[GS] Haven't played since Civ 5.

[Gamgee]

What is the best way to play Civ 6 and all its expansions? In Civ 5 for example I liked going tall. How far do I want to place my cities? In 5 IIRC it was 6 tiles between them or so to maximize profit and not make roads too costly.

 

[ArallanKing]

In Civ6, you need to play wide because of the districts and stuffs. Also, for city placement there's this "reserved area" as far as three tiles away from a city centre which makes you unable to settle closer than 4tiles away, but for optimal placement I think it's kinda different for every Civs cuz if you put it in the right way, you can make something like Sosratus's Hansa:https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/the-mythical-45-hansa.642810/

 

[Sherlock]

Stay with CiV.

 

[Sostratus]

For starters, let's look at the "small" map size, which is the default. While you can certainly win with fewer cities, if you want to play well you're going to want to get at least 7 or so, preferably 10ish, cities by the midgame. In civ6, things are usually identified as "tall" options by giving bonuses to city with governors/maluses to those without. There are 7 no matter how big you are, hence I used 7 as a minimum. But this really is your starting point; your power base, if you will, going into the mid-late game. I'm just going to talk about the cities you settle yourself; you can also acquire them by taking the ones other people found. (Indeed, early war is very very strong!)

How tight to pack them? It depends on how you want your economy to be based. There is no longer a per city penalty* and there are upsides to having more cities vs fewer, so we will focus on what the cities do.
*Number of cities affects the era score threshold for dark and golden ages. More cities makes it harder to achieve, after a point.
Some civs really thrive based on their terrain. Often they have a unique improvement (Australia, Inca, Sumer.) Australia is a good example. Their Outback Station gets big bonuses for being near other outback stations, so you want to leave open spaces between cities to make sure you get the most out of them. This would push you towards spreading out cities a little; 4-6 tiles.
Some civs really thrive by using their districts. Japan is a good example. Getting extra yields by placing districts next to each other would suggest you might want to clump cities together so you can build a sprawling district megalopolis. As @ArallanKing mentioned, Germany is another example of this. Because they have a special Industrial Zone interaction with Commercial Hubs, you want to place as many of those together as possible. (See my signature for efficient ways to do that.) This means you want a lot of cities packed tight, so you can fit as many of these clusters of districts in as you can.

Generally, though, Civ6 has a lot of flat yields and few % based boosts; this pushes players to have more copies of districts by having more cities. There are also regional effects, like stadiums and factories being able to give benefits to cities up to 6 tiles away- incentivizing you to place cities so that you can cover the most cities with the fewest entertainment complexes/ industrial zones. Regardless of how tight you pack, you will want a couple cities that have some breathing room so they can become large and able to push out a lot of production when you need to - building an army, getting a wonder, doing a space race, etc. You can even do both - have tightly packed clusters of cities with some space in between the different clusters.

So the best leader/victory agnostic advice I can give is "fill up the space you have as best you can." A civ like australia may place their first handful of cities farther apart (to claim more of the map) and fill in some of the holes later; a civ like germany or japan may want to settle like a slowly spreading carpet so they can develop their clusters of districts early.

 

[Morningcalm]

The best way to play Civ is often to play wide, and with some conquest to gain ground initially.

 

[iammaxhailme]

In Civ V I play much taller and I spread my cities out more. I usually make 3-4 cities early and then a few more later in the game when my first 3-4 are developed.

In Civ VI I try to spam out as many cities as I can fit in a reasonably defendable land as early as possible, and then develop them. I often have 7 or 8 cities before the renaissance starts without going to war.

 

[jddods]

Stay with CiV.

Try Civ VI for yourself, we have a varied community . I for example never liked CivIV, loved Civ V and loved Civ VI even more.
Play wide, roads are build by traders as to city placement, depends on several factors, one being your play style. Just do it, most aren't disapointed but you never know till you have ago.

 

[Gamgee]

Okay great stuff then. In that case how much is the minimum amount of cities you want then on the other map sizes? Then the recommended amount?

 

[youngsteve]

This is why Civ V is so good, & this is so poor. In this game you are on a forced chase to keep building cities, otherwise you will fall behind. Added to that the game has no challenge, & you are constantly building cities & clicking turns. As Sherlock said stay with Civ V, until the developers actually make this a game that can challenge it.

 

[Noble Zarkon]

Try Civ VI for yourself, we have a varied community . I for example never liked CivIV, loved Civ V and loved Civ VI even more.

I agree with this sentiment, I loved Civ IV, thought Civ V was a total disaster and quite liked Civ VI before Gathering Storm. Now I think Civ VI might even be better than Civ IV!

 

[MooFreaky]

The way I found to enjoy Civ6 is not to try and beat the system.
I played Deity, pushing for the quickest victory I could get. And I could get 160-180 victories, but it was very repetitive and rather dull.
It was actually the same with Civ4 & 5, that there is an optimal progression and a checklist of what turn to have started X, Y and Z, then when they should be done. And it just wasn't fun, but I struggled with not playing efficiently as I just don't process things that way.

But I've really taught myself to play on Emperor most of the time and to play a certain way each game. Before a game I will set out a few boundaries. Maybe I will just say I am going to build the biggest cities I can, no harvesting resources and follow a path that makes sense for a Civ in my situation rather than "playing the game".
Other time I will say, I will not attack an enemy city. If I am declared war on I will take a city or two, but I will never go into negative grievances. While still trying to play an Empire rather than a game.

I find this approach far more enjoyable overall. Civ games have become increasingly less enjoyable to play optimally IMHO, because that is not their intention. So just jump in an give it a go, enjoy the game for what it is. If that's not your style, then there are other versions that are still incredible there is no need to hate on one because you prefer another.

 

[Infixo]

I believe the best way to play Civ6 is the way you like and gives you the most of what you seek in such a game.
No amount of text reading will answer that for you, it is really much better to just play a game or two.
The Civ6 is much more flexible in „how to play it”. There are as many opinions of the „best way” as there are players here probably.

 

[Onii-chan]

Okay great stuff then. In that case how much is the minimum amount of cities you want then on the other map sizes? Then the recommended amount?

There isn't any specific number. In Civ V you had policies for that, like it was logical to have 4 big cities due to Tradition bonuses, but there's nothing like that in Civ VI. All you really need to know is that since every city can have one district of each type and they take land space to build, you need more cities to really develop your empire, but as for exactly how many depends on the map you get. Essentially just squeeze in as many cities as you can in what you can designate as "your" part of the map that still seem like decent cities resource-wise. You don't need to put them 6 spaces away from each other, 4-5 is generally enough but it's more important that it's actually a worthwhile city. There's no big downside to settling more cities in Civ VI. In Civ V you got bigger happiness penalties and your culture cost per social policy went up, but there's nothing like that here. I guess the settler production cost goes up for each one you build and there are some minor amenity penalties but it's no big deal. As long as you feel like you can defend them and they won't loyalty flip then it's probably not a bad idea to build more

 

[Sostratus]

Okay great stuff then. In that case how much is the minimum amount of cities you want then on the other map sizes? Then the recommended amount?

There isn't any specific number. In Civ V you had policies for that, like it was logical to have 4 big cities due to Tradition bonuses, but there's nothing like that in Civ VI.

This is the right sentiment. The give some concrete examples, suppose you've got a nice cluster of mountains. Mountains are very valued because they give +1 science to adjacent campuses; in GS, geothermal fissures also now give a bonus.
So you definitely want to settle near that mountain range to get a campus down. But wait! Maybe this mountain range is a little snaky, and actually has three or four great campus spots! Then you might want to settle a few cities all very close to each other, so that each can get a campus in one of those prime spots.

Another example is if you find a really big plateau of hills. Normally, an Industrial zone gets more production from being surrounded by mines. But if you think about it, if you had one IZ ringed by mines, some of those mines could also touch a second IZ. So one plateau could give you two great IZ spots in a fairly compact space- making you want to settle another city in there to take advantage. The flipside would be if you wanted this city to build Ruhr Valley world wonder. It grants +1 production to any mines in that city, so in that case it might be worth giving that city as much space as it needs to work all the mines in range.

Ultimately, the limiting factor on your growth is amenities, which limits your total, empire wide population. If you have enough amenities to support 100 citizens, it doesn't really matter if they are spread between 10 cities or 20. (In the most optimal sense, there are reasons to have more smaller cities to a point, but not smaller than 10 population long term.) So don't feel bad if some cities have lots of space and some cities are fairly dense. Both can be good in the right context!

 

[Aristos]

I agree with this sentiment, I loved Civ IV, thought Civ V was a total disaster and quite liked Civ VI before Gathering Storm. Now I think Civ VI might even be better than Civ IV!

... but for the challenge in general, right? But that's a small thingie.

 

[Sostratus]

... but for the challenge in general, right? But that's a small thingie.

What was the description text for Civ4 Deity... "Muahaha, good luck sucker!" ?
Now that's what I call deity!

 

[Aristos]

What was the description text for Civ4 Deity... "Muahaha, good luck sucker!" ?
Now that's what I call deity!

I still have the printed manual. Sometimes I like to read the foreword, the design line of thinking written by Soren at the back of the booklet... it reminds me fondly of times past when the developers were of another breed... classy.

 

[NukeAJS]

This is why Civ V is so good, & this is so poor. In this game you are on a forced chase to keep building cities, otherwise you will fall behind.

You could easily argue that Civ5 forces you to stay small.

And it's possible to play tall. It's just not usually optimal to play tall. I've won games with 6 cities or less on immortal. TBH, playing tall can be more fun than wide because you have to compete for each great person, every tech boost counts, every trade is important, every district placement is key. With wide play, you can basically fumble yourself into a victory despite making tons of errors.