Closed Beta Feedback Thread

[MrRadar]

There should probably be scaling victory/defeat support depending on the size of the battle, and affected by losses on both sides. If you barely win a battle, you shouldn't get 8 war support and kill the enemy by 8, rather you MIGHT get a small bump, and the enemy might get a debuff but mitigated by the heroic delaying action. If your one scout kills an enemy scout because you had the high ground, it shouldn't be taken as a catastrophic loss that is unrecoverable/a great victory for you. If you kill eight enemy units with six and suffer no casualties, YES you should get a massive buff and they should get a massive debuff! And vice versa. At least that's how i would handle it, because as of now it's all or nothing. I do love the war support system though, it just needs tweaking.

Yes, by all means there should be something like that - the scale of the battle should be taken into consideration, and, perhaps, the actual position of the armies. Also, AI should be made aware that having declared an unjust war, they lose war support every turn. In my case they were rather passive and only sent an army to threaten my actual city with weaker garrison on the same turn they surrendered, after having lost two skirmishes involving one weak unit on their side shortly before.

 

[MrRadar]

Did you actually kill the Scout in the manual battles? If you were the attacker then you needed to either kill the enemy or capture their Flag to achieve Victory.

Another game, another case like this, only this time it was a deer hunt. Due to the hunt happening on the river, I was not attacking during the first two rounds and let the deer come at me, I attacked only on the third round, and the battle should have continued next turn, as both sides survived three rounds. However, the result is defeat and lost tribe unit despite the UI clearly showing no elimination:

Spoiler :

 

[Taefin]

Played a second game on Humankind difficulty, focusing on science Zhou > Greeks > Franks > Joseon > Italian. Ultimately the game glitched on turn 125 when I tried invading Eagles, when my embarked units couldn't idle and I was unable to end my turn.

The Joseon EQ now seems quite a bit more dramatic, as it seems the tech costs were reduced while the science yields were not. Using Zhou to get ~60 science early on and dropping Greek EQ everywhere and expanding rapidly with the influence I was able to stay roughly on pace with tech. Expansion was aided by city states forming everywhere around me, and being able to be conquered with just 4 hoplites and 2 archers. This allowed me to gain the largest empire by far without any conquest (just paying back Rams' aggression with 100 GPT vassalage). Then when i put down Joseon EQ and research quarters turn ~90 I went from ~600 to ~2000 science in 10 turns and plateaued at 3400. Reached line infantry at turn ~115 which completely eliminated the need to get saltpeter (though I tried unsuccessfully to conquer my vassal to steal their two deposits; I was required to force surrender before I could occupy their city with a deposit).

All in all, this was pretty unsatisfying. I just meandered through the game and out-teched the AI

The game would have been a lot more interesting if the AI attacked me instead of each other. For a time in Medieval, Rooks and Dragons had superior armies (to my 4 hoplites and 2 archers) but kept each other busy. Early on, Zhou helped get a few spears out in time to counter the AI rush
I notice the AI does now spam quarters, and their cities get quite large.

I did notice that late-game units were costing upwards of 2k industry and 3 pops, and since I neglected industry for science, I did not have any cities capable of pumping them out (200 industry max). However, the upgrade from spears/archer to line infantry is only 1288 gold and I was able to pump out 7-8 hoplites in 1 turn/pop each before researching halberds (I skipped pikes). If the game were to go on longer, I could see my self getting into trouble when the AI caught up on tech and had the industry (~6000) to outlast me.

Also, this was the second time in a row my religion got sniped by my vassal. This time I started it quite early, and ended up being the largest in the game, but my early game population was small, and I guess this meant I lost leadership of it.

Given that snowballing is so extreme in this game, I think the AI needs to be programmed to look for openings to attack the game leader(s). This way we could get natural rubber banding.

Also, this playthrough even more leads me to believe that winning wars needs to be harder. I secured my early vassal this time by forcing Rams to surrender on the very same turn their hunnic hoarde arrived that would have otherwise wiped me out. I had secured none of their territory, and had no capacity to do so. As other's have stated, picking off stray units and forcing retreats against their forward units should not be enough to force them into submission for the rest of the game. Although the game feels very unstable right now, I suspect a few changes here could brings some substantive balance.

 

[CoconutTank]

Hiya folks. Finally been able to play Humankind. Thanks for giving me the opportunity to try it out

For starters, my laptop doesn't die immediately so that's a fairly good sign. If I play for long enough though, the laptop definitely gets hot enough to require cranking up the AC, and for a bit longer after that, the audio starts to distort badly. My laptop specs are the following: https://imgur.com/a/mnMox5X.

I've been having a decent amount of fun so far, though I've basically restarted at least 3 times on average for every session I could manage. I haven't been able to complete any session yet. So far my longest session has the following cultures:
Assyrians > Huns > Mongols > Spanish
Having speedy horsies that could horse all over enemy faces is a good lot of fun, even if they only have 1 attack range. Being able to instant buy horse armies with influence was also greatly appreciated, since it lets me convert scouts to horses quickly, and also made certain messages go away. I was quite sad that picking up the Spanish made that option no longer available, but keeping up with other civs likely mattered more.

Here are some of the things that stood out for me while I was playing:

*** Is there a real-time component to unit movement in the game? If not, why can't I speed up unit movement? I didn't see an option for that anywhere in the settings, but if someone could point it out to me, I'd really appreciate it. Unit movement being so slow is one of my greater annoyances in Humankind so far, esp since it seems to be on purpose.

*** There's a whole lot of "new citizen" and "starvation" spam that shows up in my ticker. Generally this happens in outposts that I can't do anything about, esp when I'm in no position to attach outposts or train hordes. Am I supposed to move my population between regions somehow? Or am I doomed to be spammed with these messages until I get enough influence to deal with them?

*** Picking a culture in Humankind tends to have a similar feel of picking religious beliefs in Civ 6, except culture picks have way more impact and picking a culture comes up more often than picking religious beliefs. If I miss certain religious beliefs or miss picking up a religion at all in Civ 6, I could at least abandon any plans for religion and continue playing normally (assuming I'm not playing Byzantine). Missing one or more culture picks in Humankind feels like too big of a hole for one to dig out of. There are other cultures one can pick, but to me it's pretty clear that cultures aren't equally compatible with each other.

*** I wish the mechanics on sieges were clarified a bit. So apparently if I choose to endure or progress a siege, I can go on to the next turn? All battles that I've played through feel like they're mandatory fights.

*** There are various bugs that I've encountered, similar to the ones folks have already described, such as battle previews getting stuck on the screen, units becoming invisible, and the game halting completely, such as when the AI needs to decide on what to do for a battle but doesn't. Sometimes saving and reloading fixes these bugs, and uh sometimes it doesn't.

*** Attempting to mouse over the affinity ability to see what it does just doesn't seem to work most of the time? When I mouse over an affinity ability, sometimes the tooltip wil stay up for a bit, other times the tooltip will just flash on and off.

*** LOS on gunner units is a pain. I get that ranged units are going to be pretty strong, esp at 4 range, but my xbows basically have only 1 range b/c my own units are blocking sight all the time, and the terrain is pretty uneven. That area to the north-east of where one starts is basically unsuitable for LOS ranged combat.

*** Speaking of uneven terrain, having all those height differences in the game is neat, but it gets pretty hard to read for me, esp when a cliff or ramp is facing away from me. Sometimes I have to hold right click and swipe around an area to see if I that's a place I can actually traverse.

*** Is there a way to see how much movement a unit has left during a battle? My horses seem to have infinite movement until they don't, which is kind of weird for planning. They seem to have way more movement in battle than on the map.

*** NGL, seeing a civic for slaves did not sit well with me, even if it is a big part of human history. Y'all probably hashed that out awhile ago, but as someone that's diving into Humankind with no previous knowledge this was... surprising.

*** It was kind of interesting to win wars w/out actually taking any cities from a rival. Honestly I like that field victories are meaningful (in comparison to Civ 6, where only capturing cities matters).

*** Speaking of which, it seems like the AI is allowed to retreat multiple times in a turn? IIRC this wasn't a choice that I could make when I played, wondering if this is gated on a tech?

*** I think it might be a worthwhile idea to cut down tech costs a bit? It generally felt like my culture was able to consistently progress faster than my tech level all the time. Culture already feels like it takes awhile to get though imo, and I don't know if making a game take longer to play is necessarily a great idea. I'm actually wondering if I'll see planes before the end of a session!

*** Once older cultures fall off of the culture track, I could no longer see what legacy traits those cultures offered, which kind of sucks since I might forget what I got from a previous culture. As it turns out, the roman numerals in the culture UI will actually show legacy traits if one mouses over them. If that's what those icons are meant for, maybe a smaller or zoomed-in portrait of a culture, or a culture's icon in those boxes would be clearer than numerals?

*** I've played ~26 hours so far, but I haven't done anything meaningful with boats. There was an event where I could buy a sea raider and have them drift off into nowhere, but that was pretty much it. I kind of want to go all in on boats with Phoenicians, Norsemen and Venetians, but it feels like land capability is too important to pass up on, and it's not like I'll be able to defend my regions with boats.

There's probably a lot more that I can bring up, but I'll just leave it at this for now. I'm definitely having some amount of fun, and it's very different from Civ 6! It feels like positioning and flanking matters a lot, but I've only been able to make the most of this with the Assyrians' +1 move and horse armies. Being able to block reinforcements or box in a rival's available starting space before starting a battle are very cool features.

 

[Taefin]

Good point about slavery! As the game is more about 8 friends cosplaying history together than gritty realism, naming a mediocre civic “slavery” seems really tone deaf. If anything it should be called craft fairs since it give at most a 1% boost in production.

Edit: Also completely agree about the balance between cultures! If you don’t take Phoenicia for the 50% buyout discount, what’s the point of any of the 5-10% buffs in money later. Overall I find it very fun that cultures’ legacy traits are so powerful, but the mediocre ones really fall flat. Also it seems like there are too many focused on increasing faith. Given how easy it is to lose leadership of your own religion, I’d rather see one or two cultures focused on increasing faith, maybe some focused on abusing it, but more each era doing something unrelated to faith for the games when religion doesn’t happen.

Also, is Joseon supposed to make harbors worth 133 science? It seems every water tile gets upgraded from 4 > 17 science when built (at least when using hover-to-predict-yields feature). I noticed other science tile yields were increasing by 3 when building a RQ next to them, do these tiles have an adjacency bonus to other tiles producing science? At least for Joseon, this seems like it is not intentional.

 

[CoconutTank]

Quick question, if I'm the Phoenicians and the Carthaginians, do their legacy traits stack? If so, does that mean 30% buyout cost (100 - 20 - 50), or 40% buyout cost (0.8 * 0.5)? Also does that apply to units as well as buildings? I kind of want to try that combo now, esp if buying out units is that much cheaper.

Edit: Ok, so for my own amusement I tried going Phoenicians > Carthaginians to see how well that would work. I don't know the game well enough to see if the buyout cost reduction applied to units as well, but I think it did?

None of that mattered though. I tried to beeline for Sailing to get Havens and Biremes, but I got to Carthaginians before I got to Sailing, which I think is both hilarious and horrible

Also, beelining for Sailing meant that I didn't get City Defense, which meant I was also delayed on Spearmen and Organized Warfare, which was really bad b/c it meant I was completely open to green's aggression coming from the south. Being able to buy Scouts and Archers faster doesn't really matter if I can't muster them properly against Spearmen armies. I think green also chose the Hittites that time, so, I was probably pretty hosed.

Besides choosing a culture with a EQ that grants science (like Zhou), is there any other way for me to boost my science that early on? Going boats early on seems like a really bad idea in any case.

Edit2: I guess, to be more clear, the legacy traits probably work fine together as a combo. However, the naval foci are not particularly great, so those legacy traits have to do some heavy lifting.

 

[FinalDoomsday]

*** NGL, seeing a civic for slaves did not sit well with me, even if it is a big part of human history. Y'all probably hashed that out awhile ago, but as someone that's diving into Humankind with no previous knowledge this was... surprising.

Perhaps you could clarify, you were surprised a game about history included slavery or you were surprised it was depicted as a civic? It would be stranger for it not to feature at all. You can choose not to pick the civics and I think theres emancipation and other progressive civics later on.

 

[CoconutTank]

Perhaps you could clarify, you were surprised a game about history included slavery or you were surprised it was depicted as a civic? It would be stranger for it not to feature at all. You can choose not to pick the civics and I think theres emancipation and other progressive civics later on.

Ah, I never did see emancipation.

I guess the fact that slavery in Humankind has productive benefits and no visible drawbacks, which kind of encourages it, was kind of brazen and off putting to me, as well as being somewhat ahistorical. In a game about human history, I don't know if I could reasonably demand that slavery be omitted, but slavery still sucks, and it sucks to see it being mechanically represented.

Slavery is a touchy subject, though I guess there are plenty of other uncomfortable things that can happen in Humankind.

(Also yay AW!)

 

[Kwami]

During the Victor OpenDev, I actually pointed out the slavery civic in my comments at the end. There are so many problems with this civic.

1. You can choose criminal slaves or war slaves. You can't have both. You also can't have slaves for any other reason, such as debt, race, or birth. It's all very ahistorical and hides the true reasons that so many people were taken as slaves.

2. There are no drawbacks for choosing slavery, which suggests that you should totally do it. In fact, the prompt isn't even whether you should have slaves, but rather, "How do we procure slaves?".

3. You can't choose not to have slaves unless you ignore the civic entirely, at which point it will glow for the rest of the game, suggesting that you should make a choice on the matter.

4. Choosing criminal slaves moves you toward the World endpoint, which has the following description: "The choices taken emphasize cooperation, humanism, universalism, militarisation for reasons of unifying groups, etc." It rewards you with bonus production in the commons quarter and bonus food for alliances. Neither bonus makes any sense and the description is just gross when you relate it to slavery.

5. After playing through the full Victor OpenDev and the current Poe Closed Beta, I've never seen emancipation. Is choosing slavery one of the requirements to unlock it?

I'm not against including slavery in a historical game if it's done well, but it's just done really badly here. The human sacrifice stuff is really bad, too. Come to think of it, the whole civics system is pretty terrible and they should probably just start over.

 

[Atlas627]

*** Is there a real-time component to unit movement in the game? If not, why can't I speed up unit movement? I didn't see an option for that anywhere in the settings, but if someone could point it out to me, I'd really appreciate it. Unit movement being so slow is one of my greater annoyances in Humankind so far, esp since it seems to be on purpose.

Yes, there is a real-time component. Moves are simultaneous, and moving inside a Zone of Control costs 3 extra movement. So if your army moves *while* an enemy army is moving, you can catch each other and one of you can choose to trigger battle. As far as movement during a battle, this real-time component only matters so far as there could be armies moving on the main map in the meantime, I think. Keep in mind that in late eras units outside of a combat can affect a combat.

*** There's a whole lot of "new citizen" and "starvation" spam that shows up in my ticker. Generally this happens in outposts that I can't do anything about, esp when I'm in no position to attach outposts or train hordes. Am I supposed to move my population between regions somehow? Or am I doomed to be spammed with these messages until I get enough influence to deal with them?

I hope they add an option to turn these sort of minor notifications off. I like having them, but I agree it is sometimes more hassle than its worth.

*** Picking a culture in Humankind tends to have a similar feel of picking religious beliefs in Civ 6, except culture picks have way more impact and picking a culture comes up more often than picking religious beliefs. If I miss certain religious beliefs or miss picking up a religion at all in Civ 6, I could at least abandon any plans for religion and continue playing normally (assuming I'm not playing Byzantine). Missing one or more culture picks in Humankind feels like too big of a hole for one to dig out of. There are other cultures one can pick, but to me it's pretty clear that cultures aren't equally compatible with each other.

I believe it is intended that you desperately want to get the right culture, so that there is actually a reason to hurry to advance. This helps even out players that are ahead and gaining Fame with players who are behind and are rushing through an era so that they can catch up.

*** I wish the mechanics on sieges were clarified a bit. So apparently if I choose to endure or progress a siege, I can go on to the next turn? All battles that I've played through feel like they're mandatory fights.

This is correct. I think it is pretty clear due to the fact that the Wait button uses the same icon as the normal Skip turn button for armies, and also that said button is automatically pressed for you, so you can end a turn.

*** Is there a way to see how much movement a unit has left during a battle? My horses seem to have infinite movement until they don't, which is kind of weird for planning. They seem to have way more movement in battle than on the map.

Sorry? I don't understand. In battle, a unit moves then may attack. They can't move then move some more. You pick the spot to move to and that uses up all of its movement for the turn. As far as movement in battle vs on main map, were your armies using units with varying movement stats? If so, they use the movement of the slowest units.

*** NGL, seeing a civic for slaves did not sit well with me, even if it is a big part of human history. Y'all probably hashed that out awhile ago, but as someone that's diving into Humankind with no previous knowledge this was... surprising.

There is also a civic for Emancipation.

*** It was kind of interesting to win wars w/out actually taking any cities from a rival. Honestly I like that field victories are meaningful (in comparison to Civ 6, where only capturing cities matters).

I agree, this is a good thing.

*** Speaking of which, it seems like the AI is allowed to retreat multiple times in a turn? IIRC this wasn't a choice that I could make when I played, wondering if this is gated on a tech?

They may not retreat more than once on the same turn. Maybe you forgot which army you had already forced to retreat?

*** I think it might be a worthwhile idea to cut down tech costs a bit? It generally felt like my culture was able to consistently progress faster than my tech level all the time. Culture already feels like it takes awhile to get though imo, and I don't know if making a game take longer to play is necessarily a great idea. I'm actually wondering if I'll see planes before the end of a session!

I think the era progression needs to be slower, not the tech faster. Well, maybe a little bit faster. There's definitely a huge increase in tech costs that should be dialed back a little, but I like that it isn't linear.

*** Once older cultures fall off of the culture track, I could no longer see what legacy traits those cultures offered, which kind of sucks since I might forget what I got from a previous culture. As it turns out, the roman numerals in the culture UI will actually show legacy traits if one mouses over them. If that's what those icons are meant for, maybe a smaller or zoomed-in portrait of a culture, or a culture's icon in those boxes would be clearer than numerals?

I do wish I could go check all the powers that were already taken by other players, that appear in eras later than the next one, and that were in previous ones. I assume there will be such a thing available in the in-game encyclopedia.

*** I've played ~26 hours so far, but I haven't done anything meaningful with boats. There was an event where I could buy a sea raider and have them drift off into nowhere, but that was pretty much it. I kind of want to go all in on boats with Phoenicians, Norsemen and Venetians, but it feels like land capability is too important to pass up on, and it's not like I'll be able to defend my regions with boats.

Yes, this part of the game is woefully underdeveloped. I imagine they'll add stuff with an expansion, like the game that preceded Humankind.

 

[CoconutTank]

Yes, there is a real-time component. Moves are simultaneous, and moving inside a Zone of Control costs 3 extra movement. So if your army moves *while* an enemy army is moving, you can catch each other and one of you can choose to trigger battle. As far as movement during a battle, this real-time component only matters so far as there could be armies moving on the main map in the meantime, I think. Keep in mind that in late eras units outside of a combat can affect a combat.

Hmm. I do see a value in ZoC, but I don't see a value in the way simultaneous movement is implemented here. In single player, I can just wait for the AI to make their move if it really mattered to me, and I don't see how that's worth making units move as slow as molasses.

I hope they add an option to turn these sort of minor notifications off. I like having them, but I agree it is sometimes more hassle than its worth.

I think the minor notifs can be turned off by clicking the X on the ticker? But more importantly, I want to have more ways to deal with outpost pop control besides attaching the outpost or buying hordes from it.

I believe it is intended that you desperately want to get the right culture, so that there is actually a reason to hurry to advance. This helps even out players that are ahead and gaining Fame with players who are behind and are rushing through an era so that they can catch up.

I mean, it doesn't feel like there's usually much reason to wait? Advancing culture grants access to units and districts that are usually better, on top of accessing an additional legacy trait.

The only time I'd wait is during the nomadic era and to try get as many units and curiosities as possible while making use of Tribal unit HP regen.

This is correct. I think it is pretty clear due to the fact that the Wait button uses the same icon as the normal Skip turn button for armies, and also that said button is automatically pressed for you, so you can end a turn.

Good to know. That's not really all that clear to me, but I'll keep that in mind.

Sorry? I don't understand. In battle, a unit moves then may attack. They can't move then move some more. You pick the spot to move to and that uses up all of its movement for the turn. As far as movement in battle vs on main map, were your armies using units with varying movement stats? If so, they use the movement of the slowest units.

So the army display shows the army's movement per turn, and how much movement it has left. These values don't show up for individual units on the battlefield though. And there are certainly units that can move after attacking; Hunnic Hordes and Mongol Hordes specialize in focus-firing by re-using a tile to attack from. Hordes definitely seem to have more movement in battle, compared to when they're on the map.

There is also a civic for Emancipation.

Is there a specific trigger for this? I haven't played a full session yet, but I haven't come across it.

In any case, the presence of emancipation doesn't change that slavery is a touchy subject, along with it being poorly represented in-game, which Kwami covered very well.

They may not retreat more than once on the same turn. Maybe you forgot which army you had already forced to retreat?

Hmm, that might be it.

I think the era progression needs to be slower, not the tech faster. Well, maybe a little bit faster. There's definitely a huge increase in tech costs that should be dialed back a little, but I like that it isn't linear.

So this is my opinion, but for games in general, making a game take less time to play is sometimes an improvement, but making a game take more time to play is always a detriment.

I do wish I could go check all the powers that were already taken by other players, that appear in eras later than the next one, and that were in previous ones. I assume there will be such a thing available in the in-game encyclopedia.

Yeah, I have a lot of questions about Humankind, and I wish the encyclopedia was available for me to consult it

Yes, this part of the game is woefully underdeveloped. I imagine they'll add stuff with an expansion, like the game that preceded Humankind.

Hopefully!

 

[Atlas627]

Hmm. I do see a value in ZoC, but I don't see a value in the way simultaneous movement is implemented here. In single player, I can just wait for the AI to make their move if it really mattered to me, and I don't see how that's worth making units move as slow as molasses.

And in single player you can also choose to move armies and block the enemy. The slow movement is part of the game.

I think the minor notifs can be turned off by clicking the X on the ticker? But more importantly, I want to have more ways to deal with outpost pop control besides attaching the outpost or buying hordes from it.

Can you give a suggestion?

I mean, it doesn't feel like there's usually much reason to wait? Advancing culture grants access to units and districts that are usually better, on top of accessing an additional legacy trait.

The victory condition of the game? You have access to a lot more Fame opportunities if you wait.

The only time I'd wait is during the nomadic era and to try get as many units and curiosities as possible while making use of Tribal unit HP regen.

I'm glad this strategy exists. It is a lot less overpowered than before, which I think is a good thing.

So the army display shows the army's movement per turn, and how much movement it has left. These values don't show up for individual units on the battlefield though. And there are certainly units that can move after attacking; Hunnic Hordes and Mongol Hordes specialize in focus-firing by re-using a tile to attack from. Hordes definitely seem to have more movement in battle, compared to when they're on the map.

You can hold right-click to see if your unit can reach any particular space in combat (just like in the main map). I had not considered the Hun/Mongol units, so you make a good point there. I think that is a good enough reason to add movement display for all units in combat, so you don't need to check every tile either.

Is there a specific trigger for this? I haven't played a full session yet, but I haven't come across it.

In any case, the presence of emancipation doesn't change that slavery is a touchy subject, along with it being poorly represented in-game, which Kwami covered very well.

If I knew the trigger, I would say it! And if you feel slavery is poorly represented in the game, then the developers need some feedback on what you don't like about it, so they can represent it better.

So this is my opinion, but for games in general, making a game take less time to play is sometimes an improvement, but making a game take more time to play is always a detriment.

You never feel that a game is more epic if it takes longer? The more time you spend the more invested you become?

That wasn't my original point, but I don't think you can possibly say that making a game take longer is *always* a detriment. I agree that I prefer the game to take less time. However, the current scale of the game is mostly good imo, and making the science progression faster to match the era progression will throw the science progression out of whack relative to everything else in the game. You have to move armies, fight battles, build infrastructure, settle lands, explore, etc. I like the science progression relative to those things. It is the era progression which is too fast.

And if you want the total scale of everything to be smaller and faster, that's what game speed settings are for.

Yeah, I have a lot of questions about Humankind, and I wish the encyclopedia was available for me to consult it

I wish they had it in the beta, since it is a great thing to have a bunch of playtesters look at and give feedback on...

 

[CoconutTank]

And in single player you can also choose to move armies and block the enemy. The slow movement is part of the game.

Eh, okay. I'm not seeing any benefit, but alright. If I wanted real-time movement to mean something, I think I'd go boot up an RTS game instead.

Can you give a suggestion?

Hmm... what if cities and outposts can stockpile food instead of consuming it immediately? Each unit of food surplus (which would take more food to create than a pop) would be available at an empire level, and can be applied to a city/outpost to instantly create a pop. Units of food surplus can be bought by other empires with money, but food surplus will also go bad over time, so they can't be kept around forever. Food preservation techs could be introduced to help keep food surplus around longer. Food surplus going bad won't get notifications, just like how grievances expiring won't get notifications.

The victory condition of the game? You have access to a lot more Fame opportunities if you wait.

I don't really know Humankind that well, so I'm curious how that's the case. An empire's capabilities tend to get stronger over time as it accumulates additional cultures, they're more likely to complete competitive deeds due to the increased capabilities, and afaik they get access to more wonders from going up eras.

If I knew the trigger, I would say it! And if you feel slavery is poorly represented in the game, then the developers need some feedback on what you don't like about it, so they can represent it better.

I don't have any good suggestions, as I don't really know how to approach the subject well. All I know is that making slavery all upside and treating it like the other civic choices is not great.

You never feel that a game is more epic if it takes longer? The more time you spend the more invested you become?

That wasn't my original point, but I don't think you can possibly say that making a game take longer is *always* a detriment. I agree that I prefer the game to take less time. However, the current scale of the game is mostly good imo, and making the science progression faster to match the era progression will throw the science progression out of whack relative to everything else in the game. You have to move armies, fight battles, build infrastructure, settle lands, explore, etc. I like the science progression relative to those things. It is the era progression which is too fast.

And if you want the total scale of everything to be smaller and faster, that's what game speed settings are for.

Making a game take longer means having to commit more time to complete sessions of said game. Increased play time has a slight negative impact to single-player sessions for the most part, but it can potentially kill multi-player sessions completely. Game speeds can be adjusted, but generally games are balanced around a particular game speed instead of every game speed.

Furthermore, I would think the argument could be turned around; wouldn't it be easier to make things be faster, then have slower game speeds to make the session take longer? Trying to halve the time requirements causes fractional differences which aren't handled well by discrete turns, whereas doubling the time requirements is less likely to have these problems.

No, I don't necessarily feel that a game becomes more epic the longer it gets. I don't necessarily become more invested with more time either. If I was playing on a map that was literally 1 tile wide, or if every empire was sequestered on a 1 tile land mass in a bunch of ocean, it'd probably take forever to get anything done, but I doubt it'd feel epic, or that I'd become particularly invested.

 

[Atlas627]

Eh, okay. I'm not seeing any benefit, but alright. If I wanted real-time movement to mean something, I think I'd go boot up an RTS game instead.

I am sure many players will not like the simultaneous turns. I am very much looking forward to Multiplayer being smooth and active with this game though.

Hmm... what if cities and outposts can stockpile food instead of consuming it immediately? Each unit of food surplus (which would take more food to create than a pop) would be available at an empire level, and can be applied to a city/outpost to instantly create a pop. Units of food surplus can be bought by other empires with money, but food surplus will also go bad over time, so they can't be kept around forever. Food preservation techs could be introduced to help keep food surplus around longer. Food surplus going bad won't get notifications, just like how grievances expiring won't get notifications.

I find this too complicated for my liking, but I don't have to like your idea; I'm just some guy! But I think anything this complicated must wait for an expansion, regardless.

I don't really know Humankind that well, so I'm curious how that's the case. An empire's capabilities tend to get stronger over time as it accumulates additional cultures, they're more likely to complete competitive deeds due to the increased capabilities, and afaik they get access to more wonders from going up eras.

The benefits from the cultures are not as high as what science progression and empire expansion will give you normally. And some of the benefits from the cultures (Emblematic District, the Affinity powers) are only usable while you stay that culture. If you can afford to hang around and collect more Fame, I have almost always found that it is worthwhile.

I don't have any good suggestions, as I don't really know how to approach the subject well. All I know is that making slavery all upside and treating it like the other civic choices is not great.

Well that answered the question. You don't like that it is all upside, nor that it is simply another civic. That is useful feedback for them.

Making a game take longer means having to commit more time to complete sessions of said game. Increased play time has a slight negative impact to single-player sessions for the most part, but it can potentially kill multi-player sessions completely. Game speeds can be adjusted, but generally games are balanced around a particular game speed instead of every game speed.

There is certainly a limit to how long people will play multiplayer in a single session. I have found that the limiting factor is instead interest, and having the game structured around simultaneous turns is going to help with that a lot.

Furthermore, I would think the argument could be turned around; wouldn't it be easier to make things be faster, then have slower game speeds to make the session take longer? Trying to halve the time requirements causes fractional differences which aren't handled well by discrete turns, whereas doubling the time requirements is less likely to have these problems.

The game has already been balanced around a game speed, as you say. Some people, like yourself, apparently want something even faster than that. Can't necessarily balance the game around the faster speed.

No, I don't necessarily feel that a game becomes more epic the longer it gets. I don't necessarily become more invested with more time either. If I was playing on a map that was literally 1 tile wide, or if every empire was sequestered on a 1 tile land mass in a bunch of ocean, it'd probably take forever to get anything done, but I doubt it'd feel epic, or that I'd become particularly invested.

You have imagined a scenario that is not the same game but longer, but instead a scenario that is a bad game and longer. Of course you wouldn't want to play that.

 

[CoconutTank]

The game has already been balanced around a game speed, as you say. Some people, like yourself, apparently want something even faster than that. Can't necessarily balance the game around the faster speed.

Just so we're clear, we're talking about different things right? Earlier I asked for tech costs to be reduced a bit to speed up the pacing. Your eventual response was that I toggle game speed to be faster, which changes the entire game and is likely to have weird consequences that the game is not designed for.

So I'm giving feedback, but now my feedback doesn't count for some reason?

You have imagined a scenario that is not the same game but longer, but instead a scenario that is a bad game and longer. Of course you wouldn't want to play that.

Admittedly I am exaggerating, but I don't think I'm being uncharitable. Civ 6's random map generation is still prone to creating long narrow chokepoints, meager landmasses and other unfortunate circumstances. Humankind maps will probably be more complex than Civ 6 maps, and along with how battlefields are drawn and the presence of fortifications, chokepoints and other blockage seem fairly likely.

To draw this back to my earlier argument, if the duration of a Humankind session is increased somehow, such as with bad starts or terrain, I don't see how that's necessarily more epic or would draw more investment from me.

Edit: Hmm, I suppose an earlier claim I made is too absolute. If a change improves the game, but applying the change increases how long it takes to finish sessions, maybe the change is worth it! But that means the extended duration is being tolerated, not that the extended duration is vital to the game's goodness.

 

[FinalDoomsday]

There was a good interview back in October 2019 talking about their approach to darker parts of human history.
https://www.gamesindustry.biz/artic...ng-the-darker-periods-of-history-in-humankind

"The number of things you can list in human history that are dangerous, like colonisation, slavery, authoritarian regimes, mass displacement... you know there's so many topics that are logical hot buttons for entire nations, civilisations, cultures, peoples," he tells GamesIndustry.biz. "The thing is, from our point of view, if you're going to make a game that pretends to be about human history, you can't avoid this.

"On the other hand, if you put it in your game, you're going to get yelled at. No matter what you do, and how sensitive you are, there's someone who'll think it's too sensitive and someone who'll think it's not sensitive enough. It's just something we're going to have to deal with, as grown ups, and as game developers and as responsible games developers.

"If you avoid these questions, you're avoiding things that we think mass market entertainment IP ought to address, to put out on the table and discuss. And so we're going to go there with baby steps."

Basically they accept that by including these themes they open themselves to critisism but I respect that they do so anyway. Better that than treat history with kid-gloves and offer a very sanitised depiction like Civ 6.

 

[Atlas627]

Just so we're clear, we're talking about different things right? Earlier I asked for tech costs to be reduced a bit to speed up the pacing. Your eventual response was that I toggle game speed to be faster, which changes the entire game and is likely to have weird consequences that the game is not designed for.

So I'm giving feedback, but now my feedback doesn't count for some reason?

No, we're talking about the same thing, I just didn't have the time to word it properly (and don't have time now either, but I'll try). The tech costs being reduced doesn't just speed up the pacing, it changes all the game balance. It changes the speed of tech relative to everything else in the game. I don't think it is tech that should be faster, but eras that should be slower. The stars are too easy to earn and you need so few to advance to the next age (though I think 7 is a good amount of stars to need, you just earn them so fast that 7 feels like nothing).

We each are asking for the game to be designed for something different. I like the current granularity and pacing of all the other things that, as you say, will not be balanced properly if you use a faster speed. I think the current speed is good. I think you cannot balance the game around making those portions faster. Examples are map size and combat zones, which therefore set a minimum on unit movement, which therefore sets a minimum on build times, which therefore sets a minimum on research and advancement times... and as you say, making the game speed faster does not affect map size, combat zones, or unit movement, throwing the whole game out of whack. We simply disagree on what is the minimum for research and advancement times. You think research is too slow, I think advancement is too fast. Making the whole game faster in the first place and then letting game speeds only be slower is attempting to break all of those minimums at once. It's the same problem you were complaining about with using fast speeds.

Edit: Hmm, I suppose an earlier claim I made is too absolute. If a change improves the game, but applying the change increases how long it takes to finish sessions, maybe the change is worth it! But that means the extended duration is being tolerated, not that the extended duration is vital to the game's goodness.

This is why I said that I agree I like games to be shorter rather than longer. But if the extended duration were not itself enjoyable to some people, there would be no need for slower game settings. To some people, the extended duration is itself fun.

 

[Kwami]

There was a good interview back in October 2019 talking about their approach to darker parts of human history.
https://www.gamesindustry.biz/artic...ng-the-darker-periods-of-history-in-humankind


Basically they accept that by including these themes they open themselves to critisism but I respect that they do so anyway. Better that than treat history with kid-gloves and offer a very sanitised depiction like Civ 6.

The problem with the slavery civic isn't that it exists. The problem is that it's implemented so badly.

 

[FinalDoomsday]

The problem with the slavery civic isn't that it exists. The problem is that it's implemented so badly.

It greatly simplifies a complex topic, sure but that just comes with the territory of a 4X game. It would be nice if some civics had more than two choices and there is not any civics relating to serfdom or any other forms of bonded labour.

I think the war slaves work well as another incentive for war outside of conquest. Although your cities can rarely sustain all the extra population from ransacking for slaves, but thats just an incentive to use the extra population for more troops. The criminal slaves bonus is pretty underwhelming they could do with changing.

As for why it shifts your culture to the 'world' ideology, I suppose to put it bleakly the game considers using criminals for labour more progressive than kidnapping innocent foreigners from their homes. Court ordered community service still exists in many places today and I suspect the weaker in game bonus compared to war slaves is intentional due to the much more limited labour pool you have to use (your own empires criminals versus literally anyone you choose to go to war with.)

 

[Boris Gudenuf]

I have always firmly believed that marketing a game supposedly with some kind of historical basis and leaving out the Ugly Bits, like slavery in all of its forms and variations, religious or ideological wars, etc, is to simply produce Propaganda or Mental Pablum rather than a good game.

And if you are going to include anything in a game with a supposed historical basis then to be intellectually honest (and to make a good game mechanic) you have to show both the good and the bad aspects, the positive and negative consequences of any in-game decision. All Bonuses makes a dull game. All Minuses or Maluses makes for a game hat won't be played much except by masochists (which, given some of the games that sell well, may actually turn out to be the majority of the gaming community . . .)

Slavery is a case in point: first, because the term covers a huge variety of human institutions, from captives taken in battle to captives provided by the courts to various forms of Indentured Servitude and wage-slavery ('temporary slavery') which is still very common in the 'modern' world. Second, because most people (at least the ones who buy and play games) have no idea what the actual bonuses and minuses associated with slavery really were (and are).
Yes, it appears to provide 'cheap' labor and therefore should be a Production Bonus. BUT to keep a large number of slaves inevitably means you need a large number of slave guards, which simply takes another segment of the population out of the productive labor force as you put slaves into it. Worst case scenario, this has very bad effects on the rest of your society: the Spartans, relying on an entire Helot population as chattel slaves, so completely militarized their entire society that they produced no known art: no poetry, songs, literature, sculpture, engaged in virtually no trade (they used iron coins for 'money', which was worthless outside of Sparta itself) and left behind no architectural or scientific achievements at all. In other words, by being a massively slave-holding society, they produced a completely militarized state with no Fame in any other sphere (in Humankind game terms) or (in Civ VI terms) no possibility of Cultural, Scientific or Religious Victory.

So, by all means include a representation of Slavery in a semi-historical 4x game. But get it Right or you are better off leaving it alone.