Civ VI vs. Marvel's Midnight Suns

[blackbutterfly]

While waiting around for the Great Builders DLC I've been playing Firaxis' other game: Marvel's Midnight Suns.
There are in fact a ton of similarities:

• Leylines
• Sun Tzu Art of War
• Card play
• Turn based strategy
• Double bars = health + block/defences (though behaviour is slightly different in MMS vs. Civ VI)
• Vampires
• Heroes
• Research
• Map
• Exploration
• Unit XP
• Upgrades/promotions
• HQ/Capital
• Credits/gold
• Resources/Reagents
• Intel/espionage (i.e. intelligence as a currency like Civ IV, the earlier vers.)
• Petting dogs/scouts

Anyone notice other things in common?
---

MMS a super game BTW! I never knew I would get hooked on tactical strategy (still turned based crucially!)
I've been unable to put it down.

EDIT: I will keep this list updated.

 

[Eagle Pursuit]

I'm kinda waiting for the first pass of DLC to all come out before I try it. If I only end up doing one playthrough, I want all the heroes available.

 

[blackbutterfly]

I'm kinda waiting for the first pass of DLC to all come out before I try it. If I only end up doing one playthrough, I want all the heroes available.

It's the most fun I've had since BioShock!

And I eventually played BioShock twice. (When the combined edition came out some years later? With the DLCs).

The card playing mechanics got me thinking if Firaxis are thinking of something like this for future Civ?
Many people have been praising Old World's system. This isn't bad either, except it hardly seems fair the AI gets to move all their units.

 

[Kwami]

I'm kinda waiting for the first pass of DLC to all come out before I try it. If I only end up doing one playthrough, I want all the heroes available.

Fortunately, they're coming out faster than I expected them to. We got the first one in January and the second one in February. So, you might not have to wait too much longer!

 

[Eagle Pursuit]

@blackbutterfly I've begun looking at Triumph's Age of Wonders 4. It's a fantasy 4x game and they have a similar 3-card draw for research goals

Also, they have regions sort of like HK, but much smaller. You get to add one to a city every time it gains a pop.

And they split Production into two currencies, Production for buildings and Draft for units. It seems like an interesting idea. I could see that in Civ.

 

[Kwami]

@blackbutterfly I've begun looking at Triumph's Age of Wonders 4. It's a fantasy 4x game and they have a similar 3-card draw for research goals

Also, they have regions sort of like HK, but much smaller. You get to add one to a city every time it gains a pop.

And they split Production into two currencies, Production for buildings and Draft for units. It seems like an interesting idea. I could see that in Civ.

Stellaris also had the 3-card draw for research. It was sort of fun. You couldn't just beeline certain techs, but you could try to play with the system and increase or decrease the number of available cards in the pool and the number that you would draw next. On the other hand, it could be quite a bit random and random isn't always good. It could work, though, if it's done well.

 

[Eagle Pursuit]

Stellaris also had the 3-card draw for research. It was sort of fun. You couldn't just beeline certain techs, but you could try to play with the system and increase or decrease the number of available cards in the pool and the number that you would draw next. On the other hand, it could be quite a bit random and random isn't always good. It could work, though, if it's done well.

I play Civ 6 with the tech and civic scramble mode almost exclusively now. I like not having the same beelines and technology strategy every game. So, I think this would work for me.

 

[tedhebert]

As you know, big fan of Midnight sun here... enjoyed it a lot, finished the base game, didn't buy the season pass so waiting for all 4 DLCs to be out and the discounts to come in before buying them, in the meantime I still play a little to raise friendship with the last 2 heroes I'm not maxed in yet.

As for the civic/tech VS card discussion, yes stellaris had some of that.... More recently, Galactic Civilizations 4 implemented a very interesting take on this, with a proposition of 4 possible cards to choose from each time, with a 5th slot opened by a tech... They also have a color scheme added to the
cards to emphasize rarity vs commonality of the techs to choose from. I really liked it... LOTS of thing didn't work out in GC4, but that one was nice...

 

[Kwami]

As for the civic/tech VS card discussion, yes stellaris had some of that.... More recently, Galactic Civilizations 4 implemented a very interesting take on this, with a proposition of 4 possible cards to choose from each time, with a 5th slot opened by a tech... They also have a color scheme added to the
cards to emphasize rarity vs commonality of the techs to choose from. I really liked it... LOTS of thing didn't work out in GC4, but that one was nice...

Stellaris also had rarity on the cards and unlockable additional slots. And, somewhat like we see in Civilization VI, Stellaris separated tech into multiple pools.

I haven't played Stellaris in years because I have no interest in keeping up with their absurd DLC model, but the tech system is one thing that I remember fondly from early Stellaris.

 

[blackbutterfly]

I haven't played Stellaris in years because I have no interest in keeping up with their absurd DLC model, but the tech system is one thing that I remember fondly from early Stellaris.

Well how many XPs have we had for Civ VI?

More then any other Civ game in history, right?

 

[Eagle Pursuit]

@TheMarshmallowBear Has a very interesting idea for a card draw system for techs, but I'm not going to share it. It sounds like he has plans for it

 

[Kwami]

Well how many XPs have we had for Civ VI?

More then any other Civ game in history, right?

Yes, but it's nothing like Paradox games! The total cost of the DLC for Stellaris is currently $253.80. That doesn't include the game itself, though. That's another $40.

And, sure, you can wait and get sales. Paradox regularly has sales at 25/50/75% off. But, then you're months behind the rest of the community. That means that you're playing a game patched for the latest DLC, but without the DLC, which often results in less than ideal gameplay for Paradox games.

In contrast, the total cost of DLC for Civ VI is $171.90 if you buy it outright (counting the $19.99 for the Leader Pass, which most of us got for free). But, only the two expansions really came with big patches that changed the game and those two expansions were installed as new rulesets so that the base game still played OK without them. Waiting for sales is much easier with Civ. And, Firaxis released Gold/Platinum/Anthology versions to bundle the DLC at a huge discount. Paradox doesn't do that.

 

[InsidiousMage]

@TheMarshmallowBear Has a very interesting idea for a card draw system for techs, but I'm not going to share it. It sounds like he has plans for it

Old World has one that actually makes the tech tree interesting. You get four random techs and the techs you don't choose from go into the discard pile and you only get a chance to get them again once you've cycled through the available techs. Makes you have to think about your choices and prevents you from beelining key techs.

 

[Eagle Pursuit]

Old World has one that actually makes the tech tree interesting. You get four random techs and the techs you don't choose from go into the discard pile and you only get a chance to get them again once you've cycled through the available techs. Makes you have to think about your choices and prevents you from beelining key techs.

That's what AoW4 is going to have

 

[bbbt]

@blackbutterfly I've begun looking at Triumph's Age of Wonders 4. It's a fantasy 4x game and they have a similar 3-card draw for research goals

Also, they have regions sort of like HK, but much smaller. You get to add one to a city every time it gains a pop.

And they split Production into two currencies, Production for buildings and Draft for units. It seems like an interesting idea. I could see that in Civ.

Have you played previous AoW? They are very close to Heroes of Might and Magic (which I love) more so than Civ. It does look like they are adding a little more empire building and non-military options in 4 though.

 

[Eagle Pursuit]

Have you played previous AoW? They are very close to Heroes of Might and Magic (which I love) more so than Civ. It does look like they are adding a little more empire building and non-military options in 4 though.

I haven't, but I was intrigued by some youtuber videos they did last week, so I got to reading the dev diaries and I'm impressed.

 

[TheMarshmallowBear]

Old World has one that actually makes the tech tree interesting. You get four random techs and the techs you don't choose from go into the discard pile and you only get a chance to get them again once you've cycled through the available techs. Makes you have to think about your choices and prevents you from beelining key techs.

My tweak for that is, utilizing the boost system, where every boosted tech is ALWAYS available in your pick so, you can always research it, but non-boosted techs go back to the discard if you have not picked it.

It also opens door for Tech Trading to return, but maybe that's just me.

 

[Planktonic]

Have you played previous AoW? They are very close to Heroes of Might and Magic (which I love) more so than Civ. It does look like they are adding a little more empire building and non-military options in 4 though.

At the risk of being slightly off topic, I'd be interested in a 4X fantasy game and looked briefly at the AoW4 announcement video after Eagle Pursuit's post. But one question: what does victory look like in AoW games? What's the win condition?

 

[Eagle Pursuit]

At the risk of being slightly off topic, I'd be interested in a 4X fantasy game and looked briefly at the AoW4 announcement video after Eagle Pursuit's post. But one question: what does victory look like in AoW games? What's the win condition?

In AoW: Planetfall it was either destroy all enemies, control a certain % of the map, or research the ultimate technology.

I would assume AoW4 is somewhat similar.

I do know that certain map options add extra victory conditions, like one map has a powerful demonic faction, and if you kill their champion hero unit, you win.

Another one has 3 powerful AI factions, and you win when you vassalize or destroy all three.

 

[bbbt]

At the risk of being slightly off topic, I'd be interested in a 4X fantasy game and looked briefly at the AoW4 announcement video after Eagle Pursuit's post. But one question: what does victory look like in AoW games? What's the win condition?

AoW3 was very similar to heroes of might and magic. It's primarily a domination victory basically, there was also a king of the hill style victory. It sounds like AoW4 is expanding for more non-domination victory options. I'm not much of a domination player in Civ though, where I find it pretty tedious, so I don't think there's necessarily a one to one there.

Heroes of Might and Magic was my favorite strategy series outside of Civilization, and I very much enjoyed AoW. They are very different vibes though, Endless Legend is much closer to a fantasy Civ than AoW. In AoW/Homm, heroes/units are the primary focus. City management is more secondary. It's a lot more exploration focused, and more battle heavy, as exploration and resource gathering usually involves fighting a lot of neutral creatures (there are auto resolution options). A lot of focus in building up your heroes, giving them skills/items/spells. Resources, and control of the resources (like mines), are primarily on the map and control is given/taken of them by heroes, not cities. Little more RPG/RTS elements than Civ maybe.