Adding special bonuses to 'generic' +5 Happiness monopolies?

infidel88

Prince
Joined
Jul 29, 2013
Messages
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Yuggoth
Doable?
At the moment Cloves, Coffee, Furs, Glass, Incense, Jewelry, Perfume, Tobacco, Truffles and Wine all add +5 :c5happy: Happiness.
And Gems, Gold, Ivory, Lapis Lazuli, Porcelain and Spices add 25%:c5goldenage: Golden Age Length.

Now I don't know if those were intended yields or (as I assume) someone just made it 'for now' and it stayed like this as all temporary changes last very long :)

I know monopolies and luxuries are somewhat random, but still - more diversity is always better, right?
So:
- Furs - +5/10 HP gained on heal;
- Incense - +10% :c5faith: in cities;
- Lapis Lazuli - +10% :c5greatperson: points in cities;
- Perfume - +10% more effective diplo units;
- Wine - extra :c5culture::c5faith::c5goldenage: on new citizen born;
- Gold - 10% unit maintenance;
- Tobacco - reduces poverty threshold by 10%;

That would leave coffee and truffles to add happiness and gems, ivory and spices add GA length. This way they would no longer feel generic.
 
I too am very much in favour of addressing the weakness of the +5 happiness bonus! Quite a few interesting ideas, thnx for the suggestions.
 
If you're going to take a look at reworking monopoly bonuses can we please do it as part of a wider rebalancing of luxury yields? There are some very big differences in the combination of bonus yields from luxury tiles, the bonuses available from buildings, and the bonuses available from policies.

As a quick example fully upgraded Furs give a total of +6 yields (2f 1c 1p 2g) while Truffles give +7, and Olives give +10 (+13 with monopoly). The gaps are pretty big and can be rather consequential once you consider that the Olives give an arguably better monopoly bonus, get their upgrade building earlier, and have an upgrade building you would be building 99% of the time anyway instead of the more situational and lower priority Caravansary. The penalty for having a bad luxury can be greater if it is upgraded by a bad building like the Stone Works (not worth building at all if it's only upgrading 1 tile, leaving poor Jade as giving just 1c more than an ordinary mine unless/until you score the monopoly bonus).

I don't need these to be more balanced, but it'd be nice.
 
Maybe just do a monopoly tuning thread? The monopolies fit different styles, Jade is mentioned as weak above but its one my favorites. They won't ever all be totally equal, but some more parity would be nice (Olives are better than most other plantations in my opinion). The plantations that appear of forest/jungle are generally kind of weak and you get this awkward moment where improving your luxury lowers your yields if you have a herbalist or any forest synergy. I don't know if more monopoly bonus types are needed; each luxury having its own unique monopoly sounds like an additional mod to me.
 
IMO not every Monopoly needs to be unique or amazing. +5 Happiness can be a boon in the mid-game, too.

But that makes some resources outright a bore to start with. Something like Jade/Pearls becomes a true powerhouse, but Furs remain meh throughtout. Sure, some should stay with +Happiness/+GA length, that's fine and also adds variety to the game, but I think there's too many of them.

OAt the very least the +Faith ones should be included because it's just weird that there's ones boosting every regular yield and yet none do so for Faith. At the very least, if the other ones are too complicated, something like +3Faith from Wine/Lapis Lazuli and +10%Faith from Incense would be fun to see.

Maybe just do a monopoly tuning thread? The monopolies fit different styles, Jade is mentioned as weak above but its one my favorites. They won't ever all be totally equal, but some more parity would be nice (Olives are better than most other plantations in my opinion). The plantations that appear of forest/jungle are generally kind of weak and you get this awkward moment where improving your luxury lowers your yields if you have a herbalist or any forest synergy. I don't know if more monopoly bonus types are needed; each luxury having its own unique monopoly sounds like an additional mod to me.

Agreed about Jade, +3 Culture per tile early on is probably the strongest monopoly, especially since IIRC Jade is also improved early on (by Stone Works), making it a real beast.
 
Maybe just do a monopoly tuning thread? The monopolies fit different styles, Jade is mentioned as weak above but its one my favorites. They won't ever all be totally equal, but some more parity would be nice (Olives are better than most other plantations in my opinion). The plantations that appear of forest/jungle are generally kind of weak and you get this awkward moment where improving your luxury lowers your yields if you have a herbalist or any forest synergy. I don't know if more monopoly bonus types are needed; each luxury having its own unique monopoly sounds like an additional mod to me.

Funak 'balanced' them all forever ago, take it up with him. :)

No new features, though. There's no support (IIRC) for % faith in cities (besides, that'd be pretty weak, given the low FPT of most cities), for example. And no unit-related stuff. Yields only.

G
 
Doable?
At the moment Cloves, Coffee, Furs, Glass, Incense, Jewelry, Perfume, Tobacco, Truffles and Wine all add +5 :c5happy: Happiness.
And Gems, Gold, Ivory, Lapis Lazuli, Porcelain and Spices add 25%:c5goldenage: Golden Age Length.

Now I don't know if those were intended yields or (as I assume) someone just made it 'for now' and it stayed like this as all temporary changes last very long :)

I know monopolies and luxuries are somewhat random, but still - more diversity is always better, right?
So:
- Furs - +5/10 HP gained on heal;
- Incense - +10% :c5faith: in cities;
- Lapis Lazuli - +10% :c5greatperson: points in cities;
- Perfume - +10% more effective diplo units;
- Wine - extra :c5culture::c5faith::c5goldenage: on new citizen born;
- Gold - 10% unit maintenance;
- Tobacco - reduces poverty threshold by 10%;

That would leave coffee and truffles to add happiness and gems, ivory and spices add GA length. This way they would no longer feel generic.

It's not a bad idea, I like it
 
Funak 'balanced' them all forever ago, take it up with him. :)

No new features, though. There's no support (IIRC) for % faith in cities (besides, that'd be pretty weak, given the low FPT of most cities), for example. And no unit-related stuff. Yields only.

G
Technically I only did resource-yields, you never really got around to my monopoly-suggestions, which is perfectly fine tbh as I think the current ones are decent enough.
 
IMO not every Monopoly needs to be unique or amazing. +5 Happiness can be a boon in the mid-game, too.

I don't know, I rarely find it useful, to the point that I always restart a game if I have a luxury with that monopoly bonus. It seems by far the worst and least interesting. I would be heavily in favor of getting rid of specifically the happiness boost altogether. It wouldn't even have to be something new, just use some of the existing bonuses. Its just so disappointing to get that bonus.
 
Currently I think amber is the only +3 science monopoly, and whales the only +10% science, so maybe you could convert some of the golden age or happiness to those. I do find +5 happiness rather weak (other than on Cloves)

@Funak
Cotton strikes me as a little beat weak. Its only a 2 food 1 gold tile at first, after the plantation its average at best, and it needs a caravanasary (not that early, generally a low priority) to get its last bonus. After all that its a pretty good tile, but I don't think its enough to cover its really weak start. I really hate seeing cotton as my starting monopoly
 
Well, if the monopolies are to be yields only, Incense and Wine or Tobacco are obvious targets for a +3 Faith per tile monopoly. Is there support for stuff like +3 Golden Age Points per tile? Gold and something else, like Furs or Gems, could get that. I remember seeing pics of Great General points per tile, so Ivory would work great with these for a monopoly. Whales could get Great Admiral points, with +10% Science going to something else.
 
Well, if the monopolies are to be yields only, Incense and Wine or Tobacco are obvious targets for a +3 Faith per tile monopoly. Is there support for stuff like +3 Golden Age Points per tile? Gold and something else, like Furs or Gems, could get that. I remember seeing pics of Great General points per tile, so Ivory would work great with these for a monopoly. Whales could get Great Admiral points, with +10% Science going to something else.

The Golden Age length bonus could just be increased to maybe 50% instead, it would be much easier than golden age points I bet. I don't think great person points would be a good idea. That's not what tiles or resources do. And I doubt it would be easy, and based on what G said above I doubt they'd do it.
 
how about the 5+ happiness monopoly also provide a decrease to the needs by a % (like some wonders do). that way it scales better with empires that has a high number of cities and into the lategame. It would also scale better with the rationalism policy (3+ happiness alone from a policy is a joke).

Just my thoughts
 
Currently I think amber is the only +3 science monopoly, and whales the only +10% science, so maybe you could convert some of the golden age or happiness to those. I do find +5 happiness rather weak (other than on Cloves)

@Funak
Cotton strikes me as a little beat weak. Its only a 2 food 1 gold tile at first, after the plantation its average at best, and it needs a caravanasary (not that early, generally a low priority) to get its last bonus. After all that its a pretty good tile, but I don't think its enough to cover its really weak start. I really hate seeing cotton as my starting monopoly
Cotton doesn't provide any food at all, it's all about gold and eventually some hammers, which makes perfect sense to me. I mean it is slightly worse than some other resources for sure, but not all resources are created equally, if they were, this would be a really boring game tbh :D.
 
Cotton doesn't provide any food at all, it's all about gold and eventually some hammers, which makes perfect sense to me. I mean it is slightly worse than some other resources for sure, but not all resources are created equally, if they were, this would be a really boring game tbh :D.
It appears on grassland, making it a 2 food 1 gold tile. I have the game open right now according to tooltips it never provides production
 
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