Specialised cities

[Arlequin]

I see what you mean now. And yes, I can see the problems with my suggestions. Allow me to make modifications. First, forget randomization. All bonuses will be the same from game to game, from civ to civ, and from city to city. The only exception is if we want some bonuses to be unique to a certain civilizations.

As for the bonuses themselves, you are right. There is nothing to stop players from specializing their cities all in the same way, such as, for example, turning all science districts in all my cities into super science districts, while keeping all other types of districts undeveloped by specialists. The way to resolve that problem might lie in making the bonuses conditional on trade routes, resources, or geography. For example, all of industrial districts bonuses are dependent on the hammers already being produced on the worked terrains. The first upgrade bonus will increase output by 25 percent. The second upgrade bonus will increase output by another 25 percent. A city that is located on mostly grassland without forests or mines will not find it worth their while to invest specialists in industrial districts. Another example maybe harbor. All harbor bonuses are tied to the trade routes. The higher number of trade routes, the higher the bonuses. But since we only have limited number of trade routes, not all cities can specialize in harbor.

The harbour bonus idea is an interesting one. Seems overpowered said like that, but it looks really great and indeed make for specialized cities.

Concerning improving the adjacency bonus in order to encourage specialisation. I did think of that (not with your mechanic however) but I am not sure it is a good enough answer. First if the adjacency bonus get too significant, good starts (like mountain area) may become way too powerful. There is already enough luck involved in the game. Second a lot of district tends to get the same bonus, wherever the city you are in. If no mountains around, campus are almost always +1/+2, same for theatre districts. CH can often reach +5 or more, but their main use if for the trade route and GMP, the gold yield is not so much significant. So it will be significant only for HS and IZ, maybe for Campus when you have a lucky starts.

For the adjacency bonuses to be a real incentive toward specialisation, a big rebalancing must be done and yet still, it may create overly powerful or pointless starts.

 

[Leyrann]

I think that specialization is only going to work, indeed, if it is dependent on the terrain, which also has the additional advantage that it makes sense (after all, it was the area around Manchester in England and the area around Cologne in Germany, to name a few, that became the industrial powerhouses, as that was where the coal was mined).

So, how does that work? The game we're all playing right now quite clearly shows that just adjacency bonuses doesn't do the trick. We spam everything that grants Trade Routes anywhere, we build Industrial Zones so that they perfectly layer the cities and we then simply build the district required for victory (Campus, Theater Square, Holy Site) in every city, and the best strategy is to not build any other districts if possible.

Apparently, the gains or not-gains depending on location need to be stronger. There was a mod I played with for a while (sadly it doesn't update anymore and it's not compatible with the live version of hte game) that made districts and district buildings grant bonus yields to resources. For example, Stone would get +1 faith if the city had a Holy Site, and another +2 for a Shrine (and then I had a 5 stone start with Poland...). This would be a step at least, as the difference between a good campus (4 mountain adjacency + a mercury resource) and a bad campus (nothing) would be bigger, but current district planning, which includes things like Campuses without any adjacency bonuses just because you're going for a science victory, show that it's not enough.

Why not? Because of buildings not. Even if you have a campus without adjacency bonuses, you still get 2+4+5=11 science, which becomes 22 with the right policy card. That far beats the maximum of 12 you're ever going to get from adjacency (6 from 6 mountains doubled by card). In fact, by the time the renaissance rolls around (still the first half of eras), you already have the possiblity to make any campus get science from buildings equal to the maximum a campus can possibly get from adjacency, and that adjacency isn't exactly likely; 4 is a more likely "very good adjacency" if you're not playing Australia or Brazil.

So apparently, buildings also need to be changed. Maybe a Library can grant 1 science and +50% adjacency bonuses (+3 science if you got that 4 adjacency bonus, but only +1 if you don't have adjacency bonuses), then a University grants 2 science and +50% adjacency bonuses and a Research Lab grants +2 science and +100% adjacency bonuses. A 0 adjacency bonus campus now grants 5 (10) science, while a 4 adjacency bonus campus now grants 12 (24) science just from adjacencies. In the current version of the game, 4/15 (slightly over 25%) of a full campus with 4 adjacency bonus is earned from the adjacency, while in this version 12/17 (about 70%) of the full campus' science is earned from adjacency. With these numbers (that I just made up on the spot, btw), a 4 adjacency bonus campus is just slightly stronger than it is right now, while a 0 adjacency bonus campus grants only half of what it granted before. Numbers would need more balancing, by the way, as the current 4 adjacency bonus campus would be stronger than the new one if you'd take just one card, which doesn't really make sense (it's a good location after all). On top of that, Australia would need quite a bit of additional balancing (or that +3 for breathtaking appeal from the 4 mountains next to your campus becomes +9). With such buildings, however, you're probably not going to bother with a bad campus anymore; after all, two mountains next to your campus (6 science) is better than a full campus without adjacency bonuses (5 science).

Every district can get such a balance change, though it seems likely that Commercial Hubs and Harbors need additional balancing because trade routes are simply too strong. Maybe something like "Commercial Hub only grants a trade route if it's adjacent to a River, Harbor only grants a trade route if it's adjacent to the City Center, also can't get 2 trade routes from one city". And domestic trade routes need a nerf. Make them grant gold instead of production, or something.

 

[Arlequin]

I think that specialization is only going to work, indeed, if it is dependent on the terrain, which also has the additional advantage that it makes sense (after all, it was the area around Manchester in England and the area around Cologne in Germany, to name a few, that became the industrial powerhouses, as that was where the coal was mined).

So, how does that work? The game we're all playing right now quite clearly shows that just adjacency bonuses doesn't do the trick. We spam everything that grants Trade Routes anywhere, we build Industrial Zones so that they perfectly layer the cities and we then simply build the district required for victory (Campus, Theater Square, Holy Site) in every city, and the best strategy is to not build any other districts if possible.

Apparently, the gains or not-gains depending on location need to be stronger. There was a mod I played with for a while (sadly it doesn't update anymore and it's not compatible with the live version of hte game) that made districts and district buildings grant bonus yields to resources. For example, Stone would get +1 faith if the city had a Holy Site, and another +2 for a Shrine (and then I had a 5 stone start with Poland...). This would be a step at least, as the difference between a good campus (4 mountain adjacency + a mercury resource) and a bad campus (nothing) would be bigger, but current district planning, which includes things like Campuses without any adjacency bonuses just because you're going for a science victory, show that it's not enough.

Why not? Because of buildings not. Even if you have a campus without adjacency bonuses, you still get 2+4+5=11 science, which becomes 22 with the right policy card. That far beats the maximum of 12 you're ever going to get from adjacency (6 from 6 mountains doubled by card). In fact, by the time the renaissance rolls around (still the first half of eras), you already have the possiblity to make any campus get science from buildings equal to the maximum a campus can possibly get from adjacency, and that adjacency isn't exactly likely; 4 is a more likely "very good adjacency" if you're not playing Australia or Brazil.

So apparently, buildings also need to be changed. Maybe a Library can grant 1 science and +50% adjacency bonuses (+3 science if you got that 4 adjacency bonus, but only +1 if you don't have adjacency bonuses), then a University grants 2 science and +50% adjacency bonuses and a Research Lab grants +2 science and +100% adjacency bonuses. A 0 adjacency bonus campus now grants 5 (10) science, while a 4 adjacency bonus campus now grants 12 (24) science just from adjacencies. In the current version of the game, 4/15 (slightly over 25%) of a full campus with 4 adjacency bonus is earned from the adjacency, while in this version 12/17 (about 70%) of the full campus' science is earned from adjacency. With these numbers (that I just made up on the spot, btw), a 4 adjacency bonus campus is just slightly stronger than it is right now, while a 0 adjacency bonus campus grants only half of what it granted before. Numbers would need more balancing, by the way, as the current 4 adjacency bonus campus would be stronger than the new one if you'd take just one card, which doesn't really make sense (it's a good location after all). On top of that, Australia would need quite a bit of additional balancing (or that +3 for breathtaking appeal from the 4 mountains next to your campus becomes +9). With such buildings, however, you're probably not going to bother with a bad campus anymore; after all, two mountains next to your campus (6 science) is better than a full campus without adjacency bonuses (5 science).

Every district can get such a balance change, though it seems likely that Commercial Hubs and Harbors need additional balancing because trade routes are simply too strong. Maybe something like "Commercial Hub only grants a trade route if it's adjacent to a River, Harbor only grants a trade route if it's adjacent to the City Center, also can't get 2 trade routes from one city". And domestic trade routes need a nerf. Make them grant gold instead of production, or something.

A return to %bonus yield from buildings is certainly a good idea. It does encourage specialisation (better to have a full well chosen district then just 4 raw districts). nqmod does introduce this idea, but the % are too low (probably to keep the game balanced).

This should diversify the game for sure. However balancing it is a problem:
- if terrain can change district from useless to excellent, a civilisation in a mountain+mercury area (to use your exemples) will just snowball the science game while a civilisation in flat land without mercury will stay forever in the stoneage. Also in both those extreme case the civ will either put campus everywhere or nowhere (the average case being more interesting).
- if terrain can change district from ok to good, there wont be much change from now.

The balancing is maybe possible, but seems very hard to achieve.

This is why I think the "specialisation for one city" system is better (also a mix is possible).
- If you have a science generating natural wonder and some mountains in a city: it will be your technopolis for sure ! If you still have a lot of mountains around, you can still put campus there but those cities will only get small boosts.
- If you have no mountains around, you are unlucky but you can still dedicate a city to be a technopolis. It can still get you 2/3 of what a perfectly placed city would have made. If later in the game you get to put a new city in a great location, you can decide to switch the technopolis when this new city has grown enough.

All in all this seems easier to balance, lead to less frustrating games, encourages to adapt the strategy to the terrain, make possible both tall and wide play (or a mix), and it is fun to have different cities ! All of this with only one new mechanic !

 

[Leyrann]

Good point regarding the "a lot of mountains" vs "no mountains" case. The city specialisation you mentioned will probably help a lot with that, and to add to that I see a good spot for national wonders, and of a new type. This national wonder I'm thinking about would be placed instead of a district, and would act like a +x adjacency bonus district. Basically, in one city you build a National Academy instead of a campus (they're mutually exclusive; can't build both in the same city), which always has a +6 adjacency bonus, as if it were a perfect campus. You can then build the normal campus buildings in the district.

Because the wonder replaces the district while they have a fixed adjacency bonus, they would barely be any different from a normal district if you have good adjacency bonuses, but a lot better if you have bad or no adjacency bonuses. And as you can only build one, it also helps with specialisation. Of course, an empire next to a mountain range will still out-tech an empire on flat land, but that's part of how the game works. the one on flat land may have more rivers and therefore better commercial hubs.

In general though, if you have something like 8 cities, chances are that only a few of those are actually next to the mountain range, which automatically means more specialisation - after all, you're only going to bother with a campus for the cities next to the mountain range.

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On a semi-related note, I feel like a good thing to allow more specialization would be to increase the amount of districts in the game, possibly together with a reduction in population requirement per district. This could, for example, allow you to choose between going two science districts, or going a science district and a gold district, choosing to either specialize in science or generalize for both. Of course that would need to be coupled with different adjacency bonuses for different districts, not mountain for both science districts and river for both gold districts.

 

[Arlequin]

Good point regarding the "a lot of mountains" vs "no mountains" case. The city specialisation you mentioned will probably help a lot with that, and to add to that I see a good spot for national wonders, and of a new type. This national wonder I'm thinking about would be placed instead of a district, and would act like a +x adjacency bonus district. Basically, in one city you build a National Academy instead of a campus (they're mutually exclusive; can't build both in the same city), which always has a +6 adjacency bonus, as if it were a perfect campus. You can then build the normal campus buildings in the district.

Because the wonder replaces the district while they have a fixed adjacency bonus, they would barely be any different from a normal district if you have good adjacency bonuses, but a lot better if you have bad or no adjacency bonuses. And as you can only build one, it also helps with specialisation. Of course, an empire next to a mountain range will still out-tech an empire on flat land, but that's part of how the game works. the one on flat land may have more rivers and therefore better commercial hubs.

In general though, if you have something like 8 cities, chances are that only a few of those are actually next to the mountain range, which automatically means more specialisation - after all, you're only going to bother with a campus for the cities next to the mountain range.

---

On a semi-related note, I feel like a good thing to allow more specialization would be to increase the amount of districts in the game, possibly together with a reduction in population requirement per district. This could, for example, allow you to choose between going two science districts, or going a science district and a gold district, choosing to either specialize in science or generalize for both. Of course that would need to be coupled with different adjacency bonuses for different districts, not mountain for both science districts and river for both gold districts.

Hum, I am not convinced by the +6 adjacency national wonder.

The national wonder can of course be a way to specialise a city. They tend however to be all built in the capital, which in practice might mean a super capital, and no specialised cities. A solution would be to limit to only one national wonder per city, a bit like my idea. The only drawback is that once it's done: it's done. No way to change your technopolis to a new city with better potential. Not only is this frustrating and limits the gameplay, but it is also unrealistic: an empire can change it's policy and decide to stop putting all the money toward research in one region and send it to a new region. Of course you can counter arg that in real life you can have 2 or more technopolis, but we want it unique so that specialisation is encouraged. So I would like it to be movable. In civ4 if my memory is correct you can move the palace. So we could do the same with national wonder, but I find it more immersive to move a regional policy instead.

Considering the bonus. A national wonder with +6 adjacency means that where you place it doesn't matter much. It seems not funny. I still want the terrain to matter, just not to be necessary. Also a +6 adjacency instead of a percentage based bonus is not enough to make the specialisation matter, and to make you use specialists in this city. So I would stick to a percentage based bonus.

So I will look stubborn but I stick with my first idea, HAHA

Considering having more district, they already take a lot of place on the ground so is it realistic to allow to build more ? And about having multiple district: we may end up with all cities having 3 CH and 3 campus, so something must be done to balance them.

 

[Leyrann]

Well, it was a pretty basic idea with the districts. A bit of a pet idea from me that I kinda wanna work out and maybe make a mod of someday, but at the same time I don't have the patience to learn how to mod. My original idea regarding that was to basically triple the amount of districts, and also add new kinds like a Science/Culture hybrid, and then change more mechanics so that all cities would be larger sizes (less food to grow, more housing, more amenities) and have 4 range instead of three, as well as increasing minimum city distance to 5 and either reducing civs on the map or increasing map sizes. But yeah, it'd require quite a bit of balancing to stop people from building the same over and over.

The idea with the national wonders was more of a rubber band mechanic because of moving the yields from base to adjacency, so that a bad start wouldn't basically lock you out of the tech game or something like that, with the reduced "normal" Campus yields (5 instead of 11). It would be alongside adjacency changes and other specialisation stuff, not as main specialisation tool. That said, I fully agree you should have a cap of one, or maybe two, per city.

To look at it another way: Campuses without adjacency bonuses are pretty bad, but everyone gets exactly one super campus to provide something of a baseline for civs. Also, the super campus takes a campus spot, thereby reducing the ceiling for a good start.

Really, it depends on wheter it's needed. If this were to become a mod or something, then the strategy would be to make the mod without the national wonders first, and if the difference between a good and a bad start would be too big, they'd be added to even the starts a bit while still providing meaningful differences.

 

[Arlequin]

Well, it was a pretty basic idea with the districts. A bit of a pet idea from me that I kinda wanna work out and maybe make a mod of someday, but at the same time I don't have the patience to learn how to mod. My original idea regarding that was to basically triple the amount of districts, and also add new kinds like a Science/Culture hybrid, and then change more mechanics so that all cities would be larger sizes (less food to grow, more housing, more amenities) and have 4 range instead of three, as well as increasing minimum city distance to 5 and either reducing civs on the map or increasing map sizes. But yeah, it'd require quite a bit of balancing to stop people from building the same over and over.

The idea with the national wonders was more of a rubber band mechanic because of moving the yields from base to adjacency, so that a bad start wouldn't basically lock you out of the tech game or something like that, with the reduced "normal" Campus yields (5 instead of 11). It would be alongside adjacency changes and other specialisation stuff, not as main specialisation tool. That said, I fully agree you should have a cap of one, or maybe two, per city.

To look at it another way: Campuses without adjacency bonuses are pretty bad, but everyone gets exactly one super campus to provide something of a baseline for civs. Also, the super campus takes a campus spot, thereby reducing the ceiling for a good start.

Really, it depends on wheter it's needed. If this were to become a mod or something, then the strategy would be to make the mod without the national wonders first, and if the difference between a good and a bad start would be too big, they'd be added to even the starts a bit while still providing meaningful differences.

Great idea: I would love a mod with 4 tiles range cities, doubles district limits (adding +1 distance limit, +1 movement, improved movement on road etc). It would be great for play on huge map or especially on YNAMP greatest earth, assuming you have a good enough hardware. Great mod and I encourage anyone to do it, if the 4tiles range is possible. Not for the base game.

I would also like to mod the game myself. I have another project I am working one for now, but one day I may kick myself in the ... and start learning how to mod to try this specialisation mod. I just hope someone will do it before me . I would much more like to see it in the next expansion, or any alternative that address the gameplay points that I want to be improved.

 

[Arlequin]

I couldn't wait: I started making it a mod. It might take some time however. A lot of stuffs are not straightforward.