Should the NC be nerfed?

Aaron90495

Aaron90495

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So I've been playing a lot of Immortal/Deity lately and I've come to this conclusion: the National College makes far too much of an impact on the game. NC almost doubles science, and on the higher levels, you're dead in the water if you don't get it ASAP.

Say, for example, you're playing on Deity. Built the NC by T70? You're in good shape. Put it off for a mere 15 or 20 turns and got it up around T85 or T90? Might as well restart, because chances are you've pretty much already lost.

Does anyone else think the NC needs to be nerfed, maybe to 33% instead of 50%? It just seems your hopes on the higher levels are solely dependent on how quickly you get it up, and it doesn't seem right that this one building is leagues more important than any other on Immortal/Deity.

Thoughts?
 
Aaron90495 said:
So I've been playing a lot of Immortal/Deity lately and I've come to this conclusion: the National College makes far too much of an impact on the game. NC almost doubles science, and on the higher levels, you're dead in the water if you don't get it ASAP.

Say, for example, you're playing on Deity. Built the NC by T70? You're in good shape. Put it off for a mere 15 or 20 turns and got it up around T85 or T90? Might as well restart, because chances are you've pretty much already lost.

Does anyone else think the NC needs to be nerfed, maybe to 33% instead of 50%? It just seems your hopes on the higher levels are solely dependent on how quickly you get it up, and it doesn't seem right that this one building is leagues more important than any other on Immortal/Deity.

Thoughts?
Click to expand...

No I like it where it is. I always feel good when I get it up and get that science boost. Sure they could nerf it for diety perhaps, but leave it the same for the other levels.

The other thing though if you nerf NC with diety it will make it much harder. I am not a diety player, but isn't it challenging enough for you?
 
nokmirt said:
No I like it where it is. I always feel good when I get it up and get that science boost. Sure they could nerf it for diety perhaps, but leave it the same for the other levels.

The other thing though if you nerf NC with diety it will make it much harder. I am not a diety player, but isn't it challenging enough for you?
Click to expand...

I don't think it'll make it any harder. Part of what gets the AI's ahead so quickly science-wise is that they can almost immediately do a 2-city NC. So that would be a nerf to the AI, too, though I agree it would make Deity a tad harder.
 
I don't know this for certain, but I feel like the AI's massive science rate is due to their high number of cities, not their specialized main city. I doubt the AI can specialize their capital(or whatever city) towards science quite like the human. So nerfing the NC would be hurting the human player more than the AI in this case.
 
Aaron90495 said:
I don't think it'll make it any harder. Part of what gets the AI's ahead so quickly science-wise is that they can almost immediately do a 2-city NC. So that would be a nerf to the AI, too, though I agree it would make Deity a tad harder.
Click to expand...

No, its a combination of factors and getting NC asap is only one of them

1) Map size and land space to expand. The larger the map, the more room they have to expand but also the higher the beaker costs for techs. But on maps like Tilted Axis or high sea levels... they tend not to have much room

2) Starts. AIs that start off ALONE and isolated tend to do poorly in techs, even if they are known "fast techers" who expand like crazy (I'm looking at you, Hiawatha)

3) Are they always in a RA/trade circle? If they are at war all or even most of the time with each other and have no room for friendship, even the runaways will be hard pressed to win Science.
 
Unresolved said:
I don't know this for certain, but I feel like the AI's massive science rate is due to their high number of cities, not their specialized main city. I doubt the AI can specialize their capital(or whatever city) towards science quite like the human. So nerfing the NC would be hurting the human player more than the AI in this case.
Click to expand...

Yeah I think so as well. You can see their science rate at capital once you get spies and it is rarely impressive. The bajillion 18+ cities spammed across the map add up though.

As for NC having too much impact, I think in general that "science boosts" should be split between the top and bottom half of the tech tree. It feels like the higher you go, the more your tech path is already set out of your control. What I mean is that it isn't necessarily NC is too strong, rather it is that NC to colleges is more or less required. Deviate from a straight path and it had better be for a very damn good reason else you are just gimping yourself.
 
Matthew. said:
Yeah I think so as well. You can see their science rate at capital once you get spies and it is rarely impressive. The bajillion 18+ cities spammed across the map add up though.

As for NC having too much impact, I think in general that "science boosts" should be split between the top and bottom half of the tech tree. It feels like the higher you go, the more your tech path is already set out of your control. What I mean is that it isn't necessarily NC is too strong, rather it is that NC to colleges is more or less required. Deviate from a straight path and it had better be for a very damn good reason else you are just gimping yourself.
Click to expand...

I guess that whole "1 path" thing is what I'm getting at. Sure, there are other ways to get good science, but Philosophy --> Education is pretty much set in stone for any game that requires good science. And EVERY game requires good science.

I just wish possible science tech paths were more varied. Would there be any way to fix that?
 
Aaron90495 said:
I guess that whole "1 path" thing is what I'm getting at. Sure, there are other ways to get good science, but Philosophy --> Education is pretty much set in stone for any game that requires good science. And EVERY game requires good science.

I just wish possible science tech paths were more varied. Would there be any way to fix that?
Click to expand...

Not really. There is always a "cookie cutter" tech path that leads to the best results, only I solution I can come up with would to move Unis/Edu a lot later in the tech tree, making deviation from the Philo/Edu path less costly (but still undesirable) or make the buildings ungodly expensive.
 
there is a cost of doing nc first. it slows down production by alot. resulting in a smaller army for a while. it can also cause you to looose so very good city sites.
if deity ai did a dedicated archer/composite bowmen rush you will die.
 
It seems to me that there's ALWAYS going to be a prevailing strategy. The developers make tweaks that change that effectiveness of the current day's best strategy, but this only creates another one, someplace else. At launch, the most important factor in CiV was buying the loyalty of a maritime city state... It eventually got nerfed and we moved to other strategies, but there's always something.

(I do feel the same about the NC, though. It's too important. Generally, science is too important too. But this can't be changed, since it's a concept that sits right at the core of te current design of Civilization.)
 
Not really for NC. It is difficult to field a large army that early until markets anyway. Unless you meant that it delays markets, which indirectly delays more military.

There is a little bit of play after NC in rushing up to muskets/cannons before unis, but if you don't make good use of them you will feel it as you start going up against great war infantry while you slowly try and catch up in tech. It is certainly possible, but on a continents map I will nearly always beeline universities, because if you ever want to get out a good frigate force while maintaining tech pace, you need the science.
 
I don't see the point in nerfing it. There will always be optimal builds and suboptimal builds, you may as well nerf the monument and the granary while you're at it since you'll be behind if you don't get them every game too.
 
Aaron90495 said:
So I've been playing a lot of Immortal/Deity lately and I've come to this conclusion: the National College makes far too much of an impact on the game. NC almost doubles science, and on the higher levels, you're dead in the water if you don't get it ASAP.

Say, for example, you're playing on Deity. Built the NC by T70? You're in good shape. Put it off for a mere 15 or 20 turns and got it up around T85 or T90? Might as well restart, because chances are you've pretty much already lost.

Does anyone else think the NC needs to be nerfed, maybe to 33% instead of 50%? It just seems your hopes on the higher levels are solely dependent on how quickly you get it up, and it doesn't seem right that this one building is leagues more important than any other on Immortal/Deity.

Thoughts?
Click to expand...

No, I think NC is fine as is. You're supposed to build it fast.

The only issue the AI is having is that it doesn't know how to cash rush libraries so it can build NC faster. (Nor does the AI know how to cash rush colosseums for happiness or any other building.)
This affects the expansionist AIs much more than the wonder hog AIs.
 
NC is not the problem (and a 50% boost in one city is not "nearly doubling" science output). If you wanted to slow down science a bit, just shift one of the university specialist slots to research labs. That would parallel the other specialist buildings, where the last available building is the one with two slots (Museum, Factory and Stock Exchange). However, since labs come much later than the others, perhaps shifting the slot to public schools would be more appropriate (same era as the others). But, in any event, nerfing NC is not necessary.
 
For any high level difficulty, science beelining is always going to be key, regardless of nerfing.

It's just how the game is.

So while it would certainly make it even harder, it wouldn't change the important of it.
 
Though it would be nice to see the other National Wonders buffed to have as much of an impact on the game; imagine if you actually *wanted* to build barracks to get your Heroic Epic. :)
 
Aaron90495 said:
Say, for example, you're playing on Deity. Built the NC by T70? You're in good shape. Put it off for a mere 15 or 20 turns and got it up around T85 or T90? Might as well restart, because chances are you've pretty much already lost.
Click to expand...

Well I guess I need to go back and undo my wins where I built NC late. :blush:

When I warmonger(read: always) my NC often comes pretty late because I've been busy beating the crap out of someone with Composites but I still manage. Hell in the current Deity Challenge I'm doing pretty well even though I didn't get NC until obnoxiously late(like t115 or something). :p

I have somewhat disliked the way National College has almost been mandatory(unless you're ICSing I guess) but I think that says more about how insanely important beakers are in this game rather anything about NC itself.
 
Lets not get rid of it just yet. NC is a gambit, there are plenty of other things you can do to get beakers like make more cities or take more cities. A wider opening might achieve the same results as a NC rush. We need to look at beaker output circa turn 70 with a few cities plus NC opposed to more cities without NC on the same map. Happiness and population growth also contribute to science.
 
Bandobras Took said:
Though it would be nice to see the other National Wonders buffed to have as much of an impact on the game; imagine if you actually *wanted* to build barracks to get your Heroic Epic. :)
Click to expand...

That's already on my always build list in G&K but in mid game: Specifically after I can build Privateers & Frigates. Designated unit building city already having Barracks & Armory; a few of each built to get out the door at 30 XP, but a barracks construction spree is used (some built, others cash rushed). Same city immediately starts the HE; upon completion all copies of barracks (except for this city) scrapped to remove maintenance cost and more of these units built at 45 XP.
 
joncnunn said:
That's already on my always build list in G&K but in mid game: Specifically after I can build Privateers & Frigates. Designated unit building city already having Barracks & Armory; a few of each built to get out the door at 30 XP, but a barracks construction spree is used (some built, others cash rushed). Same city immediately starts the HE; upon completion all copies of barracks (except for this city) scrapped to remove maintenance cost and more of these units built at 45 XP.
Click to expand...

Interesting, I may have to try this out sometime. Heroic Epic buffing Frigates and Privateers, especially if as England, sounds just monstrous.
 
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