[GS] Unique District Vs. Unique Improvement Vs. Unique building?

[Sostratus]

Secondly, why aren't unique buildings half-cost? Seems really unfair.
Also, what's up with Georgia?! Maybe if they had half-cost ancient walls which provided faith and culture (or an additional combat strength, or the equivalent of Victor's 'Garrison Commander' or 'Defense Logistics' promotion...)

Well generally speaking, most of the time a civ's power budget is going to be spent in other areas if they have a UB. Whereas a unique district tends to get the spotlight. Look at Korea: as crazy strong as they are, they have a ton of their power invested in their Seowon, with their Civ ability dedicated to boosting it. The civ would play almost the same if you stripped away the rest of its kit and left in those 2 things. Whereas another powerhouse civ like the Aztecs have extremely powerful abilities and a good UU, but their building is pretty bad. It's there for flavor, and as anyone who has had to face AI monty's eagle rush can admit, that's honestly okay.

That said, only UDs scale their cost over the game, and you can't rush buy them normally. And a late game district can cost up to 540, which is on par with the most expensive tier 3 buildings like a stadium. Although some buildings cough tsikhe cough are definitely still way overpriced.

Also, what's up with Georgia?! Maybe if they had half-cost ancient walls which provided faith and culture (or an additional combat strength, or the equivalent of Victor's 'Garrison Commander' or 'Defense Logistics' promotion...)

Everyone hates on them because when they were released:
-Their UU was quite literally the worst unit in the game. It was inferior to swordsman, a unit of the same class and an era earlier.
-Most players with some experience don't struggle to get chain golden ages anyways
-City States didn't used to have it so good (i think they start with walls now?) they'd get swallowed up by the AI like no one's business of high difficulty. So you couldn't really even use GotWK&F because all the city states were dead within 100 turns.
-Renaissance Walls themselves were a meme, and they had unique walls that give a whole +3 faith. They didn't even have the extra wall HP they do now.

So all their bonuses are either strictly good on paper but useless in game, or are actively bad. Since release they made the khevsur not suck after a billion community threads and some detailed math showing that without it's special ability a khevsur was actually worth about 0.7 swords. They also buffed city state survival, and they just made the changes to rams and towers that boost walls. And they made the Tsike grant +200 defense strength instead of +100; and of course, the creme de la creme, 5 cheaper. Tsikhe could be free and people would still probably class it as pretty weak.

 

[King of Prussia]

TBH. I would be pretty happy with Georgia if they got a % boost to building walls. Would make getting their UB easier and it would fit their defensive theme imo.

 

[Trav'ling Canuck]

and of course, the creme de la creme, 5 cheaper. Tsikhe could be free and people would still probably class it as pretty weak.

Aye, the 5 discount is a marketing fail. Like, make it a real discount, or make it full price. But a discount of 5? It's sort of like if a restaurant serves you half-cooked food. Replace it and still charge you the bill, fine, or waive the bill, great. But take 25 cents off the bill? What kind of a middle finger salute is that??

PS I like Georgia as is, and if the Tsikhe cost the same as renaissance walls, I think that'd be fine. If they cost 50%, that'd be better and the civ still wouldn't be OP, but it's not a big deal.

 

[Sostratus]

TBH. I would be pretty happy with Georgia if they got a % boost to building walls. Would make getting their UB easier and it would fit their defensive theme imo.

That used ot be untenable because of the production overflow "bug" / hidden feature, because if they had double wall speed, people would stack Limes on and the world congress decision and then magnus chop one deer tile and suddenly you'd have finished the spaceship and built a moon base off that one action. But they don't have that problem now, so... I'm all for it!

PS I like Georgia as is, and if the Tsikhe cost the same as renaissance walls, I think that'd be fine. If they cost 50%, that'd be better and the civ still wouldn't be OP, but it's not a big deal.

I feel that the unique walls themselves just aren't doing enough. +3 faith on a tier 3 building that costs an insane amount of production to even acquire (it's 300 for ancient+medieval, then another 300 for Rwalls, or 260 for the tsikhe.) is trash. And the darn thing obsoletes. Other civ UBs don't. But the other main benefit, the extra defense strength, is pretty moot too; If an enemy is gonna breach 300 strength walls, he's gonna go all the way through 400. I mean they are super cool but just not practical. Perhaps if they unlocked with medieval walls or, georgia got some little bonus for building walls in the first place (like the Basilikoi Paides grants science for each trained unit, perhaps Georgia gets X% of the production costs as culture when they finish a wall building.)

 

[lotrmith]

That used ot be untenable because of the production overflow "bug" / hidden feature, because if they had double wall speed, people would stack Limes on and the world congress decision and then magnus chop one deer tile and suddenly you'd have finished the spaceship and built a moon base off that one action. But they don't have that problem now, so... I'm all for it!

I feel that the unique walls themselves just aren't doing enough. +3 faith on a tier 3 building that costs an insane amount of production to even acquire (it's 300 for ancient+medieval, then another 300 for Rwalls, or 260 for the tsikhe.) is trash. And the darn thing obsoletes. Other civ UBs don't. But the other main benefit, the extra defense strength, is pretty moot too; If an enemy is gonna breach 300 strength walls, he's gonna go all the way through 400. I mean they are super cool but just not practical. Perhaps if they unlocked with medieval walls or, georgia got some little bonus for building walls in the first place (like the Basilikoi Paides grants science for each trained unit, perhaps Georgia gets X% of the production costs as culture when they finish a wall building.)

They gain tourism after going obsolete.

 

[Navelgazer]

The value of a UI is all in how powerful and spammable it is. So, for instance, the Kampung is game-changing while the Golf Course mostly looks pretty on the map. Unique Districts tend to have quite-powerful bonuses in addition to being half-price, so they're the winner here.

 

[Sostratus]

They gain tourism after going obsolete.

Well yes at conservation; and Tsikhe have +3 tourism innately iirc. But I just meant, you can only build tsikhe in 2 eras of the game, because in ancient/classical/medieval you haven't unlocked them and in modern/atomic/info you're at urban defenses and can't build them any more. This is unlike any other UB, was my only point. So we would expect it to be extra punchy!

 

[Foulweather]

Regarding the Tsikhe, I’d like to see her get free Ancient Walls when settling on hills, and make Tsikhe unlock with Castles (not require Medieval Walls at all).

 

[Ziad]

Unique Districts have a major advantage of visual distinction and evolution as buildings are added. So just for that I place them highly in addition to the halved cost.

The Cothon is probably the most appealing district in the game by just how rendered and dynamic it is.

 

[Sostratus]

The Cothon is probably the most appealing district in the game by just how rendered and dynamic it is.

If you use alt+drag right mouse button to rotate the camera, oh my they did not skimp on the cothon model. That district is beautiful.

I do like the subtle UD aesthetic undertones. Combined with how well they've fleshed out things like unique monument and palace designs, the civs have real character.

 

[ShakaKhan]

It seems the consensus is that the reason that some UI's are really good, possibly equaling or surpassing UD's, is because of the type of bonus that they give coupled with the availability - kampungs, outbacks, and I'm surprised no one mentioned mekewaps. This digresses to the derivative problem that hammers are so much more valuable a yield than the others in this iteratio of the game.

I'm a big fan of UI's - they compound more frequently as each city can have only one UD or UB. Some UIs have this limitation, others have prerequisite terrain that means some cities won't have others while others can have them spammed, and others can be spammed everywhere.

Here's my thought - another reason that UIs are less valuable is because some city-state's enable UIs that are pretty good, most of the GS CS UIs are better than the civ specific ones if I'm reading it right (don't have GS yet.)...

... how about if in an expansion, some new CS's unlock unique buildings/districts? Like an entertainment district who provides 2 hammers for every amenity it provides (and to ZoC cities)? Or a library that makes the campus district provide faith and culture equal to its adjacency bonus?

 

[Sostratus]

Here's my thought - another reason that UIs are less valuable is because some city-state's enable UIs that are pretty good, most of the GS CS UIs are better than the civ specific ones if I'm reading it right (don't have GS yet.)...

The core problem is that spammable UIs are feast or famine.
Any tile that's not a district is going to be a farm or a mine/lumbermill.
So if your unique improvement is better than that (mekewap, terrace farm, outback, ziggurat) you're going to put them everywhere. If it's not, you're going to put maybe a small handful if any (sphinx.) The myriad UIs based around faith all have this problem. They need help. Those production improvements aren't inherently superior to faith improvements, the faith improvements are very poorly balanced. I mean most people think food is trash but terrace farms are amazingly strong even without the Aqueduct bonus. You odn't to wait the whole game for it's power - it's on tap right away.

 

[S1AL]

UD are the best within current design parameters because they combine half-price construction with significant bonuses. Buildings - especially the oddball ones (Stave Church, Tlachtli) - do not get a discount, come later, and tend to have smaller bonuses. UI are the highest variance, ranging from awesome-sauce ones like Terrace Farm and Mekewap to why-even-bother ones like Golf Course.

IMO, buildings should have had both a relative price discount and larger bonuses... as it stands, half of them are actually an increased price.

 

[Sostratus]

IMO, buildings should have had both a relative price discount and larger bonuses... as it stands, half of them are actually an increased price.

I don't think UBs need tobe on the level of UDs or UIs. Those two are very much "defining" traits of a civ's playstyle, and most of the time if a civ has one it's got a lot of the power budget.
UBs seem to given to civs when their Civ ability, Leader ability, or UU has the power budget. I respect the holistic civ designs. I also appreciate the choice to give everyone some unique infrastructure, a good move.

That said, I agree that no unique should feel "bad to use." For example, the polder on release felt awful because you couldn't hardly place any on the map, let alone take advantage of the adjacency effects. That's an anti-fun situation. We don't want things to be anti-fun.

 

[S1AL]

"Holistic" design doesn't work when one piece (i.e. leader ability) is designed to be interchangeable. Of the civs with Unique Buildings, they're all either (1) generally bad, (2) completely dependent on the leader ability for power.

 

[Lily_Lancer]

UB not good?
Are you talking about Madrasa?

 

[RealHuhn]

Spamming UDs for half the cost essentially makes most of the other districts you build 50% cheaper as well because of the district discount mechanism. Very powerful if you know the math behind it.

 

[S1AL]

UB not good?
Are you talking about Madrasa?

Would you rather have Madrasa or Seowon?

Even if Madrasa is reasonably good (which it is), relative to the closest comparison district it's a joke.

 

[Ziad]

Aye, the 5 discount is a marketing fail. Like, make it a real discount, or make it full price. But a discount of 5? It's sort of like if a restaurant serves you half-cooked food. Replace it and still charge you the bill, fine, or waive the bill, great. But take 25 cents off the bill? What kind of a middle finger salute is that??

PS I like Georgia as is, and if the Tsikhe cost the same as renaissance walls, I think that'd be fine. If they cost 50%, that'd be better and the civ still wouldn't be OP, but it's not a big deal.

I"ve memed about it too but it's rather evident that the cost decrease to Tsikhe was for consistency with the cost decrease of walls rather than being a targeted buff for Georgia.

As to the number 5, I suppose it can be a turn difference in some edge cases. I would think something like 15-20 would have been more useful overall.

 

[kryat]

I would say that certain UB can be better than either a UD or UI when they grant extra abilities and don’t need to be built empire wide. Ex: the Ordu, the Basilkoi Paides, Sukiennice, and Queen’s Bibliotechque are all powerful because they can concentrate the ability into one city, sort of augmenting the Civ’s UA. Additionally, they’re good when they’re buildings you would’ve built anyway, especially as that empire.

On the other hand, the Marae is just fantastic for other reasons, but it can’t be concentrated into one city.