What follows are my compiled final thoughts based on the upwards of 30ish playthroughs I enjoyed during the Stadia OpenDev. I organized it to the best of my abilities but I'm sure it's still a mess. Before I begin however, I will admit that I did not enjoy playing the game of Stadia, as it seemed to preform much worse than it did during the original 3 Open Dev Scenarios on Steam. Additionally, I noticed several bugs which have been pointed out by other people, so I'll try not to harp on those. Then without further ado, in no particular order.

On Trade

I quite liked the trading system! Starting as Nubia was a smart move to get us playing with it. I don't really have too much to say about it otherwise, as I never really encountered any issues with this particular system. Merchant cultures are looking a lot more appealing to me now.

On Diplomacy

Echoing my above opinions, I am absolutely in love with the diplomacy features. Managing various stages and parts of a treaty is a delight, and I'm certain will allow for some sneaky play in multiplayer, and hopefully in single player as well should the AI be up to snuff. I do wish however that we could adjust the monetary requests for countering offers, because making it 100 quite early seems incredibly steep of a price for some relatively simple things. I can see it being chump change come the future though, so an adjustable amount seems like an idea already in the works just not implemented yet.

My one regret was that too late into the OpenDev I realized that the soundclip the leader gave for offering a surrender agreement was in fact, not your surrender, coupled with the conquered player getting all their territory back, lead me to believe I simply couldn't properly get my opponents to surrender to me, and I was the one surrendering, so I may have gone a little "Scourge of God" and just eliminated my opponents from our island home most of the time. Whoops. I will say though, that the surrender menu is very nice. I await my next chance to get it right.

Greivances were another delightful surprise, and I was impressed at all the things that could trigger them. I do wish we could set the price on money related ones, because sometimes the monetary cost seems far too great. However, over the course of my playthroughs, I think I only ever had a single grievance pay off, when the Greeks actually gave me a territory had influence over. I have no idea what other factors were at play here that weren't at play in previous playthroughs, so... I don't know? I hope it will be easier to pull off in the actually released game, or at least we will figure out some factors that will lead towards grievances getting dealt with in our favor.

On Units and Armies

When I first started playing this OpenDev, I was a little shocked that units would now cost population, and I surmised that now Agrarian Cultures would be a neccessary "dip" for war-focused games. More on that particular foible later though. However, having had time to think about it, I am all for the change. I feel like this, combined with generals who were sadly not appearing in this OpenDev, should reign in unit spamming snowballs. This too, I suppose, also seems to support that Humankind isn't one of those games where you're encouraged to wipe other cultures off the map, which I quite like.

I do wonder if Rome's LT that we saw is going to be it's new LT, considering the other one had something to do with Generals, if I recall.

On Battles

I'll come out and say it, I'm not good at tactical combat, so thank you from the depths of my tactically inept heart for Auto-Resolve, even if I had a few loses to Greek Hoplite armies I totally should've won. But what battles I did play though, I found the system as fun as I could muster. I'm sure tactical geniuses will do even better. I await to see how combat shakes out on air and sea, as I noticed neither culture built any boats to engage.

On Capturing Cities and Territories

Sieges are fun! However, I would usually set the army to build up some siege weapons, then leave to do something else and end up forgetting about them. I don't believe there is one currently, but a notification that an army has completed all their siege weapons would be a godsend.

One of the small annoyances I had early on was the lack of ability to raze a city right to the ground so I could set up an outpost to attach it to a nearby city, before eventually learning I could do this by ransacking it. This kind of feels rather awkward to me, and the lack of info on how to do this may annoy some people. I do know there is a tech in the medieval that allows you to attach cities, but the prices to do some seemed extremely steep from what I saw.

I think that, on completion of a siege, you should get a selection of options based on what techs you have unlocked. "Capture" which gives you the city as it currently does. "Loot and Pillage" which sets the army to ransack the city and all attached tiles for X amount of turns. This does not capture or destroy the city, it would leave it there, yet all it's tiles would be ransacked, so they could, in time, pick up the pieces and rebuild, while I walk away with the loot and a healthy dose of slaves. The lastly, something like "Destroy" which ransacks the city where you get some of the ransack gains but not all, and the city is destroyed and the territory free to be outposted. I'm sure there could be other additional options in future eras. 

On Affinities

This is going to be the longest part, and I'm already so sorry for anyone who has already read this far.

As for the affinities, having given the chance to play them all, I see that there are some clear winners and some clear losers.

Agrarian seems to be to be the clear winner here for their cultural affinity abilities. Their ability to just gain population for free and their ability to steal neighbor's population from other cities just make it better at what the culture is already supposed to do, get more population. Since the number of quarters a city can have and the amount of units one can make are directly tied to the number of population a city has, Agrarian definitely stands out. Even if the ability to steal neighboring city's populations does generate a greivance, the penalty for it doesn't seem that terrible.

It seems to me like Agrarian cultures will do better militarism than Militarist cultures. Agrarian cultures, which already have a focus on food and population, will always have population available for creating new units and will be less effected by the creation of these units than other cultures due to the fact they'll have high pop cities simply by nature of being Agrarian.

Builder is definitely up there. Industry is King, even if Food is a Queen. "Build Mode" is a beauty, but it's the only jewel in this king's crown. It's one of the three cultures that as of this OpenDev only have one special ability noted. Even though it only has this one ability, it's still a damn nice ability, but I'm sure that given time it'll get a second one.

Merchant is like a ghost. Both of it's abilities are passive and not activated like the previous two. You get cheaper prices on buying luxuries/resources from other players and sell them for high prices and you get to sell those luxuries/resources you buy from other players to other players. So Merchant is nice in the way you don't have to toggle anything and then realize you've made a terrible mistake and can't turn it off for another few turns. You just get to sit back and without really trying, watch the money roll in. Just make sure your trade routes are protected and everything should be fine.

Scientist is good, but both their abilites are dangerous. "Science Mode" cannot be toggled off so if you aren't careful, you set yourself up for a potential bad time when an enemy comes rolling up to the gates and you haven't enough money to purchase some units for defense. The additional danger of Scienist cultures is it's passive ability to science into the next era. If you science to hard, you will lock yourself out of a good chunk of fame in the next era, as there may be too few or no sciences to unlock, so you'll want to pick a scientist culture again, which can just snowball harder and harder. No idea if this is actually a viable strategy though. Scientist requires some smart play to get the max benefit from it, in my opinion.

Aesthete is nice. I'll admit I only really played the OpenDev's one Aesthete culture twice, but it's effects are quite nice. The ability to "influence bomb" territory allows you to more easily assimilate independent people and bother your rivals with instability and osmosis events. The other ability I didn't quite get, but I believe it ended up getting me more money? So that's nice.

Expansionist is kinda eh. Expansionist's only current ability has a lot of red tape that needs to be snipped away at before you can do anything useful. It requires you to station an army on top of a CC (not the city's main one, but one of an attached territory) and then pay some cash to essentially annex the territory and bring it under your control, like a sort of bribed treaty to either be city made or attached. This is very easily foiled by stationing a unit atop the CC, renegotiating a treaty, or just... Not being able to do it like I was several times. I'm not really sure how I would even improve on the ability to be honest. Perhaps stationed on the CC or adjacent? Maybe just having an army in the territory? I don't know. With it's only one ability, it seems rather weak. Yet, it's not as disappointing as the last affinity.

Militarist is really eh. The militarist ability is to spend four population to instantly get four units. What four units? The city defense units that are weak at best. This seems more like a defensive ability than an offensive ability, and doesn't bring to mind military might at all. If these units were perhaps the culture's EU or at least a relevant unit of the era that had been discovered, then it would feel immediately much better. At the moment, it's really only good for transfering population from city to to city. For it's second ability, I can definitely see it getting a "Mobilization Mode" or somesuch, where units produced while in the mode do not consume a population, but in exchange cannot be disbanded for a population.

So in my opinion, the winning affinity is definitely Agrarian, while Expansionist and Militarist fall a little flat, abilitiywise. 

It should be noted though that the Stadia Demo seemed to be playing on the fastest speed, so I imagine these arbitrary ramblings could be quite different if seen through the game's normal pace.

On Classical Cultures

Before getting too into it, I will say that cultures with a unique ranged unit in this era are particularly nice, since the Ancient Archer doesn't get upgraded until Medieval, this is probably a lot more notable when not playing Nubians like we were, who get an EU archer.

Aksumites are pretty nice. Their LT is very good, especially if you plan on picking merchant cultures in the future. The Grand Stele encourages some slight agrarian play, as you sort of want to surroud it with farms to get the most out of the quarter, then in later eras just throw down a Commons Quarter to replace it should your stability start suffering. If the AI actually founded religions, which I only ever saw them do rarely, it may have gotten some more use, but I imagine that an Aksumite player who focuses on mingling religions will get a lot more use out of it come release. The extra zone of control their swordsmen exert with their Grappler trait seems good? I'm don't think I quite used it to it's full extent.

Carthaginians are okay. I can see getting a lot of use out of the LT in eras to come, whether or not you're picking more Merchant cultures. The War Elephant is nice, if expensive, but now you can buy them out cheaper, just make sure you have plenty of population. Due to a lack of naval stuff being focused on, I didn't get much use out of the Cothon, which seems an alright EQ at best.

Celts are the best, hands down, no contest, in my humble opinion of course. +3 food everywhere is fantastic, especially if you plan on going militarist in the future. The Gaesati Swordsman, while slightly weaker than other EUs of the era, has the movement speed of calvary, and doesn't do less damage from getting hurt, so these guys can come out of nowhere and swarm you, which they will excel at, again, because they're Agrarian. But the best factor that makes the Celts so good, is the Nemeton. They exploit everything from it's tiles. Food, Industry, Money, and Science. This means that even in like, even if the tile and it's surrounding tiles producednothing the nemeton would still net you +18 food thanks to their LT, and it's base yields, +2 food, industry, money, and science. That's amazing. It definitely feels like it should get a nerf, maybe requiring a pre-existing forest to be built on, or maybe it can only exploit Food and Science?

Goths are good at what they do but are kinda eh otherwise. Their LT gets the army more strength on a ransack, so you can send them into independent people's territories and ransack the heck out of them for super troopers. Their EQ seems fairly weak, as it only gives faith and influence, but can be placed anywhere so I suppose there is the benefit of building other quarters off it. Their EU calvary is just better calvary that gets more stuff out of a ransack. I believe the real use of the Goths is to chain them with future cultures like the Mongols and Spain, who also benefit from or make ransacking better.

Greeks are alright. Their LT is very passive, and I never really found myself building many scientific quarters for researchers to do their extra science thing. Loved the hoplites though, and I'm sure in the base game that their Amphitheatron will be very nice as the eras progress and more uses for influence open up, presumably.

Huns scare me. Their LT just makes cavalry better, which may not have much of a use in the later two eras, but it makes their EU particularly terrifying. Ransack the hell out of city states and become the Scourge of god quite literally over a few turns. The unit's ability to grow more of them from ransackings is frightening. I definitely feel like it'll end up getting nerfed come the future, probably requiring more food to grow an extra unit and making the grown units unable to be disbanded for population. The Ordu seems like a good trade off though, as the huns are unable to produce more cities, and have to capture them instead. Once they get out of the era though, I'm sure they can be made into cities.

Mauryans are alright. I didn't play the Mauryans much, but their EQ and EU make up for what I feel is a lackluster LT. The elephant, like all the elephant units, is scarily good. The EQ is a nice faith and science producer, and Industry maker. It's just that none of this really helps them accomplish their LT, which involves getting patron status on Independent Peoples, which costs loads of money, so you definitely want to start out as a merchant and save up in the era prior. For all that money though, +10 Faith and Science really doesn't feel like that great of a reward.

Mayans are pretty good. Their LT turns everything into production heaven. Build a harbor and get a Carthaginian Cothon minus the fortification. The Javilineer is fantastic for weakening enemy frontline units so your frontline can crush them, and the temple I can't spell the name of is good too. I feel it's more in line with what the nemeton should be like, as it only exploits industry, unlike the Nemeton which again, does it all.

Persians are kind of meh. Their LT is good if you like to build loads of cities, obviously. Administrators make things go much more smooth. The Immortal, great unit. The downside? Expansionist Culture and the Satrap's Palace. Perhaps it's because we started as Nubia but I didn't see much reason to build Merchant Quarters, so I didn't see much reason to build Satrap's Palaces, other than to just, y'know, build them for the sake of building them.

Romans are alright. Despite being an Expanionist like the Persians above, I liked Rome a lot more, the Praetorian Guard is a great unit though a little late in the tree, the extra army slot is never going to go to waste, and the Triumphal Arch seems great if you can reliably trigger the Victorius status.

The clear winner cultures here are the two I expect to get nerfed, the Celts and the Huns.

On Cultural Ascendence

I do so adore the delicate rope we have to walk when it comes to the issue of moving on into the next era. Dare I stay for a few more era stars for fame as the Nubians? Or should I grab the Celts post-haste for the bonuses before someone else does? I mean, the OpenDev was set up so the others would not ascend until after we did, but once it gets to base game, I'm very excited to see it play out. I imagine there will be some AI tags like "This person prefers to ascend to the next era as soon as possible" and "This person prefers to get as many era stars as they can before moving into the next era."

On Religion

I think I got the general gist of how religion functioned from the OpenDev, and I'll say, I like where it's going, as I recall it being mentioned religion was very much still a work in progress. I think maybe some more historical religions could get thrown in for the second and third tiers, but I'd say the current selection is quite nice. 

On Independent Peoples

These guys were the most annoying part of the OpenDev for me. The infested near every territory, the violent ones go out of their way to fight your much stronger armies, claimed territories I wanted to, and then I'd have to suffer invading them, ransacking the city, and then making my own or attaching the territory.

Perhaps my biggest gripe with IP is that they are all totally the same. On first glance, you can't tell which city these little jerks are from, so you have to click them and check it out. I feel like maybe they could be shaded some pastel color or something, a light color, so you know they aren't part of another civilization, or maybe they get a unique border to their units and city or something? There just really should be a way to easily identify who they are.

When it comes to using them as mercenaries, the OpenDev didn't really give me much reason to, considering that they only ever produced scouts, so perhaps it's more beneficial come actual play. As for assimilation, I tried it out my first few games because, y'know, I'm nice. But god damn, it's far too expensive, it's bizzarely expensive even. It's so much more cost effective to just invade the little buggers yourself to claim the territory, even if you have to suffer the grievances of their patron. You can probably pay off the grievance for cheaper than the money you would've had to put in to patronize them to the top and then assimilate them. Maybe come actual play, the Independent People will build way more units and make it way more difficult to militarily take them over, but that still seems much less expensive than patronizing and assimilating them in OpenDev.

On the Narrator

While I enjoyed a majority of the narrator's quips, I found that some of his comments regarding my civic choices or wonder constructions to be a bit "on the nose." It was mentioned elsewhere, but some players, myself included, didn't like the idea that we had picked the "wrong" choice based on the narrator's reaction. While this is not to say that all the civic choices should've been treated with glowing approval, like the Slavery or Press Freedom's choice, some, I would say, were handled much better, like Legitmacy and Founding Myth. I also don't think that informing me that Zeus was kind of a dick after I built a giant statue and temple complex honoring the guy is all that great of an idea, even if he was kind of a dick.

If the voice giving the narration is tied to our avatar's voice or personality, our avatar being the nation personified, then I can see this working a little better, as different voices/personalities may have differing comments to make. One that clearly likes more "evil" choices and one that likes more "peaceful" choices and the like. Could be fun.

On the UI

I liked it. Nice, sleek, good colors. I imagine the blue will change to whatever color you end up getting for you empire. A little bit blurry though, but I blame the Stadia for that. My one gripe is that the notifications pop up directly in front of the city's construction menu and they seem to take up way more space than they appear, because I often found myself unable to click on some infrastructures or quarters I wanted to build because of it.

On Various Other Things

The art is beautiful, it really really is. Everything from the tech tree, culture cards, units, infrastructures, natural wonders on card and map, it's all so nice.

While playing the Celts, I heard this lovely rendition of the Skye Boat Song and that put a tear in my eye, so thanks for making me cry I guess.

After picking Inherited Land or after just not having territory to expand into, and having built all wonders I could, I realized that Influence doesn't really have much of a practical use? Science gets you tech, Money can be used to buy goods and services, but influence just kinda builds up. It'd be nice to perhaps use Influence to buy civic points, perhaps? Or maybe even change our own civic choice instead of having to hope for a cultural osmosis event?

While moving my troops through the territory of Independent Peoples to conquer them, I had the other empire's armies just kind of block my path and engage in combat with me. This felt rather strange, as most of the time we had fairly good relations (as I used the IP to train up my armies before unleashing them on the other empires), but our treaties didn't stop us from doing it, yet they seemed to always be the ones engaging, even if they had no chance, which lead to an easy grievance for me to throw at them.

I worry that some of the early CCs are going to take me out of the game when it gets to late game. The Babylonian Ziggurat or the Celtic huts on a hill are all well and good in those early eras, but come Industrial and Contemporary I'm gunna be quite taken out. While I suppose the option of transfering the capital somewhere without those CCs is viable, if possible, some event or civic like "Renovate the Administration Centers" or "Historic Building Preservation" in the Industrial to either upgrade them all to current culture for some bonus or keep them as they are for another bonus would be nice.

The Commons Quarter continues to baffle me. While I understand that keeping the masses happy equals stability, the fact that the quarter's Icon is a Comedy and Tragedy mask, yet it's description talks about the bueraucratic functions of the nation doesn't seem to mesh to me. 

On The End

That's that. God help you if you managed to read this. You should've read my actual notes.

TL:DR

I enjoyed my time during the OpenDev!

Trade and Diplomacy are really good, I would like to be able to set prices myself though for counters and grievances if possible.

Population costs for units is better than I expected but may place a greater focus on Agrarian Cultures because of it.

Auto-Resolve is a great feature, sieges are great, but I'd love a notification when all siege engines are complete.

Options to deal with a city once captured based on techs and whatnot would be nice.

Builder and Agrarian Affinities are King and Queen (though this Queen is making power plays in the shadows), while Militarist and Expansionist definitely could use some work. Militarist would benefit from a unique unit construction mode where it doesn't cost population to build them with the caveat that when disbanded they don't grant population.

The Celts and the Huns seem very OP compared to their fellow Classical Cultures, and should probably be reigned in a bit.

Independent People really need a lot of love to be able to differentiate between them, the costs of patronizing and assimilating them needs to come down, and they need to be a lot better at defending themselves from invaders.