OT? SEIV vs GalCiv

[Abdiel]

Well, I've so far managed to figure out that Soil and Habitat improvements raise the Planet Quality, so a 14 goes up to 15 and then 16. It's percentage, so a 20 would go up to a 22, then a 24. If you luck on a 26 at the beginning (i did ) it can go straight up to 31.

But hell that's like playing in paradise and you might as well not play

The strategy comes in an idiotic form. AI consistently ignores planets of PQ 14 and below, so if you find an untouched galaxy of PQ 14, you can colonize it, improve it, and use it as a base against the enemy. Or they might just take it over. That sucks.

And the research sucks, too. I was told that GC was better than SEIV, but yeah so far only the diplomatic model. Then again, would I want to see that in SEIV? In any hard mode, all you do is standard, you bribe them to fight each other, leave you alone while you grow and harvest the spoils of war. If you play easy, you simply blackmail for money right at the start and that keeps them impoverished for quite some time. I see no way of getting out of this, in any game...

Would I want such a diplomatic model in SEIV? So far, no. But hopefully someone can come up with a better idea...

Abd.

PS. Ships repair automatically. darn slow rate too. You can research Repair and Advanced Repair. Something might exist beyond that but that's as far along the tech as i got.

[Roanon]

Originally posted by Abdiel:
Well, I've so far managed to figure out that Soil and Habitat improvements raise the Planet Quality, so a 14 goes up to 15 and then 16.

I suspected something like this. Why can't they just enter it in their description that clear?
And what effects does it have exactly?. Ok, 14 going up to 15 turns a moneysink into a cashcow, but what effects does improving a 15 to a 16 have? I am a strategy gamer, I like to calculate beforehand if a certain investment pays and if, in how many turns. But I guess this game just was not designed for my kind of play style. Not that I preplan every ship construction and movement 10 turns ahead in SEIV, but sometimes it's fun ...

[Prophet-PBW]

I actually like Galactic Civilizations. I think it's a good beer-and-pretzels style game.

To be honest, I like the research. The uncertainty about the benefits and how the tree is setup made it feel like.. research. Sorry, I'm a roleplayer.. sue me.

I also like how there are many ways to win. I hardly ever won through military conquest. For me, it was always about the Influence.

And I was a big fan of the starbases. I got a kick out of lining my borders with McBurgerWorld stations. But you could build stations that can speed up repairs, increase production, affect speed and combat, etc.

The diplomacy was good. I like the idea of a UN-style body, though I wish you could propose your own petitions. And the democratic government is really neat. I like there are multiple parties and you can actually lose control of the government. Unfortunately, they never made the penalty for such a loss make sense to me.

But I like designing ships too, and we all know which wins there. I love thinking up new styles, new specialties. And I always preferred SE4's way of mapping the galaxy. Rather than having one giant map, you have lots of mini-maps connected by points. And I like SE4 combat more than Gal Civ's.

And SE4 is so easily moddable. It is the only game I have ever dabbled in modding.

Now, as to which is better..
Gal Civ has been installed/uninstalled many times.
I've been playing SE4 PBW for 3 years straight.
'Nuff said.

-edit-
Double post deletion hijinks

[ June 28, 2004, 16:52: Message edited by: Suicide Junkie ]

[EvilGenius4ABetterTomorro]

I played it for about 2 weeks (1 more than MOO3)and just got bored. They said it is supposed to be like CIV in the stars. CIV has far more replay and dept than this game does. I think if I never heard SE4, it would have been a great game. No matter what game I start playing, I always end up going back to SE4. I also got tired of flying my ship around in space picking things up.

[solops]

Originally posted by Ragnarok-X:
honestly, galciv is not even half as good as SE 4 is. I dont like the research, i dont like the graphics, i dont like the colonizing, i dont like how your ships MUST pick up stuff in space. THere is just one thing that is better than in SE 4, and thats diplomacy. Everything else -> SE 4 !

I agree almost completey. I do like the research tree if not the mechanics of researching it. And the GalCiv AI is more challenging. I believe that is a function of the number of choices available. SEIV has sooo many things to do and so many items available to do them with (or to) that its AI seems to be incapable of juggling the legion of variables to reach an intelligent decision. GalCiv has fewer decision points, with more of the complexity "under the hood", making it easier to program the AI.

....at least, I think so.

[Paul1980au]

Here is hoping SE5 stays true to form without getting over commercialised and underpeforming like MOO3 and GalCIV.

Looking foward to it when it does come out.

[Prophet-PBW]

Me too! SE5 is gonna kick ***.

I was so pissed when I read the reviews of MOO3. I love that series, and was eagerly awaiting it. Not to go way off-topic here, but is it just the AI that's broken? Or is it a horrible game thru-in-thru?