Is it dishonourable to restart a game?

[JamesNinelives]

Coastal capitals have the advantage of having more trade partners, assuming you play a continents-styled map. Capitals often have higher resource diversity to generate more yields from trade routes.

Yes, that's true. And I do value that. There's also the ability to build coastal-only wonders in your capital which is great. I still feel that overall they could use a buff though - especially late-game. Land tile improvements get so many bonuses over time that most coastal tiles feel irrelevant at a certain point.

 

[azum4roll]

It's not usual for a capital to have that many water tiles around even if coastal, thanks to the fertility thing. You should have enough tiles to work even at late game.

 

[JamesNinelives]

Sometimes yes, sometimes no.

I mean - going back to the core of this thread - I restart games I don't like so it doesn't bother me too much. But I've been going outside my comfort zones lately and playing unusual starts. One time I had a game where my capital was on a narrow pensinsula. There were resources around, but most of the non-resource tiles were water tiles.

I don't mind playing a challenge, but that kind of thing is just not enjoyable for me. It doesn't happen all that often - but it does happen sometimes. And when each game takes days - a week even, I don't want to waste my time doing something that I'm just going to get frustrated or disappointed by. I have enough experiences like that IRL. Gaming is my escape .

 

[Gidoza]

There's no happiness from settling on a river and culture bonus triggers only during a golden age. I can win deity games without them, so your assumption that baths are needed for a good play is not true.

Culture and Gold bonus of 10% is a hell of a bonus, and especially potent when I'm able to keep permanent Golden Ages.

And yeah, I can win without them as well - that's not the point. I've also lost without them. What I can easily note is that games w/o a river tile are harder to win and if I were to tabulate it I'm sure I've lost more games without a river tile nearby. It's not a mystery why. For EVERY other city, I seriously don't care - but for the Capital...yeah I'm not ok with it.

And thanks for the shout-out. Nevertheless, I'll have to call you a stupid, dumb idiot-head. B/c I disagree with you and YOUR RONG!!!!!!11 <3 <3 <3


askov said:
I think giving fresh water to all cities (non-freshwater settled cities get freshwater from the Well) would greatly improve balance.

Sorry I got a bit aggressive there. If discussing only mines and ivory then yea I can agree, it's often a good play and I would consider giving up baths for it.


This would make settling on a river a disadvantage. Wells are already a lot better than watermills.

Just to be clear, I'm personally only talking about Capital/Holy City when I'm talking about the Baths thing. Whereas I would suggest that any city anywhere on flat land should have 3F/1P/1G and any Hill should get 2F/2P/1G.

Nevertheless, the Well/Watermill thing would be a fair point in this regard. I wouldn't want to mandate Windmills in every Capital because that would be limiting to strategy. Dropping the base 1F on Wells though might do the trick as that Food is being "replaced" by an extra Food in most places where a city that needs a Well might be.

BUUUUUUUTTT...Lake and Oasis cities both get Fresh Water and early Well, making them super strong in early game, and super strong in late game with Baths - in some sense getting the best of both worlds. Non-freshwater Capitals get burned later game without Baths, and River Capitals get burned early game due to lack of an early well. Some of these small things can make rather large differences in my experience.

 

[Cokolwiek]

Non-freshwater Capitals get burned later game without Baths, and River Capitals get burned early game due to lack of an early well.

I think it's exaggeration. Those are nice bonuses, they could scale great if following the certain strategy, but that's it. Also, first the baths' happiness bonus was pulled like a rabbit out of the hat, now they also give ten percent to gold? I have been playing different VP then.
I never was under the impression river cities in general or non-riverside capitals is something imbalanced. I thought he had a thread not so long ago that argued to boost rivers cities, allowing them to city connections without roads.

 

[CrazyG]

I don't see 10% gold on the bath's description. Cities on rivers do get more gold from trade routes though.

Actual numbers from a game:
In medieval era golden age the baths in my tradition capital is giving 24 culture per turn (tested by selling the bath). My total per turn culture is 301, and I don't much bonus culture (maybe like 10 per turn on average). This is without Divine Inheritance, which i think would put it to 27 culture.

The upcoming wonders I'm looking at (Chichen Itza and Leaning Tower) both require 10 policies. I can easily see 24 culture per turn being the difference between getting those or not.

I also tested progress. My capital isn't on fresh water but a different city with a writers guild and two specialists is. Selling the bath lowered my culture by 11 in a golden age. Outside of a golden age it gives 6 (I don't have a garden in the city). My total culture 212 per turn, with around 40~ culture in bonus yields.

Those are pretty significant yields. I realize the early game is the most important and that wells help a lot, but it isn't the only part of the game that matters. Missing key Medieval or Renaissance wonders (and letting a runaway build them) can have a huge impact on games.

To be completely fair, those cities would have a different building instead of a baths. An armory maybe? Even then I'd rather have the bath's yields than armory yields, and the bath is cheaper, and I'd eventually have both.

 

[Cokolwiek]

The upcoming wonders I'm looking at (Chichen Itza and Leaning Tower) both require 10 policies

These are far apart when in it comes to putting them into this comparison. I can get Leaning Tower 80% of the time, not being policy blocked no matter if I play tall tradition or wide authority. Meanwhile Chichen Itza tends to be unachievable in all but 10% of the games I play, unless you don't have any tradition factions present.

Your comparison shows that mainly that are tradition capitals that tend to have a good scaling potential and create enough of difference. It becomes even more so because tradition should have low cities number so much less penalty on culture cost of policies, would generate majority of its yields in a single city so that's plays hand in hand with the baths, and have a much higher chance to have artistry which is great policy for generating golden ages.
On the other hand eight or ten city progress or authority that has guilds and culture generation spread among many cities would benefit far less from baths in any given city. It would also have a much larger policy combinations available with artistry being not so amazing, so generating golden ages in the time culture is most crucial (early and midgame) would be much harder and rarer without outside bonuses like certain monopolies or beliefs. Another thing is, in my opinion for wide empires it is much better to orient their religion on culture with flat yields per city (like from creativity, way of the pilgrim, mendicancy) than on percentage bonuses as they have far larger potential than for tall tradition and go online much faster with better yields in midgame than percentage ones and you can have something like either mosques or Sistine or Eiffel Tower anyway, so you are never restricted to baths in getting substantial culture percentage bonuses. Not to mention Terracotta (which is under consensus that should be nerfed) or imperium yields for capturing cities.

 

[Stalker0]

I'm seeing a lot of extreme proposals here... I still think a simple change to the palace to allow baths (I would even be fine if it "always" counted as having fresh water to keep it simple)....is an easy change that would solve the key problem. Its only baths in the capital that has a really major impact, yes it matters in satellites, but not as much.

 

[Gidoza]

I'm seeing a lot of extreme proposals here... I still think a simple change to the palace to allow baths (I would even be fine if it "always" counted as having fresh water to keep it simple)....is an easy change that would solve the key problem. Its only baths in the capital that has a really major impact, yes it matters in satellites, but not as much.

I mean hell you could allow all Capitals to build both Wells and Water Wheels - raze the one and build the other when the time comes. That's at least fair for everyone all around.

 

[Soupy Delicious]

In single player mode it doesn't matter at all. You could even use InfoAddict or Ingame map editor however you please and there is nothing dishonorable in that. You can just treat the game like a sandbox.

Well that's pretty much the dumbest thing I've read on these forums. Of course it's still cheating. The difference is that it's not WRONG, which is what cheating in multiplayer would be.

 

[CppMaster]

Well that's pretty much the dumbest thing I've read on these forums. Of course it's still cheating. The difference is that it's not WRONG, which is what cheating in multiplayer would be.

What's dumb about that? You have l just confirmed what I said, that it's cheating, but not wrong, so not dishonorable. It's weird to agree with the dumbest thing you've read

 

[CrazyG]

We could consider moving wells to construction, making the gap between them and watermills a lot smaller.

 

[CrazyG]

These are far apart when in it comes to putting them into this comparison. I can get Leaning Tower 80% of the time, not being policy blocked no matter if I play tall tradition or wide authority. Meanwhile Chichen Itza tends to be unachievable in all but 10% of the games I play, unless you don't have any tradition factions present.

Is this because your culture is high in the mid-game, or because your science is low? If you are never blocked by social polices I'd say you need more science. For example in my most recent game I had completed University of Sankore before you even discovered education in that Netherlands game you shared. In my best performing games I meet the science and culture goals at about the same time.

Also it sounds like it could really help you if you want Chichen Itza (I built it this morning, beating Russia and several tradition AI). Those are also just two examples.