What's your opinion on civ switching?

[SupremacyKing2]

I think the problem is that the game is not inherently different in each age, much of it feels like you are just repeating yourself and moving ahead incredibly slowly. Its that lack of momentum that kills it for me every time. Someone mentioned earlier that the first age should be setting yourself up for the implementation of your plan, but it never feels like that is what you are doing in the game. Mostly it feels like someone just kicked your sandcastle over and you need to build it up again. I think the problem goes far deeper than smoothing out the transition as well, which is what the devs are concentrating on.

I think if you smooth over the ages and also rework the legacy paths, it could help solve this. Smoother age transitions would help create more continuity so that it does not feel like you are starting anew. And if the legacy paths connected with each other, then it might help the player feel like the previous age was setting up a plan to then implement in the next Age. For example, if the science legacy in the Antiquity Age was setting you up to do the science legacy in the Exploration Age or if the culture legacy in the Exploration Age was setting you up to do the culture victory in the Modern Age.

 

[King Flevance]

Antiquity Age is fun but I think the reason it is so good is mostly due to the early game being inherently more fun. That is when the game is new, there is a whole map to discover and expand into, new civs to meet and you are laying the foundation for the rest of the game.

I think this is what ages can improve in the game. In Age 1, it is as you say. But I think currently Age 2 and 3 have you go through similar cycles as age 1 but all of those cycles are most fun at the beginning. (Exploring map, settling first cities, building first armies, etc.) So Age 2 needs to ignore those ideas and offer new mechanics and new ideas. You can see them try to do this with simply "spam missionaries" but somehow they didn't realize that isn't fun. Personally, I think merchants/trade need to be redesigned. I get that the current design is 'simple' but I would argue it is so simple that you can't build on it. Even if a merchant only was able to pull just 1 resource, it is something to build on. I think Age 2 should be focused on trade and resources in general. But grow the game - Imagine if the Sawmill could have lumber assigned to it (like a factory) to lose the bonus to ship building but offer it to building production. (I am not saying to do that - but imagine if new mechanics came in like this that elevated the game's basic mechanics in Age 2) Something along those lines where it changes the 'resource game' in Age 2. Having each Age have its own identity that feels unique and have new things that make that old map interesting in new ways is a possibility here and was what I was hoping Civ 7 would have out of the box. The problem is that they felt the same 4 legacy paths were enough "divergent gameplay" despite it being the same every time.

 

[SupremacyKing2]

I think this is what ages can improve in the game. In Age 1, it is as you say. But I think currently Age 2 and 3 have you go through similar cycles as age 1 but all of those cycles are most fun at the beginning. (Exploring map, settling first cities, building first armies, etc.) So Age 2 needs to ignore those ideas and offer new mechanics and new ideas. You can see them try to do this with simply "spam missionaries" but somehow they didn't realize that isn't fun. Personally, I think merchants/trade need to be redesigned. I get that the current design is 'simple' but I would argue it is so simple that you can't build on it. Even if a merchant only was able to pull just 1 resource, it is something to build on. I think Age 2 should be focused on trade and resources in general. But grow the game - Imagine if the Sawmill could have lumber assigned to it (like a factory) to lose the bonus to ship building but offer it to building production. (I am not saying to do that - but imagine if new mechanics came in like this that elevated the game's basic mechanics in Age 2) Something along those lines where it changes the 'resource game' in Age 2. Having each Age have its own identity that feels unique and have new things that make that old map interesting in new ways is a possibility here and was what I was hoping Civ 7 would have out of the box. The problem is that they felt the same 4 legacy paths were enough "divergent gameplay" despite it being the same every time.

I do think religion is very undercooked right now. If religion were fleshed out more, that in itself would make the Exploration Age more interesting. I also like your ideas to make trade more interesting. If trade was fleshed out, that too would make the Exploration Age better.

 

[King Flevance]

I saw a YouTuber discussing somewhere that he thought those little dev notes in the recent patch notes were suggesting a revamp of religion in one of the upcoming patches. I hope he is right because I agree that religion is severely undercooked in 7.

 

[Krikkit1]

This is why I am still quietly optimistic that Civ 7 can be turned around and made into a good game. If you had described how the game was going to work before I had seen the reality I would think these are all good ideas. I do love the concepts behind the ages, the idea that you would need to slightly switch focus for each age, and the game becomes different within it, is enticing and could work really well.

I think the problem is that the game is not inherently different in each age, much of it feels like you are just repeating yourself and moving ahead incredibly slowly. Its that lack of momentum that kills it for me every time. Someone mentioned earlier that the first age should be setting yourself up for the implementation of your plan, but it never feels like that is what you are doing in the game. Mostly it feels like someone just kicked your sandcastle over and you need to build it up again. I think the problem goes far deeper than smoothing out the transition as well, which is what the devs are concentrating on.

It's the whole idea that now I need to overbuild (yeah its actually just rebuilding) the same buildings, but now they just have different names and slightly better yields, is really not very interesting. The gameplay is inherently the same between the ages, with just a bit of extra flavour. That is a fundamental design decision, that I don't know if it can be fixed. Overbuilding itself is not a bad idea, having to basically rebuild everything, that is a bad idea. Having to start my tech tree again, starting each age being unable to do very much at all, these all contribute to the killing of game momentum, which I think is one of the main issues with the game.

So maybe I'm less optimistic than I thought I was, but I still think the idea of ages can work, but it really needs some major rethinks as to what they mean.

I think that is important...
Basic Science buildings get boosts from Resources...in ALL 3 Ages
Basic Food buidings get boosts from Water...in ALL 3 Ages
Culture buildings get boosts from the same things Happiness buildings do...in ALL 3 Ages

You get resources from other civs by building a Merchant and getting it to a Trade route.... in ALL 3 AGES
..what if Merchants were for Antiquity and
in Exploration, You got resources from other civs or your distant Lands settlements from Treasure Convoys.
You want Iron from China or your new Colony in America... a Treasure Convoy has to move to one of your Homeland cities.. (the Iron doesn't count for points, but the Spices might)
...In Modern, Trade has a different model.. it has to connect to a Factory to supply that Factory.... or not just the exact same thing as Ancient but the Merchant gets to Teleport.

Specialists have a base of 2 Culture and 2 Science with +50% adjacency in Every Age
Now here at least Modern has big Ideology based boosts and Exploration enhances the Adjacency,... but it could be differentiated further.

etc....

 

[Crashdummy]

I cant believe the gymnastics you guys are doing to try to blame failure on other things except Ages themselves

I dont think any of the suggestions made here in the last two pages would improve Ages at all. It isnt a problem of where i get the iron from, or the religion, the Age change feels bad way before that. Chaining Legacy paths would feel atrocious if for some reason you couldnt finish the previous Age one

I am sorry, i dont want to be a party pooper, but none of that would work

 

[Gorbles]

Yes

Yes it does IF it means the AI outplayed me, and then leveraged their position of strength to keep me down

That would be amazing. Last time I legit remember Civ being capable of that, as opposed to “early rush with 7 free warriors” was 4.

Why the hell are people so afraid of taking a loss? You learn more from defeat than victory.

In Deity, if the AI played much better than me? Yes

In any game, at any time, in any difficulty. We're talking about snowballing here, not the AI being more of a competent threat to high-level players.

I'm not talking about "leveraging" anything. I'm not talking about "keeping you down". I'm saying they get an advantage, and they win. Because that's how Crashdummy was portraying snowballing, and how they liked it as a result.

Some folks like a challenge. Some folks like feeling powerful in their games. These design goals are inherently at-odds. And they get very dissonant if the AI becomes capable of the same kind of thing as the player wants to feel good at. I'm surprised neither of you can see this.

 

[Crashdummy]

In any game, at any time, in any difficulty. We're talking about snowballing here, not the AI being more of a competent threat to high-level players.

I'm not talking about "leveraging" anything. I'm not talking about "keeping you down". I'm saying they get an advantage, and they win. Because that's how Crashdummy was portraying snowballing, and how they liked it as a result.

Some folks like a challenge. Some folks like feeling powerful in their games. These design goals are inherently at-odds. And they get very dissonant if the AI becomes capable of the same kind of thing as the player wants to feel good at. I'm surprised neither of you can see this.

Difficulty is a thing. Higher difficulties should be more punishing with mistakes, if you make mistakes in the early game in Deity, you should be almost lost as long as the player that is snowballing doesnt make mistakes. The punishment should be severe, you should have no chance to recover, specially if you want to streamline all the Civs so that you are always in similar power

If you are making bad decisions in the easier difficulties, there should be more leniency

They are not at odds, and snowballing help both. You have a challenge because you cant get behind, and you feel powerful if you play well. Both are ccomplished WITH SNOWBALLING. If you can recover form bad decisions easily, then the challenge goes DOWN, not up

Civ 7 is VERY FAR from being the most challenging Civilization game, its quite the opposite, its one of the easier games in the franchise and i am talking with the launch rules that reduce snowballing....

 

[phoenixician]

Considering the tremendous resources and time for a classic mode, why not just remaster older civ titles?

 

[Gorbles]

Difficulty is a thing. Higher difficulties should be more punishing with mistakes, if you make mistakes in the early game in Deity, you should be almost lost as long as the player that is snowballing doesnt make mistakes. The punishment should be severe, you should have no chance to recover, specially if you want to streamline all the Civs so that you are always in similar power

If you are making bad decisions in the easier difficulties, there should be more leniency

They are not at odds, and snowballing help both. You have a challenge because you cant get behind, and you feel powerful if you play well. Both are ccomplished WITH SNOWBALLING. If you can recover form bad decisions easily, then the challenge goes DOWN, not up

Civ 7 is VERY FAR from being the most challenging Civilization game, its quite the opposite, its one of the easier games in the franchise and i am talking with the launch rules that reduce snowballing....

So what you're saying is that on lower difficulties, it doesn't matter if snowballing is reduced, because you get to choose the lower difficulty that allows you to build back up anyway?

Snowballing is a feedback loop effect. It's not "constantly play well until the end of the game". It's "you got lucky or did something well and now nobody else can catch up". The definition of snowballing doesn't involve a tightly-fought victory across two hundred turns.

And if VII isn't challenging enough . . . why does it need snowballing? Why do you?

Help me out. I'm a casual player, I don't play on high AI difficulties. Rarely do. I play to chill. But even I have absolutely no interest in a snowballing advantage deciding the progress of the game. Why should I like it? It's boring. It trivalises the game. Like you said - we have difficulty settings for that.

 

[Crashdummy]

Considering the tremendous resources and time for a classic mode, why not just remaster older civ titles?

Because Civ 7 has a lot more things than just Ages and Civ switching

Seriously, the game has alot of things that are not related to those mechanics that would be great to play in a Classic Mode. The work required for a Classic Mode is MUCH LESS than to create a new game

 

[Crashdummy]

So what you're saying is that on lower difficulties, it doesn't matter if snowballing is reduced, because you get to choose the lower difficulty that allows you to build back up anyway?

Snowballing is a feedback loop effect. It's not "constantly play well until the end of the game". It's "you got lucky or did something well and now nobody else can catch up". The definition of snowballing doesn't involve a tightly-fought victory across two hundred turns.

And if VII isn't challenging enough . . . why does it need snowballing? Why do you?

Help me out. I'm a casual player, I don't play on high AI difficulties. Rarely do. I play to chill. But even I have absolutely no interest in a snowballing advantage deciding the progress of the game. Why should I like it? It's boring. It trivalises the game. Like you said - we have difficulty settings for that.

No, i am saying that if you are snowballing in lower difficulties, then you are playing in a lower difficulty than you should, and thats your choice. If you want an easy game, by all means, go for it. If you want more challenge, increase the difficulty

Its not about needing snowballing, Civ 7 is quitre possible the easiest Civlization game ever created and none of the hardest Civilization entries needed to stop snowballing, its about rewarding good gameplay and punishing bad gameplay. If you play bad, you should LOSE, you should not be giving a helping hand to catch up. If you play well, you shoud WIN and not have a stone attached to your leg

 

[Leucarum]

So what you're saying is that on lower difficulties, it doesn't matter if snowballing is reduced, because you get to choose the lower difficulty that allows you to build back up anyway?

Snowballing is a feedback loop effect. It's not "constantly play well until the end of the game". It's "you got lucky or did something well and now nobody else can catch up". The definition of snowballing doesn't involve a tightly-fought victory across two hundred turns.

And if VII isn't challenging enough . . . why does it need snowballing? Why do you?

Help me out. I'm a casual player, I don't play on high AI difficulties. Rarely do. I play to chill. But even I have absolutely no interest in a snowballing advantage deciding the progress of the game. Why should I like it? It's boring. It trivalises the game. Like you said - we have difficulty settings for that.

I think one of the answers here is to put yourself in Firaxis' shoes. They have had to put a lot of resources into late game features in previous Civ games, and yet... We aren't finishing our games so we never play them. That's a lot of resources being spent for very diminishing returns, and it impacts those civs which come into their own at the end of the game. So it makes sense that they'd try to do something about it.

Snowballing is a part of the puzzle, games become solved at a certain point, so why play on? Excessive micromanagement is probably the other big part of the puzzle. We stop playing when we start clicking more for less impact.

Civ7 has for better and worse made stabs at both root causes above. For micromanagement they made a lot of progress - I do think they could go further personally, especially toning down settlement limit gains in Exploration. But overall they get a solid A from me on this front. Snowballing unfortunately I think they might have managed to make worse thanks to the era system, and simultaneously more consequential thanks to Civ Switching.

Fundamentally if you don't curb snowballing then each era gets a lot less relevant. Modern era civs might as well be blank at this point relative to how much the snowball from previous eras gives you. If you had the era system with snowballing but no Civ Switching I don't think as many people would be mad. We'd just stop playing in exploration like it seems most of us are and that's fine (for everyone except the devs working on late game stuff). Unfortunately Civ Switching is in there so in practical terms we have a third less civs in the game. I don't think I'd be harping on about snowballing without it... I certainly didn't care about it in Civ6.

Realistically, settlement limit is probably the best tool they introduced to limit snowballing. If they tuned it more harshly it would probably work ok-ish but annoy more people than it pleased. So Firaxis probably shouldn't try to please me...

I think the fact that recent patches have exacerbated snowballing is - either via the easy way or the hard way - the end of civ switching as a consequence...

And levelling leaders is probably the best tool they introduced to get us to finish games... Though that is not a ringing endorsement.

 

[Gorbles]

No, i am saying that if you are snowballing in lower difficulties, then you are playing in a lower difficulty than you should, and thats your choice. If you want an easy game, by all means, go for it. If you want more challenge, increase the difficulty

Its not about needing snowballing, Civ 7 is quitre possible the easiest Civlization game ever created and none of the hardest Civilization entries needed to stop snowballing, its about rewarding good gameplay and punishing bad gameplay. If you play bad, you should LOSE, you should not be giving a helping hand to catch up. If you play well, you shoud WIN and not have a stone attached to your leg

Arguably, snowballing is bad in any game. It's doesn't reward any good gameplay from the point of critical mass onwards.

That's why I asked you: what if the AI could win, just like that. On any difficulty. Just by being in the right place, at the right time, which in software terms can often involve a good amount of luck. Certainly not skill (not for an AI player anyway).

If you want decisions to matter, for good gameplay to be rewarded, you should be against snowballing (regardless of your opinion on Civ VII, even). You're already being rewarded. Snowballing isn't the reward. Snowballing is additional, compounding bonuses that you accrue after that initial reward, and consequently nobody can catch up. Nomatter how well they play.

That's not skill

Civ7 has for better and worse made stabs at both root causes above. For micromanagement they made a lot of progress - I do think they could go further personally, especially toning down settlement limit gains in Exploration. But overall they get a solid A from me on this front. Snowballing unfortunately I think they might have managed to make worse thanks to the era system, and simultaneously more consequential thanks to Civ Switching.

I personally preferred the state of transitions at release (except the army regrouping, if I'm being picky). I preferred it when snowballing was more curtailed than it is now.

I don't think the era system makes it worse, but it does go overboard with the bonuses. But then, people complain when they think they're being punished. That's not a problem with people, or a problem with Ages per se. It's an inherent tension in trying to create challenge by maintaining the stakes.

I'm a casual player and I was fine with Age transitions. I like history in layers and I understand the abstraction of a period of change causing a civilisation to evolve. I dislike that it's being watered down to try to appeal to people that flat-out hate the concept.

 

[Krikkit1]

No, i am saying that if you are snowballing in lower difficulties, then you are playing in a lower difficulty than you should, and thats your choice. If you want an easy game, by all means, go for it. If you want more challenge, increase the difficulty

Its not about needing snowballing, Civ 7 is quitre possible the easiest Civlization game ever created and none of the hardest Civilization entries needed to stop snowballing, its about rewarding good gameplay and punishing bad gameplay. If you play bad, you should LOSE, you should not be giving a helping hand to catch up. If you play well, you shoud WIN and not have a stone attached to your leg

Snowballing =/= easier or harder
Snowballing means the game gets easier and easier if you don't lose... getting a Strong Antiquity play in Deity is hard for some players easier for others... but once you have that good antiquity game, Exploration is easier, and Modern is a cakewalk.

It shouldn't be that way... if a good antiquity game is hard for you on Difficulty level X, then a good Exploration or Modern should also be hard.

I think the best way to keep that level of challenge without
1. Taking things from the player (other than the normal going obsolete)
2. "Punishing the player for bad performance" or "rewarding them for bad performance"

is to give the AIs a boost based on how well they did in the previous age


And Snowballing is inherent in the nature of the game: the more you build/research/conquer, etc. the faster you can build, research, conquer, etc. new things (and the easier to interfere with others and prevent them from interfering with you)

 

[aieeegrunt]

No, i am saying that if you are snowballing in lower difficulties, then you are playing in a lower difficulty than you should, and thats your choice. If you want an easy game, by all means, go for it. If you want more challenge, increase the difficulty

Its not about needing snowballing, Civ 7 is quitre possible the easiest Civlization game ever created and none of the hardest Civilization entries needed to stop snowballing, its about rewarding good gameplay and punishing bad gameplay. If you play bad, you should LOSE, you should not be giving a helping hand to catch up. If you play well, you shoud WIN and not have a stone attached to your leg

I swear that is like a foreign concept to people now or something.

 

[King Flevance]

I cant believe the gymnastics you guys are doing to try to blame failure on other things except Ages themselves

I dont think any of the suggestions made here in the last two pages would improve Ages at all. It isnt a problem of where i get the iron from, or the religion, the Age change feels bad way before that. Chaining Legacy paths would feel atrocious if for some reason you couldnt finish the previous Age one

I am sorry, i dont want to be a party pooper, but none of that would work

It may not work to please you, but it would please some of us. These comments aren't made in an effort to redeem Civ 7 to those who are upset. We are just fans discussing how we would like to see Ages addressed. Obviously, some of us see value in Ages as a mechanic.

I am aware some people will always argue Ages and/or Civ switching can never work. It would be nice if others could acknowledge some of us don't agree and we aren't just making excuses. We actually just legitamately disagree as hard as that may be to see. And our perspective is just as valuable as yours.

Snowballing is inherent to the 4x genre. Whoever Expands the most, has more to exploit. This is why the tall vs. wide dynamic is crucial to add more depth. It is important to support both. Tall allows small empires to compete against wide ones and vice versa. Otherwise, it is just a competition of who can build the tallest or widest to snowball.

I also don't mind a 'reset everyone' back to their fundamental core value. But I do not care for how it was implemented for a few reasons. I like the concept of using this reset as a timing mechanism to refocus your strategy, however the AI doesn't pick their civ based on a strategy they plan to employ this age (which they should) but rather whatever random/ historical flavor reason they picked. Having a civ who had cities conquered, last Age, pick an aggressive civ would make more sense to "fight the snowball".
Or you know, you can pass out powerful rewards to the person who acquired the most power instead. It is all in implementation.

 

[Crashdummy]

Arguably, snowballing is bad in any game. It's doesn't reward any good gameplay from the point of critical mass onwards.

That's why I asked you: what if the AI could win, just like that. On any difficulty. Just by being in the right place, at the right time, which in software terms can often involve a good amount of luck. Certainly not skill (not for an AI player anyway).

If you want decisions to matter, for good gameplay to be rewarded, you should be against snowballing (regardless of your opinion on Civ VII, even). You're already being rewarded. Snowballing isn't the reward. Snowballing is additional, compounding bonuses that you accrue after that initial reward, and consequently nobody can catch up. Nomatter how well they play.

That's not skill

You are not being rewarded, you are being PUNISHED for playing well early. You play well early and you get punished, you get units removed, you get resources taken away from you, and then your opponents get free stuff, upgrading units far beyond their science level, etc

That is LAME and rewards a lazy playstyle

You are supposed to play well or suffer the consequences, if you are not good enough, you should LOSE so you learn. Getting free stuff to compensate for your lack of skills is cheating

 

[King Flevance]

Getting free stuff to compensate for your lack of skills is cheating

This is how every AI in civ has ever "been good" so it makes me wonder if your argument is focused on multiplayer.

Because the reset point is superficial, (No one gets free cities and extra science/culture/happiness per turn) anything lost is easily replaced, it just lessens the gap temporarily. I would not want to play Civ 7 multiplayer, that's for sure.

 

[Crashdummy]

This is how every AI in civ has ever "been good" so it makes me wonder if your argument is focused on multiplayer.

Because the reset point is superficial, (No one gets free cities and extra science/culture/happiness per turn) anything lost is easily replaced, it just lessens the gap temporarily. I would not want to play Civ 7 multiplayer, that's for sure.

Yes, the AI is constantly getting free stuff every turn, but that is just a way to compensate for lack of talent on Devs to make a proper AI. I can understand that

But this isnt to help the AI, if the one behind is YOU, then YOU get the free stuff and YOU are cheating, and you cant do anything about it. We already accepted that the AI will get free stuff, we dont need more double dipping. If you are doing well even considering that, you SHOULD snowball, and if you cant keep up with the AI, you shouldnt receive any free stuff and you need to lose to learn

I dont play multiplayer, but if i did, then i would be even MORE pissed off