[NFP] Renaissance Era Policy Card Elimination Thread.

[InsidiousMage]

Drill Manuals (12)
Invention (25)
Logistics (27) (30-3) There are far more useful military policies to run if you are going for a science or domination victory and the only time I ever use this is in the landscaping phase of a culture victory.
Machiavellianism (16)
Rationalism (6)
Religious Orders (1)
Triangular Trade (25) (24+1) 4 gold per trade route is great because CHs have the weakest adjacency bonuses and Free Market and Town Charters only effect CHs so completely lose their value if you are playing a coastal game, not to mention the fact that there are so many ways to get trade routes from civ and leader abilities to Great Merchant and Admirals that anything that buffs them is almost always superior to boosting gold from district adjacency because it is hit or miss and inefficient compared to just making trade routes better. The faith is merely a nice bonus, especially if you don't have a religion or a lot of holy sites.
Wars of Religion (19)
Wisselbanken (28)

 

[Duke William of Normandy]

Drill Manuals (12)
Invention (26) (25+1)
Logistics (30)
Machiavellianism (16)
Rationalism (6)
Religious Orders (-2) (1-3) [Eliminated]
Triangular Trade (24)
Wars of Religion (19)
Wisselbanken (28)

Religious Orders: I've got you, @Mr. Salt. This card just unimpressed me so much, and it just seems like a waste of a Military Policy Card Slot.

Invention: As others have said, not the most useful Card, but certainly helps in some situations when I need a World Wonder GE.

 

[DogeEnricoDandolo]

Drill Manuals (12)
Invention (26)
Logistics (27)
Machiavellianism (16)
Rationalism (3) I feel like this trope of card is nerfed a bit too hard. Right now the only civ I feel can reliably use this every single game is Maya. Australia, to a lesser extent. Technically, Korea as well, but I'm not sure if anyone is like me that you pay a lot of attention to the adjacency bonuses of districts when you put them down that sometimes you totally forget that the best position for some districts happens to be right next to the Seowon. Once you make that mistake, it cannot be undone, since the Seowon can only scale downward, thus disqualified from being considered by this card.
Triangular Trade (25)
Wars of Religion (19)
Wisselbanken (29) I am an aggressive player who likes going for Domination a lot, but when I don't I run this card almost 100% of the time.

Corrected the scores for the 2 simultaneous posts above.

 

[blok]

Drill Manuals (12)
Invention (26)
Logistics (28) (27+1) Just a really great versatile card that can be used to invade a nation next to yours or to bring builders and other civilians across your empire faster. I find that this card never loses its value later in the game, especially in cultural victories.
Machiavellianism (16)
Rationalism (0) (3-3) ELIMINATED. The requirements for this card are incredibly strict, and I can only reliably meet them when playing as certain civs (read: Maya). We're getting to the point where a card can't be situational and only be useful under the correct situation.
Triangular Trade (25)
Wars of Religion (19)
Wisselbanken (29)

 

[Steamboat Willem]

Drill Manuals (9) (12 - 3) Half the card (coal) only takes effect in the next era.
Invention (26)
Logistics (28)
Machiavellianism (16)
Triangular Trade (26) (25 + 1) It works on all trade routes, internal, international, allies or not.
Wars of Religion (19)
Wisselbanken (29)

 

[Leucarum]

Drill Manuals (6)
Invention (26)
Logistics (29)
Machiavellianism (16)
Triangular Trade (26)
Wars of Religion (19)
Wisselbanken (29)

The extra resources from Drill Manuals (9-3) rarely make a huge difference... The extra movement from logistics (28+1) will always be useful however.

 

[canadamufc]

Drill Manuals (7) (6+1) Letting this survive one more downvote as I feel this is better than Wars of Religion and maybe Invention. Coal Power Plants are so much better than any other power source, so just getting a couple more is a real boost to my empire. More production means more of every other yield essentially.
Invention (26)
Logistics (29)
Machiavellianism (16)
Triangular Trade (26)
Wars of Religion (16) (19-3) Personally, I would take Drill Manuals over this, just for the fact I use it more than this. Some games you may not found a religion or go to war. +4 combat strength is nothing to scoff your nose at, but I feel it's the most situational. In most Domination games I play, I avoid religion (unless I play Byzantium, Spain, or someone else of the sort) as it can be a loyalty malus, albeit quite a small one.
Wisselbanken (29)

 

[hhhhhh]

Drill Manuals (7)
Invention (26)
Logistics (30) (29+1)
Machiavellianism (16)
Triangular Trade (26)
Wars of Religion (13) (16-3)
Wisselbanken (29)

Rationalism is gone. Although I downvoted that this is still kinda surprising to me. It was so important before the nerf. If it was nerfed to 3 adjacency and 12 population it would be so reasonable.

I had a hard time deciding what to downvote and what to upvote. Actually at Renaissance, one is more likely to use policies from previous period (Military: Veterancy, occasionally Raid, and Professional Army, Economic: Natural Philosophy, Serfdom etc.) Non of the renaissance policy are that game-changing. Except maybe, Logistics (+1). But that's late renaissance. Wars of Religion is a good one if both you and your opponent got a religion. That's not always the case. Thus -3.

 

[SammyKhalifa]

Drill Manuals (7)
Invention (26)
Logistics (30+1=31) I'm trying to think of a situation where giving all my dudes the ability to walk around faster is NOT useful.
Machiavellianism (16)
Triangular Trade (26)
Wars of Religion (13-3=10) I like this card. But what are you going to do, they're all good at this point.
Wisselbanken (29)

 

[mrwho]

Just going through these threads - Renaissance era policy cards seem surprisingly underwhelming in general. Also has there really not been a wonder elimination thread yet? Seems like by far the most obvious but doesn't seem to exist.
Moderator Action: It looks like some of the elimination threads have been missed off the summary, will try to get fixed --NZ

Anyway:

Drill Manuals (7)
Invention (26)
Logistics (31)
Machiavellianism (16)
Triangular Trade (26)
Wars of Religion (7) (10-3) I forgot this policy even existed. It's a decent bonus when it hits, but completely useless if you share religion with your opponent or either you or your opponent don't have a religion. And as a peaceful player it's rarely something I use on offense. Drill Manuals is at least useful for coal plants so is more general purpose.
Wisselbanken (30) (29+1) I'll find myself with an ally or two in almost every game by this point and I've usually got international trade routes going by then anyway. It's a nice little bonus to make up for not going domestic. Even without an ally you can send to a city-state, so it's very good as a general purpose. Wouldn't call it exceptional, but wouldn't call any of these policies exceptional. Logistics is nice, but is usually just a card I throw in if there's nothing else. It's always okay and never great.

 

[Equilin]

Drill Manuals (7)
Invention (26)
Logistics (32) (31+1) Ultimate peacetime red card. shortens time for builders, and less commonly engineers and great people. HUGE amount of time.
Machiavellianism (16)
Triangular Trade (23) (26-3) It's strong, but I think it's a bit overrated. Mainly because there are more important yellow cards to use in this time and age (mostly from previous eras, like Serfdom or Naval Infrastructure or Natural Philosophy). Notice how there are no other yellow cards remaining.
Wars of Religion (7)
Wisselbanken (30)

 

[CoconutTank]

Logistics (33) (32 + 1) +1 movement is tough to pass up on, even if it's conditional on the unit starting their turn in one's territory. For Builders, this generally applies all the time. For Settlers, it'll help them get where they need to faster. For military units, being able to blitz from city to city, being able to put siege and range units in proper firing position, and even simply just being able to move units out of the way are all incredibly valuable. Logistics is useful pretty much at any time after it is unlocked.

Invention (23) (26 - 3) Out of the cards left, I'm probably least likely to slot in Invention. Not that Great Engineers aren't potentially useful, but I generally don't build that many Industrial Zones in the first place. I might've slotted Wars of Religion once or twice when I decided to mess around with a religious victory. I've never slotted Invention, even after it's been buffed.

Drill Manuals (7)
Invention (23)
Logistics (33)
Machiavellianism (16)
Triangular Trade (23)
Wars of Religion (7)
Wisselbanken (30)

Edit: Added in Equilin's votes.

 

[Noble Zarkon]

I also don't think we should be docking points from this just because someone personally doesn't decide to make use of the mechanic, either.

I agree, just really tough to know what to do with this card for people like me!

Drill Manuals (7)
Invention (23)
Logistics (33)
Machiavellianism (16)
Triangular Trade (24)
Wars of Religion (4)
Wisselbanken (30)

Tough choices now.

Wars of Religion (7-3=4) To use this one you need to a) be at war and b) have a religion (founded or spread to you) and c) be fighting someone with a different religion. Super useful if you meet the criteria but useless otherwise.
Triangular Trade (23+1=24) Really good card in most circumstances, I like the production from internal trade routes to get new cities started so Wisselbanken is often left out in favour of this one.

 

[Archon_Wing]

Drill Manuals (7)
Invention (20) 23-3-- It's a good card and does a lot for minimal investment, but it is by no means an essential card or good as the rest. Also having Sinan and Da Vinci show up really makes a GE strategy much less effective.
Logistics (33)
Machiavellianism (16)
Triangular Trade (24)
Wars of Religion (5) 4+1 I don't find this card very hard to use. It's generally more useful in intercontinental invasions because they're almost guaranteed to be following a different religion. There's also a good synergy with Crusade as long as you convert one city at a time.
Wisselbanken (30)

As for the extra four gold, I think there are a lot better cards to generate money. If you are bent on world domination, conscription would be better. If you are bent on world peace and diplomacy, merchant confederation would be better. Ignoring harbors and unique cases for a moment, commercial hubs are necessary to get trade routes. Why not just run the free market card for 8 extra GPT even before stock exchanges are unlocked?

Those cards don't even compete with Triangular trade so it makes no sense to compare them like that. You can combine all of them and then toss them all when you don't need more gold. And while Commercial Hubs may be good, getting +4 in a lot of them is really not worth the effort in most cases.

Assuming a modest mid game selection of 10 trade routes, that's 40 gold when you may only be generating 200 gpt or less.


If you're playing a domination game, it's a guarantee that most of the districts you capture are crap because the AI is playing them and thus all development based cards are not as effective.

I will say that it is not that useful late game, since by then it doesn't scale with the trade routes good enough.

 

[Mount Suribachi]

Drill Manuals (7)
Invention (21)
Logistics (33)
Machiavellianism (16)
Triangular Trade (24)
Wars of Religion (2)
Wisselbanken (30)



Invention 21 (20 + 1): Swap bacon and eggs for Great Engineers. This is what this card does.


Wars of Religion 2 (5-3): Maybe useful on the defence if you have a religion and your attacker has a different one. Otherwise meh.

 

[MrRadar]

Drill Manuals (4) (7-3)
Invention (21)
Logistics (33)
Machiavellianism (17) (16+1)
Triangular Trade (24)
Wars of Religion (2)
Wisselbanken (30)

I'll just repeat my earlier votes, but looking at this list at this point I can't find anything else to upvote and downvote.
Drill Manuals (4) (7-3) - again, I prefer to solve my niter and coal shortages by settling new cities, vassalizing respective city states or just buying required amounts from the AI. For a while now, there has been no more need to buy those resources one by one, if you wanted to get reasonable price, purchase in bulk is very much affordable, so why not to use it?

Machiavellianism (17) (16+1) - spying can bring in loads of cash, if you take time to scout out AI territories so you have a number of potential targets to choose from. AI does not build a lot of CH at first, so scouting is important in finding those built. Stealing money is the easiest operation and the first step into upgrading your spies. After that you can branch off into eureka stealing, governor removal, loyalty sabotage or AI envoy slaughter in a key CS. But spies are production intensive and work slowly, so this card serves to enliven the spying scene considerably. Much faster training of spies, so they're in the field earlier and working faster. And when a spy returning from a mission in Niani casually unloads ~4.5 K gold on your desk, that does bring a smile on your face

 

[Mahi]

Drill Manuals (1) (4-3)
Invention (21)
Logistics (33)
Machiavellianism (18) (17+1)
Triangular Trade (24)
Wars of Religion (2)
Wisselbanken (30)

I'll double the above points.

Drill Manuals. I just don't use this card very often. I'd rather try to get my ressources by settling outskirts cities than relying on a policy card. Anyway, it's still good but I don't use it too much personally.

Machiavellianism. Honestly I think this should be leading and probably also win this elimination thread. Spies have such a huge range of applications that I think it's a no-brainer compared to the rest of the cards. Siphon fonds are so easy to execute and once you done it three times you have your level three spy, which will be able to run mission really, really fast, when you get the 'no time to settle' promotion for the spy. Get Intelligence Agency along with it and I will argue that spies can win the game for you at any time.
I will also argue that this card is probably the one, out of the ones left that will stay in place the rest of the game.

 

[enKage]

Drill Manuals (1)
Invention (21)
Logistics (33)
Machiavellianism (19)
Triangular Trade (24)
Wars of Religion (2)
Wisselbanken (27)

Wisselbanken -3
I don't see it as a runner up.
At the point it is available, I usually got GovPlaza and at least 3 others distrits in a trade hub, this i 7 yields in total of food and hammers. This card gives 4 food+hammers on top of other yields in foreign city. Ok foreign city yields are growing in time, but my central hub is growing in districts too (and buffed by merchants on the way)
But:
1) in terms of trading with ally it also gives it to AI. And AI multiplies this by difficulty multiplier. If you want to max yields, you probably send it to biggest AI city, and that makes that rival city hyperproductive. You want AI to steal important wonders and speed up their progress?
2) City states - tend to have few districts, so the yields are not great anyway
4 yields is too little to give up green card slot, that an have better uses at that moment. I would never work it IF NOT paired with demoracy.
This is a good card for Kumasi / Zimbabwe strategies and for certain civs and leaders, but it is not you will work in every game - sometimes it is better to go 100% domestic trade, sometmes 100% international. From the runner-up I expect to be present and useful every game, like fe....


Mahiavelianism +1
And green card that can and should be used every game is Mahiavellianism.
Building spy maybe is not a factor, but quick mission is sth that would allow you to:
1) steal more gold
2) get important promos faster and start killing other civs' envoys
3) culture flip cities by freezing governors

 

[kryat]

Drill Manuals (1)
Invention (21)
Logistics (34) (33+1)
Machiavellianism (19)
Triangular Trade (24)
Wars of Religion (eliminated) (2-3)
Wisselbanken (27)

Logistics - This is good no matter what victory you’re after. It moves builders for accelerating projects, it moves missionaries and apostles, it moves naturalists and rock bands, it moves armies. It’s never not useful.

Wars of Religion - Its not just that it’s a domination/RV type card; it also requires that you managed your empire’s religion in the first place.

 

[Vizurok]

Drill Manuals (ELIMINATED) (1-3) I get it that niter and coal RNG seems to be weird sometimes, but I don't really see how this card helps that. If I don't have a single resource, I will have to go out of my way and secure a source via settling or war. If I have at least one resource, then I'm practially done as Niter and Coal are both fringe resources with limited uses.
Invention (21)
Logistics (34)
Machiavellianism (19)
Triangular Trade (24)
Wisselbanken (28) (27+1) I know that I'm somewhat ignorant but I don't even understand the debate between domestic and international trade routes. Domestic yields can be easily substituted by a few chops while international yields provide scarce Science, Culture and Faith - and now this card adds the usual domestic yields to my international trade routes. And, now it works with city states, so you don't even have to get locked in alliances if you want to keep on spying. Also, Merchant Republic now comes with two green slots, so you don't even have a huge competition for the slot. What's not to love?