Policies

[SlightlyMad]

I love the idea of free policies per era, but it seems like it would still not go far enough to ever be able to explore the order or autocracy trees with an empire that could actually use them. Have you considered adding a free policy as a great leader ability, either to all of them or just great artists? In the early game, you probably wouldn't consider it, as the improvement or GA would be far more valuable, but in the late game when their other uses aren't particularly good, it would be a very strong motivation to keep that GP farm going.

Since you have the ability to get free policies per era, I assume this change would be possible without a c++ modification?

 

[Thalassicus]

Yep. The free policy function was added in the Mongol dlc, so we can use it for whatever we want. The idea of great artists giving a policy instead of culture bomb has come up several times. I'm really not sure how I could balance that effectively, as I haven't played many culture-focused games.

If you or anyone else has lots of experience with culture games and could give some tips in this regard, it would be helpful. How many great artists can you conceivably get out through the course of a game? Just replacing the ability as-is would clearly not be an option in its current state, since that'd be 1-3 free full policy trees.

 

[SlightlyMad]

It could certainly be unbalanced for culture victories, but is that really a problem? Diplomatic victories are already absurdly easy, so I'm more concerned about whether or not a change makes the game more fun, rather than easier or not to obtain a certain victory.

The bigger concern I'd have is that it would remove the last remaining disadvantage of having a large empire, since you can have a single city crank out endless great artists with the same effectiveness at 1 city or 100. What sort of limitations can you apply to GP abilities?

I would think you could balance it by either limiting the maximum number of times it can be used (so the ability goes away after the 3rd or 5th or whatever time you've used it), or make the ability only available starting in the industrial era. I haven't touched any Civ5 modding yet, so maybe I'll try it out myself and see.

 

[Thalassicus]

Alternatively, I could have it give culture like the Civ IV culture bomb, which gives more fine-tune control over it.

 

[SlightlyMad]

That's a really good idea. Maybe if it could flip the tile it was on (no adjacent tiles), and additionally gave you the culture points, it would make it worthwhile to actually use the culture bomb.

 

[Seek]

I definitely like the idea of a civ4 type culture bomb. IIRC, when you have an abundance of culture in a city, you'll get one tile per turn until it stabilizes so it's more fitting with the civ5 mechanics as well. It would make the Great Artist much more worthwhile.

 

[bobbyboy29]

What you could do (if possible) is make the culture bomb also add a set amount of culture towards your next policy. That makes the culture bomb a double whammy like in civ 4, steals tiles AND brings you closer to the next policy. I have a feeling that one policy per GA would be just too much, this might work however due to rising SP costs, you could just set it at a fixed amount which could be adjusted if things get out of balance.

 

[Tomice]

I just wanted to vote for keeping the culture bomb mechanic in the game. You could add culture points if you think it's to weak, but taking out the function entirely is maybe too much.

You could also let the player choose between a culture boost or taking tiles (possibly with a smaller culture boost).

 

[Perkus]

I'm not against it also giving some culture, but I wouldn't want to lose the tile-flipping mechanic in order to add that. I find that quite useful for grabbing otherwise difficult to obtain resources without resorting to war. If you reduce the flip radius to 0 (is that even possible?), I think it becomes too weak because then you can only use it 1 tile away from your current territory, which is too limited.

 

[Seek]

So just for kicks I thought I'd do a quick test to try to figure out a good amount of culture if we decide to go this route. So how fast can one get their first GA out? And how much culture would be needed to gain a SP immediately from it? I beelined to Philosophy, got a Temple on line with two Artists as soon as I could (bought a Monument) and popped a GA at turn 70. At this point I had five Policies, no doubt in part because of the culture specialists, and three cities as that seemed like a reasonable number for people to have by then. The next SP cost 335 and in my cap (which is where I popped the GA from) I had popped five tiles, the next one costing 110. So I'd suggest giving the GA 400-500. Don't forget that the city will pop another tile by natural cultural expansion every turn for the next several turns with such an infusion (assuming the culture would flow through the city before going to the global pot).

This is the very early game, I understand, but I think this amount of culture would still be useful late game, it could shave 1-4 turns off of the next policy depending on the game they're running. Doubt it's possible, but maybe the amount could be increased by era? I hear what people are saying about wanting to keep the culture bomb mechanic, so I would suggest giving this amount *in addition* to the original one tile culture bomb. Would this be OP/UP? What do you guys think?

 

[Thalassicus]

One thing to point out is that although it's possible to do this with current tools for the human player (by intercepting the culture bomb button), changing what the culture bomb actually does (for AIs) would require access to the code it runs.

Still, it won't be hard to do... a simple matter of calculating the nearest city and adding culture to it.

 

[Seek]

On another topic, there's been a lot of discussion in the forums recently about the upcoming change that forces players to choose SPs on the turn they get them. The MegaMod thread has recently had some interesting stuff discussed about the possibilities for managing this issue without being too punitive (which many think the patch will be). Note, I am not personally invested in either side of the discussions because I generally take the SP on the turn they show up; opportunity cost and all that.

So a thought I had would be to have a chance that the civ enters a turn or two of anarchy if you have excess culture for a SP. For example, say that after 5 turns without choosing a policy, there would be a 10% chance that you'll have a turn of anarchy, after 15 turns a 20% chance, etc. (These are just numbers off the top of my head and would have to be tested and balanced obviously.) So it would be a risk that becomes more and more chancy the longer one goes without choosing: you could wait a few turns to get to the next critical era, but to save all your culture throughout the game would be severely detrimental. The anarchy mechanic is underutilized in civ5 also, as AFAIK nobody switches between exclusive policy trees, and it may help with realism/immersion too because your people would literally be demanding social change!
Of course, this is assuming you are interested in modding out the proposed change.

Hope this could be of some use to you.

 

[Thalassicus]

One positive thing about Civ V is its shift towards a more deterministic, less random nature... great people and combat are good examples of this. I'm not sure a chance would be the best solution as a result... something that occurs after X number of turns would be rather limiting too.

I personally think removing the choice to save policies is a poor decision -- should have fixed the underlying cause of players saving policies (Christo Redentor and free speech), not a band-aid solution to the symptoms by reducing player choice.

 

[Seek]

One positive thing about Civ V is its shift towards a more deterministic, less random nature... great people and combat are good examples of this. I'm not sure a chance would be the best solution as a result... something that occurs after X number of turns would be rather limiting too.

I personally think removing the choice to save policies is a poor decision -- should have fixed the underlying cause of players saving policies (Christo Redentor and free speech), not a band-aid solution to the symptoms by reducing player choice.

I hear you, but personally I think Civ5 needs a little more life. What I mean is that since the game is *so* deterministic, the excitement derived from risk taking or unforeseen events is moderated. The mechanic above isn't strictly random like events were in civ4, but is based on a conscious decision by the player to accept the possibility of a negative consequence to attain the goals desired. There are many threads on the GD page saying that civ5 is boring, not immersive and/or only fun to play during war. This to me is because outside of war (and to a lesser extent, wonder building) there are really no risks leading to potential gains that the player can choose to take, and half the fun of gaming in general is the risk involved for potential reward for success. I'd argue that more mechanics which do so -especially in peacetime- would improve many people's enjoyment of the game.

So anyway... I'm honestly not trying to pressure you to use my idea in any way, I just think this aspect of the game is somewhat important and should be considered.

 

[Thalassicus]

This to me is because outside of war (and to a lesser extent, wonder building) there are really no risks leading to potential gains that the player can choose to take, and half the fun of gaming in general is the risk involved for potential reward for success.

This is part of it. I think war is a lot more fun in Civ V, placement and maneuvering have become important. On the other hand, building is less fun... fewer choices like improvements, fewer worries like healthiness. That's why I've been focusing on trying to enhance builders' choices.

To be honest, healthiness is what I miss the most. It well-represented the negative side of economic development.

 

[Troublehalf]

Sorry to add to this thread late, but here is my two cents.

Prior to the patch, I thought the game was fine, bar the bugs and such, it was fun, even sided and challenging. I was Japan, played on Earth, was on my own in America with Aztecs, eventually captured the entire South + North and moved onto Europe.

Now, the game wouldn't work with the new patch, and when starting a new game, I am shocked to find, that even on Chieftan (I like just having fun) the game has reverted to the stupid Civilization III game plan of. Spam Settlers. Lots of them. Over. And Over. And over. Spamming them till they have 20-30 cities in random places, no thought at all where they go. The AI, even on EASY, then just overwhelm small empires through HUGE cash income (70-200 a turn) huge armies, huge luxury resources and even worse, which is research. Therefore, since they have decided that the AI should be stupid and designed to pointlessly expand and build Trade Posts on every tile, small empires are not viable compo. You either try and take out a few cities with your 3-4 troops and hope to get peace, but no, this does not work! While I took out 12 American cities, by the time I had another force up, they had built 16 more. You can't do a culture victory because you end up being targeted cause of your small military, thus, loosing again. You can't do diplomatic victory, cause of above reason. Science victory is out of the question, you'll be lucky to be 200 turns behind another Civ's research.

So, to my point. There needs to be more bonuses for small empires. I normally go, Tradition --> 33% Wonder Building. Then Liberty, which I max out. Then Commerce, max out. By then I'm dead or nearly. I prefer having one or two cities, my Capital being a Wonder Capital. This also pisses off the AI. So, there needs to be production bonuses for small empires. I never settle my capital without being next to a river, the sea and not on a hill just to get some extra production. Then comes to the research problem, you just can't get enough research going to keep up with the others, while you're in Classical, they are totting rifles because they have 30+ cities with libaries. Next is gold, everything is so expensive to buy, you hardly get any income. To win a game, you just go into Liberty, spam settlers, build near resources. Done.

I'd like to see a policy that when you select "Research" from the build menu, it gives 200% instead of 25%. That way, one decent city could give out 80 research points when researching. While some of you might say "Too much" think about it, you won't be able to build anything while you are researching, so you'll be torn between building new things or trying to keep up with the others.

Next policy I'd like would be "Population Tax" where you get 5 gold or something per population. Thus, big cities can give you enough gold to keep up with those who make 200 a turn by having 30 cities. However, it could also increase unhappyness the more cities you have with that policy, thus it means you cannot go building/capturing more and getting more cash. These policies should reward small empires and punish big ones. If you wanna go big, use the other policies. I mean, 30 cities, all linked to your capital + Machu Pichu = insane gold income.

Final policy could be like "Government Work Projects" which gives you +1 per population in that city. Thus, a big 20 pop Capital will get 20 more production, which will help you get buildings + wonders up quicker for the cultural win, but allow you to switch to research + wealth when you have nothing else to build. Or it allows you to protect/go to war by building big armies, but you'll then be controlled by what policies you used... I mean if you are careful and keep happiness high you could expand and keep the polcies designed for small empires.

Shame I have NO idea how to mod, as I would do it myself, but I dunno, what do you guys think? I just think the game supports massive, pointless and blind expansion, and in its current state, small, spec cities don't work and cannot win.

 

[gruven]

To be honest, healthiness is what I miss the most. It well-represented the negative side of economic development.

Yes. You used to have to have to think hard about putting in something like a coal plant because the health needed to be taken care of. Now, you can just build a factory and revel in the extra hammers.

I really miss city maintenance based on distance from the capital as well. It bugs me every time I see a city get settled far away from an empire and completely surrounded by another civ's cities.

 

[Troublehalf]

Yup, I just can't enjoy the game like I used to. While I don't mind missing health bonuses, it did make sense to plan, then when you got a Wonder which wiped every unhealthy point from every city.

But now, the game is like Civ III, spam cities, cause even if you loose one or two, you can just get them back... I love to just have one for building stuff, one for gold and one for research, but you just can't do a Marathon game without fast and pointless city making. Coupled in then Markets, Banks, Smiths and so on, the extra gold, extra research... sigh, the new patch ruined it I think, either that or I was so isolated that I missed 8 other Civs.

Romans + Liberty = Easy mode. Just spam cities, get 25% production bonus from buildings already in Rome. Egypt should be the fun "Try and build every wonder" Civ, Aristocracy + Marble + Civ bonus = 33% + 25% + 25% = 88% more hammers for building wonders. With lots of hammers, that is awesome.

I mean I found an amazing random map. I start next to a river + coast marble, 6 iron, 6 horses, lots of plains and grasslands, a cattle, 3 whales, 3 fish, 1 wheat and 1 wine. If I got more hammers, I don't think other Civ's could beat me to Wonder production.. but alas, they will, due to quicker research and more cities.... but it is a great map. Colossous gives +1 gold for those 5 (can't get one fish tile) sea resources, then by Navigation, Seaport gives 3 hammers per one, so 15 more there, plus Merchant Navy +3 hammer... plus Workshop and IronWorks, can quickly make wonders

 

[Thalassicus]

I've been doing a few things to help improve small vs large empire balance, in particular with buffs to the tradition tree. I added a policy there which gives extra research. You have a point about production though... I could add some sort of production enhancement to the tree, possibly a certain amount of per wonder.

 

[Ramesses]

I just realized that, after this latest patch, entering a new Era no longer grants you a free policy. You still need 6 branches to win a Culture Victory.

Also, I'm sure everyone here would be eternally grateful if you could change all of the policies not currently affected by this patch back to the way they were before the developers "fixed" them.