Addicted to Creative

[futurehermit]

if you can't pop it like a creative leader, then why pop at all?

yep, i'm working on getting over my creative addiction as well. what i did to ween myself off of it was to play industrious leaders for awhile and knock off cheap stonehenge.

now, however, what i focus on instead is to settle horses/copper in the first ring of my 2nd city's bfc. that way, if an opponent is close, i can still rush by cranking troops out of my capital while the 2nd city supports as much as possible. if not, i have a high production tile that can help me get a monument quick while i deal with the delayed border pop.

 

[OTAKUjbski]

I can provide a concrete example of this, from just last night. I had the choice of either immediately restricting Justinian to a three-city peninsula, by placing a city in an otherwise sub-optimal position, or placing the city optimally and allowing his settler + support (in sight and moving towards me) through.

Depending upon the game speed you play at, if you could already see the Settler coming your way, it's unlikely Creative's border pop would've come in time to make the block. (But I digress ...)​

Nobody is saying these events don't occur. What is being pointed out is that these situations don't occur in every game.

It's for this same reason I don't like Aggressive for every game I play. In those games I don't see much/any combat, Aggressive is largely wasted.

Similarly, the map generator doesn't always put you in a position to have the need, desire or even ability to block opponents (with or without Creative).

So, if your strategy is specifically built on blocking your opponent using Creative's +2 , it's very likely the bonus will go largely "wasted" in that department in many (if not most) of your games.

This leads me to my conclusion that because other traits exist which are guaranteed to play a large role in every game (especially since some of those are able to "mimic" the Creative trait in certain ways), Creative is not a great general-purpose leader trait -- a good one, definitely, but not a great one.

Do you really find you are able to GET 7 temples/religions in a single city; I think 3 is a more reasonable number but feel free to argue.

No. You're right: 3 is more reasonable.

Any, with 3 you get 3 happy and 3CPT (the religion benefit occurs for any civ that has the religion, the discounted building is the advantage) with no possibility to increase the happy by running the drama slider. You spend 120 hammers, ignoring Christo Redentor.

With creative you get 5 CPT, 1 happy and the chance to get more happy, plus the science boost. You spend 110 hammers. You also have 2CPT from the trait itself.

I see three "flaws" (so to speak) with your logic:

• First, it's the assumption that is better than . Given those two scenarios, I'd much prefer to spend the extra 10 for the extra 2 .
  
  
• Second, it's the assumption that more is always better. I don't argue that more is bad, but in a very basic sense, a city only needs 10 .
  
  If a particular city needs more than that and on a per-turn basis, then ample local solutions exist. But IMO, using a global affect like the Culture slider or a leader trait to fix one city is waste of a trait.
  
  
• Third, it's that you restricted each trait scenario to a certain set of buildings. It's not like each trait can't have them all:
  
  With Creative, building a Library, Theatre and 3 Temples costs 310 and grants +9 and +3 .
  With Spiritual, the same buildings cost 260 for +7 and +3 .
  
  Given a choice, I would generally prefer to save the 50 and apply them to something else.
  
  (Although, the chances are high the Spiritual leader would've already applied 30 of those hammers to a Monument, so the net would really be something more like +8 , +3 & +20 -- which is still generally a better choice.)

nothing matches the speed of border pop by creative trait. there are ways to mimic it and they came close, but not quite. If the "settle it and forget it" style is such a big part of your game plan, then I think you will not be satisfied by the cheap knock-offs.

I think that most adequately sums up my sentiments.

Creative is not a bad trait.

It is, however, a trait which is not always vital and one that doesn't always play a huge role in every game. So, when given the choice of a "general-purpose" trait (one which is guaranteed or at least more likely to play a large role in every game), Creative is not one of them.

-- yet more of my 2

 

[futurehermit]

I see creative as one of the best support traits. I won't base my whole strategy around it, but give me Willem (financial), Pericles (philosophical), Louis (industrious), Hatty (spiritual/uu), Kublai (aggressive), Cathy (imperialistic and good setup for strong rush or rex) any day of the week. Gilgamesh (protective) with his uu/ub is also good imo.

 

[Mossada]

I see creative as one of the best support traits. I won't base my whole strategy around it, but give me Willem (financial), Pericles (philosophical), Louis (industrious), Hatty (spiritual/uu), Kublai (aggressive), Cathy (imperialistic and good setup for strong rush or rex) any day of the week. Gilgamesh (protective) with his uu/ub is also good imo.

wins

 

[bardolph]

I see three "flaws" (so to speak) with your logic:

• First, it's the assumption that is better than . Given those two scenarios, I'd much prefer to spend the extra 10 for the extra 2 .
  
  
• Second, it's the assumption that more is always better. I don't argue that more is bad, but in a very basic sense, a city only needs 10 .
  
  If a particular city needs more than that and on a per-turn basis, then ample local solutions exist. But IMO, using a global affect like the Culture slider or a leader trait to fix one city is waste of a trait.
  
  
• Third, it's that you restricted each trait scenario to a certain set of buildings. It's not like each trait can't have them all:

With Creative, building a Library, Theatre and 3 Temples costs 310 and grants +9 and +3 .
With Spiritual, the same buildings cost 260 for +7 and +3 .

Given a choice, I would generally prefer to save the 50 and apply them to something else.

OK, but you're building a straw man here. If you want to add happiness to the debate so that you can show how cheap Temples are a better value than the Creative builidings, then don't purposefully leave out the happiness bonuses from cheap Coliseums, research bonus from Libraries, and the access to specialists from both Libraries and Theaters.

For example, the 50 hammer "savings" that the Spiritual civ gets in your scenario is reduced to a mere 10 hammers if the Creative civ builds a Coliseum instead of one of the temples, and the Creative civ still enjoys a 1-culture advantage for that 10 hammers.

You've also assumed access to 3 religions in the same city, which is a huge assumption, especially in the early and mid game. I've frequently played games where I have ZERO religions well into the Medieval era. In this kind of scenario, your comparison falls apart completely.

 

[Roxlimn]

Personally, I think the scenario falls the most when it's assumed that the city's Monument or Stonehenge is not a big deal. Even when Industrious, that Stonehenge costs a pretty bunch of hammers - easily a Settler or two in exchange.

 

[Hereditary Rule]

I see creative as one of the best support traits. I won't base my whole strategy around it, but give me Willem (financial), Pericles (philosophical), Louis (industrious), Hatty (spiritual/uu), Kublai (aggressive), Cathy (imperialistic and good setup for strong rush or rex) any day of the week. Gilgamesh (protective) with his uu/ub is also good imo.

What do you consider to be the 'support' traits then? Is a leader with 2 such traits inherently weaker because he would be lacking some focus?

This is a very good thread overall btw.

 

[druidravi]

Creative for me is one of the strongest situational traits particularly in BTS . It's only when you end up isolated it becomes mid-tier .

Main advantage is it saves huge amount of valuable early game production . 30 shields for monument while working only the first ring squares? wasted . 40 shield saving on library .

Lets say you get 6 cities in beginning . Shields saved is 5*30(monument) + 4* 40 ( library ) = 310 shields which is huge early game . Add in working better squares due to earlier border pops it is more than that . Strong early game leads to a snowballing effect on your mid game/ late game.

In mid game you need theaters in 6 cities for the globe and late game draft . It saves a bit of hammers and also you get cheap colloseums combination of which is useful if you plan on using culture slider for happiness

Best way to exploit creative is aggressive city placement . Steal those extremely good resource rich spots from heart of Ai territory . Steal AI's cities second ring resources in its newly established cities by settling a city next to it.

 

[OTAKUjbski]

I see creative as one of the best support traits. I won't base my whole strategy around it, but give me Willem (financial), Pericles (philosophical), Louis (industrious), Hatty (spiritual/uu), Kublai (aggressive), Cathy (imperialistic and good setup for strong rush or rex) any day of the week. Gilgamesh (protective) with his uu/ub is also good imo.

I largely agree with that statement (If the "top tier" traits cannot be "support" traits based on semantics, then I fully agree) -- especially the part about not basing a whole strategy around it.

Creative is a good support trait, but not so great I would take it over Industrious, Financial, Spiritual or even Charismatic.

Considering all the traits you just paired with CHA (FIN, PHI, IND, SPI, AGG & IMP), I would generally much prefer supporting any of them with ORG or CHA.

Again, that's not to say Creative is a bad trait or not a good support trait, I just can't justify choosing Creative over other traits unless I know exactly what I'm getting into and that I will need its bonuses.

If you want to add happiness to the debate so that you can show how cheap Temples are a better value than the Creative builidings, then don't purposefully leave out the happiness bonuses from cheap Coliseums, research bonus from Libraries, and the access to specialists from both Libraries and Theaters.

I wasn't the one who first brought into the equation (Polobo did it in this thread.)

I just assume leave all that out, because including it means arguing the strength of each specialist and whether a +25% increase from the Library is enough to match working two more cottages or specialists from +2 , etc, etc, blah, blah, blah.

Personally, I'm not up for getting that deep into it.

For example, the 50 hammer "savings" that the Spiritual civ gets in your scenario is reduced to a mere 10 hammers if the Creative civ builds a Coliseum instead of one of the temples, and the Creative civ still enjoys a 1-culture advantage for that 10 hammers.

That's still based on the belief that more is better, which is one I don't prescribe to. I'd still rather have the +10 advantage than the +1 advantage.

You've also assumed access to 3 religions in the same city, which is a huge assumption, especially in the early and mid game. I've frequently played games where I have ZERO religions well into the Medieval era. In this kind of scenario, your comparison falls apart completely.

I can agree to that. Even one religion is not a guarantee -- regardless of its frequency.

In that case, I would have to fall back on the original "mimic" of building a Monument in the meantime, which would put us back on a completely different discussion again.

So yeah, in situations where a religion doesn't come your way for an extended period of time, Creative would certainly see a production advantage over Spiritual.

However, this touches on why Creative just isn't one of my favourites:

Without its buildings bonuses, Creative is weak. That's why it had to be buffed in the first place with them.

When comparing traits like Organized, Spiritual, Philosophical and Industrious, for example, the buildings bonuses are just that -- bonuses that can feasibly be eliminated entirely -- not its primary quality.

 

[OTAKUjbski]

Personally, I think the scenario falls the most when it's assumed that the city's Monument or Stonehenge is not a big deal. Even when Industrious, that Stonehenge costs a pretty bunch of hammers - easily a Settler or two in exchange.

Main advantage is it saves huge amount of valuable early game production . 30 shields for monument while working only the first ring squares? wasted . 40 shield saving on library.

I can't help but largely agree, because the Library building bonus plays a good synergy with Creative's +2 . Since a Monument is largely extraneous, those 30 hammers can instead be applied as 67% of the already cheap Library (this application is direct where chopping & whipping is considered).

However, that brings us full circle to the crux of my argument against Creative. After the Library is built, and after the first border pop is achieved ... what then?

Sure, those extra early-game can be applied to something else, but can they be applied to a level that competes with other traits?

Creative for me is one of the strongest situational traits particularly in BTS.

...

Main advantage is it saves huge amount of valuable early game production.

That is exactly my point. Without that building bonus, Creative is borderline weak. And without the right situation to fully (ab)use Creative, it seems more of a bane than a boon.

 

[druidravi]

Library is not for culture but for that +25% research . Library is important building for both CE and SE particularly for SE. Not only is it an early bonus to research but also gives you an early academy if going the cottage capital+ buearacracy way

 

[OTAKUjbski]

Library is not for culture but for that +25% research . Library is important building for both CE and SE particularly for SE. Not only is it an early bonus to research but also gives you an early academy if going the cottage capital+ buearacracy way

But is that bonus enough to justify Creative?

IMO, traits should first be judged on their primary bonus -- which in the case of Creative is +2 .

Sadly, Creative's primary bonus is generally weak -- finding abusive strength in only certain situations and almost always declining in usefulness fairly early in the game.

It is only because of Creative's secondary bonus (specifically the later-added cheap Library) that Creative finds consistently useful strength. But, alas, that is also short-lived.


Again, it is for that reason though Creative is a good supporting trait, it is not strong enough to merit sacrificing other, more generally useful traits for when presented the option.

 

[MyOtherName]

Sure, those extra early-game can be applied to something else, but can they be applied to a level that competes with other traits?

And this is essentially the most important question in this discussion. Everything else is secondary.

To use financial effectively, you need to work cottages / coast.
To use industrious effectively, you need to build wonders.
To use organized effectively, you need to build a big empire.

and so forth. Even the so-called 'top-tier' traits are worthless if you don't play to take advantage of their benefits.

So, the question to ponder is what does one have to do to take advantage of cultural? I will agree that it seems clear that the biggest benefits of cultural occur in the early game (fast, free border pops, cheap libraries). So how does one play the early game with a cultural leader?



I can give one specific example where creative is a huge advantage: on an archipalego map, it allows you to settle islands early when the seafood is in the outer ring of prospective city sites' radii. This is particularly important because such maps are production poor (so monuments are very slow), and the increased demand on your capitol (you need work boats and galleys, and so waiting for stonehenge is even more annoying).

Of course, this is just an extreme example of how creative lets you settle your cities in places where a critical resource isn't next to the site.

IMO, traits should first be judged on their primary bonus

That seems awfully artificial...

 

[bardolph]

But is that bonus enough to justify Creative?

IMO, traits should first be judged on their primary bonus -- which in the case of Creative is +2 .

Why? You're changing judging criteria just to strengthen your position. While you have a point that the +2 by itself is small, the 3-building boost does in fact make up for that. I find Theaters, Libraries, and Coliseums to be important buildings for a large majority of cities.

But, to be honest, I think traits should also be judged in the context of the Leaders they are attached to, which includes other traits, unique units, and unique buildings. It's a much more difficult comparison, but actually much more useful, since it's the interaction of all of these components that determines how to best approach a game.

 

[InvisibleStalke]

I class Creative as a support trait. To me its like expansive - its not strong enough that I will build a strategy around this trait. The other trait is what will determine my strategy and creative will just help a bit.

I don't see it as a great early warmongering trait. My concern with early warmongering is winning with less troops (aggressive helps this) and how to pay for my expansions (financial/organized). Border pops are relatively low down on my list of problems to solve.

And for early expansion my concern isn't really whether I can grab optimal sites and push the AI borders. Its how to I organize my research path to gain wonders I want, how do I get my settlers out quickly enough and the competing demands of things my local cities need to get going and things my empire needs built.

Creative helps this by requiring one less early tech (mysticism) and one less building in some of my cities (if a city doesn't need an early border pop I won't give it a monument - a library, another city or religion will take care of this later).

So its a faster start. But my start is throttled back anyway by the amount of maintenance I can withstand - which means that if I don't have one of organized/financial and possibly industrious/philo, my growth needs to be controlled anyway. There are so many other factors influencing how fast I can grow (building the settlers, maintenance, building workers so that cities are working good tiles etc), that just solving one problem - the border pop - doesn't seem to help much.

If creative were something that accelerated my start in the same way that someone proposed a free settler would, I'd expect to see results from it. And I don't. At least not anything big enough to notice.

And if it doesn't make that big of a difference in the early game, and it makes no difference in the mid/late game (my opinion - but I think from the mid game on its effect is too marginal to notice), then it must be a weak trait.

Maybe others mileage differs. To me it belongs with Expansive and Imperialistic as the weakest three traits. I prefer protective even.

To anyone who likes the trait - how often do you achieve city flips by culture? I think I have probably yet to get one with a creative leader. Maybe that means I don't play the trait as well as others. But I find the +2 culture to be relatively insignificant during the part of the game when I actually engage in border culture wars.

 

[OTAKUjbski]

So, the question to ponder is what does one have to do to take advantage of cultural?

...

So how does one play the early game with a cultural leader?

I think that might be part of the "problem" I see with Creative. You don't have to do anything different to take advantage of Creative.

Except in specific, often extreme situations, Creative generally doesn't offer any new possibilities or open any additional strategic options.

Popping a city's borders as soon as is necessary is still going to happen. Building a Library is still going to happen. Creative just makes it a little bit faster and cheaper.

Whether those "saved" turns are enough to make the rest of the game any easier or more winnable I guess is up for discussion based on the different strategies which exist out there.

But in my experience, the few turns gained by the early Creative production savings is great ... but not to the extent I'd be willing to give up the all-game savings from traits like Industrious, Organized and Spiritual.

I can give one specific example where creative is a huge advantage ...

Once again, that is precisely my point: In most cases, Creative needs specific examples to justify its usefulness. For most of the other traits (especially the "top tier" traits), no specific scenario has to be contrived to make them useful or applicable -- they just always are!

EDIT: Willem rocks on Archipelago.

Why? You're changing judging criteria just to strengthen your position. While you have a point that the +2 by itself is small, the 3-building boost does in fact make up for that. I find Theaters, Libraries, and Coliseums to be important buildings for a large majority of cities.

Ironically, your statement only shows just how weak Creative really is ... that it requires its other bonuses to "make up" for its own, innate shortcomings.

Creative needs its buildings bonuses to be of general value. While nearly every other trait can stand solely on its primary benefit.

Regardless of whether we first simplify the left side of the equation or the right, we're still going to end with the same result.

Not to mention that even though Creative and Spiritual have been compared a few times, Spiritual's primary "No Anarchy" bonus has not once come into the discussion -- despite Creative going full force with all of its bonuses together.

I think if we really wanted to take off the gloves and get into a knock-down, drag-out over the full implications of Spiritual vs Creative in a general sense, Creative wouldn't stand a chance.

And I think if we continued the brawl onto every trait other than Aggressive, Expansive, Imperialistic and Protective, Creative would likely find itself fighting the same losing battle.​

But, to be honest, I think traits should also be judged in the context of the Leaders they are attached to, which includes other traits, unique units, and unique buildings. It's a much more difficult comparison, but actually much more useful, since it's the interaction of all of these components that determines how to best approach a game.

It sounds like you're the one who wants to change the criteria to strengthen your position.

 

[futurehermit]

I see phil/fin/ind/agg as traits that define your strategy/opening.

I see cre/exp/org/imp/pro/cha/spir as traits that support your strategy/opening.

Agg isn't generally considered as powerful, because early warfare isn't always an option. Great people, wonders, and commerce are always options.

The top leaders imo are ones that have 2 of fin/ind/phi (liz/hc). The next tier of leaders are ones that have 1 of fin/ind/phi and one of the "good" support traits (agg/cre/org/cha/spir). The next tier of leaders are ones that don't have fin/ind/phi, but have 2 of the "good" support traits or have find/ind/phi and a "bad" support trait (I would make an exception for the mayans because of the synergy between fin and exp). The bottom tier of leaders are ones that have 2 of the "bad" support traits (e.g., joao, HRE). This is adjusted somewhat depending on the uu/ub of the given leader.

I find the REXing ability creative allows to be really advantageous. E.g., I love REXing hard with Willem and cottaging up to pay the maintenance. I love REXing hard with Cathy since settlers are so cheap. Paying the maintenance is somewhat harder, but she has stronger rush potential than Willem imo.

I think Acidsatyr said it best when he said that after a certain point in the game, it's not about traits anymore, but how much land you control. He valued creative really high as well, before I came to value it highly. Now I understand more what he was talking about because once you have enough land it is only a matter of time before you win. Sure, financial will help you win sooner, but getting the land is more important imo. That's not to say that I would ever rank creative > financial, but I would never downplay the really significant impact it can have on your early game which can be leveraged into a strong position going forward. I'd take a strong opening over strong long-term potential any day of the week. I rarely lose games in the long run. I lose them in the first couple of eras (partly that is because I don't have the perseverance to fight back tooth and nail if I fall behind )

 

[Unconquered Sun]

The top leaders imo are ones that have 2 of fin/ind/phi (liz/hc).

Heh. Rumor has it the top combo is ind/phi. Repeatedly went thru the roof in betatesting and never got imped.

Anyhow, acidsatyr and I hold creative in high esteem because it's powerful in early game, and early is where countering deity bonuses is hardest.

 

[OTAKUjbski]

@futurehermit:

That sounds agreeable to me.

 

[Monkeyfinger]

Funny enough, I'd argue that the combo of the top 2 traits is something completely different, but is still one of the 3 not in the game.

It's Cha/Cre.