Talk:Civilization IV/Archive 2

Archive 1

Archive 2

Archive 3

Lack of tribes

It's a pitty that there are a bunch of new civilizations which were not included in this new edition of civilization, like those were introduced in the highly aclaimed,(and not by its popularity on excelence; after millions of complaints about buggy edition) Civilization III Play the World. Some tribes such as Carthaginians, Celts, Ottomans, Vikings and specially the Koreans, its unique unit the hwacha surely is a potential and dangerous howitzer threat in the whole middle ages, deserve to be included in this version, maybe it's another strategy twist from those civilized guys at Firaxis which certainly i disagree. --HappyApple 04:58, 14 August 2005 (UTC)

Yes, I agree. A lot of the good tribes from the Conquests expansion (like the Hittites and the Dutch) got taken out. Worra pi'y. I loved the 3-man chariot. I will sorely miss it (unless it makes a re-appearance in an expansion). Davidizer13 18:29, 22 September 2005 (UTC)

The lack of tribes leaves room for an expansion. The expansion hopefully will fix bugs, have new senarios, and many other new units and features. Party guy87 20:58, 28 November 2005 (UTC)

We can also add customized tribes easily by changing the XML. Ned Scotland 22:57, 22 December 2005 (UTC)

Saladin the Arab?

Why would they choose a Kurd from Iraq as the only leader of Arabia?

1) He is more well known than most other Arab leaders, 2) most Muslims would take offense if they used Mohammed, and 3) he was a great general, yet ran his country with civility, which is one of the main concepts of Civ. Davidizer13 21:33, 28 October 2005 (UTC)

Soundtrack

I'm going to add a section or sub-section about the soundtrack in the next few days. First thing I need to find out is who actually wrote the music. (I know that the older tunes are public domain works, like Bach, but the modern-era music seems to be original work -- as well as the intro song. If anyone wants to bring up anything before i add this, just let me know! --Quasipalm 14:25, 31 October 2005 (UTC)

• Not all of the modern era is original work. The song "The People Are The Heroes Now" was so distinctive (primarily because it has lyrics) that I went searching for it, to see if it was original or not. It isn't. In fact, the version heard on the Civ4 soundtrack is lifted directly (with permission, of course, I'm sure) from this recording of the opera Nixon in China, a sample of which can be heard at Amazon (Disc 1, Track 3). This may mean that some of the other moderns are not original works as well. Baryonyx 05:55, 13 November 2005 (UTC)
• Going off the name of the piece "Tromba Lontana", I quickly discovered that John Adams is the composer behind ALL of the modern era themes. Using this [CD at Amazon one quickly finds the following music from Civ4's modern era soundtrack (probably straight from this recording, BTW):

Harmonielehre: Part I → Harmonielehre.mp3

Harmonielehre: Part II. The Anfortas Wound → AnfortasWound.mp3

Harmonielehre: Part III. Meister Eckhardt And Quackie → MeisterEckhardt.mp3

The Chairman Dances: Foxtrot For Orchestra → Chairman Dances.mp3

Two Fanfares: Tromba Lontana - Jonathan Holland → TrombaLontana.mp3

• • Another CD includes:

Christian Zeal And Activity → ChristianZeal.mp3

Common Tones In Simple Time → CommonTones.mp3

• • Another CD includes:

Grand Pianola Music: Part IA →> GrandPianola1.mp3

Grand Pianola Music: Part IB → GrandPianola2.mp3

• • Yet another CD includes:

Violin Concerto (1993): II Chaconne: Body Through Which The Dream Flows → Chconne.mp3

• • And a final John Adams work takes care of:

I. Shaking And Trembling → ShakingandTrembling.mp3

II. Hymning Slews → HymingSlews.mp3

III. Loops And Verses → LoopsandVerses.mp3

• That takes care of the entire modern era theme collection. Every single one was composed by John Adams. Baryonyx 06:28, 13 November 2005 (UTC)

this [1] and this [2] should answer your question. It appears that Fixasis CEO, Jeff Briggs, had a major hand (composer?) in the Civ4 soundtrack. Funkyj 21:57, 2 November 2005 (UTC)

p.s., how the hell can this page not mention Leonard Nimoy?!?

"beep... beep... beep..." Craig Sniffen 23:32, 10 November 2005 (UTC)

"Voice acting, new to the Civilization series, is provided by Leonard Nimoy." Alpha Centauri has voice acting, and it's listed in the continuity of the main Civ series in the template on the bottom.

Should there be a mention that the lyrics of Baba Yet seem to be the Lord's Prayer in Swahili? --Cskalenda 07:20, 16 November 2005 (UTC)

• The wording of your question reveals the answer. "Seem to be" implies that this is speculation, and speculation shouldn't be added to Wikipedia, unless the nature of the page is speculative. This particular page is not meant to be speculative, so this factoid shouldn't be added unless there is some type of factual backing. An official source would be a good start, but as long as the best one can say is it seems to be this, it shouldn't be added. Baryonyx 02:04, 17 November 2005 (UTC)
• What are you talking about? It IS in Swahili, an actual Swahilian even confirmed it on civfanatics forum aswell, this should be mentioned in the article. Im not going to dig for a source and waste my time proving it is, unless you can prove it isn't (why don't you look around?) Don't expect other Wikipedians to bend over backwards to come up with evidence, its time consuming and bothersome.
• Wikipedia is an encyclopedia, and has policies concerning verifiability. It is explicitly stated that people are expected to check sources:

"The goal of Wikipedia is to become a complete and reliable encyclopedia. Verifiability is the key to becoming a reliable resource, so editors should cite credible sources so that their edits can be easily verified by readers and other editor."

If you take issue with this grave burden of verifiability, I submit that perhaps Wikipedia would not be the best use of your time.

I further note that I don't have to provide a source to anything, because I'm not adding any statement related to this to the article. Those who wish to add it do, and those who would wish to remove it would need counter-evidence. My response very clearly restates a Wikipedia policy on speculation... all I said was, basically, show us a source, and it can go in. It's very simple to find a source, but in all your huffing and puffing, I don't see a link to the CivFanatics forum, which you clearly could have posted. I, however, went and did the work you're unwilling to do, and found the song's composer, Christopher Tin, whose site notes the origin of the song here. And that was all of 2 minutes of Internet searching to take something speculative (the "seems to be" of the original poster) and make it confirmed. Finally, you should be signing your posts. Note to others: the original posters speculation is now confirmed. Baryonyx 09:22, 26 November 2005 (UTC)

A lot of the music is made by Jeff Briggs. See the original soundtrack track list here. --ZeroOne 23:55, 28 December 2005 (UTC)

1990s Soundtrack tribute

The [|song listed as first] on Civilization IV soundtrack that comes with the Special Edition actually is a tribute taken from Original Civilization released on 1991, but i feel it's not the orginal at all, it seems to be a little bit updated, Any comments?, by the way, how about the song used for the opening on Civ IV, can somebody post what lyrics were used on it? --HappyApple 21:10, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

Bugs

I have compiled a reference of bugs if anyone feels inclined to use them, patch will be out next week

• Problems with player-trading windows in hotseat

Out of sync error in multiplayer

MP Lobby scroll bar buggy

Cities beyond the size of 20 are mysteriously reverted to 1

Knights can beat helicopters (this isn't a bug but it's a game flaw)

Game locks if you double right click on the mini map menu for some computers

Black tiles can be seen for some nvidea graphic cards

On very late stages of the game the governor automatically removes peasants from working mysteriously

Workers stop improving if automated during later stages of the game

• single player:
  • roll over popups (for units, production etc) sometime do not appear. This behavior seems to come and go.

--Raddicks 16:42, 5 November 2005 (UTC)

• Note: Add anything else you've stumbled across that feels appropiate

I havent bought the game yet, but how come that would be possible, Knights beating helicopters ? 200.106.30.102 13:33, 6 November 2005 (UTC)

It's not. That's why it's a bug.  :) --Quasipalm 17:24, 6 November 2005 (UTC)

A knight taking a gunship is not impossible, just improbable. There is a luck factor involved. Not only that but numbers can also effect the chances. 50 knights against 1 ship is bound to result in a knight victory sooner or later. --party guy87 16:19, 25 november 2005

• Since 1.09 is out, I'm thinking that the "launch problems" section of the page might be old news. What do you guys think should stay and what should go? I admit that it's 100% true as history, but I'm not sure if it's really encyclopedia-worthy information. --M@rēino 05:13, 30 November 2005 (UTC)
  • I say it looks fine as it is, at least for the moment. Of the five bullet points in the section, none are entirely fixed by the patch. There's still going to be a lot of ATI users buying copies, too. --Kizor 18:33, 30 November 2005 (UTC)
    • "Black tiles can be seen for some nvidea graphic cards "
    • I have this problem with my Civ 4.. and the version is upgraded to 1.52. First i thought it was a graphic card problem, but according to wiki it might still be a bug present in even the lastest update mouselmm 19:52, 26 January 2006 (UTC)

Cleaning up the Talk Page

A lot of the talk page refers to questions we all had before the game was released. Now that it's out in the US and Europe, would anyone object if I deleted the obsolete issues? I'll give you four days to object :)! --M@rēino 15:47, 7 November 2005 (UTC)

I've had a go at archiving the pre-launch stuff, feel free to modify as you see fit. --Apyule 10:30, 8 November 2005 (UTC)

Fire away. Niffweed17 02:10, 12 November 2005 (UTC)

Swedish Copies

In the beginning of the text it says that the German and Swedish copies were released on the same day, but Civ4 arrived to Sweden November the 4th. There are also no copies of Civ4 in Swedish, I think Civ4 is only in German and US English. There might be manuals in other languages though.

Unusual, there must have been a mix up between Switzerland and Sweden. I had a look in the archive of civfanatics forum and there is indeed Swiss reports instead of Swedish. Im recorrecting the typo now --Raddicks 11:11, 18 November 2005 (UTC)

Patch

I read that there is a new patch out. Any chance somebody could incorperate this in here?

there is a new patch out it is versoin 1.09 check out civfanatics Party guy87 20:56, 28 November 2005 (UTC)

Technology switching?

I just realized today that you can change what technology you're developing prior to its being completed. Although I certainly don't remember having this ability in Civilization III, I don't have a copy handy to check right now for certain. If it is new, it would be a change worth noting. Sarge Baldy 04:09, 28 November 2005 (UTC)

I'm not sure how it works in Civ IV (haven't got it yet), but in Civ III you could switch research in progress - just that you would have to start over on the new tech (ie the beakers you accumulated up to that point would not get transferred). — QuantumEleven | (talk) 08:29, 28 November 2005 (UTC)

As said above, in Civ III you could switch, but you'd lose all progress. In Civ IV when you switch, all beakers devoted to the formerly researched tech are saved. The amount of saved beakers decays at what appears to be a slow and steady rate each turn that you research something else. --M@rēino16:10, 28 November 2005 (UTC)

This sounds consistent with the rest of Civ IV. --Kizor 00:01, 30 November 2005 (UTC)

It is.--M@rēino 05:01, 30 November 2005 (UTC)

---

Special Edition

Anyone know what the Special Edition [3] has over the regular boxed edition? Amazon doesn't say (just has the same description as for the regular boxed edition). I'm just wondering if it's worth the extra $$$. Actually, this info should also probably be added to the article too. — Frecklefoot | Talk 16:49, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

This is based on my own copy of the Special Edition, but it's also verifiable at the Apolyton Civ4 news archive: the Special Edition has

• the neat-looking faux book cover
• a spiral-bound (instead of staple-bound) manual
• a hard copy of the technology tree
• but no software extras

Merchants were supposed to sell out of the Special Edition before offering the regular edition (it was a was of rewarding early purchasers), but Amazon appears to have either messed up and over-ordered, or kept the page so that their third-party merchants could keep on selling the Special Edition as a collector's item. When I bought it, they were the same price. I wouldn't pay more for it unless you enjoy displaying your game collection. --M@rēino 17:07, 6 December 2005 (UTC)

Weird thing is, in the store I bought my copy, they had two versions: one with just a cd box and the cd, and one with a booklet, the cover, and the tech tree. I'm assuming what I picked is the special edition you mentioned... but it was priced the same as the other version! Wouter Lievens 09:41, 14 December 2005 (UTC)

Don't forget about the soundtrack CD and the keyboard map, those were also in the special edition. If you were lucky, you got the Tech Tree in French ;) --AlexWCovington (talk) 14:09, 14 December 2005 (UTC)

Chart

Hey all, I moved the chart from the main page to "Civilization IV/Civilizations and Leaders Chart." This should simplify edits, since the chart is almost perfect, while the main page will probably be edited more frequently. --M@rēino 02:20, 7 December 2005 (UTC)

A suggestion to the makers of the game

Before criticism, I`d like to state that Civilisation is a serial of great games, some of my all time favourites.

However I`m sick and tired of facing American Swordsmen. or Knights! We all know how America came into being, that their first unit should be a Musketman and that it should appear later in the game. Why isn`t it possible for a civilisation to rise not from a single settler, but through the declaration of independance of a part of an existing civ? I know that Civ I had this feature only in an extreamly rare situation: when the capital of the largest civ falls to another civ, but I haven`t encountered that in subsequent Civ games. Besides, nobody captured London when US declared their independance.

How about adding such a feature? Say, if several distant cities founded by the civ they belong are in disorder for some time, they declare independance and form an entirely new civ (American, Brasilian, Chilean, etc scenario) as a further development of the city defection feature. The decision, weather this way of starting a civ should be restricted to Americans and similary-built civs of real life I leave to the makers (or to create separate "Historical rise" scenario?)

On the other hand, if the cities in question once belonged to a destroyed civ, that civ should be resurrected (Polish, Lithuanian, Greek, Serbian etc. scenario). As a consequance of this, if the player lost all his cities, he should have a chance to resume the game as a leader of a resurreced civ if the electronic dice favored him.

I also think that the head of a Civ should have an option to purposfully split his civ (creating a new one from his civ`s heavilly corrupted distant parts) that should be bound to be his original civ`s ally and/or to be in money debt to him for some time (Canadian, Australian, New Zealandean, and many African neocolonial scenarios). Also, if WW2 happaned the Civ way, France or Germany would not exsist. A victorious civ should be able to resurrect it`s formerly occupied allies or presently occupied enemies.

I would also suggest a large increase in number of available civilisations.

Veljko Stevanovich 9. Jan 2006. 00:50 UTC+1

How about sending Firaxis an email instead of posting it here? --Patrick 00:26, 9 January 2006 (UTC)

Yes, what he said. Even if Firaxis does find this, why would they want to deal with something that was indirectly addressed to them on an encyclopedia website? bob rulz 06:53, 9 January 2006 (UTC)

But it is impossible to mod such features into the game- via xml. It works at least in scenarios.

In the Desert War scenario, Italy was destroyed when Naples was held by the Allies for 2 turns or so, and their cities were then taken over by the British, Allies and Germany. In the Greek World scenario, the Parthians - a full-fledged civilization- could appear.

• Actually, it is very much possible to mod extra civilizations into the game. XML alone could change the name of the civ; if you do Python, you can give the civ unique characteristics; if you do graphics, you can give the civ unique units. They're working on these sorts of projects right now at Apolyton and CivFanatics, actually. --M@rēino 02:57, 10 January 2006 (UTC)

Well, I posted it here so that I could hear some oppinnions from fellow players first. Besides, when I went to the developers` site, in section "Write to Sid Meier" it says "Dont send us game ideas". So they probably wouldn`t read it. Any other e-mails to send the suggestion to?

Veljko Stevanovich 10. Jan 2006. 23:00 UTC+1

Now why the heck would they do that? Or even consider it? America's a civilization in the game. They can't just make it appear "late in the game". How would that work? Half-way through the game you're sent back to the civilization selection screen to assign an AI player to it? How would the player play as America? If a civlization "broke off", and you chose to play as America when this cultural break-off thing happens, what happens to your old civilization? Does it dissapear? Do you start over? You have to select your civilization BEFORE you start playing. Your suggestion fractures the concept of the game. What if this break-off that forms america happened in the classical era? Or some other era? America might have musketmen before anyone else. How is that fair? America would just pop into being with all of this great technology. Like I said before, this suggestion just fractures the entire concept of the game.

It isn't SUPPOSED to follow history. It isn't SUPPOSED to be historically accurate. It's supposed to be a game where you can write your OWN history. And in this new history, America could very well be around in the ancient era. I'm sorry if I seem harsh, but it really makes no sense to me.

-Jetman123 05:05, 16 January 2006 (UTC)

It is a pretty silly argument -- why complain about the inclusion of just America when nearly all of the leaders and civilizations come from different time periods. If you had to start with the civilizations of 5000 years ago, I think our only option would be China -- and not just one china, lots of little proto-chinas. I think such accuracy would be a little over the top. --Quasipalm 22:05, 16 January 2006 (UTC)

Brahms

Johannes Brahms was a romantic composer, wasn't he? It would be wrong to classify his music as classical (the only classical composers included in this game are Mozart and Beethoven). The whole Industrial era is dominated by Romanticism. It is quite ironic that most of the Medieval music is actually from the Renaissance.—Preceding unsigned comment added by 145.254.154.223 (talk • contribs) 15:38, 9 January 2006

New Features

The article is dominated by the "New Features" section. This means that a reader new to Civilization mostly sees text describing changes compared to Civ III. This seems wrong. The article should stand by itself as a description of Civ IV. Perhaps there should be a separate article detailing the changes.

Wikismile 15:42, 12 January 2006 (UTC)

I agree that it shouldn't focus on new features. I plan to rewrite this article more to what Civilization III is like when I have the time and when I know more about the game (I've only had it for about 3 weeks). bob rulz 01:28, 13 January 2006 (UTC)

Jus a quick question: does Civ 4 have a map based on real Earth dimensions, as in, a world map including all 6 inhabited continents with their true shape and size, as i feel this adds to the value of the game. Could somebody please reply back as the other forums have not been helpful. Thank you and much appreciated:)

There is a Terra random map which creates something similar to Earth but every game I've played on it, all civs were on the same continent. There are also custom Earth maps available for download, check out civ fanatics or some other website.

• • I can't find the URL right now, but on the Apolyton site, the Firaxis map programmer explained that the Normal and Terra maps are both supposed to be similar to Earth, but that Terra will lead to a VERY similar arrangement, with all sorts of little details taken into consideration. One of those details is the "New World", namely that the civilizations found on North America, while very cultured, were no match for the Old World invaders. Therefore, most Terra maps come out with only barbarians and minor civs (the black-flag cities that don't conduct diplomacy) on the New World continent. --M@rēino 18:07, 17 January 2006 (UTC)

If you play in scenario mode, you can play on a fairly accurate Earth, either starting in 4000 BC (it's effectively an ordinary game with 8 civs starting in the Old World) or in 1000 AD (You start out in the middle of the Crusades, but keep playing until 2050 AD. I find this one very interesting.) rspeer / ɹəədsɹ 17:18, 25 January 2006 (UTC)

Religion

I think religions are excellent idea, but they have also alot of missed potential. First of all, once the city is converted to some religion, it is impossible to remove it. Hey camoon, the history of mankind is full of religious (and ethnic, which also isn't possible in this game) persecution! Even though they aren't the most honourable moments of mankind, I still think they should be included. Of course it would have both negative and positive impacts, for example harassing Hindus would anger countries where Hinduism is a state religion and so on, but it could also unite the population. Latre

More music?

Changed this phrase, since it is incorrect: "The scale of music used in the game surpasses that of all its predecessors. Each leader – except for Kublai Khan, whose music is the same as that of Genghis Khan – now has his/her own diplomacy music."

In civilization 1, there was actually more music. Each leader had its own diplomacy music, and there were sequences with music relating to the WLTK-day and City-riot events. Luigi Vercotti 00:36, 6 February 2006 (UTC)Luigi Vercotti

The SDI kit release

In one of the sections in the Civ IV article, it says that in early 2006 a SDI kit will be released. But when? Its already March when I posted this and there's nothing which the official websites said on when will this be launched, no a single hint other than "early 2006". - InGenX