What are your pros/cons/questions after watching the previews?

[durfal]

We've seen that there is a setting for age duration and since they had only 1 hour I bet all the You Tubers set it to the shortest duration to try to show some exploration age too.

 

[Maniac]

The game feels unfinished, lacking basic functionality or UI QoL, like renaming cities, swapping tiles between cities, no map pins, no search function...

I will not buy it on launch, and wait for community reactions.

 

[sTAPler27]

-Pros:

• Minimap looks good with the exception of the cities themselves (the terrain gradient looks smooth so I don't know why the cities are squares)
• I forgot abou the Quest system which seems like it will be very fun.
• The flavor text for a lot of the narrative events seems fun and feel based on what's going on in game
• I like how unique some of the City State bonuses are
• City States seem to give gifts which is fun and makes relationships unique and two sided
• Villages are a unique mechanic because they function like City States but start with one tile like Barb Camps whicg really distinguishes them as being an evolution of both
• They didn't have to make the City State models look unique but they did which gives us a great look at the games artstyle up close.
• The UI reflects potential yields.

-Not Enough Information:

• Rome starts with the Legion and the upgrade path seems focused on just buffing a singular unit so i'm worried their may not be a lot of unit variety
• Really can't make out how the Appeal system works
• Don't quite get how Urban districts worked, I thought you'd require a pop to have one just like Rural Districts, if so why even link Districts to Population?
• The trading system seems cool but I still don't know enough about it, why do multiple cities have multiple routes avaliable and you do spend Gold on those Resources, right?

-Cons:

• Starting with 3 settlement spots seems really limiting given how much territory there is and how little civs there are, I wish towns counted as like have a settlement becasue otherwise you're going to be spreading out cities like crazy
• I wish the adjacency system was a bit more complex than Resource, Mountain, Wonder, Water
• The narrative events are good its just that a lot of them feel very simple, I wish the rewards were obscured or randomized sometimes
• Government system seems a bit basic
• Religion system feels incredibly lackluster, I was hoping they'd give it more pros and cons and alternating paths but its basically just a watered down version from the past two games
• The culture path gets worse with each age
• Why are Treasure resources separated from regular ones? What's considered a treasure resources should just be randomized, very Euro focused
• I wish City States evolved with the ages instead of just disapearing, like if some collapse sure but all of them?
• Map tacks are part of the fun of building Cities and make planning easier
• Minor rivers really were not designed with the same care as the navigable rivers that stole the show because you build over them like other land districts with the model covering them them

 

[Trengilly]

The game feels unfinished, lacking basic functionality or UI QoL, like renaming cities, swapping tiles between cities, no map pins, no search function...

I will not buy it on launch, and wait for community reactions.

And no nested tool tips or links to the civilopeda. Kind of crazy omission in this day!

 

[AriochIV]

View attachment 715534

Buganda? Did we know this already?

Yes, it appears that the only way to unlock Buganda is by playing as Amina.

 

[sonicmyst]

I just wish they put different text color for some keywords like: Ageless or Persistent

 

[Sagax]

Yes, it appears that the only way to unlock Buganda is by playing as Amina.

Songhai unlock them too.

 

[Eagle Pursuit]

There's no known gameplay unlock for Buganda, but Firaxis may have removed it from the press build, although they failed to remove the ridiculously easy gameplay unlock for Prussia.

I suspect that we will discover that Buganda is unlocked by having three settlements adjacent to lakes.

 

[chaosprophet]

Yes, it appears that the only way to unlock Buganda is by playing as Amina.

There's no known gameplay unlock for Buganda, but Firaxis may have removed it from the press build, although they failed to remove the ridiculously easy gameplay unlock for Prussia.

I suspect that we will discover that Buganda is unlocked by having three settlements adjacent to lakes.

Isn't that because, like we saw with others similar screens, that person is on Antiquity (so spain that is exploration is on the list), and likely has the hide setting checked, so it won't show gameplay unlocks for modern civs as they need to be done during exploration? America the other Modern on the screenshot also isn't listing their gameplay not exploration civ uunlock there, afterall.

 

[Eramas]

I don't mind the idea of civilization switching, but the way the game state almost completely resets at the end of each Age is discouraging. City-states disappear, cities revert to towns, wars end, your units reposition and convert, resources change yields... it barely even feels like the same playthrough.

I agree, it's my biggest problem with the game right now. I'm not a huge fan of civ switching, but at the same time it's not a dealbreaker, and I'm willing to give it a fair shot. Unfortunately, the fact that so many things reset at the end of each Age makes it 10x more difficult to accept, I genuinely don't understand this decision. I'm afraid it won't feel like truly playing the game, but experiencing one of the scenarios they have prepared for you.

 

[Lord Lakely]

There's no known gameplay unlock for Buganda, but Firaxis may have removed it from the press build, although they failed to remove the ridiculously easy gameplay unlock for Prussia.

I suspect that we will discover that Buganda is unlocked by having three settlements adjacent to lakes.

is it possible that Firaxis simply removed the Modern Age from the press build?

 

[Lord Lakely]

The game being unfinished or reportedly easy doesn't quite bother me too much. I won't buy it until May anyway, and by then most of the problems will be streamlined out via patches. Most of these games look like they were played on low difficulties as well.

Still not bothered by unclipped leaders or Civ switching although the ahistorical paths some leaders take raises some eyebrows (Greek Tecumseh. Mississipian Catherine into Hawai'i, etc). The general gist for me is that it's a pedantic change that neither improves nor decreases gameplay. It's a net neutral, which meh.

I don't particularly like the Legacy points, or the Memeto's, which feel cheesy and in a sense undercut the game's difficulty. Is there ANY reason to not take the Economic Golden Age every time, for any leader? I suppose you skip it if you plan to play Russia in Modern, but you can also take Golden Econ and then not convert your Tundra settlements into Cities.

Likewise, these inter-age victory points feel like they slow down the game and force you to play in a way you normally wouldn't, just to get any advantage you can.

Don't approve of the culture bombing whenever you claim a tile, nor that the tiles can't be swapped between cities. Don't like that city names are retained between ages and that you can't rename them.

Indeps in a sense feel like they clutter the map, limiting your free expansion via settlers.

Generally though, like the changes they made. I like how most Civs have multiple unlocks which make mechanically sense (even if the unlock methods are a bit klunky. French Empire having three wines is weird when the Wine resource has no direct bearing into playing as the French Empire). The map looks amazing, and it looks like there's enough space for Settlements. The changes to diplomacy are AMAZING and meaningful.

It looks like a general improvement over Civ6, with several mechanical changes that the game frankly, didn't need in the first place.

 

[Leucarum]

. Is there ANY reason to not take the Economic Golden Age every time, for any leader?

I think you can only take one golden age policy slot. I'd agree that it does look a lot more potent than the others, but since you could just re-upgrade your cities... Depending on how things are balanced I can see situations where it makes sense not to take it. Agreed that with what context we have it looks like the usual no brainer choice though.

 

[Lord Lakely]

I think you can only take one golden age policy slot. I'd agree that it does look a lot more potent than the others, but since you could just re-upgrade your cities... Depending on how things are balanced I can see situations where it makes sense not to take it. Agreed that with what context we have it looks like the usual no brainer choice though.

You can but if you use your coin for that, you're not using it for something else.

Isabella wants to buy naval units so she can explore.
Charlemagne wants to buy his newest military buildings so he can stack happiness adjacency and get knights for free
Kong, who wants each of his settlements to be Cities absolutely does not want to respend tons of cash reconverting his settlements.

To me it not only seems that going for an Economic Golden Age is a no-brainer, including actively playing into it. And from what I can tell, it's EASY to do so as well.

 

[Leucarum]

You can but if you use your coin for that, you're not using it for something else.

Isabella wants to buy naval units so she can explore.
Charlemagne wants to buy his newest military buildings so he can stack happiness adjacency and get knights for free
Kong, who wants each of his settlements to be Cities absolutely does not want to respend tons of cash reconverting his settlements.

To me it not only seems that going for an Economic Golden Age is a no-brainer, including actively playing into it. And from what I can tell, it's EASY to do so as well.

Agreed that it looks more potent than the others, still... I'll try and play devil's advocate.

Science and culture - will the golden age buildings be active in settlements? I'd presume so (if Augustus can buy culture buildings in settlements then presumably buildings can be active in settlements). If so, then with reduced yields from non-ageless buildings, that could be balanced into a meaningful enough boost to consider it.

Millitary, if you need it you'll know, though I'd assume it's the weakest - if you are in a position where you need the golden age policy for millitary, you probably aren't high enough on the millitary track to get it.

As for the leaders, I've got to be honest and say that Charlemagne and Confucius are close to the bottom of leaders I personally want to play, so I wom't comment on there, I haven't really thought about either (I think Charlemagne is the leader I'm least interested in). Isabella - tech might be the limiting factor in your early exploration anyway until you can safely cross oceans.

 

[UWHabs]

Some of the Pro/Con:
Pro:
Looks Beautiful
Big Tile Yields
Love the Narrative choices - lots of decision points
Lots of stuff to deal with

Con:
Lots of stuff to deal with
Gonna be a lot of micro at the end of the age to transition to the next.

Looking through, there's going to be a lot of work to try to figure out what you want where. Trying to figure out if you want a sawmill or a shrine or a granary, which tiles each go on, which ones you'll be able to build over next era, which tiles to put a library on, etc... They need to get the advanced pin system out ASAP so we can plan everything out. Also, due to the high and mixed yields, definitely a lot of the building placement is confusing. At least things are relatively consistent with like +1 for each adjacent X, and not the +2/+1/+0.5 we had in civ 6. But man, it's going to take a lot to remember.
Plus, there's a lot of trees to worry about. Science tree, culture tree, civ specific culture tree, Commander upgrade paths, never mind the masteries, etc...
And at the end of the age, there's definitely going to be a lot of trying to make sure your city-state influence counters pop at exactly the right time, that your buildings finish properly, that you have saved the right amount of coin to carry over, etc... It might be fun, but it will be a lot of stuff to figure out in the end.

But all in all, it does look like a lot of fun.

 

[gdr_willter]

Pro:
Lots of stuff to deal with

Con:
Lots of stuff to deal with

This. The long live dilemma of all 4X gamers...

 

[uppi]

Pros:

• I really want to play it!
• I have the impression that they managed to reduce busywork while keeping meaningful decisions
• The ages system means that you can prioritize in one area and neglect another, because the age transition lets you catch up somewhat
• The adjacencies are much more universal, so if you have a good spot, you need to decide what to prioritze

I am not so sure about:

• The last turns of an age might not really matter, if you cannot really do anything that will have an impact on the next age
• This might actually be the reason for the crisis system: They want you to worry about keeping what you got, but I am not sure how much fun that will be

Cons:

• I don't think the legacy paths are equally worthwhile to go for. In Antiquity, science might actually be the weakest: You get to keep the towns you conquer, (most of?) the resources you grab and the wonders you built. But I don't think your scientific progress in the last age will matter too much in the next. In Exploration, it might actually be religion: Those relics will disappear, so the only thing you will have to show for your efforts are the legacy points?
• I disliked having to run around with missionaries to convert and reconvert cities in previous civ games and now religion has been reduced pretty much to this. It might be mostly optional though (see above)
• Isabella of the Shawnee is not really doing it for me. But this is the consequence of the strange imbalance between leaders and civs. We need more European civs and a ban on additional European leaders!

 

[Xyael]

Personally, I'm just worried about the civilization which have resources requirement to unlock them. If you do not have the resource on your native continent (or even in the game, or even it is too rare), you cannot play that civilization. It will be all the more true, when the game will grow and we will have more new resources. I hope there will be new conditions in the future.

Also, the camels seem really important. If you do not have camels the economic victory is immediately more difficult.

 

[Lord Lakely]

As for the leaders, I've got to be honest and say that Charlemagne and Confucius are close to the bottom of leaders I personally want to play, so I wom't comment on there, I haven't really thought about either (I think Charlemagne is the leader I'm least interested in). Isabella - tech might be the limiting factor in your early exploration anyway until you can safely cross oceans.

Ohhh i hard disagree there. I think Charlemagne is among the best leaders in the game (of those revealed so far) and one of the most fun for builders actually.

- Free happiness from building adjacency, which helps mitigating penalties from overexpansion AND helps deal with the crises, which often force you to slot in minus happiness policy cards
- Free expensive units that you don't have to build, which help you defend against the AI, which are also stronger than normal if you can chain up Celebrations.
- Also since you're getting 2 Cav for free, you won't need to build or buy as many units, which means you can save your gold, or spend it on getting more buildings
- Automatically unlocks the hyper defensive and expansionistic Norman Civ
- Scientific attibute point which guarantees a small trickle of science, allow you to be beeline to unlock Cav before your first Celebration trigger.

One of the biggest threats to being a peaceful builder is being invaded. He completely mitigates that problem with only upsides. I would currently put him near the top of the leaderboard in terms of strength, alongside Ben Franklin (who I think is the actual strongest leader in the game of those revealed), both Ashoka's and Lafayette.