Frosty_AUT
Chieftain
- Joined
- Oct 2, 2010
- Messages
- 85
Courthouses
As we know, Courthouses in their current incarnation are a quite a pain with their long buildtime, their ridiculous upkeep (5G, IIRC) and the issue that for whatever reason you can't rushbuy them. It makes puppeting or simply razing a conquered city just that much more attractive than annexing it, leaving whole parts of the map full of puppeted cities or even completely empty. I guess CHs purpose simply IS to discourage players from going on conquest sprees and creating huge empires, but the game mechanic itself is simply annoying.
Therefore I propose a radical re-design of Courthouses:
With this, CHs in Civ 5 would basically serve a similar purpose as Civ 4's (countering upkeep), with the added benefit of slowly (?) removing the unhappiness penalty from annexed cities.
Puppet states
Puppet states are one of those concepts that just like CH's are sloppily implemented. Okay, the purpose of puppeting is that you now own the city and get all of its output (gold, culture, science) without any of the drawbacks (happiness penalty, increase in Social Policy cost) of annexing it. The only disadvantage of a puppet state is that you can't assign their citizens and that you can't control their production. And there lies to problem, because they'll eventually turn into money sinks from building every kind of building that you don't need. Yeah.
My suggestions:
First of all, the focus on wealth and the reduced growth/culture/research are supposed to represent that your government doesn't really care about the puppet state other than how much money it can squeeze out of it. That's just asking to have a negative effect on the city's economy.
Other than that, these proposed changes aim towards removing the annoyance of puppet states constructing all the maintenance-intensive buildings while still keeping them more of a temporary solution so that you'll eventually want to annex them - not because they begin putting a strain on your economy but because you want to use their full potential output. Of course, keeping them as puppet states could still be a better solution if you're going cultural or don't want to suffer from the unhappiness penalty which will take a CH some time to remove.
Any opinions, ideas, questions?
As we know, Courthouses in their current incarnation are a quite a pain with their long buildtime, their ridiculous upkeep (5G, IIRC) and the issue that for whatever reason you can't rushbuy them. It makes puppeting or simply razing a conquered city just that much more attractive than annexing it, leaving whole parts of the map full of puppeted cities or even completely empty. I guess CHs purpose simply IS to discourage players from going on conquest sprees and creating huge empires, but the game mechanic itself is simply annoying.
Therefore I propose a radical re-design of Courthouses:
- Buildtime reduced and players allowed to rushbuy them
- CHs no longer instantly remove the unhappiness penalty but degrade it over a couple of turns
- CHs cost no upkeep and reduce building maintenance in the city (kinda like CHs in Civ 4)
- CHs can be built in any city, not just annexed ones (the trick is that they will reduce your maintenance but could also potentially help your enemy should he annex the city, provided the CH isn't destroyed in battle)
With this, CHs in Civ 5 would basically serve a similar purpose as Civ 4's (countering upkeep), with the added benefit of slowly (?) removing the unhappiness penalty from annexed cities.
Puppet states
Puppet states are one of those concepts that just like CH's are sloppily implemented. Okay, the purpose of puppeting is that you now own the city and get all of its output (gold, culture, science) without any of the drawbacks (happiness penalty, increase in Social Policy cost) of annexing it. The only disadvantage of a puppet state is that you can't assign their citizens and that you can't control their production. And there lies to problem, because they'll eventually turn into money sinks from building every kind of building that you don't need. Yeah.
My suggestions:
- Puppet states always produce wealth
- Growth rate, culture and research of puppet states are halved
- MAYBE allow players to rushbuy buildings in a puppet state (for example, you could rushbuy a CH beforehand if you're planning to annex the city eventually)
First of all, the focus on wealth and the reduced growth/culture/research are supposed to represent that your government doesn't really care about the puppet state other than how much money it can squeeze out of it. That's just asking to have a negative effect on the city's economy.
Other than that, these proposed changes aim towards removing the annoyance of puppet states constructing all the maintenance-intensive buildings while still keeping them more of a temporary solution so that you'll eventually want to annex them - not because they begin putting a strain on your economy but because you want to use their full potential output. Of course, keeping them as puppet states could still be a better solution if you're going cultural or don't want to suffer from the unhappiness penalty which will take a CH some time to remove.
Any opinions, ideas, questions?
