HONOR: A Tree in Need of Sprucing Up

[steveg700]

Honor on the brain, but, yes, Tradition is what I meant.

I normally pick a few of both early (rarely finishing Tradition), simply due to how they play off each other.

Going wide and having each city a haven for a free unit is heaven in itself, let alone how other things can be woven together.

Same here. I finish Liberty, use the GE to get Hagia Sophia, Great Wall, or Petra. Then start Tradition. That gets me four free amphitheaters rather than one amphitheater and three monuments. The renaissance comes too quickly to finish it though.

Commerce would be the next on my list to spruce up.

 

[steveg700]

Returning to Honor, I can't help but find it funny how half of the posters here praise the Honor finisher for being fantastic, whereas the other half find it severely underpowered. I'm just curious, those who find it excellent, how much gold do you approx. think you get from it in, say, Medieval and Renaissance era in an average game where you pick Honor?

You find it funny that people have differing opinions on something highly variable? I find your amusement amusing. Aha, so there!

There's really no average. It depends on how much war you're fighting. If you have some civ just shoveling units into your cattle chute, it's quite lucrative. It only gets better as eras pass. At the industrial era I can enough off kills to make sure the CS bribes never end. If I'm warmongering.

 

[Galgus]

Some extra gold for killing Barbarians would certainly strengthen Honor's early game.

Honor empires could grow at a closer rate to Tradition and Liberty ones without needing to conquer a city.

 

[Matthew.]

The only major downside to Honor is lack of gold. As I've mentioned in other threads, the Honor tree encourages keeping a large military, yet does nothing to help support it. Give some kind of eco boost, and the tree would be much better.

Culture is fine. People focus too much on the opener and forget about the +2 per garrison, which is going to net way more overall culture in a wide puppet empire than Tradition or Liberty.

No need for growth bonuses, as too much growth slows conquer/expansion rate of speed.

I think the finisher is fine how it is. Of course you won't see much benefit sitting on four cities clicking next turn until science or culture win. If you are aggressive with wars, you should be killing multiple enemies every single turn once your war machine gets going.

The main use for me is to use that gold for military upgrades. When pushing army numbers, GPT can get low which means no reserve pool available for upgrades (which can get expensive). The Honor finisher allows you to keep adding to that pool and, in a way, having military units pay their upgrades themselves, as long as they are out fighting.

 

[steveg700]

Well-said, Matthew. Sounds like you're a man after my own heart in some respects. Having said that, Honor should be good tree for anyone who wants a strong military, not just the warmongers.

However, we are basically on the same wavelength anyway, since like I said, gold is growth because it buys settlers.

 

[Matthew.]

Honestly the easiest change would be to have the free garrison half of Oligarchy transferred over to one of the Honor policies. Tradition doesn't need it and could use a slight nerf, and it is going to net more gold in the long-term than something like free barracks or +1 gold on strategic resources.

The killer on gold is keeping those garrisons full. A large empire will be spending more on garrison unit maintenance than the actual fighting army. Taking Oligarchy in addition to Honor is a temporary fix, but it isn't free. Tradition opener and Oligarchy could instead be used to go deeper into the Commerce tree, or one of the Industrial trees which are difficult to complete.

 

[killmeplease]

tradition opener helps in the early game a lot
so while it isnt free its definitely not a waste

 

[Cajamarca]

Has anyone considered giving great generals the ability to found cities? It's my recollection that Alexander would plop one of his generals down fairly regularly to found another Alexandria.

It would have synergy with the Huns, who usually get going with the battering rams and go for a total civ kill, and have to raze cities behind them to avoid morale problems. When the dust settles, the general could go back, settle on the same spot, and start using the improved tiles immediately.


Another thing about honor, mentioned previously: Early expansion is tough. Plus, Alexander the Great didn't use garrisons all the time, he'd just put the old king back on the throne as a satrap and keep going, so Military Caste wouldn't be much use.

Perhaps a policy could give you a chance of capturing enemy units when you defeat them? That would let you leave some troops behind as a garrison without losing forward momentum.

 

[sufficiency]

What I think will be better:

Opener: in addition to barb bonus, also provides +1 culture per barracks, armory, and military academy. Builds them in half time.

Warrior Code: also applies to melee mounted units.

Finisher: in addition to gold per kill, also provide a small bonus (maybe 5~10%) on defense.

 

[Securion]

Border expansion would be an aggressive civs main focus, yes?
Add border growth to the Honour opener and remove it from tradition?