple of other games, of course then I raped them instead.

So yeah, it happened to me at least.

It has to be random. I've had 1.5k points when the rest of the civs were at 500 and only had 4 super horse archers to defend, yet the only one with the balls to attack me was Gandhi.
 

Annonchinil

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Something like Balance of Power would be a cool concept in a game.
 

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