Civilization V- Might actually be good now. Stay tuned.

[WayAbvPar]

For most games I would be inclined to agree. This particular franchise has a pretty good track record of delivering a TON of new content and tweaks/fixes in their expansions, though. Worth the price for sure.

I would have rather they dump $5 into my Steam wallet than gift me copies of a game I have owned for 10 years (or however long it has been). Oh well- my nephew got a 'new' game to play. He is just getting to the age that he might think it is cool.

[Stormwaltz]

I think $30 is too expensive for just about any expansion but 1) I'm a cheap bastard and 2) that ship sailed when WoW priced all its expansions at $30.

I seem to recall the Civ expansions always costing about $30, going back to Civ2's Conflicts in Civilization and Fantastic Worlds. For this franchise, that ship sailed long before WoW.

[Tannhauser]

Coming up for air long enough to report my games and grade the civs.  I have played every BNW civ to at least 100 turns and a few games to completion. 

Poland B
  Their Winged Hussar is a beast and the Ducal Stable is a boon to an early economy.  The UA is powerful, you basically gain an entire policy tree for free.
  I played them for about 200 turns, they felt tough as nails, especially with the Hussars knocking enemies around.  Domination.

Brazil A-
  Their camps are extremely powerful and Carnival is really great.  But the Prachina comes in a bit late.  I just now lost in a time victory to Ethiopia.  I had
  three of five civs influenced, but Haile just built too many gotdamn wonders and he kept a tech edge on me the whole game.  Brazil's jungle starts are
  also not optimal but of course are needed for the camps.  Still, I had fun even in defeat and I understand 95% of the culture game now.

Assyria A+
  Matches my preferred playstyle perfectly.  The UA and UU's are great.  I won one Domination game with them and on another.  The Royal Library is
  soooo good.  It's a building for science and culture.  Could this building even give Ash a leg up to win a culture game?  I'm going to find out.

Zulus C+
  A bit of an unfair rating, since I only played them about 150 turns.  The Impi's seemed very powerful, but I wonder if they fade in the stretch.
  The unique promotions are cool but everything seems so front-loaded.  At least Assyria's libraries offer alternatives.  Domination or nothing for the Zulu.

Portugal B-
  Another civ I've only put about 150 turns in.  I was just entering their crucial era when I moved on.  The Nau's special ability is hella cool and I love
  the idea of the Feitoria, even if I haven't built one yet.  This might be the sleeper hit civ for me if I put some time in it.

Indonesia D
  Won a science victory as I cruised along.  The only excitement came when Austria and Greece backstabbed me for a seaborne invasion.  I only built
  one Kris, it seemed weird.  The Candi was meh.  The extra luxuries were fairly cool but I won't play this civ again for a while.  Boring even in victory.

Morocco B-
  About 200 turns of moderate fun going for a culture win, even though it seems like a Dip civ.  Still struggling to finish it, Egypt has to be knocked
  out for my culture win.  Apparently if Ramses has even a single pop shack in tundra, he keeps all the old culture for defense.  Grade might rise to
  an A if I played for a Diplo win.  They make an OBSCENE amount of gold.  No, seriously, King Midas WISHES he had the coins under Ahmad's couch
  cushions.

Venice B
  The last civ of BNW I played.  No interest in playing them...until I played them.  Such a unique civ!  I'm cruising toward a diplomatic win.  I really
  like the new diplomacy rules, awesome addition.  Talk about another civ that makes the cheese!  This isn't 'pasteurized cheese food', no this is
  real cheese.  What was I saying?

Shoshone D+
  I'll probably get some flack for this grade, but the Sho's seemed this xpac's version of America, just kind of vague and unfocused.  Ok, you can
  choose what you get from a goody hut, but the tech grabs are spread out.  I just don't 'get' the Sho's yet.  I won't take back my grade though,
  that would make me an...never mind. About 100 turns played.

France B
  Played them for about 150 turns.  The chateaus are very cool, but I struggled with a culture win since Poland was determined to upset my
  apple cart.  This new version of France has a good feel to me.  But I give the culture edge to Brazil with their amazing camps, etc.

Arabia -
  Ok, shit I forgot I haven't played them yet.  Well not going to delete this post because of a statement I made wayyy back up at the top of the post.
  They look like money-makers, but religion-spread is still a bit foggy for me to leap into this civ.

There you have it.  I have logged a LOT of hours in BNW.  Awesome xpac which completes and puts a masterwork painting over the smeared shit
 on canvas Civ V had at release. Religion and Espionage have been improved and even more integrated into the game.  Just great stuff, now bring on VI!




 

[Teleku]

Shoshone would be crazy good for a cultural victory under the old rules....... but under the current, not so much.  Started a game with them to go for a single city culture win, without actually reading what was changed for cultural victories in the expansion.  Thought I was doing great and they were overpowered.  Till I started to pay attention to tourism and actually read the manual.  Woops!   

Venice is a shit load of fun.  Very different to play, and that's very good.

I  Poland, for a number of reasons.   

[Ingmar]

Shoshone is outstanding at expansionist sprawling empire stuff due to the extra land grabbing you do with new cities and their early exploration advantage. Single city is definitely wasting their potential.

[Spiff]

Only started 2 games with the Sho so far (and haven't finished either), but they seem to get a truckload of aggro for that passive. I could hardly settle a city without someone denouncing me.

Also, France is incredibly annoying to play against when I'm aiming for a cultural win; almost every game I've had against them I was influential or even dominant with every other Civ and still had near 100 projected turns 'till they bought my blue jeans. The early/mid game cultural lead they build up with those chateaus is just insane.

Overall I think I enjoyed my Venice games the most, such a different game with them.
It's also about the only Civ I can resist dipping into the liberty tree with, damn that tree! Always tempting me with it's free units.

A great expansion though, I can hardly believe how far they've come since launch. Awarding this best recovery of a mediocre game ever!

[Maledict]

Messing around as Assyria - their siege towers are ridiculous. Not sure if they keep the abilities when you upgrade them but they make battering rams look weak.

Problem is that early era warfare comes with a lot more penalties now. Feels like you are okay making war on one player, but after that people will forever distrustyouif you keep going and take on someone else (which makes sense but is annoying!)

[Merusk]

Yeah, the war metagame seems kind of off for players that like it.  Maybe it's just that I'm not very good at it, but if you don't crush folks by 1100 or so, seems like you just have to sit on your hands until WW2-era units at least.

[Maledict]

Civ 5 has always had a 'trench' mode built in from the end of the renaissance until artillery basically, due to the huge increases in strength melee units get and the decrease in range for ranged units. Once folks start getting muskets and riflemen it starts taking 3+ crossbows to take one down, at which point you need ridiculously high numbers to win. Equally cannons, whilst strong, do tend to get one spotted by cavalry or cities themselves and their range / set up time leaves them very vulnerable.

Without cheap ranged units to hammer at cities and the melee units, you end with a stalemate until artillery (and then Great War bombers) come along to blow through the defences.Personally think that air power is too powerful when it comes online as the defences for it a much further down the tree.

That's another reason why England is so good. Longbowmen act as artillery during the renaissance and early industrial, and then when they upgrade you keep your two range ranged units which makes a huge different when assaulting cities.

[MrHat]

Civ 5 has always had a 'trench' mode built in from the end of the renaissance until artillery basically, due to the huge increases in strength melee units get and the decrease in range for ranged units. Once folks start getting muskets and riflemen it starts taking 3+ crossbows to take one down, at which point you need ridiculously high numbers to win. Equally cannons, whilst strong, do tend to get one spotted by cavalry or cities themselves and their range / set up time leaves them very vulnerable.

Without cheap ranged units to hammer at cities and the melee units, you end with a stalemate until artillery (and then Great War bombers) come along to blow through the defences.Personally think that air power is too powerful when it comes online as the defences for it a much further down the tree.

That's another reason why England is so good. Longbowmen act as artillery during the renaissance and early industrial, and then when they upgrade you keep your two range ranged units which makes a huge different when assaulting cities.

Frigates change most of that depending on map type.

[Spiff]

The siege towers keep their regular buffs (like the free ranged defense), but they do lose the 'sapper' upgrade giving every unit near it that damage increase against cities.
You can however keep one or 2 around to park next to the units doing the attacking; the AI doesn't seem to target them often (probably considers them low priority past the medieval era). A bit cheesy, but helpful if you want to speed up the conquering.

[Shannow]

New expansion is kicking my ass on King difficulty. Tried the Iroquios (intrigued by the forests of doom!) and could never get my empire decently happy or in the black. Even with Golden Ages.

Didn't help that Indonesia was sending about a missionary a turn into my territory to convert my cities, I had to DoW him just to stop that shit.  It's annoying that that appears to be the only way to keep them out of your territory.

[Merusk]

Yeah Indonesia and Siam are huge pricks about that.    They need to die early on I've decided.

Hiowatha is a dick like that, too, untill you yell at him. He either stops for good or I was strong enough to scare him, I'm not sure which.

[Tannhauser]

New expansion is kicking my ass on King difficulty. Tried the Iroquios (intrigued by the forests of doom!) and could never get my empire decently happy or in the black. Even with Golden Ages.

Didn't help that Indonesia was sending about a missionary a turn into my territory to convert my cities, I had to DoW him just to stop that shit.  It's annoying that that appears to be the only way to keep them out of your territory.

I play at King myself.  Keep at it.  I lost my first two or three King games after BNW.  But my play has improved because I've focused more on what tech and social paths to take and prioritized certain build chains.  For instance I've moved Archery way up. You can count on barbarians coming at you between turns 15 and 25 and you want a backup to your warrior to help clear the nearby camp. 

In the spoiler is my build order for Assyria to gear up for their first civ attack with Liberty as their policy tree.  R=Research, B=Build, P=Policy

 

Obviously YMMV when to research Masonry and/or Calendar depending on your starting situation.  But this build order gets me my Siege Towers with the Cover promotion.  With two archers, a spearman and two Siege towers I can take the first, weak enemy civ city. 

[Shannow]

Interesting , I always build my scout first then the monument.
Started a game last night as England and about 30 turns in my scout uncovered El Dorado. Had never seen that before , muy bueno? 500 gold at turn 30 comes in reaaaaaal handy. Still stuck on a continent with 5 other civs is not my favourite thing in the world. Also the Dutch will die a painful death for putting a city next to my city of gold. Fuckers. (Also found Solomons Temple...love the new stuff)

I'll admit that with the better load times I will reload games if I get a shitty load off a ruins find. Reveal Barbarian encampments? Screw that! Papa wants some fresh new tech!

Have built the Great Lighthouse, and thinking of unlocking explorer social policy. My Frigates should be able to move like 10 hexes in a turn when I'm done..:P

[Teleku]

Yeah, I learned a long time ago building the scout first is way important.  The extra villages you will get from doing that make a big difference early on.

[CmdrSlack]

The Shoshone village selecty power is cool because choosing to upgrade your scout at a village gets you a composite bowman, iirc.

[Ingmar]

Yeah, basically always go scout first. I typically also go Pottery first to grab a shrine so I have a prayer at getting a decent founder belief.

[Shannow]

Holy mother of City States. So my English game ended with Greece winning a diplomatic victory. I was behind in science to Babylon who was starting to build Apollo bits and I was contemplating nuking a few of his cities to try and eke out a win. I wasn't even worried about Greece as it had appeared they had pissed off pretty much everyone in the entire world. They were constantly at war with 3-4 different civs (including myself at one stage, but fucking war is expensive) and were down to maybe 4 cities. Then the vote comes up for World leader and they have 38 votes.

Mothersuck.

Started an Archipelego(sp) map with Polynesia. Got a start position with an island that has El Dorado on it. Yeah baby.

[Merusk]

You have to watch Greece and city states, as you sadly learned.

I learned the votes you get for having city states at ally are the way you win diplomatic victory.  I did a game as Venice this past weekend that I won via gold the exact same way.  I was getting 2k gold per turn, so nobody could break my stranglehold on the city states without bankrupting themselves.  And them I'd swoop in the next turn and buy my ally back anyway.

No army whatsoever, but nobody dared touch me because I was so key to their economies.   I only puppetted 4 cities, but I had 38 votes in 1955 and was only waiting out the time to the actual vote.  This was only on prince, so I want to give it a shot at king next and see how that works.

[HaemishM]

ARISE!!!!

If you don't already have Brave New World (like I didn't), you can get it for 50% off today at Green Man Gaming. If you have a coupon code from them, you can get another 20% off - total $12.

[Lantyssa]

Thanks!

[Tannhauser]

The new patch has helped with the warmonger problems.  Instead of all nations forever hating you for knocking off a city-state, some leeway is granted now.  There are warlike civs, like Hiawatha who aren't as disturbed by your conquests as other civs.  Even peaceful civs only drop to neutral or guarded with a bit of the old ultra-violence.  Still playing, so not sure when I'll get back in some civs good graces.

One annoying change is that civs won't straight up trade luxury resources 1 for 1 now.  Maybe they do at a friendlier level, but right now they charge a high price for a single lousy pearl.  More playing needed.

They put me, Assyria, on a map with Rome, Iroquois, Denmark, Korea AND Zulu.    Korea is a lost civilization and the Iroquois have lost their capital three times.  Blood flows like water.

[koro]

ARISE!!!!

If you don't already have Brave New World (like I didn't), you can get it for 50% off today at Green Man Gaming. If you have a coupon code from them, you can get another 20% off - total $12.

Thanks for that. I bit the bullet and got both expansions, since G&K was also on sale.

[Sky]

There is a 20% voucher link on their twitter feed that works with this sale.

[Shannow]

Pulling from the other thread, what mods are good/actually work/people recommend. I'm playing with all the expansions.

[WayAbvPar]

Pulling from the other thread, what mods are good/actually work/people recommend. I'm playing with all the expansions.

This is a good question. Been long enough now that there should be some really good mods around.

[Teleku]

Just downloaded the CivRome mod thats been getting some good press lately.  Unfortunatly, not sure when I'm going to get some time to play it, but will update when I can.

I've never actually played any of the mods (having enjoyed the game quite a bit as is).  Looks like there are a lot of interesting mods out now, going to have to start playing Civ5 again.

[Cheddar]

Is ther an FFH mod? About to have tons of game time 

[Nevermore]

Closest I was able to find about 6 months or so ago was a Forgotten Realms mod, but it was more of a scenario with a lot of pre-set stuff.

[Merusk]

Is ther an FFH mod? About to have tons of game time 

No, and there won't be. He went to work for a guy who'll fire him for working on that sort of thing.

[Sky]

 

[Shannow]

Closest I was able to find about 6 months or so ago was a Forgotten Realms mod, but it was more of a scenario with a lot of pre-set stuff.

Looks like there are a couple of complete conversions for Faerun available

I'll also admit I have no idea what FFH is?

[Seraphim]

I'll also admit I have no idea what FFH is?

Fall From Heaven, a great fantasy themed conversion mod for Civilization IV.

Edit: Oops, missed a bracket.