Civics Improvements Suggestions

I'm certainly in favour of retaining the hints towards parliamentary democracy/constitutional monarchy. Just replacing them with modern democracy etc. would be terribly uninteresting.

Afforess said:

Random Idea: Make the government category names update based on the civic currently active?

Good, Bad, Maybe?

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Maybe. I think that might be unnecessarily complicated as well. I think I'm having a hard time distinguishing between Government and Power as well. I just have some serious issues with making sure that the names of everything feel right.

Regardless of anything else, please cut down the numbers of things each civic does. Some of them have seven or eben more effects, which makes it quite impossible to predict how it would affect you if you make the switch.
I suggest 3-4 effects per civic.
Also, I would appreciate If the civics in each category are somewhat evenly spread across the timeline. I used to be really bad with economics. It has gotten somewhat better since we cot coinage, but slavery is still (at least for me) the only viable option until modern times.

Der_Zorn_gottes said:

Regardless of anything else, please cut down the numbers of things each civic does. Some of them have seven or eben more effects, which makes it quite impossible to predict how it would affect you if you make the switch.
I suggest 3-4 effects per civic.

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It's not bad, if a civic has many things. What only matters, is to have each civic different in its coloumn. I have no problems with that.

Sogroon said:

It's not bad, if a civic has many things. What only matters, is to have each civic different in its coloumn. I have no problems with that.

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I'm completely agree with Der_Zorn_gottes.
In vanilla CIV they have only 1-2 thing for each civic - and it has a good gameplay, there wasn't feeling that is too small. All civics were usefull according your situation, game style etc.
I suppose, it will be better to concenctrate on 2-3 things on each civic. Yes, it is harder to determine the main changes rather them to specify them all, but it'll make game more clear and playable. This "+5% there", "-5% there" - only confusing without solid gameplay effect.

I'm definitely in favor of simpler civics. Having a lot of effects increases the time it takes to compare the civics and makes it harder to compare which is better for a particular situation. Some civics I tend to ignore simply because they are too complicated to understand.

I think Civics should be re-written with the primary goal of accommodating two separate play-styles:

Large Imperial Expansionism and Small Free Republics.

I'm sure the realists here will immediately protest and point out that there are large Republics, but I must counter with the fact that America and other large foreign powers more closely resemble an Empire (albeit one with an elected legislature). Republics are simply too hard to maintain over great distances and with large populations.

So there should be civics that help keep the cost of maintaining a large empire down, and civics that give smaller civilizations an easier time.

I think we can have civics for war, and for peace, for big empires and for small countries, for totalitarian despotism and for democracy, for cultural victory and for commerce, for specialists economy and for cottage economy, for big, but unskilled army and for small, but experienced professional army, for product all and for buying all, for good trade and for isolationism "all world against us", for religious pluralism and for untolerant, for big social budget ( in medicine and education ) or total capitalism.
Not only two dimensions - respublic and empire

val3 said:

I think we can have civics for war, and for peace, for big empires and for small countries, for totalitarian despotism and for democracy, for cultural victory and for commerce, for specialists economy and for cottage economy, for big, but unskilled army and for small, but experienced professional army, for product all and for buying all, for good trade and for isolationism "all world against us", for religious pluralism and for untolerant, for big social budget ( in medicine and education ) or total capitalism.
Not only two dimensions - respublic and empire

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I'm not saying you can't try for those strategies, but it would be absurd to try and explicitly write civics to appeal to every possible playstyle. I thought you wanted less modifiers, not more.

Afforess said:

I'm not saying you can't try for those strategies, but it would be absurd to try and explicitly write civics to appeal to every possible playstyle. I thought you wanted less modifiers, not more.

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Yes, less modifiers for each civic. But we have now something like 50 civics.
And they should have different modifiers ( at least in one branch), because if two civics of one branch have the simular modifiers - than you can determine for each civic which is always better and it's not interesting. You should choose set of civics depending on current situation, your playstyle and current goals, I suppose.

So, I think each civic should have it's own feature, it's own area of usage, as it was in Vanilla. It's ideal imo - not 8-10 modifiers, but only one good feature or 1-2 important modificators.

val3 said:

Yes, less modifiers for each civic. But we have now something like 50 civics.
And they should have different modifiers ( at least in one branch), because if two civics of one branch have the simular modifiers - than you can determine for each civic which is always better and it's not interesting. You should choose set of civics depending on current situation, your playstyle and current goals, I suppose.

So, I think each civic should have it's own feature, it's own area of usage, as it was in Vanilla. It's ideal imo - not 8-10 modifiers, but only one good feature or 1-2 important modificators.

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I think you are putting the cart before the horse. We don't need to code civics to suit the playstyles of players, we need to code the civics to suit the playstyles we want to encourage. Just because it is possible to it is possible to use civics to emphasize the cottage economy, or maximize specialists, does not mean we want to encourage that. We want to encourage balanced gameplay.

Specialized strategies like the cottage economy or specialist economies are a result of emergent gameplay, not top-down design. I don't think we should focus on specialized strategies, players will develop new ones for whatever civics we code.

What I do think we should focus on is allowing smaller civilizations to be more competitive. This is an area Civilization 5 got quite well and RAND does quite poorly at.

I know I only want to play Conquest victory. So yes if there're balanced civics, then there's a chance I'll be bloodied before finally conquering small civs. More interesting game than just mopping up small civs, if you understand what I mean.

I just had a great day reading the history of Rome, Rome: An Empire's Story.
Then I was thinking while eating my dinner and came to this realization.
Admittedly, it is ridiculously obvious but I feel this is an important one.

This game is only one step before total fantasy.

That's it.

Let me explain. There is a mod called Fall from Heaven. It is a total fantasy creation modpack. That makes sense. However, if you think about this modpack here, Rise of Mankind - A New Dawn, you will quickly come to realize that it is not that far from FfH.

Why?

Because the histories we create in-game is diferent. Because LHs are more like gods than actual human personalities. Because we can go conquer the entire world and win the game.
You name it.
This game is a fantasy with inspirations from human's history.

So my point here:
Don't stress out about how civics are created here. I decided today to stop really care about labels of civics and agree with Afforess 100% to have civics be gameplay balanced for my pure fantasy of playing conquering hero!
Seriously, this discussion can move forward a great deal if we just admit that this game is purely a fantasy world inspired by human history. So you are a slave-owning society here? Big deal! You reap great hammers until better civic come along, then switch over to the better one! That kind of thinking can get this balancing of Civics and the axing of Inflation discussed in another thread a great easier if we concentrate on creating a great modpack to be played down many years from now!

os79, you're just forgetting one thing: there are people who actually like to recreate earth's history. Otherwise we would not need any earth map at all. Or we could simply rename every civilization to our liking, same for religions, techs and everything else. So if you want to play like Ghandi of the Roman Empire that's good but it's not what everyone is looking for in this mod.

45°38'N-13°47'E;13343451 said:

os79, you're just forgetting one thing: there are people who actually like to recreate earth's history. Otherwise we would not need any earth map at all. Or we could simply rename every civilization to our liking, same for religions, techs and everything else. So if you want to play like Ghandi of the Roman Empire that's good but it's not what everyone is looking for in this mod.

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True. However, how to do that realistically? We can't. We can only approximate it in the games, but that's it. That is what I'm trying to say here. I'm saying not to get too attached to Civics in the game because they are very approximate and rough imitation of real life, that's it.

I believe what Os79 is trying to say is that we should be inspired by reality, but not attempt to mimic it.

Afforess said:

I believe what Os79 is trying to say is that we should be inspired by reality, but not attempt to mimic it.

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There you have it. Better words I can't think of!

Here are my civic suggestions so far:

Government

Chiefdom
No Upkeep
+100% Maintenance costs from number of cities
Can not settle more than 3 cities

Rationale: Chiefdom is the starting government civic. It sucks. It has been designed to suck.

Despotism
Low Upkeep
Fixed Borders
+50% Military Unit Production
Cities Require 100% More to grow
+1 in All Cities Per 25% Tax Rate
+1 per 10% foreign
+25%
+50% Faster Construction of Barracks, Garrison

Rationale: Despotism is designed to be the all-purpose government civic. When you just need to get things done with minimal fuss, Despotism should just work (TM). It doesn't offer much benefits, but doesn't hurt you too much either. Watch out for foreign (subversive) culture.

Monarchy
Medium Upkeep
-50% Maintenance from Number of cities
-50% Maintenance from Distance to Palace
+1 per military unit stationed in a city
No in the capital city
+1 in All Cities Per 25% Tax Rate
+1 from Walls, High Walls, Castle
50% Faster Training of Archer, Longbowman, Knight, Noble Knight, Walls, High Walls, Castle

Rationale: Monarchies are the real empire builders. Any government that wants their despotic rule to last beyond their grave establishes a dynasty of some kind. Maintaining a dynasty takes work, hence the higher upkeep. Because your rule is a divine right, maintenance costs are lower. Empire builders should pick this civic.

Republic
High Upkeep
+200% Maintenance from Number of Cities
+200% Maintenance from Distance to Palace
+2 in all cities
+50% Military Unit Production
+25% in all cities
+25% , , in all cities

Rationale: The tiny civilization civic! Republic represents early republican democratic ideals with direct democracies. Direct democracies don't work well with large populations or over large distances, hence the extreme maintenance costs. However, if your civilization is small, this civic offers very nice rewards for your democratic leadership.

Democracy
High Upkeep
+50% Maintenance from Number of Cities
+50% Maintenance from Distance to Palace
+1 in all cities
+25% , in Capital City

Rationale: The medium civilization civic. Democracy provides a representative form of government without the need for direct citizen action, as with Republic. High upkeep, but the warm and fuzzy feeling that you get from knowing your citizens elected you.

Federation (formerly known as Federal)
Low Upkeep
-25% Maintenance from Number of Cities
-25% Maintenance from Distance to Palace
-25% Maintenance from Oversea Cities
+1 in all cities
+25% in all cities
-15% in all cities
-25% Military Unit Production

Rationale: Federation is the late-game empire builders civic. A Federation (like the USA) is a political entity made up of smaller entities (think states inside of the USA). This adds layers of buearcracy and democratic indirection, which slows down pretty much anything you want to get done. Hence the weaker production effects.

Fascist
Axed. Was just Despotism by another name.

I'm sure my Government civics will be controversial so I won't implement them until I get plenty of feedback. I'll write up my ideas for rebalancing Power Rule civics when I get more time.

So the realist comes here to complain.

I think there is a great misunderstanding here. It seems you are forgetting what a game of civ truly is.

Civilization is a simulator, and not going deep into its true meaning I'll pick the most important part of it for this discussion. History-Making.

Civilization is all about making History. You play a game, have some struggles and emerge defeated or victorious, then you remember your story and how special it was to you.

If you don't want to know the game entirely, you play on an easier difficulty and then you can be whatever you want: A global Theocratic Despotism? A peaceful small Republic? A Communist Massive Nation? A Socialist utopia? A copy of the USA? It's free, and with many options it's better then with a few. It has several informations, but in easier difficulties it doesn't matter.

If Civics are thought like their RL counterparts, you don't really need to study all their aspects, you may use intuition to make the best combinations That would be the first steps to increase someone's difficulty.

But as you go higher in the difficulty level, all pieces of info matter, and now you must do the best combos to survive and win. Here is when those small values are truly important. And with a multitude of options you have several different strategies to pursue. Capitalist full of Corp HQs? You might enjoy TR civics, reduced maintenance cost civics. Communist Union? No corps civic, may avoid distance maintenance cost decreasing civics.


So for both gameplays, the calm player who wishes to just simulate his dream without concern for many gameplay aspects and the hardcore gamer who wants to bring every aspect to his advantage, a bigger number of civs is the focus.

But the multitude of small effect is indeed a bad thing. That's why not only it should be decreased, but thought like their RL counterpart. Once again because if we try to be more realistic, people won't have to truly check every benefits and disadvantages a civic brings, because they will be able to do good combinations by common sense.

Spirictum said:

So the realist comes here to complain.

I think there is a great misunderstanding here. It seems you are forgetting what a game of civ truly is.

Civilization is a simulator, and not going deep into its true meaning I'll pick the most important part of it for this discussion. History-Making.

Civilization is all about making History. You play a game, have some struggles and emerge defeated or victorious, then you remember your story and how special it was to you.

If you don't want to know the game entirely, you play on an easier difficulty and then you can be whatever you want: A global Theocratic Despotism? A peaceful small Republic? A Communist Massive Nation? A Socialist utopia? A copy of the USA? It's free, and with many options it's better then with a few. It has several informations, but in easier difficulties it doesn't matter.

If Civics are thought like their RL counterparts, you don't really need to study all their aspects, you may use intuition to make the best combinations That would be the first steps to increase someone's difficulty.

But as you go higher in the difficulty level, all pieces of info matter, and now you must do the best combos to survive and win. Here is when those small values are truly important. And with a multitude of options you have several different strategies to pursue. Capitalist full of Corp HQs? You might enjoy TR civics, reduced maintenance cost civics. Communist Union? No corps civic, may avoid distance maintenance cost decreasing civics.


So for both gameplays, the calm player who wishes to just simulate his dream without concern for many gameplay aspects and the hardcore gamer who wants to bring every aspect to his advantage, a bigger number of civs is the focus.

But the multitude of small effect is indeed a bad thing. That's why not only it should be decreased, but thought like their RL counterpart. Once again because if we try to be more realistic, people won't have to truly check every benefits and disadvantages a civic brings, because they will be able to do good combinations by common sense.

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I honestly can't tell what you are writing about. Your prose is just not natural and hard to understand.

I think you are trying to say that you want civics to have a lot of smaller modifiers. I did make some simplifications, but my overall goal is to make it possible to play/win with tiny civilizations just as well with large ones. Correct me if I am wrong.

Forgive me for my poor english. On my last 'teen' years, my vocabulary in my mother language got a lot better, while I stopped practicing my english. It turned out now my mind creates several ideas that are hard for me to put in english because of that.

Actually I'm against the small bonuses. What I'm in favor of is the multitude of civics, for the reasons I gave above.

I mistype civs instead of civics in here:

So for both gameplays, the calm player who wishes to just simulate his dream without concern for many gameplay aspects and the hardcore gamer who wants to bring every aspect to his advantage, a bigger number of civics is the focus.

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So trying to tie my ideas here: I think many details should be removed. But the number of civics is good and should remain more or less the same. Having several options of civics bring flavor to the game. Having several small bonuses on each civic brings confusion.