Revamping the district/wonder/building system for Civ VII

[moysturfurmer]

I know Civ VII is definitely too far along for Firaxis to change the gameplay model of Civ VII, but this is just something I’m hoping they do:

Cities got too damn big in Civ VII. Between wonders taking up full tiles, tons of tile improvements, and like 15 districts, cities just got too messy and didn’t really feel all that cohesive. I think the district system was a great start, but think they could simplify it considerably.

Instead of having to build separate districts for each type of resource, I propose that there should be 4 types of district: The Urban District, the Port District, the Suburban District, and the Military District. And within each district, there ought to be space for 7 buildings, per side of the hex and middle.

Urban districts would have to be adjacent to either the city center or another urban district, and would be the main resource generator for the city.

Port districts would be placed on coast and would function similarly to the seaport in VI.

Suburban districts would be primarily for housing.

Encampments would function similarly to their VI counterparts.

Buildings built in a city will now have to be manually placed in an open slot within a district. Location would matter such that a Watermill would only be able to be built next to a river, and Granaries would confer bonuses if built adjacent to a farm. All buildings within a particular track would confer bonuses on each other if built next to eachother, so the notion of having one section of a city be devoted to commerce, and another be devoted to industry would still be intact. If a library is next to a university, then they would both produce +1 more science each (+2) max science. If a library is next to a university, and research center, then the library would have a +2 science bonus, and the university and research center would both have +1 (+4 total). But if a library, research center, and university are all adjacent to eachother, then they would all have + 2 science (+6 total). In order to maximize gold adjacency bonuses you could place an economy building in the center tile, since that would have the most adjacencies, and make it a de facto Financial District.

Buildings would also increase the output of adjacent tile improvements. A granary would increase the food yield of an adjacent farm, and a workshop would increase the production output of an adjacent mine, stables would increase the output of a pasture and so on and so on.

Wonders can now be built in districts. The majority of wonders would be built within Urban/Seaport districts, when appropriate. Certain rural wonders (like Stonehenge) or mountain-specific wonders (like Christo Redentor) would still be built on their own tile however. Wonders can also generate bonus yields if adjacent to similar buildings

whipped up an image to illustrate all this.

 

[criZp]

Nice model. I agree with everything except perhaps the adjacency bonus from buildings of the same type, I'm not sure if that really adds anything to the city building and it might look more organic if you can just put buildings wherever there is space.

 

[Alexander's Hetaroi]

I kind of have a similar feeling. The difference is that I do feel that having separate science, cultural, commercial districts etc. would still be nice upon construction. At least that opened up the possibilities for more unique infrastructure ideas for civilizations.

That being said my initial idea is where most districts and wonders would end up taking up spaces inside of the city center on a separate map. This might be a better approach.

 

[moysturfurmer]

I kind of have a similar feeling. The difference is that I do feel that having separate science, cultural, commercial districts etc. would still be nice upon construction. At least that opened up the possibilities for more unique infrastructure ideas for civilizations.

I’m of two minds about that. On one hand it was cool that some had unique districts, but aesthetically and gameplay wise it wasn’t to my tastes. Cities just got too big and disconnected looking and the gameplay would up just being “fill your 3 building slots with your 3 buildings” most of the time. That said, perhaps urban districts perhaps Districts could be designated a particular type, and would confer extra bonuses that way? But you’d still be able to build any building in them. The current model just feels a bit limited to me, because Seowons had shrines in them, Hansa’s were a collective of both manufacturers and merchants, etc. That’s not exactly reflected kn the current model. Idk, just spitballing.

Nice model. I agree with everything except perhaps the adjacency bonus from buildings of the same type, I'm not sure if that really adds anything to the city building and it might look more organic if you can just put buildings wherever there is space.

The idea there was to both retain the concept of specialty districts by incentivizing yield adjacency, while also providing opportunity for more gameplay decisions. Do I want to build by Factory next to this new Coal Resource for increased coal reserves, or do I want to build it next to these other two production buildings for bonus production. Do I want to build my temple next to this shrine for a lot more flat faith, or do I want to build it next to Notre Dame for a little faith and a little culture?

 

[Zaarin]

Wonders can now be built in districts.

I like your overall ideas (I might like a little more district diversity, but I like your overall approach), but this one gets a hard no from me. I like the wonders on the map. It creates an opportunity cost for building wonders, and it just looks great. The way wonders dominate the map feels very rewarding, especially for someone who basically plays the game for the purpose of building wonders...

 

[Alexander's Hetaroi]

I’m of two minds about that. On one hand it was cool that some had unique districts, but aesthetically and gameplay wise it wasn’t to my tastes. Cities just got too big and disconnected looking and the gameplay would up just being “fill your 3 building slots with your 3 buildings” most of the time. That said, perhaps urban districts perhaps Districts could be designated a particular type, and would confer extra bonuses that way? But you’d still be able to build any building in them. The current model just feels a bit limited to me, because Seowons had shrines in them, Hansa’s were a collective of both manufacturers and merchants, etc. That’s not exactly reflected kn the current model. Idk, just spitballing.

For those reasons I think the idea of unique districts could become even more unique. I think the best example that we got was the Thanh in NFP with it being an Encampment that yielded culture and tourism late game.

I've already said it before but I think in Civ 7 it would be interesting if the Seowon yielded culture instead of science however could still build the science buildings in them. The Maya Observatory could have faith bonuses too, or science bonuses if they get a religious pyramid district. Romans could get a forum that could go a number of ways such as a Government Plaza yielding gold or Commercial Hub yielding culture.

I do agree that aesthetically placing districts around the map did make the city look disjointed a lot of the time. To be fair in my mind I would still consider most districts like the Theater Square, Campus and Commercial Hub, along with their unique counterparts more or less, as different types of Urban districts and have them be built next to the city center or another Urban District.

I like your overall ideas (I might like a little more district diversity, but I like your overall approach), but this one gets a hard no from me. I like the wonders on the map. It creates an opportunity cost for building wonders, and it just looks great. The way wonders dominate the map feels very rewarding, especially for someone who basically plays the game for the purpose of building wonders...

I mostly do agree on this. Then again there are wonder like Oxford that theoretically could be built instead of a university or the Great Lighthouse instead of a lighthouse in some cases. Though I also wouldn't mind if they still took their own tile on the map next to a Campus or Harbor either so we don't have different size wonders. I do agree that some wonders such as Eiffel Tower, Big Ben, Pyramids, Stonehenge etc. do need their own tiles whether in the city itself or outside the walls.

 

[moysturfurmer]

I like your overall ideas (I might like a little more district diversity, but I like your overall approach), but this one gets a hard no from me. I like the wonders on the map. It creates an opportunity cost for building wonders, and it just looks great. The way wonders dominate the map feels very rewarding, especially for someone who basically plays the game for the purpose of building wonders...

yeah there are a lot of wonders where I’d agree on that, whether because of size (the Pyramids), remoteness (Stonehenge), or terrain (Machu Pichu), but some of them are just a little hard to swallow for me. A.H. already mentioned Oxford, but tbh I feel the same way about the Eiffel Tower snd Bolshoi theater and a lot of the post-Renaissance wonders. Granted, a lot of my issue stems from the fact that wonders tend to look really disconnected from the rest of the city. Perhaps if they were just better integrated graphically (more random buildings near them if adjacent to other districts) it wouldn’t feel so jarring. I’d figured they’d still be a lot bigger than the regular buildings in a district either way

 

[Zaarin]

yeah there are a lot of wonders where I’d agree on that, whether because of size (the Pyramids), remoteness (Stonehenge), or terrain (Machu Pichu), but some of them are just a little hard to swallow for me. A.H. already mentioned Oxford, but tbh I feel the same way about the Eiffel Tower snd Bolshoi theater and a lot of the post-Renaissance wonders. Granted, a lot of my issue stems from the fact that wonders tend to look really disconnected from the rest of the city. Perhaps if they were just better integrated graphically (more random buildings near them if adjacent to other districts) it wouldn’t feel so jarring. I’d figured they’d still be a lot bigger than the regular buildings in a district either way

In general, more "city clutter" would help everything look more coherent. I just want the wonders to be visually stunning in purple.

 

[Alexander's Hetaroi]

Granted, a lot of my issue stems from the fact that wonders tend to look really disconnected from the rest of the city. Perhaps if they were just better integrated graphically (more random buildings near them if adjacent to other districts) it wouldn’t feel so jarring. I’d figured they’d still be a lot bigger than the regular buildings in a district either way

If that is the case I would say maybe wonders should take up at least two slots, instead of the usual one slot per building.

At least in my mind, in order to receive the awards of the wonder you should have to sacrifice space in your cities like how it is currently.

 

[moysturfurmer]

If that is the case I would say maybe wonders should take up at least two slots, instead of the usual one slot per building.

At least in my mind, in order to receive the awards of the wonder you should have to sacrifice space in your cities like how it is currently.

I like that. And different wonders can take up different amount of tiles in a district based on size/real world considerations/balance. Either 2 adjacent slots, 3 adjacent slots, 4, adjacent slots, etc.

Fingers crossed for its implementation in Civ VIII

 

[jsciv69]

Wonders should correspond with certain building. For instance. Caesars Palace as a Wonder could double the effects of Casinos.

 

[Boris Gudenuf]

I like that. And different wonders can take up different amount of tiles in a district based on size/real world considerations/balance. Either 2 adjacent slots, 3 adjacent slots, 4, adjacent slots, etc.

Fingers crossed for its implementation in Civ VIII

At least. As to Wonder Sizes, right now in Civ VI we have Wonders that are individual buildings (Mausoleum), small towns (Mont St Michel), entire Districts (Broadway), entire cities (Angkor Wat) and entire Regions (Ruhr Valley).
We have a whole batch of Wonders like temples and temple complexes or Sydney Opera House that have no real function unless they are in the middle of a city where people can get to them.
We have another batch of Wonders (Machu Picchu, Stonehenge, Oracle) that were and are built nowhere near a city.

Bottom Line: I like your ideas, because they are very similar to my own ideas for revising the District system, but Wonders need a lot more variety in their placement options. For starters, they take up wildly different amounts of Space, which should be shown by making their In-District Footprint range from 1 'slot' to the entire District while others will, essentially, be Improvements to be built out in the countryside.

This also implies that anything built in a city except a Wonder should be Removable: "Urban Renewal" as been an on-going process since people first started building cities, and one of the 'costs' of building a Wonder should be finding space for it in a suitable spot in the city if it is appropriate to put it there.

 

[Phrozen]

It would be much better if the main city was the administrative center and the 'districts' are the outlying towns and small cities that provide the administrative center with goods and services. It wasn't until the 19th century when big cities starting becoming big in land area as well and started swallowing up the outlying towns ie NYC swallowing Brooklyn, Staten Island, and Queens or London swallowing Westminster among others.

 

[Boris Gudenuf]

It would be much better if the main city was the administrative center and the 'districts' are the outlying towns and small cities that provide the administrative center with goods and services. It wasn't until the 19th century when big cities starting becoming big in land area as well and started swallowing up the outlying towns ie NYC swallowing Brooklyn, Staten Island, and Queens or London swallowing Westminster among others.

Strictly by the map scale of a game that purports to show the entire world, any city before the mid-19th century should take up no more than 1 tile/hex. However, the 'visible infrastructure' available in a city of multiple tiles means, I suspect, that it is here to stay, at least for now.

To get the correct relationship (if not the strictly accurate Ground Scale) of cities, though, there has to be some serious thinking about what a 'District' represents. The old shibboleth that they represent 'separate towns" or 'feeder settlements' just doesn't hold up: that would mean for most of the game they are separate cities/towns in their own right, and therefore can include everything the major Cities do except possibly the Palace (Even many Wonders were actually built far from any major urban location) - which makes it nearly impossible to cram everything in the city onto the map, since it will all by in a single tile.

So - and as usual - we are stuck with a Game Compromise. Especially now that Humankind has shown that largely accurate game maps, though beautiful, don't make it easy to see what is actually on the map, and keeping track of 90+ potential Buildings and infrastructures without any On Map clues other than the Wonders is a major Pain once you've gotten used to Civ VI's easily-visible structures. (Don't get me wrong, I LOVE the look of the Humankind game maps, but they are much better maps than they are GUI, and GUI is what you need to play the game without pain)

 

[Xandinho]

I like your ideas, I just think the current district system doesn't look like city expansions, they look like disconnected pieces of cities.
There could be the following types of districts:
-City expansions: where most buildings could be built, and where they could receive internal and external adjacency bonuses.
-Infrastructures: aqueducts, bridges, dams, canals, harbors and power plants. They don't necessarily need to be built next to the city center or expansion districts (except aqueduct that always needs to be built next to the city center). Bridges, when linked to an expansion district on the coast, allow another expansion district to be built on another tile of coast that is separated by an ocean tile.
-Military: encampments, citadels/fortresses, airstrips and missile silos.
-Spaceport

As for the wonders, there could be those wonders that would have their own tiles (Pyramids, Angkor Wat, Mont St Michel, Alhambra...) and those that would be built inside the city (Great Library, Temple of Artemis...) and those that require specific terrain (Cristo and Machu Picchu can only be built in mountains).

 

[Alexander's Hetaroi]

-Infrastructures: aqueducts, bridges, dams, canals, harbors and power plants. They don't necessarily need to be built next to the city center or expansion districts (except aqueduct that always needs to be built next to the city center). Bridges, when linked to an expansion district on the coast, allow another expansion district to be built on another tile of coast that is separated by an ocean tile.

I think it would be cool if aqueducts could span multiple tiles, similar to canals. Of course they would have to start say from a mountain or source of freshwater three tiles away from the city. I don't thinks that these shouldn't be fully separate districts but structures that could be placed in districts, though also separate from buildings? I feel the same way about the Canal district and possibly even a Bridge.

 

[Zaarin]

I think it would be cool if aqueducts could span multiple tiles, similar to canals. Of course they would have to start say from a mountain or source of freshwater three tiles away from the city. I don't thinks that these shouldn't be fully separate districts but structures that could be placed in districts, though also separate from buildings? I feel the same way about the Canal district and possibly even a Bridge.

Aqueduct should be an improvement that can be placed over districts, like roads.

 

[mitsho]

This idea has been brought up before (by for example me ;-)), but it's a very good sign that we come to the same conclusions separately! And you did create a very stunning model, kudos to that, looks very good. I do not have anything to add content-wise, I think your model works very fine and the enhancements (wonders taking up more slots) have already been addressed. For me, the wonders in civ6 just stick out a bit too much in the countryside, most of them after all are in cities in real life.