What Economy?

[Von Wibble]

I have noticed from playing (although I certainly do not claim to be anything above mediocre in ability) that the cottage economy in FFH just doesn't seem to get much love. Compared to the specialist economy

- Civics such as agriculture, theology, guilds and caste system all help SE. Yet there is no equivalant to help CE (like the +1 hammer and accelerated growth in BTS). Iirc the fully upgraded town gets 2 less commerce and 1 less hammer, whilst the fully upgraded farm gives 1 more food and 1 less hammer (but sanitation comes a lot earlier than biology)

- Since there is often war pillaging is more common affecting CE more - Raiders adds to this

- Some civs bonuses are strongly linked to SE - Grigori and Sidar. Some civs seem to definately do better out of it also, like Calabim.

Are there any reasons to in general favour CE over SE? Which non adaptive leaders would people say it suits? I'm just curious as to if I've missed anything as assuming the 2 are balanced in BTS would lead to the conclusion that SE is better in FFH...

 

[Grey Fox]

I think cottages are more balanced now. They used to be better and get +1 Hammer from some tech and I think +1 commerce from some additional tech.

 

[oyzar]

with no CE civics and the insane agriculture i can't but help feel that SE is alot stronger than CE currently. Ofc they aren't compleetly balanced against each other in bts anyways with SE beeing way stronger going long imo..

 

[Ozcor]

I have to agree with Von on this one. In regular civ, the choice between a SE and a CE is a crucial one, while in FFH it isn't much of a choice at all. With all the bonuses available, an SE is nearly always going to be the better economy.

I think it would be great if some more bonuses for CE were thrown into the mix. It would give the player another strategic decision to make, which is always a good thing.

 

[Grey Fox]

Well, the thing here I would like to change in this discussion is; When you say CE do you mean Commerce Economy or Cottage economy? Cause I do not really want to see much more improvements on cottages per se. Maybe a slight bonus on a civic, +1 hammer perhaps. But I'd rather see improved is Wind mills and Water mills. They also provide commerce, and are very under used by the players I think. Cause they come late and their bonus come late. Now this is fine, cause they are supposed to be kinda late game improvements, but I still find them lacking.

 

[Mailbox]

If you play as the Bannor, they get military bonuses for towns in the form of Demagogs. That's enough reason for cottages to be spammed in their borders. However, it does seem that other civilizations (save perhaps the Grigori) have little reason to CE instead of SE.

 

[Grey Fox]

Well Hyborem has a reason for cottage spam.

 

[ShadowDrgn]

I seem to do rather well with a mostly cottage economy and usually only 1-2 cities maxing out on specialists. Cottages are of course useful early game when you don't have access to buildings/techs to assign lots of specialists, and specialists shine late game when the game isn't going to last long enough for a cottage to mature. I don't think either is overpowered enough to completely replace the other.

For an equivalent population, towns bring in more gold/research than specialists, plus towns are equally good on plains as grasslands, unlike farms (due to agriculture civic). Also, a lot of those extra GPP you're generating are going to go to waste on cities that will never accumulate enough to produce a great person during the course of the game. Finally, using civics to improve/assign specialists prevents you from using other good civics.

The main advantages to specialists are that you can pack cities closer together, you don't have to build as many improvements, and you get more great people. However, you're going to want cottages to get to specialist-enabling techs, and cottages are still good choices for cities on mostly plains.

 

[BCalchet]

It seems you're forgetting one major upside of a cottage-based economy, here:
Blight.

Sure, it only happens once per game, but when it does happen, any large farm-heavy empire will find itself completely crippled, until enough workers and water-adepts can be brought to bear on the resulting wasteland.

Cottage-users take much less damage.

 

[westamastaflash]

And remember that farms are just as easily pillaged as cottages - and losing food is a :"bad thing" when you are playing SE.

 

[Grillick]

Farms are actually MORE EASILY pillaged than cottages, since they go away entirely with one pillage.

However, they are much easier to replace, as well.

 

[Humakty]

Doesn't the blight supress the ability to spread irrigations ?
It limitates greatly SE economies, so I don't think there is some needs for boosting CE. You won't have much of a choice to do after the blight.

 

[onedreamer]

CE and SE economies just don't exist. You are intended to use all features of the game if you want to be most successful. On the forum this is called hybrid economy, if you really need to call it someway (thankfully not with an acronym, for now).

 

[Papillon]

I think you must compute in the equation of SE versus CE the wonders which improve the SE even more like the Hall of Kings and the Great Library, and the number of specialists which can be sustained by square.

Supposing we are speaking about a Scientist, it produces 5 2 3 / turn before building modifiers with the 2 civics improving the SE = 7 3 .
If you add the Hall of Kings and the Great Library, this amounts to 10 3 .

A farm on a grassland with Agriculture sustains 1,5 specialist. So we are speaking of 10,5 4,5 without the wonders or a maximal of 15 4,5 .

Compare this to the maximal 8 produced by a grassland square with a town on a resource near a river with a Financial leader in order to take a very favourable case for the CE.

The CE is down by 2,5 4,5 in average and 7 4,5 in the most extreme case.

(Please correct my calculations if I am wrong, I have written on the basis of what I remember.)

 

[Papillon]

(Sorry for the double posting, I was compelled to do it because of the limit of 20 images / post.)

Now, if you play Sacrifice the Weak...

One farm on a grassland with Agriculture sustains 4 scientists for an average of 20 8 12 = 28 12 in average.
With the Hall of Kings and the Great Library, this increases to 40 12 .

You still produce 8 on a square with a town in the best case, and you can add 1 scientist for 5 2 3 = 15 3 .
Even if you have build the Hall of Kings and the Great Library, this increases to 18 3 . But I would be surprised that a CE has build the SE wonders...

With StW, the SE overkills the CE by 13 9 in average and 22 9 at the maximum.

What do YOU play ?

(Corrections are still welcome if my calculations are wrong.)

 

[Humakty]

Maybe your calculation is correct, but after the blight, what will YOU do on your squares having no direct access to fresh water ?

 

[onedreamer]

there are too many ifs and buts in all these theories. What about using both farms and cottages, and watermills, and windmills, workshops, etc ? You'll discover nice things, for example that the economy is more city-based than civ-based. Specialize your cities. This is also good vs. the Blight, since if you have a city with many farms, you can rebuild them quicker than if you had farms spread all over. Btw you can prepare for the Blight early on, so it isn't nearly the issue cottage fans want to make it appear. The real problem is loosing resources permanently and temporarily.

 

[Papillon]

The real problem is loosing resources permanently and temporarily.

Exactly.

 

[Calavente]

and you need to factor the happy and health counts

a city can only be so big at any time of the game.

your calculations are accurate but take into account the pop.. and the total commerce per pop.
your math are ok when you have neither happy nor health issues... and when you grow at the rate of the firsts levels.

when your cities are size 15 ... one civ with 15 towns, the other with ... 6 farms + 9 specialists...

by your maths it means :
8*15 for CE = 120 (in truth it would be 5*15 = 75), (and 6*15=90 if you are financial) (reduced as rivers and ressources bring to bth economies
9*10 for SE = 90 +27
so there is an equilibrium between a fully developped CE + financial and a fully developed SE (needing all the civics, wonders and tech.. so mid game)

with AV SE shines. but with AV you are evil and infernal terrain may easilly spread to you, killing all farms.. StW is made to be able to survive/thrive in hell terrain. then there is blight !!!

the real advantages of SE are : quicker reach of the happy limit, the very best when you have a lot of health (late game) and no happy issues : LawIII. (so limited to 4 cities, maybe 7) and that you profit the most of the gambling houses, not needing any science slider to have your research.

so while CE is understengthed, it is not overwhelmed. (as you can build cottage even when you have no watter nearby, and on hills. and if you have spare food, you can have more production as cottage on hills and plains don't lose the hammer.

the only issues for cottage are the long maturation time, and the slower city growth (easilly fixed by a bit of micro and going all farms until reaching pop cap then all cottage)

for me good fix to reéquilibrate this would be a civic that would give either of :
-+1 to towns
-+1 to village and towns
-+50% growht for all cottages-type.

 

[Papillon]

You are absolutely right for the happiness and health caps during the early and mid-game, though I think Drama and Mathematics come quite soon to push back the happiness cap.

Nevertheless, your estimation for the CE economy is much more realistic and therefore less optimistic than mine, and we can see that even if we take into account the caps, the SE still generates 27 / turn more than the CE city.

No, the real weakness of the SE is the generally low output like you have hinted.

Another nice thing is if you are playing elves, you will run GoN as early as possible instead of Agriculture (+ the eventual StW). In this case you will of course be happy to take in the same as with Agriculture thanks to the growing Ancient Forests but with the increased output and the much higher happiness and health caps.

On a more practical side, and to be frankly honest, I often start with a farms and cottages mix, a bit like you have said, which I convert to full farms later on, when the caps have been pushed back a little more.

for me good fix to reéquilibrate this would be a civic that would give either of :
-+1 to towns
-+1 to village and towns
-+50% growht for all cottages-type.

I agree.
Or the two first, split over a technology and a civic in order to compell the players to choose between the two main economies.