Future Update - Speculation Thread
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criZp
Deity
They just refuse to tell us anything about what's going on.
Vahnstad
Emperor
What I would like to see, assuming your dlc set-up and that three packs contain DLC's
May - Akhenaten (Egypt) & Wu Zetian (China)
June - Scipio & Hannibal (Rome + Phoenicia)
September - Isabelle I (Spain) & Ivan The Terrible (Russia)
October - Venice & Florence (one city civs)
November - Gauls + Iceni
February:
Austria
Babylon
Byzantium
Colombia (or Muisca)
Ethiopia
Maya
Portugal
Vietnam
Alt leader: Charlemagne (France/Germany) or Kublai Khan (China/Mongolia)
Rework of ideologies (communism vs capitalism), (liberalism vs conservatism), (democracy vs authoritaranism)
Actual elections in democracy
Corporations & economic victory
Rework of trade (autarky vs globalization)
Expanded diplomacy (vassalisation, ... )
Diseases & Pandemics (tied to emergencies)
New wonders like Notre Dame (which should be included)
Rework of policies
Rework of pop system
Rework of colonization
Weather maybe, which could affect battles, and tiles. Or maybe just seasons and rainfall
wishfulthinking
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Sunday is upon us, any guesses for the coming week? 
AntSou
Deity
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Sunday is upon us, any guesses for the coming week?
Next week is a 3.6 on my hype scale.
Abaxial
Emperor
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Why do people say they want such-and-such an alternative leader? Is it just for variety and seeing a new face? Supposing Firaxis released a DLC with, let's say, a new leader for Russia: Catherine the Great. Just having a new animation isn't very interesting. Catherine the Great would just be a front for some new mechanic, which might or might not be fun, depending on what it is. It might make more sense to say that one would like a new leader for Russia who does this and this and this, and then you could stick any name on, and it wouldn't matter if it were Catherine the Great or Nicholas II.
In any case, why not download some new leaders from the Steam Workshop? There are plenty to choose from. They don't have the cartoonish animations, but that's hardly a loss. And they're free, whereas if they came in an official DLC you would have to pay for the effort of creating it, the bulk of which expense would be doing the animations. Some of the free leaders even have quite decent models (done with Poser, you can tell) even if they don't move.
In any case, why not download some new leaders from the Steam Workshop? There are plenty to choose from. They don't have the cartoonish animations, but that's hardly a loss. And they're free, whereas if they came in an official DLC you would have to pay for the effort of creating it, the bulk of which expense would be doing the animations. Some of the free leaders even have quite decent models (done with Poser, you can tell) even if they don't move.
Abaxial:
For me a new leader gives a new interesting twist for a civ. For example, I really like Germany's Free Imperial Cities bonus, Hansa and U-boat.
I like Barbarossa's bonus too but what if Germany was led by Bismarck with a diplomatic angle, or Frederick the Great that would help on battlefield?
I like to play Germany (for example) and have them in the game, and of course there's the added bonus of having a fresh adversary when playing against new leader like India's Chandragupta.
For me a new leader gives a new interesting twist for a civ. For example, I really like Germany's Free Imperial Cities bonus, Hansa and U-boat.
I like Barbarossa's bonus too but what if Germany was led by Bismarck with a diplomatic angle, or Frederick the Great that would help on battlefield?
I like to play Germany (for example) and have them in the game, and of course there's the added bonus of having a fresh adversary when playing against new leader like India's Chandragupta.
WillowBrook
Lurker
Roleplaying and/or alternate history scenarios are big reasons that some players play Civ. Interest in specific abilities ranges from none to that's the only thing that matters.
AvianBritish
King
Is it because you feel you will need to sleep more oftern next week? Have you been working all this week and therefore will have longer lay-in next week when you are off?
As for my hopes for the next 4 (or 5) DLCS:
May: Sennacherib (Assyria) & Ramesses II (Egypt Alt)
July: Lady Six Sky (Maya) & Geronimo (Apache)
September: Brennus (Celts) & Constantine the Great (Rome/Byzantium)
November: John I (Portugal) & (Haile Selassie) (Ethiopia)
January: Prithvi Narayan Shah (Nepal) + Sun Yat-sen (China) (one can hope)
But for me, I really want 1 more North American Civ; preferably a native (sad to say it, but I can live without the Maya as their city state is very nice; would be nice to have them return though as a proper Civ)
I really want to see Portugal back and a Celtic civ (to represented the "native Europeans")
We propbably will get one more African Civ, I think everyone is hedging their bets on Ethiopia which I won't mind.
I would love to see Assyria return as they completed so much; also they could have Babylon within their city name list and have bonuses reflecting that. Also I would love to see more of Egypt's lengthy history represented with an alt leader; preferably an ealier one.
I would love to see another mountain civ in the game (maybe it's because of the sheer amount of mountains I get stuck next to with) and as Tibet is out of the question; Nepal would be a perfect candiate for a religious mountain civ; and the Gurkhas are the perfect unique unit for them!
Since leaders have their own unique bonuses and agendas, I'd say it's more than just new animations.
Take England for example.
Sure England's playstyle is about creating an empire with many cities but the leaders do it differently. Victoria uses her redcoats and navy while Eleanor puts art in her museum.
Change the name of Palenque to Monte Albán (Zapotec city) and you wouldn't have to change anything else.
AvianBritish
King
Thanks for giving me a Wikipedia artical to read this evening! I like learning about new cities/peoples/civs!
Kmart_Elvis
King
I like to do alternative strategies/gameplay with existing civs. Chandragupta is a good example. He takes the existing civ and really leans in to their awesome UU. So you can play peaceful and religiously as Gandhi, or take Chandy on the warpath. India's amenity bonuses also work well with him.
The other thing is I would like alternative leaders to replace leaders with abilities I hate. For example, I love Scotland's civ ability... It's easy to use, powerful but not OP, relevant, etc. On the other hand I loathe Robert's bonus because I find it too fickle and RNG-dependent to activate. It would be great to give Scotland a spin with someone with a better bonus. Lautaro, Wilhelmina, Jayarvarman, etc. are also leaders I think weigh their respective civs down.
PhoenicianGold
Emperor
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Generally one of two reasons.
1) Cults of personality. People have their favorite historical figures and want to see them in a game that supposedly assembles a list of "greats." I would say this makes up the bulk of the civ playerbase, although I don't find the reasoning very compelling from a game design perspective. For one, there are far more interesting figures in history than can possibly be included, so the bigger your list of "must includes" becomes, the more disappointment you face. For two, many of the GOATs have already been in the Civ franchise, so to some extent sticking to this sort of meritocratic selection process would make for a pretty boring, predictable cast.
2) Representing different eras/polities/cultures from that civ's history. This, to me, is a more robust reasoning behind alternate leaders. Civ VI so far has used alternate leaders to represent very different periods in Indian, French, and English (and to some extent Greek) history, and this not only makes for a more diverse cast and playstyle, but also makes for a much narrower methodology for vetting alternate leaders than merely adding "greats." In VI, not only does an alternate leader have to be "great," but also add new cultural, aesthetic, political, and/or mechanical facets to an existing civ. It removes many of the obvious choices from the running and generally assures that whatever alternate leaders are selected add as much as possible to historical, aesthetic, and gameplay variety.
Yes, we could mod any number of leaders into the game, but given that VI seems to have some semblance of a unifying thesis or broader design philosophy in a way prior installments didn't really have (or at least a different thesis), it is interesting to see what official content is being developed by Firaxis to complete the larger picture.
XX36789
Chieftain
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I think Firaxis should do another double alt leader, like Kublai Khan leading both China and Mongolia.
His ability could focus on generating culture and science faster in conquered cities and suzerain city-states, a unique medieval naval unit that can be built very quickly (he was the Mongol warlord that invaded Japan but lost his fleet to a freak storm), and he could give both nations he leads a unique standalone district that improves the effects of district projects and gives a special promotion tree to units trained in that city.
Also another concept that could be fun is a 'bad' emperor of Rome like Nero, who could be focused on recovering from Natural Disasters and Dark Ages. He would be a fun character for the AI to be erratic and backstabby with since he was crazy and evil irl.
His ability could focus on generating culture and science faster in conquered cities and suzerain city-states, a unique medieval naval unit that can be built very quickly (he was the Mongol warlord that invaded Japan but lost his fleet to a freak storm), and he could give both nations he leads a unique standalone district that improves the effects of district projects and gives a special promotion tree to units trained in that city.
Also another concept that could be fun is a 'bad' emperor of Rome like Nero, who could be focused on recovering from Natural Disasters and Dark Ages. He would be a fun character for the AI to be erratic and backstabby with since he was crazy and evil irl.
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PotatoMcWhiskey
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Personally based on Firaxis and 2k's history of delivering really good content updates and stuff - silence to me is good. They are always watching though, paying attention to what the community says about the game, just the studio generally takes a hands off approach because a lot of the designers believe that they are "poisoning the well" by talking to the community too much. I talk about this whenever people get frustrated with Firaxis not talking much to the community. They are always reading the forums, reddit etc.
I would be very surprised if there wasn't a small, core group of players who they have on retainer that they have a dialogue with, but they keep the rest of the community at arms length and communicate through delivering content. Its a culture of designers and developers that "grow up" at Firaxis. Valve has a similar approach.
If they mostly stay out of touch with the community, the community will say the honest things they are thinking about the game. It can be frustrating for those who "aren't in the know" but imo having been a beta tester for a game in a different genre who was in the "know" it really does result in a better game. The developers have extremely heated but calm conversations with each other constantly about this feature or that feature, and what the community are talking about.
I would be very surprised if there wasn't a small, core group of players who they have on retainer that they have a dialogue with, but they keep the rest of the community at arms length and communicate through delivering content. Its a culture of designers and developers that "grow up" at Firaxis. Valve has a similar approach.
If they mostly stay out of touch with the community, the community will say the honest things they are thinking about the game. It can be frustrating for those who "aren't in the know" but imo having been a beta tester for a game in a different genre who was in the "know" it really does result in a better game. The developers have extremely heated but calm conversations with each other constantly about this feature or that feature, and what the community are talking about.
That would be the Frankenstein test group we see in the credits.
CPWimmer
King
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Based on my own experience with Software Development - I believe that they are using "2kqa_d" as a "Merge Branch" of sorts. Based on how frequently it gets updated (and it's name) it appears to contain changes from all of the other Smoke "X" branches all in one set of code to send over to 2K's Quality Assurance team to test together as one entity. This allows them to test everything to make sure it all works together.
I do not think that "2kqa_d" itself represents a larger Expansion Pack on it's own. However, unless i am mistaken, we don't actually know the size of any of the content in any of the Smoke "X" branches. It is possible that any one of those 6 branches could be something larger. I tend to think that is not the case, but that's even more of a guess than anything else we are doing here.
I'm not sure what the changes with the Launcher mean - especially since it looks like they added it, and then took it away. I'm also not sure if I should count those as changes to "2kqa_d" or not, as compared to the other changes I've been tracking.
It still looks like whatever's going on in Smoke A might be done, and Smoke (original) and Smoke C are winding down.
SnowKomodo
Deity
Those Civ 5 silhouette hints were the peak of teasing in terms of generating excitement. I wonder if they would consider going back to something like that
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