(Based on the original game - can't be arsed to fit RT's wonky diplomacy system into this, but I think something can be worked wth, and diplomacy in RT probably needs to be reworked. I can't really comment on stuff like diplomatic capital and shared abilities, but most of this addresses fundamental issues with BE's economy.)
So yeah, BE's economy is pretty busted. One of the biggest offenders is internal routes crapping out free food and hammers, and the way small cities are rewarded in the traderoute game. Having played enough of the base game, I'd propose the following to put some balance back into the game.
Internal routes - No longer generate free hammers / food out of nowhere. At all. Rather, internal routes function like international routes in most respects, but don't gain the bonuses for autoplants, feedsite hubs, and so on. Internal routes generate far less energy than international routes.
For both internal and foreign routes, energy generated is based on the size of both cities, with routes between two large cities being far more profitable than a route between a large and small, and way way more than between two small cities. Internal routes are 1/4th as effective at generating energy and gain no science. Science gained from international routes is based on the combined research of both cities, modified by an exponential factor favoring routes between cities with higher science rates; routes to small cities basically don't generate research on either end. A modifier is added for tech disparity, favoring the player who is behind in tech.
However, Trade routes have the following effects:
- Any basic resources are shared between the two cities, for the purposes of building requirements. For instance, if one city has silica, the other can build Optical Surgery. The resources must be improved.
- Shared basic resources treat the city tile as if it has the basic resource, for buildings that improve the yield of a basic resource. For instance, a city receiving Copper gains +1 science with a Network. These yields are shown when forming a trade route.
- A few resources grant bonuses simply for being part of a trade route. Gold and Coral, for instance, add +1 culture to the originating city, for internal and external trade routes. Only one of these bonuses is applied, so the limit on culture is +1, but an exporting city gains +1 for every trade route they make (unless the recipient city has improved gold/coral).
- Some other resources give bonuses in combination with other resources, if the two cities have compatible resources. For instance, if one city has fungus and another has tubers, the route (at both ends) will give +1 food. This bonus is applied for any two cities which share more than one food resource, and is applied even if the resources surround one city. Some of these bonuses will require a building present in the city in order to be effective; for instance, and they stack with each other; the basic food combination is available at start, but something like fruits+fiber would require a mass digester.
- Strategic resources will only travel along routes to access buildings, for instance Firaxite for Observatories. Unlike bonus resources, the city tile does not receive a bonus, but it does allow an observatory to be built. There are no bonuses for sharing strategics. Only internal routes can carry strategic resources, as other factions will not allow foreigners to access them.
- Trade restrictions can be placed on foreign trade routes; a tariff can be levied, adding extra gold (and taking away profit) for the recipient, and charging the recipient for the exchange of bonus resources. This can cut both ways. However, doing this will naturally discourage players from forming trade routes with you, and raising a tariff has diplomatic consequences for AI. Additionally, when a tariff is levied, bonuses for resources and buildings are lost on both ends (exception for the wonder that gives culture for trade routes).
- The virtue "Gift Economy" adds +1 culture for international and station routes and +1 energy for every 2 bonus resources acquired from international routes, instead of its current effect.
- The virtue "Interdependence Network" adds a slot for 1 internal route in every city with a Trade Depot instead of its current effect.
- The virtue "Profiteering" grants +0.25 health per trader.
- Stations get a bit of an overhaul (more on that in their section).
- The virtue "Alternative Markets" improves the base yield from stations by 25%, stations grant +1 energy for every bonus resource they naturally lack, and bonuses from resource exchange and buildings are 25% stronger.
Right now internals give about 10-12 resources for every new city, and this is bad. Under the reformed system, trade routes would give something like:
Big->Big foriegn (say both size 15, both empires close in science and both cities generate 40 sci): 22.5 base energy for sender, 5.625 base energy for receiver, 8 science for both, +1 culture to foreign city for gold, +1 energy for autoplant, +2 food on both ends for shared food (tubers, fungus, fruits are available, vivarium built in both cities), +1 science for both cities (feedsite hubs), +1 culture to foreign city for gift economy, +1.5 gold to foreign city for gift economy.
Small->Big foreign: (size 5 to size 15, 10 sci to 40 sci): 6.25 base energy for sender, 1.5625 base energy for receiver, 1 science for both, foreign city has same building/resource bonuses and virtues, but small city lacks autoplant or feedsite hub. Sending the to the big city is going to be pretty bad, but the big city might have a resource you want. Presumably the big foreign city wants open markets due to its virtues.
Finally - big change. Aliens no longer attack trade convoys unless they are hostile with you. You wouldn't believe how many times I cursed the screen about this. As such, the ultrasonic fence event has to be changed. If you piss off the aliens, you'll have to make sure your trade routes are clear, which adds some incentive to play nice with the buggers.
Other economy changes:
Population slider: Instead of population going 100% towards science, a slider is implemented. Population investment can be directed towards culture, science, gold, or production. By default, the game sets the tax rate to 50% gold and 50% science, so each population is giving 0.5 gold and 0.5 science. Technological advance, virtue acquisition, and sponsor choice affect the upper limit of each category for the slider; for instance, Franco-Iberia can run their culture slider to 80% from the very start, while Slavic Federation can put their science slider to 60% due to their scientific bent. Enough technological advance can allow 100% in anything. There is however a slight benefit for diversifying your population investment, up to +20% in all yields for an even split.
For production, the yield is delivered directly to the local city.
Culture and production slider can only go up to 20% at the start of the game, while energy/research/prod start at a limit of 50%. The energy and production sliders generate twice as many units as sci/culture, in order to compensate for the relative abundance of production/energy.
Flat science buildings: All flat science from buildings and terrain is affected by the slider, unless specifically exempted. Percentage bonuses are NOT affected, nor are wonders. This prevents Lab/Network spam from getting around the slider, and blunts Academy spam (assuming they are dropped to 2 beakers).
The net effect of this is to allow players to switch their empire according to their needs, rather than being locked into "get more pop, get more science".
The virtues which add production, science, and knowledge per population are less effective, but allow the slider to be adjusted 20% higher and improve the bonus effect in their appropriate category.
Techs which improve slider rate:
Power Systems (+10% to production slider)
Ballistics (+10% to research slider)
Genetic Mapping (+10% to culture slider)
Geophysics (+10% to energy slider)
Fabrication (+10% to production slider)
Biology (+10% to culture slider)
Cognition (+10% to research slider)
Communications (+10% to energy slider)
Social Dynamics (+10% to research slider)
Human Idealism (+10% to culture slider)
Human Conservation (+10% to production slider)
Euthenics (+10% to energy slider)
Ballistic LEV (+10% to production slider)
Alien Domestication (+10% to culture slider)
Protogenetics (+10% to research slider)
Field Theory (+10% to energy slider)
Affinity 8 Purity: +10% to production slider
Affinity 8 Supremacy: +10% to energy slider
Affinity 8 Harmony: +10% to culture slider
5 Affinity in all: +10% to research slider
All of these slider bonuses also increase the yield of their respective areas by 5% (additive)
Virtue tweaks:
Might:
Public Security: +0.2 health per military unit and +1 health per 8 population in a city. Swaps places with Adaptive Doctrine in the tree, so it's a tier 2 item.
Liberation Army: Shorter unrest in puppeted cities, outposts are replaced with your own outposts upon capture, automatically excavate the ruin of stations you destroy.
Special Service: Extra covert agent from Spy Network, +25% intrigue
Joint Operations: Stations provide 3 range orbital coverage, and gain 20% battle strength when you trade with them
Propserity:
Workforce Initiative: Free worker, clear forests and miasma 33% faster.
Colony Initiative: Moved to tier 2. Pioneer Spirit moved to tier 1, and made a prereq for Colony Initiative. Colony Initiative leads nowhere, Pioneer Sprit leads to Settler Clans and Settler Clans leads directly to Mind over Matter. This should allow players to take Colony Initiative and all Health virtues with only 10 picks, rather than being screwed into 11 picks. The main purpose tho is to move the free settler to 4th virtue, requiring a virtue which is kind of junk.
Helping Hands: +10% production for Civilian units, +15% worker speed
Gift Economy: Change mentioned above.
Pathfinders: +2 expeditions for explorers, Explorers are 20% stronger in combat
Knowledge:
Social Mores: +20% limit to culture slider, +0.1 culture for every population and +1 culture for every 10 culture generated by a city after modifiers.
Lab Apprenticeship: +20% limit to science slider, free maintenance for Laboratories
Creative Class: Gain 10% global health when no category is at 0% funding, 30% of excess health is converted to culture to spend on virtues
Field Research: +1 Movement for Explorers, gain science for expeditions. Expeditions which further distant research are 25% more useful.
Applied Aesthetics (prereq Creative Class): +2 yield to energy/science/production/culture based on your colonist type, or +2 energy for other colonist types
Community Medicine: Pay no maintenance on Clinics and Pharmalabs. Free Clinic, Pharmalab, or Cytonursery in every city. (in that order, new cities get a clinic).
Information Warfare: Free covert agent. Gain 20% of pillaged gold from cities and improvements as science.
Industry:
Centralized Planning: +20% limit to energy slider, +5 energy in the capital
Scalable Infrastructure: Moved to Tier 2, in place of Entrepreneurial Spaceflight. +20% limit to production slider, +15% towards Wonders
Magnasanti: +0.25 health per building per population in a city. (Therefore Magnasanti is only giving +4 health in a size 16 city, rather than +bazillion.)
Diplomacy:
In a nutshell - cut out the exploitable mechanics, have an AI that behaves rationally and only responds to rational things. No "you hurt the aliens therefore we don't like you" and certainly nothing that exists to be exploited by the human player. The AI should, as a rule, be averse to trading any strategy resource, nor should they keep asking to open borders. I would very much like an option to automatically reject the advances of an AI if they ask for particular things, and likewise there are items the AI should have no business trading away for any reason. Strategics should only be up for trade in a dire situation, or if the AI knows they can make a sick profit off of something that is cheap and nonthreatening for them. AIs will NEVER trade away a city even if they're losing badly, unless it's a city in revolt / puppet of yours, and likewise they won't bother asking for your cities unless you're really willing to offer them up. The AI will consider a war indemnity, usually an onerous one, and is more willing to buy peace with gold.
Miasma:
No more units damaged by Miasma - this causes more AI pathfinding havoc and is a mild irritant to the human player. Instead, Miasma does a few things:
- Blocks trade routes unless all units are immune to miasma penalties.
- Aliens and Harmony-unique units have an advantage against Human units in miasma (even against generic Harmony units). Harmony generic units gain a slight edge in Miasma against other units.
- High Harmony affinity levels allow for free Miasma healing (+5/turn)
- Workers and Explorers take 50% longer to work in Miasma, unless they have the miasma immunity techs / immunity from affinity.
- Additional unhealth in large cities with Miasma. Playing Harmony reduces this somewhat but does not entirely eliminate Miasmic health damage.
- Tiles that normally yield 4 or more of a resource yield -1 of that resource when covered in Miasma. This effect is only lifted with an endgame Harmony tech.
- Ranged units bombarding into Miasma are 20% less effective. Harmony affinity reduces and eventually eliminates this penalty.
Thus, clearing Miasma is a big priority for economic reasons, and spreading Miasma to wreck economy is something to consider.
Sponsor Traits:
In short - everyone gets some Economic bonuses. These should be more balanced but would need fine tuning. Some bonuses are also uniquish. I'm not going to muck with the diplomatic currency stuff, which is a whole other can of worms.
ARC:
-25% time required for espionage, and intrigue generates 25% faster.
All tiles which produce 3 or more energy produce +1 energy
All tiles which produce 3 or more production produce +1 energy
-5% upkeep for improvements
(These bonuses can stack on the same tile)
ARC is focused on big tile yields in energy and production, owing to their superior exploitation of natural resources. This can generate a lot of extra energy for the ARC, especially with virtues to enhance particular buildings. They really don't want Miasma on their prized tiles, as this will negate their bonus. They have no bonus in the capital or per-city bonus, so claiming the profitable terrain should be your first priority. They have no particular slider preference either.
PAC:
+20% worker speed and +10% construction speed for wonders
+20% limit for production slider
+20% effect from population (slider-based)
-5% upkeep for buildings
PAC's strength lies in its industrious population; the more people they can get, the better their results. This doesn't just affect industry, but everything - science, culture, gold, you name it. They also improve terrain faster and have a slight edge in building wonders. The ability to go harder on production earlier allows them to crank out those critical first units before most other factions.
PAU:
+10% growth in all cities when healthy
All cities with a Command Center or Headquarters gain +1 food, production, culture, and science
+1 culture in the capital
-5% upkeep for units
As before, PAU's start is one of the best, with a free set of resources in the capital that work for you on planetfall. Their bonus is a take on the Party Leadership tenet in Civ5. While Command Centers are pretty expensive and late-gameish, Barre has that much extra incentive to push for Communications.
Kavithan Protectorate:
-50% cost of purchasing tiles with gold or culture
Outposts grow twice as fast
+10% limit to slider for all categories
+10% production for civilian units
Cheaper settlers and flexibility with the slider give the KP a lot of choices in where to go. The centerpiece is their cheap border expansion and fast outpost growth, allowing KP to claim a lot of land quickly.
Brasilia:
+5 healing for all units
+10% melee strength
+1 research per active soldier or combat rover (affected by slider; prod/energy are thrown out when calculating this).
Veteran status is 50% more effective (+15% per tier rather than +10%)
Brasil's bonus unsurprisingly lies in military units - fielding a large army defrays some of the lost research or cultural investment. It's not a bad idea to go 50/20 on sci/culture to get the most out of your standing army. Any ranged units you build don't get this bonus however, and that should be the majority of your army in many games; nor do affinity-unique units, though they still get the melee and healing bonuses.
Franco-Iberia:
Free Virtue for every 10 Virtues
+40% limit to culture slider
+1 culture from all specialists
+25% culture in the capital
Tree synergy requirements reduced by one (i.e. receive +10% growth in all cities with 4 prosperity instead of 5, gain free affinity level at 14 might instead of 15).
Get culture, get win. The free virtue is a ways off and the start is punishingly slow, but you have a culture slider to help generate early virtues.
Polystralia:
+2 trade routes in the capital
+25% energy from city connections
+20% limit for energy slider
Bypass the energy cost of tariffs
New trade routes require 2 less population. (Next trade route at 8, 20, 32...)
Wide is the name of the game, with your own private Machu Picchu you can rake in some serious money with a wide, peaceful empire, and the extra trade routes are another shot in the arm. Watch out for hostiles killing your traders.
Slavic Federation:
Free technology on Planetfall
Orbital units last 50% longer
+25% science in the capital
+20% science slider limit
In addition to their Orbital unit bonus, the Slavic Federation get to choose a free technology to start out, and have a natural affinity for science. They lost the free resources (no mulligans here, go down might ya hippies), but you could easily tech chemistry first.
Al Falah:
Processes are 50% more effective
+1 energy on tiles producing <3 total resource (of any type)
I haven't played with these guys, but with the changes I proposed the trade route thing should be less obnoxious.
Chengsu:
About what they are in RT, except for the water start thing.
Also dunno about these guys, the free spy at start can do some really nice things.
Sea people:
Screw 'em
INTEGR:
Screw 'em!
Building changes:
Vivariums: No more extra food on deserts. Instead, they give +1 food for Fruits and open up the Fruits+Tubers trade pair for another +1 food on trade routes. This should close the "build terrascapes on desert for boffo food production" exploit.
Mass Digester: +1 energy from forests and opens up Fruits+Fiber trade pair
Various buildings open trade pairs as well, lots of minor stuff. The big one was the remove terrascape exploits.
Wonder changes:
Basically, overhaul them so that wonders are worth building. Here are some samples:
Gene Vault:
+4 global health, free colonist, +2 culture.
Do you like a free city without health effects? The Gene Vault is for you! The AI will build this very often, sometimes in place of a settler. Races for this can end badly though, so in a close game it's a big gamble.
Master Control:
Free maintenance on Workers, +1 move for Workers, +5 science, and two free workers appear.
Daedalus Ladder:
+20% food/energy/production/culture/science in the city that builds it, and +25% effect from population
Cynosure:
+1 research for every population in the city (RAW, unaffected by slider and can't be reallocated)
Human Hive:
Free Perimeter Defense in all cities and defensive buildings are 25% more effective. Covert ops immunity for the city that builds it.
New Terran Myth:
+3 trade routes in this city
+2 culture for all trade routes (internal and international)
Deep Memory:
Can pick two Tier 1 virtues for free. +5 culture
Stations:
Stations can fight back now. At first, their ability to fight back is limited to bombardment, but as the game progresses stations will pick up a missile rover garrison, a squad of 3 tacjets, improved city defenses (perimeter defense and missile batteries), and finally affinity boosts up to t2. These improvements occur at set points in the game, though stations that trade will get them earlier; additionally, trading partners with a station can donate energy to build up a station's armament, if they are falling behind. The exact order in which these occur depend on the resources that station normally provides; science stations tend to raise affinity levels faster and pick up the missile rover first, energy bases focus on tacjets and channel aid better, culture bases usually get defensive builds sooner, prod bases are well-rounded by lean towards units, and food/health bases have no particular bias.
Stations can now offer Health as a perk of trading.
Each individual station has (hardcoded) basic resources it offers to trading partners. This has nothing to do with the surrounding terrain, for instance Far Base One always trades Chitin, Jinsoku Labs always trades Resilin, Omoikane always trades Fruit.
Every station has a unique backstory and quests, similar to the Far Base One quest; though not all quests activate immediately and not all require trading with the base. There are also generic station quests (such as the Harmony quest that pops a random station). Many of these quests are small things, like asking to connect a basic or strategic resource that combines with their natural stuff.
Finally, aside from the resources and raw output of the station, each station offers a bonus ability. There are too many to list but some examples come to mind:
- +10% strength for soldier-line units (Far Base One, must decline the quest to eliminate them)
- +10% science/food/energy/production/culture/health (all the stations which solely provide those resources, except Palatine)
- +2% food/production/culture yields for each hill and mountain a city works (Palatine, must complete quest to eliminate rival)
- Units built here start with 10XP (Fort Barca, must complete quest and raise to Tier 3)
- Borders expand 50% faster (Golden Bell Temple)
- Purity and Supremacy basic affinity units gain 5% strength (Church of Light's Dawn)
- Expeditions generate a small amount of energy (Keagungan)
- +20 city HP (Camp Cascade, must raise to tier 3)
- +1 Global Health for providing a Paddock resource (Camp Cascade, quest)
So yeah, BE's economy is pretty busted. One of the biggest offenders is internal routes crapping out free food and hammers, and the way small cities are rewarded in the traderoute game. Having played enough of the base game, I'd propose the following to put some balance back into the game.
Internal routes - No longer generate free hammers / food out of nowhere. At all. Rather, internal routes function like international routes in most respects, but don't gain the bonuses for autoplants, feedsite hubs, and so on. Internal routes generate far less energy than international routes.
For both internal and foreign routes, energy generated is based on the size of both cities, with routes between two large cities being far more profitable than a route between a large and small, and way way more than between two small cities. Internal routes are 1/4th as effective at generating energy and gain no science. Science gained from international routes is based on the combined research of both cities, modified by an exponential factor favoring routes between cities with higher science rates; routes to small cities basically don't generate research on either end. A modifier is added for tech disparity, favoring the player who is behind in tech.
However, Trade routes have the following effects:
- Any basic resources are shared between the two cities, for the purposes of building requirements. For instance, if one city has silica, the other can build Optical Surgery. The resources must be improved.
- Shared basic resources treat the city tile as if it has the basic resource, for buildings that improve the yield of a basic resource. For instance, a city receiving Copper gains +1 science with a Network. These yields are shown when forming a trade route.
- A few resources grant bonuses simply for being part of a trade route. Gold and Coral, for instance, add +1 culture to the originating city, for internal and external trade routes. Only one of these bonuses is applied, so the limit on culture is +1, but an exporting city gains +1 for every trade route they make (unless the recipient city has improved gold/coral).
- Some other resources give bonuses in combination with other resources, if the two cities have compatible resources. For instance, if one city has fungus and another has tubers, the route (at both ends) will give +1 food. This bonus is applied for any two cities which share more than one food resource, and is applied even if the resources surround one city. Some of these bonuses will require a building present in the city in order to be effective; for instance, and they stack with each other; the basic food combination is available at start, but something like fruits+fiber would require a mass digester.
- Strategic resources will only travel along routes to access buildings, for instance Firaxite for Observatories. Unlike bonus resources, the city tile does not receive a bonus, but it does allow an observatory to be built. There are no bonuses for sharing strategics. Only internal routes can carry strategic resources, as other factions will not allow foreigners to access them.
- Trade restrictions can be placed on foreign trade routes; a tariff can be levied, adding extra gold (and taking away profit) for the recipient, and charging the recipient for the exchange of bonus resources. This can cut both ways. However, doing this will naturally discourage players from forming trade routes with you, and raising a tariff has diplomatic consequences for AI. Additionally, when a tariff is levied, bonuses for resources and buildings are lost on both ends (exception for the wonder that gives culture for trade routes).
- The virtue "Gift Economy" adds +1 culture for international and station routes and +1 energy for every 2 bonus resources acquired from international routes, instead of its current effect.
- The virtue "Interdependence Network" adds a slot for 1 internal route in every city with a Trade Depot instead of its current effect.
- The virtue "Profiteering" grants +0.25 health per trader.
- Stations get a bit of an overhaul (more on that in their section).
- The virtue "Alternative Markets" improves the base yield from stations by 25%, stations grant +1 energy for every bonus resource they naturally lack, and bonuses from resource exchange and buildings are 25% stronger.
Right now internals give about 10-12 resources for every new city, and this is bad. Under the reformed system, trade routes would give something like:
Big->Big foriegn (say both size 15, both empires close in science and both cities generate 40 sci): 22.5 base energy for sender, 5.625 base energy for receiver, 8 science for both, +1 culture to foreign city for gold, +1 energy for autoplant, +2 food on both ends for shared food (tubers, fungus, fruits are available, vivarium built in both cities), +1 science for both cities (feedsite hubs), +1 culture to foreign city for gift economy, +1.5 gold to foreign city for gift economy.
Small->Big foreign: (size 5 to size 15, 10 sci to 40 sci): 6.25 base energy for sender, 1.5625 base energy for receiver, 1 science for both, foreign city has same building/resource bonuses and virtues, but small city lacks autoplant or feedsite hub. Sending the to the big city is going to be pretty bad, but the big city might have a resource you want. Presumably the big foreign city wants open markets due to its virtues.
Finally - big change. Aliens no longer attack trade convoys unless they are hostile with you. You wouldn't believe how many times I cursed the screen about this. As such, the ultrasonic fence event has to be changed. If you piss off the aliens, you'll have to make sure your trade routes are clear, which adds some incentive to play nice with the buggers.
Other economy changes:
Population slider: Instead of population going 100% towards science, a slider is implemented. Population investment can be directed towards culture, science, gold, or production. By default, the game sets the tax rate to 50% gold and 50% science, so each population is giving 0.5 gold and 0.5 science. Technological advance, virtue acquisition, and sponsor choice affect the upper limit of each category for the slider; for instance, Franco-Iberia can run their culture slider to 80% from the very start, while Slavic Federation can put their science slider to 60% due to their scientific bent. Enough technological advance can allow 100% in anything. There is however a slight benefit for diversifying your population investment, up to +20% in all yields for an even split.
For production, the yield is delivered directly to the local city.
Culture and production slider can only go up to 20% at the start of the game, while energy/research/prod start at a limit of 50%. The energy and production sliders generate twice as many units as sci/culture, in order to compensate for the relative abundance of production/energy.
Flat science buildings: All flat science from buildings and terrain is affected by the slider, unless specifically exempted. Percentage bonuses are NOT affected, nor are wonders. This prevents Lab/Network spam from getting around the slider, and blunts Academy spam (assuming they are dropped to 2 beakers).
The net effect of this is to allow players to switch their empire according to their needs, rather than being locked into "get more pop, get more science".
The virtues which add production, science, and knowledge per population are less effective, but allow the slider to be adjusted 20% higher and improve the bonus effect in their appropriate category.
Techs which improve slider rate:
Power Systems (+10% to production slider)
Ballistics (+10% to research slider)
Genetic Mapping (+10% to culture slider)
Geophysics (+10% to energy slider)
Fabrication (+10% to production slider)
Biology (+10% to culture slider)
Cognition (+10% to research slider)
Communications (+10% to energy slider)
Social Dynamics (+10% to research slider)
Human Idealism (+10% to culture slider)
Human Conservation (+10% to production slider)
Euthenics (+10% to energy slider)
Ballistic LEV (+10% to production slider)
Alien Domestication (+10% to culture slider)
Protogenetics (+10% to research slider)
Field Theory (+10% to energy slider)
Affinity 8 Purity: +10% to production slider
Affinity 8 Supremacy: +10% to energy slider
Affinity 8 Harmony: +10% to culture slider
5 Affinity in all: +10% to research slider
All of these slider bonuses also increase the yield of their respective areas by 5% (additive)
Virtue tweaks:
Might:
Public Security: +0.2 health per military unit and +1 health per 8 population in a city. Swaps places with Adaptive Doctrine in the tree, so it's a tier 2 item.
Liberation Army: Shorter unrest in puppeted cities, outposts are replaced with your own outposts upon capture, automatically excavate the ruin of stations you destroy.
Special Service: Extra covert agent from Spy Network, +25% intrigue
Joint Operations: Stations provide 3 range orbital coverage, and gain 20% battle strength when you trade with them
Propserity:
Workforce Initiative: Free worker, clear forests and miasma 33% faster.
Colony Initiative: Moved to tier 2. Pioneer Spirit moved to tier 1, and made a prereq for Colony Initiative. Colony Initiative leads nowhere, Pioneer Sprit leads to Settler Clans and Settler Clans leads directly to Mind over Matter. This should allow players to take Colony Initiative and all Health virtues with only 10 picks, rather than being screwed into 11 picks. The main purpose tho is to move the free settler to 4th virtue, requiring a virtue which is kind of junk.
Helping Hands: +10% production for Civilian units, +15% worker speed
Gift Economy: Change mentioned above.
Pathfinders: +2 expeditions for explorers, Explorers are 20% stronger in combat
Knowledge:
Social Mores: +20% limit to culture slider, +0.1 culture for every population and +1 culture for every 10 culture generated by a city after modifiers.
Lab Apprenticeship: +20% limit to science slider, free maintenance for Laboratories
Creative Class: Gain 10% global health when no category is at 0% funding, 30% of excess health is converted to culture to spend on virtues
Field Research: +1 Movement for Explorers, gain science for expeditions. Expeditions which further distant research are 25% more useful.
Applied Aesthetics (prereq Creative Class): +2 yield to energy/science/production/culture based on your colonist type, or +2 energy for other colonist types
Community Medicine: Pay no maintenance on Clinics and Pharmalabs. Free Clinic, Pharmalab, or Cytonursery in every city. (in that order, new cities get a clinic).
Information Warfare: Free covert agent. Gain 20% of pillaged gold from cities and improvements as science.
Industry:
Centralized Planning: +20% limit to energy slider, +5 energy in the capital
Scalable Infrastructure: Moved to Tier 2, in place of Entrepreneurial Spaceflight. +20% limit to production slider, +15% towards Wonders
Magnasanti: +0.25 health per building per population in a city. (Therefore Magnasanti is only giving +4 health in a size 16 city, rather than +bazillion.)
Diplomacy:
In a nutshell - cut out the exploitable mechanics, have an AI that behaves rationally and only responds to rational things. No "you hurt the aliens therefore we don't like you" and certainly nothing that exists to be exploited by the human player. The AI should, as a rule, be averse to trading any strategy resource, nor should they keep asking to open borders. I would very much like an option to automatically reject the advances of an AI if they ask for particular things, and likewise there are items the AI should have no business trading away for any reason. Strategics should only be up for trade in a dire situation, or if the AI knows they can make a sick profit off of something that is cheap and nonthreatening for them. AIs will NEVER trade away a city even if they're losing badly, unless it's a city in revolt / puppet of yours, and likewise they won't bother asking for your cities unless you're really willing to offer them up. The AI will consider a war indemnity, usually an onerous one, and is more willing to buy peace with gold.
Miasma:
No more units damaged by Miasma - this causes more AI pathfinding havoc and is a mild irritant to the human player. Instead, Miasma does a few things:
- Blocks trade routes unless all units are immune to miasma penalties.
- Aliens and Harmony-unique units have an advantage against Human units in miasma (even against generic Harmony units). Harmony generic units gain a slight edge in Miasma against other units.
- High Harmony affinity levels allow for free Miasma healing (+5/turn)
- Workers and Explorers take 50% longer to work in Miasma, unless they have the miasma immunity techs / immunity from affinity.
- Additional unhealth in large cities with Miasma. Playing Harmony reduces this somewhat but does not entirely eliminate Miasmic health damage.
- Tiles that normally yield 4 or more of a resource yield -1 of that resource when covered in Miasma. This effect is only lifted with an endgame Harmony tech.
- Ranged units bombarding into Miasma are 20% less effective. Harmony affinity reduces and eventually eliminates this penalty.
Thus, clearing Miasma is a big priority for economic reasons, and spreading Miasma to wreck economy is something to consider.
Sponsor Traits:
In short - everyone gets some Economic bonuses. These should be more balanced but would need fine tuning. Some bonuses are also uniquish. I'm not going to muck with the diplomatic currency stuff, which is a whole other can of worms.
ARC:
-25% time required for espionage, and intrigue generates 25% faster.
All tiles which produce 3 or more energy produce +1 energy
All tiles which produce 3 or more production produce +1 energy
-5% upkeep for improvements
(These bonuses can stack on the same tile)
ARC is focused on big tile yields in energy and production, owing to their superior exploitation of natural resources. This can generate a lot of extra energy for the ARC, especially with virtues to enhance particular buildings. They really don't want Miasma on their prized tiles, as this will negate their bonus. They have no bonus in the capital or per-city bonus, so claiming the profitable terrain should be your first priority. They have no particular slider preference either.
PAC:
+20% worker speed and +10% construction speed for wonders
+20% limit for production slider
+20% effect from population (slider-based)
-5% upkeep for buildings
PAC's strength lies in its industrious population; the more people they can get, the better their results. This doesn't just affect industry, but everything - science, culture, gold, you name it. They also improve terrain faster and have a slight edge in building wonders. The ability to go harder on production earlier allows them to crank out those critical first units before most other factions.
PAU:
+10% growth in all cities when healthy
All cities with a Command Center or Headquarters gain +1 food, production, culture, and science
+1 culture in the capital
-5% upkeep for units
As before, PAU's start is one of the best, with a free set of resources in the capital that work for you on planetfall. Their bonus is a take on the Party Leadership tenet in Civ5. While Command Centers are pretty expensive and late-gameish, Barre has that much extra incentive to push for Communications.
Kavithan Protectorate:
-50% cost of purchasing tiles with gold or culture
Outposts grow twice as fast
+10% limit to slider for all categories
+10% production for civilian units
Cheaper settlers and flexibility with the slider give the KP a lot of choices in where to go. The centerpiece is their cheap border expansion and fast outpost growth, allowing KP to claim a lot of land quickly.
Brasilia:
+5 healing for all units
+10% melee strength
+1 research per active soldier or combat rover (affected by slider; prod/energy are thrown out when calculating this).
Veteran status is 50% more effective (+15% per tier rather than +10%)
Brasil's bonus unsurprisingly lies in military units - fielding a large army defrays some of the lost research or cultural investment. It's not a bad idea to go 50/20 on sci/culture to get the most out of your standing army. Any ranged units you build don't get this bonus however, and that should be the majority of your army in many games; nor do affinity-unique units, though they still get the melee and healing bonuses.
Franco-Iberia:
Free Virtue for every 10 Virtues
+40% limit to culture slider
+1 culture from all specialists
+25% culture in the capital
Tree synergy requirements reduced by one (i.e. receive +10% growth in all cities with 4 prosperity instead of 5, gain free affinity level at 14 might instead of 15).
Get culture, get win. The free virtue is a ways off and the start is punishingly slow, but you have a culture slider to help generate early virtues.
Polystralia:
+2 trade routes in the capital
+25% energy from city connections
+20% limit for energy slider
Bypass the energy cost of tariffs
New trade routes require 2 less population. (Next trade route at 8, 20, 32...)
Wide is the name of the game, with your own private Machu Picchu you can rake in some serious money with a wide, peaceful empire, and the extra trade routes are another shot in the arm. Watch out for hostiles killing your traders.
Slavic Federation:
Free technology on Planetfall
Orbital units last 50% longer
+25% science in the capital
+20% science slider limit
In addition to their Orbital unit bonus, the Slavic Federation get to choose a free technology to start out, and have a natural affinity for science. They lost the free resources (no mulligans here, go down might ya hippies), but you could easily tech chemistry first.
Al Falah:
Processes are 50% more effective
+1 energy on tiles producing <3 total resource (of any type)
I haven't played with these guys, but with the changes I proposed the trade route thing should be less obnoxious.
Chengsu:
About what they are in RT, except for the water start thing.
Also dunno about these guys, the free spy at start can do some really nice things.
Sea people:
Screw 'em
INTEGR:
Screw 'em!
Building changes:
Vivariums: No more extra food on deserts. Instead, they give +1 food for Fruits and open up the Fruits+Tubers trade pair for another +1 food on trade routes. This should close the "build terrascapes on desert for boffo food production" exploit.
Mass Digester: +1 energy from forests and opens up Fruits+Fiber trade pair
Various buildings open trade pairs as well, lots of minor stuff. The big one was the remove terrascape exploits.
Wonder changes:
Basically, overhaul them so that wonders are worth building. Here are some samples:
Gene Vault:
+4 global health, free colonist, +2 culture.
Do you like a free city without health effects? The Gene Vault is for you! The AI will build this very often, sometimes in place of a settler. Races for this can end badly though, so in a close game it's a big gamble.
Master Control:
Free maintenance on Workers, +1 move for Workers, +5 science, and two free workers appear.
Daedalus Ladder:
+20% food/energy/production/culture/science in the city that builds it, and +25% effect from population
Cynosure:
+1 research for every population in the city (RAW, unaffected by slider and can't be reallocated)
Human Hive:
Free Perimeter Defense in all cities and defensive buildings are 25% more effective. Covert ops immunity for the city that builds it.
New Terran Myth:
+3 trade routes in this city
+2 culture for all trade routes (internal and international)
Deep Memory:
Can pick two Tier 1 virtues for free. +5 culture
Stations:
Stations can fight back now. At first, their ability to fight back is limited to bombardment, but as the game progresses stations will pick up a missile rover garrison, a squad of 3 tacjets, improved city defenses (perimeter defense and missile batteries), and finally affinity boosts up to t2. These improvements occur at set points in the game, though stations that trade will get them earlier; additionally, trading partners with a station can donate energy to build up a station's armament, if they are falling behind. The exact order in which these occur depend on the resources that station normally provides; science stations tend to raise affinity levels faster and pick up the missile rover first, energy bases focus on tacjets and channel aid better, culture bases usually get defensive builds sooner, prod bases are well-rounded by lean towards units, and food/health bases have no particular bias.
Stations can now offer Health as a perk of trading.
Each individual station has (hardcoded) basic resources it offers to trading partners. This has nothing to do with the surrounding terrain, for instance Far Base One always trades Chitin, Jinsoku Labs always trades Resilin, Omoikane always trades Fruit.
Every station has a unique backstory and quests, similar to the Far Base One quest; though not all quests activate immediately and not all require trading with the base. There are also generic station quests (such as the Harmony quest that pops a random station). Many of these quests are small things, like asking to connect a basic or strategic resource that combines with their natural stuff.
Finally, aside from the resources and raw output of the station, each station offers a bonus ability. There are too many to list but some examples come to mind:
- +10% strength for soldier-line units (Far Base One, must decline the quest to eliminate them)
- +10% science/food/energy/production/culture/health (all the stations which solely provide those resources, except Palatine)
- +2% food/production/culture yields for each hill and mountain a city works (Palatine, must complete quest to eliminate rival)
- Units built here start with 10XP (Fort Barca, must complete quest and raise to Tier 3)
- Borders expand 50% faster (Golden Bell Temple)
- Purity and Supremacy basic affinity units gain 5% strength (Church of Light's Dawn)
- Expeditions generate a small amount of energy (Keagungan)
- +20 city HP (Camp Cascade, must raise to tier 3)
- +1 Global Health for providing a Paddock resource (Camp Cascade, quest)
