Civic tree vs Science tree

[Sansa_Stark]

Funny thing happened to me when watching Marbozir's part 8 - I noticed that he has something like +62 science and only +25 culture, and couple seconds after that he started talking about that topic

So, you guys who have studied known civic/science trees, what do you think? Will it be viable to pursue culture much more than science, i.e. really strongly focus on culture? It seems that next to policy cards, civic tree brings only some wonders and some units, so will these things and bonuses from civic cards (and better governments) be enough to offset advantages of science tree? Especially with regard to military? One thing that comes to my mind is that bonuses from civic cards seems to be really strong, and help in all aspects of the game (including science and military), so having strong culture will result in stronger cards sooner, as well as more cards sooner (better government), which in the end of the day might compensate for the lack of science (and resulting weaker military).

I understand that it is one of the goals - to have many various paths leading to victory, so I guess it should be possible to go balanced with trees, or prefer (maybe even strongly) one of them. I would love if that would work in reality. So, on first glance, do you think it could be viable?

 

[stealth_nsk]

Funny thing happened to me when watching Marbozir's part 8 - I noticed that he has something like +62 science and only +25 culture, and couple seconds after that he started talking about that topic

He is playing Brazil, which gives bonus from Rainforests. This fits nicely with Campus already existing adjacency bonus from Rainforests, so Marbozir utilized this by building 2 very powerful Campuses in the first 2 cities.

 

[Kouvb593kdnuewnd]

Civic have some really powerful stuff. Feudalism is probably in the top 5 or even top 1 in terms of game changer amongst the civics and techs because it is the one that give farms an adjacency bonus.

Culture is probably a bit harder to produce as their district bonus is based heavy on wonder and populations produce less culture then science per pop.

 

[Sansa_Stark]

He is playing Brazil, which gives bonus from Rainforests. This fits nicely with Campus already existing adjacency bonus from Rainforests, so Marbozir utilized this by building 2 very powerful Campuses in the first 2 cities.

Well I am aware of this I only used that as an example of serious difference between science and civic output, and wonder how it will work the other way around. Although, to be fair, we don't even know how will it work if we prefer science...

 

[Kouvb593kdnuewnd]

China is likely to have a larger culture output then science output due to great wall and their wonder rush ability.

 

[smartcanuck1988]

I'd like to see really powerful culture abilities later on, the equivalent of a nuke in the science tree. Things like enforcing peace between two civs (doesn't have to be your war).

 

[ThisNameIsTooLo]

I'd like to see really powerful culture abilities later on, the equivalent of a nuke in the science tree. Things like enforcing peace between two civs (doesn't have to be your war).

That wouldn't be very effective; what's to stop those two civs from going back to war after 10 turns?

Instead, I'd like to see the cultural ability to bombard a warring civ of your choice with Unhappiness, which gradually wears off only during peacetime. The effectiveness of this ability is calculated by the difference between the number of non-barbarian units the civ has killed vs. the number of its own units lost, within the current war. If the target civ's kills are significantly greater than their own losses, the Unhappiness penalty will be practically crippling. This could force a warmonger to call off their current campaign and recoup their happiness levels for a not-insignificant duration.

The ability works on any civ at war, regardless of who was the instigator, or whether it's a surprise or justified war.

 

[Haggbart]

That wouldn't be very effective; what's to stop those two civs from going back to war after 10 turns?

Instead, I'd like to see the cultural ability to bombard a warring civ of your choice with Unhappiness, which gradually wears off only during peacetime. The effectiveness of this ability is calculated by the difference between the number of non-barbarian units the civ has killed vs. the number of its own units lost, within the current war. If the target civ's kills are significantly greater than their own losses, the Unhappiness penalty will be practically crippling. This could force a warmonger to call off their current campaign and recoup their happiness levels for a not-insignificant duration.

The ability works on any civ at war, regardless of who was the instigator, or whether it's a surprise or justified war.

I don't think we will see that, but since war weariness is making a comeback, I'm pretty sure there will be a social policy card and/or a wonder that will increase war weariness for civs that are at war with you.

 

[Wolle68]

I don't think we will see that, but since war weariness is making a comeback, I'm pretty sure there will be a social policy card and/or a wonder that will increase war weariness for civs that are at war with you.

It could also be an espionage action.

Or possibly both.

 

[Kouvb593kdnuewnd]

I'd like to see really powerful culture abilities later on, the equivalent of a nuke in the science tree. Things like enforcing peace between two civs (doesn't have to be your war).

Feudalism is more powerful then nukes in civilization VI.

 

[Haggbart]

It could also be an espionage action.

Or possibly both.

Yes instigating war weariness would make a lot of sense as an espionage action as well!

I stray of the OP here, but another thing I really wonder about is if war weariness will increase on a different rate if you DOW or being DOWed, and if there is a difference in ww between surprise DOW and casus belli.

 

[smartcanuck1988]

That wouldn't be very effective; what's to stop those two civs from going back to war after 10 turns?

Don't forget that now we have "occupied" cities which means enforcing (white) peace will completely reset the warring civs back to their original state. That's a huge deal if you could do that just by being diplomatically superior. The cost of more unit damage might not be worth it for the aggressive civ to restart the war and go through it all over again.

Still 10 turns is a lot of time to reinforce certain locations or have you as a neutral civ prepare enough army to join the war if it starts again. Plus an enforced peace deal can easily be tweaked to be longer than that, say 30 turns. It's minor issue imo.

 

[Eagle Pursuit]

Btw, the article I just posted in the Articles thread says that Corps and Armies are in the Civics tree. It gives a way for civs that are behind in science but ahead in culture a way to be militarily viable with weaker units.

 

[Kouvb593kdnuewnd]

That is a good point. Also some governments and cards give military bonuses.

 

[ftl]

An interesting idea I just had: since we can swap policy cards each time we get a new civic, that gives culture civs who discover civics faster even more flexibility.

Many of the policy cards seem like they would be good to swap in and out. For example, it may be good to swap in the card that gives +50% production to settlers, build a few settlers, and then swap in some other policy that helps small cities. Or for military, you want to swap in a card that helps your military production, then once you start your war you want cards that give combat bonuses, and then maybe once you have done some conquering you want a policy that helps reduce maintenance costs of a standing army and one that helps assimilate conquered cities.

And if you research a lot of civics, if you get them at the right time, you can not only have all these policies to choose from, you can also do all these policy switches for free at the right time.

 

[Eagle Pursuit]

An interesting idea I just had: since we can swap policy cards each time we get a new civic, that gives culture civs who discover civics faster even more flexibility.

Many of the policy cards seem like they would be good to swap in and out. For example, it may be good to swap in the card that gives +50% production to settlers, build a few settlers, and then swap in some other policy that helps small cities. Or for military, you want to swap in a card that helps your military production, then once you start your war you want cards that give combat bonuses, and then maybe once you have done some conquering you want a policy that helps reduce maintenance costs of a standing army and one that helps assimilate conquered cities.

And if you research a lot of civics, if you get them at the right time, you can not only have all these policies to choose from, you can also do all these policy switches for free at the right time.

You can swap policies any time you like by spending a little Gold. Not just when you earn a new Civic.