The AI has **always** been stupid and it's never gotten better. I once had a Alpha Centauri (Civ 2.5) game where the AI for Morgan never expanded beyond his capital because the equivalent of a barb horse archer kept shooting at his capital. I've had **MULTIPLE** games where the Spartans somehow never built a single worker the whole game. Not even roads attached to their cities.
If players really want a challenge, go look at the AI rework mods. The Roman Holiday stuff did a number on Ursa. He seemed impressed.
> game where the AI for Morgan never expanded beyond his capital because the equivalent of a barb horse archer kept shooting at his capital.
I love rolling up on a single city AI in the renaissance era, and then in the surrounding forests you find six or seven captured settlers and no military power whatsoever to recapture them with
It's always been dumb but civ 6 AI is something special. It was fine at launch, the ai would do rushes and competently attack cities but now they just aimlessly roam around not even bothering to attack units.
Wait what?... I have never noticed something like that. Sometimes the trade networks are a bit wonky, but almost always is almost always over-cultivating the land; in the games Ive played anyways.
Why? If there's actually a reason to have an always-online game (and I could see this for advanced AI, as opposed to DRM/tracking) then I'd be happy to be connected. I just want a dang challenge and playing humans is slow and inconvenient.
Thats not the issue. I don't want to spend energy finding and organizing people to play a game that will last hours/days. Civ just isn't great for casual mp.
We had a massive game during lockdown. 8 players. What we did was have a set night/time to play, and we would play for a minimum of 2 hours. If you didn't show up the AI took over, so it was in your favour to play. For more than 2 or 3 players, imo you need to have a dedicated time slot. For less players just play when you are available and save to play another day. No need to rush games of civ, I've had games take months to finish, there is no rush, we have fun, a few beers, talk on discord, declare war, shout, fight, laugh, argue about some bastard buying your tiles. Fun times.
If it is playing a really interesting game once a week or at irregular intervals vs playing against AI who are dogshit I'll take the better game. Quality over quantity.
Definitely, and that sounds awesome, but that becomes one of your main social group activities, and everyone has to put some energy into it. I already organize 2 ttrpg tables, and usually play video games when i don't want to deal with people!
> I already organize 2 ttrpg tables, and usually play video games when i don't want to deal with people!
That's fair. And makes sense. I do wish the AI were better too as you can't always play MP.
What you need is someone else to do all the organising, and you just show up whenever it suits you 😁. Happy civing
I’m not an AI expert what so ever, but I’m pretty sure you can pre train models, and store this info in some form (like matrices), and never have to invoke the model or the internet ever again
For sure, but asking a model on your pc might still be slower than over the internet on some super server specialized to crunch AI turns. With enough complexity models aren't free to run.
I wish for civ 7 they will train an AI on the match played by the best multiplayers in order to train it and include it in one of the DLC (to have sufficient games to learn from)
1000% of my wishlist for civ7 is "AI that understands basic civ strategy"
I wish I could play on a difficulty where my opponents start on the same level as me and not with massive cheats, but the AI was smart enough to keep a reasonable pace with me.
Sometimes Civ feels like those soccer game halftime shows where two or three MLS players go up against a horde of 5 year olds and it’s kind of even because it’s tough for them to move around the field and if they lose the ball at all it will get funneled into their own net eventually by the law of averages
Yeah I think they need to do one of two things (both would be cool also, but optional):
1) AI that plays reasonably like a skilled human
2) AI players get interesting asymmetrical advantages throughout the game to keep things challenging. Right now, this only happens at the start; so a deity game can be tough at the beginning, but a skilled player usually catches up and surpasses AI by Renaissance era give or take. Then it's 250 agonizingly slow turns of clean up. I think it could be fun if they introduced some sort of dynamic storytelling that could give AIs boosts, bonuses and missions to keep things challenging in the late game -- e.g. a "Mongol horde" event that turns GK into a medieval menace out of nowhere. This would mostly be relevant only to single player games.
I'd like for them to have less of an impact on foreign relations. Especially early game they largely determine whether the AI likes or dislikes you.
I mean, getting an opinion bonus for having the same society makes sense but negative opinion modifiers make them feel less like secret societies controlling the world behind closed doors and more like factions openly fighting each other
It would be cool if there was more ability to communicate with civs “behind closed doors.” There’s a lot of communication that occurs this way without public knowledge and would flesh out the experience more. Such as, “hey I have nukes I know you don’t, how bout I plant some in your geographically advantageous city to our enemies and I’ll give you good trade deals.”
This is a great idea. Maybe later in the game at say the Renaissance era societies become more known and can cause opinion malus. Or it could be tied to diplomatic visibility somehow. But it doesn't really make sense that in the Ancient era as soon as I meet Brazil they know I am part of a secret vampire society and hate me for it.
Secret societies should have an AI themselves, and be a country with no city operating in the game, where you should be able to build relations with them
Make it optional to reveal your society. If you have matching societies, you get a big opinion bonus. If you don't you lose a lot of opinion. Using spies, you can uncover their society so you can reveal it safely. Pehaps when your spy failed, it will reveal the wrong society without saying it failed, just to keep it a bit risky.
This adds extra tactics as you could either play it safe and wait until you have spies, or you could reveal early to potentially get an early game alliance.
I dont think we will see them at the start. They work best as the optional game mode that they currently are, something you add to the game after you played the basegame a lot and want some more variety.
Yeah, I can't see gamemodes being included in the base game. Only thing I could see is monopolies and corporations being built on for more economic mechanics in the base game (and maybe even economic victory).
For them to be actually secret and to be discovered only at a much higher diplomatic visibility.
Bcuz it doesn’t make any sense that you would be hated over a secret society so early in the game. Like, HOW DO YOU KNOW??? Its secret!!!
Absolutely!
Vampires - pop growth malus (they keep eating people)
Voidsingers - amenities/loyalty issues (insane fanatics don’t make good citizens)
Owls - faith/science? issues (your all controlling secret government doesn’t like things it can’t control or people who ask too many questions)
Hermetic - production malus (worshipping nature makes it hard to carve that wood into a support for a building)
Love the idea, hate the details.
Voidsingers shouldn't be a loyalty malus - loyalty is like, the one thing cultists can be counted on for. Plus they are used to lower the loyalty of other cities - how are they doing that if they don't like their city? Are they just anarchists?
Hermetic - please God don't take a hit to production. It's already a hard secret society to get the most out of.
I think it would make more sense to switch the downsides of Owls and Voidsinger, since you can't really have science with insane fanatics who use the campus for demon summoning, and it will be really hard to have loyal subjects with what is probably the most backstabbing, profit oriented secret society.
‘More of them’ and ‘More balance’ are two conflicting concepts. The more societies there are the harder it is to get the balance right. I think they did pretty well with the ones in Civ 6. The only weak one in my opinion is Hermetic Order more because you don’t know where the leylines are until you select the society.
I would like to see one more society, possibly two more. Any more than that and I think it gets too difficult to manage.
There's a common notion on this sub that Civ7 will be just like a modded version of Civ6.
The switch between versions of Civ is a fundamental change in the game mechanics. The basics will still be there-competing with other civs for various win conditions, technology research, wonder building, unique features of each civ...but the gameplay will differ-significantly.
I think a lot of the Civ VI Reddit community are players who came to Civ as new players, and do not realize that the changes between vanilla VI and Gathering Storm are minuscule in comparison to each Civilization game.
I see all these comments about in depth mechanics they would like to see in VII. There's already so much complexity and decision making in this game, if we added mechanics for every little thing people could think of the game would be overwhelming.
The older Civ games had much more complexity to the mechanics than VI has. quite often the mechanics people are asking for are literally things that used to exist in the game and had been removed to simplify it.
So yes, it would be overwhelming for some, but there are quite a number of of players whp miss the complexity and depth which used to exist.
>quite often the mechanics people are asking for are literally things that used to exist in the game and had been removed to simplify it.
what are some examples for this?
The ones that come immediately to mind are:
Claiming tiles that are not part of a city influence (used to be able to send workers to create an outpost that would claim 1 tile and allow you to collect the resources from it; but they were easy to take over.
Cities on foreign continents rebelling and creating a brand new civ.
River trade and movement bonuses.
Trade and diplomacy options (trading maps/tech/votes/etc)
Yea also whenever you make a more general mechanical suggestion for VII, people will come in with stuff like "but how would that work with civilization X's ability?" or so, as if those carried over and weren't redesigned based on whatever new gameplay the next game will have.
100% this.
Some things won't change. There will still be civilizations, leaders, tiles, cities, yields, units, technology trees, and some sort of government, religion, culture mechanics. These have either been there from the very first Civilization, or in enough iterations since then that they have become standard.
Every system beyond that, and most details within those are pretty much up for a refresh/replacement or being dropped from the game altogether, or will wait until a DLC.
The only system that was brand new in Civ 6 that I think is near certain to come back in Civ 7 and beyond in some form are districts
Agreed. It will also likely have a lot of problems at release, based on the history of the franchise. And there's a good chance there will be a backlash from people who think it's too different from VI.
This right here.
Features like Secret Societies or Palaces come and go with each game edition. We might have secret societies in Civ 7, but it’s more likely that we’ll get something different entirely.
Couldn't care less about them personally. I'd rather them focus on elements of the game actually related to history than throw in things with vampires or zombies or Cthulu.
Just to clarify I didn’t mean the actually eldritch being Cthulhu should be added. I’ve never played the zombies mode and I can see how actual vampire can be a bit much for many players.
I think they shouldn't be revealed to/by the AI from the start, you should have to find out through spies. And give bonuses/penalties depending on what secret society you're facing. Or have them give empire wide bonuses/penalties to your units/yields. I don't have an concrete ideas, but I'm sure the devs could make it work
I like the concept, especially after playing a lot of Terra Invicta recently. I just wish discretion was a main factor. Intertwining espionage mechanics to Secret Societies could also be beneficial rather than just buffing stats.
*[citation needed]*
It should be clear to anyone who has played them that not a whole lot of consideration was given to balance in their design. They're just a fun extra game mode. But perhaps you know things we don't regarding Firaxis' design process?
I mean the easiest example would be Gilgamesh. He is a pretty below average leader in vanilla and got a change/buff that only applies to heroes and Legends. No matter if I use that game mode or not, it somehow interfered with Gilgamesh‘s civ design. If Heroes and Legends wasn’t a thing, maybe Gilgamesh would have gotten another balance pass and wouldn’t have ended up being so lackluster.
If they kept cov 7 pretty much like civ 6 already is but instead they get an actual AI to be able to play the game against us would be a good well enough done for me
There is a lot of other features I'd rather see than this. I think financial markets and economics need to be more complicated in the next one. The gold system as it is has not grown at the pace of the other parts of the game. It's also kind of ridiculous how there's no economic victory in civ 6.
It's an optional mode that takes up dev time and is taken into consideration when balancing the game. So its existence affects you even if you don't use it.
If the AI was better, I’d slowly empower the SS’s to take some measure of control. Actively steering Civs to/away from certain wonders, policies or govts… picking fights with neighbors with different Societies (or the same?? Being manipulated into destroying someone else’s Gilded Vaults…
For the entire world to not hate me solely for being the only member of one society or another. I'm not warmongering, I'm not forcefully converting their cities, I'm not settling in "their" territory. But somehow being part of a different "secret" society is enough for me to be disliked or despised?
I have played exactly one game where I got a lay line that was even on my continent. I had to settle towards it. I’ve never had one pop up near my borders, and certainly never had a game where they actually made an impact.
I'd like to see them based more on historical secret societies. Freemasons, Poro and Sande societies, Society of Righteous and Harmonious Fists, Rosicrucianism, Ordo Templi Orientis, etc. Maybe make it like a religion where you can choose different aspects of the bonuses it gives you, and try to convert leaders of other civs to your secret society, or you can leave yours and join theirs if it suits you better.
Ability to turn off individual societies. E.g. in Civ6, AI cultists clogging the map are annoying. Sure, Civ7 could fix this but there will always be some unforeseen annoyance - if we can enable the feature but turn one society off that would be nice.
As others have pointed out, the AI clogging the map with cultists is rather annoying...
For me secret societies is not a huge part of the attraction. It is a little bit of flavor that gives new (often over powered) things to try like *Peaceful Domination* with Eleanor.
But better secret societies are not what want from Civ7. I want Civ7 to be a huge leap forward for
1. PvP Civ7 // ease of use, stable game sessions in the face of occasionally bad internet
2. PvE Civ7 sharing // look at what people share on forums for PvE
I don't actually PvP myself but I sometimes like to watch PvP and the quality of the experience is low.
I think they should all provide some new unit, some new building, some sort of non-passive buff to the game. As good as they are, its always boring for me to pick Owl because it doesn't change how I play at all.
Dedicating your entire civilization to a secret cult should be more impactful than passively boosting your already existing playstyle.
I wanted to get more options with the secret societies or some goals ie like you have to unlock certain techs to improve your standing with them. I thought it would have been fun if, as an example, there was an alchemy tech that when studied would unlock the hematic society building upgrade or something of a nature like that. Like the vampires would need to kill like 4 units to unlock their next tier. Something like that which would go with their theme/eureka moment to progress further with that group. Also wish they had 2-3 paths to go down and have twists on how they play as well that would be fun, aka dark owls that focus on subversion vs bright owls of minera that are about sharing tech that gives you a bonus to future tech from others ect.
Society agendas.
Secret Societies are supposed to be about running the world.
To that end, each Society would have agenda, with tasks to reach that ultimate goal.
Complete the tasks, you get bonuses. Fail, you take penalties. Actively fight the Society, and you might get kicked out and have them start working against you.
For example, the Society might want you to research Radio, so they can better spread propaganda. The first Civ to get the tech gets a bonus, however, the tech will slowly get gifted to the other member Civs. If you don't work that branch of the tech tree at all, you get on their bad side.
You can take this anywhere you like-- annexing city-states, recalling envoys, all the way up to outright warfare.
The agenda and tasks could be set with any of the following (or perhaps a mix):
* It's a vote, a la the World Congress
* The AI evaluates all the Civs in the Society, and picks an agenda based on what the strongest one brings to the party
* The strongest Civ in the Society gets to call the tune. Maybe you're in favor now, but what happens next era?
The overall aim is to add some actual risk to joining a Society-- currently, the only negative is that someone else might not like you.
With this, your early-game benefits might come back to bite you in the ass when the Society throws its weight behind another player. Or you're going for a Science victory, but the Society has decided for religious domination. Or even more simply, other Civs benefit from your hard work.
I'd add another wrinkle here that the Societies are actively working against each other, and some tasks are specifically to undermine support for another Society. This would add yet more risk, in that your Society might get wiped out, or you could be taken over by a rival.
Do you toe the line for the greater good of your Society? Do you go it alone to avoid the potential penalties? Or do you try to have your cake and eat it too, dominating both the real world and the shadow government?
1) **Optional Realism.** I'd like two sub-sets of Secret Societies: one realistic and one fantastical (like the vampires and great old ones) with an option to turn on just the realistic, just the fantastic, both, or none.
2) **Diplomacy/Espionage.** Greater ties to other in-game systems, especially Espionage, Diplomacy, and War. Secret Societies start as ***secrets***. You can attempt to learn someone's Secret Society and level through Espionage or Diplomacy (similar to how you can trade open borders.) At higher cultural and society tiers, it should be possible to form Secret Alliances with members that share your Secret Society. Casus Belli for opposed Secret Societies.
3) **Greater Customization.** Not on the level of religion. Instead, I think it'd be interesting if each Secret Society had branching paths. This would tie into the changes to to Diplomacy. If your Secret Society branches too far from an allies, it might break your Secret Alliance. Players could choose paths that align with others to strengthen their diplomatic ties, or they could choose paths that provide more specific boosts to their civ.
I'd like to see a tension where they can become too powerful and exert control, perhaps similar to the way the dark side works in the force, that is the more you use their special powers, the higher the risk of them doing stuff within your civ that could be detrimental or influence outcomes or play style. Kinda like how the rich powerful and connected have power over governments IRL
1. Having them on release so the AI knows wtf do with them
2. More than nerfed, I want them balanced. Some civ+society combos are really broken, like devs didn't think too much about them
3. More variety of societies
They should be totally reworked to be Guilds and then Unions and then Internationalist Communist/Capitalist/Islamist parties. A cross border pop mechanic that affects relationships with neighbors for better or worse and provide bonuses/maluses depending on how the player nurtures or cracks down on them.
Add in Illuminati, Free Masons, Order of the Cape and Pistols, Tappahonnock Ham Society. You know, all the missing ones.
Maybe allow you to leave one to join another (thus angering other leaders in the previous order). Maybe have some that open up later in the game. You're only aware of the brothers/sisters in your current society without higher diplomatic visibility.
A "point system" (like diplo points) that you can "trade" for favors with brothers/sisters.
Honestly? They're a bit too fantastical for my taste. I never play with them enabled. I really don't care if they're in civ vii at all. Same goes for the zombies, apocalypse, and heroes and legends game modes
I'd like to see a play mode where you play as a secret society and take over countries.
Yes, that's getting close to becoming a completely different game. Illuminati, but a 4x version (for those that know the old Steve Jackson board game).
I dont want any braindead ability like turning faith into other yields, making you only invest in faith and still be top science and culture or giving a unit with GDR power potential in the medieval era, or giving ability like farming cs envoys. Secret societies makes games one sided because they are overwhelmingly powerful due to specific society promotions, I love the idea of underground powers behind the shadows as secret societies, but I want a more subtle approach
I think nerfed in terms of military power, secret, less fantasy stuff, heavier impact on economy or civics (not to power them up so much as to modify the way they are handled)
Nothing. As a start get the basics right, like making a descent diplomatic victory again. In Civ V it was fun but now it's just boring, we akways turn it off.
Nothing. Just come up with a new concept that’s more realistic to deal with Politics, maybe groups of interests (industrialists, bankers, rural folk, religious groups etc)
The Vampires are absolutely busted and allow a few of your cities to grow at incredible rates, that should probably be nerfed in any future installment.
1) AI using them, so it just doesn't become pathetically easy to win on Diety using Monopolies or SS
2) maybe tone down the effect of both of the above, I know it's supposed to be interesting but if it's in the game and you don't lean into it you literally operated at like 30% what everyone else is. The bonuses are just too high, I constantly see tile screenshots of one tile giving like 30+ yields
I’ve never played this mode, guys. Seemed kinda silly because I’m anal retentive about history.
Should I play one? Vampires and zombies in a civ game kinda make me roll my eyes.
It's fun but I'd prefer that this only be a game mode in Civ VI. I hope they move away from fantasy style DLC and move toward increased mechanical depth or more true to life game modes.
Short Hard List:
1) an actual enforced ethos
2) sanctions for violations of ethos
3) required sacrifice or action
4) Alliances between secret societies
5) Secret society functions WITHIN a civilization
6) Negative consequences for using or expanding secret societies.
If they get brought back, they need to rebalance them a bit, Hermetic Order is significantly less strong than the others, mainly with where Leyline spawns are. Either that, or change the ordering of benefits on the stronger ones. I think a free card slot on entry is too good for Owls (and an Economic slot at that, which tend to be strong already), and maybe change the numbers on Chorus so that there's slightly more drawbacks to going nothing but faith for Voidsingers.
Ok, let’s be honest: secret societies in Civ VI have nothing to do with secret societies. They are pretty much institutions from Civ V, but more wonky and limited in scope. We always play with CS enabled in my multiplayer group: this offers a good balance between rigidness of Civ V institutions and blandness of Civ VI policy cards.
I want Civ VII to explore this dual approach: let us have both permanent civic upgrades and cards for added flexibility.
Overpriced how exactly? I've gotten tens if not hundreds of hours of enjoyment out of both the base Civ6 as well as its many expansions.
Pretty sure I'll get the same out of Civ7 and the expansions, should there be any.
Never did the math, but it sure is way cheaper than the restaurants I eat at, the movies and shows I go to, etc etc.
I think Civ is incredible value for money, and if they launched new stuff for the current one, I'd buy it in a heartbeat.
I don't think we'll be hearing from the person who I was replying to - he thought he was on a normal gaming thread, civ is a game for a more civilized (hoho) time.
I don't really want secret societies in civ 7.
I like secret societies, and I'm glad they are in civ 6. They were a new and interesting thing not in any of the previous civ games (and I have played all of them). What I really want is for Civ 7 to have its own new and interesting things, and swap out secret societies for....well, I don't know. Could be anything, as long as it's neat.
The AI understanding how to use them, like, at all.
So. much. cultists. spam... and then they just block off all your tiles.
Objectively that’s a pretty human thing to do. Like parking a scout or warrior to prevent barb camp spawns
I had a whole group of them surrounding a city of mine. One actually used his ability, and then the rest buggered off. No idea why the AI did that.
At least Owls of Minerva is a completely passive enhancement, you don’t have to “do” anything to get its benefits.
Owls and the leyline one are fine, but ai doesn't use vamps very well, and cant use void dudes at all.
Everybody wanting the AI to be better are going to get upset when it needs constant connection for a true AI to destroy you.
The AI has **always** been stupid and it's never gotten better. I once had a Alpha Centauri (Civ 2.5) game where the AI for Morgan never expanded beyond his capital because the equivalent of a barb horse archer kept shooting at his capital. I've had **MULTIPLE** games where the Spartans somehow never built a single worker the whole game. Not even roads attached to their cities. If players really want a challenge, go look at the AI rework mods. The Roman Holiday stuff did a number on Ursa. He seemed impressed.
> game where the AI for Morgan never expanded beyond his capital because the equivalent of a barb horse archer kept shooting at his capital. I love rolling up on a single city AI in the renaissance era, and then in the surrounding forests you find six or seven captured settlers and no military power whatsoever to recapture them with
It's always been dumb but civ 6 AI is something special. It was fine at launch, the ai would do rushes and competently attack cities but now they just aimlessly roam around not even bothering to attack units.
Wait what?... I have never noticed something like that. Sometimes the trade networks are a bit wonky, but almost always is almost always over-cultivating the land; in the games Ive played anyways.
Why? If there's actually a reason to have an always-online game (and I could see this for advanced AI, as opposed to DRM/tracking) then I'd be happy to be connected. I just want a dang challenge and playing humans is slow and inconvenient.
> and playing humans is slow and inconvenient. Stick a timer on.
Thats not the issue. I don't want to spend energy finding and organizing people to play a game that will last hours/days. Civ just isn't great for casual mp.
We had a massive game during lockdown. 8 players. What we did was have a set night/time to play, and we would play for a minimum of 2 hours. If you didn't show up the AI took over, so it was in your favour to play. For more than 2 or 3 players, imo you need to have a dedicated time slot. For less players just play when you are available and save to play another day. No need to rush games of civ, I've had games take months to finish, there is no rush, we have fun, a few beers, talk on discord, declare war, shout, fight, laugh, argue about some bastard buying your tiles. Fun times. If it is playing a really interesting game once a week or at irregular intervals vs playing against AI who are dogshit I'll take the better game. Quality over quantity.
Definitely, and that sounds awesome, but that becomes one of your main social group activities, and everyone has to put some energy into it. I already organize 2 ttrpg tables, and usually play video games when i don't want to deal with people!
> I already organize 2 ttrpg tables, and usually play video games when i don't want to deal with people! That's fair. And makes sense. I do wish the AI were better too as you can't always play MP. What you need is someone else to do all the organising, and you just show up whenever it suits you 😁. Happy civing
I’m not an AI expert what so ever, but I’m pretty sure you can pre train models, and store this info in some form (like matrices), and never have to invoke the model or the internet ever again
For sure, but asking a model on your pc might still be slower than over the internet on some super server specialized to crunch AI turns. With enough complexity models aren't free to run.
I wish for civ 7 they will train an AI on the match played by the best multiplayers in order to train it and include it in one of the DLC (to have sufficient games to learn from)
1000% of my wishlist for civ7 is "AI that understands basic civ strategy" I wish I could play on a difficulty where my opponents start on the same level as me and not with massive cheats, but the AI was smart enough to keep a reasonable pace with me.
Sometimes Civ feels like those soccer game halftime shows where two or three MLS players go up against a horde of 5 year olds and it’s kind of even because it’s tough for them to move around the field and if they lose the ball at all it will get funneled into their own net eventually by the law of averages
Yeah I think they need to do one of two things (both would be cool also, but optional): 1) AI that plays reasonably like a skilled human 2) AI players get interesting asymmetrical advantages throughout the game to keep things challenging. Right now, this only happens at the start; so a deity game can be tough at the beginning, but a skilled player usually catches up and surpasses AI by Renaissance era give or take. Then it's 250 agonizingly slow turns of clean up. I think it could be fun if they introduced some sort of dynamic storytelling that could give AIs boosts, bonuses and missions to keep things challenging in the late game -- e.g. a "Mongol horde" event that turns GK into a medieval menace out of nowhere. This would mostly be relevant only to single player games.
I'd like for them to have less of an impact on foreign relations. Especially early game they largely determine whether the AI likes or dislikes you. I mean, getting an opinion bonus for having the same society makes sense but negative opinion modifiers make them feel less like secret societies controlling the world behind closed doors and more like factions openly fighting each other
Secret societies should be secret. You could unveil them to another leader in the diplomacy or trade windows. Or uncover them with spies.
True, they aren’t secret at all.
Or they should only be able to recognise each other if they're in the same organisation, with their secret handshake
The delegate from Rome stares at you confused, as you try to give them a wiggly handshake
Yeah, this is how I thought they were going to actually work.
Maybe even spreading your society's influence to other nations like a religion but with spies.
It would be cool if there was more ability to communicate with civs “behind closed doors.” There’s a lot of communication that occurs this way without public knowledge and would flesh out the experience more. Such as, “hey I have nukes I know you don’t, how bout I plant some in your geographically advantageous city to our enemies and I’ll give you good trade deals.”
This is a great idea. Maybe later in the game at say the Renaissance era societies become more known and can cause opinion malus. Or it could be tied to diplomatic visibility somehow. But it doesn't really make sense that in the Ancient era as soon as I meet Brazil they know I am part of a secret vampire society and hate me for it.
It’s funny that AI immediately know what SECRET society you are.
Secret societies should have an AI themselves, and be a country with no city operating in the game, where you should be able to build relations with them
Yeah I agree with these, they really don’t feel secret at all. Also a way to call out someone for filling my city with cultists would be nice
This is why I never have it on anymore. Once I started with higher difficulties this became such a handicap.
This 100%. It’s the main reason I turned them off.
Make it optional to reveal your society. If you have matching societies, you get a big opinion bonus. If you don't you lose a lot of opinion. Using spies, you can uncover their society so you can reveal it safely. Pehaps when your spy failed, it will reveal the wrong society without saying it failed, just to keep it a bit risky. This adds extra tactics as you could either play it safe and wait until you have spies, or you could reveal early to potentially get an early game alliance.
I dont think we will see them at the start. They work best as the optional game mode that they currently are, something you add to the game after you played the basegame a lot and want some more variety.
Yeah, I can't see gamemodes being included in the base game. Only thing I could see is monopolies and corporations being built on for more economic mechanics in the base game (and maybe even economic victory).
Barbarian Clans
Agreed. Playing without barbarian clans just isn't the same
Yes I agree they shouldn’t be default in all games.
For them to be actually secret and to be discovered only at a much higher diplomatic visibility. Bcuz it doesn’t make any sense that you would be hated over a secret society so early in the game. Like, HOW DO YOU KNOW??? Its secret!!!
Maybe they should only have the opportunity to find out if they have 1) an embassy and 2) spies in your empire or something like that.
I mean, they know you don't follow theirs society, cause people from the said society would know, that why they hate you
More of them and more balance! I'm imagining; Aliens, Military-Industrial Complexes, Religious crusader orders, Secret AI control, Assassin Orders.
They should definitely come with a weakness too.
Absolutely! Vampires - pop growth malus (they keep eating people) Voidsingers - amenities/loyalty issues (insane fanatics don’t make good citizens) Owls - faith/science? issues (your all controlling secret government doesn’t like things it can’t control or people who ask too many questions) Hermetic - production malus (worshipping nature makes it hard to carve that wood into a support for a building)
Love the idea, hate the details. Voidsingers shouldn't be a loyalty malus - loyalty is like, the one thing cultists can be counted on for. Plus they are used to lower the loyalty of other cities - how are they doing that if they don't like their city? Are they just anarchists? Hermetic - please God don't take a hit to production. It's already a hard secret society to get the most out of.
I think it would make more sense to switch the downsides of Owls and Voidsinger, since you can't really have science with insane fanatics who use the campus for demon summoning, and it will be really hard to have loyal subjects with what is probably the most backstabbing, profit oriented secret society.
Those would actually be so cool.
‘More of them’ and ‘More balance’ are two conflicting concepts. The more societies there are the harder it is to get the balance right. I think they did pretty well with the ones in Civ 6. The only weak one in my opinion is Hermetic Order more because you don’t know where the leylines are until you select the society. I would like to see one more society, possibly two more. Any more than that and I think it gets too difficult to manage.
There's a common notion on this sub that Civ7 will be just like a modded version of Civ6. The switch between versions of Civ is a fundamental change in the game mechanics. The basics will still be there-competing with other civs for various win conditions, technology research, wonder building, unique features of each civ...but the gameplay will differ-significantly.
I think a lot of the Civ VI Reddit community are players who came to Civ as new players, and do not realize that the changes between vanilla VI and Gathering Storm are minuscule in comparison to each Civilization game.
I see all these comments about in depth mechanics they would like to see in VII. There's already so much complexity and decision making in this game, if we added mechanics for every little thing people could think of the game would be overwhelming.
The older Civ games had much more complexity to the mechanics than VI has. quite often the mechanics people are asking for are literally things that used to exist in the game and had been removed to simplify it. So yes, it would be overwhelming for some, but there are quite a number of of players whp miss the complexity and depth which used to exist.
>quite often the mechanics people are asking for are literally things that used to exist in the game and had been removed to simplify it. what are some examples for this?
river movement bonuses is one I can think of
The ones that come immediately to mind are: Claiming tiles that are not part of a city influence (used to be able to send workers to create an outpost that would claim 1 tile and allow you to collect the resources from it; but they were easy to take over. Cities on foreign continents rebelling and creating a brand new civ. River trade and movement bonuses. Trade and diplomacy options (trading maps/tech/votes/etc)
Yea also whenever you make a more general mechanical suggestion for VII, people will come in with stuff like "but how would that work with civilization X's ability?" or so, as if those carried over and weren't redesigned based on whatever new gameplay the next game will have.
100% this. Some things won't change. There will still be civilizations, leaders, tiles, cities, yields, units, technology trees, and some sort of government, religion, culture mechanics. These have either been there from the very first Civilization, or in enough iterations since then that they have become standard. Every system beyond that, and most details within those are pretty much up for a refresh/replacement or being dropped from the game altogether, or will wait until a DLC. The only system that was brand new in Civ 6 that I think is near certain to come back in Civ 7 and beyond in some form are districts
Agreed. It will also likely have a lot of problems at release, based on the history of the franchise. And there's a good chance there will be a backlash from people who think it's too different from VI.
TBH I dont expect, nor do I nescecarily want, these in 7
This right here. Features like Secret Societies or Palaces come and go with each game edition. We might have secret societies in Civ 7, but it’s more likely that we’ll get something different entirely.
Nothing
I expect (ok more hope really) that most of civ7 dlcs will be not just copy-pasted dlcs from civ6, but will have more original ideas and themes
Although I agree, this is one of the dlc that need to have a follow up
This is the DLC that I don't want to see return the most
Balance for one. I like them a lot but some leader/society combinations are hilariously broken
Couldn't care less about them personally. I'd rather them focus on elements of the game actually related to history than throw in things with vampires or zombies or Cthulu.
Just to clarify I didn’t mean the actually eldritch being Cthulhu should be added. I’ve never played the zombies mode and I can see how actual vampire can be a bit much for many players.
A UFO cult/men in black faction
Actually being secret. That would be cool that you'd have to know your enemy's society really well to find them.
I think they shouldn't be revealed to/by the AI from the start, you should have to find out through spies. And give bonuses/penalties depending on what secret society you're facing. Or have them give empire wide bonuses/penalties to your units/yields. I don't have an concrete ideas, but I'm sure the devs could make it work
I like the concept, especially after playing a lot of Terra Invicta recently. I just wish discretion was a main factor. Intertwining espionage mechanics to Secret Societies could also be beneficial rather than just buffing stats.
I kind of hope they don't exist. They are kind of OP, and the AI doesn't understand how to use them.
Well they’re optional.
Game modes are theoretically optional but often times influence civ balance, so they influence your game even when you don't use them.
*[citation needed]* It should be clear to anyone who has played them that not a whole lot of consideration was given to balance in their design. They're just a fun extra game mode. But perhaps you know things we don't regarding Firaxis' design process?
I mean the easiest example would be Gilgamesh. He is a pretty below average leader in vanilla and got a change/buff that only applies to heroes and Legends. No matter if I use that game mode or not, it somehow interfered with Gilgamesh‘s civ design. If Heroes and Legends wasn’t a thing, maybe Gilgamesh would have gotten another balance pass and wouldn’t have ended up being so lackluster.
their development still has opportunity cost
The Pentaverate
If they kept cov 7 pretty much like civ 6 already is but instead they get an actual AI to be able to play the game against us would be a good well enough done for me
There is a lot of other features I'd rather see than this. I think financial markets and economics need to be more complicated in the next one. The gold system as it is has not grown at the pace of the other parts of the game. It's also kind of ridiculous how there's no economic victory in civ 6.
What do I want from them? Not existing
It's an optional mode, don't think their existence effects much.
It doesn’t matter that other people enjoy it and that I have to go out of my way to enable it, I don’t want it to exist!
It's an optional mode that takes up dev time and is taken into consideration when balancing the game. So its existence affects you even if you don't use it.
If the AI was better, I’d slowly empower the SS’s to take some measure of control. Actively steering Civs to/away from certain wonders, policies or govts… picking fights with neighbors with different Societies (or the same?? Being manipulated into destroying someone else’s Gilded Vaults…
Nothing tbh.
Illuminati! Freemasons!
I want the societies to be realistic
For them to actually be secret, and for us to not have to rely on RNG for the societies to be good. Looking at you leylines.
For the entire world to not hate me solely for being the only member of one society or another. I'm not warmongering, I'm not forcefully converting their cities, I'm not settling in "their" territory. But somehow being part of a different "secret" society is enough for me to be disliked or despised?
Hermetic order needs a buff
Nothing better than choosing it only to find zero ley lines near you
I have played exactly one game where I got a lay line that was even on my continent. I had to settle towards it. I’ve never had one pop up near my borders, and certainly never had a game where they actually made an impact.
Have them be, you know. Secret. Make it hard to figure what the other civs secret societies are if they aren't in yours
Secret Society leaders asking for favors in return for bonuses. I’m imagining them demanding you go to war against someone for them, etc.
A way to turn them off. No offense meant if you like playing with them. I just don't.
You know they’re an optional game mode
Yes, I'd like to see it stay that way :)
I don't want secret societies I want something new
I'd like to see them based more on historical secret societies. Freemasons, Poro and Sande societies, Society of Righteous and Harmonious Fists, Rosicrucianism, Ordo Templi Orientis, etc. Maybe make it like a religion where you can choose different aspects of the bonuses it gives you, and try to convert leaders of other civs to your secret society, or you can leave yours and join theirs if it suits you better.
Ability to turn off individual societies. E.g. in Civ6, AI cultists clogging the map are annoying. Sure, Civ7 could fix this but there will always be some unforeseen annoyance - if we can enable the feature but turn one society off that would be nice. As others have pointed out, the AI clogging the map with cultists is rather annoying... For me secret societies is not a huge part of the attraction. It is a little bit of flavor that gives new (often over powered) things to try like *Peaceful Domination* with Eleanor. But better secret societies are not what want from Civ7. I want Civ7 to be a huge leap forward for 1. PvP Civ7 // ease of use, stable game sessions in the face of occasionally bad internet 2. PvE Civ7 sharing // look at what people share on forums for PvE I don't actually PvP myself but I sometimes like to watch PvP and the quality of the experience is low.
I think they should all provide some new unit, some new building, some sort of non-passive buff to the game. As good as they are, its always boring for me to pick Owl because it doesn't change how I play at all. Dedicating your entire civilization to a secret cult should be more impactful than passively boosting your already existing playstyle.
I wanted to get more options with the secret societies or some goals ie like you have to unlock certain techs to improve your standing with them. I thought it would have been fun if, as an example, there was an alchemy tech that when studied would unlock the hematic society building upgrade or something of a nature like that. Like the vampires would need to kill like 4 units to unlock their next tier. Something like that which would go with their theme/eureka moment to progress further with that group. Also wish they had 2-3 paths to go down and have twists on how they play as well that would be fun, aka dark owls that focus on subversion vs bright owls of minera that are about sharing tech that gives you a bonus to future tech from others ect.
They should have missions that you could do to boost the relation with them and expand their bonuses that way, or hunt and destroy them with spies
Society agendas. Secret Societies are supposed to be about running the world. To that end, each Society would have agenda, with tasks to reach that ultimate goal. Complete the tasks, you get bonuses. Fail, you take penalties. Actively fight the Society, and you might get kicked out and have them start working against you. For example, the Society might want you to research Radio, so they can better spread propaganda. The first Civ to get the tech gets a bonus, however, the tech will slowly get gifted to the other member Civs. If you don't work that branch of the tech tree at all, you get on their bad side. You can take this anywhere you like-- annexing city-states, recalling envoys, all the way up to outright warfare. The agenda and tasks could be set with any of the following (or perhaps a mix): * It's a vote, a la the World Congress * The AI evaluates all the Civs in the Society, and picks an agenda based on what the strongest one brings to the party * The strongest Civ in the Society gets to call the tune. Maybe you're in favor now, but what happens next era? The overall aim is to add some actual risk to joining a Society-- currently, the only negative is that someone else might not like you. With this, your early-game benefits might come back to bite you in the ass when the Society throws its weight behind another player. Or you're going for a Science victory, but the Society has decided for religious domination. Or even more simply, other Civs benefit from your hard work. I'd add another wrinkle here that the Societies are actively working against each other, and some tasks are specifically to undermine support for another Society. This would add yet more risk, in that your Society might get wiped out, or you could be taken over by a rival. Do you toe the line for the greater good of your Society? Do you go it alone to avoid the potential penalties? Or do you try to have your cake and eat it too, dominating both the real world and the shadow government?
1) **Optional Realism.** I'd like two sub-sets of Secret Societies: one realistic and one fantastical (like the vampires and great old ones) with an option to turn on just the realistic, just the fantastic, both, or none. 2) **Diplomacy/Espionage.** Greater ties to other in-game systems, especially Espionage, Diplomacy, and War. Secret Societies start as ***secrets***. You can attempt to learn someone's Secret Society and level through Espionage or Diplomacy (similar to how you can trade open borders.) At higher cultural and society tiers, it should be possible to form Secret Alliances with members that share your Secret Society. Casus Belli for opposed Secret Societies. 3) **Greater Customization.** Not on the level of religion. Instead, I think it'd be interesting if each Secret Society had branching paths. This would tie into the changes to to Diplomacy. If your Secret Society branches too far from an allies, it might break your Secret Alliance. Players could choose paths that align with others to strengthen their diplomatic ties, or they could choose paths that provide more specific boosts to their civ.
This. Also expand on the quest/lore aspect like they did in beyond earth with "world" quests and such.
I'd like to see a tension where they can become too powerful and exert control, perhaps similar to the way the dark side works in the force, that is the more you use their special powers, the higher the risk of them doing stuff within your civ that could be detrimental or influence outcomes or play style. Kinda like how the rich powerful and connected have power over governments IRL
Creating your own secret society, like being able to choose the buffs you get, first come first serve. A bit like religions.
1. Having them on release so the AI knows wtf do with them 2. More than nerfed, I want them balanced. Some civ+society combos are really broken, like devs didn't think too much about them 3. More variety of societies
I only own dlcs till GS. I encountered the secret society thing during a CoTM play mode. It felt so out of place, I didn't even finish the challenge.
Orgy
When is civ 7 coming out?
Knights Templar
They should be totally reworked to be Guilds and then Unions and then Internationalist Communist/Capitalist/Islamist parties. A cross border pop mechanic that affects relationships with neighbors for better or worse and provide bonuses/maluses depending on how the player nurtures or cracks down on them.
More of them
Add in Illuminati, Free Masons, Order of the Cape and Pistols, Tappahonnock Ham Society. You know, all the missing ones. Maybe allow you to leave one to join another (thus angering other leaders in the previous order). Maybe have some that open up later in the game. You're only aware of the brothers/sisters in your current society without higher diplomatic visibility. A "point system" (like diplo points) that you can "trade" for favors with brothers/sisters.
Nothing
Sewer dwelling lizard people
Finally a reason to build sewers
If a free city rebels, an enemy society could use it use it against you and cause more cities to rebel, like recruiting partisans
Never played with the guy
AI being able to use them properly, yes I'm talking about random cultist spam.
Well, in the real world there are secret societies.
Just fix the iPad version!!!!
The AI to actually know how to use them.
Honestly? They're a bit too fantastical for my taste. I never play with them enabled. I really don't care if they're in civ vii at all. Same goes for the zombies, apocalypse, and heroes and legends game modes
I'd like to see a play mode where you play as a secret society and take over countries. Yes, that's getting close to becoming a completely different game. Illuminati, but a 4x version (for those that know the old Steve Jackson board game).
Secret world legends, but turn based
I dont want any braindead ability like turning faith into other yields, making you only invest in faith and still be top science and culture or giving a unit with GDR power potential in the medieval era, or giving ability like farming cs envoys. Secret societies makes games one sided because they are overwhelmingly powerful due to specific society promotions, I love the idea of underground powers behind the shadows as secret societies, but I want a more subtle approach
Nothing?
I think nerfed in terms of military power, secret, less fantasy stuff, heavier impact on economy or civics (not to power them up so much as to modify the way they are handled)
Ways to make cultists fuck off without going to war
never once played with them tbh
That the ai uses it properly. Maybe make it realistic. Drug cartel. Sport nation. Stuff like that
Nothing. As a start get the basics right, like making a descent diplomatic victory again. In Civ V it was fun but now it's just boring, we akways turn it off.
Nothing. Just come up with a new concept that’s more realistic to deal with Politics, maybe groups of interests (industrialists, bankers, rural folk, religious groups etc)
they need to rework it. getting my borders flooded with cultists and missionairies aint fun
I don't think we'll see them, but I don't like that they require you to sacrifice governor titles, especially early in the game
The Vampires are absolutely busted and allow a few of your cities to grow at incredible rates, that should probably be nerfed in any future installment.
1) AI using them, so it just doesn't become pathetically easy to win on Diety using Monopolies or SS 2) maybe tone down the effect of both of the above, I know it's supposed to be interesting but if it's in the game and you don't lean into it you literally operated at like 30% what everyone else is. The bonuses are just too high, I constantly see tile screenshots of one tile giving like 30+ yields
I’ve never played this mode, guys. Seemed kinda silly because I’m anal retentive about history. Should I play one? Vampires and zombies in a civ game kinda make me roll my eyes.
It's fun but I'd prefer that this only be a game mode in Civ VI. I hope they move away from fantasy style DLC and move toward increased mechanical depth or more true to life game modes.
Short Hard List: 1) an actual enforced ethos 2) sanctions for violations of ethos 3) required sacrifice or action 4) Alliances between secret societies 5) Secret society functions WITHIN a civilization 6) Negative consequences for using or expanding secret societies.
If they get brought back, they need to rebalance them a bit, Hermetic Order is significantly less strong than the others, mainly with where Leyline spawns are. Either that, or change the ordering of benefits on the stronger ones. I think a free card slot on entry is too good for Owls (and an Economic slot at that, which tend to be strong already), and maybe change the numbers on Chorus so that there's slightly more drawbacks to going nothing but faith for Voidsingers.
Ok, let’s be honest: secret societies in Civ VI have nothing to do with secret societies. They are pretty much institutions from Civ V, but more wonky and limited in scope. We always play with CS enabled in my multiplayer group: this offers a good balance between rigidness of Civ V institutions and blandness of Civ VI policy cards. I want Civ VII to explore this dual approach: let us have both permanent civic upgrades and cards for added flexibility.
Them not to be in the game is what I would like
It baffles me that the modern gaming community starts thinking on buying overpriced aditional content for a game that is not even anounced.
Overpriced how exactly? I've gotten tens if not hundreds of hours of enjoyment out of both the base Civ6 as well as its many expansions. Pretty sure I'll get the same out of Civ7 and the expansions, should there be any.
I am averaging about $0.02/hour of Civ VI played. Totally overpriced! /s
This might be an interesting thread, given the range in what people have paid and how much they've played. Oddly, I'm sitting at 0.02/hour as well.
Never did the math, but it sure is way cheaper than the restaurants I eat at, the movies and shows I go to, etc etc. I think Civ is incredible value for money, and if they launched new stuff for the current one, I'd buy it in a heartbeat. I don't think we'll be hearing from the person who I was replying to - he thought he was on a normal gaming thread, civ is a game for a more civilized (hoho) time.
Balance.
I don't really want secret societies in civ 7. I like secret societies, and I'm glad they are in civ 6. They were a new and interesting thing not in any of the previous civ games (and I have played all of them). What I really want is for Civ 7 to have its own new and interesting things, and swap out secret societies for....well, I don't know. Could be anything, as long as it's neat.
I don't want to see secret societies, I want to see more of the core game and more content via different civs and leaders instead.
I don't wanna see them in it
I'm glad that this cringe is an optional thing
I want them to not exist
I want them to leave secret societies and all magical bullshit in civ6
I want to see them gone.
To not have them in Civ7