Bring Back Old Trait Combiantions in Next Expansion?

[Antilogic]

NO!!!

I'm against (largely) mythological leaders! I'd rather have Maria Theresa! She might have been real, but the best resources are epic poems? What's next, Arthur of Camelot?

As for the agricultural trait...they might be able to fudge one in. However, as I posted before, most of the major "elements" of the game have been covered (look at pages 1 and 2). Unless a new game system or feature is added, there isn't much more than can be done.

 

[Mad2rix]

Seriously...why don't we change Montezuma's traits to Aggressive/Charismatic? The Jag. Warrior is crap, so there is a tradeoff to having the end-all killer warmonger trait combo.

Then Montezuma's army will really have to attain the intent of conquest and murder rather than being enslaved by Spanish Conquistadors to force foward-tech civilizations to recognize him as the most apocalyptic ruler in the world.

Montezuma wasn't consider spiritual or religious in Civ 3 Conquests, so the same thing might happen in 2nd civ 4 x-pack.

 

[Sharpe's Civ]

Spiritual isn't about saving 7 turns in civics changes, although a late-game civics change for even one turn can be pretty rough. Spiritual is about changing civics at your leisure, and doing this often. Switch to beauracracy once you start building a wonder in the capital. Switch to vassalage to start ramping up the war effort. Switch between Organized Religion for building, Theocracy for military and Pacifism to squeeze out a Great Person faster. When you acquire new territory, switch to slavery to whip a theater or temple and then to serfdom to hook up new roads and resources, then back to slavery again, all possible within 15 turns. If you don't find yourself visiting the civics screen several, several, SEVERAL times a game, you're not playing Spiritual right.

I'm still pretty unconvinced by Spiritual. I don't want to continuously meddle with my civics for a simple reason: my civics are tailored towards my goal. So for example I'll go for the ones that give exp if I'm going for Conquest or Domination. For Cultural I'd go for things like Emancipation, Pacifism or Environmentalism. So if I change things for the sake of building a theatre in a recently captured city then it'll muck up what's going on in the rest of my nation. There is also the quesiton of Civic upkeep. Change to Theocracy then/or Vassalage for a military build up and my treasury might go into the red. I lower my research rate to compromise and hey presto! someone discovers Islam one turn before me.

Spiritual has its good points - it's just too weak in my opinion. It should make religious buildings churn out more culutre/happiness or something.

 

[Bast]

Maria Theresa would be a nice inclusion to the game. Since Firaxis feels obliged to add female leaders to the game, I would much rather see her than someone like Dido or Theodora.

Yes, let's petition Firaxis.

NO!!!

I'm against (largely) mythological leaders! I'd rather have Maria Theresa! She might have been real, but the best resources are epic poems? What's next, Arthur of Camelot?

Who are you talking about? Are you talking about Maria Theresa?

 

[Thedrin]

I'm still pretty unconvinced by Spiritual. I don't want to continuously meddle with my civics for a simple reason: my civics are tailored towards my goal. So for example I'll go for the ones that give exp if I'm going for Conquest or Domination. For Cultural I'd go for things like Emancipation, Pacifism or Environmentalism. So if I change things for the sake of building a theatre in a recently captured city then it'll muck up what's going on in the rest of my nation. There is also the quesiton of Civic upkeep. Change to Theocracy then/or Vassalage for a military build up and my treasury might go into the red. I lower my research rate to compromise and hey presto! someone discovers Islam one turn before me.

Spiritual has its good points - it's just too weak in my opinion. It should make religious buildings churn out more culutre/happiness or something.

Not everyone commits to a single strategy throughout a game. I enjoy the builder side of the game - creating large, rich, productive cities - but I rarely play a game where I don't go to war.

Even if you don't micromanage your civics it still provides up to seven cheap buildings in each of your cities.

 

[Antilogic]

Who are you talking about? Are you talking about Maria Theresa?

Actually, I was referring to Dido--I'd sooner have Maria Theresa, despite being only an average leader, over Dido.


Sharpe's Civ: The whole point of Spiritual is the quick change. Try to gear all your cities to produce units and stay in Vassalage and Theocracy for ~10 turns, then everyone switches to buildings and you switch to Organized Religion for ~15-20 turns. Then, you want to build a wonder in your capital, so you flip over to Bureaucracy while the wonder is being built and then switch back to Vassalage for troops afterwards. Say you just got into a modern war while running Free Speech. Switch to Nationhood for 5 turns to draft like crazy and then go back to Free Speech.

I'm just giving some obvious examples...I've done all of those in my games before. The thing is, you can use a variety of civics to make your goal. And also, just because you aren't actively trying to conquer the world does not mean that having extra experience on your troops isn't helpful. Using Spiritual to constantly maximize your empire's productivity takes a lot of planning, but it is well worth the cost. Spiritual, for that reason, is by far a good and balanced trait...

 

[Jarrod32]

I really like the spiritual trait, for all the reasons Antilogic just outlined...he illustrated the power of the spiritual trait better than I could have.

As for an agrarian trait...maybe just give the the Civil Service ability to chain farms from the beginning of the game, and perhaps the ability to irrigate desert to get a food (or for the purpose of chaining irrigation).

And maybe an extra food from land-based food resources (grain, meats, sugar, etc)...

 

[Antilogic]

That would be way too overpowered--I think everyone should have to wait for the chain-farming, and possibly having more than 1 bonus food could be quite imbalanced. If I had to build an Agricultural trait, I would do something along these lines:

Agricultural: +1 food in city squares, double production speed of granaries
Expansive: +3 health per city, double production speed of harbors

And then expansive needs another boost, because the double production speed of granaries was one of its crowning abilities. Playtesting would be required to tell if the Agricultural trait is over- or under- powered, but remember how strong it was in Civ3, and this is essentially the same effects.

 

[napoleonbee]

Actually, I was referring to Dido--I'd sooner have Maria Theresa, despite being only an average leader, over Dido.

You misread what I said when I introduced Dido to this thread: I said I'd much rather have Maria Theresa than Dido or Theodora. I agree with you, semi-(Joan of Arc)or-fully-(Dido)mythological leaders don't deserve a slot in Civ.

 

[Antilogic]

Oh, in that case, there isn't a problem! I agree.