Vox Populi Congress Proposal Workshop

[pineappledan]

edited

 

[Hinin]

proposal for new Austrian National Wonder to replace the Coffee House, in light of the new changed Austria which will be implemented this congress

Spoiler :

UA change:
further reduce the resting influence bonus to 60, scaling with era. (down from 75).

new UNW: Ballhausplatz(unique printing press)
available at Printing Press
+5 (up from +1)
10% of the Empire's Culture output is converted to Science each turn
+2 Culture to Chanceries on Empire
+1 Great Diplomat Points
+2 Paper (up from 1)
2 Civil Servant specialist (up from 1)
+20% production of diplomatic units in this City
Each of Your City-State Embassies provide 2 Votes to the World Congress each instead of 1

All diplomatic units receive the Literacy promotion: Grants +5 Influence when you conduct a diplomatic mission, +1 movement for diplomatic units, and the ability to ignore terrain costs

reasoning:
Inspired by @DoveCDog 's proposal from last congress.
The coffee house is terrible. It strikes that perfect balance of not synergizing with the rest of the kit, but instead does a worse version of the same thing. It offers no new incentives other than some raw yields.
If players wanted to see a return of the extra WC votes to Austria's kit, this is a weaker form that is unlocked at the same time as the WC, so it's a much better place for such a bonus.

I agree with what you propose. Just wished we could also give some more power to Austrian spies (as a nod to the Evidenzbureau), but that will obviously have to wait for the finalization of the debates about the spy system.

 

[KlHannibal2]

If your domination games regularly end in the Modern Era, I think you need to choose a higher difficulty.

My bad, I meant special forces. Anyway, the scout line comes at techs that a warmonger will not go for early. So what about giving scout UUs to non warmonger civs, or move them lower in the tech tree?

 

[KlHannibal2]

Or you need to tone down the minuteman, which is precisely what this is meant to do. The minuteman is overwhelmingly powerful, one of the strongest UUs in the game. It’s so strong that players use it to push their advantage well into industrial, and wipe their opponents out before America even gets access to their unique wonders.

It looks like you maybe missed the part where I proposed they unlock at economics, 1 tech early. That puts them next to to America’s UNW on the tech tree as well, so it gives them a military bonus on the top side of Renaissance, and allows America to pursue their other unique component without delaying their military edge.

Regardless, if America was just a warmonger then there would be no point giving them any other wonder than West Point. We have been trying to make them more multivalent, but the minuteman has such a massive and prolonged power spike it scuttles our efforts. Im already moving all the wonders earlier next version and buffing the trade wonder, so I am hoping we can have more games where we at least get to see American wonders, but I think another piece of this is the minuteman as it currently exists is just way too good and tilts America full warmonger.

Yeah, I agree that despite many options, warmongering is way stronger for America than the rest. Not only the minuteman. The UA part to buy enemy tiles is very strong for conquest if you use it to citadel. And it can push through any difficult terrain.

Suggestion for a minuteman nerf: remove the free accuracy one (or what it is called nowadays). It's the least unique part. Also, the archer line was nerfed recently by removing indirect fire. Maybe these two are enough for a first try.

 

[KlHannibal2]

Other UA change ideas:

Spoiler Siam UA change :

Current UA:
Influence with City-States starts at 40. Yields from Friendly and Allied City-States increased by 100%. +25% to Combat Strength of Allied City-State Capitals. +10 Experience to Units gifted by City-States.

Proposed UA:
Yields and Unit Gifting frequency from Friendly and Allied City-States doubled. +10 Influence from Diplomatic Missions.

Rationale:

• The current UA has 2 weird bonuses:
  • +25% to Combat Strength of Allied City-State Capitals is basically useless. It doesn't affect you. It only manages to make tributing your allies a little harder for enemy civs. Otherwise it's a non-factor
  • 40 starting Influence is an ultra-early steroid, but it is a 1-off bonus that has no lasting impact. It just gets you some early quick yields from meeting CS and then doesn't do anything ever again. A bonus that has impact for the whole game would be much better
• Conventional, safe bonus for the most pure diplomatic civ in the game. relevant, straightforward, and easy to use.
• It's unique. We don't have a civ that boosts diplomatic missions

Spoiler India Change :

Current UA:

Starts with a Pantheon.​

Great Prophets require 35% less Faith.​

Founding a Religion converts all owned Cities.​

+0.6 Religious Pressure and +1% Food for each Follower of your primary Religion in a City.​

No Unhappiness from Religious Unrest.​

Cannot build Missionaries.​

problems:

Spoiler :

• That's 6 different abilities in 1 UA!
  • What a mess! look at all the fiddly abilities needed to make this thing work.
  • This is the clearest example of a civ UA being overdesigned
• Boosts both Passive spread and Great Prophets. No clear theme
  • Compensates for not having missionaries by boosting... Everything else possible. Once again, a mess
• Scaling Passive spread as a UA doesn't work
  • We've been trying to get this civ UA to work at some decent level of power for years, and it always falls out of balance, goes under or overpowered for long stretches of time. It requires constant tuning, but none of it addresses the fundamental problem that Passive spread doesn't match the pace of the religion game, and no amount of fiddling with it is going to fix that.
  • In the early religious game, Passive spread is almost non-existent. You need to spread to multiple cities to gain critical mass. Devs tried to address this with automatic conversion, but that only partially works, and it doesn't help them defend themselves, or maintain spread to new cities or growing cities
  • In late game, the population spread becomes overwhelming. Missionary costs get higher and higher, and so the effectiveness of missionaries falls away as the game progresses, but passive spread just gets stronger and stronger. It doesn't match how the religion game is supposed to become stagnant, but continues to ramp up. Meanwhile, the cost of inquisitors for other players to defend against your passive pressure also gets more and more expensive. It's not possible to balance this mechanic because it is way to weak to start and way too strong at the end.
  • If another civ comes and tries to convert you early you're basically screwed. India has almost no defense against conversion until enhancing and getting inquisitors. Early and vigorous conversion can turn off your UA with almost no possibility for counterplay
  • It's boring. Your unique ability focuses on a passive mechanic, and de-emphasizes actively spreading with GProphets and turns off Missionaries entirely. emphasizing GProphets as the main spread component would be more active, and give players something to do.

Proposal
New UA: Mahatma
Starts the game with a Pantheon.
Great Prophets require 35% less Faith, and spend only 1 spread action to Found a Religion, Enhance a Religion, or build a Holy Site.
Cannot build Missionaries.

UB Change:
Add +1% Food in this city for every follower of its primary religion.

Notes:

• Great Prophets that do not have all 4 of their charges cannot Found a Religion, Enhance a Religion, or build a Holy Site.
  • In other words, every Great Prophet can do 1 major action first, and then instead of being expended, they get 3 spread actions
• The for Harappan Reservoir is now just any religion. It doesn't have to be your majority religion. It just scales off whatever is the biggest religion in that city.
• Requires AI work to teach the India AI to always Enhance or plant a Holy Site if able to.

Rationale:

• The idea is that all GProphets can spread, so they become your main way to establish your religion. Your Great Prophet that founds your religion can immediately spread it to 3 more cities.
• No more automatic conversion, immunity to unrest, or scaling pressure bonuses. fewer, stronger bonuses that focus only on better Great Prophets
• India retains its food bonus, scaling with followers, but now it's off the UA, freeing up space. It is also slightly more flexible, allowing you to get the bonus on a converted city. India is a very pluralistic society, so it makes sense to allow them to benefit from multiple religions.

Spoiler Hunnic UA Change: Round 2 :

Congress 5 Hunnic UA: Scourge of God
+10% Combat Strength for each subsequent attack against a single target during a turn.
Inflict +100% and receive -50% War Weariness.
Claim adjacent unowned land tiles when Cities claim a tile of the same type.

Proposed Change: Scourge of God
+10% Combat Strength for each subsequent attack against a single target during a turn.
Inflict +100% and receive -50% War Weariness.
All tiles with Gold or Culture gain 1 more for 1 turn for each Citizen you kill.

Note: Things that kill Citizens:

• Capturing cities (cities lose population)
• Razing cities (lose 1 per turn)
• Nukes

Losing population by Starving cities does not count.

Reasons:

• Huns and Shoshone are too similar:
  • skirmisher UU
  • flatland unique tile improvement that unlocks in late ancient era and gives
  • UA ability that gives a combat bonus and free tiles. Not cheaper, specifically tiles at no cost.
  • They're both Grey
• Additionally, every civ from the Eastern European Steppes in the game (Huns, Mongols, Russia) has a bonus to border expansion and it is both repetitive and creatively bankrupt
• Huns could benefit from a unique angle, and we don't have a Razing civ in the game.
• New bonus is very 'Scourge of God'.
• The tile claim bonus is interesting, and stronger than the Shoshone's current bonus. I think it could find a good home there.

Spoiler Shoshone UA Change :

Current UA: Great Expanse
Cities claim up to 8 tiles on Founding and 4 tiles on Conquest.
Land Units receive a +20% Combat Strength bonus when fighting in friendly territory.
All Recon Units can choose rewards from Ancient Ruins.

New UA: Great Expanse
Claim adjacent unowned land tiles when Cities claim a tile of the same type.
Land Units receive a +20% Combat Strength bonus when fighting in friendly territory.
All Land units can claim Ancient Ruins. (if 5-18a passes)

Notes:
I would suggest the following changes be made for the UA tile claim bonus to work better:

• Tile claim AI only picks the best tile to expand to when this trait ability is active, instead of randomly picking from the top 3
• AI's Tile valuation adds the value of adjacent tiles of the same type when choosing a tile to claim if this trait ability is active.

Rationale

• The Shoshone UA is called Great Expanse, but the Hunnic tile claim bonus is stronger (it claims more tiles faster)
• The Hunnic tile claim ability is more interesting and continues to work throughout the game, instead of mostly being an early expansion-phase bonus that never is used in the mid-game
• The Huns and Shoshone have lots of overlapping abilities (see above), and I think the Huns should drop their tile claim ability in favour of the Shoshone
• Getting to choose ruins instead of getting them randomly is a weak bonus, and a chore. It's not a fun ability, and many people simply turn Ruins off if they don't like the randomness.
• Allowing all units to collect ruins if only Scouts can normally would be a much more impactful and useful ability.

I love the prophet change for India. One more idea what to change: I always found it hard to make a good pantheon choice on turn 1 with India due to little map knowledge. We could give India a larger revealed area at the start of the game or after founding the first city. Or we could delay the pantheon to turn 10 or lower the threshold for getting a pantheon.

I also like the Hun proposal. The way I would play them is to conquer normally and keep some conquered cities as pop farms. Preferably with high food and few eki tiles. Keep razing and regrowing these cities constantly to max the yields. Is that the intended way to play them?

 

[der_weihnachtsmann]

draft 2 of the Arabia/Byzantium swap:

Spoiler :

Details:
New Arabian UA: Seal of the Prophets
Can always found a religion.
Can pick any belief even if it was already adopted, and has 1 additional belief slot.
-15% Faith purchase costs.
Can purchase unlocked Great People with Faith in Classical
View attachment 669888
Bazaar(unique market UB)

32​

+1 and for every 4 in the city​

1 Merchant specialist​

1 to Trade Routes to or From this City​

+100% religious pressure from Trade Routes originating in this City​

+1 to Spice and Sugar​

New Byzantine UA: Arete
+1 Culture and +1 Science in your capital whenever a Historic Event occurs.
Whenever a City adopts your Religion for the first time, a Historic Event is triggered.
Cities gain 10% of their City Defense as Faith each turn.
View attachment 669890
Lavra (unique temple UB)

32 (up from 3 faith only)​

+50% Pressure in this city (up from 25%)​

Gain 100% of the city's and output as an instant yield when a new Citizen is born​

1 GW Music slot​

-1 from religious strife​

+1 to Incense, Wine, and Amber​

2nd attempt is more similar to what we already have.
The Bazaar is basically the existing Tetraconch's bonuses, but earlier
The Lavra is similar to Spain's old Mission UB, with a large bonus on Growth. This reinforces the civ's Tall emphasis.

The main difference remains with Byzantium losing the % Great Person completion bonus, losing access to the earlier TR completion HE trigger, and getting 2 different bonuses in recompense.

If people still like the random % GP completion, I thought of a new home for it: the Maya.
The Maya placed 34th out of 43 on the AI test games, indicating they are doing fairly badly.
Their UA already gives free GPs, but it is pretty barebones, and could benefit from a 2nd effect.

Spoiler Maya UA proposal :

Current Maya UA:
After unlocking Mathematics, you can pick a free Great Person every 394 game years. Can only pick each Great Person once.

New Maya UA:
Every 394 game years, gain 50% completion towards a Great Person of your choice. Can only pick each Great Person once.
Gain 25% completion towards a random Great Person every 20 turns.

current UA

• With the current version, you can get a free GP on turns 62, 72, 86, 101, 117, 133, 152, 183, and 234 for a total of 9.
• You have to research Mathematics before turn 62. This is doable, but makes Maya very inflexible early game and unable to respond to their start, or else they will delay their UA.
• The current UA also pretty much turns off after turn 234. After that the game clock slows down so much you won't get another Baktun before the game ends.
• This is the only UA with an explicit tech unlock, that just doesn't function without a prereq tech. That's arbitrary and restrictive, and it doesn't seem very fun to be strongarmed into a tech path by your UA when you have 2 other components that already give enough direction for tech emphasis.

New UA

• With this new UA there is no tech unlock for your UA which means no priority tech forcing you to go down Mathematics. This makes Maya's early game flexible. Math is still a high priority tech for Maya, because their UU unlocks on it, so nothing is lost for roleplay flavor.
• There are 3 potential extra triggers on turn 33, 42, and 52, for a total of 12 triggers. At 50% completion for each, that's a total of 6 free GPs.
• Assuming a game takes about 400 turns, a 25% GP completion every 20 turns is equivalent to +5 GPs over the game. Combined with the UA that is equal to 11 GPs, an increase in 1 over the game.
• The random % completion is more interactive than the full free GPs, giving you something to aim at completing, either through GP generation or by finishing off with your 50% Baktun trigger. You also interact with it on a consistent period throughout the game, so you have a part of your UA that stays active after turn 234.
• Giving 50% completion for Great Generals, Admirals is a little unorthodox, but doable. I think that Great Prophets would have to be removed as an option, however. GProphets are generated with Faith, so you would have to give a burst of Faith equal to 50% of the next GProphet, but that Faith could be spent on other things instead.
• Unlike the previous version, the GPs would no longer be Free, meaning they would contribute to the const increase of the next GP. This makes it weaker than the existing UA in one respect.

While I like removing the mathematics prereq a lot, i disagree with the 50% thing. It forces the Maya into a gp generation focus with a weird incentive to pre develop a gp to 50 % and then stop. Also one of the strongest aspects was the free religion, so it even could be a nerf. More importantly though its just a lot more satisfying to get a window pop up for a free gp which you instantly get for a more indirect bonus. You wont habe the feeling anymore that this date is something special to look forward too. You would also need to count separately for a different bonus which even conflicts with accurately pre generating a gp.

 

[Rekk]

The way I would play them is to conquer normally and keep some conquered cities as pop farms. Preferably with high food and few eki tiles. Keep razing and regrowing these cities constantly to max the yields. Is that the intended way to play them?

We would likely implement a restriction that you can't benefit from killing more population than the city had after capturing it.

 

[pineappledan]

this comes up every time we talk about razing.

If it hasn’t been implemented already, then if you stop razing a city, you should never be allowed to start again. I believe that has already been implemented though.

No, the intended way to play them is you conquer and kill people. You don’t harvest your own previously conquered cities like crops. That would be absolutely brain dead and next-level gross.

 

[KlHannibal2]

this comes up every time we talk about razing.

If it hasn’t been implemented already, then if you stop razing a city, you should never be allowed to start again. I believe that has already been implemented though.

No, the intended way to play them is you conquer and kill people. You don’t harvest your own previously conquered cities like crops. That would be absolutely brain dead and next-level gross.

Good, I also prefer this way. That said, cyclical razing and regrowing would be very efficient yield-wise. So it is necessary to make it impossible.

As for conquered cities you raze: do you have to raze them to 0 like Timurids, or can you stop razing at 1 pop to keep the city and buildings? I would prefer the latter in order to differentiate the 2 civs. Also, the Huns' free tiles will give them much fewer yields from border expansion than other civs would get, discouraging resettlement.

 

[KlHannibal2]

While I like removing the mathematics prereq a lot, i disagree with the 50% thing. It forces the Maya into a gp generation focus with a weird incentive to pre develop a gp to 50 % and then stop. Also one of the strongest aspects was the free religion, so it even could be a nerf. More importantly though its just a lot more satisfying to get a window pop up for a free gp which you instantly get for a more indirect bonus. You wont habe the feeling anymore that this date is something special to look forward too. You would also need to count separately for a different bonus which even conflicts with accurately pre generating a gp.

Yeah, I agree. If not fixing Maya to mathematics is the goal, why not let the GP party start at reaching classical? It would be about the same time as with mathematics, but would give them more tech options.

 

[KlHannibal2]

This Congress was tribute rework. Next Congress is shaping up to be the one where we fix PoPs. Love it.

Until PoP proposals with clear support emerge, I’m going to modify my Greece proposal so that the stacking military bonus does not rely on PoPs.

I don’t think any diplo civ can switch onto requiring PoPs for a stacking benefit until we know what the conditions are. Ally status is more stable for now. The only thing that can be moved onto PoPs are things that are currently unconditional, like Siam’s +100% yields, Austria’s quest bonus, or Greece’s decay reduction:

Pledges of Protection grant -50% Influence decay.
+4% Combat Strength of owned and Allied Units for each City-State alliance (up to +40%).
Treat neutral City-State territory as friendly territory.

As for the idea to move Greece's decay bonus to PoP: I think the current format is a better one.
It works right away without conditions, but you have to raise your influence in the first place to benefit from it. First needing a big army to PoP and then getting the influence to finally benefit from your UA seems quite weak.
Another thing I like better with the current UA: it also gives you faster recovery of negative influence. This allows tributing with an early hoplite army and moving over to allying the CStates with less penalty. In other words, it allows for a more varied but still unique playstyle for Greece with meaningful variety and decisions. Also, it allows faster recovery of negatives after an enemy great diplomat use.

As for PoP: Hittites have that as a core mechanic.

 

[pineappledan]

As for the idea to move Greece's decay bonus to PoP: I think the current format is a better one.
It works right away without conditions, but you have to raise your influence in the first place to benefit from it. First needing a big army to PoP and then getting the influence to finally benefit from your UA seems quite weak.
Another thing I like better with the current UA: it also gives you faster recovery of negative influence. This allows tributing with an early hoplite army and moving over to allying the CStates with less penalty. In other words, it allows for a more varied but still unique playstyle for Greece with meaningful variety and decisions. Also, it allows faster recovery of negatives after an enemy great diplomat use

The purpose of this is to nerf Greece. We can either lower his numbers or gate his abilities to make him harder to use.

The Hittites are a mod civ and aren’t relevant to VP base balance

 

[Stalker0]

proposal for new Austrian National Wonder to replace the Coffee House, in light of the new changed Austria which will be implemented this congress

Spoiler :

UA change:
further reduce the resting influence bonus to 60, scaling with era. (down from 75).

new UNW: Ballhausplatz(unique printing press)
available at Printing Press
+5 (up from +1)
10% of the Empire's Culture output is converted to Science each turn
+2 Culture to Chanceries on Empire
+1 Great Diplomat Points
+2 Paper (up from 1)
2 Civil Servant specialist (up from 1)
+20% production of diplomatic units in this City
Each of Your City-State Embassies provide 2 Votes to the World Congress each instead of 1

All diplomatic units receive the Literacy promotion: Grants +5 Influence when you conduct a diplomatic mission, +1 movement for diplomatic units, and the ability to ignore terrain costs

reasoning:
Inspired by @DoveCDog 's proposal from last congress.
The coffee house is terrible. It strikes that perfect balance of not synergizing with the rest of the kit, but instead does a worse version of the same thing. It offers no new incentives other than some raw yields.
If players wanted to see a return of the extra WC votes to Austria's kit, this is a weaker form that is unlocked at the same time as the WC, so it's a much better place for such a bonus.

We just fought to drop the votes, I don't see any reason to bring them back in. The rest of the UB looks fine.

 

[pineappledan]

I agree they should stay dead, but if community really wants them, then this is they way to do it: through a UNW.

I am but a man of the people

 

[Legen]

New Maya UA:
Every 394 game years, gain 50% completion towards a Great Person of your choice. Can only pick each Great Person once.
Gain 25% completion towards a random Great Person every 20 turns.

This is quite a big change to Maya. One of the fun parts of this civ is that they can go for a heavy Progress focus with their UI, and nonetheless enjoy some early GPTI as if they went Tradition instead. Which is quite unique for a Progress build, getting GPTI as early infrastructure. Your proposal changes Maya to be a more Tradition oriented civ, as Progress can't make the same benefit of the 25%/50% completion that Tradition can. Is that intended?

 

[pineappledan]

You’re right it’s probably not a great idea. @Rekk’s proposal is better.

Both do something to solve the main problem I have with this UA turning on and off again in the middle of the game.

There is a problem with Rek’s however, because you’re going to have a 20% bonus towards your last GP you picked for a long time. Like half the entire game time. As permanent UA bonuses it’s better than nothing, but still isn’t that interesting.

 

[hokath]

What if it boosted specialists of the type associated with the GP as well (scaling with era).

 

[ma_kuh]

Mayan UA Proposal:

Receive a bonus Great Person at the end of every Maya Long Count calendar cycle (every 394 years), and Great People of that type are earned 20% faster for the duration of the next cycle. Each bonus Great Person can only be chosen once.

As much as I love being able to instantly Enhance with Maya, we could also just pull Prophet from the list. They aren't guaranteed to found, despite Kunas' best efforts, so there are games you might just not get a Prophet. Or locking it to pre-Industrial only to avoid issues with GoG becoming too auto-choose.

I also wonder what it would look like if there was a little more structure to the great people selections, something like:
B'ak'tun #...

1. Choose a GEMS
2. Choose a GWAM
3. Choose a Great General, Prophet, Admiral, or Diplomat (GGPAD new great person sub-group?)
4. Repeat...

And then lifting the no-repeats rule. But maybe it's too samey to just pick the same cycle of 3 GPs every game? I don't know, just another configuration of the rewards that might spark some ideas.

 

[Legen]

Both do something to solve the main problem I have with this UA turning on and off again in the middle of the game.

There is a problem with Rek’s however, because you’re going to have a 20% bonus towards your last GP you picked for a long time. Like half the entire game time. As permanent UA bonuses it’s better than nothing, but still isn’t that interesting.

An alternative is to have a new effect take place once you select the last GP on the list. Like this:

"Receive a bonus Great Person at the end of every Maya Long Count calendar cycle (every 394 years). Each bonus Great Person can only be chosen once. After selecting the last Great Person, <<insert new effect here>>."

For instance, the effect could be the "25% completion towards a random Great Person every 20 turns" that you suggested, or Rekk's "+20% rate to a different GP type every 20 turns".

 

[pineappledan]

An alternative is to have a new effect take place once you select the last GP on the list. Like this:

"Receive a bonus Great Person at the end of every Maya Long Count calendar cycle (every 394 years). Each bonus Great Person can only be chosen once. After selecting the last Great Person, <<insert new effect here>>."

For instance, the effect could be the "25% completion towards a random Great Person every 20 turns" that you suggested, or Rekk's "+20% rate to a different GP type every 20 turns".

“The last great person” is unclear, because the list refills after you pick your 9th GP. If the UA is unlocked from the beginning of the game there are a potential 12 free GPs

I guess this is my problem with Maya. People have pointed out that my proposal of % completion forces Maya to be a Tradition GP civ, who needs to generate lots of GPPs to make use of his kit. While that is not exactly my intention, civs like Maya and Poland are my least favorite to play, because they offer little guidance re: what you’re supposed to do with them.