Do you use all civics?

theocracy is decent except that it comes too late to be all that useful, if it were moved to Priesthood id get a lot more use out of it

Theocracy + Grigori + worldspell = Altar victory!

I use Theocracy if I am going for an altar victory. With enough levels of altar it can be very powerful (enough hammers + high level disciple unit out of the gate). Also every XP boost helps with Sidar going for more shades.
 
I like to switch to Conquest when I get the +1:food: from Sanitation if I need to build some firepower or even defensive units, which is usually the case. As the happiness cap is often reached way before anyway, "big" farms are more an annoyance than anything else.

That being said, I usually don't stay on Conquer all the game neither, Foreign Trade being some kind of a must, if the environment is peaceful enough.

I really don't understand why you wrote that Conquer was an uninteresting civic, or that it sucks ; it depends on style of play (and lvl difficulty maybe ?) I guess.

If we talk about Fend for Themselves, then ok, this one is useless ; and as Verily wrote it, the silly AI seems to be the only one to enjoy it :confused:
 
Theocracy is good if:

You go for Altar Victory (then its clearly the! best Governement Civic from Altar 3+ hands down. From Altar 5+ its borderline overpowered (especially if combined with Scolarship and Caste System / Hall of the Kings). Also fulfills all support needs if your cities grow big enough and you run enough priests thanks to one raw Gold each.)

In long games if you have grabbed a few religions and really want shrines but have got alot of other greath people before so its hard to otherwise get the prophets to build the shrines.

If Philosophical + good / Neutral and strong leaning towards specialist Economy (If using Altar not / not just for winning but more the other benefits.) and if your civ / strategy relies heavyly on divine units.

As Sidar (because for Sidar Free XP = anything they need economywise.)

If you badly want your Civ clean of Non-State Religions (can only imagine Veil-Free-Zone as a case outside of one Victory type:) especially if you go for Religious Victory and want to force everyone to also adopt Theocrathy + your State Religion (only possible if you run Theocracy yourselves.).



Serfdom seems really bad to me in comparison and the Worker-benefit negligable (Why not just axe the food penalty of that civic? Perhaps then it gets decent enough to use.), as does mercantilism (+1 to respective specialist output (like sidar / greath library / guild of hammers / theatre of dreams offers) whould sound interesting enough to adopt perhaps?).

The compassion civics are rather dull (exept perhaps for Sacrifice the Weak or expansive civs. Still could use some work for other than StW.)

Economy seriously needs a balancing review imo. (GoN and Agriculture rule my choice most of the time but seem ok balancewise overall.
Other things in that category seem more (Mercantilism) or less (Conquest, Foreign Trade) to weak exept for some very special cases / civs and could use a beaf-up.)

I find use for all Governement Civics depending on Settings and Civ and find them acceptably balanced (including despotism) exept perhaps the nonadoption penalty for non-republic civs which seems a little bit annoying to me. And all seem distinct and interesting enough to justify their existence.
 
There are certain civics I do not really use.
In Government I never use Theocracy, Republic, nor Aristocracy. Theocracy would be more useful if it came at an earlier tech. Republic... isn't bad, but I never have a use for it. With a large empire I'd use City States, small God King, and if in war I'd even consider Despotism. But never Republic, I'd rather build Pillar of Chains and forget about it. Aristocracy is really bad IMO. Maybe if the commerce bonus was raised to +3, or if the food penalty was removed and just made +2 commerce with no malus.

Cultural Values has mostly good civics... but I never use Consumption. It just doesn't offer enough. I think it could use a boost.

Labor civics are mostly good too, but I don't use Serfdom unless playing Infernal. Even then I'd probably rather have Caste System. I'd recommend some kind of boost to Serfdom, maybe take away the food penalty.

Economy Civics... agriculture or GoN. Rarely, I'll use Conquest. I've never used Foreign Trade (I fight too many wars for it to be useful, and 1-commerce internal routes don't strike me as being very exciting) and I've never used Mercantilism (maybe if it were on some other tech or if it were improved... I usually don't find it worthwhile to research that tech).

Compassion: Either Basic Care or STW. Rarely, Fend if I'm already switching some other civic and I don't need health. The other two aren't useful enough to pay upkeep costs on.
 
Aristocracy is downright overpowered when used with somebody like flauros who doesn't care about city upkeep because of dirt cheap courthouses that are needed for there vampires, with sanitation it's 4 food 4 coins, it doesn't work quite as well with other civs or none financial civs, but the royal guard are still pretty good and can use metal.

That said, as anything other then calabim, aristocracy is so-so.

Agriculture there is really no reason to ever switch out of it, it has low upkeep and no downsides if you just farm grasslands, AND it gives +1 health, and if you ever switch out of it your cities are likely to starve and lose a couple population.

I'v never used merchantism or foreign trade, since by the time I get merchantism the game is about decided, and with foreign trade I would rather just continue to grow and get more cash since the larger the city = the bigger the bonus of trade income.
 
Aristocracy is downright overpowered when used with somebody like flauros who doesn't care about city upkeep because of dirt cheap courthouses that are needed for there vampires, with sanitation it's 4 food 4 coins, it doesn't work quite as well with other civs or none financial civs, but the royal guard are still pretty good and can use metal.

That said, as anything other then calabim, aristocracy is so-so.

Agriculture there is really no reason to ever switch out of it, it has low upkeep and no downsides if you just farm grasslands, AND it gives +1 health, and if you ever switch out of it your cities are likely to starve and lose a couple population.

I'v never used merchantism or foreign trade, since by the time I get merchantism the game is about decided, and with foreign trade I would rather just continue to grow and get more cash since the larger the city = the bigger the bonus of trade income, plus why would I switch to a civic with a negative attached to it when I could stick with agriculture that has all bonuses?
 
Aristocracy is downright overpowered when used with somebody like flauros who doesn't care about city upkeep because of dirt cheap courthouses that are needed for there vampires, with sanitation it's 4 food 4 coins, it doesn't work quite as well with other civs or none financial civs, but the royal guard are still pretty good and can use metal.

Not quite.

With sanitation and the Agriculture civic, it's 4 food and 2 commerce on a grassland tile. Financial makes this 4 food and 3 commerce. Compare that to a town which is 2 food and 6 commerce with taxation as a financial leader. I'm strongly of the opinion that Flauros is better off skipping Aristocracy, mixing farms and cottages, and maybe running a small number of all-farms cities for feeding. Note also that Calabim's manors reduce city maintenance less than normal courthouses (only 20% vs 40%).
 
Running specialists and farms, or running cottages... the economics depends on the situation, but one definite advantage of running farms is that you can pack cities more closely together, fitting more cities in a given space, and reduce upkeep. I personally like large land areas and fewer, better cities, but that's just a matter of taste and whether you care about the AC counter or not.
 
It may be silly, but I decide which government the leader would be likely to choose and stick to it, no matter what.
 
In vanilla civ the civics all had their very special use. And in late game, I switched the quiet often. That never happens in my FFH-Games. Some of the best civics ( citystates, agriculture) are very early in game. Wouldn´t it be nice to switch aristrocratie(perhaps a little bit improved) and citystates?
 
Theocracy is decent, one of my favs
I like to play Malakim and with malakim its just part of strat.

I always resereaching Military Strategy early, so :
Capital Command post + Conquest, + Apprent + Theo = cap
Deis Deei + Altar of Lonottar + 6xp civis = HC
I developing under GodKing and etc. then switching in one turn inot "conquest XP mode (normally using GA).
10 xp disciple units (only with altar 1, add more 2 xp per each altar upgrade, add hammers for priests too)
8xp arcane units (10xp if i manage to build capture Form of Titan)

Poop Arcane units in cap, disciple in HC. Win.

+ unlimited priests. Later Altars give huge bonuses including inceased hammers for priest specialists. The outcome and benefit is huge, if you have bit patience... and theo.
3hammer2commerce priests is easy thing to get with theo, and its just crazy infrastructure boost as well.

As for rest of "underpowered civics"
Foreign Trade - can be desent with alot of coastal cities and Traderoute benefiting buildings. Income from trade routes can be HUGE. Dont understimate it.
Mercantilism - if you dogpiled that may help.
Aristocracy - Should be used with financial trait imo, and good with FOL (AF+Aristo Farms) and SE. Tryed, working good. dont forget you get 4 awesome national units. (you not getting commerce boni from river tile using forest, but if you make river tiles farms you get 4 food 4 commerce tile ! (with sanit conquest) - unit building speed can be insane + lol 4food 4com tiles pown. (u can go 5/4 with agri))
Conquest - one of BEST civics imo.

SO: fucxk the haters, learn to play :D
 
Even so I think teh Calabim should get a UU (better) Royal Guard unit to give them more of a reason to use their most thematically appropriate civic. Especailly since they get a smaller reduction in city mantainance from their UB courthouses, meaning theu have a even bigger reason to stick with city states for the whole game.
 
Foreign Trade - can be desent with alot of coastal cities and Traderoute benefiting buildings. Income from trade routes can be HUGE. Dont understimate it.

I actually don't think this is true at all. The highest I've seen a traderoute give is 10 gold, under extremely stacked circumstances: +100% from intercontinental trade (a Scions of Patria unique building, an undead civ mod for Fall Further), another 30% from another Scion unique building, +25% traderoute from harbor, then tavern and inn for another +50%, plus huge modifiers from never fighting with the trade partner on another continent. Compare that to any of my largest city's commerce output (the ones that would be getting the best trade routes), which by the time I built all those bonuses would have at least 50 gold per turn (and this is extremely low end, fully developed cities produce upwards of 200). So straight up Mercantilism is worth 10gold in every city, and is not dependent on a bunch of modifiers to provide that. And not only that, adding a trade route isn't going to give you as much as the best routes, it will give you a new, cheap route (since all the best routes are already active), which is not likely to provide more than 2 or 3 gold, even with all those stacked modifiers.

So I get -10% gold and a trade route (or two, coastal) that will provide maybe 2 or 5 gold depending on just how many trade modifiers are in question. Or I can get straight up 20% more gold in every city, which can be anywhere from 10 to 40 gold per city depending on just how developed they are. assuming I can even give up the food bonuses from Agriculture. I guess the only thing trade routes have going for it is you don't need citizens to work a trade route. If your city is too small to produce enough commerce on its own to outweigh a traderoute or two, I suppose the extra gold would amount to more than Mercantilism.

I don't think you can underestimate trade routes. They are pretty lackluster, except in stacked circumstances.
 
I actually don't think this is true at all. The highest I've seen a traderoute give is 10 gold, under extremely stacked circumstances: +100% from intercontinental trade (a Scions of Patria unique building, an undead civ mod for Fall Further), another 30% from another Scion unique building, +25% traderoute from harbor, then tavern and inn for another +50%, plus huge modifiers from never fighting with the trade partner on another continent. Compare that to any of my largest city's commerce output (the ones that would be getting the best trade routes), which by the time I built all those bonuses would have at least 50 gold per turn (and this is extremely low end, fully developed cities produce upwards of 200). So straight up Mercantilism is worth 10gold in every city, and is not dependent on a bunch of modifiers to provide that. And not only that, adding a trade route isn't going to give you as much as the best routes, it will give you a new, cheap route (since all the best routes are already active), which is not likely to provide more than 2 or 3 gold, even with all those stacked modifiers.

So I get -10% gold and a trade route (or two, coastal) that will provide maybe 2 or 5 gold depending on just how many trade modifiers are in question. Or I can get straight up 20% more gold in every city, which can be anywhere from 10 to 40 gold per city depending on just how developed they are. assuming I can even give up the food bonuses from Agriculture. I guess the only thing trade routes have going for it is you don't need citizens to work a trade route. If your city is too small to produce enough commerce on its own to outweigh a traderoute or two, I suppose the extra gold would amount to more than Mercantilism.

I don't think you can underestimate trade routes. They are pretty lackluster, except in stacked circumstances.

nah on hi advance game my trade routes are 6s+ (no much stacking btw) (there are lot of AI big cities to trade with) , that bring you to +7-10 after more stacking with buildings and techs.If you use Fol city without cottages for example, it can have nice prod, big size. Best income for it from trade routes (assuming you in peace with most of civs on map). +1 trade route is like +2 cottages to city. I like to specialize cities. Such city commerce mostly - resources in cityarea + traderoutes , and ocassional 1-2 cottages + may be some farm/river +1 boni. With mercantilism you get much less, also its good to trade with AI 15-20 size cities.
Also add +1 trade route per each city conquered /captured.
As for stacking bonuses from +commerce % buildings.
In case of traderoutes you increase base. In case of traderoutes you just add another boni, that applies as addition to lets say Money
Exchanger.
its not (base*125%)*120%, it is base * (100% + 25%+20%).
With trade routes tyou increase base, so for small cities wghere traderoute can be 1/3 of base it will look like: 133%*base*(115%)
if we compare that we see that commerce bonuses difference beetween Merc and Foreign Trade neutralised for small cities, and not so big for larger ones .
if we take numerous commerce enchancing buildings, and more traderoutes enchancing buildings, Foreighn Routes work better more and more (b/c traderoute is just raw add to base but some bonus substract, Mercantilism is raw substract from base and add to bonus, which is less than FT commerce outcome often)
 
@ Niveras: Try Lanun and you will learn to value foreign Trade (and Conquest btw.). Trade Routes if massed and gained in big pop-cities (which is rather easy to accomplish as Lanun thanks to coves.) do indeed rock and do give yields in addition to the normal ones from working tiles without any real disadvantages (save for not beeing able to run conquest or one of the other economic civs.)
Add in the Greath Lighthouse and you have a real ton of Trade routes going up to around 10 Endgame. (And 10 Trade Routes per city is a big heap nearly out of the box.)

(Also Agriculture and GoN are not all that hot for them because they dont help water tiles.)

But they are the only civ (save from perhaps Lanun-summoned Mercurians / Infernals) to have a big incentive to build alot near water / ocean. So they naturally get most out of it. By a big margin. Hence me saying that its a bit! waek for most civs.
But only Mercantilism seems really sucky and in dire need of a makeover in that category.

Also you have to play rather peacefully then (CoE really helps there.) because then those trade routes yield far more commerce.

Due to missing Harbor and 3 missing trade routes (2 from greath lighthouse 1 from Foreign-Trade costal bonus) non-costal cities are a lot less interesting for a trade-route economy.

And with a possible bonus of about 400-500% (more in the most ideal cases, but that is for highend-supercities) to trade route yield in all they can yield a big heap if you really aim for it.
 
Aristocracy switch with city states. No.

If you rush it, the civic is already very powerful. Royal guard are not worthless. Calibim or not, you rush aristocracy and you can guarantee quick culture production and impenetrable defense in new conquests. It's an excellent civic for a cramped map. To get it from education, royal guards would have to be changed big time, and royal guards are the big boost that takes it from an option to a strategy. You wouldn't want nerfed farms during your early growth anyway.

Niveras, 20% gold is zero if you're running 100% science outside of gold producing buildings. Try using it as Lanun while part of the overcouncil with forced foreign trade routes even with your enemies. At 60% science, sure, there's no comparison, but I'm usually running 90% or higher and the 20% is about as useful as a single foreign route. Mercantilism is a good wartime civic, if you're at peace with low upkeep and high science, it's pretty worthless.
 
Aristocracy - Should be used with financial trait imo, and good with FOL (AF+Aristo Farms) and SE. Tryed, working good. dont forget you get 4 awesome national units. (you not getting commerce boni from river tile using forest, but if you make river tiles farms you get 4 food 4 commerce tile ! (with sanit conquest) - unit building speed can be insane + lol 4food 4com tiles pown. (u can go 5/4 with agri))

Grassland: 2 food.
Farm: +1 food.
Sanitation: +1 food.
Aristocracy: -1 food.
Total: 3 food.

Agriculture gives another, raising the total to 4, but can't be used at the same time as Conquest which means that you won't be building units with 4f/4c tiles. Something is funny here...
I also don't understand where FOL and ancient forests come into this.
 
Because I suppose the best example of City-States is Ancient Greece (majory poetry, economy, but slow to react coherently to an outside threat and constant infighting)

Not if Platon was right about that Egypt tale he once heard about... :king:


I think City States are thematically linked to Lanun - quite independend island folks, "together we're strong", great commerce (ok theft), etc. There are arguments in favour and against it's "reduce away from palast cost"-benefit.

But I really think the thing to do is to remove the cost for Aristocratic and replace it with something else. Instead of losing one food, they could have increased maintenance costs, or plain and simple nothing bad: 2Gold for farms plus the Knights and it's fixed in my opinion.
 
Yeah yeah there's always an exception :)

I like the idea of simly no penalty per se for Aristocracy (aside from the upkeep obviously) that would make me use it. I just think there should be another civic outside of the government one with a - to maint city cost or distance. This can have some requirements like doesn't work with city states or something. My reason for asking for this is as stated before I like the huge maps and the costs tend to get out of control if I go a conquesting. (Occasionally I can set it up with a Financial Leader to make enough gold to offset but more often than not city states is just way more effective)
 
At least Theocratie and Mercantilism are useless. I wonder if anyone played with them?

Um...yeah, I use Theocracy (not Theocratie) all the time. And there are certain times when I've found the use of Mercantilism. So, yeah, here's one more player who uses both.

Tho I do hate how Aristocracy reduces the amount of food available. Whenever I use it, which I haven't for while, I lose population.
 
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