Dev Diary #4 Emergent Narrative

[Pfeffersack]

Not owning/playing the game myself I can only rely on what I have read and see in Lets Plays/Streams:

- what events come up seems to depend both on Civ/Leader played and the ingame situation (which is a plus for me compared to total randomness)
- however, outside the variation mentioned in the bullet point before quick repetition of events seems to be an issue (heard/read the multiple time as main negative point, when people are asked and talk about Civ VII's events)
- my personal impression of the texts and effects is that they feel a bit generic/mechanic in narration, triggers and variation of effects (compared to e.g. Old World, though I concede that OW has the advantage of being even more character-centered, so that characters aside from the player alter-ego can take a role); presentation is playing here a role as well, the grey boxes feel just sterile (again OW and the Paradox GSG show what you can do with pictures, tooltips or emphasizing words in the text)
- another (subjective) downside to me is that (in most cases) you just have to pick between two flat boni (no comparison to OW, where nearly each event is dilemma: you usually gain and lose stuff, regardless what you pick, and the trick is to situationally make the best out of the situation)
- as events happen quite frequently (though not as many as in OW on the standard setting) and their boni can be considerable (e.g. I watched youtuber Steinwallen getting in a Deity game getting three Immortal units within two turns by two events) I see even an impact on difficulty here - and for me the questions emerges whether the AI gets those events as well?

 

[stealth_nsk]

Not owning/playing the game myself I can only rely on what I have read and see in Lets Plays/Streams:

- what events come up seems to depend both on Civ/Leader played and the ingame situation (which is a plus for me compared to total randomness)
- however, outside the variation mentioned in the bullet point before quick repetition of events seems to be an issue (heard/read the multiple time as main negative point, when people are asked and talk about Civ VII's events)
- my personal impression of the texts and effects is that they feel a bit generic/mechanic in narration, triggers and variation of effects (compared to e.g. Old World, though I concede that OW has the advantage of being even more character-centered, so that characters aside from the player alter-ego can take a role); presentation is playing here a role as well, the grey boxes feel just sterile (again OW and the Paradox GSG show what you can do with pictures, tooltips or emphasizing words in the text)
- another (subjective) downside to me is that (in most cases) you just have to pick between two flat boni (no comparison to OW, where nearly each event is dilemma: you usually gain and lose stuff, regardless what you pick, and the trick is to situationally make the best out of the situation)
- as events happen quite frequently (though not as many as in OW on the standard setting) and their boni can be considerable (e.g. I watched youtuber Steinwallen getting in a Deity game getting three Immortal units within two turns by two events) I see even an impact on difficulty here - and for me the questions emerges whether the AI gets those events as well?

I don't know whether AI gets events or not, but if I'd make the game, I wouldn't do it. Those things are totally invisible to player, meaning they don't exist and it's easier to code AI advantages in much simpler ways than code AI choices. It could even get no rewards from goodie huts, for example, and just grab them as part of their programming, that's totally fine.

The only exceptions are pure MP-focused games, where game server doesn't differentiate AI and human players, so all things happening to human players should happen to AI. But that's not the way turn-based strategies are done.

 

[Siptah]

Not owning/playing the game myself I can only rely on what I have read and see in Lets Plays/Streams:

- what events come up seems to depend both on Civ/Leader played and the ingame situation (which is a plus for me compared to total randomness)

yes, this is really nice.

- however, outside the variation mentioned in the bullet point before quick repetition of events seems to be an issue (heard/read the multiple time as main negative point, when people are asked and talk about Civ VII's events)

there are a few events that turn up every game, indeed. However, the generic events often are things that you would do anyway, are easy to fulfill or simply choices. They don't feel too repetitive to me right now after 8 games. There also seem to be multiple events per civ and leader/age: I got an immortal-related quest in my two Persia games, but they didn't give me free immortals (but replaced one for free when my last one died though), the reward was a free commander.

- my personal impression of the texts and effects is that they feel a bit generic/mechanic in narration, triggers and variation of effects (compared to e.g. Old World, though I concede that OW has the advantage of being even more character-centered, so that characters aside from the player alter-ego can take a role); presentation is playing here a role as well, the grey boxes feel just sterile (again OW and the Paradox GSG show what you can do with pictures, tooltips or emphasizing words in the text)

Writing could be improved in general! The graphic presentation is suboptimal, especially for the non-generic events. However, there is a different representation in the game files that has backgrounds and 3D models of the respective units or your leader. And (as a bug, I guess) this is still in the game for a few events. I should have taken a screenshot when I got it with Hatshepsut/Egypt.

- another (subjective) downside to me is that (in most cases) you just have to pick between two flat boni (no comparison to OW, where nearly each event is dilemma: you usually gain and lose stuff, regardless what you pick, and the trick is to situationally make the best out of the situation)

Fully agree. There are some of these events that have a negative+positive option (e.g., scouts losing 75 HP in exchange for culture, or paying for an artifact). But there's also always a simple "take some money instead" option. I wish there would be more diverse choices with negatives.

- as events happen quite frequently (though not as many as in OW on the standard setting) and their boni can be considerable (e.g. I watched youtuber Steinwallen getting in a Deity game getting three Immortal units within two turns by two events) I see even an impact on difficulty here - and for me the questions emerges whether the AI gets those events as well?

I would assume that the AI gets these as well, but doesn't pursue the quests. It might choose random option or always the freebie (instead of the quest), or it might choose options that are fulfilled automatically after some turns pass. I agree that the quests interact with difficulty, however, as it seems you cannot count on getting a specific quest (see above).

And all leaders and civs get these quests - although they don't seem to be equally good in rewards nor difficult. E.g., my immortal quest required to kill a ranged, infantry, and cavalry unit each with an immortal. This is straightforward and will happen at some point - and a free commander is always helpful. Napoleon requires to build some artillery in exchange for more artillery - also easy, and gives a nice power spike. In contrast, Charlemagne wants you to befriend CS in the distant lands - which depends much more on luck, and the rewards aren't noteworthy. And Ashoka wants a capital with 20 population, which you get anyway - but you also don't get much for it.