well, i've tried several civ games and their mods, and i've tried almost all tw--but i don't think an ordinary joe can try any number of the tw mods there are for him to say he has played most of them-- and there's a big difference. in tw, you build up your economy to buy some troops, and when you're ready to battle you'd have a fair chance of victory--the more warriors (of whatever kind) in relation to the enemy, the bigger is your propensity of winning in combat and at the same time you could suffer less casualties. in civ, you build up your economy to buy some troops and when you think you've enough and start to do battle--why the troops that you have fight one after the other and not all together as a team they slug it out in individual combat until one or the other "dies," then it's the turn of the next individual, etc., until either you or the enemy runs out of troops! in tw, you have a general or family member, you can develop him to be a tyrant or a benevolent ruler; in civ, you unrealistically shift government styles from monarchy to communism or fascism to democracy or whatever else (this won't happen to ANY kind of real-world people who have cultural sentiments, traditions, family ties, etc.) so, my point is--for me, there is no comparison between tw and civ, as there is nothing in common between fantasy and the real world.
but oh, of course, i DO play quite a number of civgames, and continue to do so--only i don't feel it's anything real, and i don't play civ for a substantial length of time. in fact, i feel the AGE OF EMPIRES games would be more realistic-feeling for me, than civ is (although, get me right, i don't consider AoE to be "very" realistic," only they're that closer to being realistic games than civ games are). and, by the way, i truly appreciate Sid Meier's talents at game-making, for example his very amusing PIRATES.
Hawooh.