Late game still seems weak?

[Ovarwa]

Hi,

The tipping point in 4x games, in which the tedium far outweighs interest or challenge is hardly unique to Civ. Most games reach "Ugh, I know exactly how this ends, do I really want to slog through the next umpteen turns," long before the game ends, long before all those cool late game features really matter.

Attempts to constrain the late game also work against the AI, which is always much weaker than the late game design, resulting in, once again, the late game not really being the weak link.

Anyway,

Ken

 

[joncnunn]

Moderator Action: Seven posts moved into new Climate Change Idea thread in Ideas & Suggestions: http://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/climate-change-idea.599433/

 

[Big J Money]

I think Age of Wonders III accomplishes this well due to how things work differently in combination.

Late game means you're getting to see how your late game Race + Class + Skill/Spell schools you chose work out as a strategy. Plus what other races you added to your empire. So every late game you have different combination of toys to play with. Every early game too, for that matter.

Civ doesn't really have RPG specialization elements since every civ can eventually get (almost) every tech and civic. So I think this has maybe something to do with it. So it might be a more interesting game if the Civic tree were not like the tech tree, but required specialization.

 

[need my speed]

When a civ is close to winning (be it a human or an AI) the others should ally against him.

No, most certainly not. This is an absolutely terrible idea for more or less half - I'd bet more, actually, for many of these wouldn't be active online - of all players, who care not about winning, but about playing, having fun, with AI's that have their own rational personalities. The only thing this would achieve is for people to simply play with victory conditions off.

 

[Big J Money]

I agree that AI behavior should be tweaked. When a civ is close to winning (be it a human or an AI) the others should ally against him.

You know the AI played more like this in Civ V andt then they reverted that behavior right? That's a very controversial concept in this community, and I don't think all the designers would get behind that idea again any time soon either.

 

[ls612]

A mod for Civilization IV and kinda for Civilization V implemented Revolutions. Cities in these mods could grow increasing unstable the further away from the capital they were, the more isolated (not connected by roads) they were, and a lot of other reasons. In the latter mod, cities would form city-states while in the former, cities would become entirely new civilizations.

However, dissolution of empires really doesn't seem to be Civilization's goal. Unlike the idea about the Revolutions mods, or behind some recent games like Stellaris, Civilization doesn't really want the world to be *too* dynamic.

The problem was that the REV mod was hot garbage as far as balance went. There was no way to get it to be challenging without it breaking up the AI into 50 different one city civs after a while.

 

[Atlas627]

I have a plan for a mod that should help address the issue of lategame boredom by addressing the necessary mechanic of snowball. I would appreciate feedback and help with brainstorming. http://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/stand-the-test-of-time-overhaul-mod-brainstorming.573232/

The general idea is that the game requires snowball because the only way to claim victory is to be winning at the end of the timeline. Thus, the only point in winning early is that it will result in winning late, aka snowball. If we make the victory condition dependent upon doing well as much as possible throughout the game, then we no longer require as much snowball and can implement some catchup mechanics.

 

[KrikkitTwo]

That

I have a plan for a mod that should help address the issue of lategame boredom by addressing the necessary mechanic of snowball. I would appreciate feedback and help with brainstorming. http://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/stand-the-test-of-time-overhaul-mod-brainstorming.573232/

The general idea is that the game requires snowball because the only way to claim victory is to be winning at the end of the timeline. Thus, the only point in winning early is that it will result in winning late, aka snowball. If we make the victory condition dependent upon doing well as much as possible throughout the game, then we no longer require as much snowball and can implement some catchup mechanics.

That would be a good idea
-make "score" the primary victory
-every turn your score goes up based on how well you are doing that turn
-civ with the highest total score at turn X wins (or first civ to total score X)

So a "Rome" could still get a good score in the classical, but would slowly fall behind other civs that outlasted it....but it might still beat an "America"/"Japan" that only had good scores in the last few eras.

 

[Atlas627]

That

That would be a good idea
-make "score" the primary victory
-every turn your score goes up based on how well you are doing that turn
-civ with the highest total score at turn X wins (or first civ to total score X)

So a "Rome" could still get a good score in the classical, but would slowly fall behind other civs that outlasted it....but it might still beat an "America"/"Japan" that only had good scores in the last few eras.

This is sorta the idea I was doing, with some tweaks.

First, I have specific timings for checking score, which are dependent upon world events. Thus, players can influence when and thus how much they and others get scored.

Second, these scorings only check specific things, which are different for each scoring. So in Classical, we care about Great People, expanding, getting a government, and building Wonders. In Medieval, we care about founding and spreading a religion, having a strong standing army, etc. This means that someone that is strong in the Classical might not be strong in the Medieval, and someone that was "weak" in the Classical might be strong in the Medieval.

Third, the game ends when the last era is scored. So you still go through all of history and check who stood the test of time. Completing one of the original victory conditions grants you a lot of points, so you're still incentivized to do those.

 

[Zenstrive]

Don't we have a more active science victory? You need to complete phases to do it? Looks like an interesting endgame.

 

[Kouvb593kdnuewnd]

The game do have civilizations that are cleary late game bloomers and others that are early game bloomers.

The early game bloomers include amongst others Rome and Sumeria and these civs have the tools needed to have a very strong early game but it comes with a price of having a very average late game. Their only late game strength is their strong early game.

America is a late ame bloomer, althougth it do have an early game bonus is true strength is unlocked in the late game. I know people will say that late game do not matter but that is not true. Most victories will come in the late game and Americas bonuses could give it the edge it needs. America have also a physiological advantage in that as a civ it grow stronger and stronger as time passes while many others grow weaker and weaker. Even if the early game bloomers have large empires america may be stronger due to its bonuses.