GAP points vs Artists

Question for everyone. It seems to me that other than accelerating the first Golden Age....base GAP points don't really seem to do much in the game. Ultimately, they seem dominated by artist bombs which give so many points in comparison that the base GAP points are effectively lost.

In other words, I don't know if GAP points really have much value in the current game. Does that track with your games as well?

 

Not at all. I get a lot of golden ages through artistry's points.

Without artistry I still get a few. CS quests sometimes give a big chunk.

 

GP bombs give too much in general, especially GS give so much science, that in later eras you get research done mostly by GS (when you by them with faith it's almost game breaking you by 2 GS and get 5-7 techs, so era ends in less then 10 turns)

 

I also don't enjoy the massive yields from GP bombs.

 

Writers imo give an appropriate amount, but yeah Artists imo give an amount that mostly makes my other accumulations irrelevant. I may use the first few artists to make some themes, but once that's done I know I can sustain s golden age for the rest of the game easily. I think golden Ages should be rare but special.

 

I've had GArtitsts give 50,000+ GAP, when my next Golden Age costed only ~17,000. I typically only get about 1.5 Techs worth from GScientists w/o Rationalism.

 

I get 2,5-3 techs with 1 GS, because I think all instant yields that I get counts together and everything adds

 

I also think that scientists, writers, and artists get a little bit out of hand at the end of the game. I've had writers that give more than 50,000 culture.

 

reminds me of the time when I had world's fair + GA + hero worship GWAM, brandenburg GWAM, faith bought writer spam as Japan, spacing faith buys every 8 turns after the world's fair boost. Got me like 4 policies in 3 turns.

 

I think a slight reduction of power is fine.

 

I think that instant bonuses shouldn't count as base for other instant bonuses

 

I'd like to see Golden Ages last like only...4 turns, and have completely insane bonuses applied to them.

 

Well, there goes Persia's whole thing as a civ.

 

Yeah, I don't think we need to rebalance the entire golden age system. Nerfing artists already will be a nerf to civs that depend on golden ages.

 

The idea is to encourage great people to use their secondary abilities.

For example, great engineers get better yields from each manufactory. So you can expend them right then for getting the wonder of your choice, or you can produce a manufactory so the following engineers are better.

Great writer behaves similarly, you can get culture on the spot or produce great works that will increase your base culture, making next writers better at the cultural bomb.

I am uncertain about what it is exactly current mechanic for great artist, but it seems to depend on your civ base gap rather than the number of great paintings.

The problem with this approach is that it is exponential, so it is easy to have overpowered people in the late game or underpowered people in the early game. What ought to be reduced is the grade of the exponential.

 

I was thinking about that when you get like for example 800 Science per turn, but get some more instant yields, then you bulb GS and get like 25-50 thousand science

 

I see a deeper problem than the one you mention here, because the details haven't been hammered out well enough.

Whereas a GE can be used early on for a Manufactory or to Wonderbuild, a GS has no such option - it's a complete waste to bulb a GS early in the game, and is only useful by first building Academies: then the issue is that Academies are the default choice until a certain point in the game, at which point the bonus from Academies is no longer useful, at which point you switch to bulbing. Simple math, and no actual choice involved.

To put that another way - I see this as a deeper and more neglectful version of the other thread where we are talking about lack of choice in policy trees. I think we can set this situation up like this:

GE - Choice is active pretty consistently.

GS - Choice does not exist.

GA - There is some choice, but it depends on the situation. However, I'd say it's pretty bland through and through - you start with GWorks until you can get perma GA, then you do GWorks again.

GW - Pretty much the same as GS imo, there's not much choice here.

GM - This one has some choice later on based situationally on whether the Tourism from the Work is more useful globally than a targeted Tourism on a particular Civ.

GM - Is say little choice here as the duration for WLTKD is so pathetic without having used some towns first to make the choice easy early on before the switch.

GD - Some discussion going on in another thread about changing this.

GP - This has actual choices I'd say, but the real choice is whether to build one at all.


Overall, I would say that about two Great People or maybe three have authentic choices around them that aren't determined by how many Works/tiles you've made.


If you wanted to give the two uses actual choices, you'd plain and simply need to change he effects or mix them up a little (eg Scientists build Manufactures but bulb science; Engineers build Academies but bulb production).

 

The best rounded one is the great engineer, I agree.
Great merchants are very rare now, I don't know why it takes forever to produce them. Anyways, I see how a town is better for a very tall civ than a few WLTKD turns, and the opposite, so rather than a choice, GM is versatile tool for both tall and wide.
Great scientist is the hardest one. I just can't see the appeal to expend it for early game science. Academy mechanic is good in the sense that it discourages hoarding scientists for a late game boost. Maybe it is OK to expend scientists in medieval to get to knight earlier and wreak havoc, maybe. I never tried.

The great writer follows the same logic as the scientist, but it advances policies instead of techs.
Great musician special action was made appealing for both early and late game, where great music is left for extra culture and theming.

I believe great artist was changed because it was too easy to stay in golden ages like forever. Now golden ages from artists just come later, after you produce a few great paintings.

Well, I think it's OK for the late game to be reliant in instant bonuses, with the mini game of choosing the right moment to switch to instant. The GPTI and theming bonuses scale with eras, so it's not that bad. It's in the early options where I wish we had a real choice.
Maybe we already have this choice with GS and GW, it doesn't look like it to me, but certainly the GA has no choice but to produce great paintings first and golden ages later.
Perhaps if great artists gave an additional flat bonus in the city they are used, or a free public works for cities in trouble, it will make this a real option for early game.

 

GM has lots of choice. Bulbing them early game gives proportionally more money than if it's done late game (900 gold early on is wayyyy stronger than 900 gold in late game), shorter WLTKD, but also clears the required luxery for WLTKD so that the next needed one is different (very useful when the required luxeries aren't available).

If anything I think the GM's town improvement needs some love relative to bulbing. Maybe the gold gained from bulbing should scale with current number of towns as well as the WLTKD duration? If the gold gain already scales it doesn't seem to do it sharply enough.

 

I agree. A lot of times I GM bulb for the money, and the fact that the town just isn't that great (also the luxury reset can bag you several more WLTKD if it switches you to favorable luxs). Its an okay amount of gold, but the food it gives isn't that great. I would love to see the WLTKD increase to 2 per bulb (heck maybe 3), and more yields on the base tile.

All of that, quite frankly I think GP choices are overrated. To me the strategy of GP is in getting them, not spending them. How I optimize my GP points, which GP I choose to go for, which free GP I choose when I get those...that to me is the strategic choice. I would personally have no issue if most GP I just clicked the button and said "yields!!". I still get that "oh yeah!" feeling when I do.