So sometimes I go Honor

[Seoul]

After finishing Tradition or Liberty (on Raging barbs, I might get Honor before finishing Tradition / Lib), I occasionally go to Honor and fill out just the opening and get discipline and sometimes warrior code.

Maybe I'm weird for thinking this, but i think Discipline is a really really good tenet. The 15% combat strength bonus applies when attacking cities and also applies for your navy ships. And it's so easy to have a unit adjacent before you attack, it's basically +15% combat strength to all melee units / ranged units defending against melee attacks. It gets to the point that on domination ocean maps, I sometimes don't even go exploration and go honor instead.

I don't like the rest of honor (nor that craptastic opening, for that matter) though. I only ever seem to need great generals to deal with great wall against AI or when I'm in a pinch in the early game, but 15% production boost to all melee isn't terrible. Filling out more than the first 2 trees in honor though, I just about never do. (Yeah, I don't like the EXP tenet in honor because of the opportunity cost and how underwhelming it actually is in practice - plus, discipline encourages massing military carpets rather than having a few super experienced troops anyways).

 

[ShakaKhan]

I concur that discipline is a great policy. That along with Statue of Zues are easily quantifiable bonuses: if you're intending domination, you need to take cities. Zues makes this goal 15% easier. Discipline makes it 10% easier (btw - I think discipline is a 10% bonus, not 15%, but I may be wrong.) So whenever I go honor, I go right first, but it seems that the majority of the forum prefer going left.

I don't like the idea of getting the honor opener after completing tradition or liberty. If, for example, your goal is to end up with full tradition plus the honor opener, I'd either start with the honor opener and then go full tradition or tradition opener, honor opener, complete tradition. The reason is that if you're going to invest in the honor opener, you can partially compensate (not fully compensate) for the opportunity cost by maximizing the amount of culture you get from barbs. Not sure where you are in the difficulty level spectrum, but at deity the AI will usually remove barbs from the game by the time you finish tradition, except for a few encampments in the boonies that you're not going to interact with much. Also, regardless of difficulty, the barbs can be quite problematic in the early game but regress to a minor annoyance by the time you finish tradition.

Also, while much of the rest of the honor tree are filler policies, the finisher is so-so at lower difficulties but scales incredibly with increasing difficulty level. On deity, every AI amasses huge carpets, and you can get tons of gold from finishing them off. There is a great example of this in Marbozir's LP "turks vs. white walkers," a challenging mod set in the worst of map settings where there was no way to defend against the onslaught without the honor opener and no way to establish an economy without the honor finisher. Research penalties accrued and compounded from having 0 gold and losing 30 gpt, but then the honor finisher completed and while his gpt was still deep in the negatives, he made more than that and got a few hundred gold in the treasury simply from fighting.

 

[BurnBabyBurn]

I opened Honor and finished it in an ongoing game. Without Tradition or Liberty my economy has suffered but with the early upgrades on Normal Speed my Ranged had logistics/range...so did my artillery and all very quickly. My tanks quickly acquired Blitz, etc... So I never lost a war the whole game. -30 to -40 GPT per turn but enough fighting made up the difference. Since on Deity(likely less important on Immortal) the production for the AI is insane so you have no lack of units to kill. You gain about 20 gold per enemy unit killed. I have been running a surplus between 1000-3000 most of the game despite spending a lot on upgrades(which are cheaper when you finish honor) It is not superior to Tradition~Liberty for Science but I'm on par with the Science leader. I also have heard Commerce Couples well(I have yet to Master this) I am not sure how one would use a Honor/Commerce Strategy but I'm sure that could be powerful if done right?

I concur that discipline is a great policy. That along with Statue of Zues are easily quantifiable bonuses: if you're intending domination, you need to take cities. Zues makes this goal 15% easier. Discipline makes it 10% easier (btw - I think discipline is a 10% bonus, not 15%, but I may be wrong.) So whenever I go honor, I go right first, but it seems that the majority of the forum prefer going left.

I don't like the idea of getting the honor opener after completing tradition or liberty. If, for example, your goal is to end up with full tradition plus the honor opener, I'd either start with the honor opener and then go full tradition or tradition opener, honor opener, complete tradition. The reason is that if you're going to invest in the honor opener, you can partially compensate (not fully compensate) for the opportunity cost by maximizing the amount of culture you get from barbs. Not sure where you are in the difficulty level spectrum, but at deity the AI will usually remove barbs from the game by the time you finish tradition, except for a few encampments in the boonies that you're not going to interact with much. Also, regardless of difficulty, the barbs can be quite problematic in the early game but regress to a minor annoyance by the time you finish tradition.

Also, while much of the rest of the honor tree are filler policies, the finisher is so-so at lower difficulties but scales incredibly with increasing difficulty level. On deity, every AI amasses huge carpets, and you can get tons of gold from finishing them off. There is a great example of this in Marbozir's LP "turks vs. white walkers," a challenging mod set in the worst of map settings where there was no way to defend against the onslaught without the honor opener and no way to establish an economy without the honor finisher. Research penalties accrued and compounded from having 0 gold and losing 30 gpt, but then the honor finisher completed and while his gpt was still deep in the negatives, he made more than that and got a few hundred gold in the treasury simply from fighting.

 

[ShakaKhan]

I always go commerce when going domination. There's very few policies that I always do for a specific VC (well, rationalism for all of 'em, but I digress.) The way that I play, I have until I finish my first SP tree to decide which victory condition I'm going for. If I'm going culture for example, It'll usually be partial aesthetics before going rationalism. But commerce always for domination. Usually ties that in with Autocracy. The big bonus is mercantilism + Big Ben + Mobilization. Three bonuses that decrease purchase cost. I think Xcoms are under 500g each with all three. The extra gold from the honor finisher would be nice, but that probably suggests 3 full SP trees (full honor, full commerce, at least partial rationalism if not all) plus sprinklings of autocracy, which is trending towards a poland-only strategy.

 

[BurnBabyBurn]

Shaka how you can achieve all those without Poland/Aztecs ... baffles me. I am fortunate to get 2 total SP trees open, and without Poland or Aztecs I'm working hard to get Rationalism open before an Ideology.

Aztecs you can set the game to perma'war and I have opened 2 SP Trees, and began work on a 3rd...

 

[Dushku]

I'm working hard to get Rationalism open before an Ideology.

Is the opener an option you're not taking? Regardless of which way you get into an ideology, there's no way so much time is passing that you don't get ANY policies.

As for the rest, it's easy to up your culture intake. Build and work your Writer's Guild. Maybe cozy up with a cultured city state.

 

[ShakaKhan]

Shaka how you can achieve all those without Poland/Aztecs ... baffles me. I am fortunate to get 2 total SP trees open, and without Poland or Aztecs I'm working hard to get Rationalism open before an Ideology.

Aztecs you can set the game to perma'war and I have opened 2 SP Trees, and began work on a 3rd...

I haven't. My standard SP approach to domination games is full tradition ->commerce opener/landschnects->rationalism opener/right side of rationalism/secularism ->free mobilization/either futurism or united front. From there, several factors change which direction I'm going, too many to list. For example, if I'm happy-starved, I'll get mobilization next. If it's a tech-oriented civ, I may be looking to finish rationalism to cash in on an expensive tech like rocketry. If it's a very tech-poor game, I may need to get rationalism finished for free plastics. If my opponents are weak and Big Ben is done, I'll just get mercantism then and rush buy multiple units every turn and end the game.

So I don't have all those SP trees finished. Full trad, partial economics, partial rationalism, and cherry-picking autocracy is usually what I've attained by the time victory is in sight. The amount of those trees that I actually complete is inversely proportional to how well I do since doing better means finishing earlier means fewer SP trees completed. Regarding honor (the focus of the thread), the finisher is very powerful on deity. The underlying disclaimer throughout the thread is that honor is cool and different but nobody is saying it is equal to tradition or liberty. As such, and as an aggressive-oriented SP tree, the extra gold would complement the commerce/auticracy tricks described above nicely. Switching full honor for full tradition may be an interesting alternative for this reason

Here's another bonus of the commerce/autocracy/optional honor strategy that addresses your point about difficulty filling all those trees: world's fair. Proposing world's fair (which often happens at a point when some of the other civs are just starting to hate me and my warmongering ways enough that the diplo boost from proposing it really helps) is a great choice in this situation. On deity, you rarely can win it because you can't gamble having all your cities build it and sacrifice what they would be producing. In this situation however, 1.) many of the civs are at war when it's in effect (30 turns after the diplo boost from proposing it) meaning that they'll contribute less because they're fighting. Furthermore, since you're not interested in wonders (with the exception of Prora, the other civs build wonders for you) and you don't need to build units (the strategy emphasizes gold-purchasing units over hard building them) you can switch all your cities production to WF while the AI are making units and win. Free policy and double culture for 20 turns goes a long way.

 

[Sclb]

Actually Discipline isn't that great.
I believe Melee means in this game only the following units: scout, warrior, swordsman, longswordman, spearman, pikeman.
It doesn't affect the combat strength of other type of units. In a game where wars are fought with primarily ranged units, this isn't so useful at all.

Also for domination, if you started war early, you usually don't even need rationalism. Game should end before you need that much science.

Winning WF is trivial on deity if you started war early and have half of the capitals. It is only hard if you stay at 4 cities. It is pretty much my only way of getting huge amount of culture, other than allying culture CS, which you should do anyways. Using gold from commerce/honor finisher to ally CS is very important. Peddroelm has a guide somewhere for warring with Honor - Commerce - Autocracy.

 

[Dushku]

Also for domination, if you started war early, you usually don't even need rationalism. Game should end before you need that much science.

As somebody who's starting to try domination, I'd like to learn more about this. It's not the first time I've heard dom games go relatively quickly. As such, I fear I might be focusing too much on infrastructure as a habit of peaceful play. Could you take a peak at my current game and tell me if you think I'm wasting my time on buildings I shouldn't be and/or are not focusing on units enough? Here's where I'm at right now.

I've mostly been building Monuments, Libraries, and happiness buildings. But I'm about to be at a point where Markets, Amphitheaters, and guilds are options and am unclear about how much doing those things will better prepare me for the long haul and how much those things would detract from my goal of world domination. Any help would be appreciated and is one of the reasons why I publish my games at all (to solicit feedback from better players).

 

[consentient]

Honor is a fantastic tree, but it's heavily reduced in value if it's not your opening tree. Since for Domination games, growth isn't anywhere near as important, Tradition is not such a big loss. And since with Honor, you can beeline Machinery and arrive at around the same time as through Tradition, you won't need the early-war benefits of Liberty, and the delayed war and limiting yourself to 3 cities can make you some valuable friendships. So you should open it, and get to the finisher ASAP.

After Honor, Commerce and Autocracy are gotten to in short order, and by the Industrial Era you can be earning so much GPT, you'll never see anything like it again.

 

[ShakaKhan]

Actually Discipline isn't that great.
I believe Melee means in this game only the following units: scout, warrior, swordsman, longswordman, spearman, pikeman

I may be wrong about this, but I thought the honor-melee-definition problem (which I believe is a bug and was intended to include gunpowder units that function as melee units) only applies to warrior code and not discipline. It's been a while since I played honor, but I clearly remember the discipline bonus applying to frigates and if memory serves, siege units as well.

 

[yung.carl.jung]

After finishing Tradition or Liberty (on Raging barbs, I might get Honor before finishing Tradition / Lib), I occasionally go to Honor and fill out just the opening and get discipline and sometimes warrior code.

Maybe I'm weird for thinking this, but i think Discipline is a really really good tenet. The 15% combat strength bonus applies when attacking cities and also applies for your navy ships. And it's so easy to have a unit adjacent before you attack, it's basically +15% combat strength to all melee units / ranged units defending against melee attacks. It gets to the point that on domination ocean maps, I sometimes don't even go exploration and go honor instead.

I don't like the rest of honor (nor that craptastic opening, for that matter) though. I only ever seem to need great generals to deal with great wall against AI or when I'm in a pinch in the early game, but 15% production boost to all melee isn't terrible. Filling out more than the first 2 trees in honor though, I just about never do. (Yeah, I don't like the EXP tenet in honor because of the opportunity cost and how underwhelming it actually is in practice - plus, discipline encourages massing military carpets rather than having a few super experienced troops anyways).

Going Honor just for the Opener is pretty bad, however I agree Discipline is fantastic and if you're warring, doesn't matter whether or not you have a Domination Victory in mind, it is extremely useful and maybe the best Social Policy that directly affects war next to the Honor finisher.

Still, Commerce is by far the strongest second Policy tree, even for warring, in my opinion. The best thing about Honor is the finisher, the best thing about Commerce is the discount and Big Ben.

I may be wrong about this, but I thought the honor-melee-definition problem (which I believe is a bug and was intended to include gunpowder units that function as melee units) only applies to warrior code and not discipline. It's been a while since I played honor, but I clearly remember the discipline bonus applying to frigates and if memory serves, siege units as well.

I always thought this, too, would be nice if someone could confirm. If that's not the case that certainly makes the Policy a lot worse.

 

[Seoul]

Actually Discipline isn't that great.
I believe Melee means in this game only the following units: scout, warrior, swordsman, longswordman, spearman, pikeman.
It doesn't affect the combat strength of other type of units. In a game where wars are fought with primarily ranged units, this isn't so useful at all.

Also for domination, if you started war early, you usually don't even need rationalism. Game should end before you need that much science.

Winning WF is trivial on deity if you started war early and have half of the capitals. It is only hard if you stay at 4 cities. It is pretty much my only way of getting huge amount of culture, other than allying culture CS, which you should do anyways. Using gold from commerce/honor finisher to ally CS is very important. Peddroelm has a guide somewhere for warring with Honor - Commerce - Autocracy.

Discipline literally goes to every single unit you have - naval, ranged, cavalry, etc. Even the ones that were made before you get the tenet receive it, similar to Himeji castle.

The thing is, it only affects the melee strength of every unit (so you don't get +15% strength when attacking with crossbows or frigates), but with ranged units it still affects their ability to defend against melee based on their melee strength component (the 13 melee str of crossbows gets a 15% boost defending against knights, longswords etc).

It's Warrior Code that doesn't effect cavalry or ranged units (though I'm not sure if it affects gunpowder units or not).

Also @ Khan, I'm mostly an immortal player. I go emperor to kick back and relax from time to time, and play deity when I feel like going for a challenge (I've beaten deity enough times, however).

And yeah, you're absolutely right. Going honor after Tradition/Liberty isn't good since as you pointed out, barbs get routed quickly at that point. I tend to go tradition -> honor -> finish tradition -> get discipline -> go rationalism when I'm in a mood for honor (occasionally starting honor... but usually not). I don't like commerce or finishing honor much, even though I know it can be quite strong (just personal preference). It's just sometimes, I don't really feel like going anything else after finishing tradition so I just stick one on honor and am like "lol whatever at least I can get discipline now".

 

[Sclb]

Discipline's description:
+15% combat strength for melee units which have another military unit in an adjacent tile.
ranged unit can activate the bonus for an adjacent melee unit, but it doesn't benefit from the combat strength themselves.

 

[Dushku]

Honor is a fantastic tree, but it's heavily reduced in value if it's not your opening tree. Since for Domination games, growth isn't anywhere near as important, Tradition is not such a big loss. And since with Honor, you can beeline Machinery and arrive at around the same time as through Tradition, you won't need the early-war benefits of Liberty, and the delayed war and limiting yourself to 3 cities can make you some valuable friendships. So you should open it, and get to the finisher ASAP.

After Honor, Commerce and Autocracy are gotten to in short order, and by the Industrial Era you can be earning so much GPT, you'll never see anything like it again.

I'm intrigued by this post. I want to get better as a player, but try to enjoy the game also. You mentioned 3 cities; Is this what you've found to be ideal? How do you decide in terms of how it might be different from opening Trad/Lib?

[EDIT]
Also, when opening Honor, do you go down the right side to get more culture sooner or the left side to get XP sooner? I'm guessing right since the process you describe, you'll mostly just be fighting barbs at first, which caps XP anyways. Also, do you tech luxes then military? If so, do you take a sidestep to grab Writing for Libraries? Do you do National College ahead of say Comp Bows and Swordsmen? Do you build Barracks in every city? If so, do you also go for Heroic Epic?

Sorry for all the questions, but it's the one area of Civ I've explored the least. Afraid I've already developed some "bad habits".

 

[stormtrooper412]

I think it depends. For Huns, it's pretty much a no brainer that you take the xp bonus first because you'd want to speed up the Logistics. At that point Horse Archers basically become Keshiks and there's not much anyone else can do about it. Usually though you go right hand side first if you don't really plan on hitting anyone before Crossbows. You can farm experience points hitting a city state but I never found it really making much difference.

I suggest working on Immortal domination first, there's a couple really really good maps available in the ICL, Mongolia, Huns, China, Assyria and to a degree, USA.

 

[Redaxe]

I think it depends. For Huns, it's pretty much a no brainer that you take the xp bonus first because you'd want to speed up the Logistics. At that point Horse Archers basically become Keshiks and there's not much anyone else can do about it. Usually though you go right hand side first if you don't really plan on hitting anyone before Crossbows. You can farm experience points hitting a city state but I never found it really making much difference.

If you plan on early war the left side of Honor is clearly the best as you get a very early Great General and the sooner you get the xp bonus the sooner your archers are going to get to range and logistics.

In my mind that's really the only way to play Honor.

 

[stormtrooper412]

Yeah but Archers are quite useless compared to Horse Archers/Chariots

 

[GenuineRisk]

Honor is probably my favourite starting tree and I almost always go right side first. (Huns are an exception, of course) Military Caste and Professional Army are too good and too relevant in the early game to delay.

 

[Redaxe]

Yeah but Archers are quite useless compared to Horse Archers/Chariots

Oh for sure but they soon upgrade to composites and then to Xbows. Hence it is still worth getting those units out asap and training them if you are doing an dom victory