Sid Meier's Civilization IV: Warlords (PC Games, 2006)

Sid Meier's Civilization IV: Warlords is the first expansion pack for Civ IV. It offers a handful of minor changes to the already fantastic lineup: it added 6 new civilizations, 10 new leaders & 3 new leader traits, 6 new units, and 3 new wonders. Warlords also includes loads of rule tweaks, including an option to turn rival states into vassals. I am very glad that the tech tree was not modified too much, so it’s all pretty straight forward business if you are familiar with the regular Civilization IV.

In regular Civ IV defense bonuses made all-out warfare suicidal. As the expansion pack name "Warlord" would suggest, it has a stronger focus on battling. Similar to the great people, in Warlords, you’ll get great military leaders that you can either "cash in" to discover technologies, build special buildings, start golden ages etc. just like other Great People, or you can attach him to a unit, making it a leader. In addition to distributing a total of 20 XPs to units in the stack, it gives that unit access to a set of leader-only upgrades.

Also like the Conquer the World scenarios for Civ III, there are eight brand new campaigns – they essentially rewrite some of the rules of the game to give you a specific task. My personal favorite is the opportunity play as the pesky Barbarians in the Barbarian scenario. Your goal is to destroy as many Civs as possible, and that’s never a bad thing.

Civilization IV: Warlords is a great expansion to a fantastic game. If you really enjoy being an aggressive, combat-oriented player, you’ll absolutely love it. And if you are a more peaceful player, you will still enjoy some of the new Civs and units.