Denmark

Well, I don't play them :D. Sometimes when I don't play them I get kinda sad about not having access to the Jelling Stone, fantastic building.
 
I have never played them myself, but they do very well in AI hands - Harald is regularly one of the top dogs in the world congress or on a conquering spree. In Vanilla he used to conquer, then fall behind and falter, but now he keeps up while doing conquest, resulting in quite impressive empires.
 
You don't need to be next to the Coast to build the Jelling Stone.

Berserkers are awesome. Their only weakness is lacking Iron due to Map Gen. Three Moves, Charge I, Amphibious (don't need to worry about rivers), and available earlier.
 
You don't need to be next to the Coast to build the Jelling Stone.
Exactly, that's awesome. So many games where I've been forced to choose between getting a lighthouse and fitting more luxuries in range, with Denmark you don't have to make that choice.

Berserkers are awesome. Their only weakness is lacking Iron due to Map Gen. Three Moves, Charge I, Amphibious (don't need to worry about rivers), and available earlier.
Yeah, there are some Jaguar warrior level of promotions on them.
 
Is there any way to give Denmark an iron starting bias? Every time I play a game with them, I end up quitting early because there is no iron within 30 tiles of my starting location.
 
Is there any way to give Denmark an iron starting bias? Every time I play a game with them, I end up quitting early because there is no iron within 30 tiles of my starting location.

There is an map-option for strategic balance if you can't deal with RNG.
 
The Problem

If you're playing Denmark, you're going to war, and you're liable to pick Authority for that reason. The Jelling Stones :c5production:/:c5culture: on kill benefit harmonizes entirely too well with Authority. Frequently when I'm at war, I'll overflow the right hand side of my screen with notifications that
  1. I got :c5production:/:c5culture:/:c5science: from a kill
  2. The :c5culture: expanded my borders
  3. My border expansion gave me :c5food:/:c5gold:
  4. That :c5food: gave me :c5citizen:
  5. That :c5citizen: gave me moar :c5science:
It's an incredibly powerful virtuous cycle, and there aren't any weaknesses. Playing as Denmark, I am easily locking up #1 in every single yield and demographic category (with the possible exceptions of military and approval) while simultaneously conquering the world. The only yield that I'm not getting from conquest is :c5faith:, and I could've even set that up with a different Pantheon if I'd wanted (I generally go God-King, because God-King). Ultimately I have more :c5faith: than I know what to do with anyhow, because my population and city counts are enormous, and I'm systematically exterminating other religions.

Part of what feels so wrong about this is that killing an enemy unit is a benefit in and of itself. The victory is already a victory. When it's larded with :c5production:, :c5culture:, :c5science:--and, indirectly, :c5food: and :c5gold:--it becomes too powerful as a mechanism for the rich to get richer. Yes, you have to wage successful wars to take advantage of this virtuous cycle, but if you manage it, the game is over before the Renaissance. I keep meeting the transoceanic Civs and feeling let down when I realize that I already devoured my most worthy opponents.

Also, not for nothing, but the Embarkation bonus is amazing. That alone is one of the most powerful combat UAs in the game, what with the CBP's additional Embarked movement. There's only so much you can do when a flotilla of Trebuchets and Berserkers starts its turn off your coast with 7/7 moves, and doesn't stop after landing. Especially if you're a naive AI player.

Solutions

I'm focused on the Jelling Stones here, but part of Denmark's problem is that it has an incredible conquest UA, an incredible conquest UB, and an incredible conquest UU. The Jelling Stones are just the most egregious to me because of their synergy with Authority, and probably because they're totally novel to the CBP. I think you have to fix them to get Denmark balanced right.

I had thought that removing the :c5production: from Jelling Stones would be enough to fix Denmark, but Authority's synergy with the :c5culture: is incredibly strong too. My recommendation would be to cut them both. I'm not sure you can add that sort of yield on kill UB/UA on top of Authority without it becoming both OP and necessary (e.g., not really a choice--you have to take Authority, build Jelling Stones, and war aggressively in order to even approach your potential).

What about awarding GP points for kills? That keeps the heroic, skaldic flavor of the Jelling Stones without directly adding to the Authority feedback loop.

Another option might be that kills add :c5production: to cities producing units? It's less powerful as a Win Moar because if you're winning battles, then you might not need to produce more units. It makes Denmark more one-dimensional, and less of a skyscraping, universal superpower fueled by blood and thunder.

This could be super esoteric and difficult/impossible to do, but what if kills added to the experience of future units? Kind of the same idea as Assyria having XP bonuses, or JFD's Prussia. The notion here is that you're banking XP for future units (maybe it goes into a pool expended upon the creation of your next unit?), or creating a martial culture that forever produces craftier warriors.

Or Jelling Stones could be removed altogether and replaced with something else. I really like the idea of something related to early transoceanic exploration/colonization, but there's a major risk of stepping on Spain and Polynesia's toes.
 
I've had a couple of Denmark games in the last few weeks and they seem in a real good and unique spot. The emphasis on ancient era raiding and warfare (where the cash pillaging and from melee damage to cities is huge) and continuous warfare past that encourages a warfare style that diverges from the timing-based approaches most warmonger civs have.

Only a couple of tweaks I would make:

- If available, the authority finisher should really give swordsmen instead of spears if you have the iron available. Spears/Pikes for Denmark just aren't very good when you get berserkers so early.
- The Jelling Stone's bonus to GP generation is very modest-not enough to really make me want to build around great people. I think 20% would be interesting because then you get into jelling stones+gardens+policies for a great people generation strategy into the late game, such as wide culture or wide science.
 
The jelling stones are all kind of ubiquitous with the Greek UB.

I love playing as Denmark, and would hate to see them nerfed, but they might need it a touch.
 
The jelling stones are all kind of ubiquitous with the Greek UB.

I love playing as Denmark, and would hate to see them nerfed, but they might need it a touch.

why touch something which is fun and not unbalanced. Yes the jelly stone can snowball you but many UA/UB can : Poland, Ethiopia, Korea, Brazil, etc ...
I've NEVER seen AI becoming a huge treat with Denmark. The UA requires a lot of micro management and you have to keep on wagging wars to make the best use of jelly stones.
 
why touch something which is fun and not unbalanced. Yes the jelly stone can snowball you but many UA/UB can : Poland, Ethiopia, Korea, Brazil, etc ...
I've NEVER seen AI becoming a huge treat with Denmark. The UA requires a lot of micro management and you have to keep on wagging wars to make the best use of jelly stones.

I'm much more in the camp that the Greek UB or the Danish UB needs to give a different on-kill yield. Denmark is a lot of fun as-is and would hate to see them changed.
 
once promotions and unit balance gets the re-work it sorely needs that will help the AI to not be such pushovers militarily, it will in turn tone down on-kill bonuses as well.
 
once promotions and unit balance gets the re-work it sorely needs that will help the AI to not be such pushovers militarily, it will in turn tone down on-kill bonuses as well.

You keep saying this, but you're in a very small minority on the topic (that the military is broken).

G
 
You keep saying this, but you're in a very small minority on the topic (that the military is broken).

G

I think he was referring to the conversation about changing promotions.
 
approaching offtopic now but im nowhere near the minority who thinks horse/knights are op, and the base promotion lines need changing.

anyway, when my naval fleet faces off against AI and every other caravel they have is buffed up with promotions that are %100 worthless for them in the fight... yeah.... kills wont be so easy to come by when this gets fixed.
 
the same way currently that every AI unit unfortunate enough to wind up with drill (going on for how long?) is fodder for my horses because theyre at a huge disadvantage being i know better and always take shock leads to very easy on-kill bonuses for me.

i'm right about this (and in the majority) which is why youre about to change it no? for land units anyway. this is part of what i meant talking about easy on-kill bonuses yeah and military has been broke, but seems like its starting to get a 2nd thought which is good for the ai.
 
Maybe we should have a straw poll about the military balance.
 
approaching offtopic now but im nowhere near the minority who thinks horse/knights are op, and the base promotion lines need changing.

anyway, when my naval fleet faces off against AI and every other caravel they have is buffed up with promotions that are %100 worthless for them in the fight... yeah.... kills wont be so easy to come by when this gets fixed.

There's a big difference between 'the military AI is broken' and 'these two promotion lines need a tweak. Gross exaggerations like that are frustrating as a developer because they're equal parts vague and incendiary. Also not a lot I can do with the word 'broken.' That's all.

G
 
There's a big difference between 'the military AI is broken' and 'these two promotion lines need a tweak. Gross exaggerations like that are frustrating as a developer because they're equal parts vague and incendiary. Also not a lot I can do with the word 'broken.' That's all.

G


i thought i've been pretty clear about my positions, i just did a whole writeup in the main forum on my thoughts about both promotions and knights, separately. if you ever feel i'm being vague when i throw something out and youre looking for more information from me feel free to ask though

When my ground units and naval units enjoy a %20-%30 combat bonus against their AI peers half or more of the time, i can't sugar coat it with euphemistic lanuage. also, you used the word "broke" before i did
 
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