So in order to get the discussion started on VEM for GK, I went ahead and did 3 full playthroughs to see where what I liked and disliked with the new system. I have detailed my thoughts below.
My 3 playtests were:
1) Continents, King, as Byzantium. Won by science easily.
2) Earth, Emperor, as Celts. Lost science victory by literally 1 turn.
3) Earth, Emperor, as Ethiopia. Won by culture so easy it wasn't funny.
Difficulty: While the AI has gotten a bit better in warfare overall (see below), it still appears that the base game is easier than VEM. I am normally a King player on VEM, where as now I am actually winning Emperor games in base.
AI: The AI has made some improvements in the new game, its not earth-shattering but there are some special notes:
1) City State Management: The AI is a lot smarter when dealing with CSs. They use the quests, use their spies to leverage advantage, and spend a lot more money on alliances. In my second game, the Iroquois and Siam both went full patronage and were fighting over CS the whole. Let me tell you, keeping CS when you have a -3.25 influence per turn is a bit tricky!
2) Navy Building: The AI now knows to build a navy, whether they know how to fight with it remains to be seen. I will say they are good about keeping their navies in formation. I was absolutely shocked in my 2nd game when I sent a large army across the sea to stop an enemy science victory and they were torn apart by a strong enemy navy. I'm so used to not needing an escort navy I was in for a rude awakening.
Other than that, I've noticed the AI makes less obvious blunders. I still see the occasional unit just thrown into my army...but it seemed less obnoxiously stupid. Past that, the AI is still fundamentally the same AI. A few improvements, but still a long way to go.
Gold: A lot of people have been complaining about early economy issues, but I didn't see it in the games I played. A few luxuries sold and I never had money issues. In fact, in game 1 I had the kind of gold numbers I'm used to seeing in VEM (and I generally have way more money in VEM than I have in base).
I used TPs in game 1 after a while, mainly because I had a lot of jungle. In games 2 and 3, I never built a single one.
Science: I think generally research is once again too fast, especially from a military standpoint. Maybe its the new units, but it always felt like the second I built a unit the new version was researched. The research pacts felt alright, I like the way diplomacy builds up now. While they helped, I generally just felt research was too quick.
Production: Some have mentioned that early production is quicker for buildings. I do feel that is somewhat true, I generally felt I have able to build the buildings I wanted to. Overall, the production pace felt decent for buildings, units I think still take too long to build at times.
Culture: In my non-culture games, I generally felt the culture pace was pretty good. I got a decent number of policies, enough to do the main things I wanted, without having to commit to it to much. However, in my culture game, culture was too easy.
The problem I think is the freedom finisher combined with faith and great artists. Landmarks provide 12 culture at the end and you get a lot more great people in GK it seems to me. My capital was simply belting out culture, and I finished the culture victory just as I got radio.
Strategic Resources: In every one of my games, strategic resources were a feast or famine scenario. Normally I had so much of a resource it was laughable (35 aluminum in 1 game), otherwise there was none of it on the continent! In game 2, all of the coal on the planet was located in two areas, one controlled by a city state. A lot of bartering was going on with that city state!
I was so desperate for coal (I couldn't build a factory, or a nuclear plant without the factory, OR a spaceship factory!) at the end of game 2, I went to war with 2 civs just to try and get units through the borders to take an area with coal.
I know Thal has spent a lot of time re balancing strategic resources to make the spread fair, but I wonder if ultimately that's the wrong way to go. While I would like to see less resource glut, there is something to be said for having to change strategy to account for resource shortages. It really makes bargaining and warfare more strategic when resources are limited, and keeps the game variable.
Great People: I really like the approach that they took with Great People in the new version as far as giving them all unique abilities.. The first thing I noticed was that I seem to get more Great People now. I recognize with faith that you can buy more but just my base rate I was accuring them faster. As far as each great person
.
Scientist: The bulb seems to be toned down a bit. I don't know the exact numbers, but I used them for academies early and then bulbed late, as opposed to always bulbing.
Artist: The artist creating the golden ages I think is very well done. I never feel cheated by getting an artist now, and the fact that the golden age length is constant can make them very strong.
Engineer: Still solid.
Prophet: I found the conversion very good early game but late game there is so much religious pressure, you have to use prophets with a lot of missionaries and inquisitors if you want to break in anywhere, else your efforts are simply wasted.
The holy site to me is garbage unless I have the piety finisher. I am spending thousands of faith to get 6 more per turn, no thank you.
Merchant: Overall I think they are too weak. I can get 4 gold when I can get 8 science with an academy, and the trade mission still isn't that great.
General: I like the new citadel mechanic, makes them much more useful now. the only issue I found was not having anything to do with them late game. Since I can't use them for GAs now, they often just sit around. It would be interesting to give them a healing mechanic similar to the admiral.
Admiral: I believe this one has a bug. An admiral is not restricted to coast tiles only. Mine was merrily sailing around the world long before astronomy. If that is not a bug it is a hell of a feature, being able to trade with everyone long before they meet each other is huge!
Units/Warfare: While I didn't get involved in a lot of war, here were my general thoughts.
Cities and Siege: I like that cities are more powerful now overall. What makes it so tricky is both the absolute need for siege to take a city, and how quickly a city can now take out a unit. I would send 3 catapults to a city and have to start dancing them as they would be nearly killed in a single hit. To me, this also made terrain a much bigger deal. In base and VEM, I've never much cared if the city was on grassland or surrounded by hills, but it's so important now. Having to slog an extra turn through forest and hills can mean life and death now that cities can assassinate units so quickly.
I also generally like how siege works now, they are a truly dedicated city killer. Even in VEM, by the time I got cannons I would simply use them to blow up units, rarely needing ranged support. But in GK, even 5 artillery pieces would only slowly take down an advancing army, meaning ranged units were still important.
Swords and Pikes: After 3 games, I really don't like how swords are weaker than pikes. The problem is by the time I get iron working, and then actually mine the iron, and then build the unit, the others have moved on to civil service (and the AI loves to beeline to CS).
Both because I don't feel swords are that useful now, and also because it seems to eliminate unit diversity. Pikes are very strong against composite bowmen, horseman and knights, so pikeman are the predominate unit built. Heck, a pike can stand toe to toe with a Lancer for the most part!
Navy: The melee naval idea is interesting, but so far I find ranged navy so much stronger. I can hit units, I can hit cities, I can hit your navy with 3 ranged attacks before you even get to fire. Melee is an interesting concept, but so far I've only found them useful as the last attack on a city to take it.
Cruise Missiles: Is it just me, or are these units more expensive overall then they used to be? It just doesn't seem like I get the bang for the buck compared to other units.
Knights: Maybe it's the pikemen, but Knights feel weak to me right now. On the other hand, they do now have 4 movement, and it's very easy to forget the power of mobility, so I may be too hasty.
Gatling Gun: Same tech as the riflemen, but stronger and ranged. Overall, I don't see much need to build rifleman.
Espionage: Civ 5's spying system has done what no civ game's has done for me, made me want to use it. To me, the system is beautiful simplistic, and gets to exactly what I want to use spies for.
The first thing is that I don't have to spend anything to use it. I don't have to dedicate 20% of my commerce to it like in Civ 4 to get anything. I don't have to buy spies. I simply do it.
I love that my options are straight and to point, get techs, get city state influence, get intelligence on my enemies. I like that I can drop my spies in a city and never think about them again, or I can move them around to every city on the planet and get full intel on what other civs are doing.
The only thing I will say is sometimes the intel is a bit spotty. One time I was told England was building a fleet to attack me. I scout the whole area, never saw a single ship. But another time I was told of an impending attack and find the army coming to my doorstep.
If Thal was to anything to this, the only thing I could see is maybe an extra spy. I really think this is a gem and doesn't need much tweaking.
Faith: Faith is a mixed bag for me right now. On the one hand I love the early game variety. It lets you work with your terrain (minimizing bad starts) and do a lot of other things. On the other, a lot of the time I feel like I'm going faith simply for faith's sake.
In game 3 I went evangelical, using World Church to get more culture. Well...even after an aggressive faith push to my neighbors, the culture I gained was a small pittance compared to my culture generating capital. Faith can get me a diplomacy bonus.....but only after a diplomatic incident for spreading my faith to my neighbors. The only real use I saw for spreading faith was to city states, because I believe your influence drops less if you share the same faith.
A lot of faith options gives you more faith, which you can then spend to get more faith....but there is no real point to it. Mainly by midgame I would just buy great people with faith and call it a day.
Terraforming: [\B] One of my favorite parts of the game.
Trading Posts: Still a dumb name. I still think +1 gold TP are worthless, I never build them, but 2 gold TPs are pretty good. And you can really make them strong now with rationalism and commerce. I had jungle tiles providing me 3 research and 3 gold! I still think they should start at 2 (even the bonus on fresh water TPs in VEM didn't do it for me, I would still generally want +2 food farms), but I don't think they should get better except through the commerce finisher.
Mines: While I miss +2 hammer mines, +2 is a really strong bonus early game for production so I will still sometimes build mines even at +1.
Forts: I miss VEM forts, the ones I would actually build.
Walls/Castles/etc: Even without Thal's bonuses, the new defensive structures are worth it. They bring a massive improvement to a cities defense now, and are often worth a rush buy. Thal I would seriously consider removing your defense structure bonuses, they may not need them anymore.
Policies:
Tradition: Feels like a solid tree.
Legalism: I don't mind the bonus, except it comes too early. It needs to be on the bottom of the tree. Normally when I'm ready to pick it, I'm still on my first city!
Monarchy: Great bonus. I would switch it with Legalism.
Oligarchy: Its okay. I never want to pick this, I normally do it for the finisher.
Finisher: Solid, I really like the aqueduct bonus. I often don't even have engineering by the time I get the finisher so it's a great growth bonus.
Liberty: Generally does what its supposed to.
Opener: One of the weaker ones but not too bad.
Republic: I nice bonus that scales with time.
Collective Rule: Good that's on the second row, to make people work for it.
Honor: Good war tree
Opener: Strong opener, and barbs now give more culture due to the strength increase!
Warrior Code: Nice bonus
Piety: I would say its one of the weaker trees now.
Opener: Faster building is good, but kind of meh.
Mandate of Heaven/Religious tolerance: I hate policies where I spend culture simply to get more culture later. It's purely for cultural wins, its lame, and boring.
Reformation: At least in this case a 33% bonus is exciting, and I get a golden age out of it.
Finisher: The finisher is pretty weak. The culture can be nice but I would rather just belt out great artists instead.
Patronage: This tree hasn't changed much, but because city states are more dynamic and interesting I think it has use. I will say, if you don't use the finisher, the AI will!
Commerce: A really nice tree
Naval Tradition: With the addition of the admiral I really like this one now, especially because with an admiral I can explore the world before astronomy.
Trade Unions: I would rather it gets the science bonus, and mercantilism gets the harbor bonus. Overall I think mercantilism is much stronger, so I would like to spread the bonuses out a bit.
Protectionism: At +2 happy it feels too strong.
Finisher: Really makes TPs useful
Rationalism: A blend of really strong and decent policies.
Opener: I think 15% science straight up is too good for the opener, it's one of the better bonuses and needs to be buried a bit. I would swap it and secularisms bonus.
Soverienty: This is really weak bonus imo.
Freedom: A mixed bag of good and terrible, but absolutely mandatory for culture win.
Constitution: A terrible boring bonus for the culture victory.
Free Speech: Another boring bonus
Universal Suffrage: Only ever get it for the finisher.
Finisher: Its broken for culture right now since you have so many landmarks. I'm curious to see if a academy heavy order with freedom could beat out an early rationalism push.
Autocracy: I'm not a warmonger so hard for me to say much here.
Fascism: Strategic resources just never seem that problematic for me to need twice as much of them.
Order: My favorite late game tree
Planned Economy: Love how it feels me get those factories up, and then gives me a great science bonus for the work.
Communism: Terrific bonus.
City States
Overall I think GK did a wonderful job with city states. Diplomacy with them is more dynamic, alliances and friendships shift and are more fluid, and the multiple quests are great.
I love getting a request from a city state for a good, befriending another city state for that good, and watching this domino effect of friendships as I complete requests because of chaining friendships.
The only thing I would love to see is a little more loyalty for long term alliances. It would be nice if my influence dropped slower with CS if I've been their friend/ally a long time.
The only negative I have is the wow me with science/faith arenas, mainly because that seems pretty fixed in the late game. If I'm not going a culture win, I'm not going to be able to belt out the culture of a civ that is, same with science or faith.
Final Words
There's plenty more I could talk about, but this is already so much. I think my take away message is that a lot has been improved, and as Thal adapts VEM I think its important to maintain a minimalist mindset. GK fixed several areas and frankly I think used VEM as an inspiration in many areas. I think we should respect the baseline and only adjust changes that truely need adjusting.
My 3 playtests were:
1) Continents, King, as Byzantium. Won by science easily.
2) Earth, Emperor, as Celts. Lost science victory by literally 1 turn.
3) Earth, Emperor, as Ethiopia. Won by culture so easy it wasn't funny.
Difficulty: While the AI has gotten a bit better in warfare overall (see below), it still appears that the base game is easier than VEM. I am normally a King player on VEM, where as now I am actually winning Emperor games in base.
AI: The AI has made some improvements in the new game, its not earth-shattering but there are some special notes:
1) City State Management: The AI is a lot smarter when dealing with CSs. They use the quests, use their spies to leverage advantage, and spend a lot more money on alliances. In my second game, the Iroquois and Siam both went full patronage and were fighting over CS the whole. Let me tell you, keeping CS when you have a -3.25 influence per turn is a bit tricky!
2) Navy Building: The AI now knows to build a navy, whether they know how to fight with it remains to be seen. I will say they are good about keeping their navies in formation. I was absolutely shocked in my 2nd game when I sent a large army across the sea to stop an enemy science victory and they were torn apart by a strong enemy navy. I'm so used to not needing an escort navy I was in for a rude awakening.
Other than that, I've noticed the AI makes less obvious blunders. I still see the occasional unit just thrown into my army...but it seemed less obnoxiously stupid. Past that, the AI is still fundamentally the same AI. A few improvements, but still a long way to go.
Gold: A lot of people have been complaining about early economy issues, but I didn't see it in the games I played. A few luxuries sold and I never had money issues. In fact, in game 1 I had the kind of gold numbers I'm used to seeing in VEM (and I generally have way more money in VEM than I have in base).
I used TPs in game 1 after a while, mainly because I had a lot of jungle. In games 2 and 3, I never built a single one.
Science: I think generally research is once again too fast, especially from a military standpoint. Maybe its the new units, but it always felt like the second I built a unit the new version was researched. The research pacts felt alright, I like the way diplomacy builds up now. While they helped, I generally just felt research was too quick.
Production: Some have mentioned that early production is quicker for buildings. I do feel that is somewhat true, I generally felt I have able to build the buildings I wanted to. Overall, the production pace felt decent for buildings, units I think still take too long to build at times.
Culture: In my non-culture games, I generally felt the culture pace was pretty good. I got a decent number of policies, enough to do the main things I wanted, without having to commit to it to much. However, in my culture game, culture was too easy.
The problem I think is the freedom finisher combined with faith and great artists. Landmarks provide 12 culture at the end and you get a lot more great people in GK it seems to me. My capital was simply belting out culture, and I finished the culture victory just as I got radio.
Strategic Resources: In every one of my games, strategic resources were a feast or famine scenario. Normally I had so much of a resource it was laughable (35 aluminum in 1 game), otherwise there was none of it on the continent! In game 2, all of the coal on the planet was located in two areas, one controlled by a city state. A lot of bartering was going on with that city state!
I was so desperate for coal (I couldn't build a factory, or a nuclear plant without the factory, OR a spaceship factory!) at the end of game 2, I went to war with 2 civs just to try and get units through the borders to take an area with coal.
I know Thal has spent a lot of time re balancing strategic resources to make the spread fair, but I wonder if ultimately that's the wrong way to go. While I would like to see less resource glut, there is something to be said for having to change strategy to account for resource shortages. It really makes bargaining and warfare more strategic when resources are limited, and keeps the game variable.
Great People: I really like the approach that they took with Great People in the new version as far as giving them all unique abilities.. The first thing I noticed was that I seem to get more Great People now. I recognize with faith that you can buy more but just my base rate I was accuring them faster. As far as each great person
.
Scientist: The bulb seems to be toned down a bit. I don't know the exact numbers, but I used them for academies early and then bulbed late, as opposed to always bulbing.
Artist: The artist creating the golden ages I think is very well done. I never feel cheated by getting an artist now, and the fact that the golden age length is constant can make them very strong.
Engineer: Still solid.
Prophet: I found the conversion very good early game but late game there is so much religious pressure, you have to use prophets with a lot of missionaries and inquisitors if you want to break in anywhere, else your efforts are simply wasted.
The holy site to me is garbage unless I have the piety finisher. I am spending thousands of faith to get 6 more per turn, no thank you.
Merchant: Overall I think they are too weak. I can get 4 gold when I can get 8 science with an academy, and the trade mission still isn't that great.
General: I like the new citadel mechanic, makes them much more useful now. the only issue I found was not having anything to do with them late game. Since I can't use them for GAs now, they often just sit around. It would be interesting to give them a healing mechanic similar to the admiral.
Admiral: I believe this one has a bug. An admiral is not restricted to coast tiles only. Mine was merrily sailing around the world long before astronomy. If that is not a bug it is a hell of a feature, being able to trade with everyone long before they meet each other is huge!
Units/Warfare: While I didn't get involved in a lot of war, here were my general thoughts.
Cities and Siege: I like that cities are more powerful now overall. What makes it so tricky is both the absolute need for siege to take a city, and how quickly a city can now take out a unit. I would send 3 catapults to a city and have to start dancing them as they would be nearly killed in a single hit. To me, this also made terrain a much bigger deal. In base and VEM, I've never much cared if the city was on grassland or surrounded by hills, but it's so important now. Having to slog an extra turn through forest and hills can mean life and death now that cities can assassinate units so quickly.
I also generally like how siege works now, they are a truly dedicated city killer. Even in VEM, by the time I got cannons I would simply use them to blow up units, rarely needing ranged support. But in GK, even 5 artillery pieces would only slowly take down an advancing army, meaning ranged units were still important.
Swords and Pikes: After 3 games, I really don't like how swords are weaker than pikes. The problem is by the time I get iron working, and then actually mine the iron, and then build the unit, the others have moved on to civil service (and the AI loves to beeline to CS).
Both because I don't feel swords are that useful now, and also because it seems to eliminate unit diversity. Pikes are very strong against composite bowmen, horseman and knights, so pikeman are the predominate unit built. Heck, a pike can stand toe to toe with a Lancer for the most part!
Navy: The melee naval idea is interesting, but so far I find ranged navy so much stronger. I can hit units, I can hit cities, I can hit your navy with 3 ranged attacks before you even get to fire. Melee is an interesting concept, but so far I've only found them useful as the last attack on a city to take it.
Cruise Missiles: Is it just me, or are these units more expensive overall then they used to be? It just doesn't seem like I get the bang for the buck compared to other units.
Knights: Maybe it's the pikemen, but Knights feel weak to me right now. On the other hand, they do now have 4 movement, and it's very easy to forget the power of mobility, so I may be too hasty.
Gatling Gun: Same tech as the riflemen, but stronger and ranged. Overall, I don't see much need to build rifleman.
Espionage: Civ 5's spying system has done what no civ game's has done for me, made me want to use it. To me, the system is beautiful simplistic, and gets to exactly what I want to use spies for.
The first thing is that I don't have to spend anything to use it. I don't have to dedicate 20% of my commerce to it like in Civ 4 to get anything. I don't have to buy spies. I simply do it.
I love that my options are straight and to point, get techs, get city state influence, get intelligence on my enemies. I like that I can drop my spies in a city and never think about them again, or I can move them around to every city on the planet and get full intel on what other civs are doing.
The only thing I will say is sometimes the intel is a bit spotty. One time I was told England was building a fleet to attack me. I scout the whole area, never saw a single ship. But another time I was told of an impending attack and find the army coming to my doorstep.
If Thal was to anything to this, the only thing I could see is maybe an extra spy. I really think this is a gem and doesn't need much tweaking.
Faith: Faith is a mixed bag for me right now. On the one hand I love the early game variety. It lets you work with your terrain (minimizing bad starts) and do a lot of other things. On the other, a lot of the time I feel like I'm going faith simply for faith's sake.
In game 3 I went evangelical, using World Church to get more culture. Well...even after an aggressive faith push to my neighbors, the culture I gained was a small pittance compared to my culture generating capital. Faith can get me a diplomacy bonus.....but only after a diplomatic incident for spreading my faith to my neighbors. The only real use I saw for spreading faith was to city states, because I believe your influence drops less if you share the same faith.
A lot of faith options gives you more faith, which you can then spend to get more faith....but there is no real point to it. Mainly by midgame I would just buy great people with faith and call it a day.
Terraforming: [\B] One of my favorite parts of the game.
Trading Posts: Still a dumb name. I still think +1 gold TP are worthless, I never build them, but 2 gold TPs are pretty good. And you can really make them strong now with rationalism and commerce. I had jungle tiles providing me 3 research and 3 gold! I still think they should start at 2 (even the bonus on fresh water TPs in VEM didn't do it for me, I would still generally want +2 food farms), but I don't think they should get better except through the commerce finisher.
Mines: While I miss +2 hammer mines, +2 is a really strong bonus early game for production so I will still sometimes build mines even at +1.
Forts: I miss VEM forts, the ones I would actually build.
Walls/Castles/etc: Even without Thal's bonuses, the new defensive structures are worth it. They bring a massive improvement to a cities defense now, and are often worth a rush buy. Thal I would seriously consider removing your defense structure bonuses, they may not need them anymore.
Policies:
Tradition: Feels like a solid tree.
Legalism: I don't mind the bonus, except it comes too early. It needs to be on the bottom of the tree. Normally when I'm ready to pick it, I'm still on my first city!
Monarchy: Great bonus. I would switch it with Legalism.
Oligarchy: Its okay. I never want to pick this, I normally do it for the finisher.
Finisher: Solid, I really like the aqueduct bonus. I often don't even have engineering by the time I get the finisher so it's a great growth bonus.
Liberty: Generally does what its supposed to.
Opener: One of the weaker ones but not too bad.
Republic: I nice bonus that scales with time.
Collective Rule: Good that's on the second row, to make people work for it.
Honor: Good war tree
Opener: Strong opener, and barbs now give more culture due to the strength increase!
Warrior Code: Nice bonus
Piety: I would say its one of the weaker trees now.
Opener: Faster building is good, but kind of meh.
Mandate of Heaven/Religious tolerance: I hate policies where I spend culture simply to get more culture later. It's purely for cultural wins, its lame, and boring.
Reformation: At least in this case a 33% bonus is exciting, and I get a golden age out of it.
Finisher: The finisher is pretty weak. The culture can be nice but I would rather just belt out great artists instead.
Patronage: This tree hasn't changed much, but because city states are more dynamic and interesting I think it has use. I will say, if you don't use the finisher, the AI will!
Commerce: A really nice tree
Naval Tradition: With the addition of the admiral I really like this one now, especially because with an admiral I can explore the world before astronomy.
Trade Unions: I would rather it gets the science bonus, and mercantilism gets the harbor bonus. Overall I think mercantilism is much stronger, so I would like to spread the bonuses out a bit.
Protectionism: At +2 happy it feels too strong.
Finisher: Really makes TPs useful
Rationalism: A blend of really strong and decent policies.
Opener: I think 15% science straight up is too good for the opener, it's one of the better bonuses and needs to be buried a bit. I would swap it and secularisms bonus.
Soverienty: This is really weak bonus imo.
Freedom: A mixed bag of good and terrible, but absolutely mandatory for culture win.
Constitution: A terrible boring bonus for the culture victory.
Free Speech: Another boring bonus
Universal Suffrage: Only ever get it for the finisher.
Finisher: Its broken for culture right now since you have so many landmarks. I'm curious to see if a academy heavy order with freedom could beat out an early rationalism push.
Autocracy: I'm not a warmonger so hard for me to say much here.
Fascism: Strategic resources just never seem that problematic for me to need twice as much of them.
Order: My favorite late game tree
Planned Economy: Love how it feels me get those factories up, and then gives me a great science bonus for the work.
Communism: Terrific bonus.
City States
Overall I think GK did a wonderful job with city states. Diplomacy with them is more dynamic, alliances and friendships shift and are more fluid, and the multiple quests are great.
I love getting a request from a city state for a good, befriending another city state for that good, and watching this domino effect of friendships as I complete requests because of chaining friendships.
The only thing I would love to see is a little more loyalty for long term alliances. It would be nice if my influence dropped slower with CS if I've been their friend/ally a long time.
The only negative I have is the wow me with science/faith arenas, mainly because that seems pretty fixed in the late game. If I'm not going a culture win, I'm not going to be able to belt out the culture of a civ that is, same with science or faith.
Final Words
There's plenty more I could talk about, but this is already so much. I think my take away message is that a lot has been improved, and as Thal adapts VEM I think its important to maintain a minimalist mindset. GK fixed several areas and frankly I think used VEM as an inspiration in many areas. I think we should respect the baseline and only adjust changes that truely need adjusting.