Simplification?

[bjbrains]

Stupid question. How do you know civ 5 will have no commerce? Just asking because in the confirmed featured thread it says some tiles will give commerce and others gold.

That post is a bit out of date. We know that gold has supplanted 'commerce' in terms of terrain production from videos/interviews/articles. Science is now primarily produced by each citizen.

 

[Disgustipated]

Just a thing to add about the slider removal. It actually complicates the game more, which counters what the OP and thread title suggest. If I understand this right, I will have to manage specialists, and tiles worked in each individual city to adjust my tech rate or my gold income. Sounds very tedious to me. I'm sure they thought of this, and have "governors" to adjust what you want a city to focus on. But honestly, I believe the slider to be a better system. I never liked governors in civ4, and I doubt the ai for them will be much better in civ5. So this means I have to micromanage each city.

 

[JonoLith]

Just a thing to add about the slider removal. It actually complicates the game more, which counters what the OP and thread title suggest.

I strongly disagree, as I've stated multiple times throughout this thread. Let us begin the debate once more! (Cue spock versus kirk music.)

If I understand this right, I will have to manage specialists, and tiles worked in each individual city to adjust my tech rate or my gold income. Sounds very tedious to me.

This is actually something you could do in Civilization 4, and 3, 2, and 1. It's just that no one did, because it was a massive pain, and made more confusing because of the slider system. "Wait... I want to take away some gold from city A, but that means I'll have to figure out my empire's total gold is, then figure out my city's gold output, divide that by a factor of 10, carry the one, launch the rocket into space for more data," and so on. While that's a silly example, it's just in place to show how opaque the slider system actually is.

I'm sure they thought of this, and have "governors" to adjust what you want a city to focus on.

This is pretty much a guarentee.

But honestly, I believe the slider to be a better system. I never liked governors in civ4, and I doubt the ai for them will be much better in civ5. So this means I have to micromanage each city.

The only reason governors were so poor in Civ 4 is because no one saw any reason to ever use them. The slider acted as an overmind-ish type of demigod that ran the game for you, and anyone who actually attempts to alter anything by themselves must do so at the permissions and bending of it's fiendish whims.

I'm beginning to see, more and more, that the only reason why people don't try and alter tiles in cities is because to do so means figuring out a dense and complex slider system. Once that system is gone, altering tiles will be shockingly SHOCKINGLY simple.

And if you're not of a mind to alter tiles, I'm hyper convinced that the game will simply play for you, if that's what you're in the mood for it to do.

Edit: Just to be clear on that last statement. I don't mean to say that letting the game play for you is bad. Governers are good, and allowing players the option to just go through a game without delving into the inner workings is very very good, and important. Even I, the largest proponent of delving deep into the inner workings of the game's mechanics, will simply want to play a nice casual game where i don't have to do anything. A well built game will allow for both.

 

[tom2050]

The slider is easy to use simply because it lets players give control over to the computer, allowing the game to play itself for the player.(As a note; I don't think this is bad, or negative. There are multiple occassions where I will simply say "God, I just want to hit the end turn button." and it's important that the option is there for the enjoyment of the game. More options are always better.) However, it would be foolish to think that the development team won't have a system to do just that in a non-slider system. So, I'm not a fan of calling the slider system "Easier" as the only thing that makes it "Easier" can, and should, be in place in a non-slider system.

The moment a player tries to actually use the slider system, however, it becomes much more difficult to utilize then a non-slider system, as we've already agreed on. So, I have no difficulty in saying that the non-slider system is far and away the superior system, even before I've gotten my hands on it.

It's tough to move a slider back and forth? I've never heard that one before. That sounds like the other guy when he said it is terribly complicated to have a stack of units. All you do is move the slider to get the amount of research, gold, or happiness you want. It's pretty easy.

The alternative speculative way Civ5 works is micromanagement of each city. I don't mind this, but I'm sure most everyone else will with all the micro backlash that occurs all the time.

We would need a better look at the game to know for sure if gold has really been seperated so that improving gold production won't decrease science production, because as you say, this would be indifferent to the slider system.

Agreed... Is the seperate gold/science from citizens an assumption? It seems that if it is true, than the obvious thing would be 'no slider because slider is impossible with a system like that'. But if it is not known for sure, we could still have a commerce system with no slider... meaning that much micro will be in the game.

 

[JonoLith]

It's tough to move a slider back and forth?

Sigh...

No. It is not tough to move a slider back and forth, but that was never my assertion, and the only way you would have concluded this is if you did not read anything I wrote beyond perhaps a single sentance.

My entire point has always been that, overall, a non-slider system is easier to understand and manipulate then a slider system.

Yes, if all you care about is mindlessly placing a bar and seeing your science bar go up, then fantastic. But for those of us that care about actually knowing what is going on in the game, the non-slider system is vastly superior. For those of us that want to adjust the game so that we get one less gold, for two more production, without effecting our science output, the non-slider is vastly superior.

I can go back and show you my post where I compared the two systems to see which one was easier to understand, and thereby easier to manipulate, if you would truly like. The slider system was over a page long, and the non-slider system was three sentances.

 

[Celevin]

It's tough to move a slider back and forth? I've never heard that one before. That sounds like the other guy when he said it is terribly complicated to have a stack of units. All you do is move the slider to get the amount of research, gold, or happiness you want. It's pretty easy.

The slider is very very complicated. The end result is easy if you're not concerned with efficiency.

If you try and make your empire the most efficient possible, the slider can boggle the mind a bit. For example, you build marketplaces to increase your gold output, and move the slider. But as the slider moves towards 100%, marketplaces lose their effectiveness quickly as they increase gold and not commerce. Put the slider to 0, and your libraries almost cease to work. How does that make sense to the average player?

If I build my religious special building, I get x amount of gold. But I can't convert that to science, unlike the gold mine on the map which produces *commerce* even though it's a gold mine with gold symbols.

Binary research is a total pain in the ass and there's no reason it should be an option to do. It makes no sense, and is just rounding errors.

Finally, when you have a commodity that has no diminishing returns, more is better, and you absolutely cannot have too little compared to other civs, it outweighs all other things you can buy with commerce. This commodity of course is science. This is the #1 reason that gold, culture, and espionage aren't held in a higher light, and they will fail to be actual good currencies until the slider system is removed.


How is any of this fair to a new player trying to learn the game? It's a dumb mechanic, as elegant as it works.

 

[timtofly]

And if you're not of a mind to alter tiles, I'm hyper convinced that the game will simply play for you, if that's what you're in the mood for it to do.

Edit: Just to be clear on that last statement. I don't mean to say that letting the game play for you is bad. Governers are good, and allowing players the option to just go through a game without delving into the inner workings is very very good, and important. Even I, the largest proponent of delving deep into the inner workings of the game's mechanics, will simply want to play a nice casual game where i don't have to do anything. A well built game will allow for both.

Do you mean that there are civfanatics that do not look "in" their cities to see if they are efficient at what they are doing?? If that is the case, then the slider is a crutch they lean on. Hopefully the computer is managing the game ok for them.

I am still playing Test Of Time. And to me each version has been "simplified" to some degree or another. When are they going to bring back multiple worlds? In II and III people complained about the stupid AI suicide attacks, and we got SOD's. In IV they complained about SOD's, and we are getting 1UPT. In II we had a triple slider and people complained about balance. In IV we had a double slider and people still complained about balance. Now we do not have a slider and people complain that it will be too simple.

I am thankful for the people that complain, change happens. I am glad that people speculate, brings new perspectives that can result in change. Debate may be helpful to see two different perspectives, but arguing, I am not sure helps anything. If change does not go our way, then we can live with it, or we can go out and create our own game that we like or live without it.

 

[JonoLith]

Do you mean that there are civfanatics that do not look "in" their cities to see if they are efficient at what they are doing?? If that is the case, then the slider is a crutch they lean on. Hopefully the computer is managing the game ok for them.

I'm sorry, let me try and be even more clear.

A well manufactured game will allow for players who do not wish to invest in micromanagement, and players who do, to both have a fun game experience.

A game that requires extreme micro-management is as much a failure as one that doesn't allow for extreme micro-management.

Players that wish to simply hit "End Turn" every three seconds, and players that want to spend lengthy periods of time on each and every turn should both be given the option to do so, and find an enjoyable play experience.

That was what I was trying to say.

 

[Schuesseled]

the slider isn't complicated, next your gonna tell me that the triangle button in civ rev was vastly complicated too.

 

[Celevin]

the slider isn't complicated, next your gonna tell me that the triangle button in civ rev was vastly complicated too.

Scroll up to my post.

If you wanted to play on the higher difficulties of Civ, you needed an in-depth knowledge of the slider. It's also holding both gold and culture back from becoming meaningful numbers.

 

[tom2050]

Sigh...

No. It is not tough to move a slider back and forth, but that was never my assertion, and the only way you would have concluded this is if you did not read anything I wrote beyond perhaps a single sentance.

My entire point has always been that, overall, a non-slider system is easier to understand and manipulate then a slider system.

I read it all.

Yes, if all you care about is mindlessly placing a bar and seeing your science bar go up, then fantastic. But for those of us that care about actually knowing what is going on in the game, the non-slider system is vastly superior. For those of us that want to adjust the game so that we get one less gold, for two more production, without effecting our science output, the non-slider is vastly superior.

I like to mindlessly slide and divide. j/k. I don't really care if it goes; but I think the point of citizens working seperate gold and science beakers is still an assumption. No one has shown where the info was stated at to date that I have been able to find.

It's possible that they made it under the commerce system and no sliders. But it is I agree an almost given that they would rid the game of commerce if they remove the slider. And I think the system is fine although to make big economic or science changes will be extremely micro-management oriented (and it might not even be possible to do without major re-hauls of your society). So in this regard could provide some 'realism'. Depends on if it is 'fun' or not having to go through hell to get some extra income.

The underlying mechanics of the slider system are pretty straightforward though I think. And it was there for the gameplay side of things to be an easy adjustment.

The slider is very very complicated. The end result is easy if you're not concerned with efficiency.

Oh come on... very very complicated? The efficiency issue is there of course, but complicated?

If you have 80% science and 20% wealth, this means that your city citizens that create commerce have it split 80/20. It also means that marketplaces e.g. are only working 20% of their full efficiency, and labs only 80% of their full efficiency. The mechanics aren't exactly like this, but it's an easy way to see how it basically works.

The only thing is the efficiency issue., which is brought about by having different improvements only increase specific things (research or gold).

If you try and make your empire the most efficient possible, the slider can boggle the mind a bit. For example, you build marketplaces to increase your gold output, and move the slider. But as the slider moves towards 100%, marketplaces lose their effectiveness quickly as they increase gold and not commerce. Put the slider to 0, and your libraries almost cease to work. How does that make sense to the average player?

It helps the player by teaching them that far extremes on the fringes is never a good position to uptake. Moderation is superior. See, the slider teaches important life lessons!

Finally, when you have a commodity that has no diminishing returns, more is better, and you absolutely cannot have too little compared to other civs, it outweighs all other things you can buy with commerce. This commodity of course is science. This is the #1 reason that gold, culture, and espionage aren't held in a higher light, and they will fail to be actual good currencies until the slider system is removed.

Well, the slider system really wasn't 'removed'. Because it cannot exist with the way things in Civ 5 are right now (not sure if it is speculation or known though still). You literally cannot have a slider if citizens make completely 100% seperate research beakers and gold.

It was actually the move that eliminated 'commerce'. The slider was just a side effect because the slider needs the commerce aspect in order to exist in the game (it divides the commerce).

I agree with pretty much all of it... but all the people who hate micro-management, which seems to be mostly everyone, should be prepared to be in a possible uproar; since it seems Civ 5 actually might have more micro-management now! As long as it's not more than Civ 2 or 3 had, I'm fine.

To end it all here, I'll state "making a unit attack another unit is horribly and just crazy complicated!"

 

[Schuesseled]

(As to the whole moving the slider changing the effectiveness of library and market.)

Yes? And?

Don't you build both?

There isn't a building cap.

(The buildings also have secondary effects, so jsut because your playing with the slider on 100% doesn't mean you should ignore building markets and banks.)

 

[Celevin]

Before anything: I'm going to use "removal of slider" and "removal of commerce" to mean the same thing. Sorry, Pieceofmind.

Oh come on... very very complicated? The efficiency issue is there of course, but complicated?

If you have 80% science and 20% wealth, this means that your city citizens that create commerce have it split 80/20. It also means that marketplaces e.g. are only working 20% of their full efficiency, and labs only 80% of their full efficiency. The mechanics aren't exactly like this, but it's an easy way to see how it basically works.

Yes, very complicated. Some things which I brought up just don't make sense.

"Commerce" is a commodity which is spent before you can even see it created. Most Civ players don't even know what it is, they just lump it in with gold. Pieceofmind came into this thread only one page ago to correct a bunch of people, including you, when the term was being wildly misused. How can you say the system isn't complicated when you've been messing it up all this time?

Why does commerce exist in the first place? It's a placeholder commodity that can be replaced by a much simpler system. All it does is make you choose between gold, culture, espionage and science, with 2 of those things not even being needed to succeed at the game for almost all victory conditions, and science taking up 80% of all spending. Moreover, the stuff that you *do* spend commerce on is then spent immediately! You don't make any decisions, you just slide the bar, watch commerce get spent for gold and science, then watch it again being spent. There's no interaction.

The only thing is the efficiency issue., which is brought about by having different improvements only increase specific things (research or gold).

It's much more than that. First, we have different incomes. We can either gain commerce, gold, or science. Then the commerce is converted to gold and science depending on the slider. Then the gold and science is added to in the form of percents from various effects and buildings. Then we take our gold, and subtract our maintenance costs. But this isn't enough, because this leftover gold is almost worthless. So we keep our slider adjusted to turn all of it into science so there is no leftovers.

We did all of this crap just to make science. Commerce is the inbetween, and gold is almost worthless with the current system. Try and explain it to a new player, and they'll go cross-eyed. Moreover, take out some tokens, and do the system by hand, and you'll see that it's almost purposely confusing. Why can't it be this:

We make gold. We multiply it with effects and buildings.
We make science. We multiply it with effects and buildings.

It helps the player by teaching them that far extremes on the fringes is never a good position to uptake. Moderation is superior.

You never ever want to confuse the player. Also, it's just not true, as binary research is key.

Yes? And?

Don't you build both?

There isn't a building cap.

(The buildings also have secondary effects, so jsut because your playing with the slider on 100% doesn't mean you should ignore building markets and banks.)

It's not about that, it's about a new player finding out "Hey, my marketplace didn't add much money, what's wrong, my empire doesn't have any gold? What about all those GOLD MINES I'm using?". It doesn't make sense, and is confusing.

As for more advanced players, no, you don't always build every building you can. There's always a priority, and new types of buildings crop up faster than the old ones are built in a lot of the less productive cities.

You ignored all my other points, and tried to point out the flaw in that one in particular.


I know the slider can be used by new players without a problem. That doesn't mean they necessarily know what's actually going on. There comes a stage in advancing in Civ difficulty when the player actually has to re-learn the basics about Civ economy to move forward. It results in a poor difficulty curve, and as I said before, gold, culture and espionage being near worthless.

 

[JonoLith]

I agree with pretty much all of it... but all the people who hate micro-management, which seems to be mostly everyone, should be prepared to be in a possible uproar; since it seems Civ 5 actually might have more micro-management now! As long as it's not more than Civ 2 or 3 had, I'm fine.

I do have to agree, completely, that the developers do have to be careful how much forced micro-management exists.

While I love the idea of having a system that can be manipulated down to the very last nut and bolt, I respect and understand that the same system shouldn't require it.

The systems need to be transparent, so people like me can manipulate it fully, but for people who simply do not care, it just needs to work.

My assumption is that they will put in governers that will facilitate this.

 

[tom2050]

Yes, very complicated. Some things which I brought up just don't make sense.

"Commerce" is a commodity which is spent before you can even see it created. Most Civ players don't even know what it is, they just lump it in with gold. Pieceofmind came into this thread only one page ago to correct a bunch of people, including you, when the term was being wildly misused. How can you say the system isn't complicated when you've been messing it up all this time?

The commerce was produced by citizens, and then according to the slider, portions were spent towards researching technology, portions were spent towards happiness, and the rest was put in the bank (or there was a debt incurred, like most of the countries in the world are doing). It makes sense if you think about in the way it was meant to be thought about.

When the info was brought forward, I had no clue that they 'Seperated' gold and research beakers 100% completely, in which it made sense that a slider cannot exist with that; and that's when I posted. Still, no one shows where this was stated, I can't find it. It could be an assumption. Might be true/Might not. ? I believe it is, because it only makes sense to work such a way.

Why does commerce exist in the first place? It's a placeholder commodity that can be replaced by a much simpler system. All it does is make you choose between gold, culture, espionage and science, with 2 of those things not even being needed to succeed at the game for almost all victory conditions, and science taking up 80% of all spending. Moreover, the stuff that you *do* spend commerce on is then spent immediately! You don't make any decisions, you just slide the bar, watch commerce get spent for gold and science, then watch it again being spent. There's no interaction.

It is simpler if the city count stays very low, and there is an easy method of dealing with making major changes (or major changes aren't possible immediately, but take a long time to implement <---- is more realistic). To go to Civ 2 micromanagement would not be in favor with what everyone is expecting.

Why can't it be this:

We make gold. We multiply it with effects and buildings.
We make science. We multiply it with effects and buildings.

It is, IF it's true that gold and science is seperate. I hope it's not assumed that gold and science are seperate because they took the slider out. I hope a statement was actually made saying this.

It's not about that, it's about a new player finding out "Hey, my marketplace didn't add much money, what's wrong, my empire doesn't have any gold? What about all those GOLD MINES I'm using?". It doesn't make sense, and is confusing.

All you have to do is slide the research slider down and watch the hordes of gold start pouring in! Civ Players are smarter than the average gamer.

I do have to agree, completely, that the developers do have to be careful how much forced micro-management exists.

While I love the idea of having a system that can be manipulated down to the very last nut and bolt, I respect and understand that the same system shouldn't require it.

The systems need to be transparent, so people like me can manipulate it fully, but for people who simply do not care, it just needs to work.

My assumption is that they will put in governers that will facilitate this.

Games that are easy to play, but tough to master are the ones worth their weight in gold. I agree with you here, and I hope Civ 5 is one of them!

 

[PieceOfMind]

I apologise in advance for sort of just quote mining here - but they are things that are IMO important to get straight.

Binary research is a total pain in the ass and there's no reason it should be an option to do. It makes no sense, and is just rounding errors.

This is absolutely wrong, I'm sorry. Try going to the Civ4 strategy forum and asking about why players do binary research, and you will learn why. In fact, rounding is almost a non-reason any more. It was more important in unpatched vanilla, but now that cities collect gold, science etc. to 2 decimal places, the rounding is barely something worth noting to even the most hardcore of micromanagers.
I'll give you the best example of why binary research was important - waiting to start on a tech that could come up for trade in the meantime.

It was actually the move that eliminated 'commerce'. The slider was just a side effect because the slider needs the commerce aspect in order to exist in the game (it divides the commerce).

I am glad to see at least someone else willing to state the change for what it correctly is - the removal of commerce - not the removal of a slider.

It's worth noting that civrev technically had commerce, except every city had its own slider that could only be set to 0-100 or 100-0 in terms of gold or science conversion (I might be getting this a bit wrong actually, if you didn't emphasis gold or science, it might have produced both - my memory isn't all that good). If civ4 had commerce but with an individual slider for each city, that would still be a commerce system and one that probably Jonolith would like more.

Before anything: I'm going to use "removal of slider" and "removal of commerce" to mean the same thing. Sorry, Pieceofmind.

If you were truly sorry, you would stop doing it.

It's your choice what language to use of course.

You never ever want to confuse the player. Also, it's just not true, as binary research is key.

I can almost agree here. It is indeed useful to do binary research at high difficulties, but I wouldn't quite call it key. It's certainly not pointless.

It results in a poor difficulty curve, and as I said before, gold, culture and espionage being near worthless.

Again I think the blame is misplaced. It's not the commerce system or the slider that makes gold, culture and espionage worthless. It's the fact that one beaker is simply worth more than 1 gold, 1 culture and 1 espionage. If you want to change that, you change the relative value of those things by making more powerful the things you can do with culture, espionage, and gold. For example, culture would be valued more highly if cultural victory thresholds were lower. Gold would be valued more highly if unit upgrades were cheaper, rush buying things were cheaper etc. Espionage would be more valuable if espionage missions didn't cost as much.

Science or were just extremely valuable.

The simplest way to change that fact would be to do something drastic like double the cost of every single tech in the tree. A change like that would have far reaching consequences of course that I won't pretend to understand, but it would certainly reduce the value of 1

Anyway, I don't want to follow that line of argument too far because it's getting away from the point of what I want to discuss.

The point I really want to make is that in civ5 it is looking like gold and culture etc. are more valuable because they have been given important and game-changing uses. It is not just because commerce has been removed from the game. If technological advancement was still far stronger than what you could do with gold and culture in civ5, you would have the same problem in civ5 as you did with civ4. e.g. You would always build libraries before markets.
Of course, the fact that gold and culture have been made more important in civ5 is giving false evidence to everyone who claims it was the slider (or more correctly the existence of malleable commerce) that made gold and culture worthless in civ4.

Civ5 will probably bring a bit more micromanagement to the game, which is usually a bad thing in my books, but as I always say, I'm willing to play the game before I make a judgement about which game did it better. In these discussions I'm only arguing about how certain mechanics affect the game - not which ones are inherently better or worse.

 

[JonoLith]

I apologise in advance for sort of just quote mining here - but they are things that are IMO important to get straight.

Forsooth! I hath been misquoted! I shall swear an oath of vengance upon thee and thine that shall last until the end of supper!

 

[PieceOfMind]

Forsooth! I hath been misquoted! I shall swear an oath of vengance upon thee and thine that shall last until the end of supper!

You're right. I'll fix it now. Sorry bout that.

 

[Celevin]

Me mistaken for Jonolith? I'm too new to know who this is an insult towards

I realize my position has changed in the past week over the course of this thread. That's natural, given we're still sorting out what the ramifications of the removal of commerce actually are. I like selecting a side over just talking about a particular mechanic, as I think it brings out more information in the end.

This is absolutely wrong, I'm sorry. Try going to the Civ4 strategy forum and asking about why players do binary research, and you will learn why. In fact, rounding is almost a non-reason any more. It was more important in unpatched vanilla, but now that cities collect gold, science etc. to 2 decimal places, the rounding is barely something worth noting to even the most hardcore of micromanagers.
I'll give you the best example of why binary research was important - waiting to start on a tech that could come up for trade in the meantime.

Crap, I didn't know that, now I look like a dumbass! I don't pay attention to the forums much, and must have missed the patch notes.

There's of course even more reasons to do binary. For example, after getting a tech that offers a science building (writing's the biggest culprit), it's good to put your science to 0% until your main few cities built the libraries. It doesn't feel natural to me at all, and while I do it at a few crucial techs at Immortal/Deity, I really wish I didn't feel obligated. I used to play with tech trading on until around a year ago, as per the reason you brought up. I found myself spending more brain power on working out my exact system on to get the most science by tech trading / binary that it stopped becoming fun.

Again I think the blame is misplaced. It's not the commerce system or the slider that makes gold, culture and espionage worthless. It's the fact that one beaker is simply worth more than 1 gold, 1 culture and 1 espionage. If you want to change that, you change the relative value of those things by making more powerful the things you can do with culture, espionage, and gold. For example, culture would be valued more highly if cultural victory thresholds were lower. Gold would be valued more highly if unit upgrades were cheaper, rush buying things were cheaper etc. Espionage would be more valuable if espionage missions didn't cost as much.

Science or were just extremely valuable.

The simplest way to change that fact would be to do something drastic like double the cost of every single tech in the tree. A change like that would have far reaching consequences of course that I won't pretend to understand, but it would certainly reduce the value of 1

Anyway, I don't want to follow that line of argument too far because it's getting away from the point of what I want to discuss.

The point I really want to make is that in civ5 it is looking like gold and culture etc. are more valuable because they have been given important and game-changing uses. It is not just because commerce has been removed from the game. If technological advancement was still far stronger than what you could do with gold and culture in civ5, you would have the same problem in civ5 as you did with civ4. e.g. You would always build libraries before markets.
Of course, the fact that gold and culture have been made more important in civ5 is giving false evidence to everyone who claims it was the slider (or more correctly the existence of malleable commerce) that made gold and culture worthless in civ4.

Here's where I disagree. I said something along these lines:

Science is a commodity which has no diminishing returns, has the most bang per buck, and you need to stay close in science with the other civs, otherwise there's a good chance you lose.

You can make gold do as much as science by putting in more abilities and such, but people most of the time will still feel obligated to max out their science, even if it means on missing out on a whole bunch of other features. And if those features are extremely worthwhile, it will just make the player feel very very binded between choosing effective uses of commerce, and absolutely needed uses of science. It comes back to the "cold war" feeling that you have to put in as much science as the other players, or forever be left in the dust. This wouldn't be so bad if we could trade techs (as much as I abhor the tech trading system).

You are right though that if gold and culture wasn't given good uses (or even now if they aren't perceived as good uses), people will still build libraries over markets. However, if it plays out correctly, this can be mitigated. Let's assume libraries give +25% science, and markets give +25% gold. If the city is size 12 from a lot of food (thus +12 ), and has almost only food and production tiles, the city will want to build a library. If the city has 2 gold mines and a trading outpost and is working all three at size 5, then they will want to build a market over the library. The reason is simply instead of there existing commerce which is either gold or science depending on the player's choice, now cities produce different levels of each, making some buildings more worthwhile than others.


While I'm always worried about levels of micromanagement, I wonder how much there will be in this case. In Civ4, we were playing accountants by managing the books, and were trying to be perfectionists by maxing science. I think the fear is that instead of having a macro slider, people will have to go into each individual city and adjust. However what are they adjusting now? Is it so bad to have an excess of gold which can be used to buy tiles and deal with city states? This time around, with building maintenance costs and more city specialization (as I showed above), it seems to be about specializing cities to making the currency, whether it be gold, science, culture or production, that will give the most "total amount" in the end. In Civ4, "specialization" merges gold and science cities together unless buildings like the religious wonders, and national wonders changed that in rare cases.

 

[PieceOfMind]

Let's assume libraries give +25% science, and markets give +25% gold. If the city is size 12 from a lot of food (thus +12 ), and has almost only food and production tiles, the city will want to build a library. If the city has 2 gold mines and a trading outpost and is working all three at size 5, then they will want to build a market over the library.

Still, this is assuming gold is comparable in value to science. Remember that you still make the choice to work those gold mines and IMO having two gold mines is going to be an exceptional circumstance - it doesn't look like resources clump together any more.

The reason is simply instead of there existing commerce which is either gold or science depending on the player's choice, now cities produce different levels of each, making some buildings more worthwhile than others.

Sure if you assume that 1 is going to be roughly equal in value to 1 then if a city has more gold than beakers and a market is a similar price to a library (which it wasn't in civ4 - market much more expensive) then it would be wise to build the market first. However I think that's a very big assumption to be making right now. I have my doubts that 1 beaker will so near to 1 gold in terms of value.

Suppose they do a similar thing to civrev where every single tech had a "first to discover" bonus. That makes science extremely important if you're near the front of the tech pack.

It is basically impossible to decide with the information we have whether the balance between science and gold is going to be as level as some of you appear to want it to be. It's an ideal that won't necessarily be achieved with the vanilla game.

While I'm always worried about levels of micromanagement, I wonder how much there will be in this case. In Civ4, we were playing accountants by managing the books, and were trying to be perfectionists by maxing science. I think the fear is that instead of having a macro slider, people will have to go into each individual city and adjust. However what are they adjusting now? Is it so bad to have an excess of gold which can be used to buy tiles and deal with city states?

Yes, an excess of gold will be pointless if it could have been more science instead, assuming science is better.

This time around, with building maintenance costs and more city specialization (as I showed above), it seems to be about specializing cities to making the currency, whether it be gold, science, culture or production, that will give the most "total amount" in the end.

As I said before, this will depend on the relative important of each income type. In civ4, a building that produced 4 wans't necessarily as useful as one that produced 4. We can hope they are trying to reach a balance, but we can't take it as a given.

In Civ4, "specialization" merges gold and science cities together unless buildings like the religious wonders, and national wonders changed that in rare cases.

Yes, and that's why they were called commerce cities. Actually people who were proficient at running specialist-heavy empires could run lots of small cities with libraries running 2 scientists (or more with Caste System) and run their science slider rather low so that one or two cities could generate large amounts of commerce and make markets/banks etc. more profitable than usual. However because Oxford Uni was available earlier and cheaper than Wall Street it was more typical to make the massive commerce city - typically a Bureaucracy capital - a science focused one. So generating as much gold as possible in other cities became priority. Even to the point that high level players advocated building wealth in cities rather than markets and banks and even courthouses. Building wealth was only 2 turning into 1 but the massive +50% commerce bonus on the capital (which was multiplicative, not additive, with the +% science bonuses in the capital) easily made it worth it. If you ever take a walk through Deity game discussions and wonder how on Earth players are running higher science sliders than what most Noble players can even manage - that is why (actually it's also the gold from tech trades, this is probably even more important). Some of them even boast that they run 100% science slider for 90% or so of the game.

Anyway, for now I'll just leave it at it's hard to tell yet whether there will be much balance between gold,science, culture etc. There doesn't necessarily need to be, but the game will be quite a bit different if science is finally on a more level playing field - I think I would enjoy the game more that way too.