My fear: that there are screens with text "xxx years later" between ages"

[Professor Phobo]

and that's why so many people seem to hate the idea. The point of the civilization series building an empire to stand the test of time. Who asked for that empire building to be split into three seperate, barely connected rounds?

Well, I dunno, the more I think about it, the more I think it's kind of cool your civilization is a broader series of "legacy builders" rather than strictly a continual empire. I'd rather three interesting phases to a game that tells a connected-but-staggered story than one long story, 2/3rds of which isn't super interesting.

Imagine a novel trilogy where the series is about a particular family but each individual novel is about one specific member of the family across the generations. Novel #2 might be about the kid of the main character in #1. Unambiguously a different character, different personality, different name, but also a descendant whose story is a component of a larger story about his roots and what he leaves for the next generation.

What I'm saying is Civilization VII is like an onion, it will have layers, but they'll make you cry. Is the metaphor getting away from me? yes.

 

[LastSword]

Rubber-banding and eliminating "science is king" are the main points of "split" eras.

It is the main innovation of the series and I am looking forward to it. Everything else matters little.
I would be fine with dark screen.

 

[Olle Wernersson]

It seems there is a jump of a few hundred years between the Antiquity and the Age of Exploration.

Source:

8:13-8:30

 

[Krikkit1]

It really doesn't make sense though. Some civilizations were completely left behind technologically, culturally, militarily, etc.

Bringing all civilizations back to the race's starting point at arbitrary points and then giving one a slight headstart isn't going to reflect or abract that reality and I don't think introducing abitrarily artifical and strict rubber banding mechanic (like Mario Kart) is the proper way to solve Civs running away with the game.

The ones that “in reality” were left behind
either
1. count as “changing civ” because someone took them over
2. are the independent cities you find in the new continent

 

[Arent11]

Gaining all the techs of a past era (unconfirmed AFAIK) might actually work. In all civ games, going heavy on Science has basically been a must. You could ignore Culture, Faith, and most game systems to some extent, but Science was king. Now, you might be able to push Science a few steps down the priority ladder for an era, and go completely nuts in something else, without sabotaging your ability to survive (or even participate in) the end-game eras. It is going to take some fine-tuning in balancing.... but it could add some serious diversity to gameplay.

That said, I hope more carries from one era to the next than just some sort of victory points and a legacy bonus. I'm excited about a roll back where you lose the extraneous bit of your power but keep the foundations, not a hard reset.

In Alpha Centauri, espionage and productions civs (Believers and Hive) were completely valid. Probably even the strongest.

 

[TheGrayFox]

The ones that “in reality” were left behind
either
1. count as “changing civ” because someone took them over
2. are the independent cities you find in the new continent

Most people don't want the Aztecs to be forced into changing into Mexico or the Shawnee to become the United States

 

[lt22677]

Most people don't want the Aztecs to be forced into changing into Mexico or the Shawnee to become the United States

They're not entirely wrong, imagine if they play Greece - Byzantium - Türkiye you'll see how angry the Greeks get

 

[Binkov]

It seems there is a jump of a few hundred years between the Antiquity and the Age of Exploration.

Source:

8:13-8:30

Crap. So they are indeed going that "hundreds of years later" route. Dont like feeling like a harbinger there.
If its any consolation, my harbinger sense tells me there is almost no way they won't go the hibernation route someone else mentioned above in the thread. AI taking over control won't happen.

 

[DWilson]

Well, I dunno, the more I think about it, the more I think it's kind of cool your civilization is a broader series of "legacy builders" rather than strictly a continual empire. I'd rather three interesting phases to a game that tells a connected-but-staggered story than one long story, 2/3rds of which isn't super interesting.

Imagine a novel trilogy where the series is about a particular family but each individual novel is about one specific member of the family across the generations. Novel #2 might be about the kid of the main character in #1. Unambiguously a different character, different personality, different name, but also a descendant whose story is a component of a larger story about his roots and what he leaves for the next generation.

What I'm saying is Civilization VII is like an onion, it will have layers, but they'll make you cry. Is the metaphor getting away from me? yes.

Your response made me want to recommend the Century Trilogy by Ken Follett

 

[DWilson]

Not what I wanted to hear, but there are two plausible interpretations:

Hibernation - The game calendar moves forward a few hundred years and, by having access to a different tech tree, you're also moving forward technologically to what people had a few hundred years later. But everything "concrete" in your civilization stays where it is: the settlements stay, the units stay, the terrain stays, the terrain improvements stay... Maybe a few of those get destroyed during the crisis or change state (ie, cities -> towns), but there's continuity of action.

OR

Loss of Control - You literally lose control for a few hundred years. Essentially, the screen goes black, the AI takes over and plays dozens of turns with every civs so that everything is different - or an equivalent bit of code that leads to a similar outcome but runs faster.


The latter would be pretty devastating for me.

The evidence strongly suggests the former rather than the latter

 

[DWilson]

In Alpha Centauri, espionage and productions civs (Believers and Hive) were completely valid. Probably even the strongest.

In Beyond Earth Rising Tides, the strongest was probably trade followed by espionage. But I always thought growth was underestimated

 

[Bonyduck Campersang]

Most people don't want the Aztecs to be forced into changing into Mexico or the Shawnee to become the United States

I prefer to think of it as the Aztec Empire descending into anarchy and years later the Mexican people, among others (Buganda, Maratha, France) emerging from it.

If my head holds I'll write up a mythos I've concocted to rationalise the rise and fall of empires in Civilization VII (as far as we know)

 

[Arent11]

In Beyond Earth Rising Tides, the strongest was probably trade followed by espionage. But I always thought growth was underestimated

Tried to buy it some days ago on steam, but it didn't run on windows 10 for some reason. So I had to refund it.

I like Beyond Earth, only the civs were a bit bland.

 

[aieeegrunt]

Your fear is my hope.

(OK, that's putting it strongly, but I rather like the idea that between each Age you'll be rebuilding anew from the ashes of bygone empires)

Or you could just start a new game, instead of the game designer deciding that for you.

The problem of snowballing and end game monotony in Civ is a complex thing to solve. I'm glad they're at least trying something a bit radical, remains to be seen whether it works or feels too unfair or artificial.

They are’nt trying to solve it at all. They are basically imposing a restart on you. It’s a complete cop out.

 

[Mr Jon of Cheam]

They are’nt trying to solve it at all. They are basically imposing a restart on you. It’s a complete cop out.

If you say so.

 

[Binkov]

Well, one idea for trying to solve snowballing might be:

If you research a tech that no one else has, its gonna be slower to research. If its some sort of beelined advanced tech, its gonna be super slow and inefficient to research.

If you are in a contact with a civ that has a tech you dont, that tech will be faster for you to research. If you trafe wirh them, its gonna be faster still.

If you fight against a player who has musketmen, while you dont, you will get a bonus for researching muskets.

When it comes to cities, simulating nationality of each population (i think civ 3 had that?) might help with stopping a quick conquest of other cities. Basically, make nationality be very hard and slow to change, and have conquered cities largley useless and a burden on economy and military for a long time. Also make razing cities come with a massive set of penalties. Especially after the medieval period.

Up until 1800s or so, have all cities that are far away from your core be quite unruly and expensive to keep in line.

Make large empires very hard to defend from outside powers, as most of the military is needed to simply keep the pooulation in check and empire from not breaking apart.

None of that is novel and most ideas were used in civ games in one way or another. But perhaps never all at once and not to the full degree.

Certainly, players who want to literally conquer 100% of earth and players who love super wide empires would not like such rubber banding rules.

 

[Mr Jon of Cheam]

Well, one idea for trying to solve snowballing might be:

If you research a tech that no one else has, its gonna be slower to research. If its some sort of beelined advanced tech, its gonna be super slow and inefficient to research.

If you are in a contact with a civ that has a tech you dont, that tech will be faster for you to research. If you trafe wirh them, its gonna be faster still.

If you fight against a player who has musketmen, while you dont, you will get a bonus for researching muskets.

When it comes to cities, simulating nationality of each population (i think civ 3 had that?) might help with stopping a quick conquest of other cities. Basically, make nationality be very hard and slow to change, and have conquered cities largley useless and a burden on economy and military for a long time. Also make razing cities come with a massive set of penalties. Especially after the medieval period.

Up until 1800s or so, have all cities that are far away from your core be quite unruly and expensive to keep in line.

Make large empires very hard to defend from outside powers, as most of the military is needed to simply keep the pooulation in check and empire from not breaking apart.

None of that is novel and most ideas were used in civ games in one way or another. But perhaps never all at once and not to the full degree.

Certainly, players who want to literally conquer 100% of earth and players who love super wide empires would not like such rubber banding rules.

It's possible that things like this could work but I don't know, they've tried all sorts of things over the history of the franchise and it has never really worked. Maybe the fundamental structure of Civ up until this point will always have an element of snowballing, so why not change that structure? It's worth a go imo.

 

[AlfaLeporis]

Well, one idea for trying to solve snowballing might be:

If you research a tech that no one else has, its gonna be slower to research. If its some sort of beelined advanced tech, its gonna be super slow and inefficient to research.

If you are in a contact with a civ that has a tech you dont, that tech will be faster for you to research. If you trafe wirh them, its gonna be faster still.

That's pretty much how it works in Realism Invictus in Civ4 and this is awesome - makes you think a few times before you open borders with someone because they will be able to research your tech faster. Beelining is solved by "ahead of time" penalty for research cost. As long as you have a few good relations, you can't get extremaly behind. Really sad Civ7 didn't go that way and instead we're getting this weird system.

 

[lt22677]

Firaxis could use many methods:

- Do you have an overly aggressive civilization? pact of defense and alliance against the bad boy

-A civilization has acquired an excessive scientific advantage, other nations make research pacts to reduce the gap (and the other methods mentioned above can also be done)

 

[aieeegrunt]

Well, one idea for trying to solve snowballing might be:

If you research a tech that no one else has, its gonna be slower to research. If its some sort of beelined advanced tech, its gonna be super slow and inefficient to research.

If you are in a contact with a civ that has a tech you dont, that tech will be faster for you to research. If you trafe wirh them, its gonna be faster still.

If you fight against a player who has musketmen, while you dont, you will get a bonus for researching muskets.

When it comes to cities, simulating nationality of each population (i think civ 3 had that?) might help with stopping a quick conquest of other cities. Basically, make nationality be very hard and slow to change, and have conquered cities largley useless and a burden on economy and military for a long time. Also make razing cities come with a massive set of penalties. Especially after the medieval period.

Up until 1800s or so, have all cities that are far away from your core be quite unruly and expensive to keep in line.

Make large empires very hard to defend from outside powers, as most of the military is needed to simply keep the pooulation in check and empire from not breaking apart.

None of that is novel and most ideas were used in civ games in one way or another. But perhaps never all at once and not to the full degree.

Certainly, players who want to literally conquer 100% of earth and players who love super wide empires would not like such rubber banding rules.

There are mods for Civ6 that do all of that and more, and they improve the game so much.

People who need to steamroll can play on Chieften, that is why it’s there.

It's possible that things like this could work but I don't know, they've tried all sorts of things over the history of the franchise and it has never really worked. Maybe the fundamental structure of Civ up until this point will always have an element of snowballing, so why not change that structure? It's worth a go imo.

We’ve tried nothing and are all out of ideas. Earlier civs did, and there is a plethora of mods for Civ6 as well