Germany UA [Poll - Multi vote]

[BiteInTheMark]

A lot of talk was done about Germanys UA. Not only in the leader balance thread, but also on the main page with a poll created by pineappledan.

His poll have clearly shown, most people would like to see a change in Germanys UA. And I think that way too, but I am not convinced, that Germany should stay as a diplomacy civilization, cause it's not really the first thing most people will think from Germany.

In my opinion, it's not only the UA, which should change but also the UB. First, it's really strange, that a medieval era building connected to money should be responsible for the big industry power Germany get in the late industrial age. Second, locking the power of Germany behind connections with City-States is also weird. I understand the connection to the HRE, but this wasn't the phase were Germany excelled at production, it was the complete opposite, cause a lot of duties were taken from merchants which was denying greater economical power. The power spike happened, after the unification of Germany, not in the HRE.

I come to the point.
Here are some suggestions for other UA and also a rework of the Hanse building. Keep in mind, that my plan is to weaken the Hanse but make the UA stronger. If you think, the "new" Hanse doesn't fit, still think about the UA separately with an otherwise designed, but weaker Hanse, and then vote.

Any shown numbers are only suggestions and not set in stone. Please decide dependent of mechanic.

Spoiler Hanse - UB :

Hanse - UB
+2 //
Gain +1 for every 3 different luxuries you control
Trade routes to City-States from this city creates one copy of all improved luxuries of the target city

Historical context:
The Hanse was a north German organization, which formed first under the hand of mighty merchants in the 11th century, then switched more to a economical alliance between over 100 cities. This alliance expanded it's economical and to some degree political influence over Central and North Europe, also to the baltic region and peaked in the 14th century. A lot of money was earned by trade and credits, luxuries imported and exported and sometimes military actions done against enemies, which treat the free trade in that region.

Spoiler Welthauptstadt Germania :

Welthauptstadt Germania - Great Person / GPTI
Gain +1 in your capital for Great Merchants/Engineers/Scientists, scaling with era
Gain always 50% of the instant option yields, whenever you use such a GP for constructing a GPTI
10% of // and 3% of / of your capital is split equally to all non-capital/non-puppet cities, scaling with era

Historical context:
After Friedrich Wilhelm take leadership of the region around Berlin, he made city to his major residency and increased the population of Berlin from 6000 in 1648 to 57000 in only 60 years. The population increased even more and Berlin was in the 1920s one of the biggest cities in the world with 4 million inhabitants. After Germanys unification, the city was a center of culture and science, every third person receiving the Nobel Prize was a German. After Hitler take control, he wanted to make Berlin to a world capitol (Welthauptstadt) called Germania, with plenty of gigantic construction projects which should consolidate Germany as one of the leading nations of earth.

Spoiler Productivity and Efficiency :

Productivity and Efficiency - industrial/semi militaristic
Gaining a new (Era/General/City/Wonder) gives you (4/3/1/1) strategic ressources (SR), which are split equally to all currently available SR, (except uranium)
Gain +4 and +1 in capital for every 8 SR and +1 / to each non-capital city for every 12 SR, passing to a new era reduce the necessary amount by 1

Historical context:
The Germans are well known for their productiveness and efficiency. Industrial processes are optimized in any way to increase the output and minimize the necessary ressources and work time. Even beeing smaller in size and population than others, with less access to natural ressources, the export of that nation was very long time leading in the world. Shortages in Aluminium to construct aircrafts were compensated by creativly designed wooden aircrafts and the shortage in oil was lowered by simply transforming the abundant coal into it. If problems appeared, science and creativity were used to solve it.

Spoiler Lightning Warfare :

Lightning Warfare - Militaristic
For every turn in peace, you gain +1% combat strength for all units, up to +15%. At war, you lose 1% of this modifier every 2 turns, maximum and minimum increased by 2% for every vasall
If your status change from peace to war, all your trade units gain immunity for 2 turns, scaling with era and number of vasalls
+10% attack strength for siege units

Historical context
The warriors of the germanic tribes were feared but also respected for their skill in combat. One of the earliest examples for their superior abilities was in the battle of the Teutoburger forest, where fast surprise attacks and close combat supremacy lead to the complete destruction of a whole leading nations army. They anticipate in crusades, fought a whole lifetime against each other in the 30 year war and overthrow later on Napoleon with others.
Their ability to attack fast and hard lead to victories against Denmark, Austria and France, ending with Germanys unification. The Third Reich overrun in only some month several nations in Europe with the help of superior tactics and won battles even outnumbered and outgunned against the Russians.

Spoiler Holy Roman Empire :

Holy Roman EmpireEmpire - Pupppets
All cities founded after your capital are puppets, with -20% penalty. You can't increase the number of annexed cities above 2 (scaling with era)
Courthouses are always constructable in a quarter of time. Courthouse and palace get +2 // and +3% Growth to all cities.
Each puppet add +2 to every palace/Courthouse, scaling with era

Historical context:
Dozens of German cultures were spread all over Central Europe. Each of these cultures was further divided into many independent tribes, principalities, and kingdoms. The German tribes grew together only slowly; at first they only became a loose confederation in the Holy Roman Empire. In this alliance, protected from outside, trade, culture and science could flourish. Individual nations could become stronger and later take the lead. When the national feeling finally got the upper hand in the 19th century, the stage was created for the union of one of the most powerful nations in the world at that time.

Spoiler Realpolitik (new) :

Realpolitik - Diplomacy and City-States
Gain +1 / from friendly CS and +2 / from allied CS, scaling with era
+1 influence with a City-State for every 2 military units not farther away than 2 tiles of it
Gain an embassy and open borders with civs containing your diplomat, vote trading capacity increased by 1

Historical context
"Realpolitik" is a way how to lead a country. It goes away from the conservative way to rule based on religious, cultural or traditional aspects and instead use a pragmatical view and only decide by objective targets. The word already come to existence in the mid of the 19th century, but later Otto von Bismarck was the major example how diplomacy and a very objective view can lead to great results. Nobody thought, that within 10 years, the since centuries divided small german nations could unite under one banner and form one of the most powerful nations in the world. Bismarcks not only cleared the path to the unification, he also secured the position of Germany with alliances and treaties, sometimes with diplomatic skill, sometimes with power projection.

Spoiler Workbench of the world :

Workbench of the world - Food/Industry
+1% , +3% and -2% building maintenance for every 3 in a city, WLTKD and Golden Ages increase the effect by 50% (100% if both)
External Trade routes give yields like you have 1 step higher influence over the target city (foreign civilizations and City-States)

Historical context:
Already before the unification of the German Empire, a customs union established a strong economical base in the Holy Roman Empire. The combined economical power of all german nations was already high, but with the unification and the industrial revolution in its full speed, the agrarian and industrial output exploded and surpassed any other nation. The unification and the short time after it could be called a golden age, we're the innovations and success of the middle class created fast technological advantages and big companies

Spoiler Pineappledans new Realpolitik :

UA - Realpolitik
+3 Science per Friendly City-State and +3 Culture per Allied City-State, scaling with Era. Gain Science and Culture, scaling with Era, and Influence with all City-States for each World Congress Resolution you help pass or defeat

https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/germany-changes-poll.672049/

Spoiler Pineappledans Blood and Iron :

UA: Blood and Iron (pineappledan)
+3 Culture in the Capital for each City-State Ally and +3Science for each Friend, scaling with Era. Military units gifted to City-States generate 1 Influence for Germany each turn

• Blood and Iron is modded and playable in this mod
• Historical Context: The name of this UA comes from one of the most famous speeches by Bismarck, where he is famously quoted to say that Prussian dominance of an emerging German state would be decided by its military strength. For the minor civ unit gift mechanic, solve the German Question by binding the smaller states to you with your military production. Reaching further back, German history is replete with renowned mercenary organizations which fought on all sides of wars, sometimes on both sides of the same wars. Reaching even further back, the unit gifting evokes the proto-Germanic honor culture of lords and their retainers. The Druhtiz is the oath-bound retinue of a thane, it survives as the Latin term comitatus, and has analogies in Slavonic (druzhina), Gallic (Ambaxtoi), Scandinavian (Hird/Huskarl) and Frankish (Antrustion) cultures.
  
• The direct quote (in English)
  • "The position of Prussia in Germany will not be determined by its liberalism but by its power [...] Prussia must concentrate its strength and hold it for the favourable moment, which has already come and gone several times. Since the treaties of Vienna, our frontiers have been ill-designed for a healthy body politic. Not through speeches and majority decisions will the great questions of the day be decided—that was the great mistake of 1848 and 1849—but by iron and blood"

 

[ridjack]

Purely from a gameplay perspective, I love the Welthauptstadt. Reminds me of a modded Franklin Roosevelt civ I like quite a lot.

 

[pineappledan]

If you could alter your OP, there is another Germany change proposal you missed that were discussed by other people:

UA: Blood and Iron (pineappledan)
+3 Culture in the Capital for each City-State Ally and +3Science for each Friend, scaling with Era. Military units gifted to City-States generate 1 Influence for Germany each turn

• Blood and Iron is modded and playable in this mod
• Historical Context: The name of this UA comes from one of the most famous speeches by Bismarck, where he is famously quoted to say that Prussian dominance of an emerging German state would be decided by its military strength. For the minor civ unit gift mechanic, solve the German Question by binding the smaller states to you with your military production. Reaching further back, German history is replete with renowned mercenary organizations which fought on all sides of wars, sometimes on both sides of the same wars. Reaching even further back, the unit gifting evokes the proto-Germanic honor culture of lords and their retainers. The Druhtiz is the oath-bound retinue of a thane, it survives as the Latin term comitatus, and has analogies in Slavonic (druzhina), Gallic (Ambaxtoi), Scandinavian (Hird/Huskarl) and Frankish (Antrustion) cultures.
  
• The direct quote (in English)
  • "The position of Prussia in Germany will not be determined by its liberalism but by its power [...] Prussia must concentrate its strength and hold it for the favourable moment, which has already come and gone several times. Since the treaties of Vienna, our frontiers have been ill-designed for a healthy body politic. Not through speeches and majority decisions will the great questions of the day be decided—that was the great mistake of 1848 and 1849—but by iron and blood"

 

[KlHannibal2]

I want blood and iron!

 

[pineappledan]

Overall comment: I like that Germany is a diplomatic civ. We have fewer diplo-focused civs than any other type. Likewise, I am very opposed to making them another Domination civ, because that's the type we already have the most of.

Specific comments:

• Hanse change: This proposal is just flatly worse than what we already have; it makes the Hanse a less effective and blander version of the Portuguese Feitoria.
• Welthauptstadt Germania: Firstly, I don't like Nazi stuff; We have an entire ideology tree of Nazi stuff already. Secondly, as far as changing your gameplay style, this just means you always build the GPTI until Information instead of Industrial. That's the sum of how Welthauptstadt Germania changes up the script. It's pretty similar to the modded Israel and FDR modded civs in that respect, but less interesting than either.
  
• Productivity and Efficiency: I appreciate the idea of having more GGeneral Birth and Wonder construction triggers in the game. However, this is an overly-complicated mess. It wouldn't even fit in the UA description. It has 3 different scaling methods and 4 different triggers, and all to do something pretty passive.
• Lightning Warfare: The name is already taken, it's a pure warmonger bonus (boo!), and it's more Nazi crap. Your ability to use your UA would have very little to do with you, since other civs DoW you all the time. It would be almost impossible to build charges in the mid or late game. All-in-all, it's just a worse, more complicated version of Persia that you have less control over.
• Holy Roman Empire: I already hate playing Venice, so I don't see the point of even discussing this.
• Realpolitik (new) - 2 new proposals here: the unit nearby influence and the diplomats giving embassy/open borders
  • Unit Nearby Influence - This sucks. In order to counter decay and build influence up to friendship, I need to sit 4 units within 2 tiles of a city for 30+ turns, assuming they don't lose me friendship for trespassing. That's a waste of time, maintenance, and units. I should be moving those same units around and tribute several CS for several times the yields I would get for friendship. This is more boring and less rewarding than doing the thing that any other civ can do already.
  • Diplomats give Embassy and open borders: I have no issue with this bonus other than it's just really weak and situational. If you have normal relations with a civ, this might save you 3-5 GPT, if you even wanted open borders with them anyways. If you are at war, you can move through their territory anyways. Diplomats unlock later than Open Border Agreements, and it's too late to help me spread my religion. The only real utility I see is being able to steal some archeology sites from civs that don't like you, but not enough to declare war on you. Combined with the % tourism bonus, this seems to be flipping Germany to a CV, but in a way that is exceedingly limp, situational, and obtuse.
• Workbench of the World: This is my favorite of your proposals, except for the name. Wasn't Britain the "Workshop of the World"? It would be nice to have another tall civ, a civ that is rewarded for growing large cities besides just India. Not sure if Germany is the best fit for that, but whatever. regardless of anything else, I also like the trade route bonus idea. It pairs well with the existing Hanse bonus; I think that's a really cool suggestion. The Trade bonus is definitely the better part of the design to me.
  
• Realpolitik (pineappledan): My original proposal. Austria gives you more votes, while Germany makes voting more rewarding was the basis for this. I like how this rewards you for voting differently than how you normally would: vote based on what you think is most likely to win instead of just voting for what you want. If I have 1 misgiving about this proposal, it's how much it would reward players for save-scumming.
• Blood and Iron: My personal vote. It will require reworking the 4UC, because it would be way too good with all the cheap/free early units Germany gets with the existing Ulfhedinn UU2, but I think it ties into several different temporally distant aspects of Germany's history, and offers a very different playstyle for a diplomatic civ.

 

[BiteInTheMark]

Hanse change: This proposal is just flatly worse than what we already have; it makes the Hanse a less effective and blander version of the Portuguese Feitoria.

We both know, that the Hanse is the core quality of current Germany. Everybody wants this production bonus, but without the usage of statecraft, you would need to kinda sacrifice your trade routes to trigger your core ability. Its boring to be every time forced to pick statecraft. On top, statecraft or small City-States trade not really have that much to do with big industry output.

I want to break that up. The building enables you to get happiness, trigger WLTKD or maybe even secure a monopoly. But none of this is really essential (except the WLTKD for "Workbench of the world"). If you can buy all luxuries you need and didn't need another monopoly, you are not punished for not using that ability.
The UB not already says you, which path you have to go.

Welthauptstadt Germania: Firstly, I don't like Nazi stuff; We have an entire ideology tree of Nazi stuff already........ It's pretty similar to the modded Israel and FDR modded civs in that respect, but less interesting than either.

You cant fade out a historic event with such a huge impact simply by not liking elements in it.
The name is absolutly fitting, cause its the pure symbol, a dream of a big, pulsing city full of monuments, technological achievements and megalomania. But you know that you are free to suggest any other name, which would fit into the Germany context and playstile, or? As suggestion from my side, we could chose "Königliche Residenz Berlin". Its the name of the edict of Friedrich the first, king of Prussia, which made Berlin to the capital of the country and greatly accelerated the developement of the city.

Productivity and Efficiency: I appreciate the idea of having more GGeneral Birth and Wonder construction triggers in the game. However, this is an overly-complicated mess. It wouldn't even fit in the UA description. It has 3 different scaling methods and 4 different triggers, and all to do something pretty passive.

The UA is flexible, you can play it passiv or active, and getting bonuses for access to strategic ressources will definitly influence your city placement in the early stage, making the hunt for those an interesting early game aspect. Passivly played as tradition/progress civ, you have a secure access to strategic ressources. Together with the increased production output, you are able to get much more strong units as normal tradition/progress civs and be much more resilent to attacks. Activly played as warmonger, you can gain much more strategic ressources and trigger more likely or earlier the monopoly bonuses from strategic ressources, supporting your warmongering.
The last scaling (reducing the amount of strategic ressources for one trigger) is necessary to create an exponential increase in yields. I maybe rethink a bit the scaling to make it less complex but as much impactful as it would be. Lets see. Its more about the general mechanic, you know?

Holy Roman Empire: I already hate playing Venice, so I don't see the point of even discussing this.

The concept was unfortunatly not fully polished, I changed it a bit to show what I was thinking in first place. (EDIT)
You are not forced to stay all the game with only one controllable city, you can increase each era the amount of controllable (annexed) cities to be more like a normal civ (like the historical progress of Germany).
The early game playstile is very flexible, but definitly more war orientated in later ages, cause Imperialism is a natural choice thanks to the bonuses to courthouses and puppets. (Also the real Germany had "chosen" the path of Imperialism)
The clue is, to hold a balance between annexed and puppet cities. Annexed cities gives happiness to fight the puppet unhappiness and the increase in growth negates the inevitable growth penalty for puppets. Puppets on the other side increase the production of "normal" cities.

Tradition can work well, even if you expand 6+ cities, cause you can annex only the best cities up to the limit of a normal tradition civ and be not hit of culture/science penalties for having more cities. A fully normal tradition game is possible too, you have greater supply cap to help in that area, more happiness for GA points and another growth boost. Progress works well too, of course and authority is a good choice anyway. The extra happiness stabilize warmongers and more supply cap let you wage war over the map more effectivly.

 

[Snipergw]

Of these I prefer Welthaupstadt, because Germany should be about Germany, not the Hanseatic League, not the Holy Roman Empire, not the Teutons, not even Prussia, and certainly not antique Germanic tribes, many of which migrated away.

The Civ is called Germany, and it's led by Bismarck, so for me, thematically, it should be completely based on post-unification Germany. This still leaves a lot of room: Old Wilhelm (the one with the long beard) and Bismarck period, Wilhelm II's Pathetic Adventures, the impotent Weimar is probably not meaningful enough, and the post-war socialist attempts were far too short-lived, Hitler's all-night party throwing all of Europe into the blender, but also post-war Germany, the economic miracle, and succeeding at what they failed at twice, but this time with diplomacy and economic benefits, not stormtroopers.

A focus on the capital probably isn't the right fit for Germany, though. Berlin was a big city, sure, but not outstandingly so. Some mechanic around Manufactory adjacency to encourage you to create your own Ruhrpott would be better. Welthaupstadt thematic only works for Hitler, but he (nor most of the nazis) didn't like Berlin at all, and the policy was basically an excuse to bulldoze the entire thing and build their own city. Science/hammer focus and related Great People is definitely the best thematic fit for Germany, though. Iron and Blood is a strong thematic too, but the actual gameplay effects makes Germany just another city-state Civ, which doesn't really fit the Germany in the game. We've got Bismarck and Panzers, the feel of the Civ is 1871-1945, the weird Hanse aside, and the mechanic would better fit a dedicated HRE civ, or a Germany fully themed around the EU.

 

[InkAxis]

@BiteInTheMark you need to change the poll so we can select multiple options also maybe add an option for "I want to change germany, but not like this"

I think Germany can work well as a diplo civ. There are not too many of those and if done right they can be interesting.
As for history, it's certainly substantial enough. Even if you don't could the HRE, you have the leader, Bismark, and I think people think that he was somehow an exception but that's not the case. Stresemann and the Spirit of Locarno come to mind, postwar as well it's not difficult to think of anything.
That's not to say there shouldn't be any military bonuses, I think like pdan's suggestion they can be militaristic and diplo.
And, economic bonuses can also be considered, for example a reference to the Zollverein, indirectly leading to unification.

So, on the ideas:
For Blood and Iron:
Based on what I wrote above you might think I'm quite positive on this. I think historically it is completely justified, but I'd need need to see some justification for the gameplay. In a normal diplo game, I would build diplo units. Now, I build military units. Is it that different? maybe, but I'd need more convincing it's something unique and interesting.

Welthauptstadt Germania - Great Person / GPTI
Gain +1 in your capital for Great Merchants/Engineers/Scientists, scaling with era
Gain always 50% of the instant option yields, whenever you use such a GP for constructing a GPTI
10% of // and 3% of / of your capital is split equally to all non-capital/non-puppet cities, scaling with era

The first two bonuses seem kinda just like tradition bonuses. But the third one makes it kind of interesting, because it rewards wide play. Or, at least how I interpreted it. So, you would have a strong capital that would give benefits to a wide empire.
But, this gave me a slightly different idea: what if it was reversed? Maybe each time you built a unit/building, part of that units/buildings production went to the capital (or get a production bonus if the capital already has the building)? This would mean you have a large empire, and each city supports the capital with new infrastructure and units. It's similar to the Philippines mod, but the production source and output is different.

Gaining a new (Era/General/City/Wonder) gives you (4/3/1/1) strategic ressources (SR), which are split equally to all currently available SR, (except uranium)
Gain +4 and +1 in capital for every 8 SR and +1 / to each non-capital city for every 12 SR, passing to a new era reduce the necessary amount by 1

It's a little complex, yeah. But also seems just like a "get bonuses" kinda thing. I guess that makes it flexible, it's interesting. Maybe the (Era/General/City/Wonder) can be changed to a Historic event? It's mostly the same triggers, except instead of gaining a city it's winning a war and it also triggers for all GP.

For every turn in peace, you gain +1% combat strength for all units, up to +15%. At war, you lose 1% of this modifier every 2 turns, maximum and minimum increased by 2% for every vasall
If your status change from peace to war, all your trade units gain immunity for 2 turns, scaling with era and number of vasalls
+10% attack strength for siege units

Seems a little too militaristic, also that's already the name of a tenet.

Holy Roman EmpireEmpire - Pupppets
All cities founded after your capital are puppets, with -20% penalty. You can't increase the number of annexed cities above 2 (scaling with era)
Courthouses are always constructable in a quarter of time. Courthouse and palace get +2 // and +3% Growth to all cities.
Each puppet add +2 to every palace/Courthouse, scaling with era

I like how you get to annex more cities every era, but this seems like it's pretty focused on the HRE, I think it would be better as a HRE civ.

Realpolitik - Diplomacy and City-States
Gain +1 / from friendly CS and +2 / from allied CS, scaling with era
+1 influence with a City-State for every 2 military units not farther away than 2 tiles of it
Gain an embassy and open borders with civs containing your diplomat, vote trading capacity increased by 1

Needs to be more powerful, these bonuses are pretty niche. Also, two tiles is *really close*, it's not possible to get that close without trespassing and other times it's just not even possible at all. Should at least be 3-4 tiles.

Workbench of the world - Food/Industry
+1% , +3% and -2% building maintenance for every 3 in a city, WLTKD and Golden Ages increase the effect by 50% (100% if both)
External Trade routes give yields like you have 1 step higher influence over the target city (foreign civilizations and City-States)

It's kind of interesting, not sure if thematically it's germany.
pdan really liked the TR idea but to me it just seems like "gain more yields on External TR", doesn't seem that interesting.

@Hinin also had an interesting idea, with gaining XP and reduced unit maintenance for every friend/ally CS. The issue is, Greece already has an almost identical UA.
I think we do need to be careful because there already is a civ with a diplo/military focus.

As for the hanse, I think most people like it. We shouldn't change it for now. We have every suggestion from a complete warmonger to a peaceful tall UA, so we should decide how the hanse fits the UA after we decide on the UA.

 

[BiteInTheMark]

Blood and Iron: My personal vote. It will require reworking the 4UC, because it would be way too good with all the cheap/free early units Germany gets with the existing Ulfhedinn UU2, but I think it ties into several different temporally distant aspects of Germany's history, and offers a very different playstyle for a diplomatic civ.

For Blood and Iron:
Based on what I wrote above you might think I'm quite positive on this. I think historically it is completely justified, but I'd need need to see some justification for the gameplay. In a normal diplo game, I would build diplo units. Now, I build military units. Is it that different? maybe, but I'd need more convincing it's something unique and interesting.

I will not take that into the poll (Edit: Ive done it), cause its simply broken. How much cost a warrior? 90 gold? All you need is spending 180 gold on a CS and you definitly will ally it sooner or later.
In comparison to Austria, where you need to ally that CS first for atleast 10 turns and then spend 500 gold, only to stop decay, which is literally +1 influence. Of course you get an extra vote and GP growth, but allying a CS would be far too easy for Germany. CS are very cautios about thier units, and if you stay there with atleast one unit too, nothing bad should happen to the units you have spend.
Spamming warriors and gift them could easily end in 4+ CS alliances in classical era, if you are not too dump.
Next point is AI bonuses..... do you really want to sit close to an AI Germany which can spam warriors like peanuts and ally every CS around it with +3 or +4 influence per turn in classical?.

Unit Nearby Influence - This sucks. In order to counter decay and build influence up to friendship, I need to sit 4 units within 2 tiles of a city for 30+ turns, assuming they don't lose me friendship for trespassing. That's a waste of time, maintenance, and units. I should be moving those same units around and tribute several CS for several times the yields I would get for friendship. This is more boring and less rewarding than doing the thing that any other civ can do already.

In my eyes, the current balance between bullying and reward for influence ridicoulus. This is a general problem, not one by the UA and should be looked at. (Getting 520 production from a CS with the huns while a normal world wonder cost 400 is out of balance)
Otherwise, these arguements are simply wrong....
The second ring has 12 tiles. The territory of a CS grows very slowly past 5 or 6 additional tiles. There shouldnt be any problem in sticking 6 or even more units around a CS without causing any trespassing penalty. After reaching friendship status, another 6 tiles in the first ring are free for you too. ANd if you have reached the ally status, you can move with all units except 2 to the next city state, all you need is +1 influence to stay ally.
You also forget, that an alliance with a CS not only gives the normal yields, but also yields per turn from the UA (+2 /), access to the luxuries and strategic ressources and maybe unit gifts.
You also might not be able to meet a lot of CS to bully, or these are already bullied (like you said, every other civ actually can do this). If the CS you meet are already under protection, you have a harder time to get tributs or cause a war.
You also completly missundestand the purpose of that mechanic. Its there to give Germany a better start, till the Hanse comes. You will produce units for your empire anyway, and before those are sitting useless in your cities, you can place them on one or two CS to influence them. Like the real Germany or Third Reich always had only influence over nations relativly close to it, your units will be at your borders and influence CS, but didnt run in 500 AD to the other side of the world to influence a CS.

 

[InkAxis]

I will not take that into the poll, cause its simply broken.

Well, you're asking people for what they want and then not allowing people to vote for something you don't want. It doesn't matter, put it on the poll.

Also, I meant to mention it but this is partially why we agreed NOT to do polls like this, in the middle of discussion. You yourself have 6 ideas, obviously 5 of them will get thrown out in the best case so voting isn't really useful as these ideas evolve.

And lastly, please, make us be able to vote for multiple options, it is simply a better voting system for consensus.

 

[BiteInTheMark]

Well, you're asking people for what they want and then not allowing people to vote for something you don't want. It doesn't matter, put it on the poll.

Also, I meant to mention it but this is partially why we agreed NOT to do polls like this, in the middle of discussion. You yourself have 6 ideas, obviously 5 of them will get thrown out in the best case so voting isn't really useful as these ideas evolve.

And lastly, please, make us be able to vote for multiple options, it is simply a better voting system for consensus.

I allowed multiple votes an hour ago and also added the extra option you mentioned.
Also, I take Stalker0s idea into the Realpolitik UA and added pineappledans Realpolitk.
I will take Blood and Iron into the poll. But please think about it, its simply broken. Building warriors and use them like fire and forget rockets without any disadvantage is far more uninspiring and boring than you might think.

 

[pineappledan]

I will take Blood and Iron into the poll. But please think about it, its simply broken. Building warriors and use them like fire and forget rockets without any disadvantage is far more uninspiring and boring than you might think.

You don't need to think about it, you can actually play it. Blood and Iron is the only one of these proposals that users can actually try out, if they want to.

Based on what I wrote above you might think I'm quite positive on this. I think historically it is completely justified, but I'd need need to see some justification for the gameplay. In a normal diplo game, I would build diplo units. Now, I build military units. Is it that different? maybe, but I'd need more convincing it's something unique and interesting.

I need to test it quite a bit myself. Obviously it's a very powerful bonus, especially if you can get the units to leverage it early. Each unit you gift prior to Classical will net you 300+influence over the course of the game, assuming they survive. The power and utility of this ability decreases as the game progresses, but your ability to build more units more quickly also increases. Ideally, you would get 3+ units into CS hands all before the Classical, but prioritizing that means you will put yourself far behind on city infrastructure, settlers, wonders, and your own military, of course. I'm finding it difficult to tear myself away from my set build orders to put out more units earlier.

I still haven't gotten past mid-game with a Blood and Iron playthrough. the Unit gifts put me in a major advantage for 4 CS allies before statecraft unlocked, but at 200 with the highest one, I wasn't so far ahead that a dedicated AI player couldn't have caught up. As you say, for 200 in classical, I could have 50Influence right now, meanwhile I am paying 100 for spearmen that give me 50 in 50 turns. So it certainly feels powerful, but I'm waiting for more user feedback for whether it's too powerful. It certainly does make you play different though, so that's not a problem.

 

[Drakle]

Workbench of the world - Food/Industry
+1% , +3% and -2% building maintenance for every 3 in a city, WLTKD and Golden Ages increase the effect by 50% (100% if both)
External Trade routes give yields like you have 1 step higher influence over the target city (foreign civilizations and City-States)

I'd like a modified version of this, but for China, not Germany. Real Mandate of Heavan vibe, with trade routes like tributes and a country that actually has a very large population. And better WLTKD and Golden Ages.


Anyway, the new Hanse idea sucks

Welthauptstadt is meh and as people said, partly already taken.

No to Productivity and Efficiency. Germany was lacking strategic resources. And at least Russia has to get a few for theirs to work, Germany just gets some for playing.

No to Lightning Warfare, for the reason Pineapple said

Not really into HRE. I think HRE should be a separate civ, or be more Austria's jam. Germany is very much a Prussian-North Germany thing, which while it overlaps partly with the HRE, also includes stuff outside it, like the Tectonic lands/East Prussia.

I'd say go with one of Pineappledan's suggestions, or something similar.

 

[DeAnno]

I think we don't have enough tall civs, so I voted Workbench and PD's Realpolitik; I feel like those are the two most clear tall options. On balance I like PD's Realpolitik a bit more, the mechanic of bonus yields for WC stuff is a good one I think and I always have fun with it when I choose the Reformation Belief for it.

 

[Solic]

I voted for no UA change and blood and iron.

The mere fact that there are so few diplomatic civs already makes Germany's UA unique in that it forces them to really try and get lots of allies as early as possible, which really almost no other civs do. Austria works incrementally with a marriage at a time and Greece is capped at 5. Getting more world council votes fits directly to their intended win condition. I think the fact that "it's too similar to Austria which is a similar historic civ" is weak when getting world council votes is simply what you must do for diplo victory and most votes don't even come from City States in the end, but from religious authority Statecraft, Freedom, so having a civ benefitting a lot more from the city states sounds good to me.

I did vote for blood and iron as well, because I think making the unit gifting mechanic nicer is pretty cool. Perhaps that needs to scale per era or something though, because I can see those influence bonuses quickly becoming useless. Investing in the early CS allies will delay your other development and army. You'd have to be lucky to be surrounded by CS that would defend you. I don't know if enemy AI will be able to assess strength of allied CS or early Germany might be attacked a lot. Also @pineappledan does the AI know how to use this bonus and potentially even better how to counteract this bonus? (I guess a similar thing for Austria marriages counts, if there is increases aggression there against CS with marriages)

 

[BiteInTheMark]

You don't need to think about it, you can actually play it. Blood and Iron is the only one of these proposals that users can actually try out, if they want to.

First, where?
Second, have you ever tried how the AI handles this? Let the AI play on a donut or pangäa map with access to a lot of CS and look what happened?

No to Productivity and Efficiency. Germany was lacking strategic resources. And at least Russia has to get a few for theirs to work, Germany just gets some for playing.

It was lacking strategic ressources, but this doesnt stopped them from creating everything they needed.
In the Third Reich, the airplane production shifted more and more from metal constructions to using wood as so called "Heimstoffe" (materials which didnt needed to be imported). Planes which need aluminium as strategic ressource could be constructed instead of wood, but cause we didnt have "wood" as strategic ressource, gaining aluminium represents that ability.
Also oil was gained later on mainly by conversion from coal, which had and still have Germany plenty of. Beeing able to generate oil out of something like coal is also represented by the UA.
Gaining Uranium looks for me a bit too powerful, but after the war, greater deposits of it were spotted in the east part of Germany and was mined from the russians, so gaining uranium by the UA is also realistic.
The germanic tribes were also excellent weapon crafters, and were one of the earliest users of steel, so gaining iron very early in the game is a reference to that area.

 

[pineappledan]

First, where?

Blood and Iron can be tried in my civ tweaks mod (linked)

Second, have you ever tried how the AI handles this? Let the AI play on a donut or pangäa map with access to a lot of CS and look what happened?

Blood and Iron is coded in lua, so the AI doesn't know it exists. It would need to be DLL integrated for the AI to "handle" it. That being said, the AI does gift units already, if there was some way to increase an AI's proclivity for gifting units, that would be nice, but it's a question for someone that handles the game's AI.

I so far I have only played 2 games: 1 as Germany up to medieval, and 1 up to Rennaissance where AI Germany was on the other continent.
When I played as Germany, I mainly wanted to see how badly I could abuse the 4UC extra components, which was pretty bad. I will need to run a test game where I don't lean on the Ulfhedinn, or don't play with 4UC at all.
When I played against Germany, he was 2nd on his continent after Aztecs, but before Austria, but I couldn't tell you what exactly went down.

Perhaps that needs to scale per era or something though, because I can see those influence bonuses quickly becoming useless [...] Also @pineappledan does the AI know how to use this bonus and potentially even better how to counteract this bonus?

Based on my own test, I think scaling by era would get out of hand very fast. The relatively smaller impact of each unit gift as the game progresses is countered by how easy it is to make units quickly later on.
As I have it now, it's hard for even a human to counteract it, because I haven't tagged the Germany-gifted units in any way. They have no unique promotions etc, so unless Germany gifts a UU, it would be impossible to know which units were gifted. This could be changed, but it would be giving the human player an advantage the AI doesn't have.
Teaching the AI to hunt down -- and how much to hunt down -- German unit gifts is a pretty tall order. They do very much like going after your CS allies though, so they will kill off Germany's unit gifts as a matter of course during a war with Germany.

 

[Solic]

I honestly never gifted enough units to really know, but from discussion around this topic, I'd thought that you can only gift up to a cap (maybe this cap could be lifted specifically for Germany, that would be fairly cool). You are able to have more production as the game progresses, but you are also meeting more CS and units get more expensive to produce, so I still think some era scaling would be good (maybe by 0.5 influence point or something) The current cap would really limit how much you can use this otherwise. We already have Siam, who has early CS influence as their thing, so maybe this could have more longevity if willing to pay a certain cost in producing military units for gifts.

I see your points on the AI and I think the only truly necessary component is that Germany's AI really gifts units a whole lot more or its UA will not be used efficiently whatsoever. If this gets into base VP than DLL integration must hopefully be doable as well.

 

[Whitehorns]

May be you can make it so that for each CS, only 1 unit donated produce influence at the start, and for each (or even every 2 more) era progressed, 1 more unit donated produce influence,

Or

Depend on map-size, only X unit donated produce influence at the start, and for each era, Y more units can be donated to CS for influence.

 

[Rekk]

I honestly never gifted enough units to really know, but from discussion around this topic, I'd thought that you can only gift up to a cap (maybe this cap could be lifted specifically for Germany, that would be fairly cool). You are able to have more production as the game progresses, but you are also meeting more CS and units get more expensive to produce, so I still think some era scaling would be good (maybe by 0.5 influence point or something) The current cap would really limit how much you can use this otherwise. We already have Siam, who has early CS influence as their thing, so maybe this could have more longevity if willing to pay a certain cost in producing military units for gifts.

I see your points on the AI and I think the only truly necessary component is that Germany's AI really gifts units a whole lot more or its UA will not be used efficiently whatsoever. If this gets into base VP than DLL integration must hopefully be doable as well.

Restrictions on gifting (per CS):
-only full health units
-only one at a time through the CS menu (takes X turns to arrive)
-as many as you want if the units are already in CS borders, as long as there is space.