Tune in November 7 for an Exploration Age livestream!

[NooBusMaxximus]

I really enjoyed the naval gameplay showed on the stream: with treasure fleets, piracy etc. However I feel like exploration age is decent at representing interactions with new world, but at the same time it abandons the continental aspect of medieval ages, especially due to the fact that legacy path literally forces you to explore terra incognito, and not your homeland. At least from what devs have shown to us.

For example such system would not cover the land spice trading which started within the Eurasia between India, Arabs and Europe, or medieval Silk Road across the Eurasia. And in this case I would like to see not only naval but also land treasure traders. Maybe they could be less efficient (To support naval expedition like Portugal did in this situation =D) but for sure beneficial in case you are not a naval empire. For the same reason I think that treasure resources spread should work similar way to civ 6, when you have a few contents on your homeland and each continent have it’s own set of unique resources, and you have to get ones far from you somehow. And same for distant lands. It would be symmetrical, so trading is equal for all players in all lands(would be especially important for MP, in case there are players that start on different lands), and it would allow to stay relevant in case you are land empire without huge naval power.

Same with military legacy path it again forces you to be a naval empire. Making mongol an exception isn’t the way, I think all civs should be able to progress this path through colonizing your own continent (example - Russian colonization of Siberia) or capturing the neighbors(same Mongols). For example all civs receive full points for distant land settlements and half on a homeland (except mongols for example that have full points for any towns or cities on their land).

Among other medieval aspects - Religion got simplified and I am not sure how I feel about it. It had a huge influence on medieval politics and culture. And each player having it’s own religion seems to be “just another set of bonuses for now”, and doesn’t contribute much to interactions between players, how it was in previous civs. Especially Civ IV for example: when civs with the same religion had better relationships, different religions affected trading, alliances and wars. Maybe stream didn’t show a full picture and it’s deeper, I don’t know.

Also culture highly relying on relics seems incomplete. Yes, the art was mostly religious, but it was more than some religious artifacts: paintings, sculptures, mosaics, architecture, texts - all of this is a big part of medieval culture on the humanity’s way to Renaissance . Probably it is now a part of civ-specific great people, than it is okay, I just didn’t see that from stream.

Overall I think that there are still plenty of work to do regarding this age, and I am sure it will be more complete on release or soon later, but for now it seems significantly less worked out than antiquity (which is already really good).

 

[Evolena]

- we've been told that trade works differently in each age. We haven't seen any trade in the stream, right? I also didn't catch any merchant unit in the production overviews, but I also haven't looked specifically for them.

The Chola is all about Trade Routes, by land or sea, so I suppose they are stille there. But you may have to make the Trade Agreements again...

 

[V. Soma]

My take on their reaction there is that the new world civs essentially don't play the same game, they're more or less locked out of the policies. I wonder if they could add a mechanism where their goals essentially are the reverse of the old world civs - ie. they can "capture" treasure fleets, and when they bring them back to their lands, they get points for "defending their resources". I don't think it makes sense to have them try to go the opposite way with treasure fleets.
You need to come up with some alt version for their military path. Maybe you give civs over there a default ability like Mongolia where it's simply about conquering stuff. Even if they're not playing with the same victory conditions, it would be nice if they could be a foil with an adversarial feel.



Yeah, I don't recall seeing anything different with trade. I do think the whole treasure fleet thing is probably what they were referring to mostly when they talked about "trade" being different in the different ages. Maybe there's other pieces, but IMO given that's tied to resources, that's probably what they meant most. Whether the old trade system is still in place in that era or not, I don't know.


Overall, it looked interesting, although obviously it's so heavily geared towards a race for the new world, my problem is that if you don't have a naval base setup, you're pretty much going to be completely locked out of the era if you don't take a Mongolia-like civ. I mean, I guess you could ignore those trees and really focus on the other trees, but I can definitely foresee a number of games where you essentially are stuck in an inland sea or in impassable ice/tundra, and you're just not going to be able to do any of the new world stuff.

So then you can't get colonies, like real world Germany couldn't get much - so you would then go to war in modern age - like Germany did... talk about history game, eh

 

[Josephias]

Sorry if i’m repeating someone, but wanted to say that the moment I saw it on the stream:

Anyone else finds the “tresaure fleets” mechanic having echoes of Colonization “bring treasure to metropoli” feature?

 

[Haig]

Remember that this is still "vanilla" Civ VII, many things like homeland-centered strategy will probably be more fleshed out in the future.

 

[Krikkit1]

The Chola is all about Trade Routes, by land or sea, so I suppose they are stille there. But you may have to make the Trade Agreements again...

Also there was a religious belief that spread over trade routes.

It would be interesting if trade routes can go to the Distant Lands. or if Treasure Fleets are the only option there.

 

[Siptah]

With the new info digested, I wondered how it feels to skip the distant land and exploration in exploration era, and instead focus on your homeland as a non-mongol civ. Looking at the legacy paths, two are wide open, and two are closed. This means, in worst case, you'd miss out on a few militaristic and economic legacies and attribute points. In return, you can concentrate on culture and science to get these respective points. This is certainly suboptimal (as the first points in all paths seem rather easy to get if it weren't for the distant lands requirements), but it's also not game breaking to focus on the homeland and preparing for the actual victory goals of age 3.

But maybe, and here the speculation starts, this isn't it. In previous civ games, you could only get cities in peace deals when you occupy them. With the clear separation between homeland and distant lands, I could see the following option: you fight a war against another civ in the homeland, occupy their capital and other settlements, but in the peace deal, you ask for some colonial possessions, and not in the homeland. As you then control a conquered city in the distant lands, this would give you a bit of progress towards the militaristic path at least - a reward for your military prowess without really engaging in distant lands play. I don't think this is particularly likely to be the case right now, but maybe this would help in games in which you have a hard time to get exploration or coastal cities going.

 

[Eagle Pursuit]

With the new info digested, I wondered how it feels to skip the distant land and exploration in exploration era, and instead focus on your homeland as a non-mongol civ. Looking at the legacy paths, two are wide open, and two are closed. This means, in worst case, you'd miss out on a few militaristic and economic legacies and attribute points. In return, you can concentrate on culture and science to get these respective points. This is certainly suboptimal (as the first points in all paths seem rather easy to get if it weren't for the distant lands requirements), but it's also not game breaking to focus on the homeland and preparing for the actual victory goals of age 3.

But maybe, and here the speculation starts, this isn't it. In previous civ games, you could only get cities in peace deals when you occupy them. With the clear separation between homeland and distant lands, I could see the following option: you fight a war against another civ in the homeland, occupy their capital and other settlements, but in the peace deal, you ask for some colonial possessions, and not in the homeland. As you then control a conquered city in the distant lands, this would give you a bit of progress towards the militaristic path at least - a reward for your military prowess without really engaging in distant lands play. I don't think this is particularly likely to be the case right now, but maybe this would help in games in which you have a hard time to get exploration or coastal cities going.

The Mongol UA gives them militaristic play with or without going to the Distant Lands. They will certainly be very competetive in that Legacy

 

[Siptah]

The Mongol UA gives them militaristic play with or without going to the Distant Lands. They will certainly be very competetive in that Legacy

Yes, I'm sure of that. I meant whether there is a ways for non-Mongol civs to make progress in the militaristic legacy without going to the distant lands by fighting in the homeland, but still taking settlements from the distant lands (instead of in the homeland, as the mongols will do).

 

[Eagle Pursuit]

Yes, I'm sure of that. I meant whether there is a ways for non-Mongol civs to make progress in the militaristic legacy without going to the distant lands by fighting in the homeland, but still taking settlements from the distant lands (instead of in the homeland, as the mongols will do).

Yes, probably. Unless you could somehow receive a rival's Distant Lands cities in a peace settlement, or you somehow meet Distant Lands city-states and annex them with Influence without crossing yourself

 

[Mr Jon of Cheam]

Remember that this is still "vanilla" Civ VII, many things like homeland-centered strategy will probably be more fleshed out in the future.

The potential is huge imo; some teething problems are to be expected, I guess it's up to us to identify them and hopefully for FXS to listen.

 

[SammyKhalifa]

The potential is huge imo; some teething problems are to be expected, I guess it's up to us to identify them and hopefully for FXS to listen.

And every age has a different ruleset, of course: besides the balance/etc. issues, I am expecting a steep learning curve compared to previous games.

 

[Uberfrog]

A day late, but I really enjoyed the livestream! I think the look at the exploration age gameplay is reassuring that continuing j to the next era will not feel like starting over. I also love the look of naval exploration and treasure ships.

Also the narrative choice after building over the altar is exactly the sort of reactive event I like to see!

 

[Disgustipated]

I believe they said near the beginning of the stream that there's at least another civ like Mongolia who isn't tied to exploring distant lands and can concentrate on the home lands. Let's hope that's the case with at least a few civs. I believe for the sake of showing off Isabella and Spain they concentrated mostly on distant lands mechanics.

 

[Siptah]

I believe they said near the beginning of the stream that there's at least another civ like Mongolia who isn't tied to exploring distant lands and can concentrate on the home lands. Let's hope that's the case with at least a few civs. I believe for the sake of showing off Isabella and Spain they concentrated mostly on distant lands mechanics.

Presumably that would be the Inca then, no?

 

[Zaarin]

Presumably that would be the Inca then, no?

Inca would make sense as a possibility. It is a nice idea to have a few civs in every era who play against the era's "theme."

 

[Sagax]

Presumably that would be the Inca then, no?

True. But also, technically, there is nothing about Normans that screams “distant exploration”. Same with Shawnee, actually.

 

[Siptah]

True. But also, technically, there is nothing about Normans that screams “distant exploration”. Same with Shawnee, actually.

Depends on how you define „distant“ but agreed. But we know their bonuses.

Of the unrevealed civs, Hawaii and Ming seem unlikely to have Homeland-related gameplay. I could see it for Inca and Songhai only. But I believe Songhai, being important for intercontinental trade, will have a trade and river focus of some sort, but keep the treasure ships. Inca, in contrast, were able to unite a larger part of their home continent (at least for a few years before the Spanish came). Hence, I could see the cities on distant lands legacy goal being changed for them.

 

[The_J]

A quick thanks to @Guandao @Rac @Eagle Pursuit and @Nikolai II for helping to organize stuff .

 

[Zaarin]

True. But also, technically, there is nothing about Normans that screams “distant exploration”. Same with Shawnee, actually.

I mean, the Shawnee roamed the entire eastern and central portions of the North American continent, and the Normans had colonies as far afield as the Mediterranean, the Levant, and the Canaries.