Refugee from Civ 5 - HELP NEEDED - is there a way to fix this game?

[consentient]

In a nutshell:

• - I am a veteran Civ 5 player with 6000-7000 hours logged
• - I bought Civ 6 a couple of days ago
• - As it stands, I really can't get along with it, nothing makes sense to me.
• - Even on Settler difficulty, it seems really hard to achieve anything, even when focusing one particular area. For instance, on Civ 5 if you went all-in on religion, you would be pretty successful in spreading it. My first game was on Prince and I got overrun with barbarians. Restarted on Settler to try and learn the game. Focused on religion, converted 2 or 3 cities besides my own, but then got dogpiled by everyone as if I was doing something terrible.
• - The game is SO different from Civ 5 and way more complicated, and there seems to be no way to know what to do or how to make sense of it all

Can anyone tell me:

- if anyone has put together comprehensive guides about optimal strategies
- if there are mods that fix this mad pile of weirdness into something more playable?

Steam would not refund me because I played more than 2 hours, and don't seem to understand that a game of this complexity will not reveal itself fully until more than 2 hours have been played

Therefore, I either need to find a way to salvage this game or just resign myself to having lost $40.

Would be very grateful for any help received

 

[Haig]

I have thousands of hours in both Civ 5 and 6, and I feel that Civ 6 is the most rewarding one.

I recommend you give it another chance, maybe dont focus on religion but on the core mechanics.

 

[Quintillus]

It's a bit hard to tell what aspects are proving troublesome based on your description, but you mentioned getting overrun with barbarians which is a hint. While imperfect, IMO the combat AI is much better in Civ6 than in Civ5. I never felt challenged by the combat AI in V, and almost never lost a unit; that was a factor in why I went back to III and IV.

By contrast, I do lose units in Civ VI. I have lost cities to barbarians (playing on Prince). Especially if a city doesn't have walls, barbarians are a significant hazard.

So, build walls, especially on the periphery. Keep units garrisoned or at least nearby cities on the edge of the empire. If you're settling close to a barbarian camp, you might need to send a couple units to clear things out before building a city. Beware of ships, they can attack coastal cities. Early units are fairly cheap and low maintenance, build them. Consider the Limes policy, which gives a 50% bonus to Walls production, as well as the policies that boost unit production rates and, if needed, decrease unit maintenance.

Build builders to build quarries and mines to boost production early; this is more important than farms as you'll usually be limited by housing or happiness or both in the early parts of the game. The extra production can be put into more units to avoid being overrun. I also like the policy that gives +1 production in every city; it's not a lot, but early on that can be the difference between having walls before barbarians discover your city, and not.

I agree with the suggestion not to focus on religion until you have the basics down. Holy Sites take a fair amount of resources early on, and don't do anything for helping you expand and deal with barbarians.

(That's another difference in VI versus V; it returns to the "wider" playstyle of I through IV where more cities is generally a good thing. V leaned more towards a "tall" playstyle where having too many cities early was strongly discouraged. As someone who's played a lot of V, you may be under-emphasizing expansion. VI also has the barbarians evolve technologically at a halfway decent rate, so under-expansion and insufficient defenses can be quite dangerous. If I see a small nearby AI struggling with barbarians, I'll intentionally avoid settling close enough to cause the barbarians to move towards me instead, so that they continue to harass the AI, and those AIs pretty consistently wind up near the bottom of the rankings)

I'd need more info on what you've been doing and what's been going wrong to make suggestions beyond that, but as someone who's played 3 games of VI, that's my advice on how not to get overrun with barbarians, and how to get to the mid-game on Prince in a competitive position.

 

[UWHabs]

One thing to note is that especially after some of the expansions, you don't actually need to rush religion nearly as much as in some iterations. Some games you can honestly even get a couple cities in before you get holy sites in, and still get one of the later religions. Sure, if you want the first pick of dedications you need to get there quick, and some games will go faster than others, but you can still play religious game without beelining it 100% from turn 1. And with religion, if you do aggressively spread it to a neighbour, not all will take kindly to that, so yeah, be sure that you are prepared for them.

2 mods to help learn the game would be advanced map tacks and the extended policy cards, I think they're called. Both do a great job at not changing the core game, but simply telling you more information. The Map Tacks mod will let you play around with putting pins on a map and seeing how districts (and even improvements) change. The policy cards mod will give you a hint basically at which cards might be more valuable to run. Neither are perfect or account for every factor, but they get you closer at least and can really help you understand those parts of the game.

 

[Disgustipated]

The game has its quirks. I was eased into it by watching some Let's Play videos before I even bought the game 7 years ago. Once you get the hang of it, it's not overly difficult or complicated. It's just getting a handle on how the AI behaves, including barbarian ai. You definitely need to be more proactive on barbarian camps, at least ones near you (if they are by a city state usually they will take care of it).

The only other thing is district placement. But on an average difficulty level, placement isn't that important. Just try to get a +1 or +2 bonus and you'll be fine. Put a campus next to a couple of mountains and/or coastal reef. Commerical hub next to river. Industrial zone next to mines/quarries and aqueduct. The important thing is balance. Don't neglect building units to go for a religion unless you are sure you can handle any near barbarian camp.

In addition to the 2 mods mentioned above, you can also get the quick deals mod. Some may say this makes the game too easy. But for someone like me who is lazy about contacting the leaders searching for the best deals, it's lifesaver. It will solve a lot of gold problems. Don't be afraid to trade away your only luxury in the early game too. That gold can come in handy.

 

[Futumch]

Zigzagzigal's guides over on the Steam community inferior board are worth a look if you're just getting your head around how to play.
Click here --> Zigzagzigal's guides
I find all sorts of little nuggets of information there about Civs I haven't played in ages, or strategies for certain victories. Definately worth a look.

 

[Ordnael]

Not to sound patronizing here, but did you tried the tutorial first? I did, then I played my first game at prince difficulty and it went smoothly, can't remember if I won or lost though. When I got anthology and tried the game with GS rules (never played RF rules) I, again, played the tutorial first and then proceeded to a very easy prince win, actually got Kupe's first settler and swiftly eradicated the Maori from the game...true story, already wrote about it in the forums

 

[Bonyduck Campersang]

While I find Civ5 better overall Civ6 does some things much better. They're both excellent games, and I wouldn't recommend refunding Civ6.

I also jumped onto Civ6 from Civ5, and as of now I play Civ6 at the same level (Prince) as I play Civ5. I'm not even a serious player, I don't plan long-term or min-max yields, I just amble about aimlessly looking to do something real cool . So if I can play Civ6 decently well, I'm sure you can too

I also found barbarians rather overwhelming at the start, but now I can manage them just fine.

At the bare minimum, you want at least one warrior (though two is better), and a slinger stationed in your city. Also get the policy card that gives your units +50% combat strength against barbarians. First time a barbarian scout sights you, let him go back to the camp to tell his buddies. (The ! icon on the unit tells you that it's seen your settlement and it's going back to the outpost to alert the rest of his pals, who will swarm you unless you kill the scout before he can get back home.) When their military arrives, time your attacks so that your slinger achieves the killing blow. You'll get a Eureka for Archery. Research it immediately, upgrade your slinger, and now you have a defensive death machine (for the Ancient Era at least).

You can then train another archer or the just recently upgraded one, send him with a warrior to an outpost, your warrior will shield your archer from the defending spearman while your archer pummels the spearman from a safe distance, then move your warrior in and finish off the outpost. Alternatively you can just use the archer to approach the outpost from one direction and the warrior from another, just make sure they're equidistant from the outpost, the spearman gets out to get your archer (barbarian spearmen just can't resist archer bait, also workers and settlers are also their weaknesses), move your warrior into the empty outpost and you finish it off in one move. Now your spearman must have hurt your archer, but if you planned it right your archer and warrior were both a tile or two away from the outpost, so the spearman is now sandwiched between the two of them. Attack with your archer and your warrior to finish off the spearman.

Rinse and repeat for all other problematic barbarian outposts

 

[SupremacyKing2]

In a nutshell:

• - I am a veteran Civ 5 player with 6000-7000 hours logged
• - I bought Civ 6 a couple of days ago
• - As it stands, I really can't get along with it, nothing makes sense to me.
• - Even on Settler difficulty, it seems really hard to achieve anything, even when focusing one particular area. For instance, on Civ 5 if you went all-in on religion, you would be pretty successful in spreading it. My first game was on Prince and I got overrun with barbarians. Restarted on Settler to try and learn the game. Focused on religion, converted 2 or 3 cities besides my own, but then got dogpiled by everyone as if I was doing something terrible.
• - The game is SO different from Civ 5 and way more complicated, and there seems to be no way to know what to do or how to make sense of it all

civ6 is indeed very different than civ5. So I am not surprised that you are experiencing a difficult learning curve. It sounds like you are trying to play civ6 like it is civ5 and that is why you are losing. So my guess is you are keeping just one city and focusing on building it up with monument, granary, holy site district for religion and neglecting your military. That is a sure way to lose in civ6.

Here are a few key things to understand:
- civ6 rewards expansion and going "wide" more than civ5. So you want to "spam" cities. You should not hesitate to have 6-7 cities by the end of the classical age.
- Early military is more important than in civ5. You need to build more units in civ6 than in civ5. And in civ6, barbarians will spawn near you and try to sack your cities if you don't protect them. Spam a few warriors and then archers once you unlock the tech early to protect your cities. And always escort your settlers with a military unit or your settler will get stolen by barbarians or another civ.
- Use your early warriors and archers to hunt down and kill barbarian outposts as soon as possible to prevent them from spamming units. Also, killing barbarian outposts will give you gold you can use to rush buy stuff.
- My early game is always this: spam a warrior or two first, then build a settler, spam another 2 warriors, build a setter, build an archer etc... I use 1 warrior for exploration and use the other ones for defense. When I find a barbarian outpost, I kill it as quickly as possible.

If you do these two things (spam some early warriors and archers and then expand with cities) you should have a decent start on settler.

Other things:
- Get walls as soon as possible as they will greatly protect your cities and add a ranged attack. Also, put an archer in the walled city for a second ranged attack. Your cities will be much safer early on.
- Always keep a strong military (as many units as your economy can afford) to deter other civs. The AI will not hesitate to declare a surprise war against you if they perceive your military as weaker than theirs.
- when you get commercial districts. build at least one early on and get traders. Trade routes will greatly boost your economy early on and prevent your economy from going into the red because of too many units. Also, get the policy card that makes unit maintenance cheaper since that will also help you from going into the red.
- Pick your first government based on your focus in the early game. If you need to fight wars or planning conquests, go oligarchy to boost your combat strength, If you are focusing on wonders, go autocracy for the wonder bonus. If you are planning to play peaceful and build districts, go classical republic for the bonus to Great Persons. I almost never go autocracy. I usually go oligarchy to boost my military to further help me against barbarians and early wars.
- Ignore holy sites early, unless you are trying for a religious victory (but I find the religious victory super boring since it requires spamming missionaries and evangelists and micro managing them to convert cities).
- Pay attention to your policy cards. They replace the traditions in civ5. They allow you to customize your empire. For example, get the policy card that makes settlers cheaper when you are building settlers. That will make your expansion go faster. get the card that makes builders cheaper and gives you extra charges when you are focused on builders because that will make improving your terrain go faster. In civ6, your builders improve terrain instantly but use limited charges. Once they use up all their charges, they die. So for example, they start with 3 charges meaning they can improve 3 terrain tiles before they go away and you have to build another builder.
- Always use the "discipline" policy card in your military slot as soon as you get. This will boost your military against barbarians and make it much easier to defeat barbarians.
- You get policy cards from your civics. You can change cards for free when you get a new civic. If you want to change cards at other times, it will cost gold. Governments have different slots (military, economy, diplomacy and wild). Cards can only go in their category (military cards in military slots etc...) The exception is the wild slots can take any card. You will note that governments have different number of slots in each category. Some governments give you more military slots but fewer economy slots. This will make governments better at certain play styles than others.
If you do these two things (spam some early warriors and archers and then expand with cities) you should have a decent start on settler.
- Early wars can be really good in civ6. Spam 2-3 warriors and a couple archers and rush a nearby civ. On settler, you should able to conquer the AI civs pretty easily. Conquering a couple neighbors early (ancient and classical age) will set you up for a much easier game since you will have fewer enemies and more space to spam cities. You can them expand to 8-9 cities easily with no opposition, and dominate your continent.

I know it is a lot. There are more mechanics in civ6 than civ5 but once you learn them, they are not complicated.

Hope this helps.

I would encourage you to stick with it. civ6 is good once you learn the mechanics. Also, maybe watch some civ6 playthroughs. Hopefully, you will learn a few tips that way.

Good luck and don't hesitate to ask questions.

 

[consentient]

Yeah, looking back at my OP, I can see that the barbarians thing seems to have misled the issue. Sorry for that. It was just one of the many things that's been griping me here.

The main issue I have is that eras are over before I have a chance to DO anything in them. I started another game, on Deity, no barbarians, just to get a sense of the AI. Had no drama from anyone, even my nearest neighbour, who just sat there while I converted all 5 of his cities to my religion. had 2 CS allies, had the most pop or any known civ, but:

- my 2 scouts had still not found the whole map by like T120 or sth. Scouting progress seems woefully slow compared with V
- eras are so short that it seems like there is no way to build all the buildings of that era (I built no units purely to see how readily the AIs would DoW me. None did.
- The interactions started by the AI seem to make no sense and have no relation to what I'm doing
- I enjoyed one of my CS alliances for absolutely ages, with the relationship appearing strong, then suddenly in one turn another player was suzerain and there was no notification to tell me how or why this occurred
- even when I got the thing that said 'units can embark', one of my settlers simply refused to do it
- the maps are dreadful. I guess playing with Hellblazer on V for almost 10 years kinda spoiled me, but the maps here seem geographically inaccurate AND provide so few good city locations, you really have to just stick them anywhere. Also that whole thing where the map your units can't see is made to look like a paper map, is just awful. Worst design decision in a game, ever, IMO

But yes, the thing I absolutely don't understand is that the number of hammers available per era seems to promote a playstyle where you either

- focus on a wonder
OR
- 2 or 3 buildings
OR
- a few units
OR
- some projects and improvements

I wish there was a way of extending the eras without slowing production. In V, eras were based off your tech pace. This 'Ancient Era ends in T minus 5 turns and counting' thing is just... well I have no words.

 

[consentient]

It sounds like you are trying to play civ6 like it is civ5 and that is why you are losing. So my guess is you are keeping just one city and focusing on building it up with monument, granary, holy site district for religion and neglecting your military.

I've tried various different approaches, none of them seemed particularly effective, and none of them were fun

You should not hesitate to have 6-7 cities by the end of the classical age.

Fine, but from what I can see, doing this would mean that at the end of classical, so many hammers have gone to Settlers that I'd have maybe 2 or 3 other things in each city to build

- Early military is more important than in civ5. You need to build more units in civ6 than in civ5. And in civ6, barbarians will spawn near you and try to sack your cities if you don't protect them. Spam a few warriors and then archers once you unlock the tech early to protect your cities. And always escort your settlers with a military unit or your settler will get stolen by barbarians or another civ.

I understand that there is very little overlap between playerbases (on this forum) between the two games, but I was known as something of a warmonger on the Civ V forums. I rarely built buildings. But production is so slow that I cannot imagine how an Archer rush is possible in this game.

I DO appreciate everyone's replies, but what I'm looking for is something ROUGHLY like the guide I put together for warfare on Civ V:

Domination on Immortal/Deity - a noob's guide

[Please note this guide is still under construction, so while I value input, it might also be a good idea to wait and see if I add the thing that you think is missing ;) ] Disclaimers:- 1. I am not the best warmonger on these forums. But I am someone who made a switch from mostly peaceful...

forums.civfanatics.com

 

[Bonyduck Campersang]

The main issue I have is that eras are over before I have a chance to DO anything in them. I started another game, on Deity, no barbarians, just to get a sense of the AI. Had no drama from anyone, even my nearest neighbour, who just sat there while I converted all 5 of his cities to my religion. had 2 CS allies, had the most pop or any known civ, but:

I hate the pace of the game too, which is why the Historical Speed mod is a must-activate for me

I enjoyed one of my CS alliances for absolutely ages, with the relationship appearing strong, then suddenly in one turn another player was suzerain and there was no notification to tell me how or why this occurred

The other player simply had more envoys than you. You get envoys from completing CS quests as well as acquiring them through influence points. I don't remember how you increase rate of influence points, but one of the ways is the Diplomatic Quarter (from the New Frontier Pass DLC)

 

[SupremacyKing2]

Fine, but from what I can see, doing this would mean that at the end of classical, so many hammers have gone to Settlers that I'd have maybe 2 or 3 other things in each city to build

In the very early game, I only use my capital to spam settlers since it is the only city with decent production. My other cities will focus on a monument first. But yes, if you focus only on building settlers, you will not build other things. That is the trade-off you need to make.

I understand that there is very little overlap between playerbases (on this forum) between the two games, but I was known as something of a warmonger on the Civ V forums. I rarely built buildings. But production is so slow that I cannot imagine how an Archer rush is possible in this game.

You do not rush with archers only. You rush with warriors in the ancient age and add a couple archers (optional) in the classical age. Usually, your capital will be the best city to spam early units since it will have the best production.

The strategy should be:
- build warriors in your capital. Send warriors to rush nearby civ.
- then build slingers.Upgrade slingers to archers.
- Send warriors with archers to rush nearby civ.
- If you can get early iron, upgrade your warriors to swordsmen to help take cities in the classical era.

You should also switch the city focus to production to help boost production if you don't want to manually micro the tiles the city works. Also, getting a builder out to improve tiles can help boost production too.

Of course, some civs are better at the rush strategy than others. Civs with a unique early unit are usually good. So the Nubians with the unique archer and the Gauls with the unique warrior are good. The Greeks with the hoplite are good too. If you get iron early, the Romans are fantastic for a classical era war with their legion unit.

 

[consentient]

I hate the pace of the game too, which is why the Historical Speed mod is a must-activate for me

Thanks, I will look into it

 

[SupremacyKing2]

But yes, the thing I absolutely don't understand is that the number of hammers available per era seems to promote a playstyle where you either

- focus on a wonder
OR
- 2 or 3 buildings
OR
- a few units
OR
- some projects and improvements

I think that might be by design because in each era, you pick a dedication which will heavily influence whether or not, you achieve a golden age or fall into dark age. So the game wants you to make a decision about what you will focus on in each era. if you select the dedication that rewards era points for building districts, then you will want to focus on districts to earn as many era points as possible. And you can focus on wonders to earn more era points but that might come at the expense of your military. Or you might focus on you military to conquer your neighbors but then you don't achieve enough era points so you fall into a dark age. I think it is designed to make the player have to make tough choices.

I wish there was a way of extending the eras without slowing production. In V, eras were based off your tech pace. This 'Ancient Era ends in T minus 5 turns and counting' thing is just... well I have no words.

In civ6, the world era is based on the median of every civ's tech and civic progress. So depending on quickly civs research stuff, eras can end sooner or later.

But I agree about the eras being too quick. It does feel like you barely have time to do much and then the era is over. I also wish that eras would be longer but without slowing down production. But short of a mod, that is how the game is.

 

[Alexander's Hetaroi]

I understand that there is very little overlap between playerbases (on this forum) between the two games, but I was known as something of a warmonger on the Civ V forums. I rarely built buildings. But production is so slow that I cannot imagine how an Archer rush is possible in this game.

Have you considered using slingers? I find them to be much easier and quicker to upgrade them into archers and they are easier to build/purchase. By getting a kill with them it will help you learn Archery quicker.

The other player simply had more envoys than you. You get envoys from completing CS quests as well as acquiring them through influence points. I don't remember how you increase rate of influence points, but one of the ways is the Diplomatic Quarter (from the New Frontier Pass DLC)

The main way is by your government. The more advanced your government is the more influence points you get per turn. Monarchy government also increases it by 50% and the legacy bonus is 20%.

 

[Bonyduck Campersang]

Thanks, I will look into it

I haven't played Civ6 for a while, but I think this was the mod I used:

Steam Workshop::Epic Eras (Extended Eras / Historic Game Speed for Vanilla/R&F/GS)

steamcommunity.com

 

[vorlon_mi]

I found this video

and its follow-ons, "Civ 6 Overexplained" to be very helpful. Potato McWhiskey aims this video at a player who understands 4X games, at Prince difficulty, and goes slowly enough to understand his reasoning. Potato uses 4-5 videos to go through the first few eras, invade a neighbor, and expand into good city locations.

I've played a lot of Civ3, BERT, and some Civ4 and Civ5, so I knew many of the basics of empire management. But some Civ6 behaviors were counter-intuitive. These include:

• Harvesting, rather than improving, bonus resources. Since builder charges are limited -- rather than unlimited workers in Civ5 and earlier -- one must be thoughtful about how to use those charges.
• Building slingers, more troops than I usually do. I usually build a couple of warriors for fog-busting, but Civ6 rewards early warmongering and defending against barbs. The barbs surprised me with their fierceness, in the early early game
• The rewards for pillaging when invading an AI. Both the gold *and science* from pillaging can be comparable to 2-3 turns worth of one's own production

 

[Nigel_Tufnel2]

Hey Consentient, good to see you trying VI!

Easiest advice I can give is to play Rome. Roads automatically hook up new cites, and the free Monument really helps with culture.

 

[consentient]

Hey Nige! I still have fond memories of you defeating Oda with his 200 or so cities

I actually finished a game of Civ 6 this evening. Domination in around T250ish with... *drumroll* artillery and cavalry, just like in 5. I have to say, I don't think I will play again. No part of what they've added feels fun to me, and the stuff that is objectively worse, like unit movement, is just a real drag.

So, pls let me extend both thanks and apologies to those who've responded to try and help me out. I just don't like this game. Maybe VII will be the sweetspot?