Civ VI is easy? I don't know...

oakdragon

Stagnating amongst the Siliconians
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I don't know what version of Civ Vi you all are playing, but I keep getting my butt handed to me on Prince. On this occasion, Sumeria just took my capital on turn 62. :(

Both Sumeria and my only other neighbor, China, had neutral but improving (positive modifier ratio) relationships with me. Sumeria surprised attacked me and then China did also a few turns later. China barely had an opportunity to slap one of my warriors, though, before Sumeria took my cap.

I know I'm no expert, but I usually comfortably won games on King level in Civ V. I suddenly understand why people want to ragequit sometimes. I'd never had that feeling before until Civ VI.
 
Because of the low warmongering penalty and early advantages the AI get you will always almost have to fend off an early game attack. After you do this the game is fairly easy.
 
I think the game is easy... if you take enemy cities early, have a good start position, and/or take favorable AI peace treaties.

The game is a lot harder if you have a smaller continent, can't expand as much, and only create just enough troops for defense.

Interesting, the game I lost came from just not having much expansion space, while trying to get an early religion and failing, while the game I dominated happened because I got attacked early, which led me to crank out units to kill everyone on my continent.
 
In my first game (Prince, which I am still playing), I chose playing on a large continents map and did not adjust the number of civs. It gave me a chance to just fend off the barbarians for awhile to get my feet wet and get a feel for the game. Would it have been the same on a standard map? I don't know.
 
It is kind of harder, if you were playing King comfortably in Civ V. I did play King regular on Civ V, but that was because King was easy-peasy level for me. Always won. Always expected to win. Didn't reload anything. Any start. Even the awful Tundra ones.

Sumeria is an early game warring Civ - they got a beefy early game heavy cavalry in the War Cart - 30 Strength and with no weaknesses against Spearmen. Spearmen themselves are only Strength 25 and the fairly beefy Swordsmen are Strength 35. They're going to rush you because they only have a very narrow window of use for those War Carts, and they're going to hit you hard. Unlike previous Civs 3, 4, and 5, the early AI in Civ VI makes a LOT of units to combat the Barbarians, who are also formidable in Civ VI. You're going to need to think about your military.

Consider founding your second and third cities on Hills to increase their defenses and prioritize Archery and Masonry for Ancient Walls to beef your defense even further. To some extent, actively courting a Civ's agenda can help to deflect aggression if they have another nearby target. You can even start things off with a Joint War proposal. You may need to allow a Barbarian wave to come to you just to get the Slinger kill that will boost Archery research.

In addition, you need to think about what you're going to do if the AI declares war NOW. Don't think it's not going to happen. Think that it's always going to happen. That's the only way to prevent it. Putting your units on Fortify on strong tactical positions before the AI attacks can be enough deterrence to prevent a war, or survive one.

I got games where I got expansion space. You still need the military to fend off Barbarians and take Barbarian Outposts. The one game the enemy was in my face, I was Gorgo of Greece, so I beelined Bronzeworking and took out the nearest Civ - Pericles, also of Greece. I didn't allow him to get hoplites. I made hoplites, then I attacked immediately. The one thing about not having expansion space is that your back is to the mountains or to the sea, so you never have to worry about Barbarians or other Civs attacking from the other side, so make your armies and take their cities.
 
I went up a level and it is getting more difficult for me. And I'm not playing an "easy" civ like the Aztecs this time. Of course the AI is still in no position to take my cities. They are giving more challenge in score, however. If I hadn't conquered a bunch of cities I'd be behind in score. I had a bad starting position with no rivers and no city states which didn't help either.

I'm playing Prince difficulty btw. You have to build a lot of units. At least 3 archers (you want 3 for the Eureka anyways) and a couple of warriors. But 3 archers is a must.

My main threat since my religion failed to launch for unknown reasons is defeat by religious victory, but I have the tech to conquer Russia if need be.
 
Both games are dead easy once you got how they work.
In VI,build lots of military units early on in order to defend from barbs and neighbours.
If you've got past this stage, you've won.
 
So what do people think the shortcut would be to increase the difficulty? Higher mid/late game AI yield buffs? Higher AI unit strength buffs? More stacking? More mid/late game AI aggression (via say warmonger civs getting a conquer the world agenda to ignore diplomatic penalties)? All of the above?
 
So what do people think the shortcut would be to increase the difficulty? Higher mid/late game AI yield buffs? Higher AI unit strength buffs? More stacking? More mid/late game AI aggression (via say warmonger civs getting a conquer the world agenda to ignore diplomatic penalties)? All of the above?
Maybe an AI that does a better job of developing their cities.
 
The game is really easy build some slingers. Get experience fighting barbs and upgrade to archers when you get archery. Once you past the initial stage you have won, even on deity as the AI hardly ever builds walls. Quite annoying actually. Even Civ V was more of a challenge, it took me a while to win on deity in Civ V and ages on Civ IV.
 
I could not work out how to get a screenshot but I had one civ right next to me rolling their entire army across my territory as I agreed to open borders. Also the same one settled right next to my city when I was one turn away from settling in the one spot. The other civs get mad at you for no reason and then settle right next to you and box you in.

I do not know how the people on Youtube are doing so good at the game, they are mutants!

I usually play on the lower difficulties but the game defaults to Prince level when you select the 'play game' option.

I'm going to need a strategy guide in printed form or similar as I did with CIV III. Can you even get those these days? I don't like everything being hidden. I forget what I built the wonders for one or two turns after they finished.

I ran out of money in the tutorial and one of my cities revolted due to lack of amenties.
 
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I forgot to mention that archery should be an early tech. Even on the middle levels that I play you need it. Lately I've been going pottery, astrology, animal husbandry, and then archery (with the boost which hopefully you have by now). If at higher levels or you don't care about religion, then go for writing over astrology.
 
I'm finding that once you get past the ancient era it's easy because the AI isn't upgrading it's units and is bad at attacking my cities. Hopefully this will be something that gets 'fixed' in the first patch.
 
And how many units did you have at turn 62 ?
The early agression IS the only difficulty currently. That's why people find the game easy. The AI is a one trick poney.

This, pretty much. There's not losing a religious victory to insane AI apostle spam, but mostly it's all about surviving that early rush. At which point you're pretty much set.
 
Because of the low warmongering penalty and early advantages the AI get you will always almost have to fend off an early game attack. After you do this the game is fairly easy.

This. On deity ive found that once your survive the initial carpet of death the game is over.
 
the AI not upgrading it units is possibly its worst flaw. survive early game and counter attack slaughtering massed warriors and war carts.

AI needs keep a ranged unit in cities and encampments, upgrade and focus on trying to kill units to be a threat. so many times it just lets your unit escape on low health.
 
I suspect most players who post or read these forum range from moderate to expert in skill in Civ/Strategy.
The fact that they are here, shows they are looking for information and/or interested in sharing it, understanding it, and improving.
That said, there are many players that don't participate and they range the full spectrum in skill - novice to expert.
Those at the low end, find the AI early rush, barbs, and such a significant challenge - certainly not an easy game for them.

It's difficult to create a game that challenges such a wide spectrum of skill levels appropriately with difficulty levels.
They haven't created a expert AI at least based on most reports, so it's difficult to dumb down for easier difficulties.
And even if they created a easy or standard AI, that's super difficult to scale up (in this case it may be mostly just extra units, boosts, and such).

I would say the game is easy for experts and aspiring experts. Everyone below that has some challenge.
 
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