Poland, Casimir, overpowered?

[jlim201]

no, although the ones mentioned above are good, those civs get it without the policy, and if they get the policy, they get both bonuses. Poland is a overall good civ, but not OP because SP are not the main factor. The only civ I find OP is Korea because they are often runaways with AI, and is almost impossible to lose as unless playing Immortal/Deity.

 

[reddishrecue]

I also originally thought that solidarity was op but ended up not being so op in the voting. I wonder why more people thought that. Another thing that comes to mind is that I voted for op and I was an emperor or Immortal difficulty player.

 

[danaphanous]

It is a fun ability though. I've personally never played Poland, but have no trouble getting through the trees so I'd assume it'd be more like a perk...you'd get things a bit faster than other civs (like reformation beliefs) or what have you. There'd be a few times such as for religions that this might give a permanent bonus but usually it just means he unlocks what everyone else gets too, just a little earlier. I could see it snowballing if played well but certainly not OP. It could allow you to nab some tree-specific wonders before others though if you time things right...

 

[Merciorum]

Immensely dull but no, not overpowered. Poland deserves better.

 

[Depee]

It's not overpowered. It would be if they got the SPs at once. One SP an era isn't that much. By the late game I usually have more SPs than I really need with other civs as well. I think there are more powerful UAs. What about Babylons free academy by researching writing? You pull up a national college and there's no way anyone can compete with you in science. Or can you beat a horde of impis by getting two more SP by the medieval era?

 

[reddishrecue]

I don't know you figure it out can't you? Why not just play random civilizations and not know what civilization you're working for so that way civilizations won't get treated like they don't deserve to be treated.

 

[Nick Carpathia]

Poland's just strong in general, and can be tuned towards any victory condition.

My vote is a definite yes. I have felt that Poland's UA was overpowered ever since it was first introduced with BNW.

Many civilization's UAs are roughly equal in power to a single Social Policy. So if Poland got a single SP, that would be balanced. But getting a free SP *every single* era, is overly strong.

For example:

- Egypt's Monument Builders UA is roughly equivalent to Tradition's Aristocracy.

- France's City of Light UA is weaker than the Aesthetics finisher.

- Greece's Hellenic League UA is slightly better than the Patronage opener.

- India's Population Growth UA is worse than many of the happiness SP's.

- Portugal's Mare Clausum UA is similar to some of the SP's that increase trade route income.

etc.

So Poland can easily simulate one of these civilizations with a single SP choice, and then it gets all the additional SP's on top of that.

Yeah, I realize that you have to consider the UU's and UB's as well. Nonetheless I think that Poland's UA is the strongest and most flexible of all the civilizations in the game.

Playing an India game right now, and its pop growth is actually incredibly powerful. It's like a free Monarchy in every city. You barely even notice the 6 unhappiness from the city base. And once you hit size 6 (pretty easy), it pure profit.

 

[danaphanous]

Playing an India game right now, and its pop growth is actually incredibly powerful. It's like a free Monarchy in every city. You barely even notice the 6 unhappiness from the city base. And once you hit size 6 (pretty easy), it pure profit.

Yep, I discovered this recently as well. Ridiculous. With a high enough happiness base to start from I can essentially expand with limits. ICS is back! No other civ can do this as only INdia can create cities that eventually overcome the base unhappiness penalty. I'm not sure if firaxis realized this when they gave them this OP ability.

 

[Myth and Legend]

France's UA stacks with the Aesthetics finisher, so don't be so quick to dismiss it.

To gauge how good an entire tree worth of culture for free is, we have to measure comparable amounts of other resources in the game for free. An example:

Boudicca getting free shrines in all her cities which produce 4 faith per turn.
Venice getting a free cargo ship or caravan when they receive a new trade route.
India getting 1 happiness per pop.
Any warmonger getting a 50% hammer bonus to unit production.
Babylon which starts with a great scientist.

Overall Poland is one step ahead over the other civs in terms of a raw resource advantage.

 

[Doktor Vic Tim]

Their UA is versatile as all heck. That's what making it powerful. No need to save policies for opening Rationalism; with Poland, you hit Renaissance, you open Rationalism, simple as that.

 

[Makavcio]

My vote is "yes" because when you play on a high difficulty level, you need to prioritize. For example, it's impossible to have a decent, sustainable religion on immortal difficulty level when you do not specialize in piety. With Poland, the goal is quite easily obtained because you have bonus social policies that allow you to pursue tradition and piety at the same time.

What's more important, you can get the finisher for tradition much earlier than any other civ and the boost is huge. If the map is no bigger than standard, the bonus is gigantic.

In late game, you sometimes need to wait a bit with proper development of ideology because you want to further develop all your rationalism. With Poland, you already have it completed or completed to the point you wanted it to have.

Furthermore, playing as Poland allows players to unlock various policy trees, even if you don't want to pursue them any further and just want some bonus gold on diplomatic boost with CSs.

All in all, I find Poland overpowered, even though UB is completely circumstantial and often useless, and the UU isn't good on high difficulty settings for anything other than pillaging (wrong side of the tech tree).

It can ofc be argued that certain other civs can be even more overpowered in some certain circumstances but Polish power is completely unconnected with any random factors.

 

[Moriarte]

Poland UA is unfair. Culture is everything in this game. And Poland gets it all. This becomes increasingly apparent when you move up in difficulty and meet AI Casimir.

 

[Iberian]

I think most people will agree there is no other UA that is more powerful.

Is it OP? Depends on your definition I guess, but if I am looking through the list of who to play I often pass over Poland because it is a lot simpler to win. Trying to wring a appreciable amount of culture out of Japan's UA however is a challenge.

 

[SeedenGreedens]

I don't think Poland is that powerful. I think Washington and its new minuteman is a lot better now with its golden age through kills promotion.

 

[Myth and Legend]

I don't think Poland is that powerful. I think Washington and its new minuteman is a lot better now with its golden age through kills promotion.

Erm he can give trouble to civs like England and China which rely on crossbow level UUs to dominate around that time. Hardly anything on the level of an entire policy tree for free.

 

[CraigMak]

This ability is very strong. Poland's liberty tradition mix is insane. Then when you get to later ages and they have an entire policy tree for free... Just wow, crazy. They can fill out all of tradition and all of patronage before renaissance the plow through rationalism and ideologies.

I am going to say yes, OP considering they also get gold from pastures, free stables and a very good UU.

 

[reddishrecue]

The Poland uu, winged Hussar does seem unique. When attacking, the winged hussar pushes back the unit attacked and makes them withdraw. That's very useful against ranged units.

 

[Strategist83]

The only reasoning you could possibly come up with in defense of 'Solidarity is not OP' is that it doesn't provide all the social policies at once, but only over the course of a full game - hence, Poland only gets a free policy tree (a whole tree, it's crazy!) by the very end of the game.

 

[Cromagnus]

Poland is only OP in one sense. There are quite a few civs with huge advantages. (Like 5-10 at least) There are at least 10 civs that have tiny advantages. So, it's definitely not an even playing field. But Poland isn't necessarily stronger than the other civs with huge advantages. (Like the Maya)

They are however virtually the only civ that can execute certain strategies. 7 extra social policies by the Information era allows you to complete an entire extra policy tree. This makes them one of the only civs that can take advantage of Jesuit Education without hamstringing themselves. (by delaying Rationalism, Tradition, Order or Commerce)

They may be the only civ that can pull off full Liberty + full Tradition by the start of the Renaissance without delaying Rationalism.

But this isn't OP, it's more an indictment of Jesuit Education, in that it takes 5 extra social policies before it's not an inferior strategy for science victory.

Poland also has one flaw in their UA. They get a policy on the turn that they reach the modern era, but you don't get ideology until the next turn. This prevents them from using it on Ideology. So it's not nearly as overpowered as it would be otherwise.

I think, really, Poland just outlines how broken some of the policy trees are... that you need 5+ extra policies before certain Ideology policies are worth taking. But yes, they're *very* strong. Definitely top 5 at all victory conditions. The ability to take Honor + Liberty makes them pretty bad-ass at warfare, the ability to take Rationalism + Aesthetics makes them amazing at cultural victory, the ability to take Rationalism + Patronage makes them amazing at diplomatic victory.

But what this really all says is:

1) Patronage and Aesthetics are under-powered if you have to prioritize Rationalism over them to be efficient.
2) Honor is under-powered if you have to prioritize Liberty over it to be efficient.

So Poland's biggest advantage is not having to choose, which is only necessary because the trees are broken. (IMHO)

 

[Soffacet]

Poland finishes Tradition faster than is possible. They can plow halfway through Patronage/Commerce/Aesthetics/Piety while they wait for Rationalism. Then they finish Rationalism faster than is possible. I really don’t think that the overwhelming snowball effect that Solidarity has can be overstated. I can really only compare it to Spain, tbh.

Spain is a “generic” civ that just so happens to usually gain ~300-700 gold within the first 30 turns and sometimes has a really nice early tile. Unless you settle on LV or something, it’s not very unique. But Spain with a good roll is considered god-tier because of the ridiculous snowball. That’s sort of how Poland is, but every game.