Civilization 6

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Happysin

Happysin

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  • #1,522
    So I am a weak man and picked up the pack on this long weekend anyway. I played through a Maya game on King, and she is definitely the new Tall civ. I clustered my cities as tight as I could, stacked science, and made farms as far as the eye could see. I normally wince about harvesting jungle and forest, but not this time. I won a science victory by the mid-1800s without anyone ever even trying to declare war on me. Maya is a strong science civ, but not set up to tech out and then dominate a map. Though Maya's early archer unit is great in controlling barbs and preventing anyone from early declaring on you.

    I am going to try a Gran Colombia map next, and I expect it to be comedy on wheels. I don't play domination often, but I don't see any other way to play them well. Let's see how long that lasts.
     
    Happysin

    Happysin

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  • #1,523
    Ok, played some Simon. Holy crap, he is just brokenly fast. I'm definitely going to have to play above King to play Bolivar.

    Also, I turned on the extra disaster stuff this time. It's a lot of disasters, especially with Soothsayers. Also, Soothsayers mean that the Great Bath actually has a function now! Soothsayers cause natural disasters. The Great Bath is the earliest flood mitigator there is, and it adds Faith to your floodplains. Well, you can use Soothsayers on your own flood plains, and stack Faith generation. Soothsayers get expensive quickly, but I'm still at a point were I have 3 tiles generating 20 Faith each. No cheese, straight-up game mechanic. Suffice to say I can buy other faith units essentially whenever I want.
     
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    Delor

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  • #1,525
    I'm a total newb at the moment, having given the game less than 20 hours of play almost 4 years ago at this point, but I'm really liking what the expansions have done with Civ 6. Definitely feels more like a Warlords+Beyond The Sword situation than the treadmill I got into with Civ 5 where every expansion and major patch everyone would say how no, this time the game's really dramatically better and then it never was.

    Still just getting my feet wet so my feelings may change, but this is the most excitement I've had for Civilization since my Civ 4 days.
     
    tarbox

    tarbox

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  • #1,526
    So, Apocalypse Mode is a blast for Role-Playing with a Science Victory.

    Playing as Maya, Lady Six Sky, which basically involves tall gameplay and keeping your cities within 6 hexes of your capital. I basically settled an entire large island with 6 cities.

    Chose an island type map (forget which, but not too slinky like the most extreme water maps) and immediately volcanoes are erupting, random land is burning, floods are wiping out farms ---


    My RP goal is to get the hell off of this forsaken planet and colonize somewhere else.

    So far, it is around 1600ad and I am working on a Mars mission as meteors have begun dropping around the map, sea level is at 2.5m ---

    This Apocalypse mode has been the most enjoyable and insane play through I have had in Civ 6 in awhile.
     
    BitPoet

    BitPoet

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  • #1,527
    I just started playing Civ 6 a few weeks ago, and have slowly been ramping up disasters. So far a Primordial map with disasters at 4 is awesome. I currently have one city with 3 volcanoes, each two hexes away in a Y formation, so there are alleys between each ones. They've been constantly erupting for pretty much the whole game, and the tile yields are insane. I think I've got a few at 11 food 11 prod or higher. The only downside is that there are really very few hexes where I can put wonders there.

    I haven't shelled out for the season pass yet, so no apocalypse for me.
     
    Happysin

    Happysin

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  • #1,531
    So I have realized that if you're playing the disaster game, making a money-rich civ is your license to print victory points. There is almost always a disaster relief request up, and it's trivial to wait until the last turn and drop N+1 gold to get those two victory points over and over. I'm only in the 1500s and I already have 11 VPs. I'd have 13, but I got lazy on one relief and only got bronze.
     
    dferrantino

    dferrantino

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  • #1,533
    dferrantino

    dferrantino

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  • #1,537
    Squrf said:
    What settings? I might be in.
    Click to expand...
    8 players, all human, and the below. Nothing crazy except the Fractal map. Discord for discussion and turn notifications (whenever that starts working again...) is here: https://discord.gg/MDnczbK

    VAHHk7X.png
     
    Happysin

    Happysin

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  • #1,538
    I played a bit of the new update. Having leader variations is nice, like they decided to expand on the Elenore idea, but in the same civ. I played as Mehmet, the new civ. I'm not much of a religion player, but he worked fine. Though Diplo wins are still face-palm easy now. I was going for religion victory and stumbled ass backwards into a diplo win. Which is good, because France was handing everyone their ass on ever other win type.

    I think I'm going to turn off diplo wins for a while, they're just absurdly easy with the new game setups.
     
    S

    Starbuck79

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  • #1,539
    The new DLC for Ethopia adds Secret Societies which I hope are a larger focus in the future. It's worth $5 on it's own. It requires Rise & Fall OR Gathering Storm Expansions.

    Early in the game you will be introduced to 4 separate secret societies, each of which provided significant bonuses that grow through the ages. They use the Governor's interface. You can choose only a single society and it cannot be change.

    Owls of Minerva (Civ6) The Owls of Minerva are puppeteers who mastermind plots behind the scenes and use espionage to achieve their goals. Joining their ranks gives access to the Gilded Vault, a new building with all the benefits of a Bank, but also grants Gold adjacency bonus as a Culture adjacency bonus as well. It also grants an additional trade route for cities with a Harbor.

    Hermetic Order (Civ6) The Hermetic Order values alchemy and occult science above all else. Their success comes from theories and inventions that other societies dismiss as mere fairy tales, such as Ley Lines. Ley Lines are a new map resource only Hermetic Order members can see, which gives standard adjacency bonuses to all specialty districts. They also grant bonus yields whenever a Great Person is earned. Members of the society can build the Alchemical Society, a University replacement building that has all of the base University effects, plus extra Great Merchant points, Great Engineer points, increased Production, and Gold.

    Voidsingers (Civ6) The Voidsingers follow a dark religion of ancient gods and sow chaos to control adversaries. Joining them unlocks the Old God Obelisk, which replaces the Monument. It has all of the Monument's base effects, and provides additional Faith and Great Works slots. The Voidsingers also have a unique unit, the Cultist. Purchased with Faith, Cultists can spend a charge to recruit followers in enemy cities, reducing the target city's Loyalty by calling its citizens to madness.

    Sanguine Pact (Civ6) The Sanguine Pact is a militaristic regime known for sapping enemies of their will to fight, shunning the sunlight. Joining the pact unlocks the unique Vampire unit, which gains Combat Strength when adjacent units perish. Instead of dying, Vampires retreat to safety with one HP and can be healed back to full by pillaging. Vampire Castles can be placed in any empty tile in your territory or in neutral territory and grant defensive bonuses and extra yields. In later eras, Vampire Castles allow you to teleport units between them
    Click to expand...

    I tried out the Voidsingers with the new Ethopia civ and it was insanely powerful to get both Money and Culture from Faith. I plan on a economic game with The Owls next. I've heard that the Vampires is increasingly powerful as they grow significantly in power through out the game.

    This got me thinking about either a larger expansion or an entirely new 4x type game focused on the Secret Societies. I've always enjoyed the cultural/economic parts of Civ but was always less interested in combat. I could see a game were you start a secret society at the beginning, or at a particular age that is not specifically associated with a country or civilization. You build and spread loyalty to gain influence with multiple civs like the the Diplomacy actions. Eventually can control the direction of wars. Each society would have a unique win condition.
     
    S

    Starbuck79

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  • #1,541
    Other than Endless Legends, anyone know if any good 4X style fantasy games? I like Civ6 but I would love some more flexibility in the setting.

    Replaying for the first time in a few years I was thinking a lot about what a 4X game might look like where you play as the secret society with the actual civilizations as AI. You combine parts of the Religion, Governor and Great People systems to guide the general direction of a civ without direct control.
     
    Happysin

    Happysin

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  • #1,542
    D

    Deleted member 4603

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  • #1,545
    Starbuck79 said:
    Other than Endless Legends, anyone know if any good 4X style fantasy games? I like Civ6 but I would love some more flexibility in the setting.

    Replaying for the first time in a few years I was thinking a lot about what a 4X game might look like where you play as the secret society with the actual civilizations as AI. You combine parts of the Religion, Governor and Great People systems to guide the general direction of a civ without direct control.
    Click to expand...

    Total War: Warhammer is actually surprisingly good, though again frustratingly difficult for many (myself included.)
     
    hambone

    hambone

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  • #1,547
    Telwar said:
    I picked up Warlock 2 since it was only $5. Wishing I could build roads, tbh.
    Click to expand...
    Warlock is a fun but ultimately thin experience, almost like a light or arcade version of a strategy game like Civ. I think I got 50-ish hours of gaemplay out of it several years ago as a diversion while waiting for the first big Civ6 expansion.

    If you are willing to branch out a bit and try some "fantasy sim" type games as a fresh diversion, I can recommend Kingdoms and Castles as a fun and affordable experience. It's a pausable real-time medieval village building sim game, with various layers of challenges and things to fight. Each individual peon in your town is individually modeled, and each of them skill-up, get buffs, produce more, fight better, live in family units, get drunk, walk to work, etc. in a way taht is much more concrete than say Cities Skylines. Despite that granularity and the impetus to optimize all these little dudes somehow the game never feels management heavy, just fun. The Devs are super dedicated and have been filling out the game for over two years, and it just keeps getting better and better.
     
    hambone

    hambone

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  • #1,548
    The August Update is now live and you can find the Patch Notes here. Bit of a refinement patch with a few novelty options and balance changes being the headliners:
    • New: Tech and Civic research shuffle - hides and scrambles techs and civs so the research pathways are unpredictable (all players share the same shuffle)
    • New: Natural Wonder Picker - define the pool of Wonders a map will select from
    • Rebalancing of amenities means it'll be easier to make your pop unhappy and harder to make them happy and ecstatic

    Frontier Pass subscribers don't have long to wait for more goodies. September will see the release of 2 new civs, 2 new leaders, and a new game mode.
     
    W

    Wwen

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  • #1,550
    Puke Flyswatter said:
    Starbuck79 said:
    Other than Endless Legends, anyone know if any good 4X style fantasy games? I like Civ6 but I would love some more flexibility in the setting.

    Replaying for the first time in a few years I was thinking a lot about what a 4X game might look like where you play as the secret society with the actual civilizations as AI. You combine parts of the Religion, Governor and Great People systems to guide the general direction of a civ without direct control.
    Click to expand...

    Total War: Warhammer is actually surprisingly good, though again frustratingly difficult for many (myself included.)
    Click to expand...
    I've enjoyed some EU IV
     
    hambone

    hambone

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  • #1,553
    stormtalon said:
    And now we have a look at Gaul:

    TLDR: Land-bound Kupe with SUPER TURTLE POWERS!

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NPhGpbCIPUA
    Click to expand...
    As a guy who has never beaten the AI above Emperor difficulty, I gotta say Gaul looks like my ship has come in.

    Agressive early expansion, strong early units, strong focus on production for cranking out units, industrial zones that double as a defensive encampment tile, strong culture to fend off loyalty challenges... hello.
     
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    spiralscratch

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  • #1,556
    Bad move, Roosevelt, to declare war on me for using a nuke (fired off dozens of turns ago even), seeing as only a few turns ago I led the Council in taking all yours away and I had far more thermo-nukes in reserve than you even have cities. Now the entire American Empire glows bright green.

    Even after a year and a half and nearly 600 hours (according to Steam, probably a fair bit less in reality) I'm still picking things up:
    • GDRs can actually intercept ICBMs.
    • It's possible to do a culture flip on an opponent's capital/last remaining city (probably helped that I nuked it first).
    • While a city is in limbo from a takeover (the point where it asks if you want to keep/reject/return/raze it), it's possible to go into any neighboring cities, swap over any overlapping tiles, and then reject the petition. Free land.
    • It would seem that it's possible for the AI to raze a capital, as a couple of them are missing in this game.
     
    hambone

    hambone

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  • #1,557
    I had a couple of really fun games this month already that really showcase how Civ supports radically different styles of play to keep things fresh.

    First I did a large emperor islands map and went all in on Herald's enhanced coastal raid abilities. I was never much of an islands map or boat guy before but this turned out to be hilarious fun. Early game strategy is gloriously one-dimensional, and it's all you'll need: just crank out the Viking Longboats (which are pretty cheap once you have a couple production mines going), sail far and wide, find the opponents ocean-side capital, and just beat it it to death with the melee boats. All the while stealing any builder units wandering along the coast line and finding and raiding fantastic numbers of goodie huts everywhere. By the time 0AD rolled around all but 1 civ had fallen to my mighty ancient era boats.

    Second game was a domination win with the new Hamurabi expansion civ. This guys unique ability is just pure trolling joy to use: every triggered science "eureka!" grants you the entire tech. You can see where this is going. Before like 0AD I already had musketmen, and by like 500AD was flying stealth bombers over everyone. I think that game ended up being my highest ranked score ever.
     
    Happysin

    Happysin

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  • #1,558
    FYI, for anyone that is curious, Civ VI on Android is exactly as expensive as it is on Steam, without (as far as I can tell) and benefit of Steam Sales. If you want to play Civ on Android (and I'm guessing iOS), expect to pay darn near $100 if you want all the most current ruleset.

    Made me kinda mad that I could find no way to find that out other than to buy the base game and then look at the in-app store.
     
    Arasirsul

    Arasirsul

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  • #1,559
    spiralscratch said:
    Bad move, Roosevelt, to declare war on me for using a nuke (fired off dozens of turns ago even), seeing as only a few turns ago I led the Council in taking all yours away and I had far more thermo-nukes in reserve than you even have cities. Now the entire American Empire glows bright green.

    Even after a year and a half and nearly 600 hours (according to Steam, probably a fair bit less in reality) I'm still picking things up:
    • GDRs can actually intercept ICBMs.
    • It's possible to do a culture flip on an opponent's capital/last remaining city (probably helped that I nuked it first).
    • While a city is in limbo from a takeover (the point where it asks if you want to keep/reject/return/raze it), it's possible to go into any neighboring cities, swap over any overlapping tiles, and then reject the petition. Free land.
    • It would seem that it's possible for the AI to raze a capital, as a couple of them are missing in this game.
    Click to expand...

    I'm probably as deep into it hours-wise as you are, and the Ars PBC Civ games have taught me a _lot_ that I didn't realize beforehand.

    - Renaissance Walls exist for a reason. The AI never seems to bother bringing siege hardware, but real humans do. I've watched dferrantino simply obliterate cities without bothering with cannons or catapults just by bringing in some current-tech units backed by a siege tower.

    - You can get a pretty good guesstimate of the techs/civics another civ has by expanding their "score" page.

    - I've actually gone through and learned how the math is done on things like combat and amenities because details matter a whole lot more when you can't just roflstomp the AI.
     
    dferrantino

    dferrantino

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  • #1,560
    Arasirsul said:
    - Renaissance Walls exist for a reason. The AI never seems to bother bringing siege hardware, but real humans do. I've watched dferrantino simply obliterate cities without bothering with cannons or catapults just by bringing in some current-tech units backed by a siege tower.
    Click to expand...
    I'll be honest: it's kind of a crutch. Siege Towers become completely useless once you run into an opponent with Ren Walls, and you can't upgrade them into Medics unless you're in your own territory (and discover Sanitation). The whole strategy ends up being about finding a throwaway city to cap and delaying the war until the big guns get to the front line. Which, of course, are effectively obsoleted by air units. Domination against civs at tech parity is hard between the late-Ren and Atomic ages, and against more-advanced civs it's about nukes.

    So I hope for your sake there's no Uranium in my lands, because there was a fuckload of Oil.
     
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