Jungles: banana vs basic food

[Delekhan]

Just for the sake of "Fun Factor," not so much for hardcore balance (jungles aren't that common anyway), I believe that 1 with common bananas works well. (the way it was in GEM - it was perfect there imho)

I don't know about other players, but I find that founding cities in a scary jungle with lots of bananas is loads of fun. Eventually, I've tamed the jungle and converted the land into a beautiful territory, with productive plantations on the bananas.

For that reason I also think it makes sense to return to the 3 - 4 turn jungle clearing time from GEM (jungles in RL are tough to clear, spread & regrow quickly and don't catch on fire easily, being composed of moist, green wood).

GEM was a big success. Why mess with something in it unless there's a really compelling reason?

 

[JohnS]

For the record, like Delekhan I also found it fun to find an "acceptable" spot with enough bonus resources to sustain myself against the harsh jungle, and then slowly my spot became good either through science bonuses or because I'd cleared the jungle enough. It feels like a strategic investment that pays off later, but the choice could become tougher by making jungles more difficult to clear (maybe combined with making villages take longer time to build?).

Though Ahriman makes a good case that it's unbalanced. I'm all for finding a way to keep the fun but introduce the balance - if I could change my vote from alternative 1 to alternative 3, I would. Maybe the bonus belief could affect jungles in a different way? Some happiness/yield for each city with a close jungle tile or something, so it's not just a straight tile improver yield either, there's quite enough of those...

 

[mitsho]

Stone in marshes? Seems strange. That would fit better on the jungles themselves. (But I guess not making those tiles jungles is the whole idea for the reason of the belief, no?).

What about Deer in marshes? I just can't imagine a quarry in a marsh... Coal would make the most sense I guess but we already have those in jungles and its a strategic ressource rather than a bonus one...

Civ5 just has not enough bonus ressources... sigh..

 

[Thalassicus]

Stone increases the production of low-production areas. It appears on flat grass, desert, and tundra. Marsh is a low-prod flat grassland tile so it fits in that category. Jungle are plains, which have production, so they normally do not get stone.

@Ahriman
You're right; I reduced the culture of monuments from 3 to 2, but the 3 was in gem. I'll reduce their culture more since you're concerned about it.

 

[Thalassicus]

(double post)

 

[Ahriman]

(double post)

Honestly, I think I would rather have the BNW values on everything. 1 is going to make early tile acquisition very painful and monuments not really worth building.

I don't see anything wrong with culture in BNW. What is the objective that you are trying to achieve? If it is to do with social policy acquisition then it would seem easier to adjust policy costs rather than culture income.

 

[MortalD]

Honestly, I think I would rather have the BNW values on everything. 1 is going to make early tile acquisition very painful and monuments not really worth building.

I don't see anything wrong with culture in BNW. What is the objective that you are trying to achieve? If it is to do with social policy acquisition then it would seem easier to adjust policy costs rather than culture income.

Need to agree to that. Last game had to pay for half the tiles to give my cities something to work on. Tho I admit to go crazy with growth at the time

 

[Thalassicus]

I believe buildings should give rewards proportionate to their cost, and culture buildings should be important for policies and border expansion. These are my goals for culture buildings which unmodded BNW doesn't meet. The monument and museum are better than the theater and opera house, and most culture comes from citystates and great people.

How about I reduce monument culture, and reduce initial border expansion cost? This will reduce culture income (as you want), meet my goals, and not affect border rate.

 

[Ahriman]

I believe buildings should give rewards proportionate to their cost, and culture buildings should be important for policies and border expansion. These are my goals for culture buildings which unmodded BNW doesn't meet. The monument and museum are better than the theater and opera house, and most culture comes from citystates and great people.

The ampitheater and opera house are basically there for great work slots. I think it's ok that they give modest culture on their own. The design is meant to make great works meaningful, such that you want to generate some even when you aren't going for a tourism victory, because they're the most effective way of getting culture.
If you think they're underpowered relative to their cost, then consider reducing their maintnenace cost or production cost.

How about I reduce monument culture, and reduce initial border expansion cost?

That still doesn't work IMO, because it makes monuments trivial relative to other sources of early culture, such as religious beliefs and buildings, killing barbarians, social policites, etc. It isn't worth investing early production in a building that just turns 1 gold into culture.
It also ends up seriously nerfing the Tradition policy that gives free monuments.

I would rather increase tourism from great works than nerf monuments or make it too easy to get culture just from buildings on their own.

 

[EricB]

The culture mechanics seem fine as they are right now. +2 culture from a monument is about right.

Amphitheaters really give +4 culture once you have a great work in there.

The only culture that I see as really overpowering right now is the religion belief that gives you +5 culture per foreign city following your religion. I've used that one before and my culture was off the charts. +2 or +3 culture per foreign city would be about right.

 

[tedoll78]

Pilgrimage. It's been an incredible belief. On my last game, played on a huge map with 24 city-states, I mass-produced missionaries (including three missionaries given with Borobudur) and deliberately targeted the city-states. The decision to do this came after I noticed that the civilizations in these games seems to target other main civs with their missionaries and Great Prophets (with city-states seeming to be of lesser priority).

The strategy worked, and I ended-up with more than half of the city-states keeping their conversions for centuries on-end, allowing me to rack-up a really nice number of policies.

Overpowered? I'm not sure. It took a good bit of investment (and risk) to gain the belief's benefits. Definitely lucrative.

 

[mystikx21]

2 culture on monuments is fine. I'm not sure that more culture on later buildings is necessary. They give more on great works, and theaters give on a few resources. The only one that concerns me is opera houses in the tier. If the problem is the tourism effects from higher culture available, then increasing great work tourism would be the better solution than reducing the monument.

The bigger balance issue is culture from beliefs and natural wonders (and then obviously any culture opportunities)

 

[Zai]

I still think as far as the beliefs go you are taking the tile bonus out of context too much. There are two +25% growth beliefs, a +6 food in every single city belief, and a +6 culture in every single city belief, just to name a few that compare to the current circumstances. On a normal map (IE not hot and wet) you are only going to have a handful of cities with heavy jungle, in almost every single situation I've seen the +3/3 food on shrine/temples belief is going to add more total food to a large civ than the +1 food on jungles, and taking the two +25% growth beliefs will get you large cities much more quickly. The terrain related beliefs aren't "bonuses to bad terrain" they are there because desert, tundra and jungle tiles are the least common tiles on an average map which balances them against the other beliefs.

I just don't think the belief should even factor into the discussion here, and changing it really wont change the balance of the game at all.

The real question is whether 2 farmable jungles is balanced correctly with universities. I personally think it's fine, it makes them not suck as much early on while waiting for universities to make them pay off. Jungle cities still hurt really bad with production, if you want to save them for the bonus later you are going to lose out on a lot of early wonders, especially if you grab related beliefs instead of related ones. I don't think the vanilla jungles were balanced and I think it left certain civs hurting really bad early game waiting for only a mediocre boost later.

 

[Anastase Alex]

I will slide with Zai. However I believe there is another interesting solution:

Universities give +2 science on unfarmed jungles.

 

[Ahriman]

Universities give +2 science on unfarmed jungles.

It would need to be jungles with no improvement (ie no villages, plantations, etc.). That would satisfy my concerns on the science, which is that the total yield gets too high. My problem was never with science, it was with science + regular improvement bonuses.

 

[mitsho]

If we go that route (higher science, but un unimproved terrain), I'd much rather just introduce a new Improvement: Research Outpost, buildable on jungle, tundra, snow, desert (?), one-tile-islands (?), but not next to another one. Make it late game, high yield.

But I guess that's the long way around and just adjusting jungle yields is far easier.

 

[Anastase Alex]

Could indeed add tundra in that case.

 

[Thalassicus]

I'll start a separate thread for culture buildings since it's mostly unrelated to jungles.

 

[ExpiredReign]

I like the ideas around the boost only coming on untouched jungle. It fits in more with my idea of the relative values.
For that reason I think we should avoid a 'Research Post' type improvement.
Scientists are not likely to make extensive changes to an environment that they are wanting to study.

If it is possible I think a 'Logging Site' improvement would fit as jungles/rainforest do provide a lot of timber. Some of it may be classed as luxury timbers and thus provide boosts other than .

 

[mitsho]

Logging Site = Lumbermill. Don't we make jungles too similar if we give them production? And as its only 1, it won't be the most popular option anyways.

I also prefer "on unimproved tiles" over a new improvement, but it's probably harder to balance.

I do feel that Snow or Tundra and Deep Ocean (new tile?) should get a similar science boost. Probably... or not.