Austria. Broken on higher difficulties? Or just plain broken?

[Buccaneer]

I understand about Austria's city-states, I was speaking in generality since they were originally city-states. The 'more work' means that you have more cities to puppet/raze/annex. Try attacking Austria with your superior military.

 

[Veneke]

I understand about Austria's city-states, I was speaking in generality since they were originally city-states. The 'more work' means that you have more cities to puppet/raze/annex. Try attacking Austria with your superior military.

I'm not following your argument. Yes, you could simply snipe their capital for a Domination Victory but no one, I think, is suggesting that this isn't possible. The problem ultimately persists with your proposed solution. Austria's UA removes City States from the game and if there's no way to liberate them it dramatically alters one of the victory conditions. It closes down an approach to the game for no good reason. If that doesn't constitute a broken UA I'm not sure what would.

 

[Motrok]

I understand about Austria's city-states, I was speaking in generality since they were originally city-states. The 'more work' means that you have more cities to puppet/raze/annex. Try attacking Austria with your superior military.

Suuperior military? Did you know that when she marries she also takes the army of the city states? I'm sure you are familiar with how many military units they usually make. She marries twice, she gets 10+ state-of-the-art tech units. I am not saying it is impossible, but it's not like you go "oh, she went full marriage, she must have no units". Quite the opposite really.

 

[Infantry#14]

Simple solution: exclude Austria in your games?

Or maybe nerf the UA such that in order to marry CS, she must have borders touching the CS's borders. This way, she can only buy off neighbors, but not CS from other continents.

 

[Veneke]

Simple solution: exclude Austria in your games?

Or maybe nerf the UA such that in order to marry CS, she must have borders touching the CS's borders. This way, she can only buy off neighbors, but not CS from other continents.

Excluding a Civ is more time-consuming than it sounds - you either have to mess around with the base game files, make a mod or manually select the Civs you want at start-up. Far from impossible and it is an easy solution but it shouldn't have to be one.

Even if you kept it to neighbours it wouldn't fix the problem. You'd still be cutting down on a victory condition and all you'd need to do would be to settle a small city nearby and then purchase your city state.

 

[Buccaneer]

My point is simply if you can't beat Austria by one condition, then try to beat them with another. I think the trap some fall into is that they decide what they want to do and not react to changing or situational game/geopolitical conditions. I just wish there were more opponents like Austria, which mean you have to get out to explore (always a good thing anyways) and know what you are facing. Then changing your priorities if you run into Austria. You know how overpowered you are when you play as Mongols, Arabia or X? Now we have one opponent (and maybe Greece) that actually plays similar as you. However, I do think they will nerf Austria unfortunately because some people feel the higher difficulties should not be difficult or cause those to play at a lower level. My hope is that they make all opponents play like Austria on Immortal+ so most of us have to play at Prince. But imagine the outcry if that happens!

 

[Veneke]

My point is simply if you can't beat Austria by one condition, then try to beat them with another. I think the trap some fall into is that they decide what they want to do and not react to changing or situational game/geopolitical conditions. I just wish there were more opponents like Austria, which mean you have to get out to explore (always a good thing anyways) and know what you are facing. Then changing your priorities if you run into Austria. You know how overpowered you are when you play as Mongols, Arabia or X? Now we have one opponent (and maybe Greece) that actually plays similar as you. However, I do think they will nerf Austria unfortunately because some people feel the higher difficulties should not be difficult or cause those to play at a lower level. My hope is that they make all opponents play like Austria on Immortal+ so most of us have to play at Prince. But imagine the outcry if that happens!

The problem is not that Austria's ability is powerful, nor that the AI knows how to use it, the problem is that it rules out a particular path. It is possible, likely on the higher difficulties, that there will be no City States left if Austria is in play by the mid to late game. Worse, it is impossible to combat this inevitable development or reverse it. If the inclusion of 1 Civ fundamentally alters the entire game in a way that no other Civ does, then there is something wrong with that Civ.

I'd love if all the AIs were as competent with their UAs as Austria but that isn't the point. The problem is not AI competence, nor even it's overpowered nature. The problem is that it severely alters the flow of the game in a way that other Civs do not.

 

[Buccaneer]

The problem is not that Austria's ability is powerful, nor that the AI knows how to use it, the problem is that it rules out a particular path. It is possible, likely on the higher difficulties, that there will be no City States left if Austria is in play by the mid to late game. Worse, it is impossible to combat this inevitable development or reverse it. If the inclusion of 1 Civ fundamentally alters the entire game in a way that no other Civ does, then there is something wrong with that Civ.

I'd love if all the AIs were as competent with their UAs as Austria but that isn't the point. The problem is not AI competence, nor even it's overpowered nature. The problem is that it severely alters the flow of the game in a way that other Civs do not.

I would go along with most of that except the last sentence. I would think (and love to see) a runaway conquering civ would alter a particular game, making it difficult if not impossible for you to win in that manner. But that probably does not happen nearly as much as Austria's manner. Just like we have to make it a (high) priority to take out Greece if they are next to us or to play more defensively for a little while if the Huns are next to us, we have to make it a priority to prevent Austria from doing their thing and they can be beat (which sounds more challenging to me then leaving them alone and then quitting). But they will patch it so that we can liberate and thus, make them another mediocre civ. Unless there is a more clever change.

 

[Veneke]

I would go along with most of that except the last sentence. I would think (and love to see) a runaway conquering civ would alter a particular game, making it difficult if not impossible for you to win in that manner. But that probably does not happen nearly as much as Austria's manner. Just like we have to make it a (high) priority to take out Greece if they are next to us or to play more defensively for a little while if the Huns are next to us, we have to make it a priority to prevent Austria from doing their thing and they can be beat (which sounds more challenging to me then leaving them alone and then quitting). But they will patch it so that we can liberate and thus, make them another mediocre civ. Unless there is a more clever change.

Not only is a runaway Civ less likely but that isn't restricted to a single Civ, unlike Austria's UA.

I'm rather curious to see how you would combat Austria's UA. As far as I'm aware there are only two options - kill them quickly or keep them broke. Neither are viable unless you can reach Austria, while the latter is impossible on the higher difficulties and the former requires the geography to be just right.

I think we'll just have to agree to disagree on the power of Austria's UA if they patch in a liberate option.

 

[Buccaneer]

Fair enough.

 

[Infantry#14]

Even if you kept it to neighbours it wouldn't fix the problem. You'd still be cutting down on a victory condition and all you'd need to do would be to settle a small city nearby and then purchase your city state.

However, it is not likely for austria to buy up all CS. There will be CS that are completely surrounded by other civ by the way the map is setup. The human or ai can actively thwart austria's UA by not allowing borders touching between austria and CS and thus limit its UA power. In some instances, Austria may not border a single CS and must resolve to war to capture land next to a CS in order to marry them.

Using this method, I can envision Austria marry 2-4 CS in each game instead of all of them. Obviously humans can utilize the power more intelligently, but we are limited by happiness and resouce constraints.

 

[Veneke]

However, it is not likely for austria to buy up all CS. There will be CS that are completely surrounded by other civ by the way the map is setup. The human or ai can actively thwart austria's UA by not allowing borders touching between austria and CS and thus limit its UA power. In some instances, Austria may not border a single CS and must resolve to war to capture land next to a CS in order to marry them.

Using this method, I can envision Austria marry 2-4 CS in each game instead of all of them. Obviously humans can utilize the power more intelligently, but we are limited by happiness and resouce constraints.

Fair points alright. It would certainly also be an improvement - and more in keeping with the concept behind it too.

 

[turkeypotpie]

So basically you guys think any civ that becomes a runaway is broken and force you to quit because you cannot win easily or by the way you want to??? We need to have more civs use their gold to buy city-states, units, etc. instead of just hording it. We need more civs to be aggressive in taking out opponents including the human player (I'm look at you, Mongols). If you come across Austria later in the game, all that means is you have to build a bigger armed forces.

Any civ that can consistently and largely runaway is broken. Austria is the only one (afaik) who can.

Runaways do often happen in games. That's normal. See the difference?

 

[qemist]

Austria's UA removes City States from the game and if there's no way to liberate them it dramatically alters one of the victory conditions.

I'm not sure about broken but it's certainly ironic that players aren't allowed to raze city states because it would alter one of the victory conditions but as Austria they can effectively make them cease to exist.

 

[PhilBowles]

I'm not sure about broken but it's certainly ironic that players aren't allowed to raze city states because it would alter one of the victory conditions but as Austria they can effectively make them cease to exist.

Conquering a CS also now removes its vote post-G&K - although it can be reinstated through liberation. So Austria doesn't do anything much to affect the new diplo victory condition that other civs don't - the "you can't raze city-states" is just a holdover from vanilla, it's no longer relevant to the VC.

 

[elprofesor]

I'm not sure about broken but it's certainly ironic that players aren't allowed to raze city states because it would alter one of the victory conditions but as Austria they can effectively make them cease to exist.

Very good point, actually.

 

[chazzycat]

Conquering a CS also now removes its vote post-G&K - although it can be reinstated through liberation. So Austria doesn't do anything much to affect the new diplo victory condition that other civs don't - the "you can't raze city-states" is just a holdover from vanilla, it's no longer relevant to the VC.

Actually they do have a unique effect - they are usually in danger of taking so many city states that diplo victory becomes impossible for the player. It puts a twist on diplo games for sure. I like it though.

 

[cman2010]

I think the best solution is to make it where you can liberate the city states, also maybe and some kind of cool down like someone suggeste. I have only played 3 games of gods and kings I had austria in one game and while she did well it was far from a runaway civ.

 

[cman2010]

Simple solution: exclude Austria in your games?

Or maybe nerf the UA such that in order to marry CS, she must have borders touching the CS's borders. This way, she can only buy off neighbors, but not CS from other continents.

A fair amount of us like to play with random civs so this realy is not an option.

 

[steveg700]

I'd like Austria's UA to have a success/failure chance based on how much influence they currently have (a la espionage coups over CS's).

I'd also like demanding tribute to work this way as well, with success being determined by the strength of forces present in the area, and failure resulting in an angry CS (maybe even war).