In all the information we have encountered today, there is one thing that strikes me as odd: we have come to known the ways that affinity has a strong, even defining influence on the military part of the game, shaping how a faction would play in a conflict situation. But we have until now not encountered one way how affinity would shape society.
I know how Civ5 sees itself as a tactical simulator looking outward rather than a nation-simulation looking inwards into the nations inner workings, but both the expansions somehow mitigated that. We also know that devs have put considerable thought into an overhauled virtue system (even though it will probably be static). It's just strange that while military needs would drive a faction to specialize into one affinity (because of the big leaps in military power only on the main affinity upgrades (secondary affinity levels don't seem to grant unit strength and additional traits), that does not seem to affect the inner workings of the faction at all.
It stands to reason that persuing an affinity as pronounced as supremacy or harmony would have a decisive effect on wealth and scientific progress, but lead to high societal stratification (not everyone would be able to afford the augments neccessary to improve his income). Granted those are highly speculative and there is no point in arguing how exactly it would affect societies, but there is no doubt that it would. A Harmony society would be fundamentally different from a Purity society on almost every level.
That could be achieved by adopting an additional spec option, like with units, on say every second affinity level (and allow secondary affinities to grant traits too), or by affinities locking out incompatible virtues from the virtue tree or the affinity points distribution even skewering virtue cost. Lets say by selecting supremacy you'd be given a rebate on some virtues affecting wealth generation, science or offensive military, but virtues that enhance production an growth would become more expensive. That would a supremacy faction not prohibit from developing a strong production base, but it would reflect that it would need a lot more effort to achieve that. This societal steering should with time become stronger than the starting factions bonuses, reflecting the gradual evolution of societies. It would also give more depth to specs persuing more than one affinity ("roleplaying" the tech tree).
I know how Civ5 sees itself as a tactical simulator looking outward rather than a nation-simulation looking inwards into the nations inner workings, but both the expansions somehow mitigated that. We also know that devs have put considerable thought into an overhauled virtue system (even though it will probably be static). It's just strange that while military needs would drive a faction to specialize into one affinity (because of the big leaps in military power only on the main affinity upgrades (secondary affinity levels don't seem to grant unit strength and additional traits), that does not seem to affect the inner workings of the faction at all.
It stands to reason that persuing an affinity as pronounced as supremacy or harmony would have a decisive effect on wealth and scientific progress, but lead to high societal stratification (not everyone would be able to afford the augments neccessary to improve his income). Granted those are highly speculative and there is no point in arguing how exactly it would affect societies, but there is no doubt that it would. A Harmony society would be fundamentally different from a Purity society on almost every level.
That could be achieved by adopting an additional spec option, like with units, on say every second affinity level (and allow secondary affinities to grant traits too), or by affinities locking out incompatible virtues from the virtue tree or the affinity points distribution even skewering virtue cost. Lets say by selecting supremacy you'd be given a rebate on some virtues affecting wealth generation, science or offensive military, but virtues that enhance production an growth would become more expensive. That would a supremacy faction not prohibit from developing a strong production base, but it would reflect that it would need a lot more effort to achieve that. This societal steering should with time become stronger than the starting factions bonuses, reflecting the gradual evolution of societies. It would also give more depth to specs persuing more than one affinity ("roleplaying" the tech tree).