[NFP] Medieval Era Policy Elimination Thread

[kaspergm]

Chivalry (21)
Civil Prestige (ELIMINATED) (3-3) - When is there not better cards to slot into a yellow slot?
Craftsmen (21)
Feudal Contract (18)
Gothic Architecture (19)
Merchant Confederation (26)
Naval Infrastructure (24)
Professional Army (29) (28+1) - stupidly powerful, to the extend that it alters game balance. I hate the fact that you can slot in - multi upgrade - slot out. It basically means you never upgrade at full cost.
Retainers (11)
Retinues (21)
Serfdom (31)
Trade Confederation (9)

 

[hhhhhh]

It seems like my post (#55) is ignored. Use the following for future votings:

Chivalry (21)
Craftsmen (21)
Feudal Contract (15)
Gothic Architecture (19)
Merchant Confederation (26)
Naval Infrastructure (24)
Professional Army (29)
Retainers (11)
Retinues (21)
Serfdom (31)
Trade Confederation (10)

 

[Vargas1]

Chivalry (22) (21+1)
Craftsmen (21)
Feudal Contract (12) (15-3)
Gothic Architecture (19)
Merchant Confederation (26)
Naval Infrastructure (24)
Professional Army (29)
Retainers (11)
Retinues (21)
Serfdom (31)
Trade Confederation (10)

Chivalry - melee and ranged will usually be built in ancient/classical and upgraded, but I often won’t prebuild chariots. If I’m warring in the mid game, this is how I bang out my knights.

Feudal Contract - see above. Rarely used unless I’m in trouble and need to replenish crossbows.

 

[enKage]

I wanted to upvote Aestheticswith TS easy adjecencies now, but suprisingly eliminated

Trade confederation - requires 2 card slots, to be viable (the second card is 2f2h from trades to allies), still you would get more yields from aesthetics with easy entartainment djecencies
-3
Feudal contract +1
Probably I use +50% cards the most among military cards in this era with a temporary relacement of prof. army

Chivalry (22)
Craftsmen (21)
Feudal Contract (13)
Gothic Architecture (19)
Merchant Confederation (26)
Naval Infrastructure (24)
Professional Army (29)
Retainers (11)
Retinues (21)
Serfdom (31)
Trade Confederation (7)

 

[GinandTonic]

Chivalry (22)
Craftsmen (22) Craftsmen is a red card now. Whenever you don't need a red card this can be slotted in over conscription or retainers.
Feudal Contract (13)
Gothic Architecture (19)
Merchant Confederation (26)
Naval Infrastructure (24)
Professional Army (29)
Retainers (8) Craftsmen is a red card now. Generally I'm only desperate for amenities if I'm at war, in which case my units are not garrisons.
Retinues (21)
Serfdom (31)
Trade Confederation (7)

 

[Noble Zarkon]

Chivalry (22)
Craftsmen (22)
Feudal Contract (13)
Gothic Architecture (19)
Merchant Confederation (27)
Naval Infrastructure (24)
Professional Army (29)
Retainers (5)
Retinues (21)
Serfdom (31)
Trade Confederation (7)

Retainers (8-3=5) gives too little value and how often do you have the troops spare for this?
Merchant Confederation (26+1=27) by contrast this gives amazing value, by this time you should have double digit envoys in place.

 

[Duke William of Normandy]

Chivalry (22)
Craftsmen (22)
Feudal Contract (13)
Gothic Architecture (19)
Merchant Confederation (27)
Naval Infrastructure (24)
Professional Army (29)
Retainers (2) (5-2)
Retinues (21)
Serfdom (32) (31+1)
Trade Confederation (7)

Retainers: Basically what others have said. I'll let someone else kill it.

Serfdom: Always plug this until Public Works becomes available. Extra Build Charges always helps, and save you Production by not having to produce as many Builders.

 

[Francel]

Thought of the day: A card kept slotted as little as possible can be stronger than a card slotted many more turns. Case in point, allowing the first envoy to count as 2 instead of 1 finished much higher than extra 2 envoy points per turn. Nonetheless, you would only want to use diplomatic league on turns in which you are sending an envoy to a city state for the first time, as it's otherwise useless.

Chivalry (19) (22-3) - Cav are good for pillaging and defeating enemy units, but a little less effective on the defense (because they cannot stay in an encampment or city center and attack) and struggle against walls on offense without either siege tower or unusual cases of Akkad/Byzantium. Anyway, I find myself tending to build many more xbows than knights/coursers.
Craftsmen (22)
Feudal Contract (14) (13+1) - Crossbows are an excellent medieval era unit for defense and offense that also cost no resources; this lets you build them 50% faster.
Gothic Architecture (19)
Merchant Confederation (27)
Naval Infrastructure (24)
Professional Army (29)
Retainers (2)
Retinues (21)
Serfdom (32)
Trade Confederation (7)

 

[bengalryan9]

Chivalry (19)
Craftsmen (22)
Feudal Contract (11) (14-3)
Gothic Architecture (19)
Merchant Confederation (27)
Naval Infrastructure (24)
Professional Army (29)
Retainers (3) (2+1)
Retinues (21)
Serfdom (32)
Trade Confederation (7)

Feudal Contract (11) (14-3) - Meh. I'll jut upgrade my archers and warriors instead.

Retainers (3) (2+1)

how often do you have the troops spare for this?

As a peaceful player who only keeps an army around so that the AI don't declare on me? Literally all the time. It may not be as powerful as some of the other cards on this list but it's so easy to take advantage of and it takes a slot that I'm not likely to have anything better to put in 90% of the time that I think it has plenty of value.

 

[MrRadar]

Chivalry (19)
Craftsmen (22)
Feudal Contract (11)
Gothic Architecture (19)
Merchant Confederation (27)
Naval Infrastructure (24)
Professional Army (29)
Retainers (3)
Retinues (22) (21+1)
Serfdom (32)
Trade Confederation (4) (7-3)

Retinues (22) (21+1) I've found this card very useful in situations when I was hard pressed for strategic resources.

Trade Confederation (4) (7-3) At this point most of my trade routes are still domestic.

 

[Mount Suribachi]

Chivalry (19)
Craftsmen (22)
Feudal Contract (11)
Gothic Architecture (19)
Merchant Confederation (27)
Naval Infrastructure (24)
Professional Army (29)
Retainers (4)
Retinues (22)
Serfdom (32)
Trade Confederation (1)

Retainers 4 (3+1): The question was asked, how many spare units do you have? The answer as someone who plays peacefully is lots. Eurekas requires a swordsman, a knight, a spearman, 3 archers, 2 bombards.....you usually want 6-10 cities in the mid-game, this card gives you 6-10 amenities from units that otherwise are doing nothing once they've popped their boosts.

Trade Confederation 1 (4-3): I used to use this card all the time, then I realised how thoroughly mediocre it is.

 

[hhhhhh]

Chivalry (16) (19-3) All the card left are pretty good so this is a difficult choice for me. One tricky thing about this card is it is unlocked by Divine Right and sometimes people don't even do that civic.
Craftsmen (22)
Feudal Contract (11)
Gothic Architecture (19)
Merchant Confederation (27)
Naval Infrastructure (24)
Professional Army (29)
Retainers (4)
Retinues (22)
Serfdom (32)
Trade Confederation (2) (1+1) I have to upvote this again. This card is complicated - it's not immediately useful like some of the cards here, but can be useful if you have a lot of trade routes later. Especially with democracy government.

 

[Leucarum]

Chivalry (16)
Craftsmen (22)
Feudal Contract (8)
Gothic Architecture (19)
Merchant Confederation (28)
Naval Infrastructure (24)
Professional Army (29)
Retainers (4)
Retinues (22)
Serfdom (32)
Trade Confederation (2)

I'll downvote feudal contract (11-3) as you nornally would want to be upgrading into these units not building them. I'll put my upvote into merchant confederation (27+1) which can add up to a big amount of gold pretty quickly...

 

[JhGf_123]

Chivalry (16)
Craftsmen (19) (22-3)
Feudal Contract (8)
Gothic Architecture (19)
Merchant Confederation (29) (28+1)
Naval Infrastructure (24)
Professional Army (29)
Retainers (4)
Retinues (22)
Serfdom (32)
Trade Confederation (2)

Craftsmen (19) (22-3) I think this is being overrated. Yes, it's handy that it's now a military card. But how many industrial zones do you really build? Me, I personally only build three or four, depending on the size of the empire, and most not until right before factories come around.

Merchant Confederation (29) (28+1) Haven't upvoted this yet. Having recently installed that mod which lets you see exactly how many yields each card will give you, I really rate Merchant Confederation—it adds up to a lot of gold, for no effort at all.

 

[TCBB]

Chivalry (17) (16+1)
Craftsmen (19)
Feudal Contract (8)
Gothic Architecture (19)
Merchant Confederation (29)
Naval Infrastructure (21) (24-3)
Professional Army (29)
Retainers (4)
Retinues (22)
Serfdom (32)
Trade Confederation (2)

Naval Infrastructure (21) (24-3) Three arguments against it.

• 1.) it’s located on a dead-end branch civic with a hard-to-trigger inspiration
• 2.) it’s main power comes from Shipyards, which are expensive and don’t come online for a while
• 3.) in some games, you simply won’t have enough Harbours / Shipyards to justify it taking up a valuable economic slot

Chivalry (17) (16+1) As someone else remarked, it’s common not to build cavalry units until Knights or even Cuirassiers (because Heavy Chariots kinda suck). That makes this card much more valuable than the other “+50% to unit production” ones.

 

[DogeEnricoDandolo]

Chivalry (17)
Craftsmen (19)
Feudal Contract (8)
Gothic Architecture (19)
Merchant Confederation (30) A nice boost of Gold that I use almost every game.
Naval Infrastructure (21)
Professional Army (29)
Retainers (4)
Retinues (22)
Serfdom (32)
Trade Confederation (ELIMINATED) Most likely in Medieval I won't have enough Trade Routes to make this card useful, and later in the game when I have many Trade Routes, there are much more powerful opions.

 

[Josephias]

Chivalry (17)
Craftsmen (16)
Feudal Contract (8)
Gothic Architecture (19)
Merchant Confederation (30)
Naval Infrastructure (21)
Professional Army (29)
Retainers (4)
Retinues (22)
Serfdom (33)

Craftsmen (19-3=16): Unless I downvote Retainers twice in a row, it's becoming difficult to select. Even becoming now a Red Card, as some others have said and except for specific cases, it will not provide much benefit until later stages with more IZ are completed, but at these times more juicy red card options become available (e.g. Military Research, Wars of Religion). In medieval, if you are at war, probably you might get more production from Chivalry/Feudal Contract. And if you play peaceful, you probably want to minimize red slots nevertheless.

Serfdom (32+1=33): Before or after I had to vote this one. It gives a big push to your land development at a moment when all your cities start to grow and work more tiles. It is rare a game I will not slot it. And should take the lead over Merchant Confederation.

 

[canadamufc]

Wow, this list is getting real short.

Chivalry (17)
Craftsmen (17) (16+1) Production can go anywhere you like. You need production to do the things you want, and getting an IZ+Coal Power Plant+Craftsmen is the key to this. These days, Industrial Zone adjacency is very easy to obtain, so you can easily get a 6+ Industrial zone which could be doubled to +12. This is minimum, with good planning you can get that far higher all the way up to a +10 or 11 base. You can use that city as a builder pump or maybe a settler spam, either way it really helps your empire. Production from one city can help your empire as a whole. Being a red card is only an extra bonus as well. Military slots are usually dead slots that are hard to fill in games other then domination, and this card fills that gap.
Feudal Contract (8)
Gothic Architecture (16) (19-3) Not the worst card, and it definitely has its uses, however I think its bonus is pretty meager compared to the rest. +15% is nice, but it wont change the tide tremendously. Also, and yes I understand circumstances could be different, but Craftsmen could help speed up wonder production more than this (although it is best if they are put in together).
Merchant Confederation (30)
Naval Infrastructure (21)
Professional Army (29)
Retainers (4)
Retinues (22)
Serfdom (33)

 

[João III]

Chivalry (17)
Craftsmen (17)
Feudal Contract (8)
Gothic Architecture (16)
Merchant Confederation (30)
Naval Infrastructure (21)
Professional Army (29)
Retainers (1) = 4-3→ Out of the remaining policies, this is the one I've gotten the least out of.
Retinues (22)
Serfdom (34) = 33 + 1 → More builder charges are a universal good, an automatic slot-in for me

 

[Archon_Wing]

Chivalry (17)
Craftsmen (17)
Feudal Contract (5) 8-3. If you're waiting until Machinery to start building Crossbows, you're doing it wrong. And honestly, Medieval/Renaissance warfare is awful in general given how much stronger walls get. So warfare in these eras is usually going to be either a fast overwhelming attack before defenses get too high or pillaging. None of it involves spamming crossbows or even musketmen.

Using this card for defense is even more nonsensical, since you might as well have garrisoned archers ready to upgrade. You'd be better off running Limes, Veterancy, or even Bastions to create cheap defenses that would stop attacks cold. Note that these things are available long before these eras. Walls don't cost upkeep either, and encampments have minimal.

Defense should be proactive, not reactive. Building units in response to an attack and thus letting the enemy free reign to ravage your countryside for a few turns or more by this point in the game is simply bad planning. If Montezuma has been unfriendly to you for the last 50 turns and has 3x your military score, why would you wait until now to build such common units?

And of course, this is not to exclude options like just flat out buying your troops (Grand Master's Chapel comes here) and this is a good option for the greedy.

Gothic Architecture (17) 16+1 I can understand why people don't care for this card. It comes at a leaf civic and it doesn't actually last very long given how fast you can skip Renaissance which doesn't really have much wonders anyways. However, some of the most important wonders of the game (Kilwa, Forbidden City, etc) are here so it can come in handy
Merchant Confederation (30)
Naval Infrastructure (21)
Professional Army (29)
Retainers (1)
Retinues (22)
Serfdom (34)

 

[Vizurok]

Chivalry (14) (17-3) Now that I am thinking about, it might be possible that I have never ever used this card at all. Obviously, you don't need it in peaceful games, but I don't really care for it in Domination as well. By the time this card becomes online, you should be already snowballing and wreaking havoc with your troops set up in the earlier eras. One could argue that this card helps with providing additional troops but hard-building is just so inefficient: it takes time to build the units and it takes even more time to move them to the front from your core productive cities - if you need reinforcements, you are much better off with purchasing (faith with Grandmaster's Chapel is very powerful) units next to the action.
Craftsmen (17)
Feudal Contract (5)
Gothic Atchitecture (17)
Merchant Confederation (31) (30+1) I am a Classical Republic - Merchant Republic guy, and will vehemently defend those governments but I will also admit that having to play the early green cards is not optimal. Merchant Confederation solves this problems and provides a permanent solution for your green slot. Going envoy-heavy (taking care of doubling the first envoy, completing quests) is a useful strategy on its own, so gaining extra rewards for your envoys seems even a little snowball-y.
Naval Infrastructure (21)
Professional Army (29)
Retainers (1)
Retinues (22)
Serfdom (34)