[GS] Your first impression score of this expansion

[Depravo]

7.
Civ and Unity of Command are the only games I buy on day 1 any more, GS certainly hasn't put me off continuing to do so. Only the AI lets it down.

 

[StrideColossus]

What do you mean most people? What you mean a few dozen enthusiasts on these forums. Hardly a representation of the players base is it.

Oooo hand-bags!

 

[StrideColossus]

6/10 ...

Agreed on almost every point you made both positive and negative (except maybe the end-game stuff only because I've not got that far in any game yet). In particular railroads just seem so pointless, why - if traders create the roads - are players required to manually build the railroads? Dull tedious micro.

 

[gozon]

I like this expansion, lots of new exciting additions like more unique civs, disasters and better diplomacy, but I can't give it a 10/10 because of the following
1. World congress votes are not straightforward. The current system is like 2 votes mixed into 1, making the results somewhat unexpected.
2. Pillage rewards feels imbalanced. Also chopping is still a "no-brainer" choice if you want to build faster (punishment from disasters are negligible).
3. With essentially no changes to other victory types, science victory feels like it's taking way too long. Waiting for the 50-light-year travel to finish is boring, as you probably already win at that point, and there is limited stuff you can do in cities without spaceports. The future era looks cool on the book, but the unlocks are either space projects or GDR upgrades, which is also somewhat uninspired.
4. Bugs. Graphics of roads/railroads are awful. There are also bugs with regards to production overflowing and bonuses. It seems like programming and QA have been sloppy for this expansion, as the two bugs I mentioned are easily identifiable.
5. New wonders aren't very impactful. It doesn't feel rewarding building new wonders. (Golden gate looks cool nonetheless)

 

[Aussie_Lurker]

8, bordering on an 8.5. Though I haven't yet been impacted by all the biggest stuff from the new Expansion (like the natural disasters), but I am really enjoying the World Congress so far-in spite of minor flaws-& I really love the new Strategic Resource system. Oh, & of course, I love the named features on the map. Really helps to increase my immersion.

 

[Depravo]

Also, the graphics and score continue to pwn. I love Dido's and Mansa Musa's mannerisms.

 

[Deggial]

... And yes, I miss some of the old wonders and definitely miss that wonders used to have IMPACT. They are just so flat and boring now (for the most part). But as I said above, most of the game's mechanics are like that now. Everything is muted and subdued. There is very little "WOW, I gotta get that!" with wonders, techs, GPs, etc. Most of my decisions are made for ease of use rather than strategic impact. ...

Any you know the reason for this, yes?

I blame multi-player!

Civ5 was the first game that tried to seriously cater this game mode. Everything had to bend to this decision.
Powerful wonders? Unfair, because the player building it had a too big advantage.
Exceptional and unevenly distributed tile yields (= city spots with "WOW!" effect)? Unfair, because not all players could settle them equally.
Truely unique UUs? Not possible, because it would shred multi-player balance.

But if everything gives merely mediocre benefits, steps towards victory are tiny and smooth, nobody has an "unfair"/"game breaking" advantage and only player skill decides over the game's outcome.
Yay, perfect!

---

Oh ... and related to the actual thread topic ...

I gave GS a solid "8".

It certainly re-ignited my love for "Civilization". There is not only the "just one more turn" feeling, but even the "Just one more game" after I finished the last one.
This didn't happen to me pre-GS.
The reason for this are:

• the new ressource system
• dissasters
• the grievance system
• the improved map generation (!emphasized!)
  
• the fun new civilizations.

(I LOVED Civ5, by the way, despite the reservations above. And a huge part of it was 1Upt. It might not be perfect for the AI, but was handled well enough in Civ5 - at least with mods. The improved, but still lackluster Civ6 AI (air combat!) is mainly what holds my ranking down. But the SoD must never, ever make his comeback to the series, imo.)

 

[Trav'ling Canuck]

AExceptional and unevenly distributed tile yields (= city spots with "WOW!" effect)? Unfair, because not all players could settle them equally.

Liked your post but would quibble with this one comment. Yields in Civ 6 vary hugely, and settling spots aren't close to equal. Contrast to Civ 1, where different tiles had different strengths, but starting positions were much more consistent.

 

[SammyKhalifa]

Any you know the reason for this, yes?

I blame multi-player!

Civ5 was the first game that tried to seriously cater this game mode. Everything had to bend to this decision.
Powerful wonders? Unfair, because the player building it had a too big advantage.
Exceptional and unevenly distributed tile yields (= city spots with "WOW!" effect)? Unfair, because not all players could settle them equally.
Truely unique UUs? Not possible, because it would shred multi-player balance.

But if everything gives merely mediocre benefits, steps towards victory are tiny and smooth, nobody has an "unfair"/"game breaking" advantage and only player skill decides over the game's outcome.
Yay, perfect!

Forget multiplayer, it's the forums and growth of online resources. Back in civ II says when you found a good way to use a wonder efficiently or whatnot, you probably thought you were pretty clever. Now everything is dissected and analyzed before you ever see it and the Hive Mind lets you know it's been done a hundred times before, and is just better than the other things you could be doing.

Never mind that civs didn't have a unique anything, and I'd argue that the abilities now are more unique than anything we've seen before. Pick two of a set of 8-10 civilization traits, and a unit that was just like the generic unit but more strength--that's what the first uniques are. The natural wonders are way more unique (and powerful for that matter) than a grassland with an extra shield icon on it. On the opposite end wonders like Leonardo's were kind of silly in hindsight and made everything else not really matter. But it was fine for the time because the game was not dissected the way it is now. You were just some kid in the basement playing a game or whatever.

 

[ExemplarVoss]

Solid 5 (which is better than I'd rank R+F). It exists, it adds some long missing pieces, but the central focus of the expansion is dull and involves more make-work, which is the last thing the mid and late game needed.

Diplomacy is a wacky system that seems mostly self defeating, with a lot of rubbish decisions and a couple that you always want to win (and often can, as the ai is bad at managing flavor)

Climate change and volcanoes mostly requires keeping some spare workers around to tidy up. Yawn. Don't care.

 

[Kamino]

5.

A lot of cute stuff but so many flaws are remaining at the core of the game. It would be better to get a Civ7 with stronger fundamentals to really have fun with all those cute stuff.

 

[PhoenicianGold]

9.

Since VI seems to be a long-support tentpole, I don't mind that things still need polishing. Patches are easy. Art design and mechanical cohesion is difficult. And I am immensely satisfied with how every civ in this expack was chosen and implemented.

There are a couple things I would have liked changed with this:

1. Don't give the Ottomans the Barbary Corsair. Save it for Morocco.
2. Change the Polish UU to the Uhlan and redo the aqueduct district so that Rome gets an aqueduct UI. Hungary poached on two uniques when it didn't need to.
3. I really, really dislike the Golden Gate Bridge as "the only bridge in the game." Drop it, replace it with something which is actually impressive like the Chunnel.

Minor nitpicks.

 

[megabearsfan]

My feelings so far are very mixed.

I like the idea of making the world feel more vibrant, alive, and dynamic, and emphasizing the civilizations' relationship with the planet itself. I feel GS does a better job of that than Beyond Earth did. That being said, I'm not happy with the weather-related disasters (though flooding and volcanoes work well enough), nor am I happy with the Global Warming implementation. I get the idea: they wanted to add a late-game challenge that all civs had to pseudo-cooperate in order to overcome. That's a worthwhile goal. But I feel that climate change disproportionately affects coastal civs, since coastal flooding is the only permanent effect that global warming has. Just keep a few builders hanging around with 1 charge, and you can trivially repair any improvements pillaged by other disasters.

I would much rather have seen more gradual, large-scale climate change mechanics (both natural and anthropogenic). Things along the lines of the Little Ice Age and Medieval Warm Period, as well as anthropogenic global warming, that cause ice caps, glaciers, deserts, and rainforest to expand or receed over the course of many game turns. That might lead to animal resources migrating to more temperate parts of the map. And that might cause civs to expand to (or conquer) new territory as their homeland becomes less hospitable, or they run out of food, fresh water, or other resources. I feel something like that would make the map feel more dynamic, and would lead to a lot less turtling. I feel like that would be much better (and more in-line with the scale and scope of Civ) than a random storm pillaging a few tiles.

On the other hand, I really love most of the supporting ideas in Gathering Storm. I really like the strategic resource supply (even though I am a bit iffy on the balance of the numbers), and how it gives additional value to Encampments (which I rarely built). I like how the most conspicuous gaps in the unit upgrade paths were filled (with the inclusion of the Courser, Skirmisher, and Curaissier), though I wish a medieval naval unit or two, and a Trebuchet siege weapon had also been added. I like how the disasters give additional relevance to Aqueducts (which I also rarely ever built). I like that "peacemonger" civs now have more options for dealing with aggressive civs via Diplo Favor, world congress, and emergencies. The Forestry Management promotion has me seriously considering recruiting governor Reyna before Magnus or Liang on many maps. Canals and tunnels are a long overdue addition, and I can't believe we had to wait two expansions to get them!

So I like a lot of the little changes, but the big core feature is very "meh".

 

[WideCoast]

I really have just played almost one game so I still might be a bit "hyped" about GS, but I gotta give it a 10! Althought when starting it I was like " it's still just a civ game with some added flavour ", but I started it anyway and you know something just happened and I really loved it and wouldn't have wanted to stop

Then again idk if it's this game or GS

 

[Disgustipated]

Just keep a few builders hanging around with 1 charge, and you can trivially repair any improvements pillaged by other disasters

People exaggerate this. I find my improvements aren't just pillaged, but completely removed and require numerous builder charges to fix (even on disaster setting 2), but I agree they can be easily fixed with multiple builders. My biggest problem is sometimes I don't notice my missing improvements, or I forget what improvements I originally had in those tiles.

 

[Victoria]

People exaggerate this. I find my improvements aren't just pillaged, but completely removed and require numerous builder charges to fix (even on disaster setting 2)

Some events will wash away some topsoil and its no big deal....
I was doing a Toa rush last night and traversing a riverbed for speed.... i did not lose a unit but when full health units are 80-90% damaged you just lost at least 5 turns of attack. Luckily it was not in the middle of a fight which it has been before. last time I posted what had happened and said do not fight on a riverbed... but where are the AI cities?

Lets be clear, I am not complaining about this because the weather feature is just nice, the graphics are great and the game is less fixed, it feels great... but agreed, let us not underestimate those floods in particular.

 

[AmazonQueen]

People exaggerate this. I find my improvements aren't just pillaged, but completely removed and require numerous builder charges to fix (even on disaster setting 2), but I agree they can be easily fixed with multiple builders. My biggest problem is sometimes I don't notice my missing improvements, or I forget what improvements I originally had in those tiles.

It varies, sometimes pillaged, sometimes destroyed. I just had an iron mine pillaged by a catastrophic eruption. Fortunately I'm not at war atm.

 

[MrRadar]

It varies, sometimes pillaged, sometimes destroyed. I just had an iron mine pillaged by a catastrophic eruption. Fortunately I'm not at war atm.

All this is very understandable and OK. I also get that a volcano can burn all the cows or sheep from the nearby slopes and they become extinct from that specific location.

However, I've also had a volcano who made a nearby copper deposit disappear. I get that hot magma could've melted it and carried a little bit down, but to make it evaporate entirely? Some bonus resources might be a little more resistant than others.

 

[AmazonQueen]

All this is very understandable and OK. I also get that a volcano can burn all the cows or sheep from the nearby slopes and they become extinct from that specific location.

However, I've also had a volcano who made a nearby copper deposit disappear. I get that hot magma could've melted it and carried a little bit down, but to make it evaporate entirely? Some bonus resources might be a little more resistant than others.

True enough. Still Ottowa now has an unimproved 4f 3h tile (used to be stone, I was too slow to harvest that one) and a 3f 4h 1s iron mine. Actually eruptions should probably add stone deposits. Tuff, also sometimes called tufa, was used a lot by the Romans and is what the Easter Island statues are made of.

 

[SammyKhalifa]

People exaggerate this. I find my improvements aren't just pillaged, but completely removed and require numerous builder charges to fix (even on disaster setting 2), but I agree they can be easily fixed with multiple builders. My biggest problem is sometimes I don't notice my missing improvements, or I forget what improvements I originally had in those tiles.

I think they could better highlight what was damaged/destroyed, and what tiles got the gain in case you forgot where they were before.