[GS] What level of disaster setting will you play first?

[Rup]

I thought I'll go for 1 or 2 before the livestreams but after watching so many livestreams I'll go straight for 4.
Disaster frequency is too low even on 4.I think it will be balanced for it.

 

[Elhoim]

4, and then I'll mod it because it will be too tame especially in the later game.

 

[Disgustipated]

I was originally planning on 4 first, but now going with 2. If I start off with 4, everything else will seem like a letdown. Plus I want to learn all the new mechanics first. Don't worry, I will still get to playing Germany on setting 4, and putting coal plants everywhere, and it will be glorious.

 

[blackcatatonic]

3 or 4, most likely. It's a fun mechanic and it's a shame that it seems so watered down.

 

[Karmah]

Do we know how those figures affect the disaster precisely ?
Is it linear in frequency ?

 

[Isengardtom]

I remember Ed mentioning multi players will probably put it on the lowest

Why’s that?

Personally, I think it’s still fun to have it on a higher settings because with most of the disasters you know the risk and what areas are likely to be affected. This is especially the case for floods, droughts and volcanoes.

Want to avoid droughts, keep forests around
Want to not get hit by a volcano blowing up, don’t settle near one
Want to not have a flood, avoid the floodplains or aim towards the dam.

I don’t mind the more RNG storms. I find other RNG such as random promotions for apostles and rock bands for example more annoying

 

[Arent11]

I was thinking to maybe play on three first, so I get a good look at the new system but its not too crazy. What are your thoughts?

Is there no possibility to completely switch it off? I don't want to micromanage single flooded tiles, they are just bothering me & do not change the outcome of the game.

In fact, as a long time civ fan, I am working very hard to ignore whole parts of the game. I try to ignore the continuous reassignment of trade routes, the theming bonuses for culture, the religion system. I try to avoid micromanaging governors, try to ignore chopping economy, try not to exploit city flipping. My disctrict are placed completely unoptimized, my cities are underdeveloped, my unit promotions are chosen randomly.

Somehow, I still manage to win my games.

 

[Red_warning]

I watched Marbozir play a game as Maori with Level 4 Disaster Intensity. On turn 108 he only had 5 disasters in total; 1 drought, 2 floods and 2 tornadoes.

If Firaxis don't increase the frequency of disasters i'll be picking Level 4 for sure.

I enclosed the turn 108 screenshot below.

Spoiler :

View attachment 517277

I'm watching Solar Gamer's playthrough right now and I'm pretty sure he has had more than that even before turn 60. Loads of floodings.

 

[JH24]

Probably on 1 or 2. I'm curious about the effects, but I don't want it to be too distracting during the first game.

 

[Ondolindë]

I was originally planning on 4 first, but now going with 2. If I start off with 4, everything else will seem like a letdown. Plus I want to learn all the new mechanics first.

You summed up my thinking exactly.

I'm watching Solar Gamer's playthrough right now and I'm pretty sure he has had more than that even before turn 60. Loads of floodings.

Well, that sounds promising and I like it. Although not necessarily a crucial mechanic, disasters can indeed add complexity to the game in a fun and interesting way by having to consider them in your strategy and strive to manage them along the way. I hope it helps me feel along other things like grievances and World Congress resolutions that I don’t have it guaranteed that things will go my way and I might be seriously affected, derailed even or just plainly lose a game.

 

[thecrazyscot]

4, definitely. And I wish they'd add a Raging Barbarians option in too.

 

[Stilgar08]

I heard eruptions can extend up to 2 tiles away from the volcano but only when playing on 3 or 4, is that right? So I'll go with 3 although I heard 2 is default and I'll play on standard for all the rest of the settings.

 

[Hatchie]

3 as they mentioned it’s the lowest settings at which it is possible for volcanoes to errupt so strongly they hit up to 2 tiles away and not just the adjecent ones. I agree having the erruptions restricted to only adjecent tiles makes for too little risk for the reward of volcanic soil... After I get the feeling of the system I might jump to 4.

 

[TheDisco]

Is there a setting where the Civs pass policies or mandates that wreck your production or make your citizens unhappy, but no weather changes actually ever occur? Because I want the most realistic setting possible!

 

[leandrombraz]

I watched Marbozir play a game as Maori with Level 4 Disaster Intensity. On turn 108 he only had 5 disasters in total; 1 drought, 2 floods and 2 tornadoes.

If Firaxis don't increase the frequency of disasters i'll be picking Level 4 for sure.

I enclosed the turn 108 screenshot below.

Spoiler :

View attachment 517277

Does this screen show disaster that happened on unexplored territory? I feel like it doesn't, so it's possible there was more disasters that didn't show there.

I heard eruptions can extend up to 2 tiles away from the volcano but only when playing on 3 or 4, is that right? So I'll go with 3 although I heard 2 is default and I'll play on standard for all the rest of the settings.

I still didn't see that happening in any gameplay, it was quite a late addition that might not be on the build they are playing or Firaxis decided to remove it after the stream they talked about it. It's also possible the chance for it happening is quite low, reason why it still didn't happen in any gameplay AFAIK. Either way, I wouldn't take this feature for granted, I'm not so sure it will be a thing on release.

 

[Hatchie]

4-3-2-1---ZERO?

For the very same reasons i eventually lost interest in grinding off Barbarians & gaining easy bonuses from Goodie/Huts... i'll most likely grow tired of various other randomized GS events except maybe Volcanic eruptions (GFX visuals). See -- i enjoy full control over my results.. good or bad. Heresy?! For me, Strategy in an intellectual challenge where MY own decisions dictate performance or failure instead of reactive luck(s).
Soooooo.. a modder would have to create such optional settings for us; None or only certain types from clickable drop-down lists.

You’re under (wrong) impression that uncertainty always reduces the impact of your decisions on your performance. If it’s well designed (tools to influence the random events, keep the spread of possible results reasonable) it’s the exact opposite and it makes the game more demanding on your strategic decisions.

Barbarians have random spawn points, but those spawn points are distributed around the map (so you can’t have bad luck and have all barbarians spawn near you while you opponents are under no threat) and you have ways both to prevent barbarians from spawning in certain areas (scouting) and to deal with them (if you deal with the scouts or just don’t let them near your cities the camp is pretty harmless). If you have barbarians raiding your lands you have only your strategic decisions to blame!

The dissasters systems seems to be quite well designed as well. While the exact occurence of dissaster is random, the dissasters have very predefined areas where they might happen: floodplains, volcanoes, larger ares with no features, coastal tiles to be flooded first during searise are marked since turn1. You know the risk (and possible rewards) when you settle/build/move units around and you have plenty of ways to lower/remove the risk. The system is also made so that it spreads the dissasters around the map so there are no bad strokes of luck when you had 3 volcanic erruptions and 7 floods at the start of the game while your opponents got nothing. And you got plenty of tools to deal with disassters (dams, governor, flood barriers, CO2 production) and many interesting strategic decisions to make (where to settle/build, if you remove features at the cost of increasing the risk of dissasters). It’s randomness that increases the impact of your strategic decisions to yout performance instead of decreasing it!

The only system with random elements I would agree is not designed so well is the goody huts. The reason is the bonuses are completely random and by far not equally strong. So you can focus on exploration to get as many goody huts as possible but get all the weak bonuses while someone else can stumble upon one goodie hut but get one of the strongest bonuses. Simple fix to that would be either to rebalance the bonuses to make them equal in strength or make it so the bonuses get better the more goodie huts you find, keeping their intended purpose as reward for investment in exploration while removing the unwanted uncontrollable variety...

 

[Stilgar08]

I still didn't see that happening in any gameplay, it was quite a late addition that might not be on the build they are playing or Firaxis decided to remove it after the stream they talked about it. It's also possible the chance for it happening is quite low, reason why it still didn't happen in any gameplay AFAIK. Either way, I wouldn't take this feature for granted, I'm not so sure it will be a thing on release.

press build isn't release build or day one Patch version. If not stated otherwise somewhere I'll give it a go and look for myself.. .