How bad do generalist cities do in Civ 6?

[Pragmatic]

Note: I don't own the game. I'm considering buying if it gets a 50% off sale. The only info I have is what I've read on the Civ 6 wikia and a few posts here and on reddit. So EXPECT a lot of misunderstandings below.
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I was looking through the strategies for setting up cities, and it struck me. "I can't build generalist cities!"

I always build generalist cities. I like "jack of all trades, master of none" cities, in Civ and MoO. But the more I thought on Civ 6, the more it's obvious it wouldn't work. You'd have to balance everything.

To get the 10 specialty districts, I think it's one per 3 population (?), so you'd need a population of 30.

I figure that any city, on average, will have 24 tiles (two hexes out, plus 1/3 of the hexes in the third ring), maybe reduced to 20 when taking away the worthless tiles (e.g., mountains). Lock up 10 tiles with districts, and you're down to 10 free. In those 10 tiles, you've got to have the housing for 30 pop (after city center and rural towns, probably 5 neighborhoods for late-game?), farms to feed them, mines to provide the production needed, a couple of wonders, etc.

How generalized can you get? Assuming a max population of around 15, and the 20-tiles-per-city I guesstimated, how generalized can you get? I've seen strategies where the three biggies (Campus, Commercial Hub, Industrial Zone) are placed in every city's area, that leaves only two other districts per city...

 

[Shorlin]

So you want cities that have lots of districts? If you play as Kongo (early special neighbourhoods) or Ghandi (stepwells), this might work decently, but it still goes against the received wisdom and optimal strategies of civ6, which are: you focus at a very early stage on the direction/victory you want to go and build your districts/infrastructure accordingly. Also in civ6 many cities is better than few (very different to civ5), which goes against your playstyle, because its best to focus on settlers/builders/units, rather than just districts and infrastructure at the start of the game.. and if you don't build districts relatively early their cost goes up and up and they are harder to justify in all but your most production heavy cities..

tldr: tall playstyle which you seem to prefer is a lot worse in civ6 than wide. Hopefully future patches/expansions will give some buffs to tall playstyle.

 

[stormerne]

It strikes me, from your post, that you're looking not so much for generalist cities but rather for completionist cities! It's rare to have a city with absolutely everything, and it's rare to have a real need for that.

I find that cities in Civ6 tend to be generalist more often than not, in that many cities often have the same core districts. They're often specialist only in what they choose to miss out rather than what they choose to incorporate. Very often Civ6 cities start out general but then each takes an emphasis depending on terrain (e.g. sea suggests harbor, mountains suggest campus) or strategic position.

This is very different than, say, Civ4, which tended toward very specialist cities.

(By the way, good luck on waiting for a 50% discount, if it happens. I waited four months for a 20% discount and wished I'd bought it sooner! Waiting, for me, was false economy.)

 

[UWHabs]

I do find that you can get cities pretty big by the end of the game. When I was playing as India or Kongo, I did get cities up to the high 20s, although at some point, I didn't feel the need to build more districts in the cities.

Other things to keep in mind:
-The first district is at pop 1, so at size 16 you can have 6 districts in a city, or 7 if playing as Germany. As you go through the game, I find housing tends to be what limits me most. Through buildings and policies, I can usually get my cities to size 10-12 before neighbourhoods come online, so take that base plus a neighbourhood and a sewer, and you can easily get cities to size 16 if you have the food for that (which isn't too hard with internal trade routes)
-In most ways, the way the game is set up, every city ends up being "generalized", as other than a slight difference in adjacency bonuses, every city with a commerce hub will get the same gold production, or every city with a campus will have the same science (not counting science per pop). Sure, if a city has a lot of hills, it can be a little more specialized for production. And some cities can get a really nice campus or holy site spot and get a +5 bonus there, but there's not much you can do to really make a "specialized" city out of that bonus.

So no, it's very rare to find a city that can build every district, but I find that most of the time, after the first few districts, what I end up building tends to be more just what I feel that my empire needs most. So if I start falling back in science, I start building campuses. Especially as you have more and more districts down, you can get a decent adjacency just from other districts, so the specific location matters less and less. It's definitely not like civ 4 where you see a specific location and say, "oh, this city is totally just going to me my specialist city".

 

[Pragmatic]

It strikes me, from your post, that you're looking not so much for generalist cities but rather for completionist cities!

Yeah, I do like to be completionist. But I can't imagine how you'd be able to find the food or housing to support a fully-kitted city, nor the production to actually build all the districts/buildings.

(By the way, good luck on waiting for a 50% discount, if it happens. I waited four months for a 20% discount and wished I'd bought it sooner! Waiting, for me, was false economy.)

I'm currently futzing around with Civ:BE, so I'm in no hurry. When that ceases to placate me, I'll go back to GalCiv. I'm not eager to buy Civ6 until there's at least a decent map editor (I'm a "turtle-up completionist," give me a small corner of the map to putter around in and I'm happy), so it's going to be awhile, I'm guessing.

 

[stormerne]

Yeah, I do like to be completionist. But I can't imagine how you'd be able to find the food or housing to support a fully-kitted city, nor the production to actually build all the districts/buildings.

Kongo cities can be fairly large. I think I had a game with a whole bunch of cities size 20-30.

But I suggest your idea of what "fully-kitted" means relates to your experiences with previous incarnations in the Civ series, not Civ6. The devs' stated intention in Civ6 was to design it such that that players were encouraged to pay more attention to the landscape. To play the most successful (and therefore most enjoyable) games, they've made it so you have to be more responsive to the needs of the landscape than in previous incarnations. You can no longer just impose your desire on it; you have to work with it.

Therefore "fully-kitted" will mean different things for each city depending on where it is, who you're playing as, and whom you're playing against. Even your eventual victory condition will adjust accordingly. I prefer that, as it makes each game different to the last, For me, it makes games more challenging and satisfying, and certainly less formulaic. However, that may not be for you, in which case you'll be disappointed even with a discount, and your true home will be in other games.

 

[Canadian Bluebeer]

You can't always build all the districts anyway.

Harbor: if no coastal tile, no can do.
Aerodrome: flat land req.

Spaceport: don't need that everywhere anyway. Does nothing if not going for science victory, and you only NEED 3 at max.

Industry: handy
Commercial: handy
Theater: useful but limited.
Holy Site: limited
Campus: limited
Encampment: handy
Aerodrome: handy but limited
Entertainment: useful but limited.
Spaceport: very limited
Harbor: useful, limited

Industry, Commercial, Encampment are very useful, and I build as many as I can.
I want the production and gold.

Harbor: if available, I build them. Production and gold (+ships)

Campus: I build some, but not everywhere. 2 for eureka
Theater: some, more late game, more for archaeologists than anything else to clear ruins. build 2. first with art, second archaeology. eureka for each.
Holy Site: I build some, but not many. Don't need many if not going religious victory 2 for eureka
Aerodrome: I build several, production, aircraft, and transport. (need airport) 3 airports for eureka, 3 biplanes for another.
Spaceport: not often.1 for eureka (I rarely make it that fast)
Entertainment: I make some as I'll need the ameneties later. 4 for the eureka

So my generalist cities have industry, commercial, military, as my 3 core. Some have campus, some have other stuff

Generalist yes, completionist, rarely.
(there IS an achievement for getting 12 districts + a wonder though, so yeah, you can do it)

Also, there are great people that will let you build 1 more district than population allows. That helps for the compleat city.

 

[historix69]

Cities in Civ 6 are often placed close together in 3-4 tiles distance due to geographical limitations like coastline or mountains or neighbouring Civs and City States.
A city usually has tiles with luxury, strategic and bonus ressources, a number of tiles for food and some for production. When cities grow, more tiles are used for districts, wonders and housing and these tiles loose their basic food/production-income. You cannot place districts on luxury or strategic ressources and you will discover a lot more strategic ressources when you advance in science.
You should also consider the happyness (amenities). You can get limited (global) happyness from luxury ressources, but to have high base happyness in your cities, you need an entertainment district and a religion which may allow unlimited number of cities around size 20.

Placing cities on 1-tile-islands is possible and they can live with harbor and sea-resources, but the missing extra tile for an entertainment district means, they eat your flexible happiness (luxury).

 

[stormerne]

Note: I don't own the game. I'm considering buying if it gets a 50% off sale.

Incidentally, it's currently on sale at Humble Bundle for 33% off for a Steam key. Not quite your desired 50%, but still...

At the time of writing, it's available for another 40 hours.

 

[Kyro]

On Emperor games, very well if you do it right. Jack of all trades and master of all.

On Deity not so much unless you eat your neighbours before they become an actual challenge.

 

[TurboJ]

My play style nearly always involves building the capital city as an all-purpose city. It has to do with the early bonuses you get from the palace and from city states (one envoy always boosts capital only). Together these bonuses make the capital much stronger than an equivalent non-capital city. Plus there's the fact the other cities are always also founded later so they have less time to reach their pinnacle.

I use those bonuses to make sure I'm always able to build the important things somewhere. With a very strong and varied capital, it's very likely you get to build those things with a lot of production bonuses. Works on deity, works on lower diff even better.

 

[Canadian Bluebeer]

The capital is the one that I really like to have the good stuff, since it gets extra housing.
Holy Site, Campus, Encampment, Industry, Commercial. Some Wonders as well.
Sometimes it has an airport, sometimes not. (if I'm building wonders, then maybe not)

Ruhr Valley is a really nice wonder for your production heavy city, which for me, is usually the capital.
(unless it's a no river area, and I'll usually restart in that case)

I always try for high production cities, as I also want the wonders that give policy cards, and the +2 amenities one. (really, really nice late game when you're conquering everything in sight)

 

[historix69]

All wonders have specific requirements regarding terrain, resources and/or districst, so you must plan your city ahead if you want a specific wonder.

Spoiler :

from https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/civilization-6-features-thread.567144/

Wonders

Alhambra +1 military slot, Provides the same defensive bonuses as the Fort improvement. Must: Hills adjacent to an encampment District
Big Ben Doubles current Treasury, +Gold, + Great Merchant Points, Must: Next to river, adjacent to a Commercial District with a Bank
Bolshoi Theatre Awards 2 randomly-chosen free civics when completed. +Great Writer Points per Turn, +Great Musician Points Per Turn, +1 Great Work of Writing Slot, +1 Great Work of Music Slot, Must: be built on flat land adjacent to a Theatre District.
Broadway 1 free random Atomic Era civic Boost. Must: be built on flat land adjacent to a Theater Square district
Chichen Itza +Culture, +Production to Rainforest tiles, Must: built on Rainforest
Cristo Redentor Tourism output in Relics and Holy Cities is not diminished by other civs who have researched The Elightenment. Doubles tourism output of Seaside Resorts across your civilization. +culture, Must: be built on hills.
Colossus of Rhodes +Gold, +Great Admiral Points, + Trade Route output
Colosseum +amenities to all cities within 6 tiles, Must: Flat Land, next to Entertainment Complex
Eiffel Tower +Appeal on each tile of your Civ, Must: on flat land, next to City Centre
Forbidden Palace +1Wildcard Slot, +Culture, Must: On Flat Land, Next to City Centre
Great Library +Science, 2 Great Writing slots, +Research on Ancient and Classical Era Techs, Must: next to Campus with Library
Great Lighthouse +1 Movement for all naval units, +Gold. +Great Admiral points, Must: be built on the coast and adjacent to a harbor district with a lighthouse.
Great Zimbabwe +Gold, +Trade Route Capacity, +Gold for your Trade Route for every Bonus Resource in the City +Great Merchant Points, Must: Next To a Commercial Hub with a Market & A Cattle Resource
Hagia Sophia +Faith, +Great Prophet points, Apostles and Missionaries have one extra charge, Must: next to Holy Site, have founded a Religion
Hanging Gardens of Babylon +growth in all cities, Must: next to River
Hermitage +Great Artist Points per Turn. +4 Great Work of Art Slots, Must: be next to a River
Huey Teocalli -+Amenity from entertainment for each adjacent Lake tile. +Food, +Production for each Lake tile in your empire, Must: be built on a Lake tile adjacent to land. Pre-order Bonus
Mahabodhi Temple of Bodh Gaya +Faith, 2 free Apostles, Must: on Woods, next to Holy Site with Temple, have founded a Religion
Maracanã Stadium
Mont St. Michel +Faith, 2 Relic slots, apostles get Martyr Ability, Must: on Floodplains/Marsh
Oracle of Delphi +Faith, +Culture, Patronage of Great People costs less, Each District in your city produces more Great People Points, Must: on hills
Oxford University +science, 2 free randomly-chosen free technologies +Great Scientist points, + Great Works of Writing slots, Must: on Grasslands or Plains, adjacent to a Campus District with a University.
Petra +Food, +Gold and +Production on all desert tiles for this city (non-Floodplains), Must: Desert or Floodplains without Hills
Potala Palace +1 Diplomatic policy slot. +Culture. +Faith, Must: on a Hill adjacent to a Mountain.
Pyramids +Culture, one free Builder, Builders get extra charge, Must: on Desert/Flood Plains
Ruhr Valley +Production in this city, +Production for Each Mine and Quarry in this city, Must: built along a River, adjacent to an Industrial Zone district with a Factory.
Stonehenge +Faith, Free Great Prophet, Must: on flat land, next to Stone
Sydney Opera House +culture. +Great Musician Points per Turn. +3 Great Work of Music Slots, Must: be built on coast, adjacent to land & a harbor
Terracotta Army +Great General Points, free promotion for all land Units, Archeologists can enter territory without a Open Boarders agreement, Must: on grasslands/plains, next to Encampment with Barracks or Stable
Venetian Arsenal +Great Engineer points, receive a second navel vessel when every you build one in this city, Must: next to Coast, next to Industrial Zone

For a more readable list see e.g.
http://civilization.wikia.com/wiki/Wonder_(Civ6)

 

[antimony]

I think my core cities end up with about 5 districts in most games, which would be >13 pop. Even on a cultural or science victory, with as few as 5-6 cities, I rarely go beyond 16 pop per city.

- Commercial - always
- Campus or theater or holy depending on victory. If not going for science, I would still build campuses in >1/2 of cities. Holy sites can be useful in domination with the right religion bonuses and theocracy, but you'll get those from the opponents' cities anyway. Theater squares are rarely a priority for non-cultural games, though you need a few, + the Meritocracy policy card to cover the remainder of culture generation.
- Industrial in >1/2 of cities, at least enough to cover all cities with regional effect. Since encampment also gives production bonuses, it makes sense to build it instead of industrial for peripheral cities that get the bonus from another's city industrial zone. In coastal cities replace encampment with harbor.
- Entertainment in <1/2 of cities, again planning for regional effects.

 

[Disgustipated]

In previous civs I generally built generalist cities. So the transition is not difficult at all. I don't have patience to micro manage "science" cities and what not. I almost never built specialized cities, and even then only by chance.

That said, you'll find you can't build everything everywhere. You simply won't have enough production and time to do so. So you'll have to make decisions of what to build where. I like to build either a harbor or commercial district in every single city. Coastal cities get harbors of course. I like to build a industrial zone in every 3 or 4 cities to ensure overlap with factory/power plant 6 tile range bonus. And same with entertainment complexes. I like to build 1 or 2 campus districts in cities that have mountains if possible. Theater districts depend on if I'm going for cultural victory or I'm trying to defend against cultural victory. Encampments I should build more of, but I find I don't often have the production and time to build them. I try to build 1 or 2, however.

 

[historix69]

Holy Site (or Stonehenge) is mandatory if you want to found a Religion.
Combining harbor, industrial and camp district gives high production which allows to produce military units, buildings or wonders faster, especially with City State boni.
Harbor and commercial district allow +1 trade route per city and give a nice income which allows large army (upkeep) many buildings (upkeep) or rushbuying stuff like units, buildings, tiles or GP.
Entertainment district is necessary for high pop cities to not use up all the luxuries.
If you go wide / domination :
Culture for normal civic progress is available via Meritocracy (1 Culture per District) and Population (0.3 Culture per Pop) and Monument (2 Culture). A standard size 10 city with Monument and 4 Districts should produce around 2 + 3 + 4 = 9 Culture per turn.
Science is available via population (0.7 Science per Pop). A standard size 10 city should produce around 7 Science per turn.
Well timed heurekas reduce Science and Culture Costs by 50%, so I hardly build any Campus or Theatre districts in Civ 6 and Civic and Tech progress still feels to be too fast.

 

[isau]

I think you just need to adjust your thinking a little. It isn't so much that cities can't be non-specialist, its just that different opportunities will stand out to you the more you play the game. Like you will start seeing clusters of mountains and thinking, "The Campus needs to go right there." Compared to past Civ games I find the empire building in Civ 6 oddly satisfying. I'm much less concerned about winning the game (generally) than building a awesome empire, and Civ 6 delivers on that due to how the tile management works, along with the many, many, many special abiliites and permutations that can totally change how the map plays.