Game is too superficial, too boring, too onesided, too imbalanced

[GAGA Extrem]

How does it fail?

It fails because the web is supposed to promote meaningful choise and freedom over the traditional linear tree progression. Inside the game, however, this choise is quite limited past the early game. Later on, it is even restricting choise because you are forced to research Affinity techs over techs that grant actual benefits you want.

What is wrong with defending something that I see as useful? Throwing out statements such as "I see no real way to do X" doesn't actually help the discussion, all you're doing is trying to discredit the action of defense itself.

No need to interprete that as a personal attack. You are free to like the system if you want, after all it might fight your playstile. But I can't see an objective way to defend it in it's current iteration.

How do the Victory conditions interact with the tech web? How much of this is due to Science is King? How do we solve Science is King in Civilisation games?

I don't think that the problem is about "science is king". Because Affinity points are the emperor. You only get that science to grab Affinity points.

Ryika described the same thing I also mentioned in our other thread: Once you have your affinity wonder under construction, the game would suddenly return to CIV-like decision making, if it wasn't for the fact that you have won and everything is now pointless. You would again research techs that unlock interesting stuff, you would stop converting science and build all these mid game buildigns you skipped, you would settle a few extra colonies if you had good locations.

I guess the best way to solve the "no-brainer" approach past the early game would be to connect the affinity victories to all player actions, not just techs. But that would require a significant rework of the whole game and is probably not feesible. The easiest way might be to replace some of that affinity level with a sort of "tech level" requirement. That way you still need a certain number of tech points to win (weighted by science cost of the tech), but you could at least choose freely which stuff you research - and it would delay the win timers a bit, so stuff that is currently pointless (e.g. Nanopasture) may actual become useful.

The aliens are absolutely NOT space barbarians. In my current game I sent a colonist and a marine together right into the midst of a swarm of aliens to get to a fantastic location. The aliens hadn't attacked me yet and so I gritted my teeth and made my way through them. They left me alone and I grew the outpost into a city. Barbarians would NEVER have done that.

Nah, he is pretty accurate there. Aliens are mostly space barbarians that just have additional restrictions for their attack behaviour. And the (simplified) rules are pretty obvious:
"Do not attack unless: Attacked first OR target is within range 2 of nest OR alien aggression variable is at least X OR target is an unprotected settler"

And on an unrelated point, FWIW, there are more positive reviews of Civ BE on Steam than negative.

As a related point, I wouldn't really interprete a 53% ratio on Steam as a sign of a good game. At least not when comparing it to the 97% for CIV5, 93% for CIV4 or 89% for CIV3.

 

[Gorbles]

1. It does promote meaningful choice. You're only forced into Affinity progression if you enable Affinity Victories. This isn't to say that it can't be improved, of course. But it's in no way a failure.

Complaining that you're forced to beeline for Affinity technologies in an Affinity-decided game scenario is a bit of a silly complaint, in my opinion.

2. Objective ways to defend it:

a) it prevents slingshot strategies which cut out huge swathes of the game time (i.e. midgame) and allow users to rush dominance with United Nations / World Congress style game control and / or Spies and / or any other benefit to employing a slingshot strategy.

b) there are multiple optimal strategies depending on Victory type. In CiV interaction with Victories was mostly one-dimensional until around the Modern Era. There were only one or two most-optimal slingshot strategies to employ - it was only around the Modern Era where Research costs get too prohibitive that you're forced to decide between which Victory type to aim towards.​

3. Only in Affinity games. There are a bunch of other Victory types that are seemingly ignored here, and I have no idea why.

Science is King because Affinity points are so useful. You can't get Affinity points without Science. Ergo, generating more Science is what you're aiming to do per turn because that's how you deal with the exponentially-scaling Science costs for technologies on each "ring" of the web.

Also, it must be noted that it's perfectly possible to play a game beyond the Victory state (assuming you're the faction that wins).

Affinity actions are already tied to various game systems, from Explorer excavations to Virtue bonuses to the Quest system (which admittedly at the moment needs fixing - badly). What I think you mean is making technology not the primary source of Affinity benefits, which is an avenue that could be explored. It would help reduce reliance on Science and promote alternative playstyles (as well as incentivising Explorer upgrades that improve Expedition limits - this helps what I perceive to be a very lacklustre Supremacy faction barring a couple of ridiculous ranged units).

-------------​

@Ryiga:

I think we mostly agree on a lot of points, I think the confusion was that I was trying to discuss things that would draw users back to the game instead of increasing enjoyment for you or I (though I quite enjoy the game as it is. Modded gameplay is a bit better, but annoying due to compatibility issues with mods and some bugs Firaxis needs to fix).

 

[GAGA Extrem]

As for (1): To be frank I am not sure how to react here, because now you support my claim from the previous page. So we do agree, but with a different perspective?

As for (2a): Nah, if anything tech webs promote to beeline, because they allow yout to skip and cherrypick techs. I guess the same is true for slingshots (depending on definition?).
As for (2b): Can you give a few examples here? I think I don't understand what you are trying to point out.

As for (3): Mostly because these are far less problematic. I'd argue that Domination is probably working quite close to what the devs had in mind for all VCs.

 

[Gorbles]

What do I agree with?

Slingshot doesn't exist in BE. You literally can't do it. There are no eras, nor benefits tied to eras, to slingshot. Add to that the fact you have multiple branching paths that branch into multiple branching paths and you have more options than a linear tech tree could ever provide.

 

[GAGA Extrem]

This:

[...]Its [the tech web's] design fails due to the way the Victory Conditions interact with it. It would need a lot of extra tech effects and a complete redesign the Victory conditions to make it work properly.[...]

As for sling-shotting:
Mh, guess if it is mostly related to the CIV era design - yeah. Not that CIV:BE offers many tools for slingshots anyway. The free techs you can get come way to late to have signifcant impact on the game.

 

[Ryika]

What do I agree with?

Slingshot doesn't exist in BE. You literally can't do it. There are no eras, nor benefits tied to eras, to slingshot. Add to that the fact you have multiple branching paths that branch into multiple branching paths and you have more options than a linear tech tree could ever provide.

Uhm... prepatch Battlesuit-Slingshot as the slavs? Most overpowered thing that existed back then... but that was one of the main things the fall patch did: Removing half a dozen slingshot-strategies that were op as hell. ^^

 

[GAGA Extrem]

Haha, right, I completely forgot about that one already...

 

[Gorbles]

I don't agree with you because I reject the premise that the tech web "fails". The only thing that "fails" is expecting to be able to prioritise non-Affinity techs when running a Affinity Victory.

That's like expecting to be able to win a Domination without military units.

2. b) Each Victory type requires a specific build path. There is even a degree of variety in those specific build paths depending on your optimal strategy.

With regards to CiV variety takes until the Modern Age to open up (because that's when you get variant Factories, Culture Victory buildings appear), before that you're following the optimal path. Optics into what is it, Drama & Poetry? Into the third one. There's literally one major tech per era that you need to aim towards and that's it.

 

[Ryika]

I don't agree with you because I reject the premise that the tech web "fails". The only thing that "fails" is expecting to be able to prioritise non-Affinity techs when running a Affinity Victory.

There is a difference between "prioritizing" affinity-techs and "getting nothing BUT affinity techs" though. Not sure on what level you play, but from what I get you play for fun, so maybe you just don't know how the game plays on higher difficulties? It basically works like this:

<A few Techs> -> Academies -> <A few Techs> -> Affinity Tech -> Affinity Tech -> Affinity Tech -> Affinity Tech -> Affinity Tech -> Affinity Tech -> Affinity Tech -> Affinity Tech -> Affinity Tech -> Affinity Tech -> Affinity Tech -> Affinity Tech -> Affinity Tech -> Affinity Tech -> Victory Wonder -> Victory.

There isn't much (if any) space for "optional" techs and if there WAS space for optional techs then those wouldn't really benefit from them because at that time in the game there's just not enough time for a building to really accumulate a total yield that makes up for the delay in science - it's better to just use the science project.

So I can't see how that is not a failure, because... what the hell do we need a tech web for when the big chunk of techs just isn't useful? Even the techs that you need to reach new Affinity Techs are only things that delay your victory without really giving you too much useful stuff.

That's like expecting to be able to win a Domination without military units.

Which is possible thanks to Coup d'état.

2. b) Each Victory type requires a specific build path. There is even a degree of variety in those specific build paths depending on your optimal strategy.

With regards to CiV variety takes until the Modern Age to open up (because that's when you get variant Factories, Culture Victory buildings appear), before that you're following the optimal path. Optics into what is it, Drama & Poetry? Into the third one. There's literally one major tech per era that you need to aim towards and that's it.

Actually, that's not true. Civ 5 even begins with you researching the techs you think are most useful first - depending on the resources you have around. Then the path to Education is pretty much set in stone, but after that it's once again the decision between Archeology, Scientific Method, Industralization or Dynamite. All before the modern Era. Not a TON of variation of course and Archeology is very situational... but more variation than the tech web really allows for.

 

[Acken]

The failure of the tech web isn't the web in itself, I think that was a rather good idea. What is bad is to have linked 3/4 victory conditions to completely different sets of leafs tech.

The originality of the tech web was it's non-linearity, getting away from a more restrictive tech-path in Civ5. But putting victory condition in a limited subset of it is counter productive to that idea, it linearize the tech web. The most interesting part of the web are the first techs where it really feels as if you have choices that matter but once you are set on your affinity you could queue up the whole tree by picking affinity techs from the inner-rings to the outer-rings and just ignore it for the rest of the game.
The short length of the game also works counterproductively to the tech web.

In that sense I also view it as a failure.

2. b) Each Victory type requires a specific build path. There is even a degree of variety in those specific build paths depending on your optimal strategy.

With regards to CiV variety takes until the Modern Age to open up (because that's when you get variant Factories, Culture Victory buildings appear), before that you're following the optimal path. Optics into what is it, Drama & Poetry? Into the third one. There's literally one major tech per era that you need to aim towards and that's it.

Like the other thread you should stop trying to compare things with Civ5. You don't seem to have enough experience with it.
The true milestones of Civ5 are the science techs. But in-between you have choices.

 

[Gorbles]

If the aim is to slingshot ahead of your opponent, you don't have much choice. Do you disagree that slingshot strategies are both prevalent and / or necessary to an optimum path?

If you don't disagree, all you're doing is quibbling over details. Calling the tech web of the failure when the issue is game pacing is also inaccurate, and smacks of piling on when you've already agreed elsewhere that pacing is a major issue.

@Ryika:

Define the "higher difficulties". Bearing in mind that if we're discussing the AI they also get resource bonuses which further necessitates the prioritising of Affinity technologies simply to keep up. That isn't a flaw with Affinities, that's a flaw with scaling AI in these kinds of games, and unlikely one that is solveable without massive advances in AI across the board.

And yet, still, you're only debating Affinity Victory types, and ignoring all others. Why?

And honestly, if you can show a video or something of a Domination game won solely through coups, I'd love to see it. Especially if it wasn't situational or otherwise dependent on getting lucky.

 

[Ryika]

@Ryika:

Define the "higher difficulties". Bearing in mind that if we're discussing the AI they also get resource bonuses which further necessitates the prioritising of Affinity technologies simply to keep up. That isn't a flaw with Affinities, that's a flaw with scaling AI in these kinds of games, and unlikely one that is solveable without massive advances in AI across the board.

Haven't played anything other than Apollo ever really (literally, I started my first game on Apollo the day the game was released (when Apollo basically was a joke) and never played any of the other difficulties since then), so I guess I can't really speak for the others. I don't really see your point though, are you saying that the system is okay, because on lower difficulties you can do things that don't have anything to do with efficiency and get away with it? That's not a choice between two somewhat equal things, that's just being able to choose a horribly underpowered thing over a good thing and getting away with it.

And yet, still, you're only debating Affinity Victory types, and ignoring all others. Why?

Well, because domination doesn't really have any other "resources" to manage other than affinity, the difficulty of that victory condition comes from managing empire development and conquering at the same time.

Contact does suffer less from that "Affinity = power+progress"-problem, but don't get me wrong... it's still a luck-based piece of crap with that random ruin that can make you win the game in record time and a ton of exploit-potential by going into energy-focus, then trading all your resources against gpt to make the victory trigger a few turns earlier.... But other than that, yeah, it's probably the victory that has the best general concept - you can choose to skip a lot of the affinity tech and try to end the game before other Civs overwhelm you with units that are 2 tiers above yours, or you can choose to play it save and add some techs in the mix.

And honestly, if you can show a video or something of a Domination game won solely through coups, I'd love to see it. Especially if it wasn't situational or otherwise dependent on getting lucky.

Obviously that only works on small maps, but you used map sizes as part of your argument earlier in this thread, so I guess the comment that wasn't at all meant to be taken seriously has some merit. I'm too lazy to look for that thread now, but there was at least one person winning a 4-Civ-game by beelining the Spy Agency with the ARC and then couping all 3 capitals with his 3 spies at basically the same time before the AI even had counter-spies.

Anyway, I don't really know what you're arguing for. We've already established that the Tech Web does a decent job at providing a playing field for people who do not at all care about efficiency and instead just play without planing too far ahead. And you also seem to agree that the game becomes very limited the more you refine your gameplay. We also established that this is normal to an extend, but at the same time the argument that especially the "Affinity-Tech-Spam" towards the end doesn't really allow for ANY variation anymore hasn't been refuted and I think there is no way to refute it for higher difficulties (or "Apollo") because it's just an objective truth. So it seems to come down to is if this is to be considered a "failure" or if it's "okay", which then is personal opinion and probably not really worth arguing about.

 

[tedeviatings]

<A few Techs> -> Academies -> <A few Techs> -> Affinity Tech -> Affinity Tech -> Affinity Tech -> Affinity Tech -> Affinity Tech -> Affinity Tech -> Affinity Tech -> Affinity Tech -> Affinity Tech -> Affinity Tech -> Affinity Tech -> Affinity Tech -> Affinity Tech -> Affinity Tech -> Victory Wonder -> Victory.

You can choose which affinity tech to get when, though. Most of them are rather useless (i.e. allow for a wonder that does nothing) but some benefit your economy in some way and others allow for units you may or may not need. This allows for variation in order to suit your current game situation, though the variation is pretty much exclusive to matching affinity techs.

 

[Acken]

If the aim is to slingshot ahead of your opponent, you don't have much choice. Do you disagree that slingshot strategies are both prevalent and / or necessary to an optimum path?

If you don't disagree, all you're doing is quibbling over details. Calling the tech web of the failure when the issue is game pacing is also inaccurate, and smacks of piling on when you've already agreed elsewhere that pacing is a major issue.

-I disagree that "you don't have much choice". It's not 100% freedom but you are free in-between necessary milestones. If you think this is only a detail you're wrong.

-The pace is not the only issue. It's just icing on the cake why the tech web fails.

 

[Gorbles]

Haven't played anything other than Apollo ever really (literally, I started my first game on Apollo the day the game was released (when Apollo basically was a joke) and never played any of the other difficulties since then), so I guess I can't really speak for the others. I don't really see your point though, are you saying that the system is okay, because on lower difficulties you can do things that don't have anything to do with efficiency and get away with it? That's not a choice between two somewhat equal things, that's just being able to choose a horribly underpowered thing over a good thing and getting away with it.

----------​

Well, because domination doesn't really have any other "resources" to manage other than affinity, the difficulty of that victory condition comes from managing empire development and conquering at the same time.

Contact does suffer less from that "Affinity = power+progress"-problem, but don't get me wrong... it's still a luck-based piece of crap with that random ruin that can make you win the game in record time and a ton of exploit-potential by going into energy-focus, then trading all your resources against gpt to make the victory trigger a few turns earlier.... But other than that, yeah, it's probably the victory that has the best general concept - you can choose to skip a lot of the affinity tech and try to end the game before other Civs overwhelm you with units that are 2 tiers above yours, or you can choose to play it save and add some techs in the mix.

----------​

Anyway, I don't really know what you're arguing for. We've already established that the Tech Web does a decent job at providing a playing field for people who do not at all care about efficiency and instead just play without planing too far ahead. And you also seem to agree that the game becomes very limited the more you refine your gameplay. We also established that this is normal to an extend, but at the same time the argument that especially the "Affinity-Tech-Spam" towards the end doesn't really allow for ANY variation anymore hasn't been refuted and I think there is no way to refute it for higher difficulties (or "Apollo") because it's just an objective truth. So it seems to come down to is if this is to be considered a "failure" or if it's "okay", which then is personal opinion and probably not really worth arguing about.

1. You somehow missed my argument about the resources bonuses the AI gets, necessitating the Affinity tech spam in order to keep pace with the AI in such an area. On lower difficulties, you get more options in your gameplay. On higher difficulties, you get less options. This is how every game works because a computer is far more efficient at plotting an optimal route than humans are. The computer breaks down at response strategies and handling events on the fly (hence, AI).

Let's not even start on strategies player vs. player. You can't necessarily predict a human as well as an AI, nor will human players get bonus resources, so the optimal path will branch as necessary depending on game flow and user mistakes. But thankfully we've already established that human MP is a rather small proportion of the game's players, so we can discard that.

2. So the problems with Affinities only extend a certain way through the game. But Affinities are present in every game mode.

How do you resolve that contradiction?

3. My original argument was to do with player retention and how to address the flaws of the game that are an issue for that the majority of those players. If those issues then coincide with the complaints high-level players have then there are easy resolutions. If those issues are not the same, then what do you prioritise?

You're a modder, I'm a modder. I like debating solutions to a problem, instead of endlessly complaining about that problem. That's all. I didn't force you to do this :/

-I disagree that "you don't have much choice". It's not 100% freedom but you are free in-between necessary milestones. If you think this is only a detail you're wrong.

-The pace is not the only issue. It's just icing on the cake why the tech web fails.

So game pacing isn't a core issue, and the core issue is in fact . . . something else?

And if you have non-100% freedom that you can't express in any qualitative terms then it is a detail and your declarations of me being wrong hold no weight. Restrictions are restrictions.

 

[GAGA Extrem]

So game pacing isn't a core issue, and the core issue is in fact . . . something else?

The connection between the tech web and victory conditions. As stated several times now.

As for the rest:
(1) AI bonuses have nothing to do with the problem we are discussing.

(2) There is no contradiction, since the game as a whole is affected.

(3) If you want to debate actual solutions you should first and foremost understand the game and its mechanics.

More to come tomorrow, since I am out of time.

 

[Ryika]

1. You somehow missed my argument about the resources bonuses the AI gets, necessitating the Affinity tech spam in order to keep pace with the AI in such an area. On lower difficulties, you get more options in your gameplay. On higher difficulties, you get less options. This is how every game works because a computer is far more efficient at plotting an optimal route than humans are. The computer breaks down at response strategies and handling events on the fly (hence, AI).

It's funny how your words basically translate into: "Going for affinity techs is the far superior strategy, but if you play on a lower difficulties, then you can get away with doing things that are just really, really bad, so there's no problem here!"

Let's not even start on strategies player vs. player. You can't necessarily predict a human as well as an AI, nor will human players get bonus resources, so the optimal path will branch as necessary depending on game flow and user mistakes. But thankfully we've already established that human MP is a rather small proportion of the game's players, so we can discard that.

I don't think we have established that but due to the fact that I don't care at all about mp and that you're the only person who even mentioned multiplayer for the second time now I don't see how that paragraph did add anything to the conversation.

2. So the problems with Affinities only extend a certain way through the game. But Affinities are present in every game mode.

How do you resolve that contradiction?

I don't even understand what you're trying to say here.

3. My original argument was to do with player retention and how to address the flaws of the game that are an issue for that the majority of those players. If those issues then coincide with the complaints high-level players have then there are easy resolutions. If those issues are not the same, then what do you prioritise?

The main problem here is that you seem to think that my opinion is that Firaxis should fix the problems I mentioned asap and with maximum priority, when in reality I didn't do anything but to point out the main flaws the game has from my perspective. You are free to disagree and I won't argue against your position, after all it's still your personal opinion, but that's not what you're doing - you're trying to explain the problems away with arguments that just don't make any sense.

You're a modder, I'm a modder. I like debating solutions to a problem, instead of endlessly complaining about that problem. That's all. I didn't force you to do this :/

So I shouldn't complain about the problems the game has and instead just do Firaxis job and develop a better version of the game? It's not like I'm nagging about these constantly, I made a comment in a thread that was specifically made to talk about these issues and you dragged me (us) into this argument.

 

[Acken]

So game pacing isn't a core issue, and the core issue is in fact . . . something else?

And if you have non-100% freedom that you can't express in any qualitative terms then it is a detail and your declarations of me being wrong hold no weight. Restrictions are restrictions.

-Game pacing is a core issue for the game. But when talking about the tech web it's not the main issue. In the sense that if you fixed game pace, you would still beeline affinity techs. This is the core issue with the tech web I and Ryika have underlined. If you don't see a problem with it then fine we just disagree on this. The fact that half of the affinity techs have almost no use is also a part of the problem.

-Of course there are restrictions. You were the one arguing you don't have choices in Civ5 tech tree, this is wrong. Especially when trying to compare to BE. Civ5: Some choices in-between key techs, CivBE: Some choices for your first 10ish techs then queue up affinity techs and never open the thing again.

 

[Kutuzov]

Sure, if that's your opinion, then that's fair game, although I have to say that I strongly disagree about the "That's how 4x are, we have to accept that."-part. Just because people have been lazy about that for some time now doesn't mean that it has to be that way.

I'm not arguing that we have to accept it. It's simply a statement of fact. I am not aware of any 4x game played against an AI opponent that consistently* presents a challenge to a human player throughout the entire life of the game. To my mind, no designer has managed to solve this particular problem in 4x games. That doesn't mean that I don't want them to but that I appreciate that it is no simple thing to do.

* I had a session in Civ V where victory was determined on the very last turn of the game but that is hardly the norm for my games.

 

[Kutuzov]

Nah, he is pretty accurate there. Aliens are mostly space barbarians that just have additional restrictions for their attack behaviour. And the (simplified) rules are pretty obvious:
"Do not attack unless: Attacked first OR target is within range 2 of nest OR alien aggression variable is at least X OR target is an unprotected settler"

As a related point, I wouldn't really interprete a 53% ratio on Steam as a sign of a good game. At least not when comparing it to the 97% for CIV5, 93% for CIV4 or 89% for CIV3.

If you are willing to ignore the one, glaringly obvious change to 'barbarian' behavior, which the developers spent an entire development session demonstrating to us, then perhaps you are right that he is pretty accurate. Civ barbarians would never have allowed me to move a settler with a single escort through adjacent hexes without attacking me.

Of course it's not a sign of it being a good game. I mentioned the Steam stats because some might be under the impression that the nay-sayers are in the majority there. They are not. They are just noisier by at least one order of magnitude.