Philosophical/Industrious?

[Colossian]

I suppose one could try to mitigate the power of the combination by givng the civ a terrible unique unit and a terrible unique building.

And a terrible land. More Tundra and Ice.

 

[Tristan daCunha]

A worker with 1 movement would be pretty bad.

But they could build forts twice as fast.

 

[azzaman333]

Such a combo is not overpowered.

 

[eldar]

Phi+Ind might be overpowered in some ways, but as someone pointed out, eventually the GPPs needed will spiral so high you'll miss out on the really important ones if you're looking long. It's very nice to be able to squirrel away a bunch of GEs for the Space Elevator

Now, Aggressive/Protective - that's overpowered. In fact Protective is overpowered full stop. City defenders built with the equivalent of Level 2 promotions? Only need a 'Rax+Vassalage to get City Garrison III+Drill I on a LB? Yuck.

 

[druidravi]

It isn't that powerful at all. It's powerful in lower levels but tell me where on emperor + would you build so many wonders assuming non-archipalego starting?. I would build Great Library and national wonders , if I start with Mystism might try Oracle thats it.
Philosophical/Financial is overpowered on isolated starts. Spritual/philosophical is strong as well. Aggresive/charismatic should take the cake really. Charismatic is not just simply a warmonger trait. It is an economic trait as well because of the +2 hapiness which is huge in early game. Financial/charismatic is powerful as well and Philosophical/charismatic will be nice but is missing.

And of course Augustus Ceaser the daddy of all traits + Ultimate unit. Whatever combo you give to the other leaders it will never be as powerful as Augustus.

 

[aronnax]

Theres an easy way to solve this, murder it first

 

[Blaarg]

It isn't that powerful at all. It's powerful in lower levels but tell me where on emperor + would you build so many wonders assuming non-archipalego starting?. I would build Great Library and national wonders , if I start with Mystism might try Oracle thats it.
Philosophical/Financial is overpowered on isolated starts. Spritual/philosophical is strong as well. Aggresive/charismatic should take the cake really. Charismatic is not just simply a warmonger trait. It is an economic trait as well because of the +2 hapiness which is huge in early game. Financial/charismatic is powerful as well and Philosophical/charismatic will be nice but is missing.

And of course Augustus Ceaser the daddy of all traits + Ultimate unit. Whatever combo you give to the other leaders it will never be as powerful as Augustus.

What is the ultimate trait? He's what, Organized/Creative, right? I play Vanilla, so I don't know, did they change either of those. They're both kinda good, but I wouldn't go so far as to say either of them are the best.

 

[Mehmed100]

If Firaxis added a leader with Philosphical and Industrious it would be ultimate for builders. Since there are already leaders like Cyrus Char/Imp Genghis Agr/Imp and Churchill Char/Pro for warmongering, why not Phi/Ind?

 

[Scaramanga]

Now, Aggressive/Protective - that's overpowered. In fact Protective is overpowered full stop. City defenders built with the equivalent of Level 2 promotions? Only need a 'Rax+Vassalage to get City Garrison III+Drill I on a LB? Yuck.

I don't have any experience with Protective myself but I can see your point. I like how the Protective trait is designed to be the anti-thesis of Aggressive and the concept of a conservative and perservative leader.

 

[druidravi]

What is the ultimate trait? He's what, Organized/Creative, right? I play Vanilla, so I don't know, did they change either of those. They're both kinda good, but I wouldn't go so far as to say either of them are the best.

It is not exactly the ultimate trait but a just overpowered synergy with its ultimate unit. Creative+ organized you can expand to huge size by conquering with your preatorians and organized with half civic costs and 1/2 couthouses make sure that you can maintain the empire while creative will make sure your captured cities become productive very soon. Even if you are in a isolated start creative+ organized are good enough builder traits.

 

[KMadCandy]

Now, Aggressive/Protective - that's overpowered. In fact Protective is overpowered full stop. City defenders built with the equivalent of Level 2 promotions? Only need a 'Rax+Vassalage to get City Garrison III+Drill I on a LB? Yuck.

i like using Protective offensively too. make some of those LBs/CBs CG1+Drill3 instead of CG3+Drill1. when they grow up to be riflemen or higher, they can inflict a lot of pain, and they still do well protecting your newly capture cities. Drill4 is a superlovely promotion, a big jump from Drill 3 (it adds 2 guaranteed first strikes, not 2 first strike chances), and is usually hard to get but much easier if you're protective. caveat: gunpowder units can't earn drill promotions so you have to do the 2-4 promotions while it's still an archer.

drill4 archery units upgraded to mech infantry are heinous. and they have march, so if they do get a scratch they still never need to stop!

 

[chessplayer]

Phi/Ind too strong

 

[kniteowl]

Try being the operative word. We didn't even have unique buildings in vanilla, so we can obviously get by without, and I've played many many games without touching the unique units. They're hardly essential.

Of course, if the unique building/unit was an intentionally underpowered version of the normal one, well, that's a different story... though I can't think of anything appropriate that would be crippling enough.

How about a UU Explorer, it's almost never used and you can't attack with an explorer. Their a UU combined with Overpowered Traits. Unless they make the UU explorer somehow usable... maybe give it Free Woodsman II and Guerilla II Promotions or Increase it's Strength to 6 then they'd make reasonable Stack Defenders.

I believe the Traits People Consider Overpowered are

Fin/Org
Phil/Ind
Agg/Cha


Financial/Organized was Crazy in Vanilla, The power of Financial and half cost Civics and Cheap Court houses Made Wars cheaper and allowed you to keep the Science Slider at a high rate which allowed you to speed through the tech tree, I believe A LOT of people loved this combination. I believe the makers took this combination because they soon realized how overpowered it was, it was the ultimate Tech Whoring Combination in my opinion.

I've reed somewhere I've Forgotten... that the makers of Civ tested out Phil/Ind, in Civ4 Vanilla Alpha or Beta... I'm not exactly sure... but this is from memory and they realized it was very overpowered compared to other trait combinations because of it's powerful synergy and chain reaction, it was so powerful that it basically broke the game, like the Civil Service Slingshot pre-2.08 patch.

Ind led to quick Wonder led to GPP, Phil increased GPP by 100% which led to early Great Person, Great Person led to early Advantage, Early Advantage ultimately led to easily won game... Well that's what'd I'd Assume, Someone here could make a mod (Probably change Gandhi's traits) and test it out for yourself then post your opinion on this thread.

Agg/Cha would be the Ultimate Warmonger Combination, Agg/Pro Would be 2nd, Drafting with Agg/Prot combined with Barracks and Theology, and you get Equivalent to a Level 5 Unit Fresh out of a city and you can do this 3 times a turn on a standard map, combine this with Globe Threatre... ... ... You can imagine the results.

Agg/Cha would be overpowered because I'd assume you can go through the Combat Promotion Line quite quickly once you have Vassalage and Theology, Combined with barracks, you'd get a unit with 7XP, 1XP away from level 4, which would allow you Three, Free Promotions, high level Promotions because you can Free Combat 1 also, You can Quite Easily get Shock, Cover and Formation Quite easily to decrease the loses from counter units. Although you'd have to test it out with a mod to check out if it's really overpowered. It'd have to be someone with a UU that doesn't benefit from both Agg & Cha.

I heard Someone else on another thread say Freddrick's old traits Cre/Phil post 2.08 patch could possibly also be overpowered, a beeline to Writing and whipping those cheap libraries up and assigning those Scientist Specialist allows you an early GS for a free tech or a Academy in you capital. Almost like half a Civil Service Slingshot.

 

[azzaman333]

There are already overpowered leaders, like Elizabeth's Philo/Financial, Augustus' Cre/Org + Praet and Ghandi's Spi/Phi + Fast Worker. They wouldn't be any more overpowered than what the Agri civs from C3C were.

 

[druidravi]

How about a UU Explorer, it's almost never used and you can't attack with an explorer. Their a UU combined with Overpowered Traits. Unless they make the UU explorer somehow usable... maybe give it Free Woodsman II and Guerilla II Promotions or Increase it's Strength to 6 then they'd make reasonable Stack Defenders.

I believe the Traits People Consider Overpowered are

Fin/Org
Phil/Ind
Agg/Cha


Financial/Organized was Crazy in Vanilla, The power of Financial and half cost Civics and Cheap Court houses Made Wars cheaper and allowed you to keep the Science Slider at a high rate which allowed you to speed through the tech tree, I believe A LOT of people loved this combination. I believe the makers took this combination because they soon realized how overpowered it was, it was the ultimate Tech Whoring Combination in my opinion.

I've reed somewhere I've Forgotten... that the makers of Civ tested out Phil/Ind, in Civ4 Vanilla Alpha or Beta... I'm not exactly sure... but this is from memory and they realized it was very overpowered compared to other trait combinations because of it's powerful synergy and chain reaction, it was so powerful that it basically broke the game, like the Civil Service Slingshot pre-2.08 patch.

Ind led to quick Wonder led to GPP, Phil increased GPP by 100% which led to early Great Person, Great Person led to early Advantage, Early Advantage ultimately led to easily won game... Well that's what'd I'd Assume, Someone here could make a mod (Probably change Gandhi's traits) and test it out for yourself then post your opinion on this thread.

Agg/Cha would be the Ultimate Warmonger Combination, Agg/Pro Would be 2nd, Drafting with Agg/Prot combined with Barracks and Theology, and you get Equivalent to a Level 5 Unit Fresh out of a city and you can do this 3 times a turn on a standard map, combine this with Globe Threatre... ... ... You can imagine the results.

Agg/Cha would be overpowered because I'd assume you can go through the Combat Promotion Line quite quickly once you have Vassalage and Theology, Combined with barracks, you'd get a unit with 7XP, 1XP away from level 4, which would allow you Three, Free Promotions, high level Promotions because you can Free Combat 1 also, You can Quite Easily get Shock, Cover and Formation Quite easily to decrease the loses from counter units. Although you'd have to test it out with a mod to check out if it's really overpowered. It'd have to be someone with a UU that doesn't benefit from both Agg & Cha.

I heard Someone else on another thread say Freddrick's old traits Cre/Phil post 2.08 patch could possibly also be overpowered, a beeline to Writing and whipping those cheap libraries up and assigning those Scientist Specialist allows you an early GS for a free tech or a Academy in you capital. Almost like half a Civil Service Slingshot.

Yep and financial + creative is way too powerful with those cheap libraries. Philosophical + Creative is an SE dream followed closely by Philosophical+spiritual which gandhi already has and creative+ spiritual which hatty has. But it is quite funny though when the game was first released Hatty was considered a very weak leader .
There are basically t 4 warrring traits

Aggresive - for the cheap barracks + combat 1 on melee and gunpowder

Charismatic - for the cheaper promotions and also the possible +2 hapiness in
beginning which is huge and leads to more troops being
produced.

Imperial - those GG's generated can either be used as warlords leading
your army or joined as military instructors getting high level
units from the city. Faster settler production also helps you
capture those military resources faster beating others to it.

Protective - Good archery and gunpowder units with cg1 and drill 1
promotions. It benifits gunpowder units and crossbows more than
other units since in the beginning with a small empire you would
be more fighting to keep enemy units from pillaging than
defending in a city. In the lategame when empires become big
and railroads hasten travel enemy units can rapidly attack your
border cities with huge SOD's . City garrison helps deal with it
particualry as draftees are better

Out of these Agressive and chrismatic are more powerful than protective and imperial. We have these trait combos

Agressive+ Imperial Shaka
Agressive + protective Tokugawa
Charismatic + Imperial Cyrus
Charismatic + protective Churchill
Imperial + protective


Only combo left is Agg+ Charismatic which are indeed a strong warmonering cynergy . I don't remember whether Imperial+ Protective is there and even if it is there should be weak atleast in singleplayer.

 

[kniteowl]

Yep and financial + creative is way too powerful with those cheap libraries. Philosophical + Creative is an SE dream followed closely by Philosophical+spiritual which gandhi already has and creative+ spiritual which hatty has. But it is quite funny though when the game was first released Hatty was considered a very weak leader .

I don't think Fin/Cre and Phil/Cre were removed from Warlord because of the cheap libraries though... because the Cheap Libraries for Creative wasn't added until after the patch. Although I don't think we'll see those Trait combinations in the next Expansion pack.

Here's another possible Overpowered Combination. Imp/Exp Cheap settlers and Worker lead to a Very Fast Expansion. Just Oracle Beeline to COL to deal with the maintenance cost.

 

[eldar]

Someone up there mentioned Praets... well there's always going to be a "Best UU" and "Worst UU", but IMHO Praets come so far ahead on the "Best" count, they probably are overpowered too (CS is a long way off, especially for AIs and especially in Warlords). Never mind leader traits. But Aggr/Prot, that's too much, and I think Toku is now Aggr/Prot?! I certainly know that if I meet a Prot AI, I pretty much give up ideas of hitting them quick unless I get really early Copper.

 

[Capt Buttkick]

How about a UU Explorer, it's almost never used and you can't attack with an explorer.

I've recently found some use for explorers.
I had a monarch game in which I slinged to Machinery. I had no copper nearby, so after I researched MC, I went Iron Working --> Compass

Turned out iron was in the tundra and I wasn't very keen on setting up a size 5 fishing village just to get iron, so I waited for my capitol to expand before I hooked it up. Meanwhile, I built... explorers for defence against barb axes. It worked brilliantly.

I think a UU explorer could: 1) prove useful in some cases 2) be interesting 3) even the playing field for one of the stronger trait combos

 

[LucyDuke]

How about a UU Explorer, it's almost never used and you can't attack with an explorer. Their a UU combined with Overpowered Traits. Unless they make the UU explorer somehow usable... maybe give it Free Woodsman II and Guerilla II Promotions or Increase it's Strength to 6 then they'd make reasonable Stack Defenders.

I think you might've misunderstood my intention. To compensate for an overpowered trait combination, it's no help to simply make a useless unit even more useless. What I meant was to take a standard unit that is used regularly and handicap it. Taking away an explorer's strength would amount to beans. The Shale Plant comes to mind - I don't build Coal Plants anyway, so a Shale Plant's characteristics are irrelevant.

The idea is to take away the power of a standard unit. The overpowered trait leader's unique unit would have to be a common unit that's been stripped of some of its power. For example, an infantry with -50% against gunpowder units would be a serious handicap to compensate for other advantages. That sort of unique unit would balance the bonus of trait synergy. Another example would be a granary that came with unhealthiness. What would be difficult is to find a unit or building that is essential to a normal game and take it out of play by making it more of a burden than a bonus.


OTOH, and more on topic (!), it seems like this thread has become "forget Ind/Phi, x/y is overpowered, and y/z is overpowered, and all these combinations are overpowered because of their synergy!" and almost has me rethinking my position. Of course we're going to look for synergy in traits. Does that mean that whenever two traits complement each other, we write them off as overpowered? With Ind/Phi, the synergy and the strategy are apparent. Same thing with Org/Fin. But I've also found ways to embrace Fin/Spi, does that mean it's overpowered?

Just because two traits have obvious synergy does not make the combination overpowered. A leader is only overpowered if the trait synergy is so strong that its advantage cannot be otherwise obtained. With Agg/Pro, your gunpowder units are going to be fearsome whether or not you're warmongering. Who plays a game and never builds a gunpowder unit? However, if you build Barracks and run war civics, you can at least compare to the bonus. Imp/Cha is going to be useless if you never go to war, but even a short defensive war will allow you a substantial advantage. But, if you fight more than the Imp/Cha leader, you'll more than beat him. You would have to build four wonders for every one Ind/Phi wonder to match the bonus. Considering the cost of wonders, and especially the race that each wonder initiates, I don't see this as a benefit that can be matched. The only way to compare to Org/Fin is to cottage spam and courthouse spam. It's possible, but it's not a terribly reasonable comparison.

Most combinations are not overpowered because they're only moderate bonuses lined up next to each other. When they pile up, though, when the synergy is unparalleled, that is when they offer an unfair advantage.

I expect many of you will tear this to shreds, and I welcome it. I'm not sure that I myself am fully convinced of what I'm saying, I just want to see more meat to the "what constitutes overpowered" discussion than "oh I can play awesome with x/y".

 

[azzaman333]

You would have to build four wonders for every one Ind/Phi wonder to match the bonus. Considering the cost of wonders, and especially the race that each wonder initiates, I don't see this as a benefit that can be matched.

Ind/Phi can be almost matched by a Philo civ having either Marble or Stone, or an Industrious civ getting Parthenon.