Do you want districts to come back in Civ 7?

[ManoftheHour333]

So long as they sprawl out from the city center, and we lose the stupid adjaceny bonuses from mountains/reefs. Adjacency bonuses, if used at all, should come from buildings within the dsitrict, or interestingly, from buildings in other nearby districts.

Like a campus could get +1 science if placed by an ampitheater/ cultural district. An IZ should get +1 production if next to a market and later, +2 if near a neighborhood/housing district (Easier commutes lol). A monument and/or a shine (Or any other initial buildings your city center can produce) should provide flat bonuses to any adjacent districts and all their buildings...further incentivizing this style of play.

One could argue you'd interact less with the map but that also makes the game more strategically intricate over based on luck. And IMO I really valued that depth of "my ability to know when and how to get these bonuses" be more important than "my ability to reroll the map until I get a start I can work with". Just some ramblings while at work but I'm very curious if they can make districts be more organic extensions of a city instead of pieces to put down on a game board.

 

[AffineConstant]

One could argue you'd interact less with the map but that also makes the game more strategically intricate over based on luck. And IMO I really valued that depth of "my ability to know when and how to get these bonuses" be more important than "my ability to reroll the map until I get a start I can work with". Just some ramblings while at work but I'm very curious if they can make districts be more organic extensions of a city instead of pieces to put down on a game board.

I think this is my real problem with the adjacency bonuses. It felt less like I was solving a puzzle and more like "what victory I'm going for is largely influenced based on what's nearby on the map". There wasn't any interesting choice, as Sid himself would put it, instead just "do you want the bonus or not?"

I like the idea of placing districts and wonders and etc. on the map to adapt to the terrain, but feel like it could be done in a more interesting manner than VI did.

 

[Arcaian]

On the flip side, I would be pretty unsatisfied if there ended up being optimal district adjacency setups that you could do every time regardless of the map. The bit of adjacency that I do enjoy is that you can see a good spot for a district, found a city there on purpose, and get a nice boost you otherwise wouldn't have gotten - if every city has the same layout if you're looking for the same mechanical outcome from it, I think it'd be a move backwards in terms of interesting gameplay.

 

[GeneralZIft]

On the flip side, I would be pretty unsatisfied if there ended up being optimal district adjacency setups that you could do every time regardless of the map. The bit of adjacency that I do enjoy is that you can see a good spot for a district, found a city there on purpose, and get a nice boost you otherwise wouldn't have gotten - if every city has the same layout if you're looking for the same mechanical outcome from it, I think it'd be a move backwards in terms of interesting gameplay.

This aspect would still be in the game, just that the districts would be limited to having to connect to each other or the city centre perhaps

I think that would limit issues and still have variety.

 

[ManoftheHour333]

I think this is my real problem with the adjacency bonuses. It felt less like I was solving a puzzle and more like "what victory I'm going for is largely influenced based on what's nearby on the map". There wasn't any interesting choice, as Sid himself would put it, instead just "do you want the bonus or not?"

I like the idea of placing districts and wonders and etc. on the map to adapt to the terrain, but feel like it could be done in a more interesting manner than VI did.

Inn retrospect, I LOVE the idea of this way to play civilization as a concept. It's almost like the wholeFXS team all read Germs, Guns, and Steel and made the game entirely around that. Historically it totally checks out and makes sense why different civilization, regardless of their inherent differences, developed that way. Given that terrain and resources (well, except anything to do with oceans) so, so massively influence the trajectory of your gameplay (i.e. must have mountains to play for science, must have river valleys to have good production, etc.) Genuinely really cool from a historical perspective!!

...but being cool historically doesn't naturally translate to the same amount of fun in game. Instead, the environment above all else made the choices for me. Where I could place wonders, where I could build cities, where I could get proper bonuses. Again, some environmental constraints make perfect sense (i.e. building harbors on coasts, some wonders) but making so many aspects of the game dependent on it really decreased the flexibility to play certain strategies. Again in the style of GGS there isn't "one" optimal gameplay strategy for civilizations...but Civ VI deconstructing that to terrain randomness and the "map" instead of the player (Or even the AI) really took a lot agency (And even creativity) from players to play the "game of civilization" in their own way. Just some thoughts lol

 

[UWHabs]

Inn retrospect, I LOVE the idea of this way to play civilization as a concept. It's almost like the wholeFXS team all read Germs, Guns, and Steel and made the game entirely around that. Historically it totally checks out and makes sense why different civilization, regardless of their inherent differences, developed that way. Given that terrain and resources (well, except anything to do with oceans) so, so massively influence the trajectory of your gameplay (i.e. must have mountains to play for science, must have river valleys to have good production, etc.) Genuinely really cool from a historical perspective!!

...but being cool historically doesn't naturally translate to the same amount of fun in game. Instead, the environment above all else made the choices for me. Where I could place wonders, where I could build cities, where I could get proper bonuses. Again, some environmental constraints make perfect sense (i.e. building harbors on coasts, some wonders) but making so many aspects of the game dependent on it really decreased the flexibility to play certain strategies. Again in the style of GGS there isn't "one" optimal gameplay strategy for civilizations...but Civ VI deconstructing that to terrain randomness and the "map" instead of the player (Or even the AI) really took a lot agency (And even creativity) from players to play the "game of civilization" in their own way. Just some thoughts lol

I think there are relatively few cases though where the terrain truly moves you one way or another. Like, sure, if you start near a mountain range with a geotherm and can get a +5 campus down early, obviously that's a massive boost to your early game science. But that alone isn't going to turn you to a science victory instead of domination or culture or whatever else you may have done.

Yeah, if you were aiming for religion and suddenly your start in vast open plains, you're kind of SOL for where to slap in holy sites. Perhaps the game could be a bit more open about some of those adjacencies - like, say "God of the Open Skies" gave you +1 adjacency to your holy sites for any pastures nearby. You're not getting rich off of them, but at least that's going to give you a little more faith. But at the same time, even a +3 adjacency for a holy site will still get dominated once you get the shrine and temple down, it just means you need a few more to be able to get the same output.

 

[ColtSeavers]

Districts themselves are fine, but less Micro Management with regard to the Bonuses please. Style wise I do like the Districts, though.

 

[ldvhl]

Why is that?

Too restrictive hex usage (especially if you're trying to optimize), given the limited space available.

Given the preview today showing the return of districts as well as small maps, I'm hard out on 7. I'll go back to my Frankenstein version of 5 because I can't get my version of 4 working.

 

[Giskler]

In the video they said placing the granary turns the tile into a district, but I'm not sure if they meant a city district or the district mechanic from Civ 6.

 

[Giskler]

It seems the city center is called a district so might be that districts are back.

 

[Laurana Kanan]

It seems the city center is called a district so might be that districts are back.

Same as Civ6.

 

[DukeSammael]

View attachment 699866
In the video they said placing the granary turns the tile into a district, but I'm not sure if they meant a city district or the district mechanic from Civ 6.

I think this means that now districts (Civ6 style) grow organically from buildings instead of being explicitly built. To which I can only say... FINALLY. I hated that "district" was a thing that had to be built separately when that has 0 historical sense before Urbanization.

 

[Seek]

There are urban and rural districts; urban districts are have slots for buildings and are constructed, and rural districts are gained with each new population - think more like tile improvement - which causes a culture bomb as well (source: Quill18's live stream)

Edit - Quill explains here, starting at 4:34

 

[UWHabs]

There are urban and rural districts; urban districts are have slots for buildings and are constructed, and rural districts are gained with each new population - think more like tile improvement - which causes a culture bomb as well (source: Quill18's live stream)

Yeah, buildings themselves get the adjacency bonuses, rather than forcing the districts. Rural districts are basically tile improvements. Specialists come later to give more yields.

 

[unfairlane]

Definetly NO!

 

[acluewithout]

I loved the district placement stuff. I liked it even better with how it interacted with things like improvements or districts from other cities.

I only really cooled on it a bit after FXS made a heap of game updates, resulting in being able to get massive adjacency bonus almost regardless of terrain. ‘Huzzah, now I get campus bonuses from mountains, jungles, reefs, horses, cotton, that barbarian over there, that other barbarian - the one with a limp - and his sister - I think she’s named Debra - and this government district, and this harbour district … etc.

Hope we get more than 2 new district in Civ 7. But who knows?

 

[MasterPaw]

Seems like they have an interesting implementation of it

 

[Albertan Civfanatic]

I've grown quite fond of districts. It really allows you to keep track of your buildings and yields well as well as allowing for greater specialization.

 

[Krikkit1]

There are urban and rural districts; urban districts are have slots for buildings and are constructed, and rural districts are gained with each new population - think more like tile improvement - which causes a culture bomb as well (source: Quill18's live stream)

Edit - Quill explains here, starting at 4:34

Interesting…it seems you can’t swap food/production by changing the tiles you are working. Essentially the Rural district is the population unit.

 

[Professor Phobo]

I didn't like Districts in 6, mainly because pre-planning all the adjacency optimization felt tedious. Do we now how that will work in 7?