Maps that lend themselves to Warfare

[yung.carl.jung]

I'll be honest, I absolutely hate every single map type in Civ 6. I think the new map generation algorhythm is atrocious and an insult to Civ players, it is also strictly a downgrade from Civ 5 in any way imagineable. 9/10 Pangeas that I roll either have a mountain range completely cutting me off (I mean literally, not even exaggerating here), or water cutting me off (despite sea level being set to low), or place me more than 12 hexes away from any AI. This might be really nice if you love playing peacefully, but it is absolutely infuriating if you like to actually engage other players / city states.

In Civ 5 there was a map type called Great Plains, two actually. Imho that was the best map type that ever came from the Civ series, it actually made defending on Deity a real challenge and simultaneously allowed a capable player to stomp an AI if they had a contemporary, balanced army. In my entire playtime of Civ 6, I haven't really had one good war. It was either a one-sided slaughterfest, or a boring slog where the AI just suicided units into me. I don't think I ever lost a city in my ~100 games. And I don't settle defensively. A few hills or one mountain tile or even a river is usually enough to send the AI into constant military spasms.

Believe me, I have tested all of the map options the game has to offer. I don't like a single one. The most tolerable map for me is Lakes with low sea level, but even then you often don't have an adjacent AI or CS, even then more often than not you're blocked. Even when maximizing the amount of CS and AIs in my game, I often do not have any neighbours closer than 10 hexes. I just genuinely want to enjoy scouting and warmongering, but with most of my current games the units I build are entirely useless outside of defending against barbs and getting a few Eurekahs.

I saw that Hellblazer published a map package, are those any good? Do you know of any fan-made map types that I could use? Are there any settings I could play with to make the standard map types more friendly to warfare? Do you yourself struggle with mountain ranges, being cut off, or simply not having any AI or CS adjacent? Thank you in advance for your answer!

 

[Victoria]

Parameters are the likely cause. For a start
CITY_MIN_DISTANCE_FOR_INCURSION" Value="8" I believe settling within 8 of a cap is considered time for brutal war.
Then there is START_DISTANCE_MAJOR_CIVILIZATION" Value="12" ... it is no wonder you are not finding any closer, you could always try and change it (gobal params of the base game)
One must consider loyalty as well.

@yung.carl.jung when civs were closer as in vanilla it was easier to take them out. Just build archers and attack your nearest. Even better have them attack you. In GS if you do not attack for 30 turns you may find more of a challenge but yes it is strabnge hobbling but this closer civs is not necessarily better and does freak out loyalty rules.... maybe it is the loyalty you do not like? it is another reason to have longer distances, it is not so easy just to walk up and take and keep a city.

GS is not civ 5 not vanilla civ 6, it is a different game and they have tried to limit the walk over warmonger a bit. Your approach seems to be "I prefer vanilla" which is your choice.

 

[yung.carl.jung]

I'm not even playing with loyalty It's not a part of patched Vanilla right now. Can't say I prefer Vanilla at all since I haven't played GS nor RF. Thank you so much for these parameters, I didn't know having no neighbors (no civ 10 tiles or closer to you) was literally hard coded into the game. no wonder I never get maps I like.

 

[Victoria]

no wonder I never get maps I like.

There is also grievances to consider now. I got tired of fake peace games and hard pure brutality gets boring. There is now a middle ground which to me feels more real where you play without getting hundreds of grievances which also means you benefit from great trade. Part of this approach is the first parameter above but there does seem to be another which seems to be settling quite close to their capital seems to guarantee a war with them. Certainly cutting off their expansion points does the same. They declare on you so you get the grievance against them meaning you can take a couple of cities at least before anyone starts getting less than happy.

 

[yung.carl.jung]

I mostly got used to not having a single trade with the AI post T100. I'm universally hated in every single one of my games, it was the same in Civ 5. I often have good relations starting out, I prioritize gifts (like Open Borders) and pleasing their agenda, but then when it comes to mid- lategame I just stop caring at all.

 

[tetley]

I mostly got used to not having a single trade with the AI post T100. I'm universally hated in every single one of my games, it was the same in Civ 5. I often have good relations starting out, I prioritize gifts (like Open Borders) and pleasing their agenda, but then when it comes to mid- lategame I just stop caring at all.

I look for hate-triangles in diplomacy. I see Joe hates Pete. So I negotiate joint war vs. Pete, or I ask Joe to join ongoing war. Or better yet, they go to war with each other and one of them declares a Military emergency. I then get a zero-grievance Casus belli, and everyone but Pete loves me for it.

 

[Bangau]

Do you set world age (or what's it called?) to have less mountains and hills? Makes you an easier target for the AI.

Problem remains that the AI in VI still seems unfocused on any victory condition, particularly domination. In V and earlier versions I often found an AI (or even two) who were actually on their way to a victory, so it was a challenge to stop them (I'm a bit better at VI though then I ever was at V and earlier, could be it.) I love many aspects of VI, and in the early game you can sometimes get in nasty situations given the right map and opponents. I more and more play maps I know will make it harder to survive the early game (e.g. Terra map with extra AI, war and loyalty issues from turn 25 to solve). Sometimes I get my but kicked, often I find a way to survive, but rarely when I emerge from the initial struggles I find AI that have significantly gotten ahead. They focus on too many things at once. Have great armies, but try (poorly) to win a culture victory... Are ten techs ahead in science, build 15 spaceports instead of 3 or 4 in cities that take 50 turns to do so... Put all their production in emergency projects with no chance whatsoever to win diplo... I understand to some extent why it's not that easy to build a proper AI for a game like this (have a master in AI...), but the AI doesn't seem written to win, just to give you a little challenge and then let you win. From a commercial perspective I understand why you don't want a game to beat you every time. That's no fun. But even on a difficulty level called 'deity'? You should have godlike skills to beat it on that level, no mistakes allowed, but many of us can beat deity easily while playing far from optimally. Ah well, somehow I still keep finding ways to have fun with this game, there's a lot to make up for the mediocre AI.

 

[yung.carl.jung]

It's truly not easy to build a great AI, but it's also not impossible. The Civ 5 AI was exactly as you described the Civ 6 one, unfocussed, always going for suboptimal builds, damaging themselves via city penalties or getting stuck in infinite wars and never going towards any VC at all.. but there was one mod who basically overhauled the entire AI "flavor" system. I think it didn't really touch on anything besides their decision making: preferring certain techs and buildings over others etc. It made it into a whole different game, incredibly challenging and more rewarding. It's called Acken Mod if you ever feel like checking it out. It seems like a big endorsement, but for me it really "fixed" the AI completely. It was so effective actually that only a handful of people ever beat the highest difficulty. Took me weeks, I'm still haunted by that game.

 

[Fluphen Azine]

It's truly not easy to build a great AI, but it's also not impossible. The Civ 5 AI was exactly as you described the Civ 6 one, unfocussed, always going for suboptimal builds, damaging themselves via city penalties or getting stuck in infinite wars and never going towards any VC at all.. but there was one mod who basically overhauled the entire AI "flavor" system. I think it didn't really touch on anything besides their decision making: preferring certain techs and buildings over others etc. It made it into a whole different game, incredibly challenging and more rewarding. It's called Acken Mod if you ever feel like checking it out. It seems like a big endorsement, but for me it really "fixed" the AI completely. It was so effective actually that only a handful of people ever beat the highest difficulty. Took me weeks, I'm still haunted by that game.

Makes sense since @Acken is a heck of a Civ Player!