Pondering an Economic Victory Condition

We are all familiar with the victory modes in CiV, but I often wonder why we didn't get an economic VC? The Commerce SP tree has some decent economy-centric items (although it's unfortunately largely naval/coastal/sea-map based stuff), but I seldom if ever put any points into it due to the fact that there are too many other key SP trees that I need to focus on, for the existing VC's.

So it is mostly a pointless/ignored SP section in all of my games. Some of the SP's in it have nice bonuses for +gold, +happiness, and +production (if you have a lot of coastal cities, anyway), but then, so do most of the other SP trees- but those other trees also have key policies you need to boost science, culture, military power, and city-state bonuses... each one a key factor in an existing VC. The commerce tree is a key factor in boosting, er, um.... none of them. Hence its wallflower status.

So why didn't they include an economic victory condition to the game? I never played the older Civ games, did any of them include an economic VC? It would make as much or even more sense than most of the existing VC's... oh, I shot a rocket to alpha centauri, I own the world now! Oh, my cultural greatness is just so orgasmically wonderful, everyone else in the world has decided to bow to me for the rest of eternity! Oh, I just convinced most of the UN delegates that I should be voted King of the World, I win! Mmmm, k... right-O.

Now, for the two most likely REAL victory conditions, one included, and one not... domination by raw military power, and domination by overwhelming economic power (backed with good science and a decent military deterrent, of course). We have military domination, so why don't we have an economic VC? It wouldn't be too hard to rework the Commerce tree to be less naval/coastal <yawn>, and more pure economic in furthering such a VC.

As it is now, the buildup of wealth, science, happiness and culture in CiV is all aimed towards some other VC to which commercial concerns are purely secondary- merely a means to shoot a rocket into space, or build tanks and bombers to roll over everyone, or bludgeon the world into submission with a deluge of Michael Jackson videos. I'd like to see a true economic victory condition, which involved becoming the richest, happiest, most high-tech'ed and culturally awesome civ in the world, without needing to roll tanks through Siberia and Yugoslavia in order to win. A commerical victory condition which you could attain whether your civ existed of only 3 cities, or 53.

A VC in which the player with the most money, economic power and luxury toys at the end, wins. Not sure exactly what the details and particulars of that VC would be, but I'm sure it would be doable. What kind of things do you think would make a great commerce VC?

Gold, and hence the commerce branch, is useful for all VC at the same time. Gold is transverse, it is just a mean to get somewhere faster, not the goal itself.
Plus diplo is pretty much an economic VC in disguise because with enough money you don't even need to have fulfilled quest before.

While I agree with avatan, diplo victories are essentially money victories, I see where you're going. And to answer your question, yes, Sid Meier's games have had an economic victory condition. In SMAC (Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri), cornering the global energy market (in SMAC, energy was the monetary system) was a victory condition and I LOVED those games. I guess a lot of others didn't enjoy it so much which led to the exclusion of market-cornering in future civ games.
If this was re-instated, I'd certainly be for at, but as I've hinted at in other posts, G&K has almost necessitated the addition of a religious victory condition. As it stands, religion works the way you've hinted at gold working, enhances other victory conditions but not in and of itself one; a means but not an end. As it stands though, religion-centered strategies have a TON more investment with marginally better payout than a gold-centered strategy.

It was occasionally argued that in Vanilla (and still to some degree in G&K), the Diplomatic Victory was in essence an Economic Victory, since if you have any gold you simply ally all the city states you need to win.

As for a religious victory, don't forget that in Civ IV, a religious victory *was* a (non-economic) diplomatic victory but just at an earlier stage in the game.

Wish there was a religious VC too...

Smokeybear said:

So it is mostly a pointless/ignored SP section in all of my games. Some of the SP's in it have nice bonuses for +gold, +happiness, and +production (if you have a lot of coastal cities, anyway), but then, so do most of the other SP trees- but those other trees also have key policies you need to boost science, culture, military power, and city-state bonuses... each one a key factor in an existing VC. The commerce tree is a key factor in boosting, er, um.... none of them. Hence its wallflower status.

So why didn't they include an economic victory condition to the game?

Click to expand...

The others jumped in before me.

The current diplomatic victory serves as a de facto economic victory, since the most reliable way of getting city state allegiance/votes is through monetary bribes.

Now, if Civ V revised the conditions for diplomatic victory (making votes dependent on population rather than one nation/one vote), there might be the case for implementing a separate economic victory condition.

Smokeybear said:

I never played the older Civ games, did any of them include an economic VC?

Click to expand...

Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri offered an economic victory. I wasn't a big fan of it, because I usually could've achieved one of the other victory conditions long before economic.

Avatan said:

Gold, and hence the commerce branch, is useful for all VC at the same time. Gold is transverse, it is just a mean to get somewhere faster, not the goal itself.
Plus diplo is pretty much an economic VC in disguise because with enough money you don't even need to have fulfilled quest before.

Click to expand...

All resources in the game are transverse, not just gold. If you are going for culture win, then science is a means to help you get there faster. If you are going science, then culture helps you get there faster. If you are going domination, then all resources are simply a means to get there faster, not just gold/wealth. Yes, diplo VC requires a certain amount of gold at a specific time, but it feels nothing like a true 'economic' victory. It's more of just the bastard VC of the lot, you can be going for anything else and then decide to switch and go that route too, regardless of what social policies you've chosen.

Winning with gold shouldn't be a real victory. It just means you're being stingy.

An economic victory should be about the net worth of your civ. Nothing more or less. It should be triggered when you have a good surplus of most or almost all of the resources on a map (through trade or tile improvements), and won by expending gold-per-turn (not gold from your treasury) into a World Bank-type mechanic up to, say, the total maintenance cost of all of your buildings, roads, and units at the time of the trigger. Or maybe something like 10% of the cost of all of your buildings and units combined had they been purchased.

Anyone remember the other Civ type games where you could "bribe" enemy units to join your side? Heh.