Civics Improvements Suggestions

[Vokarya]

I was thinking of even more possibilities for Rule civics. I was speculating on what to do with Nobility, and I had an idea for a very basic Warlords civic. This is the Rule civic for early offensive war. Warfare already has a lot of content so I'm thinking of giving this one to Bronze Working.

Its effects would be quite short:

• +15% military production
• -1 happiness all cities

This makes Warlords good for the early warmonger, but not so good if trying to stay peaceful. You might even stay in Barbarism if you are close to your happy cap. I definitely DON'T want to give Warlords either +Great General points or drafting ability.

Nobility becomes a go-wide civic that emphasizes semi-independent cities. Keep the following:

• Unlimited Noble
• +15% city defense
• -15% military production

Remove the +gold from Nobles and +gold from buildings, and the -25% gold for distant unit supply. Give Nobility -25% maintenance for distance to palace.

To avoid this stacking too early with Monarchy, Nobility moves up to Feudalism tech. Feudalism keeps the Feudal civic, but Vassalage goes to Heraldry and Imperium goes to Politics. I don't want too many civics stacked up on Feudalism, I've never liked having Imperium and Appeasement so far apart, and I've wanted to give Heraldry an extra trick. The Vassalage civic needs to stay in the Medieval Era because it's the first civic that allows breaking the 5 XP barrier for Melee/Archery units unless you burn a Great General on a Great Military Instructor. Prior to this, you are limited to 4 XP from Barracks/Archery Range + Mercenaries/Warrior Caste. Mounted units do get 5 XP from Knight's Stable/Mercenaries or Warrior Caste, but they are probably not going to be the bulk of an army.

Without the Nobility civic, there isn't really much need for the Aristocracy tech. I've always thought this tech was fairly artificial and very easy to skip. So we get rid of it. Silk Road stays with Calendar and the Great General goes to Stirrup. Villa becomes the civic building for Monarchy instead; scale its bonuses down to +2 commerce, +3 for a capital connection, 2 Noble slots, and no culture bonus. Keep the 1 employed citizen, but +5 commerce is better than what you can get for many tile types. We can always revisit this. Estate becomes Nobility's civic building (shared with Feudal).

 

[PPQ_Purple]

My thoughts:
1. Make sure that there is a way to run a kingdom properly in the ancient era. By that I mean both mechanics vise and lore vise. So some form of monarchy or nobility has to be available.

2. Don't nerf warlords simply because it's the first civic you can desperately claw your way to in order to get out of the city number limit which is crippling, especially if you get into early wars with the AI and you just auto-raze cities. That sucks.

3. Be careful about making any civic extremely situational. If you ask me, ideally every civic should have its use from the moment you can get it to the end of the game and not be something that's only useful in a short period. Slavery is a good benchmark here as it is something you can actually run very late into the game and still be competitive.

So personally I definitively cringe when I hear definitions as extremely specific as "early game war monger".

 

[IPEX-731BA5DD06]

City limit is that you can't SETTLE new cities, you CAN "warmonger" and retain the extra cities above the cap, you just can't plonk down a new city with the cap.

 

[PPQ_Purple]

City limit is that you can't SETTLE new cities, you CAN "warmonger" and retain the extra cities above the cap, you just can't plonk down a new city with the cap.

Are you sure? Because I have had several wars in the past where the AI razed all captured cities indiscriminately and than suddenly didn't as soon as they switched over from what ever the 1st civic is called. Than again I am using a slightly older version so that might be something that's been changed.

 

[Vokarya]

My thoughts:
1. Make sure that there is a way to run a kingdom properly in the ancient era. By that I mean both mechanics vise and lore vise. So some form of monarchy or nobility has to be available.

It's supposed to be difficult to get big early on. Monarchy's still available at the same place. Nobility is getting pushed off to put some space between the two parts of the combo. Your pre-Medieval choices for Rule civics will be Warlords, Theocracy, or Senate. I'm intending to make Senate drawback-free and Theocracy's only drawback as "No Non-State Religion Spread"; get one religion, make it your state religion, then switch to Theocracy and you're good to go.

2. Don't nerf warlords simply because it's the first civic you can desperately claw your way to in order to get out of the city number limit which is crippling, especially if you get into early wars with the AI and you just auto-raze cities. That sucks.

Warlords is a Rule civic, not a Government civic. The Government civics aren't changing in when they come available. Chiefdom is the only civic that has a city limit, and it's a Government. Your first opportunity to change government civics is still Despotism. You need a lot of military to soak up Despotism's extra unhappiness, but Warlords can help with that.

3. Be careful about making any civic extremely situational. If you ask me, ideally every civic should have its use from the moment you can get it to the end of the game and not be something that's only useful in a short period. Slavery is a good benchmark here as it is something you can actually run very late into the game and still be competitive.

So personally I definitively cringe when I hear definitions as extremely specific as "early game war monger".

Warlords is supposed to be viable up until Junta comes available, but Junta will not be available until the late Renaissance -- Military Tradition is the most likely tech. I think we will try Warlords at +20% military production instead of +15%. The next best Rule civic for military production would be Bureaucracy which gives +10% flat production.

 

[Vokarya]

City limit is that you can't SETTLE new cities, you CAN "warmonger" and retain the extra cities above the cap, you just can't plonk down a new city with the cap.

As long as you don't have a civic without a city limit available. If you've researched to Masonry but haven't switched to Despotism yet, taking a city that would put you over Chiefdom's cap automatically switches your civic.

 

[IPEX-731BA5DD06]

Sorry, your quite correct, it USED to be that way, now it will automatically switch you, without any anarchy, when you take that "Extra city".

AI's might have a 'hard limit' coded, so they auto raise, or they just can't handle the extra city.

 

[Vokarya]

Sorry, your quite correct, it USED to be that way, now it will automatically switch you, without any anarchy, when you take that "Extra city".

AI's might have a 'hard limit' coded, so they auto raise, or they just can't handle the extra city.

I wouldn't know about AI behavior. That's totally not my department.

 

[Vokarya]

I'm doing some planning about the Theocracy civic. There are a lot of abilities I think it could have, but I want to keep it simple. So it starts with two abilities:

• One positive ability, tied to a state religion. I'm considering either +X% building production in cities with State Religion or +1 happy in cities with State Religion, but I could try something else.
• No Non-State Religion Spread.

This gives one positive ability and one negative ability. But I don't think the negative is that large of a negative. I did a quick test and even running Atheist (earned early through WorldBuildering Shwedagon Paya) doesn't stop you from founding a religion. So even if you or the AI adopts Theocracy without a state religion, you can still found a religion, convert to it, and then start spreading it. But if you adopt Theocracy without any religion present, then a foreign religion can't spread to your cities.

Theocracy is supposed to be available early. I'm looking at Scriptures, mostly because Priesthood already has enough content. So the other two effects are present but delayed a little.

• Can conduct Inquisitions.

This is delayed because you still need Holy War tech to train Inquisitor units. I want a non-Religion-category civic that can do Inquisitions.

• A civic building, available in the Medieval Era or later, that gives +2 XP to units trained in that city.

I want to delay any XP from this civic so as not to wreck the XP curves I have already tuned. Prior to the Medieval Era, the only way to get 5 XP for Melee/Archery/Siege units is by spending a Great General as a military instructor. You can get 4 XP maximum with Barracks/Archery Range + Mercenaries/Warrior Caste. Mounted units can get 5 XP after Stirrup with Knight's Stable + Mercenaries/Warrior Caste, but that matches what can be done in BTS with Barracks + Stable. Once the Medieval Era is reached, many combinations can give 5 XP, such as Barracks + Vassalage, Barracks + Mercenaries + Asatru Monastery, or Barracks + Mercenaries + Intolerant. So a flat +experience from the civic would not be what I want, but a civic building with an independent tech requirement would be ideal.

That makes four bullet points total, which I think is good for an early civic. It's not a civic that would hurt you to adopt unless you had no religions at all in your entire civilization before you adopted it and couldn't manage to found a religion on your own or capture a city with a religion.

I do not want this civic to have Train Missionaries without Monastery. That ability was deliberately pushed off to the Medieval Era (State Church) so as not to cheapen Monasteries too much.

 

[<Nexus>]

There are already 12 military civics and 11 economy civics, and I don't see any graphical glitches there. I will test before I upload anything.

Okay, sorry. That happened in Chronicles only, where there are more categories and the horizontal slider covers some of the small icons - when there were more than 10 of them. So it's not a problem for you, only for me

Sorry, but I WASN'T wrong after all.

See the 3 icons not properly displayed?
So can you or 45 fix the civic screen so that not only 10 but 15 icons can be displayed?

 

[Vokarya]

Sorry, but I WASN'T wrong after all.
View attachment 473483
See the 3 icons not properly displayed?
So can you or 45 fix the civic screen so that not only 10 but 15 icons can be displayed?

I can probably fix that. It should be just changing the values in CvCivicsScreen.py.

 

[Vokarya]

It's a one-number fix as I thought. I don't think we would need to handle more than 15 icons, so I won't go any further, but if we REALLY want to, we can expand the panel to make even more room.

 

[Vokarya]

As far as Senate goes, I would like to differentiate it better from what will be Parliament. I think the way to do this is to make Senate "go-tall".

Senate keeps:

• +1 happiness from Agora. This encourages going down the Senate-Republic combination.
• Polis Council.

Senate increases:

• Capital commerce from +10% to +20%.

Senate loses:

• +1 happy all cities. This discourages going wide. You can still net +1 happiness from Polis Council and possibly +1 from Agora if you go Republic.
• -5% production all cities. -5% is too small to be meaningful.
  
• House of Parliament building. This will go to the Parliament civic. House of Parliament will keep its abilities, and as yet another Palace-equivalent, it will encourage going wide with this civic.

This makes Senate all-upside but with its primary benefit concentrated in the capital. The other cities only get to benefit from the Polis Council and possibly a boost to Agora.

 

[Arakhor]

Sounds like an interesting idea.

 

[Vokarya]

So Warlords and Theocracy also need Revolution Index changes. I'm interpolating from the current Rule civics to get some test values.

Barbarism is the worst-case scenario. It has +1 local instability, +2 national instability, and +30% instability from distance. Nobility lowers the national instability to +1 and the distance modifier to +20%. I want to try Warlords with +15% distance modifier, +1 local instability, and +1 national instability.

Theocracy draws some of the modifiers from the religion civics. I'm looking at +1 local instability with +50% modifiers for both state and non-state religions, and -1 national instability with +2 national stability for owning your holy city and -2 for in the hands of rivals with different SR. In addition, Theocracy gets -5% national stability for religious oppression. That should be a good testbed.

 

[Vokarya]

And now for the quartet. There are four Rule civics clustered towards the end of the Renaissance: Autocracy, Parliament, President, and Junta. I like the concepts behind all four, and I think I -- or Zeta -- has picked out some good core mechanics that we can elaborate on.

Autocracy (available with Absolutism)
Theme: "I'm the leader! Look at me!"
Core mechanics:

• +50% production and commerce in the capital. This is the same mechanic as Bureaucracy in BTS, but it comes along almost two eras later (late-Renaissance vs. early-Medieval). I think this is a good way to handle the attention being paid by the leader to the capital.
  
• Civic building: Throne Room. Requires Palace, Forbidden Palace, Versailles, Apadana Palace, or Alhambra (basically every Government Center building except Edinburgh Castle, which is nearly obsolete, and House of Parliament/Voting Link, which are incompatible). Provides +5 culture and +2 Wonder Capacity. It helps you build monuments to your glory.
  
• Incompatible with Democracy/Federation. Is compatible with Republic; represents a nominal ruling body that you dominate.

Parliament (available with Liberalism)
Theme: A go-wide civic that is more stable revolution-wise than Nobility.
Core mechanics:

• +2 happiness in all cities.
  
• +25% Great Person production.
• +25% war weariness. A parliamentary government is more susceptible to ill-feelings in the populace.
• Civic building: House of Parliament. Counts as yet another government center.
• Incompatible with Despotism.

President (available with Democracy)
Theme: A strong but democratically-elected leader.
Core mechanics: I like two of Zeta's choices here.

• No Capital Unhappiness. No other Rule civic does this.
  
• +1 relations with all leaders. No other Rule civic gives positive relations. (Junta gives negative relations.)
  
• Incompatible with Monarchy. Compatible with Despotism as a "President-for-Life".

I feel President needs another mechanic, but I don't think a maintenance break is appropriate here.

Junta (available with Military Tradition)
Theme: A government ruled by professional military forces.
Core mechanics:

• +25% unit production. It's better than Warlords; in fact this is supposed to be Warlords 2.0.
  
• Can Draft 2 units per turn.
• -25% war weariness.
• -1 relations with other leaders. Is this enough? MAD is only -2, and while this is the equivalent of patrolling your front yard with an arsenal of weapons ready, it's not as bad as threatening Armageddon.
• Incompatible with Pacifism.

As much as possible, I want to stay away from duplicating mechanics, or use a mechanic in its + and - forms once each. Military production is the only one showing up three times: increased by Warlords and Junta, decreased by Nobility.

 

[Fozman]

I like it. The Rule civic line seems to be shaping up well so far.

I feel President needs another mechanic, but I don't think a maintenance break is appropriate here.

• Per my earlier post with tables outlining civic mechanics... would a specialist allowance or modifier be appropriate here? These are moderately used mechanics, both of which show up in Rule civics currently. I was thinking something like Unlimited Magistrates (probably OP) OR a small boost to Magistrates in the form of another per specialist or a (+1 to +3) per specialist.
• In the same vein, a building modifier could also be used. +1 or +1 for Hall buildings or some other building(s) of choice.
• Or... How about a small increase in domestic connections output (commerce thrives with Suffrage).
• Finally... + OR + nationwide; these are very common mechanics within the Rule civic line.

 

[45°38'N-13°47'E]

Talking about civics, I'm still attracted by the idea of adding the code for the "active senate", where you might be prevented to go to war or you might be forced to it by the senate. Maybe this could be applied to other civics as well (Senate, Parliament, maybe Junta and Theocracy). Of course as an option. What do you think Vokarya? Maybe it would be possible to make it work differently for different civics, meaning that for example Parliament would probably have an increased chance to force peace while for example Junta might have an increased chance to force you to go to war. And we might have some other civics overruling the senate's overruling, like for example Personality Cult overruling the Senate. Opinions?

 

[PPQ_Purple]

Would that be fun to play though? Or would it just be an annoyance that uses the RNG to throw a wrench into players plans at the worst possible time leading to much rage? I'm leaning toward the later. Using the RNG to take control away from the player is simply newer fun. Not that I am opposed to the idea of having the senate get a mind of its own. But if you ask me a much better way to do it would be to have the civics that represent democracy produce context sensitive choice events.
So for example say you are in a war. Than you would become eligible for an event something like this:

Debate over the current war is raging in the senate. Opposing sides are arguing bitterly over the conflict and our role in it.

Option A: We must end this conflict now and stop the pointless waste of lives. (Concludes an instant peace treaty)
Option B/C/D... : Various things that give you different bonuses for the war for you to pick based off your current strategy at the cost of say adding war .

That way you could have a representation of the democratic debate but still allow the player to chose his path through the game.

 

[Vokarya]

Would that be fun to play though? Or would it just be an annoyance that uses the RNG to throw a wrench into players plans at the worst possible time leading to much rage? I'm leaning toward the later. Using the RNG to take control away from the player is simply newer fun. Not that I am opposed to the idea of having the senate get a mind of its own. But if you ask me a much better way to do it would be to have the civics that represent democracy produce context sensitive choice events.
So for example say you are in a war. Than you would become eligible for an event something like this:

Debate over the current war is raging in the senate. Opposing sides are arguing bitterly over the conflict and our role in it.

Option A: We must end this conflict now and stop the pointless waste of lives. (Concludes an instant peace treaty)
Option B/C/D... : Various things that give you different bonuses for the war for you to pick based off your current strategy at the cost of say adding war .

That way you could have a representation of the democratic debate but still allow the player to chose his path through the game.

You can't ever use events for something like this. There are players who insist on "No Events" and this would be too important to make part of that system.