Poland

[Enrico Swagolo]

Admittedly I'm being kind of hyperbolic with the word OP.

What I mean is, it's a different kind of "good". It's too generally useful. It works for you no matter the scenario. A lot of civs are kind of dependant on the situation and on how feasible it is to get a certain victory type, but Poland's is just... good.

Every high tier civs UA is just good. Korea's is just good[i/], Babylon's is just good, Maya's is just good, Brazil's is just good, Arabia too, every UA of a high tier civ is generally useful. Even lesser echelons of "high tier" like Portugal/Ottomans/Indonesia/etc. have UAs that you could say are "just good". There's not a single thing you point out about Poland that doesn't apply to at least 5 other civs.

In fact from what I notice only low or mid tier civs have UAs or general themes that don't work no matter the scenario, like the relatively low-tier Spain which requires you to found a religion, Germany which requires you to focus on CS, Egypt which means you must put an emphasis on Archeologists, etc. Same with Japan to an extent, for Japan the UA may be irrelevant in some cases, or Greece, or etc.

 

[Wodhann]

I just...I just don't know how to respond with anything other than "yes?"

So...yes?

Seems like a solid vote in favor of keeping it, then.

*Sigh*

I italicized good for a reason. I didn't say it's just good. I said it's just good.

In other words, too good.

I'm actually surprised how far I'm going to have to explain my point. Only Funak so far has understood what I mean, everybody else seems to think I'm criticizing Poland on the grounds that it needs a buff or something. I'm saying the ability is dumb. It's unbalanceable because it will always be dumb, unless it's changed.

 

[Wodhann]

Every high tier civs UA is just good. Korea's is just good[i/], Babylon's is just good, Maya's is just good, Brazil's is just good, Arabia too, every UA of a high tier civ is generally useful.

How many times do I have to explain that it's not a matter of how good it is, but that it's unbalanceable because it's inherently badly designed?

Some of these UAs indeed have problems, similar to the one I'm describing. But Babylon was changed (afaik), and Maya's has a little bit benefit from being strong in flavor and being a tiny bit more active (which doesn't mean it doesn't share the same problem).

As I said though, if I were to do things my way, pretty much the whole civ roster would be radically different. I'm focusing on Poland because of how comparatively dumb its UA is. It's just stupid. You get something you'll invariably always want by doing something you'll always do.

 

[Funak]

"Good" is the wrong question. This is a matter of design, not balance. Especially since the bad design means it's unbalanceable.

Yeah, talk about missing the point , I don't even think he was in the same continent as the point.

How many times do I have to explain that it's not a matter of how good it is, but that it's unbalanceable because it's inherently badly designed?

Some of these UAs indeed have problems, similar to the one I'm describing. But Babylon was changed (afaik), and Maya's has a little bit benefit from being strong in flavor and being a tiny bit more active (which doesn't mean it doesn't share the same problem).

As I said though, if I were to do things my way, pretty much the whole civ roster would be radically different. I'm focusing on Poland because of how comparatively dumb its UA is. It's just stupid. You get something you'll invariably always want by doing something you'll always do.

Doesn't really look like there is enough interest in this project, I'm on your side here I personally think both this UA and the Ethiopian UA are pretty boring, mostly because the things they reward you for doing things that you're just doing anyways.

"Yay, I get social policies for advancing eras, without that motivation I would never think of actually advancing"

"Yay, I get free techs for founding a religion as a religious civ? Nice, now I feel like it would be worth it to found a religion"

 

[Enrico Swagolo]

How many times do I have to explain that it's not a matter of how good it is, but that it's unbalanceable because it's inherently badly designed?

Some of these UAs indeed have problems, similar to the one I'm describing. But Babylon was changed (afaik), and Maya's has a little bit benefit from being strong in flavor and being a tiny bit more active (which doesn't mean it doesn't share the same problem).

As I said though, if I were to do things my way, pretty much the whole civ roster would be radically different. I'm focusing on Poland because of how comparatively dumb its UA is. It's just stupid. You get something you'll invariably always want by doing something you'll always do.

I was quoting you in "good", as in your definition of "good" = generally useful, which is the case with pretty much every civ that is, in loose terms, "high tier". None of the UAs of the best civs are situational, that is a fact. In ALL of those mentioned civs, you get something you'll invariably always want by doing something you'll always do, at most making you put a slightly bit more emphasis on thing X.

You mention "You get something you'll invariably always want by doing something you'll always do" again. I reiterate - this is the case for pretty much all the "better" civs in the game. Hell, it's the case even for just good and decent or even not very good civs, unless they are carried by their UB/UI/UU which - in turn - always has the same problem you hate, as that civ's UI/UB/whatever must give you something you invariably want and make you do something you always want to do (get UB/UI ASAP, which is usually the case for every civ).

If you have a situational UA that makes you do something you don't always want to do, you get Egypt/Germany-like civs which I really can't consider neither fun, good nor good in their current state as they're rather boring and weak to boot. (I admit though that unlike those two, Spain is very fun and often solid tho despite being arguably the most situational and random of all).

 

[Wodhann]

I was quoting you in "good", as in your definition of "good" = generally useful, which is the case with pretty much every civ that is, in loose terms, "high tier". None of the UAs of the best civs are situational, that is a fact. In ALL of those mentioned civs, you get something you'll invariably always want by doing something you'll always do, at most making you put a slightly bit more emphasis on thing X.

You mention "You get something you'll invariably always want by doing something you'll always do" again. I reiterate - this is the case for pretty much all the "better" civs in the game. Hell, it's the case even for just good and decent or even not very good civs, unless they are carried by their UB/UI/UU which - in turn - always has the same problem you hate, as that civ's UI/UB/whatever must give you something you invariably want and make you do something you always want to do (get UB/UI ASAP, which is usually the case for every civ).

If you have a situational UA that makes you do something you don't always want to do, you get Egypt/Germany-like civs which I really can't consider neither fun, good nor good in their current state as they're rather boring and weak to boot. (I admit though that unlike those two, Spain is very fun and often solid tho despite being arguably the most situational and random of all).

I guess we have philosophical differences. You say that "situational" civs are bad and "generic" civs are good. I disagree. Plus you seem to equate fun with being good. Fine, but I preffer to think of it in terms of pure game design though.

But let's do something more constructive, shall we. I want to exercise my creativity.

Can you tell me, as a pole, what about your nation that you think i'ts worth putting into an UA? I'm not even talking specifically about Kasimir's reign, but poland as a whole. I'm asking in abstract terms, not in game terms.

 

[Enrico Swagolo]

I guess we have philosophical differences. You say that "situational" civs are bad and "generic" civs are good. I disagree. Plus you seem to equate fun with being good. Fine, but I preffer to think of it in terms of pure game design though.

But let's do something more constructive, shall we. I want to exercise my creativity.

Can you tell me, as a pole, what about your nation that you think i'ts worth putting into an UA? I'm not even talking specifically about Kasimir's reign, but poland as a whole. I'm asking in abstract terms, not in game terms.

No-no-no, you misunderstood me. I love playing Spain which is probably the most situational and is one of my favs, if not the fav. I don't really like playing Maya and absolutely hate Korea (I played the current Korea once and didn't touch it since - boring, too strong, not satisfying to outera other civs on Immortal, that feels just wrong), only like Poland and all of those are probably the best civs. I like playing France too and it's really not the best, same with others.

What I don't like is playing Germany, less because it is weak but because it is boring. The entire point is going Statecraft (which is a terrible policy tree for non-Germany/Greece/Portugal civs) to send trade routes to CS so your Hanse is not useless and so your UA actually does something.


Anyway, abstract? I don't know what you mean by abstract. I already told you what some kangz are known for before.

Well, a bit of a history lesson then.

Poland originally was Pagan (like all Europeans), got converted in 966 by the king marrying into Czech (IIRC?) family and getting baptised, almost everyone else following soon after.

There was a long period of Commonwealth with Lithuania, before which there was the won war with Teutonic knights (Prussia) due to them trying to convert nearby pagans by force which the Polish kings didn't like as the cruelty was needless (they wanted to be converted anyway), after which pagans were converted by them peacefully. Fun fact - Teutons were initially invited by one of Polish princes whose name I forgot to convert/remove some pagans from upper part of Poland and leave, but they mostly killed them and then refused to go away.

Poland was one of the first democracies in the world and it was sort of unique - it was ruled by nobles who were the only ones with the right to vote, no matter who they were. There was probably more people with noble titles in Poland compared to populace than anywhere else. People of all religions were nobles, Muslims, Jews, Christians of all sorts, etc. Back to the point, a person with a noble title who lost his entire wealth and possessions (often due to gambling) still could vote, their votes were often bought by others. The King could be elected and could be anyone (at least a noble, obviously) from any country and sometimes was. Kings in renaissance during noble democracy were pretty pointless though, just figureheads who couldn't really force nobles to do much. I could elaborate but don't see the point.
Anyway, all that was guaranteed by written law.

At first it worked well, but then they decided to just go with their own gain and everything fell apart because of liberum veto (I don't allow!). If ONE noble disagreed, the entire thing the Sejm was considering was rejected. Of course only things that were accepted after that were those that all nobles benefited from. Patriots tried to do something but the nonsensical law made it impossible to actually act until the constitution was made, but it was too late and Poland fell. Multiculturalism and greed really didn't pay in the long run, same as can be seen now in Europe.

IIRC at one point about 2/3rd of populace wasn't Polish, mostly Lithuanians, Ukrainians (or Rusins, rather), Jews, Germans/Prussians and Tatars, with Lithuanian/Rusin/Tatar populace becoming polonised at least partially rather quickly.

Poland was a bit too kind at one point, which sort of led to its demise - it would've been tactically much better to help the Ottomans conquer Vienna/Europe (which Turks proposed) or at least not interrupt and gain huge land for pretty much doing nothing, but instead King Sobieski decided to do the honourable thing and defend Christianity. He also offended the HRE in the process by attributing the defence to himself (and it WAS his charge that removed kebab from the premises, like that popular Serbian meme video on youtube is titled), which then led to them becoming salty. The western monarchs didn't forget it in time, the relations between countries actually turned much worse after Vienna.

Besides that pretty much all themes commonly found in both western and eastern European countries are found (due to Poland being in-between and having contact with both) - devotion to god, culture, architecture, etc.

 

[Gothic_Empire]

Honestly, Poland is fine. I feel like most of the civs have been brought up to Poland's level in terms of power, with the possible exception of The Zulu, but I suspect that they are extremely powerful in a way that simply doesn't interest me.

I kind of assumed that Poland was one of the model civs Gazebo used for redesigning the UAs.

There's some core philosophical disagreement here and I don't understand one side of it.

Everything I do in Civ -- every point I put in any bucket toward in goal -- is something I wanted and was going to do anyway. Sometimes there's some flexibility in a cool way, say, with Inca and Portugal making certain city locations WAY more desirable, but at the core, I wanted to settle cities anyway.

Poland is very similar -- you are encouraged very strongly to surge toward wonders deep in the tree and given more power to access them since this is also likely going to get you past an era marker and give you a policy, which you'll need to actually build the wonder. Sure, I'd do that anyway as Babylon or Egypt, but I'd also settle cities as them. I don't understand the philosophical approach behind the idea that rewards for in-game behavior is somehow bad.

###

There's a cool thing that Civ does, that I like a lot, and that the CBP seems to have completely grokked and made better. There are hundreds and hundreds of goals and microgoals in the game. And there is always a way to be slightly better at some aspect of these things.

For instance, you can get more rewards from killing units, which the Celts and Aztecs highlight well, or you can be really good at killing units, which the Zulu and several other civs do very well, but you have to choose which one you want.

You can be good at building wonders by unlocking policies, or you can be good at building wonders with a straight up modifier, but you can't have both.

When you get to combine powers, the game starts to get interesting. The celts and the aztecs are REALLY fun when they've got the morrigan or god of war. There are a lot of great synergies and the way they're currently broken up encourages different styles of play on basically every civ.

This is an interesting kind of design. I'd argue that if you haven't figured out how your civ is changing your gameplay, you are probably missing some critical idea for taking advantage of how they work.

 

[Takagi Hiro]

Honestly, Poland is fine. I feel like most of the civs have been brought up to Poland's level in terms of power, with the possible exception of The Zulu, but I suspect that they are extremely powerful in a way that simply doesn't interest me.

I kind of assumed that Poland was one of the model civs Gazebo used for redesigning the UAs.

There's some core philosophical disagreement here and I don't understand one side of it.

Everything I do in Civ -- every point I put in any bucket toward in goal -- is something I wanted and was going to do anyway. Sometimes there's some flexibility in a cool way, say, with Inca and Portugal making certain city locations WAY more desirable, but at the core, I wanted to settle cities anyway.

Poland is very similar -- you are encouraged very strongly to surge toward wonders deep in the tree and given more power to access them since this is also likely going to get you past an era marker and give you a policy, which you'll need to actually build the wonder. Sure, I'd do that anyway as Babylon or Egypt, but I'd also settle cities as them. I don't understand the philosophical approach behind the idea that rewards for in-game behavior is somehow bad.

###

There's a cool thing that Civ does, that I like a lot, and that the CBP seems to have completely grokked and made better. There are hundreds and hundreds of goals and microgoals in the game. And there is always a way to be slightly better at some aspect of these things.

For instance, you can get more rewards from killing units, which the Celts and Aztecs highlight well, or you can be really good at killing units, which the Zulu and several other civs do very well, but you have to choose which one you want.

You can be good at building wonders by unlocking policies, or you can be good at building wonders with a straight up modifier, but you can't have both.

When you get to combine powers, the game starts to get interesting. The celts and the aztecs are REALLY fun when they've got the morrigan or god of war. There are a lot of great synergies and the way they're currently broken up encourages different styles of play on basically every civ.

This is an interesting kind of design. I'd argue that if you haven't figured out how your civ is changing your gameplay, you are probably missing some critical idea for taking advantage of how they work.

Well said. I agree completely.

 

[Wodhann]

Everything I do in Civ -- every point I put in any bucket toward in goal -- is something I wanted and was going to do anyway.

So? What you do is your strategy. I'm talking about UA design. To have an UA that gives you something you already want for doing something you're already doing anyway is tautological and idiotic.

Poland is very similar -- you are encouraged very strongly to surge toward wonders deep in the tree and given more power to access them since this is also likely going to get you past an era marker and give you a policy, which you'll need to actually build the wonder. Sure, I'd do that anyway as Babylon or Egypt, but I'd also settle cities as them. I don't understand the philosophical approach behind the idea that rewards for in-game behavior is somehow bad.

What "rewards for in-game behavior"? Polands UA is as brainless as you can get, rewarding you for doing nothing that you wouldn't be doing already. Rewarding niche or throroughly planned in-game behavior is exactly what it doesn't do.

There's a cool thing that Civ does, that I like a lot, and that the CBP seems to have completely grokked and made better. There are hundreds and hundreds of goals and microgoals in the game. And there is always a way to be slightly better at some aspect of these things.

For instance, you can get more rewards from killing units, which the Celts and Aztecs highlight well, or you can be really good at killing units, which the Zulu and several other civs do very well, but you have to choose which one you want.

You can be good at building wonders by unlocking policies, or you can be good at building wonders with a straight up modifier, but you can't have both.

When you get to combine powers, the game starts to get interesting. The celts and the aztecs are REALLY fun when they've got the morrigan or god of war. There are a lot of great synergies and the way they're currently broken up encourages different styles of play on basically every civ.

This is an interesting kind of design. I'd argue that if you haven't figured out how your civ is changing your gameplay, you are probably missing some critical idea for taking advantage of how they work.

Thanks for explaining why other UAs are better than Poland's.

 

[Takagi Hiro]

Thanks for explaining why other UAs are better than Poland's.

There is literally nothing wrong with Poland, and it's not like the UA is all Poland brings to the table. As Poland, your goal is focus on science and culture to swiftly grab policies. Other civs don't have such a demand to do so. I don't know why you're ripping all over them; ALL civs in the game reward you for doing something you're already planning to do. Just because Poland's UA is more open doesn't make it boring.

 

[Wodhann]

As pretty much every civ in the game, in some level, your goal is focus on science and culture to swiftly grab policies.

FTFY

Science and policies are about the most generic empire-wide improvements in this entire game. "Focusing on science" to get something, especially if that something is a free policy, is nothing challenging or special. It is almost as basic and expected as leveling up in an RPG game.

ALL civs in the game reward you for doing something you're already planning to do.

You guys still don't understand what I mean when I say this, do you?

What I mean is: I could be playing as Mayor Blandface of Vanilla Town, without any unique elements, and I would still be pursuing science and wanting policies. Again, science and policies are about the most generic empire-wide improvements in this entire game, and Poland happens to be a lazy combination of both.

 

[Gazebo]

So? What you do is your strategy. I'm talking about UA design. To have an UA that gives you something you already want for doing something you're already doing anyway is tautological and idiotic.

What "rewards for in-game behavior"? Polands UA is as brainless as you can get, rewarding you for doing nothing that you wouldn't be doing already. Rewarding niche or throroughly planned in-game behavior is exactly what it doesn't do.

Thanks for explaining why other UAs are better than Poland's.

FTFY

Science and policies are about the most generic empire-wide improvements in this entire game. "Focusing on science" to get something, especially if that something is a free policy, is nothing challenging or special. It is almost as basic and expected as leveling up in an RPG game.

You guys still don't understand what I mean when I say this, do you?

What I mean is: I could be playing as Mayor Blandface of Vanilla Town, without any unique elements, and I would still be pursuing science and wanting policies. Again, science and policies are about the most generic empire-wide improvements in this entire game, and Poland happens to be a lazy combination of both.

I'm usually pretty open-minded about changes, Wodhann, but it is really hard not to interpret your line of argumentation in this discussion as anything but trollish. As I said earlier, you can't claim that everyone's arguments against your points strengthen your argument, when they clearly don't. You also can't fall back on the 'oh you just don't understand what I'm saying' argument, because people clearly understand you. It's not winning you any points, and the toxicity of the thread is rising as a result.

G

 

[Wodhann]

As I said earlier, you can't claim that everyone's arguments against your points strengthen your argument, when they clearly don't.

I'm not saying that they do just to say it. If they strengthen my point, they strengthen my point. If you disagree then show why they don't, don't just lecture me about how wrong and infantile it supposedly is. "Clearly don't" is a void argument without evidence.

You also can't fall back on the 'oh you just don't understand what I'm saying' argument, because people clearly understand you.

If they are demonstrating that they don't, then they don't, and I'm explaning why they don't and clarifying my position (which seems to be fruitless). Again, ditto what I said above.

It's not winning you any points, and the toxicity of the thread is rising as a result.

And this kind of condescending post doesn't really help, if anything it just makes me more frustated and prone to reply with acidity. If you disagree with me then just address my points. If there is such thing as toxicity rising (which I personally don't see - but then again I'm pretty thick skinned), it's because of people constantly misunderstanding and derailing a simple point of argumentation. Again, nobody has yet to sucessfully establish as to why the UA is well-designed enough to be worth keeping. Not good enough - well-designed enough. This difference for some reason is difficult for people (besides one other person here) to understand.

I'm honestly waiting for an opportunity to start giving suggestions to give way to a more constructive line of discussion but this cycle of people misunderstanding my criticisms and completely missing the point when countering them is sort of stalling me to do so.

 

[Takagi Hiro]

I'm honestly waiting for an opportunity to start giving suggestions to give way to a more constructive line of discussion but this cycle of people misunderstanding my criticisms and completely missing the point when countering them is sort of stalling me to do so.

Maybe you haven't noticed, but the majority here are happy with Poland as is. Changing them for the simple sake of making them more "unique" to you, and you personally, is silly. If you don't like them, why not take up modding them yourself?

 

[Gazebo]

I'm not saying that they do just to say it. If they strengthen my point, they strengthen my point. If you disagree then show why they don't, don't just lecture me about how wrong and infantile it supposedly is. "Clearly don't" is a void argument without evidence.

If they are demonstrating that they don't, then they don't, and I'm explaning why they don't and clarifying my position (which seems to be fruitless). Again, ditto what I said above.

And this kind of condescending post doesn't really help, if anything it just makes me more frustated and prone to reply with acidity. If you disagree with me then just address my points. If there is such thing as toxicity rising (which I personally don't see - but then again I'm pretty thick skinned), it's because of people constantly misunderstanding and derailing a simple point of argumentation. Again, nobody has yet to sucessfully establish as to why the UA is well-designed enough to be worth keeping. Not good enough - well-designed enough. This difference for some reason is difficult for people (besides one other person here) to understand.

I'm honestly waiting for an opportunity to start giving suggestions to give way to a more constructive line of discussion but this cycle of people misunderstanding my criticisms and completely missing the point when countering them is sort of stalling me to do so.

Poland's UA is good. Not 'good,' not good, not good, or good: good. It works, it is flexible. In general, it gives the player the ability to get wonders of all varieties earlier, which is great. If you focus less on culture you'll stay relevant compared to others, as the free policies make up for the lower culture per turn. If you invest heavily in culture, it gives you access to ideologies earlier, potentially much earlier, which can be incredibly powerful. Tailoring your empire around your policy selections, and getting those policy branch finishers more quickly, allows you to build up your strategy synergies related to policies more quickly. All in all, it is very capable and flexible, the latter of which is the real key.

It isn't going to change.

G

 

[Wodhann]

Maybe you haven't noticed, but the majority here are happy with Poland as is. Changing them for the simple sake of making them more "unique" to you, and you personally, is silly. If you don't like them, why not take up modding them yourself?

This thread had a very small sample size to consider a majority, but anyway, even being happy with something (and honestly I feel people are more happy with it for "feel good" reasons, rather than a rational conclusion of how well designed it is) doesn't means it couldn't be improved. Which is sort of the point of the CBP.

Poland's UA is good. Not 'good,' not good, not good, or good: good. It works, it is flexible. In general, it gives the player the ability to get wonders of all varieties earlier, which is great. If you focus less on culture you'll stay relevant compared to others, as the free policies make up for the lower culture per turn. If you invest heavily in culture, it gives you access to ideologies earlier, potentially much earlier, which can be incredibly powerful. Tailoring your empire around your policy selections, and getting those policy branch finishers more quickly, allows you to build up your strategy synergies related to policies more quickly. All in all, it is very capable and flexible, the latter of which is the real key.

*Nervous twitch*

Yes, Poland's UA is "good". It gives you free social policies. Makes life easier. Makes the player feel good about himself. Ok. Yes. We established that.

Now explain to me why it's well-designed.

As in, adds variety and dimension to the game, explores uncharted facets of the game, challenges the player to seek alternative styles of gameplay and capitalizes on something that they would not otherwise do when playing any old Mayor Blandface of Vanilla Town.

Because to me it seems that Poland is just buffed Vanilla Town. And considering that the game already has certain civs that fulfill the role of "Sandbox Civ" in a more interesting flavorful way (Maya comes to mind, even if I personally dislike its design philosophy for the same reasons), do we really need more of this kind of civ? And if we do need this kind of civ, does it need to be in such a lazily designed way such as Poland is?

 

[Gothic_Empire]

Now explain to me why it's well-designed.

As in, adds variety and dimension to the game, explores uncharted facets of the game, challenges the player to seek alternative styles of gameplay and capitalizes on something that they would not otherwise do when playing any old Mayor Blandface of Vanilla Town.

Everything doesn't need to be a Rube Goldberg machine. Social policies are well-designed, and Poland takes advantage of them without having so much extra culture that their borders are huge as a result. The beauty of Poland is its flexibility through simplicity, and they are a fantastic civ for someone transitioning from CP to CBP, or for a new player all-together.

I'd point out that it's a tried and true concept: humans in D&D 3.5 and 5e (WE DO NOT SPEAK OF 4th ED) take a free feat and eschew a lot of other complicated but strong racial perks. Maybe you think it's poorly designed, but apparently other game developers, including Gazebo, Firaxis, and Wizards of the Coast disagree. You might just want to respect the people who do this work enough to say, "Fair enough."

Or maybe make your own Poland Civ and make it CBP compatible. I know the community would appreciate the extra content.

Edit:

If you make your own Poland Civ, please please please call the UA: "With hookers and blackjack!"

 

[Wodhann]

Everything doesn't need to be a Rube Goldberg machine. Social policies are well-designed, and Poland takes advantage of them without having so much extra culture that their borders are huge as a result. The beauty of Poland is its flexibility through simplicity, and they are a fantastic civ for someone transitioning from CP to CBP, or for a new player all-together.

Social policies are a base game mechanic, if an UA makes use of them that doesn't mean their quality of design gets "transfered" to the UA. Is it good design then if I make an UA that states "you start the game with 3 free social policies"?

I'd point out that it's a tried and true concept: humans in D&D 3.5 and 5e (WE DO NOT SPEAK OF 4th ED) take a free feat and eschew a lot of other complicated but strong racial perks. Maybe you think it's poorly designed, but apparently other game developers, including Gazebo, Firaxis, and Wizards of the Coast disagree. You might just want to respect the people who do this work enough to say, "Fair enough."

I see civs more as classes, not as races, so that point is moot from the start. Each class has a different way of playing, and makes the game more dynamic and fun. Races are more base modifiers, if we were to draw a civilization analogy from this, it would be more like when older civs had "categories" of civs like maritime, economic, etc.

Or maybe make your own Poland Civ and make it CBP compatible. I know the community would appreciate the extra content.

Hey, why don't you paint a classical style painting? Why don't you build a spaceship? Why don't you get in a national team and win the World Cup? Because just asking someone to do something means they automatically have the skillset to do it, right? (And time to acquire it)

 

[Gothic_Empire]

Social policies are a base game mechanic, if an UA makes use of them that doesn't mean their quality of design gets "transfered" to the UA. Is it good design then if I make an UA that states "you start the game with 3 free social policies"?

The first turns in Civ are critically important; the UA that gives free social policies to start would be absurdly overpowered because of that--though if you wanted to play with this sort of idea, JFD's Cultural Diversity gives a few different civs free opener trees and this really highlights how much of an advantage a single free policy is on turn one, let alone three free ones.

So no, Poland isn't really equatable to three free starting policies.

Do you think that Zulu has a bad UA, too? It's essentially the same as Poland's. More free promotions for doing the same thing you'd normally do, yeah? Nevermind that getting these free policies and free promotions creates interesting scenarios that cannot happen normally.

So I disagree with you fundamentally, here.

Zulu's UA exists to highlight the power of synergized promotions.

Carthage, excess money (You send trade routes no matter what, so the 3x gold falls under the archetype of your criticism of Poland.)

Poland, excess policies.

Promotions, the investment system, and the policies in CBP have all been completely revamped, and it's perfectly fair to have civilizations that exploit these things in a simple way.

I also disagree with your implication that an empty civ would be unfun, as this sort of equates to criticism that the game itself is unfun. Civ and the CBP are fun, so a simple civ can also be fun.

And in hitting the fun marker, slips into the realm of good design.

If you want complex, game-changing interactions, there are a lot of other civs. And again, there is always the ability to make your own content.

I see civs more as classes, not as races, so that point is moot from the start.

My point is not moot simply because you have a different point of view. Your opinions are not the center of the earth.

Each class has a different way of playing, and makes the game more dynamic and fun. Races are more base modifiers, if we were to draw a civilization analogy from this, it would be more like when older civs had "categories" of civs like maritime, economic, etc.

This essentially describes how Civ IV worked, and there is a mod out there that gives civs these classificiations. But now I am suddenly in love with the idea of every civ getting its own classification as military, maritime, etc, and getting a version of the city state buff per city. <3

Hey, why don't you paint a classical style painting? Why don't you build a spaceship? Why don't you get in a national team and win the World Cup? Because just asking someone to do something means they automatically have the skillset to do it, right? (And time to acquire it)

I'm kind of the wrong guy to use this rhetorical appeal on. I can't draw, but I make a comic. I can't mod, but I fixed a mod that was broken. This is probably a bad community in general to try this argument on, actually, since I suspect very strongly that we have a lot of mod makers and mod dabblers here. I notice that you, yourself, have a very helpful tutorial on making assets for mods in photoshop.

Comic: I made friends with an artist, and we make comics together now because we both wanted to. We spent a while hashing out a concept and then did it. Since starting, I've learned how to letter and color comics and have picked up niche skills in the industry that I earn a part-time income from.

Mod: A while back, the Vietnam Civ had a bug where its great people generation from defense buildings was not working as noted. I learned a bit about modding and fixed my copy of the mod. The fix was wonky, and created its own strange problems with balance, but the defense buildings gave the great people points. (I haven't followed it in a while, so it might have been fixed. If it hasn't been fixed, someone else posted a DIFFERENT FIX in the comments section that I actually want to go test here in a bit.)

I guess the point I'm working toward is this: these sub-fora are part of the greater fora's community of makers, yourself included. And making civs is a very well-documented activity--there's guides out there, and TONS of code to copy to make piecemeal changes to for your own devices. Or, since you're graphically competent, make a friend and pair of with that person to make some mods. Or don't. That is also absolutely your prerogative. Regardless, I'm sticking to my guns here. Poland is fine. But you can have your own Poland with blackjack and hookers, and doing this would probably get you a lot of positive attention.

Implying repeatedly that other posters and modders here are stupid, however, won't, especially if you do this while demanding that they make some specific change that's been made clear will not happen.