April 2021 Update - Patch Notes Discussion

[mrwho]

lol, it takes some real mental gymnastics to argue 'good' doesn't mean 'good'.

 

[Villager720]

I’m honestly shocked and very disappointed they still haven’t fixed the luxury bug for corporations and monopolies months later.
It is a core component of the game and the core component of that game mode.
It be akin to Barbarians not interacting with AI on Barbarian clan modes or the AI never using secret societies.

I hope they have more coming down the pipeline - this would be a tragic state to leave the game in.

Edit: I voted disappointed on the poll.

 

[Tuvok694]

AI seems to use heroes more efficiently now. I tried to play as Khmer, my neighbor Georgia declared war on me and Mulan one-shot every military unit that was not inside a city in only a few rounds. Never seen such an aggressive Mulan hero before. All those fancy holy sites did not help me after all, I would have had to build more units. My usual mistakes.

 

[João III]

lol, it takes some real mental gymnastics to argue 'good' doesn't mean 'good'.

If it wasn't labeled "good", would you argue 3 out of 5 is good?

 

[Pietato]

Just saw the poll. Those results are worse than they look, seeing as 'good' is the middle-ground and disappointing has the most votes.

If it wasn't labeled "good", would you argue 3 out of 5 is good?

This.

 

[Melkus]

I think these poll results are not that hard to read - pointless to argue about their interpretation.

I'll only speak for myself: There was the hope that this is a big wrap-up patch that solves at least some of the issues (the longstanding ones and the ones that have opened up during NFP):

- a non-challenging and boring AI with almost no individuality
- weak integration of game modes (AI; but rulesets too, great concepts like Dramatic Ages and Corp Mode that fall apart at the first playthrough)
- the clear imbalance between city centers' strength and units (again: worsened by a AI that can't consistently organize its units)
- a progressively more boring mid- and endgame
- a lack of deep modding abilities that made stuff like Rhye's and Fall or Vox Populi possible.

Only the third of these points has been addressed at all, and not in a consequential way. And the fact that Carl casually dominated three different quick deity games in the latest stream shows that Firaxis isn't as worried about this as I am.

The single player experience I hope for in a civ game is just not there yet (despite huge potential and creativity on display).
That is why "disappointed" exactly fits my reaction to this patch. It doesn't help that there's no communication about any future plans.

Does it matter if that's fair or not? - No. I respect the people who make this thing and would be just as disappointed if I were a part of the team.

But seen as a bunch of changes without this context, I'd be more positive. (I don't get the cheering about the absurd and unnecessary yields for Spanish trade routes, but whatever)

 

[Linklite]

Just saw the poll. Those results are worse than they look, seeing as 'good' is the middle-ground and disappointing has the most votes.

The problem is that the responses crafted by the maker were biased (no offence intended). By having "Good" as the middle option, people might interpret that as neutral, or take it at face value, which brings in the problem of having more positive options than negative. This causes inconsistent reponses (what does "good" mean?), so it's hard to tell. But given that this might be the final patch you would have thought that the devs would have tried to go out with a bang, and you'd expect the results to be tilted towards positive responses.

This leads me to my conspiracy theory that it wasn't as comprehensive as it could have been because it's not expected to be the final update (cue suspenseful music). We'll see, I guess. No real evidence either way, all just speculation at this point.

 

[Villager720]

(I don't get the cheering about the absurd and unnecessary yields for Spanish trade routes, but whatever)

This baffles me as well. We literally just got an absurd trade yield civ, from Iberia no less!

 

[Pietato]

The problem is that the responses crafted by the maker were biased (no offence intended). By having "Good" as the middle option, people might interpret that as neutral, or take it at face value, which brings in the problem of having more positive options than negative. This causes inconsistent reponses (what does "good" mean?), so it's hard to tell. But given that this might be the final patch you would have thought that the devs would have tried to go out with a bang, and you'd expect the results to be tilted towards positive responses.

This leads me to my conspiracy theory that it wasn't as comprehensive as it could have been because it's not expected to be the final update (cue suspenseful music). We'll see, I guess. No real evidence either way, all just speculation at this point.

Yep. Most people who want to vote average will default to the 'good' option.

 

[slavaskii]

I think these poll results are not that hard to read - pointless to argue about their interpretation.
I'll only speak for myself: There was the hope that this is a big wrap-up patch that solves at least some of the issues (the longstanding ones and the ones that have opened up during NFP):

I bolded what's really important here, that by repeatedly communicating this as the 'final free patch' (whatever that's supposed to mean), they created an expectation about the update that wasn't fulfilled. I look at this patch from the perspective that it is indeed the final update, and because Firaxis won't really address this point (intentional or not), we have no choice but to view it as such. Therefore, I ask myself: is Civ VI in a better state with this patch? If yes, is this how I want Civ VI to end?

Because I think we can all agree that this update didn't do anything to really make the game worse, there's no problem with answering the first question with a resounding yes. But as to the latter? A hard, hard no. That's why I'm forced to rate it as disappointing. There were things that were left out here, changes that were just confusing, and overall I can't say it fulfilled the role of a 'community balance update' at all, particularly one associated with finality.

Lastly, I just want to say this: while I'm glad to see people came and did vote their mind, validating that there were indeed far more than four people here dissatisfied, I also want to make it clear the poll should in no way be perceived as a competition. It's just something that I hope can be used to provide feedback to the team, and judging by how it's gone so far, I hope our concerns are acknowledged in one form or another before Civ VI is ended.

 

[Buckets]

Maybe I've learned to temper my expectations, but I find this update to be good, and voted so.

Did it fill out my personal wish list for fixes and changes? No.

Did it make the game a little better? Yes.

I call that good. And that's, like, just my opinion, man.

 

[Duuk]

Since this patch, I seem to be getting weird issues. Is anyone else having TSL Mediterranean maps not start civs in the right spot or, worse, having invalid civs loading? I really want to like the patch, and I was super excited about TSL Med (the only thing I liked about Civ5)... and it doesn't work for me. I uninstalled YNAMP and Better Coastal (my only two map mods), leaving me with Sukiract... and it won't work right.

Edit: On a side note: Our discussions over this led me to buy CTP2 from gog and play it again and it's so snappy.

 

[Noble Zarkon]

The problem is that the responses crafted by the maker were biased (no offence intended). By having "Good" as the middle option, people might interpret that as neutral, or take it at face value, which brings in the problem of having more positive options than negative.

Yeah I probably should have made the "good" option OK or something. At the moment we have 38% who voted it Outstanding or Very Good and 37% who voted it Disappointing or Poor. I made the poll because there were what seemed to be a small number of very vocal people in here who were totally slating the patch, it seems only 3% agree with that view. Disappointing is perhaps because of skewed expectations based on the debate here and the fact people have been debating it in depth. Certainly the reaction outside CivFanatics seems to be much more positive than on here.

 

[Banana Sam]

Currently disappointed by the patch.

Biggest issue: no apparent changes to the myriad issues the AI faces. In my most recent deity game, Genghis Khan lost 4+ cities to me through the influence system, and more cities to other AIs - he simply refused to build the proper infrastructure or install governors to protect the cities. And since it's trivially easy to get the entire world to simply befriend you, even on deity, there was no risk of war or anything that could stop my victory. Finishing with a modest t250 science victory, no AIs had even finished the first project of the science victory, nor were threatening any other wincons for the next ~100 turns or so.

Second problem: haphazard and random balancing. Why are Korea and Inca, two objectively powerful civs, buffed while others like India and Cree that are nearly unanimously considered weak left alone? Saw an argument here that Korea's buff is okay because their unique unit wasn't improved while others' were. I strongly disagree - Korea could already trivially steamroll any difficulty level in single player without even building its UU, and this is now marginally easier with the update. The gulf between a civilization like Korea and India has now increased even further - the game is now less balanced due to this patch.

Finally, this patch didn't address any pie in the sky hopes. Walls are still OP. There's still no real incentive for high population cities aside from the hamfisted Rationalism changes over the past year - we still desperately need infrastructure that scales properly with population, something the developers should be familiar with given Civ 5. Lategame is the worst it's ever been in the series with no realistic way for AIs to stop a player from winning once they're far enough ahead, nor are they even programmed to try doing so. While backstabs from friends in 4/5 were lame, at least the AI could potentially catch you off guard.

Totally understand maintaining reasonable expectations for things. Problem is Firaxis not only labeled this the final update but the number of civs they said they were changing indicated they were changing everything outside of the NFP. Instead we got random buffs to already strong civs while the bottom tier was left alone. There's a chance that they'll keep updating the game, but considering how they refused to continue patching Civs 4 and 5 despite these games maintaining massive playerbases, and 5 in particular ending up as one of the most unbalanced Civ games, it's difficult to remain hopeful for the future of this entry.

 

[SammyKhalifa]

You have to account for that fact that people who do polls are way more likely to be very very angry or very very happy. The patch is like 26 hours old I'm not sure most people are ready to make a declaration yet. Most people who have said they hate it were ready to hate it before any information about it came out at all, and vice versa.

 

[Pfeffersack]

Does anyone of you have bugs with river labels, floods and dams not working or placeable in TSL Huge Earth?

I tried other maps and it works fine.

you tried the other earth maps by Firaxis and they have river labels ?

Tested all TSL maps and except the new Mediterranean one all are suffering from this problem. Posted saves and a pic here:

https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/1-0-12-9-tsl-huge-earth-map-river-label-and-dam.669574/

---

AI seems to use heroes more efficiently now. I tried to play as Khmer, my neighbor Georgia declared war on me and Mulan one-shot every military unit that was not inside a city in only a few rounds. Never seen such an aggressive Mulan hero before. All those fancy holy sites did not help me after all, I would have had to build more units. My usual mistakes.

Not that it matters a lot to me (as I wouldn't even use that mode with a better AI probably), but the main problem is that the AI is completely absent when it comes to using their (non-combat) special abilities:

https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/heroes-mode-and-ai.667118/

It is surely a welcome slight plus if they use them better for fighting, but it probably will be not enough to give that mode the label "AI can cope with it"

 

[Linklite]

...I made the poll because there were what seemed to be a small number of very vocal people in here who were totally slating the patch, it seems only 3% agree with that view. Disappointing is perhaps because of skewed expectations based on the debate here and the fact people have been debating it in depth. Certainly the reaction outside CivFanatics seems to be much more positive than on here.

Part of the problem is also how debate shapes the perception of views. I don't know how I'm viewed on here, but I was disappointed with the patch. I was expecting it to be the final polish, and so to have civs like Scotland that have basically non-bonuses was disappointing, a feeling compounded by the fact that they'd spent time buffing civs that didn't really need it (even in my strictly amateur view) like Korea. As a patch on its own, it's fine or even good. With thr free maps and units, I'd normally be very happy about it. As a farewell patch that might leave Civ VI in its final state, though? Not so much, and I can understand why some are upset. Add to that the ganging up and refusal on the part of some to recognise the shortcomings in the discussions and it makes me feel like I need to make a stand on certain issues, which portrays me as being more negative than I really am. Debates always make things seem more polarised than they really are.

Of course, there are some that are overly zealous or can't ever be pleased which can make things feel more heated.

I will note this though, and I've said it before somewhere. This is their "final" patch and should be the effort to go out with a bang. You'd expect that, if they did a good job, the ratings would be better than merely "above average" ratings being roughly on a par with "below average" ratings.

 

[slavaskii]

Yeah I probably should have made the "good" option OK or something. At the moment we have 38% who voted it Outstanding or Very Good and 37% who voted it Disappointing or Poor. I made the poll because there were what seemed to be a small number of very vocal people in here who were totally slating the patch, it seems only 3% agree with that view. Disappointing is perhaps because of skewed expectations based on the debate here and the fact people have been debating it in depth. Certainly the reaction outside CivFanatics seems to be much more positive than on here.

From my perspective, I feel like the reason CivFanatics has a more negative view than others is because we've particularly emphasized the fact this was the 'final free update'. That word hasn't been mentioned as much elsewhere, we even had a whole thread devoted to figuring out if this was the end of Civ VI. I will say that I'm probably one of those that was seen as 'totally slating the patch' yesterday, but I wasn't at all. I was just really honing in on the negatives because I felt people were trying to defend (or worse, even ignore) the flaws behind the veil of it being freely provided. That's why I still maintain that if you voted 'poor', it was likely because the game is actually unplayable for you right now, as some on consoles were saying this was the case. I'm wholly unsurprised to see only 4 poor votes, but I think the sheer amount of dissatisfied actually best reflected what myself and others thought.

Regardless, I thought the choices were fine and the poll was an excellent idea on your part. It's invaluable insight for the team.

 

[Haig]

This very forum gives pretty narrow and negative view I think.

For example on reddit its people having fun with the game, here it's always topics titled "The game is a failure, an essay (part one of nine)"

Goes back to Civ 5 days too, I remember a multipage thread before the first expansion titled something like "Face it: there will be no expansions" lol

 

[SammyKhalifa]

Yeah, I'm trying to stop my gratuitous use of the simpsons comic book guy gif.