[NFP] Civilization VI: Possible New Civilizations Thread

[Kouvb593kdnuewnd]

With all the focus on the new stuff it's easy too forget how much balance patches can change the game.

If they are as indepth as the post GS patches then nothing is off the table.

They might even give religion beliefs a look over like they did with pantheons.

Yes, I feel there is quite alot that need to be balanced, currently it feels a bit like playing early version of civ V but replace 2 scientist library ICS in civ 5 with Civ 6 campus ICS. The early game is decent but economy grow as such exponential rate that suddenly you are at end game stuff, basically jumping over the middle part of the game.

I feel districts and the buildings need a much stronger relationship with city population and stuff like the Power of city states should probably be looked at.

 

[bbbt]

On the other hand, I'm super irrationally bothered by the Persona packs. I could tolerate Eleanor since she was technically two civilizations, but I really don't like the idea of bloating the leader list with existing leaders in different outfits. As petty as it is, I would honestly rather they just be lazy alternate costumes you could select from an additional dropdown box than dedicated "leader options" that could have different gameplay (if the thing about luxuries stands). As it stands, I almost want to actively avoid the pass just to pretend that they aren't there, and I'll definitely avoid doing so until I can at least see how the game handles them.

I get that it's less work than making an entirely new model, but it's also more work than just... not including them at all, which I'd prefer to a "bonus" that looks super lazy/cheap. If they're chosen independently from the leader list, I can probably tolerate them, but if they populate the normal one I'm not interested until/unless there's a mod to straight up convert them into different people.

I think the Unique Leader Ability is the main hook. The 'alternate outfit' is just a way to tell which Leader Ability you are playing against if they show up as the AI.

I think it would be interesting if every leader had one of two LUA you could choose from. Perhaps leading to LUAs that can be changed mid-game or the like.

I'd agree with the additional drop down approach though, it would be very bloated to have all that in one leader dropdown.

 

[Xefjord]

The idea of having two Teddys and two Cathys doesn't sound terribly bad to me. although I hope much like with Eleanor that when you hit the toggle to not do repeat leaders, it prevents them from repeating in the game. I don't love the addition, but I get why it would have been a lot easier for them to add and essentially tack on for free. You won't see me complaining.

Everyone's estimates are all including Vietnam is a high potential pick for a new civ. If Vietnam doesn't get added. That will make me mighty upset. but all the other content looks good to me too. I would almost pay 40 dollars just for Vietnam alone though lol.

 

[Alexander's Hetaroi]

No, it's agenda and abilities. It seems to be essentially a cheaper alternative to provide alt leaders. I think it's a great idea.

Well okay. Then I don't know how to feel about that. It's the type of playstyle for France that I've been hoping for but it's, in my opinion, with the wrong leader. Oh well I've been saying it since the beginning, it could have been Louis XIV.

 

[Sostratus]

This makes a lot of sense for FXS.
The business model is more in line with a lot of other studios.
But that's pretty irrelevant; the big upside is this is a way better cash flow model for them than "make 1 Xpac per year and sell that." It's better deployment of your developers (they will be working on stuff all the time instead of feast/famine) and gives them the ability to be fairly agile in responding to the consumer base. It's really hard to justify working on balance changes when there's no $ involved, so tying free content updates with the release of a leader pack makes sense - you sort of market both at the same time.

I hope this leads to better game overall as we reach the end of the new content life for civ6.

Purely daydreaming:
They will adopt some of the ideas in my unit balance mod to the main game, finally bringing balance to the universe. Perhaps they'll even be willing to go farther and do some bold stuff for the series.
Oh and sneak in a lot of new modding ability under the hood. There's a few things like being able to tie adjacency effects for a non unique infrastructure to a trait, that would probably not be too hard for them but would be nice for me.

 

[AntSou]

I think people are considering a false choice.

E.g. sure Louis XIV would be nice rather than a reskinned Catherine, but I don't think that's a realistic alternative. A full Louis XIV would just take a slot out of the usual 9.

This way we get alts on top of the usual Civs/leaders.

 

[Sostratus]

This way we get alts on top of the usual Civs/leaders.

It seems like they want to test the waters on whether this sort of thing is marketable. New frontier seems like the Civ7 bizdev testing ground.

 

[Eagle Pursuit]

I think people are considering a false choice.

E.g. sure Louis XIV would be nice rather than a reskinned Catherine, but I don't think that's a realistic alternative. A full Louis XIV would just take a slot out of the usual 9.

This way we get alts on top of the usual Civs/leaders.

Based on the description of Magnificence Catherine, she will be Louis XIV in all but appearances.

 

[Casworon]

From the sounds of it she is going to be a culture focused Montezuma.

I wonder if she can use traded luxuries too get her bonus or if she needs to own them like Montezuma does.

 

[Alexander's Hetaroi]

I think people are considering a false choice.

E.g. sure Louis XIV would be nice rather than a reskinned Catherine, but I don't think that's a realistic alternative. A full Louis XIV would just take a slot out of the usual 9.

This way we get alts on top of the usual Civs/leaders.

Oh I wasn't expecting Louis XIV to show up anyway after Eleanor's reveal. I'm sure I'll get over it. I do admit Catherine and Eleanor are unique, even though they wouldn't have been my first or second pick for a leader for France.

Based on the description of Magnificence Catherine, she will be Louis XIV in all but appearances.

Yes, that was my original point. It now does make it like France will have 3 leaders but in 2.

 

[PhoenicianGold]

Oh I wasn't expecting Louis XIV to show up anyway after Eleanor's reveal. I'm sure I'll get over it. I do admit Catherine and Eleanor are unique, even though they wouldn't have been my first or second pick for a leader for France.


Yes, that was my original point. It now does make it like France will have 3 leaders but in 2.

Yeah it does feel weird that France now has three leaders before the likes of China, Russia, Arabia, and Germany get a second leader. Even weirder that it's not Napoleon. Still weirder that it's a second version of the highly contentious CdM.

One thing I do find interesting about this development is that it not only opens up design space for even more "alternate leaders" that could even be made more cheaply than new leaders, but that it implies there will be still more content overall.

Remember when we were all speculating that there would be only one more expack because the leader selection screen had nine slots left on the last row? That limitation is thrown out the window if in fact we get eleven new leader portraits. I'm hoping, depending on what the final New Frontier lineup looks like, that all signs point toward a second season pack. I definitely think that they could fit about another 16 civs in the game without being too repetitive, and alternatively that they could whip up a bunch of alternate leaders from development scraps.

 

[Leucarum]

I wonder if this pattern of recurring civ + new civ will be a pattern for the 2 civ DLCs?

Based on what we're seeing, I'd be amazed if we don't get Byzantium.

I'm less convinced by Portugal, Babylon and Italy. My gut instinct says that Brazil, Sumeria and Rome are their respective analogs in this game for now... Plus they may want to leave some big names for a future season pass....

 

[MagGlb]

New Frontier has a bunch of possible double meanings. Don't know which ones apply:

- The fact that it's a new approach that Firaxis is taking in regards to content. A new frontier for the series itself;
- JFK;
- Colonisation;
- American western expansion;
- Future Tech and Space exploration.

It would be very nifty if either JFK or Thomas Jefferson were to be added as an alternative leader for the U.S. Also, hopefully at least one of the new modes will focus on Future Tech and space exploration. Some cool new units for the future era and certain space mechanics such as around asteroid mining and moon outposts would be intriguing.

 

[oSiyeza]

I hope not, unless as something that can be toggled or at least as something that is extraordinarily rare. Could meteors have drastically changed history? Yes. Have they? No, not really. There hasn't been a major impact in recorded history. The Tunguska event was kind of interesting, but it didn't actually do anything except make us a little more aware that something could happen.

This is actually incorrect. Meteorites were a source of pure iron that could not be found any other way. They were the first sources of iron for humankind. We know that Chinese and Egyptian iron weapons were made from meteorite sources, and they may have shaped the rise and fall of kings and nations. Also the discovery and use of the meteorite iron surely provided the grounds for metallurgy. We also know meteorites were sources of Iron for the Inuit and the Vikings.

Also we will never know how many religions and myths appeared from meteorites, but we are certain of stories about them in many cultures. And that there were tied to the Gods, in Greek mythology,

It is true that we are unaware of big disasters originated from meteorites, but that does not mean that they did not happen. It is actually not unreasonable to believe that legends or myths like the end of the Atlantis or the destruction of Sodoma and Gomorra, could have been inspired by them.

In any case, the fact is that meteorites are a real treat that may change human history if it happens. Civ is not about retracing the past of human history, but building a new one, and to me they surely can in the game, to provide iron and for them being a rare catastrofic event.

I’m actually more excited by by this line in the steam announcement than anything else:

"Game modes can include additional content such as new units, buildings or improvements and can be turned on or off during game setup to apply significant and dramatic changes to the rule of the game'"

Hope that this means all new stuff from the different game modes can be carried if we want to a regular game... Maybe even some mecanics from existing game modes can also be carried out.

I know that the phrasing of the announcement was not clear at all. But, I sure hope this will be the case.

Also I am more excited about the updates in between DLCs than by the DLCs. Hoping there would be balance changes, bug fixes, UI improvements, AI improvements, and some QoL like disabling autolenses...

In any case, for me this is also a big letdown as I dont think we can expect significant changes in the terrible religion and WC systems. Or any big improvement in current systems at all. Also all Mods may be broken for the entire next year until the season pass ends and modders can fix the mods again, if they still care about it.

Bittersweet announcement for me.

PS: I want tsunamis and eathquakes, come on FXS, give me hope.

 

[PhoenicianGold]

I wonder if this pattern of recurring civ + new civ will be a pattern for the 2 civ DLCs?

Based on what we're seeing, I'd be amazed if we don't get Byzantium.

I'm less convinced by Portugal, Babylon and Italy. My gut instinct says that Brazil, Sumeria and Rome are their respective analogs in this game for now... Plus they may want to leave some big names for a future season pass....

I won't assume as much. If they (hypothetically) stick to the same distribution as prior expacks (four new, four old), then at least one DLC pack will have a new civ with no returning civ to solidify consumer interest. So there's no clear advantage or disadvantage to pairing a new civ with a returning civ. If anything, it makes more sense to pair two new civs together and hope together they amount to enough interest to buy that DLC individually, because it would mean three single-civ DLC packs would have returning civs as opposed to only two (and therefore more likely at least three single-DLC packs will sell well).

I could see Byzantium being pushed off for a second season, in the same way that Canada was pushed off to allow the Cree a year to shine without feeling like the region was too crammed with "redundant" civs. If a second season is planned, I think Bulgaria will happen first.

I'm not sure about Portugal, but I'm pretty sure I agree with you. I don't think Brazil is the "analogue," given that we also have the Dutch. If anything, I think the fact that Portugal could easily have all of Spain's uniques is what is holding it back. I keep feeling Portugal will be one of the last things we see ever released for the game, much like Babylon/Assyria or Byzantium. They are iconic enough to be included just on familiarity alone, but mechanically they struggle to find a niche and are best saved as a gratuitous last hurrah than allowed to weigh expectations down with an earlier release.

We will probably get something Italian. I think, depending on how they want to implement it, that could be something we see this season. Italy has a huge gamer market and is one of the last holdouts where the devs could really pander to snagging some new players. It could easily be the Canada of this season pass, although I have my doubts because if it were the Canada, it would have been announced alongside the season pass and not kept secret.

 

[Alexander's Hetaroi]

I'm less convinced by Portugal, Babylon and Italy. My gut instinct says that Brazil, Sumeria and Rome are their respective analogs in this game for now... Plus they may want to leave some big names for a future season pass....

Brazil being replaced by Portugal doesn't make any sense. In fact I think Portugal has the biggest chance of returning.
I hope your wrong about Italy though.
Babylon I don't know about, but I don't see Sumeria being the replacement. I could see them doing Assyria though. Ancient era civs are lacking and I think we need one of those.
I'm not hopeful on a second season pass to be honest anyway, so that's why those are my reasonings. That would basically put the game at like 4 expansions.

 

[AntSou]

Hope that this means all new stuff from the different game modes can be carried if we want to a regular game.

They don't need to be carried. The modes are described as independent rulesets which you can toggle on/off in "normal games".

Unless they also appear in separate scenarios.

 

[Xandinho]

These alternative personas are just a way of giving us the impression that we are playing alternative leaders. It is understandable, since alternative leaders take a lot of work, but an alternative persona not so much. I particularly find the idea interesting.

 

[Leucarum]

I don't think Brazil is the "analogue,"

I get what you mean. Spain is definitely the mechanical analogue while - and I don't think its particularly fair - I suspect they are treating Brazil as their cultural analogue.

 

[oSiyeza]

They don't need to be carried. The modes are described as independent rulesets which you can toggle on/off in "normal games".

Unless they also appear in separate scenarios.

Hope so!, it is unclear what would be the difference between scenarios with different mechanics lets say the red death scenario, or the plague scenario; and a game mod. They look like almost the same thing. To me they cannot be only rulesets, as they seem to have different units, buildings, mechanics, and looks like even new disasters.

I hope you are right, and thay they implement them the way you describe it.

Also, if this is the case, they should integtrate some of the old scenarios scenarions into game modes.