A world without consulates

[Forkandles]

How are people getting on now that Consulates isnt an automatic pick? What policies are you going for instead, or are you still making consulates work for you?

Playing with the beta patch and diety difficulty Ive had some success with 2 approaches:

Poland, full tradition, commerce as far as mercantilism, full rat and as much as order as I can. I used to play this before the patch anyway and its still good. Buying cheap public schools and labs is great and extra gold is always useful.

Shoshone (but could be any civ I just wanted an easy start to play with). Variation on Tommynts Poland guide. Open trad, take liberty to collective rule, finish trad, full rat and as much order as I can. All the benefits of growing the cap and then pinging out settlers when collective rule hits really fast. No 'wasted' social policies - think my poland opening had to open patronage if I got the Oracle.

Been using spies and coups a lot to at least have a couple of CS allies / friends. Games definitely a bit harder Ive managed a turn 235 SV before but I cant see me beating 250 with this patch.

Edit: Finally got round to going past turn 200 to see a finish time and hit the double time to produce spaceship parts too. 250 seems wildly optimistic maybe 275 in this game
Edit: Turn 277 SV. Im not against the idea of a longer end game and perhaps seeing some of the later units and buildings getting used, but the game slows down so much after about turn 200 it becomes 90% sitting waiting for your turn and 10% doing stuff - its not a good balance for me. Maybe I need a better PC!

 

[CaptainPatch]

At +20 to the CS Influence resting point, it would be foolish to not make a point of securing the Patronage Consulates policy.

 

[redwings1340]

I still think consulates is a really good policy, because if you can get up to scholasticism and ally everyone, that's about +20% science for a tall empire.

Still, it's no longer an auto pick, and some civs can get by without it.

 

[Forkandles]

At +20 to the CS Influence resting point, it would be foolish to not make a point of securing the Patronage Consulates policy.

Well you say that, but thats 2 social policies used, for +20 resting point influence. 20 influence with a CS gets you nothing. Can you expand on why its so useful for you?

 

[CaptainPatch]

Well you say that, but thats 2 social policies used, for +20 resting point influence. 20 influence with a CS gets you nothing. Can you expand on why its so useful for you?

In all the games I've played, getting CSs to the Ally stage is pretty essential. There's just wayyyy too many Good Things that the CSs send your way. So even beyond those two policies, I make a point of filling out the entire Patronage policy tree ASAP. But aside from that, once you have beFriended or Allied a CS, those 20 Influence points save you from having to do cash (Gifting) renewals by 20-60 turns (depending on the Influence degradation rate) each. That translates into MANY thousands of gold over the course of the game.

A fringe benefit that I think is present (and if it's not, it definitely should be) is that if you have many CS Allies, other civs are less likely to do a DoW on you because that would mean that they would also be at war with ALL of those CSs as well. Plus if they have any trade routes with any of those CSs, there went that cashflow. Plus if they had any Influence built up with any of the CSs, there all that went because the CSs immediately turn Hostile towards any other civ at war with your civ.

 

[redwings1340]

Well you say that, but thats 2 social policies used, for +20 resting point influence. 20 influence with a CS gets you nothing. Can you expand on why its so useful for you?

It means that if you complete a quest worth 40 influence points, you'll be friends for 30 turns instead of 10 (or maybe more depending on if the city state is hostile). You will also become allies for one turn, which would be useless, unless being allies with that city state gets you a luxury or strategic resource that fulfills another city state quest!

If you give a gift of 1000 gold and get 100 influence, you'll be more likely to ally the city state over others ones.

This isn't a policy you'll want to get and then ignore, the same way pledge/consulates was. This is meant to start you on the path to allying everyone. If there are 16 city states on the map, and you haven't started to ally any of them yet, in 20 turns this policy will give you 320 free influence that doesn't ever go away. That's pretty worthwhile, although you now will have to build on it and take city states seriously if you take the policy.

 

[Forkandles]

Im not denying that consulates still has its upside but you dont take it in isolation, theres an opportunity cost of taking those policies ie you dont get to take other policies. Can you argue that consulates is more powerful than a fast start of full trad and a bit of lib? Or full patronage is more powerful than taking rationalism? Or even that consulates is more powerful than commerce and its mercantilism?

Im firmly on the side of ignoring patronage. Would love to have the CS allies of course, but I cant see how you can delay rationalism or not grab mercantilism in commerce (I see this as a science policy cos it allows you to buy science buildings very easily). Then again I always go for Science Victories so perhaps I only see one angle.

You can still grab a few CS allies anyway and secure them with spies. You just have 3 or 4 allies not 12-16 without consulates and the influence degrade rate means you need to keep an eye on them a bit more.

 

[joncnunn]

Playing with the Beta patch now.

Looks like what's become my go to two filler policies for between the time I finish Tradition & the time I can open Rationalism are the opener to Ascetics & the first left hand one that makes cultural buildings cheaper.

Artists / Musicians / Writers are on their own count needed so increasing their spawn rate by 25% doesn't decrease number of Scientists spawned. (Unlike the policy in Commerce that increases Merchant spawn rate)

Double production rate of Opera Houses / Museums and (outside the capital Amphitheaters) help even if all my monuments are free and with having built an Amphitheater in my capital earlier to fit the first great work of writing.

This also gives me a base should it look like a Cultural victory would be faster than Diplomatic.

Still, it's clear in my case that if I were to turn on save cultural policies advanced game option, I'd just hold onto the points in favor of faster Rationalism completion. I'd probably springboard from there to faster level 3 tenet completion.

 

[redwings1340]

Im not denying that consulates still has its upside but you dont take it in isolation, theres an opportunity cost of taking those policies ie you dont get to take other policies. Can you argue that consulates is more powerful than a fast start of full trad and a bit of lib? Or full patronage is more powerful than taking rationalism? Or even that consulates is more powerful than commerce and its mercantilism?

Im firmly on the side of ignoring patronage. Would love to have the CS allies of course, but I cant see how you can delay rationalism or not grab mercantilism in commerce (I see this as a science policy cos it allows you to buy science buildings very easily). Then again I always go for Science Victories so perhaps I only see one angle.

You can still grab a few CS allies anyway and secure them with spies. You just have 3 or 4 allies not 12-16 without consulates and the influence degrade rate means you need to keep an eye on them a bit more.

Hmm... I've played really well with city states in the past, but that was before I discovered how strong rationalism was. Depending on your ideology/victory though, I think a good time to dip further down in to patronage might be after rationalism is completed, but before you go too far down in to ideologies. There are times where after I get my first lvl 2 ideological tenant, I switch back in to patronage for scholasticism. The extra happiness benefit is pretty good too, and the extra gold gifting is a nice policy to have.

The cheaper buying in the commerce tree is great, but at least pre-patch, it had a useless policy as a prerequisite, and taking useless policies really hurts you. I don't think any patronage policies are useless. I haven't played post patch yet, but prepatch I considered patronage to scholasticism at least the 3rd strongest policy tree in the game, behind tradition and rationalism.

 

[Forkandles]

Cheaper roads and railroads useless? It saves a few bucks but yeah its not amazing. I only go commerce as Poland to be honest. They are spare policies coming out of their wazoo. But wow it works really well especially once Skyscrapers from Order is in as well. Something like 25% off purchases plus 33% off purchases plus 15% off purchases with Big Ben. Thats some really cheap public schools, research labs, nuclear plants, hydro dams. The effect of getting this stuff instantly rather than in 10 turns or whatever is remarkable too.

Dont think Ive ever come out of Order once its opened unless I havent yet finished Rat. Theres too much good stuff in there.

So whats your typical policy order after the patch?

 

[Qoma]

IMO, consulates could have been kept as-is but moved a bit further down the tree. At least if you had to invest more into getting it, that might have made sense. I'm just not sure if the policy means a lot anymore.

 

[Matthew.]

Yes, I agree Qoma. I don't necessarily think perma-friendship was overpowered in itself, rather that the two policy investment was too little.

 

[Forkandles]

Playing with the Beta patch now.

Looks like what's become my go to two filler policies for between the time I finish Tradition & the time I can open Rationalism are the opener to Ascetics & the first left hand one that makes cultural buildings cheaper.

Artists / Musicians / Writers are on their own count needed so increasing their spawn rate by 25% doesn't decrease number of Scientists spawned. (Unlike the policy in Commerce that increases Merchant spawn rate)

Double production rate of Opera Houses / Museums and (outside the capital Amphitheaters) help even if all my monuments are free and with having built an Amphitheater in my capital earlier to fit the first great work of writing.

This also gives me a base should it look like a Cultural victory would be faster than Diplomatic.

Still, it's clear in my case that if I were to turn on save cultural policies advanced game option, I'd just hold onto the points in favor of faster Rationalism completion. I'd probably springboard from there to faster level 3 tenet completion.

I like it, Ill think Ill try it. Sometimes I dont get time to do the open trad/lib to collective rule start mostly because I either didnt get an early culture ruin or the AI is going to settle right in my face very quickly or both. In that scenario Ill go full trad and build a settler early. Ill then be needing to build amps so this could work nicely.

 

[Qoma]

Yes, I agree Qoma. I don't necessarily think perma-friendship was overpowered in itself, rather that the two policy investment was too little.

I mean on one hand, I can see why it can't be a third-tier policy, because if you're investing that much into that tree it's not so you can be "just friends" with every CS. However, if it was a second-tier policy, and even better maybe a dead-end policy, that might fit better...? (maybe requiring something worthless - IMO haha - like Merchant Confederacy which IMO was a crappy policy)

 

[bonafide11]

It's a good policy, but I don't find it so overwhelming that I don't ever go with another strategy that is also effective. Don't you people get bored of the game picking the same social policies and playing it the same way all the time?

 

[Forkandles]

Theres at least 5 different social policy orders suggested in this thread bona. Your points a bit off the mark in my opinion

 

[joshua43214]

I just played 2 Immortal Shaka domination games up to the point where they turn into drawn out slogs. The AI does indeed seem to tech a bit faster whish is good.
The first game I went full trad opener, liberty opener, finish trad, left honor, right commerce. It is kinda viable but happiness is a major issue.
Second game I went full liberty, full commerce, and then autocracy. The +2 happiness from commerce is really huge when warmongering. I had a decent amount of extra happiness even though I was at war with all but 2 CS's, and all but 2 AI's at the end, and the AI's I was at peace with would not trade with me.

The new value on trade goods when the AI is not happy with you is even worse that before. I was seeing a lot of guarded civs that wanted 5 lux's and gpt for a surplus lux. This is really past the point when they should DoW me. I assume this will be fixed.

Going to take a run at an SV, planning to go with commerce and skip patronage altogether.

 

[CaptainPatch]

Can you argue that consulates is more powerful than a fast start of full trad and a bit of lib? Or full patronage is more powerful than taking rationalism? Or even that consulates is more powerful than commerce and its mercantilism?

I am inclined to suggest that Patronage is probably the most powerful of all of the policy trees. But there are two very important qualifiers: 1) Difficulty level and 2) the number of City States. I really can't say just how things differ up there in Diety-land because the highest I've gone is only King (my current game). And when doing setup I always have a Huge map with all 41 CSs in play, playing at Marathon speed. Inside that criteria, I pretty much dominate by the end of the Renaissance, mainly because I'm Friendly with all 41 CSs, with most of them being Allies. As such, for the entire game, I've never actually built more than a dozen units -- yet I have THE most powerful Military because of all the units the Militaristic CSs send me. I'm also the Faith leader by a very large margin because of the Religious CSs contributions, as well as the Culture leader because of the Cultured CSs sending me Culture points. And the empire is happy as clams because the Commerce CSs sending us Happy points. And Food is no concern because of all the groceries the Maritime CSs contribute. Plus, because I fleshed out the Patronage tree, I'm getting several hundred Research points every turn, along with occasional (more often than "rare") Great People units.

Policy-wise, the first tree I do complete is Patronage. But I also at least initiate practically every other tree as well. I eventually fully complete Commerce (for healthy cashflow), and perhaps Piety (to get the Reformation Belief, and being that close might as well take the last one to complete the tree). Then I cherry-pick certain useful policies from the other trees until Ideology kicks in. The reason I have been able to adopt sooooo many policies is because, beside the CS contributions, I really focus on completing those Wonders and techs that bestow free Social policies. That's between 6 and 12 extra policies where I didn't need to pile on the Culture points AND drive up the per policy price. There are also several things that can reduce Culture costs by 10-33%. If you're paying close attention, it's all quite doable.

This game, I disabled both the Domination and Diplomacy Victories because if I didn't the game would be over -- like all the others before it -- by @1950. And if I enabled the Diplo Victory, because of my total control of the World Congress, I'd be World Leader in the 1800s, at the latest.

And I attribute all that to Patronage.

 

[z284pwr]

It means that if you complete a quest worth 40 influence points, you'll be friends for 30 turns instead of 10 (or maybe more depending on if the city state is hostile). You will also become allies for one turn, which would be useless, unless being allies with that city state gets you a luxury or strategic resource that fulfills another city state quest!

If you give a gift of 1000 gold and get 100 influence, you'll be more likely to ally the city state over others ones.

This isn't a policy you'll want to get and then ignore, the same way pledge/consulates was. This is meant to start you on the path to allying everyone. If there are 16 city states on the map, and you haven't started to ally any of them yet, in 20 turns this policy will give you 320 free influence that doesn't ever go away. That's pretty worthwhile, although you now will have to build on it and take city states seriously if you take the policy.

This indirectly made Greece even betten. influence degrading at half speed is so much nicer. Complete quests and enjoy the friendships longer

 

[redwings1340]

This indirectly made Greece even betten. influence degrading at half speed is so much nicer. Complete quests and enjoy the friendships longer

If you're Greece or Siam then taking full patronage (or at least to scholasticism) is a no brainer. I think if you're an economic focused civ (with the exception of Portugal), it's also a good idea, as you'll have that much more money to spend on city states. It's also very helpful in getting world congress power, because even without diplo victory, the world congress power, culture, food, faith, military, and happiness from city state allies is pretty huge.