Well, my last thread about Civ 4 seemed to run downhill after a lot of folks realized that it wouldn’t run, or wouldn’t run right on their PC.
Hopefully by now that’s been fixed, for those interested in playing.
Recently an expansion pack came out, that I myself haven’t played yet. I’ll be picking it up next payday.
Until then, has anyone played with it yet? Or in fact, have any good Civ 4 stories to tell?
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I got Warlords last week. The expansion is (obviously) very combat-heavy. All the new scenarios are focused around conquering and expansion, which is not my normal style of play in Civ games, so for me, the expansion wasn’t a great value. The scenarios are still pretty cool, though: I’ve played the Unification of China map, and am working on the Alexander the Great map.
I do really like the changes they’ve made. Each civ gets a unique building in addition to a unique unit. Like the units, the building is an “improved” version of a regular building. Americans, for example, build shopping malls instead of supermarkets, which gives them a better happiness bonus. Vassal states are very cool, and if you are going to carve yourself an empire, it makes it vastly easier: you don’t have to go chasing down all the odd colonies stuck out on some two-tile patch of tundra inside the arctic circle to beat an enemy. Just take all his big cities until he offers to capitulate, and not only does his territory count as yours for domination victories, he also automatically votes the same way you do in all UN sessions. Plus, he declares war on anyone you do, although that’s usually not such a big help because you’ve already pulverized him trying to get him to capitulate in the first place.
The warlord great leader is pretty cool. They tend to crop up much more often than other leaders. They’re not nearly as uber-powerful as they were in Civ III. Instead, they basically give one unit a huge amount of experience points. Technically, its 20 shared over every unit in the stack when you attach him to a unit, but I usually make sure there aren’t any other units in the stack, so the points all go to the same guy. That, and he gives the unit access to three new power-ups: +1 move, +50% experience, or +30% withdrawal.
Lastly, the Great Wall wonder is now the wonder to get. Makes it impossible for barbarian units to enter your territory, and is never made obsolete!
I haven’t got the expansion yet, but one thing that bugs me o no end is the scoring, Not that scoring points is the prime reason for me playing, not even close, but still…
If I play on a tiny map on the easiest level and go and kick the other civs asses, ASAP, I get a stratospherically high score, even if I haven’t accomplished anything (wonders, tech, culture, wealth), but if I play a huge map and conquer everything before 2050, I get an abyssmal score. I think scoring is geared to much towards a fast win and not skill in managing an empire.
Also, some techs arrive way too late - What? Ancient Greeks and Babylonians didn’t have spies? Oh, and BTW, the Spy function still suck in this 4th incarnation of the game.
Is it worth buying if I never play scenarios or use different maps? Is it worth it just for the changes in game play?
So how are Warlords generated? Do they arise from battle, like the Great Leaders of III, or from wonders and specialists, like the other Great People of IV? And do they have any uses other than boosting units (discovering techs, starting Golden Ages, etc.)?
Taken from the manual: Great Generals are generated as your units gain experience points. When you have acquired a certain number of points a Great General unit will be placed in one of your cities. You can see how many experience points you have in the “Military Advisor” screen.
They can be used to boost units, build a “military academy,” which then the city recieves a +25% production bonus when building military units. They can also become a great military instructor for a city. If you choose that, new units constructed in that city receive +2 experience points.
Personally, the new “Vassal” option is worth the expansion alone. And like the above poster said they declare war if you’re in a war, must give you whatever resource you ask for, even if it’s their only one, and they count towards your domination score.
I remember always wanting the ability to have a one sided right of passage agreement. I mean, I won the war so I should be able to go into your land whenever I want. If the loser capitulates you get that, and you get visibility inside all of the vassal’s cities. Also you can take advantage of whatever fortifications they built and your units heal in their territory at the same speed as they would if they were in their own. There’s also a happiness bonus. The downside is for every vassal you have the maintenance cost of your cities goes up.
And if you play it right, you can get yourself a powerful vassal. I became the master over The United States, but they were very useful allies in wars. As were the Arabians.
I’m sorry if this was rambly, but I adore this expansion.
They’re created through combat, but not the same way as in III. Every time any of your units gains experience in battle, a Combat Experience bar fills up on your Military Advisor screen. When it fills up completely, a Great General appears in one of your cities, and the bar resets. They can also be turned into a Specialist Citizen: a military instructor that gives all units produced in that city +2 experience. Or, they can build a military academy that increases production of military units in the city by 25%. I don’t think they can be used to get Golden Ages or new techs.
I heard this one adds chemical and biological weapons…is that true, or just another rumor to build my hopes up?
Just a rumor to build your hopes up.
Sorry.
It’s a nice little expansion. I would have liked to see more civilizations. I do like the new civ traits.
I admit that I would actually have NOT wanted to see chemical or biological weapons, or powerful spies. Conflict in Civ is at an extremely high strategic level; by the endgame your units are, roughly speaking, representing corps and armies. Chemical weapons have never been a significantly influential weapon at that level of warfare. Biological weapons could be, but inventing a plague that wipes out the whole world is something of an unbalancing game feature.
Spies as units are a silly concept; individual spies, again are simply not important on the scale Civ “simulates.” If you look at countries that have gained big advantages fromw an intelligence advantage - such as the British in the latter half of WWII - it’s a fairly significant national effort, not one James Bond. What would add something to the game would be intelligence capabilities on a strategic level - building something, or attaining a tech, that gives you the ability to detect units or look into enemy cities or something like that.
Ah, well…there’s always modding. (Evil laugh)
(Sorry, this was just getting in my craw. A mild rebuttal, if I may…)
“Never been” doesn’t equal “could never be.” I mean, nukes have only been used in actual combat twice, and they’re still in the game.
And by my figures, chemical weapons have killed about 105,000 people, just between WWI and Iran-Iraq. Maybe not as impressive as the 220,000 from Hiroshima & Nagasaki, but hardly something to scoff at—and those are all military casualties, not from attacks on civilian population centers.
Bio weapons ain’t just humanity-killing doomsday weapons, y’know—you also have your area denial, anti-agriculture, and debilitating but not purposely fatal varieties. Not to mention lethal types that explicitly aren’t contagious.
I guess I’m saying…if the Zulus conquering Rome with war elephants, or the Aztecs and Carthaginians racing to build parts for the first starship to Alpha Centauri can work in the game mechanics, I see no reason why Chemical Mortar Battalions or bombers armed with Wheat Rust or Tularemia couldn’t. 
Quite possibly. As others are stating, the whole “Vassalage” thing makes it loads easier to win games through Domination; likewise, the Great Generals make wars slightly more interesting to fight.
There are also new units for everyone to attack with (Trebuchets and Triremes), new leader traits, and brand new leaders and civs to deal with.
Check out Civ Fanatics for their information list on Warlords for a comprehensive list of what’s added and different.
For me, I spent a week tooling with the scenarios, decided they were too hard and/or boring for me, but have spent a wonderful two weeks playing random Warlords games.
What’s awesome is that without this board, I would never have known that Civ4 was coming out in the first place, let alone the expansion packs for it.
Been playing since CivI, but it’s the ONLY video game I play, so I’m not exactly in the know when it comes to games coming out.
I was going to spring for Civ IV until I took a look at the (Mac) requirements. It’s amazingly resource intensive – needs a G5 or Intel Mac to run even acceptably. I have a Powerbook G4 that’s probably a hundred times faster than the machine I first ran Civ I on back in the day, and it’s not even a contender for Civ IV. Ouch.
I love the Civ franchise, but not enough to drop major dollars on a new PC just to run it.
Like Fiveyearlurker, I’ve been playing since the early days. I even still have a working copy of Colonization. And it’s pretty much the only game I play. I was very disappointed when IV came out and my older Athlon just could not handle it. As soon as I can get the $$$ together, I’m definitely getting a new computer. I look at Civ IV not as the reason for a new computer, just the catalyst.
You do well, siah. And the people… live happileh… in yo kingdom ::sneers::
ROFL! I loved the live action advisors, and miss them.
I’ve never been one for most of the popular games, but I’ve been working Civ since 1994, and loving it each and every step of the way.
Next weekend, the wife says I get to buy a case of Woodchuck, and Warlords. Gonna be a good time.
