How to Fix Liberty

[Kallowe]

One benefit of Tradition that hasn't been mentioned is the indirect diplomacy buffs. The AIs tend to get rather testy if you settle anywhere near them. This makes it harder, even if only a little, to get favorable trade deals. I don't think that's wrong, but Liberty and Honor both could use a bit more autonomy.

 

[Calouste]

One benefit of Tradition that hasn't been mentioned is the indirect diplomacy buffs. The AIs tend to get rather testy if you settle anywhere near them. This makes it harder, even if only a little, to get favorable trade deals. I don't think that's wrong, but Liberty and Honor both could use a bit more autonomy.

That's not a benefit of Tradition, that's a benefit of settling closer together versus wider apart, or of which direction you are settling in. The AI is still going to be upset if I settle within 5 tiles of one of their cities in a nice location even if I don't settle any other cities. What might indirectly help is that with Tradition your cities tend to be larger and thus have higher defense values which could deter the AI from viewing you as a potential target and declaring war.

 

[Mutineer]

Stealing a worker from a CS is not an "exploit" per se. There are just some very poor design choices put into City-States in general and they haven't been fixed yet.

1) you can DoW a CS and make peace in the same turn with little consequence other than -60 influence. Some people (me!) would argue that "City-State is just a minor civ, I should be able to push it around if I want to!" Which leades us to...

2) if you conquer said minor civ it will count as exterminating a regular civ and will instantly kill your diplomacy with everyone you've met.

If it was up to me I'd simply disable the option to DoW a CS that isn't allied with anyone as a band-aid fix, until we can get a proper diplomacy rework.

To answer on point 1,

But you can not declare second war freelly, or all CS's will perma dow you. Only first war free.

 

[reddishrecue]

The AI feels that liberty can be OP because when I mass expanded and used liberty to up to 5-7 cities all built, all the AIs ended up dowing me. AI difficulty on liberty can also help fix it a little because even though I had way more cities than other civilizations, their combined arms were match for my large amount of self-made cities and large of amount of production that I was getting. Since the AI still had a larger bonus from immortal difficulty level, the production from my cities and their liberty weren't match for their still OP.

 

[megabearsfan]

One benefit of Tradition that hasn't been mentioned is the indirect diplomacy buffs. The AIs tend to get rather testy if you settle anywhere near them. This makes it harder, even if only a little, to get favorable trade deals. I don't think that's wrong, but Liberty and Honor both could use a bit more autonomy.

With that in mind, I still think a good idea for a Liberty policy would be to allow internal trade routes to generate gold. Even just 2 or 3 gpt could make a huge difference, as it would make an expansive player less reliant on external trade, deals, and would give them more freedom to use trade routes to speed the development of new cities so they aren't stuck with a bunch of dead-weight cities for half the game. It would be even better if the gold value scaled up over the course of the game. I had suggested earlier that Meritocracy could be buffed to grant +2 gold from internal trade routes and +1 addition gold for each era after ancient.

Alternatively, internal trade routes could provide some kind of percentage modifier towards the gold earned from the city connection or it could be based on the respective wealth of the cities in the trade route. That way, the value will automatically scale up over time, and it actually matters what city is the source of an internal trade route: starting from bigger, more productive/wealthier cities would be better than sending trade routes out of 3-population cities with no infrastructure.

There are a few more fundamental changes that could be made to help alleviate this problem, but they are almost certainly non-starters at this point in Civ V's life cycle:

1.) Bring back some kind of shared victory condition (similar to Civ IV's permanent alliance), and make the A.I.s capable of utilizing it. This way, A.I.s don't have to be arbitrarily angry at players for growing too large or settling too close as long as the player doesn't take openly aggressive action. They could actually view the other player as a long-term ally, and view friendly relations with a powerful neighbor as an ends towards winning the game. Something like this would be a very fundamental change that would probably require a lot of changes to game rules and mechanics in order to make it less exploitable.

2.) Create some kind of benefit for having close borders with another player. Perhaps some kind of cultural, economic, scientific, or happiness "leakage" whereby a city belonging to one civ could receive benefits from being very close (and probably having a road connection to) a neighboring Civ's city. Kind of like how religions spread to nearby cities. Perhaps culture, production, gold, science, or happiness could too. This way, a foreign city very close to your borders wouldn't be threatening as long as that city isn't building defenses and popping out military units.

3.) Make the maps bigger and reduce the number of CSs: more room for everybody!

 

[HorseshoeHermit]

If we're talking about changes beyond Civ V's lifecycle then there is this thread: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=513741

Gold on ITRs is outmoded by the simple "extra trade route" buff to Liberty which has been suggested. An extra trade route even appeases the AI. An extra gold per connected city is a good revival of Arabia's UA, and if the gold appears on the map that works with Golden Ages and modifiers.

That appears to be in the ballpark of even for gold with Tradition. Can any buffs overcome the science penalty to wide, without putting growth straight into liberty and removing what makes it different? If it's not happiness and not gold and not growth it has to be hammers.

 

[megabearsfan]

If we're talking about changes beyond Civ V's lifecycle then there is this thread: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=513741

Gold on ITRs is outmoded by the simple "extra trade route" buff to Liberty which has been suggested. An extra trade route even appeases the AI. An extra gold per connected city is a good revival of Arabia's UA, and if the gold appears on the map that works with Golden Ages and modifiers.

That appears to be in the ballpark of even for gold with Tradition. Can any buffs overcome the science penalty to wide, without putting growth straight into liberty and removing what makes it different? If it's not happiness and not gold and not growth it has to be hammers.

Liberty already has a policy that reduces the increase in policy cost for new cities. Perhaps it should also have a policy that reduces the science penalty (maybe this could be the finisher).

Another way to solve the gold problem while encouraging expansion would be to reduce maintenance costs of buildings.

 

[Sheershaw]

I feel like Liberty needs these changes:

Opener: +1 and +1 per city

I want to make the opener more attractive for players. Right now, it makes much more sense to open Tradition if even if you don't plan on completing it because that +3 is really good.

Republic: + 5% production for buildings, and +3% production for every city that already has that building.

IE, the more cities with Monuments you have, the faster you can build a Monument in a new city. This way you can settle a new city and get it up and running pretty quick with the essentials.

Collective Rule: Speeds training of Settler by 50%in all cities. Free Settler appears near capital.

Citizenship: +25% improvement build rate. Maintenance paid on workers is halved, and Workers do not count towards the unit cap. A free Worker appears near capital. +25% production towards Work Boats.

Meritocracy: +1 Happiness for each city connected to the capital, and -5% Unhappiness from population in non-occupied cities.

Representation: Each city you found increases the culture cost of new policies by 33% less than normal. Starts a Golden Age.

Finisher: A free Great Person of your choice appears near the capital. -1 and +1 in every city.

Basically the CN tower moved to the finisher, except it also applies to new cities as well.

 

[_hero_]

I feel like Liberty needs these changes:

Opener: +1 and +1 per city

I want to make the opener more attractive for players. Right now, it makes much more sense to open Tradition if even if you don't plan on completing it because that +3 is really good.

Republic: + 5% production for buildings, and +3% production for every city that already has that building.

IE, the more cities with Monuments you have, the faster you can build a Monument in a new city. This way you can settle a new city and get it up and running pretty quick with the essentials.

Collective Rule: Speeds training of Settler by 50%in all cities. Free Settler appears near capital.

Citizenship: +25% improvement build rate. Maintenance paid on workers is halved, and Workers do not count towards the unit cap. A free Worker appears near capital. +25% production towards Work Boats.

Meritocracy: +1 Happiness for each city connected to the capital, and -5% Unhappiness from population in non-occupied cities.

Representation: Each city you found increases the culture cost of new policies by 33% less than normal. Starts a Golden Age.

Finisher: A free Great Person of your choice appears near the capital. -1 and +1 in every city.

Basically the CN tower moved to the finisher, except it also applies to new cities as well.

The only addition I'd make to this is Representation should do something to combat exponential science costs from adding cities on top of the culture effect.

 

[Kurtbob]

Well, if Liberty needs more happiness and gold, why not give it free buildings? How about free coliseums in your first four cities upon completing the liberty tree?

Liberty is also one of the only trees without a faith purchasable unit after entering the industrial age. How about buying workers/work boats/settlers with faith upon entering the industrial age if you completed the liberty tree?

 

[tommynt]

why is it so hard to understand that liberty isnt up but trad op?

buffing liberty tree would just increase imbalances between sp further.
Liberty is perfectly fine balanced to peity and other trees, maybe its even stronger allready now.

 

[ezysquire]

The liberty policies are good; they're just ordered wrong.
A re-allocation on the liberty tree could solve the tradition balance issue.
Collective Rule needs to move back to being a first pick after the opener. The whole point of liberty is to help you expand quickly and that free settler is too slow to come as the third policy.
I'd align it as the first policy on the left branch of the tree and then have representation follow it.
This way the left side of the tree is about quick city-building expansion with fast settlers first up and then the culture saver on new cities to follow soon after. The free (and now very early) golden age can be viewed as a way to get that next settler even faster. On lower difficulties maybe a quick ToA.
The right side of the liberty tree remains as it is, just with republic swapped in for representation as that's moved to the left side. The right side of the tree is then thematically correct as the side that assists in building cities up (worker, hammers, happiness)
I would like to see a buff to the liberty finisher though. A single free great person isn't great on its own. Perhaps a % boost to rate of great people points in all cities would work? Maybe 10%? This would make up for not having a faith purchase great person.

 

[Teproc]

I think Liberty is fine as is. Tradition needs to be nerfed and Piety needs to be buffed, but Liberty is good as is, and Honor isn't that bad, if very situational.

 

[CraigMak]

why is it so hard to understand that liberty isnt up but trad op?

buffing liberty tree would just increase imbalances between sp further.
Liberty is perfectly fine balanced to peity and other trees, maybe its even stronger allready now.

Do you really think that piety is a viable option against liberty or tradition? Piety seems terrible to me unless you want to sacred sites spam for an early culture vic, that's about it.

 

[Teproc]

Do you really think that piety is a viable option against liberty or tradition? Piety seems terrible to me unless you want to sacred sites spam for an early culture vic, that's about it.

That's not what this thread is about though. I think this thread is based on the wrongful premise that Liberty needs to be fixed, when it doesn't. Piety does need to be fixed, and Tradition needs to be nerfed. Liberty is fine, and Honor might be fine as well, although a little buff could probably work there.

 

[CraigMak]

That's not what this thread is about though. I think this thread is based on the wrongful premise that Liberty needs to be fixed, when it doesn't. Piety does need to be fixed, and Tradition needs to be nerfed. Liberty is fine, and Honor might be fine as well, although a little buff could probably work there.

Liberty is not fine, Tradition is superior so Liberty needs to be either buffed or Tradition nerfed. In my mind Honor and Piety are completely not viable in comparison to tradition or liberty.

 

[kaspergm]

That's not what this thread is about though. I think this thread is based on the wrongful premise that Liberty needs to be fixed, when it doesn't. Piety does need to be fixed, and Tradition needs to be nerfed. Liberty is fine, and Honor might be fine as well, although a little buff could probably work there.

Well arguably, that depends on where you place the bar for "fine". You can place the bar at Liberty level - which makes Tradition OP and Honor and Piety UP - or you can place it at Tradition level - which makes Liberty UP and Honor and Piety laughable.

There is no right and wrong in that question as I see it, but I do think that someone earlier in the thread raised a valid point: It makes the game more fun by setting the bar high rather than low, because a game full of policy trees that make very little impact on game would be utterly boring - just imagine if all policy trees were as bad as Honor or Piety.

Personally, I think the best level lies somewhere between Tradition and Liberty. I do think Tradition needs a small nerf, but I also think Liberty needs a boost, because basically it fails at what it's intended to do, namely help you found a wide empire, and bottomline is, even with Liberty, founding a wide empire is just not going to do you a lot of good.

 

[Wodan]

I don't really have anything new to say to the latest comments, other than to restate/summarize previous comments.

• Liberty as is, isn't good. Even when I plan to go wide, 95% of the time I still choose Tradition, because the speed increase to my core empire 4 cities is too huge. It kickstarts a wide empire much more than starting with a Liberty opener does.
• Piety could use some tweaking, as I often find myself stopping short of Religious Tolerance. The others simply don't seem worthwhile 99% of the time.
• I challenge the assumption that Piety or Honor need to be opener trees. There's nothing wrong with Tradition and Liberty being better than the others as openers, with Honor/Piety being intermingled or 2nd tree candidates. What would be wrong is if you never pick Honor or Piety (even as a 2nd tree).

Other than that, I agree with kaspergm and Craig. Ezysquire's suggestions may work and certainly are improvements. Would be best to do some playtesting to see.

 

[Ninakoru]

I challenge the assumption that Piety or Honor need to be opener trees. There's nothing wrong with Tradition and Liberty being better than the others as openers, with Honor/Piety being intermingled or 2nd tree candidates. What would be wrong is if you never pick Honor or Piety (even as a 2nd tree).

But the reality is that you can choose honor or piery from ancient era. Honor was once useful (even if was situational) for warmongering on the Vanilla version, but as they didn't adapt the branch, now is crap. Want them to act as secondary trees? at least make them to unlock on classical era. As they stand now, they are just noob traps.

 

[Wodan]

But the reality is that you can choose honor or piery from ancient era. Honor was once useful (even if was situational) for warmongering on the Vanilla version, but as they didn't adapt the branch, now is crap. Want them to act as secondary trees? at least make them to unlock on classical era. As they stand now, they are just noob traps.

No offense, but those are crazy comments. There's a difference between being allowed to do something and optimizing your game for different strategies. Even the biggest opposers on here have said there are times when doing a very specific strategy that they would want to pick those trees as openers. If we're going to disallow non-optimal choices then the whole game will turn into a series of non-choices.

They aren't noob traps... the game isn't going to blow up and the noob isn't going to all of a sudden not have fun. For example, you can have a very cool game playing with a Honor opener. I do it myself (for variety) every now and then (usually as the Aztecs or Germany).

All this said, I wouldn't be opposed to improving those trees (as I've said several times). I just feel that people who say they MUST be valid openers (so that you have a genuine toss-up choosing your opener between them and Tradition/Liberty) -- are looking at it the wrong way.