Standard Immortal on Continents Plus (Indonesia). SV on Turn 434.
Another intense game that came down to the wire. Portugal was neck and neck with me, and was building the parts (and was going for Global Hegemony all the way to the wire). Ultimately a fun game, notes below:
1) So I've been doing a lot of SV lately, and consistently finding that its more of a hammer game than science one. I usually research future tech 2-3 times before I finish the parts....so its not science that's holding me back in most cases. This could be the way I generally play it (Get Sydney -> Hubble -> Go for CERN -> backfill remaining techs -> build final parts). The only reason I mention that is to firm up a suspicion I've had for a while....I do think the new hydro/wind plants are very strong, but ultimately I'm switching to nuclear plants in my top 2-3 cities...and then hydro/wind in the rest if I'm going for SV. The hammers are ultimately what I need more of, the other yields aren't nearly as important. No balance concern there, I think that's perfect fine...its just important to consider when we think of the balance of late game yields.
2) In general I've been very happy with the later game buildings now. Agribusiness, Factories, Power Plants, and Medical Labs now all have a "good mouthfeel" when I build them...at least in certain cities.
3) I'm getting used to the skirmisher model, and I did find some use for both mounted and skirmishers in this particular game (generally mounted is good in rough and good at pillaging in rough). I'll echo what I said last game, I don't know if this is the best model, but its a workable model and I found a place for all of the units in my gameplay. The exception remains the helicopter as I've noted before.
If I were to pick one "annoyance", its that I find the Anti-warmonger penalty really skews the balance between mounted horse and siege units. For example, if the enemy doesn't get an anti-warmonger penalty I can sometimes one shot a field gun with a lancer...but I can never pull that off with the +30-49 bonus they normally have in my games. That makes a tremendous difference in the strength of siege and mounted horse at that point in the game.
4) The AI was overall very aggressive this game....until right at the very end. Portugal had 2 atomic bombs and a nuclear missile (that I could see so maybe more), and was my next door neighbor, yet never tried to hinder me at the very end. Morroco hilariously declared on me the last turn of the game, fun enough if the xcoms he dropped had been in a slightly different position it could have actually delayed my last part a turn or two because of the pathing. For Portugal, he was engrossed in a number of wars, so that might have been the reason. The other... does the AI recognize when your parts are built or only when they are deployed? I deployed all of my parts together at the end, so its possible the AI did not know I was so close to SV. If that's the case I will start deploying them immediately as I'll consider doing it at the end an exploit.
5) Diplo Unit play on Immortal is still very difficult. One CS for example this game had a 9k influence gap towards the end! Ambassadors are pretty much a waste of hammers and gold for me other than to shore up friends lost by Great Diplomats. Speaking of GDs....
6) One weird thing this game. Even towards the late game there were embassies available on certain CS. This is very strange to me, those slots usually get gobbled up quick...and there were plenty of GDs flying around. So I'm not sure what happened there.
7) Great Merchants. I think we could consider bumping the town scaling of WLTKD by 2 instead of 1 or increasing their base yields. I think the recent changes have made towns more attractive, but the issue is that GMs as a whole are now pretty weak.
8) Happiness: So with happiness and my wide plays, here is generally how it goes down for me:
a) Power expand early
b) Dip into unhappiness, have to connect roads and infrastructure to get back up to good.
c) Global Happiness will fluctuate between 70 - 34 happiness, depending on how aggressive I am with my infrastructure and my text path. I can generally keep it above 50 after I stabilize from my power expansion early (which does take some time). It drops when I need to focus on wars or military for a while. I will on occasion get into the super danger zone, especially if I make some mistakes in war...but its always correctable if I'm paying attention.
d) Local happiness is a big seesaw (especially for tradition plays but I see it on progress wide as well). I grow...become unhappy. Stop growth, build infrastructure, get happy. Grow, become unhappy....rinse and repeat. This is countered by my top cities that generally stay locally happy the whole game and tend to prop up the Global Happiness for me.
e) Early Game: Distress is big. Mid Game its boredom, Late game its poverty. Religious Unrest is the X factor, if I am near strong religious civs this actually generates a noticeable amount of unhappiness.
f) My happiness generally dips significantly sometime in the Industrial era. The X factor here are landmarks and how many resources I've been able to import (sanctions can be a big X factor here as well). Most of the time I need to do one round of public works building (in most if not all cities) to get everything back in the black and move on....the amount of which varies on the X factor. I generally find that doing one round of public works doesn't take too long (4-8 turns).
Overall: My only gripe with happiness is the amount of micromanaging I have to do when the local unhappiness kicks in. I wish the governor was smarter about switching off food when local unhappiness kicks in, as otherwise I waste a lot of yields to the penalties. That said...the system is working. Its a factor in my decision making but not the dominant one (except here or there). It hinders early expansion, but doesn't stop it. Resources are important, trading with other civs is an important part of my happiness maintenance. I generally don't have to worry about global unhappiness too much, but I have to interact with the local system smartly for best results. Public Works are needed but not overt, and gives me flexibility depending on my X factors to overcome unhappiness. I never feel any unhappiness spirals anymore. The tooltip math is still a bit mysterious to me, but I can at least quickly check if I think a few yields will give me a happy or if I just need to reduce the unhappiness through a building (which is ultimately all I really need). While there may be some tweaks here or there...its getting the job done. Congrats G
10) Tech Trading: I think its in a good place. If I'm able to friend up an AI he will generally offer me the option of techs. Its a king ransom each time, but its an option...and one I have both turned down and entertained from time to time...which suggest to me the price is about right.
11) Defensive Pacts: This could be my more passive style, but even when I have units equal to my full supply, I never get a DP ask. The AI loves to buddy up in the mid game, but I never get invited.
12) World Maps: The AI still overvalues these to me, they will often offer an incredible amount of gold for one. Don't get me wrong, the maps can be nice, but they aren't worth that much.
