Wealth, progress, and social policies all demand attention, because excelling in only one won't secure a victory. To win, a civilization must lead in three out of five areas for at least five turns. I love that 'Aetherium' makes things fly, and that I can consult the 'League of Empires' and imagine men with mustaches and cigars convening in the elaborate parlor of a floating city. The special units are very standard steampunk stuff - giant armored landships and blimp-like air fortresses - but the fiction is well-crafted and intentionally whimsical. Eruptives, Landships, Sky Fortress, Galvanomagnetism, and Subterranean Exploration are among the scientific discoveries researched on the way to The Future Era. The scenario opens at the onset of the Steam Era, where the tech tree diverges from the vanilla game's. Hi, would you like to go to war with Ignace Curnow of Orlin? What's that? You ARE Ignace Curnow of Orlin? Well, this is most embarrassing. Before I became familiar with the five new bespectacled leaders and their industrious civilizations, I kept mixing them up and accidentally talking to the wrong guy.

That's an impressive amount of stuff for one custom scenario, and it takes adjusting to. It features new leaders, units, strategic resources, research options, and victory conditions, each slathered thick with rivets, goggles, and coal. Like with molded chocolate shapes and everything. The core game additions are Gods & Kings' main course, but its alternate history scenario, Empires of the Smoky Skies, is a surprisingly elaborate dessert. The intel my spy recovered changed the outcome of battles and made me feel like a more powerful and competent leader, which is the feeling I play Civ for. By the time he declared war, I was in a position to make it hurt. I also built an army deep within my borders and secretly constructed a railroad that allowed me to rapidly flank one of his vulnerable cities. When I discovered that the leader of a neighboring civilization was plotting against me, I used two Great Generals to build forts along my border and stationed a line of defensive units. Espionage in Gods & Kings adds strategic depth without being a managerial burden, and unlike the religion system, which primarily introduces new strategic choices, it helps you make those choices intelligently. I've only played through one scenario with espionage, but I think I may be in love.

Spies stationed in your own cities perform counter-intelligence and can kill enemy spies. The Intrigue system allows you to peek at what the AI is planning - who they're plotting against and what they're building.Д¤. If you want to be really devious, you can stage coups in city-states.ДЈ. Once embedded in a city, your spy can steal technology and information, and you can peek at your opponent's city management screen. Your first step is to send him to a foreign city to set up reconnaissance, which takes several turns.Дў. He isn't a unit on the map - all espionage actions occur in the menu. From the espionage menu, you can manage your first covert operative. When you reach the Renaissance, the strategic importance of religion takes a backseat to spies. I didn't feel compelled to treat Religion as more than passive bonuses and story flavor, but I can see its potential to become a major component of pre-industrial strategy.ДЎ. I worried that too much focus on faith and followers might not pay off, so by the time I reached the Renaissance I'd largely abandoned my spiritual ambitions. I spread it to a couple cities in a neighboring civ, but after that, I let it do its thing mostly unchecked. Since I wasn't in a resource-heavy area, I focused on Beliefs which increase happiness to keep my citizens from becoming frowny-faces over the lack of luxuries. Religion can be used relatively passively, but if you want to wage holy wars, you'll have to make it one of your priorities and reduce progress in another area. The new resource and specialty units also add a lot of decision making to the early game. Earning bonuses for worshiping tree and sea gods on my civ's forested island helped construct a more interesting narrative. But they're not arbitrary: each Belief is tailored to one of Civ's win strategies, and I like that many are related to geography. I spent a long time scrolling up and down through the list of Beliefs before settling on my first - there are a lot of options to weigh. To those (myself included) who complained that Civilization V lacks the strategic depth of Civ IV, and lamented the loss of religion and espionage in favor of Social Policies and city-states, the religion system in Gods & Kings says, вЂњOh, you want more detail do you? HERE'S ALL OF IT!вЂќ

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