[Civ VII]Learning from Napoleon - A Civ VII Exploration/Tutorial

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

My enemies are many; my equals are none. 
In the shade of olive trees, they said Italy could never be conquered.
In the land of pharaohs and kings, they said Egypt could never be humbled.
In the realm of forest and snow, they said Russia could never be tamed.
Now they say nothing. They fear me, like a force of nature — a dealer in thunder and death!
I say: I am Napoleon. I am - Emperor!

[

Hello, everyone, and welcome to Civilization VII! I'm eager to share the latest entry in the series with all of you. I loved Civilization VI, while acknowledging it to be a far from perfect game. Civilization VII, also, is far from perfect - but I hope I will love it, too. Let's explore it together, learn the new mechanics, and take a game through from start to finish. Then, decide if it's a game for you - or not. Let's just dive straight in:

Chevalier Plays Napoleon: Civilization VII
Part I: The Age of Antiquity
For any true grognard, there is obviously only one correct choice for the first civilization & leader of the game: Napoleon, of Rome.


Right from the start, you'll notice that Napoleon is not leading France. That's because leaders and civs are two separate entities in VII. Your leader, the disembodied spirit of your people, has a few bonuses that he or she will contribute throughout the game, while the civilization that you inhabit will grow and evolve over time. France is a modern civ and so we shan't see it until 1700 or so. Instead, we open the game with one of ten civilizations of Antiquity - your classics like Greece, Rome, Egypt, Han China, Persia, the Mayans, etc. Eventually, a crisis will come, our empires will weather the storm, more or less, and in so doing evolve into the next age, the Age of Exploration, and take a new civ. 

This single change is probably the most controversial one the developers have made. No longer do you see ancient age Americans founding Washington DC by the waters of the Tigris, nor is Atomic Ramses II leading his Egyptians into space. For many people, this is almost a deal-breaker with the game - they like leading one civ from the stone age to space, and are outraged that they'll need to swap. I don't mind, personally. The civilization itself was always more of a collection of bonuses than "Romans" or "Koreans", since I'd typically rename my cities* and follow my own theme anyway. By giving you a new civ in each age, the designers can allow the uniques to really shine. America has always kind of sucked, since its bonuses only come online in the modern age - by the time P-51s unlock in Civ VI the game is over anyway (and Fighters literally never matter). Now, in every age, you're guaranteed to have some unique kit tailored to that age. You'll have Egyptian Medjays and buildings in the ancient era, then transition to say Abbasid cavalry in the medieval period, and end up with modern Ugandan infantry. I think this is promising design. The age-reset mechanic is related to this, but I'll get to it later. For now, I personally really like having a slate of civs each carefully tailored to be strong in their own eras, which leads to a bunch of strength on strength matchups. 

So let's discuss my choices, then. Napoleon was the obvious choice for me. In Civ VII, Napoleon has two personas, L'Empereur, who gains bonuses for making enemies with the AI, and the Revolutionary:



+1 movement on land units is enormously beneficial for land warfare, and is historically accurate. Napoleon was famous for his lightning marches, with armies covering ground unexpectedly rapidly during campaigns such as Lodi & Rivoli, at Marengo, prior to Ulm, at the battle of Austerlitz, at Jena, at Eckhmuhl in 1809, before Lutzen and Bautzen, throughout the French campaign in 1814, and even shocking Wellington with his sudden march to Charleroi just prior to Waterloo. " The Emperor has discovered a new way of waging war; he makes use of our legs instead of our bayonets." Napoleon's other ability awards culture in exchange for land victories, like Gorgo in Civ VI, again good historical flavor, and one which I will try to make use of to speed through the culture trees. 



Let's turn to Rome. It has two unique units and two unique buildings, which seems like a lot, but I think that shows off the strength of the new model Civ - developers can pile on the goodies for each civ since it doesn't need to be balanced and relevant all the way through the game. So, we get:

• The Legion, which no longer has a build charge but DOES get increasingly boosted strength as I slot Roman traditions into my government (what are traditions? More on those later, but basically each civ now has its own unique culture tree which unlocks bespoke government civics, called traditions). It will square off against Egyptian medjays, Persian Immortals, Mississippian fire archers, etc. A good workhorse conquest unit.
  
• The Legate, a unique Commander. Commanders are VII's Great Generals, buildable, and basically required for effectively waging war. The settlement charge isn't as fancy as it sounds, since you have a soft settlement cap and I actually forgot to use my two legates' charges in this game. :x I'm learning, too! 
  

Every civ that has at least one unique building will actually get two. This is due to how districts & buildings have been changed in VII. We'll see it in action in a little while, but in a nutshell: You no longer pre-build districts and then fill them up with buildings. Instead, buildings are placed directly on the map, and when two building are constructed in the same hex, a district is created there instead. So, the Romans have the Basilica, a market-esque district to generate gold, and a Temple of Jupiter, which grants happiness and the new diplomatic currency, Influence, when built. When you build both, you get a Forum, which gains culture and gold the more traditions you have. Rome also receives bonus culture on their city centers, and a production boost towards the Colosseum. Put it all together, and you can see the gameplan for Rome: Emphasize culture & military might. The culture will unlock more traditions, which will boost the Legion's strength and the Forum's yields, which of course feeds back into more culture, leading to more traditions, more military strength, etc. My intention will be to try to research the entire Antiquity culture tree, as well as gobbling up at least one AI opponent, before the end of the age. 

Let's dive in and see how all this stuff looks in practice. Turn one coming soon!

[T-hawk]

Thanks for doing this. I'll be reading along. We need some actual gameplay rather than just all the haters going on in the other thread.

Do you want this thread in Civ General for better visibility? We've usually been okay with single-player game reports there. This doesn't sound like a succession game where you're sharing the save with other people, right?

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

Thanks for doing this.  I'll be reading along.  We need some actual gameplay rather than just all the haters going on in the other thread.

Do you want this thread in Civ General for better visibility?  We've usually been okay with single-player game reports there.  This doesn't sound like a succession game where you're sharing the save with other people, right?

Sure! I usually stick the single player reports here to avoid cluttering general, but if y'all don't mind then I don't mind.

[Krill]

+1 to reading along, and agree it should be moved to a prominent part of the forum.

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

Part II: The First Few turns

Okay, let's get this thing going. Full disclosure, my reporting through the Antiquity age is going to be very spotty, as I didn't take it seriously until I was most of the way through. My coverage of the Exploration & Modern Ages will be better. For now, I beg your forgiveness with the gaps that emerge - at least this area is thoroughly covered by every Civ Youtuber and streamer out there. 



We start here, at the dawn of history. Don't worry about deciphering the screen quite yet - I'm learning to read it along with you. At the center of the screen, just behind the textbox, you can see my settler (technically a Founder but what the hell), standing on a minor river. Rivers are revamped in Civ VII - instead of running between hexes, they now run through them. Minor rivers are the narrow ribbon you see snaking beautifully through the hex, navigable rivers are broad estuaries that everyone's really excited about. Since I don't know what makes a good start and what doesn't, yet, I go ahead and settle in place. I have no other units - you don't start with a warrior or scout, but you do get a 1-turn build of whichever is your preference. Scouts are significantly better in VII than in previous entries, so I queue up a scout, set my researches towards some likely-looking early techs (Pottery and Code of Laws, I think, more later), and end the turn. 

The first few turns pass quickly. Scouts now have two actions in addition to moving - they can set up as a sort of sentry, sacrificing all their movement in return for +1 vision, OR they can execute a sort of radar-like scan of the area in exchange for 1 movement point. Their vision will burst out one tile for a turn, AND all discoveries within 2 tiles of that - goody huts, natural wonders, etc - will be revealed. This ability syncs perfectly with Napoleon's +1 movement, as I can scan and still move rapidly over the terrain. I quickly find my first goody hut north of Rome:



Huts, tribal villages, whatever, in Civ VII take a variety of forms - cairns, encampments, huts, ruins, etc - but as far as I can tell always have the same mechanical effects. There will be a brief flavor text, and then you'll be presented with a pair of boons to choose between. In this case, we can gain extra happiness, or a burst of production. I take the free hammers on the theory that food and production are always king. It seems to work out okay. 

A few turns later, still on the edge of the tundra as I circle west, I find my first barbarian encampment AND city-state:

 
The little village of Izirtu, white text highlighted in red, fulfills the role of both barbarian and city-state in VII. The two have been blended into the new "independent powers" system, allowing you to interact with them as you choose. Izirtu's red border indicates that they haven't exactly taken a shine to me. Their units will attack mine and they'll raid my borders - barbs, in other words. I also find another camp with more production. 

All that production enables Rome to pop a second scout, which I send to the east. It quickly finds a small coastal estuary:


I admit, I miss the river labels from Civ VI. But the two broad tiles south of my scout (and some camels) are a navigable river. I know that in future ages, I'll need good access to the sea, so while I have no idea how to identify good settling sites yet, I'll probably be founding at least one city here. My ships can sail up and down the river, and besides, navigable rivers are a New Thing so I wanna play around one. 

Back home, as "independent powers" sniff around my borders, I complete my first warrior and get to work on a granary. Let's look at how cities work:

 
Units visible include the barb scout, my warrior, and the legate, who spawned with the first warrior. We'll have time to talk exactly how he works once I get a larger army. Note the city, though. I have several rural improvements around - a clay pit on the river for extra production, a plantation behind the city improving food, a quarry distantly visible (not highlighted). However, I haven't built a single, ugh, builder (so glad I don't need to type that anymore). There are no workers in Civ VII. Instead, the population, border growth, and worker systems have all been consolidated. Now, when your population grows, you choose one tile to permanently assign the pop to. That's right - no pop micro as you juggle food and production or try to squeeze out just enough gold or science to finish a key tech or win a wonder race. Instead, once the pop is assigned, in the first place an improvement immediately drops dependent upon the tile (no, you don't choose - every tile gets the same improvement every time. Horses always get a pasture, grass plains always a farm, a river always a clay pit, etc). Additionally, you culture bomb adjacent tiles to that improvement and can claim those with your next pop, if you choose. I like some aspects of this - CHOOSING where your borders expand is a no-brainer and totally obsoletes Civ VI and V's goofy tile pickers. There's at times a real tradeoff between picking an immediately great tile to work, or trying to grow towards a key resource a few tiles away. However, the city system as a whole feels a bit dumbed down, as plays like skipping a builder to let your pop work unimproved forest hills while you concentrate on other things are no longer present. It's definitely streamlined. For the better? I'll see.*

The other system present is the new district system. Just behind the palace is a growing urban quarter. Buildings are placed on the map and immediately start to urbanize the area around the city when they do so. Placing two buildings creates a district, which in turn enables specialist citizens once you unlock a few key techs. I don't fully grasp this system yet - are there synergies behind placing, say, two production buildings together? Does it matter at all? How exactly do adjacencies work? (I had Civ VI's memorized for so long that I'm a bit rusty re-learning them). I DO know that you need to build both your unique buildings in the same hex to unlock your unique quarter, but beyond that, I just plop things where the system tells me I get the greatest yields, with no longer term strategy since I'm too ignorant to formulate one at the moment. Eh. I'll work it out. 

Meanwhile, to the south, my scout finds the first signs of civilization apart from Rome - a small peasant farm sits in a pleasant valley. After much gesturing and frustrated attempts to translate the gobbledygook that the confused farmers speak, we make formal diplomatic contact with the god-king Xerxes, appropriately leading the Persian Empire:



 
Persia is incredibly war-like as a civ, with bonuses to movement and attack in surprise wars (like before) and the awesome Immortal unique unit, so he'll be a thorn in my side later. 

I continue to fumble through the early turns, alternating units and buildings as my whims take me, eventually producing my first settler about 20 turns into the game.


I also research Mysticism, which triggers the Pantheon selection. Pantheons give you bonuses only once you build an altar, meaning you need to jump through a building hoop in order to fully utilize them. I think I like this change over the previous fully passive pantheon. Again, I take what seems like a safe +1 to all yields with my altar, I can't screw that up too badly. 

The next 30 turns speed by. I found Ravenna on the navigable river mentioned earlier, make contact with Harriet Tubman of Egypt, Lafayette of Greece, and Frederick der Grosse of India. At this point I'd gotten so in the flow I plumb forgot to take screenshots of these things, but we'll get caught up. 

One big change is the suzerainty and diplomacy system. Envoys are gone, as is the bargaining table with the AI. Instead, you accumulate Influence through various sources, which is then spent to trigger various effects - denouncing an enemy to gin up war support against him, spying out rival tech, signing a trade agreement, that kind of thing. Influence, though, can also be spent on a barb camp/"independent power" to trigger the process of befriending them and civilizing them. I tried that effect out on the little village of Izirtu, up in the tundra. After a few turns:


This is a good change. The village converts to a city-state under my suzerainty. As a reward, I get to choose the suzerain bonus on offer. There are many available, but the obvious choice is an entire extra government slot. That's a huge bonus and I snap it up right away. However, like other things in VII, extra choice in one area is limited by "streamlining" in others. There is no battling for influence over a city-state - once one leader spends the influence to lay claim to it, all others are locked out, and the city-state is my faithful vassal for the remainder of the age. You also cannot conquer them - a city-state, when overrun, is treated like a barb camp and dispersed. Killing a civilization ALSO kills all its vassals, as well. So in many ways it's a more limited system than what we had before. Does the streamlining enhance hte process? Eh. Once again, I'll wait and see. 

At nearly 60 turns in, that actually covers most of what would be the Ancient Era in a game of Civ VI. I've barely scratched the surface and I'm still trying to learn how everything fits together. That's also all the time I have to write for now, so I'll call this a good halting place. See y'all in a day or two when we plough through the middle part of Antiquity (and conquer our first opponent)!

*On the bright side, the multiplayer meta of rushing for Serfdom in order to spit out a huge wave of builders and deforest your entire empire at once is no longer a thing!

[haphazard1]

Thanks for posting this, good first hand info is much appreciated.

How is performance? The game looks good; how heavy is the load for all that?

[Krill]

Great thread, really appreciate the effort

[civac2]

also reading along

[Cornflakes]

Reading along as well

[Chevalier Mal Fet]

Thanks for posting this, good first hand info is much appreciated.

How is performance? The game looks good; how heavy is the load for all that?

Really good! I actually load saves faster than I did on Civilization VI, and turn times are instantaneous - I actually keep playing more than I intend because the new turn starts so seamlessly after the last that I don't always realize I'd begun a new one.