Balance Issue: Unit-boosting buildings are all but useless

I agree... most of the buldings are useless. I have never built a workshop, armoury, forge, watermill... the list goes on. It's not just the build time, but also the maintainance costs! Given gold is so effectively turned into goodies through city states, it's much more cost effective to just to skip them.
 
I suggested that Barracks and Armory should make a boost to city defense in addition to its previous benefits. That would make them perhaps more worthwhile to construct.
 
@Veshta

I think you missed the point of the OP :D He is arguing that, even if you want to use the barracks and other XP giving buildings, the balance between the costs of making and maintaining those buildings and making and maintaining some extra units heavily favour making extra units and forget about the XP buildings. Not exactly the expected result, you should reckon ... reminds me of the more useless building of BtS, the custom house: in most cases you would be better building wealth than building it :D
That's correct.

By the way, someone pointed out in another thread that increasing the tile yield wouldn't completely solve the problem of building costs, because it would make everything else cheaper too (wonders and units). However, it'd be a start. Either that, or make buildings cheaper across the board (and especially reduce some of the maintenance costs).
 
I agree... most of the buldings are useless. I have never built a workshop, armoury, forge, watermill... the list goes on. It's not just the build time, but also the maintainance costs! Given gold is so effectively turned into goodies through city states, it's much more cost effective to just to skip them.
Absolutely. And that's another issue altogether, as well... city state benefits are WAY too much for the cost to obtain them. I'm guessing they'll probably be nerfed in a future patch, but at the moment... wow, it's a bit insane. ;) Perhaps if city state benefits were nerfed a bit (especially Maritime benefits), and Granaries/Watermills made a bit cheaper/less costly to maintain, they'd be worth building more.

I suggested that Barracks and Armory should make a boost to city defense in addition to its previous benefits. That would make them perhaps more worthwhile to construct.
Hmm, in a small way I guess... personally I think it'd be more useful to give them a hammer bonus to building units in addition to the XP bonus (perhaps a +10% hammer boost). Either that, or reduce the cost of the buildings. Or both.
 
Hmm, in a small way I guess... personally I think it'd be more useful to give them a hammer bonus to building units in addition to the XP bonus (perhaps a +10% hammer boost). Either that, or reduce the cost of the buildings. Or both.


That would be great. Give +20 % hammer bonus with barracks and Armory...then you dont need a forge.
 
This thread was started and propagated by people who do not know how to culminate production in cities, or maintain a couple cities as specialized production. If you've never had a 40+ production city before industrial age (without golden age) of course you will think alot is useless, because you're following an algorithm of pacing your empire far below potential.

Similar arguments steadfastly insist culture buildings are a "waste of money". Similar arguments incessantly decry the inability to support substantial standing armies in the modern age. Similar arguments repetitively try to maintain a position the AI cheats when it has 20 cities and +60 happiness. Similar arguments necessitate starting a game over and over and over until you're nowhere near desert or tundra.

You're doing it wrong. Your math is bad. Learn to play.
 
... make production quicker instead of giving any xp boost. Unless they increase the xp boost significantly...



Fantastic idea... I think I'm going to make this mod tonight.



btw... This post is a perfect candidate for making a mod. And it's so damned easy to do... So... good job on that Firaxis.
 
The problem with the buildings is really the crappy battle AI. The AI sucks in combat. Therefore it is not killing enough of your units. Since your units are not dieing you do not have to build more units. Therefore those buildings are not worth using. If they can manage to fix the AI it will fix many of your problems with these buildings (and AI is really what they need to be concentrating on right now).

That is an excellent point.

Everything hinges upon what happens to that. Changes to make certain buildings more reasonable to build could make it overpowered if you need way more troop.

Puppets would be much less attractive if like in civ 4 you needed to constantly build tons of troops. If they did a fix to make puppets weaker for the current AI and then changed the AI puppets could become clearly terrible.
 
This thread was started and propagated by people who do not know how to culminate production in cities, or maintain a couple cities as specialized production. If you've never had a 40+ production city before industrial age (without golden age) of course you will think alot is useless, because you're following an algorithm of pacing your empire far below potential.

Similar arguments steadfastly insist culture buildings are a "waste of money". Similar arguments incessantly decry the inability to support substantial standing armies in the modern age. Similar arguments repetitively try to maintain a position the AI cheats when it has 20 cities and +60 happiness. Similar arguments necessitate starting a game over and over and over until you're nowhere near desert or tundra.

You're doing it wrong. Your math is bad. Learn to play.

Perhaps you might wish to expand on your argument, it seems a tiny bit illucid to me. The number crunching on this thread that we have 'started and propagated' seems fairly sound, it's not exactly rocket surgery after all...
 
Perhaps you might wish to expand on your argument, it seems a tiny bit illucid to me. The number crunching on this thread that we have 'started and propagated' seems fairly sound, it's not exactly rocket surgery after all...

Have you (honestly) ever had 2 or more cities before 1200AD with 35+ production? If so, why didn't you use those as your sole goon producers (skipping market, bank, maybe building monument, temple) with +unit production and +unit upgrade buildings?

Best case scenario if you don't need the units, you can sell them within your border for very fast income, or conversely buy units in those cities and they get the upgrades relevant to the buildings.
 
This thread was started and propagated by people who do not know how to culminate production in cities, or maintain a couple cities as specialized production. If you've never had a 40+ production city before industrial age (without golden age) of course you will think alot is useless, because you're following an algorithm of pacing your empire far below potential.

Similar arguments steadfastly insist culture buildings are a "waste of money". Similar arguments incessantly decry the inability to support substantial standing armies in the modern age. Similar arguments repetitively try to maintain a position the AI cheats when it has 20 cities and +60 happiness. Similar arguments necessitate starting a game over and over and over until you're nowhere near desert or tundra.

You're doing it wrong. Your math is bad. Learn to play.
I think you'll find my math is fine, and I know how to play the game fairly well. You can skip the derision.

Have you (honestly) ever had 2 or more cities before 1200AD with 35+ production?
In my current game in 1170 AD I have five such cities. Plus several more that I could potentially convert to such a status if I shifted around tiles and citizens.

If so, why didn't you use those as your sole goon producers (skipping market, bank, maybe building monument, temple) with +unit production and +unit upgrade buildings?
Because as most Civ veterans know, it's not the later game that matters, it's the early game. By 1200 AD you will often have the game fairly well in the bag (or at least heading that way). Being able to produce stuff more quickly matters less at that point. Barracks, Stable, Armory and Forge all become available fairly early on, and they should become useful at the times when they arrive in the tech tree. Otherwise, why put them in so early if they're of no use until later?

The key to a successful campaign in the early-mid game is to have the strongest army possible. With such low unit numbers overall in Civ5 compared to Civ4 though, buildings like the Barracks/Armory/Stable/Forge are fairly useless in the key early-mid game interval. At present it's better to produce a larger army of non-promoted units than to waste valuable hammers producing buildings which give minimal benefits to your smaller army. It shouldn't be that way. That is the key point I have been trying to make here.

Best case scenario if you don't need the units, you can sell them within your border for very fast income, or conversely buy units in those cities and they get the upgrades relevant to the buildings.
If you truly don't need the units, you're wasting your time building them given that there are so many other things to build. But I don't see how you could ever not need the units until you win the game. If you're producing units and then deleting them immediately, you're probably doing it wrong (unless you're not going for a Conquest victory). ;)
 
I'm curious if map-size affects how people use these buildings. I can see them being more useful when more units are in play and the scale in general is larger.
 
Buildings need to be cheaper period. I almost always build wonders if I can because many of them take the same time as building a building IF NOT LESS!

(I've intentionally avoided the Egyptians for this purpose. If it's bad with everyoen else it must be downright stupid with the Egyptians)

Buildings need adjusting and rebalancing.

Things like the Coliseum and Stadium should produce some money per population (like 1/2 or something). So that in large cities they generate money, and in smaller ones they lose money (but still get you happiness). The in-game purpose of many buildings is a bit over-specialized, imho. Other adjustments are needed as well.

Seems to me you should be able to tell puppets to focus on one thing, though that might make puppets too powerful.
 
The key to a successful campaign in the early-mid game is to have the strongest army possible. With such low unit numbers overall in Civ5 compared to Civ4 though, buildings like the Barracks/Armory/Stable/Forge are fairly useless in the key early-mid game interval. At present it's better to produce a larger army of non-promoted units than to waste valuable hammers producing buildings which give minimal benefits to your smaller army. It shouldn't be that way. That is the key point I have been trying to make here.

Early game they take too long to build. Later though it isn't THAT bad, especially if you use some money to grease the wheels, imho. Of course, the later in the game you are, the more likely you won't need to build that many units, since you'll upgrade the ones you have.
 
The main problem that I have with unit boosting buildings is that I build them when I feel like really getting into war that game...in that case I go honor for 2x experience and find that it is betetr to build units or wonders, so I agree with OP.
 
I think you'll find my math is fine, and I know how to play the game fairly well. You can skip the derision.


In my current game in 1170 AD I have five such cities. Plus several more that I could potentially convert to such a status if I shifted around tiles and citizens.


Because as most Civ veterans know, it's not the later game that matters, it's the early game. By 1200 AD you will often have the game fairly well in the bag (or at least heading that way). Being able to produce stuff more quickly matters less at that point. Barracks, Stable, Armory and Forge all become available fairly early on, and they should become useful at the times when they arrive in the tech tree. Otherwise, why put them in so early if they're of no use until later?

The key to a successful campaign in the early-mid game is to have the strongest army possible. With such low unit numbers overall in Civ5 compared to Civ4 though, buildings like the Barracks/Armory/Stable/Forge are fairly useless in the key early-mid game interval. At present it's better to produce a larger army of non-promoted units than to waste valuable hammers producing buildings which give minimal benefits to your smaller army. It shouldn't be that way. That is the key point I have been trying to make here.


If you truly don't need the units, you're wasting your time building them given that there are so many other things to build. But I don't see how you could ever not need the units until you win the game. If you're producing units and then deleting them immediately, you're probably doing it wrong (unless you're not going for a Conquest victory). ;)

I believe you play/have played civ4 alot. You even have a link to a forum about civ4. I think that's great. I don't believe you play civ5 much, and even then not past prince level.'

I appreciate your feedback because most people would say it's impossible to have decent production, but there are flaws in your post. If you have decent production, why would there be "low unit numbers"? Have you played germany or russia in ciV? Better yet, have you played multi-player yet? Do you know I routinely rush neighbors with 6 swordsmen before 1000bc, with Arabia?

Cranking units and disbanding them in your border in the best way for a production city to "idle" during peace time. Net income is more than double of producing "wealth". But you'd know that by now, since you're good with numbers. What "lots of things" are there to build? Money buildings in city with little base income to which to add bonus? Redundant wonders? Don't answer these, they are rhetorical.
 
I believe you play/have played civ4 alot. You even have a link to a forum about civ4. I think that's great. I don't believe you play civ5 much, and even then not past prince level.'
You'd be wrong. Had a cakewalk first game on Prince, won easily on my second Emperor game, Immortal wasn't much trickier, will be trying Deity next. Civ5 isn't that hard, at least with the present AI.

I appreciate your feedback because most people would say it's impossible to have decent production, but there are flaws in your post. If you have decent production, why would there be "low unit numbers"?
Because you don't need a lot of units in single player, since the AI sucks. Multiplayer would of course be different, and I'd play differently in that circumstance as required.

Have you played germany or russia in ciV?
Not yet, but I'm guessing it wouldn't be much more easy/hard than any other nation.

Better yet, have you played multi-player yet?
Not at present in Civ5, though I'll get to that once I'm done with the Deity AI (which shouldn't be long, just need the time to play through another game). In Civ4 I have racked up countless hours in multiplayer games, and while it's a different game, a lot of the general concepts will be transferrable to Civ5. Stuff like attacking early with superior numbers, maintaining the element of surprise, etc. I'm fairly confident that I'll do alright in Civ5 multiplayer when I get started.

Do you know I routinely rush neighbors with 6 swordsmen before 1000bc, with Arabia?
Sure, that's not particularly difficult to achieve. I prefer the 5-6 Horseman rush against the AI myself, but I can see how against human players who build/use Spears properly, Horses may not be quite as effective as Swordsmen. Same principle though: spam units and go kill someone as early as feasible.

Cranking units and disbanding them in your border in the best way for a production city to "idle" during peace time. Net income is more than double of producing "wealth".
Good to know. I still question why you wouldn't be building up units for the next war rather than disbanding them, though.

What "lots of things" are there to build?
I'll admit that I am a bit of a wonder hog (at least in single player), so there's that. I probably wouldn't bother as much with them in multiplayer. But there's also the fact that new buildings come along quite quickly, since the research rate in Civ5 is rather fast compared to production speed.
 
Just fyi the factory does not require a workshop. That's just what the civilopedia says. The xml does not include anything about the factory requiring a workshop, and I've certainly built them without it.
 
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