A world without consulates

[Forkandles]

Well after finishing or playing very deep into a number of games trying different approaches to policies, I find the hardest part is getting enough culture going in the late game. Before the patch, I often found myself "wasting" policies on whatever near the end of the game because consulates gave so much cpt. I had just barely got T3 order and the rationalism finisher in one of my Inca games. I suspect we are going to be back to the vanilla style finesse for getting into rationalism right out of tradition, and aesthetics is looking a lot more attractive than before.

Of all the changes made in the Fall Patch, this is the one I am most happy with. Consulates was OP as the 1st policy in patronage. Going to keep playing around with the trees, it should be interesting to see the solutions that the top players here use

Agree, culture generation feels so below par without the automatic cultural CS friends. think ive been sitting on about 80 or 90 when the Worlds Fair comes up. I usually ally a cultural CS at that point and get up to about 100 or so. Double culture when you win the Worlds Fair is still quite handy at that point. Think my writer bombs were worth about 1800 after I won the fair. It was enough to finish rat and get the good stuff from Order for a SV. The free GS and GE from Spaceship Pioneers were really handy.

 

[homegrown]

It sounds like you're playing on too low of a difficulty level. Try bumping it up to Emperor - if it works there, it's probably a viable strategy! (Not sarcasm, I'm curious if you can make it work at the higher levels )

Of course he will. Huge marathon maps with 41 cs's are broken that way.

 

[CaptainPatch]

1) only benefits you for city-states that you aren't already allies with

I disagree with this view. Having a +20 to a CS relationship means that whatever you did to make Ally now has a 20 point buffer above and beyond what would be normally required. For example if your minimum was at 10 (PtP) and you won the "Most _____" quest, the +40 reward would leave you only at Influence 50 = Friends. Add the Consulate +20 and the value would be 70 = ALLY, for at least 20 turns (or perhaps as many as 60 on a .33 degrade).