RFC Europe Wonders

[Disenfrancised]

The buildings which I rarely/ever build are the tanner (never - the health penalty is a killer for those small bonuses), the weaver, the brewery (sometimes one or the other, but they're very low priority), and the coffee house. I haven't played many games which ran late enough for the coffee house, but I rarely have happiness problems even with 20+ population cities. It seems like we could eliminate some of those without taking much away.


If we're interested in adding the well, we could make it available with the same tech that makes quarrying possible, and give it either the same function as the herbalist (possibly making the herbalist much more expensive, and giving it a +2 health bonus?) or make it much more expensive and give it a +2 bonus.

If we really wanted to make it interesting, we might make cities with wells more likely to get plague, to represent outbreaks of cholera and typhus.

Health being the limiting factor to growth is rather realistic for European cities.

For Northern Europe the brewery is pretty useful - its one of cheaper ways to get quick happiness before the Colonial Era, and generally the first happy building I get once all the religion buildings have been built.

I do like the philosophy of every resource having two buildings that provide a bonus, but I think it'd be better if they were slightly more distinctive and varied than the +5% commerce.

Another possibility to explore is having more unhappiness penalities to mitigate the happiness surplus most cities get - have certain civics generate unhappiness (say Beaurocracy gives +1 unhappy in every city without a palace for example), and the +XP buildings give unhappiness (to show the citizenry's dislike at being recruited/pressganged and hard trained) so you don't just build them everywhere.

 

[Verily]

Too overpowered.

How so? That's even weaker than +1 Health because it can only be built in a non-freshwater city, and I don't see how providing a fresh water source would do anything for a city tile but be +1 Health.

 

[3Miro]

How so? That's even weaker than +1 Health because it can only be built in a non-freshwater city, and I don't see how providing a fresh water source would do anything for a city tile but be +1 Health.

You can build irrigation around it.

 

[embryodead]

Personally I got the opposite impression about health... there's way too much health bonuses available and city growth is rampant, nothing like the balanced growth of vanilla/bts. There's more resource types, they're more abundant, and bonus-buildings come very early (eg. smokehouse vs. supermarket). With standard rules my cities would struggle at 8-12 during the Middle Ages, but would grow later, when more buildings and imported resources are available. In RFCE, my cities often skyrocket to 20-25 in High Middle Ages. Plague isn't much of a factor, it cuts 3-4 pop if it strikes at all. The only time I actually had to watch health was when playing Arabs (in Egypt) but pop was still in high numbers.

I never have issues with happiness either, and that's without building brewery at all.

 

[Cethegus]

You can build irrigation around it.

Thus rendering the Gardens of Al-Andalus obsolete... good point.

 

[merijn_v1]

You can build irrigation around it.

I don't think he means the well carries irrigation. If you build a city next to a river or a oase, you get a +2bonus for fresh water. And because the well gives +1, you'll still have 1 less then rivercities. And AFAIK, farms (irrigation) doesn't provide the fresh-water bonus.

 

[3Miro]

I don't think he means the well carries irrigation. If you build a city next to a river or a oase, you get a +2bonus for fresh water. And because the well gives +1, you'll still have 1 less then rivercities. And AFAIK, farms (irrigation) doesn't provide the fresh-water bonus.

There is no +2 health bonus for being next to a river. There is a +2 health bonus for Fresh Water, which means that for most purposes well = river.

What makes the well OP is the ability to build farms near the city that has no river.

If we make the well so that it only provides +1 health and no "fresh water", then it is not OP.

 

[merijn_v1]

There is no +2 health bonus for being next to a river. There is a +2 health bonus for Fresh Water, which means that for most purposes well = river.

What makes the well OP is the ability to build farms near the city that has no river.

If we make the well so that it only provides +1 health and no "fresh water", then it is not OP.

I know the first part, maybe I didn't explain it well, but you get the fresh water usually from the river.
And even if a city has fresh water (from a river) it doesn't carry irrigation untill Public Works. So if you build a well in a city, you still can't build farms next to it untill PW.
But I think the +1 is the best option, or don't include it at all. We already have too much health IMO.

 

[Cethegus]

But that would make its inclusion rather questionable, again.

I find the Well building more suitable for the Fury Road mod.

 

[jessiecat]

I don't think we need the well at all. We already have too many buildings now, IMO.

BTW Why the heck are we discussing this in the Wonders thread?

 

[micbic]

Because we have no Buildings thread.

 

[micbic]

Requoting from JediClemente's post:

OK. Here's a first approach.

Catholic: Cluny Abbey, Palais des Papes, Stephansdom, Notre Dame, Leaning Tower, Krak des Chevaliers, San Marco, Marco Polo's Embassy, Sistine Chapel, Escorial (and all the military orders-corps, not the economic ones)

Orthodox: Round Church, Sophia Kiev, St. Basil
(Theodosian Walls and Hagia Sophia don't matter as they're already prebuilt)

Protestant: Kalmar Castle, Amsterdam Beurs, Brandenburg Gate

Jewish: Temple Mount (done before)

Rest of the wonders:

Shrine of Uppsala, Dome of the Rock shouldn't require any religion.

Imperial Diet, Westminster, Magna Carta, Golden Bull I would put catholic but don't know if it's OK.

Later wonders which are theoretically catholic but I would leave open (Protestantism may have been found already): Paço da Ribeira, Bibliotheca Corviniana, Leonardo's Workshop, Magellan's Voyage, Belem Tower, Fontainebleau, Copernicus Observatory, San Giorgio, Pressburg Castle, Versailles

Alhambra, La Mezquita, Gardens of Al Andalus, Tomb of Al Khalid already require the Arab Knowledge tech which gives muslim civs plenty of time to build them.

Topkapi Palace I don't know. Muslim or not? Or add the Arab Knowledge req?

And opinion: Topkapi should require both Orthodoxy and Islam (codable?).
The later wonders (ie Belem tower) should be Catholic, except the Copernicus observatory (Protestant). That would make intriguing for civs to stay at Catholicism.

 

[sedna17]

And opinion: Topkapi should require both Orthodoxy and Islam (codable?).

Not (easily) codable.

The later wonders (ie Belem tower) should be Catholic, except the Copernicus observatory (Protestant). That would make intriguing for civs to stay at Catholicism.

I feel the other way -- that there isn't enough incentive to switch to protestantism to overcome the loss (principally faith points).

 

[JediClemente]

Copernicus was polish and catholic, though I see the reasoning for making the wonder protestant.

If Topkapi required orthodoxy, Turks could always build it in Istanbul. Except by now they don't conquer it, but well, I hope some day they will.

For me there's no incentive to keep catholicism. As I understand it, most of the papal bonuses disappear, and protestants get discounts for techs and wonders. I also thought you didn't lose all your faith points (?), but even if you did, I'd still always switch.

And the main problem here is that, at least in my games, all cities keep both religions after you switch...

 

[Jusos2108]

Copernicus was polish and catholic, though I see the reasoning for making the wonder protestant.

Martin Luther opposed Copernicus and his heliocentric views, so I think this wonder shouldn't be tied to any religion as Copernicus was afraid (due to religious reasons) to publish his main work (On the Revolutions of the Celestial Spheres) until just before he died. If you want to tie it to a religion, I strongly recommend that it is 'free religion' above anything else.

 

[FakeShady]

There are a lot of wonders which NEEDS to be secular. Buildings such as the Pressburg castle or leaning tower or tower of belem etc etc are indeed built by Catholic nations, for example. However since they are not religious in nature they should not require a religion in the city to be built. A wonder should not require a religion unless its religious in nature, example being Sistine Chapel is Catholic is nature and Dome of the Rock is Islamic in nature.

 

[JediClemente]

There are a lot of wonders which NEEDS to be secular. Buildings such as the Pressburg castle or leaning tower or tower of belem etc etc are indeed built by Catholic nations, for example. However since they are not religious in nature they should not require a religion in the city to be built. A wonder should not require a religion unless its religious in nature, example being Sistine Chapel is Catholic is nature and Dome of the Rock is Islamic in nature.

It's not a question of religious nature, but cultural background.

Byzantines and Arabs have a huge technological advantage in the early game. That is compensated by making the wonders more expensive in hammers for them (or so I think), but they can, and in most games do, use great engineers for example.

For me it isn't realistic to see those built in Constantinople or Damascus. It should be a competition between the "catholic" civs.

Of course you could argue that goes against you when you play an orthodox or muslim civ, but well... still it requires the religion in the city, not as state religion.

Though perhaps we can requiere the state religion only for the military orders.

BTW Dome of the Rock shouldn't be islamic, or if done so we should add another wonder with the +50% wonder age length duration and change that one.

 

[sedna17]

In my opinion requiring the religion to be present in the city (but not to have a state religion) is a good compromise. It will make it less likely but still possible for wonders to go to the unhistoric civ. Sure, the Arabs can build Notre Dame in Jerusalem -- but this limits them to building wonders in one city -- and not the best one for wonders. A human playing the Arabs at emperor difficulty can dramatically improve their chance of getting these wonders by spreading catholicism judiciously to strong wonder-building cities, but I doubt the AI will grok this.

Think of it as allowing the dominant religion to be "enlightened" and permitting the construction of wonders by their minority religious population.

 

[JediClemente]

I've tested some games with a medium/later civ, and the religious requirement seems to work, even if Jerusalem has catholicism.

Interestingly, I've seen for the first time ever Cordoba conquering all of Spain (and collapsing afterwards, of course).

At least now Cordoba (city) isn't packed with christian wonders.

 

[micbic]

A human playing the Arabs at emperor difficulty can dramatically improve their chance of getting these wonders by spreading catholicism judiciously to strong wonder-building cities

A human playing the Arabs in Emperor would never make such a mistake. He will have an UHV which will make him eradicate all other religions XD
BTW, could we counterweight this case by increasing instability for cities without state religion?