Help understanding districts

[PhazonReborn]

Hi there,

Fairly long time player of Civ V, and new owner of Civ VI because of the Steam winter sale.

I did my obligatory "first game" as Teddy on a quick game, and it was pretty quiet all game. I decided to choose Warlord (level 3 difficulty) just to get my feet wet. Seems the AI is pretty easy on this mode. I remember having a tough time in Civ V even on Warlord until I started getting good enough to tackle King and above, but I digress.

I get the concept of districts, but the long-term planning that seems to go along with them is what is crippling my game plan. Now, all I used to know about Civ is gone, I feel lost here. I think I understand what I need to do, but how to implement districts the correct and optimal way are what I'm asking.

What if you cannot found a city next to any mountains? Do campuses become something less of a priority? Do you generally want at least one of all district types in every city? Also, it seems like in general, this game heavily favors city spamming. Where I was more of a tall player in V, I feel like optimally you need 10+ cities in this game. Is there any point to specializing a city for certain districts? When it comes to Amenities, which now replace happiness, does this always mean that I should be looking for land plots that have 2 or more luxuries?

Any tips for this mechanic, which seems to be the biggest change to the game, is welcome.

Another question - what type of victory favors Teddy? I started going for science but the production needs to finish the Mars satellites is too great and the AI won on Culture before I could finish.

 

[Disgustipated]

What if you cannot found a city next to any mountains? Do campuses become something less of a priority? Do you generally want at least one of all district types in every city? Also, it seems like in general, this game heavily favors city spamming. Where I was more of a tall player in V, I feel like optimally you need 10+ cities in this game. Is there any point to specializing a city for certain districts? When it comes to Amenities, which now replace happiness, does this always mean that I should be looking for land plots that have 2 or more luxuries?

You can still build Campus districts. Sometimes you won't have mountains. You lose adjacency bonus, but you will have benefit from them once you get libraries and universities up. Campuses aren't a high priority on Warlord difficulty, but as you go up you want to increase the number of campus districts you use.

Building one type of all districts is pretty much impossible, at least for me. I like lots of trade routes, and do built lots of commercial and harbor districts, but you can win the game without them, but for a new player they are recommended because gold is so versatile. Theater districts don't need to be built at all (on low difficulties), but they do help in culture generation, and of course cultural victory. Even on the middle difficulties, I put off building theater squares for later. If you have a wide empire with lots of luxuries entertainment districts can be put off for later, but eventually you'll want them. Industrial zones you don't want for all your cities, though as Germany I sometimes do build them everywhere, but for everyone else 1 industrial zone with a factory can give production bonuses to cities within 6 tiles. 10+ cities is a good number, but on smaller maps you can get by with less.

As for amenities, I'm happy to pick up 1 amenity, but 2 is always a plus. Just get as many as you can. Don't be afraid to settle cities for important strategic resources like iron, coal, oil, etc. even if you have no luxuries.

Another question - what type of victory favors Teddy? I started going for science but the production needs to finish the Mars satellites is too great and the AI won on Culture before I could finish.

Cultural victory is best for Teddy, but nothing is stopping you from going science victory. To defend against cultural victory build your own theater squares with all the buildings, and fill them with artifacts with great works if you can. Though you may end up winning a cultural victory this way. There are other ways of earning culture as well, but think of your cultural generation as your defense against a cultural victory. For Science victory, you do want fully built industrial zones in your space port city or cities. Ruhr valley is a plus too, but not necessary. Don't be afraid to have lots of mines and concentrate a couple cities on big production. Production is king in this game.

 

[rschissler]

Try to settle cities next to a river or lake, so you don't have a housing hit or have to build an aqueduct district. I try to build Commercial Hubs or Harbors as a priority in every city, to get traders going for the bonuses they give, and because buying stuff with gold is key for me. Also, Industrial Zones are my next key builds. Campuses can be important too. I may only build one or two Encampments total, because they don't offer much, and you can get them from conquered AI cities because the AI is obsessed with building them.

I try to build Holy Sites too, because with Theocracy government, you can buy almost all the units you need in the later game with faith. This is another reason why Encampments aren't necessary. I don't bother with Theatre Districts much because I only use domination victory condition, and I can always get them from conquered AI cities.

Later on you will need Entertainment districts to deal with amenities.

 

[clapyourhands]

I'll answer the last question first. Teddy's bonuses most readily lend him aid towards a cultural victory. +1 Appeal to National Park cities essentially translates to +4 Tourism per park, as well as +2 Tourism to Seaside Resorts in these cities (plus extra housing in Neighborhoods, though this is smaller in comparison). This makes late game America a tourism behemoth, as long as you make sure to keep some forest intact and settle near mountains, natural wonders, and/or the coast.

He also has a bonus to combat on his continent and his own unique military units that make domination an option, but it's not quite as potent.

You're correct about more cities in general being better. District placement is valuable and proper management is necessary for optimal play, but unless you're aiming for the absolute fastest/highest playstyles, it's not something that will make or break your games. Playing for fun, I'd say it's a combination of considering the civ you're playing, the victory type or types you want to achieve, and the terrain available to you.

Obviously holy sites are integral for a religious victory for instance, and England is very much inclined to build harbors over any other civ. If you can't find mountains, it shouldn't stop you from building campuses; science is important for military even if you aren't going for a science victory, and you can always found a later city that is surrounded by mountains (or conquer one). The gist of it is this: districts provide you with an open-ended puzzle based on your immediate surroundings. You can scout the immediate area for the best place to found a city, but from there you work with what you have and what you need. Remember that districts provide adjacency bonuses to other districts, and some terrain like rainforests do the same; some civs also receive different adjacency bonuses that should be planned around. It's not something to sweat too much over and won't make or break a lower-difficulty game on its own.

 

[katanaD]

you pretty much want a science district in all your cities. The placing bonuses are quickly out done with the science from the buildings themselves, and then the bonuses you will get from the city states.

 

[PhazonReborn]

I think I may have woefully neglected culture in my current game. I prioritized Science in just about all facets of the game and always prioritized it. To give you an example, I was almost an entire age behind Kongo in Culture but several ages ahead in Science, however, this did not stop Kongo from beating me in culture in the long run.

I think I had somewhere around 40 culture per turn around the Modern age...I'm guessing even for a Civ not focusing on a Culture victory, that isn't too good.

I'll answer the last question first. Teddy's bonuses most readily lend him aid towards a cultural victory. +1 Appeal to National Park cities essentially translates to +4 Tourism per park, as well as +2 Tourism to Seaside Resorts in these cities (plus extra housing in Neighborhoods, though this is smaller in comparison). This makes late game America a tourism behemoth, as long as you make sure to keep some forest intact and settle near mountains, natural wonders, and/or the coast.

He also has a bonus to combat on his continent and his own unique military units that make domination an option, but it's not quite as potent.

You're correct about more cities in general being better. District placement is valuable and proper management is necessary for optimal play, but unless you're aiming for the absolute fastest/highest playstyles, it's not something that will make or break your games. Playing for fun, I'd say it's a combination of considering the civ you're playing, the victory type or types you want to achieve, and the terrain available to you.

Obviously holy sites are integral for a religious victory for instance, and England is very much inclined to build harbors over any other civ. If you can't find mountains, it shouldn't stop you from building campuses; science is important for military even if you aren't going for a science victory, and you can always found a later city that is surrounded by mountains (or conquer one). The gist of it is this: districts provide you with an open-ended puzzle based on your immediate surroundings. You can scout the immediate area for the best place to found a city, but from there you work with what you have and what you need. Remember that districts provide adjacency bonuses to other districts, and some terrain like rainforests do the same; some civs also receive different adjacency bonuses that should be planned around. It's not something to sweat too much over and won't make or break a lower-difficulty game on its own.

Religion seems pretty interesting in this game. Would you say that in order to stay competitive in a King or Emperor level game, that I'd need to at least found a religion? One flaw I felt that Civ V had was that it was necessary to participate in all realms of the game systems, that is Culture/Tourism, Science, Diplomacy and Religion no matter what Civ you were, or you were going to be at a major disadvantage if you didn't dabble in all of those things. I'm kind of seeing it this way early on in Civ Vi but if I don't need to focus on a Religion, that that would be better for me because while it's interesting it's not my favorite.

 

[Disgustipated]

40 per turn. ouch. Way too low.

And Kongo is dangerous with the cultural victory. At lower levels 1 or 2 campus districts is plenty. Even at King level I can easily win with only 2 campus districts.

I don't build a lot of theater districts, but I do get around to them. Especially since I can't stand annoying antiquity sites cluttering up my land. I build archaeologists to clean that crap (I mean priceless cultural artifacts) up.

Religion seems pretty interesting in this game. Would you say that in order to stay competitive in a King or Emperor level game, that I'd need to at least found a religion? One flaw I felt that Civ V had was that it was necessary to participate in all realms of the game systems, that is Culture/Tourism, Science, Diplomacy and Religion no matter what Civ you were, or you were going to be at a major disadvantage if you didn't dabble in all of those things. I'm kind of seeing it this way early on in Civ Vi but if I don't need to focus on a Religion, that that would be better for me because while it's interesting it's not my favorite.

Feel free to ignore it, it's not even remotely necessary to winning in Civ6. Except religious victory of course. It's just something interesting that can provide minor benefits to your society. Some civs like America really don't benefit at all from religion. Civs like Spain and Arabia should concentrate on it more, however.

important districts for me are:
commercial (though we do have one poster here that says they are a waste, I think gold is fun)
harbor
campus (at deity this has to be very high priority, but at King and below you can get trade routes up first)
industrial
entertainment
theater

holy and encampments are the least important. But encampments are important for Macedon if you have that DLC, to really take advantage of what they have to offer.

 

[clapyourhands]

Religion seems pretty interesting in this game. Would you say that in order to stay competitive in a King or Emperor level game, that I'd need to at least found a religion? One flaw I felt that Civ V had was that it was necessary to participate in all realms of the game systems, that is Culture/Tourism, Science, Diplomacy and Religion no matter what Civ you were, or you were going to be at a major disadvantage if you didn't dabble in all of those things. I'm kind of seeing it this way early on in Civ Vi but if I don't need to focus on a Religion, that that would be better for me because while it's interesting it's not my favorite.

You can definitely ignore religion. I think the religious game is fun though, and an improvement from V. There are more concrete bonuses from Faith generation this time around; the one with the biggest use it Great Person recruitment, which lets you snipe the ones you want without spending lots of Gold (not as much of an issue if you have tons of Gold already, but it still frees up that Gold for other things like unit upgrading and tile purchasing). Some of the beliefs are also impactful. So overall, totally optional, but once you get a better grasp of the game it's nice to have and doesn't feel like a chore to maintain IMO.

As a side note for cultural victories I wouldn't leave the theater district until the end; there are a number of civics that drastically increase tourism output or unlock techs/buildings that do so.

 

[PhazonReborn]

Thanks for all the helpful replies. I'm eager to start a new game.

 

[Noble Zarkon]

Industrial zones you don't want for all your cities

Do people generally agree with this?

To me an IZ and either a Harbour or a Commercial District in every city is a must, the 3rd district then depends on lots of other factors.

 

[pietro1990]

This is a good video wich explains everything

 

[liv]

Do people generally agree with this?

To me an IZ and either a Harbour or a Commercial District in every city is a must, the 3rd district then depends on lots of other factors.

I hardly ever build industrial zones unless playing Germany. Too many hammers to build for too little return. Better to get production from hills. I think on higher levels a campus is a must and probably should be your first district unless going for a religion or you are Macedon. Great Scientists are good. Some people also try to get the first great writer and build theatre squares as their first districts before campus.

 

[rschissler]

I hardly ever build industrial zones unless playing Germany. Too many hammers to build for too little return. Better to get production from hills. I think on higher levels a campus is a must and probably should be your first district unless going for a religion or you are Macedon. Great Scientists are good. Some people also try to get the first great writer and build theatre squares as their first districts before campus.

I'd say the placement for the IZ is more important than any other district. If you can choose a location that is surrounded by three or more hills, it is definitely worth it.

 

[liv]

Maybe we play different sorts of games. My games are usually over between turn 200-250. The buildings for the industrial zone comes late. Maybe I can build a district with 3+ adjacency but I keep my cities small so it is unlikely that the city really needs more than 3 hills to be really good and I can use the production for other purposes. I have seen people post civs with large cities. Perhaps in those kinds of games they have a purpose.

 

[antimony]

Arguably the first reason why campuses are so important right now is that there aren't any reliable sources of science outside that district. Theater squares are optional in many games if you have enough cities with monuments and the meritocracy policy.

Most unique districts are very strong though: Russia's Lavra is essential for religious or cultural victories, England's RNDY generates massive commerce (and eventually production), Hansa and Acropolis are good in almost any situation.

About the (standard) IZ: the adjacency bonus is roughly equivalent to an extra mine. Workshops are too weak for their cost (compare with the library, and consider science is more rare and valuable than production). The IZ really starts to pay off with the factory, so you have to count the cost of the district + workshop + factory, how many cities will get the factory bonus, and figure out in how many turns it pays for itself in production. However, you also need to count the lost yield (opportunity cost) from what could have been build during that time instead of the IZ.

 

[UWHabs]

Maybe we play different sorts of games. My games are usually over between turn 200-250. The buildings for the industrial zone comes late. Maybe I can build a district with 3+ adjacency but I keep my cities small so it is unlikely that the city really needs more than 3 hills to be really good and I can use the production for other purposes. I have seen people post civs with large cities. Perhaps in those kinds of games they have a purpose.

I like to get at least one IZ to cover my core cities with factories, and often want my biggest production city to be covered by 2 different IZ incase if one is damaged by spies. But yes, I have started to realize that they don't pay off nearly as much as you think. Although if you do have a lot of envoys in industrious city-states, that can change the calculations. Even 6 envoys in 2 different city-states now gives each IZ +8 production when building buildings, which suddenly means it can pay itself off very soon.

Otherwise, for districts, I will often go with a district with a very high adjacency bonus if I can, but definitely don't feel bad with putting a +0 campus. I mean, if your civ gets 100 science per turn, the difference between a +0 campus and a +2 campus is not actually that much for your civ as a whole. So don't feel bad about putting that +0 campus on desert or tundra to save a good tile. The other thing to think about is that districts get increased bonus for multiple adjacent districts, so sometimes it might make more sense to, say, place a harbor so that it gets a +3 instead of a +4 bonus now, but that when I build my next district that will make a triangle with it, and I'll end up with a +4 bonus anyways.

And for all of this, always remember to pay attention to your city-states. If you're struggling in culture but have lots of cultural city-states, placing a single theatre square can easily give you +4 or +8 culture, even if you don't have any spots for it with a good adjacency (which you usually won't, unless if you're Australia/Japan/Brazil/Greece).

And overall, you don't really "specialize" any city, so these things can essentially be taken at a global level. So if you're low in culture, next time you think about placing a district, maybe you plant a theatre square instead of another campus. This can especially be valuable once you start getting your lesser-used districts with the reduced costs. Even mid-game it can be useful to throw down a couple holy sites to start getting some faith, if not for religions, then at least for naturalists or to speed up great people.

 

[Victoria]

@PhazonReborn
There are different ways of playing this game while in Civ V you pretty much went the same way at the start.

The biggest tip by far... Huge top #1 is go wider than Civ V. Too wide is very strong but gets a lot to maintain so about 7-10 cities is a good start on say Prince level. So... settlers , not necessarily first in your build queue but you need to push settlers a lot to get those cities out there. Alternatively build an army and take your cities that way which is in a way more efficient as the other civ has built infrastructure for you.

The next biggest tip is Eurekas. You need to start learning the trees and getting eurekas. Especially if you combine this with card use So for a classic example at the start of the game... you really should try to get the Agoge card in play which gives you 50% discount building melee and ranged troops. You get the Agoge card when you discover Craftsmanship and you will get half of that discovery for improving 3 tiles with a builder.... so look at your capital, can you build mines/farms... you may need mining technology so start that while you build a builder... it should be one of your first builds if not first.

Science gets you better troops so getting science is important even for defense. Also weirdly for a cultural victory your most important target is Computers tech so you need science even for a cultural victory. With that in mind you should be building campuses at some stage but getting settlers out early is the most important thing. The next most important thing is building your infrastructure and to do this you need builders. Now at Agoge your builders are 50% discount to build but you are much better to wait until Feudalism before you build many builders because they then get 5 charges rather than 3. (6 with pyramids)
Feudalism is important as is Political Philosophy so you can slot more cards. This means that culture is important early game pushing culture first with Monuments, cultural city states, natural wonders, trade routes, culture luxuries, looting... any way you can get culture.

The cost of buildings is static but the cost of building a district scales quickly with the techs or civics you have got. The cost of a district is the cost when you place it, not when you finish it so people often will place districts as soon as possible (depends on population size).

Chopping also scales and is a very powerful part of the game. Chopping a tree early can get that settler out faster although the chop may only give you 40 production... if you slot the 50% settler card while building a builder and chopping a tree you will get 60 production for your chop (leftover will overflow)... By the end of the game your tree chops will be 200 production each so you see that chopping trees etc can be really helpful (look at the chopping example in my signature).

There is sooo much more but the above are the key points. Also early while your cities are small you can sell luxuries and resources for money and money can buy troops or monuments to speed you up. The earlier you can speed up the faster you become strong.

Also keep asking, people are happy to respond