Eureka system - anyone else started to dislike it?

[SammyKhalifa]

I love the system. But as others have said, it gets repetitive after several dozen games. I also use the 8 ages of pace mod to deal with the insane late-game pace.

I would like there to be 3 or 4 possible boosts for each tech/civic, with two showing up in each game. Getting one would give 30%. The second, 20%. After a certain point, you could also trade boosts.

Yeah, balanced a certain way they would make each game more different, not the same.

 

[pgm123]

Generally speaking, I like it because it means the map effects how I play. If I stone near me, I get Masonry much earlier than if I don't. Same with metal resources and The Wheel. The lack of bronze near me (often) means I don't usually get the wheel until much later. But that sets off a chain reaction where I don't get the Construction boost, which means I don't get the Games and Recreation boost. That's ultimately fine, though. You shouldn't play towards Eurekas, but you should take advantage of them if they're convenient.

 

[JacquesBquick]

I think Eurekas are an effective solution to a big problem in the past, that being optimal paths through the tech tree. Because eurekas and inspirations are often dependent on what's going on around you on the map and in the game, its inconsistent which ones you will get. You may not have any stone around your capital. You may have several animals and no crops around your capital. from the start eurekas are encouraging you to follow different paths down the tech tree.

Not a perfect system for sure, as i think the tech tree itself has some branching and beelining issues, but at least eurekas often encourage you to think about your paths forward rather than that being a static same part of every game you play

 

[stinkubus]

I sort of feel the same way. But I don't think toning them down is the answer. Making Eurekas harder to get would be a better solution in my opinion.

These are functionally equivalent.

 

[SammyKhalifa]

These are functionally equivalent.

I'm not sure about that. What you do would guide how you progress, not the other way around.

It would probably annoy the "quickest victory" crowd when you roll "bad" starts but I think it would be more interesting too.

 

[PhilBowles]

I've disliked it from the start and was disappointed even in previews when it was revealed this was the devs' idea of 'playing to the map' (notwithstanding that a minority of the effects are based on the map). Watching deity Civ 6 playthroughs is pretty miserable as gameplay revolves around min-maxing, to the extent that mods even warn you when you're close to 'maximum inspiration potential' and prompt players to switch to a different tech until they meet the condition.

It's also exceptionally badly-balanced in the sense that you get the same bonus for things you're going to do naturally (mining iron, growing to pop 6 etc.) as you do for actively hunting down a eureka, and there's no very close correspondence between which eurekas need to be actively worked for and the value of the tech you get as a result. Many of the later ones are so far down the tech/civic tree that it's difficult not to get them well in advance.

It's a shame because I like the idea of rewarding game actions that would logically prompt specific developments (such as mining iron boosting iron working), although many of the inspirations/eurekas are much more arbitrary than that. They just didn't succeed in finding a good way to implement that, and 'every tech/civic must have a eureka' was probably a bad idea.

On the plus side, it has proven to be a fairly good way to implement tribal village boosts (getting free techs is fun but was always a bit broken for a random bonus) and Great Person boosts.

 

[stinkubus]

I'm not sure about that. What you do would guide how you progress, not the other way around.

It would probably annoy the "quickest victory" crowd when you roll "bad" starts but I think it would be more interesting too.

The pay off for a eureka is half the beaker cost of the tech (assuming you don't research more than 50% the old fashioned way) multiplied by the probability you trigger the necessary condition in time for it to matter. Reducing either the beakers awarded or making the eureka harder to hit (reducing its probability) have the same effect: a lower effective beaker pay off.

The boosts are so important that players would just start doing whatever it took to get them. Half off all significant early game techs and civics is by far the best boost available. Your idea would also introduce some serious balance issues. Suppose for a moment we launch a new game on all standard settings. If civ A can boost Early Empire by doing as little as founding a second city, but civ B must get to 6 pop, you've effectively given civ A a huge shortcut to Political Philosophy. This may not be bad to make AI civs better, but the human certainly doesn't need the leg up in the current game.

 

[GoodSarmatian]

I still like it a lot. Instead of falling into the same tech route each game, I make far more adjustments than in previous Civs, and it simulates to some degree different progressions influenced by geography. It could have been implemented better with multiple eurekas, but then again everything in every game probably could have been implemented better.

 

[SammyKhalifa]

I agree with that: not as good as they could be, but more interesting than if they weren't there.

 

[Yokel]

My only complaint is that the Eureka for Sanitation (build two neighborhoods) is pretty much impossible without min-maxing. Spending the turns to get the Urbanization civic in the same era, and also shifting production to two neighborhoods, is a lot of turns, no matter how you do it, unless you're charging through the civic tree well before the tech tree.

 

[Xur]

There are some really abstract and weird eurekas. I’d be ok with them if they made sence 100%. Like the eureka for building a city on the coast.

In my opinion ½ the techs could be stripped of a eureka. Limit eurekas to only be available during golden age and heroic.

The problem is that Firaxis wanted to make every game different, but they achieved the opposite. So attaching eurekas to for example heroic age only, then every game would truely be different.

 

[SammyKhalifa]

There are some really abstract and weird eurekas. I’d be ok with them if they made sence 100%. Like the eureka for building a city on the coast.

In my opinion ½ the techs could be stripped of a eureka. Limit eurekas to only be available during golden age and heroic.

The problem is that Firaxis wanted to make every game different, but they achieved the opposite. So attaching eurekas to for example heroic age only, then every game would truely be different.

To be fair in Deity games and stuff, any mechanic system will end up getting the min/max treatment. I don't think there's any way around that, and I'm pretty sure people who like that kind of game wouldn't have it any other way. But yeah generally I agree with you. You're always going for the same things to get those early ones especially.

 

[Arent11]

Yeah, harder to get so it's not worth your while to go out of your way to get them--maybe even more specific. And MORE powerful (not less).

My tribe grew up living near the ocean so we naturally grew to become a seafaring people.

Well, "living by the ocean" is quite broad. Compare that with "own a slinger & defeat a barbarian". The first condition is simply achieved by finding an ocean or settling a city on the sea. The second condition requires you to build a specific unit & defeat a barbarian in a small time frame. Every. Single. Game.

 

[SammyKhalifa]

yeah, for it to work it would definitely need a balance pass

 

[Amrunril]

These are functionally equivalent.

Making Eurekas harder and making them weaker would have similar effects on tech pace, but their effects on gameplay overall would be distinctly different. Powerful but difficult to earn bonuses play very differently than minor but easily accessible ones.

 

[WillowBrook]

Your idea would also introduce some serious balance issues. Suppose for a moment we launch a new game on all standard settings. If civ A can boost Early Empire by doing as little as founding a second city, but civ B must get to 6 pop, you've effectively given civ A a huge shortcut to Political Philosophy. This may not be bad to make AI civs better, but the human certainly doesn't need the leg up in the current game.

I'm not certain which idea you're addressing, but in my suggestion of having different possible boosts, every civ in a given game would have the same possibilities. So you wouldn't have to worry about the alternate boosts being balanced. Some games it might be super easy to boost early empire and others it might be difficult, but it would be the same for all the civs in a given game.

 

[Scaramanga]

Turn off barbarians, go Pangea, use different resource distribution. There are options other than changing the Eureka system.

 

[shaglio]

I like the Eureka system. If the game is becoming too repetitive because you're trying to maximize your Eurekas, that's not a problem with the system, it's a problem with one's game-play. If it bothers you enough, just do what I do: ignore them. If I get one, that's great, but I don't alter my game-play just to trigger one.

 

[PhilBowles]

Turn off barbarians, go Pangea, use different resource distribution. There are options other than changing the Eureka system.

The existence of partial buildarounds to mitigate the effects of a poorly-implemented mechanic doesn't resolve the problem with the mechanic. This solution is akin to advising people who disliked Civ V's implementation of 1UPT to reduce the number of civs on large maps.

Eurekas have the same problem as ideology in Civ V, and I've observed before that it appears to a common feature of Ed Beach designs that there's no subtlety to them - we see interesting ideas taken to an absurd and in some cases game-breaking extreme which warps the gameplay so heavily around them that, as others have noted, the game always ends up playing out much the same way.

Eurekas are too common, too restrictive in their requirements in many cases, too poorly-balanced, and probably above all too binary.

There are a great many eurekas that require reaching a threshold X (6 farms, 6 pop, 3 barbarians, 2 neighbourhoods, etc. etc.). Games like the Endless series are already capable of implementing scaleable achievements that track how many of X you've achieved - granted in those games as well you generally get a flat bonus once you've achieved X and nothing before that point, but there's no clear reason why that has to be the case.

Say your civ gets a small percentage boost towards a eureka every time it creates a farm (Fuedalism), kills a barbarian (Bronze Working), increases pop size (Political Philosophy) etc. up to a certain threshold - possibly the existing 50%. Then gameplay is less about min-maxing and more about calculating a trade-off between the value you gain for an incremental boost to a eureka in a particular game context and doing something else.

That also rebalances boosts from spies and Great People, as those could still give the full bonus - which makes them more desirable and gives you an alternative way to get specific eurekas that are less useful to rush through game actions on any given playthrough. Ideally, eurekas would be balanced so that it varies with context which route is most effective for most boosts.

 

[Art Morte]

(2) The conditions for Eurekas are too specific, leading to a chain of events you have to trigger every single game.

This is my biggest beef with them. With some of them, it just makes no sense to act any other way in 90% of the games. The earliest example that comes to mind is: get the 100% galleys production card -> build two galleys to get shipbuilding -> upgrade them later on to caravels to get the merchant republic boost (the best of the 6 slot governments). I find myself doing this every single game as long as I've got a coastal city and it's only because of the eurekas.

Generally speaking, I like it because it means the map effects how I play. If I stone near me, I get Masonry much earlier than if I don't. Same with metal resources and The Wheel.

This is a minimal impact on the whole, this argument that "you can play to the map conditions". Sure, I'm kinda annoyed if I don't have a resource to farm or mine to get irrigation and wheel boosts, but in the bigger picture these are irrelevant.

I still like it a lot. Instead of falling into the same tech route each game, I make far more adjustments than in previous Civs, and it simulates to some degree different progressions influenced by geography. It could have been implemented better with multiple eurekas, but then again everything in every game probably could have been implemented better.

Well, my experience is different, I fall into the same paths of the tech and civic trees because maxing out eurekas makes so much sense, not because eurekas direct me to different paths every game.

I like the Eureka system. If the game is becoming too repetitive because you're trying to maximize your Eurekas, that's not a problem with the system, it's a problem with one's game-play. If it bothers you enough, just do what I do: ignore them. If I get one, that's great, but I don't alter my game-play just to trigger one.

Sorry, but ignoring eurekas just isn't smart gaming in Civ6. They're big bonuses and you're going to do better by chasing them. The only exception might be a full-on domination victory. But basically my experience has been that maximizing eurekas = smart = repetitive.