Things I hoped would be gone from Civ5

[PhilBowles]

I disagree with this paragraph. I think religion is well placed in the tech tree, as it is a concept that arises from a certain circumstance like everything else.

That's a conceptual argument, not a mechanical one, and it's the mechanics that cause the issue. More to the point, it's not really a conceptual argument that addresses the issue.

Firstly, religion as a concept is a development - but only to a limited degree (the extent to which settling large communities and developing the ability to build places of worship) is it a scientific rather than social development. So if we're modelling scientific and cultural advances on different trees, that doesn't argue for putting religion on the 'science tree'.

Secondly, the way religion is implemented in Civ V and Civ VI - unlike Civ IV - there is a difference between religion (=the faith resource) and specific religious systems. You don't rush to research Confucianism. Presumably faith generation is still going to be linked fundamentally to districts and buildings that are unlocked by technological progression, as is the culture generation that allows you to progress on the social tree.

Finding certain optimal paths through the tree is possibly a problem, but only a minor one, as you do have to play and research quite a bit to find them, certainly getting your money's worth in the process. In any case, I think this is solved adequately when the map has more of an impact on the direction you choose as seems to be the case in Civ6.

I'm reserving judgment on the way the map will impact strategy at this point. From what I've seen it looks as though most tech boosts are linked to things that are only peripherally dependent on the map (you can build 3 farms or a district anywhere, or make contact with another civ on any map) and seem designed to be 'gameable' to the extent that you're told in advance which actions will always contribute to which advance.

Aside from fiddling a bit with which buildings etc. care about which terrain (which happens with every Civ game), this seems to be the main way in which the map is intended to influence how games play (beyond the way it always does in Civ games).

 

[Leathaface]

I do like the inclusion of city states in Civ VI. They can provide a big advantage in the right circumstances, but only if you dedicate a good couple of envoys to get their unique bonus. (Suizeran??)

I also like how having a seperate Civic tree breaks up the monotony of a single tree. You could invest more into culture than Science if you're aiming enable a specific Government type that'll help you in war against another Civ. Governments are powerful in Civ VI, at the very start you can get huge bonuses towards settler and builder production.

I can only imagine that later forms of Government will have bonuses and uses just as powerful. So progressing in Civ VI isn't just "Science, science, science."

 

[Staler87]

The Iroquois Confederacy was a development influenced by contact with American colonists, not a truly indigenous institution. By three hundred years ago these groups had contact with people who had discovered writing and had the concept of a constitution. It was much more of a 'natural' evolution of their society by local cultures incorporating lessons learned from elsewhere than the colonial states, but it wasn't something that would ever have evolved in the absence of contact with Europeans.

It was recorded on wampum belts in 1451AD or 1150AD (archaeologists aren't quite sure). Either way the Iroquois met Europeans (for the first time) in 1609. By then their constitution had stood for centuries. It was amended in the 18th century to include another nation. The one established pre-contact had a working foundation for a government. Plus the Great Law of Peace was pretty unlike any current European Constitution that the Iroquois were exposed to.

In all actuality a better argument would be the the Great Law of Peace influenced the American constitution, but this is highly debatable.

 

[the343danny]

Like mentioned previously, I really disliked how city states took up so much room and prevented me from building a nation the way I want. Instead, it would have been cool if city states were associated with a certain area, so that any city built there is associated with that independent state. Then I would be able to destroy the original city and rebuild it a few tiles over without eliminating a key gameplay mechanic like the city states.

If somebody destroys Taipei and a city gets rebuilt on the other side of the island, the city inhabitants would still identify as Taiwanese.

Civ 4's huge failing with RNG was when you could have game-altering or even game winning/losing outcomes depend on a single dice roll or small set of them. By design, civ 4 mitigated that in combat with collateral to balance against RNG, but collateral wasn't there for ancient wars. This is one area where civ 5 is soundly better than civ 4 in its design and implementation. You will never lose because someone sent 2 inexpensive units at you and you got unlucky attacking it with more of counter units.

Agreed. Its just crushing to lose your elite unit youve grown attached to, because you thought a 99.8% win is basically a free win. It felt even worse in mods like FFH due to the RPG elements.

Still, Civ V combat is absurdly easy to the point where you need to give AIs stupid amounts of bonuses to compete with you, which is also frustrating. Also 1UPT meant that later on in the game, the AI is absolutely covered by units, which looks awful and eats up CPU time.

I hoped they would limit unit carpets by allow mixed army building (like the fleet system in VI) but that seems to only be for siege units. Bummer.

 

[Hail]

1. Having 1 tree means huge advantage for civs with higher science, so there should be a lot of different gameplay mechanic contributing to the science and whose who don't do it should provide comparable advantages.

prior to civ6, focus on science provides too much benefit.
but suppose that the player, who goes full science will research units he will not have the resources to build, research buildings he will not have the production to build, research civics he will not have enough culture to "adopt"?

by splitting one tree in two, devs ended up with two half-empty dull trees.

Civ 4's huge failing with RNG was when you could have game-altering or even game winning/losing outcomes depend on a single dice roll or small set of them. By design, civ 4 mitigated that in combat with collateral to balance against RNG, but collateral wasn't there for ancient wars.

wat? civ4 warfare relies on unit quantity to overcome RNG variance.
obviously, ancient warface lacks unit quantity, so the unit combat design falls flat on his face.
really strange that that was not caught during testing (ancient era always receives more love) and something done about it. maybe unit combat was even worse before release?

P.S. more so, the looser is actually double punished in civ4: not only he lost his unit(s), but enemy unit(s) gained xp and will partially heal when promoted. care to explain these design choices?

Still, Civ V combat is absurdly easy to the point where you need to give AIs stupid amounts of bonuses to compete with you, which is also frustrating. Also 1UPT meant that later on in the game, the AI is absolutely covered by units, which looks awful and eats up CPU time.

the AI needs qualitive bonuses to units. in an 1UpT environment, an AI will not be able to utilize a quantitive unit advantage (production bonus can only be converted into more units) due to spacial limitations (only six adjacent tiles, impassible mountains, water tiles, etc.).

the obvious solution is to implement a "production into unit xp" conversion. here you go, free advice Firaxis
another solution is to remove unit autoheal. units require pop to build and must visit a city to replenish lost troops. units that cannot retreat, will be lost.

things I hoped would be gone from civ5:
* 1UpT
* city states
* denunciations
* research agreements
* bleak terrain improvements
* uncontrolable by the player cultural tile acquisition

 

[CaiusDrewart]

RNG forces the players in a strategy game to make risk-adjusted choices based on potential returns.

By itself, that isn't bad. In fact, RNG done well will let a player hedge choices and come out on top in spite of RNG in the vast majority of cases.

Civ 4's huge failing with RNG was when you could have game-altering or even game winning/losing outcomes depend on a single dice roll or small set of them. By design, civ 4 mitigated that in combat with collateral to balance against RNG, but collateral wasn't there for ancient wars. This is one area where civ 5 is soundly better than civ 4 in its design and implementation. You will never lose because someone sent 2 inexpensive units at you and you got unlucky attacking it with more of counter units.

Events were a different boat, mostly. Most events were more nuisance than serious, though their relatively limited agency and lack of any new decision making in the gameplay made their role questionable. A few awful ones like pre-patch Vedic Aryans and tsunamis, and Bermuda triangle to this day can ruin a game outright.

I never minded the Civ IV RNG myself. I generally think warfare was/is a really risky and uncertain thing, and no one really knew how battles would turn out beforehand. And anyway, in later eras, the number of units used are such that it is extremely rare that the RNG makes the difference. Early warfare is a dicey proposition, true, but is that such a bad thing? I certainly can't say I prefer Civ V's system where I can succeed on an early rush 99.9% of the time. There should be elements of danger and uncertainty in combat.

I'm with you on events, though. Those are bad gameplay. Fortunately, they're easily turned off in Civ IV.

 

[LDiCesare]

I never found Civ IV warfare that random. War should be random if it's to be even somewhat related to reality, the question being how much randomness one wants (various games answer with anything between none and a lot). Usually, non random games are much easier because you don't have to adapt to unexpected results. To me, that ends up being less interesting.

 

[Magil]

I never found Civ IV warfare that random. War should be random if it's to be even somewhat related to reality, the question being how much randomness one wants (various games answer with anything between none and a lot). Usually, non random games are much easier because you don't have to adapt to unexpected results. To me, that ends up being less interesting.

While I don't dislike Civ IV's warfare I fundamentally disagree with your assertion. It's much more satisfying if an "unexpected situation" comes from the enemy's strategic savvy, like hiding units in an area they knew where you wouldn't have vision, rather than a bad roll of the dice.

 

[apocalypse105]

Alright, suicide those 8 trebuchets on the 6 guerilla longbows positioned between two of your cities. See how that works out in a to trade. Maybe you'll get that lucky 1% win?
.

Was talking about using trebuches for killing a stack that isnt a city. But maybe you are right waste of hamers but you can easy kill other huge armies just by suiciding siege and get collateral damage

 

[qwerty25]

While I don't dislike Civ IV's warfare I fundamentally disagree with your assertion. It's much more satisfying if an "unexpected situation" comes from the enemy's strategic savvy, like hiding units in an area they knew where you wouldn't have vision, rather than a bad roll of the dice.

I think we would mostly prefer the latter. However 1upt coupled with small maps leads to small room for any large strategies besides place melee in front of ranged.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

Was talking about using trebuches for killing a stack that isnt a city. But maybe you are right waste of hamers but you can easy kill other huge armies just by suiciding siege and get collateral damage

When you play something with a pulse, those longbows might not be in cities. Take them lightly and they will be in yours though.

 

[PhilBowles]

It was recorded on wampum belts in 1451AD or 1150AD (archaeologists aren't quite sure). Either way the Iroquois met Europeans (for the first time) in 1609. By then their constitution had stood for centuries. It was amended in the 18th century to include another nation. The one established pre-contact had a working foundation for a government. Plus the Great Law of Peace was pretty unlike any current European Constitution that the Iroquois were exposed to.

Interesting - I hadn't been aware that it predated the Confederacy itself, which I'd understood to be essentially a post-European creation (though looking it up it may be that I've confused the Confederacy as a whole with the later Six Nations period).

 

[LDiCesare]

I think we would mostly prefer the latter. However 1upt coupled with small maps leads to small room for any large strategies besides place melee in front of ranged.

Yes, but I actually like randomness because it's more realistic. What I actually prefer is the results of a fight to be predictable but not the casualties. So you get a decent appriasal of what the result of this turn fight will be, but you don't know that much what it will be next turn and have to adapt.
Not knowing whether the enemy will bring more units on your front or keep them on another one is indeed the more interesting 'randomness', but as you say, 1upt makes such maneuvers almost impossible on crowded maps.

 

[Karmah]

I really didn't like the concept of city states. I much prefer the idea that everyone starts off equally, and if given the chance, could develop into a great civilization. Civ4 had city states if you just fill the map with lots of civs, some would necessarily stay small and you could deal with them how you wanted to, albeit without the gamey bonuses.

I didn't like having two tech trees. A civilization knows what it knows, and everything you know is dependent on everything else. You can't have Rock n' Roll without electricity, you can't have organized religion without a writing system, etc. It makes sense to have a winding, diverse path, but splitting the tree in two pretends that culture can advance without science, and vice versa.

With both of these contrivances in place, I can't see Civ6 surpassing Civ4.

And we should care because ....?

 

[salty mud]

And we should care because ....?

Because it's a reasoned and logical argument that highlights big flaws in Civ VI's mechanics.

 

[KrikkitTwo]

Because it's a reasoned and logical argument that highlights big flaws in Civ VI's mechanics.

Those aren't flaws those are things the OP doesn't like, his "argument" is just detailing what he doesn't like about them. (mostly he seems to favor more of a simulation than a game)

I personally like both the things the OP hates, and the reasons the OP gives are merely preferences (as are mine)....
There is no reason any of us have to care that you like chocolate or vanilla, unless we are making ice cream for you specifically...
The developers are making Civ VI taking the things they liked about Civ V, and adding some things they think they will like better.

 

[x2Madda]

With both of these contrivances in place, I can't see Civ6 surpassing Civ4.

I find that statement really hyperbolic. It implies that if combat was completely rubbish and unbalanced, if the AI didn't even work, if the game had just 1 map with no random seed generator or map types, the game would still be great but these 2 features have ruined it?!

You should have said "surpassing Civ4 TO ME".

Your comment on city states I disagree with, small civs in civ4 were better off being taken over whereas city states serve a useful purpose, being genuine allies.

The split in the tree I also disagree with because the science tree has always been split with military focus on one side and most everything else on the other.
In civ5 its even possible to get close to the end of the tree and never research sailing!

I don't take umbrage with you on a personal level but we had a civ game you feel is perfect, it's called civ4 and it still exists. I don't want another Civ4,5,3,2 or 1. I can go back and play any of those, if anything I want Civ6 to introduce new, exciting features!

 

[LDiCesare]

I agree with the OP, but he didn't say Civ 4 was perfect so if you want to nitpick him for not saying "to me", don't make him say what he did not.
From my point of view, Civ 4 religious system is weak, hexes are way better than squares, for instance. Stacks of doom could be better replaced with stacked combat a la Call to Power (which limited each tile to 12 unit max-armies and handled combined arms in a way no game in Sid's series ever approached).

It's not about wanting a simulation to me. I developped a game which was more of a simulation than a game, I develop simulations for a living, that's not what I want.
What I want is a game where I can have some immersion (orroleplay if you prefer). If I see a city state that is magically unable to become a great power, I just can't believe it and I just can't get it. Also, Civ is great as an educational game, it helps at discovering things. Civ 1 was awesome in the sense it conveyed the message "any people, properly led, can reach the stars". Civ V says "some people are dooomed from birth to be underdogs". (Although actually, civ 1 had barbarians, so it was not that utopic either).

So I agree with the OP, I think Civ V and likely VI will be inferior to Civ IV, but Civ IV is not perfect by any means.
Civ VI could have used CtP2 as an inspiration (and no, I don't want a Ctp2) to fix flaws in the combat system (1upt and stacks of doom), in builder production (why are they still not usign public works, seriously?) but the game shied away from such changes. It made interesting changes in the government system part with the cards idea. Apart from that, I don't think there's anything really new in this game wrt the previous one (Eurekas look like they will happen no matter what, and the terrain dependencies/adjacencies seem a bit cosmetic to me - you could build cottages on the map in IV, which was akin to building a library on a tile).

 

[Thunderfist]

I wish civ6 would make border expansion more like civ4. Having borders expand 1 tile at a time means that your territory is often a patch of islands rather than a continuous territory for a large portion of the game. It takes away from the sense of having an empire.

I completely agree with this. I thought it would've been a great idea to at least give border growth a bias towards expanding in the direction of your nearest city, or to either make tiles cheaper to purchase the closer they are to another city of yours and/or have those tiles require fewer culture points for the city to obtain.

 

[stealth_nsk]

Because it's a reasoned and logical argument that highlights big flaws in Civ VI's mechanics.

I really don't see any logical arguments highlighting flaws in mechanics here.

People don't like city-states because they think everyone should start equal? This has nothing to do with game mechanics, that's their vision of "realism". Comments about 2 tech trees are the same. Are those complains about game balance, lack of choices or anything like this? They are about how unrealistic 2 trees are.

Civilization is a computer game. It's impossible to make it 100% simulation of life, it's impossible to make it even 1% simulation of life, it's pure abstraction with some references to history for better immersion. So comments about "unrealistic" game mechanics have no value for anyone except poster.