The mid to end game of Civ6 is so bland

[kaspergm]

I have had this problem with all of the versions of Civ. That is why I usually start over after gunpowder.

I'm not sure how this can be overcome.

In Civ4, there were coorporations. I don't know how balanced the whole thing was, but back then I didn't care too much about min/maxing and numbers, and I remember it gave me something to do as a builder in late game, and for that reason, it was always a feature I wanted to come back. It was like a religion race part 2 - you had to rush to get to found the coorporations and spread them, and it's a game feature that could easily be expanded in a way similar to the way that "beliefs" were added in Civ5. Something I've long been advocating for is the ability to produce new luxury resources in your factories based on what bonus and luxury resources you have access to. Civ6 already has a great framework for this with the specialist luxury resources (toys, jeans, perfume, etc.) so this is still something I really hope will come in an expansion.

Also, Civ5 made a good attempt at cultural late game, and while I think there's still room for improvement, the different types of art are a good start. I would want something similar for different types of writing - something like novels, poetry, plays (theatre), etc. - to add the aspect of more theming possibilities and more difference between the great writers (at the moment, those are really generic).

 

[Lee Duane Fitzsimmons]

I love your suggestions about different types of writing, kaspergm. The various genres of creativity with the pen deserve more detail--especially with long term and short term writers (journalists vs. novelists).

Never forget that the pen is mightier than the sword.

 

[kaspergm]

Honestly, I can't think of a single strategy game where the end is as interesting as the start. While this is a problem for civ6, I'm not sure it can be blamed on a particular feature of the game.

Essentially, a lot of the fun in a strategy game goes from not winning to starting to win. It's having a plan that lets you develop an edge over your rivals. Using that edge, or making it slightly larger just isn't fun. You'd have to add brand new challenges for the players to face: but then all you've done is moved the goal posts. You can make it so that 'winning' the early game means that you have an easy time 'winning' the late game, but that makes the late game boring. Or you can have 'winning' the early game gives no advantage to 'winning' the late game; but that's a contradiction in terms, as winning the early game means that you are in a strong position to win the late game.

Actually, I think the World Congress in Civ5 - for all its flaws - did a pretty good job at "resetting" the game by mid-game. Of course what happened before was important, but the fact that everybody started in the WC at the same time meant that you could have a slow start and still participate there. I think that's a model the game needs to bring back to make late game more interesting. I also think the WC projects of Civ5 were interesting in this context. On the contrary, what they did with space victory in Civ6 was going the completely wrong way, by requiring you to construct a number of space ship parts with huge production cost which essentially just invites to endless hauls of "next turn" drags.

 

[Scaramanga]

Ancient civilizations and history are more interesting. It's more fun to invent the wheel, a granary, writing, etc, than to build the Eiffel tower.

I want a spin-off game (like 'Colonization') called 'Ancient Civilizations' that goes from 4000 b.c. to maybe 800 a.d.

Not a game of Civ with the end cut off, a game that is paced differently (not rushing up to the end) and gives you more to do in your ancient civ. More trade, more war, more research.

There is a ruleset called "Ancient Rivals" included with the game. I don't think it's to the granularity you're hoping for but it can be a fun 50 turns even against AI on a LAN.If anything it is good practice for the first 50 turns of a real game.

 

[stinkubus]

You could also play small or tiny maps on epic or marathon speeds?

 

[Arms Longfellow]

Have you heard about Civ: Beyond Earth?

Yeah I know, but the difference with Alpha Centauri and Beyond Earth is that the mission to another planet IS the whole game. What I'm proposing would be you still managing your empire on Earth (Civilization), but there would also be the other world to deal with (a mini Alpha Centauri/Beyond Earth game). I'm not saying they'd have to go through the whole shebang of making a whole new game on the scale of those two, it could obviously be scaled down, but it would help breathe some new life into the late game by giving a new dose of exploring and expanding on the moon/Mars that makes the early game so fun.

Even if you're not going for a Science Victory it could be important to go to the moon/Mars, to mine resources or whatever. Or you could make the calculated decision not to go because it costs too much and others have taken everything already, sort of like the decision not to colonize a new continent.

 

[Victoria]

I can't think of a single strategy game where the end is as interesting as the start

Probably my most enjoyable endgames are when I have played for a cultural victory without using theaters. Not as good as the start because there is not that unknown element but I still enjoy it because you have to get out there and settle. Many cities are just not on the coast.

 

[Mark the Bold]

I don't think the WC ever changed the player rankings in any game I played. ...... The start is more fun than the end.

I agree. The WC just was a glorified nag, although I did like the trade embargo part. Was pretty much the only thing that really had "teeth" on a runaway, and even then, not all that game changing.

With Civ 6, I don't see trade embargo's as all that important because I make most of my trade routes domestic anyway. Moar production over gold is what I always say!!

What would make it cool, if the AI could pull it off, would be a United Losers league against the runaway (human player or otherwise) that would unite and oppose him unconditionally. For instance, those of you who have played MP games know, once one players score starts runawaying, virtually all the humans (with the exception of the truth sociopaths) gang up on and pick away at him.

I'm playing a huge, archipelago Emperor game right now where I have lied, backstabbed, cheated and stole my way to runaway status the entire game, and virtually all the other civs are throwing themselves at my feet for trade deals and DOF's. Makes no sense. Sure I could clobber them all one by one, but if all attacked me together, pillaged my trade routes, it would be one hell of a job to keep them at bay, and they would probably benefit each other with AI <--> AI trade routes, etc etc.

 

[Mark the Bold]

If Paradox decides to make a historical version of what they did with Stellaris and learn from the mistakes they made in their first attempt to create a 4x-ish game, the days of Civ being at the top of the historical 4x hierarchy are over.

Honestly, when you look at the developmental progress that 4x space games and 4x fantasy games have made, Civ looks like a relic from 10 years ago in terms of mechanics - and UI design of course. I'm really surprised no other company has really tried to break into that market.

I like Stellaris, but lets not go nuts here. There is one hella lot of cheating going on in Stellaris games. AI has full 100% knowledge of everything you do, including fleet composition, weapon types, etc..

I still can't forgive them for inventing the "War Goals" garbage. Alien will surprise invade me, torch some of my worlds. Then through a herculean effort, and defensive scramble, I turn the tables and push them back. Get this, I am not allowed to actually claim some Golan Heights territory from them in return for even starting the war, because I didn't ask for permission from the AI to do so at the start of war he declared on me?!?!?!? No thanks. Paradox can eat hard cheese for even inventing a game concept so ridiculously arbitrary, infuriating and unfair as this. Stay away from my Civ games Paradox.

 

[Ryika]

I like Stellaris, but lets not go nuts here. There is one hella lot of cheating going on in Stellaris games. AI has full 100% knowledge of everything you do, including fleet composition, weapon types, etc..

I still can't forgive them for inventing the "War Goals" garbage. Alien will surprise invade me, torch some of my worlds. Then through a herculean effort, and defensive scramble, I turn the tables and push them back. Get this, I am not allowed to actually claim some Golan Heights territory from them in return for even starting the war, because I didn't ask for permission from the AI to do so at the start of war he declared on me?!?!?!? No thanks. Paradox can eat hard cheese for even inventing a game concept so ridiculously arbitrary, infuriating and unfair as this. Stay away from my Civ games Paradox.

Sure, Stellaris has its own flaws (looking at some of the AI Planet Management videos on youtube makes Civ AI look smart), that's why I wrote "and learn from the mistakes they made in their first attempt to create a 4x-ish game". I do however think with their own fanbase, and the portion of Civ Players who would be interested in a "Paradox-Version of the Civ Formula", they could easily outdo Firaxis if they delivered a good product. At least temporarily of course, one would hope that Firaxis counters with a much better developed Civ VII and regains the throne, but that sort of competition is what I think makes Civ lag behind other 4x games, all of which aren't direct competitors because many people play Civ for its theme.

 

[Acken]

Thats what you get when you lack 3 things:
-Challenging AI
-New mechanics in the later ages
-Difficult empire management

The late game is bland because there is nothing to do of interest or challenging.

 

[King Rad]

They could make the late game more interesting by drastically re-working the science victory. You could get spaceship tech and launch a ship to Mars ... but the game isn't over yet. Now you have the new, albeit smaller planet to explore and fight for territory against other factions all over again. They could do the same thing with moon bases.

Something like this could be done for each victory condition. The early part of the game would be spent maximizing the potential for a specific victory type; then the end game could be spent achieving a technological, cultural, diplomatic, etc. victory that built on what was done in the early part of the game; all while other players were doing the same for their chosen victory type. You could be competing against all or none of the other players for the specific victory chosen [e.g. they could all be trying to explore and subdue Mars, or you could be the only one while they were all trying to achieve a cultural or diplomatic or [fill in the blank] victory]. Even if your early game primes you to beat the others at a specific game, it would be at the potential cost of their early game priming them for an even faster victory of some other type. Corporations, the World Congress, and similar functions could be added that would support one victory type but not the other. The "xpansion" of the 4 x's would continue to be a primary aspect of the game, but it would be in a different area - cultural influence, diplomatic influence, another world, etc. Something like this might give more fun and meaning to the end game and mean that just because you primed your empire for a specific victory, there's no guarantee that you would be able to achieve that before someone else achieved theirs.

 

[Mark the Bold]

Sure, Stellaris has its own flaws (looking at some of the AI Planet Management videos on youtube makes Civ AI look smart), that's why I wrote "and learn from the mistakes they made in their first attempt to create a 4x-ish game". I do however think with their own fanbase, and the portion of Civ Players who would be interested in a "Paradox-Version of the Civ Formula", they could easily outdo Firaxis if they delivered a good product. At least temporarily of course, one would hope that Firaxis counters with a much better developed Civ VII and regains the throne, but that sort of competition is what I think makes Civ lag behind other 4x games, all of which aren't direct competitors because many people play Civ for its theme.

I get your point. Competition is always good. John Madden football is a perfect example of what monopolies do. Repackage same game every year, add arm hair pre-rendered graphics, and instant-million+ game sales. Sigh.

What I liked about Stellaris was the "role-playing" elements they added via the galactic events and that the diplomacy had some complexity to it. The whole slavery thing / xenophobia concept was genius and I am not sure why Civilization can't effectively add something like that to the game. I mean practically all of human history / conflict had a racial / cultural "flavor" (euphamism) to it, so why can't Civ 6 do this.

I know the game designers all live in the socialist paradise of California where all races exist in perfect harmony, but I don't see why Civ 6 can't actually add a feature to the game that makes managing a global empire actually different to managing a small homogenous empire. Sun Tzu was full of beans when he said" management of the few is the same as the management of the many; it is just a matter of organization". He never had to manage a place like the Middle East with 24/7 cable news coverage.

I think this would really solve the end game blandness part, because if you are really a sprawling massive global civilization, why can't you have the actual problems of a global sprawling massive civilization. I mean why can't they add a civilizational self-loathing SJW unhappiness factor once you get so rich / powerful that all other civs can't catch up? Recent game, I completely conquered half of another continent and all the pop was happy as clams within 15 turns of me destroying their native civilization. That ain't right.

I can't imagine a more interesting late game management struggle where you have to independently manage different regions of the world you've conquered because of their respective racial / cultural heritage. I mean really, in today's date, who in Western Civilization is actually trying to colonize Mars? What about managing massive population movements from ruined failed civs to successful, rich civs like today's Germany / EU?

The possibilities are endless with this, are very interesting, and entirely possible to do with the current game mechanics.

Just think of all the free earned advertising Firaxis would get by all the NYT, BBC, National Review hot takes of this new game concept?

 

[Art Morte]

Thats what you get when you lack 3 things:
-Challenging AI
-New mechanics in the later ages
-Difficult empire management

The late game is bland because there is nothing to do of interest or challenging.

I think late-game can still be challenging, as in to actually win the game if you're not ahead. What makes it boring for me is the lack of decision making that is required. Your cities are (usually) all settled and you've decided on their districts, i.e. which victory condition way you're going. You're on railway tracks. At first I really liked the new districts-in-cities model and I still kind of do, but I feel they add to the late-game boredom. The choices about what to build in your cities become too obvious. Warfare can mix things up, but I'm not a particularly aggressive player and even warfare feels somehow more interesting in early and mid game, imo.

In a nutshell, I don't mind if the late-game isn't very challenging if I'm winning, I'd just like to have meaningful decisions to make.

 

[iammaxhailme]

I don't think the WC ever changed the player rankings in any game I played. The person who was ahead in tech in the early game could basically stay as host all the time and only propose beneficial stuff. The one with the most gold would just buy up the CS. The one with the best spies could flip the CS at will. Ect... The WC was a nice touch, and you could get heavily involved with it for roleplaying, but it never made-or-broke any of my games. If it *was* that powerful, than the early game would either
a) be about securing the best possible position for the WC
b) if that was impossible to do (ie, the WC completely evened out the playing field) then the early game would be pointless.

I think it's just an intrinsic fact of strategy games. The start is more fun than the end.

I somewhat agree that the WC of Civ V never really was too game changing for me, but it still added some interest to the late game (although sometimes it was annoying to have to come up with something to vote for when I didn't really care about any of the things, and I was a host). I'd welcome it in Civ VI with some changes, such as opting out of making a proposal, adding a diplomatic victory (as long as it isn't just "money victory" like in civ V), etc.

 

[Scaramanga]

A diplomatic victory wouldn't make sense with the "we're winning they fear us" modifier. As soon as you get AIs friendly enough to vote for u they start disliking you again. Lotta plate-spinning.

 

[agonistes]

Not talking about the AI and the late game slow down again, I am just talking about the general game design.

In reality, after the discovery of nuclear warfare, the stronger nations have a low likelihood to get into a full scale war between them. Using USA as an example, as long as a country has any sign of owning nuclear weapon, they won't directly war with them, but will instead use other more subtle, less violent strategies that include a combination of ideology pressure (see USSR), economic/curreny war (US currency has been their biggest weapon), culture/propaganda (I honestly think many Hollywood movies are), espionage acitivities (the fingerprints of Americans are all over behind those "color revolution") and diplomatic activities (that is how they are trying to beat China now)....

Some of these strategies were actually presented in the previous versions, like the corporation, like the ideology pressure, like culture pressure/city flip, like permanent alliance, like election rigging/coup......but nothing at all in Civ6.

I expect some posters will defend with the "will see these features in expansion" argument. To be honest, it's the same devs that worked on Civ5, so I never understand why instead of expanding, polishing, perfecting some of these previous good but may not be optimal features, the devs just simply throw them away until somebody complain.

In most of the mid- to late-games playing Civ6, it's just a series of pressing "next turn". They don't even give us the hall of fame. There are very few things that motivate a player to finish the game....oh, forgot to mention that "they are winning, we fear them...-120 dip penalty", which actually makes the end game even more predictable. My gosh....

The subtle game is why I enjoy the late game. I usually play without vc and turn limits. Improved diplomacy and UN would be nice though.

 

[Biz_]

the games are bland because they aren't close and aren't interactive

there are a few ways to fix this, but the game has to not completely suck from a balance point of view if we want to even begin to have that discussion

 

[KayAU]

This is a common problem with 4X strategy games. In the beginning, you make fewer, but more important decisions. At the end, you are making many more, but far less important decisions. I think it was a bit better in Civ 5, for a couple of reasons:

• I could play tall, which meant I didn't have to spend 90% of my time making mundane decisions about production queues. These are interesting in the beginning, when you just have a few cities and every decision matters, but a chore at the end. I actually prefer clicking "End turn" over and over to doing chores.
• There were some new elements introduced in the late game, mostly related to the World Congress, ideology and cooperative projects.

There are different ways of dealing with this, but in general, I feel the best approach is to minimize the micro-management, and introduce something new to do instead. Reducing the micro-management can be done by making tall viable, or by at least introducing some limitation to how many cities you can effectively manage directly in some way. This should be done anyway, in my opinion. Another way would be to enable some degree of automation (production queues, governors), or add UI features to manage larger empires. Improving performance and turn times would also improve the experience.

As for adding new things to do in the late game, it's not hard to come up with ideas. Expanded diplomacy, expanded espionage, world congress/UN/planetary council, end game crisis, cooperative projects, lunar/orbital expansion, information warfare, economic warfare, there are many possibilities. It would be especially good if these new elements could potentially change the standings of each civ, without making what happened earlier irrelevant. It is not impossible to achieve that. Elements like spies are not necessarily tied to the other strengths of the empires. The way ideology worked in Civ 5, you could have a bunch of other players choose a different ideology, influencing your people, and soon your empire was unhappy. The blooming of the planet in SMAC changed the map, and could disadvantage more technologically advanced factions. Just to mention some examples.

 

[SammyKhalifa]

Thats what you get when you lack 3 things:
-Challenging AI
-New mechanics in the later ages
-Difficult empire management

The late game is bland because there is nothing to do of interest or challenging.

That's been the case with every iteration of civ. Boring end game is not new--not sure how someone got this far through the series if that flaw ruins it for them. I hardly if ever finish but that's hardly a "feature" of 6. It's just a product of me getting part way through and deciding I want to try something different this time.