Civ Discussion - French Imperial

[Lord Lakely]

I have to say Mughals I think are far more of a disadvantage than a playstyle (Money is not hard to come by, what they lose is), Buganda is a semi-distinct playstyle, but I've never enjoyed pillage gameplay and the rest is lacking. Qing felt completely busted in the game I played with them. Not sure if it was a playstyle or god mode... Or just one game going really well.

The Mughals can purchase anything with Gold. It's a slower start into the age but the acceleration IS a very real thing. 20 turns into Modern you should be ahead, if only due to the ability to purchase a World Wonders or Factory every 2 turns.

 

[Leucarum]

The Mughals can purchase anything with Gold. It's a slower start into the age but the acceleration IS a very real thing. 20 turns into Modern you should be ahead, if only due to the ability to purchase a World Wonders or Factory every 2 turns.

The thing is everyone can purchase factories at that fast already. Gold is very very easy to come by. Mughals end up being slower because it takes longer to get to the key techs. I guess we can go into it on their thread, but unless Firaxis fixes gold scaling the Mughals are very underwhelming. They could be good, but Firaxis have to fix modern first.

 

[disjointaccount]

Do you feel like you can get enough of their culture bonuses without playing aggressively / militarily?

I think my answer would be yes, with the caveat that it's just because culture is ina really weird place in modern.
If you're doing a domination victory, their UQ helps alongside the war-focused culture bonuses to get you quickly through the French tree and whatever other civics you want.
If you're doing a culture victory, the UQ alone, if placed on a good tile and pumped full of specialists is probably enough of a boost to get you to hegemony on a competitive pace, given that the AI tends to slack a little in getting there?
Take this with a bit of a grain of salt as I haven't played them in a while, but I definitely have done a pacifist culture game or two with them and felt like they held their own.

 

[uppi]

Do you feel like you can get enough of their culture bonuses without playing aggressively / militarily?

Their culture from killing units is not very relevant, anyway. That is like 15 culture per landship you kill? Even in a major war this is not going to amount to much.

 

[SemiLazyGamer]

I will say that playing as Joze or building the Taj Mahal is actually detrimental for a French Empire. A bunch of happiness means more Celebrations, but if you extend them, you don't get the government policy slots.

 

[queenpea]

Their culture from killing units is not very relevant, anyway. That is like 15 culture per landship you kill? Even in a major war this is not going to amount to much.

That’s interesting. I don’t really understand how the civilizations are labeled in most cases. Why is this not militaristic / cultural? Why diplomatic?

 

[Krikkit1]

That’s interesting. I don’t really understand how the civilizations are labeled in most cases. Why is this not militaristic / cultural? Why diplomatic?

Those labels are their own separate bonuses (attributes you get)

 

[uppi]

That’s interesting. I don’t really understand how the civilizations are labeled in most cases. Why is this not militaristic / cultural? Why diplomatic?

In Civ 7, diplomatic also means happiness. And I would say their happiness bonuses are more significant than their cultural bonuses

 

[queenpea]

In Civ 7, diplomatic also means happiness. And I would say their happiness bonuses are more significant than their cultural bonuses

That’s odd to me and doesn’t feel intuitive. Diplomacy should mean bonus influence—or advantages in interacting with IPs or civilizations around you.

 

[Siptah]

That’s odd to me and doesn’t feel intuitive. Diplomacy should mean bonus influence—or advantages in interacting with IPs or civilizations around you.

Diplomatic means you get diplomatic events/quests (which often give influence rewards). It‘s not really important for the modern civs though. I‘m not sure if I‘ve completed or even seen all modern era quests.

 

[queenpea]

Diplomatic means you get diplomatic events/quests (which often give influence rewards). It‘s not really important for the modern civs though. I‘m not sure if I‘ve completed or even seen all modern era quests.

Yeah, I know. Then on top of that you have the leader attributes and the leader events. Then you have mementos. Then you have the civ. Then you have the Legacies.

It honestly becomes a mess of modifiers (I won’t even describe it as complicated, because I think the game lacks strategic depth) — more often than not, your civilization just feels well-rounded and (with the exception of some) not particularly specialized.

 

[Boris Gudenuf]

Yeah, I know. Then on top of that you have the leader attributes and the leader events. Then you have mementos. Then you have the civ. Then you have the Legacies.

It honestly becomes a mess of modifiers (I won’t even describe it as complicated, because I think the game lacks strategic depth) — more often than not, your civilization just feels well-rounded and (with the exception of some) not particularly specialized.

On the one hand, many players really like 'unique' Civs with unique attributes that make them very different to play from other Civs in the game.

On the other hand, a Civ that cannot make any decent use of certain types of maps or map configurations (classic example: a navy-oriented Norway or Britain in the middle of a Pangaea map) or deal adequately (read: have a bonus for the gamer) with combinations of AI Civs and IPs will cause rage-quits and vociferous complaints from gamers.

There is (so far) no middle ground that satisfies everybody, so Civ VII has largely gone with Civs that, by gamer configuration using Leaders, Momentos and other modifiers can be almost anything to anyone, for anyone in almost any game.

Personally, I think the problem is not in allowing 're-configuration' of a Civ for a particular game, but the fact that Civ VII's system makes you pick your Leader, Civ, Momentos and other 'specialization' effects before you see the map and your neighbors. Therefore, any attempt to specialize your Civ is partly random and may not be appropriate for the starting situation.

The simple "(map) starting bias" which is all the game has now is woefully inadequate and can even be misleading: a 'rough coastal' bias can put you on anything from an inland sea surrounded by mountains and jungles to a seacoast of rough Tundra (and yes, that has happened to me more than once).

 

[javier51]

You can choose the map and even the civilizations if you click the advanced options.

 

[Krikkit1]

On the one hand, many players really like 'unique' Civs with unique attributes that make them very different to play from other Civs in the game.

On the other hand, a Civ that cannot make any decent use of certain types of maps or map configurations (classic example: a navy-oriented Norway or Britain in the middle of a Pangaea map) or deal adequately (read: have a bonus for the gamer) with combinations of AI Civs and IPs will cause rage-quits and vociferous complaints from gamers.

There is (so far) no middle ground that satisfies everybody, so Civ VII has largely gone with Civs that, by gamer configuration using Leaders, Momentos and other modifiers can be almost anything to anyone, for anyone in almost any game.

Personally, I think the problem is not in allowing 're-configuration' of a Civ for a particular game, but the fact that Civ VII's system makes you pick your Leader, Civ, Momentos and other 'specialization' effects before you see the map and your neighbors. Therefore, any attempt to specialize your Civ is partly random and may not be appropriate for the starting situation.

The simple "(map) starting bias" which is all the game has now is woefully inadequate and can even be misleading: a 'rough coastal' bias can put you on anything from an inland sea surrounded by mountains and jungles to a seacoast of rough Tundra (and yes, that has happened to me more than once).

Well the Civ and Mementos can be changed out each age.

It would be good if they let the player choose an additional terrain bias (not like Natural Wonders or resources, but biomes or features)

 

[Boris Gudenuf]

You can choose the map and even the civilizations if you click the advanced options.

But these choices only give very gross approximation of the kind of terrain and situation you start in. And this is by design, because allowing more precise control could make it very hard to place AI Civs in the 'proper' (according to their terrain bias) start positions.

Note that they tried to make all terrain 'equal' in the sense that each type of base terrain (tundra, temperate, desert, tropical) has some kind of bonus or advantage, and none of them have deadly maluses. Unlike Reality, if you start a settlement in the middle of an arctic tundra in 4000 BCE, the population doesn't immediately move south, and a start in the middle of the desert doesn't require you to research Irrigation immediately in order to make a go of it.

This is a very sore point with me, because while we now know that there were large urban concentrations in temperate (grassland and forest), taiga, desert, and tropical biomes from very early, we also know that they had very different strategies and technologies for feeding those urban areas, and a simple single tech of 'agriculture' doesn't begin to cover them all. - As it does now in Civ VII, where you can plunk down your initial settlement anywhere on the map and start farming right away, even in places where the growing season is measured in single-digit numbers of weeks or the amount of available water by the single bucket.