Tech Progression Too Fast?

[Wolle68]

Marbozir, with a more balanced approach, is in early industrial for both civics and tech at 1500 AD. That's not too out of place for a Deity player playing Prince level.

 

[zocki]

It feels way too fast especially as the streamers hardly focus on technologies and still make a lot of mistakes. On the other hand speed can be modded any time and easily halved without much effort. As for Eurekas/Inspirations i don't like them being a 50% boost for little effort. the idea is nice but it should be more like a 2-step boost for each 25% or 3 for 20% to realy require dedication.
The real issue for me is the fewer numbers of technologies and development per era. It realy doesn't feel like the same amount of "new stuff" through research but less and more clutter that just doesn't matter that much(like lots of situational civic cards).

 

[Zanteogo]

Eurekas are a great idea, but for the most part from what I have seen from the press builds, you end up getting most of them without putting any effort at all. The idea was that they matched your play style so civ's who did sea things, would unlock ship and water techs. It doesn't seem to work that way in practice.

The tech progression even without Eurekas seemed like it was too fast too. Though I am used to playing on marathon speed.

 

[Arkangelus]

My immediate concern was not only that techs were progressing too fast to take in many of the new features, but that dancing about doing specific things for the eureka bonuses seems like a huge advantage over the AI. Its trivial for a human to make sure that they are using their slinger to land the final blow on a barb and knock 6 turns of research off archers, but much more likely to hamper the AI.

 

[V. Soma]

I know it is to late to create rules for civ6 but:

Maybe it could be that when you do sg and get the boost/inspiration - you get it ONLY if you immediately go and do that that tech/civic...

 

[Magil]

Marbozir, with a more balanced approach, is in early industrial for both civics and tech at 1500 AD. That's not too out of place for a Deity player playing Prince level.

Deity-level player in Civ V. That time is going to move up significantly as people learn how to play Civ VI.

And if it doesn't, there's a severe problem because it means that proper city management and careful prioritization don't mean a thing.

 

[Sansa_Stark]

Well then, we have nothing to worry about.

It only took those players a thousand hours to be able to win SVs in such fashion. These are LPs and videos from people's first few hours into the game.

And?

"These" is ONE gameplay of Quill (or let me know if there's anyone else with similar science). And what did he managed? NOT to get SC by turn 311? How exactly this proves that you can manage SV faster than in Civ5 is beyond me.

Deity-level player in Civ V. That time is going to move up significantly as people learn how to play Civ VI.

And if it doesn't, there's a severe problem because it means that proper city management and careful prioritization don't mean a thing.

Judging by Quill, he's on pace to win SV on turn 350 or so. So what's wrong with getting significantly better?

 

[Kouvb593kdnuewnd]

Increased district cost may make campus a poor investment in the long run so while you can get massive science you won't have the economy for doing anything yet like in Quill18's game.

The problem with campus is that the most important district later on seems to be the industrial zone and the commerce hub which are a key to the economy development. And the more campuses you build the longer it will take to get your zones and hubs up.

And the longer it take to get these up the slower your economy growth may become.

 

[V. Soma]

a note on prince level and AI:

I would balance it so that - on average AI game play - AI goes through the ages in development accordingly to the eras, I mean date eras and tech/civic eras in synchron - so getting to medieval in ca. 400-800 AD, renaissance ca. 1400 etc...

This should be set for Prince level... with no bonus to the AI

 

[Magil]

Judging by Quill, he's on pace to win SV on turn 350 or so. So what's wrong with getting significantly better?

I didn't say it was good or bad. Though science victory is hardly the only thing to consider when it comes to tech pacing. What I was saying is that just saying Marbozir's "more balanced" approach isn't necessarily a good indicator of what "deity-level" players will manage to do in VI with a "balanced approach".

Frankly while I admit the tech pacing "feels" too fast to me right now I would be very hesitant to make any changes based on what little we've seen. And I think there are more important issues to tackle.

 

[joncnunn]

I'm not seeing anything in science that can't be solved by basically doing what Civ IV's balance patches did : Namely increasing the base cost of techs starting at the beginning of the midevil era with the highest increases later on.

But in the case of Quill's videos, because he left so much on the default worker allocation, we are really seeing what happens when your cities are constantly too close to the housing cap (50% / 75% reductions) combined with only having built things allowing one specialist slot : It naturally because growth would be so poor anyway assigns max possible specialists, and scientists were pretty much the only thing they could choose from for most of the game because he built very few Markets.
This also caused buildings to be really expensive for him later on; because each of his cities didn't grow as much as it could have, they weren't working as many production tiles either.

 

[King Jason]

Deity-level player in Civ V. That time is going to move up significantly as people learn how to play Civ VI.

And if it doesn't, there's a severe problem because it means that proper city management and careful prioritization don't mean a thing.

Hardly. On both accounts. If you're a deity level player than it means you basic comprehension of the game far exceeds the average player even if you're playing a completely new version. Why these guys are even playing on Prince in the first place is baffling, honestly. Even for my first test game I'm not going to drop below emperor.

Why? Because it's civ. If you're good at civ - hell, strategy games - you're going to be good at civ6. The new changes to civ6 aren't hard to wrap your head around at all so the skill gap between a veteran civ5 player and their first civ6 playthroughs should be very small.

Frankly, I'm actually shocked at some of the ridiculous mistakes that players like Filthy end up making, as they fall within the realm of basic observation; Such as failing to improve a resource that's in your capital city for most of the game when you've had spare builders lying around on more than one occasion.

In regards to the tech pace - I can't comment on the late game eras but I've done multiple simulations of the first 100-150 turns comparing let'splay footage to civ5 on Quick (and now normal due to recent footage) and the pace of technology in that timeframe is almost identical, with civ5 actually being the slightly faster game.

Civ6 becomes faster than civ5 in the mid-to-late game.

 

[Zanteogo]

Hardly. On both accounts. If you're a deity level player than it means you basic comprehension of the game far exceeds the average player even if you're playing a completely new version. Why these guys are even playing on Prince in the first place is baffling, honestly. Even for my first test game I'm not going to drop below emperor.

It's locked on Prince

 

[Magil]

Hardly. On both accounts. If you're a deity level player than it means you basic comprehension of the game far exceeds the average player even if you're playing a completely new version. Why these guys are even playing on Prince in the first place is baffling, honestly. Even for my first test game I'm not going to drop below emperor.

Why? Because it's civ. If you're good at civ - hell, strategy games - you're going to be good at civ6. The new changes to civ6 aren't hard to wrap your head around at all so the skill gap between a veteran civ5 player and their first civ6 playthroughs should be very small.

Frankly, I'm actually shocked at some of the ridiculous mistakes that players like Filthy end up making, as they fall within the realm of basic observation; Such as failing to improve a resource that's in your capital city for most of the game when you've had spare builders lying around on more than one occasion.

You acknowledge they're making low-level play mistakes, but you don't think they have a great deal of room for optimization and speeding up their victory, in a game as complex as Civ VI? I'm afraid I cannot agree. Yes, they're better off playing this Prince-level preview build than someone who never played V before or only played V at Warlord-level or below, but there should be significant room in there for optimization of their gameplay that will make them far more efficient than what they're doing right now.

 

[King Jason]

I'm just not seeing it. Late game progression may be sped up a bit, admittedly. But Quill cleared the tech tree in his game at about 300 turns and he was maximizing science. He was suzerain of two science city-states with no contest, and went almost virtually uncontested with every single great scientist in the game - I believing missing one, and passing on another. In civ5 on prince/standard/standard I can max the tech tree in about 350-400 turns, maybe even less - That's not really that far off. I don't consider myself a Deity lvl player.

These playthroughs are providing skewed information due to the difficulty setting vs the player because of the sheer advantages that favor the player. Just like wonder competition is fierce on higher levels in civ5, so will things like suzerain bonuses and great people competition become meaningful due to the advantages that the A.I. has available to them in higher difficulties.

In civ5 on prince, you're guaranteed a great library sling-shot and crazy science boost because of it. Depending on your skill level, the higher up you go in difficulty, the less of a reality of doing that sort of thing exists. It's the same thing in civ6. Like I said, perhaps late game progression needs to be tweeked - but in all of the comparison games I've run to come up with some sort of analysis to prepare for these kind of debates - the tech rate is almost identical between both games when it comes to the fist 100-150 turns.

I am not surprised that Quill got nearly every scientist in his Rome game. He's playing on Prince. If he were playing on Emperor or higher, I would be concerned. The fact that he got so many scientists and suzerain bonuses, as well as wonders - all things that will be harder to do on higher difficulties, make the result of him flying through the tech tree a perfectly reasonable outcome as far as I'm concerned. This should not happen with a bad player or a higher setting.

I get what you're saying - if Quill were actually playing competently he'd do even better, and you're right. But Again, I can't see this as cause for concern because of how low the difficulty is. To some players, Prince might as well be Settler. I just don't think being able to nab all of a great person type and maintain suzerainty over the vast majority of city-states is going to be the normal state of the game. That's like suggesting that building every wonder in a city civ5 is normal - that just doesn't happen to most players that play on any reasonable difficulty.

 

[Captain Fargle]

I suppose there is another way of looking at it. What if the increased speed actually is intentional? Maybe it's a deliberate choice on the part of Firaxis after all the talk of how many people got bogged down in the endgame of 5 and never finished?

 

[Civbra]

watched some gameplays and I don't like - even in a prince mode - the tech tree is to easy to advance! I don't know, maybe cut down the eureka boost, instead 50%, something down, would be more appropriate!

Plus I know the tech tree was cut down cause the cutural tree, however with the enormous progress in science they could put more tech! To advance from the medieval to renaissence era, it took only 7 techs(if I'm not wrong) - Ok the medieval era is well know not for the human science advance, but for me, I tought was kind frustrating!

what y'all think?

 

[Kouvb593kdnuewnd]

Civilization VI have about as many techs as civilization V but also the whole civic tree as well.

Tech is only one thing you have to manage to build an empire and Quill18 may have gone a bit overboard with tech which may actually made him weaker, not stronger due to taking resources from other areas of development.

 

[King Jason]

Plus I know the tech tree was cut down cause the cutural tree, however with the enormous progress in science they could put more tech! To advance from the medieval to renaissence era, it took only 7 techs(if I'm not wrong) - Ok the medieval era is well know not for the human science advance, but for me, I tought was kind frustrating!

what y'all think?

The tech tree in civ6 has 5 less techs than civ5 vanilla so I don't really think the size of the tree is an issue at this time. Obviously expansions will likely... expand... on specific eras, as has been the usual trend. Thus far, civ6 appears to be the most complete and feature-filled version of any Vanilla release compared to it's predecessor.

Taking issue with a handful of techs seems frivolous.

Medieval era may have 7 techs to civ5's 11, but Classical era has 8 techs to civ5's 6. So between both eras there are 15 for civ6 and 17 for civ5 vanilla. The ancient era has the same amount of techs for both versions so I don't think losing two techs in the first part of the game is much of a deal. Again, considering the total - that means for the rest of the game civ6 has only three less techs than what were originally included.

 

[Magil]

I don't know whether it's a problem, I only said that the potential fastest science rate on these settings is probably much faster than what we are seeing, regardless of how many excuses are made. So just saying "he's on part for science victory by turn 360, I don't see a problem" is a little disingenuous, because I refuse to believe that he couldn't cut 50 or more turns off that if he knew the system better. Is that an issue? Who knows? I have no idea how difficulty will really impact this. It's something worth considering.