Babylon Strategy

[pineappledan]

I was thinking of starting up a new game with Babylon, whom I have never played with VP before. I am thinking that the new changes to policies and scientist specialists have affected this is civ in quite a few ways. I wanted to hear other's opinions about how best to play Babylon now.

So unlike Vanilla, Babylon looks like it's played semi-wide with a focus more towards infrastructure than GP production. Sounds like most people go progress & Industry, focusing on buying up/building everything in site for the yields:
UA+Division of labour: 75% reduction in building production with gold investment
Organization + Industry opener + Broadway: 10f/10c, 15g, 250c on construction
Industry scaler+forbidden palace = 45% reduction on purchasing buildings

So what do people do for the mid game policy tree? Fealty seems like the obvious choice for a wide civ, but the only obvious synergy I see is the 1 extra scientist slot on monasteries. With the recent nerf on scientist specialists, wide play is hurting pretty bad for culture. Artistry looks like it might be uniquely suited to Babylon because of its +25% GP opener, the +1c/sc scaler, and national treasure (gold on GP use). Artistry is normally the tall civ option, but I'm wondering if Babylon isn't the exception?

Ideologies: I'm pretty split on whether freedom or order is the best route.

Order Pros:
Communism brings investment on buildings reduction to 78%
With Progress, 5-year plan reduces building costs to 40%
Free research labs almost a full era early if you kept up on culture, huge boon to G.Sci production

Freedom Pros:
Better gold production (2 extra trade routes)
Better GP production (33% on all vs 25% in order)
Civil society, Statue of Liberty, & Capitalism synergize well with specialist-focused UAs in general
Space procurement better-suited to Babylon than Spaceflight Pioneers

Basically, Order has all the synergies with Babylon's infrastructure UA, but Freedom has the synergies with GP generation side of the UA. Are the bonuses in Order infrastructure overkill? does pivoting to GP bonuses make sense at that point, or do you want to maximize infrastructure potential? Are there other aspects of the ideologies which I haven't considered properly?

Let me know what you guys think

 

[neo_arcadia]

I played Babylon long time ago but since his UA UB UU is basically not changed at all I think I can share you couple things about Babylon. I always play wide and always pick progress so this opinion somewhat limited. I'm also not a good long-term planner meaning I do not decide which future social policy I will take, especially Ideology. Discussing about theory is always fun but trying firsthand is definitely more fun. Anyway, because of this, Fealty is the obvious choice. Nobility is worth mention because going wide always come at the cost of happiness in which this social policy provides. Besides, you already built wall in all of your city, why not built accelerated version of castle (+100% construction). You will take little bit of hit because of Serfdom though but it's not that big of issue. For Artistry, I am pretty sure that in current patch that 25% bonus is only for Great Artist, Writer and Musician. If this is correct, I see little synergy between Babylon and Artistry.

For Industrial Era policy, it really depends on your preference and condition of your empire. If you adopt Industry make sure that you build Bank first before investing. Half of your UA is related to building investment and the good thing about Industry for Babylon is earlier social policy for extra investment rather than having extra steroid for Great Scientist at the end of social policy of Rationalism. If you are swimming in gold you can still somehow catch up in science because of Bank but on the other hand (again, it's because I always play wide) growth from Rationalism is also worth mentioning. I don't remember about Observatory having scientist slot or not but if it has, more reason to pick Rationalism. Then again, Rationalism needs two things to maximize its role: happy empire and source of golden age. Industry don't need those two, it's quite flexible. You only need monies.

 

[pineappledan]

The bonus to GP from the artistry opener affects ALL GP. just checked.

I wouldn't go rationalism for two reasons:
The +10% investment modifier on buildings is a first line policy, whereas rationalism you are holding out for the finisher
The scaler and wonder synergize incredibly well in Industry; Much better than porcelain tower.
I forgot about the extra scientist slot on observatories, but I just can't legitimately pick rationalism over industry, there's too many synergies in industry, and the recent buffs are really good.

 

[CrazyG]

I find you don't need to stack every single investment bonus as Babylon. If you do its just overkill, you run out of things to build. Progress->Industry can actually run out of things to build. Its a flexible civ and I wouldn't rule out any of the social policy trees. The investment bonus is great for production light empires who can struggle with infrastructure. Rationalism's GS bonus is also really great. Its a decent warmonger as well

 

[ShadedSkies]

The focus is still on tall GS spam, with the investment bonus easing the burden that comes with teching faster than you can build and the wall keeping you alive. Each new city slows your progress towards victory by increasing GP/science/policy costs.

The strongest start I've found is to make it to the industrial era as quickly as possible where all the OP buildings appear and then invest to build them faster than anyone else. Even on Deity the AI will never be able to catch up after that, the post-renaissance buildings and units are just too strong, having a factory combined with a seaport/train station early lets you build anything you want for the rest of the game.

 

[Ziad]

GP costs aren't affected by city count