Civ 6 Release and Update Discussion Thread

[Quagma Blast]

First impression: looks like a great expansion for single-player games.

I mean.... If you have control over Golden/Dark ages, you could use those interestingly in MP. Emergencies could be useful to help team up against runaways in AI Diplo, but I don't have high hopes. Governors sound cool, and basically culture flipping returning is also really cool. It will all boil down to the implementation and how much agency you have over the different systems. Hard to tell at this point.

I'm also really curious about what the two new districts could possibly be....

Timeline is very silly SP stuff though, I'll give you that.

Some info in other places (for example here) indicates that you get an "Era Score" based on your activities, and if they hit a high enough or low enough threshold you get a Golden Age or Dark Age in the following era. Also that Dark Ages are not uniformly bad, since they let you set Dark Policies which give you a strong bonus to one thing in exchange for an even bigger penalty in something else, and are the only way to unlock "Heroic Ages" which are extra-strength Golden Ages.

It also describes one of the new districts: a Government District, a national-wonder like one-time-only district which can be used to unlock policy cards depending on your government (and probably relates to governers somehow)

People have also done some examination of the provided screenshots: some aquatic equivalent of an Entertainment District (possibly an actual Entertainment District built on the water), a few new World Wonders and Natural Wonders (Statue of Liberty, some monumental Buddha, St. Basil's Cathedral, Delicate Arch, others), an arctic research station and an undetermined aquatic improvement.

[Ichabod]

To be fair, this is the first time I read a civilization announcement where I get the feeling that whomever wrote it really played this game and the previous ones. From the title of the expansion, to the gameplay revealed, I feel an inspiration coming from the Rhye's and Fall Civ 4 mod, which was great for SP. MP could be affected by some of these changes, so lets hope you can disable them, as with Random Events in Civ 4.

[BRickAstley]

That definitely needs to happen, if any of them are completely out of the player's agency of control. None of them seem to be "Random Events" like at the moment from the description I have seen though.

[Bacchus]

Looks like SP feature bloat to me. The era score and golden ages as described are a particularly annoying "win more"/"lose more" addition. Governors -- fine as a way to decrease expansion ROI, but we hardly need yet another development tree, especially as I imagine their promotions will be mutually exclusive. Loyalty is potentially cool.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

I have to say, I'm not really excited. Loyalty, governors, golden ages vs dark ages - it all seems like stuff that's geared at making Civ more like a Paradox type grand strategy game. Don't get me wrong, I love me some Paradox, probably got thousands of hours among all their titles, but it's not what I come to Civ for.

[Mr. Cairo]

I was slightly worried when I first heard about it that it was going to be a blatant rip-off of Rhys and Fall. While I'm glad that isn't the case (the stability system isn't something that can be ported to Civ6 very well imo), I'm not sure what the point of much of this stuff is. Adding what are essentially even more "targets" like the inspirations and eurekas isn't something that interests me. Also, The whole Golden Age mechanic looks like something easily exploited by decent players, and something that the AI will probably not be very good at.

[Japper007]

Looks like they continue to steal every mechanic they can from the Endless series (governors at least seem so, and the Districts where clearly inspirered by Endless Legend city expansion). But I approve, that series is starting to be a serious contender for top 4X franchise, better a good ripoff than a bad original design.

[Hail]

Governors look interesting, but I want fucking pitboss.

nope. no pitboss, no railroads, no multipliers, not even lootboxes. no one at Firaxis cares about MP

To be fair, this is the first time I read a civilization announcement where I get the feeling that whomever wrote it really played this game and the previous ones.

to be fair, Anton plays alot of Endless Legend and installed Rhye's Rise & Fall mod for civ4 recently.

my thoughts (not that anyone cares):

the number of governors are limited to 7 per player. hm... does Anton know that civ6 has different map sizes?


loyalty - largest modifiers are dark/normal/golden age the player is currently in and the presence/absence of a governor. "peer pressure" - increasing the loyalty of your cities will lower loyalty of nearby other players' cities and visa versa.

do aritificial action X to earn Era points, do artificial action Y to earn Governor Titles. namely, the player will be forced to construct useless wonders for Era points.

Emergency situations reminds me of the good old civ2 AI hivemind gangbang.

one more thought - (1) a player starts a new era in the Dark Age, (2) accumulates fewer (lower loyality in all cities - lower city yields) Era points, (3) sockets immensely powerful (?) policy cards, (4) goto 1.

frankly, I am disappointed. not sure how any of this will shake up the late-game, that Ed talked at length about.

[Brian Shanahan]

Stealing a summary from Reddit:

GREAT AGES: As your civilization ebbs and flows, and you reach milestone Historic Moments, you will experience Dark Ages or Golden Ages, each providing specific challenges or bonuses based on your actions in-game. Rise triumphantly from a Dark Age, and your next Golden Age will be even stronger – a Heroic Age.
LOYALTY: Cities now have individual Loyalty to your leadership – let it fall too low, and face the consequences of low yields, revolts, and the potential to lose your city to another civilization, or its own independence. But one civilization’s loss can be your gain as you inspire Loyalty among cities throughout the map and further expand your borders.
GOVERNORS: Recruit, appoint, and upgrade powerful characters with unique specialization bonuses and promotion trees to customize your cities, and reinforce Loyalty.
ENHANCED ALLIANCES: An enhanced alliances system allows players to form different types of alliances and build bonuses over time.
EMERGENCIES: When a civilization grows too powerful, other civilizations can join a pact against the threatening civilization and earn rewards, or penalties, when the Emergency ends.
TIMELINE: Review your civilization’s history at any time with the new Timeline feature, a visual journey through the Historic Moments that you encountered on your path to victory.
NEW LEADERS AND CIVS: Nine leaders and eight new civilizations are introduced. Each brings unique bonuses and gameplay, as well as a total of eight unique units, two unique buildings, four unique improvements, and two unique districts.
NEW GLOBAL CONTENT: Eight new world wonders, seven natural wonders, four new units, two new tile improvements, two new districts, fourteen new buildings, and three new resources have been added.
IMPROVED GAMEPLAY SYSTEMS: The Government system has been enhanced with new Policies and additional improvements have been made to existing systems.

First impression: looks like a great expansion for single-player games.

I mean.... If you have control over Golden/Dark ages, you could use those interestingly in MP. Emergencies could be useful to help team up against runaways in AI Diplo, but I don't have high hopes. Governors sound cool, and basically culture flipping returning is also really cool. It will all boil down to the implementation and how much agency you have over the different systems. Hard to tell at this point.

I'm also really curious about what the two new districts could possibly be....

Timeline is very silly SP stuff though, I'll give you that.

Sounds to me like a combination of ideas from the Civ 4 revolutions mod (dark ages city loyalty) and the most annoying parts of the more recent Paradox games.

[MJW (ya that one)]

There's already a lot of luck that makes PBEM unplayable without "cheating" (handcrafted maps). It's not a big deal to tack on a mod to remove stuff anymore. For other forms of MP it's not a big deal to start a new game if you get unlucky. What really shows Firaxis not caring about MP is lack of pitboss.