Arioch's Analyst Thread

[beestar]

As we know, in Gamescon demo users didn't found the SP switch. And, since many policies give one-time bonus, I don't see how the switch could be implemented logically.

Doesn't seem to be a contradiction to me. For example, work your way down the Piety tree (OR, Reformation), gain the one-time 6-turn Golden Age, then switch to a Rationalism (disabling OR). Acquire Free Thought and Humanism, then decide you want to switch back to Piety. Free Thought and Humanism become inactivated, but OR becomes active again, and Reformation also becomes active but obviously doesn't provide another Golden Age.

What it does let you do is keep OR active, and it lets you buy the next Social Policy in Piety (Theocracy).

Actually, I'm just guessing that you need to have Piety "active" in order to progress down the Piety tree. But if you don't, then you could buy Theocracy while running Rationalism, and then switch to Piety to gain the benefits of OR, Reformation (i.e. no benefit ), and Theocracy.

 

[Celevin]

I don't see what the big discussion about being able to switch between opposing social policy trees is, anyway. Even if I was given the option to switch, I wouldn't in 99% of my games since it means losing previous benefits, thus wasted culture points. The times that I did do it, I would feel a sour taste in my mouth on not being efficient. Besides, while it isn't 100% realistic, I think it's cool that civs can specialize their empire and make permanent game-lasting decisions.

The coolest is definitely Piety / Rationalism. My only concern is that they both aren't activated at the same time, making it more of a decision about time than actually based upon the tree's strengths.

 

[The_J]

Just in case that someone didn't read my thread:

Thats a good point; is there a distinction between crossing ocean tiles vs coast tiles?

Or is optics needed for both?

After optics, you ships can NOT enter ocean, only coast.
didn't see, what is need for ocean.

I'm thinking you have to develop a certain technology (Optics has been mentioned) before your units are given the Embarkation upgrade.

 

[KrikkitTwo]

Well at the time Piety is available, there are 3 other trees avaialble, so unless you probably can invest in them while you pursue Rationalism

 

[Senethro]

Even if I was given the option to switch, I wouldn't in 99% of my games since it means losing previous benefits, thus wasted culture points. The times that I did do it, I would feel a sour taste in my mouth on not being efficient.

That kind of efficiency is for people not playing on a sufficiently challenging difficulty level. I think the decision to accept that past investment should not influence future investment (and I guess the Sunk Cost fallacy applies here too) is an interesting one I would like to have available.

 

[Celevin]

That kind of efficiency is for people not playing on a sufficiently challenging difficulty level. I think the decision to accept that past investment should not influence future investment (and I guess the Sunk Cost fallacy applies here too) is an interesting one I would like to have available.

What do you mean "that kind of efficiency is for people not playing on a sufficiently challenging difficulty level"? I think you mean the opposite of what you're saying, but in either case, the sentence is convoluted.

No matter the amount lost, it would make me peeved, even if it was very little, due to my OCD. But we're not talking about losing a little bit of power. Each social policy on average is as strong as a civ's unique ability.

I fully admit that if the ability to switch was added, it would not hurt my playing very much, and would please others. I'm just surprised at the number of people that really really want the opportunity to switch, and think they would take advantage of it. My guess is they think it's a good idea, but when presented with the option, would find that it's too detrimental to lose 2-3 policies.

I also take a bit of comfort in seeing an AI choose Autocracy, and choose to not switch off of it. It gives them more flavour!

 

[DeepQantas]

You know who else liked Social Policy tree switching? That's right!

...

Sorry Hitler and Mussolini, I can't join your little fascist club. You see, 5000 years ago our people really needed cheap settlers and...

 

[Venereus]

The developers have been pretty clear about keeping the bonuses you get, instead of switching and lossing some ("what cool effect do I want now?"). It seems like a better design to add a long-term planning aspect by making you choose to not invest in an early tree that would lock you out of a later one.

 

[DeepQantas]

But that planning aspect is present even if you can switch.

 

[Venereus]

But that planning aspect is present even if you can switch.

How so? That'd be more like when you prepared for anarchy in Civ IV, or when you waited for a Civic to unlock before making a switch. Hardly long-term planning.

 

[DeepQantas]

If you switch, you're disabling an already paid for social policy tree for the rest of the game. Other things being equal, enemy civs will have more active social policies than you and it might even make cultural victory impossible depending on how much you toss out.

If you plan ahead poorly you'll pay a price for it.

 

[12agnar0k]

Their is no planning aspect if you can undo all previous decisions, i.e take all of the honour branch for an early conquest plan, and then later on undo each upgrade giving you back lots of cluture and then buy up a couple branches of economic & scientific bonuses, for the later part of the game, this is not planning, this is "I don't need to make sure I save my culture for when I unlock this branch, because I can undo my choices", I dont need to worry about spending on honour early on because I can just undo it.", their is no planning in this model, as it stands you can mix-match permanent choices and get the bonuses you want for the entire game. If you only want settler expansion for the first say 50 turns and then youll stop, then don't bother taking it at all. If however you want to expand as much as possible and make a larger land base and expand till your economy suffers, then go ahead and take it. This is planning baby.

As far as "switching apposing policies" go, no culture is ever "given back", so if you switch according to your "plan" you will have to do so taking into account all the lost culture on the other branch, hence planning needed. So switching in general to opposites is okay, but certainly not switching and getting back all you spent for the sake of "I dont need it any more", I'm sorry but you can't get it back, it was all spent on those extra settlers.

 

[Celevin]

might even make cultural victory impossible depending on how much you toss out

It's interesting how you state this, you raise a very big issue. I completely agree with you that if you lose 2-3 policies due to a switch, chances are you can no longer win by culture.

Think about this, when the developers are making the game, their goal is to balance culture victories so it is just as and only just as challenging as the other victory conditions. So they set some number x as the amount of culture points needed. More than x, and the space race might be a lot easier, or less than x, and we might see 500 AD culture victories. We also know that social policies cost more depending on how many you've already bought.

 

[DeepQantas]

Ragnarok:
I don't think anyone was talking about undoing decisions for a refund so no need to be sorry.

 

[Polobo]

You know who else liked Social Policy tree switching? That's right!

...

Sorry Hitler and Mussolini, I can't join your little fascist club. You see, 5000 years ago our people really needed cheap settlers and...

Except no single leader in history has ever led their "country" from the year 3000 BC until present day. It'd be more like Gandhi deciding that "peace" was overrated and ineffective and decided to go nuke someone; very inconsistent with the basic character of the person making the decision.

I'm slightly leaning toward allowing the disabling of SPs but recongnize that doing so would require a whole different series of benefits (or additional penalties) since the number of paths that need to be made viable/balanced increases significantly. Since, the personality of the AI does not change throughout the game I have little difficulty giving up the ability to change my mind mid-way through the GAME. Given that we do have foreknowledge of the policies is more than a fair tradeoff (unlike real leaders who, in 400BC, were limited in their ability or desire to implement the institutions we have today). That said, the fact that some trees are unavailable until later in the game (as opposed to simply less effective) fails to reflect the reality of human history which further leads to gameplay (and development) considerations winning out over historic modelling.

 

[Polobo]

It's interesting how you state this, you raise a very big issue. I completely agree with you that if you lose 2-3 policies due to a switch, chances are you can no longer win by culture.

Think about this, when the developers are making the game, their goal is to balance culture victories so it is just as and only just as challenging as the other victory conditions. So they set some number x as the amount of culture points needed. More than x, and the space race might be a lot easier, or less than x, and we might see 500 AD culture victories. We also know that social policies cost more depending on how many you've already bought.

So when you go for culture you better not change your mind; but if going for another branch it very well may be worthwhile to forgo being able to have 4 active branches at the end of the game and instead pickup autocracy (and only have 3 active) to hold off late attackers while you get your spaceship built or gather your final few votes; especially since you've already gotten over the happiness-lull part of the game and can afford to lose Piety.

I think this kind of planning and decisions are good but having to consider that plan of action, and program it into an AI, when balancing the victory conditions is going to be more difficult. Personally I'd probably program such that branch swapping is allowed but would try and make it so that AI would play without swapping - and still be balanced. If swapping ended up being too powerful then maybe a later patch would disable it by default - with an option. Adding additional penalities later would also be an option.

EDIT: I am probably getting the trade-off braches wrong but the ideas still hold.

 

[Celevin]

Their is no planning aspect if you can undo all previous decisions, i.e take all of the honour branch for an early conquest plan, and then later on undo each upgrade giving you back lots of cluture and then buy up a couple branches of economic & scientific bonuses, for the later part of the game, this is not planning, this is "I don't need to make sure I save my culture for when I unlock this branch, because I can undo my choices", I dont need to worry about spending on honour early on because I can just undo it.", their is no planning in this model, as it stands you can mix-match permanent choices and get the bonuses you want for the entire game. If you only want settler expansion for the first say 50 turns and then youll stop, then don't bother taking it at all. If however you want to expand as much as possible and make a larger land base and expand till your economy suffers, then go ahead and take it. This is planning baby.

As far as "switching apposing policies" go, no culture is ever "given back", so if you switch according to your "plan" you will have to do so taking into account all the lost culture on the other branch, hence planning needed. So switching in general to opposites is okay, but certainly not switching and getting back all you spent for the sake of "I dont need it any more", I'm sorry but you can't get it back, it was all spent on those extra settlers.

While I'm not on the side of switching policy trees, the argument isn't about "undoing" choices. It's about comparing these two designs:

1) Will I take advantage of being able to switch policy trees, and will it lead to interesting decisions? Or is it always a bad idea to switch trees, and will it take away a certain "permanent flavour" my empire had, the same way that wonders have?

2) What strategic implications are there to being completely locked out of a tree? Is this a bad design, as in will some trees not see use due to them being too late / too weak compared to their lock-out counterpart?


The point I am arguing is that if a player invested 2+ policies into a tree and want to garbage them, then there's a few things that could be wrong. The trees might be unbalanced, or the player made a REALLY REALLY bad decision early.

 

[DeepQantas]

This whole discussion could probably use another thread, but I'll just say that it'd be absolutely hilarious for every civ to temporarily adopt Autocracy when World Wars start happening. The one that has to switch back first loses.

 

[Polobo]

If you switch, you're disabling an already paid for social policy tree for the rest of the game. Other things being equal, enemy civs will have more active social policies than you and it might even make cultural victory impossible depending on how much you toss out.

If you plan ahead poorly you'll pay a price for it.

I've probably already written this but; since many policies are either 1-time OR limited use (the settler bonus is only useful during the settlement phase for instance - late game it is of marginal benefit) not having them "active" - without some kind of "deactivation penalty" - results in minimal/zero loss to the player.

 

[Celevin]

This whole discussion could probably use another thread, but I'll just say that it'd be absolutely hilarious for every civ to temporarily adopt Autocracy when World Wars start happening. The one that has to switch back first loses.

I can't wait to be Persia, then activate a Golden Age + Autocracy. It'll be so so bloody...