Episode: 4570
Title: Playing Civilization V, Part 8
Source: https://hub.hackerpublicradio.org/ccdn.php?filename=/eps/hpr4570/hpr4570.mp3
Transcribed: 2026-07-31 16:14:10 (official HPR transcript)

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This is Hacker Public Radio Episode 4570, for 2026-02-06
Today's show is entitled, "Playing Civilization V, Part 8"
The host is Ahuka and the duration is 00:12:15
The flag is Clean, and the license is CC-BY-SA
The summary is "Computer games, strategy games, Civilization V, diplomacy, spies"
Hello, this is Huka, welcoming you to Hacker Public Radio and another exciting episode
in our ongoing series about computer strategy games, and we're chugging along with Civilization
5, and I want to get into some related issues here about how you can interact with other players
and things that don't involve the force of arms. And you can get an interesting new victory
type called the diplomatic victory, which was added in Civilization 5, and we're going to discuss
that and even do an example of it. So diplomacy to start with with other players, you have a relationship,
and it's based on their approach to you. They are neutral, okay, neutral means they're not friendly,
they're not hostile. The trades you make with them will be fair from their point of view.
If they're friendly, they like you, and will accept requests from you more often.
Trades will be slightly in your favor from their point of view. They can be afraid of you.
This only happens if you have a very substantial advantage in military strength. So this is rare.
They will readily accept requests from you, and trades will be in your favor.
They might be guarded. That means they are suspicious and defensive, and will be more likely to be
unfriendly. Trades will be harder to achieve and favor them rather than you.
They can be deceptive, and that means they will pretend to be friendly, but they're plotting against you.
They may bribe other players to declare warn you. They will not accept requests for help, and trades will be hard to achieve.
They could be hostile, and this means they hate you and they're completely open about it.
Trade deals, if you can get them, will be heavily against you.
And finally, there could be a state of war.
So in that case, if their attitude towards you is war, it may not be war yet, but it's coming.
They need the right conditions, so they may pretend to be friendly, neutral, guarded, or hostile,
while they wait for those conditions to mature.
These are not set in stone, and as you can modify how the other player feels to you by your actions,
if you have friends in common, that will tend to improve your relationship.
Similarly, if you have enemies in common, agreeing to their requests will also improve things,
but if you cannot agree, just say so.
The worst negative modifier is when you agree to do something and then do the opposite.
Now saying no is also negative, but it's not as bad as saying yes, and then we're nagging on the deal.
Finally, remember that negatives will erode over time if they're not reinforced.
Now, if you want a very detailed look at the mechanics and details of this,
I put a link in the show notes to the Civ fandom site with a detailed guide to diplomacy.
Now, city states are also very important diplomatic partners.
Now, we'll cover all of the benefits in a different section, but here I want to focus on how they enable
the diplomatic victory. At a certain point, the United Nations will be born out of the world's
Congress, and when this happens, a diplomatic victory is possible. Now, this will occur when any
player reaches the information era, or whenever half the players have reached the atomic era.
So, diplomatic victory requires that you get the votes of a certain number of delegates to the
United Nations. Each player gets delegates based on their population, and there are also some
additional delegates you can earn, such as to building the world wonder for bidden palace,
which gives you two additional delegates. Anyone planning for a diplomatic victory should
consider building this wonder as mandatory. But each city state gets one delegate, and if you are
allied with them, their delegate is yours. The mechanics of city state relationships is that they
love gifts and cash is always the best. So, anyone planning a diplomatic victory would be well
advised to focus on building a large treasury. You will know when a leader vote is coming up
in the United Nations and can make cash drops on any city states that are not already allied with
you before the vote. But watch out that another player doesn't do the same thing after you do,
and snipe away some of your allies. Another thing you can do is place spies in the city states to
regulations, and that's another way to get them to ally with you. And it brings us to the topic
of spies and espionage. Spies are simply awarded to you at points along the way. The first one
comes when any player enters the Renaissance era. After that you receive another spy each time
you advance to another era. So, you can, in general, have as many as five spies. But if you build
the national intelligence agency, you get one more. Now, this is an national wonder and should
be a mandatory build if you're going for a diplomacy victory. And England starts with one
extra spy. So, if you play as England, you could have as many as seven spies. Spies can be used
for offense or defense. If you station one of your spies in one of your own cities, it can operate
as a counter spy and may thwart or even kill an enemy spy. If you are well ahead in technology
that might be a good use since other players will be trying to steal your tech. But if you're
behind, you might want to use your spies to steal tech from other players. You may be successful
in this, but the theft does not go unnoticed. And the other player may use one of his spies to counter
your operation. If your spy is killed, you will get another one in three to five turns, but if
your spy was a high rank spy with promotions, that's a serious loss. So, you may want to move
that spy elsewhere for a while. Now, diplomats, when you assign the spy to the capital of another
player, you can designate them as a diplomat. Now, that will take a few turns, depends on the
game speed, but around six turns on normal speeds, to get them set up. This is called making
introductions, but the point is that if you need an effective diplomat, don't wait until the
last minute. Now, diplomats can be useful in several ways. Early on, they allow you to trade
votes in the world congress, and they will bring you intelligence about intrigues, and you can then
share that with other players. And it can also give you a view of the other player's city screen.
Once you have researched globalization, your diplomats can help with a diplomatic victory
because each one counts as one additional vote in the United Nations for world leader.
Now, you can change a spy into a diplomat, or a diplomat into a spy, just by moving the spy
or a diplomat from its current location to another location, and that triggers the ability to
change their job assignment. This means that when you first get spies and they cannot yet be used
to get additional delegate votes as diplomats, you can assign them to city states where they
can help you get alliances. Then, if you start to research globalization, move them to the
capitals of other players and turn them into diplomats. This, of course, assumes you want to win
a diplomatic victory. If instead, you are going for a science victory, and in our head in science,
it's probably best to station them in your own cities to do counterintelligence work.
If you're a head in science, other players will be trying to steal tech from you.
Now, religious pressure. If you have researched all of the piety social policy tree,
you'll have the option to choose a reformation belief to add to your religion.
One of these, called underground sect, allows your spies to resort religious pressure
against the city they have been sent to. However, this effect is fairly small.
If there is not a follower of your religion in the city, it seems to do nothing.
But in combination, it can flip cities to your religion.
Start by sending an missionary to spread your religion, and then your spy can add to that.
And you should also combine that with a trade route to add additional religious pressure.
And by gradually moving your spies, missionaries, and trade routes from city to city,
you can make your religion dominant in a region.
Now, the diplomatic victory, which is the new one that was added in Civilization 5,
we didn't have diplomatic victory as an option previously.
That can be a fun way to win. I've done it.
Now, if you want to get a leg up, start with a save that gives you advantages,
such as Greece or Venice.
Now, you know, half to do that, my last diplomatic victory was achieved with Ethiopia,
which is generally regarded as a military domination kind of safe.
And you can win any victory type with any save, and it can be fun to play against type.
Now, Greece gets an advantage from relations with city states,
which are key to diplomatic victory because each one gets a vote for the world leader.
And Venice is interesting, because with Venice, in Sioux 5, you cannot build settlers.
So, you know, what can you do? Well, you can use cash that Venice generates to puppet city states.
And you can purchase units in puppet city states as well.
Cash is king in the Venice strategy, and you will want to get as many trade routes as possible.
The first two should send food to Venice to help boost your population.
Since you will only ever have one city as Venice, you'll want to max it out.
All trade routes after that, the first two should focus on cash.
Use your cash to purchase or upgrade military units and employ a defensive strategy.
You want enough military to deter any aggression against you, but you should avoid making any
hostile moves against others if possible. Remember, this is a strategy for a diplomatic victory.
If you want to go to war, don't choose Venice. Choose one of the other domination sives,
like the Zulu's or the Mongols. So, this is a hookah for Hacker Public Radio, signing off,
and as always encouraging you to support Free Software. Bye-bye!
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