Thoughts about balancing Republic and Feudalism

[player1 fanatic]

Republic:
Compared to old Republic,
New one is better if having less then 2 units per town (ok).
New one is also better if having less then 6 units per city (!!!).
New one is also better if having less then 8 units per metropolis (!!!).

Makes you not to go to Demoacracy even more then before.

Suggested fix.
Free units (town/city/metro): 1/2/2
Then new Republic would only be better when having less then 4 units per for cities and metropolis.
That would also makes Democracy more desirable in later part of the game.



Feudalism:
It has 5/2/1 support, some WW, and 3gp cost per unit.

Considering that no maintaince cost is removed after the betatesting, I think that unit cost could be swtched back to 1gp per unit without problem.

Because, Monachy would still be better when having mostly cities (higher upkeep, no WW),
Republic would still be better with trade bonus (if having not to many units).
And Despotism would still keep some small use, if in need to get rid of WW and still have great number of free units (4 units per town, no WW).

[Grille]

Originally posted by player1 fanatic
Republic:
Compared to old Republic,
New one is better if having less then 2 units per town (ok).
New one is also better if having less then 6 units per city (!!!).
New one is also better if having less then 8 units per metropolis (!!!).

Makes you not to go to Demoacracy even more then before.

Suggested fix.
Free units (town/city/metro): 1/2/2
Then new Republic would only be better when having less then 4 units per for cities and metropolis.
That would also makes Democracy more desirable in later part of the game.

Note that support is 2 per unit once unit number reaches the free support limit.
By the time you get the republic tech (being able to change), you should have at least one defender and one worker per town/city (=eats up all the free support from towns). And that's a pretty much low unit count in total in an avarage game. The additional support bonus from your cities (you would not have metros then) is easily used up in the late ancient. You might need even more than 1 worker per town/city to build all those mines on hills or to change exisitng tile improvements now that despotism penalty is gone. If free unit support was 1/2/2 you would probably have to run science at 0% on any level above monarch in a republic: your workers would eat up the free support alone (if not even paying some of them), then comes every military unit at 2gpt and lux tax. Just remember, improvements do also require *some* upkeep.
Ok, I have just played a bit C3C yet (especially epic games that reached the late industrial/modern age were erm... rare), but republic *seems* to be balanced, although the metro free support feels a bit high. But hospitals and steam come around about the same time, so you'd possibly pump out some new workers to get the rr done - which then eats up support again.
If you wage an offensive war, unit upkeep and eventually increased lux tax do have an impact IMHO.
Demo might now be worth it for the worker speed (especially for religious civs).

[player1 fanatic]

The thing is that new Republic is better then old one if having 6 or less units with cities (6+ pop).

6 units with old republic: 6gp
6 units with new republic: 6gp

5 units with old republic: 5gp
5 units with new republic: 4gp

4 units with old republic: 4gp
4 units with new republic: 2gp

3 units with old republic: 3gp
3 units with new republic: 0gp

2 units with old republic: 2gp
2 units with new republic: 0gp


You see.
And my experience is that peqacful civs stay at lower then 4 units per city total.

This actualy makes Democacy even worse choice then before.

[player1 fanatic]

With my suggested chance it would be:

The thing is that new Republic is better then old one if having 6 or less units with cities (6+ pop).


4 units with old republic: 4gp
4 units with new republic: 4gp

3 units with old republic: 3gp
3 units with new republic: 2gp

2 units with old republic: 2gp
2 units with new republic: 0gp

Which should still be pretty good.

Especaily considering that big cities have marketplaces and other bonuses which increase commerce bonus which Republic has even more. And peaceful civs do stay at 4 or less units per city.


P.S.
Rememebr the point of change to Reblic in C3C was actually to tone it down a little.
I don't see it toned down, when you get cities (only for towns).
It's even better then before.

[player1 fanatic]

Originally posted by Grille
Demo might now be worth it for the worker speed (especially for religious civs).

Until you RR most tiles.

Then Republic is better if having less then 6 units per city and less then 8 units per metropolis.

[Grille]

Well, as I said above, I have just a limited experience with C3C, especially with a republic full of metros. So far, my games had still a lot of towns while the core consisted of cities. And it was just four games/'starts' (all unfinished except for one) in total with different map sizes (2 just on tiny) on levels that I could beat very easily in vanilla.
Now with increased upgrade and upkeep cost (and the currently broken corruption calculation as unintended negative effect on economy?), I felt republic was a bit toned down. I was often regarded as weak civ compared to the ai at some point. On a large map game, I had possibly just 1.5 military units per town/city and quite a lot of workers (was non-ind & having a lot of jungle/marsh, maybe I had like more than 2 workers per town/city), still feeling that I need more workers.
Maybe I could make comparably more money in total being such a peaceful civ at some point, but the usual Horseman->Knight mass-upgrade or similar was nearly impossible. At least it felt harder to build up a vanilla-like sized decent invasion force for a war in the early/middle medieval. Although I had Leo's in that game, I could only upgrade defenders at the front lines (and defenders for invasion forces) before going to war. With such a weak military, I received quite a lot tribute demandings; that changed once my military was built up (advisor says avarage or strong military), but then, I was actually paying quite a lot of support. You may be right that peaceful civs could get away easy with the new rebuplic, but the desaster starts when your neighbour decides that you're not a peaceful civ anymore (which is not unlikely when you're too weak).
I may change my mind (corruption patch, actually having metros and/or more cities), but until now, I don't think republic has become better than it was in vanilla. That is, if I changed to republic ASAP as I used to.

[alexman]

Originally posted by player1 fanatic
Suggested fix.
Free units (town/city/metro): 1/2/2
Then new Republic would only be better when having less then 4 units per for cities and metropolis.

In my experience, on most maps, 4 units per city is more than enough to continue my warmongering at will, especially if most of my workers are slaves.

On the other hand, if you remove all free unit support per city, and add a flat free unit support of 20-30 units, the Republic will be very good for small empires (for 10-15 cities it would be the same as the 2 per city you suggest), but it would start getting worse than Democracy if you have more than 40-60 units.

Feudalism:
It has 5/2/1 support, some WW, and 3gp cost per unit.

Considering that no maintaince cost is removed after the betatesting, I think that unit cost could be swtched back to 1gp per unit without problem.

I agree. If not 1g, at least 2g per unit support.

[player1 fanatic]

Originally posted by alexman
On the other hand, if you remove all free unit support per city, and add a flat free unit support of 20-30 units, the Republic will be very good for small empires (for 10-15 cities it would be the same as the 2 per city you suggest), but it would start getting worse than Democracy if you have more than 40-60 units.

I don't like this idea, since it makes republic benefits too much map dependent.

It becomes great at small maps and bad at huge maps.

[alexman]

That wouldn't be the first thing that depends on map size.

And I don't even think it's that strong of a dependence on map size. Does anyone in Republic have fewer than 10-15 cities on any size map? Map size doesn't matter, until you have run out of room to expand. And 40-60 units in the late game is a small number, even on tiny maps (remember to count ships, airplanes, artillery, workers, defenders...)

[jamesjkirk]

Maybe for Republic take a leaf from the Feudalism stats, and have higher or as high free units in a city than in a metropolis, this would make sense since the govt would be well suited to medium sized civs/cities

[Intruder13]

Though I have not tried the new Republic govt, I think that its stats seem reasonable. I do think that Feudalism should be improved because it comes later than Monarchy and it is obviously inferior unless your continent is a jungle. I would like Feudalism to get back its free improvements but not at the cost of AI using the govt exclusively. I think that Feudalism at least needs unit support lessened if there is no workaround for this problem.