AndyNemmity

Could we do a kickstarter to help fund Crash Course?

How?!

I worked on AI mods for Civ 5 and Civ 4. Civ 4 was significantly easier to make decent war AI with.

1UPT creates a lot of challenges that even now aren't solved. I just watched in my last test an Army try to attack through a mountain range with 1 open tile.

I've done a lot of work on Civ 4, 5 and FFH (and modmods) AI.

The level of user options isn't really a huge difference in my view. FFH had a lot of user options, and I think I had the AI really quite good at a certain point.

It's more around the balance of those options. If inherently the options offer some balanced advantages, even getting the AI partially there, provides a realistic challenge.

Civ 5's base tech tree is horribly unbalanced, and that creates the first chasm. There is one "right" way to play Civ 5, and no other strategies are as effective.

Which means any time the AI doesn't play that way, they are giving up an advantage.

Community Balance Patch fixes this with far more balanced gameplay.

Lots to say though, I'm summarizing and glossing over a lot in this comment.