Policies

[Aussie_Lurker]

Hey Thal. Been playing with v0.8 of your Combined Balance Mod, & just have a few suggestions re: Policies.

I've noticed you've eliminated Spoils of War from Honor Tree-any chance you'll bring it back?

I'm also not a huge fan of their Freedom of Speech Policy. I don't mind having maintenance-free units, but feel it should have an effect for peaceful builders too. So maybe nerf the unit bonus (maybe halve it) & add a peace-time bonus alongside it (though I confess I'm not sure what that should be).

I feel a similar way about Nationalism-though I don't object to the Combat Bonus, I again feel that a non-combat bonus would also be helpful. Maybe a bonus to cultural buildings of some sort might be in order?

Anyway, just suggestions

Aussie.

 

[Txurce]

I've noticed you've eliminated Spoils of War from Honor Tree-any chance you'll bring it back?

In this case, it's part of the vanilla finisher (in terms of gold, anyway).

 

[Txurce]

Every finisher.

I think the Honor finisher works. I see +15's, etc, on the screen when I kill someone.

 

[Seek]

I think the Honor finisher works. I see +15's, etc, on the screen when I kill someone.

The bug is that finishers add to the next policy cost as if you'd taken two policies. Doesn't sound like the policy finishers themselves are bugged.

 

[Txurce]

The bug is that finishers add to the next policy cost as if you'd taken two policies. Doesn't sound like the policy finishers themselves are bugged.

Ohhhh....

Thank you, Seek.

 

[Thalassicus]

One of the devs told me they expect to have an update out within two weeks or so. It might be pushed back if problems come up though. Getting rid of all the finishers would be impractical so for now I'm just going to adjust overall policy costs.

@Aussie_Lurker
The gold part of Spoils of War was added to vanilla as the Honor finisher. I'm leaving the culture part out for now until I have more time to assess the policy trees.

I've changed Freedom of Speech in v8.1.

I agree about Nationalism, but it's hard to find effects to replace these things with. We've got very limited options for policies. I'm doing concept work for something that might give us more flexibility in the future.

 

[Aussie_Lurker]

@ Thal. That's cool. As long as I understand the reasoning behind it, then I'll wait to see how things develop. I have to say that its good to see the developers including a lot of your changes into their patches!

 

[Ahriman]

I like the Nationalism bonus. It is useful, logical, thematic, and fits strategically in order (order is designed for a wide scattered empire, which means you will have lots of territory within your borders in which to get the bonus, and a relatively lower concentration of military force and weaker cities, so the bonus is a big help).

 

[Thalassicus]

I agree that a military bonus in borders makes sense for Nationalism. To clarify my earlier statement, I'd prefer it to be some sort of out-of-combat military bonus, since combat is too easy.

 

[Seek]

Not particularly creative, but I could see a city defense/offense buff on Nationalism.

 

[Ahriman]

Not particularly creative, but I could see a city defense/offense buff on Nationalism.

I don't think a city boost is very good; Order is for big, wide, scattered empires. These are going to have fairly small pop and aren't going to be worth building defensive structures, so the cities aren't going to be doing any decent damage, so a boost to city stats isn't going to help much.

I think the boost to cities works much better in Tradition and Freedom than in Order.

I don't see a problem with the current policy effect.

 

[Thalassicus]

I'd like feedback on something. People have mentioned policy trees seem generic right now, with trees resembling one another. I figured out a way to clearly distinguish playstyles of Commerce and Rationalism. This would be very easy to do so I'm wondering which method people would prefer.


Option A

• Commerce: Gold flavor
• Rationalism: Science flavor
• Freedom: Multiple flavors
• Each tree has village and specialist policies.
• Encourages a generalist economy.

Option B

• Commerce: Village flavor
• Rationalism: Specialist flavor
• Freedom: Tall-empire flavor
• Each tree has gold, science, and culture policies.
• Encourages a village or specialist economy (like Civ 4).

The key difference is the new policy finisher system. To get a finisher with Option A we have to get both the village and specialist sides of a tree, which is why it's most efficient to do a "generalist" economy, and vice versa for Option B.

 

[Txurce]

I'd like feedback on something.

A) Right now the trees are loosely:

• Commerce: Gold (with village and specialist sides)
• Rationalism: Science (with village and specialist sides)
• Freedom: Culture (with village and specialist sides)

B) I could rearrange it to:

• Commerce: Village economy
• Rationalism: Specialist economy
• Freedom: Tall empire bonuses (research agreements, city defense, world wonders, etc)

This would be easy to do, so I'm wondering which method people would prefer. I'm not leaning towards either one right now.

Presumably a switch would buff the more focused policy. My preference would be based partly on how accessible in their respective trees each policy is. Right now my own play benefits from both villages and specialists at that stage in the game, so if I can't reasonably access both benefits, I'd rather not change it. But if they were easier to reach, then it may "feel" better to separate them.

That's regarding Commerce and Rationalism. I like Freedom having a culture focus, and some of the alternatives you're proposing there would make it more general (RA's city defense, etc).

 

[Ahriman]

I prefer option A, by far. If you stick all the trading post or specialist boosts in the same tree, it becomes too easy to get overpowered abilities. And I think it is important to retain flavor; commerce should be about gold and trade. Rationalism should be about science.

But I like splitting the trading post/cottage abilities onto different sides. I would also make sure that for some trees the trading post tech was tier1 and others it was tier 2, and similarly for specialists, so it isn't easier to get all of the boosts for one style or the other.

I did have one other thought: we are looking for good policy boosts in Freedom, one nice boost for a specialist economy might be significant boosts for yields for great person improvements. Much more fun than +X culture per wonder.

Also: how about moving +X culture per wonder into the tradition tree, on the policy that increases wonder building? Much better synergy there.

 

[Thalassicus]

There's flavors with either option - the question is which type of flavors we want. The strength of policies is adjustable so it obviously would involve more than moving policies around.

It's a good point that some village/specialist economy boosters should probably be second tier. Rationalism was already like that in vanilla, so I'll revert back to that, and rearrange the policies in Commerce.

The freedom finisher increases the effect of great person improvements +100% and golden age durations +50%.

I originally had a +2 effect on the wonder-improving policy in Tradition many months ago, so I agree with you there. I plan on replacing the policy in Freedom with +1 from specialists, and rearrange the tree, once I have time to write the code necessary to make that possible.

 

[Txurce]

I did have one other thought: we are looking for good policy boosts in Freedom, one nice boost for a specialist economy might be significant boosts for yields for great person improvements. Much more fun than +X culture per wonder.

Also: how about moving +X culture per wonder into the tradition tree, on the policy that increases wonder building? Much better synergy there.

If Freedom is viewed as a culture tree, then I would rather have culture per wonder than GP boosts at that stage in the game.

Also, I think adding culture per wonder to the Wonder building policy makes it relatively OP.

This is a good example of why I don't think it's a good idea to make piecemeal changes in the trees. Our earlier approach - one tree at a time - worked very well the last go-round.

 

[Txurce]

I originally had a +2 effect on the wonder-improving policy in Tradition many months ago, so I agree with you there.

Do the same reasons for the change back then apply now?

 

[Thalassicus]

Over/underpowered is not important when moving policies around. The strength of the policies can be adjusted, and I balance the power of each policy based on its position on the chart (not its general concept)... if that makes sense?

There's two reasons for the culture-on-wonders effect:

• It's one of the few unused policy effects available (probably why Firaxis added it).
• The policy-cost reduction effect was one of two reason the policy-saving ban had to be instituted, so removing/nerfing it from this place in the policy chart was important.

The problem is that on its own it's overpowered for low-difficulty games and useless for high-difficulty games.

 

[Txurce]

1. Over/underpowered is not important when moving policies around.

2. The problem is that on its own it's overpowered for low-difficulty games and useless for high-difficulty games.

1. It's OP when you're combing policies (Wonder production + culture-per-Wonder), which is what I believe Ahriman proposed, and I responded to.

2. If by this you mean vanilla Aristocracy, then buffing it presumably makes it even more OP on lower-difficulty games, right?

Or am I missing your point?

 

[Ahriman]

There's flavors with either option - the question is which type of flavors we want.

Freedom is a mix of Tall/Specialist/Culture. Those work well together.

I plan on replacing the policy in Freedom with +1 from specialists, and rearrange the tree, once I have time to write the code necessary to make that possible.

That sounds great. However, if you stack all the specialist boosters on one side, which is fine, you have to make sure the other side is equally powerful.

Also, I think adding culture per wonder to the Wonder building policy makes it relatively OP.

The policy would lose it's free great engineer, which doesn't really make thematic sense, and is a bit dull. Say, +15% wonder construction and +1 culture from Wonders.
I don't see that as OP at all.
I agree that there is a challenge that it is harder to get wonders at high difficulty, but it is not hard to beeline for a specific Wonder and get it at Emperor.