Civilization VII Wishlist

[Gorbles]

I am pretty convinced he had to follow the larger design of civ6. The “boardgame” civ edition. Everything they did with civ6 fits with the boardgame mentality. I think Ed Beach is the root of the problem.

Honestly, I've never understood the "boardgame" attitude here. Civ, as a tile-based turn-based strategic game, is inherently a board game. Literally. There are no real-time elements, there is a board, and stuff like movement and the like is pretty fixed.

Things can be more boardgame-y, or less, but it's not an Ed Beach thing. It's inherent to the entire franchise, as far back as the original. Maybe the issue is that some iterations departed more from a strict interpretation, and we have folks who prefer those iterations weighting them against less favourably received iterations (I'm thinking III - IV contrasted against V and VI). I didn't have a lot of time with II, but I spent boy howdy a lot of time with SMAC.

One constant in my experience r.e. fans and video games is there's always a focus on "blame". It's rarely "things turned out this way and I simply personally don't enjoy it". It has to be turned into something objective. Something concretely "bad" as a way to explain away player frustration. And that sits weirdly with me, because Civ is a massively popular franchise, with thousands and thousands of concurrent active users across a bunch of its iterations (IV, V and VI - other titles and side-titles are going the way of diminishing returns, I'd say). One person's food is another person's poison, or so the saying goes.

Why do we have to attempt to quantify things that ultimately boil down to "I enjoy this or I don't" in such concrete terms? How do we weight this against the entire playerbase? The latter is kind of an unanswerable question, but I'm just trying to dig for a bit of introspection here. "this single person is the root of The Problem™" is a kinda yikes way to phrase something. No?

 

[Xur]

I’m sure it’s the janitor that sets the tone and direction for each iteration of a civ. It cant possible be the lead designer.

Civ4 was very much a Soren Johnson product, civ5 was very much a Jon Schafer product and civ6 is an Ed Beach product. He even talked about boardgames and his love for them. I’m not saying Ed Beach is bad or wrong - just saying it’s the wrong direction for the franchise. If you want that boardgame feeling, then Ed Beach is fantastic.

Let’s agree to disagree before I get my 1000th warning from a mod.

 

[Gorbles]

I’m not saying Ed Beach is bad or wrong

You said, and I literally quote, "I think Ed Beach is the root of the problem".

I'm fine with agreeing to disagree over opinion, that's all these posts are. But if you're going to say something - own it. No sarcasm about janitors or the like is necessary. I'm simply confused over the whole "boardgame" bit, and I know it hasn't come out of nowhere (and you're possibly right - this could be the wrong thread for it, but it does imo fundamentally relate to what each of us want out of each new release in the franchise). It seems to be that people compare it to a set of principles that is understood to be central to "boardgames" (which board games? Whatever ones the named figurehead was associated with in the past I guess). A lot of this discussion is often well-written, and at times lengthy. But to me, fundamentally, Civ is a boardgame. In video game format. There's only so many ways you can slice "turn based strategy where units move on a tile-based grid".

"yes, but exploding cities out into districts more strongly codifies an item-per-hex, ergo more boardgame-y"

But is it? Or are we discussing the strength of abstractions (infinite Wonder stacking to take an easy, often-referenced CiV-and-earlier example) vs. mechanical solutions (or incentives) to exploring the game (board, which has always been a board)?

This relates to a wishlist for me, because it seems like we're discussing how the direction of the game influences both actual mechanics as decided by the devs, and emergent (player and AI) gameplay potential of these mechanics.

For example, Wonder stacking (when they didn't occupy tiles) seemed cheap to me. It doesn't do the Wonders justice. That said, if there was another way to do the Wonders justice that didn't represent them as brilliantly on the map as VI does, then I'd be up for that. Wonders should be Wonders. Even in SMAC, they were relatively abstract, but you had the (hilariously good / bad / bizarre / love them anyway) videos. I still remember them (and I've been skipping them for years, as little as I play SMAC these days).

To me, it's not a question of "boardgame" or not. I prefer Wonders being represented as unique choices that actually make an impact beyond the amount of Science-or-Hammer optimisation a player can make. To put it in different terms (possibly inaccurate terms, borrowing RTS lingo here), micro vs. macro. The space you use on the map should matter, and to me that doesn't make it a "boardgame". This is a concept that exists in any game where territory owned affords bonuses. It applies to Risk as much as it does Starcraft.

So my wishlist is: more decisions like Wonders in VI. Or some other way of that choice feeling impactful, vs. feeling like production queue optimisation. I'm not here to play Factorio. I'm here to build an empire that stands the test of time. For me, choices of this magnitude need to matter, and locking Wonders to hexes was a great way of doing that.

 

[Naokaukodem]

My wish - and actually, my hope - is that the ideas in the thread of my signature to be exploited. But in the same time, I feel that they experimented it but it didn't met the "fun" requirements. Personnally, I would never call any game of Civ "fun", rather "interesting" or "boring", or "frustrating". Maybe the "fun" part is where it is not "frustrating" ? (therefore Civ6 is an "unfun" game most of the time) Because in my ideas, you could see your empire collapse by 5 times a chance in 500 turns (1 chance per 100 turns, it is to say 1% chance per turn) even if you meet the maximal requirement of "stability". The issue of this is that you probably have at least 1 collapse per game, which could become redundant, just saying. But after all, "collapses" have been common, especially in the proto-states of Mesopotamia, so I guess it could become regular gameplay. A patch to this idea could be as following : the more you collapse, the less likely you are to collapse in the future. For example, if you collapse once in 3400 B.C., and you meet the requirements of "maximum stability", then your chances of collapse per turn disminish to 0,5%. Or, make events to trigger a possible collapse, but then it's hard to have unpredicatable events that the player wouldn't feel "forced" to exploit. Don't get me wrong, collapses could be good early, but probably wouln't be so much fun late game, except maybe if ideologies are back. "Communism" could the equivalent of Fundamentalism in Civ2 (or, if IIDRC, the "ultimate government"), but with a risk of collapse. While I'm saying this, the "ultimate government" could also be seen as Fascism or Liberalism. In that way, I think that some policy cards could mitigate the effects of collapses : for example, a card that forbid people to leave cities in case of collapse (Agrarianism ?), but with cities with rising criminality and poor revenues. (gold, science, culture, etc.)

EDIT : Liberalism have abuses that lead to disastrous crisis, and Fascism is just "wrong" therefore obliterated. And The long-lasting results of abysmal debt could be the ultimate collapse. Well I understand nothing to economy, it's too complicated. Heck, you could have an ultimate choice to pay or collapse. (like in reality) But if you don't have the gold ? > Loan.

 

[civac]

For example, Wonder stacking (when they didn't occupy tiles) seemed cheap to me. It doesn't do the Wonders justice. That said, if there was another way to do the Wonders justice that didn't represent them as brilliantly on the map as VI does, then I'd be up for that. Wonders should be Wonders. Even in SMAC, they were relatively abstract, but you had the (hilariously good / bad / bizarre / love them anyway) videos. I still remember them (and I've been skipping them for years, as little as I play SMAC these days).

To me, it's not a question of "boardgame" or not. I prefer Wonders being represented as unique choices that actually make an impact beyond the amount of Science-or-Hammer optimisation a player can make. To put it in different terms (possibly inaccurate terms, borrowing RTS lingo here), micro vs. macro. The space you use on the map should matter, and to me that doesn't make it a "boardgame". This is a concept that exists in any game where territory owned affords bonuses. It applies to Risk as much as it does Starcraft.

So my wishlist is: more decisions like Wonders in VI. Or some other way of that choice feeling impactful, vs. feeling like production queue optimisation. I'm not here to play Factorio. I'm here to build an empire that stands the test of time. For me, choices of this magnitude need to matter, and locking Wonders to hexes was a great way of doing that.

The choice to build a wonder is the opportunity cost of getting it vs your other needs (settlers, infrastructure, units; especially settler in the early game) as well as the chance of making the investment and losing out anyway because someone else is faster. Never played Civ6 but I have followed it a bit due to an interest in the whole game series and I have a hard time seeing how the the loss of a tile (for a district?) is not comparatively trivial to the usual opportunity costs like in any other Civ game.

 

[Gorbles]

The choice to build a wonder is the opportunity cost of getting it vs your other needs (settlers, infrastructure, units; especially settler in the early game) as well as the chance of making the investment and losing out anyway because someone else is faster. Never played Civ6 but I have followed it a bit due to an interest in the whole game series and I have a hard time seeing how the the loss of a tile (for a district?) is not comparatively trivial to the usual opportunity costs like in any other Civ game.

Those opportunity costs still exist.

But aside from that, my intent isn't to say "Civ VI did this perfectly". I'm saying "I want more choices to play out like this". To me not only does it come with immersion through great aesthetics, but functionally it adds a permanent cost in using the hex. It's a two-for-one (again: for me).

It's simply one example of something that gets continually caught up in the "boardgame" discussion, and I wanted to unpack it a bit is all (as Wonders are a favourite of mine in VI).

 

[Alexander's Hetaroi]

Those opportunity costs still exist.

But aside from that, my intent isn't to say "Civ VI did this perfectly". I'm saying "I want more choices to play out like this". To me not only does it come with immersion through great aesthetics, but functionally it adds a permanent cost in using the hex. It's a two-for-one (again: for me).

It's simply one example of something that gets continually caught up in the "boardgame" discussion, and I wanted to unpack it a bit is all (as Wonders are a favourite of mine in VI).

To add in more choices in the game, my wish is for more mutually exclusive buildings to be able to be built in districts.
With very few exceptions most Commercial Hubs and Campuses look the same with the exact same buildings. Choosing to build a Caravanserai instead of a Market, or a Guildhall instead of a Bank, would give the game much more variety, both graphically and mechanically.

 

[Futumch]

I'd like to see some improvements in the map generation. The current one in Civ6 is not very good at all. I would like a much higher fidelity map to work with.
I'd like to see the return of the "Top 5 cities in the world" from Civ 1.
I'd like to see a project like the old "Apollo Program" which grants you the full, visible world map completely revealed.

I'm happy to see the World Congress be taken out round behind the shed and put down.
A de-emphasis on Religion as a victory condition would be nice. Just converting the world doesn't mean jack if nations are still belting the crap out of each other. Both world wars IRL should demonstrate that.

 

[pokiehl]

I'd like to see some improvements in the map generation. The current one in Civ6 is not very good at all. I would like a much higher fidelity map to work with.

I quite agree. For some reason the maps in civ 6 just don’t feel very exciting. The shapes of the landmasses are boring, we generally lack interesting features like bays, and stuff like rivers and lakes feel very substandard. One of my biggest wishes for civ 7 is a better map generator.

 

[Alexander's Hetaroi]

A de-emphasis on Religion as a victory condition would be nice. Just converting the world doesn't mean jack if nations are still belting the crap out of each other. Both world wars IRL should demonstrate that.

Religious tourism is a thing so I wouldn't mind it being lumped into the cultural victory. Something along the lines of 1) have the majority of your citizens being under your religion and 2) receive more international tourists than other civilizations receive domestic tourists (same winning condition already).
In fact, religions play a very big part of a civilization's culture throughout history in the first place.

 

[frutiemax]

How about some good net code so we don't have to rejoin every multiplayer lobby so we don't get that mysterious 0ms ping?

 

[uppi]

I wish units will be more mobile than in Civ 6. If they keep the current movement system, each unit needs one more movement point. That would fix quite a few things: from unit shuffling and traffic jams to the AI being more challenging in war. Every time you get an effect that gives your unit an extra movement point, unit movement feels so much better that it should have been the default to begin with.

 

[Askia Muhammad]

<hey Civ Community,

// Old Stuff:
- PLEASE KEEP Governor gameplay (new Great Person class?).
- PLEASE KEEP power and weather system, it's very relevant to modern times (fusion energy as late game power spike?).
- FOR THE LOVE OF SID PLEASE KEEP District gameplay.
- PLEASE KEEP going crazy with the music and leader animations and backdrops. Amazing state-of-the-art stuff!!!

// New Stuff:
- Future Era is increasingly relevant and should be expanded upon.
- Please tone down the Overwatch/Fortnite audiovisual-LSD art style. Make this a real Renaissance man's game.
- Please study depictions of each leader and culture respectfully. A few are extremely disrespectful (ie. Montezuma and Amanitore).
- Please simulate economic strata (street cleaners, crime and unrest, farmers, craftsmen, merchants, landowners, etc.).

// Pie in the Sky Stuff:
- Add multiplanetary gameplay (the practice will be needed)
- Add branching civic and tech paths to specialize your Civ in later Eras (genetic vs. cybernetic mastery, police states, secret societies are a titillating feature and should be kept in mind.).
- Slavery is an undeniable fact of human history and should not be skirted around.

// Never stop respecting your audience and all the billions of humans you represent in the Civilization franchise!

_aztlani>

My wishlist:

- World Congress more like Civ V
- AI Capable of waging war and capturing cities (don’t create mechanics or systems that prevent this such as ancient walls ending all threat of AI invasion). I think what I’d actually like to see is perhaps an AI for each victory type and assign them based on a Civs strength but of course allow random personalities
- expanded diplomacy in some sense
- less micro (not sure how to accomplish this. I don’t want Civ V 4 city tradition meta but I also don’t want Civ 6 expand as much and as fast as humanely possible. Make some interesting choices somewhere that allow a player to play tall or wide. Perhaps bring back puppet cities. My own personal idea is actually being able to meld multiple cities into a region and assigning governors by region rather than city, when war is declared a Civ can capture parts of a region city by city still but as a region the micro will be greatly diminished.

 

[Haig]

I thought it was Ed Beach?
Or he was just the lead for both expansions, and Anton designed the WC for both?

Yeah Strenger said in an interview he designed both WCs

 

[RavennaAl]

I hope that they have a custom civ where you can pick 4 choices from a list of options. For instance, if I want Sumeria’s Warcart, Frederick’s extra district, Percules Wildcard and Cleopatra’s extra gold per trade route. Something like that. Also have biological weapons ( and gas masks as a defense against it) that kill off the people, but leave the infrastructure alone. ICBM’s would be nice, as well as a Star Wars defense against them. And a giant Death Star for the ultimate science victory after you reach the exoplanet where you blow up the Earth. Also, have sabotage people who you can control their movement and they can sneak into other civ’s as well as city-states and wreck havoc or steal things other than just spies. Just some of my wishes.

 

[Kotofei]

I too would like to see something that looks more like Civ 5. Civ 6 became a contest of how well you can memorize and optimize a mind-boggling array of mini-games and micro-decisions. I feel like Civ 5 wasn't that way.

And make the game harder, too. I never mastered Deity in Civ 5, and kinda miss the ruthless AI in vanilla.

 

[Kotofei]

I wish units will be more mobile than in Civ 6. If they keep the current movement system, each unit needs one more movement point. That would fix quite a few things: from unit shuffling and traffic jams to the AI being more challenging in war. Every time you get an effect that gives your unit an extra movement point, unit movement feels so much better that it should have been the default to begin with.

Good one. Yeah, combat in 6 is more like solving a Rubik's cube than battlefield maneuver.

 

[UncivilizedGuy]

Hopefully CivVI's implementation of districts is just a stepping stone to something better in CivVII. If districts and wonders are implemented in the same manner then 7 will feel redundant. I imagine having to zoom into a city to build it rather consuming tiles on the map. This would free up real estate across the map possibly giving the developers more freedom to experiment with other ideas and also making the map larger. City bombardment could also become a mini game.

Yes please fix the World Congress. Just give me something more realistic.

I'm not a fan of the civics tree either. There needs to be more interconnectedness between the techs, civics and eras.

Hopefully diplomacy will be less silly. Maybe implement gen AI so that I can have full blown conversations with the leaders... ha ha.

Mostly I'm asking for a greater sense of immersion.

 

[Prester John 2]

I'm actually fine with most parts of Civ6, I just wish the AI was more proactive in military terms after the medieval era. For this reason I'd like the combat system simplified, with less power to city strikes, more stackability, more ability to build up armies in the later part of the game. Right now, if you don't have Grandmaster's chapel it takes to long to produce units which seriously hinders the AI.

 

[Oberinspektor Derrick]

I'm actually fine with most parts of Civ6, I just wish the AI was more proactive in military terms after the medieval era. For this reason I'd like the combat system simplified, with less power to city strikes, more stackability, more ability to build up armies in the later part of the game. Right now, if you don't have Grandmaster's chapel it takes to long to produce units which seriously hinders the AI.

AI unit production isnt the main issue tbh, its that they often refuse to go to war with them and utterly fail to take cities with walls unless at an extreme numerical advantage. And if they do take a city, loyalty usually screws them over right afterwards.

Remember, unit production was not any faster for the AI in civ 5, but that didnt stop them from taking over their entire continent.