(2-06b) Counterproposal: Rome Rework - Wide Happiness Bonus (amended)

[axatin]

Counterproposal to: https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/2-08-proposal-please-perpetuate-pilum.680223/

Proposal for Rome's Unique Ability

Pax Romana
- Empire Size Needs Modifier reduced by 33% *
- Can Forcefully Annex city-states via Tribute
- Conquered City States continue to provide rewards

* Clarification: The Empire Size Modifier is now defined as (5% per city, excluding the capital and puppets, plus 1% for 4 citizens in non-puppet cities), multiplied with modifiers for difficulty and map size. The proposal is to multiply this value by 0.67. Reductions apply as before (e.g. Walls add -5% to the value).

Rationale
I would like to give Rome a bonus on wide play and stability, acknowledging that they not only conquered a large amount of territory but also held it for a long time. The tern Pax Romana refers to a period of inner stability and peace in the Roman Empire although wars were being waged at its borders.

The ability to annex city-states (which is the same here as in the original proposal) gives Rome an incentive to expand early and it provides Rome with additional early units. The reduced empire size modifier in an incentive to keep on expanding and building a wide empire. It would replace a +15% production bonus towards buildings already in the capital, which doesn't work together well with the CS annex ability as forcefully annexed city-states retain all their buildings.

The happiness system will undergo some changes in the upcoming version, so I cannot really say how weak or strong the UA proposed here would be. The value would of course be subject to play-test and ratification.


EDIT: Proposal amended.
First version of the proposal:

Spoiler First version of the proposal :

Proposal for Rome's Unique Ability

Pax Romana
- Needs Thresholds Modifier from Empire Size is reduced to +6% per (non-puppet) City in the Empire (for the other civs it's 9%)
- Unhappiness from War Weariness is decreased by 25% in all cities
- +15% Production towards Buildings already present in your Capital

Rationale
I would like to give Rome a bonus on wide play and stability, acknowledging that they not only conquered a large amount of territory but also held it for a long time. The tern Pax Romana refers to a period of inner stability and peace in the Roman Empire although wars were being waged at its borders.

Some counter-arguments to this proposal are that the originally proposed Roman UA (city-state annexation using tribute) models the historical development of the Roman empire well and that there are other historical civilizations that lasted longer. Please see the original proposal thread for a more detailed discussion.

The happiness system will undergo some changes in the upcoming version, so I cannot really say how weak or strong the UA proposed here would be. The values would of course be subject to play-test and ratification.

EDIT: SECOND AMENDMENT: Proposal updated to reflect changes in the current version

 

[pineappledan]

Unhappiness from War Weariness is decreased by 25% in all cities

This is a worse version of something the Huns already do.

Huns get -50% weariness, period, so it affects unit combat penalties. They also inflict more weariness on their enemies.

 

[pineappledan]

the originally proposed Roman UA (city-state annexation using tribute) models the historical development of the Roman empire well

The Roman Republic. The idea being that you build a large-ish army early, force annex neighbouring city states, and then take that larger army (with the free CS units you picked up) and throw that at a major civ. This role plays how Rome dominated the Latin peninsula, and then picked a fight with Carthage by trying to annex a Sicilian city. Winning the Punic wars is what tilted the Roman Republic into the Roman Empire.

In terms of game mechanics, early game annexations benefit Rome the most because that is when CS armies can contribute to your own strength the most. Also, the era-scaling per-turn yields of annexed CS friends means the sooner you annex the better.

 

[axatin]

Thanks for your remarks. I amended the proposal and the happiness bonus now replaces the production bonus on buildings already in the capital, not the ability to forcefully annex city-states.

 

[pineappledan]

Oh also, @Recursive just went on warpath on % need reductions. They will be stripped out for next version and all replaced with flat needs reductions.

I doubt the modders will be enthusiastic about adding them right back in again.

 

[axatin]

If I understood it correctly, then it it is only the local need reductions that will be removed. Global need modifiers like Empire Size will still exist

 

[pineappledan]

No those are going away too

 

[Rekk]

No those are going away too

- Tech Modifier is now removed entirely, unfun because it's out of the player's control
- Empire Size Modifier is now +9% per non-puppet city (excluding the capital), plus +1% per non-puppet citizen, scaling with map size
- City Size Modifier is now -1% per citizen in the city - Unhappiness from Isolation nerfed to 0.33 per citizen, rounded up (was 0.34 per citizen, rounded up)

I believe the bolded text is to what Axatin is referring. This is the same modifier that the Walls line operates on (still via %).

 

[pineappledan]

Thanks for clarifying, I thought he was talking about % need reductions like in NWs.

 

[Recursive]

Needs Thresholds Modifier from Empire Size is reduced to +6% per (non-puppet) City in the Empire (for the other civs it's 9%)

This was changed to +5% per city and +1% per 4 citizens, so your proposal needs updating. I would suggest a simple % modifier to empire size; e.g., "Empire Size Modifier is 33% less impactful than normal".

 

[axatin]

Thank you, I updated the proposal.

 

[BaldSamson]

Forceful Annex : Presumably this is the Mongol trait that existed at some point (I can't remember if this was a VP added ability, but I don't think it was in Vanilla). In addition to the annex, you also continue to get rewards, so it's even more powerful.

Does anybody remember why this was removed from Mongolia? I presume it ruins the Diplo game too easily, but I don't remember. The only comparable ability is Venice, which is tied to expending a Great Merchant and leaves the city as a puppet (albeit a more controllable puppet).

As it stands proposed, this is wildly overpowered. Conquering a CS by force is not usually easy and at the minimum there is a serious time commitment where a sizeable chunk of your military is engaged. Also, this affects much more than just the diplo game. Greece loses military strength, Austria loses votes/large investments, part of Siam's UA is useless, Portugal's UI is useless, etc. I'm sure there are more.

On the other hand, I am interested in seeing Rome rebalanced to be a bigger factor in the early game and I like the idea of rewarding the wide play. How can we prevent this from snowballing quickly? What about a mechanic similar to Portugal, where Great Generals can be expended in CS territory and provide some permanent bonus and free conscripts every 20 turns? In the case of a military CS it will grant you their UU, which would be pretty cool. Also, it wouldn't destroy the mechanics of so many other civs with one button.

 

[BaldSamson]

Forceful Annex : Presumably this is the Mongol trait that existed at some point (I can't remember if this was a VP added ability, but I don't think it was in Vanilla). In addition to the annex, you also continue to get rewards, so it's even more powerful.

Does anybody remember why this was removed from Mongolia? I presume it ruins the Diplo game too easily, but I don't remember. The only comparable ability is Venice, which is tied to expending a Great Merchant and leaves the city as a puppet (albeit a more controllable puppet).

As it stands proposed, this is wildly overpowered. Conquering a CS by force is not usually easy and at the minimum there is a serious time commitment where a sizeable chunk of your military is engaged. Also, this affects much more than just the diplo game. Greece loses military strength, Austria loses votes/large investments, part of Siam's UA is useless, Portugal's UI is useless, etc. I'm sure there are more.

On the other hand, I am interested in seeing Rome rebalanced to be a bigger factor in the early game and I like the idea of rewarding the wide play. How can we prevent this from snowballing quickly? What about a mechanic similar to Portugal, where Great Generals can be expended in CS territory and provide some permanent bonus and free conscripts every 20 turns? In the case of a military CS it will grant you their UU, which would be pretty cool. Also, it wouldn't destroy the mechanics of so many other civs with one button.

I just realized there a bunch of counterproposals to this in other threads, so I'm not sure I've located my comment properly. Should I create a CounterProposal (2-08d)?

 

[Rekk]

Does anybody remember why this was removed from Mongolia?

People didn't like losing the ability to perform Heavy Tribute.

 

[BaldSamson]

People didn't like losing the ability to perform Heavy Tribute.

I remember Mongolia snowballing into insanity most games with Heavy Tribute. Sure, it's great if you're playing Mongolia, but terrible for a lot of the other civs.

 

[pineappledan]

That old Mongolia also got triple yields from a heavy tribute AND the city/all of its units. Rome would just get the city. More than the quick city acquisition, the trouble with the old Mongolia was that it could just found/enhance a religion, gain a policy or 2+ techs in addition with heavy tribute. The old Mongolia was like playing with the combined powers of venice/Poland/Ethiopia

 

[BaldSamson]

That old Mongolia also got triple yields from a heavy tribute AND the city/all of its units. Rome would just get the city. More than the quick city acquisition, the trouble with the old Mongolia was that it could just found/enhance a religion, gain a policy or 2+ techs in addition with heavy tribute.

Ok, but the city is the main prize and makes up 90+% (made up number) of the value. IIRC the units would revert back to 0xp, so they weren't all that great.

The old Mongolia was like playing with the combined powers of venice/Poland/Ethiopia

A little hyperbole there eh? The policies weren't "free", so they didn't break scaling ala Poland and the impact of the tribute falls off eventually. Regardless, I understand your point.

 

[pineappledan]

Ok, but the city is the main prize and makes up 90+% (made up number) of the value

Not really, no. If you heavy tributed a religious CS, the bonus went from being a large sum of faith to a full GProphet. A cultural CS went from some culture to an entire policy. Mongolia back then also had abilities that allowed him to intimidate CS easier. Force annexing a city saves you some turns and a settler, but the pure instant yields out of the heavy tribute were far more substantial for getting ahead.

A little hyperbole there eh?

Not really, no. Poland gets a free policy every 2 eras. Mongolia could get a free policy for each cultural CS near him every 1.5 eras or so. It’s not hyperbole to say that if you actually capitalized on Mongolia’s heavy tribute modifier you could trivialize the game. It was an absolutely broken mechanic, and still is today, but to a lesser degree.

 

[BaldSamson]

if you actually capitalized on Mongolia’s heavy tribute modifier you could trivialize the game. It was an absolutely broken mechanic, and still is today, but to a lesser degree.

I do remember that playing Mongolia felt like a cheat mode, but many changes have been made to make it more difficult to get heavy tribute since then. It can be trivial in the early game, but in many games it can be a real struggle to get an army in range WHILE fighting a war on another front. It's very situational though, as naval melee units can also make the difference, CS alliances and protections push it in the opposite direction. Now, I'm forced to go to war with the CS and thin out it's units to make the case they should pay me.

Force annexing a city saves you some turns and a settler,

Now, you really are minimizing this to try and make your point. It's not as simple as a building a settler and "plopping it down". The CS many times have choice locations and some have access to natural wonders/unique luxuries. Settling a city in free space != taking a city with 10 pop and all buildings included either.

I disagree that tribute yields can compete with great cities over the course of the game. However, I do play with tight quarters (always play on small maps overloaded with civs/CS).

 

[pineappledan]

CS placement is specifically NOT in great locations by design. The game plops them in low fertility places like tundra or small islands specifically so CS stay out of players’ way. So no, CS cities are usually not even worth conquering, and that’s deliberate.