[NFP] I really hope New Frontier isn’t the Final Frontier

[MrRadar]

The extended development cycle also goes against tradition, no?

Yes, it just so happens that Civ VI design is very fit to serve as a platform, which can be built upon for a very long time, along the lines of Paradox titles.

And there's no indication Ed is retiring...

Third Expansion it is then!
Or so I do hope

 

[m_mus]

My presumption is that Ed Beach and the bulk of the team are hard at work on VII while Anton and a smaller team take care of remaining VI content.

This.
I can only echo how much I believe and fear this to be true.
While in theory this growing variety of game-modes sounds innovative and fun, they appear in practice not designed in view of potential imbalances if one were to combine a particular number of them - leaving the question of the AI's (in-)capability to deal with them aside, which is another gripe I have. And before those imbalances would be fixed or the AI would be tought to play effectively within this new environment, the next gamemode is introduced and little attention is seemingly spared to the already released portions of NFP.
While I like and always applaude new civilizations, I cannot help but notice the apparent brevity of the introductory texts or the reuse of already existing 3D-models.
All in all, NFP feels to me, that indeed "Ed beach and the bulk of the team" have moved on to work on CIV VII, whereas some have been left behind (for now) to implement those wild and innovative dreams they had thought about for long individually but never had the chance to pitch them succesfully into a team-effort.
And I sincerely do not mean to disrepect the dev-team in stating this. I know, this is wild speculation. And I feel the passion individual members of the dev-team invested in bringing these game-modes to life. But those particular game-modes feel disconnected, as a lot of loose threads hanging in the air.
I did spent money on the new DLCs and probably am going to buy the rest as well - this is not bad quality, but it is not the quality of content I'd expect, if a full team of a major studio would still be invested in active development.
I had hoped for well-thought, new core-mechanics, like colonisation, vasallisation, economic victory, and so forth. But this, this does not feel like a prolonged interim-period in order to keep us happy until the 3d real expansion drops. To me, it feels like a slow fading out, which is the end.
I'd rather have had the bang which gathering storm was and a release of VII a year earlier or so.

 

[Wielki Hegemon]

Whatever it is, new expansion or DLC Pass they should focus on is revamping unfun mechanics and unfun parts of the game not adding some new mechanics. Look at the fan demanded world congress that did not solve current problems, but added new ones. And this is how this new expansion would look like with a current development philosophy. A bunch of random fan demanded mechanics without any synergy and sense...
Honestly, I would rather prefer just graphical, building/Wonder/Unit/Civs packs instead.

 

[KayAU]

I think NFP is fine for what it is: a bit of fun new content to play around with. I am not really that eager for anything beyond it, though. There have been two expansions already, and while they have added some things I like, they have not really transformed the game in the way I would have hoped. If you look at Civ V, most people seem to agree it was weak on launch (although I personally liked it), but got significantly better with expansions. With the Civ VI expansions, though, I just feel like they are adding more and more stuff, and the features don't really interact much. I end up ignoring a lot of it, and it is a shame. The World Congress is a good example: apart from the lackluster implementation and the inability to influence proposals, what really gets me is that there is no meaningful interaction between it and regular diplomacy in the game. Another example is tourism, which interacts with nothing at all. Not trade, not diplomacy, not any form of cultural influence. It is just a bucket you try to fill up, and when you do, the game ends.

At this point, while I still enjoy Civ 6 from time to time, I don't really hold much hope for any expansion coming along and improving the game in a significant way. There doesn't really seem to be a will to refine or redesign what is already there, and just adding more stuff on top isn't doing much for me anymore.

I am looking forward to Civilization 7, Humankind, Old World, and would also be very excited for a new Beyond Earth or Fallen Enchantress.

 

[sonicmyst]

I enjoy mixing the game modes in my playthroughs but I do not think this would be how Firaxis will say, hey this will be the last for Civ 6.

I am hopeful for a proper expansion that can cap off this game on a good note.

 

[pokiehl]

Yes, it just so happens that Civ VI design is very fit to serve as a platform, which can be built upon for a very long time, along the lines of Paradox titles.

Sure, but my point was that precedent is of no use to us here We're in uncharted territory

 

[Alexander's Hetaroi]

The extended development cycle also goes against tradition, no? And there's no indication Ed is retiring...

That was my initial question as well, though I didn't necessarily imply he was retiring. I mean he could easily be working on a spinoff too.

 

[acluewithout]

I feel like speculating about a Third Expansion is a path that leads to madness. Anyway.

Personally, between FXS adding a whole Future Era, NFP and its game modes and persona packs, and a few other things, it feels to me more like Firaxis are trying to stretch out Civ 6’s development rather than just spinning their wheels while they move onto other things. Indeed, it feels a bit like FXS are deliberately not giving some players what they want, perhaps so they can convince them to buy both NFP now and more “classic” additional content later (I mean, seriously, why is there no Trebuchet ... that seems a really odd thing to leave out of the game).

The game modes and season pass also seem to give FXS more room to move with future development, because they’re not locked into one big game expansion that reworks all of the game mechanics every year. I suspect the game modes also make a bit more sense from a sales perspective - the expansion model has this problem where you really only have to buy Vanilla and the latest expansion to get all the mechanics to date. With game modes etc, consumers are maybe a bit more incentivised to get each individual DLC so they can actually mix and match all the content.

I don’t know if that all means we’ll get a Third Expansion. But, as I’ve said, I could certainly see something that splits the difference between a Season Pass and an Expansion - eg something that introduces some long requested end game mechanics, tweaks a few other things, but mixes that up with more game modes etc.

Anywho. I really hope that’s the case. Because frankly, I can’t see myself ever buying into a hypothetical Civ 7 if Firaxis haven’t managed to finish Civ 6 first.

 

[Victoria]

no filling unit gaps, no equivalent to ideologies or ideological pressure, no future tech, no expanding religion or world congress, no corporations

Didn’t Anton give a little talk on this and promised something exciting near the end of NF?

 

[Leucarum]

So I quite like the modular nature of the game modes in NFP. There's a lot of potential diversity in terms of the types of games it allows. I'm not suggesting that it'd become a default as it limits the devs from creating civs that specifically interact with those modes and can force ad hoc modifications of existing civs (like Georgia in dramatic ages). However, I'd hope that the devs carry it forward and allow more parts of the game to be modularly turned off or on in future. As I see it, increasing the diversity in the kinds of games you can play is a great (and cheap) way to keep the game fresh.

As for people saying the content is light? I'm not sure I agree but in any case I'd cut firaxis a lot of slack for hitting what must be tight deadlines consistently and regularly in the middle of COVID. Thanks guys, you've made social distancing a lot more bearable.

 

[acluewithout]

Didn’t Anton give a little talk on this and promised something exciting near the end of NF?

Not that I recall. But I’m certainly happy to be surprised.

snip

Agree FXS have done a pretty good job on NFP, all in all.

 

[Pfeffersack]

Didn’t Anton give a little talk on this and promised something exciting near the end of NF?

Not that I'm aware of, apart from the statement (after the first two game modes get mixed responses for their fantasy elements, making them prone to not getting constantly used) that some more historical/conservative/"always on" game modes would follow. I assume that Tech shuffle and Dramatic Age fall in that category (and probably the leaked "Advanced Economy" one as well), so I wouldn't count on getting more.

 

[8housesofelixir]

I think the problem still lies in the scale of things.

It's World Congress being lackluster and cannot interact with other parts of the diplomacy? Yes. But would it take a new DLC to change them? Probably not, because WC was implemented in the form of a DLC.
The same can be applied to Climate Change, Tourism mechanics, Late game Era and Ideology, etc.

IMHO, a lot of "unfinishness" we shared in this thread about Civ6 don't really require another expansion as the finishing touch. (Not to say I don't want new things such as Vassalage and Ideological Tenets, but let's just focus on the existing poorly-implemented features here.) These features can be fixed with several dedicated patches. No 3rd DLC needed.

For instance, the Amenity change was done in the form of a patch. Although it is certainly not a good change, the Amenity mechanism remains poorly implemented, it still shows that these changes can be done in a scale smaller than a DLC.

Now, will the devs dedicated themselves to these patches which fixes some problems that the majority of the player base probably doesn't care about much? Probably not. The scale of these problems is not that massive.

In general, FXS does not really need a DLC to fix these problems...therefore it is not very likely they will fix these problems.

I can see they address problems within the NFP, or tweak some core mechanism here and there, such as the CS change, the religion change, and the Amenity change (some of them are good, some of them are not).
But I don't see semi-independent mechanisms such as World Congress and Ideology will change in the future.

 

[bengalryan9]

So I quite like the modular nature of the game modes in NFP. There's a lot of potential diversity in terms of the types of games it allows. I'm not suggesting that it'd become a default as it limits the devs from creating civs that specifically interact with those modes and can force ad hoc modifications of existing civs (like Georgia in dramatic ages). However, I'd hope that the devs carry it forward and allow more parts of the game to be modularly turned off or on in future. As I see it, increasing the diversity in the kinds of games you can play is a great (and cheap) way to keep the game fresh.

As for people saying the content is light? I'm not sure I agree but in any case I'd cut firaxis a lot of slack for hitting what must be tight deadlines consistently and regularly in the middle of COVID. Thanks guys, you've made social distancing a lot more bearable.

I agree, and what I'd really like to see (maybe in the last update?) is a game mode randomizer so that each game I play has different rule sets out of my control that I have to adjust to on the fly. One game you might have Secret Societies, the next might stick you with Apocalypse + Dramatic Ages.

 

[Wielki Hegemon]

It's World Congress being lackluster and cannot interact with other parts of the diplomacy? Yes. But would it take a new DLC to change them? Probably not, because WC was implemented in the form of a DLC.
The same can be applied to Climate Change, Tourism mechanics, Late game Era, and Ideology, etc.

And this is the problem. One "Fixing DLC" would require all expansions installed. What about peoples who have only two, or obe then? "Few" fixing DLC addressing small pieces of content on the other hand would still lack complexity. The more I think about it the more I don't believe it is even manageable

 

[tedhebert]

You have gratitude towards people who take your money?
.

I'm sorry, but they don't TAKE your money. You say this word as if they're thieves. They design a product and put it on the market, and YOU choose to buy it, OR NOT ! And then have full liberty to decide if you're satisfied with said product or not. And have full liberty to choose to buy their next product or not.

For my part, i'm not sure the word 'grateful' is the right one here, but I AM very happy that they keep on giving love to this wonderful product on which I have spent more than 2000 Hours on. I feel I'm getting an incredible value for my money compared to most other game where it's impressive if you've gone 100 hours on it.

 

[glider1]

I agree they are not "taking our money" in the strict sense but FXS is surviving because it is a monopoly on civ. If fanatics are compelled to play civ (like me) FXS effectively do take our money because of a lack of choice. For example I knew the Frontier pack would not fix the underlying issues with the game but I spent money on it anyway because of my addiction to civ and the promise it held. I comfort myself for the disappointment with the quality of it by saying that the money I gave them is in thanks for all the hours I have spent playing their previous civ versions like IV and V (thanks to them releasing the DLL to modders) but ironically not for playing civ 6 itself. If they don't release the DLL for civ 6 from my point of view in the future there will be nothing left to thank them for.

 

[Kmart_Elvis]

1) End game is just dead boring. Frankly, if you are not going to war, all eras after Industrial are just endless managing production queues - and talking about that, how on earth have they still not made a proper queue in the game? - and clicking next turn forever. They addressed this issue by reworking scientific victory ... by adding more techs and another era. Eeh ... not exactly the fix that was needed? Civ5 did a very good job with ideologies to add some refreshing new elements in late game, all we get in Civ6 is a diplomatic penalty for "different governments" because AI chooses to stick with their medieval government. Ugh.

Yeah, I actually kind of miss the old science victory because now it's just a bunch of extra steps that prolong the game. I agree it's not really much of a fix. Religion is also horrible in the sense that once you get to Theocracy, there's nothing really after that. Granted, RV games tend to be shorter , but I would like some late game additions to religion. Culture is vital for RV, up into you unlock everything, then it's kind of worthless.

2) World congress is objectively a mess in Civ6. You are left more or less completely clueless with regards to what the AI will vote and how many votes they will throw after a specific suggestion, so you can either a) memorize fixed AI behavior, b) save scum, or c) guess blindly. To add further salt to the wound, the way that vote cost escalates means that when more than about 4-5 AI civs are alive, they can always outvote you no matter how much diplomatic favor you work to accumulate. I know people complained about vote monopolizing through buying city states in Civ5 (which was indeed an issue), but new system is just worse.

I think what they need is 1) being able to submit your own proposals. There can still be RNG proposals, but I think civs with a diplo focus could really gain from having a way to control what gets voted on. Maybe a neighbor is going through a dark age and I want to capitalize on it by submitting the proposal where you can increase growth but reduce loyalty, instead of just hoping I randomly get it the next congress. 2) We should be able to see what other civs will vote on. Give spies a "diplomat mission" that reveals that particular civs vote plans. The devs have explicitly said they did not implement this because they want the game to be balanced around multiplayer, but I think that's the wrong way going about it. True, it would be a pointless mission in MP, but give it to us SP players.

3) Cultural Victory has become completely nontransparent. The way tourism works is a complete enigma to all but the very most dedicated players. I've read guides on it here on this forum, and I still don't understand it. They may have added rockbands and I know not what, but in Civ5, it was extremely easy to understand: Your tourism more than all their culture. In Civ6: Well, you do stuff and at some point, you may win

Thanks for pointing this out. I love CV because there's so many ways to generate tourism but the opaqueness of it all is so frustrating. Every other victory type is perfectly clear: SV has a bunch of stages you have to reach, DomV has capitals, RV has civs converted, and DiploV has a points system. With CV, I have no idea how fast I am progressing. I have absolutely no way to estimate how much time is left. Can I win this in 20 turns? 50? 100? I honestly have no clue.

...
4) Poor balancing. They are working a lot on this, and credit to them for that, but look at something like Secret Societies. How on earth can anybody who plays this game just moderately well think that something like Voidsingers (here, take massive amounts of free faith in early game, then take free boost to science and culture in mid game, and then a unit that can make enemy cities rebel without any defense in late game) is balanced with Hermetic Order (take a blind guess that you may get these map lines, except you may not get them, or maybe they are placed so they screw up your district placement, and even if you get them, the benefits from them are mediocre until late game)?

Fortunately, they did say they are going to rebalance the first two packs. Whether that includes SS, remains to be seen. But yeah, definitely nerf Voidsingers, buff Hermetic Order, it's kind of ridiculous and obvious so I hope they have this on their radar.

 

[Wielki Hegemon]

They are not taking our money, but...
Please let's not go this way Sorry to say it, but this is a ridiculous childish approach that actually disqualifies any further discussion, and covers all meaningful arguments and feedback. Let's behave as a discussion partner for devs, not grumpy teenagers.

 

[The Civs 6]

Can you please explain more detailed what you would like to see here. A Civ 3 that includes the successes of Civ IV - VI and avoids the failures of Civ IV - VI ??

It's an analogy. Civ 3 added a lot of new ideas to Civ 2, but it didn't feel totally well thought through. Then Soren Johnson took what Firaxis had learned from those ideas, what worked and what didn't, and basically restarted the franchise with 4, which is a genuinely great game.

Similarly, I think 6 has a lot of great ideas, but I think it's time to step back and give the franchise a bit of a restart while thinking through what worked and what didn't. Clean things up a bit. Come out with 7 being a great game out of the box with simple, tight, and thoughtful mechanics.