New Concept Idea: Converting Tourism into Influence / Spy Speed

[Stalker0]

Every so often I get the itch to take another look at tourism. Though we have tried some ideas in the past, I still feel that tourism is that "black sheep" yield, unless you are going CV, you just don't care a lick about it. So here is another attempt.

With buildings like the hospital and agribusiness, we have successfully given new life to late game food by allowing the yield to be used for new purposes. So the thought being...why not tourism as well?

So here is the concept.

Hotel: (in addition to normal ability). 10% of Per Turn Tourism is converted into influence, applied to all met city states.

So you can use your tourism to apply some diplomatic influence with city states...which makes sense in the context of tourism in civ 5. Tourism is in many ways a "culture influence", so it makes sense it could be used to influence CS.


Concept 2 is the idea of bringing spying back to the late game (at least in part). Currently spying pretty much drops off after constabularies, but it would be interesting to see it come back a bit. So this idea.

National Intelligence Center (in addition to normal ability): Gain +10% spying rate for every influence level you have over the opposing civ.

So in this case you are using your cultural influence with another civ to gain intel about them, which again I think makes thematic sense.


Thoughts on the concepts?

 

[CrazyG]

Though we have tried some ideas in the past, I still feel that tourism is that "black sheep" yield, unless you are going CV, you just don't care a lick about it. So here is another attempt.

I don't have an issue with tourism being sometimes unimportant.

 

[Tantro]

Tourism already has some benefits outside of CV. Valuable trade routes, up to 20% growth in parent city, fewer turns for spies to establish and cities retain more buildings and population on conquest.

 

[JamesNinelives]

Would it be interesting if tourism gave some benefit to the country the tourists were coming from? Right now it's kind of like citizens who travel abroad is a bad thing lol.

Or maybe tourism giving some benefit to happiness? If people want to fly in from all over the world, it must be worth something to live there year-round ^^.

Also might be interesting if tourism went down a lot to/from anyone you are at war with. Not sure if this is the case already, but that would obviously happen, right? Similarly I wonder if denouncing people should discourage people from that country travelling to yours (because they might not feel welcome after all). On the flip side, having a declaration of friendship or a defensive pact would absolutely encourage people to learn more about their neighbours.

 

[crdvis16]

I like Stalker's idea personally, though the numbers might need to be tweaked to stay balanced (10% of tourism converted to per turn influence could get REALLY out of hand quickly).

My other concern would be that it just becomes a win more mechanic. Often times the tourism leader is already doing great so giving him a bunch of free influence might lead to even worse runaways.

 

[Psikus]

I like the idea of tying tourism to diplomacy, but I don't think passive influence per turn to all CSs is a great mechanic - we already have too much influence inflation as it is. Maybe something that works on diplomatic missions? How about:
- When you send a diplomat to a city state, other civs lose a % of the influence you gained, based on your level of influence with that civ (between 10% and 50%).

 

[lunker]

I really like this idea, though I haven't really considered any balancing implications. The other victory conditions have a lot of side effects that help you compete in the other victory conditions but tourism only seems to marginally help with domination. You can often dabble in multiple VC's as to not keep your eggs in one basket but Tourism usually feels like an all or nothing affair. I think something like this will help make "off"-tourism more of a viable strategy, allowing for more interesting ways to build your civ.

 

[DeAnno]

I actually kind of think the problem is that you first start getting Tourism around the Classical age, and it doesn't do much of anything for a long time. I would like to see more uses that rewarded it some in the earlygame, though the effect on trade routes is nice at least.

 

[Stalker0]

I don't have an issue with tourism being sometimes unimportant.

To me the crux of the issue (which granted is only an issue to some of us), is that the benefits of tourism sans a CV are not worth investing in. Nothing else really works this way, all of the other yields work together to provide game end conditions. Tourism is the strange exception, which means the things that generate the yield are nearly completely ignored for many playstyles. That has always rubbed me the wrong way.

 

[Kim Dong Un]

Why do nations want tourism in the first place? Money...

To make tourism more lucrative for all styles, tie it more directly into gold generation. Right now tourism only affects gold indirectly through ETRs (the value of a given ETR will vary based on your influence over that civ who's receiving the route), while there are many civs and styles that won't utilize ETRs at all throughout any given game. However, if civs received extra gold directly on a per-turn basis corresponding to their tourism output, the impact increases across the board and tourism gains some other purpose besides simply pursuing a CV. Currently you only want tourism for tall play, but if all civs gained a certain % of gpt depending on their tourism with other civs, it would make it a bit more viable for all styles and give incentive for all civs to try and accumulate at least some -- e.g., if Austria is generating 100 gpt while Russia's influence over Austria is "Exotic", Russia would receive 2% of Austria's gpt, meanwhile Austria's influence could simultaneously be "Familiar" with Russia and grant her 4% of Russia's gpt, etc.

This could represent each civ's population and economies exchanging currency between each other without direct trade, and you would no longer want to neglect tourism because this would be cumulative across all civs present in each game. Numbers could be adjusted, but here's another quick example of what it'd look like in a standard game using the values: Exotic = 2%, Familiar = 4%, Popular = 6%, Influential = 8%, Dominant = 10%

Assuming the other 7 civs all generate 100gpt (for simplification) and my influence levels with those civs are Exotic x 3, Popular x 2, Influential x 1, and Dominant x 1, I would then be receiving 6 + 12 + 8 + 10 = 36 gpt. Now that looks like a lot initially, but you'd also have to consider the net gain/loss with gpt you're losing to other civs based on their influence levels over you. Again, it needs to be impactful otherwise tourism stays trivial for everyone not going CV. My only initial concern would be that players near the bottom might be unfairly penalized due to usually being "dominated" by other civs in the influence category (regardless if those other civs are playing for CV or not) simply from lagging too far behind in everything else.

This is just an idea that jumped out at me, so I don't know how well it'd play out in practice, but you're welcome to tinker with the idea.