Is the criticism correct: Is there no actual farm/rural-looking parts of the developed map? [Share your screenshots]

[queenpea]

The game doesn't really incentivize you to put lots of farms together, but nothing prevents it.

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That looks great! I would love for there to be some kind of adjacency bonus, or the ability to put a specialist (farmer) on rural tiles like these.

 

[kaspergm]

I agree, it's a pity that the rural towns don't encourage more coherent farmlands, because it looks great.

 

[Isengardtom]

In my first playthroughs I put the settlements reasonably close to each other and then you end up with nothing but urban tiles by the end of exploration

Now I put them apart a bit more (or at least try)

 

[wilcoxchar]

Just to provide another example from the modern age.

Both Parsa and Tarsus I'd taken from Ibn Battuta a while ago, but I took Tarsus first and it was disconnected from the rest of my borders for a while, so it ended up less built up.

I've also found you also tend to get more rural areas on the islands around the distant lands where there might be a lot of resources but not much room to build urban districts. This island has tea, two spices, tobacco, and quinine on it.

 

[Mr Jon of Cheam]

I like some urban sprawl, but do worry that it has gone a bit too far. Looking at these screenshots, I think they've almost got it right, it just needs some minor tweaks. Bigger maps would certainly help, but beyond this, increasing the necessity of farms would help, increasing minimum distance between settlement would help, limiting number of Urban districts per city would help. Wouldn't need to do all of these things, point I'm making is that a small change could make a big difference. I hope it's something that they consider.

 

[moysturfurmer]

Yeah if there’s one thing I miss from the earlier games it’s farm adjacency bonuses. Would love love love to see it return. Anything to incentivize it.

 

[Vitruvian Guar]

Yeah if there’s one thing I miss from the earlier games it’s farm adjacency bonuses. Would love love love to see it return. Anything to incentivize it.

Adjacent bonuses makes less sense when there is no choice what improvement to build on a tile. Town designation are supposed to incentivize placing farms together, but probably not enough.

 

[kaspergm]

Well maybe this highlights the point that taking away all choice for the player in a strategy game is not the best idea. I mean, I know it’s called “streamlining”, but if you make a strategy game with no choices, there’s not much strategy left …

 

[Mr Jon of Cheam]

Well maybe this highlights the point that taking away all choice for the player in a strategy game is not the best idea. I mean, I know it’s called “streamlining”, but if you make a strategy game with no choices, there’s not much strategy left …

They obviously haven't taken away all choice, that's crazy. They've changed the choices.

 

[moysturfurmer]

Adjacent bonuses makes less sense when there is no choice what improvement to build on a tile. Town designation are supposed to incentivize placing farms together, but probably not enough.

I hear you, but there’s still the decision of where to of place IP improvements and urban districts and wonders. It would be nice if you were faced with a decision of losing out on 3 extra food to drop an Oracle on one of your 3 farm plots

 

[kaspergm]

They obviously haven't taken away all choice, that's crazy. They've changed the choices.

Obviously they haven't removed all choices, but my point is: When you remove a choice, you need to ask why it improves the game. They've taken away the ability to place farms on forested or jungle tiles (the massive chop production bonus - good riddance, but the ability to remove the trees was fine both from a gameplay and a realism perspective), and they've taken away the choice of which tile improvement to place on the tile in more general sense. They've also removed the option to switch around workers between tiles, should you so desire. Why? To reduce micromanagement? If so, I don't think this makes the game better.

First off, managing citizens was never an issue to begin with - it was one of the areas where the AI actually was pretty capable in Civ5 and Civ6. As such, you could perfectly well go through a game without bothering micro-managing your citizens if you were not a hard-core min/max-player, and if you wanted to force a certain yield, there was a super easy "focus" button you could use. You may even argue the new system adds more micromanagement, because you need to choose the placement of each citizen when the city grows, whereas in the old system, you could just leave the AI to pick the tile it found best if you had not big desire for hard control.

Secondly, it makes the game worse, because like I said, it removes options of control for the player and takes away a pretty core (imo.) decision-making part of the game, namely the choice of how you wanted to develop your lands. Meanwhile, they left us with missionary spam, which was like one of the most hated features of Civ6, so yeah ... not the best of judgemement imo.

 

[queenpea]

I do wish we had the choice to “chop” vegetated tiles/forests—this would at least make room for more farms.

 

[Hellenism Salesman]

It's still pretty shocking to me that you have no choice but to play the map. If you get lots of different terrain types whose improvements won't make for nice stacking Warehouse bonuses, you're just kind of screwed

This might not be so bad if it were easier to distinguish terrain from a glance...

 

[pokiehl]

It's still pretty shocking to me that you have no choice but to play the map. If you get lots of different terrain types whose improvements won't make for nice stacking Warehouse bonuses, you're just kind of screwed

That's actually a good point. I'd like the option to be able to put a Farm over vegetated terrain. Mind you, I don't want to the return of chopping for Production (too gamey and micromanagey), but some way to convert a tile from Vegetated to Flat would be nice.

 

[Hellenism Salesman]

It doesn't even have to come into play early on. But by the time the Modern Age roles around and my Civ is looking to send people into space, I should at least be able to cut down some trees or terraform some hills.

The question of how the player would initiate that is hard to answer. It'd be wasteful if it cost an entire growth event, so I guess it would just be a cheap task in the production queue, like the "repair [tile improvement]" items or the ones for Unique Improvements.

 

[Mr Jon of Cheam]

Obviously they haven't removed all choices, but my point is: When you remove a choice, you need to ask why it improves the game. They've taken away the ability to place farms on forested or jungle tiles (the massive chop production bonus - good riddance, but the ability to remove the trees was fine both from a gameplay and a realism perspective), and they've taken away the choice of which tile improvement to place on the tile in more general sense. They've also removed the option to switch around workers between tiles, should you so desire. Why? To reduce micromanagement? If so, I don't think this makes the game better.

First off, managing citizens was never an issue to begin with - it was one of the areas where the AI actually was pretty capable in Civ5 and Civ6. As such, you could perfectly well go through a game without bothering micro-managing your citizens if you were not a hard-core min/max-player, and if you wanted to force a certain yield, there was a super easy "focus" button you could use. You may even argue the new system adds more micromanagement, because you need to choose the placement of each citizen when the city grows, whereas in the old system, you could just leave the AI to pick the tile it found best if you had not big desire for hard control.

Secondly, it makes the game worse, because like I said, it removes options of control for the player and takes away a pretty core (imo.) decision-making part of the game, namely the choice of how you wanted to develop your lands. Meanwhile, they left us with missionary spam, which was like one of the most hated features of Civ6, so yeah ... not the best of judgemement imo.

Right. I don't entirely disagree, you could have maybe said that initially?

I think maybe there is a halfway between what they had and where we are now. For me, I think it is good that when a city grows, I can now choose which tile the new pop works and improve that tile in the same process, no need to build workers/builders to improve the tile. Personal preference but I always found workers entirely annoying, good riddance.

What I would like to see is additional choice; i.e., allow me to put farms on vegetated tiles, if I like. It might also be nice if it was a bit more flexible, and allow me to move a citizen if needed - I'm just not sure how that would work in a system where the tile is improved by placing a citizen. I don't know!

 

[Leyrann]

snip

Just dedicated my towns to producing food again (meaning they stop growing) in the Modern Era, here's how the area looks now. I will note that I took some effort to grab all the tiles in between Pompeii and Burdigala over, for example, fishing boats.

 

[Elhoim]

That's actually a good point. I'd like the option to be able to put a Farm over vegetated terrain. Mind you, I don't want to the return of chopping for Production (too gamey and micromanagey), but some way to convert a tile from Vegetated to Flat would be nice.

Yeah, or a farm in a rough tile with a river. Seeing an oasis become a quarry is also painful jajajaja

 

[AriochIV]

Yeah, Fishing Boats usually produce more food than Farms, which works against having lots of farmland. That doesn't seem like it should be the case.

 

[pokiehl]

Yeah, or a farm in a rough tile with a river. Seeing an oasis become a quarry is also painful jajajaja

Yeah, agreed. I hate how the quarries totally remove all the water from the "wet" tiles like oases. Looks ugly.