Entirely too early 1st expansion speculation

[DJ_Tanner]

Wanted to have so fun speculating about what will appear in the first expansion. This is far too early to speculate, but these ideas will be 100% accurate and irrefutable.

Theme: (xpac gotta have a theme) What is sorely missing is economic gameplay so the xpac is all about trade and economic gameplay.

"Anchor" civs (civs that are focal to the new xpac and popular among the community):
Phoenicians (for their luxury goods and naval trade)
Mali (Mansa Musa for his hilarious wealth)
Inca (for their infrastructure)
The Dutch (East India Company, 'nuff said)

New Features:
Economic Victory Condition
"Rotating" Wonders - a system of new wonders that can pass from civ to civ.
- The Silk Road - given to the civ with the longest international trade route connecting starting in a city with a lux not owned by the other civ. (This will, of course, require a revamp of the current trade route/road system and the Roman UA.)
- Tallest skyscraper (taken from another poster) a wonder built that unlocks the next in the order (with increased hammer cost) starting with the Chrysler Building ending with the Burj Khalifa
Corporations - Back from the dead, but will tie into the economic victory condition, similar to a religious victory but with more stocks and money.
Railroads - Improvement that must be manually built with both increased move speed (but you can only end movement at a station, a city or a built improvement) and trade value. Also will give military engineers a role again.
Canals - A 1-tile district that will allow naval units to pass over land but ends their movement. Tied into the Panama Canal Wonder a 2 tile canal with trade benefits.



Well I have done all the heavy lifting here, and I must get back to pretending work during the summer.

 

[Eagle Pursuit]

That would be a good time to introduce Genoa too.

 

[Noble Zarkon]

I think it's more likely to be themed around the New World and the World Congress but nice speculation!!

 

[xISOADIx]

Itll def be about colonization and introduce native Americans and African civs as well as euros like Portugal and Dutch.

 

[Manifold]

Railroads - Improvement that must be manually built with both increased move speed (but you can only end movement at a station, a city or a built improvement) and trade value. Also will give military engineers a role again.
Canals - A 1-tile district that will allow naval units to pass over land but ends their movement. Tied into the Panama Canal Wonder a 2 tile canal with trade benefits.

A railroad system would be what is needed

 

[Siptah]

It will surely introduce revolution mechanics along with the World Congress.
You can declare a revolution at some later stage of the game, go into a phase of anarchy and instability, but can choose another ability from a given set for your civ. Revolutions have the chance to fail and you don't get anything after this phase - you can influence the probability of success through certain actions. Other civs with some level of diplomatic visibility know that you are in a revolutionary phase and might attack you in this weakened state. The last tier of government is only possible if you had a revolution before that. Neighboring civs might create pressure on your civ and force a revolution where you can't freely choose the ability any more. Abilities gained from revolutions are not unique (so they are unlike religious beliefs) and can be taken by more than one civ.

 

[xISOADIx]

It will surely introduce revolution mechanics along with the World Congress.
You can declare a revolution at some later stage of the game, go into a phase of anarchy and instability, but can choose another ability from a given set for your civ. Revolutions have the chance to fail and you don't get anything after this phase - you can influence the probability of success through certain actions. Other civs with some level of diplomatic visibility know that you are in a revolutionary phase and might attack you in this weakened state. The last tier of government is only possible if you had a revolution before that. Neighboring civs might create pressure on your civ and force a revolution where you can't freely choose the ability any more. Abilities gained from revolutions are not unique (so they are unlike religious beliefs) and can be taken by more than one civ.

I like this but I think it would be the final expansion.

 

[sonicmyst]

What city states will come to mind? Will there be a new type of city state if the first xpac is about trading and economy?
Will there be new luxuries to be introduced?

Let the speculations begin!

 

[Siptah]

What city states will come to mind? Will there be a new type of city state if the first xpac is about trading and economy?
Will there be new luxuries to be introduced?

Let the speculations begin!

Food is not a problem in civ VI, so there is not much need for CS helping with growth like the maritime CS of civ V. So far all CS are tied to a district iirc. The harbor hasn't one CS type that makes it better yet. But what would it do? Replace the +gold from trade routes cards?
I can imagine something like political city states if diplomacy gets changed and build up more with a victory type, world congress and a new district - it could also help with espionage. Cities that seem fitting are Geneva (change from religious), Vienna, Algiers, Venice, Ugarit, Milan, Panama City and Tangiers. I don't know which Asian or New World cities would be fitting here that don't belong to a existing civ. The bonus of this cities for 1/3/6 envoys is +2 of the newly introduced resource diplomatic capital that is needed for the world congress, alliances, casus belli, demands and the diplomatic victory.

 

[Paramecium]

No brainer: New Techs and Units

The current tech tree has way too many and large gaps it is obvisiously that there is sth missing/left out. And if you look at unique units like Berserks, Samurai, Redcoats and Garde Imperiale, it screams like there is a basic unit missing which is aviable for everyone. Sth like Longswordmen and Line Infantry is missing at the moment but those units actually solve partly that problem. And if they get integrated in the normal upgrade path of the melee class, they will get way more usefull.

Im sure that at the end of Civ 6 production cycle that it will be solved, only question is after the first or second expansion (or will be there even more?)

Personally I think the first expansion will mainly focus on the missing Diplomacy Victory. But Im quite unsure how they will solve it. I dont hope that it is just collecting the most suzerains and then you win. You wont produce enough envoys normally and it is quite hard to get every quest solved. And especially the AI seems to get bonus envoys on higher difficulties so without another future to get envoys it seems to me that you will have a big disadvantage.

And yeah, Civs or Leaders which/who are giving boni to envoy generation are missing completly at the moment ...

 

[Leyrann]

There's two obvious possibilities for expansions, I would argue that the two expansions that are more-or-less guaranteed will focus on them:

-Exploration: Terra map, establishing colonies, more naval stuff, etc.
-Economy and infrastructure: Railroads, canals, and so on.

The World Congress will probably be in there somewhere, but I do not think that it will be the focus point of an expansion. Most likely going to be in the Exploration expansion.

I myself really hope for an empire stability mechanic, though, with cities being able to break off, and the likelyhood depending on all kinds of factors like tax rate (higher tax rate is more money, lower tax rate is revolts less likely), distance from capital (and more precisely time required to travel to/contact the capital with current technology), nearby army, conquered or settled, etc.