With Civ VI over, how would you design its Civs?

[Taizong4Civ7]

USA deserve to be like real life a huge nation that progressively excel in anything at late game, and that power comes from generation after generation of immigrants.

It would be lovely for the Americans in-game to honour the contributions of immigrants and other people of colour. A late game immigration boom would also make them much more interesting to play as.

I think having a Sweden civ based around Vikings is redundant as well

Great power Sweden controlling half of the Baltic and marching and pillaging all around the Northern European Plain seems pretty Viking to me ngl.

 

[Alexander's Hetaroi]

Great power Sweden controlling half of the Baltic and marching and pillaging all around the Northern European Plain seems pretty Viking to me ngl.

Except that's not how they are portrayed in Civ 6. Plus, we already have Norway portrayed as the Viking civ in this iteration which was my point.

Anyway, going back to my design for Scotland would it be better if maybe instead of your builders being able to build Golf Courses in your allies' cities, any civ that you have an alliance with could use their own to builders to build Golf Courses in their own cities? That would make it more unique instead of another Portugal building Feitorias situation.

 

[Xandinho]

Brazil
UU: something related to agriculture, livestock and commodity trading. Make Brazil expansionist, which always needs new land to develop its agribusiness.
LUA: it's currently ok, but simple. Add extra age score when recruiting a new Great People.
UU: I don't really care that much, but having the Voluntários da Pátria would be nice and appropriate for an empire-focused Brazilian civ. Make them quite cheap to produce or buy.
UI: Sambódromo is a more appropriate name for Street Carnival district. Make it an one-per-city improvement and give it a bonus of tourism, appeal and amenity.

 

[dagriggstar]

Norwegian longboats should be a stand alone naval raider UU that upgrades into privateers. Being invisible so early in the game makes them dangerous.

 

[reddishrecue]

Norwegian longboats should be a stand alone naval raider UU that upgrades into privateers. Being invisible so early in the game makes them dangerous.

That sounds like a good strategy, particularly when next to someone in a coast, same with Dido. If not next to someone in a coast then time will pass and the strategy wont work.

 

[doomer]

As of right now I don't think I have enough understanding of all the different mechanics to really redesign them, so I'm going to redesign the look of their leaders. Let's ditch the childish cartoon style in favor of something more true to life. Especially Gandhi and Wilhelmina are abysmal to look at. I'm also giving them more voice lines, the constant sighing, 'hmmming' and tongue clacking they do during trade deals and the like is unbecoming of a world leader. Was it really too much effort to give them a bit more personality, Firaxis?

 

[Krajzen]

Civ series has this awkward problem where all the most powerful civilizations in history get into the first release cycles, when every game is at its simplest and least spectacular. So very great empires end up either being really mediocre in game, or strong in a crude straightfoward way, while the most complex and badass power creep goes to Maori and Colombia

You know it's amazing to me how in every game US has some random collection of quirks and perks instead of some mighty bonuses establishing it as an economic superpower, just wanted to say that
Same with China, always has some weird collection of stuff instead of crushing economic powerhouse

I'd just like India which is actually a powerful faction, not mediocrity mixed with misery (hint: abandon Gandhi, pacifism and stereotypes and actually give them some imperial economic engine, on top of making them serious religious power)

I'd like France and Spain which don't somehow always end up being mediocre or terrible despite being, you know, France and Spain (similar problem as India). Honestly England is not too great either; in civ5 it was "great civ" as in "essentially has only military bonuses" and in civ6 it was an abomination of like a dozen separate bonuses which barely amounted to something acceptable.

Basically, as you can see, I want obligatory civs, which are also great superpowers, to not oscillatw between being mediocre or boring

I'd like Incan empire focused on expansionism and their very unique "central planning" economy, I'd like Korea not focused on science fixation for once and instead going for Buddhist religion or oversea commerce, and
I'd like not - Achaemenid Persia just one goddamn time, either Sasanian or Islamic, so maybe it wouldn't have the exact same unique unit, rotating two leaders, city list, flavour and expansionist focus for 50 games in a row

 

[pineappledan]

One major drawback to the sassanids is that it puts Persia’s TSL at Ctesiphon, so another Middle East start instead of in Iran proper.

 

[rocksinmypath]

I just played a game with Saladin. I had to quit ~90 turns in because the experience was unpleasant. It was probably partly because I didn't play optimally, so I'll have another go at some point, but Saladin feels weird. His kit seems like it should be coherent, unlike those of some civs I think are terribly designed. In practice, though, his kit might actually be worse than just having no synergy like French Eleanor's because his abilities cannabalize each other.

What do I mean by this? First of all, campuses and holy sites compete for placement, so it's hard to get a great campus/holy site combo in a city. If you want to maximize your chance of achieving this combo, you need to play on Highlands, which is what I did, but Highlands is notoriously difficult to scout efficiently, and without any ancient era bonus (e.g. unique unit), it's very difficult to attain a Classical golden age. Failing to achieve a golden age somewhat defeats the purpose of trying to get good adjacencies on both districts, because you can't make use of good faith generation for the majority of the next era. There's also the problem of lack of food on Highlands, so the obligation of building two districts in your early cities is a big burden.

On a non-Highlands map, unless you're very lucky, you have to choose between a great holy site and a great campus. Prioritizing holy sites in your early cities means you're not making use of the Last Prophet ability, and your Madrasas will not be great. Prioritizing campuses means you'll have a more limited selection of religious beliefs. Also, benefits of religion don't scale well as the game goes on, and you can't even found a religion without a shrine, so there's the risk of not getting much out of religion if you choose to commit to campuses early game.

Arabia also suffers from the same problem most other science-focused civs do, which is that the Deity AI has an unreasonable obsession with campuses, making it difficult for the player to recruit any early Great Scientist. This is particularly bad for Saladin because I'd say Hypatia, Hildegard and Al-Zahrawi are all potentially valuable recruits.

Anyway, here is how I think Arabia can be improved. Instead of the Madrasa, I think Arabia should get a half-priced unique campus. I think this is really the only reasonable way for the player to compete with Scientist-hungry Deity AI. Keeping in line with the theme of the Madrasa, the unique campus should yield faith equal to science output. (Maybe, for balancing, this should be contingent on the cities with the campuses following Arabian religion?) In addition, Arabia's prophet should have the ability to instantly build a holy site when founding a religion. This holy site (and only this one) should have the special ability of producing missionaries without a shrine and getting a worship building without getting a temple first. This lays out a clear and straightforward strategy with Arabia:

1) Rush campuses in early cities (+4 era score for the 1st, which makes Classical golden age more achievable)
2) When a prophet arrives, found a religion and get a free holy site
3) Choose a worship building as the second belief (Mosque synergizes well)
4) Immediately build one in the holy site for 90% discount, using the faith accumulated from campuses
5) Buy a couple missionaries to spread the religion to Arabian and foreign cities

This version of Arabia should:
1) Stay competitive with Deity AI in the early Great Scientist race
2) Not have to worry about cannabalism between campuses and holy sites because technically only one holy site is required
3) More easily achieve a Classical golden age, having a good way to spend the copious amount of faith generated from campuses.
4) Have an extra economic policy slot, freed up from not having to plug in both Natural Philosophy and Scripture.

 

[rocksinmypath]

Maya
Maya is an attempt at tall science, but there are several others like Korea, Inca and Scotland. Korea is, by far, the most capable tall science civ, and Maya is probably the weakest. I'd go as far as to say Maya is just a worse Korea with no unique merits to offer. It also has a bizarre spawn behaviour, always starting next to a river even though it gets no housing bonus from water and quite often even near a coastline.

I can think of a few ways of making Maya more viable and interesting. One is to allow the Mayan capital to increase its effect on nearby cities. Some ways this can be done:

- Each title of the established governor in the capital adds +5% bonus to all cities within six tiles of the capital for a total of +30% bonus.
- All cities within six tiles of the capital receives an yield bonus percentage equal to the capital's population.

Unless its spawning behaviour can be fixed, Maya should also be allowed to move its capital similar to how Phoenicia can.

Maya should also gain more benefits from plantations. If I'm not mistaken, currently, the only other civ that can do anything remotely interesting with plantations is Gran Colombia, so this would be an opportunity for Maya to stand out in some way. It could come in the form of additional yields or housing on plantations themselves or yield contribution to internal trade routes, which I think would be fitting for a civ that likes to build a tight-knit empire.

I had a re-think of how to improve Maya, and I think I have a better idea. Mayan non-captial cities should get an yield boost equal to 3% times the capital's population. This effect negatively scales with distance, with 10% reduction per tile away from the capital. Cities 10 tiles or more away from the capital do not receive any penalty. For example:

Capital population: 15
Bonus to city 4 tiles away (min. distance): 15 * 3% * (1 - 0.1 * 4) = 45% * 0.6 = 27%

This is a very powerful ability that comes with an interesting dilemma. If you put cities close to each other, they have trouble growing because they don't have enough tiles to work. If the capital is surrounded by cities, all of which are 4 tiles away, it essentially won't have a third ring and will probably even have to compete for some tiles in the second ring. That means it will won't have more than 18 tiles to work, which imposes a severe restriction on the capital's growth potential. There are also some key infrastructure like the Observatory, Colosseum (and the requisite Entertainment Complex), Hanging Gardens, and Temple of Artemis, which you probably want either in your capital or close to it, so that's even fewer tiles for farms in the capital. This version of Maya should require the player to have some knowledge about how to effectively grow a city, but if they can pull it off, it should be very rewarding.

 

[Zaarin]

Sweden. It's always about Nobel stuff. I would like to have the Viking and explorer stuff. Always the silly Danes and Norwegians getting that. Also one thing I want in Civ 7 is something AoE IV did, they made the different Civs way more different from each other in basically everything instead of giving the different Civs a few unique units and stats/technologies.

I mean, there's a reason for that: namely that Sweden was, however briefly, a superpower in the Early Modern period. TBH I'd happily sacrifice the Vikings altogether and just have Lion of the North Sweden (or, if we must have Vikings, have an overall Early Modern Vasa Sweden and toss in a Berserker UU). But the general public wants their Vikings...

One major drawback to the sassanids is that it puts Persia’s TSL at Ctesiphon, so another Middle East start instead of in Iran proper.

Iran is in the Middle East. At any rate, Ctesiphon wouldn't be more than a few tiles away from Persepolis/Anshan/Susa on a standard sized map, though it will overlap with Baghdad, assuming we have an Abbasid caliph again, and any of the Assyrian capitals should we get Assyria again.

 

[Alexander's Hetaroi]

I mean, there's a reason for that: namely that Sweden was, however briefly, a superpower in the Early Modern period. TBH I'd happily sacrifice the Vikings altogether and just have Lion of the North Sweden (or, if we must have Vikings, have an overall Early Modern Vasa Sweden and toss in a Berserker UU). But the general public wants their Vikings...

I personally wouldn't mind Denmark returning with Cnut and Margaret as leaders, as the sole representative of Scandinavia.

Iran is in the Middle East.

It depends where if you're talking about the region of Greater Iran.

 

[Horizons]

I'd like custom art for all the different civs - different units, buildings etc. More unique units and buildings too.

Venice from Civ5 was nice. Playing as the barbarian nation in Civ4 was cool too. Sumeria in Civ6 is decidedly uncool.

 

[Zaarin]

It depends where if you're talking about the region of Greater Iran.

True, but we're specifically talking about Pars/Fars.

 

[Lord Lakely]

redesign the civilization 6 civs? Challenge accepted. I'll keep the components Firaxis chose.

Let's start with England and I'll try more if I feel like it?

England
Civilization Ability: Workshop of the World - Mines, Lumber Mills and Quarry tiles provide +1 production, but their city loses -1 Food. Districts adjacent to an Industrial Zone or Royal Navy Dockyard construct buildings 25% faster and provide +1 Loyalty to their city.
Leader Ability: Pax Brittanica - The first City settled on a new continent receives +20 loyalty and exerts double loyalty pressure to all friendly cities. Cities you found on any continent different than your capital's continent receive a free melee unit and +1 to all yields upon settlement. Receive the Redcoat UU at Rifling.
UI: Royal Navy Dockyard: Upon completion receive a free naval unit. Royal Navy Dockyards provide +1 Production for every four gold they generate.
UU: Sea Dog: Can capture enemy ships (same as before)
UU: Redcoat - unique for Victoria, combat boost on foreign continents (same as before)

(Eleanor: pretty well-designed leader, she can remain the way she is )