Sometimes the game feels like it's trolling you...

[Bitterman]

I like the possibility of having a bad start.

I've had fun games as England just because I started just in the middle of my continent and my only objective was to expand to other continent which of course had been already settled. My first 120-150 turns would gravitate towards this and is entertaining because it will give you something to push for.

Same when you are playing a standard civ and you get one of those incredibly poor starts with no hills and poor terrain. Of course it will be hard to stay alive for the first 25 turns but I'm willing to take the risk just for fun.

 

[Boris Gudenuf]

. . . In my perfect civ game, you would start with no special traits at all, and then develop them according to where you started and what you do with it. So, a Mali civilization will not have a starting strong bias towards OP bonuses from desert tiles; they will be an empty slate, just like all others. If they happen to spawn in a desert region, and then try to make the most of it, then they start to develop some of the traits. Same for others. Now THAT would be really playing the map.

That used to be my idea of a Perfect Game Design, also, and posted to that effect back in Civ V days, but have changed my mind a bit. That sequence makes all Civs generic, which, although it may be completely accurate historically (or, more accurately, Prehistorically) trying to find a combination of 'natural' map and game factors that will lead to all the myriad individual Attributes/Uniques of all the Civs is a whole new level of Pain. I tried to put together a Matrix of terrain/climate/tile factors and combinations related to Uniques, and it got very messy very fast.

Now, I'd modify that as I said, in that based on the terrain/start position - and that means an Extended Position, because you should know that what's within a 6 - 10 tile radius - you'd get a list of Civs playable from that position, with the option to ignore it and play Mali On The Tundra, if you prefer.

I do agree, though, that a lot of the terrain-specific and terrain-modified units and attributes should develop from the terrain: a unit with ability to move faster or fight better in hills will not develop on a flat plain, so shouldn't be 'hard wired' into a Civ. England starting with 3 - 4 inland cities will be a Long Time developing any naval expertise - but they may still have a bias for deliberative, semi-democratic governments rather than God Kings because that seems to have been a thread running back to prehistory: collaborative government instead of coercive, if given the choice (in fairness, that thread also shows in the German tribes', Macedonian, Roman, and early Greek 'first among equals' type of 'royal' families. Divine Right of Kings was a much, much later development, in Europe at least)

 

[bite]

Not sure why a kiwi is playing as oz anyways

... I am Australian ....