Comparing V vs VI

[Vahnstad]

Where VI does better in:
- Map generation
- Wonders more visible
- Districts
- Builders system
- Religion
- Graphics
- Leaders and civs
- Music
- Envoy system
- Diplomatic victory
- Great People system
- Natural wonders
- Disasters
- Loyalty system
- Happiness
- UI
- ...

Where V does better in:
- Ideologies
- Policy trees
- Tall gameplay
- Large cities
- ...

Needless to say, i think VI is the better game, despite it's flaws.

 

[DogeEnricoDandolo]

I don't think Civ 5 policy tree is superior to the policy card system we have in Civ6. I've played 2000 hours in Civ 5, pretty much every single game everyone has to open with Tradition, because Tradition is superior to Liberty, Honor and Piety are pretty much not viable, then fill out Tradition, take a few filler policies here and there, and then one renaissance comes, just pick up rationalism, literally every single game. I like the ideology and tourism system though, tourism in civ6 is kinda useless outside of a cultural game.

 

[Haig]

From Civ 5 I miss the ability to gift units to city-states. Not much else.

 

[kaspergm]

I don't think Civ 5 policy tree is superior to the policy card system we have in Civ6. I've played 2000 hours in Civ 5, pretty much every single game everyone has to open with Tradition, because Tradition is superior to Liberty, Honor and Piety are pretty much not viable, then fill out Tradition, take a few filler policies here and there, and then one renaissance comes, just pick up rationalism, literally every single game. I like the ideology and tourism system though, tourism in civ6 is kinda useless outside of a cultural game.

That was mostly a question of balance, though. I used some mods that made the other culture trees much more viable, and it's one of the features from V that I miss the most. I had lots of different plays where the game developed in very different directions depending on which combinations of policy trees I picked.

As for OP:

- Graphics: I honestly think this is an open question, I liked both, but I know many players prefer V graphics (hence the Civ V graphics skin mod)
- Diplomatic Victory: World Congress in general and DV in particular in V may not be perfect, but VI is a disaster.
- Religion: I think this is at best a tie for VI. There were definitely things I prefered in V, although arguably again to some extent courtesy of mods.
- Happiness: Not sure either of them are very successful in this. I might have a preference for V here.
- Map Generation: Both games have some weaknesses and some strengths compared to the other. For instance VI starting location is a real mess compared to V.

 

[acluewithout]

Where V does better in:
- Ideologies

I don't think Civ 5 policy tree is superior to the policy card system we have in Civ6.

I think the Civ V Social Policies / Ideology System and Civ VI Government / Policy Card System aren't just different mechanically. Instead, they are directed and entirely different things.

Governments and Policy Cards are mechanics that are actually directed at "What is my Government?" and "What economic policies do I implement in my society". In other words, they are mechanics directed at governing. They are actually pretty close to how governments worked in previous versions of Civ (other than Civ V), where you researched governments through the tech tree, and then "swapped" into those governments.

Civ V Social Policies / Ideologies aren't about Governments or economic policies. Indeed, I think there's a good argument that Civ V doesn't have any mechanism for representing governments or economic policies. Instead, Civ V Social Policies / Ideologies seem more about how you culture develops - e.g. it's values, traditions and institutions. They've got more in common with Humankind's Cultural Traits than anything to do with governments or policies.

And here's the kicker. While Civ V doesn't have any analogue to Civ VI's Governments and Policy Cards, Civ VI actually does have Social Policies. The difference is, they're implemented as Governors rather than "Social Policies", which means they are City Focused not Empire Focused. The analogue is really easy to see when you look at them - Victor=Honour, Liang=Tradition, Magus=Liberty, Moshka=Piety, Amani=Patronage, Reyna=Commerce, and Pingala=Rationalism (with Aesthetics getting split between Reyna and or Pingala). I mean, you can even see it in how with both Civ V and VI you "earn" "levels" through culture and then use these to buy "abilities" through a tiered "abilities tree". Even the way Governors provide Loyalty is a bit of an echo of Civ V Ideological Pressure, although obviously working very very differently.

What Civ VI is missing is an analogue of Civ V's late game Social Policies, i.e. "Ideologies". Which, for like the billionth time, is why I think Civ VI needs the return of Ideological Pressure and some sort of additional Governors that you unlock later in the game (e.g. through Tier 2 and 3 Governments) that help with Ideological Pressure and are based around Democracy / Freedom, Communism / Autocracy and Fascism / Fascism. I'm really hoping we get something along those lines as a new Game Mode in NF. Fingers crossed.

 

[blackcatatonic]

This is an unpopular opinion but I prefer the music in Civ V - the Civ-specific music, at least, with the war and peace themes. I think the era progression is a nice idea but it works much better with some themes than others, and some of the later ones are too bombastic.

I also preferred V's much more detailed and immersive leader screens, though I concede that we likely wouldn't have got so many Civs for VI if they were all done to the same standard with the backgrounds and everything.

And I definitely dispute that V's social policy trees were better than the card system (I frigging love the card system!). I like how VI does diplomatic victory, but the WC is so much worse than V's incarnation.

But my favourite thing in VI, and the reason why I will never go back to V? Loyalty.

 

[kryat]

- Map Generation: Both games have some weaknesses and some strengths compared to the other. For instance VI starting location is a real mess compared to V.

VI has to solve an entirely different problem than V though, because the map matters beyond yields for the city and proximity to resources, city states, and natural wonders. It also needs to take into account fresh water, viable district locations, and viable wonder locations. I’d say it finds a fair balance in about 90% of starts. It rolls some weird ones every now and then, but I’d hardly call it a mess.

More crucially though, I think that since GS, VI now does better at making interesting maps from a strategic point of view. Bays, isthmuses, and mountain passes now are far more common. Fertile flood valleys are a joy to discover. Mountain chains separating continents are of incredible strategic importance. These are where VI finally excels past V in map generation, in my view.

 

[Casworon]

The main thing i prefer in Civ VI over Civ V is the new government and card system.

The social policy trees felt too restrictive. Every-game was defined by my social policy choices. While the government and card system feels more fluid and allows for more extreme variations in play-style over the course of a game. Rather than just sticking too how i've been playing so far since that's what my policy choices are geared towards.

In terms of what i miss in Civ VI however it is the ideology system and the late game conflict. The biggest thing though is moddable AI. Without that it will never be a game i return to again and again, while Civ V is. Even though i prefer the mechanics in Civ VI, if the AI isn't as challenging the experience is never going to be comparable.

 

[tiamats4esgares]

Uh, no.

 

[Inhalaattori]

Im just playing a Civ V game after a long time and there are certain things I really enjoy. I love social policy trees and especially ideologies, but there are lots of balance issues with these. Even after several nerfs tradition and rationalism are still too strong. Some trees like exploration are all over the place without clear focus. Social policy trees are just so much more fun than policy cards in Civ VI. From a balance point of view policy cards are much better though. The fact that there are some totally useless policy cards doesnt have the same impact as useless social policies in Civ V.

Ideology in general is great feature in Civ V and the way tourism works with ideologies in Civ V is very interesting. I wouldnt mind if tourism would have same type of general bonuses to trade,happiness etc. in Civ VI that we have in Civ V. (Its worth mentioning that these were added in some of the later patches.)

Science is too strong in Civ V and this is where Civ VI is much better. Also tech tree is better balanced in Civ VI.

Civ V has god tier Civs like Poland that are simply totally broken. In Civ VI the balance between civs is better especially after the latest patches. Even the worse civs can be good is some situations. Civs like Georgia and Norway have received some decent buffs. In Civ V they didnt really make that many changes to Civ abilities although IMO they should have done. Civs like Japan or Iroquois are NEVER better Civ choice than Poland.

Most smaller features are better in Civ VI. For example city states are much more interesting in CIV VI. Great people with their unique features are more interesting and different great people types are better balanced in Civ VI.

Civ V has better graphics IMO. Especially leaders look MUCH better.

Civ V doesnt have as many features so the game play can feel smoother in Civ V, which I like. For example I dont really like governors and loyalty that much. Sometimes less is more. Im not mad that they are not adding new features in New Frontier.

 

[Kouvb593kdnuewnd]

Civ 6 have pretty overpowered civs like Rome, Pericles Greece, Sumeria and Korea as some examples.There are also many cards I don't use in civ 6, but yes it is not anywhere near as bad as in civ 5.

The main thing Civ 6 does bettter is there is more stuff to do, however civ V did better in areas such as rewarding city building more while in Civ VI it is about the quantity of cities you have rather than quality of cities.

 

[Vahnstad]

For those who don't seem to understand it, it's subjective and my opinion and I encourage anyone else to compare V with VI and where it does a better job in.

I don't think Civ 5 policy tree is superior to the policy card system we have in Civ6. I've played 2000 hours in Civ 5, pretty much every single game everyone has to open with Tradition, because Tradition is superior to Liberty, Honor and Piety are pretty much not viable, then fill out Tradition, take a few filler policies here and there, and then one renaissance comes, just pick up rationalism, literally every single game. I like the ideology and tourism system though, tourism in civ6 is kinda useless outside of a cultural game.

You've got a point. It's always Tradition and rationalism.

That was mostly a question of balance, though. I used some mods that made the other culture trees much more viable, and it's one of the features from V that I miss the most. I had lots of different plays where the game developed in very different directions depending on which combinations of policy trees I picked.

As for OP:

- Graphics: I honestly think this is an open question, I liked both, but I know many players prefer V graphics (hence the Civ V graphics skin mod)
- Diplomatic Victory: World Congress in general and DV in particular in V may not be perfect, but VI is a disaster.
- Religion: I think this is at best a tie for VI. There were definitely things I prefered in V, although arguably again to some extent courtesy of mods.
- Happiness: Not sure either of them are very successful in this. I might have a preference for V here.
- Map Generation: Both games have some weaknesses and some strengths compared to the other. For instance VI starting location is a real mess compared to V.

I very much dislike V's grey graphics. I'm more a fan of VI cartoonish maps
World Congress is tedious and not fun, but it's the same system in V. I dislike DV but it's better than in V imo.
I like the amenities system more than the unmanageable happiness system in V, but that's again personal preference.
I like the map generation of VI more, while both aren't perfect, certainly.

The main thing i prefer in Civ VI over Civ V is the new government and card system.

The social policy trees felt too restrictive. Every-game was defined by my social policy choices. While the government and card system feels more fluid and allows for more extreme variations in play-style over the course of a game. Rather than just sticking too how i've been playing so far since that's what my policy choices are geared towards.

In terms of what i miss in Civ VI however it is the ideology system and the late game conflict. The biggest thing though is moddable AI. Without that it will never be a game i return to again and again, while Civ V is. Even though i prefer the mechanics in Civ VI, if the AI isn't as challenging the experience is never going to be comparable.

Yes, you're right. I miss that late game ideology system. I think it can be improved a lot however by adding new mechanics like literacy rate, inequality between pops, more complexed trade, slavery and so on.

 

[Archon_Wing]

Diplomatic victory

I don't think 6's is anywhere close to 5's on that. The World Congress in 6 is not very good. 5 had the sense to approve a proposal and then have a vote for it as opposed to the nonsensical free for all we have in 6.

 

[kaspergm]

VI has to solve an entirely different problem than V though, because the map matters beyond yields for the city and proximity to resources, city states, and natural wonders. It also needs to take into account fresh water, viable district locations, and viable wonder locations. I’d say it finds a fair balance in about 90% of starts. It rolls some weird ones every now and then, but I’d hardly call it a mess.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think Civ VI map generator has zero evaluation for viable district and wonder locations, when it evaluates starting locations. Which is probably why we see numerous examples of starts that are completely surrounded by mountains. Now you are correct that Civ V did not have to take such things into account, but afaik. Civ VI doesn't either, even if you can argue it should.

Meanwhile, Civ VI map generator throws some weird fits like civs starting literally right next to each other, or civs starting completely in polar ice, not to mention those mountain-caves mentioned above.

 

[Amrunril]

The biggest improvement from V to VI, in my view, is the district and city planning system. Unique city states and great people are also a huge step forward and provide a welcome source of variability from game to game. Gathering Storm's disaster and climate systems are an excellent newer addition, though the latter does still need some balance work.

The biggest things I miss from Civ V are the ideological pressure system and the world congress system. Ideology gave you a reason to worry about tourism outside the context of cultural victory, and it provided a mechanical reason for tensions to exist between different forms of government. The world congress system was held back from reaching its full potential by the fact that city states could easily be monopolized with gold, but the underlying system of electing leaders to choose resolutions if far superior to VI's A/B system. The idea of building up a combination of city state influence, wonders religion/ideology resolutions etc. to secure diplomatic victory would also have been great with a better city state influence system. I also think Civ VI made a big mistake be reducing the importance of specialists which, in addition to promoting interesting choices about citizen allocation and great person generation, could serve as a way of promoting city growth without arbitrarily constraining expansion.

I have more mixed feelings about the game's religion and policy/civic systems. Civ VI religion has some interesting options, but its held back by being balanced around religious victory and combat systems that rely on incompetent AI to function. As for policies, the flexibility of the new system has appeal, but at times it feels like too much micromanagement with too little choice between distinct directions to take your civ.

 

[Pistol90]

V is better in representing large empires. In V due to happines and corruption it was really hard, in VI there is no downsides to playing wide. Thats biggest advantage for V if you ask me, but VI is better game at the end. They just didnt make it enough challenging like V.

 

[pokiehl]

I prefer VI and can't go back to V but I prefer the following from V:

- Music
- Policy trees and unified tech/civic tree
- World Congress
- Writing (quotes and Civilopedia entries)
- Map biomes (different map graphics for different continents) (for the love of all that is good I cannot understand why they didn't bring this back!)

 

[AriochIV]

The district system is the main improvement in Civ VI.

Perhaps the item I miss most from Civ V is the unit animations. The units had a larger number of figures (up to 12, compared to 4 in VI) that looked more like a real unit, especially when multiple units were arrayed in a battle line; the larger number of figures also gave a better visual sense of the health of the unit. The animations gave more of a sense of the clash of two bodies of men (instead of the cartoonish antics in Civ VI animations), and were actually much shorter, wasting less of the player's time while giving a better effect. Bombers appeared over the target, instead of making the player wait for the aircraft to fly all the way from its base (which was often well offscreen). And finally, Civ V animations that were offscreen did not play (or else the camera was moved so that they could be seen), whereas in Civ VI all the animations play whether you can see them or not, dramatically increasing the time required for each AI turn while not letting the player see what's going on. It's just demonstrably worse in nearly every respect.

 

[Lanthar]

For me, it comes down to this in V vs VI:

Civ VI you have a lot of choices to make. Many more choices than in Civ V. Unfortunately, I feel like many of the choices I make only marginally adjust circumstances, or in the cases where they have a big impact, there's little choice around them. The game feels like busywork in a lot of ways, as a lot of the options are specialized for certain circumstances and help out there, but a general option would be ok too.

In Civ V, there are fewer choices, but the choices you make directly effect the game in bigger ways. It has a more Grand Strategy feel, unlike in VI where you get bogged down with a lot of additional choices that have less impact.

That plus Civ VI AI to me, feel like a regression from V and the World Council was implemented (again, in my opinion) so much better in V. I don't like the World Council in VI.

 

[yung.carl.jung]

I miss tributing. I miss AIs that can actually snowball, or backstab. And as others have said, gifting units to CS. I also think getting gold for disbanding units and great people should come back, but it should be a much lower value than before. sometimes you're forced to get GP you don't even want because the AI would take way too long to get them, which is very frustrating. In vanilla Civ 6 deleting GP for money was actually a broken strategy, so clearly it does make an impact.

But most of all I miss Great Plains. They robbed us when they took that map. It was the funnest, least complicated, least bull**** map ever. It was a glorious map.

I don't think Civ 5 policy tree is superior to the policy card system we have in Civ6. I've played 2000 hours in Civ 5, pretty much every single game everyone has to open with Tradition, because Tradition is superior to Liberty, Honor and Piety are pretty much not viable, then fill out Tradition, take a few filler policies here and there, and then one renaissance comes, just pick up rationalism, literally every single game. I like the ideology and tourism system though, tourism in civ6 is kinda useless outside of a cultural game.

that's not really true. Tradition was certainly the easier strategy, and the one that was more reliable. most players agreed that the metagame was to always go for Tradition-Rationalism, but some have proven that liberty actually rivals and beats the win times of tradition. I think it was Manpanzee, @Blatc and @vadalaz who came through with incredible liberty science victories. check out this thread: https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/fastest-science-victory.563022/page-29

Manpanzee got a t176 SV as Spain with 10 cities liberty.

same with honor actually, people decried it as a noob choice, but honor is pretty good when you want to fight wars early.