Idk, If you play smart in gc2 you can get lots of power quickly or make it a challenge to the end. In one of my maps on immense the dread lords spawned, and I knew resistance was pointless because i was so outpowered, so I built tons of farms and evacuated 120 billion people to a class 30ish at the end of the universe untill I finished enough of the tech tree to fight back

Why is the common solution to every problem here in the forums involve penalties to the game and player, to fix issues?

A designer knows that perfection has been achieved, not when there is nothing left to add. But when there is nothing left to take away. If you tore through the AI using the 4Xs then its victory earned.

I personally don't understand how a realm divide feature would help. If your going for a diplomacy victory and are about to win, people declaring war wouldn't make sense, as victory would be impossible without killing those your allied with.

for research victory, it would make sense because the Ai would lose otherwise. But it would be victory earned and then the end game is over.

The others like ascension and influence victory, it already happens to a certain extent. The AI already gets aggressive late into this victory. Influence victory would topically be hard to do with going to war on larger galaxies considering how the AI feels about influence starbases.

As for conquest victory realm divides. I love it! Apart from friendly civs that I could potentially sign a alliance with are now enemies, which I sucks if I didn't what to kill a race.

over all this I would like to see vassal states. That way we don't have to worry about the next war right after signing a peace treaty, ultimately ending in wiping out a whole race.

DARCA

I think that if the game records scoreboards it acts as an incentive to finish games. Furthermore if said recorded scoreboards score higher for quicker completion of end game goals there remains some strategy even when you are destined to win. Rather than just steamrolling you start to think how can I do this quicker. Speed of completion need not be the only thing you could work on in the endgame to boost your score either. I know recorded scoreboards doesn't solve the problem but it does negate it a tiny bit.

this is more about difficulty levels imo

these games are really designed to be played where you and your rivals are equally skilled. if you are pulling ahead easily, then the AI is just too weak

The solution is that big empires should have internal problems that smaller factions don't have.  Corruption on planets far from the capital, rebels from defeated factions, attempted military coups, etc.  This would also give you a chance to catch up if you're lagging behind another player because his home system was close to a a green resource or whatever.

Basically the kind of instability you get when you try to build an empire in Crusader Kings.

Civ4 had corruption and by and large it was considered one of the weakest elements in Civ4.

They also had corruption in Civ III, along with pollution, and between them they totally crippled the larger maps.

Definitely, corruption was the single most hated thing in Civ III. Not sure why we'd want to go down that road again.

At the end of the day, the normal conquest victory condition sucks. That's what this is about. Having to wipe out a bunch of insignificant planets that post no challenge just to meet the victory condition is pointlessly grindy.

Civ V actually did that better - you just need to take the capitals to win the conquest victory.

Is everyone forgetting about Ascension Crystals? They may not have been a perfect solution to this, but I always had a small panic attack when someone found one and I had no idea where it was.

When I say corruption, I don't mean resource penalties, I mean specific random events with a variety of consequences (anything from security leaks that make some of your planets easier to infiltrate, to terrorist bombings to civil wars)

What they would need is an I WIN button, that you press and the game will calculate if you would win, how the end outcome presents itself... it could even give you a finish story dialogue. It wouldn't be a guaranteed win, it should compute whether or not your military might / industry is capable of maintaining a prolonged engagement, against the meager might of the AI opponents. I'd have it only available as a research item, under "Advanced Military Simulation - Provides the 'I'm Done did I Win button'".

That would satisfy the people who say I won, just a matter of time. An auto-resolve for the endgame conflict.

I agree with this. For example, if you dominate 70~80% of the galaxy through diplomacy, brute force or other kind of means, and, if your allies are the 2^nd and 3^rd most powerful empires out there you are set up. At this point, what can happen to you that won’t kill anyone but you? A big plague? If that manage to kill you, the others would be dead long ago, especially if you’re going for a conquest victory. A much more powerful civilization? That would work but, why would it show at this point? Why not from the beginning so you can seize your strength instead of being obliterated by an absurd force when no one else can oppose you? Conquered/exterminated by the advance AI that you created? I would laugh to death if I were playing with Yor Collective and that happen to me.

The sad point of a 4X is that, at the moment when you dominate the game all other civilizations are practically done. And, due to the slow nature of a turn based strategy game, your grinding is way slower than, for example, SC. Some solutions sound good. For example, the idea to have a sneaky winner is good but, the sneaky winner should be anticipated so you don’t lose without knowing what happen, you must have a mean to stop it if you realize with enough time and you must be able to do the same if you wish/can/must do if it’s your only option to win. I think that my favourite is that the AI “decide” when he/she/it is lost and cannot recover.

An idea? One, that the IA decide form the beginning what kind of victory want and goes for it smartly (specific type of AIs and strategies for specific goals). Reduce the cost, according to the size of the galaxy, of some victories like technological victory. Alliance between some civilizations to fight a common enemy, but only if they ideologies are compatible (for the sake of an argument: good guys with good and neutral ones) in order to make them collaborate for a specific goal (in higher difficulties would be good that some civilization even make some “formations” like I go for a tech victory and the rest will protect me and send me resources), especially in more dire situations (like when a civilization is gaining too much power, and that civilization does not necessarily be you). I know that that won’t solve the problem in the long run, but it become much closer to a fast end/win and you might end with some help to clean.

Edited: I don't know what happen to the text that it looks so bad.