[Tuning] Ideologies: Tier 1

Stalker0

Baller Magnus
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G asked that the Ideologies be compared at Tier's instead of within their own Ideologies, so I am reorganizing the threads as best I can to accommodate that wish.

In this thread we will look at the Tier 1 Ideologies:

Freedom

Avant Garde: +33% GP

(F for OP)

There are two defining tenants in Freedom to me. This is one of them. Freedom players tend to be specialist players, and this gives you a massive boost to that.

Ultimately this and Civil Society is the basis by which I define every other freedom tenant, and ultimately I think most of them are lacking because these are too good. Either the other tenants need to be strengthen, or these two weakened.

Civil Society: Specialists consume half the amount of food.

(F for OP)

The other defining tenant with Avant Garde. Together, these two transforms specialist play, making it the dominant way to go in all cities. Overshadows all other freedom tenants....all of them, even Tier 3's.

Covert Action: Gain 1 or more spies, chance of rigging election doubled.

(F)

I just don't find CS rigging that reliable to get CS to flip for me, but the extra spies can be nice and frankly at this point in the game that is all I use my spies for anyway so might as well make it good. But there are just better tenants.

Creative Expression: +1 Culture to Great works, +2 culture to opera house, broadcast tower, museums, and amphitheater.

(F)

I've made the case before that spending a lot of culture to get a trickle of new culture is not a great policy choice, especially this late in the game. If it was tourism it would be one thing, but ultimately I think this tenant is a poorly designed one.

Economic Union

(C)

The extra trade route is flexible and useful, if nothing else for spreading franchises. The gold boost can be useful. This tenant has its uses.

Universal Healthcare: Free hospital in every city, +50 culture when a citizen is born in any city, scaling with Era.

(A)

A nice solid tenant, can save you a lot of hammers, and gives you an interesting and strong way to recoup culture, this one is well designed to me.

Urbanization: +1 food to farms, camps, plantations, and all unique improvements.

(A)

If Civil Society wasn't so strong this would be a great starting tenant. I think its well designed overall.


Order

Communism: -33% gold cost to purchase building. +20% production when building wonders.

(A)

Combined with Industry this can be a powerhouse tenant. The wonder production is also okay.

Double Agents: +1 spies. Spies twice as likely to capture agents in your cities.

(F)

The spies don't help that much at this point, spies don't do much in your cities at this point either, so the bonus is pretty meh.

Great Leap Forward: Receive 2 Free Technologies.

(F - OP)

The defining tenant for Order imo. However, what makes this one OP to me (unless I am mistaken) is that you keep the technologies whether you stay in Order or not.

So you can actually go Order, get 2 free techs, and then switch to something else...which is a big hokey to me.

Guerilla Warfare: +15% attack and 50% military experience in friendly lands. Can build Guerrilla Fighters

(C)

This one works as a Tier 1 tenant. Its not one you always want, but if you are under assault from a Autocracy conqueror, its a great tool to help you out. So its a niche tenant, but its in the right place for a niche tenant.

Hero of the People: +25% GP rate, a great person of your choice appears.

(A)

This and great leap forward start to define the Order ideology. I feel this one is just a little bit weaker than Freedom's Avant Guard just because Freedom is more specialist friendly...so the bonuses mean more there. However, a flexible GP of your choice is never a bit thing.

Peace, Land, Bread: +20% growth in all cities, -20% poverty

(C)

Ultimately this is a nice tier 1 that's just in a sea of nicer tier 1s. Growth is starting a real decline at this point, though the poverty reduction can be nice.

People's Army: Free Military Academy in every city. Military Academies produce +3 culture and +1 happiness.

(C)

Another solid one in a sea of better choice. The free academies are ok, even in a large order civ you still tend to have your military centers of production, so giving everyone the academy only does so much. The culture is just ok, but the happiness is a nice kick.

Autocracy

Autarky: +10 gold to internal TR, +3 hammers to city connections.

(C)

Corporations make external trade routes really good late game, then again +10 gold is a solid amount.

Elite Forces: Newly created units gain +15 xp, all units gain +50% experience from combat.

(A)

This allows you to crank out Tier IV promoted units in quick order, a solid warring tenant.

Futurism: +20% tourism from historical events.

(N/A)

I have no idea how much tourism historical events actually generate late game, so this could be amazing or crap I just don't know.

Lebensraum: Gain culture and GA points when your borders expand. Citadel tile radius is doubled.

(A?). At this point in the game, GA points don't mean too much I find, the culture is nice but culture for culture's sake is not enough. However, I love the double tile radius, it gives you a new thing to do with your GGs, and can really help disrupt enemies strategic resources or corporation monopolies.

Military-Industrial Complex: -33% to unit purchases/upgrading. +3 science to defensive buildings, citadels, and unique improvements.

(A)

The science bonus is just some frosting, the cake is the purchasing reduction. This can greatly increase your capacity to generate army and go to war, probably the most definitive of the Autocracy Tier 1's.

New World Order: -20% crime. Constabularies and Police Stations gain +3 culture and +5 hammers.

(C)

The crime reduction is nice. Police Stations are so expensive that the +5 hammers and +3 culture isn't enough on their own to make me get them, so I would only do it in a scenario where I had had to build them for other reasons. I think this one is just ok.

United Front: +200% to militaristic city-status unit gift rate during wars with common foes. +30 inf from unit gifts to City states.

(A)

This may actually be the best diplomatic tenant. While the other ideologies have ones that affect lots of CS, this one can actually make a dent in a CS you are trying to flip from someone else. Effectively removes the need to build diplomatic units (almost).
 
Including Quotes from the other threads:

I agree about Creative Expression being too weak for a tenet.

Interestingly, I am always grateful for anything that gives me happiness at the end. I have a happiness problem most end games, with poverty the culprit as much as crime.

This is more of a side note, but I can't figure out what to do, once I'm on gold, troubleshoot specialists for the best results, and have built banks, hospitals, barracks and arsenals (or more). Could it be not enough TPs?

The big selling point of People's Army is to be able to gold-rush units from anywhere, even a just-settled outpost or newly-out-of-resistance conquest. The benefit falls off as things start needing Military Bases, but during the Modern era and early Atomic it can make far-flung empires much easier to defend.

Military-Industrial Complex goes insane if you have one of the spammable UIs.
 
This is a repost on byhalf of Funak, these are his comments and not mine.

Avant Garde: +33% GP

(F for OP)

There are two defining tenants in Freedom to me. This is one of them. Freedom players tend to be specialist players, and this gives you a massive boost to that.

Ultimately this and Civil Society is the basis by which I define every other freedom tenant, and ultimately I think most of them are lacking because these are too good. Either the other tenants need to be strengthen, or these two weakened.

Disagree, I might get this eventually but definitely not earlly on, if at all. 33% GP is decent, but it's nowhere near the same level as some of the other tenets.


Civil Society: Specialists consume half the amount of food.

(F for OP)

The other defining tenant with Avant Garde. Together, these two transforms specialist play, making it the dominant way to go in all cities. Overshadows all other freedom tenants....all of them, even Tier 3's.

I tend to pick this up, usually as a third first tier policy in the tree. It's great, but it's not first-pick material.


Covert Action: Gain 1 or more spies, chance of rigging election doubled.

(F)

I just don't find CS rigging that reliable to get CS to flip for me, but the extra spies can be nice and frankly at this point in the game that is all I use my spies for anyway so might as well make it good. But there are just better tenants.

An extra spy is really powerful, not sure if the other part of the tenet does anything at all however, my experience with CS rigging is that it never actually fails.

Creative Expression: +1 Culture to Great works, +2 culture to opera house, broadcast tower, museums, and amphitheater.

(F)

I've made the case before that spending a lot of culture to get a trickle of new culture is not a great policy choice, especially this late in the game. If it was tourism it would be one thing, but ultimately I think this tenant is a poorly designed one.

Definitely first-pick material, worth a pile of culture per turn, especially if you've got a larger empire. Picking culture-tenets first means you're going to unlock the next policies faster which makes it even more awesome.
If Boredom was ever a problem, this tenet kills all the remaining unhappiness.

Economic Union

(C)

The extra trade route is flexible and useful, if nothing else for spreading franchises. The gold boost can be useful. This tenant has its uses.

I have been known to pick this up, trade-routes are powerful.
Usually I need to have some extra reason for picking this up beyond just getting another trade-route, maybe if I've gone for Statecraft and can bombard another city-state with influence because of it?


Universal Healthcare: Free hospital in every city, +50 culture when a citizen is born in any city, scaling with Era.

(A)

A nice solid tenant, can save you a lot of hammers, and gives you an interesting and strong way to recoup culture, this one is well designed to me.

Always the first pick in the tree, if I have two free tenets available I pick this along with Creative expression. Same reason as above really.

Urbanization: +1 food to farms, camps, plantations, and all unique improvements.

(A)

If Civil Society wasn't so strong this would be a great starting tenant. I think its well designed overall.

By far the worst tenet on this tier, +1 food to farms is nothing at this point, and +1 food to unique improvements is an insult compared to the crazy +3 science per tile from autocracy and even +1 hammer from Order.
At this point in the game you're not going to be mass-working farms anyways, you're pretty much done growing and you're ready to focus on turning your cities into production/specialist monsters. I've seen my food-focused 40 pop capital working like 5 non specialist tiles, and those 5 are pretty much always great people improvements.

This Tenet is straight up weaker than the imperialism farm-policy and the Cathedral bonus, and that's a really sad sight for a tenet.
 


Creative Expression: +1 Culture to Great works, +2 culture to opera house, broadcast tower, museums, and amphitheater.

(F)

I've made the case before that spending a lot of culture to get a trickle of new culture is not a great policy choice, especially this late in the game. If it was tourism it would be one thing, but ultimately I think this tenant is a poorly designed one.



Funak said:
Definitely first-pick material, worth a pile of culture per turn, especially if you've got a larger empire. Picking culture-tenets first means you're going to unlock the next policies faster which makes it even more awesome.
If Boredom was ever a problem, this tenet kills all the remaining unhappiness.


So I thought it was time to put some numbers where my mouth is, to try and prove just how terrible this policy really is.

In my recent German game (Standard Speed, Small Map), I picked up Freedom at turn 272 and choose the creative expression choice.

Now I was going to do a very detailed analysis for you all, literally tracking the bonus turn by turn....but I quickly realized that it wasn't necessary to prove how bad this policy is.

At my current turn, I have 9 cities. I actually have 10% culture from a monopoly and the Sistine chapel, so a +25% culture right there. Now at this point, I don't even have the tech for Museums and Broadcast Towers, nor do I have any great works, nor all of my cities have Opera Houses yet (going diplomatic not cultural). BUT, let me wave a magic wand. Let me assume that I immediately have and have built all needed structures for this tenant. And I will assume a golden age for the rest of the game, oh and WLTK too for my capital, just to add a little something extra.

My capital has a 65% culture bonus from various good things (including the baths GA bonus, and the circus maximus WLTK bonus). My other cities have 35%. Keep in mind 25% of this culture bonus would not be in many games played....but I want to try and remove any doubt in people's minds about this tenant. Actually you know what...lets go even bigger, BATHS for EVERYONE! Oh, and lets throw in that event that gives 10% bonus from universities to all my cities. Why not? So 75% to my capital, 55% to my other cities.

Let us assume I play for a total 400 turns, so 128 turns worth of this bonus (and I think that's a long game based on recent experience, [actual game was 369 turns] but hey lets give this tenant every chance to be useful).

Per Turn: 135.84 extra culture per turn
This would not me a grand total of: 17,388 culture.
At turn 272 my next policy was to cost me: 19,345 culture.

So....even though I have given these tenant every advantage, at the end of the game the tenant never even pay for itself in terms of policies, it actually costs me almost 2,000 culture....under incredibly favorable circumstances. Realistically, its probably more like 5k-6k in debt, but that's pretty challenging to calculate.

This tenant is an F.
 
So I thought it was time to put some numbers where my mouth is, to try and prove just how terrible this policy really is.

In my recent German game (Standard Speed, Small Map), I picked up Freedom at turn 272 and choose the creative expression choice.

Now I was going to do a very detailed analysis for you all, literally tracking the bonus turn by turn....but I quickly realized that it wasn't necessary to prove how bad this policy is.

At my current turn, I have 9 cities. I actually have 10% culture from a monopoly and the Sistine chapel, so a +25% culture right there. Now at this point, I don't even have the tech for Museums and Broadcast Towers, nor do I have any great works, nor all of my cities have Opera Houses yet (going diplomatic not cultural). BUT, let me wave a magic wand. Let me assume that I immediately have and have built all needed structures for this tenant. And I will assume a golden age for the rest of the game, oh and WLTK too for my capital, just to add a little something extra.

My capital has a 65% culture bonus from various good things (including the baths GA bonus, and the circus maximus WLTK bonus). My other cities have 35%. Keep in mind 25% of this culture bonus would not be in many games played....but I want to try and remove any doubt in people's minds about this tenant. Actually you know what...lets go even bigger, BATHS for EVERYONE! Oh, and lets throw in that event that gives 10% bonus from universities to all my cities. Why not? So 75% to my capital, 55% to my other cities.

Let us assume I play for a total 400 turns, so 128 turns worth of this bonus (and I think that's a long game based on recent experience, [actual game was 369 turns] but hey lets give this tenant every chance to be useful).

Per Turn: 135.84 extra culture per turn
This would not me a grand total of: 17,388 culture.
At turn 272 my next policy was to cost me: 19,345 culture.

So....even though I have given these tenant every advantage, at the end of the game the tenant never even pay for itself in terms of policies, it actually costs me almost 2,000 culture....under incredibly favorable circumstances. Realistically, its probably more like 5k-6k in debt, but that's pretty challenging to calculate.

This tenant is an F.

Okay, but with this logic the tradition opener never pays for itself, neither does Splendor or the Aesthetics tree, yet those are peoples go-to choice for making their way through the culture-game.

When I picked it up in my current game my total culture output increased by almost 20% and my boredom dropped down to 0, that's a massive massive boost, definitely worth a firstpick. Of course by that time I had amphitheaters operahouses and museums in all cities, but I don't see a good reason to ever skip those. I also had 25 or so great works.
Cultureoutput also translates into tourism-pressure in the from of historical events and culture from great works also translates into tourism with the help of Hotels/Airports/Stadium.

The only thing that makes me a little bit sad about the tenet is the fact that +1 culture to great works is straight up worse than the bonus from aesthetics, but that's the case with a few tenets so I guess that's intended.
 
Okay, but with this logic the tradition opener never pays for itself, neither does Splendor or the Aesthetics tree, yet those are peoples go-to choice for making their way through the culture-game.

culture from great works also translates into tourism with the help of Hotels/Airports/Stadium

Completely different scenario, it all comes down to timing. Ultimately you are making an investment....spending culture to make culture. Now early in the game, it absolutely pays for itself. But this late in the game, what I'm trying to show is that it doesn't.

The best analogy I can offer is the Academy....your favorite thing in the world!;) Early in the game, the academy provides stronger science than the bulb does (provided you actually work it). However, there comes a point where the bulb is the only real answer, as the investment strategy doesn't have enough time to pay off. That is where this tenant is to me.

When it comes to investments (such as spending hammers to get a production bonus, aka spend hammers to make hammers) the early you get them the better. And with any game with a set number of turns, at some point you have to stop investing, and start reaping the rewards.


On the second note, unfortunately hotels and the like do not convert the culture of great works to tourism, they just increase the base tourism bate of GWs. So the tenant does not effect tourism through that mechanic.

You mentioned that culture output adjusts the tourism of historical events....do you know how the formula works for that, it would be great to know.
 
Completely different scenario, it all comes down to timing. Ultimately you are making an investment....spending culture to make culture. Now early in the game, it absolutely pays for itself. But this late in the game, what I'm trying to show is that it doesn't.

The best analogy I can offer is the Academy....your favorite thing in the world!;) Early in the game, the academy provides stronger science than the bulb does (provided you actually work it). However, there comes a point where the bulb is the only real answer, as the investment strategy doesn't have enough time to pay off. That is where this tenant is to me.
Well with this example the lategame academy would be adding 200ish science to the tile and in that case I would definitely place and work them. A 20% increase in culture is massive


On the second note, unfortunately hotels and the like do not convert the culture of great works to tourism, they just increase the base tourism bate of GWs. So the tenant does not effect tourism through that mechanic.
Yeah this is correct, but I'm pretty sure I've actually seen my tourism increase when I picked the tenet up, which would be strange.

You mentioned that culture output adjusts the tourism of historical events....do you know how the formula works for that, it would be great to know.
Of course I know that, it's written in the civpedia.

Excluding the Historical events from the Aesthetics policy which provides around one fourth of the tourism of a normal historical event for no apparent reason.
 
So here's my balance response to the Tier 1-3 discussion. I consider 'C' to be a passing grade for tenets, as there are quite a few, and they shouldn't all super potent (some filler is okay).

  • Moved Volunteer Army to Level 1, Moved Civil Society to Level 2
  • Increased Urbanization Food to +2 (Was +1)
  • Creative Expression now +2 Tourism on Buildings (was +2 Culture)
  • Worker's Faculties - now 10% science for city (Was +3)

Autocracy, I believe, is in a really good spot. I don't see any necessary changes to it.

G
 
So here's my balance response to the Tier 1-3 discussion. I consider 'C' to be a passing grade for tenets, as there are quite a few, and they shouldn't all super potent (some filler is okay).







Autocracy, I believe, is in a really good spot. I don't see any necessary changes to it.



G


While I do think creative expression should be changed...I think this a knee jerk reaction. We are adding in a lot of raw tourism at a time where we have been trying to tone down cultural victory.

There are plenty of things we can do here, let's take some time to think it through
 
Still think creative expression is fine. If it needs a change, buff the culture-buff to great works to +2 instead of +1.
 
While I do think creative expression should be changed...I think this a knee jerk reaction. We are adding in a lot of raw tourism at a time where we have been trying to tone down cultural victory.

There are plenty of things we can do here, let's take some time to think it through

I don't think +8 tourism per city is 'a lot.' Substantial, yes, but not grossly so. Besides, freedom could use a bit more raw tourism to make its % tourism bonuses more potent.

G
 
What if you made Creative Expression give culture and gold bonuses? To synergize with the Tier 3 Tenet?
 
What if you made Creative Expression give culture and gold bonuses? To synergize with the Tier 3 Tenet?

I'm leaning towards GAP points, actually. I don't want it to be too strong at Tier 1, however GAP points get you to those lucrative Golden Ages much more quickly.

G
 
Overall, I really don't have problems with GA when I usually do freedom play. I'm in permanent GA by that point.

How about some type of science bonus? Freedom is supposed to be good for spaceship, but I think they only get the Tier 3 science victory tenant right now, other than Avant Garde which is just great for everything:)


Also, now that I understand better how Historical Events work....I think Futurism is an F. At this point in the game, the vast majority of historical events are triggered by GP creation. So Avant Garde or Hero of the People generate more historical events....so they are also generating similar extra tourism from historical events....but then also getting all the benefits of more GP.
 
Overall, I really don't have problems with GA when I usually do freedom play. I'm in permanent GA by that point.

How about some type of science bonus? Freedom is supposed to be good for spaceship, but I think they only get the Tier 3 science victory tenant right now, other than Avant Garde which is just great for everything:)


Also, now that I understand better how Historical Events work....I think Futurism is an F. At this point in the game, the vast majority of historical events are triggered by GP creation. So Avant Garde or Hero of the People generate more historical events....so they are also generating similar extra tourism from historical events....but then also getting all the benefits of more GP.

I think the idea with Futurism is that ending a war with your side being the victors is a historical event. If you get into a lot of short wars, you can build up tourism as you repeatedly demonstrate your superiority and grace in victory.
 
I think the idea with Futurism is that ending a war with your side being the victors is a historical event. If you get into a lot of short wars, you can build up tourism as you repeatedly demonstrate your superiority and grace in victory.

Again I am not the most warring player so you might be right. I could see that maybe getting your historic events with wars to be common enough where now the Tourism bonus is being competitive, but you still get all the GP advantages from Order and Freedom.....and if either of those gets an extra musician from their bonus....well that's a crapload of tourism futurism can't compete with.
 
Also, now that I understand better how Historical Events work....I think Futurism is an F. At this point in the game, the vast majority of historical events are triggered by GP creation. So Avant Garde or Hero of the People generate more historical events....so they are also generating similar extra tourism from historical events....but then also getting all the benefits of more GP.

Unless I'm mistaken futurism doubles the tourism from HE, thats a lot more than just gaining 33% more GPP, something that translates into maybe 5% more great people.
 
Unless I'm mistaken futurism doubles the tourism from HE, thats a lot more than just gaining 33% more GPP, something that translates into maybe 5% more great people.

It says you get 20% more tourism from events, so much lower than double unless the math is different than what the text describes. I know generally you get 40% of culture as tourism for a historical event, so maybe it means you now get 60%, which would be 50% more tourism from events than you were getting before...but still not double.

Just some quick math to check.

If I get 1000 tourism from GP historic events, with the first (most literal) interpretation, I would get 1200 tourism. With the second one, I would get 1500.

As Avant Guarde increases GP by 33%, I would get 1333 tourism overall. So with the second I would get more tourism overall (including other historic events to add more), but would lose out on the extra GPs...at least in the ballpark. With the literal interpretation, its garbage to me.
 
I dislike both universal healthcare and peoples army.

Universal healthcare was my usual first pick if I went Freedom, but now I think it comes too late. More than anything else, growth buildings need to be build as soon as possible - so by the time you get to ideologies, any city that's interested should have the building already. Could be replaced by the next in line.

Peoples army: Military buildings are wanted in very few cities, and ar thus very unexciting choices for free buildings. The additional yields are nice, but in the end it is really just +3 culture and +1 happiness for every city. Which is nice, don't get me wrong, but I would rather have it attached to a relevant building.

Military-Industrial Complex: -33% to unit purchases/upgrading. +3 science to defensive buildings, citadels, and unique improvements.

Are you sure? I thought the science bonus to UIs was downgraded a while ago? It would be totally nuts, especially with spammable UIs like Enkis or polders.
 
It says you get 20% more tourism from events, so much lower than double unless the math is different than what the text describes. I know generally you get 40% of culture as tourism for a historical event, so maybe it means you now get 60%, which would be 50% more tourism from events than you were getting before...but still not double.

Just some quick math to check.

If I get 1000 tourism from GP historic events, with the first (most literal) interpretation, I would get 1200 tourism. With the second one, I would get 1500.

As Avant Guarde increases GP by 33%, I would get 1333 tourism overall. So with the second I would get more tourism overall (including other historic events to add more), but would lose out on the extra GPs...at least in the ballpark. With the literal interpretation, its garbage to me.

Avant garde only increases tourism by 33% if you have no other bonuses to great people generation atall which is extremely unlikely.

I thought historical events were still based around 20% of something over a couple of turns, if that percentage has increased perhaps futurism needs to match the new number.
 
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