I had this thought too, but on science, it clearly makes military CS the best IMO. Big science plus free units? Yes please.
But the simplicity is really nice too. I'm torn
CS yield rebalance
- Thread starter crdvis16
- Start date
But the simplicity is really nice too. I'm torn
For science sure, but because of gold is mush less worth than these other yields, it obviously would be imbalanced if you get the same amount. IMHO you should get at least 3 times more gold than other yields. Simpler is not always better.
Good balance > simplicity, especially when it's not really complicated
First of all hello everybody 
After long time only reading here, I would like to contribute some thoughts about this.
As mentioned before by others, a simple system is always preferable if it does the job sufficiently good. In my opinion this works well for Culture / Faith and Gold, but Science and Food have to be treated differently. Thats why i would change crdvis16 numbers in a way that ally-yields are always double the friends-yields and that the increase per era is increasing by 1 for friend-yields in the most instances (and the double for ally to stay consistent)
Culture / Faith and Gold get the same (for sure gold is the least valuable out of these three, but this is compensated for by the extra happiness):
Ancient 2/4 (was 1/3, 3/6, 1/3 for C / F / G)
Classical 3/6 (was 1/3, 5/10, 1/4 for C / F / G)
Medieval 5/10 (was 4/10, 7/14, 2/6 for C / F / G)
Renaissance 8/16 (was 4/10, 9/18, 3/8 for C / F / G)
Industrial+ 12/24 (was 10/22, 12/24, 4/10 for C / F / G)
Science is basically doing the same, but set one era behind due its value in combination with the extra units (science is a nice addon, but i think the main reason to compete for militaristic CS should be their units):
Ancient 1/2 (was 1/4)
Classical 2/4 (was 2/6)
Medieval 3/6 (was 4/10)
Renaissance 5/10 (was 6/14)
Industrial+ 8/16 (was 10/20)
For food i am a bit unsure but maybe this way every era step could have its benefit:
Ancient 2/4 secondary 0.5 (was 3/6 secondary 0.5)
Classical 2/4 secondary 1 (was 3/6 secondary 0.5)
Medieval 4/8 secondary 1 (was 3/6 secondary 0.5)
Renaissance 4/8 secondary 1.5 (was 4/8 secondary 1.5)
Industrial+ 6/12 secondary 1.5 (was 4/8 secondary 1.5)
Whether yields should go on increasing after industrial, i am unsure. Yes, CS yields get more and more unimportant, however i still go after CS allys, but that might be mainly because of my preference to play diplomatic games.
After long time only reading here, I would like to contribute some thoughts about this.As mentioned before by others, a simple system is always preferable if it does the job sufficiently good. In my opinion this works well for Culture / Faith and Gold, but Science and Food have to be treated differently. Thats why i would change crdvis16 numbers in a way that ally-yields are always double the friends-yields and that the increase per era is increasing by 1 for friend-yields in the most instances (and the double for ally to stay consistent)
Culture / Faith and Gold get the same (for sure gold is the least valuable out of these three, but this is compensated for by the extra happiness):
Ancient 2/4 (was 1/3, 3/6, 1/3 for C / F / G)
Classical 3/6 (was 1/3, 5/10, 1/4 for C / F / G)
Medieval 5/10 (was 4/10, 7/14, 2/6 for C / F / G)
Renaissance 8/16 (was 4/10, 9/18, 3/8 for C / F / G)
Industrial+ 12/24 (was 10/22, 12/24, 4/10 for C / F / G)
Science is basically doing the same, but set one era behind due its value in combination with the extra units (science is a nice addon, but i think the main reason to compete for militaristic CS should be their units):
Ancient 1/2 (was 1/4)
Classical 2/4 (was 2/6)
Medieval 3/6 (was 4/10)
Renaissance 5/10 (was 6/14)
Industrial+ 8/16 (was 10/20)
For food i am a bit unsure but maybe this way every era step could have its benefit:
Ancient 2/4 secondary 0.5 (was 3/6 secondary 0.5)
Classical 2/4 secondary 1 (was 3/6 secondary 0.5)
Medieval 4/8 secondary 1 (was 3/6 secondary 0.5)
Renaissance 4/8 secondary 1.5 (was 4/8 secondary 1.5)
Industrial+ 6/12 secondary 1.5 (was 4/8 secondary 1.5)
Whether yields should go on increasing after industrial, i am unsure. Yes, CS yields get more and more unimportant, however i still go after CS allys, but that might be mainly because of my preference to play diplomatic games.
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On the first page of this thread I suggested making the yields all get the same consistent values but there was pretty good push back to that. The pushback was basically that the yield types are not ever equal 1 to 1 so making their values the same just for simplicity is introducing imbalance for little gain. I think that pushback was probably right especially when the yields are already separated in the code.
I do agree that gold is the weakest yield but people might be sleeping on the happiness component of Mercantile CSs a little. That happiness is GA points and growth if you're already happy. If you're on the edge of unhappiness (or on the edge of being REALLY unhappy) then the extra happiness from the Merc can be really valuable. Having said all that, I certainly wouldn't be opposed to the gold yield being a little higher than my last summation.
I do agree that gold is the weakest yield but people might be sleeping on the happiness component of Mercantile CSs a little. That happiness is GA points and growth if you're already happy. If you're on the edge of unhappiness (or on the edge of being REALLY unhappy) then the extra happiness from the Merc can be really valuable. Having said all that, I certainly wouldn't be opposed to the gold yield being a little higher than my last summation.
Something I believe strongly in, and like to mention from time to time. When its comes to change general mechanics, I would never use one Civ as a reason to do or not anything. Civs can be changed, and changed easily in comparison. The general system has to work.... generally.
So I wouldn't consider Siam one bit with this system. Lets make the system that makes CS useful but not OP, and once that's finalized, if Siam needs a tweak, then we tweak it.
First of all hello everybody
Whether yields should go on increasing after industrial, i am unsure
Welcome Iapuvida! So in terms of late game yields, I don't think they need to scale up. Realistically by Industrial I'm honestly not even looking at CS types anymore. I am seeing what friends I can get for chancery/wire service yields, and allies for votes. With spheres CS type has some impact, but its more about who I'm willing to anger, and if any CS have strategic value to me (aka protecting a key plot of land). So I do not think we need to see a lot of CS scaling late game...CS are already quite powerful and useful, we don't need to double dip with each more yields.
I feel that in a lot of comparisons on the tables so far, we are trying to compare yields directly. But that is not how all CS work, some get combo packages, others don't. So visually its better to look at the total package:
Maritime: Food Only
Mercantile: Happiness + Gold
Cultural: Culture Only
Military: Units + Science
Religious: Faith Only
So looking at this, my general notes on curves is the following:
1) Culture should set the baseline. Its the yields that's most consistently desired that doesn't have anything else to attach to it. To me this is benchmark by which we measure all other CS yields. So I think it should get the most planning.
Curve: Baseline (infact sets the baseline)
2) Faith is insanely powerful early, is generally useful through medieval, and loses a lot of potency in Renaissance. By Industrial I am not really looking at yields for CS much anyway, but I would be fine with some compensation here to compensate (as anytime I do have a preference, religious is last in my choosing at this point).
Curve: Maybe just below culture in ancient, baseline in classical, medieval, above baseline starting in Renaissance.
3) Maritime: Food has a similar curve to faith but with more extremes. Also I would love to toss the .5 food in satellites if we can afford it, I hate the decimals like that.
Curve: Ancient - Baseline, Classical - Baseline, Medieval - Industrial - Above Baseline, Industrial+ - High above baseline.
4) Mercantile: Really about happiness, the gold is a secondary measure. That said, gold is also generally a weaker yield. I think its fine to scale gold with the baseline, with the understanding its the happiness that's the main draw of the CS.
Curve: Baseline
5) Military: Military units are very strong early as you are building your armies, and tends to lose steam later on. Science is a powerful yield, so we don't need much of it until later game.
Curve: Below baseline all eras.
ElliotS
Warmonger
I mean I personally like Military CS the most (past founding) already for the units. Especially when I get a UU from them. Would they be the best? Yes. Would 2 science for classic allies make even the tiniest dent in that? No. The difference between what they're suggested and the rest is so small the imbalancing is totally worth it for not having ANOTHER rule exception. I highly doubt the 1-3 science difference in the early/mid-game would ever made a real difference in any game. It's such a small difference.
Also as long as the rewards are worthwhile the nature of how you compete for CS balances it out, in the sense that better CS are harder to ally. (At least in PVP, not sure about AI.)
Gold comes with free happiness, and the latest suggestion from crdvis16 had it slightly LESS than culture. I think gold is weak enough where it should get bumped to be equal, and let the happiness make up the difference.
Yep. StalkerO made good proposal with balancing yields, considering other bonuses. I dig it.
I think the only thing I'd push back on is faith. Early faith is probably the strongest of the yields if you're planning to found, otherwise it might be the weakest if you plan to just conquer a religion. Late game faith I think is still relatively strong because your faith/turn is often much lower than science, culture, and gold per turn. So, if my choice is 10 faith/turn from a CS and my current faith is 100/turn or 10 culture/turn and my current culture is 300/turn, I might actually take that 10% faith increase over 3% culture increase, especially if I'm still trying to spread or something.
Having said that, I think any of the suggestions people have made would be better than the current yield setup because the current numbers are really imbalanced IMO. I think most of our suggestions are in the same ballpark as each other, really. Hopefully Gazebo takes a look at our suggestions and decides on something similar- I for one am probably not going to nit pick what he would come up with because I think it is bound to be an improvement.
Siam is the only civ who gets much from Ancient CS yields. Envoys aren't available until Classical, and unless you're really lucky you won't get that much quest influence either.
chicorbeef
Emperor
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I'm going to bump this. Right now, I feel like Faith/Culture in Ancient/Classical are still a little low (also, there are no changes in Culture CS yields from Medieval to Renaissance if I recall correctly).
Tbh, I don't mind CS yields being standardized as @crdvis16 proposed, because usually getting a few more city-state yields isn't enough to dramatically alter the game, CS quest timings/rewards as well as proximity tend to be more important. However, buffing Mercantile CS'es gold output and shifting Maritime's yields aren't bad ideas.
Tbh, I don't mind CS yields being standardized as @crdvis16 proposed, because usually getting a few more city-state yields isn't enough to dramatically alter the game, CS quest timings/rewards as well as proximity tend to be more important. However, buffing Mercantile CS'es gold output and shifting Maritime's yields aren't bad ideas.
chicorbeef
Emperor
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Are we all ok with city-state yields? I think it would make sense to standardize the yields a bit and come to an agreement with what the yields should be.
ElliotS
Warmonger
I'm still heavily in favor of the following: (Mostly from @lapuvida )
Ancient 2/4 (was 1/3, 3/6, 1/3, 1/4 for C / F / G / S)
Classical 3/6 (was 1/3, 5/10, 1/4, 2/6 for C / F / G / S)
Medieval 5/10 (was 4/10, 7/14, 2/6, 4/10 for C / F / G / S)
Renaissance 8/16 (was 4/10, 9/18, 3/8, 6/14 for C / F / G / S)
Industrial+ 12/24 (was 10/22, 12/24, 4/10, 10/20 for C / F / G / S)
For food:
Ancient 2/4 secondary 0.5 (was 3/6 secondary 0.5)
Classical 2/4 secondary 1 (was 3/6 secondary 0.5)
Medieval 4/8 secondary 1 (was 3/6 secondary 0.5)
Renaissance 4/8 secondary 1.5 (was 4/8 secondary 1.5)
Industrial+ 6/12 secondary 1.5 (was 4/8 secondary 1.5)
I highly, highly, highly doubt any yeilds inbalance would cause problems, and simplicity is best when possible in our overly complex monster of a game. Not like the learning curve isn't high enough.
Science would be the best, because of the units, but that's already the case. Gold gives happiness, so it's yields don't need to be as much. Faith was over-nerfed, so I'd support bringing it to 2/4.
Ancient 2/4 (was 1/3, 3/6, 1/3, 1/4 for C / F / G / S)
Classical 3/6 (was 1/3, 5/10, 1/4, 2/6 for C / F / G / S)
Medieval 5/10 (was 4/10, 7/14, 2/6, 4/10 for C / F / G / S)
Renaissance 8/16 (was 4/10, 9/18, 3/8, 6/14 for C / F / G / S)
Industrial+ 12/24 (was 10/22, 12/24, 4/10, 10/20 for C / F / G / S)
For food:
Ancient 2/4 secondary 0.5 (was 3/6 secondary 0.5)
Classical 2/4 secondary 1 (was 3/6 secondary 0.5)
Medieval 4/8 secondary 1 (was 3/6 secondary 0.5)
Renaissance 4/8 secondary 1.5 (was 4/8 secondary 1.5)
Industrial+ 6/12 secondary 1.5 (was 4/8 secondary 1.5)
I highly, highly, highly doubt any yeilds inbalance would cause problems, and simplicity is best when possible in our overly complex monster of a game. Not like the learning curve isn't high enough.
Science would be the best, because of the units, but that's already the case. Gold gives happiness, so it's yields don't need to be as much. Faith was over-nerfed, so I'd support bringing it to 2/4.
AndreyK
King
I think that too much early yields, and food too small. I think better
Ancient 1/3
Classical 2/5
Medieval 4/9
Renaissance 7/15
Industrial 11/24
Food
Ancient 2/5 secondary 0.5/1
Classical 3/7 secondary 0.5/1
Medieval 5/10 secondary 1/1.5
Renaissance 8/15 secondary 1/1.5
Industrial 12/20 secondary 1.5/2
Ancient 1/3
Classical 2/5
Medieval 4/9
Renaissance 7/15
Industrial 11/24
Food
Ancient 2/5 secondary 0.5/1
Classical 3/7 secondary 0.5/1
Medieval 5/10 secondary 1/1.5
Renaissance 8/15 secondary 1/1.5
Industrial 12/20 secondary 1.5/2
chicorbeef
Emperor
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I would not mind either of these setups, but I think I like @ElliotS 's just a little bit more because I agree that Faith/Culture are a tad weak now and the numbers are clean and simple. Maritime could be buffed too, but I think we should go with incremental changes. I think secondary maritime food bonuses in Renaissance/Industrial could be 2
rather than 1.5.
Also, just to be clear, Mercantile city-states would give just as much happiness as gold, right?
rather than 1.5. Also, just to be clear, Mercantile city-states would give just as much happiness as gold, right?
If that was true, we would have never had to start this thread
I'm for simplicity when it makes sense, but especially early, the CS yields are not equal in value, and that has to be accounted for. I've said before that I think culture should be the baseline by which we assess all other yields. So I'd at least like to get that nailed down and then look at the others. Its also important to note that the luxs in early eras is VERY useful, as this is when your expanding heavily. Your happiness really helps determine how well you can expand. This means alliances are useful not just for extra yields, but for that lux happiness. I also find that alliances in classical are pretty easy to get....its not until later that you have to "fight" for them. That is why I am comfortable reducing the scaler on alliance yields until Medieval.
Ancient 2/3
Classical 2/3
Medieval 4/9
Renaissance 4/9
Industrial+ 8/18
ElliotS
Warmonger
I think that early faith was obviously busted. Faith is a real race, and it offered 6 faith on alliances and even more to Siam.If that was true, we would have never had to start this thread
I'm for simplicity when it makes sense, but especially early, the CS yields are not equal in value, and that has to be accounted for. I've said before that I think culture should be the baseline by which we assess all other yields. So I'd at least like to get that nailed down and then look at the others. Its also important to note that the luxs in early eras is VERY useful, as this is when your expanding heavily. Your happiness really helps determine how well you can expand. This means alliances are useful not just for extra yields, but for that lux happiness. I also find that alliances in classical are pretty easy to get....its not until later that you have to "fight" for them. That is why I am comfortable reducing the scaler on alliance yields until Medieval.
Ancient 2/3
Classical 2/3
Medieval 4/9
Renaissance 4/9
Industrial+ 8/18
On the other hand I think that getting 1-2 extra yields from any given CS type won't skew things. How often could a game be decided by 1 extra culture per turn? Even if you get really lucky and get like 2 friends and an ally that are "OP" because of yield type, will 4 extra culture per turn at turn 60 change the game? (4 more than it would be if 'perfectly balanced') I don't think it would make enough of a difference that it's worth adding complexity.
Also I don't know if they should be perfectly balanced due to the nature of competing for CS. If they're better and worse than each other, especially later in the game, then it makes for a more dynamic CS ally competition.
