Epic Six - Always War - Info Thread

[Sirian]

Never knew you were a Nascar guy, Sirian.

I'm not. In fact, I disdain the sport for what I view are its Big Huge Dice Rolls™. Results are almost invariably spoiled by various wrecks. The caution flags are necessary, but they often erase leads and always impact positioning. To me, it feels like that overrides everything else, and I do NOT want to invest hours of my time in to something where a moment's mistake or overaggression can wipe out 99% of the rest of the event. I might be interested if the RACING were the sole determinant, but instead all the players have to try to exploit the loopholes in the game.

(I'm not the biggest basketball fan, either, in part because at the end of every game, there is deliberate fouling going on in the final seconds, which is tolerated as valid strategy by the sport. Well, it's not valid in my book! I don't want to watch a whole contest only to have the result flipped on its head by a rules loophole they can't seem to close!)

I'm also not a big car guy in general, so... Heh.


What I am, though, is a writer. So I don't need to be personally invested in to something to pick up its jargon and idioms. I'll happy borrow its language and make use of it as it suits me.

Now Cyrene... He's a NASCAR guy.


- Sirian

[Kodii]

Honorable Mentions will be handed out for the following achievements:
* First (among participating players, by game year) to capture an enemy city.

Just a clarification. This means first to capture, as in not raze?

Theres no honorable mention for fastest victory? 8)

[Sirian]

Just a clarification. This means first to capture, as in not raze?

Theres no honorable mention for fastest victory? 8)

This is -NOT- a scored event.

Capture or raze, doesn't matter.

[T-hawk]

I'm not. In fact, I disdain the sport for what I view are its Big Huge Dice Rolls™.

"The citizens of Pompeii have overthrown their oppressors! They yearn to be with us!" "The 24 car has successfully avoided the wreck in Turn Four!"

It'll probably surprise you not at all that I can't help but take an interest in the technical aspects and loopholes of the sport more so than the racing itself. NASCAR and Civ colliding in the forums of Realms Beyond. Never know where discussions will go around here. And sometimes they do just end up in circles, turning left.


Anyway, back to the topic, and stop me if I'm getting too spoilerish here. So if war weariness is still present and never-ending in Always War, it sounds like there's a soft time limit cap on the game as your cities will eventually effectively get paralyzed. Is there a maximum limit on WW in Civ 4, like there was for Republics in Civ 3?

[Sirian]

Anyway, back to the topic, and stop me if I'm getting too spoilerish here. So if war weariness is still present and never-ending in Always War, it sounds like there's a soft time limit cap on the game as your cities will eventually effectively get paralyzed. Is there a maximum limit on WW in Civ 4, like there was for Republics in Civ 3?

WW does not accrue in Civ4 for action that takes place inside your cultural borders. You therefore get an unlimited pass on defense. As for offense, WW piles up based on "power lost" in casualties, as the main ingredient. Later units are rated higher in power, so as the game goes along, WW piles up faster for offensive losses per unit lost. (This is not scientific analysis, just an overall view).

There is also the patently absurd issue of WW disappearing overnight if you eliminate a given civ, as WW is still per-civ as it was in Civ3.

Therefore, choose your offensives wisely, minimize your casualties, fall back to defense if WW threatens to go out of control. You -can- completely eliminate WW effects, but only by jumping through the hoops of getting to Fascism and building Jails in every city, along with Mt Rushmore small wonder and the Police State civic.

I believe WW also fades with time, but -very- slowly. It's enough to keep you clean through the first third of the tech tree, usually. Although just how bad it can get, I'm not sure, since I'm no longer the player with the most experience with Civ4 WW in the widest variety of situations.


- Sirian

[Sirian]

It'll probably surprise you not at all that I can't help but take an interest in the technical aspects and loopholes of the sport more so than the racing itself.

Actually, that does surprise me. I surprise easily, though, at least these days. You might say that I'm walking around in a fog and only notice the things into which I actually bump.


- Sirian

[uberfish]

The trouble with WW is it scales up too high in the late game, probably due to unit strength as Sirian says multiplied by the ever-increasing size of late game armies. It usually starts to hurt at about Late Medieval and gets exponentially worse from there. In epic 4, I had 18 war weariness in some of my cities even with police state + rushmore (-75%) before building jails.

I find it a bit distasteful to have to research fascism every time there's going to be a significant Modern age war, but the game pretty much forces it on you.

[regoarrarr]

EDITED- NO SPOILERS, PLEASE!!!

[Zeviz]

WW does not accrue in Civ4 for action that takes place inside your cultural borders. You therefore get an unlimited pass on defense. As for offense, WW piles up based on "power lost" in casualties, as the main ingredient. Later units are rated higher in power, so as the game goes along, WW piles up faster for offensive losses per unit lost. (This is not scientific analysis, just an overall view).
...

Thanks for the explanation. I finally understand why late wars cause much stronger WW than earlier ones.

Do you also get WW for capturing cities, or is it just a result of losing units during siege?

[Kylearan]

Hi,

Do you also get WW for capturing cities, or is it just a result of losing units during siege?

You also get WW for capturing cities. I've had several campaigns where I did not lose a single unit, but every city I captured increased WW. I guess that had been introduced as a counterweight to the added benifits a captured city gives your empire, so that it will be harder to become a run-away civ through war alone. In my view the economic model alone would be enough to achieve this, though...

That WW increases more slowly in the beginning and faster in the late game should be exactly the other way around IMHO. It might be realistic that people are more sensitive towards waging war in modern times, but it makes the mop-up phase even more tedious than it already is.

-Kylearan