Is Old World any fun?

[FinalDoomsday]

I just lost my first Glorious-level difficulty game, with "Play to Win" turned on. It was fantastic. I only had two ambitions left, and suddenly 3 out of 4 AIs declared war on me (over the course of 3 turns) because I was close to winning, even though I had been at peace with them the entire game. Literally every Civ was Jewish so we were getting along so great, but turns out religion hates you if you're at war with others of the same religion. Because I was at peace the entire game, I neglected my military and focused entirely on domestic things. After they declared war on me They stormed my cities and I was done.

This reminded me a lot of what made Colonization so fun - that you had this looming gigantic military threat the entire game that you had to gear up to prepare for. And yet, had I properly geared up, my progress would've been a lot slower. That's the exciting kind of trade off that makes a game fun.

To put the final touches on this, there should definitely be some roleplaying scripts/events related to the fact that you are close to winning, so there's some story-based reason for people starting to gang up on you, maybe you're the crown jewel or the envy of the world or something.

Great job!

I think they said the game goes up to the fall of the Western Roman Empire so theres absolutely opportunities for maybe climate change, Huns driving minor factions into your lands and eventually reaching you and internal strife. Probably more of an expansion thing to do properly.

 

[Shadowhal]

I just lost my first Glorious-level difficulty game, with "Play to Win" turned on. It was fantastic. I only had two ambitions left, and suddenly 3 out of 4 AIs declared war on me (over the course of 3 turns) because I was close to winning, even though I had been at peace with them the entire game. Literally every Civ was Jewish so we were getting along so great, but turns out religion hates you if you're at war with others of the same religion. Because I was at peace the entire game, I neglected my military and focused entirely on domestic things. After they declared war on me They stormed my cities and I was done.

That sounds like a great way to shorten the sometimes tedious end game. I wonder whether there should be a way to "force" the issue where the player's lead is very commanding. Like saying "I declare myself emperor of the world" and then other factions have x (maybe 10) turns to act against that. A bit like a Civ VI style emergency, though I wouldn't be sure what would need to be achieved to stop the win. And what the consequences of that would be. It should be more than just not winning at that time, it would need to be a careful trade-off with a major risk.

To put the final touches on this, there should definitely be some roleplaying scripts/events related to the fact that you are close to winning, so there's some story-based reason for people starting to gang up on you, maybe you're the crown jewel or the envy of the world or something.

Yes to that too! That would be amazing to make it feel more natural.

 

[Dayvit78]

I'd just like to add something else that really blew me away compared to Civ.

I'm trying the archipelago map because I wanted a peaceful game. Turns out there was another civ that spawned on the same island as me, so that took most of my energy. When I finally finished off that civ, I realized, I wasn't winning. I had only 5 cities, whereas a competitor had 10 cities. How?
Then I started exploring and found out - this AI is using biremes to make successful NAVAL INVASIONS. Are you serious? Have you ever seen a Civ take out competitors across the sea? One was across a small straight to the west (to take out some barbarians), and I haven't explored enough to see the source of the one in the east (where he's in the middle of attacking a tribe). I still haven't explored the map totally so I'm not sure how many islands he actually owns, but I only own 1.

Needless to say, I am seriously impressed.

 

[Stringer1313]

I'd just like to add something else that really blew me away compared to Civ.

I'm trying the archipelago map because I wanted a peaceful game. Turns out there was another civ that spawned on the same island as me, so that took most of my energy. When I finally finished off that civ, I realized, I wasn't winning. I had only 5 cities, whereas a competitor had 10 cities. How?
Then I started exploring and found out - this AI is using biremes to make successful NAVAL INVASIONS. Are you serious? Have you ever seen a Civ take out competitors across the sea? One was across a small straight to the west (to take out some barbarians), and I haven't explored enough to see the source of the one in the east (where he's in the middle of attacking a tribe). I still haven't explored the map totally so I'm not sure how many islands he actually owns, but I only own 1.

Needless to say, I am seriously impressed.

I was extremely confused at first about the naval system but the way they are handling it is genius and no doubt has made the AI better at managing. Just plot a ship anchor and boom.

 

[Luddify]

Absolutely loving this so far - definitely has the "just one more turn vibe" I sadly have yet to get from Humankind. Love the art and the interface - at this stage it seems very polished and should be a solid game at release. I did have no luck whatsoever getting the Mac version to run on my maxed-out 2019 MacBook Pro (zooming/scrolling takes several seconds to "kick in") but works great with highest detail on my aging Windows gaming laptop. I do wish there was a PDF manual somewhere rather than the very bare-bones wiki and that it was also on Steam, but looking forward to spending much time with it - loads of potential!

 

[ThunderLizard2]

Outstanding and "fun" game - lots to learn and very well thought out mechanics.

 

[steveg700]

To love The Old World requires one to love RNG. In some aspects of the game, players are completely at its mercy.

It is vitally important to have a line of succession, but you can have marriage that yields no children and you'll have no reason. Some characters are gay (-50% chance of children), but this is not known right away and even when a character is finally flagged as gay, there's no explanation as to how this was uncovered and you won't even know it unless you notice from looking at the character specifically.

It is vitally important to have courtiers (court soldiers, scientists, ministers, and merchants). These are the only folks who can tutor children, which makes a drastic difference in the quality of your ambassador, chancellor, or spymaster. They're also the only people you can actively marry a family member off to. But there are no mechanisms for cultivating courtiers. You simply have to hope for some random element to produce them (either an event or a bonus tech) .This is actually pretty inexcusable IMO.

It is important to have generals, but im my experience making someone a general is a death sentence. It is far too common for them to drop dead, even when they aren't seeing battle. A lot of dudes falling off horses out there. Again, generals cannot be cultivated, so players have to work with the pool that RNG provides. And RNG taketh at a far faster rate than they giveth.

In general, updates to this game need to provide the player with options they can avail themselves of to deal with the RNG factor. If the game is going to spontaneously give a character a weakness like Cruel or Bitter or a relationship penalty like Vengeful, then give me some active means to effect a change. It's not like Ambassadors, Chancellors, or Spymasters really can do much in terms of missions right now, so maybe find a way to leverage them better.

 

[nolegskitten]

Generals aren't really at risk when battling, it's actually pretty rare in my experience. And RNG can be simply deactivated if you really want a balanced games (for competitive setup), you can simply play without characters. random events are random, but overall they are mostly positives, and It's quite common for even gay characters to have children. As an example, my gay king got two kids in my last playthrough.
If you are very risk adverse or get frustrated by any negative happening, then the game might not suit your tastes, I'll agree to that, at least not with events and characters. But overall as you learn to play it, you can actually engineer your own luck to quite a surprising extent.
And the storylines that emerge from events can also be quite enjoyable, so depending how mad or amused you get when you receive a bad event/untimely death, most people should be able to find their fun.

As steveg700 made obvious with his own feelings, not everyone will enjoy the default experience. But it can be tuned !

You can have more, less or no events, you can increase or decrease the mortality rate, etc, there are plenty of options to tailor the game more to your tastes. And if the feeling of RNG frustration expressed above proves common, I'm quite sure a "no bad event/no negative traits" mod will emerge quite soon.

 

[steveg700]

Generals aren't really at risk when battling, it's actually pretty rare in my experience. And RNG can be simply deactivated if you really want a balanced games (for competitive setup), you can simply play without characters. random events are random, but overall they are mostly positives, and It's quite common for even gay characters to have children. As an example, my gay king got two kids in my last playthrough.
If you are very risk adverse or get frustrated by any negative happening, then the game might not suit your tastes, I'll agree to that, at least not with events and characters. But overall as you learn to play it, you can actually engineer your own luck to quite a surprising extent.
And the storylines that emerge from events can also be quite enjoyable, so depending how mad or amused you get when you receive a bad event/untimely death, most people should be able to find their fun.

As steveg700 made obvious with his own feelings, not everyone will enjoy the default experience. But it can be tuned !

You can have more, less or no events, you can increase or decrease the mortality rate, etc, there are plenty of options to tailor the game more to your tastes. And if the feeling of RNG frustration expressed above proves common, I'm quite sure a "no bad event/no negative traits" mod will emerge quite soon.

I didn't say generals were at risk when battling. I said they were at risk just by virtue of being generals.

Gay characters are 50% less likely to have children. So, whatever is meant by "quite common", it's actually half as common.

The reply above rattles off a series of contradictions in defense of TOW. In the quickness to shield the game from criticism. It seems my comments were reinterpreted to suit a "get gud" response. I am not expressing a desire to remove RNG, to have fewer events, or to have a "no bad events" mod.

Rather, TOW needs more tools to actually control gameplay rather than having random events do the driving on important aspects of play such as the cultivation of courtiers, or having choice over who someone in arranging marriages (currently, the only people marriages can specifically arranged with are courtiers). Reducing RNG would not help players recruit courtiers if courtiers can only be recruited through RNG.

Similarly, for players to "engineer their own luck", they would be better served with communication about certain occurrences. If someone dies, was it a completely random, or did some factor contribute to the mortality? All the player gets is "___ died!" Likewise, if someone suddenly gets the "gay" trait, it's probably safe to assume they had it all along and it was hidden. How did it become unhidden? If there were a way for the king to discover if his queen is 50% less likely to produce heirs, I want to avail myself of it rather than wasting half of his thirties waiting for a an heir to show up.

Combine random events with player controls, such as more types of missions for council members. And increase transparency about factors that contribute to random factors.

None of this criticism, btw, is to suggest the game isn't fun.

 

[nolegskitten]

I feel the game is quite transparent about its systems, I didn't' want to "defend the game" on principle, just trying to explain some systems or mechanisms you might have missed, I appologize if it conveyed a "git gud" feeling.

Taking fertility as an example, you can "engineer your luck" to an extend (trying to explain myself better here) by choosing spouses according to the relative opinions they would have of each other, giving you fertility boosts, rather than just picking what looks like the best stats. The way you give yourself multiple avenues to get what you need or want (the right heir archetype, maximize the output of courtiers you have, etc) is definitely a skillset that you can deploy as well.

As most RNG based systems, the events can sometime change the game strongly, but often they make sense. TO take an illustration :
you were curating good relationship with two nations, but they went at war with one another. It's quite probable that one or the other is going to ask you to chose between them at one point, ruining your hope of staying neutral and just peacefully build. That's a game changing event.
If you know that these things can happen, probably you'll try to foster good relationships between them as well to prevent such a war in the first place. You might use religion, you might provide them with a common enemy to fight together, etc. So you do have some agency over it, it's just not obvious until you understand the game a bit better and adapt to the mechanics that are in place.

We could also have a game where gays don't exists, I'm not denying that fertility malus is a penalty but I'm saying you can play around and with that too. You don't need straight-line daughters and sons to have heirs (brothers, sister, nieces and nephews will do just fine), you can change inheritance laws, you don't need a huge number of family members to play since you'll always have only one leader, you can appoint your own heir, there are multiple events that will allow you to adopt people into your family, etc.

I'm not denying the RNG component of the event/family game, I was outlining that you have options to play without that if you don't like it and that there are actually many way to retain control and a degree of agency, although it takes a bit of effort and experience to master.

In the end you are absolutely right, there is a strong RNG component to the default Single player experience and that's not enjoyable for everyone.

I'm sorry if my interventions sounded like a rebuke, I only wanted to highlights available alternatives and some of the systems that you might have missed, and could have contributed to your negative impression. I admit I love this game, I just want to share my enjoyment. I'd hate for you to miss out on the game if you could actually enjoy it with a few minor adjustments.


addendum: I don't know for sure but if I had to guess such traits as "gay" are not hidden, just generated when characters reach adulthood.

 

[steveg700]

One of the most vital things to do for a kingdom is to generate children within your line of succession. That's because these can be tutored by courtiers. Tutoring will not just provide potent rulers, but all of the other court positions as well--provided there are enough kids to go 'round.

Mind you, ambassadors, chancellors, and spymasters have fairly confined value in terms of their missions, but their stat bonuses are of great value. For instance, having a spymaster with high Courage is a simple way to decrease discontent in all cities. But without tutoring, a spymaster with positive Courage can be hard to come by.

Of course, if you have commited your courtiers to other duties, you now have a choice to make. Courtiers won't receive experience while tutoring, so in a sense the player is making a decision to sacrifice their cultivation for the sake of the child. Usually worthwhile. Of course, you may simply not have enough tutors to go around (or any), and as far I can tell the player is powerless to recruit courtiers. You're at the mercy of RNG there.

I do not know what all factors influence fertility, so I must make guesses. I would have guessed that the spouse's opinion of the ruler plays a factor, but empirical evidence has yet to provide a consistent pattern.

Another reasonable guess is that youth is a positive factor, particularly in regards to wives. Start fishing for spouses as soon as the child turns 18. if I'm looking for a queen, they need to under 35. Not only shouldn't stat blocks be the primary factor for consideration, but good stats are actually a warning flag as they often come with all those years of experience.

And then once married, you sit and wait, maybe try to influence them to like your ruler (if it's their spouse) more and maybe convert them to state religion. The gay trait is definitely not revealed only upon reaching adulthood. I once married a king to a woman of 30, and divorced her at 35 when no children were born. It wasn't until some time after the divorce that game identified the trait. Certainly was not present when she was offered up by Rome.

So this all illustrates ways that you can influence the game witch strategic decisions, but it also illustrates where guesswork is required. It would be nice to be able to have missions to recruit courtiers and to investigate citizens. These would be good uses for chancellors and spymasters.

 

[Dale]

Combine random events with player controls, such as more types of missions for council members. And increase transparency about factors that contribute to random factors.

We're working on better exposure of information, but that will take a few patches.

What sort of controls and missions would you like to see?

 

[nolegskitten]

One of the most vital things to do for a kingdom is to generate children within your line of succession. That's because these can be tutored by courtiers. Tutoring will not just provide potent rulers, but all of the other court positions as well--provided there are enough kids to go 'round.

Mind you, ambassadors, chancellors, and spymasters have fairly confined value in terms of their missions, but their stat bonuses are of great value. For instance, having a spymaster with high Courage is a simple way to decrease discontent in all cities. But without tutoring, a spymaster with positive Courage can be hard to come by. (...)

I think you put a strong emphasis on some aspects of the game (fertility in particular from you messages). There are *no* hidden traits in the game. Couples just don't get children automatically, it's random and it can just be bad luck, no need to have a hidden trait.

Anyway, I posted after your initial remarks because although it's fair to say the game has a strong RNG element when you play with Characters and Events, it also averages out relatively fairly over the course of the game. I flat out disagree that it's just all random and pure luck, and I felt you were misrepresenting the game. We do have a lot of agency on what's happening, otherwise how come some players regularly win at maximum difficulty while other struggle in their first games ?

I agree that the game can be hard to master, there is a lot to know and many interacting mechanics, in fact this is the main reason I come on Civ fanatics to try to help people find their footing.

 

[steveg700]

We're working on better exposure of information, but that will take a few patches.

What sort of controls and missions would you like to see?

Thanks for asking.

It'd be good to be able to send a character to a doctor (success based on the quality and/or quality of doctor specialists) to boost their longevity, remove sickness, and maybe remove certain other weaknesses. In general, might be interesting to find a way to tie a mission to a specialist. Not a mission in the purest sense, but an activity that takes the character out of circulation for a year, and has a chance of success, failure, or event.

Foremost though would be a mission to recruit courtiers. This might be a good mission to assign to a chancellor, maybe ambassador. Again, success could be contingent on the specialists available for the type of courtier in question (philosophers for court scholars, scribes for ministers, ettc).

A spymaster mission to investigate characters, to get leverage on characters whose opinions are so negative that they can't be massaged. Force heads of families or religions to step down, or impose an "owes a favor" type of condition that will cancel out a future negative event. Maybe characters with weaknesses (drunk, wanton, cruel, superstitious, etc) are especially susceptible and could lead to some fun events.

Way more ambitious would be a spymaster mission to reveal and then influence the members of foreign councils (this assumes there's actual parity there; I don't know if AI nations even have councils).

Those ideas are all intended to provide some stochastic mitigation.

 

[steveg700]

II flat out disagree that it's just all random and pure luck, and I felt you were misrepresenting the game.

I feel like we've had enough discussion for you to realize that this is a misrepresentation of my opinions.

 

[Dale]

Actually, there is a hidden trait. TRAIT_HORSE. I'll leave it at that, because that storyline is hilarious.

 

[nolegskitten]

Actually, there is a hidden trait. TRAIT_HORSE. I'll leave it at that, because that storyline is hilarious.

Been a long time since last I had that one .

 

[Taefin]

Returning to the original question of the thread, after my first complete game (I played 4-5 partial games during beta), my conclusion is that I really enjoy playing for ambition victory, but that for me the difficulty level needs to be high enough to prevent myself from outscoring the AI (at least not before the last decade or so).

I play aggressively with the AI, and don’t automatically weave much of my own narrative when playing 4X games, so I find the characters and events help help create a memorably and emotional game, even when I generally pick the choice that looks most advantageous.

I’ve never played a 4X game that feels so satisfying to win a game. Victory feels like it comes at the right time, (this time after an epic campaign to conquer two neighbors, one being the largest starting empire and their blanket of catapults). The game ended before it lost momentum, but after I had achieved something that felt merited a victory. To go any further would have definitely begun to drag, but because the winning ambition didn’t pop up too early, I still felt motivated to grow all the way up until selecting it, not knowing if I’d need the infrastructure. Then once victory is assured, slotting festival in every city brings it about quickly enough.

And the combat is excellent! I get really attached to my LV5 units, but still have to expose them to danger to do anything meaningful.

 

[rlw33]

Yes, the game is fun. I can't imagine any 4X fan not enjoying Old World.

 

[Ita Bear]

It's great fun, but (as with many complicated 4X games) it takes some getting used to. Expect your first few games to be little more than trial and error. Each new game you load up will have a sensation of, "oh, THAT'S how it works" and the game will slowly unravel. The first few games can therefore seem aimless or frustrating. It's definitely a game that requires some digging to find the treasure.

Kind regards,
Ita Bear