Re: Comparing it to Civ 4..
 

Civ 1 is the greatest game ever. It is the founding father of the entire genre of 4X games and the great-great grandfather of Dom 3.

Civ 2,3 and 4 are upgrades of Civ 1, but the same strategy that I used in Civ 1 was still successful in the three subsequent versions, requiring only minor adaptions to the details that changed.

Dom 3 is vastly superior to Civ 2,3 and 4. (Sorry KO & JO, but nothing but an entirely new game type can knock Civ 1 off the top perch on the pantheon.) Dom 3 has vastly more complexities and is much more challenging than the Civ series. Dom 3 is a paper/scissors/rock game with unending variables and the Civ series are merely about power and research and all stem from the number of cities.

In Civ, if you have the biggest guns you win. In Dom 3, your big guns can be turned into limp noodles in front of your unbelieving eyes.

Dom 3 also has a greater variety of sites that have a chance of significently altering the game. While some probably curse their bad luck and the unfairness of the game in not getting a great site and others rejoice when they are blessed, I think these are great variables that dwarf the influence of a coal/horse/banana site in Civ.

In Civ, there is limited stratgic differences between nations. In Dom, you need a different strategy not only for every nation, but also for which nations are your immediate neighbors.

All in all, I am a major Civ fan. My Civ playing was cited in my divorce. (Guilty as charged, and the major factor why I will not MP; a smart Polack doesn't get burnt by hot Kielbasa twice.) But I find Dom 3 preferable by a wide margin to Civ 4. I played Civ 4 for about 3 months, but it really was the same game I've been playing for 20 some odd years. I've been playing Dom3 for 9 months now and still haven't figured it out.

Re: Comparing it to Civ 4..
 

The AI processing gets longer in Dom3 as well. I don't play most games to extinction of other races, but they tend to get longer and longer.

I think that the SP mode to Dom3 is challenging (to a newbie to me) and MP will regularly clean your clock.

Re: Comparing it to Civ 4..
 

Late game in Dom 3 can be at least as boring as in Civ 4. Make sure you set victory conditions to f.e. victory points else you'll have a boring end game chasing the last atlantian out of its last sea province.
Dom3 is very moddable. Of course, contrary to Civ 4, you can't mod everything since you don't have the source code, so people who tell you that dom3 is great because of its mods are not comparing it to civ4, as civ4 is 100% more moddable.
Civ4 can be extremely enjoyable. The Fall from Heaven II mod, where everything is remade, magic added in the game, where the world changes based on your actions (armaggeddon counter) changes the gameplay more than any dominions mod can ever hope to.
This said, I like dom3 more because there's always so much to discover in this game.

Re: Comparing it to Civ 4..
 

thank you..it's getting ordered..Hope at 61 I'm not to dumb to figure it out..lol
Tom

Re: Comparing it to Civ 4..
 

Gamers are a tougher lot than the normal run of humanity, so nothing to worry about.

There are many advocates for mental gymnastics for maintaining your faculties. But I had to laugh at a TV commercial I saw the other evening; some middle aged adult was playing a hand held game requiring him to choose between a "plus" sign, "minus" sign, etc as a technique to maintain his sharpness as he aged. Obviously an attempt to seperate the butter knives of the world from their money.

One bit of advice for you. This game does not play like Civ. It has many superficial similarities to Civ, but if you try to play it like Civ, you will get your butt kicked. I did.

Of course, that is how you will learn to play the game.

Re: Comparing it to Civ 4..
 

In my opinion Dominions is better than CIV_4 because you have more control over the battles and units. CIV_4 has the same battle interactions as all previous CIV versions... which is Unit_A bumps into Unit_B and battle results are determined by formula XYZ.

Dominions series allows you to specify where individual units of an army stand in battle, what enemy groups melee units target, what spells mages cast in the first five rounds of combat, what items are being worn by your commanders and a more detailed list of statistics than CIV_4.

CIV_4 allows for larger maps using the smart map tool, it's too bad Dominions doesn't have a smart map tool allowing gamers to increase the commander and unit limits within the game because 10 years from now 99% of everyone will have upgraded their computers. CIV_4 also has a more developed AI, but Dominions_4 will hopefully have a scriptable AI. I know Dominions_4 is not the next project being developed, but I believe it will be coming to us one day.

Re: Comparing it to Civ 4..
 

hmm... I can't believe that people are so negative about civ 4.

Civ 4 is just such a great improvment on earlier versions.

Re: Comparing it to Civ 4..
 

It is impossible to like Civ4 if you played Alpha Centauri... if they made Civ4 on that I would play that again. In Civ4 every game comes down to 2-3 opponents [some nations plus their vassals] + some weak nations that are smaller challange than indies in Dom3. Civ4 is like Dom3 with research and gem income based only on number of your provinces. Imagine playing that.

Re: Comparing it to Civ 4..
 

I like Civ4, I loved Alpha Centauri but dominions beats them both. I cant believe I am still playing Dom3 after nearly a year and enjoying it.

Even other much loved games such as GC2 and MOO2 never held my interest for so long.

The patches help alot to keep my interest.

The 'new project' that Illwinter is working on will after be fantastic to compare with Dom3.

Re: Comparing it to Civ 4..
 

I'm with Folket, Civ 4 is an excellent game. The best in the series, certainly.

Any beefs you have with that game specifially are more due to the genre than anything else. The gameplay has gotten to be so polished and streamlined that I don't understand where the gripes are coming from.