I was looking at the various improvements that we have in AND and I noticed that the yields from improvements vary quite wildly, and that there are a lot more bonuses than in regular BTS. I think it would be good to maybe prune down some of these bonuses, especially to make it so that certain improvements aren't overly superior to others. I'm specifically looking at yields here, and I am also limiting this to the 23 improvements that can be built without needing a resource. There are a total of 48 improvements in the Civilopedia, but 7 are aquatic, 3 are defensive, 5 can't be built normally (two City Ruins, Depleted Mine, Tribal Village, and Machu Picchu), and 10 can only be built on resources. I think we can look at the resource-tapping improvements later. I'm also not concerned with bonuses from traits or civics; I think balancing those bonuses falls under balancing the trait/civic, not the improvement.
I do not want to remove any improvements. Some time ago, we consolidated the Orchard improvement from Apple Orchard and Olive Orchard. When we did this, if I remember correctly, it broke saved games. I don't want to break games, so I think we can leave all existing improvements in place.
I do have two theory questions that I'd like to get some feedback on before looking at particular improvements. I want to be able to judge improvements in a framework and not just try to compare them as individual items.
First question: Should the different yields be considered equal? My current thought is that food and production should be considered equal, but not commerce. Going back to BTS, a Mine is worth +3 production (+2 base, +1 from Railroad) and a Workshop is worth +3 production (+1 base, +1 from Guilds, +1 from Chemistry)/-1 food. A Farm is worth +2 food (+1 from Irrigation, +1 from Biology), which is worth 1 Citizen, but since AND citizens consume 3 food each, we should treat a BTS farm as +3 food, which is an equal bonus to the Mine and Workshop. A BTS Town is worth +5 commerce (+4 base, +1 from Printing Press). This says to me that a +1 commerce is worth about 50-60% of +1 food or +1 hammer. Also in regular BTS, a Windmill gives +1 food/+1 production/+2 commerce and a Watermill gives +2 production/+2 commerce. Both of these suggest that if the best non-commerce yield is +3 total, +2 commerce is only worth +1 of the either two. So I think 50% is the right conversion factor.
Second question: What should be the maximum bonus from an improvement? There are a group of improvements that I consider the "baseline": Farm, Cottage, Mine, and Workshop (along with all their upgrades). These four improvements, fully upgraded and with all technology bonuses, top out at around +7 total yield without weighting. With weighting, all except Town drop to about +6; Town gets a significant downgrade and I think it could be beefed up a little. There are some improvements that don't show up until the very late game (like Geothermal Factory). I think these can qualify to be better than the baseline. However, improvements that do show up at the same time as these baseline improvements shouldn't be better. As an example, Watermill currently gets all the way up to +12 total yield. I don't think that is a good thing.
Let me know what you think and then I will move onto specific improvements.
I do not want to remove any improvements. Some time ago, we consolidated the Orchard improvement from Apple Orchard and Olive Orchard. When we did this, if I remember correctly, it broke saved games. I don't want to break games, so I think we can leave all existing improvements in place.
I do have two theory questions that I'd like to get some feedback on before looking at particular improvements. I want to be able to judge improvements in a framework and not just try to compare them as individual items.
First question: Should the different yields be considered equal? My current thought is that food and production should be considered equal, but not commerce. Going back to BTS, a Mine is worth +3 production (+2 base, +1 from Railroad) and a Workshop is worth +3 production (+1 base, +1 from Guilds, +1 from Chemistry)/-1 food. A Farm is worth +2 food (+1 from Irrigation, +1 from Biology), which is worth 1 Citizen, but since AND citizens consume 3 food each, we should treat a BTS farm as +3 food, which is an equal bonus to the Mine and Workshop. A BTS Town is worth +5 commerce (+4 base, +1 from Printing Press). This says to me that a +1 commerce is worth about 50-60% of +1 food or +1 hammer. Also in regular BTS, a Windmill gives +1 food/+1 production/+2 commerce and a Watermill gives +2 production/+2 commerce. Both of these suggest that if the best non-commerce yield is +3 total, +2 commerce is only worth +1 of the either two. So I think 50% is the right conversion factor.
Second question: What should be the maximum bonus from an improvement? There are a group of improvements that I consider the "baseline": Farm, Cottage, Mine, and Workshop (along with all their upgrades). These four improvements, fully upgraded and with all technology bonuses, top out at around +7 total yield without weighting. With weighting, all except Town drop to about +6; Town gets a significant downgrade and I think it could be beefed up a little. There are some improvements that don't show up until the very late game (like Geothermal Factory). I think these can qualify to be better than the baseline. However, improvements that do show up at the same time as these baseline improvements shouldn't be better. As an example, Watermill currently gets all the way up to +12 total yield. I don't think that is a good thing.
Let me know what you think and then I will move onto specific improvements.