Tier 2 social policies: Fealty a must-have in most situations?

[Terpzikhore]

There seems to be a consensus in the community that Progress is usually the go-to policy branch for most styles of play. It boosts your infrastructure and cities which can then be put to use for more expansion, conquest, science, etc. Only when you really want to focus on having only 1-3 (strong) cities and/or a culture victory you would be interested in Tradition.

I started looking at the 2nd tier of policy branches and it stood to me how much more stronger Fealty is in terms of boosting your infrastructure/cities. I used to think of Fealty as the 'faith' branch but is it actually Progress on steroids? Here is a comparison of bonuses from the 3 policy branches that you get per city. This include things like buildings, bonusses to worked tiles, specialists, etc. but not bonusses to just your capital or other bonuses that scale negatively with the amount of owned cities.

Fealty bonus in every city:
- 7 faith, +0.25 per non-specialist
- 6 science
- 3 culture, +0.25 per non-specialist
- 3 food
- 3 production
- 3 gold
- 5 defense
- 1 less unhapiness from boredom
- WltKD: +15% production, +100% border growth
- Pastures: +2 production, +1 gold
- Castles: +1 happiness, +2 gold, builds with +100% production
- Armories: +2 gold, builds with +100% production
- Shrine/Temple: +2 culture

Statecraft bonus in every city:
- +6 gold
- Constabularies/Police Station: +3 science
- Specialist: +1 science

Artistry bonus in every city:
- 5 science
- 1 less unhappiness from specialists
- Excess happiness as golden age points
- All guilds: +1 happiness, builds with +100% production
- Amphi/Gallery/Opera: +2 production, +2 culture
- Landmarks: +3 science
- Specialists: +1 culture

Let me know if you think if this comparison is unfair or misses something.

I am surprised by how good Fealty is in terms of raw science, production, gold, as well as culture. On top of that almost all the bonuses are not conditional or the conditions are relatively easily met. On the other hand, with Statecraft you are competing with the AI for the favor of city states and especially on higher difficulties this has serious consequences for how much you can benefit from this policy tree. I'm not that familiar with Artistry but it doesn't seem contraversial to say that it's not great for a wide empire.

As someone who enjoys Statecraft but doesn't enjoy sticking to 2-3 cities I am kinda bumped out by this. It seems almost mandatory to go Fealty whenever you want to have more than 2-3 functional cities, at least on higher difficulties (Immortal/Deity). For example, with England I always go Statecraft for the spy bonuses but it feels like this forces me to really limit my empire size, as any additional city directly reduces most rewards.

What do you think? I'm sure there are holes in my reasoning.

 

[AndreyK]

For me, I take Fealty opener, then take Artistry. Opener I take for 50% discount on faith purchases and monasteries, then (usually 1-2 policies later, when I get techs for castles and armories) I take Nobility. Later, usually after completing Artistry, when I have spread my religion (I play on large maps, Deity) to 35-40 cities (with Mendicancy you can very well spread, because of 10% erosion) I can take Organized Religion for more votes in WC.
For large empires Artistry is very good and GA are very important. You get very big discount on GA points needed and also double amount of them (actually even more, because in GA your production, gold and culture are increased, so you get more happiness and less unhapiness. Also I usually take Mosques for +15% culture in GA.
Later you get more bonuses in policies and WW during GA +10% food, 10% science, 10% culture, 25% GP and most of those multiplicative. Difference between culture generation in GA for me usually + 70 %.
I play Domination victory only and with many modmods.
I can complete Fealty later, very later with 4-5 Ideology Tenets taken, to be able to buy GArtists.
Statecraft is good for diplo civs I think.

 

[Terpzikhore]

For large empires Artistry is very good and GA are very important.

This surprises me - how does a large empire benefit from Artistry? The majority of the bonuses are flat yields which scale negatively with your amount of cities. The more cities you have the higher the cost for policies and technologies, but great persons give flat bonuses. Effectively this means that the larger your empire the weaker every great person or great work is.

 

[AndreyK]

This surprises me - how does a large empire benefit from Artistry? The majority of the bonuses are flat yields which scale negatively with your amount of cities. The more cities you have the higher the cost for policies and technologies, but great persons give flat bonuses. Effectively this means that the larger your empire the weaker every great person or great work is.

This not about just GP, GA by itself is very powerful, many bonuses scale multipplicative. Also in GA your happiness much higher and unhappiness downgrades.

 

[hokath]

I tend to agree Fealty atm is a bit too much. The recent +2 to Shrine/Temple I haven't personally played with because of my Religious Victory mod changing that policy but it seems overbudget to me.
For reference these are the changes, I think they would fit into VP even without adding the victory:

Spoiler :

Holy Sites: Give +6 faith only, gaining +3 faith at each tech upgrade, plus a new one on Theology
Fealty: No longer reduces costs by 25%
Monastery: Converts 10% of Faith used in purchases to Gold
Organized Religion: +1 Faith from Specialists; 25% Passive Pressure (as before); +5 Culture and Tourism from Holy Sites
Fiefdoms and Divine Right: Names and icons swapped.

all the bonuses are not conditional or the conditions are relatively easily met.

The finisher yields from following your religion are a bit swingy. The faith discount makes it easier to maintain a majority in all Cities but again this is something I've removed so it feels harder for me.

The main thing missing from the analysis is the speed at which bonuses are unlocked e.g.

• Science on Police Station is basically worthless -- something I've changed in my tweaks (which I will propose at a future congress)
• Happiness from Statecraft comes very late -- in my tweaks, I have moved this bonus to one of the opening Policies.
• Amphi/Gallery/Opera: +2 , +2 is a last policy, with 2/3 late Renaissance buildings.

Looked at this way it favors Fealty even more. Monastery is particularly frontloaded at a time when (especially if you are not a founder) Faith purchases are cheaper. Understandable why AndreyK likes the Fealty Opener-first play.

 

[CrazyG]

I find statecraft pretty awkward because many bonuses don't scale with number of cities, but that's exactly what you want to play for diplomacy. The tourism and science to police stations are particularly out of place.

I've been playing some multiplayer (2 humans and 4 or 6 AI) and it's been interesting to see artistry and fealty go head-to-head. Generally speaking, artistry has an amazing renaissance era, taking a social policy lead, which means they get first pick of wonders. However, if the fealty player hangs in there, things will start to flip things in the industrial era when great people are being faith purchased.

 

[randomnub]

I default to Statecraft on most tradition/progress games (deity/standard/continents-like maps), as long as I discovered at least half the CSs by the time it's time to unlock the 2nd tier policies.

Fealty does indeed provide a lot more raw yields but those aren't worth much in the capital, and I equate those to 2-3 bonus pop/worked tiles in expos in the late game, good but not game changing. Statecraft on the other hand is hard to quantify but my playstyle is very CS-focused and a 50% bonus reward can save many turns on victory (production to hurry stuff in the capital, bonus GPPs and culture from quests above all). Take a look at the extra luxuries provided by the CSs, the Exchange Markets policy usually grants some extra scaling monopoly and +10% yields by the mid game trumps over the flat fealty ones. It's also easier to grab strategic resource monopolies thanks to Foreign Service, not neeeding to already own half the map for the flat 50% ones.

When not going for TTGoG reformation belief, faith buying diplomats in the late game and having a firm grasp on CSs helps not losing or being bullied in the UN by diplo civs while fealty is a 'win more' tree, if stuff is looking good already.
When going Authority I'm already winning more, maybe I ate some hostile CS already and the bonus to border growth synergy is what makes the tree appealing.

Artistry I never pick, it has terrible early policies and the real game changers (hidden sites with raw culture bombs) come at archeology that is when the game is already decided. It doesn't help so many of artistry yields are GAPs and if I'm not in permanent GA by T120-T150 then something went wrong.

There's something good about opening Fealty, 2/3 into left Statecraft and 3/2 into right artistry for some discounts, a solid boost to specialists and flat yields.