Here is why I give up on civ 6

[Don Andre]

I played three or four games in all of them the AI players are almost trivial to defeat. In most cases they only have old units or even no units at all. The Germans were leading tech race in last game, even building space port. However their cities had almost no defense and they didn't have one single unit. I only have vanilla civ 6, but this is a disgrace to the series. It simply isn't a challenge to take them out.
In none of the games i was ever attacked or challenged by the ai players. What kind of ridiculous difficulty do you have to play this? In all previous civ series king or emperor gave me a satisfying experience and some challenges. And I have never seen that AI players don't build any units. There aren't even a lot of ships around. Usually the AI ships appear on your borders quite early in the game. Nothing like that in civ6. Basically only the Vikings have a couple of (extremely inferior) ships. I am not sure whether that is due to the PS4 port, but Civ 6 is too boring that way.

 

[Kernigh]

I'm playing my 1st game of Civ6 (in Dec 2021). It's vanilla "1.2.14 (226347)" for Nintendo Switch. Like you, I'm finding almost no defense in AI civs. I have played Civ4, and I knew in advance that Civ4 has a much stronger AI than Civ5 or Civ6, so I expected a drop in difficulty.

I did Play Now on Civ6's title screen, and became Cyrus of Persia at Prince difficulty. My nearest neighbor was Montezuma of the Aztecs. That should be bad news: Civ's Aztecs like to declare wars! Montezuma twice denounced me, as if he was planning a war; I replied by massing my army near his border. Montezuma was smart enough to notice my army and complain; I answered his complaint by declaring war. The Aztecs had only 2 units to defend 5 cities. Also, his cities had no walls (so my Battering Ram did nothing). I soon conquered all of Aztecland, and never lost a unit.

Each city-state in Civ6 has a larger army than a major civ! So far, I have never fought against a city-state. I had the most difficulty against barbarians. Back in Civ4, I often allowed AI civs to slay barbs, but here in Civ6, the AI civs are too weak.

 

[HiRezAudio]

I'm playing my 1st game of Civ6 (in Dec 2021). It's vanilla "1.2.14 (226347)" for Nintendo Switch. Like you, I'm finding almost no defense in AI civs. I have played Civ4, and I knew in advance that Civ4 has a much stronger AI than Civ5 or Civ6, so I expected a drop in difficulty.

I did Play Now on Civ6's title screen, and became Cyrus of Persia at Prince difficulty. My nearest neighbor was Montezuma of the Aztecs. That should be bad news: Civ's Aztecs like to declare wars! Montezuma twice denounced me, as if he was planning a war; I replied by massing my army near his border. Montezuma was smart enough to notice my army and complain; I answered his complaint by declaring war. The Aztecs had only 2 units to defend 5 cities. Also, his cities had no walls (so my Battering Ram did nothing). I soon conquered all of Aztecland, and never lost a unit.

Each city-state in Civ6 has a larger army than a major civ! So far, I have never fought against a city-state. I had the most difficulty against barbarians. Back in Civ4, I often allowed AI civs to slay barbs, but here in Civ6, the AI civs are too weak.

Then turn up the difficulty level - try Emperor or higher.

 

[General_Sahib]

Civ 6 is relatively easier than previous iterations for a variety of reasons related mostly to the AI limitations. Crank up to Emperor or Deity straight away if you're finding it that easy. The bonuses received by the AIs do make it somewhat challenging and interesting but sadly, still easy overall to figure out their mechanics and hence exploit their weaknesses.