The state of Industrial Zones and Great Engineers.

[Disgustipated]

I like building iz's mostly for the great engineer points. There are a few engineers I really like. And past games have taught me to love production. Like the thrill of a powerhouse production city in alpha centauri. Even if that production isn't particularly needed in civ6 I like to have it in at least a few cities. I like impressive cities in both population and production.

 

[Trav'ling Canuck]

I often have cities that have no particular tactical point at present, so I devote them to a more strategic longer-term focus.

Didn't say you were. I mean I get you are making izs as fillers but it's just hard for me to not think about why I wouldn't get a hub or harbor which would also give production, if a little less.

Projects are even better than both. Unless you just like building things, which is fine if you do. It is supposed to be a civilization building game.

A single IZ can be really advantategous and yield +1 production for every city in your empire IF all your trade routes target the same city AND the IZ is in that city. An internal trade route with a full developed trade hub city may provide +5 or +6 Food and Production per turn for every connected city. (The GE-trait to build additional districts beyond population limit and the Mausoleum of Halicarnassus trait help a lot.)

But to what end? You could instead be sending those trade routes to international destinations where they'd be generating science and culture, plus gold that can be spent anywhere. Unless you just like having big cities, which is fine if that's the objective. It will, however, put pressure on in other areas, like housing and amenities, to avoid losing the science/culture boost you get from having happy cities. Internal trade routes, essentially, primarily just set you up for additional management challenges down the road.

If I'm playing a Deity game I'll sometimes build an IZ if it has a +5 adjacency. I usually leave it empty because the workshop is dismal even with the eureka. On the rare occasions that I build one it's because a well placed factory can be worthwhile. I like to pack cities in around the Coliseum when I play Rome, and sometimes the boost from a factory can bring mediocre cities to life in a way that goes beyond how many hammers I spent and how many I get out. That's highly situational though, and I'm not sure it's ever optimal.

That's about the most telling comment on this thread, to me. I agree, it's hard not to want to place an IZ with amazing adjacency bonuses or the ability to reach 6+ cities. And even then, it's just a vanity build, because it's irrelevant to victory.

I like building iz's mostly for the great engineer points. There are a few engineers I really like. And past games have taught me to love production. Like the thrill of a powerhouse production city in alpha centauri. Even if that production isn't particularly needed in civ6 I like to have it in at least a few cities. I like impressive cities in both population and production.

I agree with everything here. Civ 6 is in what I consider to be a really weird state now. If you play it as if it were another iteration of Civ, you can keep yourself busy and interested doing things that were important in earlier versions of the game. Or if you play it to see how big and powerful you can make your cities, it offers lots of tools to play around with.

But if you play it on the basis of it's own rules, with a view to winning as quickly as you can before some other civ wins first, you'd do very few of the things you did in past Civ games. And you certainly wouldn't worry about having big cities or lots of production. You'd race up the tech and civics trees as quick as you can (projects, trade) and spend gold & faith to buy the things you need to finish your particular choice of victory condition. No military-industrial complex is required to conquer the world, just a handful of ancient units, campuses to research new weapons, and enough gold to upgrade to those weapons as they come on line.

Now, there's nothing that says that the efficient approach needs to be the same as the empire-building approach. But the two are so different in Civ 6 that I find it quite jarring at times. Building an IZ, at least in anything other than a horrible location, should be an investment that pays off down the road. Same for building the various Tier 3 buildings. But they're not, when looked at a time-to-victory perspective. And I think that's a shame.

 

[kaspergm]

If they want to make Industrial Zones more worthwhile, they could link it to coorporations in an upcoming expansion. You know, how about if those factories actually produced things for you?

 

[BarbarianHunter]

I like building iz's mostly for the great engineer points. There are a few engineers I really like. And past games have taught me to love production. Like the thrill of a powerhouse production city in alpha centauri. Even if that production isn't particularly needed in civ6 I like to have it in at least a few cities. I like impressive cities in both population and production.

Not to get back banging the IZ drum too hard again, but when I do build them, it's generally mid to late game and for the great engineer points. I can recall games where I had more than enough gold, science and units, but for whatever the reason didn't have a particular interest in building Theatre Squares. The IZ spam got me all 3 great engineers that give wonder production points. And if you're playing a huge map at Marathon speed, with allot of cities and warmongering, the amenities can get scarce and things don't get built so fast. If you burn all the great engineers on the Estádio do Maracanã you can get it up in something approximating a reasonable timeframe. This solves any amenity deficit and grants me +6 culture per city in my wide empire. The culture gets me to globalization faster, which gets me more science and production as well. All from IZ spam!

I'm not sure if projects are more efficient, but as Trav'ling Canuck stated earlier, perhaps I just like building things.

 

[Trav'ling Canuck]

If they want to make Industrial Zones more worthwhile, they could link it to coorporations in an upcoming expansion. You know, how about if those factories actually produced things for you?

I really, really hope we never see "corporations" in the game a la the Civ 4 concept again. I've seen enough of Firaxis' take on how economies work through their approach to trade routes and the tax system in Civ 6 (what tax system? yeah, exactly, that's not something civilizations and their rulers ever had to make tough choices about).

I think it's safer if they stick to war and diplomacy and assume "gold" just magically appears when you settle on cotton.

However, I do agree it would be great if Factories produced things, and tying that to your available resources (especially the choppable ones) could have a positive game impact.

 

[Ferocitus]

I'm not sure if projects are more efficient, but as Trav'ling Canuck stated earlier, perhaps I just like building things.

As legitimate a bias as any if it gives you enjoyment!

And that's a real problem for those proposing rebalances and tweaks, like the
IZ ones in this thread. Everyone has biases, some subtle, some entrenched over
many years of playing different civ versions. Proposals should try to account
for the many legitimate ways of playing civ enjoyably, at levels from warlord to
immortal, on all the different maps, and paces. But I can't remember seeing
anything that takes into account that there are huge numbers of entry-level
players. Most proposals seem (I might be wrong!) to be from the pov of the
most efficient play at high level, which is hardlyrepresentative of the total
player base.

Grievious inconsistencies, bugs, and convoluted mechanics should be addressed -
hell, there's no shortage of those - but tweaking for the purposes of making one
style easier for a minority is just more special pleading and cherry-picking.
I hope Firaxis ignores them and leaves that kind of tweaking to modders (who are
also very poorly supported atm!)

 

[BarbarianHunter]

As legitimate a bias as any if it gives you enjoyment!

But I can't remember seeing anything that takes into account that there are huge numbers of entry-level players. Most proposals seem (I might be wrong!) to be from the pov of the most efficient play at high level, which is hardly representative of the total
player base.

Maybe the entry level folks don't need so much help per se, as they can just adjust the level down as needed. I mean I won my 1st game as Gilgamesh on Settler via a Domination victory. Then played my 2nd game as Trajan on Settler and achieved the #1 Augustus Caesar ranking on a huge map, something I was unable to repeat for quite some time (as I ramped up the difficulty).

Grievious inconsistencies, bugs, and convoluted mechanics should be addressed - hell, there's no shortage of those - but tweaking for the purposes of making one style easier for a minority is just more special pleading and cherry-picking. I hope Firaxis ignores them and leaves that kind of tweaking to modders (who are also very poorly supported atm!)

Agreed! Personally, I'd like the overflow mechanic done away with. It strikes me as more of a finance gimic, and I have a production bias.

 

[Ferocitus]

Maybe the entry level folks don't need so much help per se, as they can just adjust the level down as needed.

Unless they are already at the lowest level.
And, "maybe", doesn't really cut it. There has to be some measure of that
and "maybe" Firaxis know that side of their demographic better than we
here on cfc.

 

[Trav'ling Canuck]

As legitimate a bias as any if it gives you enjoyment!

And that's a real problem for those proposing rebalances and tweaks, like the
IZ ones in this thread. Everyone has biases, some subtle, some entrenched over
many years of playing different civ versions. Proposals should try to account
for the many legitimate ways of playing civ enjoyably, at levels from warlord to
immortal, on all the different maps, and paces. But I can't remember seeing
anything that takes into account that there are huge numbers of entry-level
players. Most proposals seem (I might be wrong!) to be from the pov of the
most efficient play at high level, which is hardlyrepresentative of the total
player base.

Grievious inconsistencies, bugs, and convoluted mechanics should be addressed -
hell, there's no shortage of those - but tweaking for the purposes of making one
style easier for a minority is just more special pleading and cherry-picking.
I hope Firaxis ignores them and leaves that kind of tweaking to modders (who are
also very poorly supported atm!)

I agree entirely about address the inconsistencies, bugs, and convoluted mechanics. And especially those that trip up newcomers. The UI giving new players inaccurate information just makes it so much more difficult for people to learn the game.

I have a different take, altogether, however, on the idea that adjustments based on what is OP for "efficient" play is arguing for special treatment at the expense of those who want to play for fun.

To the extent that different districts are well balanced, and the game rewards doing things that are fun, the game becomes more accessible and enjoyable, not less. If a route that is contrary to expectations is what the game rules reward, why is it a problem to point that out, in the hopes that developers address it?

Civ is supposed to be about growing your civilization. Laying down a strong production base should provide a benefit in the game. I don't see why my pointing out that under the current rules, that's not always the case, is something that developers should ignore.

 

[BarbarianHunter]

And, "maybe", doesn't really cut it. There has to be some measure of that and "maybe" Firaxis know that side of their demographic better than we here on cfc.

Now that is near certainty !

 

[Ferocitus]

Civ is supposed to be about growing your civilization. Laying down a strong production base should provide a benefit in the game. I don't see why my pointing out that under the current rules, that's not always the case, is something that developers should ignore.

As I said:
...tweaking for the purposes of making one style easier for a minority is just
more special pleading and cherry-picking.

If you're not doing that what's the problem?

 

[acluewithout]

Projects are even better than both. Unless you just like building things, which is fine if you do. It is supposed to be a civilization building game.




But to what end? You could instead be sending those trade routes to international destinations where they'd be generating science and culture, plus gold that can be spent anywhere. Unless you just like having big cities, which is fine if that's the objective. It will, however, put pressure on in other areas, like housing and amenities, to avoid losing the science/culture boost you get from having happy cities. Internal trade routes, essentially, primarily just set you up for additional management challenges down the road.




That's about the most telling comment on this thread, to me. I agree, it's hard not to want to place an IZ with amazing adjacency bonuses or the ability to reach 6+ cities. And even then, it's just a vanity build, because it's irrelevant to victory.




I agree with everything here. Civ 6 is in what I consider to be a really weird state now. If you play it as if it were another iteration of Civ, you can keep yourself busy and interested doing things that were important in earlier versions of the game. Or if you play it to see how big and powerful you can make your cities, it offers lots of tools to play around with.

But if you play it on the basis of it's own rules, with a view to winning as quickly as you can before some other civ wins first, you'd do very few of the things you did in past Civ games. And you certainly wouldn't worry about having big cities or lots of production. You'd race up the tech and civics trees as quick as you can (projects, trade) and spend gold & faith to buy the things you need to finish your particular choice of victory condition. No military-industrial complex is required to conquer the world, just a handful of ancient units, campuses to research new weapons, and enough gold to upgrade to those weapons as they come on line.

Now, there's nothing that says that the efficient approach needs to be the same as the empire-building approach. But the two are so different in Civ 6 that I find it quite jarring at times. Building an IZ, at least in anything other than a horrible location, should be an investment that pays off down the road. Same for building the various Tier 3 buildings. But they're not, when looked at a time-to-victory perspective. And I think that's a shame.

I really, really hope we never see "corporations" in the game a la the Civ 4 concept again. I've seen enough of Firaxis' take on how economies work through their approach to trade routes and the tax system in Civ 6 (what tax system? yeah, exactly, that's not something civilizations and their rulers ever had to make tough choices about).

I think it's safer if they stick to war and diplomacy and assume "gold" just magically appears when you settle on cotton.

However, I do agree it would be great if Factories produced things, and tying that to your available resources (especially the choppable ones) could have a positive game impact.

Agreed. I posted elsewhere about different ways of playing Civ. But @Trav'ling Canuck has nailed one of the big problems with Civ: that there is too much of a gap between really optimal play and how one would intuitively think the game should be played.

You would think an empire game would require you to build an empire to win. But no, you just build campuses and or great writers and then chop. If I really play optimally, I feel more like a plague of locust than an empire.

I would add two glosses to what TC said though.

First. The early game is much better in this regards. The mismatch only really does start becoming a problem after around the Medieval era.

Second. You as the player can align optimal play and empire building a little yourself. You just have to accept you’re going to avoid certain optimal strategies ( eg don’t spam campuses, stop at say 12 cities) and accept you’re going to deliberately use some sub-optimal strats (eg build 2 or more IZ). I get why that’s not hugely attractive, but it does work to some extent.

 

[Flaxton]

IZ buildings should give a ratio of production per person. Then the player is left with a choice about growing the largest cities to make great production cities, but then have to cope with amenities, housing etc. i.e. could enjoy tall a bit more. The way the games works at the moment means that in the modern era production mainly comes from people working in mines or lumbermills - what? The whole bonus to other cities thing is also a bit weird, that would be more realistic with transport style projects.

IZ projects should in fact give you something like +20% production for x turns after completion, kind of like gearing up your factories for when that wonder becomes available to build.

Finally on an aside, copper is either mined or harvested. Isn't harvesting copper mining it? Answers on a postcard please!

I still miss the King Richards Crusade wonder in Civ 2.

And bring back gold to finish partially constructed items.

 

[Sostratus]

One note to make is that the IZ, uniquely of the other yield districts, has and adjacency card but does not have a building card, nor has it ever. Obviously, originally being able to stack regional buildings would have made this blatantly OP, though even today +100% from buildings would mean +9 production, which isn't awful. For reference, Theatre squares' buildings give 8 (2+2?+4), Campus' give +11 (2+4+5), and a C Hub's give +15.

Gold is clearly worth less than other resources, hence the CH buildings give more, but now that I look at it, I'm really surprised campus buildings give so much science.

Anyways, to chime in to the prior discussion, I am glad people have identified that workshops in particular exchange so much production now for production later. Yes, unlike gold, you can't actually save production from turn to turn. (Although I rarely find myself with nothing to do in the mid game.) Perhaps the project Industrial Zone Logistics, instead of giving gold upon completion, should have some kind of production boost (like n% of the project cost) available to the next building/district/wonder you produce there- then you would truly have a "logistics" project preparing to make something, and you could run it in anticipation of unlocking things or just as a way to farm up some GE points and not be too "wasteful" of your production. Either way, the release model of "production costs based on tier in the tech tree" could really use a pass to "prod costs based on what it does." Units have the same issue. This is why the workshop is so pricey.

I mentioned it in a different thread, but the mechanics of factories and power plants are such that they actually have both local and regional yield values currently coded in- the displayed number in the city report is just the highest applicable one. They are set to be the same, but you can see the difference when you have James Watt. He only boosts the local yield. Nikola Tesla boosts both. This is very sad if you were hoping to exploit the Mausoleum and Magnus to get a bunch of +7 factories stacking on one city, or if you thought you could project a +11 factory aura.
In lieu of universal stacking, I would propose the following change:
Instead of cities gaining
factory yield = max(local yield, [regional yield 1, regional yield 2,...])
they instead gain
factory yield = local yield + max(regional yield 1, regional yield 2,...)
IE, you always get the strongest aura in addition to the extra +3 if you actually have a factory in the city.

This way, factories and power plants will always benefit a city that has them, but can still benefit from having coverage. At least that way there's a reason to build IZs in more cities, even if it isn't quite 'optimal.' You'll never put inexperienced players into the noob trap of building lots of factories and power plants, and ending up costing them 5 maintenance for the luxury of 2 GE points. I abhor noob traps in any game - especially when the factory's tooltip will proudly declare +3 production when it in fact might give 0. Building a factory/pp in a city that already has coverage should do something to boost your production. The game just doesn't feel like you're properly industrialising with the current rules.

 

[sixty4half]

And bring back gold to finish partially constructed items.

Or whipping slaves a la cIV

 

[SammyKhalifa]

Or whipping slaves a la cIV

Please no

 

[Trav'ling Canuck]

If I really play optimally, I feel more like a plague of locust than an empire.

That made my morning!!

 

[UWHabs]

One note to make is that the IZ, uniquely of the other yield districts, has and adjacency card but does not have a building card, nor has it ever. Obviously, originally being able to stack regional buildings would have made this blatantly OP, though even today +100% from buildings would mean +9 production, which isn't awful. For reference, Theatre squares' buildings give 8 (2+2?+4), Campus' give +11 (2+4+5), and a C Hub's give +15.

Gold is clearly worth less than other resources, hence the CH buildings give more, but now that I look at it, I'm really surprised campus buildings give so much science.

Anyways, to chime in to the prior discussion, I am glad people have identified that workshops in particular exchange so much production now for production later. Yes, unlike gold, you can't actually save production from turn to turn. (Although I rarely find myself with nothing to do in the mid game.) Perhaps the project Industrial Zone Logistics, instead of giving gold upon completion, should have some kind of production boost (like n% of the project cost) available to the next building/district/wonder you produce there- then you would truly have a "logistics" project preparing to make something, and you could run it in anticipation of unlocking things or just as a way to farm up some GE points and not be too "wasteful" of your production. Either way, the release model of "production costs based on tier in the tech tree" could really use a pass to "prod costs based on what it does." Units have the same issue. This is why the workshop is so pricey.

I mentioned it in a different thread, but the mechanics of factories and power plants are such that they actually have both local and regional yield values currently coded in- the displayed number in the city report is just the highest applicable one. They are set to be the same, but you can see the difference when you have James Watt. He only boosts the local yield. Nikola Tesla boosts both. This is very sad if you were hoping to exploit the Mausoleum and Magnus to get a bunch of +7 factories stacking on one city, or if you thought you could project a +11 factory aura.
In lieu of universal stacking, I would propose the following change:
Instead of cities gaining
factory yield = max(local yield, [regional yield 1, regional yield 2,...])
they instead gain
factory yield = local yield + max(regional yield 1, regional yield 2,...)
IE, you always get the strongest aura in addition to the extra +3 if you actually have a factory in the city.

This way, factories and power plants will always benefit a city that has them, but can still benefit from having coverage. At least that way there's a reason to build IZs in more cities, even if it isn't quite 'optimal.' You'll never put inexperienced players into the noob trap of building lots of factories and power plants, and ending up costing them 5 maintenance for the luxury of 2 GE points. I abhor noob traps in any game - especially when the factory's tooltip will proudly declare +3 production when it in fact might give 0. Building a factory/pp in a city that already has coverage should do something to boost your production. The game just doesn't feel like you're properly industrialising with the current rules.

Yep, another good point. Would essentially double the local factory production, but it would also obviously mean that building a factory will always boost the production in the city it's in. Every now and then if my IZ stacking isn't setup right, I've built a factory in a city that already has coverage in order to get the boost in a couple other cities.

 

[BarbarianHunter]

I think IZ's can be fun given the right set of variables. For instance, spamming IZ's can get you the vast majority of the great engineers as well as extra production. Inspired by this thread, I plan to spam IZ's in most of my cities and ignore Theatre Squares. With Kumasi and Antananarivo I think I can have both a high production and culture with each GE giving me another 2% boost to my culture. This should get me the 3 wonder engineers which can be deployed to build the Estádio do Maracanã which will give me another +6 culture per city, which will also give +2 amenities empire wide. Seems a nice synergy for warmongering. And a fun challenge for the game, become a cultural juggernaut without building any meaningful quantity of Theatre Squares.

If you're warmongering, the space race great engineers are actually of some use, as you would want the War Dept, not the Royal Society. So I think IZ's are actually of some use for large map war focused games. Achieving quick cultural or science victories, not so much so.

Here is a screenshot to illustrate that I can have a high culture while also having only 3 Theatre Squares in the entirety of the realm. The great engineers should quick build the Estádio do Maracanã netting even more culture long before I could otherwise achieve it. And that will be from GE's from IZ spam. I don't think it's an accident that the workshop yields +1 culture from DaVinci. Firaxis knows this strategy works.

Spoiler :

Again, not useful for all situations, but certainly a viable district given the right set of variables.

 

[kaspergm]

One note to make is that the IZ, uniquely of the other yield districts, has and adjacency card but does not have a building card, nor has it ever. Obviously, originally being able to stack regional buildings would have made this blatantly OP, though even today +100% from buildings would mean +9 production, which isn't awful. For reference, Theatre squares' buildings give 8 (2+2?+4), Campus' give +11 (2+4+5), and a C Hub's give +15.

Gold is clearly worth less than other resources, hence the CH buildings give more, but now that I look at it, I'm really surprised campus buildings give so much science.

Interesting point. Wonder how big an impact changing University to +3 [and Research Lab to +4] would have.