Economy Civics: In need of a overhaul?

[Uberness]

Your civic choices in the line are:

Decentralization: No bonus.

125 science tech Agriculture: The earliest and strongest civic in the group, giving +1 health and +2 food to your farms with the only penalty being -1 production, which just means if your unlucky enough to get fresh water plains it's 1 food less then grass.

350 science tech Conquest: New units receive +2 XP Military units produced with food Bonus of 25-75 gold granted when enemy cities are captured, a good civic but feels out of place not being able to run agriculture at the same time hurts it's usefulness

3600 science tech Mercantilism: No foreign trade, +20% gold +1 happy from market -2 from thieve's guild, A decent civic in it's own right but carries quiet a few negatives with it.

400 science tech Foreign Trade: +1 trade route per city -10% gold in all citie +20% culture in all cities, Really not much reason to adopt this civic unless you were going for some kind of cultural victory, the -10% gold in exchange for +1 trade routes really hurts it.

800 science tech and a state religion Guardian of Nature +5 health +1 happy from grove/jungle/forest/ancient forest and -10% military production, A decent civic that ensures you will never have health or happiness problems, but also hurts your military production as a major negative, and has a high upkeep cost which will hurt your gold intake.

In that entire list, there isn't one civic that beats agriculture for being so cheap, early, the best synergy with Aristocracy and with the smallest negative effect which pretty much gives you no reason to even think of adopting any of the other civics the entire game unlike the other lines, and even if you tried to your cities would starve and shrink from the sudden lack of food and health.

Even as Ljosalfar it's often better to use agriculture instead of guardian of nature since your cities won't be able to grow high enough to take advantage of the extra happiness/health without it.

Some Suggestions on what to do:
Agriculture gives +1 unhealth per farm -or- -1 food.
Guardian of nature losses the high upkeep or military production reduction.
Conquest added to a diffient line or create a Military civic branch.
Decentralization: Rename it to something else and have it give +1 food/gold/production to any tile that has a value of 0 of either of those, so a desert would be 1/1/1 a grass would be 2/1/1 a forest grass 2/1/1 plains hills 1/1/2 and so on... isn't a huge boost (like working a forested silk or plains river tile) and would be a good boost for lanun water squares also.

To sum it up and to end such a long post, The Economy civic line could use abit of a overhaul and agriculture needs to be brought down a small bit to bring it in line with the other civics, post some suggestions on how best to fix civics or the economy line or what you think of it.

 

[onedreamer]

Guardian of Nature is definitely better than Agriculture when you're playing an already developed elven empire with FoL. Ancient Forests everywhere ensure that you don't really need that food bonus, while the happiness bonus is really huge.
The other civics are not bad, especially compared to civics in other trees. The problem is that Agriculture is too good for them. Lowering the +2 food to +1 would maybe fix the situation ? I don't think that the health penalty makes much sense honestly.

 

[Grey Fox]

Agriculture might be overpowered, but it makes the game so much more fun to play. It would be sad to see it go.

 

[OctopusOverload]

I have a love/hate relationship to Agriculture. It's the best economic civic out there, granting extreme benefits! (Think river-floodplains-grasslands)

The downside is that its addictive to your civilization. A few turns of agriculture and a civic change would be ragnarök!

I want to see a few really different economy civics, something you look at and say "Wow, that would never have worked in the middle ages..."

 

[Celeborn]

Even as Ljosalfar it's often better to use agriculture instead of guardian of nature since your cities won't be able to grow high enough to take advantage of the extra happiness/health without it.

Really? I don't find it all that hard to get cities with populations running into the high twenties, low thirties with Guardian. That extra food from the ancient forests is brilliant...

Which reminds me... I still want to try capturing a few elven workers as the Kuriates(sp). Hmmm... Sprawling Forest Cities...

 

[QES]

Your civic choices in the line are:

Spoiler :

Decentralization: No bonus.

125 science tech Agriculture: The earliest and strongest civic in the group, giving +1 health and +2 food to your farms with the only penalty being -1 production, which just means if your unlucky enough to get fresh water plains it's 1 food less then grass.

350 science tech Conquest: New units receive +2 XP Military units produced with food Bonus of 25-75 gold granted when enemy cities are captured, a good civic but feels out of place not being able to run agriculture at the same time hurts it's usefulness

3600 science tech Mercantilism: No foreign trade, +20% gold +1 happy from market -2 from thieve's guild, A decent civic in it's own right but carries quiet a few negatives with it.

400 science tech Foreign Trade: +1 trade route per city -10% gold in all citie +20% culture in all cities, Really not much reason to adopt this civic unless you were going for some kind of cultural victory, the -10% gold in exchange for +1 trade routes really hurts it.

800 science tech and a state religion Foreign Trade: +1 trade route per city -10% gold in all citie +20% culture in all cities, Really not much reason to adopt this civic unless you were going for some kind of cultural victory, the -10% gold in exchange for +1 trade routes really hurts it.

Guardian of Nature +5 health +1 happy from grove/jungle/forest/ancient forest and -10% military production, A decent civic that ensures you will never have health or happiness problems, but also hurts your military production as a major negative, and has a high upkeep cost which will hurt your gold intake.

In that entire list, there isn't one civic that beats agriculture for being so cheap, early, the best synergy with Aristocracy and with the smallest negative effect which pretty much gives you no reason to even think of adopting any of the other civics the entire game unlike the other lines, and even if you tried to your cities would starve and shrink from the sudden lack of food and health.

Even as Ljosalfar it's often better to use agriculture instead of guardian of nature since your cities won't be able to grow high enough to take advantage of the extra happiness/health without it.

Some Suggestions on what to do:
Agriculture gives +1 unhealth per farm -or- -1 food.
Guardian of nature losses the high upkeep or military production reduction.
Conquest added to a diffient line or create a Military civic branch.
Decentralization: Rename it to something else and have it give +1 food/gold/production to any tile that has a value of 0 of either of those, so a desert would be 1/1/1 a grass would be 2/1/1 a forest grass 2/1/1 plains hills 1/1/2 and so on... isn't a huge boost (like working a forested silk or plains river tile) and would be a good boost for lanun water squares also.

To sum it up and to end such a long post, The Economy civic line could use abit of a overhaul and agriculture needs to be brought down a small bit to bring it in line with the other civics, post some suggestions on how best to fix civics or the economy line or what you think of it.

Off hand I have to say that back in the day I did use both Mercantilism, Foreign Trade, and Guardian of Nature - each depending on my goals. Agriculture quickly became an obvious choice if one didnt have specific goals however.

In this, It occurs to me that each sounds excellent in idea and in practice, and only slight modifications may need to be made - I give the following as an understanding of the principles of the economic model and an assertion to each's pros and cons.

Spoiler :

Decentralization - a lack of a need of any sort of maintenance. Individualistic, ruggid and intrepid explorers and swindlers out to break new grounds and make wealth.

I think that the 0 maintenance is apt. I think it would also be apt to add a -10% buildings production and +2 exp for scout-line units. (After all much of the money made during this phase is about goodie huts - no?)

Agriculture - Moving to a model of production from the land instead of wealth from the wild ensures stability and growth.

+1 Health and +2 food per farm. - 1 production per farm and -2 exp for Military units. (Citizen/farmer soldiers have less time to train)

Conquest: Enjoying the spoils of war, and subjugating other nations to one's will.

New units receive +2 XP, Military units produced with food Bonus, gold granted when enemy cities are captured.

If possible, it would be good to double the length of 'rebellion' or 'unrest' (or whatever the post-conquering city-anger is called) in conquered cities. In return, during each turn a civ would recieve a bonus in gold equal to the total population of all cities with the post-conquer city unrest. (Thus, if two cities were conquered, one a population of 4, and another 9 - the civ would get 13 gold per turn until one of them was pacified. If the 4pop city was pacified, then the civ would be getting 9 gold per turn until the pop9 city was pacified.)

This does a few things. First, if a cities population dwindles (from starvation) the amount of money drops and drops. Secondly, it prolongs the amount of time before the city becomes "productive" for the conquering civ - representing more of an "occupation" than conversion. Finally - it provides an economic boost, allowing the continuence of the conquest without new production sources. All of this simply represents the plundering of the city by the occupying forces - making it take longer to pacify and being an economic boon for the victor - but who cares about them losers anyway?

Mercantilism: The rule of merchants over all things economic. The merchant princes ruling through trade limitations and unscrupulously harsh guild laws, however, their methods produce a large profit for both them and the tax base.

No foreign trade, +20% gold +1 happy from market -2 from thieve's guild. -10% military production (the guilds are loathe to pay taxes for warriors when that money could be used to make more money). Unlimited Merchants (the guild is always adding to its number)

Foreign Trade: A thriving merchant class and growth of exploration overseas. Trade unions and guilds organize to explore the world and bring exotic goods back to their homelands to sell at high profits. War with tradeable nations threatens profits, and the state's military is a threat to individual wealth.

+2 trade routes per city +20% culture in all cities other civs get -happy for not having foriegn trade, +3 unhappiness for each other foriegn trade civilization one is at war with. +1 Unhappiness for each military unit in a city. +1 Happiness if at war with a mercantile civ. (Foriegn-trade civilizations, when at war, are loathe to war on each other. Nor do they like the presence of the military in civilian areas - they belong elsewhere - conquering "less civilized" peoples or opening up stubborn mercantile nations.)

Guardian of Nature: Lords of the Leaf, protectors of nature, a blance is achieved with nature so that any changes are made slowly - but adaptation is always made. Give and take, the bounty of nature is endless with the right care.

+5 health +1 happy from grove/jungle/forest/ancient forest. and -10% gold (the bounty of the forest is not provided always in coin). -10% building production and -50% worker rate (the corruption of nature's lands is to be avoided.) +1 beaker per sage (nature speaks to those whom listen), and +20% great people growth. (wise and honored people are cultivated)

Just my thoughts,
-Qes

 

[loki1232]

What if agriculture gave -20% shields instead?

 

[Polycrates]

Almost every time I've felt that there was an issue of game balance in this mod, it's been something that can be traced back to the agriculture civic. I know it's part of an attempt to alter some of the dynamics from vanilla, it's just that the +2 food is so massive that it throws a bunch of other things out of whack as well.

I'm sure people will disagree on these (and I'm sure some people will think most of them are good things) but here's most of what I see as the problematic effects of agriculture (EDIT: I know I've probably worded these way too strongly ):

Vertical expansion of cities to happiness limits is almost immediate, so horizontal expansion by creating more cities becomes the only way to grow.
It further pushes rapid expansion forward as the only viable option because it makes settlers so cheap, and halted growth means nothing.
It makes workers cheap enough that it's easy to work enough squares to cope with the exploding populations.
New cities can grow to size almost instantly, rendering city maintenance penalties insignificant as a mechanism to slow growth, allowing cities to get up to speed very quickly, and further rewarding REXing.
Seafood and meat resources are almost completely irrelevant since they're pretty much equalled by farmed grassland. Even grain resources become fairly minor.
Health is almost completely insignificant.
Compassion civics (aside from sacrifice the weak) are almost meaningless in their differences.
Granaries and smokehouses become mostly pointless since cities grow so fast anyway and health barely matters.
Expansionist trait is thus very weak.
Happiness cap becomes almost the only relevant factor on city size.
Many more specialists can be run, overpowering the philosophical trait.
Water tiles are completely unattractive because their food output is so dwarfed by farms - and so coastal cities are distinctly disadvantageous.
The Lanun are crippled because even their improved coastal tiles can't hold a candle to farmed inland tiles.
The lost population from slavery or sacrifice the weak can be grown back so quickly that there is very little incentive to ever whip cheaper items, and buildings designed to be restrictively expensive can be whipped in quite painlessly.

My biggest gripe is really the effect on the very early-game, where it becomes a race to REX out to as many city sites as you can get before the world is completely covered in cities.
I would strongly favour reducing the agriculture civic to +1 food, -1 hammers, raising it to medium upkeep, and maybe moving it slightly later in the tech tree. That way, it's still a very viable alternative (I'd still run it pretty much by default), but not overwhelmingly the only choice. This would overpower the elves even more by comparison, but I'm sure something could be done.

 

[Jean Elcard]

What if agriculture gave -20% shields instead?

"Shields"? Almost two years of Civilization 4 and you are still talking about "shields", o´h man ...

But seriously, 20% less shield would let me think twice to adopt it. At the moment it's more like an autochoice for me. For the rest of the game of course. Like someone mentioned before, it's hardly possible to discard it later without reworking a lot of your improvements.

 

[Hawe Hawe]

Another big advantage of agriculture is that chain irrigation is available much earlier in FFH (Construction) than vanilla (Civil Service). So your farm-cities don't even need fresh water access.
One step further down the tech tree sanitation adds already the next food to your farms, this levels out the loss from aristocracy(?) and you gain simply 2 commerce for free.
So in my opinion the combo of agriculture and aristocracy is unbeatable strong.
On the other hand i like that feature, because its an alternative to the other common strategy cottage spam.

 

[c.fe]

I would really like if agriculture had a big negative modifier to GPP so that you can use it to let your civ grow really fast but you don't get the added benefit of exceptionally many great people.

 

[onedreamer]

What if agriculture gave -20% shields instead?

This would change by far the civic because currently both its bonus and its malus are tied to cities, while this change would tie it to the whole civ. I would really prefer if it stays tied to cities, it's also more realistic (to better express what I mean, a city that is built on hills with access to the sea and sea food resources, would not gain any food bonus but would get the production penalty, which is both unfair and unrealistic IMHO).

 

[AndrewDJ]

Even as Ljosalfar it's often better to use agriculture instead of guardian of nature since your cities won't be able to grow high enough to take advantage of the extra happiness/health without it.

I gotta call bull on this--I just finished a game as Thessa with about four cities over 30, another seven or so at 20+, and only two with a pop less than 10. I never had any problem with switching from Agriculture to Guardian of Nature as the Ljosalfar. Guardian of Nature with fully developed Ancient Forests rocks. In fact, if I hadn't won a Tower of Mastery victory, my capital would have probably broken 40 pop before time expired. (Of course, I did have eight farmed flood plains in my capital's fat cross, with two mines and the rest ancient forest)

But you have a very good point about all the other civilizations.

 

[Nikis-Knight]

I think, and suspected when I first saw the change, agriculture is overpowered. It would still be an exremely attractive civic, especially for the time and upkeep, if it were changed as follows:

No health bonus
Farms +1 food, -1 hammers.

This would still allow cities in otherwise unattractive locations to grow before sanitation, but would probably reduce many of the problems (or, perhaps, "unintended features") poly crates points out.

around version 16, this civic was changed from +1 health, to +1 health, +2 food from farms, -1 hammer. I think the in-between point would be better.

 

[Kolath]

I think it is very true that the civics need some reworking as agriculture is OP. I like QES's suggestion of revamping agriculture with the military penalty. Makes sense flavor-wise and adds a greater strategic choice between population growth and military production.

I recommend checking out the "Nomadism" civic from Mania's mod this civic had the following:

Nomadism

This new economic civic requires some more explanation. The effects: Requires Animal Husbandry. Low upkeep. -10% food production. Pasture provides +1 hammer. Can draft three nomadic units per turn, two pop per unit. Can build nomadic chariot, nomadic horseman, nomadic horse archer.
Of course having moving cities would be most fitting for a Nomadism civic, but barring that, I figured being able to draft nomadic units was the closest equivalent. Then you can still evacuate some forces if a “city” is threatened. So what do these three nomadic units do? They somewhat resemble their “sedentary” counterparts, except:
1) They don’t have a buildings prerequisite. No need to build stables or an archery range.
2) They can found cities.
3) They can build pastures.
4) The Nomadic Horse Archer has strength 6.
5) The Nomadic Horseman costs 120 hammers and have strength 4.
6) The Nomadic Chariot costs 120 hammers and has strength 4 and one first strike.
The Hippus variants have one more movement point, and +10% withdrawal chance, as usual.

See this thread: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showpost.php?p=4735331&postcount=3

 

[Uberness]

Spoiler :

Almost every time I've felt that there was an issue of game balance in this mod, it's been something that can be traced back to the agriculture civic. I know it's part of an attempt to alter some of the dynamics from vanilla, it's just that the +2 food is so massive that it throws a bunch of other things out of whack as well.

I'm sure people will disagree on these (and I'm sure some people will think most of them are good things) but here's most of what I see as the problematic effects of agriculture (EDIT: I know I've probably worded these way too strongly ):

Vertical expansion of cities to happiness limits is almost immediate, so horizontal expansion by creating more cities becomes the only way to grow.
It further pushes rapid expansion forward as the only viable option because it makes settlers so cheap, and halted growth means nothing.
It makes workers cheap enough that it's easy to work enough squares to cope with the exploding populations.
New cities can grow to size almost instantly, rendering city maintenance penalties insignificant as a mechanism to slow growth, allowing cities to get up to speed very quickly, and further rewarding REXing.
Seafood and meat resources are almost completely irrelevant since they're pretty much equalled by farmed grassland. Even grain resources become fairly minor.
Health is almost completely insignificant.
Compassion civics (aside from sacrifice the weak) are almost meaningless in their differences.
Granaries and smokehouses become mostly pointless since cities grow so fast anyway and health barely matters.
Expansionist trait is thus very weak.
Happiness cap becomes almost the only relevant factor on city size.
Many more specialists can be run, overpowering the philosophical trait.
Water tiles are completely unattractive because their food output is so dwarfed by farms - and so coastal cities are distinctly disadvantageous.
The Lanun are crippled because even their improved coastal tiles can't hold a candle to farmed inland tiles.
The lost population from slavery or sacrifice the weak can be grown back so quickly that there is very little incentive to ever whip cheaper items, and buildings designed to be restrictively expensive can be whipped in quite painlessly.

My biggest gripe is really the effect on the very early-game, where it becomes a race to REX out to as many city sites as you can get before the world is completely covered in cities.
I would strongly favour reducing the agriculture civic to +1 food, -1 hammers, raising it to medium upkeep, and maybe moving it slightly later in the tech tree. That way, it's still a very viable alternative (I'd still run it pretty much by default), but not overwhelmingly the only choice. This would overpower the elves even more by comparison, but I'm sure something could be done.

Spoiler :

I have a love/hate relationship to Agriculture. It's the best economic civic out there, granting extreme benefits! (Think river-floodplains-grasslands)

The downside is that its addictive to your civilization. A few turns of agriculture and a civic change would be ragnarök!

I want to see a few really different economy civics, something you look at and say "Wow, that would never have worked in the middle ages..."

Everything you two said I agree completly with, it's a very love/hate civic.

Nikis-Knight I like your suggestion, I would like to see the -1 production removed and have it only effect elven farms tho.

 

[TheJopa]

I don't see why bonus couldnt be tuned down to 1 food. It would still be dood and not overpowered. Second, other economy civics should be more powerful. Third, (least important but...) I dont see how one could triple farm output just by reorganising economy. Farms just cant produce so much food with same tech level but different...economy model.

 

[uberfish]

well IMO agriculture would be balanced as

+1 food per farm, no hammer modifier, and some midgame type drawback like +20% city maintenance

I suggest a drawback that kicks in later in the game as part of the progress of civilization is the move away from an agrarian economy.

Foreign trade -10% gold makes no sense at all and should be dropped, in the real world foreign trade MAKES money not loses it, and in the game the civic is really not much of an improvement from decentralization if at all because of it.

 

[xAlephx]

My first thought was that elves will gain a little more power if Agriculture is reduced, as Ancient Forest + Elven Farm would have the same food production as Agriculture + Farm but with (potentially) 2 more production (as well as it's phenomenal health and happiness benefits).

My second thought is that, besides elves/guardian, there are an incredible number of changes that weakening Agriculture will create. Whipping population, for example - should each point of population be worth slightly more if there is less food available for them? Or is whipping population + Agriculture overpowered right now and needs to be drawn back in line? I'd say OO might need the lift, but Sacrifice the Weak's 1/2 food requirement will gain in strength under these changes. Specialist economies will suffer greatly, as it will be much harder for a farm to support multiple specialists - should these economies suffer? I don't know. But given that almost everyone currently plays with agriculture on, it's a keystone of the game, and the effects of changing it should be carefully considered.

 

[Gamestation]

My first thought was that elves will gain a little more power if Agriculture is reduced, as Ancient Forest + Elven Farm would have the same food production as Agriculture + Farm but with (potentially) 2 more production (as well as it's phenomenal health and happiness benefits).

My second thought is that, besides elves/guardian, there are an incredible number of changes that weakening Agriculture will create. Whipping population, for example - should each point of population be worth slightly more if there is less food available for them? Or is whipping population + Agriculture overpowered right now and needs to be drawn back in line? I'd say OO might need the lift, but Sacrifice the Weak's 1/2 food requirement will gain in strength under these changes. Specialist economies will suffer greatly, as it will be much harder for a farm to support multiple specialists - should these economies suffer? I don't know. But given that almost everyone currently plays with agriculture on, it's a keystone of the game, and the effects of changing it should be carefully considered.

Reading some threads on how powerful philosophical trait is in FFH leads me to believe that YES specialist economies need to be turned down. Still, they wouldn't suffer that greatly if agriculture still gave +1 per farm. Not sure if OO needs a boost if this change was put in, slavery does still get you slaves afterall.