Kylearan Wrote:I think we (and Firaxis) have been exceptionally lucky to have someone like Blake in the community for Civ 4. AI coding is hard and very complex, a completely different thing than doing gameplay mods or graphic packs. I doubt you will find someone like Blake very often, who has a deep understanding of the game mechanics, who himself is a good player, and who has both the skills and the persistence to lead such an effort. I really hope this for Civ 5, but I have my doubts.
In defense of the Civ5 AI, I feel compelled to point out how dramatically the rules change to One Military Unit Per Tile (1UPT) increases the load on the AI. In Civ3 and Civ4, with stacking mechanics, the units need no awareness of one another. They can all act independently, stacking by chance, cooperating by chance, and ending up looking coordinated. The change to one unit per tile requires that AI units be aware of one another and attempt to operate as a group. The design and implementation challenges associated with this are orders of magnitude more difficult than anything that has come before. I would ask all serious analysis of the AI keep this fact foremost in mind; a look only at the final result of AI performance, comparing to past Civ titles as if apples to apples, is bound to be unfair and perhaps counterproductive.
I believe, when measured with an informed eye, that the Civ5 AI is stronger than what has come before. It certainly is more ambitious and has received a higher priority than in the past. Does this increase equal out to the added challenge facing the AI in the new more-tactical game environment? I will leave that to others to judge; but I hope the evaluations of it take in to account both the increased challenge level the AI faces and the increased priority placed on AI by Firaxis.
Likewise, the emphasis in this thread on difficulty levels. The shift to 1UPT and its enormous new set of burdens on the AI render comparisons between Civ5 difficulty levels and those of past games incongruent. I can understand the expectation set and how the discussion arrives at this point, but Civ4 enjoyed an enormous benefit set from the experiences of Civ3's initial release, patching, community development, etc. Civ5 cannot draw on these resources from Civ4 because the 1UPT gameboard obsoletes and nullifies any lessons learned under the old game mechanics. Civ5 has to build its AI from scratch, and so too everything that relies on the AI, such as difficulty levels and their calibrations. No matter how much effort has gone in to this, it is working from a blank slate. I am not sure how much I'm allowed to say (because I am not on top of what is or isn't out in the public domain at the moment) but I have only the highest regard for both the intentions and ability of my Civ5 teammates.
Now that the game is out, I can finally talk about some things. I've been on with Civ5 from the beginning. The experience has been quite different from Civ4, and I'm afraid I can't really discuss that in detail. There are some things I can say, though. In Civ4, balance engineering was my primary task, with the maps innovations being something I was able to slip in during the last few months of development. For Civ5, handling the map scripts was my primary duty, with balance input something I was only able to do on occasion. Civ5 is not Civ4.5 as you have already discovered, but no effort or intention was spared to make it the best game it can be. Nor is work on Civ5 "over with", as I am still on the project now and the new distribution via Steam will allow Firaxis to do things not possible via retail-box-only distribution.
Jon gave me great latitude within the map scope. "Turned me loose" might be a fair description. Some commentary about this resides within the documentation elements in the Lua files themselves. No effort or expense was spared when it comes to the maps. I got to do everything for Civ5 that I could only dream of attempting for Civ4. Start points and resource distribution are handled by all new systems. The core map scripts received a lot of TLC. I had major input in to how the terrain works. The look and feel of the maps, emphasizing more realistic terrain distribution and epic features like a Sahara-sized desert or an Amazon-sized forest are no accident. Care was put in to ensuring this new more diverse terrain would be better balanced as well, and that "dud starts" would be almost unheard of. Civ5 launches with fewer map scripts than did Civ4, but each has received a more penetrating effort, with specific new upgrades in quality.
As Civ5 moves forward in to its post-release phase, I will look to the wisdom of RB players, who (collectively) will turn up more insights about the interactions of the game's rules and assets than any one person could turn up by themselves in a lifetime. I don't think it's unreasonable to expect (as with Civ3 and Civ4) that fan input will play a role in the game's post-release evolution.
One positive thing (for me) about Civ5, having NOT been working 40-hour weeks on balancing its elements as I did for Civ4, is that I am still somewhat fresh to the game as it stands now. (I have been too busy with map tasks to be free to have played much of it). So I am not tired of it yet, and some of you may already know the details of the current version better than I do.
I will try to get in to an SG or two where I can fit them in.
I will have to introduce my bride. She is busy playing Civ5 as I write this. (I hear Iroquois music playing! Love the new civ-specific music system!) But there is only so much I can post at one time, so this will have to wait.
Happy Civving!
- Sirian
