Sid Meier's Civilization Series (Main Titles)

Genghis wastes so much time going after city-states that I'm rarely concerned about him unless I'm relying on city-states to win, like if I want to go diplomacy or something. In that case I'll go after him to liberate the city-states. My nemesis over my Civ V playthroughs has consistently been Alexander. Because diplomacy/domination strategies are my preferred playstyle he just always seems to be the major obstacle in my way. Breaking down Greece's late-game mass of city-state allies so you can actually attack him is a real pain.

Elizabeth is the worst, diplomatically speaking—Alex can be terrifying if neighbors early or snowballed, but can be friendly—Liz always hates me at practically first sight. This is not entirely bad since England's war music is great.

Only person to be the aggressor against me as Sweden right now, although I'd just put down a city in an amazing mountain chokepoint that sealed her and half the map off so nothing happened.

Attempting to save Poland later, though, for once her AI used massed longbows very effectively, chewing up half my army. Rather than liberate or keep Warsaw I had to sell it to Brazil, which kicked them out of their defensive positions and kept anyone from retaking next turn.

I have my revenge though; England's been eliminated from the map thanks in great part to Hakkas (outrange THAT!) and their great works will speed my cultural domination.

According to the Civ V wiki Elizabeth has a tendency to turn Hostile at the slightest provocation, but actually shies away from declaring war. Go fig. Guess it makes sense - every war I've had with her has been to defend someone a lot weaker than her than she's picking on, but I never see her attacking people who are actually comparable to her in strength.

Anyway, because I was bored I refined my idea for a HTTYD Berk Civ. Tell me what you guys think.

Berk

• Note: When worked by this Civ, the Horse Strategic Resource becomes Dragon. All units which require Dragon should have new/altered models (and names, if necessary) which reflect this. As this change is only visual and in no way changes gameplay on its own, this is not part of the Nation's UA.
• Leader: Hiccup Horrendous Haddock III
• Peace Theme: "Dragon Racing" - HTTYD 2 .
• War Theme: "This Is Berk" - HTTYD (perhaps with the first twenty seconds or so (or the first minute entirely) cut out).
• Unique Ability: Dragon Loyalty. All mounted units start with Volley (+50% against Cities and Fortified Units), even if not ranged, and have no penalty when attacking Cities, but take a 50% penalty against Ranged Attack and a 15-20% penalty when fighting a unit adjacent to an allied Ranged Unit. Armor and Air units require Dragon (Horse), but do not gain this bonus (or penalty).
• Unique Unit: Defender of Berk. Replaces Lancer. Can move and attack normally on Coast, and only embarks on Ocean.
• Unique Building: Dragon Training Academy. Replaces Stable. Each source of Dragon (Horse) gives +2. +15% Production when producing Mounted units. Each source of Dragon gives +1 Production. Each source of Sheep or Cattle give +1 Production, +1 Food.

What say ye? Too powerful? Not powerful enough? His bonuses pretty much stop after the Industrial Era, but in the Medieval Era Hiccup possibly strikes me as a bit... nasty, if swarming the map with mounted units - though a healthy defense of archers should stop him cold (I only thought of the penalty against units adjacent to archers at the last minute). I also considered giving him a penalty to non-mounted units just to balance him out, but I wasn't quite sure. Also, despite the fact that his Uniques are clearly skewed towards war, Hiccup's AI values would be focused on diplomacy (especially with City States) with heavy Warmonger hate - though he would create a sizable defensive army.

Alas, I don't even know where I would start in making a mod, let alone one that requires such graphical changes as this, so this is all just for fun.

edited 24th Oct '14 1:43:54 AM by KnownUnknown

I'm not sure it's even possible to have units treat land & coast the same but not ocean. :/

Good point. I dunno if the ability to make land units walk on water can be made to differentiate between kinds of water or if it's just water in general. I think its possible, though. Bridge mods work by cordoning that off to certain areas too, but then I don't know if the same principle can be applied to terrain.

edited 24th Oct '14 3:02:51 AM by KnownUnknown

You could simulate flying units by making all mounted units ignore terrain cost and able to enter mountain hexes: the same ability that the Helicopter Gunship has.

I wouldn't give combat penalties to these units; they are already weak enough to counterattack as it is. The movement bonus alone will make Berk incredibly powerful in early-game tactical combat.

For the UU, I'd consider maybe replacing Lancer with Night Fury and giving it the Submarine bonus: invisible to enemy units unless it attacks or they try to move into its hex.

edited 24th Oct '14 6:34:40 AM by Fighteer

Two games in a row I've wound up on the same continent as Denmark and right next to Wellington. This time I'm Phoenicia and I have a good 8 city state allies because for this game it seems I'm the only not invading city states.

Eventually Hary goes crazy and refuses to stop bullying my allies so I take everything but his capital and I citadel it so I can put a road down. He is now my unhappy pet.

On one of the other continents Iceland, my ally, is going to war against super Poland (They've taken most of Wales). I have half a mind to join in as Poland is one of the few who could do anything to me at this point.

edited 24th Oct '14 6:50:25 AM by Blackcoldren

I just did an autocracy diplomatic victory on an archipelago map as the Ottomans, simply so gunboat diplomacy would literally involve gunboats.

I love my wordplay too much.

Whoo, just had a ridiculously close match on King. Playing as the Mayans, I was forced to go 3-city tall due to a lack of space from Ethiopia in the north and Greece in the south. Angled for a peaceful science victory, but lack of cities was cramping my late science, and jungle terrain was cramping my late production. In addition, Alexander was eating up all the city-states (as he does), and the ever-manipulable Attila was stuck on his own landmass, too far away to get involved. After Alex got 38/40 votes for World Leader, I tried buying up nukes and X-COM squads to wipe him off the map before the next vote, but all I accomplished was vaporizing Sparta, depopulating Athens and Knossos, and getting denounced by everyone. Just managed to buy off one of his city-states for the next vote, keeping him at 38 and delaying Greek diplomatic victory for the last few turns I needed to finish my spaceship.

edited 27th Oct '14 9:56:28 AM by ABNDT

Congrats and you know how this works now right? Get thee to Beyond Earth.

Do we know yet if Civ V can transfer to a Beyond Earth game? Cause that would be awesome.

Civ V got a patch today.

I'm really glad they finally did the scaling of Warmonger penalties for Eras thing. It makes a lot more sense and it really should've been done sooner.

Also:

Finally. This made renegotiating when the AI suggests deals during their turn very irritating.

edited 27th Oct '14 4:15:17 PM by KnownUnknown

So I recently got Civ 5, are there any mods that people recommend I install?

I 'unno. Look up your favorite other media and look for mods that add civs from them.

From the last couple times we had this conversation on here, here's the list of mods I personally think are the most essential. The R.E.D. Modpack and religion expansion packs, especially. There's also a mod that prevents the computer from automatically getting Pottery, which is nice.

Likewise, this is the list of alt. Civs I use. If you're like me an don''t like the idea of modded civs that aren't balanced well, most of those are both unique and pretty well put together.

In general, cruise the workshop for new balancing mods and civs (I tend to go for historical Civs more than fictional ones, but there's lots of different kinds) every once in a while and see what you like. People are refining the game pretty much every day.

edited 28th Oct '14 2:29:56 AM by KnownUnknown

I don't play the game, I only watch Let's Plays, but I believe the Better UI mod is quite good. No real game changes, only interface improvements.

edited 28th Oct '14 2:45:55 AM by Heatth

If you're looking for civilizations I recommend JFD and Tomatekh's mods. Note that most if not all of them need BNW.

To me, Civ Mod wise, there's nothing better than Vice Virtuoso's mods- though he mostly focuses on fictional characters. There's Civs for several Fate Stay characters, Hatsune Miku, every single Madoka character, Big Boss, Big Boss Again But Better, Liquid Ocelot, Senator Armstrong, and probably a bunch more I forgot.

Ahh sweet I will look them up, I should be good on the expansions side I got the complete version off Amazon while it was on sale for 15$.

I freaking hate Alexander.

Every game that I don't play as Domination, I end up needing to spend all of my money befriending CS so he isn't elected world leader. You basically have to start conquering CS - and being hated by everyone - so he can not win. And if he gets to Autocracy, it is even worse (and he goes really quickly through social policies with all the goddamn cultural CS he is allied with).

The bigger the map, the worst it is. Other leaders somewhat change from one game to another, but Alex is always an horrible opponent.

Depends on the sort of victory you're going for; Alex is mostly a pain if you want a science victory on higher difficulty levels.

Maybe Diplomatic as well, but I rarely play for that and I assume if you've been building towards diplomacy, you've got some kind of counter.

I usually play Culture victory and end the game before anyone can kickstart the UN. My nemesis is usually Selasse or Theodora; On higher difficulties Theodora will get religion faster than anyone has the right to and will usually get stonehenge.

If I'm on a map with both of them, I'll usually rage quit.

edited 3rd Dec '14 3:41:23 PM by Fauxlosophe

The thing is, I played him on Large or XL maps. When there are 6 or 7 cultural CS, and he is allied with all of them with more than 300 reputation, his culture production is simply off the charts, and since he also is quite the jerk, it is extremely difficult to have him open his borders so I can send Great Musicians to boost tourism.

As for the Diplomatic route, well, no comment on that.

The thing is, most leaders are heads/tails : sometimes really good, sometimes really bad - this way, you cannot know who will be your big opponent to face during the game. Alexander however is always annoying, even when he is weak, he is able to be a threat with the city-states. The second most dangerous one in average is probably Casimir, yet another guy with a slightly broken UA who gives him an edge on everyone.

Theodora is almost always laughable against me though, unlike Selassie ; she is at the end of the spectrum along with Enrico Dandolo or Pedro (unless you play on a map with only the friendliest bunch of leaders, Pedro will get destroyed by the local powerhouse). If you need one very specific Religion belief build to play, she will be a pain though, what with her being able to steal one more than everyone else.

I bet Enrico is a fun rival nation to keep around a kind of weapon again Alexander: since even though his AI is shit he can take C Ses away no matter what the other players' relations with them (at least, that's how it was when he stole them from me). Even better, you can't liberate C Ses he puppets (again, at least that's how it was with me).

Take him under your wing, liberate him when he is inevitably wiped off the map. Give him money when his AI inevitably runs his nation into the ground, puppet him - if you will...

Granted, this probably won't be too effective, but it is funny.

Indeed. But you have to basically behave like his mom because in many of my games he kept sending unprotected Merchants of Venice through the map, that got captured because barbarians near CS are a common sight. So you have to gift him money, wait for him to produce the merchant, and then escort it.

Or you can just go Patronage and pray for a Merchant to be gifted.

My next challenge: getting the "longest name ever" achievement. I picked a Pangea map and put abundant resources to make it easier to create cities - and I'll admit, I rerolled until I got a desert start just to be sure to dominate the religious game, because holy crap Desert Folklore is OP (I remember my most violent Religion game being as Arabia, starting next to Sinai). Next question: being Boa, it is obvious I will go Liberty, then Piety, then Commerce, but what Ideology should I get for very wide empires ? Is Order the best ?