Relic/Artefact Spam and Stealing Victory + Soulless Ideologies

[jaegermeister]

I really hate this mechanic in this game. Basically, what the modern age cultural legacy boils down to is spamming archaeologists and mass excavating tiles before everyone else does. I also noticed that my military units cannot kill them working on MY tiles. What the hell? Or is this a bug?

Similarly in exploration age you just spam priests and mass convert urban or rural tiles mostly, which is just microing priests and/or trade caravans (given you have dawah trained unlocked in your religious perks). There is no natural spreading of religions. It's just not well-thought mechanic.

Some questions/ways to improve this poor mechanic:

1. Why can't we kill/assassinate these archaeologists or priests? Foreign powers just spam them and send them into our territory, we have literally no control over this. Why the heck is this so? We should be able to create an assassin/spy unit or at least have an espionage action to stop this nonsense for good. Otherwise this is just 'spam and win' kind of thing, and it's infuriating.

2. Why is there no inquisition/religious intolerance in this game? Why do I have to tolerate some foreign religion in my land? Why is it so simple to mass convert my towns and steal the win? Additionally, it makes more sense to get into the religion business AFTER some time in the game, otherwise, even if you were the first converter of a place, it gets converted to some other religion at the end of the age and you are left without any advantage. There should be some advantage of doing this from the get-go. Like, the first religion to become majority in that region should hold some sort of trait or resistance to conversion, otherwise what's the point for a city to follow a religion for 50 turns? Just go and convert it at the end of the era. And as I mentioned, there should be some inquisition mechanic in this game. We had this in previous Civ games. I hope we get it for Civ7 too. This was one of the core mechanics of denying the foreign religions. Why is it not there? Is this due to political correctness by Firaxis by any chance?

3. Ideologies are just colors, there is no influence of them on another. Your neighbor switches to communism and your civ does not get affected by that at all. It just feels like switching from blue to red. Completely bland and soulless. There should be some advantages and disadvantages of these switches. If you switch to something at least your border towns should start having the echoes of that switch and you should take prevention actions, OR rejoice that change and push for a revolution.

What do you make of all this? Do you feel what we have as religions, ideologies, archaeologists are OK?

 

[Krikkit1]

1. If an enemy unattackable Unit is in your territory, then moving a military unit next to it ought to send it back to its capital. (possibly with a time delay)

2. Conversions should require influence…amount could be based on policies/civics

3..There are advantages/disadvantages you get a whole set of bonuses that other ideologies can’t get. (it might not be enough, but it’s definitely there)

 

[jaegermeister]

I appreciate the answer.

1. Yes, that used to be the case in Civ6, and this is the worst-case scenario solution that some modders could implement already. BUT I'd still prefer inquisitor/hitman mechanic to be included in the game though. Not to have extra micro of these, no, I believe these should operate on their own like how spies operated in Civ6. You tasked them once, and they worked on the task, telling they failed or succeeded. You did not have to micro them tile by tile. You assigned them to the cities they had to operate in, and this worked quite nicely, actually.

2. Definitely agreed. In Civ6, if you were a theocracy, you would have better faith policies that could help you spread your religion. In Civ7, the government system selection has no role, you just get some % bonuses on your celebration and that's it. Why isn't there any difference in play between a republic and theocracy, apart from some % bonuses? Why is this working like a bonus picker? Where is the tree?

3. Ideologies yield bonuses to you as a player, but there is no influence of them on each other - it's just a color pick. You like red? Cool, with red, there comes your bonus this and that, that's it. This isn't how ideologies should work. Again, all this is just 'bonus picker' at the moment. Very soulless. Why is there no influence of them to your neighbours? I mean, your neighbor picks whatever, and you pick whatever, it's like your civilizations have absolutely no interaction, they are just living in separate universes, you know? There is no natural spread, natural resistance to ideologies or religions. You should definitely get some echoes across your border towns if your neighbor switches ideologies. Your civilization cannot just pretend like absolutely nothing next door.

 

[Krikkit1]

I appreciate the answer.

1. Yes, that used to be the case in Civ6, and this is the worst-case scenario solution that some modders could implement already. BUT I'd still prefer inquisitor/hitman mechanic to be included in the game though. Not to have extra micro of these, no, I believe these should operate on their own like how spies operated in Civ6. You tasked them once, and they worked on the task, telling they failed or succeeded. You did not have to micro them tile by tile. You assigned them to the cities they had to operate in, and this worked quite nicely, actually.

2. Definitely agreed. In Civ6, if you were a theocracy, you would have better faith policies that could help you spread your religion. In Civ7, the government system selection has no role, you just get some % bonuses on your celebration and that's it. Why isn't there any difference in play between a republic and theocracy, apart from some % bonuses? Why is this working like a bonus picker? Where is the tree?

3. Ideologies yield bonuses to you as a player, but there is no influence of them on each other - it's just a color pick. You like red? Cool, with red, there comes your bonus this and that, that's it. This isn't how ideologies should work. Again, all this is just 'bonus picker' at the moment. Very soulless. Why is there no influence of them to your neighbours? I mean, your neighbor picks whatever, and you pick whatever, it's like your civilizations have absolutely no interaction, they are just living in separate universes, you know? There is no natural spread, natural resistance to ideologies or religions. You should definitely get some echoes across your border towns if your neighbor switches ideologies. Your civilization cannot just pretend like absolutely nothing next door.

Well your relationship does decline.

I agree it might be good idea if having an ideology made your neighbors with no ideology unhappy (or gave them other penalties). Those would be removed if you picked the same ideology or changed to different if you picked a different ideology but maintained friendly relationships.

 

[MutilationWave]

There is no natural spread, natural resistance to ideologies or religions. You should definitely get some echoes across your border towns if your neighbor switches ideologies. Your civilization cannot just pretend like absolutely nothing next door.

I'm gonna echo Krikkit here and add something. In my games at least, if you have a different ideology from someone, you will eventually be at war, even if they've been your ally all game. I'm not sure what you mean about pretending nothing about next door. Different ideologies give huge negative relations that keep getting worse.

 

[jaegermeister]

That's just minus relations with other Civs that have different ideologies, and it doesnt matter if they are your next door or not. It's not what I am talking about .

I mean there is no biological affect of ideologies, same problem we have with religions in Civ7 - there is no real deal religion feeling in this game. You switch to fascism and your neighboring cities pretend like "oh so what? we are programmed to stay as is", you know? Maybe I am expecting too much from Civ7, but there was "natural spread" mechanic in other games that I played, like Victoria III. You cannot just sit and watch your neighbor falling to communism. Sooner or later your people will get influenced by these news, they will demand rights, unionize and get radical if you do not take measures. Kinda like how Bolshevik revolution influenced the red movements in Europe in 1910s/20s.

Same problem with religions. They just feel soulless. No effect whatsoever. They are just colors. You're Catholic and others something else, but there is actually no role in any of this. You do not set up alliances based on religious history with other civs. You tolerated their faith? Who cares? No influence. You persecuted their people? Who cares, zero effect.