How to make the game harder?

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Feb 11, 2019
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... without made up rules, like no chopping?
I have been beating deity game after game.
So current game I am Nubia which start with very weak tiles. Desert tiles. I settled and had 0 production from tiles. Like literally zero. Only food and no gold, no faith, no science, no culture. My river flooded 3 times. In total I lost 5 pop during the first 30 turns in the capital. By turn 170, in my capital, I had Great Zimbabwe, Petra, Ruhr Valley, University of Sankore, the Mauseleom, Oracle (only 50 faith/turn but still buying the great great peoples), a horsehocky campus with 0 adjecency, a factory, commercial hub, harbor. I had 1 rainforrest and 1 forrest for chopping. I am popping out builders every turn. I turned a horsehocky capital into a power monster without too much effort. Of course I rushed mathematics and industrialization. But here’s the thing, on turn 120 I had 40 science. I delayed Pingala till turn 70’ish. I invested in a religion because I wanted work ethic for another city.
I declared three times to condemn heretics. I had zero battles. Took no cities. My opponents are not that weak on paper: Persia, Gran Colombia, Kongo, Aztecs. They are doing okay, but no way they’ll win.
Setup: small terra map, standard speed, no special modes, no mods, everything default, diplo victory disabled.
I don’t exploit or game the system. I don’t even research grants project that much either. I don’t trade diplo favors that much either. At least not anymore, it feels a bit cheesy.
I am the suzerain of two cs (production, science yields) out of 9. I don’t have the Kilwa wonder.
Kongo built Oxford. He already has sattelites up and I haven’t researched rocketry yet, but there’s no way he’ll win. I have the highest science per turn without even researching research labs yet. And my capital is just too damn good to not lose.

so, what can I do to make the game more difficult? Because ‘’not rerolling” doesnt appear to do all that much. I am good at this game but no way I am an expert. At all.
Also I often forget to switch policy cards. I often forget to switch civic/tech. I don’t save/load scum. Ever.
In this game I even didn’t have a golden classical age either. I hard built my settlers with provision on Magnus. I have like 7-8 cities
 
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I could give the AI extra starting setllers and units, but it wouldnt really help them much later in the game.

i tried all of the AI mods, but they appear to make the game easier

Bonus % AI increase with age mod: this is like playing on king level.

Real strategy: some of the AI ignore science all together making them a complete pushover. They ignore science because they are busy winning a culture victory or worse: domination victory

AI+: didn’t do much and is not compatible anymore
 
Once you have a good understanding of the game's systems, it's very hard to find real challenge, unless you handicap yourself in some way (e.g. OCC), which you don't seem to be interested in.

Pretty much the only way to lose on Deity is in the beginning of the game if you spawn right next to 1 or 2 aggressive civs that attack you with their extra troops and overwhelm you. Or if you don't play to win at all.
 
I could try the one city challange. I am more of a tall player anyway. But I would lose the district-wonder puzzle mechanic, for the most part, which is the reason I keep playing this game. It is just too much fun to plan your win during the first 100’ish turns with the district-wonder placement mechanic combined with policy cards.

Maybe I could try a game with end turn set to like 200-250 instead of 500... This might be an idea. Bcause score is pretty much the only thing the AI actually gets points for, and appears to be always ahead of me
 
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Once you have a good understanding of the game's systems, it's very hard to find real challenge, unless you handicap yourself in some way (e.g. OCC), which you don't seem to be interested in.

Pretty much the only way to lose on Deity is in the beginning of the game if you spawn right next to 1 or 2 aggressive civs that attack you with their extra troops and overwhelm you. Or if you don't play to win at all.

I've been playing for years and can never beat King. Your comment made me ponder that. I think it is because I don't play the game's systems against each other, I simply try to replicate historic processes and events. I keep forgetting this is a game designed by people who are into systems, which are logical and predictable, and not history, which is chaotic and unpredictable. Insanity, they say, is doing the same things over and over, expecting different results. That's me, the Civilization crazy coot.
 
In my experience the AI civs are much more of a late game threat if you play on larger maps and reduce the number of civs a bit (e.g., 8 civs on a large map). The extra space and expansion, plus a lack of early squabbling, seems to let them focus more on getting large amounts of science (or culture, but they still suck at offensive tourism). This certainly means that you're less likely to get swarmed early game, but the flip side is that it's much harder to rush AI cities. Not recommended for war-like plays, obviously.

I'm definitely not claiming that it is a sea change, and that the AI will win on T200, but compared to a small map it really feels like more of a race.
 
Once you have a good understanding of the game's systems, it's very hard to find real challenge, unless you handicap yourself in some way (e.g. OCC), which you don't seem to be interested in.

Pretty much the only way to lose on Deity is in the beginning of the game if you spawn right next to 1 or 2 aggressive civs that attack you with their extra troops and overwhelm you. Or if you don't play to win at all.

yes it happens. But then again, you just focus on science and military. Wait for a surprise war and take their cities.
In the past I lost a few times because my capital flipped because I was boxed in on like turn 25. But that’s not really a defeat I would say

In my experience the AI civs are much more of a late game threat if you play on larger maps and reduce the number of civs a bit (e.g., 8 civs on a large map). The extra space and expansion, plus a lack of early squabbling, seems to let them focus more on getting large amounts of science (or culture, but they still suck at offensive tourism). This certainly means that you're less likely to get swarmed early game, but the flip side is that it's much harder to rush AI cities. Not recommended for war-like plays, obviously.

I'm definitely not claiming that it is a sea change, and that the AI will win on T200, but compared to a small map it really feels like more of a race.
Yes an isolated civ with lots of land will snowball quicker. But there’s a counter for that. Jet bombers and nukes

I play on small maps with 5 civs and 8-9 city states. I could try a standard map with 6 players. If my pc can handle it. (Probably not) But it makes getting a religion easier. It gives me lot’s of time to expand too. I don’t think it would change much.

i usually play on pangea, continents, splintered fractal, terra. I sometimes disable the world wrap in world builder (without cheating and looking ;) )

Unfortunately I have a civ addiction
 
Another thing that some of the experienced players are doing as a form of challenge is to win as quickly as possible. Obviously, here you can enter the what I call min-maxing territory, where the game mechanisms are stretched to their absolute limit.

Personally, I don't enjoy pushing it that far, so I just try to find a nice balance between winning at a brisk pace, and enjoying the journey - exploring my civ abilities, developing my cities, doing the district puzzle, etc.
 
Maybe think about redefining what you want out of the game? Is beating it on the highest difficulty as fast as possible the only way you can enjoy playing it? What about trying to play the game in very specific ways?
 
Another thing that some of the experienced players are doing as a form of challenge is to win as quickly as possible. Obviously, here you can enter the what I call min-maxing territory, where the game mechanisms are stretched to their absolute limit.

Personally, I don't enjoy pushing it that far, so I just try to find a nice balance between winning at a brisk pace, and enjoying the journey - exploring my civ abilities, developing my cities, doing the district puzzle, etc.
Nah your only enemy would be yourself. I need a threat/ticking clock that could defeat me. The reduced end turn I think is the only solution. And perhaps the one city challange from time to time

Maybe think about redefining what you want out of the game? Is beating it on the highest difficulty as fast as possible the only way you can enjoy playing it? What about trying to play the game in very specific ways?
Sure! :)
Any ideas?
In EU4, I try to make the game a challenge by picking difficult achievements and try to get them before 1821.
I don’t like to play strategy games just for the sake of playing them. I’m not that much of a gamer, really...
 
Sure! :)
Any ideas?
In EU4, I try to make the game a challenge by picking difficult achievements and try to get them before 1821.
I don’t like to play strategy games just for the sake of playing them. I’m not that much of a gamer, really...
Try completing the difficult achievements, try playing with randomized settings, try winning the game using a specific victory, but the AI can win in any way... etc
 
Try completing the difficult achievements, try playing with randomized settings, try winning the game using a specific victory, but the AI can win in any way... etc
Yes but I always have a backup plan because I will not tollerate a defeat. Culture and score victory to me are the thoughest ones.
Randomized opponents: almost always
Random map: few times. Should do it more often. Indeed!
Achievements: don’t really care for them all that much.
I don’t randomize my own leader as I want a victory with all of them!
 
There are some interesting mods on the workshop for increasing the difficulty in other ways than just Ai bonuses. The reincarnation mod is an interesting one for me if you can roleplay with it and get over the frustration of seeing the AI ruin all your plans. Adaptive difficulty is also an interesting one

But TBH i think the best thing is just to move over to playing Civ V Vox Populi, which tbh i think is the best civ game currently out there for experienced players.

If Civ VI got a DLL release i would be excited to see what AI modders could do too improve the AI, but sadly i don't think a DLL release is ever going to happen. So you just have to create your own fun and if you want a challenge move on to another game. Sad but true
 
There are some interesting mods on the workshop for increasing the difficulty in other ways than just Ai bonuses. The reincarnation mod is an interesting one for me if you can roleplay with it and get over the frustration of seeing the AI ruin all your plans. Adaptive difficulty is also an interesting one

But TBH i think the best thing is just to move over to playing Civ V Vox Populi, which tbh i think is the best civ game currently out there for experienced players.

If Civ VI got a DLL release i would be excited to see what AI modders could do too improve the AI, but sadly i don't think a DLL release is ever going to happen. So you just have to create your own fun and if you want a challenge move on to another game. Sad but true
I cringe if I hear the ancient ruins sound fx. Played V for too many hours. Never beaten it on deity, though... I'm on mac so DLL mods are incompatible. The reincarnation mod I would not like a lot by the looks of it

Try with less cities is all I can suggest but that’s self-imposed.
The AI struggles with combat, adjacency and chopping so catch up is not that difficult.
You tried TSL?
Yes just recently in Europe and I got beaten on turn 20 or something. The problem with TSL maps is that they are too big for my CPU/GFX card... And also, they give me a headstart as I know what the map looks like
I usually don't spam cities all over the place. I tend to play compact with cities rather close to each other. With lot's of overlap. Which makes it close to impossible for the AI to capture. At best they pillage one or two harbors. Or a farm with a single cavalry unit

I could make the game a bit tougher by being a jerk all the time and by not forming alliances. Or by not picking suffrage as a government which, if you have an alliance, is a little bit OP. Or maybe don't pick merchant republic and pick the religious one for a change. Stuff like that I could do; but I don't think it would make me lose. Things might slow down a bit at best
 
Try setting a win turn time on yourself then... t200-250 is rather slow.

Otherwise, you can try some of the challenge saves that are posted on the forums (usually with an aggressive neighbor).
 
I think Online speed is decent amount harder than standard. It seems both harder to war or consistently achieve golden ages.

One thing you could try is playing with the Better Balanced Game mod. It's primarily a multiplayer mod, but I've been exploring it for single player deity games recently. It's possible that I haven't found the broken stuff in the mod/optimal play lines, but I've been finding it at least somewhat more challenging.

Here are some highlights of the mod that I think add to the challenge:

No religious settlement, work ethic changed to shrine/temple giving production bonuses.

Governors have the good promotions spread around. This allows more variability in governor choice, but also slows down early culture or science (you have to pick now).
Liang now has a level 2 promotion that adds a food to revealed resources and the last tier promotion adds production to revealed resources so Liang 4 is a fun tall build.
Pingala has lost all culture bonuses. Moksha now has both Curator and Connoisseur. This means for early culture, you have to put two promotions into Moksha, which don't lead anywhere without faith purchasing or tourism. That said Faith purchasing is just two promotions in now, which may be gamebreaking with stuff like Ethiopia. I haven't been able to test it, since Divine Architect doesn't work in my game.
Pingala is now all about science. There is one promotion I'm slightly concerned about, with internal trade routes to Pingala's city providing 3 science each. This might be gamebreaking against AI, but I've found the slowdown of early culture to largely compensate for now. And there is a decent cost to trading internally, as you lose a lot of gold as soon as alliances are an option.

The second reason I've been finding the mod reasonably challenging is the change to World Congress. World Congress now always has a vote on diplo VP, no matter the era, and the AI will always vote to give themselves 2 VP. This means that an AI with strong diplo favor game tends to get quite a few early vp at low cost, allowing them to push for diplo victories quite well (I really wish the AI would start to build Statue of Liberty but they don't seem to recognize that aspect.) I've been finding the AI winning or coming very close to winning Diplo victory by turn 150-165 on quick. Some of this might just be me completely underestimating diplo victories for AI and not actively preventing them from getting points early.

Of course, if you can consistently win pre turn 200 on standard, all of this may end up not mattering much.
 
Yes, picking Online speed is a sure way to turn the difficulty up. Try Online speed, Tiny Terra map, but not as Kupe, of course :)
 
Yes, picking Online speed is a sure way to turn the difficulty up. Try Online speed, Tiny Terra map, but not as Kupe, of course :)
Good idea! I will try this for the next game: tiny terra, online speed, 5 civs, low sea level. Will report back!
I might edit the XML and bump it up to 8 civs :crazyeye:
 
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