Civ switching didn't fix early vs. late civ problem

[stealth_nsk]

Why?
Who said so?
It's up to the player to be able to stop an opponent Snowballing.
Give Ai enough OP units and the system will balance itself...

Snowballing is accumulating advantage, so the advantage gained early in the game affects how you gain advantage later. It's just exactly the same as having meaningful early game, except "meaningful early game" is meant to be positive, while "snowballing" is perceived as negative.

 

[McSpank01]

Snowballing is accumulating advantage, so the advantage gained early in the game affects how you gain advantage later. It's just exactly the same as having meaningful early game, except "meaningful early game" is meant to be positive, while "snowballing" is perceived as negative.

Gaining early advantage or snowballing I think really should not be a problem, and maybe it is slightly unsolvable even if it is. However it doesn't mean you can't craft your game so that the snowballing player can't get too far ahead by leveraging that advantage.

The first, and most obvious way to prevent it, is having the other players gang up on the leader to prevent them winning. This should be the primary way most games should handle snowballing. A single player might get some advantage, but it's very difficult to win against a bunch of other players who target you. Civ games have curiously been very bad at understanding when a player is clearly going to win, and working together to stop it happening.

The other way I think to prevent snowballing affecting the outcomes of games, is giving players multiple ways to win, ways that don't rely on just being the biggest player with the most yields. More agile players who can take advantage of specific circumstances to sneak in and get a win while the lumbering giant slowly makes their way to the finishing line is a good way to give players more options and maybe take advantage of the over confidence that snowballing can create.

 

[stealth_nsk]

Gaining early advantage or snowballing I think really should not be a problem, and maybe it is slightly unsolvable even if it is. However it doesn't mean you can't craft your game so that the snowballing player can't get too far ahead by leveraging that advantage.

The first, and most obvious way to prevent it, is having the other players gang up on the leader to prevent them winning. This should be the primary way most games should handle snowballing. A single player might get some advantage, but it's very difficult to win against a bunch of other players who target you. Civ games have curiously been very bad at understanding when a player is clearly going to win, and working together to stop it happening.

The other way I think to prevent snowballing affecting the outcomes of games, is giving players multiple ways to win, ways that don't rely on just being the biggest player with the most yields. More agile players who can take advantage of specific circumstances to sneak in and get a win while the lumbering giant slowly makes their way to the finishing line is a good way to give players more options and maybe take advantage of the over confidence that snowballing can create.

Yes, that's exactly that I meant. It's a question of careful balance and for a long running campaign finding the right balance is really hard.

 

[SupremacyKing2]

The first, and most obvious way to prevent it, is having the other players gang up on the leader to prevent them winning. This should be the primary way most games should handle snowballing. A single player might get some advantage, but it's very difficult to win against a bunch of other players who target you. Civ games have curiously been very bad at understanding when a player is clearly going to win, and working together to stop it happening.

I would look at the civ with the highest score. If the highest score gets too big compared to the second highest score then that civ is snowballing. For example, if the #1 score is at least 500 AND double the #2 score.

But for this to work, I think you need good military AI. Otherwise, AIs might gang up on the snowballing civ but not actually do anything to stop them. We've seen in this in previous civ games where AIs all declare war on the human player that is snowballing but just take weak shots or sit there and don't actually take any cities.

There is also the risk of it being too gamey if every time you are winning, your friends and allies declare war on you. It would make diplomacy meaningless.

I think this gets to the question of how much role-playing civ should have versus how competitive civ should be. Some players want role-playing where civs play their historical part. The culture civ focuses on culture and leaves you alone. The civ that is your ally never betrays you. Others want civ to be competitive where the AI will do whatever it takes to win, no matter the cost.

The other way I think to prevent snowballing affecting the outcomes of games, is giving players multiple ways to win, ways that don't rely on just being the biggest player with the most yields. More agile players who can take advantage of specific circumstances to sneak in and get a win while the lumbering giant slowly makes their way to the finishing line is a good way to give players more options and maybe take advantage of the over confidence that snowballing can create.

I think a diplomatic victory can be very good at this. This is because diplomatic victories tend to be very asymmetrical. You might be the civ with the best science or military but the "small" civ that cultivates alliances or bribes enough city-states can still eke out a diplomatic win and beat you.

But I also think it is important to craft victory conditions that end the game when it is obvious who won. You don't want victory conditions that require the snowballing civ to jump through too many pointless hoops or have to click "end turn" a lot doing nothing waiting to officially win. This ensures that games don't drag on too long. It reduces late game fatigue. It essentially rewards the snowballing civ by saying "Congrats you snowballed so much, you deserve the win!" I think this is what civ4's domination victory used to do well. When you conquer X% of the map and have Y% of the population the game declares you the winner since it is obvious you are unstoppable and it would be pointless to have to conquer the last bits of the map or drag on the game for another 100 turns towards another victory.

 

[McSpank01]

I would look at the civ with the highest score. If the highest score gets too big compared to the second highest score then that civ is snowballing. For example, if the #1 score is at least 500 AND double the #2 score.

That might be a decent method, though you'd need to work out the best stage for that to kick in. You couldn't have it happen too early, or too late. That is one of the issues, how will the AI understand that you are close to getting a victory? In some previous victory types I guess it is kind of obvious, if you are so far along building spaceship parts, that might be a point where the AI decides they need to team up and get you. The question is whether the AI is prepared to even compete against you to prevent you winning, and whether it is able to do so. Is the only way to compete just by building a military and smashing you down?

There is also the risk of it being too gamey if every time you are winning, your friends and allies declare war on you. It would make diplomacy meaningless.

I think this gets to the question of how much role-playing civ should have versus how competitive civ should be. Some players want role-playing where civs play their historical part. The culture civ focuses on culture and leaves you alone. The civ that is your ally never betrays you. Others want civ to be competitive where the AI will do whatever it takes to win, no matter the cost.

I don't mind it being gamey in this regard, because it actually means you get the sense that AI's actually exist and are playing the game. Civ 6 had a real issue where it never felt the AIs were even trying to win or paying attention to the game state. I would expect all AI's to be primarily motivated by winning.

I think a diplomatic victory can be very good at this. This is because diplomatic victories tend to be very asymmetrical. You might be the civ with the best science or military but the "small" civ that cultivates alliances or bribes enough city-states can still eke out a diplomatic win and beat you.

But I also think it is important to craft victory conditions that end the game when it is obvious who won. You don't want victory conditions that require the snowballing civ to jump through too many pointless hoops or have to click "end turn" a lot doing nothing waiting to officially win. This ensures that games don't drag on too long. It reduces late game fatigue. It essentially rewards the snowballing civ by saying "Congrats you snowballed so much, you deserve the win!" I think this is what civ4's domination victory used to do well. When you conquer X% of the map and have Y% of the population the game declares you the winner since it is obvious you are unstoppable and it would be pointless to have to conquer the last bits of the map or drag on the game for another 100 turns towards another victory.

Yeah Diplo victory is a very good example of this, because it allowed you to sneak in a win playing in a completely different way. Unfortunately it was a terrible bit of gameplay, but the idea was nice.

It is a good point about allowing the game to basically GG you when there is literally no way they can win. I don't really think that should be an issue though. I would like a game where the AI decided I was such an issue that all the other Civs tried to nuke me into space. That would make end games interesting because there is an actual challenge. It would be much harder to achieve a space victory when you are being attacked on all sides, though it might be more epic to escape a nuclear wasteland earth.

Of course for victory types that require diplomacy and good relations, things get a bit harder. How do AI's compete if they are not going to attack you? Maybe it needs to be more covert, based on relationships with other players rather than outright military power. I don't know, but Civ 6 really struggled to make you feel the AI even knew you were there.

 

[SupremacyKing2]

That might be a decent method, though you'd need to work out the best stage for that to kick in. You couldn't have it happen too early, or too late.

I agree. That is why I mentioned "at least score of 500". The idea is that it would only kick in once you reach a certain score threshold. Sorry. I should have been more explicit. This way it would not start too early. For example, you could get a big early start where say on turn 50, you are already 2x bigger than the #2 but you don't want the mechanic to kick in on turn 50. It would only kick in on say turn 200 which would give everyone a decent chance to get ahead or catch up. Or you could set the threshold at say score 500 like in my example. This way it would only trigger once civs reach a certain score level. If you set the threshold right, I think you can have it kick in at the right time, not too early but too late either.

That is one of the issues, how will the AI understand that you are close to getting a victory? In some previous victory types I guess it is kind of obvious, if you are so far along building spaceship parts, that might be a point where the AI decides they need to team up and get you. The question is whether the AI is prepared to even compete against you to prevent you winning, and whether it is able to do so.

You could give players a warning when the game is close to the snowball threshold. Using my example above, if the snowball mechanic only kicks in on turn 200, if the #1 civ has a score 2x bigger than the #2 and it is turn 150, you would get a warning that the #1 civ is only 50 turns away from hitting the snowball threshold. Maybe have another warning at 20 and then 10 turns from the snowballing threshold.

Is the only way to compete just by building a military and smashing you down?

In most civ games, yes unfortunately. That is because there are no effective mechanics to catch up other than military. Or put differently, I think military conquest is often too strong in 4X games. Taking cities away from the other civ has a double effect of reducing their power but also increasing your power. So conquering the snowballing civ is the most direct way to stop them. So even if there are non-military solutions, the military solution is often the most effective.

The game needs to give civs more non-military tools to fight. Players need more peaceful ways to hurt other civs.

This is why espionage needs to be a bigger deal. I think espionage is the perfect mechanic to stop snowballing civs without using military force. You could use espionage to sabotage the snowballing civ, to slow down production or science, slow down a wonder construction. You could even sabotage the spaceship construction to slow down a science victory. You could also use espionage to steal tech to help catch up in science or steal great works to catch up in culture. Espionage also makes cold wars more interesting since two strong civs could resort to an espionage war as a way of hurting each other without escalating to military force. This would be especially true in the Modern Age when both sides have nukes and don't want to risk an all out war. This would be historically accurate too.

Economic warfare should also be a thing. You should be able to impose sanctions to hurt the civ economically. Imagine if civs joined together to all impose economic sanctions on the #1 civ. That could work without needing the AI to be good at waging war.

 

[aieeegrunt]

Earlier versions of Civ HAD this mechanic. You’d see diplomatic attitudes start to shift if you had too much of a commanding lead. Not sure why it got removed, possibly because it felt too gamey

Under such a system, you’d have the entire world declare war on the USA in 1945 after all.

 

[Krikkit1]

Earlier versions of Civ HAD this mechanic. You’d see diplomatic attitudes start to shift if you had too much of a commanding lead. Not sure why it got removed, possibly because it felt too gamey

Under such a system, you’d have the entire world declare war on the USA in 1945 after all.

You did have 1/2 the world do that (the part that wasn’t either de facto or de jure occupied by the US). and even France which had been liberated was guarded in the US

Having some relationship decay for hegemons (your power is a threat) is reasonable.

However a bigger problem is the AI isn’t as much of a threat even if they do gang up on you.

That’s why the AI needs additional bonuses each age to balance the player snowball.

 

[SupremacyKing2]

Snowballing is alive and well in civ7. I did very well in the antiquity age, completing science, economic and military legacy paths. I was just 1 wonder shy of also getting the culture legacy path. I do think the economic golden age that let's you keep your cities in the exploration age is very powerful. But it has given me a big leg up in the exploration age. In my current game (Ada as Greece in Antiquity and Abbasids in Exploration, it is turn 65 of the exploration age and I already completed the culture legacy path and the science legacy path. I got 2colonies set up in the distant land, one of them has 4 treasure resources so I will be getting economic legacy points soon. Lastly, my colony in the distant lands is very close to another civ capital from Amina. I got 2 packed armies in my distant lands colony. I just upgraded my armies in the distant lands with gunpowder units. I willl coordinate an attack on Amina's capital in the distant lands and get some military legacy points. So the exploration age is a breeze. Exploration Age is already 66% complete. Also, I got basically all the city-states thanks to the discount I get from my Greek traditions. I suspect I will do well enough in the exploration age to easily win in the modern age.

This is the current standing:

You can see I am outperforming everyone in every yield:

 

[GeneralZift]

Btw about the earlier topic, there is such thing as too much information, which I understand that the developers can be trying to avoid when they design the UI.
Of course, I would be happy to see the results of the yields if I were to take a policy (Eg. +1 Science per Library; Result +12 science)

But yeah, imagine you go overboard with this idea, and put too much information everywhere, it'll become an extra chore just to shift through it.
It's either this worry from the developers, or perhaps they simply don't have time or effort to make a change like this.

 

[aieeegrunt]

You did have 1/2 the world do that (the part that wasn’t either de facto or de jure occupied by the US). and even France which had been liberated was guarded in the US

Having some relationship decay for hegemons (your power is a threat) is reasonable.

However a bigger problem is the AI isn’t as much of a threat even if they do gang up on you.

That’s why the AI needs additional bonuses each age to balance the player snowball.

I’m sorry, what timeline are you posting from where half of the world (plus France) declared war on the US in 1945?

 

[Krikkit1]

I’m sorry, what timeline are you posting from where half of the world (plus France) declared war on the US in 1945?

Cold “War” (and France didn’t declare war but was definitely less happy with the US than if the US had been a minor power.)

 

[aieeegrunt]

Cold “War” (and France didn’t declare war but was definitely less happy with the US than if the US had been a minor power.)

That is not remotely the same

 

[Krikkit1]

That is not remotely the same

The idea was relationships do degrade with the leading power, not that everyone in automatic total annihilation mode.

 

[aieeegrunt]

The idea was relationships do degrade with the leading power, not that everyone in automatic total annihilation mode.

The US had such a commanding lead in 1945 that under a “target the leader” AI system you’d have e everyone including their former allies declaring war on them. Which would feel super gamey.

Which is what “Under such a system, you’d have the entire world declare war on the USA in 1945 after all.” means, since apparently THAT wasn’t clear enough.

 

[Krikkit1]

The US had such a commanding lead in 1945 that under a “target the leader” AI system you’d have e everyone including their former allies declaring war on them. Which would feel super gamey.

Which is what “Under such a system, you’d have the entire world declare war on the USA in 1945 after all.” means, since apparently THAT wasn’t clear enough.

Except one former ally (Soviets. a big chunk of the developed world at the time) did declare war on them (in the only way nuclear powers declare war…that is proxy wars)

Also they wouldn’t need to declare war immediately… just slowly begin distancing themselves from the Leader (which France did to a certain degree)

The problem is the US at that point had such a commanding lead that the Soviets were the only ones that could begin to realistically oppose them… which is a problem with a “target the leader”. It must start Very early before the leader becomes strong enough to ignore/control other civs.

At that point it isn’t gamey at all (“your power may endanger our interests”…appears if you are above the average in power…so for a competent human player it is almost always there.