Initial thoughts

[Kouvb593kdnuewnd]

It is better then the previous civ games

 

[DeutschDachs]

I like the idea of governments and policies. Maybe it's because I'm playing Pericles, but I'm playing on Prince and I only have 3 civics left in the tree in the 1400s? Kinda crazy.

AI hasn't been passive in declaring war on me. I've had every person on my continent at war with me, including several coalitions. I'm pretty far ahead in tech though so I've been able to hold them back and even took Paris after France's 5th surprise war on me got on my nerves.

Production does seem much too slow. I build mines, improve diamonds, copper, stone, build all industrial district buildings ASAP and wonders still take 30+ turns and buildings/districts take 12-15. So slowwwww. Meanwhile units are pretty quick.

Got more faith than I know what to do with. I could probably win a religious game if I really wanted to but I keep forgetting to buy the units and I'd rather win science or culture for this one

My only real complaints are probably more related to my computer being old. Takes too long for tile yields to show up. Turns in the modern era are kind of taking forever. But again I think it's just because of my computer which I will be replacing in two months anyway

 

[UWHabs]

Alright, after my first humiliating defeat, tried again. King level.

Notes:

• Districts make building choices tough. I'm to the point now where my cap is running out of amenities, so I probably need an entertainment district. But I also haven't put up a culture district yet in my empire, so I wonder if I should get one up because I can definitely see that I'm not moving very fast through the culture tree. Also, it choosing city locations and improvement locations tough.
• Policy slots are awesome. Some bonuses are very strong (double adjacency? Thank you!), and some are not, but at least they can be situationally useful. I switched into the +50% settler production, moved my cap to build a settler, and I knew that my next policy tree was finishing up basically when the settler was, so I could swap it out again with basically nothing wasted.
• I love the eurekas as they definitely guide things, but as mentioned, they're both too strong and in many cases too easy to get. I would ditch the eurekas that are too trivial, and make sure every eureka takes some effort to accomplish. Also, as mentioned, probably switching them to a +25% would help
• Either science is too fast, or building is too slow. I got a great campus up, and I'm at the point where I'm researching new techs in 25 turns without a eureka, but outside of my capital, production is basically nothing. One city is going to take me 13 turns to repair its harbor that was pillaged, and building a new district is 50 turns. It's basically impossible to set up new cities to be productive. To me, district costs should only increase based on how many you have in the city itself, so basically the first district you build in a city should always come cheaply, but every one after that gets progressively harder. That would probably give a more even balance so that an average city can pretty much always build their next district in 10-ish turns.
• I think they need to make buildings cheaper overall, and add more. Since we're not putting up every district in every city, I'd rather see more buildings that give more interesting choices. So if each district had, say, 6 slots, and you made sure that a couple of them have multiple building slots with decisions, that would help guide things too. So take the campus - maybe instead of just doing library-university, you add another early-mid game building choice between, say, alchemist shop (which maybe gives you science per rainforest tile in the city) or observatory (which maybe gives you science per mountain in the city). I mean, my capital's at around size 14, and I think I only have like 6 or 7 buildings in it
• Barbarians are tough, but that's good. Some earlier games were too easy. Although I do think they need to be more raiding parties after the early game - I still have outposts that I've seen in my fog of war, but even though it was only 2-3 tiles from my cities, I never saw a raiding unit come from it.
• I like the changes to city states - very logical, and much much better done than civ 5 where you just threw money at them. Also like how they have unique bonuses.
• I like splitting the tech and culture trees. I'm zipping through techs but stalling in culture. I think there need to be more items on the culture tree, though. I'm at a point where none of the 5 or so civics that I can research are of any use to me, other than stepping stones to the next government. I do like how there are a ton of military card slots that can be used for variety, but still feels like there should be more physical items on the culture tree that can be used in cities. For example, the bank should be unlocked at a civic like mercantilism, instead of a tech like banking.

Overall, though I really like it. I played until 2AM last night, and had to force myself to go to bed. Sure, there's probably some things can can use re-balancing or moving around, but compared to where civ 6 was on release day, where it was barely playable for the first 2-3 months after release? We're in a much better shape here.

 

[LDiCesare]

After a first run, I think that the game is ok but the UI needs some work. I miss zooming, and can't see whether something is improved or not because mines etc.just don't stick out of the terrain enough.
The AI was bad, but hopefully it's because of the default level (prince).
The late game wonders seem mostly expensive and not very wonderful.
The policies mechanics is great, but most cards are meh and I kept using the same for most of the game.
The impossibility to found a religion if you are not in the first ones to compete for it, unless you play Saladin, is rahter bad. It means on higher levels you're likely forbidden to play an integral part of the game, plus you lose all those GP points with nothing in exchange. I think it's weak design.
Religious units clutter the map and prevent military units from moving, that's also quite bad.

Overall, it's quite good but I think in its current state I'll be bored quickly (for a civ game).

 

[CaiusDrewart]

If they just cut the Eurekas to 25%, I think the tech pace might be just about right. They might still have to shave 10-15% off the cost of districts and wonders.

 

[Silverdawn]

• Cannot see the yields of districts unlike other tiles, but instead you need to have your mouse on it to see the yields.

It is listed in the city details screen that lists all the buildings in the city. There is the value for the district and the values for each of the buildings in it.

 

[Raider]

If they just cut the Eurekas to 25%, I think the tech pace might be just about right. They might still have to shave 10-15% off the cost of districts and wonders.

Yeah, it does seem like the pace of tech in relation to the pace of producing units and buildings is way off the mark. Even in the first turns of the game, it was taking me longer to produce a warrior than to research a new technology. That's really not great. Tech should take a lot longer than that.

I remember in Civ 4, tech speed really picked up right before the Industrial Age. As a result, there was a very short period of time when sailing ships were useful, and by the time you produced a few of them, their time was past. In Civ 6 there seems to be that imbalance between the pace of production and research all through the game.

 

[Bechhold]

Pedro II is reincarnation of Attila in this version of the game. DoW is bugged as you see your own Civ declare war on you. Not enough depth in Diplomacy. Religious civilizations are way too powerful.

 

[wiggawuu]

Pedro II is reincarnation of Attila in this version of the game. DoW is bugged as you see your own Civ declare war on you. Not enough depth in Diplomacy. Religious civilizations are way too powerful.

The game has been out 2 days. Like anyone will value your opinion? Wait a couple weeks dude. jeez

 

[PhilBowles]

Solid way into my Emperor game on a huge map.

I rolled Gorgo but haven't been aggressive until recently, or especially focused on culture - with the result that I'm in fifth place for my best victory condition; this is however not bad for a first run with an unfamiliar Civ game on one of the higher difficulties. I'm in the middle of the pack scorewise as well, and lagging slightly technologically, but that's too be expected when new to the system given how significant new features like districts are.

I missed a religion by falling behind in the Great Prophet race - I do like the new GP system. The governments are also very nicely-done. The cards by themselves would be a bit too easy to change on the hoof, a la Civ IV, and there seems a very minimal cost to changing them when you haven't unlocked a new civic that turn (civics unlock quickly enough, however, that I've only once needed to do this) - however the bonus system and differing card slots offered by the different government options really make the system work.

The districts so far seem mostly busy-work to slow down production rates for key buildings - unfortunately my map didn't give me great sites to get multiple adjacency bonuses for many districts, so I'm not rewarded for specialising beyond the simple tile space they take up. I think this is more of a map issue with this playthrough than one with the system. Though on every one of the three starts I've rolled so far high-production terrain seems rare, which is unfortunate.

The AI has been very passive - I've very rarely had AIs contact me, and although Gandhi has been unfriendly since we've met he took no action. I went to war in an effort to obtain some of his cities - I called it off as it devolved into a stalemate and I was faced with a barbarian invasion (2 swords and a slinger, but still significant when my army was elsewhere, and more aggressive than the civs ever were). Gandhi kept retreating his units rather than attacking and seemed to have no ranged units at all (or walls in his cities to provide ranged attacks), and he was using swords and elephants shortly before he hit the industrial era. I did have one potentially worrying attack from Jakarta, as it hit Ephesus with a catapult ... but only one catapult, supported by one warrior. My own CS ally, Toronto, spammed archers and warriors but despite moving threateningly towards the Indian cities, never attacked the cities and only occasionally the units. Gandhi also offered very generous peace deals even when I wasn't making a lot of progress and neither of us was losing units. This is all a bit of a concern - it seems a step back from Civ V in terms of the AI's combat ability.

 

[PhilBowles]

Alright, after my first humiliating defeat, tried again. King level.

• I like the changes to city states - very logical, and much much better done than civ 5 where you just threw money at them. Also like how they have unique bonuses.

I'm still a little way from being sold on the new city-state system, though I'm starting to come round as I play. Inventing a new resource that functions, essentially, exactly the way generating influence did in Civ V doesn't seem a particularly good design move, since influence mainly had to be earned by trading off other resources (whether gold or spies). Envoys just appear passively whatever you're doing and don't interact with any other game system.

The specific bonuses are more interestingly-handled than in Civ V, but they could have worked this as an influence threshold with three levels rather than two and achieved exactly the same result. In practice city-states don't seem to function very differently from the Civ V version, and if anything have regressed slightly (a single fixed quest that couldn't be changed until it was completed was in Civ V vanilla and altered in the expansions following player feedback, so it's strange that it reappears here).

 

[Lord Shadow]

I'm still on my first game, playing as England on a large continents map, Standard speed, circa 1500-1600 AD. King difficulty.

These are the issues I've experienced:

• The AI seems better than Civ5's, but still needs some work and fine-tuning. As others have said, it's quite aggressive in the beginning but that tapers out as time advances. Also, wars between AIs in my experience have been indecisive, without either side achieving much. The AI also seems to panic under ranged fire. Too much self-preservation, perhaps.
• The unit tree is rather all over the place, with several unit "classes" containing too few units within. I'm not sure why there's two cavalry classes when so far I've only seen Horsemen, Chariots, Knights and most recently Cavalry. The recon class is apparently just the Scout and it's successor, the Ranger. The Redcoat is weird in that it doesn't replace the Musketman, nor Musketmen can be upgraded to them. Upgrade paths are frequently strange due to the too-numerous classes, and they get in the way of the modernization of the AI's forces, the difficulty compounded by the next item.
• Strategic resources are very rare: whole continents have to fight over 2-3 Iron deposits, Horses are similarly uncommon and Niter is even rarer (I've seen 2 deposits across three continents). Warriors can't upgrade to Pikemen, nor Swordsmen without Iron, nor Musketmen without Niter, which means that in the absence of Riflemen they can't be upgraded till Infantry without resources! The AI is quite capable of upgrading its armies, but the scarcity of resources and convoluted unit trees are a major obstacle.
• Technological progress does seem to be too fast. I've entered the Industrial Era before the 17th century, and I definitely wasn't the first. Eurekas and tech costs need careful balancing to rein this in to more reasonable timeframes.
• I was fairly quickly left out of the religious game, unable to found a religion since it wasn't one of my first priorities. So I'm left at the mercy of foreign missionaries, who have been rather slow at converting my cities. I've yet to have a dominant religion. I wish you could invite specific religions through diplomacy: Philip II is my ally, and I'm sure he'd be thrilled if I asked him to send his missionaries over. As it stands, Jewish Rome is spreading their faith across my territory, and I fear that'll strain my relations with Spain once Judaism becomes dominant in England.
• Maybe it's intended, but I'm not sure: the music diversified a lot as I explored the world and met new civs. I still hear my civ's theme every now and then, but also that of many others. Strikes me as off, but then each civ has only one theme of its own, so I suppose it'd get too repetitive if I heard it over and over again.

But overall, I'm glad all those concerned are likely to be ironed out through patches. Civ6 is a very good, potentially a great game and has probably already surpassed Civ5 and its expansions in most regards. A few neutral observations:

• Barbarians feel better and challenging now, though sort of knowing about the changes in advance, I didn't underestimate them nor had much trouble keeping them in check.
• I'm still getting used to the district system and some of its non-evident workings. I only recently found out Entertainment and Industrial districts have a regional area of effect, meaning their buildings affect all cities in range. And said range can be boosted by certain city-states.
• On the subject of industry, I believe there's something many are missing: it's true things seem to take considerably effort to build, but that's probably balanced to some extent by trade routes, which you can use to import yields where they're needed the most. Build those Harbors! For example, traders were really useful in helping me set up my first overseas colonies: routes were established from them to my most industrious home cities, and building times became far more reasonable. It's somewhat reminiscent of CivBE, but executed more thoughtfully.

 

[StittsvileJamie]

Had a lot of fun my first game, finished a science victory with Monty - prince, standard size/speed. Here are my 10 thoughts on my first game.

1. I actually like the UI. It takes some getting used to, but I think its done well. I don't just like, but love the fog of war. Not sure how anyone can dislike it. Weirdos.
2. Deciding what to build in each city was so refreshing after the mega cities I always made in ciV. It wasn't just a click the next item in the list, but actually required thought.
3. Had a few AI builders and settlers wandering about in war zones with no escorts. Dummies.
4. Tech tree does seem to go too fast. Civic tree seemed better paced. And I didn't spam campuses, although I was a little remiss on Theatre Squares.. I do agree that eurekas and inspirations should be nerfed to 25%, which would be better.
5. I wish the AI would stop denouncing me for taking a city 2000 years earlier (in a defensive war you declared Philip!). After a couple hundred years they need to let it go.
6. I like the early barb rush. Get one with a horse a little too close and you're in for a world of hurt.
7. They need to fix the AI from forward settling so much. It's annoying. And then tell me to move my troops. Up yours lady.
8. I agree that the natural border expansion should be a little faster. I had holes in my empire even as my Mars missions were being completed. That seems off.
9. I don't know if anyone has mentioned the ridiculous warmonger penalties yet, anyone else notice that?
10. I like the espionage system. Good options, got to steal a pretty painting from Les Francais with my cat burglar spy.
11. Bonus point! The unit upgrade trees are excellent. I also loved being able to rename them and having "James' Own Rangers" and "Princess Angie's Fighting Corps" in my game.

All in all, this was a great experience, and the first of many games. There is so much depth to this for strategy compared to ciV and it excites me that this is vanilla, and they can design some more awesome systems on top of this - can't wait to see how it all shakes out in a few years with DLC and expansions!

Thanks Firaxis! Now go fix the AI!

 

[Willburn]

Had a lot of fun in my first civ6 game (and the game is great) but I am shocked to find no hall of fame keeping my scores between games.

 

[CaiusDrewart]

After my Spain Emperor game ended in a Culture Victory (T305, score of 749--not too impressive I'm sure), I decided to go with something more militaristic for my second game. Germany on a Pangaea map sounded about right. I cranked up the difficulty to Immortal because the Emperor AI had been pretty pathetic game one.

Well, I had an exciting start (lots of salt mines--I could have eventually built a +5 industrial zone in the capital!), but that didn't matter, because around turn 30 I was joint-DOW'd by my two neighbors, Rome and Sumeria. I had a couple archers ready to go and started picking off enemy warriors, but there was just an incredible flood of units coming at me. I wasn't losing any archers, but it took forever to kill all these warriors. Rome was spamming units about as fast as I could kill them (Rome had even taken the pantheon that gives +25% production to ancient and classical units!)

Eventually I was able to push out and take Rome's second city, but by the time I was moving in on Rome itself, legions were starting to show up. Those things completely wrecked my units. They were resourceless, so it's not like Civ IV or V where I could have tried to cut off Rome's iron in order to put a stop to that.

Meanwhile, I was struggling to defend my first expansion from a flood of Sumerian war carts. The AI was weirdly hesitant about attacking my city (it seems to care too much about getting into siege position, when it should really just attack?), but eventually Magdeburg got overwhelmed. With progress pretty much impossible on the Roman front and my economy nonexistent, I decided to call it quits.

I think it was just bad luck on my part, getting DOWed by two civs with powerful early UUs. If it had been only one I would have been fine, but the two of them together were too much. I'll take another crack at Immortal soon.

I'd say that ranged units need a nerf. Even though they weren't quite enough against legions, under most circumstances archers are just devastating in this game.

 

[bug1]

Im a bit disappointed;
- Whatever map size you choose your city is already sounded by city states and other civs, its very hard to establish new well spaced out cities.
- Large maps dont seem very large. I havent tried small yet, i imagine there is only room for 1 city per civ.
- Graphical problems; there isnt enough contrast between fog of war and unexplored areas, hills dont stand out, goody huts are hard to spot, even world wonder can be hard to see.

AI is much better, im impressed and annoyed that barbs seem much more strategic (scout trolls pulling you away)

 

[pietro1990]

I thinx civ 6 is a amazing game good mechanics its like civ 4 with health and happiness now its housing and amenenties.

Diplomacy is olso amazing oyu can form alliances and get civs happy with you however the big coin is:

warmonger penalties are to high. if you declare war at medievel era and even classical era you get denounced by everyone . its pretty anoying. Ruins the fun of the game

 

[StittsvileJamie]

Im a bit disappointed;
- Whatever map size you choose your city is already sounded by city states and other civs, its very hard to establish new well spaced out cities.

My experience so far suggests that it's ok to have cities close together. They don't get massive where you need all 36 tiles, so having cities spaced out 4-5 tiles apart works out ok. I haven't yet been cramped by doing this, although I suck at the game so take anything I say with a grain of salt!

Anyone else feel the same, that closer together cities is OK, and preferred considering the borders don't grow fast anyways, and cities seem smaller? Or am I out to lunch?

 

[Vaclac]

I've played some with Gorgo and Kongo, and really enjoyed it so far.

A few thoughts/issues so far:
Production of districts/buildings/late game wonders is really slow. For my second game with Kongo, I specifically beelined Industrial Zones and Factories, which did help, but it seems like you need to have an industrial zone in every city for them to actually be able to build any later buildings/other districts in a reasonable amount of time.
Cultural border expansion seems very slow. Also, is there a display anywhere that says how many turns it will take for the next border expansion and where that will take place? Seems you really need to buy tiles, even if you have lots of culture in your cities as I did with Gorgo. On this note, foreign trade routes seem really awesome for generating gold and seem to make commercial hubs and harbors worthwhile on their own. Merchant Republic also seems like the best mid-tier government because of the additional trade routes.
I found it difficult to see all the terrain especially in the fog of war. I also didn't have a good sense of where I had farmed, built districts, etc. Switching to strategic view helped immensely with this. I probably left a lot of land undeveloped for too long because of the new builder system compared to workers, so that will take some getting used to
There aren't enough slots to fit great works... As Gorgo I put acropoli in all of my cities, and I still didn't have enough slots for all the great works I was getting from great people. I find it weird they have writers create two great works when only amphitheaters seem to hold any spots for them and they only hold 1.

 

[Fluphen Azine]

Had a lot of fun my first game, finished a science victory with Monty - prince, standard size/speed. Here are my 10 thoughts on my first game.

1. I don't just like, but love the fog of war. Not sure how anyone can dislike it. Weirdos.

The simple answer is that you are playing on Prince. If I was playing on Prince it wouldn't matter too much about anything and I would be just fine with the way the game looks and plays. I played a few games on Immortal and it really didn't matter much either. I usually have 3 Civs wiped out before turn 100 so I guess it doesn't really matter much on that level either but the Fog and the Animation is hard on my eyes or at least I mean that everything blends together for me. I try to play very fast too so that might factor into it. I'm about done with Immortal for now and back to Deity like usual but honestly the Fog and UI/Graphics bothers me so much I am not sure how much longer I can play this game. I guess my main problem is that I am just a Weirdo lol !