Top 3 Most Broken Exploits Currently (pre Fall patch)

[elitetroops]

I find it amusing that some claim these bugs were obvious when they found out about them on youtube or in the forums. What percentage of those complaining would have found any of these exploits on their own?

Well, the exploits I discovered within a couple of hours of the release, and was the first to report here on civfanatics as far as I know, include the Scythian horse market and the selling builders with one charge left exploits. Am I allowed to say they are obvious? They are. Maybe not to the average player, since disbanding units is rare (especially disbanding builders), but to whoever made the decision that you should get 2 gold/cog when selling units it should have been immediately obvious how exploitable that is. Later on I've discovered for example how to build any district in one chop, and just now that I can buy cities for virtually nothing.

I might be looking at the game differently than most people, since I'm curious by nature and like finding out what I can do, rather than just do what I'm supposed to be doing. The amount of gamebreaking exploits I've found within the first few days with Civ VI gives me the feeling that nobody has seriously looked at the game mechanics like that before release. I think someone should have.

As for not taking advantage of exploits, right now it is impossible. Any time you have a +x% bonus towards anything and finish it with some overflow, you exploit a broken feature if your next build shouldn't get that bonus. If you happen to want to chop, for example to improve a resource, while building a unit, you are quite likely to gain a massive bonus by exploiting a broken feature. And as was already mentioned, AI trade deals might or might not be exploits, how can you know?

 

[Aldrahill]

Well, the exploits I discovered within a couple of hours of the release, and was the first to report here on civfanatics as far as I know, include the Scythian horse market and the selling builders with one charge left exploits. Am I allowed to say they are obvious? They are. Maybe not to the average player, since disbanding units is rare (especially disbanding builders), but to whoever made the decision that you should get 2 gold/cog when selling units it should have been immediately obvious how exploitable that is. Later on I've discovered for example how to build any district in one chop, and just now that I can buy cities for virtually nothing.

I might be looking at the game differently than most people, since I'm curious by nature and like finding out what I can do, rather than just do what I'm supposed to be doing. The amount of gamebreaking exploits I've found within the first few days with Civ VI gives me the feeling that nobody has seriously looked at the game mechanics like that before release. I think someone should have.

As for not taking advantage of exploits, right now it is impossible. Any time you have a +x% bonus towards anything and finish it with some overflow, you exploit a broken feature if your next build shouldn't get that bonus. If you happen to want to chop, for example to improve a resource, while building a unit, you are quite likely to gain a massive bonus by exploiting a broken feature. And as was already mentioned, AI trade deals might or might not be exploits, how can you know?

Exactly man, it's unavoidable. They're just too ubiquitous.

 

[Kougar7]

Wow, thanks for the vid Aldrahill! I should've realized it was a commonly known issue already.

Didn't know about it and still I figured out how to end up the AI asking for open borders in trade for the ark of the convenant. Sounds fair to me. http://forums.civfanatics.com/attachments/20161031033357_1-jpg.457191/

 

[God of Kings]

The unit-selling exploit even mentioned here: http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/GameBreaker/Civilization (go to the bottom of the page)

 

[Acken]

How the hell they made trading so broken is beyond me.

 

[Takfloyd]

Anyone claiming that the trading AI would be in any way hard to improve or that testing might not have caught the issues is just plain wrong.

The AI literally never makes a balanced, reasonable trade. It is EXTREMELY easy to code how the AI weighs trade items. Even just "1 resource I don't have = 100 gold" would significantly improve it from the current mess. It's like they didn't even try.

And that's not even getting into coding the AI to take into account what it actually needs. Cleopatra here currently has so much unhappiness that rebels keep spawning in her cities, yet she has no interest in my luxuries.

 

[Takfloyd]

Another example of poor coding: The "what would it take" button is completely useless other than for exploits. The AI claims the deal can't be done but easily accepts the same small lump sum of gold as always. Of course, it refuses an offer of 300 gold per turn though.



He then refuses my attempt to gift him open borders for free, on a refreshed trade screen so again no exploit involved. He will buy open borders for gold though!

 

[Mr.WorldWide]

OP TLDR for those at work?

 

[Furycrab]

Well, the exploits I discovered within a couple of hours of the release, and was the first to report here on civfanatics as far as I know, include the Scythian horse market and the selling builders with one charge left exploits. Am I allowed to say they are obvious? They are. Maybe not to the average player, since disbanding units is rare (especially disbanding builders), but to whoever made the decision that you should get 2 gold/cog when selling units it should have been immediately obvious how exploitable that is. Later on I've discovered for example how to build any district in one chop, and just now that I can buy cities for virtually nothing.

It's like you said, the average player doesn't delete units, and every other mechanic in the game seems built on making you not want to delete stuff. I don't know why it's so generous, but I imagine they came up with numbers but then they added or changed things like the +100% military cards and since testers weren't actively disbanding units for cash no one felt to check the ratios. It happens.

Every other game will have stuff like this, if not worst. Ultimately, I'm just glad all of these exploits fall into the category of : You decide if you want to use these. Even in multiplayer, if you play against someone wanting to horse economy you, or bankrupt an AI via trade, just treat them like you would leavers: blacklist them then move on.

It's not great, but if you try to poke holes in a game, odds are, you'll succeed.

I do sometimes worry about the integrity a little because things like the HOF or Deity challenges it can be fun... but even if they had launched an absolutely exploit free game, people would still save skum or find some other creative way to exploit the strategic or diplomatic AI in some creative way I don't really want to play, so it's just best I don't care if people can cheat the system and just worry about if it actually stops me from enjoying the game...

So far, the horse/builder stuff requires you playing in an unnatural way, and to truly break the trade screen you have to really poke at it in ways I don't really want to play either, and I won't play multiplayer with people who would. If after a week of community testing and playing that's the worst they can find... I'm ok with it.

 

[MyOtherName]

If you happen to want to chop, for example to improve a resource, while building a unit

Aside: as far as I can tell, you don't need to chop to improve resources. I haven't tested every combination (e.g. forested diamonds), but every time I've actually paid attention, you can have both a forest and an improvement on your resources.

 

[stormtrooper412]

wow, absolutely terrible. I didn't know about it because I have never disbanded units or at least never paid attention to refunds but yeah I was at a point where I could 1 turn a Horseman and I probably could have stocked massive gold. I rarely trade with AIs because I generally always kill them first.

The only exploit I use regularly is settler stealing because I find free cities to be the best option in the early game

 

[Nefelia]

I agree with another poster that, most likely, these were all reported, just not fixed. Which then begs the question of what this company thinks of us that they release a knowingly bugged game (in many ways) because they know people will buy it and wait for patches.

Simple: the publisher decides the release date, and the developers are stuck scrambling to iron out the game breaking kinks. That means they have to prioritize, and bugs that crash the game or render the game otherwise unplayable get fixed first. Bugs that require the player to actively abuse the system (and ruin their own experience) get fixed last.

For the multi players, that simply means you have to play with scrupulous people. Tough break, as they se seem to be in short supply.

 

[MyOtherName]

Bugs that require the player to actively abuse the system (and ruin their own experience) get fixed last.

You're right; it's our fault for trying to play Civ 6 like a strategy game. Shame on us.

 

[Victoria]

We are here, fanatics all and perhaps that makes us more vocal.

I think this is the most strategic Civ game yet.

Nice to see the weaknesses and they must be fixed. I am blessed with being able to avoid them but multi player games must be hell currently with the old... "If I do not exploit everything I can I will be a noob"

Are the exploits damaging multiplayer?

 

[Nefelia]

You're right; it's our fault for trying to play Civ 6 like a strategy game. Shame on us.

Look, it is not rocket science. If you notice a feature on a brand new game that is obviously broken, the choice is yours (and yours alone) as to whether you abuse it or not.

I have yet to sell a single unit, despite having known of that exploit for a week. I have yet to mess around with the trade screen to buy cities for 5 GPT or less. I am playing the same way as I regularly do, and I am enjoying myself. If you are unable to resist these exploits and they are wrecking your game, then too bad for you.

 

[elitetroops]

Aside: as far as I can tell, you don't need to chop to improve resources. I haven't tested every combination (e.g. forested diamonds), but every time I've actually paid attention, you can have both a forest and an improvement on your resources.

Are you sure? I'm pretty sure plantations on for example forested tobacco or jungled banana will remove the forest/jungle.

About not using exploits, like I said, the overflow exploit is unavoidable. It is very likely to save you a few turns of production every game, want it or not. A lot more if you happen to chop at certain times. Conciously exploiting it for max gain can of course be avoided.

The one that bugs me the most is still the undocumented production bonuses towards early units. Still don't know what that is about, if it is a bug or a feature. But they are for sure unavoidable. Right now winning deity doesn't feel like much of a achievement, knowing that I get a massive unfair advantage in the early game.

 

[manu-fan]

BTW OP - you're saying 'Equitable' wrong

 

[Zuizgond]

Are you sure? I'm pretty sure plantations on for example forested tobacco or jungled banana will remove the forest/jungle.

Graphically it looks like it has been removed but it's not the case.

 

[PendragonWRB]

Just because a bug or exploit is in the game doesn't mean QA failed to report it. It just means it didn't get fixed. There are a host of reasons that can be the case, especially if it's a bug that didn't start occurring until very late and they decided not to delay the game just to fix that one thing.

THIS! We have no idea what the QA team found, we only know what was not fixed. For release they put out a game that WORKS. It may not be balanced, their may be cheats you can abuse, but you can play the game out of the box.

That said, there are TONS of things they need to patch, the only question is how long do we have to wait and what will we get when that time comes.

 

[skyclad]

Its just baffling to me that they made us get so much gold for disbanding units. In previous games the "wealth" action in cities gave 25% of production into gold was it not? Pitiful absolutely but in some cases your best option especially towards the end of the game.