April 2021 Developer Livestream Discussion

[InsidiousMage]

but Rome came out in orginal civ 6 while Korea came out in R/F... why do we need beginner civ in R/F? isn't Germany and Rome enough?

Rome and Germany do different things than Korea though. Germany is about production, Rome is general utility and Korea is a science and governor focus. You need to offer new players more than one avenue to learn about the game. In fact, I think Firaxis should just tell players in the game itself that if they want to learn how to do a science victory to play this civ, domination use this civ and so and so.

 

[BD123]

but Rome came out in orginal civ 6 while Korea came out in R/F... why do we need beginner civ in R/F? isn't Germany and Rome enough?
You could argue that for spain and Khmer and yet they received such a big change.

Well to be fair the Khmer and Spain were just absolute hot messes, weak, and in the case of Spain, entirely convoluted with massive paragraphs describing the Mission and inter-continental bonuses. Korea is boring and strong, but straightforward. I agree that more work could be given to Korea, especially separating the CUA from the Seowon, but to say they were in the same camp as Spain or Khmer is a bit much.

 

[The googles do nothing]

The Gilgamesh buff makes him even more unbalanced in MP. I don't even know why it's added in SP. If he's in the game and you auto-friend him should you then go for a domination victory?

 

[Kupe Navigator]

I think Firaxis should just tell players in the game itself that if they want to learn how to do a science victory to play this civ, domination use this civ and so and so.

they could've have done that in other ways then make Korea a Sewon civ.

 

[Kupe Navigator]

meh at least Maya is getting a buff...
right now Maya is better Korea.

 

[InsidiousMage]

they could've have done that in other ways then make Korea a Sewon civ.

Intro to gameplay civs need to straight forward and build Seowons and have lots of governs is pretty straight forward. Not to mention the fact that some civs are just going to be more boring or standard or what ever and draw the short end of the stick. The devs can design everything can't be amazing all the time because otherwise the game would never come out. Some stuff is just going to be lackluster and there isn't really anything that can be done about that.

 

[Duke William of Normandy]

In fact, I think Firaxis should just tell players in the game itself that if they want to learn how to do a science victory to play this civ, domination use this civ and so and so.

Oh, how I wish this was discussed beforehand. We could have had a definitive answer to which Civs Firaxis believes are the starter Civs that all newbies should play before going on to the more complicated Civs.

 

[BD123]

Spain got a big overhaul as we know, but the geothermal fissure start bias is interesting bc 1. I literally do not ever think of geothermal fissures in relation to Spain like yes there's volcanos in the Canaries other than that... and 2. Spain is oddly pushed more towards a science victory? Before they had an inclination towards science since you get the beefiest missions by putting them next to campuses and holy sites, but now you'll have a start bias towards geothermal vents (as well mountains by extension) PLUS you build more campuses on different continents faster on top of your mission bonuses. I guess it makes sense gameplay wise - you need good science to hit caravels and astronomy and whatever - but thematically it feels off bc Spain isn't ever considered "scientific." Cultural, economic, military, religious, yes - but science? Not really.

Also I had completely forgot about Poland until they mentioned them and then when they described the change to Poland I went from forgetful to entirely puzzled at their logic

 

[Kupe Navigator]

he devs can design everything can't be amazing all the time because otherwise the game would never come out

but they had 2+ years to really think and change.
I wasn't expecting any changes to NFP civs because they didn't have time to change but for original and R&F civs devs had more than enough time to think about each civs and look at feedbacks.

 

[Futumch]

The notes will be helpful tomorrow.
Spain looks like it might be not so one-dimensional after this patch. They are pretty lacklustre at the moment.
Oh, and the little tweaks to Maya look a lot better.

 

[BD123]

I wasn't expecting massive reworks for everyone outside of the three shown in the first look video but I don't like how they considered unit balance to be a part of civ balance like including Ethiopia as a "changed" civ only bc the Oromo Cavalry was given the same buffing treatment as all the other cavalry units...

 

[InsidiousMage]

Oh, how I wish this was discussed beforehand. We could have had a definitive answer to which Civs Firaxis believes are the starter Civs that all newbies should play before going on to the more complicated Civs.

One of the things I love about Crusader Kings 3 is that the game gives several default characters to start as, their situation and the expected difficulty level of that you will encounter. The biggest mark against Civ6 in my opinion is that while the tutorial is really good you don't get guide as how to actually win the game and specific civs to guide how to do that would vastly improve the new player friendliness of the game.

 

[InsidiousMage]

but they had 2+ years to really think and change.
I wasn't expecting any changes to NFP civs because they didn't have time to change but for original and R&F civs devs had more than enough time to think about each civs and look at feedbacks.

Again, we have no idea about the design philosophy behind any of the civs and we don't know how long they've been actively working on the NFP, not to mention that different parts got different amount of work put into them. Maybe they didn't put a lot of time into reworking Korea because they are happy with it as a new player friendly civ.

 

[Kupe Navigator]

Spain looks like it might be not so one-dimensional after this patch.

this tiggers so much since Spain and Khmer seems to be only one-dimensional civs to receive any meaningful change...
While Korea, Arabia, Netherlands and Scotland gets left in the dust...

 

[Kupe Navigator]

. Maybe they didn't put a lot of time into reworking Korea because they are happy with it as a new player friendly civ.

I guess Netherlands and Scotland is beginner friendly civ and don't deserve to be changed huh?

 

[CromulentRomulan]

this tiggers so much since Spain and Khmer seems to be only one-dimensional civs to receive any meaningful change...
While Korea, Arabia, Netherlands and Scotland gets left in the dust...

Please do me and yourself a favour and don't use "triggered"/"triggers" when you intend to say "annoyed"/"annoys". At best its annoying and at worst its disrespectful

 

[slavaskii]

meh at least Maya is getting a buff...
right now Maya is better Korea.

Here is one thing I’ll say: in terms of design and ‘fun’, buffed Maya is miles and miles more fun than Korea. I think this is unfortunate because no Civ (save some of the domination ones) are as tunnel-visioned for a specific victory type as Korea. Their ‘balance’ seemed honestly like a bug fix that, ironically, buffed them even more.

But Maya is *not* better than Korea, at least not from what we know. Korea is still much better than Maya for science victories, it just seems like Maya has more utility now. I would play Korea if I want an easy win. I would play Maya if I wanted to have a challenging, yet fun, time. The people who *really* got run over by this patch were those who loved a civ that was either already weak and was somehow nerfed or ignored altogether.

 

[Linklite]

but Rome came out in orginal civ 6 while Korea came out in R/F... why do we need beginner civ in R/F? isn't Germany and Rome enough?
You could argue that for spain and Khmer and yet they received such a big change.

To be fair, there is definitely room for more than one beginner civ in the game. I woukd support having a beginner civ that is adapted to each of the Victory types. Rome does CV and Dom, Korea does SV, etc.

 

[InsidiousMage]

I guess Netherlands and Scotland is beginner friendly civ and don't deserve to be changed huh?

I don't consider them beginner civs and expect them to get some changes, mostly to the leader abilities, but I'm not a game designer so who knows.

 

[Futumch]

this tiggers so much since Spain and Khmer seems to be only one-dimensional civs to receive any meaningful change...
While Korea, Arabia, Netherlands and Scotland gets left in the dust...

I don't know, I thought that Spain was supposed to be both a trade and religion based civ, but it was heavily religion biased. The way they presented the changes in the video looked to me like it was bringing Spain back to where it should have been in the first place.

(Aside: if you see any double "i" in my posts, just ignore them. This keyboard is dodgy, and while I try to correct as I go, sometimes they slip through).