Where I'm at after 400+ Hours in Civ 7: Thoughts

[m_mus]

1. Follow-on settlement locations: Diversity means more interesting decisions (per Sid) - do I settle in the desert, even with poor yields, because it gets me coastal access? It's the trade-off that makes the decision interesting, and it's what's been lost with the homogenization of terrain

Amen to that. I increasingly am dissatisfied with the irrelevance of the different biomes for the question whether I will have a stellar city or not.

 

[aieeegrunt]

I'd split this into three distinct items:

1. Starting location: This can be handled with a Random/Standard/Legendary settings option.
2. Follow-on settlement locations: Diversity means more interesting decisions (per Sid) - do I settle in the desert, even with poor yields, because it gets me coastal access? It's the trade-off that makes the decision interesting, and it's what's been lost with the homogenization of terrain.
3. Resource harvesting: Another interesting decision, and one that could work well with Ages. Do I harvest now, leave the area as rural, and hope with the next Age that something better might appear? (e.g., oil)

Civ 6 especially one of the big strengths was forcing you to engage with and play the map. It led to a lot of interesting decisions, even if it was only “do I restart”

7 chucking that in the bin along with all the rest couldn’t have helped it

 

[stealth_nsk]

Civ 6 especially one of the big strengths was forcing you to engage with and play the map. It led to a lot of interesting decisions, even if it was only “do I restart”

7 chucking that in the bin along with all the rest couldn’t have helped it

I don't see "do I restart" as an interesting decision. I want starting situation to alter the choices I make, not to make choices for me.

 

[Leucarum]

Civ 6 especially one of the big strengths was forcing you to engage with and play the map. It led to a lot of interesting decisions, even if it was only “do I restart”

Honestly I think 7 makes this worse thanks to civ switching. Whether it's a good idea to go Inca, Songhai, Nepal, or Russia is so obvious and binary there's barely a decision. It is more like the map playing you than you playing the map. They shouldn't have put civs with a terrain dependency in later ages...