PolyCast Episode 323: "Find That Sweet Spot"

[DanQ]

Known upon discovery. The three hundred-and-twenty-third episode of PolyCast, "Find That Sweet Spot", features regular co-hosts Daniel "DanQ" Quick, Stephanie "Makahlua", Philip "TheMeInTeam" and Jason "MegaBearsFan" Grade. It carries a runtime of 59m59s.

The summary of topics is as follows:

- 02m18s | Forum Talk
Putting together the pieces of trade routes and understanding the continued exclusion of Markets and Lighthouses creating one if the other already exists in a city (05m19s) precede a construct for an eighth Governor (14m47s), all in Civilization VI.
- 21m55s | Research Lab
What to make of disguising one's units as belonging to that of another CivVI player, a proposal to improve leader Agendas (27m18s; recorded for Episode 322) and the if, and how, to implement the concept of a Central Bank for a given civilization (33m20s).
- 45m15s | Open Mic
Community and subsequent panel follow-up input from Episode 322 on how resource copy counting for improving one's empire in Civilization VI could take lead from Civilization: Beyond Earth.
- 48m53s | Time Machine
Shining the spotlight back on Civilization III as it passes seventeen years since release.

- Intro/Outro | Assorted
Missed opportunity and giving it a try.

PolyCast is a bi-weekly audio production recording live every other Saturday throughout the year, in an ongoing effort to give the Civilization community an interactive voice; sibling show ModCast focuses on Civ modding, TurnCast on Civ multiplay.

 

[ExtremeGardens]

When listening to the talk on resource copies providing more significance, I immediately though of specialist slots in Civ V, where you could have assigned people in the city panel to generate GPP and a respective yield.

- Maybe slotting coal/oil into a building in the IZ changes its appearance and increase its yield. Techs, civics, policy cards, governors or something perhaps could provide biofuels in the future that can replace coal for slotting?
- Horses can go into IZ for production, or can go into Entertainment Complex for extra amenities.

Then you have incentive to have more!

 

[legalizefreedom]

BE itself IS great. The concept, the art, the atmosphere, the mechanics, the music, even the stability were all great (deity player balance complaints not withstanding). What wasn't great was that it wasn't finished. Even so, I can count on one hand the things it needs to be great full stop.

For returning players, be sure to use the Awesome Pods and Ruins mod. It's the only one you need to see a world of difference in the variety in the ruins and quests which adds so much of what BE needs. I still play and enjoy BERT more than VI.

 

[Inexist]

Please do more research on civ 3 next time before talking about it in vague, broad strokes. the Civ 6 concept of armies is ripped, with changes, out of civ 3, a relatively fleshed out espionage system compared to civ 2 amongst other features. For a "failure", it has an awful lot of extremely fleshed out mods, visibly more than civ 4/5.

 

[DanQ]

Please do more research on civ 3 next time before talking about it in vague, broad strokes. the Civ 6 concept of armies is ripped, with changes, out of civ 3, a relatively fleshed out espionage system compared to civ 2 amongst other features. For a "failure", it has an awful lot of extremely fleshed out mods, visibly more than civ 4/5.

Thank you for taking the time to share your concern with us. As the focus of our Time Machine segment was on the timing of Civilization III's release, not its content, we felt a general overview of its material would suffice. I can appreciate that, as a result, we only highlighted certain aspects of its content though I believe we did acknowledge the major carryovers in subsequent titles. One of those notable, positive elements mentioned was indeed its extensive modding community. As we further stated, our negative views towards this title in the franchise emerged later as it ultimately became compared to its successors. I do not recall us using the term "failure" at any point in our discussion, and we hope that is not the takeaway here.

BE itself IS great. The concept, the art, the atmosphere, the mechanics, the music, even the stability were all great (deity player balance complaints not withstanding). What wasn't great was that it wasn't finished. Even so, I can count on one hand the things it needs to be great full stop.

Comparably to as on this episode itself, I will again echo my view which is in line with yours here: Beyond Earth needed a second expansion to fully, meaningfully, constructively realize its potential. It was its Rise Tide expansion that solidified my position on this, given what it built on the vanilla release of BE.

When listening to the talk on resource copies providing more significance, I immediately though of specialist slots in Civ V, where you could have assigned people in the city panel to generate GPP and a respective yield.

- Maybe slotting coal/oil into a building in the IZ changes its appearance and increase its yield. Techs, civics, policy cards, governors or something perhaps could provide biofuels in the future that can replace coal for slotting?
- Horses can go into IZ for production, or can go into Entertainment Complex for extra amenities.

Then you have incentive to have more!

Would you see Specialists assigned utilizing -- perhaps even requiring -- additional resource copies to have an effect, or otherwise an even greater effect than without? Applying to all types of resources or..?

 

[ExtremeGardens]

As it currently stands, specialist slots seems to be where population in a big city with no more tiles to work go get utilized.

I think giving specialist and/or the city additional benefits would be good. Just a quick idea:
- Slotting 1 iron or aluminium into an Encampment building gives 10% production towards units and encampment projects and/or Encampment specialist yield +2 production and +2 culture (instead of +1 and +1).
- Slotting 1 coal or oil into an IZ building gives 5% production towards everything and/or Engineer specialists yield +4 production (instead of +2).
- Slotting 1 niter, aluminium or uranium into a Campus give 5% science in the city and/or Scientist specialists yield +4 science (instead of +2).
So a fully slotted (3, right? 1 for each tier of building in a district) Campus or IZ would give +15% of their respective yield, and +8 per specialists.

Or to simplify, just say any strategic resources are all viable and we can use our imagination on how they are being utilized in the buildings. Or to increase complexity (!), have copies go obsolete, or that you need unique types of resources to fully stock a district (e.g. can't put horses into IZ after Industrial era, or you can't just put 3 nitre into a campus, you need nitre, aluminium and uranium to get benefits).

I would apply the same logic to Commercial Hubs and Theater Squares, but those districts rely on copies of luxuries and bonus resources instead. Imagine getting +15% to the city's yield of gold if you can slot 3 different resources into the building. Goods to trade and creature comforts to inspire art and all that. Probably include Entertainment Complex in this category too, and the extra food can be abstracted as the more entertained, the more...healthy and prolific the population?

This would make a bustling metropolis with high pop more viable (and for a building player like me, more glorious). It's not like you will ever have enough copies to fill out all your cities.

However, I fear all of this would need a resource management UI screen (think the Great Works screen from Civ 5?).

 

[DanQ]

Thank you for your most detailed follow-up, EG.

Out of curiosity, have you been listening to the show for long? Did you come across it here on CFC or..?

 

[ExtremeGardens]

With the new reveal for GS, it does seem we’ll be burning coal and oil in industrial zones after all!

I came across the show in 2016, here on the forums! I tend to binge listen in bursts across a few season until I caught up, mostly in buses and during laboratory work.

 

[DanQ]

With the new reveal for GS, it does seem we’ll be burning coal and oil in industrial zones after all!

I came across the show in 2016, here on the forums! I tend to binge listen in bursts across a few season until I caught up, mostly in buses and during laboratory work.

At this point, you've become a regular listener then I'd say. Glad you're still enjoying what you're hearing to still be doing so.