Denmark

Right, because the normal gold for pillage and 25hp at no movement cost was such a burden. No reason pillage at all anymore. Literally unplayable.

This is getting a bit farcical, lads. And ya’ll are acting like the 25% bonus to military production and mountains of food that the runes tone provides doesn’t exist.
Mountains of food is hyperbolic as well. I'm not saying it doesn't make a difference, but the reason for UB is to reward a certain type of gameplay. +1 food on water tiles is not changing anything. That's why the focus is on the actual unique part of the building. The static yields can be changed later for balance, but are more or less irrelevant to this conversation.
 
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Hey even without the pillage things, the runestone is still a very solid UB. It provides 1 extra food for every sea tiles and +2 culture too. Denmark is already too strong for its UA alone.

What I like about Denmark is the pillaging aspect. We want unique civs that stand out and pillaging seems like a fun way. Balancing that is the tough part of course. I do agree that the UA is too strong. We should probably change that as well and tweak all the numbers. Ideally, we'll be able to make Viking and Longboat accessible as promotions (or new promotions if that's easier) that Denmark can get after Shock I or Drill I. That way, you don't get them early on and will have to pick between them and other promotions.

Right, because the normal gold for pillage and 25hp at no movement cost was such a burden. No reason pillage at all anymore. Literally unplayable.

This is getting a bit farcical, lads. And ya’ll are acting like the 25% bonus to military production and mountains of food that the runes tone provides doesn’t exist.

The normal gold from pillaging is quite insignificant while, as nice as healing for no movement cost is, there's still a risk vs. reward. If I get additional yields, I might get greedy and risk losing a unit. I'm not going to overextend myself on higher difficulties if I get very little yields. Let's not forget that you get WW if your units lose health so, even if I keep my units alive from that free 25 hp, I won't be able to sustain a war for long. Oh yes, pillaging also gives you WW so it's not completely free.

To be honest, I can go without the bonus to military production or it just works for melee naval units only if we can make the pillaging fun and balanced. The food just makes it a better Lighthouse so it's certainly not mountains of food. All UB give better yields compared to what they replace.
 
One way to nerf Denmark indirectly would be nerfing pillaging in general. There was already a discussion about the amount of HP you regenerate by pillaging some month ago. With a 3 movement berserker and no movement cost for pillaging, your able to run in circles around enemy cities and heal every damage you gain.
A result of the pillaging discussion was the era scaler for the gold you gain for pillaging.

So, now my suggestion would be:
- Decrease the gained HP from pillaging from 25 to 15.
- Stay with the gold/culture for pillaging, but make it dependant on the gold you gained. Farms and mines are most common improvements, a factor should lead to around 3-4 gold/culture in first eras, making it more worthy to go for higher tier improvements, creating a challenging hunt for GPTI.
- create a cap for gold by city attacks
 
This is getting a bit farcical, lads. And ya’ll are acting like the 25% bonus to military production and mountains of food that the runes tone provides doesn’t exist.
People are acting like the UA doesn't exist.

Runestones alone were better than basically any other civs UA, UB, and UU combined and it took forever to actually get a change. And for some reason, all changes are being done relative to the old runestone, which is really dumb because the old runestone was a problem. A couple arguments can be summarized as "its much worse than the old runestone". Well yea, that's the point.

I think the Danish UA is one of the best in the game. Its provides a lot of gold extremely early, its not uncommon to get more gold than Carthage does if you rush spears and play aggressive. And you useful military perks that last all game. People have mentioned this and it keeps getting ignored
+2 culture is a lot for a classical era building.
+1 food to all coastal tiles is valuable
+25% production on military units is valuable.

These benefits above are solid, they would be a reasonable (but not great).

+10 culture for pillaging sea tiles. "Sea tiles are rare". Yes but 10 culture is a lot. Per city, per era. You have 10 runestones in medieval era? That is 200 culture for every fishing boat you find. What is your per turn culture at this stage? Depends on religion and things, but probably around 200-400. You don't value getting a half turn of culture for pillaging some fish? Then you're a fool.

The gold for pillaging is great too. The UA gives so much gold already and gold decreases in value if you have a ton of it, but that's a problem you don't mind having.
 
Denmark UA is sure the best UA in the game. It helps both warfare and economic AND its a strong tool to hinder your enemies (just raid all of their gold :lol:). I personally think that Runestone as now is fine, it would be nicer if the gold on pillage land resources become faith though because I swim in gold with UA already.
 
Denmark UA is sure the best UA in the game. It helps both warfare and economic AND its a strong tool to hinder your enemies (just raid all of their gold :lol:). I personally think that Runestone as now is fine, it would be nicer if the gold on pillage land resources become faith though because I swim in gold with UA already.

"Give a man some fish, you feed him for a day. Teach him to pillage his enemies, and...he'll found a religion based on it."
- True Bible Words
 
Denmark UA is sure the best UA in the game. It helps both warfare and economic AND its a strong tool to hinder your enemies (just raid all of their gold :lol:). I personally think that Runestone as now is fine, it would be nicer if the gold on pillage land resources become faith though because I swim in gold with UA already.

It's fine if you don't want Denmark to be pillage based. I think you guys are losing sight that this a game, the goal is to balance it, and keep it fun. Denmark is the ONLY civ that is based around pillaging rather than out right conquest. Why everyone suddenly wants to strip this from them is beyond me.

If people feel the need to take the other bonuses from the Runestone to keep or add back in the pillage benefits, sure.

Please don't turn the Danes in to another bland cookie cutter civ.
 
Oh don’t be so dramatic. There are no cookie cutter civs, and toning down pillaging bonuses is not the same thing as removing them.

Even if we remove the pillage bonus entirely — which NO ONE IS TALKING ABOUT — then Denmark isn’t the only warmonger civ which isn’t strictly based on conquering:
Japan is focused on defensive wars
Iroquois is focused on defense
Aztec is focused on winning enough to get a good peace deal and killing units
Greece is focused on killing units
 
Oh don’t be so dramatic. There are no cookie cutter civs, and toning down pillaging bonuses is not the same thing as removing them....
Of course it is not the same thing, but it is the same direction. And it will not bring greater fun into the game.
Players can as well choose to play Denmark peacefully. Or to never play it. There is no need, to reduce the danish abilities.
Same thing with all the other civs you mentioned. Differences between civs/leaders should rather be sharpened than flattened.
 
Nerfing the pillaging to non-absurd OP levels does not take away Denmark’s unique utility.

G

With the current Beta patch it’s pretty much gone. I get that the idea was to nerf them down then build them back up, but there are several people saying the Runestine is now “fine”. It’s only fine if your cool with taking away what made the Danes fun to play.

The only pillage problem they had was in the mid/late game when they had too much to pillage and the era increase was too much. Now pillaging is an small side bonus.

Can anyone honestly tell me the Danes are fun to play when pillaging is no longer a real option to out right conquest? There are several other war civs that do the exact same thing.
 
Its not gone? 10 culture for a fish pillage is big. I couldnt ask for more, combine with other benefit the rune stone brings. I think it is fine, unless youre playing an all land map script. Even with pangea there are plenty of fishes to pillage.
 
Its not gone? 10 culture for a fish pillage is big. I couldnt ask for more, combine with other benefit the rune stone brings. I think it is fine, unless youre playing an all land map script. Even with pangea there are plenty of fishes to pillage.
Compare 5 culture for every improvement pillaged with 10 culture for an improvement, which is maybe a tenth of the improvements, or even less, dependant on map. Right now Iam playing on a pangäa map, with total of 12 cities, 6 of them on coast, I have access to 6 fishin boats. Thats a half improvement per city.
Also on land, theres a big discrepancy. How many ressources do you normally have per city? Take the capital aside, it may be in the range of 2-6. Instead of 10-20 improvements. Its even worse than cutting the yields per pillaged tile down to 2.
 
Compare 5 culture for every improvement pillaged with 10 culture for an improvement, which is maybe a tenth of the improvements, or even less, dependant on map. Right now Iam playing on a pangäa map, with total of 12 cities, 6 of them on coast, I have access to 6 fishin boats. Thats a half improvement per city.
Also on land, theres a big discrepancy. How many ressources do you normally have per city? Take the capital aside, it may be in the range of 2-6. Instead of 10-20 improvements. Its even worse than cutting the yields per pillaged tile down to 2.
"I don't like the nerf. Its weaker than before. Here is the math to show its weaker than before."

What a compelling argument. Yes, the old runestone is stronger than this one. That's the goal of a nerf.
 
Lets say, popping a well planned Writer gives me about 15 turns of culture on Epic, while with 5 culture on pillage of rune stone, I can easily get a turn of my culture with 4 or 5 pillages. That is very OP and it comes very early. As 10 culture per fishing boat, I still can get 1 or 2 extra turn of culture per war. Its good enough!
 
Compare 5 culture for every improvement pillaged with 10 culture for an improvement, which is maybe a tenth of the improvements, or even less, dependant on map
Oh wow, that certainly does sounds like a big change. That change is so big, it might even affect your playstyle so that you prioritize pillaging sea tiles over pillaging land tiles. But wait, raiding coastal waters sounds like something vikings might do. Hmmm....
 
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"I don't like the nerf. Its weaker than before. Here is the math to show its weaker than before."

What a compelling argument. Yes, the old runestone is stronger than this one. That's the goal of a nerf.
I wanted to compare the dimension of the nerf, not if it is one or not. It's one thing to reduce the yields from pillaging from hammer to gold or from 5 to 4. But in this case, it's a reduction to around 1-2 yields per pillaged tile. Statistically. Additionally most of it is gold, a yield with relative low value for denmark, and a very small part of it is culture.
I simply disagree with a nerf of this dimension. In most cases, if you come closer to your target, you slow down, and didn't increase the speed to shoot over it.
Oh wow, that certainly does sounds like a big change. That change is so big, it might even affect your playstyle so that you prioritize pillaging sea tiles over pillaging land tiles. But wait, raiding coastal waters sounds like something vikings might do. Hmmm....
Show me a source with a proof, the vikings raided fishing boats. The first targets were rich monasteries which had no defensive abilities and also harbor cities. But the most victims of the vikings were inland cities, not on the coast. They were travelling the rivers upwards. Cities like Paris, Cologne, Trier, Utrecht, Maastricht..... All inland cities, which were connected by a great river to the sea. But they never raided poor fisher (even if they did, in comparison to their other actions, it's not worth to mention).
 
Show me a source with a proof, the vikings raided fishing boats. The first targets were rich monasteries which had no defensive abilities and also harbor cities. But the most victims of the vikings were inland cities, not on the coast. They were travelling the rivers upwards. Cities like Paris, Cologne, Trier, Utrecht, Maastricht..... All inland cities, which were connected by a great river to the sea. But they never raided poor fisher (even if they did, in comparison to their other actions, it's not worth to mention).
TL;DR I agree with you entirely.

I don't think this was the point you were making, but you have touched on something that I think would vastly improve this system which G devised: Great person Tile improvements (the monasteries and secluded compounds we have to work with in-game) should give +10:c5culture: on pillage, and improvements on resources (including sea resources) should give +10:c5gold:. This has much better historicity, as you have pointed out.

Maybe you make GP tiles on resources give 10:c5culture: AND 10:c5gold:? I dunno.

This would actually make the 10:c5culture: more rare, especially early, but ramp up into later game. This doesn't satisfy the "but it's a nerf, boo-hoo-hoo" crowd, but I think it would be more interesting.

What do u think, G?
 
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