[NFP] Rationalism policy rework idea

[kotpeter]

Current effect: +50% science for campus buildings if the city has 10+ population. Additional +50% science if campus adjacency is 3+.

Proposed effect: +1 science per population per citizen in cities where campus is adjacent to a city center or a neighborhood (only one counts, doesn't stack). Additional +25% science to cities with governors.

What do you guys think?

 

[8housesofelixir]

I like the adjacent to city center idea - I mean both historically and realistically speaking there are not many universities that are established near a major mountain range, mountain adjacency don't really make sense - although the current metagame is adjacency-without-city-center. This card may fit an entire different game mechanism more.

Also, easily +25% is far too strong.

 

[Lily_Lancer]

Overpowered. You only need a district base to get the bonus, and the bonus is 10+ science per city, far more than the original amount, that's insane.

 

[Kwami]

Also, this wouldn't work so well for Korea or Gaul. Probably not so much for Maya and Australia, either, though that's less of a problem.

 

[Buktu]

If I had to rework the card it would become something like +2% science per citizen for all buildings in the campus if it has +1 adjacnecy, +5% per citizen for all buildings in the campus if it has +2 adjacency and finally +10% per citizen for all buldings in the campus if it +3 or more adjacency. Maybe change (reduce % or raise adjaceny threshold) some numbers here to balance it out a bit more (since the card would add even more yields than right now this way). But in general this sounds quite nice for me because the card would be great for wide and tall play.
If you play wide you don't need to grow everything to 10 and get the +3 adjacency for this card to give benefits (and since you will have lots of cities you will still get a good amount of yields here). However if you can manage to get a tall city with nice adjacency you might be able to get insanely high yields to compete with those large empires .

 

[Kwami]

If you want to boost tall cities, then why not have Rationalism increase the yields of specialists directly? Add +1-3 Science per specialist working in the Campus or something.

 

[Buktu]

Also a good idea but again I would make this bonus % based and dependant on the number of pops again. I mean there are just 3 specialists slots and if you really want to you can work all of them even in cities with 8-10 pops and you have no bonus for 15 or even 20+ pop cities again.

 

[Datgingah]

I think the card should simply add the adjacency bonus of the district to the specialist value, this would give taller cities more of an advantage, as well as specialized cities. Maybe add +1 science to non-campus districts as well if the adj bonus is 3+

 

[criZp]

If you want to boost tall cities, then why not have Rationalism increase the yields of specialists directly? Add +1-3 Science per specialist working in the Campus or something.

but that shouldn't be locked behind a policy, just like yield boosts to improvements are not locked behind policies.

 

[Lord Lakely]

Here's my proposal for Rationalism: remove it entirely.

 

[criZp]

Honestly not a bad idea

 

[Oberinspektor Derrick]

Current effect: +50% science for campus buildings if the city has 10+ population. Additional +50% science if campus adjacency is 3+.

Proposed effect: +1 science per population per citizen in cities where campus is adjacent to a city center or a neighborhood (only one counts, doesn't stack). Additional +25% science to cities with governors.

What do you guys think?

Dislike that idea.

Why?
Because it's basically a combined version of the civ 5 Library and University.
The problem with those were that it heavily encouraged tall play, as you'd want to stack up high population numbers as the raw science was based off of population (and with a percentage modifier on top), giving some ridiculous yields over wide empires who did not have the population to sustain the science.

If anything, I think the Campus itself needs a nerf in civ 6, as it can (and usually is) far too strong compared to other districts in the early game (perhaps bar Holy Sites with high adjacency and Work Ethic).
If you get a +4 (or more) Campus(es) in the early game, you pretty much get a "free ride" to a smooth game science wise, while if you don't have any high adjacency campuses available, you similarly have an uphill battle for the foreseeable future.
The buildings in the Campus are fine as they are, and need no boost - the Campus district needs a nerf however (like mountains giving minor adjacencies instead of standard).

 

[UWHabs]

Dislike that idea.

Why?
Because it's basically a combined version of the civ 5 Library and University.
The problem with those were that it heavily encouraged tall play, as you'd want to stack up high population numbers as the raw science was based off of population (and with a percentage modifier on top), giving some ridiculous yields over wide empires who did not have the population to sustain the science.

If anything, I think the Campus itself needs a nerf in civ 6, as it can (and usually is) far too strong compared to other districts in the early game (perhaps bar Holy Sites with high adjacency and Work Ethic).
If you get a +4 (or more) Campus(es) in the early game, you pretty much get a "free ride" to a smooth game science wise, while if you don't have any high adjacency campuses available, you similarly have an uphill battle for the foreseeable future.
The buildings in the Campus are fine as they are, and need no boost - the Campus district needs a nerf however (like mountains giving minor adjacencies instead of standard).

It's not scaled well because early on, your entire empire is probably only bringing in like 4 science, so if you have that +4 campus, you can literally double your entire science output.

Personally, I would think the best balance would actually be to move the campus back in the tech tree entirely. Make the library a city-centre building like the monument is so that everyone has a relatively easy source of science, and then have the campus unlock later at like mathematics or education, with a first building being like a public school or observatory (maybe you can make them vary, so Observatory is +1 science per adjacent mountain, and public school is +1 science per adjacent district or +1 science per 2 pop, so you have some choice in how to set up the campus).

 

[leif erikson]

Moderator Action: Moved to Ideas and Suggestions.