Shoshone

[pineappledan]

On the Comanche, I think PAD's strategic pillage idea is really cool (now I'm assuming its just a copy, I think a true "steal" would have too many issues or other ramifications). It creates a very unique and distinctive playstyle for the Shoshone.... you can actually engage in late wars strictly for the purpose of boosting your aluminum and oil through pillage tactics. I certainly don't think its OP....I mean compared to Russia its going to take a LOT of pillaging before you get to those strategic resource levels.

It's pretty irresistible as a cavalry bonus, because Agribusiness and Factory, the first buildings that require strategics, both come out at the same tech level as Cavalry. Coal is revealed 1 tech earlier, while aluminum and oil both unlock 1 tech later. So cavalry is unlocked right in the middle of this major shift in strategic resource use and composition.

Survivalism 3 gives the no moves to pillage, so it would clean up the promotion ribbon a bit too.

 

[JamesNinelives]

I personally would love costs no horses + science on pillage but I support the alternatives .

 

[Rekk]

It's pretty irresistible as a cavalry bonus, because Agribusiness and Factory, the first buildings that require strategics, both come out at the same tech level as Cavalry. Coal is revealed 1 tech earlier, while aluminum and oil both unlock 1 tech later. So cavalry is unlocked right in the middle of this major shift in strategic resource use and composition.

There would be a weird incentive to keep Comanche riders around until Uranium is revealed and developed, unless the promotion status on upgrade.

 

[pineappledan]

There would be a weird incentive to keep Comanche riders around until Uranium is revealed and developed, unless the promotion status on upgrade.

I don’t see any reason why such a promotion shouldn’t stay on upgrade, and Comanches don’t obsolete until helicopter gunships

 

[myeong1129]

Just come to think, wouldn't it be better to move TR pillaging ability from Morocco to Shoshone, as a substitute for ancient ruin ability? So that they could make a good use of their large territory and remove RNG of Ancient ruins. For Morocco their TR distance ignoring ability is already enough to induce TR connection to them, and for Shoshone they could get some ability they could use until the late game. They even got some anecdotes about raiding American wagon trains. (Not talking about Western movie stereotypes, it's even mentioned in civpedia)

Current Shoshone traits are largely focused on early advantages, but I personally think that's what makes Shoshone less attractive civ (to me at least), as about half of those traits are lost around mid-game. Extra tiles and ancient ruin ability literally got no use after mid-game, and yields from encampment doesn't really catch up era scaling. Friendly land CS bonus is quite passive trait, and even their UU isn't really standing out as everyone else mentioned. I won't say Shoshone's weak, but I would say it's not fun after the mid-game. So I think it could be better if there's ability that could be actively used even after the mid-game.

I also think Shoshone's unattractive as their traits don't really provide any desirable victory condition. You may say Shoshone's a versatile civ, but this versatility, IMO, is different from active versatility like Celts, India or Byzantium. That's why I think their UI is fine in its strength but bad in design. Its advantages completely overlap with UA(i.e. defense and early advantage), and both don't suggest any type of victory condition. Hope at least one of those two gain some merit toward certain type of victory condition, but that's just my hope.

For UU change I also support the idea about science from pillaging tiles. Kinda gives a straight reason for Shoshone to use their UU.

 

[chicorbeef]

I support most of the ideas floating around about Comanche Riders, I think if we go with the pillaging strategics we should probably have the Comanches not cost Horses just for the strategic resource synergy. I would be fine with either on pillaging or unlocking at Rifling too.

As for the UA and UI, I think we should just come to an agreement first as to what, if anything, needs fixing.

Here's some things I can think of for the UA:

• Getting Ancient Ruins relies on RNG, so it's a little inconsistent. A significant amount of players turn off ancient ruins due to its RNG nature and the potential for AI snowball, and that makes this portion of the Shoshone UA useless.
• Ancient Ruin rewards have been relatively balanced. It's still nice to be able to pick exactly what you need, but it's debatable how much reward you're really getting over a random reward (unless the random reward was something like extra territory that you probably don't need as Shoshone)
• The UA's border growth has a bit of an anti-synergy with border growth bonuses such as Authority's Tribute policy and God of the Expanse and doesn't give any direct yields.
• Besides the combat bonus, all of the bonuses are early game only.

I think we can talk about the UI after because talking about two topics at once tends to lead to people talking over one another and the UI is arguably at a better state than the UA.

 

[Rekk]

• Getting Ancient Ruins relies on RNG, so it's a little inconsistent. A significant amount of players turn off ancient ruins due to its RNG nature and the potential for AI snowball, and that makes this portion of the Shoshone UA useless.
• Ancient Ruin rewards have been relatively balanced. It's still nice to be able to pick exactly what you need, but it's debatable how much reward you're really getting over a random reward (unless the random reward was something like extra territory that you probably don't need as Shoshone)

I thought like you as well, but when I tried it out I was pleasantly surprised. Getting what you need when you need I and avoiding the bonuses you would rather not have is very nice.

I support pushing for a further rebalanced ruins pass, specifically changing and removing bonuses that don't scale with treasure hunter, eg turn free pop into food, free tech into science, make map reveal scale, remove unit upgrade, etc.

The UA's border growth has a bit of an anti-synergy with border growth bonuses such as Authority's Tribute policy and God of the Expanse and doesn't give any direct yields.

Besides the combat bonus, all of the bonuses are early game only.

I wouldn't exactly call this anti synergy, more that there is zero synergy. Tribute and God of the Expanse will stop giving yields sooner, yes, but Shoshone are incentivized to settle greedily and will be growing their third/fourth ring while other cisco are only growing their second/third. By the time a city is growing their third ring, yields from these abilities have really slowed down and the pantheon/first tier policy have passed their prime.

I'm playing Shoshone right now and I really like just gaining the 10 (?) bonus tiles on settle rather than replacing it with something fiddly (like something that scales through the game so must be worse at the beginning).

I'm okay with the UI and UU being the late game pull. Boost the UI as Dan suggested and make the UU desirable for long term gain with either the science or strategic resource.

 

[JamesNinelives]

I think we can talk about the UI after because talking about two topics at once tends to lead to people talking over one another and the UI is arguably at a better state than the UA.

I feel similarly but with regards to the UA and the UU ;P. It seems like everyone agrees the UU could use improvement. Perhaps this is a good point to vote on what change(s) to give it?

 

[chicorbeef]

So... if we're keeping the ruin part of the UA, should we at least change the ruin upgrade so that any unit can choose, not just recon units? It would feel much better imo.

 

[Rekk]

An idea for the replacement of the Ancient Ruins bonus from Discord:

Whenever you discover a foreign city, you gain 5 (?) Science.

Discovering a city includes when one is founded in an area that you have already explored. Could be Production instead. Faith on discovering natural wonders was suggested as well, but whether or not a natural wonders spawns on your continent is too random for a yield that needs to be around early in the game.

 

[InkAxis]

I suggested a similar thing but instead that they spawn an ancient ruin, so that it is balanced on non-ruin playthroughs.

 

[JamesNinelives]

An idea for the replacement of the Ancient Ruins bonus from Discord:

Discovering a city includes when one is founded in an area that you have already explored. Could be Production instead. Faith on discovering natural wonders was suggested as well, but whether or not a natural wonders spawns on your continent is too random for a yield that needs to be around early in the game.

I would favor it granting two yields rather than one, for versatility. E.g. 5 , 1 . Shoshone as-is are a strong contendor for founding through faith ruins, so loosing that would shift their focus pretty dramatically. I agree that natural wonders are pretty random, but I would want them to have some source of faith from exploration, at least enough to help them claim a pantheon.

 

[Rekk]

I would favor it granting two yields rather than one, for versatility. E.g. 5 , 1 . Shoshone as-is are a strong contendor for founding through faith ruins, so loosing that would shift their focus pretty dramatically. I agree that natural wonders are pretty random, but I would want them to have some source of faith from exploration, at least enough to help them claim a pantheon.

I think that would be fine. 1 faith per city isn't a lot, but it would worth at least a pantheon ruin pretty quickly if you aggressively explore.

I'm currently leaning toward production to the "nearest city"? Science is nice and easy and global, but Shoshone are mostly hurting to keep up with the extra growth they will be biased towards when utilizing their encampments.

 

[JamesNinelives]

I'm inclined towards science over production, but I would be fine with either.

 

[Rekk]

Why are you leaning towards science?

 

[JamesNinelives]

I guess because when playing Shoshone I feel incentivised to expand quickly rather than play tall so I'm often behind in science unless I pick free techs from ancient ruins (which won't be as reliable if the UA changes).

With strong early cities I'm not too lacking in production, but without a source of science I think I might struggle to keep up with the AI as they seem to shoot ahead early-game. At least on the settings I play.

Edit: I'm OK with hammers though because I can put those hammers into science buildings and other things that help with science indirectly (food, culture). I basically just want something to offset not getting as many free techs from ruins.

 

[azum4roll]

Culture, science or faith can make sense, but I fail to see why discovering a city can give production.

 

[Rekk]

Flavoured as meeting a new group of people gives a burst of productivity.

 

[JamesNinelives]

Perhaps trading of tools, animals, or materials (wood, stone, metals) as well! I agree culture, science, faith are more intuitive but I don't think it's too much of a stretch to grant production.

 

[boho]

I started VP recently and only play random leaders. Shoshone is the worst nation I've seen thusfar, and the first that I've genuinely been confused as to the intent behind, minus "not diplomacy."

The UA is just kind of mediocre. It lets you take less lucrative but more defensible positions and get better yields out of them early, and it lets you zone your neighbors - both useful but way more niche than other civs' abilities. The defensive combat bonus is a nice little boost, but if you're in a position where it makes or breaks the game, I'd argue you've already lost and you just don't know it yet. Finally, despite granting you control over ruin RNG, ruins even appearing are still at the mercy of the RNG and AI. Plus the fact that the ruin ability is really more about selecting the order of bonuses you'll get, not which bonus you get. Obviously picking a tech every time would be broken, as would rushing an Explorer (or even further), but I'm not convinced the other options - yes, even population - would be game-breaking given what the other civs can do.

The UI is fun - encampment "pillboxes" across the plains is neat, but the yields can make some otherwise terrible tiles very appealing... for a little while. They don't have nearly enough staying power unless you're going for a culture victory.

And then there's the real stinker, the Commanche. These poor guys show up way too late to contribute to or counter a domination strategy, and in their own way are a little microcosm of Shoshone mediocrity. They suffer the same problems as all cavalry: anything but a smooth surface and they grind to a halt just to be wrecked by the ranged units they're theoretically supposed to counter. Their only reliable use-case is a defensive war near the Shoshone's capitol, thanks to their plains preference.

They're also spread thinner than usual at the worst possible time to be spread thinner than usual: Ancient. You need to be cranking out settlers to zone off your opponents and later provoke defensive war. You also need to be cranking out Workers to get those encampments up so you can effectively defend against Ancient rush civs, but also be cranking out military to escort Settlers and provide ZOC on those encampments. That's a lot of production to ask from a Plains bias, and you still need to pray you find enough ruins to drive your Faith, Culture, Science, Gold, and arguably even Population (Settler Stagnation stings a little worse when you have all those tiles available) since you won't be getting infrastructure anytime soon.

idk, they seem genuinely terrible with one of the most tedious routes to victory I've seen yet.