My Old World experience, 6-hours In (initial pros and cons)

[Das Capitolin]

Old World became available on Steam today, and I put six hours into the game on my day off. Here are some of my initial thoughts, and hopes for the future.

First and foremost, I am impressed by the amount of community support there is for a game that was offered pre-release two years ago, and launched about one year ago. Although I typically like to abstain from mods until I've played through several times for many months, the massive number of available modules offering temptation may cut the vanilla experience short.

Next, the game itself is very easy to adapt to, especially if you're familiar with Civilization V, Age of Empires, or Crusader Kings. More importantly, it doesn't drift into the fantasy realm of future times, and keeps lockstep with ancient development. This is key, as it allows a player to focus on one specific era and build interest in incremental growth. You progress one year at a time, and you are definitely going to die at an early or elderly age.

While succession is emphasized, it's also very much essential. Inside of three turns I lost my initial ruler, then my adult daughter, and then my wife. In fact, I suffered at least six deaths within my kingdom inside of five turns. The other rulers didn't fare any better, and there was a lot of legacy in play. I may or may not of assisted one of those rulers to their grave, by way of an agent's garrote.

One issue I would like to see improved upon is unit/city focus when available for command. Right now I am forced to rotate through my units, often seeing the same exhausted unit over and over again, before landing on something that is awaiting orders. I am hopeful that one day this becomes as clean as Civ 6, where it jumps me to each item that is awaiting action.

Overall, though, I have found Old World to be much more interesting than Humankind, just as engaging as Civ 5, and more personally invested than Age of Empires or Crusader Kings. I initially got too attached to my first ruler, because, well, it was me, and I didn't want to die. It would be nice if there were more warning, because getting my affairs together takes more than two turns (my wife would get only one more turn after her warning). As I become more familiar with the game, I will likely plan better legacy for my heirs.

Feel free to share your thoughts on what I've posted, and how I might clean up the action focus.

 

[DizzKneeLand33]

Right now I am forced to rotate through my units, often seeing the same exhausted unit over and over again, before landing on something that is awaiting orders.

Maybe this is a old habit from Civ that I've carried over, but once I'm done moving a unit I hit spacebar to go to the next unit, and that unit is removed from the rotation. If I want to keep the unit in rotation, I click on "next unit" (or other options that appear there) -- this will bring back that unit at the end and is useful if, for example, I want to use up my orders at the end to move this unit extra spaces. You can also bypass the unit from the beginning via the click versus the spacebar (which passes the unit for good I believe unless you click on the actual unit again).

 

[Dale]

In options there are some unit cycling options. You should be able to replicate the way Civ does it through options.

 

[Das Capitolin]

In options there are some unit cycling options. You should be able to replicate the way Civ does it through options.

This solved it for me. Thank you! It is strange that the Unit Cycling option is not enabled by default.

 

[PiR]

If I want to keep the unit in rotation, I click on "next unit"

That's TAB

 

[CornPlanter]

The "early warning" you want before leaders death can be their age. The older they get the more you need to start preparing for their inevitable death.

 

[Das Capitolin]

The "early warning" you want before leaders death can be their age. The older they get the more you need to start preparing for their inevitable death.

I do not consider 46 to be very old. Nor 25, nor 14. Those are the ages of me and my family members who have died.

 

[PiR]

I do not consider 46 to be very old.

Even at that time?
Not that you couldn't live long, specially having a good place in society, but still, the average of life was not the same as today.

I think you will get used to this. It requires you to adapt to the event. Early warning would create no challenge around leader death.

 

[tiamats4esgares]

I don't mean to sound dumb, but why do you need a warning before you die? What affairs did you need to get in order that took longer than a turn or two?

For me, the only important thing was that my 2nd son was the heir, and not my oldest, and I manually did that long before I died. And then my oldest son offed himself. (Oops.)

(Unfortunately my second son can't have kids and I never had more than 2 myself so now I'm trying to figure out how to get wives for my 2 grandkids, the new king's nephews. Doesn't seem to be an option for that since they aren't direct lineage but eh, who knows.)

Next, the game itself is very easy to adapt to, especially if you're familiar with Civilization V, Age of Empires, or Crusader Kings

I was hoping, later on down the line when I'm done with Old World for a while, that i might try and venture into Crusader Kings 3, using Old World as a stepping stone into it.

 

[enjay]

Cycling through units works fine, you forget that the unit may be out of movement points, but it still can do other actions (build, promote, etc.).
Or press Space

 

[MrRadar]

OK, I've suffered through the tutorial. Walls of text that I don't remember much of what was in there, although I did try to read, but skipped chunks of it anyway. However, somehow I got a little bit of an idea what the game is about nevertheless

The highlight came in the last "Learn to play" scenario, where you have to scout out Rome and not get spotted, so that the Romans are not alerted. It seems, the scout should not get spotted at any time, even if you have already started the war and the cat is kind of out of the bag already. As soon as I moved the scout to have a look, after I've already declared the war, and with a mass of units present at and even inside the Roman borders, the scenario failed as my scout got spotted somewhere else near the Roman borders, never mind the already existing state of war. Thank the devs for 1 turn automatic autosaves and the "Undo" button, which works even after you load a save and it undoes the last recorded actions .

Having completed the 5 "Learn to play" scenarios only, I now have 28 of 265 Steam achievos. I do recognize the five "Completed Learn to Play scenario" (1–5) 'chievs, but others I feel undeserved somehow, because I don't know why do I have "Become the Good" and such. I even see some victory achievements, when I have no real victory yet, I was just doing the tutorial scenarios.

Anyway, looking forward to the first random game, it seems there is quite a lot to discover yet

 

[nolegskitten]

OK, I've suffered through the tutorial. Walls of text that I don't remember much of what was in there, although I did try to read, but skipped chunks of it anyway. However, somehow I got a little bit of an idea what the game is about nevertheless

The highlight came in the last "Learn to play" scenario, where you have to scout out Rome and not get spotted, so that the Romans are not alerted. It seems, the scout should not get spotted at any time, even if you have already started the war and the cat is kind of out of the bag already. As soon as I moved the scout to have a look, after I've already declared the war, and with a mass of units present at and even inside the Roman borders, the scenario failed as my scout got spotted somewhere else near the Roman borders, never mind the already existing state of war. Thank the devs for 1 turn automatic autosaves and the "Undo" button, which works even after you load a save and it undoes the last recorded actions .

Having completed the 5 "Learn to play" scenarios only, I now have 28 of 265 Steam achievos. I do recognize the five "Completed Learn to Play scenario" (1–5) 'chievs, but others I feel undeserved somehow, because I don't know why do I have "Become the Good" and such. I even see some victory achievements, when I have no real victory yet, I was just doing the tutorial scenarios.

Anyway, looking forward to the first random game, it seems there is quite a lot to discover yet

Thanks for the feedback !
Yes there seems to be a bug with some of the achievements triggered by the tutorials/scenarios, we're working on it.
Learning to keep your scouts hidden on forest is a valuable lesson, specially in MP . And indeed, there IS a lot to discover

 

[Pfeffersack]

Even at that time?Not that you couldn't live long, specially having a good place in society, but still, the average of life was not the same as today.

Yes and no. A part of the increased average life expectancy nowadays is certainly due some diseases killing of adults can now be cured/better terated, but AFAIK lower mortality among children today contributes even more.

 

[MrRadar]

After starting a random game and discovering there are tutorial messages, now I kinda regret playing those "Learn to play" scenarios. My own game with tutorial guidance feels so much better. I'm in love with the orders system, how it makes your decisions rather valuable.
By the way, what determines the production times? I could not find out that yet in-game. The game definitely has the gripping power, I've been glued to the screen in my first random game for the best part of the afternoon.
Until I tried to Alt-Tab and crashed so hard that my laptop lost my second monitor, I had to restart the machine. I ran high graphic settings and the dedicated full screen mode. Does the game really hate Alt-Tab so much?

 

[nolegskitten]

Never had an issue with alt-tab, actually this is very surprising. I use 2 monitors and constantly switch from the game to discord/obs/etc, never had a problem with that. I'm probably in borderless window tho, maybe something to try for you if you keep having issues with alt tab ? Never seen such a problem so far.

Responding to your in-game question, there are three kinds (and a half) of productions in OW: Growth, training and civics. (science is the additional half, but I'll let it aside).
Each city has a base production of 8 growth (apples), 8 civics (hammers) and 8 training (shields) a turn, which can be modified or improved by a variety of way. Governors stats apply multipliers, some traits can give a flat bonus, some resources and improvements can give other bonuses, etc.
For instance, an mine on an ore resource is worth 2 additional training per turn, 4 with a specialist on top.

Each turn, your city will produce these yields, whatever you produce. If you don't use them to produce anything, the growth goes into filling the "grow bar" which generate citizens when full in a familiar way, training and civics go to the global stockpile that is displayed oat the top of the screen. You can actually see how much the city contributes from the city screen.
In this screenshot for example, I am in the city screen of a very developed city. I am using it's civics production to build something, so its training is not used this turn. You can see that my city is not contributing any civics to the global stockpile (it's using it locally to produce), but its training output (all 45.5 of it) is going to the global stockpile :

You can even see a breakdown of where it's coming from by hovering those amounts :

So what happen with the civics in this case ? Well, I'm training a specialist, which takes civics. it's indicated in the building queue with a similar pointer, with a similar helpful breakdown for the curious:

Please note that I took those screenshots from a very late game OCC city, these are NOT normal numbers. Normal cities don't produce over 200 civics. the point is that the production you don't use goes in the global stockpile, or the grow box in the case of growth, or it goes toward producing the next item in your queue.

Civilian units, that is settlers, workers, disciples, scouts and militia/conscripts are trained with growth. While you train them, your city isn't growing as it's growth generation is redirected to production. Military units are trained using training (shields). Projects, permanent (such as forum, treasuries, archives, walls), or repeatable (hunt, inquiries, festivals etc) and specialists are all produced using civics. here the city is training a specialist and is pouring all its civics production in the effort.

YOU NEVER LOSE PRODUCTION. If it's not used by the city to produce something, it goes to the global stockpile. If it's only partially used by the city, the rest will overflow on the next build or go in the stockpile. if the stockpile are full at end of turn (they are capped at 2000 civics and training, the excess is converted to science and orders, and excess orders are converted to money.

So, to improve your city productivity, you first have to ask yourself what kind of productive capability you want to improve. If you want to produce workers, settlers and civilian units, you want to improve its growth production. farms on grain resources, camps on game, nets on fish or crab all improve growth. granaries too, specially adjacent to farms. The corresponding specialist will improve growth too, as will doctors and merchants, etc.

If you want to improve military production, you want to generate more training. Barracks and ranges add a multiplying bonus, and their specialists (officers) provide more training too ! for civics, marble helps, but the entire courthouse/ministry/palace line too, and monks, scribes and currently poets are a good way to boost it too. Other types of building and specialists will also provide science, etc. I'll let you explore the game, the interface and check the tooltip to get a better sense of what is good for what, but the main idea are :

• There are several types of production
• This is very important to specializing cities
• There are plenty of ways to improve each
• your city productivity and your stockpiles are linked, even if you have other sources of training and civics that go directly to the stockpile (character stats, laws, etc)

 

[Das Capitolin]

Compared to Civilization (5//6), wonders don't seem to offer game-changing yields or perks. Are they really worth the effort in Old World, @nolegskitten?

 

[DizzKneeLand33]

Well, remember, it's a single worker that's responsible for creating the wonder, you can still be doing lots of other things with the city itself.

 

[Solver]

Wonders are a bit different than Civ. They don't necessarily provide powerful game-changing bonuses, though I wouldn't say that they're all weaker than in Civ6. But unlike Civ, Old World wonders have useful secondary effects. They contribute VPs to get you closer to victory, they help boost culture (and culture is involved in many bonuses) and they may be part of ambitions that you get.

Even looking at the direct effects though, several wonders are powerful. Oracle gives you more control of tech choices and visibility into several foreign cities. Mausoleum gives every new unit a 10% defense bonus and significantly boosts culture in all cities. Apadana halves your maintenance, which translates to lots of money over time.

Doesn't seem that out of line compared to Civ6 wonders like Chichen Itza (one-city bonus at significant opportunity cost) or Colosseum (mediocre bonuses with strict placement requirements). Also Old World tries to avoid strategy-specific wonders like Hagia Sophia is in Civ6 - very important for religious victory, useless otherwise.

 

[nolegskitten]

Compared to Civilization (5//6), wonders don't seem to offer game-changing yields or perks. Are they really worth the effort in Old World, @nolegskitten?

It depends on the wonders and the game you're playing, but some can have a very strong effect.

The pyramids are a very strong early game wonder for instance. Halving the cost of adopting laws means you're quickly saving hundreds of civics. If your plan is to go for your unique unit, which will require you to adopt a minimum of 4 laws for the first level one, and 7 for the second level, this is a saving of 800 or 1400 civics ! It makes a huge difference, and makes the Pyramids a very desirable wonder in MP in particular, where players will *all* want it.
The Apadana flat reduction on maintenance (-50% everywhere, no less) is absolutely enormous and in a medium to large empire makes a very hard to overstate difference. The Ishtar Gates granting +100 culture in each city means every city with "weak" culture suddenly becomes developing, for +1 victory each at minimum. It's usually Key to rushing a a double victory if competing for a fast finish, and a few even experienced MP players have been caught off guard by a well planned Ishtar Gate (yep, I could drop names. Nope, not doing it. Not yet anyway ).
Don't forget the Hanging gardens +20% growth everywhere means you produce all civilian units 20% faster everywhere. Faster settlers, workers, disciples, scouts... Easy to miss if not yet familiar with the production system

And the list goes on. I could wax lyrical about how strong the Acropolis is for your order economy, how the Colossus and other wonders affecting all your cities are excellent but how comparatively much less desirable the become when you're playing OCC. In contrast, the Mausoleum culture bonus isn't super striking usually (indeed Solver mentions its other effects first) but excellent in OCC, etc.
Their impact might not strike you immediately upon reading the tooltips. While they are not all as strong or as desirable as one another, specially depending on the game/opponents/context, I'm confident you will read the list of their effects with different eyes as you gain more and more experience with the game.

Old world is one of these games which keep giving and get better and better the more you play them - or at least that is how it was for me and how we'd like it to be for everyone

 

[MrRadar]

So if a worker starts an improvement and gets killed by an enemy, when later you move a replacement worker on the site, the work continues automatically, without any other input from the player - how cool is that?! I understand such a case may not come up that often, but still it was thought about and implemented!
Pillaged improvements have a time limit for repairs until they're lost, with a clear number indicating the remaining time - loving it

I also like the mechanics of wonder building. Although the guaranteed selling and buying of the surplus and wanted resources to the omnipresent market does feel a bit gamey, but probably a reasonable abstraction. However, iirc, PDX Victoria series do simulate the real economy, where you can't magically buy resources that are not sold in sufficient quantities by other nations and your nation's rating isn't high enough.
I wonder if the resource market were made more realistic here, with no magical global market and more restricted ways of trade (only to known counterparties within the trade network and respective agreements), would it complicate the programming too much to be worth it? Then you also could drop the requirement to have all the resources upfront, only some portion for the starting works, and the rest could be supplied over subsequent turns by having a required resource per turn flow or additional realistic purchases, with the risk to run into shortages and halting the works that could then degrade, like in RL. But maybe that's overcomplicating for this game's purposes.

Anyway, I'm just over 70 turns in and survived the first war. Persians coming in from the East, raiders making things more difficult in the West and some Assyrian tourists just passing by and politely but firmly asking for a continued supply of souvenirs with a delivery service in exchange of not setting the shop on fire. At the same time Although at first I was already eying what cities I will be taking from Persia, after some turns I was very happy that Persians accepted the white truce I asked in a hurry.

Man, does the AI swarm you! And the amount of orders they have - I see Persia has twice the mine. First I was picking their isolated units one by one and preparing for a walk in the park, but then they brought in some serious and concentrated zerg slinger force with chariot and melee support and my overpromoted and generalled up elite units started leaving for a better afterlife one after another. I barely held onto my border city. Very cool btw that the city can repair damage even when besieged!

This is starting to look like one of the most engrossing games lately And my ruling family's grip on power seems to become stronger. The first queen, Hatshepsut, may have overbuilt some farms, her daughter may have neglected army and diplomacy a bit too much, but the granddaughter still managed to emerge from the inherited fight with the the whole realm in one piece, much wiser, albeit a bit bruised. The future beckons, time to consolidate the land!