Future Update - Speculation Thread

[topsecret]

I'd like to see features removed or abstracted, gameplay consolidated and rebalanced and single-player experience improved - what are the chances of any of that happening

See Civ1-Civ5.

 

[RohirrimElf]

A few years ago there was a game in development by Paradox, West vs East, similar to HoI but in the cold war period. They had dev diaries for those as well.

The game eventually got cancelled. I'm sure Paradox learned some lessons from that, but thankfully stopping dev diaries wasn't one of them.

I don't recall there having been any meaningful consequences to it in regards to the relationship between the company and fans. They just moved on and so did we.

i am not sure about the statistics. But from my understanding game developers abandon games all the time. EA/blizzard. Before it got released. Or after release when reviews or sales numbers are not satisfactory. Support gets dropped. With or without announcement.

parodox has also released steel division. Which had a very low player base from the start. It did not get much support afterwards. The game was underrated to my opinion and hoi4 must have been much more popular to ww2 fans. I would not have stopped playing if i could find people to play with online.

firaxis is no different from other companies that have had succesfull and unsuccesfull titles. The biggest change is that firaxis ignores their fanbase in fear of upsetting them. But i guess many of us would be able to handle disappointment if only there would have been some communication. It should not only be positive PR. If there is a setback i think most of us would understand that developing strategy games is not as easy as making a cup of tea.

 

[Casworon]

People have also been speculating that the new civ vi content included plagues and that current events have caused Firaxis too delay release. Some people even speculating that they are scrapping and removing the content from the game entirely.

Meanwhile Paradox releases the ck2 plague expansion for free to capitalize on the epidemic.

The difference in the way the two companies communicate has definitely effected the way we interpret them. I'm not sure how accurate this is but I think Civ has a much broader audience than paradox games. Including many more casual players and those outside the 'gamer bubble'.

I also think its interesting that because we perceive Firaxis as more cautious on sensitivities we hold them too a higher standard. I'm not that involved in the ck2 community but I dont remember reading about any backlash to the plague expansion being given away for free. But if the next Civ content involves plagues I definitely expect too see comments here and also articles by gaming websites asking if due to current events this was a good move.

I have faith that they know what they are doing and there current marketing strategy involves data none of us can see. Though it seemed like they where changing their ways with the indepth patch release video's, and then nothing.

 

[Proclo]

I would like to see again an emphasis on the ideology system of Brave New World. The decision between democracy/fascism/communism and everything around this mechanic made the endgame of Civ5 very enjoyable.

 

[Hakan-i Cihan]

I'd like to see features removed or abstracted, gameplay consolidated and rebalanced and single-player experience improved - what are the chances of any of that happening

You can always look for mods in the workshop which disable/remove features like religion/holy sites, disasters, loyalty, GDR etc.

 

[Deggial]

What would make 'Ideologies' actually so much different to the current late game government types? Wouldn't an increased animosity already do the trick to increase world tension?

 

[Casworon]

What would make 'Ideologies' actually so much different to the current late game government types? Wouldn't an increased animosity already do the trick to increase world tension?

I think a number of things. For a start it was much more painful to swap ideologies once you had adopted one. While switching governments is relatively painless in Civ VI.

The big ones however are how it interacted with all the different systems. Tourism bringing other empires into unhappiness and even city swapping etc etc.

This brings another main point. Civ Vi has some great systems but they all feel separate from each other. I would love to see them all interact with each other more

 

[Cyon]

Yeah I really liked how tourism tied with ideology I Civ V wherein Civ VI it is totally disconnected

 

[Deggial]

Okay, I'll agree on the ability to change freely between governments (which I actually don't do in my games, but there is of course no actual game rule againt this).
Other than that, I don't see, why a completely new approach would be necessary. The current system just could be tweaked and expanded.

But I definitely support the idea to interlink all the existing game mechanigs way more (e.g. tourism & government). That was a worthwhile change in Civ5 for sure!

 

[Socrates-]

Concerning: Economic Victory

So, in case there's (finally) an Economic Victory introduced & we're still missing Portugal as a Civ maybe these two could be linked. The same way as Sweden & Canada we're used to play towards a Diplomatic Victory in GS...

Following this logic: Maybe an Economic Victory could have something to do with getting (double) copies of al the present luxury resources in a game? It would encourage a colonial empire consisting of trading-posts/cities on all the continents.

How would you like to see an Economic Victory added to the game?

 

[mitsho]

How would you like to see an Economic Victory added to the game?

Processed Goods. Combining two resources can create another one. Maybe there's even a third level. You have to keep a stockpile X of Y different (manufactured) resources over Z turns. And maybe you have to sell them to a few civs (so that you can't accidentally trigger it).

The economic victory needs to be easy to understand and reachable by peace and war alike. Just hoarding gold doesn't seem intriguing.

I also agree that espionage should play a harder role. It's an opportunity to mess with your far away opponents and can tie in nicely with economic victory as well. Bur for me, it's too big a hassle right now, all the systems we have require a lot of clicks right now already. I am not sure we need more.

We are now back to pure wishing and speculations, right?

 

[Alexander's Hetaroi]

How would you like to see an Economic Victory added to the game?

The onleway I see an Economic Victory happening is by bringing back corporations. You would use a Great Merchant to found a corporation around the Renaissance and make your corporation a monopoly by spreading it to all other Civs and defeating the other corporations that share the same good or service.
It would sort of be like a religion game but it could spread through traders instead of creating a whole other unit.

 

[Casworon]

I imagine an economic victory would have luxury resources go the same direction as strategic where you have a stock pile and an income per turn. Also having things that drain them per turn like military units and power buildings do for strategic resources.

Managed well this can be used to buff two areas of the game that are currently underpowered. Colonial play and building tall.

Colonial play being encouraged by each continent having unique luxury resources for you too collect. And tall being encouraged by the use of these luxuries to gain powerful advantages in single cities.

The victory could be triggered by gaining a certain amount of each luxury resource in the game. Encouraging you to settle/conquer land to gain more luxury income and trade to get the others

 

[PhoenicianGold]

I have realized my own real problem with Australia and Canada, and why do I dislike them being in game, is not even with modernity per se but rather the fact they are so culturally similar to other civs already present in the game. We have England, America, Australia and Canada - four Anglosaxon civilizations which emerged as powers in the industrial or postindustrial era.
Four English - speaking civs but only one civ for India, China, Arabia, Persia, Hispanic world, Germany (disunited before 1870) etc. That's so disproportional (10% of all civs!) And... Boring. At least Mexico would be something much more culturally unique and flavourful, as it is much more different from Spanish culture than Canada is from English, not to mention it existed for much longer time. Bolivar's state was very short lived but it is interesting embodiment of Spanish South America and its unique culture, that's why that proposal is constantly alive. Argentina would start feeling out of place for me, but I'd still prefer it over Australia and Canada as it simply is something more exotic and unique to me (I'd even argue more culturally influential, due to its literature, tango etc).
England, America and Canada or Australia would be acceptable, or Spain, Mexico and Argentina or Gran Colombia, just please no four sister civs in one game

And I don't give a damn about perfectionist TSL distribution balance. Earth has been extremely unequal in population density and historical significance, accept that, especially as it doesn't affect gameplay beyond one very specific map type and size.

While I agree with this sentiment, I don't think any of the anglosphere civs are necessarily undeserving. VI particularly seems to want to represent modern cultural legacies because that appears to resonate more with consumers and translate to better sales. Representing modern powers is definitely part of that, because there are large gamer markets in Canada and Australia (and why I wholly expect some form of Italy to be introduced before the game is completed).

(Also, there is something to be said about even being a global power in the 21st century. I see a lot of members on here minimizing modern civs as not having been around for centuries like ancient and medieval civs. However, between increased globalization forcing competition and collaboration with literally every other state on the planet (as opposed to immediate regional neighbors), and the exponential growth of technology and cultural consciousness, it is absolutely a historical feat to be on top of the current meta.)

If anything, I think the problem is that they aren't developing more civs, or at least a more robust way of representing more civs (like a clone or semi-clone feature to include culturally/mechanically similar civs like Spain/Portugal or Huns/Scythia). To me, the problem isn't that we have four anglosphere civs, but, as you said, we only have token representation in other regions of the world. If, for instance, the roster included:

Sinosphere:

*Vietnam
*Tibet

Indosphere:

*Burma
*Mughals/Timurids (also kinda Persia)

Arabsphere:

*Morocco
*Oman/Swahili

Hispanosphere:

*Mexico
*Colombia

Then I think the game would feel far less biased. And since we have already included all of the anglo powers, these happen to be the only areas the game can continue expanding into. As far as I can see it, VI can only get more diverse the longer development goes on.

 

[berlin88]

Finland has yet to make an appearance, so hopefully that eventually gets rectified. Hungary has been the lone representative for the Finno-Ugric peoples so far.

I Finnish civ lead by Mannerheim or Sibelius would do nicely, with a focus on the Karelian Finns and the Kalevala epic if possible.

In regards to regular game mechanics, I want to see the ability to harvest or remove luxury and strategic resources from the map. There is nothing more annoying, than being unable to place a district or wonder, because there is a resource in the way. Adding the ability to fill in a lake and turn it into a useable tile would also be a useful addition.

 

[Proclo]

Trade is another mechanic I want to see revamp. dunkleosteus had multiple brilliant ideas in this regard almost 5 years ago. They all are here https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/civ-6-massive-overhaul-help-wanted.612405/ . Manufactured goods, a global market...

 

[Arianrhod]

How would you like to see an Economic Victory added to the game?

I kind of miss Civ V "Diplomatic" Victory tbh, it was janky as hell but at least it let you end already-won games in a timely manner without them having to drag out like 60 turns because of a dumb space laser light show (my least favorite part of GS tbh) or a cultural countdown that's about as decisive as the first five seconds of a download prompt. But I guess there isn't really a good way to reimplement it as it was.

For better or worse, I could see "corporations" being a sort of combination between domination and religion -- you'd want to acquire as many resources as possible in an effort to establish a monopoly or near-monopoly on them, and you'd need to use those resources to create a "corporation" that's more powerful than the other civilizations in play -- effectively, your corporation "owns" those civilizations, and can in turn mine them for resources with a bit of additional effort. Could also tie into a sort of "vassal state" system where a country is not technically dominated by you, but is in practice controlled by you and your ideology.

 

[Codeword Iroquois]

Finland has yet to make an appearance, so hopefully that eventually gets rectified. Hungary has been the lone representative for the Finno-Ugric peoples so far.

I Finnish civ lead by Mannerheim or Sibelius would do nicely, with a focus on the Karelian Finns and the Kalevala epic if possible.

In regards to regular game mechanics, I want to see the ability to harvest or remove luxury and strategic resources from the map. There is nothing more annoying, than being unable to place a district or wonder, because there is a resource in the way. Adding the ability to fill in a lake and turn it into a useable tile would also be a useful addition.

I find it odd, that when one doesn't know about the strategic, it can be built over, but when one finds it, it can't be...

 

[WillowBrook]

I find it odd, that when one doesn't know about the strategic, it can be built over, but when one finds it, it can't be...

And that you start collecting the resource immediately if you have a district over it with no effect on the yields of the district but have to build a mine if there's nothing there. As if mine tunnels magically appeared under the library or amphitheater when you somehow discovered coal there.

 

[acluewithout]

I don’t think the economy in Civ works very well.

There’s lots of good stuff at the moment. The whole Industrial Zone thingy is very satisfying with lots of things to play with - what order to research, hard build, chop, buy or speed with MEs, power and resources, what to improve, cluster or spread out. Harbours are also very cool - rush early or delay, use %production cards, dedications. I miss the adjacencies for Lumbermills, Shipyards sort of but not really buffing resources is annoying, and CH buildings are bland, but most of the building blocks are good. And happiness and all that stuff is good conceptually.

But there’s nothing to do with your economy - or nothing to do that matters. The only high production or gold victory is Space Victory, and you can just chop out everything or use Royal Society for that. I’m always Swimming in gold because I trade away all my Luxes, and relatedly happiness etc doesn’t matter much.

If we get a Third Expansion, and other than ideology, I hope FXS do rework economy and trade and things like that. I don’t really want to see an Economic Victory. And I’m really not keen to see Corporations return as actual Units (although, they might be interesting if they worked more like Governors). But I don’t really have any good or coherent thoughts on how FXS should tweak or rework these sorts of things - hopefully they’ve got some good ideas!