Laws (Balance)

[Stalker0]

This thread is devoted to discussing the current balance of laws. We are going to look at both the two options for each law, as well as their overall balance (aka is either of my choices a "good option"). For ease, I am going to use a simple rating system.

A - There is good balance between the laws, they both have use.
C - The balance is ok, I tend to favor one over the other, but I do use both on occasion.
F - One law is dramatically better than the other, or both laws are so weak I often won't pick either one.

Epics / Exploration (F) - Epics is a far superior pick 95% of the time, Exploration is just too niche of a benefit.

Slavery / Freedom (A) - After many tweaks to both of these, I think they are in a decent place. I think slavery is almost mandatory on high difficulties for a while, however, its one of the few pairs I actually consider switching later in the game as Freedom's power ramps up.

Centralization / Vassalage (F) - I think Central is the better pick, but frankly I often don't pick either, its not a great benefit either way.

Tyranny / Constitution (A) - Another one that has been well tuned over time, while I think Tyranny is still the better money option in most cases, sometimes having those decrees can be really really useful.

Colonies / Serfdom (A/F) - It really depends on my playthroughs. Sometimes buying tiles can be quite nice, and if your doing a persia pasture play than serfdom can be useful enough. But there are many playthroughs were I don't care about either of them, I wish their bonuses were more generally relevant.

Monotheism / Polytheism (A) - This is one where I also consider switching on occasion. Mono can be strong when you get it when you need orders, and your workers are already tied up. Longterm I think Poly is the stronger play, but they both have good uses in the right scenario.

Divine Rule / Legal Code (A) - Legal code generates a ton of civics once your laws ramp up. Divine rule in combination with polytheism is the best unhappiness reducer in the game. The choice is really about what style your playing.

Tolerance / Orthodoxy (A) - Both are great in their own way.

Professional Army / Volunteers (C) - PA is generally superior here, the treasury bonus is solid, and the upkeep is actually a lot less than volunteers. The pop consumption is pretty harsh on volunteers, it has its uses, but generally PA gives me the better bonuses.

Philosophy / Engineering (A) - I love both of these.

Iconography / Calligraphy (F) - Icon requires a LOT of cathedrals to really be worth it, otherwise its a pretty mediocre bonus for that high upkeep. Calligraphy can have use with high specialist play, but there are many games I forget this pair exists.

Pilgrimage / Holy War (C) - Pilgrimage is only decent if you have a large amount of groves, but in that situation it can gives quite a bit of science. Holy War in general though is the superior pick, the ability to money rush out units can be a major strength in the late game.

Elites / Guilds (F) - Elities blows guilds out of the water, the ability save your orders is incredibly powerful. The fact your probably throwing on another 8-10 orders is just icing on the cake. Guilds just doesn't compete imo, at this point in the game I generally have curbed my discontent with other means.

Autarky / Trade League (A) - Really cool late game laws, I love them both.

Coin Debasement / Monetary Reform (A) - Both of these have great combos. CD combined with Elites can end all money issues. MR combined with something like Holy War can allow you a massive uptick in production with minimal downside (the discontent drop is fine but its not the reason you take it).

 

[Stalker0]

So in terms of the C/F laws, here are some thoughts on corrections:

Exploration: "Scouts can move on water. +50% to harvesting; harvest does not consume orders. -50% unit consumption"
This one has a scout focus which is fine, but we need to give it some more general utility. Since harvesting tends to fall off pretty quickly in the game, lets augment that part a bit more. Now the scouts can find those resources, and consume them more easily.

On the second part, right now the only extra unit consumption is confusing, especially when combined with vassalage. Further, its just a really watered down weak bonus. With this new change, now Exploration + Vassalage becomes an interesting combo when you have a large army to keep it cheap.


Centralization: "+10 civics per year. Capital city gets +20% science and -20% cost to all projects."
This law is designed for a player going a more TALL strategy with a big capital. The -20% project costs allows a person to invest in that capital and actually make it strong. This then has good synergy with various other laws and abilities that add projects to the capital.

Vassalage: "-50% unit consumption. Militia and Conscripts have no unit consumption and train +25% faster"
Similar to exploration, I am trying to highlight a portion of the game that is already a bit weak. This makes militia a more interesting strategy, as now they are "free" long term, and with faster training can now be a more dedicated part of the army.

Colonies: Can buy tiles. Movement bonus along neutral river. All cities are connected."
This gives a fast expansion player an option to build a lot of cities and still keep them connected while they work on their road networks. That combined with the tile buying gives this law a solid niche.

Serfdom: Farms and Pastures +20% bonus. Workers train +25% faster.
Our goal here is to give serfdom a more core bonus, as farms are often not that strong in play, and pastures are hit or miss. Now that it effects workers, it always has a benefit to players.

Volunteers: I don't think the text needs to change here, it just wish the population rush gave more benefit. It feels like it takes 2+ citizens to rush things too often.

Iconography: No random non-state religious spread. All religious buildings +1 training, +5 money, -1 discontent. -1 turn to make Religious Buildings.
So we are removing the bonus for specific religious buildings, and just providing a more solid bonus for religious buildings in general. This means if your really focusing on religious buildings you get a bit more oomph from the law. We also make the buildings faster to create.

Calligraphy: Library +4 culture. -1 discontent per Elder Specialist, and -20% cost to Elder Specialist.
We are adding more speed to our elder specialist creation to round out this law just a bit.

Pilgrimage: Grove +2 science. Holy city: +5 money per city with religion. Holy City: +20% growth
So the idea here is that if you have all these pilgrims coming to your holy city, well its probably going to a grow more. Again our goal is to round the law a bit more.

Guilds: -10% rebel chance. Towns -1 discontent and +50% yields. Hamlet and Village improvement time -50%.
Since the focus is on towns, we are giving towns a bit more oomph, which can help offset the high cost of this law. We also are going to help our hamlets and villages actually get to be towns, by dramatically speeding up how fast they evolve. This allows a player going hamlets later in the game to catch up using this law.

 

[Heathcliff]

Fluffy made a video were he discussed the laws he think is best. Watch that it differs abit from your opinion.

I think vassalage is better than centralization.
Serfdom is better than colonies.

So there are two laws were we think the opposite. That shows laws are fairly balanced right now.

Also I think slavery is better early. Then there is an event chain to adopt freedom for free, I use to accept that as freedom is better lategame.
That is fair that some laws are better early and others better lategame.

 

[Stalker0]

I think vassalage is better than centralization.
Serfdom is better than colonies.

Well for those two pairs in particular, my real complaint was that neither choice was all that great, so even if you disagree on which of the two is better, my overall feedback is that both choices are bad

 

[troubleshooting]

I usually adopt centralization early bc I (usually) don’t have much to do with my civics at that point in the game and (usually) can use a little extra science

 

[steveg700]

Great conversation. Insomuch as this seems about as official a forum as OW seems to have, this is the kind of threads I'd like to see more of.

Tyranny and Constitution are both lame design, as they are simply both ways to passively generate loads of cash for what ya already got in exchange for either some civics or training. Tyranny is a little extra lame, as it goes the extra mile with regards to rewarding passivity. It's simply a math exercise. A play may be better-positioned to afford the civics or training, may have more than twice the specialists as troops. I tend not to pick Tyranny so I don't concern myself with losing money for doing something active with my military. Not an interesting decision here.

Colonies is great. Serfdom, needs a boost. Maybe improve on the boost from adjacencies to improvements of the same kind for farms, mines, quarries, sawmills.

 

[Pfeffersack]

I'm still exploring OW in all its glory, so I haven't a full personal picture of the law balance yet...but Elites strikes me. The order system is such a key mechanic and allowing to save up 100 orders sounds like the ability to practically bypass that system for a short period of time (in comparison: The minor sibling of this trick is stacking 2000 training all the time...but that only means 20 stored orders). I'm not in the position to call it unbalance, as I haven't used it yet - but 100 orders is for my taste the volume of orders you usually have available in 2-4 turns depending on empire size/game progress.
Being suddenly able to move units in one turn like someone else in several turns is probably a perfect tool to make a deadly sudden strike and overrun an enemy within a few turns. OW combat system is unforgiving, if you fail to manage your orders - even if you just have to defend: The damage caused from the automatic counterstrike of an attacked unit is minor and vs. ranged enemies, immobile units are sitting ducks. So even if your strategic goal is just to defend the status quo, you have to strike actively on the operational level to achieve it. But what I practically do, if a certain rule suddenly makes the enemy appear before my gates, having a multitude of orders? Can that be resonably be defended? You might rush a decret project or something to act at least a bit better in the second turn of such a war, but that might be too late...
I'm aware that the aggressor in this scenarion has to built up the 100 orders and gives up something in the turns before, so that might be a bit of a balancing factor and you can argue that if you don't plan to go to war you just wouldn't need that order storage and might profit more from the unrest quelling of Guilds - but again: what does happen if your neighbour runs Elite, you not and (s)he decides that its time for war?

 

[KayAU]

I just finished my first full game last night, a point (culture, I guess) victory. It's far too early to me to say which laws are better, but it does seem very dependent on situation and playstyle. I played a tall, peaceful game on a continents map, where space was restricted, and I had just 4 cities for the whole game. My cities were pretty well developed, with lots of urban specialists, and thanks to good relations to my immediate neighbor, decent relations and a body of water separating me from the rest, I was not in much military peril. I ended up having way, way more orders than I needed, so Elites was useless. I did very little fighting and had water to traverse, so Exploration was much more useful to me than Epics would have been in this game.

Anyway, I'm off to play a second game, where I'll maybe know a bit more of what I'm doing.

 

[steveg700]

So this is thread that died an early death. We don't have a lot of strat talk here. If it's happening, I don't know where it's happening.

There are a couple reasons to revisit it.

First, the FilthyRobot interview was illuminating. He said the intent with Slavery/Freedom choice really isn't intended to be an either/or choice when first gained. Slavery was intended to be the de facto choice. The real decision is when to switch over to Freedom.

Second, that no longer matters with patch #92. It's a fairly massive rebalance, and that entails swapping Slavery and Serfdom. Makes slavery way less appealing.

Vassalage and Centralization are modified significantly as well. Centralization may become the next "gotta-have".

I think making the latest patch sticky does it some disservice perhaps. It gets missed. #92 is definitely significant and merits conversation.