Suggestions and Requests

[Leoreth]

I don't really care for the interface or icons, but I love the terrain and leaderheads.

The terrain feels low contrast and undersaturated to me, but to be clear the basegame terrain in Civ4 is also not very good. I'm sure there are good mods for it. The leaderheads are very good, but my concern with them is that they make modding very hard. The requirements to create a new Civ5/6 leaderhead are so much higher than for Civ4.

Hexes are better, IMHO, because I didn't like how with squares, diagonal zig-zagging and a straight line both took the same number of movement points. Hexes fixed that problem.

I am agnostic on squares vs hexes but I never really understood why this is a problem. It seems like it's more a problem in people's minds than for the game design. If it's really an issue I don't see why making diagonal moves cost 1.4 movement isn't the easier solution.

If I made a game like this I'd probably still use squares only to avoid accidentally designing an operational/tactics game instead of a strategy game. There is a weird culture attached to hex based games that comes from the wargame community.

 

[HNation]

The terrain feels low contrast and undersaturated to me, but to be clear the basegame terrain in Civ4 is also not very good. I'm sure there are good mods for it.

Even though it is somewhat undersaturated, I think the textures are nice, and the mountains, especially, the way the mountain ranges are rendered look way better than the Civ 4 method of just having the same mountain copied ad infintum. The water is also very pretty in Civ 5. I don't know why Civ 4 Col had nicer water than regular Civ 4, though. I don't know if you ever played the "Paradise Found" scenario, but I found it to be relaxing in a strange way. Sailing across the vast South Pacific, the beautiful ocean graphics, that flute music. There's a bit of a nostalgia factor, there, too, since I played that scenario over and over again in 2011.

The leaderheads are very good, but my concern with them is that they make modding very hard. The requirements to create a new Civ5/6 leaderhead are so much higher than for Civ4.

I agree with that. While I never really loved the style of the Civ 4 leaderheads, I appreciate that they were easy to "remix" and create new leaderheads out of easily. I actually preferred the style of the Civ 3 leaderheads to the Civ 4 leaderheads, and loved the changing costumes/backgrounds on them.
Speaking of leaderheads, is there any chance you would replace the current Washington leaderhead with the one from Civ 4 Col?
I also found a nice Chiang Kai-shek leaderhead. It might be cool to have the Chinese leader in the modern era change based on what civics they are running.

I am agnostic on squares vs hexes but I never really understood why this is a problem. It seems like it's more a problem in people's minds than for the game design. If it's really an issue I don't see why making diagonal moves cost 1.4 movement isn't the easier solution.

If I made a game like this I'd probably still use squares only to avoid accidentally designing an operational/tactics game instead of a strategy game. There is a weird culture attached to hex based games that comes from the wargame community.

I also like the shape of the hex terrain better. Civ 5 coastlines aren't nearly as blocky as Civ 4 coastlines. Having diagonal moves cost 1.4 movement doesn't really work when most units have only 1 movement per turn.

 

[Dracosolon]

I don't think diagonal moves are an issue when units' speed per year is already wildly out of touch with reality.

 

[HNation]

I don't think diagonal moves are an issue when units' speed per year is already wildly out of touch with reality.

Fair enough tbh

 

[Leoreth]

I agree with that. While I never really loved the style of the Civ 4 leaderheads, I appreciate that they were easy to "remix" and create new leaderheads out of easily. I actually preferred the style of the Civ 3 leaderheads to the Civ 4 leaderheads, and loved the changing costumes/backgrounds on them.

Oh yeah, the changing appearance of Civ3 leaderheads was a cool feature. At least it tried to address the absurdity of "Lincoln in the Stone Age" but I guess it might also draw more attention to it. They probably dropped it in later games as LHs became more demanding to make.

Also I want to say that I never really liked the aesthetics and tone for any Civ game including Civ4. Civ2 was very in love with the then novel windows drop down menu and context menu UI and suffers from it a lot. Civ4 has a very strange attempt at comic art style and exaggerated personality, it shines through in how a lot of the leaderheads are drawn clearly for comedic effect (Montezuma's tantrums come to mind) as well as some diplomatic messages that go in that direction (and you could say the games overall art style is comic oriented). Not sure where this was coming from really, but thinking about WC3 being in the same time period maybe it was just in the air. I never liked the shiny sleek UI and iconography design of Civ5. Art deco is so inherently modern which puts you out of touch with the historical setting of most of the game. Civ6 really just looks like a Facebook game to me, I still don't understand how this got released in whatever year it came out as a AAA game and wasn't soundly laughed out of the room. Sorry.

Speaking of leaderheads, is there any chance you would replace the current Washington leaderhead with the one from Civ 4 Col?

I haven't thought about it, but sure.

I also like the shape of the hex terrain better. Civ 5 coastlines aren't nearly as blocky as Civ 4 coastlines. Having diagonal moves cost 1.4 movement doesn't really work when most units have only 1 movement per turn.

It is, but sometimes you also do want a straight coastline and it looks weird with the hex shaped jigsaw pattern. The fact that hexes allow straight horizontal arrangements but not straight vertical arrangements always bothered me.

 

[Glorfindel of Gondolin]

Forts could give a yield of +2 gold and add +1 trade route in capital, or +1 Great merchant per x forts.
The reason behind it is that usually forts are built not only for the purpose of defending some people, but also to defend trade routes.
They are supposed to protect the caravans and traders passing over vast distances, and also to accommodate the traders on the road, supply them with food and water and give them a place to rest.
Half an inn, half a fort.
Examples to that is the silk road, which had a lot of inns and guards spread over the whole way, meant to facilitate easy and safe passage.
The whole roman frontier to the east was dotted with forts, that protect the empire from the barbarians, but were also a commercial hub and the destination, the final stations of the silk road, and those forts had huge markets with goods from all over Asia, Africa and Europe, including china and India, Chinese silk.

 

[Glorfindel of Gondolin]

Maybe it could give +1 trade route in the nearest country, instead of in capital.

 

[Dracosolon]

Also I want to say that I never really liked the aesthetics and tone for any Civ game including Civ4. Civ2 was very in love with the then novel windows drop down menu and context menu UI and suffers from it a lot. Civ4 has a very strange attempt at comic art style and exaggerated personality, it shines through in how a lot of the leaderheads are drawn clearly for comedic effect (Montezuma's tantrums come to mind) as well as some diplomatic messages that go in that direction (and you could say the games overall art style is comic oriented). Not sure where this was coming from really, but thinking about WC3 being in the same time period maybe it was just in the air. I never liked the shiny sleek UI and iconography design of Civ5. Art deco is so inherently modern which puts you out of touch with the historical setting of most of the game. Civ6 really just looks like a Facebook game to me, I still don't understand how this got released in whatever year it came out as a AAA game and wasn't soundly laughed out of the room. Sorry.

I've never really liked how much focus the leaders get especially in later games but they're a staple of the franchise at this point, as well as the comical attempts at giving them more personality. I guess you could call them "charismatic" history along with wonders, like there is charismatic megafauna.

Three questions:

1) Are your issues with Civ IV mostly to do with the leaderheads or do they extend to the rest of the game's aesthetics as well?

2) Do you think some mods significantly improve the game on the aesthetic front (besides Blue Marble)?

3) Did you ever consider changing the leaderheads to static art (paintings, etc) like some mods do? I assume you might have and there's a good reason why you've kept animated leaderheads as the lesser evil.

 

[Logoncal]

I mean, DoC's best selling point for me is that it's artistically consistent and it isnt incredibly scrambled. It doesnt mash up too many styles, which is something that i've seen happening and your mileage can vary.

 

[Leoreth]

I've never really liked how much focus the leaders get especially in later games but they're a staple of the franchise at this point, as well as the comical attempts at giving them more personality. I guess you could call them "charismatic" history along with wonders, like there is charismatic megafauna.

I think that's a very good way of putting it. Perhaps unsurprisingly I am following a lot of discussions about the nature and appeal of historical 4X games on places like Three Moves Ahead and Soren Johnson's podcast and one thing that keeps coming up on why historical 4X games are so popular compared to scifi or fantasy settings is that everyone knows what The Wheel is and what the Pyramids are and who George Washington is. I don't even want to say emotional connection but it gives a point of grounding that helps contextualise what happens in the game. People think about their games as "oh this time the Chinese built the Pyramids but the Egyptians founded an island trade empire" and our pre-existing knowledge about the Chinese and Egyptians fills in the gaps or contrasts with game events, so that the game itself does not need to do much to explain what the Egyptians and Chinese are for the player to engage in that way.

If your science fiction game has the Protaxians invent the hyperphase drive but the Sorgoids build a spaceship with tachyon cannons that can mean everything and nothing. Such a game would need to do a lot of work to make you get an understanding of who those people and what those technologies are. Most confusingly don't even bother and that's why these games fall flat.

It's also what makes Alpha Centauri so remarkable as a game because it does invent a weird future setting but uses the tools of the genre extremely well to establish an emotional connection with the weird things in it (just think of the Recycling Tanks quote and stuff like that). And nevertheless it is still a niche game.

Three questions:

1) Are your issues with Civ IV mostly to do with the leaderheads or do they extend to the rest of the game's aesthetics as well?

I think the way units and terrain elements and buildings are proportioned is all a bit too cartoony for my taste, but it was probably a good move at the time to include strategy players with bad hardware and turn the flaw of the limited graphics into a virtue. Like I said above, Civ5 does a turn for realism and drabness and that works even less for me.

2) Do you think some mods significantly improve the game on the aesthetic front (besides Blue Marble)?

Oh definitely. I think the game in its DoC state (i.e. mostly Blue Marble added) actually looks really good. I don't mind the cartoony proportions that much, once you are used to it as what the game looks like it's fine. I don't know if there are major improvements on top of that. I think graphical improvements go more in the direction of variety rather than quality for most mods.

3) Did you ever consider changing the leaderheads to static art (paintings, etc) like some mods do? I assume you might have and there's a good reason why you've kept animated leaderheads as the lesser evil.

With all I said about some of the animations, I think you lose a lot if leaderheads do not respond at all. The diplomacy screen is all you have in terms of interaction with AI "players". If you play the game a lot there is little illusion left with respect to the "realness" of your opponent but it's still better if you have something to cling on to to sustain that idea.

And like Logoncal mentions, it would be difficult to impossible to find consistent artwork for all leaders in the game. I'd rather have everyone equally cartoony looking than juxtapose Baroque paintings with medieval illustrations with Babylonian relief works. Or worse, mix actual historical depictions with artist's imaginations. At least the animated leaderheads are honest about capturing the idea of a historical character more than being a factual depiction of them.

 

[1SDANi]

RE: Leaderheads, I've always found them to be really weird. They at once want to be a famous person from history and an immortal god. If they're going for a "spirit of the society" vibe, I feel like they could be just as well be swapped out with cultural entities that can be changed by some mechanic, like for the USA, Rosie the Riveter for production, Uncle Sam for expansion, and Lady Liberty for culture, or for Greece, Hellas for defense, Odysseus for expansion, and Prometheus for science.

I don't really care for the interface or icons, but I love the terrain and leaderheads.

Hexes are better, IMHO, because I didn't like how with squares, diagonal zig-zagging and a straight line both took the same number of movement points. Hexes fixed that problem.

If I were designing a civ game, I would probably do something like 3 combat units per tile, 4 in cities or on forts. That's a happy medium between 1UPT and stacks of doom.

Again, stacks of doom aren't a problem if you properly balance collateral damage. There's no need to create artificial limitations on the player when the same effect can be produced by giving the player counterplay.

 

[Logoncal]

DoC's stacks of doom are really not that powerful, by the way. Artillery got mega buffed by having their collat and retreat increased, so you can throw them at a stack more often.
And it hurts.

 

[Dracosolon]

I figured if the aim was really to split up stacks of doom they could have introduced some sort of "logistics" stat that limits how many units can exist on a tile, susceptible to increase with techs, pillage, generals, etc. But the real goal was probably just to make the series more accessible to casual players.

 

[Logoncal]

I figured if the aim was really to split up stacks of doom they could have introduced some sort of "logistics" stat that limits how many units can exist on a tile, susceptible to increase with techs, pillage, generals, etc. But the real goal was probably just to make the series more accessible to casual players.

Like the supply system in Realism Invictus? Which punishes you on overstacking too much, forcing you to be smart.

 

[1SDANi]

I figured if the aim was really to split up stacks of doom they could have introduced some sort of "logistics" stat that limits how many units can exist on a tile, susceptible to increase with techs, pillage, generals, etc. But the real goal was probably just to make the series more accessible to casual players.

You know, that does give me an idea: What if there was said logistics stat, but past said number of units per tile, Units cost 1 additional gold of upkeep? That way, it both "fixes" the "problem" that doesn't exist without actually creating any hard limits on gameplay and subtly nudges players away from getting themselves killed by putting all their eggs in one basket.

 

[SOVNARKOM]

Can you upload a save of that situation?

You can see that my North African cities (Tobruk and Tripoli) are eligible for recruitment (requiring 50% culture), but at the same time, I am subject to stability penalties in these cities

 

[IrishDragon]

How about, instead of total collapse, you lose all your cities but retain 3-4 units, perhaps lead by a warlord. With some message like 'The people have tired of your leadership and forced you to flee with your closest followers'. If you play your cards right and with some luck/skill, you can recapture a city over the next few turns and try to build your way back from there. Everyone loves a comeback story, it's a harsh punishment and you aren't unceremoniously dumped out of the game

 

[HNation]

Oh yeah, the changing appearance of Civ3 leaderheads was a cool feature. At least it tried to address the absurdity of "Lincoln in the Stone Age" but I guess it might also draw more attention to it. They probably dropped it in later games as LHs became more demanding to make.

It also was nice for scenarios, since it increased the number of era and culture appropriate leaderheads available. I remember that medieval Lincoln was used for some Burgundian king in the Middle Ages scenario from Conquests.
Also, since Civ 3 had only 4 eras, it was probably more manageable. I haven't played unmodded Civ 4 in years, but IIRC, it has like 6 eras.

Also I want to say that I never really liked the aesthetics and tone for any Civ game including Civ4. Civ2 was very in love with the then novel windows drop down menu and context menu UI and suffers from it a lot. Civ4 has a very strange attempt at comic art style and exaggerated personality, it shines through in how a lot of the leaderheads are drawn clearly for comedic effect (Montezuma's tantrums come to mind) as well as some diplomatic messages that go in that direction (and you could say the games overall art style is comic oriented). Not sure where this was coming from really, but thinking about WC3 being in the same time period maybe it was just in the air. I never liked the shiny sleek UI and iconography design of Civ5. Art deco is so inherently modern which puts you out of touch with the historical setting of most of the game. Civ6 really just looks like a Facebook game to me, I still don't understand how this got released in whatever year it came out as a AAA game and wasn't soundly laughed out of the room. Sorry.

I thought Civ 3 had the nicest tone of any of the Civ games I played (3,4,5). Civ4Col also had a nice tone, but I guess it's easier to make a tonally consistent game when you're focused on one area and era.
I didn't much care for the Civ 5 UI, either, but I did like the terrain and leader graphics. Nor did I really like Civ 4's UI, although you and embryodead both made it better by turning it grey and brown respectively. I liked how the Civ 3 UI kind of looked like parchment, that added to the historical feel.
The nice thing about Civ 3 is, even though it wasn't very moddable and had some flaws is, it tried to make all the eras distinct. Distinct music, leaders changing clothes, advisers changing clothes. The eras don't feel nearly as distinct aesthetically in Civ 4, and not at all in Civ 5, where, from 4000 BC to 2000 AD, there is the same music, the same leader costumes, the hyper-modern UI.
Completely agree about Civ 6 looking like a Facebook or mobile game. I found it very oftputting, I played at most an hour or two of Civ 6, because my brother has it and I was curious. I also think the Civ 6 leaderheads are a big step back...far fewer voiced lines, way more cartoony, and not even a full background.

I haven't thought about it, but sure.

Awesome

It is, but sometimes you also do want a straight coastline and it looks weird with the hex shaped jigsaw pattern. The fact that hexes allow straight horizontal arrangements but not straight vertical arrangements always bothered me.

It's not the straight coastline that I dislike, but whenever you have a coastline that should be rounded or diagonal and is just blocky. I'm sure they could have easily fixed this in the exe, which, IIRC, is the only part of Civ 4 that is still not moddable, almost 2 decades later. Civ 3's coastlines seemed less blocky to me.

 

[HNation]

Oh definitely. I think the game in its DoC state (i.e. mostly Blue Marble added) actually looks really good. I don't mind the cartoony proportions that much, once you are used to it as what the game looks like it's fine. I don't know if there are major improvements on top of that. I think graphical improvements go more in the direction of variety rather than quality for most mods.

I agree with this. The major improvements that would be nice to DoC/SoI/Blue Marble are seemingly not possible (importing water from Civ4Col which is apparently impossible because of something to do with the shaders, less blocky coastline which is apparently impossible because it's coded in the exe)

When I first started playing DoC in the fall of 2012, Blue Marble was the last of the modcomps that I downloaded, but ever since I did, it's not something I want to play any Civ 4 game without. The semidesert and salt flat terrains also seem to blend with blue marble better than Rhye's terrain or base Civ 4 terrain, I don't know where embryodead got those or if he made them himself.

But Blue Marble definitely improved on the Civ 4 experience significantly. I wonder why the base Civ 4 terrain wasn't great, when a lot of other games released around that time had much better graphics, for example, from 2006

Now obviously, Civ is on a much more zoomed out scale than Anno, but surely, they could have given Civ 4 this kind of water graphics instead of the fairly lifeless oceans we got.

 

[triplebassist]

How about, instead of total collapse, you lose all your cities but retain 3-4 units, perhaps lead by a warlord. With some message like 'The people have tired of your leadership and forced you to flee with your closest followers'. If you play your cards right and with some luck/skill, you can recapture a city over the next few turns and try to build your way back from there. Everyone loves a comeback story, it's a harsh punishment and you aren't unceremoniously dumped out of the game

Collapse to core exists for the AI, but I'm pretty sure it doesn't currently exist for the human player because we have plenty of tools to not get into that bad of a situation in the first place.