New Beta - September 17th (9-17)

[Gazebo]

Hey all,

Small update to 15th beta.

• Bugfixes
  • Fixed influence decay bug
• Artistry
  • removed Tourism from unit creation, added +3GAP/Tourism to University and -3% of tourism penalty per number of cities
  • Happiness per GW in a city now 1:2 (was 1:4)
• Tourism
  • Removed tourism boost for fewer cities compared to another player, but increased % penalty for # of non-puppet cities

Not savegame compatible. Link: https://mega.nz/#!ONMRFLIT!_NKGTxKbSGJsULnAoQEPRaj_xFa6fYkh2v7wN37iV6U

Edit: there's a small UI quirk for tourism on the top panel - the % penalty per city is about 2% higher than what it actually shows. I'll fix later.

G

 

[Enginseer]

Not sure if Venice nerf or Venice buff.

 

[Blue Ghost]

I do like the changes, but I'm still a bit concerned about both taking away a big tourism bonus and increasing a penalty, without adding anything to compensate. I guess I'll play a tourism game and see how these changes play out.

 

[Gazebo]

I do like the changes, but I'm still a bit concerned about both taking away a big tourism bonus and increasing a penalty, without adding anything to compensate. I guess I'll play a tourism game and see how these changes play out.

~2% is not a huge penalty. Tourism victories have been much, much more rare lately- far too rare in actuality (diplo or science much more common).

G

 

[Blue Ghost]

~2% is not a huge penalty. Tourism victories have been much, much more rare lately- far too rare in actuality (diplo or science much more common).

G

I was talking more about removing the tourism bonus for having fewer cities. Wouldn't that make cultural victory even harder?

 

[Gazebo]

I was talking more about removing the tourism bonus for having fewer cities. Wouldn't that make cultural victory even harder?

Harder for only very extreme cases (i.e. tiny civs).

G

 

[Blue Ghost]

I'm a bit confused. You say tourism victory is too rare, so you nerf tourism some more? Am I missing something here?

 

[kawyua]

I'm a bit confused. You say tourism victory is too rare, so you nerf tourism some more? Am I missing something here?

The ai doesn't abuse it, the player does. The mechanic of more tourism for having fewer cities is more troublesome than it is to balance around with how everything in the game scales.

"diplo or science much more common" - I think this should be the norm, right? ai sims with military and cultural victories are indicative of runaways, I'm pretty sure. I think I can make that statement. I think its really hard to maintain a significant runaway science lead against ai with all the come back mechanics around. I don't know how ai win diplos though.

 

[Blue Ghost]

The ai doesn't abuse it, the player does. The mechanic of more tourism for having fewer cities is more troublesome than it is to balance around with how everything in the game scales.

That doesn't answer my question. I understand that there are issues with the mechanic, and I'm in support of removing it. I'm just pointing out that removing the bonus makes cultural victory weaker, and asking how that will affect balance when CV is acknowledged to be already comparatively weak.

 

[kawyua]

That doesn't answer my question. I understand that there are issues with the mechanic, and I'm in support of removing it. I'm just pointing out that removing the bonus makes cultural victory weaker, and asking how that will affect balance when CV is acknowledged to be already comparatively weak.

Gazebo just buffed artistry at 9/15 beta and I'm not even sure cultural victories were bad before the patch. Anyways, I don't think there were any widely accepted claims that cultural victories are problematic even if it has been nerfed a lot. It's all up in the air, in terms of what's bad or not, as far I can tell.

 

[Gazebo]

That doesn't answer my question. I understand that there are issues with the mechanic, and I'm in support of removing it. I'm just pointing out that removing the bonus makes cultural victory weaker, and asking how that will affect balance when CV is acknowledged to be already comparatively weak.

Tourism has been getting some small buffs here and there recently. Taking away the culture-city disparity bonus hurts humans much more than the AI, but shouldn't have an affect on CVs generally (esp. since I slightly increased the per city % penalty). Really, it was more of a refactoring of systems to match existing systems.

G

 

[tu_79]

<<Happiness per GW in a city now 1:2 (was 1:4)>>
Oh. So it was local happiness. Fine! This means we always want them in even numbers in each city.

If it were <<1 Unhappiness removed per 2 GW in a city>> then I'd feel forced to spread GW to smaller, unhappier cities, for a wide empire, or enjoy stacking all those GW in the same city for synergies, for a tall empire.

 

[matlajs]

cultural victory in august version was not easy at all. if AI keep in techs and culture output, there will ever be at least some civs i can not influence. After travel ban( and AI will pass it no matter how many votes you have) + another 50% penalty for diferent ideology, i can think about change a victory condtions.

 

[Gokudo01]

Tourism has been getting some small buffs here and there recently. Taking away the culture-city disparity bonus hurts humans much more than the AI, but shouldn't have an affect on CVs generally (esp. since I slightly increased the per city % penalty). Really, it was more of a refactoring of systems to match existing systems.

G

I don't understand the meaning of this sentence : how increasing a malus against a victory path doesn't affect it.
Now you get more malus per city and you get less tourism output if you stay small.
so the only case where you can see an improvement is if you play wide and you get artistry ....

 

[CrazyG]

If cultural victory under-performs its pretty easy to buff; we can just add a couple points of tourism to something like an opera house or museum. Not that I think its necessarily underperforming

 

[Owlbebach]

Well, after my friend's most recent game i started to think that sometimes CV is not that easy (and maybe even could not be achieved sometimes). However 450 thousands culture on turn 270 is something that you do not see every game...

 

[Gazebo]

I don't understand the meaning of this sentence : how increasing a malus against a victory path doesn't affect it.
Now you get more malus per city and you get less tourism output if you stay small.
so the only case where you can see an improvement is if you play wide and you get artistry ....

The city bonus benefited small empires only (usually human) versus big AI empires. The new system does the same thing in essence, however it is more stick and less carrot. The wide player makes less tourism, so the small empire still has an advantage, just in a different way. City penalty was double dipping.

G

 

[Ziad]

It's for the best. A lot of the times I would become influential relatively early in the game when I wasn't even pursuing cultural victory.

That being said, I hope it doesn't become too difficult in the late game.

 

[Aldebaran1997]

New version in 2 days. You awe me, G.

 

[Gazebo]

New version in 2 days. You awe me, G.

Betas always come fast and loose.