Was Civ 5 the ugly stepchild and easier
Definitely not ugly, my fav art style from 4-5-6 by a long way.
Stepchild—yeah, the hexagon was a change from previous Civs, I liked it but took some getting used to. 1UPT [unit per tile] change made a mess for a while, the AI found it difficult to maneuver so combat became a lot easier for the player.
I played everything on the most accelerated settings
Civ is always balanced for Normal everything, so deviating on speed would have an effect. However, it should have made combat more difficult since it's easiest on slower settings.
My main issue with 5 was that it nerfed the wide game, the optimal was if I recall correctly about 4 cities built to the max. In 4 I'd always have at least 20 cities which gave much more a feeling of building an empire, and also far more strategic and tactical choices—a couple outlying to capture important resources, some heavily garrisoned for border control, some production-heavy for military output, and of course the central core of economic and scientific powerhouses.
I also like the biggest map settings
I got tired of lots of civs in the game—every turn would be 2-3 guys popping up with some offer or demand. A big map is also a real drag for later game warfare—the logistics of moving 3-4 large armies around, plus the nerf on capturing cities, didn't do it for me after the first few dozen.