DaviddesJ said:I think there are plenty of glitches in Civ4 that seem equally "easy" to eliminate, yet are there. The argument that something seems easy to avoid therefore doesn't carry much weight.
Edited for clarity.
Well, it's not so much an issue of easy to fix, which generally comes down to demand from the consumer base (ie the chop-rush was nerfed due to popular demand), but that it was easy to design.
In fact, it would have been easier to design a linear GP tech offering system that it would be to design the current staggered system. What I imagine is that either the system was originally designed staggered, or there was some active intention to change the original linear system to a more staggered (read: strategic) system. I say the current system is strategic because it has depth; planning is required in order to produce the desired results, and there are limitations on the production of Great People, in particular in the early phases of the game when such a slingshot would produce the most disparate advantage over other players (AIs).
The specific case of using The Oracle and a Great Prophet for CoL/CS is, in my opinion, the most extreme result produced by the system. In this case, GPP generation is in line with The Oracle. Using this one case to condemn the whole system is something I cannot support. It is arguable whether the CS slingshot is an exploit or not. However, outside that one specific instance, I do not know of any other combination of Great People, and/or a Great People and The Oracle to produce so disparate an advantage. Even the CS slingshot is limited by the fact that the most major portion of the slingshot, access to Macemen, is restricted by researching another (expensive) tech, Machinery.
A Machinery slingshot (utilizing The Oracle and a Great Engineer) is an entirely different issue. It has its own restrictions based on GEP generation (making it far slower a slingshot than the CS slingshot). As well, it provides a different return than the CS slingshot. Crossbows, for example, are more balanced than Macemen because they do not have access to the City Raider line of promotions. I would not consider the other benefits of Machinery to be on par with Bureaucracy at the point in the game at which you would complete this slingshot.
For clarity's sake, could you specifically describe any slingshots that you consider exploitative. I assume the CS slingshot is amongst them, though it would suffice to just acknowledge (rather than describe) that particular slingshot.
Referring back to the design of the system, as I said, it would have been easier to design a linear system. Yes, I make the basic assumption that any and all design was done in the easiest possible manner (to design and/or implement). I personally think that is a reasonable assumption to make. To design and implement the current system requires (required) far more work (both in design and testing) than a linear system (the linear system is easy to design, and relatively easy to test). Making sure even more disparate technology advantages could not be achieved through the current system was, I am sure, a priority when testing it in relation to the Philosophic leader trait, assuming the GP tech offering system was not as important an aspect of the game to test as the leader traits were (another relatively safe assumption; leader traits play a far larger role overall in the game).
While I agree that, at this point, fixing the system is not necessarily a priority of Friaxis, which would likely only change it at the request of popular support (ie chop rush), I cannot agree that the system was not intended to produce slingshots. As I said, there exists one particular slingshot which is quantifiably superior to all other slingshots. It is not impossible that one could manipulate Great People in order to produce a similarly extreme slingshot in conjunction with the free tech from Liberalism (or, alternatively, with any of the free Great People produced by researching a tech first, though that could be mirrored through additional manipulation of the GP system).
Simply put, originally designing it to be linear (as you seem to desire) would have been easier than designing it in its current implementation. If it was not designed to be linear, then it was intended to produce slingshots (the specific order of techs offered is conducive to this). If it was designed to be linear, then at some point during design or testing, someone with enough authority to request/authorize its change did just that, requested/authorized its change to the current system.
I personally think the current system provides a bit more depth to the game. If it was entirely linear, I'd almost question if there was any value in the tech offerings, or if the other GP usage options are 100% a better choice.
That said, this really doesn't have much bearing on the topic of this thread. With regards to that, it would seem that system would as easily be fixed as the GP tech offering system could be modified to a purely linear system. As I noted, and as you agree, change of that order is more dependent on Firaxis deeming it worthwhile, worthwhile being a function of enough demand on the part of the player base (or perhaps the personal crusade of select employees at Firaxis).