(6-CP) Caravansary/Burial Tomb Change - Buff to Villages and Trade Routes, Nerf to Merchants and Base Yields

[Rekk]

The building still maintains a moderate desert/tundra-solving flavor as most of your Villages and Towns will likely be on desert and tundra,

The only time villages and towns will be on desert/tundra is if a road has to run through said terrain. It's much more likely that said improvements will be anywhere else, just like every other improvement in the game except for resource improvements and forts.

 

[stii]

so now with the recent update to the proposal, the main change is this:

1) Caravansary goes from a situational buidling to a more "mainstay" building, as most cities have a couple of villages at least. That said, is it enough to make it a good "main stay building"?
2) We have lost the tundra/desert boost. Now frankly the bonus was so lackluster I never cared before (aka it wasn't doing its job before). But....do we need this job done? Are tundra/desert starts bad enough that we need to solve them through buildings?

I can say at least on communitas, I rarely mind desert/tundra starts nowadays, because there are often lots of resources. Deserts tend to have flood plains and oasis and a decent amount of stone. Tundra is often filled with deer and good hill mines, making for solid productive cities. So I don't know if we really need a "terrain fixer building" here.

Tundra yes, desert no. Which is a pretty big issue in balancing this building.

 

[Diomedes_]

so now with the recent update to the proposal, the main change is this:

1) Caravansary goes from a situational buidling to a more "mainstay" building, as most cities have a couple of villages at least. That said, is it enough to make it a good "main stay building"?
2) We have lost the tundra/desert boost. Now frankly the bonus was so lackluster I never cared before (aka it wasn't doing its job before). But....do we need this job done? Are tundra/desert starts bad enough that we need to solve them through buildings?

I can say at least on communitas, I rarely mind desert/tundra starts nowadays, because there are often lots of resources. Deserts tend to have flood plains and oasis and a decent amount of stone. Tundra is often filled with deer and good hill mines, making for solid productive cities. So I don't know if we really need a "terrain fixer building" here.

1) I still think its a pretty situational building as the best part of it is the TR bonus and the resource bonuses. Only some of your cities will be able to make use of both of those bonuses, let alone just one.
2) I still think my proposed Caravansary is still a bit of a Tundra/Desert solver-type building, as villages and towns are much more common in desert and tundra cities (as you won't build farms on bare tiles). However, I agree with you that we don't really even need a Tundra/Desert solver in the first place, as the Tundra pantheons are quite strong and desert cities are almost always going to have mostly hills, floodplains, or resourced tiles. Thus, the caravansary really only becomes a bare Tundra/Desert tile solver with the village/town boost, which I think is more flavorful, balanced, and in keeping with the identity of the building.

All in all, not to hype myself up unduly (and without giving credit to the people in this thread who brought up the Village/Town boost idea), but I think my proposed change kills a bunch of birds with one stone. It gets rid of two small and boring bonuses (flat gold and merchant gold) in favor of strengthening its most flavorful ability (TR income), and gets rid of a weird, hard to use tile-yield bonus in favor of a different bonus that still increases tile yields in a way that mostly helps Tundra/Desert tiles, but is simultaneously less situational yet more helpful in the situations in which the old 1/3 bonus was powerful.

 

[Rekk]

It doesn't mostly help Tundra/Desert tiles, though. This building is as strong or weaker in Tundra/Desert than elsewhere, because the player wants to place improvements anywhere but Tundra and Desert, and Villages/Towns are no exception.

 

[Diomedes_]

It doesn't mostly help Tundra/Desert tiles, though. This building is as strong or weaker in Tundra/Desert than elsewhere, because the player wants to place improvements anywhere but Tundra and Desert, and Villages/Towns are no exception.

I reject that premise, as Tundra and Floodplains cities, especially if the former has Stars and Sky or Hunt as the pantheon, can be very food heavy and in need of non-food tiles. Additionally, as bare Tundra/Desert farms are usually either impossible or really weak, villages are the most common way to use those tiles. Thus, I often find myself and the ai building more villages in Desert/Tundra cities, and prioritizing their construction as they can be a huge help for unhappiness. Additionally, the only tiles I would ever build a village not along a road would be in a Desert or Tundra city.

Additionally, the comparative advantage of +1/+1 on a bare desert/tundra village is greater than for a plains/grassland/hills village, and because bare plains and grassland tiles can also be turned into farms. Thus, desert/tundra villages aren't just competing against grassland/plains villages, but against farms. Additionally, Tundra and floodplains cities are usually shorter on gold than Grassland/Plains cities (unless the former has like Furs or Dyes), as they don't have Bison, Cattle, Horses, Sheep, or lumber mill triangles (because Tundra forest is usually full of deer), meaning that you're more likely to be working villages in Tundra and Desert cities to solve poverty unhappiness.

Even if you disagree with my argument that villages and towns are both more common and more helpful on desert and tundra tiles, I don't think a convincing argument can be made that this version of the building would be weaker in Tundra or Desert cities.

 

[Stalker0]

It doesn't mostly help Tundra/Desert tiles, though. This building is as strong or weaker in Tundra/Desert than elsewhere, because the player wants to place improvements anywhere but Tundra and Desert, and Villages/Towns are no exception.

I agree, i build villages where I have space to build them (along my roads. I'm not using them more in tundra/desert

 

[pineappledan]

I think the idea that caravansary boosting villages/towns makes a lot of sense. It’s the land TR building, and villages interact with TRs. It’s a good match.

However, villages and towns do not need a buff. They are strong enough as is. You need to move some base yields OFF the base village and onto the caravansary, so this doesn’t just become a buff to an improvement that doesn’t need one.

Proposal: caravansary give nearby villages 1 And villages base yields reduced to 2

 

[Diomedes_]

I think that's fair, but I think if +1/+1 is too strong it would be better to just reduce the bonus then to mess with base village yields, or at the very least not reduce them too much. What about Caravansary just giving either +1 or +1 to villages and then +3 or +4 of the opposite yield to Towns?

Regardless, I'm anti-increasing village culture yields as I think the improvement should be fundamentally a poverty solver, not a boredom solver.

 

[Stalker0]

However, villages and towns do not need a buff. They are strong enough as is.

At first villages are good improvements, but they do not scale well to me, I rarely work them by late Renaissance.

 

[ma_kuh]

I think the suggestion was moving the culture, not increasing it. So villages without caravansary would be exactly as you say, a poverty solver. Only with the caravansary would that emphasis on trade convert into culture. I think the theme and value is sound.

 

[pineappledan]

At first villages are good improvements, but they do not scale well to me, I rarely work them by late Renaissance.

I said strong Enough. They are in a good place, imo, and there is no good reason to buff them. Especially not right in Classical when they unlock. Moving part of their existing base yields to a caravansary boost will solve the Caravansary's theme problem without buffing villages overmuch.

 

[Stalker0]

I said strong Enough. They are in a good place, imo, and there is no good reason to buff them. Especially not right in Classical when they unlock. Moving part of their existing base yields to a caravansary boost will solve the Caravansary's theme problem without buffing villages overmuch.

I think you just countered your own argument. As you said, they are good enough. Why do I need a building to buff something that is already good. The answer is....I don't....so you are nerfing a good improvement just to make a justification for a weak building.

That's not a good approach, and that's how we got bloat in the mod. We should either:

1) Agree TRs could stand the buff.
2) Recognize TRs shouldn't be buffed and go with an alternate idea for the Caravansary (ala the OG proposal).
3) Remove the caravansary because it can't justify its own existence.

 

[pineappledan]

3) Remove the caravansary because it can't justify its own existence.

I know this is your own private warpath, but you really just need to stop.

Unless you're prepared to also remove the harbor, or remove the historic event on TR completion mechanic, then we need a building that focuses on land TRs. Should it do other things? of course it should, that's what we're discussing, but to get rid of it entirely puts us in a worse spot, and I'm pretty done hearing about it.

 

[Amask]

I wouldn't really miss it, nor the TR completion mechanic. It's just something that happens but barely ever impacts my decision making, and even when it is a factor (one holdout against CV), the decision is trivial - just send TRs that complete the fastest.

And it would not mean having to remove the harbour. Having everything be symmetrical is your own warpath.

 

[azum4roll]

I wouldn't really miss it, nor the TR completion mechanic. It's just something that happens but barely ever impacts my decision making, and even when it is a factor (one holdout against CV), the decision is trivial - just send TRs that complete the fastest.

Do you decide to grow more when you've built a Council? Not all instant yields need to impact decision making in an interesting way. They just passively stack up, and you'll find you need them for your victory.

 

[rkkn]

Do you decide to grow more when you've built a Council?

yes. when I queue up build orders, my default is to put granary immediately after council

 

[ma_kuh]

Actually, this makes me think of all kinds of ways to shake up early game buildings.

Like changing Monument from +34% border growth to a flat charge, like Granary, so that it has combo potential with Lodge.

 

[azum4roll]

I sponsor this.

 

[Hinin]

MAGI - Edited title for clarity with counterproposals

 

[Hinin]

MAGI - This thread as been locked, for its proposal as been moved to (6-44) for the purpose of the voting phase.