The 'Ultimate' Civics Expander and Balancer Mod

[cavilier210]

hey aussie, is it finally done then? i'd love to try it out. would it work as a module?

 

[Aussie_Lurker]

No, its really annoying. All the SDK changes are made, but for some reason they won't work as they're supposed to. I have a whole week off coming up, and I plan to take another look at it then .

Aussie.

 

[Xenomorph]

I take it you didn't find what you were looking for during that week?

 

[Aussie_Lurker]

Hey there. Unfortunately I spent most of that week trying to learn how to use a different compiler (because Code::Blocks stopped working for v3.17). I've figured that part out now and have since re-compiled the new code for 3.17. Unfortunately, it still looks to be not doing as it's supposed to .

Aussie.

 

[Mercutio Wilder]

Hello,

I have a few questions on the new civics in version 2.

What is the organized labor civic intended to represent? I must say I'm a little confused by the idea that any civic results in factories causing happiness .

I'm assuming the professional civic is meant to portray the guild-based economies of Medieval Switzerland and Italy. If so, I'm thinking that Draft capability would better represent their military than a unit production bonus. Also, a cash bonus instead of a production bonus seems more fitting for the very profit oriented economy. Any suggestions for what numbers would be balanced for theses changes?

Also, do you know if this mod will run on a Mac?

Thanks for all the good work ,
Merc

 

[Aussie_Lurker]

The Organized Labour Civic is meant to represent the existence of Unions-hence the happiness bonus in factories. As for drafting, the whole point is one of quality. Drafted troops are just ordinary folk off the street, who are either pushed into service via legislation or via more crude methods (like the Mickey Finn). Professional Labour-whether military or trade related-is meant to represent a much higher quality of "product". Who knows, maybe I can add a feature where Professional Labour produces troops with +2 XP.
Not sure that this works on Mac, it was designed entirely with PC in mind-sorry.

Aussie.

 

[Aussie_Lurker]

I guess on the other matter regarding Professional Labour, I again wanted to emphasise that these are people working either for themselves or for a decent wage (as opposed to slavery or forced labour). As such, the quantity of output gets increased. I guess I could look into a commerce bonus-perhaps a +2 bonus commerce from workshops-but I will re-examine all the various traits when I FINALLY get the BtS version up and working .

Aussie.

 

[Mercutio Wilder]

The Organized Labour Civic is meant to represent the existence of Unions-hence the happiness bonus in factories. As for drafting, the whole point is one of quality. Drafted troops are just ordinary folk off the street, who are either pushed into service via legislation or via more crude methods (like the Mickey Finn). Professional Labour-whether military or trade related-is meant to represent a much higher quality of "product". Who knows, maybe I can add a feature where Professional Labour produces troops with +2 XP.
Not sure that this works on Mac, it was designed entirely with PC in mind-sorry.

Aussie.

Ah, thanks. For some reason the Organized Labor = Unions things didn't click with me until you wrote it and I went, "duh".

A commerce bonus, in conjunction with the ablitity to rush buy military units might be more appropriate for Professional - to represent the preference for mercenary units in such an economy. This works well if Cash Economy grants rush buy; which I think it should.

I'll have the PC version soon, just not sure when.

Cheers,
Merc

 

[Yakk]

Going back to phase 1:

Hereditary Rule: +25 Culture Commerce; +2 Happiness from Castles

Hereditary Rule was already pretty darn good.

Police State: -1 Health; +2 Happiness from Jails (not REAL happiness, obviously )

Police state already ... sucked.

Universal Sufferage: -25% War Weariness; +2 Hammers from Towns; +2 Culture, +1 Gold from Specialists.

That is an interesting way to make it compete with Representation.

Bureacracy: +50% Gold and Production in Capital; +3 Gold per Specialist; +25% No of Cities Maintainance.

Bureacracy was already a top-notch civ. This ... seems to make it better?

Slavery: Pop Rush; +2 Hammers from Quarries and Mines.

You made slavery, an early-game civ that is among the most powerful civics in the entire game, better?!

Serfdom: +50% Worker Rate; +2 Food from Pastures and Farms.

+2 food is huuuuuuuge. I guess rather than dealing with "slavery is too good"...

Caste System: Unlimited Artists, Merchants and Scientists; +2 Gold from Plantations and Wineries.

Caste System was about the only civic as abusable as slavery -- but caste system was a niche civic. The effects given are pretty tiny.

Mercantilism: No Distance from Capital Maintainance; No Foreign Trade; +1 hammers from Camps and Plantations.

Strange. Note that this has interesting connections to BTS -- distance from capital is the cap for overseas colonies.

Free Trade: +1 Trade Route; +1 Gold from Lumbermill and Well; -1 Health.

This makes free trade worse. Remember, free trade is a relatively expensive late-game civic...

State Property: +1 Food from Workshop and Watermill; -1 Happiness; +1 Specialist.

And you made state property better -- it was already pretty good.

[qutoe]Environmentalism: +1 Happiness from Forests and Jungles; +6 Health; +25% City Maintainance Modifier.[/quote]
And you made environmentalism worse. Which was already a pretty crappy civic.

Pacifism: +100% GPP; +1 Gold per Mlitary; +3 Culture per Specialist.

Sure, that might help pacifism a tad. It already had decent uses...

My problem with the civics, in play, was:
Slavery is too damn good
Caste System kicks ass for a niche strategy.
Police State is a pretty bad civic to pick, barring a huge long war
Representation is almost always better than Universal Sufferage.
Free Trade and State Property kick the crap out of Environmentalism
Organized Religion and Free Religion win the religion category, but only marginally. Pacifism is good for a niche strategy.

 

[Aussie_Lurker]

Hmmm, I seem to recall toning a lot of these things down in phase 2 and beyond. I confess I focussed more of my efforts on post phase 1. Maybe its time to look at updating phase 1 to BtS, given that its much easier to do. Thanks for the feedback Yakk, I will look at balancing things a bit more.

Aussie.

 

[Aussie_Lurker]

For the record-though I agree that +2 food and +2 hammers for serfdom and slavery are "over the top" (am thinking of making it +1 pr +2 commerce for both instead-what do you think?), my changes to Mercantilism makes more historical sense-as it was the economic theory which drove most of 18th and 19th century European colonialism.
I never thought State Property was ever that good, given how it only benefited larger empires. These changes make it more "historical" as well as making it much more important than it actually is in the game (it's worse than bad with Corporations in the game!) As for Free Trade, I'm pretty sure I made it much less expensive-to offset the health penalty somewhat.
With Police State, I wanted to make it useful outside of war-time situations, because I saw the whole Civ2/Civ3 strategy of Communism-Monarchy=War and Democracy/Republic=Peace thing cropping up again. +2 happiness from Jails at least gave you a non-war function for the government. However, further tweaks could be examined for BtS (like bonus espionage).

Aussie.

 

[Yakk]

The last time I played with Civics, I decided that pop-rushing was too good in the Bronze era.

I moved pop-rush from Slavery to Police State.

Then, I granted Universal Sufferage a reduction in size-of-empire costs.

This generated a nice synergy:

US + State Property is wasteful, because you don't use the size-of-empire. However, you often want some 'rush' mechanic: State Property + Police State gives you pop-rushing and size-of-empire.

It also lines up with the historical massive massacres that various Police States have engaged in. In civ4, these massive massacres are explained as pop-rushing.

I then moved the +happy per military unit to Slavery (you can use your military strength to keep your slaves down). Then I had to give hereditary rule a purpose.

So you end up with:
Despotism: sucks
HR: ???
Representation: +3 bulbs/specialist[1], +happy in largest city
Police State: Pop rush, War unhappyness, ???
Universal Sufferage: $ rush, hammers from towns, -support far empires

And labor:
Slavery: ???
Serfdom: 50% faster workers + ???
Caste System: unlimited A/S/M specialists, ???
Emancipation: +growth towns, -happy other people, ???

---

I also think that some of the "niche" civics need to be broadened, in particular Pacifism and Caste System.

I'd be tempted to set up a (US|Representation)/Emancipation/(Free Market | Environmentalism)/Free Religion synergy, and a Police State/*/State Property/(Free Religion | Fundamentalism) synergy.

 

[Xenomorph]

If you remove the pop sacrificing from Slavery, you'll have to change the ability of the Aztec's UB. Part of it's uniqueness is that you get it early, making it very useful when you are under the slavery civic.

 

[Aussie_Lurker]

BTW Yakk, I had a brief squiz at the original XML for phase 1, and I have a feeling that the spoilers on page 1 are not 100% correct. i.e. I think these are the original settings, but that I changed them after playtesting and feedback. If you want, I'll rescan the XML in its entirety and let you know what the real settings are. Also, I'll try and take the opportunity this weekend to try and update phase 1 to BtS.

 

[Aussie_Lurker]

Hey guys. I'm going to go back and look at fixing-and updating-phase 1 of my Civics Mod, and just wanted to give you an insight into my "design philosophy".
So, my key thing is that-wherever possible-I want each civic to have 2 GOOD THINGS and 1 BAD THING about it. Secondly, I want each Civic Category to have 1 "Thematic Link".
So, for example, I want all the Government civics to be linked by Bonus Commerces from Specialists. My thought is that its +3 culture from specialists under Hereditary Rule; +3 Science from specialists under Representation; +1 Gold and +2 Culture under Universal Suffrage and +2 Gold and +1 Science under Police State. Then the second bonus can vary, with Police State giving a +2 Happiness from Jails, Universal Suffrage giving +1 hammers from towns, Hereditary Rule giving +2 Happiness from Castles and Representation giving +2 Happiness in the Largest Cities.
The penalty would be a Distance Maintenance Modifier for Hereditary Rule, a Number of Cities Maintenance modifier for Representation, a War Weariness Penalty for Universal Suffrage and a Health Penalty for Police State. What do you guys think?
Also, can you suggest "Themes" for the Legal and Economic Civic categories?

Aussie.

 

[Xenomorph]

Foundationalism, Keynesianism, Laissez-faire.

An alternative for Religion could be Fundamentalism.