RtR mod 3.0.0.1 proposed change log

[Krill]

RtR 3.0.0.1.h change log. Mod can be found here

Misc changes:

Capital city tile output: minimum of 2 food, 2 hammers, 1 commerce
Versailles: Cost: 500
Colossus: +2c to water tiles only in that city.
Palace: +9 commerce
Quick speed improvement build time multiplier changed from 67% (round up) to 66% (round up). This also applies to chops, and means that actions taking 3t on normal speed now take 2t on quick speed as you might expect them to.
Jungle: No random growth
Global warming: removed from the game
No City trades option now available

Heroic Epic changes:

Heroic Epic: +100% military production. Cost 150 hammers, +50% production with marble, requires Literature, Colosseum, Barracks in city.

Colosseum: +1XP to Melee, Archery, Mounted, Siege units, +2 happy, +1 happy per 20% culture slider. Cost 80 hammers, requires Construction. +100% production with Charismatic.

Greek Odeon: +1XP to land units, +2 happy, +1 happy per 20% culture slider. Cost 80 hammers, requires Construction. +100% production with Charismatic.

Mayan Ball Court: +1XP to Melee, Archery, Mounted, Siege units, +3 happy, +1 happy from incense, +1 happy per 20% culture slider. Cost 80 hammers, requires Construction. +100% production with Charismatic.

Babylonian Garden: +2 health, +1XP to Melee, Archery, Mounted, Siege units, +2 happy, +1 happy per 20% culture slider. Cost 80 hammers, requires Construction. +100% production with Charismatic.

Red Cross changes:

Hospitals: Free Medic 1 to units built in this city. Units in this heal an extra 10% per turn. +3 health.

Red Cross: Units built in this city gain a free march promotion

Naval buildings changes:

New Building: Quay: +1 commerce on sea tiles. Cost 80 hammers. Requires Compass. +100% production with Charismatic.

Universities:

Oxford University: +100% research. +3 scientist slots. +4 culture. Cost 600 hammers, Education, requires University in city, map size dependent number of total Universities. +50% production with Stone.

University: +25% research, 3 culture. Cost 150 hammers. Requires Library, Education. +100% production with Philosophical

Seowan: +40% research, 3 culture. Cost 150 hammers. Requires Library, Education. +100% production with Philosophical

Research Institute: +25% research, 3 culture, 1 scientist. Cost 150 hammers. Requires Library, Education. +100% production with Philosophical

Unique Buildings changes:

Stele: Ethiopian Unique Building: Monument replacement. Free Drill 2. +1 culture. Cost 30 hammers. Requires Mysticism. Obsoletes at Gunpowder.

Hammam: Ottoman Unique Building: Aqueduct replacement. +2 happy, +2 health. Requires Mathematics, Masonry, cost 80 hammers, +100% production with Expansive.

Baray: Khmer Unique Building: Aqueduct replacement. +2 health, +1 food. Requires Mathematics, Masonry, cost 80 hammers, +100% production with Expansive.

Armoury: American Unique Building: Barracks replacement. +2XP to mounted units, +3XP to land units. +1 culture. Cost 60 hammers. +100% production by Aggressive.

Ger: Mongolia Unique Building: Stable replacement. +2XP to Melee, Archery, Siege. +4XP to mounted units. Cost 60 hammers. Requires Horseback Riding. Obsoletes at Advanced Flight. +100% production with Aggressive.

Hippodrome: Byzantine Unique Building: Theatre. +2 artist slots. +1 happy from horse, dye. +2 happy faces per 10% culture slider. +3 culture. Cost 50 hammers, requires Drama.

Commando/Drill changes:

Amphibious: requires D2 or C2
Blitz: requires D3 or C3
Charge: requires D1 or C1
March: requires D3 or C3 or M1
Commando: requires Combat 4 OR Drill 4. Available on Mounted, Gunpowder, Armoured units.
Great General: When settled produces 2XP (no change).
Military Academy: Free Drill 1 promotion, +1XP, +50% military production. Requires Military Science, Great General.

Civic changes:

Representation: Unchanged. +3 beakers from specialists, +3 happy in largest 5-ish cities, Medium cost, requires Constitution
Universal Suffrage: Unchanged. +1 hammer from Towns. Can cash rush. Medium cost, Requires Democracy.

Environmentalism: +3 health. +1 commerce from pastures, farms, +2 commerce from forest preserves. +1 gold per specialist. Low cost. Requires Economics.

Serfdom: +1 hammer from mines, +75% worker speed, +2 artist, scientist, merchant specialist slots. Medium cost, Feudalism
Emancipation: +1 commerce from cottage/hamlet/village, +1 hammer from windmill/watermill, +1 commerce from mines, +2 artist, scientist, merchant specialist slots. Medium cost, Banking.

Mercantilism: +2 free specialists, High cost, requires Liberalism.
Free Speech: +1 commerce from village, +3 commerce from Town, +15% gold in all cities, +100% culture in all cities, +100% improvement growth rate. Can cash rush. Medium cost, requires Constitution.

Resource changes:

Aluminium: Revealed by Scientific Method

Tile changes:

Mine: +1 hammer from Chemistry. No longer gain +1 hammer from Replaceable Parts.
Quarry: +1 hammer from Chemistry. No longer gain +1 hammer from Replaceable Parts.
Lumber Mill: Available at Metal Casting. Requires forest. +1 hammer. +1 hammer with Chemistry. +1 hammer from rail road. +1 commerce from river tiles. Requires 5 worker turns.

Villages, Towns, are permanent and cannot be pillaged or improved over. Also provide access to Oil, Coal, Aluminium and Uranium

Unit changes:

Barbarian Animals: Wolf: unchanged.
Lion: Strength 1, 1 move. +50% against Melee.
Panther: Strength 1, 2 move, starts with woodsman 2 promotion
Bear: Strength 1, 1 move, +300% against Melee units
Scout: +200% against barbarian animals.
work boat: cost 25, food hammer unit. Creates fishing net. Suicide on use. Does not require tech.
SAM Infantry: Lower interception chance to 70%
Paratrooper: Starts with Blitz

War chariot: Egyptian Unique Unit: chariot replacement: Strength 5. +100% attack against axemen, -25% attack against archers. Cost 30 hammers, require horse, Wheel.
Impi: Zulu unique unit: spearman replacement: Strength 4, 2 movement points. +100% against mounted units, -40% against archers. Cost 35 hammers, requires Hunting, copper or iron.
Oromo Warrior: Starts with D1, 2 free strikes. Cost 80 hammers. Requires Gunpowder

Tech changes:

The Wheel, Agriculture, Hunting, Fishing, Mining, Mysticism: cost reduced to 35 base beakers.
Tech cost scaling: Implement the tech cost scaling feature as per ToW. This changes Fishing to be a 5 turn tech on pretty much every normal speed map. Late game tech costs adjusted accordingly: check in game for alterations.
Starting techs are unchanged.
Divine Right: Cost lowered to 800
Fascism: Require [Military Science] AND [Assembly Line OR Communism]
Corporation: Requires [Constitution] AND [Liberalism OR Economics]
Electricity: Requires [Liberalism] AND [Physics]
Industrialism: Requires [Electricity AND Economics] And [Assembly Line]
Radio: Requires [Democracy] AND [Electricity]

Trait changes:

Financial: +1 commerce on tiles that produce 3 commerce. +100% production of Bank.
Charismatic: +2 happy in all cities. +1 happy from Broadcast Towers. -20% XP required for promotions. +100% production of Colosseum, Quay.
Creative: +1 culture per city. +100% production of Library, Theatre, Observatory.

Mod can be found here



Original post:

Misc changes:

Capital city tile output: minimum of 2 food, 2 hammers, 1 commerce
Versailles: Cost: 500
Upon entering the Medieval era, all cities gain 2 artist, scientist and merchant specialist slots in addition to any other slots already available..
Upon entering the Renaissance era, all cities gain 2 artist, scientist and merchant specialist slots in addition to any other slots already available.

No longer have issue of having to move for 2 hammer start, now available regardless fo starting tile. Palace increased commerce is due to tech cost scaling changes. Versailles cost is because 800 hammers is too much. The additional 2, then 4, sci/merc/artist slots, limits hte reliance on Caste for specialists slots and increases the viability of other labor civics.

I'm considering the benefits of adding +1 hammer to workshops to both Serfdom and Emancipation as well, and I'd appreciate more feedback on that.


Heroic Epic changes:

Colosseum: +25% military production, +1 happy, +1 happy per 20% culture slider. Cost 80 hammers, requires Construction. +100% production with Charismatic.
Heroic Epic: Requires Barracks in city. +75% military production. Cost 150 hammers, +50% production with marble, requires Literature, Colosseum.

This change is to remove the minigame aspect of trying to get a 10 XP unit to unlock HE (8XP for CHM). It represents a small cost increase to enabling a +100% military production city and a large tech cost increase for the same, for the surety of being able to build the HE.

Greek Odeon: +25% military production, +1 XP for land units, +1 happy, +1 happy per 20% culture slider. Cost 80 hammers, requires Construction. +100% production with Charismatic.
Mayan Ball Court: +25% military production, +3 happy, +1 happy per 20% culture slider. Cost 80 hammers, requires Construction. +100% production with Charismatic.
Babylonian Garden: +25% military production, +2 health, +1 happy, +1 happy per 20% culture slider. Cost 80 hammers, requires Construction. +100% production with Charismatic.

The Colosseum UB have identical bonuses to before the Colosseum remake except for the Greek UB, the Odeon, which gains a small XP bonus at the loss of 2 artist slots.

The HE/Colosseum change is a reasonably large one because it's adding in a new hammer multiplier, but from what I can see from PB26 (yeah that's SMEG but OK) the additional of another useful building doesn't seem to be impacting early game strategy to a drastic extent.


Red Cross changes:

Hospitals: Free Medic 1 to units built in this city. Units in this heal an extra 10% per turn. +3 health.
Red Cross: Units built in this city gain a free march promotion

This change is to make the Hospital an improvement worth building if there are health issues, as it is on a tech line that is irrelevant except in the space race (less health than a supermarket which is cheaper and provides food, and on a tech that gives a military application). Red Cross gives free M1 on units built in that city, so that effect is moved onto the Hospital, and then the March promotion is given to RC (as March is a promotion worth having on every unit, unlike M1).

I think this is a relatively minor change that isn't really that large an issue.


Commando/Drill changes:

Amphibious: requires D2 or C2
Blitz: requires D3 or C3
Charge: requires D1 or C1
March: requires D3 or C3 or M1
Commando: requires Combat 4 OR Drill 4
Great General: When settled produces 3XP.
Military Academy: Units built in this city gain a free Drill 1 promotion, +1XP. Requires Military Science, Great General.

Completing the "parity" of Drill and Combat lines, although Combat is still pretty much better in most ways. The Free D1 from the Military Academy lowers the XP cost to access Commando from 26XP to 17XP for none CHM leaders. The increase in XP from the settled GG to 3 means that with West Point and Barracks, only 3 settled GG are needed to access Commando (4 total), 2 with Theocracy (3 GG total). For a second city to access Commando, need a further 4 GG, Vassalage and Theocracy (3 settled 1 MA). AGG and CHM need fewer still, and Boadicea needs too few to care.

OK, this is a pretty large change. The Drill bits not so much, but easing the accessibility of Commando means that everyone should be able to reach it, needing to generate 300 GG points over hte course of the game to get there...IF WP can be unlocked without attaching a GG to a unit. OTOH, 300GG points is a bitch to reach without at least 1 large war, probably 2.


Naval buildings changes:

Harbour: +1 trade route. +1 health from crab/clam/fish. Cost 80 hammers. Requires Compass. Mutually exclusive with Quay. +100% production with Expansive.

Custom house: +1 trade route. +50% trade route yield. Cost 120 hammers. Requires Harbour, Economics. Mutually exclusive with Dry dock. +100% production with Imperialistic.

Quay: +1 commerce on sea tiles. +1 health from crab/clam/fish. Cost 80 hammers. Requires Currency or Compass (not sure which due to stuff discussed in previous post). Mutually exclusive with Harbour. +100% production with Charismatic.

Breakwater: +1 hammer, +1 commerce from sea tiles. Cost 120 hammers. Requires Quay, Replaceable Parts. Mutually exclusive with Dry dock. +100% production with Financial.

Dry dock: +50% production of naval units, +4XP for naval units. +1 unhealthiness. Cost 120 hammers. Requires Steel. Mutually Exclusive with Breakwater, Custom house. +100% production with Aggressive.

The Quay/Harbour choice gives players more control over the dot map: players that are trialling this system in PB26 have given me positive feedback (at least, those people that speak to me have). The Quay giving coastal commerce allows FIN to be adjusted back to +1 commerce on tiles that produce 3 commerce, and have that effect on river tiles, which should help people have fewer headaches.

The additional of the Breakwater/Custom house/Dry dock system is there to stop the spamming of dry docks in all coastal cities and making naval warfare a battle of production rather than tactics by creating an economic incentive to build competing buildings.

Portuguese Feitoria: Customs House replacement. +1 commerce from water tiles. +1 trade route. +50% trade route yield. Cost 120 hammers. Requires Harbour, Economics. Mutually exclusive with Dry dock. +100% production with Imperialistic.

Carthaginian Cothon: Harbour replacement. +1 trade route. +1 health from crab/clam/fish. Cost 60 hammers. Requires Compass. Mutually exclusive with Quay. +100% production with Expansive.

Dutch Dyke: unchanged. Levee replacement. +1 hammer from water, river tiles. Cost 180 hammers. Requires Steam Power.

Civic changes:

Serfdom: Lumber Mills: +1 commerce
Police State: Require Military Science.
Mercantilism: +2 free specialists in all cities. High cost.

Police State is brought forward so that it's available around the same time that Rep and US would be available.

Mercantilism: cost increase as demonstrated as beneficial for comparison to Free Market by GermanJoey here


Resource changes:

Aluminium: Revealed by Scientific Method
Fish: +2 food from fishing boat (down from 3 food).

Aluminium, revealing it earlier instead of 40 turns from the end of the game is fairly obvious. Fish change is to lower it in value to that of a clam and crab and then adjust those values from fishing bots explained below.

Tile changes:

Fishing boats: +1 food from Sailing
Mine: +1 hammer from Chemistry. No longer gain +1 hammer from Replaceable Parts.
Quarry: +1 hammer from Chemistry. No longer gain +1 hammer from Replaceable Parts.
Lumber Mill: Available at Metal Casting. Requires forest. +1 hammer. +1 hammer with Paper, Chemistry. +1 commerce with paper, +1 commerce from river tiles. +1 commerce with Serfdom. Requires 5 worker turns.
Forest Preserve: Available at Iron Working. +1 commerce, requires forest. After 10 turns, grows into:
Forest Preserve 2: +2 commerce, requires forest. After 20 turns grows into:
Forest Preserve 3: +3 commerce, +1 commerce from Printing Press, Free Speech. Requires forest. After 40 turns grows into:
Forest Preserve 4: +4 commerce, +1 commerce from Printing Press, +3 commerce from Free Speech. Requires forest.

Villages, Towns, Forest preserves 3 and 4, are permanent and cannot be pillaged or improved over.

Fishing boat change is so all seafood give 4 food without Sailing, 5 food with, and 6 food with a lighthouse. Freshwater adds +1 food to this. This helps to limit the food output from starting with double seafood and a high hammer start for the first few turns without limiting the long term potential of the food resources.

The Mine/Quarry change is to move the free hammers away from Rep parts and onto Chemistry, which is a slightly more bare part of the tech tree. the PP>RP>Rifling line is full of free goodies that require no additional cost to benefit from, this is an attempt to rebalance this section of the tech tree slightly.

Lumber mill is redeveloped into a tile improvement that does not rely on the cottage growth mechanic. It maxes out as having the same yield as a fully improved workshop without civic affinity, plus 1 commerce.

Forest preserve is a cottage on a forest, so that forests are not only able to be turned into hammer tiles, and the commerce route is available to keep dot map options open.

Villages, Towns, Forest preserves 3 and 4, are permanent and cannot be pillaged or improved over. No pillaging outside culture in a warzone or for spite. No using bombing to remove them and slow down a culture attempt - get boots on the ground and exert power rather than bombing from someone elses culture and making warfare a late game multi-party bitch.

Unit changes:

Barbarian Animals: All removed except wolf.
Scout: +200% against barbarian animals.
work boat: cost 25, food hammer unit. Creates fishing net. Suicide on use. Does not require tech.
SAM Infantry: Lower interception chance to 70%
War chariot: Egyptian Unique Unit: chariot replacement: Strength 5. +100% attack against axemen, -25% attack against archers. Cost 30 hammers, require horse, Wheel.
Impi: Zulu unique unit: spearman replacement: Strength 4, 2 movement points. +100% against mounted units, -40% against archery units. Cost 25 hammers, requires Hunting, copper or iron.
Fast Worker: Works at 135% worker speed

Starting scout getting eaten by random barbs is counter productive to the point of being able to scout to identify strategic opportunities and needs. Hard coded barb warriors appearing from T25 onwards (Monarch difficulty) provides large enough window for scouting.
Workboat cost is lowered due to food hammer status but is able to be built in in 5 turns.
SAM Infantry can't take Interception 2 as that would put it over 100% Interception odds; lowering it to 70% base interception chance allows 100% interception chance and a method to defend against airpower.
UU changes are nerfs that have been on the cards for a while to to lack of counter-play in rush scenarios.



Tech changes:

Palace: +9 commerce
The Wheel, Agriculture, Hunting, Fishing, Mining, Mysticism: cost reduced to 35 base beakers.
Sailing: Cost reduced to 60 base beakers
Tech cost scaling: Implement the tech cost scaling feature as per ToW. This changes Fishing to be a 5 turn tech on pretty much every normal speed map. Late game tech costs adjusted accordingly: check in game for alterations.
Starting techs are unchanged.
Divine Right: Cost lowered to 800
Fascism: Require Military Science

Tech cost scaling is introduced to deal with early game tech costs on huge maps. Seven has explained it in a post here

Starting tech costs are normalised such that each starting tech takes 4 turns to complete on any map size, on normal speed and Monarch difficulty. Starting techs are unchanged from base RtR 2.0.7.6.

Second level tech costs are unchanged excluding Sailing, due to the changes to seafood output and to ease the cost of expansion on archipelago maps.

Divine Right tech cost is lowered for reasons I can't remember right now.


Trait changes:

Financial: +1 commerce on tiles that produce 3 commerce. +100% production of Bank, Breakwater.
Charismatic: +2 happy in all cities. +1 happy from Broadcast Towers. -25% XP required for promotions. +100% production of Colosseum, Quay.
Creative: +1 culture per city. +100% production of Library, Theatre, Observatory.
Imperialist: +50% production of settlers. +100% GG point generation. +100% production of Custom House

FIN was tried with +1 commerce on 3 commerce tiles, but without hte restriciton also applying on coastal tiles it was too strong. Adding quays allows the straight 3 commerce restriction to work better, and gets rid of the river penalty effect.

CHM gets 2 cheap buildings to make it more interesting/fun/stronger/greater player appeal. Take your pick at the reasoning.

CRE gets cheap libraries back. I've thought a bit about this, and compared ToW and RtR games which have +1 and +2 culture respectively. The +1 culture bonus leads to more difficulty placing cities for an ideal long term dot map. It's simply a different CRE, but it's still balanced. And more people request/want the cheap libs back so, sure, +1 culture it is. It can keep the cheap observatories so it has something in the late game, and +1 culture/cheap libs is only an early game bonus.

IMP...OK, it's a nerf. Anyone going to argue against this?

[Commodore]

Stop the revolution, I this is where I get off.

[Commodore]

Expanding a bit more, I think this is kind of a weird hybrid of SMEG-mod and RtR. SMEG at least doesn't pretend to be Civilization 4, and at Civ4.5 it actually seems quite decently done. This...

Capital city tile output: minimum of 2 food, 2 hammers, 1 commerce
Versailles: Cost: 500

Cool, cool.

Upon entering the Medieval era, all cities gain 2 artist, scientist and merchant specialist slots in addition to any other slots already available..
Upon entering the Renaissance era, all cities gain 2 artist, scientist and merchant specialist slots in addition to any other slots already available.

Weird and also weird. Spiritual needed the nerf, and Philosophical needed the buff, that badly?

Colosseum: +25% military production, +1 happy, +1 happy per 20% culture slider. Cost 80 hammers, requires Construction. +100% production with Charismatic.
Heroic Epic: Requires Barracks in city. +75% military production. Cost 150 hammers, +50% production with marble, requires Literature, Colosseum.

Fair enough I guess. Generally slides the game to more big stacks sooner and makes Construction the big beeline tech, but you did want to make Currency less of a One Right Choice.

Greek Odeon: +25% military production, +1 XP for land units, +1 happy, +1 happy per 20% culture slider. Cost 80 hammers, requires Construction. +100% production with Charismatic.
Mayan Ball Court: +25% military production, +3 happy, +1 happy per 20% culture slider. Cost 80 hammers, requires Construction. +100% production with Charismatic.
Babylonian Garden: +25% military production, +2 health, +1 happy, +1 happy per 20% culture slider. Cost 80 hammers, requires Construction. +100% production with Charismatic.

Greeks lost an extra happy too. Charismatic needs the happy the least from these things, so I guess giving them an incentive makes sense.

Hospitals: Free Medic 1 to units built in this city. Units in this heal an extra 10% per turn. +3 health.
Red Cross: Units built in this city gain a free march promotion

I too think this is a relatively minor change that isn't really that large an issue.

Amphibious: requires D2 or C2
Blitz: requires D3 or C3
Charge: requires D1 or C1
March: requires D3 or C3 or M1
Commando: requires Combat 4 OR Drill 4
Great General: When settled produces 3XP.
Military Academy: Units built in this city gain a free Drill 1 promotion, +1XP. Requires Military Science, Great General.

Weird but nothing totally broken outside of maybe Ethiopia? Protective didn't need the buff but sure.

Harbour: +1 trade route. +1 health from crab/clam/fish. Cost 80 hammers. Requires Compass. Mutually exclusive with Quay. +100% production with Expansive.

Custom house: +1 trade route. +50% trade route yield. Cost 120 hammers. Requires Harbour, Economics. Mutually exclusive with Dry dock. +100% production with Imperialistic.

Quay: +1 commerce on sea tiles. +1 health from crab/clam/fish. Cost 80 hammers. Requires Currency or Compass (not sure which due to stuff discussed in previous post). Mutually exclusive with Harbour. +100% production with Charismatic.

Breakwater: +1 hammer, +1 commerce from sea tiles. Cost 120 hammers. Requires Quay, Replaceable Parts. Mutually exclusive with Dry dock. +100% production with Financial.

Dry dock: +50% production of naval units, +4XP for naval units. +1 unhealthiness. Cost 120 hammers. Requires Steel. Mutually Exclusive with Breakwater, Custom house. +100% production with Aggressive.

This one is where I'm starting to go out. It's weird, it's new, and it's an alien mechanic import. I also think it might have just officially gutted cottages for good; if you can have 2/0/4 fisheries you shouldn't work cottages, I believe is the accepted wisdom with Fin/Colossus.

Portuguese Feitoria: Customs House replacement. +1 commerce from water tiles. +1 trade route. +50% trade route yield. Cost 120 hammers. Requires Harbour, Economics. Mutually exclusive with Dry dock. +100% production with Imperialistic.

Carthaginian Cothon: Harbour replacement. +1 trade route. +1 health from crab/clam/fish. Cost 60 hammers. Requires Compass. Mutually exclusive with Quay. +100% production with Expansive.

Dutch Dyke: unchanged. Levee replacement. +1 hammer from water, river tiles. Cost 180 hammers. Requires Steam Power.

Understand where its coming from.

Serfdom: Lumber Mills: +1 commerce
Police State: Require Military Science.
Mercantilism: +2 free specialists in all cities. High cost.

Meh.

Aluminium: Revealed by Scientific Method
Fish: +2 food from fishing boat (down from 3 food).

Weird grouping. The Al thing, sure, why not. The Fish thing is again weird and seems kind of unneeded. Was there a great hue and cry “Fish tile OP, nerf plz!” that I missed?

Fishing boats: +1 food from Sailing
Mine: +1 hammer from Chemistry. No longer gain +1 hammer from Replaceable Parts.
Quarry: +1 hammer from Chemistry. No longer gain +1 hammer from Replaceable Parts.
Lumber Mill: Available at Metal Casting. Requires forest. +1 hammer. +1 hammer with Paper, Chemistry. +1 commerce with paper, +1 commerce from river tiles. +1 commerce with Serfdom. Requires 5 worker turns.
Forest Preserve: Available at Iron Working. +1 commerce, requires forest. After 10 turns, grows into:
Forest Preserve 2: +2 commerce, requires forest. After 20 turns grows into:
Forest Preserve 3: +3 commerce, +1 commerce from Printing Press, Free Speech. Requires forest. After 40 turns grows into:
Forest Preserve 4: +4 commerce, +1 commerce from Printing Press, +3 commerce from Free Speech. Requires forest.

Villages, Towns, Forest preserves 3 and 4, are permanent and cannot be pillaged or improved over.

Whiff of SMEG on this.

Barbarian Animals: All removed except wolf.
Scout: +200% against barbarian animals.

Now you're just trolling me.

Work boat: cost 25, food hammer unit. Creates fishing net. Suicide on use. Does not require tech.
SAM Infantry: Lower interception chance to 70%
War chariot: Egyptian Unique Unit: chariot replacement: Strength 5. +100% attack against axemen, -25% attack against archers. Cost 30 hammers, require horse, Wheel.

Meh but I hate SMEG fishing, meh okay, sure that's cool.
Impi: Zulu unique unit: spearman replacement: Strength 4, 2 movement points. +100% against mounted units, -40% against archery units. Cost 25 hammers, requires Hunting, copper or iron.
Fast Worker: Works at 135% worker speed[/quote]
You mean impi at 35h, surely? FW is kind of odd...again why change, the morale thing was a good solution already.

Palace: +9 commerce
The Wheel, Agriculture, Hunting, Fishing, Mining, Mysticism: cost reduced to 35 base beakers.
Sailing: Cost reduced to 60 base beakers
Tech cost scaling: Implement the tech cost scaling feature as per ToW. This changes Fishing to be a 5 turn tech on pretty much every normal speed map. Late game tech costs adjusted accordingly: check in game for alterations.
Starting techs are unchanged.
Divine Right: Cost lowered to 800
Fascism: Require Military Science

Sure, whatever.

Financial: +1 commerce on tiles that produce 3 commerce. +100% production of Bank, Breakwater.
Charismatic: +2 happy in all cities. +1 happy from Broadcast Towers. -25% XP required for promotions. +100% production of Colosseum, Quay.
Creative: +1 culture per city. +100% production of Library, Theatre, Observatory.
Imperialist: +50% production of settlers. +100% GG point generation. +100% production of Custom House

FIN...hate quays, felt the no-river thing was working fine.
CHM...sure but for the SMEG-quay weirdness.
CRE...about equal in balance. I liked the more distinctive +2 culture version better but Vox Populi, Vox Dei.
IMP...yes, actually needed.

...heh, actually, I guess I was off the bus 2.7.0.6. It's fine though; 2.7.0.4 is a very well balance bit of polishing.

[Cheater Hater]

Lots of complaints about 3.0.0.1/2.0.7.6

What would you do to 2.0.7.4 to make it more balanced?

[Commodore]

Lots of complaints about 3.0.0.1/2.0.7.6

What would you do to 2.0.7.4 to make it more balanced?

EP economy: Update the spy civilipedia to include this comment for education; "You can station counter-spies to increase chances of enemy spies' getting caught and closing borders increases mission cost."

Plus rexamine late-era events. Generally, make the +promo or +hammers from cool coal or whatevers event not effect all units/buildings all of time but just the triggering unit.

[Cheater Hater]

Lots of complaints about 3.0.0.1/2.0.7.6

What would you do to 2.0.7.4 to make it more balanced?

EP economy: Update the spy civilipedia to include this comment for education; "You can station counter-spies to increase chances of enemy spies' getting caught and closing borders increases mission cost."

Plus rexamine late-era events. Generally, make the +promo or +hammers from cool coal or whatevers event not effect all units/buildings all of time but just the triggering unit.

If you're taking 2.0.7.4 as a base, you need to fix event execution first before you end up balancing them--there were some weird things going on with PB23 with my events, for instance, and I doubt Krill made any progress on fixing them.

[Krill]

This post is going to be nested quotes of hell, so apologies beforehand...

Expanding a bit more, I think this is kind of a weird hybrid of SMEG-mod and RtR. SMEG at least doesn't pretend to be Civilization 4, and at Civ4.5 it actually seems quite decently done. This...

The only true SMEG stuff is the quay/breakwater bit; everything else really predates that or originates in some form from ToW (although so does the Quay).

Capital city tile output: minimum of 2 food, 2 hammers, 1 commerce
Versailles: Cost: 500

Cool, cool.

Basic balances stuff, so yeah, nothing really unexpected or obnoxious IMO. Not that the price decrease makes Versailles any better.

Upon entering the Medieval era, all cities gain 2 artist, scientist and merchant specialist slots in addition to any other slots already available..
Upon entering the Renaissance era, all cities gain 2 artist, scientist and merchant specialist slots in addition to any other slots already available.

Weird and also weird. Spiritual needed the nerf, and Philosophical needed the buff, that badly?

This is nothing to do with SPI or PHI directly, it's to do with Caste being a default one right choice because it is the first end game civic in that column to come available, and has the best late game potential. It essentially gives unlimited zero food tiles to all cities, and gives the hammer bonus to the default late game hammer tile. Introducing free specialist slots that are civic independent decreases the mid and late game advantage from Caste because Caste essentially only gives you the 5th plus specialist slot. This also doesn't mess with Caste-Slavery balance that much because you need to reach one of Feudalism, Machinery, Music, Civil Service or Philosophy to get the free spec slots, by which point Caste is usually wanted to be in Caste anyway.

That said, Caste still probably has a better set of late game benefits compared to Emancipation and Serfdom due to the Workshop bonus, which is why I'd also consider duplicating that bonus on Emancipation and/or Serfdom instead of the free spec slots from tech eras. The advantage of "free" spec slots for those early GP is a very nice effect from a civic that gives it an early game window of effectiveness, and I have no intention of changing that in RtR given the discussions that have occurred about it. It's just finding a way to make the other civics, Serfdom and Emancipation, more useful. The Emancipation rebuild in particular is niche and aimed at usage wit Free market to grow a bunch of cottages, and then flubs out on any usefulness afterwards. So really...there are quite a few issues IMO surrounding Caste and this is just a part of it.

If I was going gung ho in SMEG mod to redesign them, it would be something like doing this, giving the workshop bonus to Serfdom and Emancipation and Caste, and then giving Caste a small commerce bonus (like +1 commerce) on windmills. But it's not, it's RtR and so smaller changes first.

Colosseum: +25% military production, +1 happy, +1 happy per 20% culture slider. Cost 80 hammers, requires Construction. +100% production with Charismatic.
Heroic Epic: Requires Barracks in city. +75% military production. Cost 150 hammers, +50% production with marble, requires Literature, Colosseum.

Fair enough I guess. Generally slides the game to more big stacks sooner and makes Construction the big beeline tech, but you did want to make Currency less of a One Right Choice.

Greek Odeon: +25% military production, +1 XP for land units, +1 happy, +1 happy per 20% culture slider. Cost 80 hammers, requires Construction. +100% production with Charismatic.
Mayan Ball Court: +25% military production, +3 happy, +1 happy per 20% culture slider. Cost 80 hammers, requires Construction. +100% production with Charismatic.
Babylonian Garden: +25% military production, +2 health, +1 happy, +1 happy per 20% culture slider. Cost 80 hammers, requires Construction. +100% production with Charismatic.

Greeks lost an extra happy too. Charismatic needs the happy the least from these things, so I guess giving them an incentive makes sense.

Goopd catch on the Greek loss, they can get that back. I'm not sure that it makes Construction a 1 right choice for beelines: you still need Literature to unlock HE. Colosseums are 80 hammers so unless you put through 320 base hammers through that building you're behind, so I doubt it gets built early in more than 2 cities unless CHM. Basically, unless you build 5 WE or 6 cats/HA, it's still a net loss before you get to knights. Worth building for sure, but I don't think it's that large a change.

For SMEG mod I had the idea to swap the Barracks and Colosseum effects around, but that's not happening in RtR.

Hospitals: Free Medic 1 to units built in this city. Units in this heal an extra 10% per turn. +3 health.
Red Cross: Units built in this city gain a free march promotion

I too think this is a relatively minor change that isn't really that large an issue.

Yup. I think that even if you end up being able to get a city that can 1 turn march gunpowder units or tanks, is it really going to effect anything on a strategic level? I doubt it.

Amphibious: requires D2 or C2
Blitz: requires D3 or C3
Charge: requires D1 or C1
March: requires D3 or C3 or M1
Commando: requires Combat 4 OR Drill 4
Great General: When settled produces 3XP.
Military Academy: Units built in this city gain a free Drill 1 promotion, +1XP. Requires Military Science, Great General.

Weird but nothing totally broken outside of maybe Ethiopia? Protective didn't need the buff but sure.

Ethiopia...need to sort that whole civ out anyway. Still taking suggestions, but in this instance I would likely remove D2 from the unit and give it the extra free strikes on the unit, or remove D1 and do the same depending on the power of the UB. Or just change them to upgrade to Grenadiers so that you couldn't build that many of them prior to Mil Sci?

Harbour: +1 trade route. +1 health from crab/clam/fish. Cost 80 hammers. Requires Compass. Mutually exclusive with Quay. +100% production with Expansive.

Custom house: +1 trade route. +50% trade route yield. Cost 120 hammers. Requires Harbour, Economics. Mutually exclusive with Dry dock. +100% production with Imperialistic.

Quay: +1 commerce on sea tiles. +1 health from crab/clam/fish. Cost 80 hammers. Requires Currency or Compass (not sure which due to stuff discussed in previous post). Mutually exclusive with Harbour. +100% production with Charismatic.

Breakwater: +1 hammer, +1 commerce from sea tiles. Cost 120 hammers. Requires Quay, Replaceable Parts. Mutually exclusive with Dry dock. +100% production with Financial.

Dry dock: +50% production of naval units, +4XP for naval units. +1 unhealthiness. Cost 120 hammers. Requires Steel. Mutually Exclusive with Breakwater, Custom house. +100% production with Aggressive.

This one is where I'm starting to go out. It's weird, it's new, and it's an alien mechanic import. I also think it might have just officially gutted cottages for good; if you can have 2/0/4 fisheries you shouldn't work cottages, I believe is the accepted wisdom with Fin/Colossus.

Fair comment on the cottages. I doubt you could get rid of all cottages from a civ, hell I tried it in PBEM2 and while that game was a long time ago, only had 6 players, tech trading and full diplomacy, I think the fundamental point is true from most games we play here: when you neglect all per turn investments, and focus on winning the game with up front advantages, you better win quick and not make any mistakes.

But if the Breakwater is pushed back from Rep Parts (which is pretty early) to something like Steam Power, does that affect things? Because Steam Power requires Chemistry. It's on the cusp of the Industrial era. It's not really reachable before T175, usually a bit later than that and even those numbers require a good tech base ie cottages. So is that a solution?

Coastal tiles that are 2/0/4 from Quays are only for FIN...and if FIN ignores cottages as well then is that a bad thing? It's giving diversity to a trait that doesn't really have much to begin with. I also meant to check before and just did, there should also be a change to Colossus so that it only gives +2 commerce to water tiles in that city ie stealing again from Seven and from Civ 3 Colossus. Quays also require investment in hammers so it's not a rolloing advantage, grow a city and as you gain more pop you get the commerce. It's still 140 hammers for lighthouse and quay, plus the granary, and need to pop borders.

Portuguese Feitoria: Customs House replacement. +1 commerce from water tiles. +1 trade route. +50% trade route yield. Cost 120 hammers. Requires Harbour, Economics. Mutually exclusive with Dry dock. +100% production with Imperialistic.

Carthaginian Cothon: Harbour replacement. +1 trade route. +1 health from crab/clam/fish. Cost 60 hammers. Requires Compass. Mutually exclusive with Quay. +100% production with Expansive.

Dutch Dyke: unchanged. Levee replacement. +1 hammer from water, river tiles. Cost 180 hammers. Requires Steam Power.

Understand where its coming from.

yeah, I don't think these changes are any problem, it would be the idea of the quay etc. I'm not 100% sure of the Carthage change, it's simply a slightly cheaper Harbour but then the NC is strong in the current form (and still better than it used to be). I don't think Netherlands UB needs changing either. It's still fine.

Serfdom: Lumber Mills: +1 commerce
Police State: Require Military Science.
Mercantilism: +2 free specialists in all cities. High cost.

Meh.

Agreed. Meh. Serfdom change in particular I don't really think does anything and will probably just not do.

Aluminium: Revealed by Scientific Method
Fish: +2 food from fishing boat (down from 3 food).

Weird grouping. The Al thing, sure, why not. The Fish thing is again weird and seems kind of unneeded. Was there a great hue and cry “Fish tile OP, nerf plz!” that I missed?

It's not to nerf Fish, it's to buff clams and crabs, I'll explain below.

Fishing boats: +1 food from Sailing
Work boat: cost 25, food hammer unit. Creates fishing net. Suicide on use. Does not require tech.

Meh but I hate SMEG fishing, meh okay, sure that's cool.

These seafood changes are the only changes to tile output (other than the Quay stuff) that I'm proposing. No Pier, no changes to base tile output, no changes to light house. The work boat is identical to base BtS workboat, except lowered cost, and it's a foodhammer unit to not screw over those players that get nothing but grass forests to work.

What it means is that when a fish/clam/crab is improved, it's a 4/0/x tile. Research Sailing and it's 5/0/x. Build a light house and it's 6/0/x. And add +1 food for freshwater.

Why? To stop double seafood from being a little too fast. The commerce form the seafood, and the lowered cost of Sailing cancel out after a certain amount of time compared to other, double land food starts. Fishing and Sailing should be able to be researched on a beeline by around about T10-12, but the seafood could be used by T5. A first ring pasture resource would not be usable until T15. Double seafood should be size 2 by eot T10-11, with second seafood hooked up T15-16 but no worker. Split land/sea food starts can still go workboat>worker and come out about even without beelining Sailing, just going Fishing>food tech.

Mine: +1 hammer from Chemistry. No longer gain +1 hammer from Replaceable Parts.
Quarry: +1 hammer from Chemistry. No longer gain +1 hammer from Replaceable Parts.
Lumber Mill: Available at Metal Casting. Requires forest. +1 hammer. +1 hammer with Paper, Chemistry. +1 commerce with paper, +1 commerce from river tiles. +1 commerce with Serfdom. Requires 5 worker turns.
Forest Preserve: Available at Iron Working. +1 commerce, requires forest. After 10 turns, grows into:
Forest Preserve 2: +2 commerce, requires forest. After 20 turns grows into:
Forest Preserve 3: +3 commerce, +1 commerce from Printing Press, Free Speech. Requires forest. After 40 turns grows into:
Forest Preserve 4: +4 commerce, +1 commerce from Printing Press, +3 commerce from Free Speech. Requires forest.

Villages, Towns, Forest preserves 3 and 4, are permanent and cannot be pillaged or improved over.

Whiff of SMEG on this.

Lumber mill is just another version of the workshop that doesn't need civics to be strong, no cottage growth.

Mine and quarry hammers moved because PP>RP has a ton of free advantages and Gunpowder>Chem just doesn't.

Forest Preserve is just a cottage on a forest. That's it...

Barbarian Animals: All removed except wolf.
Scout: +200% against barbarian animals.

Now you're just trolling me.

Basically, scouts can die to barb warriors but dying to barb animals is what really fucks up game balance for a 4X game. I mean, when you can't explore then that's going to fuck things up, right?

SAM Infantry: Lower interception chance to 70%
War chariot: Egyptian Unique Unit: chariot replacement: Strength 5. +100% attack against axemen, -25% attack against archers. Cost 30 hammers, require horse, Wheel.

Impi: Zulu unique unit: spearman replacement: Strength 4, 2 movement points. +100% against mounted units, -40% against archery units. Cost 25 hammers, requires Hunting, copper or iron.
Fast Worker: Works at 135% worker speed

You mean impi at 35h, surely? FW is kind of odd...again why change, the morale thing was a good solution already.[/quote]

Yes, good catch on Impi, that's a typo. FW change is because India was nerfed by the starting tech change, but when starting techs are made significantly cheaper that's buffing them. So it's either keep the fast worker pushed up to Machinery (and implement that new worker for everyone) or something like this. TBH, I don't really care which.

Palace: +9 commerce
The Wheel, Agriculture, Hunting, Fishing, Mining, Mysticism: cost reduced to 35 base beakers.
Sailing: Cost reduced to 60 base beakers
Tech cost scaling: Implement the tech cost scaling feature as per ToW. This changes Fishing to be a 5 turn tech on pretty much every normal speed map. Late game tech costs adjusted accordingly: check in game for alterations.
Starting techs are unchanged.
Divine Right: Cost lowered to 800
Fascism: Require Military Science

Sure, whatever.

Goodbye to the days when it took 50 turns to research 4 techs.

Financial: +1 commerce on tiles that produce 3 commerce. +100% production of Bank, Breakwater.
Charismatic: +2 happy in all cities. +1 happy from Broadcast Towers. -25% XP required for promotions. +100% production of Colosseum, Quay.
Creative: +1 culture per city. +100% production of Library, Theatre, Observatory.
Imperialist: +50% production of settlers. +100% GG point generation. +100% production of Custom House

FIN...hate quays, felt the no-river thing was working fine.
CHM...sure but for the SMEG-quay weirdness.
CRE...about equal in balance. I liked the more distinctive +2 culture version better but Vox Populi, Vox Dei.
IMP...yes, actually needed.

I agree on CRE, I generally prefer +2 culture but at the same time CRE feels like it needs something else and anything less than +100% construction bonus is blasphemy.

IMP I should have changed a year ago.

FIN, well, it feels weird to be "punished" for having a capital that is on a great long river and knowing that cottaging it is throwing a trait away.

CHM might actually be picked now.

...heh, actually, I guess I was off the bus 2.7.0.6. It's fine though; 2.7.0.4 is a very well balance bit of polishing.

Yeah, well, espionage and specifically tech stealing can go to hell when it fucks up the balance for late game research. BtS Espionage doesn't do anything good, just like all hte other shit BtS added to the game.

[Krill]

To comment specifically on Caste it basically does four things, two when Caste becomes available, and two in the late game when trying to reach win conditions:

1. Unlimited, free, spec slots when hammers are scarce for building them, enables rapid availability of GP for successive GA or tech acquisition via bulbs. "Early" game advantage that disappears as hammers and infrastructure becomes more plentiful. The "Late" game advantage is the unlimited tiles for tightly spaced cities that lowers the necessary investment to push out continued GP for the fourth and fifth GA or Great Artists for bulbs into a CV.
   
   
2. Increases workshop yield to viable levels, such that only need MC+Caste to be useful ie can spam workshops in preparation for Guilds to build a knight stack and eat someone. Another early game advantage applied to a generic strategy albeit not necessarily the ideal strategy. The "Late" game advantage is that as the workshop is the de facto spamable production tile Caste just gives a large production advantage compared to other civics, as windmills and watermills have tile type restrictions that limit their usage.

The early advantages of Caste are solid. There are what make the swap out of Slavery an interesting choice because it depends on research ability, worker numbers, tiles available for improvement, long list of factors. I think this is good.

The problem I see is that the late game there is no reason to leave Caste because the advantages of those effects outstrip the benefits form the other civics; Serfdom comes too late to be useful because workers are plentiful by that time, and Emancipation, in any form, didn't have a late game effect as it was all about cottage growth and potentially screwing other people over with unhappiness. And so if Caste can't be nerfed (which it probably shouldn't be) then the others need buffing. And probably by giving them exactly what Caste has.

[The Black Sword]

Some civic thoughts, I haven't seen much discussion on the new changes but I haven't searched too hard either.

State Property column:

SP vs FM seems pretty reasonable at the minute as late game options.

I see the reasoning behind the Merc change to compete with those two but I feel it's likely to be too good. After corp, you have 3 trade routes per city. Unlimited 6g trade routes means FM takes your trade total from 18 -> 30, only breaking even with Merc commerce and losing on gpp. I still prefer the just 1 specialist, low cost, foreign trade allowed, enabled at Banking. Having an early game civic option is good IMO, so you have the choice of when to transition into the late game ones, rather than just 3 late game. Also more in line with the base game obviously.

Free Speech: I find it pretty hard to see how this can compete with the other options with only the bonus to cottages/towns. I think the current implementation is still likely to be too weak. There's nothing really wrong with leaving it as the culture civic IMO. Or perhaps something more creative could be done.

Slavery column:
Again Slavery vs Caste seems good to me, though I think old slavery would be fine too.

The problem with Serfdom is that by the time you have sufficient mills down for that bonus to be good, you don't need the worker bonus anymore. I think it's pretty clear Serfdom isn't getting much love in our current games. What about making it into a clear mid game civic, giving a bonus to one of mines/cottages/farms, perhaps dropping the mill bonus? Maybe the cottage bonus could even be to the growth rate. If I had to pick, I'd try +1g to mines/mills and then doublecheck their late game outputs.

Emancipation then should be the late game competitor with Caste. The current version is too good IMO. You'll probably have a lot more farms/mines/cottages down than workshops by the time you hit Banking. I suspect we'd see people run caste for GAs and great people bursts and Emancipation the rest of the time. If you're continuing with the current implementation, it needs to be toned down IMO. I'd suggest moving the cottage vs workshop fight into this column, because it's so hard for Free Speech to beat State Property. Cottages +1g, Towns +2g and perhaps tinker with the cost and growth rate to compete against Caste's spec advantage. I'm not entirely sure where to put it on the tree(well Banking is fine, but in my ideal world Merc goes there).

The other columns are all pretty good IMO. Two minor points:

Where to put Environmentalism? It competes quite well with the other options in the column but it's hard to justify the upfront cost for it. That was my PB18 experience anyway, which should have been a pretty favourable situation. So I rather like Enviro at Sci Method and a culture centric Free Speech at Lib. With the 2 spec merc though, Lib is probably a fine place to put Enviro.

I don't see the need to move Police State to Military Science. And in the against column; one tech feels a bit full, the other a bit empty and it's been moved out of it's original place in the tree.

[Krill]

I've given this a day of thought (work training was somewhat lacklustre...), and I think that whilst I agree with much of hte overview, there are other issues present. I'll try to answer the post in a certain route linking to previous posts in this thread but I'm not 100% sure I'm going to make much sense.

State Property column:

SP vs FM seems pretty reasonable at the minute as late game options.

Agreed, this part of balance seems OK. My main concern is actually the "optional" aspect for Liberalism and Communism, but not enough to change the latter and hte former I'll comment on later in the post.

I see the reasoning behind the Merc change to compete with those two but I feel it's likely to be too good. After corp, you have 3 trade routes per city. Unlimited 6g trade routes means FM takes your trade total from 18 -> 30, only breaking even with Merc commerce and losing on gpp. I still prefer the just 1 specialist, low cost, foreign trade allowed, enabled at Banking. Having an early game civic option is good IMO, so you have the choice of when to transition into the late game ones, rather than just 3 late game. Also more in line with the base game obviously.

Joey has some graphs here that shows the equivalence of Merc and FM when combined with the extra multipliers and trade routes from harbours and Custom houses. The tl;dr is Merc at high cost and at Nationalism makes it reasonably balanced given that Merc needs the civic slots and Rep to reach it's high point. The additional beaker cost and civic choices add limiters on the time frame that Merc really turns on, especially given the cost of revolting the civics syncing with golden ages.

Slavery column:
Again Slavery vs Caste seems good to me, though I think old slavery would be fine too.

Slavery as in base BtS would still compare fine with Caste; the nerf isn't to do with civic balance. The reason Slavery is nerfed is to do with map balance and expansion. But Caste as implemented can stay as it is provided Serfdom and Emancipation become viable, which I'm sure is possible to implement. The only question is how drastic the changes are the make them more viable.

The problem with Serfdom is that by the time you have sufficient mills down for that bonus to be good, you don't need the worker bonus anymore. I think it's pretty clear Serfdom isn't getting much love in our current games. What about making it into a clear mid game civic, giving a bonus to one of mines/cottages/farms, perhaps dropping the mill bonus? Maybe the cottage bonus could even be to the growth rate. If I had to pick, I'd try +1g to mines/mills and then doublecheck their late game outputs.

Stripping Serfdom down to the basic implementation of giving a boost to worker speed, what does it need to be viable against Caste? I see a bunch of problems even just focusing on the early/mid usefulness of the civic, given the cost effectiveness of free spec slots and a boost to the only hammer tile for flatland.

• Caste is available earlier in the tech tree.
  
• Serfdom lacks production output increases of some form compared to Slavery AND Caste.
  
• Serfdom costs a civic revolt in some manner (ie no way to generate GP easily for further civic revolts down the line).

So I suppose the issue with turning Serfdom into a "mid game civic" is two fold: it would need to be available earlier, like available from Monarchy, and it would need to give hammers from something. Just thinking hypothetically, moving Serfdom onto Monarchy wouldn't be enough for me to use it because even if I beelined Monarchy as the first Classical tech because I'd need to replace the hammers lost from Slavery. Hammers from later game tile improvements don't help this.

At the same time, I have some concern with that lack of cheap specialist slots, which is why I've suggested enabling 2 scientist, merchant and artist slots once entering the Medieval and Renaissance (for 4 slots of each once you get into Ren). Making those specialist slots available regardless of civic should provide a baseline that is reachable for the other civics, keeps open some of the GP plays that Caste enables without touching on the power of Caste to run a bunch of specs at a food deficit in a GA etc. I'm fairly sure that without enabling free specialists slots in some manner the civics in the labour column won't ever be viable against a Caste that gives a bonus to production and has the infinite specialist slots, due to the effect on limiting the total number of GP available and delaying the production of each one.

A cottage growth bonus available in the early game is never going to happen without weird tile value changes: it skews the cottage improvement too much. Just given the +100% growth mechanic and full civics, +100% cottage growth gives a total of 405 commerce and 35 hammers over 0 turns; normal cottage growth gives 250 over 70 turns. That's the "worst" best case of how much the growth mechanic can create profit.

I think the first point of any change for Serfdom is to figure out what to do with specialist slots, and if Caste is staying the same then there have to be more free slots brought into the game somewhere. Only after figuring that out does it make any sense to continue with any designs on the civics. For the purposes of this post, I'm expecting the +2 spec slots at Medi and Ren eras to be implemented for the context of further answers.

OK moving back to Serfdom implementation:

If Serfdom is to be available around thee same time as Caste, the only reasonable position IMO is Monarchy. That keeps the balance of Monarchy>Feudalism roughly the same and Feud still has most of the power on the longbow.

Then, assuming Serfdom keeps the worker speed bonus, the choices are probably 50%, 75% or 100%. I think that 100% is probably too much given that Serfdom probably needs some form of production advantage to be worth revolting out of Slavery as that would probably make it more useful than Caste and back towards a one right choice (because you could revolt into the same time as HR and Caste revolt could wait until the first GA with the 100GPP GP).

Production bonuses are probably the hardest thing to choose. The wacky choice would be to implement pop rushing on Serfdom but that's pretty naff IMO. That leaves hammers on tile improvements. That would also make Serfdom cause a potentially interesting decision on when to revolt out of it. What are the options?

• Cottages (hamlets and villages?) - OMFG. Terrifying and probably broken.
  
• Farms - probably even more broken than the above?
  
• Mines - This one might work?
  
• Workshops - duplicates Caste but seems the best option IMO.

The other tile improvements wouldn't work because they aren't available at this point in the game.

So let's suggest the following implementation for Serfdom and compare it to Caste:

• Serfdom: +50% worker speed. +1 hammers on workshops. Available at Monarchy. Medium cost.
  
• Caste System: unlimited Scientist, Merchant, Artist Specialists. +1 hammers on workshops. Available at Code of Laws. Medium Cost.

Taken in the context of +2 scientist, merchant, artist slots available upon entering the Medieval era, to me that seems reasonable. Workshops wouldn't be available to use immediately, and heading to MC would delay getting Calendar, Currency and other Math benefits. Rushing to Feud would only give limited spec slots, enough to easily pop borders of new cities but no rushing a couple of GP for GA or Academies etc.

Other options, though:

• Serfdom: +50% worker speed. +1 hammers on mines. Available at Monarchy. Medium cost.
  
• Caste System: unlimited Scientist, Merchant, Artist Specialists. +1 hammers on workshops. Available at Code of Laws. Medium Cost.

To me this seems to scale slightly worse and would have a higher upfront boost to tile yields because mines will already be present but workshops wouldn't be available yet. That also doesn't provide cost to the civic except not being in Slavery. I think that it could be really good but is more situational due to requiring those mines but also not having much of a downside.

• Serfdom: +75% worker speed. +1 hammers on hamlets, villages. Available at Monarchy. Medium cost.
  
• Caste System: unlimited Scientist, Merchant, Artist Specialists. +1 hammers on workshops. Available at Code of Laws. Medium Cost.

Just throwing this one out here, but I'm not sure how I feel...onto Emancipation.

Emancipation then should be the late game competitor with Caste. The current version is too good IMO. You'll probably have a lot more farms/mines/cottages down than workshops by the time you hit Banking. I suspect we'd see people run caste for GAs and great people bursts and Emancipation the rest of the time. If you're continuing with the current implementation, it needs to be toned down IMO. I'd suggest moving the cottage vs workshop fight into this column, because it's so hard for Free Speech to beat State Property. Cottages +1g, Towns +2g and perhaps tinker with the cost and growth rate to compete against Caste's spec advantage. I'm not entirely sure where to put it on the tree(well Banking is fine, but in my ideal world Merc goes there).

The current version is: +2 commerce on Mines, +1 hammer on farms, +1 commerce on cottage/hamlet/village. Available at Banking.

So it doesn't affect end game cottage value, and gives +35/+70 commerce per cottage if in FS to grow cottages, or using the other civics respectively.

I'm sorry but why is it that good? Most cottages by the point banking is researched are most of the way towards Towns already. Noting Caste does mean there are difficulties getting the next GA available and also nerfs production just as a player starts trying to get OU down or build knights to kill people, just as production leads are matched by tech ability to take land. If you don't use FS (which you've already said is weak) then that's a 70 turn window where you can't push out GP and have taken a production nerf: I don't see how you are growing to work more cottages, on farms, and still being able to open up more land for said new tiles?

All that said, the values on the none cottage improvements can be changed; I don't particularly care so long as it works and adding in the extra spec slots does give Emancipation a bit of an edge on Caste. What about something like:

Emancipation: +1 hammer to windmills, watermills, +1 commerce on cottage/hamlet/village. Available at Banking. Medium cost.

Free Speech: I find it pretty hard to see how this can compete with the other options with only the bonus to cottages/towns. I think the current implementation is still likely to be too weak. There's nothing really wrong with leaving it as the culture civic IMO. Or perhaps something more creative could be done.

I think I agree but also disagree: 8 commerce/1 hammer towns that can't be pillaged, improved over or bombed down define the end game potential of an empire by its ability to keep up in tech and to rushbuy (even with the unadjusted cost). The ability to grow a cottage to that tile quickly also allows you to reskill cities that have used previously available workshops to build the necessary tile improvements. So I'd say that the main effect of the civic is sound.

The concerns IMO is the positions of US at Democracy, giving commerce to a tile improvement and then requiring it to spend an upfront cost to unlock another civic and then revolt into it. Everything else is easily adjusted in improvement output of other tiles.

So should FS unlock cash rush as well?

The other columns are all pretty good IMO. Two minor points:

Where to put Environmentalism? It competes quite well with the other options in the column but it's hard to justify the upfront cost for it. That was my PB18 experience anyway, which should have been a pretty favourable situation. So I rather like Enviro at Sci Method and a culture centric Free Speech at Lib. With the 2 spec merc though, Lib is probably a fine place to put Enviro.

I don't see the need to move Police State to Military Science. And in the against column; one tech feels a bit full, the other a bit empty and it's been moved out of it's original place in the tree.

Free Speech is available at Lib now; I think that Corp should require either Liberalism OR Economics and that would remove the "wasted tech" feeling. Customs house could be moved up to Corp without real issue IMO (as could breakwater, actually). That solves those issues quite well.

The issue with Police State is that revolts are timed around golden ages. There is no way in hell that a civic is going to be used that late in the tech tree in most games, the games won't last that long and no one will spend time revolting just for that +25% hammers into units when production bonus is already +100% in large cities. So it needs to be moved forward. Mil Sci is simply one reasonable position on the tech tree that is around about the time that a third (or potentially second, I suppose) golden age would get used and the civic can be accessed.

So I'd have to say why you feel that Fascism feels empty given it has stuff that isn't viable/cost effective anyway. It seems more like a perception issue than anything else (although saying that I should acknowledge that we all have those issues...)

I suppose I should say that I have no plans to touch the religious civics, but I'd not have a problem with that not requiring a religion to give their effect. PB18 was obnoxious to play without religion.