The Game in Action

A fun way to see some of these ideas in action is to watch another person play Civilization V. The problem with that idea is that Civ games tend to take a pretty long time, especially if they're exciting matches. To get the best of both worlds, a fun game is documented here from start to finish.

This section shows you screenshots of this single-player match, discusses what's going on, and highlights what worked (and what didn't).

Our Setup

We wanted to show off one of the new civilizations, and Morocco was an intuitive choice; through them, we can demonstrate trade, financial domination, and then any of the late-game victories that have changed in this expansion. Perfect!

Prince difficulty is toward the middle of the spectrum; it's comfortable for a huge range of players, so that seemed like the best place for a match. The strategies that we're showing here work well across most of the game’s difficulties, but there is way more tolerance built into Prince. Immortal and Deity have playstyles that are almost entirely unique to their specific challenges because the AI gets such a large amount of bonus resources. To make this write-up more accessible, we wanted to stick to the "normal" difficulty.

While getting used to the new rules, we suggest that you jump down to these middle-tier difficulties as well. Once you're happy with the new methods, it's perfectly safe to return to whatever tier you're used to.

And for newer players, don't fret if you want to try out these methods on the easiest difficulty levels. The AI won't respond as well or have much money to play with, but you can still practice some of your techniques. If you're stomping the AI too quickly to take advantage of Trade Routes, Culture, and Diplomacy, then keep bumping up the difficulty every game until you can't steamroll everyone on the board. That's when the real game begins.

Let's Play!

Turn 1: 4000 BC

We start off with our Settler and Warrior, on the shores of a river. To the east, the coastline. We can't see any coastline, so our Settlers might be landlocked for now. Available for the future: Wine, Spices, Wheat, and Sheep. There's a Deer nearby too, for a Camp. Very nice.

Because we're in the middle of these resources, next to a river, and sitting on top of a hill, it seems like we should settle immediately. The defensive setting is quite wonderful. It's going to be painful for enemies to come at us from the east. The river helps to slow attackers from getting around our city, and if they attack across it they'll face a nasty penalty.

We press "B" to settle Marrakech.

The Capital is set to train a Scout. That's almost always a reasonable first step. Getting nearby ruins often pays for the Scout a couple times over, and knowing where to expand is never a bad thing.

For now, we'll send our Warrior southwest. He can scout to find out what's lurking beyond the horizon.

Turn 5: 3800 BC

Our Warrior discovered a coastline to the southwest (we were almost on top of it), and farther to the west is the City-State of Melbourne. Finding them first got us a quick 30 Gold. The Capital finished its Scout, so now we'll switch to training a Worker. By the time we finish, our nation will have researched Pottery and the Worker will be able to improve the Wheat tile.

Let's send the Scout east to explore.

Turn 10: 3600 BC

Our Warrior is bogged down in the hills to the west, and he's finding little of interest. However, our Scout has been quite busy. Rushing down the riverside, the Scout found two sets of ruins. We explored them and received Animal Husbandry and a point of Population for the Capital! That's a very nice haul. Mt. Sinai is over there too (a Natural Wonder with high Faith as its yield). That could be useful later.

Turn 20: 3200 BC

Our Scouts found Gold in another Ruin, and they're reaching far and wide now. They bumped into Korea, far to the south. Seoul is already a little bigger than our Capital, but they're fighting off barbarians and are of little concern at the moment.

If we were playing a warmonger, we'd start sending early units to choke off Seoul and look for vulnerable Workers/Settlers to steal. But we're Morocco, and early raiding might ruin a future trade market. Unless someone really lucrative pops out, we're going to pass on raiding.

Our Worker finished training and is happily improving our Wheat tile near the Capital. That's going to go well with our Granary when it finishes. Between the two, the Capital should grow well.

Turn 30: 2800 BC

Barbarians east of town are appearing in high numbers. We've stopped our Warrior's scouting for now, and that single unit is keeping the barbarians from moving against our city. To be safe, we're keeping our Warrior in rough terrain. During some turns, we Fortify him to add some defensive bonuses in case the barbarians decide to swarm him.

We quickly built a Monument in the Capital. Now our Culture is starting to move a little. This, combined with our adoption of Tradition, gives the civilization +6 Culture. That's going to help move through the next few Policies with some speed.

Turn 40: 2400 BC

It's about time to train a Settler because there are a few tempting spots near our Capital. Mt. Sinai would give our nation quite a strong religious backbone without much work. Also, we've found a section of coast to the south that has Silk, Wine, a Cow, and three Fish within potential working range. That's a powerful setup that we don't want to miss.

We trained a new Warrior to give our Capital the last couple of turns it needed to grow and then switched to our first new Settler afterward. Soon, that process will finish and we'll settle the awesome coast to the south.

Also, our Worker finished improving the first Wine tile by our Capital. Without delay, we messaged Korea and set up a Gold Per Turn trade for the Wine. This gets us cash, depletes Korea's buildup of money, and comes at no cost to us. Our Workers can have another Wine worked within a few turns.

Turn 50: 2000 BC

We lied about being so friendly. There was a Worker at the edge of Melbourne territory having a good time without any escort. It looked too easy, so we engaged in a very short, almost bloodless war against Melbourne. Racing in with our spare Warrior, we seized the new Worker, sued for peace, and fled the scene of the crime. It wasn't fair, but that second Worker will make a big difference in our development of the Capital and our newest city.

Speaking of the latter, Rabat was founded on turn 46. It's in a very good spot and can grow well as long as we protect it from barbarians. Korea shows no sign of caring that we settled a bit closer to them; they're still rather far away.

Turn 60: 1600 BC

We finished the Great Library, giving our Capital a substantial boost to its research potential. With many nations, we would have researched Bronze Working ahead of time and used the Great Library to leap into Iron Working. But this area has been very peaceful and may well continue to be. We've taken a risk by picking Philosophy instead, in the hope of getting a free Policy out of the Oracle.

The area to the east is continuing to be tempting. A hilly desert there has Gold and Wheat, and the potential for Petra is high. If we can successfully settle there, it will mean great things for Morocco. So instead of building another Wonder, the next Settler is going to be sent over there.

Our Warriors are clearing the barbarian encampment between the Capital and our future settlement. It's good experience for our units anyway.

Turn 70: 1200 BC

Whew, it's been a dangerous race across barbarian land. The rough terrain has made it difficult to finish all of the barbarian troops in the area, so we resorted to killing a couple while escorting our Settler across the hills. No losses on our part, though the troops need some serious R&R soon, as they're beaten up pretty badly.

Our first trading arrangement with Korea ended, and there wasn't enough cash for Korea to renew it. Despite that, we continued trading them our spare Wine for a measly 2 Gold per turn. That keeps Korea dirt poor, and it's still money in our pockets. With Wine to spare, we'd be wasting it anyway. Hopefully, we'll have time to create a unit to explore other continents and islands soon; we need real trading partners for future economic expansion.

Turn 80: 875 BC

Finishing the Oracle and getting a natural Policy from Culture let us complete Tradition. The bonus Happiness from Monarchy was certainly needed, and our economy is looking better too. Hopefully those free Aqueducts will keep our first two cities growing. The newest one, in the desert, won't be a big grower for a little while yet. We'll need Petra to help it, and Chivalry will take them to the next level. Morocco loves its deserts once Kasbahs are available.

Don't Try This on Deity!

The higher difficulties present greater dangers when it comes to settling new cities. We've pushed hard to get two additional cities constructed this quickly while still keeping our Capital in a state of decent growth. Our lean military would be our doom if we were playing on Immortal or Deity.

Yet here, on Prince, it's absolutely in our favor to get these two new spots before Korea can even think about them. Access to Silk, Gold, Copper, a Natural Wonder, and a large desert will be valuable for Morocco throughout the remainder of the game.

Turn 90: 625 BC

A few things are happening here that switched our priorities. Melbourne asked for an International Trade Route. We need to start making use of our Caravans anyway, so this made it worthwhile to train a Caravan and send it off from the Capital. The mix of Gold from that route and improved relations is quite nice.

Mogadishu called for the Hanging Gardens to be constructed. They're great to have in your Capital anyway, so that became our next goal, once the Caravan finished training.

All is well in the east. We emptied our bank account to buy a Worker for the new city, and now we're frantically improving two Wheat tiles so the city can grow.

Turn 100: 375 BC

We're well into the Medieval Era now. For our first Policy choice, we adopted Commerce. That's going to help us with our economy. Normally, Morocco would already be starting its rise to wealth, but with only one AI civilization to trade with, this island just doesn't have much to offer. We're rushing a Trireme to explore the world and make contacts.

Fes is growing now and working on Petra. It's going to be a slow process, but we can't afford to let someone skunk us on that Wonder; the entire city is built around getting it. Two improved Wheat tiles form the base of our growth, and each new citizen heads up into the hills for more Production.

Turn 110: 125 BC

Our Trireme made a bit of money bumping into City-States around a large island to the west. There are ruins still there, so the place is clearly virgin territory. We'll send a spare unit to retrieve those as soon as we can. It wouldn't be horrible to settle out there either. Good coastlines, no one to upset. Hmmm, tempting.

Turn 120: 125 AD

To get the Tech that we need for several Wonders and trade items, we've been jumping around on the Tech Tree. It's time to focus more and push into the research that is needed to pull the nation forward. Chivalry is our big target over the next period, and it's going to reshape our cities once we get it.

Our first Great Scientist appeared. They were deployed near the Capital and used to found an Academy. Our Petra city finally could afford to purchase its Library. Taking so long to get our National College has been painful, and putting in this Academy should help a little.

To help with Happiness, we used Gold to expand Fes' borders and picked up a tile with Copper. It's being improved now, so there's another dose of happy people without real expense.

Turn 130: 375 AD

Where is everybody? We signed an Open Borders treaty with Korea just to be able to get along that section of coastline. There are more City-States below, but still no signs of life from any other civilization. There are sometimes reports on the state of global affairs, and my nation is probably baffled that there's anything out there.

We didn't get skunked on any of the Wonders that we were building. Petra, The Colossus, and Machu Picchu all turned out fine. Money is now pouring in, and it's being rolled directly into buildings for our continued economic expansion.

Turn 140: 600 AD

We're officially living in a strange land. There are no other nations within shallow-water range of our own, except for Korea. Because trading is light until we get a deep sea navy, it might be time to conquer the entire continent. My sweet, friendly Morocco is feeling bloodthirsty because Korea is too poor to be worthwhile economically. Strange game, but interesting!

Meanwhile, our Workers are happily running around making Kasbahs. That's a nice boost of yields for two of our three cities.

Turn 150: 800 AD

We're constructing more buildings for Happiness and preparing a military for an attack on Korea. We have all the Technology that we need already and are about to upgrade our existing Swordsmen into Longswordsmen. Combined with new Trebuchets, the army should be able to hit Korea quite hard, as its defenses are not modernized yet.

Except for none of this being part of our original plan, all is well. Fes, our city in the desert, is starting to have decent Production. It also has a Barracks and Armory, so the units being trained there are decent.

Our militant Morocco is almost ready to go.

Turn 160: 1000 AD

We started the war two turns ago, and Seoul has fallen. Though a Korean ship was able to pillage one of our Work Boats up north and kill a Trade Route, we've taken little damage. One of our Longswordsmen is looking ill, so we'll give them time to rest before going after Busan, the only other Korean city on the continent.

We'll get Workers started on new roads as soon as they're safe to work, and then get Korea's yummy Crabs into our trade network. Between those and a Courthouse, we'll be fine absorbing the additional Population into our empire.

Turn 170: 1100 AD

The war is over and the continent is ours. Korea was peacefully researching, so they didn't get to put up a real fight. If we wanted, we could hide here on this continent and go into full research mode ourselves. A Science Victory would be very easy to pull off at this point.

But let's explore the seven seas (soon) and meet other rivals instead. Maybe we'll find a path that seems like even more fun for our non-trading Moroccan marauders!

Turn 180: 1200 AD

Our army is large and modernized, so we need to rush through the naval Techs to be able to send this group abroad. While doing that, we're picking up a City-State to give our military more training and to stay busy.

Turn 190: 1300 AD

In the name of expansion, we've let ourselves get way behind on research. Money is coming in faster than we can spend it, but Technology is not screaming away. We're almost done getting Universities all over the place (later than usual), but our territory is growing rapidly, so we have more land than expected.

Turn 200: 1400 AD

With such a strong technological edge over the City-States on the continent, we decided to keep grabbing more cities. Our Happiness dropped, as you would expect, but the next 20 turns should take care of that as we get Courthouses and entertainment buildings in place. We'll also collect some good Luxuries along the way.

Looking at the Demographics Screen, we know that our military forces and research are now both at number one in the game. That's comforting, but we'd give it all up for a little more power. There's never enough.

Turn 210: 1500 AD

All City-States in the north have become food for the empire, though all of this victory comes at a dear cost. We haven't lost anyone in battle, but our citizens are complaining a wee bit. Even purchasing Courthouses as soon as they're available isn't enough to accommodate this many people flooding under our banner.

But time will smooth this out, as will additional research. There are many useful buildings and Wonders ahead that can improve our ability to handle an empire this large.

And yet again, we lament that we planned on a small trade nation instead of a martial conqueror. Blame Korea for that!

Turn 220: 1550 AD

Our Frigate bumped into an Arabian Galleass. Soon afterward, we discovered the eastern coast of a new land. It was much farther than expected, but we're happy to have new contacts. Immediate trading with Harun al-Rashid put our economy deeper into the black. Despite our Happiness problems, we didn't take the lure of immediate Luxuries in return for our own. At this point, we don't know how things will proceed, and we'd rather keep the cold, hard cash regardless of how the diplomatic situation develops.

Also, we're building Zoos left and right. It's starting to catch up to our expanded needs. We almost saw a young child smile the other day in the Capital. Maybe.

Turn 230: 1600 AD

Much has transpired. We met the survivors of continental war in the west. Attila and his Huns are gone already, but there are three others that remain. Arabia, Songhai, and Assyria are there. Songhai, Assyria, and the Huns, together in the same area at the start of the game? That must have been ugly!

The World Congress convened for the first time. We spent too long filling out side research goals and lost control of the first Congress. We're number two, so we proposed Cultural Heritage Sites. We're the leading Wonder builder, and the bill would lean strongly in our favor.

Arabia, the leader, wants to Embargo Songhai. Meh. Sounds like west continent problems to us.

Turn 240: 1650 AD

Everything continues to move at a quickened pace. We used our reserves of cash to purchase Factories at our three best Production cities. They're now even stronger at churning out buildings and units, and we took Autocracy as our Ideology the next turn. Having played a number of games with Morocco, we have to say that this was the first time we made them into Autocrats. At least it fits their nation's colors—red rocks for Autocracy.

Our military hasn't upgraded again quite yet, but one of the three nations on the western continent is ailing. Why not gobble them up now! Our fleet launched just turns ago, and soon we hope to take our sweet war to a new land.

With excess Faith built up, we also grabbed a Great Engineer. They're nice for getting through some of the mega-awesome Wonders at this phase of the game. Big Ben was our target to hurry, as it has a major Production cost.

Turn 250: 1700 AD

We meant to do the smart thing and take out the weakest link on the western continent (Assyria, with only its Capital). However, we noticed that the most powerful nation, Arabia, wanted to Embargo Songhai. Figuring that nobody would mind if we stomped Songhai first, we went after them. They were closer anyway, so it was a good match.

Landfall went well. Our first Frigate softened the city while the Cannons and Musketmen deployed around the region. We lost one Musketman, but the first city fell immediately after.

Currently, we're marching on the Capital to deliver a deathblow to Songhai. We're already upgrading to Riflemen, now that we have territory of our own here. Artillery is coming soon after. Very nice.

Turn 260: 1750 AD

Songhai is down two of its cities, and it's lost all of its major military forces. New recruits and antiquated units are all that's left. Songhai's bribed City-States to join in the fun (poor them), and that won't make any difference at all. Our Cannons have become Artillery, and they're game changers. Once we get our Riflemen upgraded it's going to be a joke out here.

An amusing sidenote for everyone: Even though Songhai is doomed and getting destroyed, Arabia still put almost all of its Delegates in the World Congress into the Embargo against them. Songhai really must have ticked these guys off.

Turn 270:1800 AD

Songhai dropped, and suddenly we needed a new target. Assyria settled one or two tiny towns in an effort to get back into the game, so we promptly flooded into one and took it. The main host is marching on the Capital and should be able to take it out quickly. Arabia is the real target, but we're going to save them for last, when no possible allies will be there to help them. They would beat us diplomatically, given enough time. We're never going to give them that much room. For now, back to Assyria.

Turn 280: 1820 AD

Great Engineers took care of our Wonder needs during the last 10 turns, quickly dispatching Broadway and the Eiffel Tower in the name of points (and fun). Assyria is only alive now because their smallest city was founded halfway across the darn continent and we're stomping after them. The end is in sight.

Turn 290: 1840 AD

With Assyria defeated, it’s time to go after Arabia. Mecca is well protected by sea and by land. We need to set up our war carefully. We could go after all of Arabia's territory and seize each city in turn. This might even be easier, though it would take many more turns.

Because Arabia has such strong diplomatic power, the best route is to ambush their Capital and move to end the game quickly. We're holding nearly all of the other Capitals already, so a single successful siege almost gives us the crown.

We're taking our army north of Mecca, where there aren't any Arabian units. We'll upgrade the gunpowder troops there, and then move in for the kill.

Turn 300: 1860 AD

The siege of Mecca is already ending. Arabia's naval forces are large enough to ward off our old Frigates, but the ground forces here are too few in number to deal with three well-upgraded Artillery units firing every turn. With only moderate losses, we cleaved the Capital. Only Attila's old Capital is left, and that's going to fall in moments.

And indeed, it does. We secure a Domination Victory, shortly after turn 300. Our score is shy of 4,500 points, barely. Not bad, but certainly not perfect. It took us too long to react to the limited scope of our starting continent. Rather than seizing that as its own opportunity, we got bored and needed to resort to warfare (which would have been better with a more martial civilization and one that took Liberty from the get-go).

These things gave us occasional trouble during our expansion. Yet, they weren't a bar to success. As always, we'll try to do better next time.