[GS] Are Mountains OP?

[acluewithout]

I've been playing Wilhelmina, Immortal, Inverted Poles, Large Maps, Disaster 3, Normal Speed (+8 Ages of Pace). They're fun maps.

Anyway. I've had handful of games where I was in the open. It's brutal. No science (well, a bit from rivers, but that's it). Limited production. And then along comes the AI rush - thump! Not a problem, but a real meat grinder early on.

But then I get other games where there are Mountain ranges everywhere. Mountains means Science, but also Hills and so production. But the Mountains and their borders also block and funnel the AI, and all of a sudden I'm basically left alone and isolated until I'm ready to take on the world.

I'm finding I'm often restarting games with Mountains, because they just make the game so easy.

I like the way Mountain ranges work now. They look cool, they follow continent dynamics much better, and they create interesting choke points. But, I also sometimes feel like Mountains have a disproportionate impact on the difficulty of games.

Thoughts?

 

[Victoria]

I agree but they are also choke points against you. Sure the AI cannot deal with them like you amd so you have more advantage but the pay off is more interesting maps.
Hills are what gets me. Grassland is 2/0 and plains are 1/1 while hills are 2/1 or 1/2. 50% better and apprenticeship comes way before feudalism also.
regardless the game works so to speak but some things are indeed more equal than others.

 

[kaspergm]

Well mountains very centrally ties into the poor scaling of the game, particularly of the Campus district. I agree that Mountains give too much science in early game. I think it would better if the science adjacency for Campus districts only came later, for instance if you build an Observatory in your district (after researching Astronomy). There could be other buildings like a wildlife research station to give adjacency bonus from jungles and reefs. Korea is a very clear proof of how overpowered getting a couple of early +4 campuses is.

 

[Disgustipated]

Probably not much chance of change in civ6, except maybe a mod. Adjacency should cap at 2 per terrain feature (meaning if you have rainforest you can go higher).

2 of the more successful modern nations (England and Eastern U.S.) primarily have flat land. U.S. does have mountains, but the most successful areas are flat. Would love to see a rebalancing of flat land to rough terrain.

 

[acluewithout]

@Victoria Your last line is spot on. I much prefer map generation now, and mountains do make for more interesting maps. But I do feel like how the early game plays is often determined by Mountains. Which may be a good thing overall.

 

[kaspergm]

Probably not much chance of change in civ6, except maybe a mod. Adjacency should cap at 2 per terrain feature (meaning if you have rainforest you can go higher).

Or maybe it should work on a per-building case. So for instance the terrain caps the maximum adjacency you can get, but you need buildings to unlock it. So what is currently a +4 flat campus site could be +1 on base campus, additionally +1 on library, additionally +1 on university, and additionally +1 on research centre, whereas a +2 spot would only get the first two bonuses. But I think just postponing the science from mountain bonus would be a more intuitive and simpler solution.

 

[TheMarshmallowBear]

Well mountains very centrally ties into the poor scaling of the game, particularly of the Campus district. I agree that Mountains give too much science in early game. I think it would better if the science adjacency for Campus districts only came later, for instance if you build an Observatory in your district (after researching Astronomy). There could be other buildings like a wildlife research station to give adjacency bonus from jungles and reefs. Korea is a very clear proof of how overpowered getting a couple of early +4 campuses is.

I think the issue, like you say, is the scaling of the yields.

In Civ 5, 1 pop meant 1 science.

In Civ 6, 1 pop meants 0.5 science.

So a 1 science mountain is worth 2 pop. And a common 3 science mountain is worth 6 population.

 

[iammaxhailme]

I often reroll if I have no mountains near my start. Getting no adjacency either for holy site or campus makes for a very slow start (depending on what victory I'm doing). If playing tall was more valuable, a city on a big open flat area with a lot of farms would be great, but tall sucks in civ 6. Bonus per population and specialists are too small for that, compared to civ 5 where specialists were worth using a vast majority of the time, compared to 6 when I can't remember ever using them

 

[Pietato]

Flat land real does suck in Civ 6...

 

[Archon_Wing]

Korea doesn't need mountains though.

And yes mountains are pretty OP, but people need to stop using them as a crutch. You can get +1 from putting any 2 districts together, and the government plaza means a lot as well. Aqueducts are very cheap and can be used to help with adjacency.

Also reefs and such.

Flat land real does suck in Civ 6...

This is true though.

 

[Bliss]

One disadvantage that I found is that usually mountains starts have less room for expansion. But it doesn't seem enough to offset the perks of having mountains around.

 

[The googles do nothing]

And yes mountains are pretty OP, but people need to stop using them as a crutch. You can get +1 from putting any 2 districts together, and the government plaza means a lot as well. Aqueducts are very cheap and can be used to help with adjacency.

The key difference to me is that adjacency from other districts requires an investment in hammers and maintenance cost from those districts. Give campus natural feature adjacency a maintenance and a district production cost adjustment for balance.

Flat land real does suck in Civ 6...

If you could mine flat land I think it would be ok. Not being able to increase the production with improvements is half the suck.

 

[Sostratus]

It’s really just the campus district has absurd adjacencies for how difficult (easy) it is to obtain them. Earlier it was colored to pops, but if you compare it to the yields you get from terrain...
1 science = 1 culture = 1 faith = 3 gold
1 food = 1 production = 2 gold

Look at how long the list of campus +1 and +2 adjacencies is. Compared to a harbor or CH, which get a paltry 1 or 2 gold... campus adjacency is absurdly inflated. Even theaters pale in comparison because they require you to build wonders. The way campuses are now is be like having relatively common +12 gold CH spots.
That said, even their adjacency pales in comparison to the buildings, albeit early game those adjacencies can really swing a game.

 

[Disgustipated]

It's always bothered me because as I mentioned above, 2 of the most famous cities that were productive and produced a lot of "science" (London and New York) were on flat land. It's very gamey, let's just say that. It's a fun mechanic to try to snag adjacency, but really has no basis in reality.

 

[steveg700]

Well mountains very centrally ties into the poor scaling of the game, particularly of the Campus district. I agree that Mountains give too much science in early game. I think it would better if the science adjacency for Campus districts only came later, for instance if you build an Observatory in your district (after researching Astronomy). There could be other buildings like a wildlife research station to give adjacency bonus from jungles and reefs. Korea is a very clear proof of how overpowered getting a couple of early +4 campuses is.

This is something the design of Civ VI intentionally dropped from the model Civ V provided. The observatory, the mint, the forge, the monastery. These conditional buildings were aspects of building a quality city (quality being the term I use to replace the sloppily-applied term "tall").

Each side of a mountain grants a major adjacency bonus for a holy site or campus, but you can have a bunch of them side-by-side, so large bonuses aren't hard to come by. Find a nice range, and having multiple cities with +3 or +4 campuses is not big whoop. If mountains only gave a minor adjacency bonus, I don't think we'd be having threads like this. Nobody complains about jungles making campuses too strong. Of course, you can't do much with mountains, so a juicy adjacency bonus seems like faiir recompense.

But in practice, players shouldn't be expecting to work every tile within city radius anyway. Most of the tiles three out are a write-off anyway because organic border expansion takes too long. So all things considered, getting +1 adjacency bonuses is a great trade-off.

I suspect the best proposition here is to have limited instances of concentrated major adjacency bonuses, especially when policy cards can double them in the mid-game. But the things to avoid are A) making adjacency bonuses uninteresting by making them unavailable in the early game when they would provide immediate value. and B) not to have adjacency bonuses be so flat and homogeneous in quality that it doesn't matter where cities all settled.

Could always go the route that was taken with Commercial Hubs and rivers. Originally, each river tile gave a bonus to the hub, now it's just a flat +2. Another alternative would be to have terrain features of differing quality, some minor, some major. Maps should definitely offer some "jackpot" locations to serve as the basis for quality cities.

As for buildings like observatories returning, I'd say bring them back and nerf policy cards like Rationalism.

 

[Matthias Corvinus]

The problem isn’t that mountains are overpowered; all other natural features are mediocre. If you look at the adjacency bonus for districts, many of them are hard to score or require playing a certain civilization (Like Japan) to make use of. While Firaxis is slowly adding adjacent bonuses to features like reefs for campuses, it would be a lot better if theater districts received less gimmicky bonuses from features, like unique improvements

Taking away from mountains only serves to deepen the issue with city planning.

 

[kaspergm]

Could always go the route that was taken with Commercial Hubs and rivers. Originally, each river tile gave a bonus to the hub, now it's just a flat +2. Another alternative would be to have terrain features of differing quality, some minor, some major. Maps should definitely offer some "jackpot" locations to serve as the basis for quality cities.

As for buildings like observatories returning, I'd say bring them back and nerf policy cards like Rationalism.

I'm 100 % for a flat +1 or +2 science bonus if a Campus is adjacent to mountain(s), similar to how it works for Commercial Hubs with rivers. Throw Holy Sites into the same pile. This would also give incentive to try to combine different types of adjacency bonuses, like Campus getting bonus both from mountains and jungles or reefs, Holy Sites getting bonus both from mountain(s) and woods, etc.

(I'd also limit the Industrial Zone bonus to be either aqueduct or dam even though I know Sostratus will not like me for suggesting that.)

I do feel that with districts offering such a neat context for alternative buildings, it's a shame that all those specialized buildings from Civ5 disappeared. It would be a great way to add flavor to cities to have alternate choices like University or Observatory, Bank or Mint, etc. Even more so if the idea of AOE bonuses was expanded, so you'd get even more motivation for going with different choices.

 

[Matthias Corvinus]

I'm 100 % for a flat +1 or +2 science bonus if a Campus is adjacent to mountain(s), similar to how it works for Commercial Hubs with rivers. Throw Holy Sites into the same pile. This would also give incentive to try to combine different types of adjacency bonuses, like Campus getting bonus both from mountains and jungles or reefs, Holy Sites getting bonus both from mountain(s) and woods, etc.

(I'd also limit the Industrial Zone bonus to be either aqueduct or dam even though I know Sostratus will not like me for suggesting that.)

I do feel that with districts offering such a neat context for alternative buildings, it's a shame that all those specialized buildings from Civ5 disappeared. It would be a great way to add flavor to cities to have alternate choices like University or Observatory, Bank or Mint, etc. Even more so if the idea of AOE bonuses was expanded, so you'd get even more motivation for going with different choices.

For a measley +1 or 2 science there is little point in building a campus or holy site at all. This change would make civilizations like Korea even more absurdly powerful without much competition from civilizations that have mountains/hills starts. Furthermore, era bonuses will need to be reworked. It will be far too hard to score a normal/golden age especially when a lot of points come from rewarding the player for smart district placement (Knowing where to place and when to place districts)

 

[steveg700]

For a measley +1 or 2 science there is little point in building a campus or holy site at all.

Now there's a sense of entitlement. What is the minimum requisite adjacency bonus before a district is worth building?

If you don't have mountains, the measly +1 or +2 is what you're likely to get. If that. Then there's the matter of districts being where buildings go, they're not supposed to be places where you rack up adjacency bonuses and call it a day. You're not going to have much of a religion without building holy sites. You're not going to be generating GS's without campuses. No Research projects either. And your CS's won't be sending you anything. Seems like giving up a fair amount to me, and I'm not sure what else you're doing to get ahead in these areas to get ahead other than population (for science--not sure what you're planning to do for faith).

This change would make civilizations like Korea even more absurdly powerful without much competition from civilizations that have mountains/hills starts. Furthermore, era bonuses will need to be reworked. It will be far too hard to score a normal/golden age especially when a lot of points come from rewarding the player for smart district placement (Knowing where to place and when to place districts)

Indeed, things would need to be reworked. Things need to be reworked. So that works.

 

[steveg700]

I'm 100 % for a flat +1 or +2 science bonus if a Campus is adjacent to mountain(s), similar to how it works for Commercial Hubs with rivers. Throw Holy Sites into the same pile. This would also give incentive to try to combine different types of adjacency bonuses, like Campus getting bonus both from mountains and jungles or reefs, Holy Sites getting bonus both from mountain(s) and woods, etc.

(I'd also limit the Industrial Zone bonus to be either aqueduct or dam even though I know Sostratus will not like me for suggesting that.)

Well, this starts getting into overcorrection territory. It's fun to effect high adjacency bonuses, it just shouldn't be so gratuitous with mountains that it becomes a matter of have-or-have-nots. Creating arrangements of aqueducts and dams to create monster IZ's is something fun players do using their planning

I do feel that with districts offering such a neat context for alternative buildings, it's a shame that all those specialized buildings from Civ5 disappeared. It would be a great way to add flavor to cities to have alternate choices like University or Observatory, Bank or Mint, etc. Even more so if the idea of AOE bonuses was expanded, so you'd get even more motivation for going with different choices.[/QUOTE]
Sure, like barracks and stables, although the differentiation there is minor. Or like swapping out one type of plant for another using a project.

Or going the same way they did with dams and aqueducts, they could allow things to be built on the map that provide adjacency bonuses.