It is only my vision of this period, but I think that the accumulation of factors leading to a more and more united German political landscape throughout the 19th century made a union of some kind a very strong possibility (with or without the south, under prussian or austrian leadership). The reaction of nearby powers, though, was in the end the main possible counter to such an endeavour, especially from France (who had enough problems with the UK already). What Bismarck did was turn this French hostility into the lever that helped the political unification, and then maintain a status quo for long enough that the resulting state could sustain itself against another possible threat (by using the European balance of power against itself to allow the rise of Germany without having a coalition against it). The resulting national body, despite what his successors did (which nearly destroyed the whole thing), is still present today, and that I think is a testament to Bismarck's work (whatever my personal opinion of Bismarck on a moral or ideological standpoint is, that's not the matter here).
Better said than what I could manage, but these are my thoughts as well. Building the house in an era of popular house-building is less impressive than building the biggest, nicest house on the block and protecting it from arsonists for 20 years. It isn't particularly impressive that you built a house only for it to be burned to the ground immediately afterwards.
I would only add "and with or without an independent Bavaria".
UA - Realpolitik
+3
Science per Friendly City-State and +3
Culture and +1
Supply per Allied City-State, scaling with Era. When helping pass or defeat a Resolution in the World Congress, gain
Production and
Gold, scaling with Era and the number of Votes invested in those Resolutions, in addition to
Influence with all known City-States.
As you can imagine, I am biased towards my own formulation, and so I will try to defend it.
I am wary of unique scaling methods, and I try to avoid them unless I feel they are absolutely necessary. Gaining yields per vote in a successful vote seems like a complication without gain, and it's my opinion that it would undercut the Realpolitik theme. The scaling based mainly of votes rewards me better and more consistently if I just dump all my votes into a single resolution, which is what I do normally. Per-vote yields doesn't make me vote any different from if I were playing any other civ. I prefer the all-or-nothing mechanic, influencing what you can, and siding with the majority on what you cannot. That feels more pragmatic, but it also rewards you for splitting your vote, which normally a sub-optimal way of voting in the WC.
The +1
per ally is a bonus above-and-beyond the bonus for friendship, which was something I specifically wanted to avoid doing. Having only a
/
difference in kind, with no additional bonuses for allying helps Germany keep that pragmatism. With no additional benefits for ally-ship, it also makes Germany the king of Open Door policies, which I like.
I prefer the
/
instant yields. Germany has a ton of %
production off the Hanse, and decent
gold generation as well. Instant
production bonuses are hard to balance, and that would be especially true for Germany, which has an enormous global production modifier.
Keeping the UA strictly to
keeps the UA slimmer and more focused, the Hanse has the
/
bonuses to round the civ out, and the new Landsknecht is cheaper, and has full XP, movement on purchase, and no cooldown like a mercenary unit. The UB/UU combination both present
/
bonuses in their own way then.
I don't like the extra WC vote. It's too similar to Austria's and the world congress is already too much a snowball of votes.
Precisely my thoughts as well.
What I want to focus on is enhancing the dichotomy between Austria and Germany more. Austria gets more votes, while Germany is rewarded more for voting well. It's like the Win-Easier vs Win-More military civs (eg. Zulu vs Rome), but for Diplomatic civs. Austria wins WC resolutions easier with more votes while Germany wins more from WC resolutions that it voted on "correctly".
Well, they already have a per turn Science bonus. And while there are other offenders, I don't like all the big burst yields of science in the later game. It makes the end game wrap up way too fast, so there is no time to enjoy the era. But it does fit in the concept. Maybe it might be fine if the bonus is tilted more to the gold than the science.
Maybe a WLTKD? Maybe with a base of 5 turns, with more turns based upon the success of votes. WLTKDs are a tad underused vs Golden Ages though it has equalised a bit more recently.
While I don't necessarily agree that this is even a problem to begin with, Removing the
GAP from Germany's Friend/Ally per-turn yields levels that WLTKD/GA unique component balance even more. I don't think Germany is the right pick for a WLTKD civ though.
The other civs that have instant
yields are Russia, Assyria, and maybe Ethiopia(?). To the degree that instant
science yields hasten the end game, they are coming from Policies, wonders, and Great Scientist Bulbs. It's actually per-science yields that make the largest impact here, because GScience bulbs scale off that, so a bit more
instant science mainly helps Germany in the mid-game, and impacts the late game relatively little.