April 2021 Update - Patch Notes Discussion

[Buktu]

I'd like to know the answer to this too. I was busy yesterday, so I didn't get to start a new game until just before bed. Unfortunately, I didn't get far enough into the game to check if this was still an issue. I'm at work now, so it'll be a bit of a wait before I can fire up my saved game again - unless someone else could shed some light on the situation.

It worked for me again in my game yesterday

 

[SammyKhalifa]

I stumbled onto what might or might not be a new bug related to City States (and barb mode?). I liberated Chinguetti but it's not showing up in the CS list. It was France's last city before it rebeled to a red city, then I took it over and liberated it.

 

[slavaskii]

Just to make a quick comment (I hadn't realized the other thread was vote-only, sorry!), at the time of writing, reactions are 25 very good, 21 good, and 18 disappointing. I personally feel as if you have to vote poor if you've been having technical issues since the patch that have made it unplayable; there are undoubtably really good changes here, such as to Maya, Spain, Georgia, Canada and tourism in general.

I think two things from this: one, if over 50% of people have opinions ranging on the patch from just good to poor, it is clear the majority of us feel like the game could've been left in a better place. Is "us" representative of the overall community? No, of course not! I honestly expect if you took this poll elsewhere on social media, you'd see more positive results (similarly, Steam reviews are often quite negative, so if you asked reviewers there this would probably be much more negative). Regardless, I think the poll results send a very clear message to the developers, and I hope we can work with them to leave Civ VI in the best state possible. Thank you, moderators, for the idea!

The second, is that I think myself and others would have a very different perception of this patch if it wasn't called the 'final' one. If we were told we could expect another similar one, even if it comes out in half a year? Fantastic! I'd consider this a very good start and would've happily changed my response. But I'm sorry, I feel like closing the book on Civ VI here after this would be a mistake. I suspect that many people who voted higher also assume there's more content coming, whereas those that voted lower assume this is the end. Of course I have no way of determining this, but when honestly examining my own opinion, I realized I would have voted much higher if I thought other civs would be getting proper attention down the line.

I hope that if the developers are taking note of this, they realize that, though more people argue the patch is 'very good' compared to anything else, that doesn't mean the majority only believe it to be good or worse.

 

[Gedemon]

The second, is that I think myself and others would have a very different perception of this patch if it wasn't called the 'final' one.

Exactly. I would not even have voted if it was not labelled "final" and would have waited for the next one, as usual.

But as a final patch ? leaving the game very unstable, with an Ai still unable to deploy fighters, and no update to the modding assets ? Absolutely nothing interesting for me, and no hope of anything this year, if ever ? yep, I'm the one who has voted "poor".

 

[SammyKhalifa]

I stumbled onto what might or might not be a new bug related to City States (and barb mode?). I liberated Chinguetti but it's not showing up in the CS list. It was France's last city before it rebeled to a red city, then I took it over and liberated it.

It showed up a few turns later. IDK. I know I wasn't just not seeing it because It's the only religious CS currently in the game

 

[shaglio]

It worked for me again in my game yesterday

Oh great! Thanks for responding.

 

[Mtgkuvalda]

I think so too! To be honest, it is not clear why there is only one samurai. To give the opportunity to reach the unit through the culture, to a real useful combat unit - this is what we were promised 5-6 years ago. The current arrangement in the apprenticeship is also terribly combined with the Gauls and crazy buffs Babylon.
It would be good to transfer Skirmisher to the apprenticeship, because there is nothing "mechanical" in it. Would be an alternative to some. Doubtful, many will say, and they will be right. It is vital for the recon units to raise their strength by 5!

 

[slavaskii]

To my surprise, there are now more disappointing (23) votes than good (22). I think these reactions really necessitate a comment from the developers on the future of the game.

Exactly. I would not even have voted if it was not labelled "final" and would have waited for the next one, as usual.

But as a final patch ? leaving the game very unstable, with an Ai still unable to deploy fighters, and no update to the modding assets ? Absolutely nothing interesting for me, and no hope of anything this year, if ever ? yep, I'm the one who has voted "poor".

Thank you for your elaboration! I think you hit the nail on the head, there's a lot with Civ VI that still needs to be worked on, and that's why the whole idea of flirting with this being the "final patch" is so troublesome. Honestly, if every few months they released bug fixes and balance changes (perhaps even culminating in more modding assets), that would be fantastic. Changing a few mechanics and providing more support is honestly what this game needs more than anything now, but new DLC and expansions are just building up the problem further.

Being cagey with details is acceptable when your community thinks the game is in a good place. But as I've said before, after paying $100+ dollars I'm saddened to think the team really believes the game is fine as-is, and it will indeed cause me to think twice before buying Civ VII. After all, Civ is the type of the game that gets exponentially better with expansions, it was reasonable to assume that after five years it would be nearing perfection. Many argued that Civ V wasn't good upon release, but after BNW (and Vox Populi, which was thanks to modders) it gained a very favorable reputation. It's okay for the developers to acknowledge the game to be incomplete right now, but it's not okay for them to pretend it's not.

 

[Leucarum]

So I voted very good. Overall there were only 3 civs where I disliked the changes. And only one civ which I wanted to see worked over that didn't get hit (Babylon, but they were probably too new to consider).

On a civ by civ basis, just rating things as a hit/miss/neither... (curious to see how others rate them, especially people who disagree)

Aztec: Neither
Australia: Neither
Canada: Hit
China: Hit
France: Hit
Georgia: Hit
Germany: Neither
Inca: Hit
Japan: Neither
Khmer: Hit
Kongo: Miss
Korea: Miss
Mapuche: Hit
Maya: Hit
Mongolia: Hit
Netherlands: Hit
Nubia: Hit
Ottoman: Hit
Persia: Neither
Russia: Miss
Scythia: Hit
Spain: Hit
Sumeria: Hit
Vietnam: Hit
Zulu: Hit

Most of the ones I marked neither are very minor changes that I can barely see impacting the game. In the case of Korea and russia I think the nerf bat should have been applied/applied harder. And poor Kongo deserved an overall buff not a (mostly) nerf.

 

[Kwami]

To my surprise, there are now more disappointing (23) votes than good (22). I think these reactions really necessitate a comment from the developers on the future of the game.

But also more very good than disappointing. Overall, there are more good+ than disappointing and poor by a large margin. And, from what I've been able to gather elsewhere, the overall response to this patch is quite positive.

 

[Cerilis]

To my surprise, there are now more disappointing (23) votes than good (22). I think these reactions really necessitate a comment from the developers on the future of the game.

Completely ignoring there are even more very good (27) votes... (and, as time of writing 7 outstanding and 3 poor)

 

[slavaskii]

But also more very good than disappointing. Overall, there are more good+ than disappointing and poor by a large margin. And, from what I've been able to gather elsewhere, the overall response to this patch is quite positive.

Completely ignoring there are even more very good (27) votes... (and, as time of writing 7 outstanding and 3 poor)

I'm sorry, but 'good' is the third option on the list, that being average. I'm not completely ignoring the fact there's more very good votes. I'm just saying that if we were really just shooting for average with this patch, they've achieved that and the poll shows that. We need to seriously acknowledge the fact people aren't happy with this and try to figure out what went wrong, because something did. I stated above: most votes are for very good. But the majority right now think it was just good or worse. I don't think any developer should be satisfied with that, and if they are, this is the last Civ game I will buy.

 

[Kwami]

I think that you're vastly overestimating the "people aren't happy" crowd. Not only is this forum not representative of the community, but even here, there are more positive votes than negative. Perhaps you aren't happy, and that's fine, but please don't project your view onto "people".

 

[João III]

But also more very good than disappointing. Overall, there are more good+ than disappointing and poor by a large margin. And, from what I've been able to gather elsewhere, the overall response to this patch is quite positive.

Seems a bit misleading to lump together the top 3 (out of 5) categories and claim a large margin. Could just as easily lump together the bottom 3 and say "Overall, more people thought it was average or below and by a large margin." I think based only on responses to the poll, it'd be fair to say the response is mixed.

 

[Kwami]

Seems a bit misleading to lump together the top 3 (out of 5) categories and claim a large margin. Could just as easily lump together the bottom 3 and say "Overall, more people thought it was average or below and by a large margin." I think based only on responses to the poll, it'd be fair to say the response is mixed.

Well, that's what @slavaskii was doing, though. He kept saying "good or worse", lumping the bottom 3 together. I just did the opposite. Besides, "good" is good. It fits better with "very good" and "outstanding" than with "disappointing" and "poor".

 

[Duke William of Normandy]

My perspective on all this, and inferring from other's posts, is that people aren't unhappy with the patch, it's that they are underwhelmed. They expected more changes, wanted certain Civs changed, etc.

I've seen many people happy and some people not with the Civ changes, and all the comments about the Cultural Domination changes seem to be positive. To me, the disappointment can be simplified down to these reasons:

• People are disappointed that some Civs got buffed/nerfed when others weren't.
• People are underwhelmed by the scale of the TSL Huge Earth Map.
• People were overly hyped about what was coming in the April Patch and were disappointed.
• People wanted more big changes and more integration of the Modes.

 

[slavaskii]

Seems a bit misleading to lump together the top 3 (out of 5) categories and claim a large margin. Could just as easily lump together the bottom 3 and say "Overall, more people thought it was average or below and by a large margin." I think based only on responses to the poll, it'd be fair to say the response is mixed.

Thank you, this is really what I've been trying to get at, and maybe I'm just really bad at explaining my opinion but I don't think it's all that controversial. Yesterday, people were saying that there were only a handful of people that were disappointed, but I think the poll today shows that's quite untrue. Yes - people are happy. But I frankly don't believe that when a developer pushes a final patch, they should be hoping people just say it's "good" and move on. Why not spend the time to address the concerns that'll make more people think it's very good?

Good doesn't mean people are in love with the patch, it implies some sort of mediocre satisfaction, or that people think it's merely "decent". It's not right to lump those with the more positive views, especially ones that suggest there was nothing more that could've been done to make it better. All I want is for people to acknowledge that there were problems here that weren't addressed. I'm not projecting my opinion on anyone, I think the poll in fact proves otherwise: there were more people than originally thought that weren't completely happy.

If I was a developer and saw this, I would be happy we knocked it out of the park for some people, but I'd be concerned so many people were tempted to only rate the patch as 3/5 or lower. I just feel like there's two mindsets being perceived on this forum right now: one, that the patch was fantastic as is, and two, that it was terrible. But that's not it at all. I feel like we should all be saying this patch could have been better and sincerely hope the developers are listening. I don't see the value in dismissing the very clear criticisms of the patch.

Edit: Just as a point of discussion for those looking only in this thread, 29 people now say it is very good and 29 say it is disappointing.

 

[João III]

Well, that's what @slavaskii was doing, though. He kept saying "good or worse", lumping the bottom 3 together. I just did the opposite. Besides, "good" is good. It fits better with "very good" and "outstanding" than with "disappointing" and "poor".

I guess it just depends on how you look at the "3-good" option. I looked at the 3, so I see it more as a score of 3 out of 5. And if we ignore the middle option, there's currently an even split between "very good" and "disappointed" so I'd still say it's a mixed reception (based only on that poll)

My perspective on all this, and inferring from other's posts, is that people aren't unhappy with the patch, it's that they are underwhelmed. They expected more changes, wanted certain Civs changed, etc.

Sounds like we need another poll with options of overwhelmed, whelmed, and underwhelmed

 

[Vandlys]

I voted disappointing. I'm okay with the patch contents, but seeing as it's the final one they failed to deliver on their promise of fixing the world builder (a fully functioning world builder was promised at release), and the fact that modding is still such a pain for the bigger mods is just a detriment to another 2500 hours of Civ.

So, I deleted my Hall of Fame and will start a new game without too many mods (only visual and QoL ones), and will play through all Civs again before probably only using the game every once in a while as a builder.

Or, more likely, by that time I'll give Gedemon's work a try and enjoy that for 1000+ hours.

 

[Duke William of Normandy]

I voted Very Good, although I haven't played yet, so my opinion may shift if need be.