Civ IV

[alanschu]

Higher level fast units are more likely to retreat.

[metadigital]

You remember the First World War, right?

 

Remember what that was all about? How the German soldiers were fighting, "with God" on their side, for FREEDOM ? Freedom from what, do you think? The English and French Empires, methinks.

 

Kaiser Wilhelm's Germany, and later Hirohito's Japan, were both trying to fast-track their own empires, to catch up with England. (Aside: the bombing of Pearl Harbour was an identical strategem to the one used by the British against the Italian Fleet in the Taranto harbour, in November 1940.)

 

And if you think the US is not engaged in an economic war, then I suggest you visit some of the countries outside the trade protection zones, e.g. in Africa.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

It's always the same minority of troublemakers who get all the attention.

 

You're focusing exclusively on the 'great powers' - but the world is full of countries that are not great powers (the great majority in fact). Yes, I'm sure you can give me lots of examples of small wars between small countries, but I stick to my main assertion: most countries spend most of the time neither at war nor planning war. How far back into the past this extends is debatable, certainly.

 

Civilization 3 simulates relations between great powers; it doesn't aim to represent a more complex reality. But I still find it fun to play it in strange ways. Thinking about it, I've probably spent more time playing this game than any other single game in my life.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

No, it's not; those examples are just the most vivid and least able to be refuted.

 

It's all about resources: if there are plenty to go around then there is not as much tension as when they are scarcer. Gold, oil, diamonds ... even the forecasted water wars, that are due any year now, e.g. especially when Ethiopia tries to damn the Blue Nile

[metadigital]

Stormtrooper Elvis is pretty intimidating.

 

Nevermind the +200% attack in cities for being the King, there's also the +100% everywhere for wearing the fantastic camoflage.

 

And te +100000% to accuracy for being a stormtrooper!

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

... Don't forget the +100000% Entertainer bonus ...

[alanschu]

Doh!

 

My bad!

 

 

People will be too awestcuk by the fancy hip movment.

[EnderAndrew]

Obsidian better make Stormtrooper Elvis an unlockable character in Redneck Rampage 2: A Hunka Hunka Burnin' Fun!

[Walsingham]

Well I finally won as the Koreans, but I am aboslutely certain I wasn't imagining it. I launched an eight veteran Modern Armor <sic> attack against a size nine city on a plain, defended by two veteran riflemen. Only one Modern Armor survived. This on top of the repeated walloping of my regular armor in the preceding phases of the war.

 

BTW, i solved my problems with the AI being grouchy by simply backstabbing at the first valuable opportunity and then remaining at war for the entire remainder of the game. The benefits of peaceful democracy in the game are not worth the benefits of being able to constantly knacker your competiors under a communist dictatorship. Vive la stinky proles, baby!

[EnderAndrew]

War is for civilizations with no culture.

[metadigital]

Yeah, communism is good for war (interesting freudian subconscious encoding) ... Have you tried a theocracy?

[Walsingham]

I only have civ3 and Play The World. I'm guessing Theocracy must be an upgrade.

 

The celts are fantastic with those zippy swordsmen, and you've ot to love the religious bonus of switching from democracy to warfighter mode instantly. But they totally suck at research. i am now having an incredibly tough time getting the tech needed to arm myself for a war with Egypt, who are a third my size, but centuries ahead.

 

Incidentally, I was wondering what landmass type/ratio everyone prefers.

 

I always choose minimal landmass, and usually either archipelagoes or pangaea. This way my wily/primitive human brain can plan campaigns around choke points, and maximise use of the sea, which the AI is pretty useless at.

[metadigital]

Big landmass, so I can fan out quickly and create gigantic civilziations ...

[SteveThaiBinh]

Normal landmass. Too big and you get too many cities to manage (yawn), too small and everyone stops expanding and starts fighting too soon. I definitely prefer continents - the age of discovery with Navigation is always one of the highlights of the game for me.

[metadigital]

... Too big and you get too many cities to manage (yawn) ...

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

See, Steve, that's the problem with your Buddhist "everybody hold hands around the world" strategem for Civ, it's boring! What you need is a good war to give your game some urgency and purpose.

 

 

[SteveThaiBinh]

Hey, you play your way and I'll play mine.

 

All I need now is the Battlefield 2 Peace Protestor Expansion Pack. :D

[metadigital]

Does that include the Conscientious Objector combatant type, or is that in the next sequel ...?

[Deraldin]

I usually play huge worlds with large landmass continents. I don't like playing on maps with lots of water because the computer never really uses the ocean for anything. They don't expand off it and they don't attack across it. The only time I had a computer attack an island was when I basically flipped them off everytime they tried to contact me and threatened to declare war if they even though of stepping foot on my island. I was kind of like alcatraz. No way in and no way out.

 

I had fun defending myself from all the other computers at the same time though. Each of them decided to gang up on me at the same time. Granted each one only sent one transport each but as soo as I beat them back I immediatly invaded the large continent that was right beside me and managed to conquer most of it before the game ended.

[Calax]

yeah but you still lose because you don't own the world.... I hate that.

[Walsingham]

Steve: Fantastic idea. I cracked up completely.

 

It did remind me of a point I was goig to make earlier, which is that my system (quite apart from the many other reasons why it wouldn't work) would result in my losing population to the war. You can't keep fighting indefinitely and expect to run things like your industries at full whack, and moreover you run out of first class recruits pretty soon. You only have to look at photos of the wehrmacht in 1945 to see how close to the bottom of the barrel they had got.

 

Random thought on society effects of war:

1) war ought to halt culture growth

2) post-war all the damn poets and painters come back harrowed and you get a culture explosion.

3) birth rates should increase during war.

[EnderAndrew]

1) war ought to halt culture growth

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Except that war can incite a huge anti-war artistic movement. Plus suffering is good for art.

[Calax]

I like the birth rates, why not after the war you enter a psudo golden age?

[alanschu]

Birth rates would likely increase immediately after a war though wouldn't they?

 

Well, just going on our baby boom anyways.

[EnderAndrew]

"Now replacing cannon fodder!"

[SteveThaiBinh]

Why shouldn't building units cost one population the same as workers?

[Calax]

I think that would make it so your cities didn't grow at all. Especially when trying to conquer the world, you would have to build up from day one just to take a continent.

[EnderAndrew]

With the Pyramids I still manage pretty good growth.

[Calax]

you wouldn't when you have every unit taking a pop away...