in this article, Ed talks about this and mentions the word HALF when talking about the size of the map left to explore in the exploration age…. I don’t think it’s just a turn of phrase… I really think they want half of the map to be unavailable in the first age ! He goes on to mention that it would be a little silly to have something called EXPLORATION AGE and have nothing left to explore
"Now we are setting up the game so there’s always a second half of the world. No matter what your first land mass looks like, there’s always an ocean separating you from the other half."
in this article, Ed talks about this and mentions the word HALF when talking about the size of the map left to explore in the exploration age…. I don’t think it’s just a turn of phrase… I really think they want half of the map to be unavailable in the first age ! He goes on to mention that it would be a little silly to have something called EXPLORATION AGE and have nothing left to explore
"GC: So this raises the age old video game question of realism vs. gameplay. You said there were no barbarians anymore, is that just because the term has become unfashionable?
EB: The term we got rid of, because it is…
GC: But barbarians were a cool thing to come across in the game and now they seem to have been turned into static cities?
EB: We have independent powers now and they’ll still attack you."
That's quite the indictment of the game design philosophy at play, Moderator Action: *SNIP* Please refrain from taking discussion in this direction. It is not welcome in the gaming forums. -lymond
And further down Ed Beach describes how religion is mostly just a thing in the exploration age, and seems to associate it only with wars of religion. Kind of a ridiculous proposition for a self-styled "amateur historian".
I was wondering how they plan to enforce that "map expands with each Age" claim, and this is it: they enforce Continents maps.
I understand the reason behind that, but that really is a blow to map variety and people playing the game as a sandbox. That disallows about 90% of current custom maps. That's very disappointing.
And it's still problematic with mechanics like a Polynesian civ that has ancient seafaring. I'm not sold on this one... it seems like they're throwing out the baby with the bath water here.
I don't thiink that's the case; we'll still have different map scripts. The one we've seen in set-up so far is "Continents Plus" and the very existence of it seems to imply that there are other scripts.
I don't thiink that's the case; we'll still have different map scripts. The one we've seen in set-up so far is "Continents Plus" and the very existence of it seems to imply that there are other scripts.
One of our problems was that exploration lasted about 50 or 70 turns, something like that, and occasionally you would get it later, when you cross the ocean, but with some of our maps the whole map was just one big continent and you didn’t even have the other side of the world to explore.
Now we are setting up the game so there’s always a second half of the world. No matter what your first land mass looks like, there’s always an ocean separating you from the other half. And so when you go into the age of exploration… it’d be horrible for us to name it the age of exploration and the exploration’s all done, right?
We enforce that there’s gonna be exploration there, because the other half of the map you’ve not encountered at all. And so you get that good feeling, basically that feeling of that first 50 turns – we want to give you that as many times as we can. And so we’ve enforced that in the way the map unfolds.
Now, maybe he's not telling the whole story because it's marketing BS time, but I don't see how the above description is compatible with the kind of variable maps we're used to. Pangea, Islands, Fractal, and any land-at-map-edge maps would not work.
Now, maybe he's not telling the whole story because it's marketing BS time, but I don't see how the above description is compatible with the kind of variable maps we're used to.
I could see some land terrain that would be like ocean. desert for example could damage Age1 units as they move and the two halves of a Pangea map could be separated by a vast desert that either stretches north to south or has "ocean" coasts so that is not possible for a unit to survive crossing it. but in Age 2 there would be a new Frontier (some people go across the desert others travel from the opposite coast around the world. (like columbus planned to do except this time it would work)
I could see some land terrain that would be like ocean. desert for example could damage Age1 units as they move and the two halves of a Pangea map could be separated by a vast desert that either stretches north to south or has "ocean" coasts so that is not possible for a unit to survive crossing it. but in Age 2 there would be a new Frontier (some people go across the desert others travel from the opposite coast around the world. (like columbus planned to do except this time it would work)
I prefer desert to mountains as a blocking tile on Pangea to be honest. Mountains are great blocker of armies; but ideas, explorers and even populations seem find a way to trickle through, around or between them. Deserts are also not completely impermeable, but they've done a good job of keeping populations out of contact of each other often enough. It's also easier for me to imagine a "Logistics" tech that opens up deserts to all units, than a way by which mountains could be opened up to more than a niche explorer / mountaineer unit.
The issue remains that you could hug the coast to get around either in antiquity, unless you have ocean water going all the way to the coast? Which would also be weird, though not game breaking or impossible.
Perhaps the more pertinent question is: if you have a massive barrier dividing Pangea in 2, is it functionally all that different from having two continents divided by ocean? IMO a little, but far less than the difference between Pangea and Terra in earlier Civ games.
Terrain blocking won't work, because you can sail around the coast, and it fails if a custom map doesn't have that specific blocking terrain where it's supposed to be. The only way it works is either you have an invisible wall, or else that whole half of the map simply isn't there in the first Age (which is what is implied in Beach's quote), and that only works on a Continents style ocean map.
Alternatively he could be thinking of the default game design during a conversational interview and not adding necessary caveats for custom maps. Fundamental indeterminacy of all human language and all that.
While Civ6 was stated as "playing the map", it actually play much less with resources than Civ5. So, at least in this aspect, Civ7 could actually play the map more than Civ6.
A few thoughts on ways they could make it work with different map types
1. “Standard” map types
for standard map types the describe the old world and new world setup, but there’s an ocean between them
(so Archipelago would have at least 2 sets of islands, separated by oceans…and players would only start on 1/2 of the sets)
2. ALL maps
Age 1 units/settlements cannot survive if they are too far from your capital. (you need some of the base Age2 techs to extend it.)
So a TSL Rome could never invade, map out, move through, or settle near a TSL China (they may be able to find out they exist by scouts meeting each other in central asia)
Then on Random start non-Standard maps, the civs are concentrated in roughly one 1/2 of the map.
While Civ6 was stated as "playing the map", it actually play much less with resources than Civ5. So, at least in this aspect, Civ7 could actually play the map more than Civ6.
I'm really disappointed by the fact they seem to be making resources non-critical. Both IRL and in-game, many wars and battles have been waged over particular resources. If that's not a casus belli anymore, that takes away a lot from the story-building.
I'm really disappointed by the fact they seem to be making resources non-critical. Both IRL and in-game, many wars and battles have been waged over particular resources. If that's not a casus belli anymore, that takes away a lot from the story-building.
They could still be fairly critical…
If each source of Iron gives +20% strength to your Swordsmen and Tanks move 2+2*Oil sources (max8)….
They are still strategic …(even more so by affecting units in the field)
Also, if the resources are not Required for units to be built, it’s easier to make them rare…. so 3 horse resources for mongolia?
If horses aren’t Required for chariots and horsemen, then maybe horses are rare and most of the time your empire won’t have Any horses.
They could still be fairly critical…
If each source of Iron gives +20% strength to your Swordsmen and Tanks move 2+2*Oil sources (max8)….
They are still strategic …(even more so by affecting units in the field)
Also, if the resources are not Required for units to be built, it’s easier to make them rare…. so 3 horse resources for mongolia?
If horses aren’t Required for chariots and horsemen, then maybe horses are rare and most of the time your empire won’t Have any horses.
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