AU mod: Balancing the Governments

[alexman]

Prior to C3C, after the Ancient Age, the Republic was the best all-round government in Civ3. There was no real reason to go through Anarchy to switch to Democracy, and only extreme cases of war weariness forced a switch to Monarchy. Communism was no match for Monarchy as a warmongering government.

C3C tried to weaken the Republic as a wartime government by requiring 2-gold maintenance per unit (but allowing 1/3/4 free unit maintenance per town/city/metro), and introduced the Secret Police HQ in an attempt to reduce corruption in Communism.

C3C also introduced two new governments (Fascism and Feudalism).

Unfortunately, the governments in Civ3 remain unbalanced.

The Problem

The luxury scarcity in C3C, along with the extra maintenance cost, has weakened the Republic in the Ancient Age, where it was previously in good balance with Monarchy. On the other hand, the extra free unit support is enough to actually make the Republic better than it was in PTW after the Middle Ages (when an empire has numerous cities to support a large army). A human Republic can wage war in the Industrial Age better than ever, and AI Republics (at lower difficulty levels) suffer due to an excessive number of units in the Ancient Age.

Feudalism provides 5/2/1 free unit maintenance per town/city/metro, but it requires a 3-gold maintenance per unit over that. This makes for a great government for Medieval REX, but many feel that the situations where such a government can be useful are extremely limited. Monarchy is almost always a better alternative than Feudalism, both in war and at peacetime.

Possible Solutions

• Republic: Provide a fixed number of free units (say 20) so that the size of the supported army doesn’t increase with the size of the empire. This addresses both the early and late game concerns with the Republic, but then the strength of the government (mainly in the late game) becomes map size dependent. This is not the only government (or aspect of Civ3, for that matter) who's strength would be map-dependent, however.
• Republic: Decrease the free unit support to 1/2/2 per town/city/metro. This is a conservative change, and somewhat reduces the power of the Republic in the late-game, but a sizeable army will still be feasible for large empires, and it does nothing to address the early-game weakness of the Republic.
• Republic: Increase the corruption to Problematic (same as Monarchy), reduce unit support cost to 1gpt, and remove all free unit support. This is the way Republic was implemented in the PTW version of the AU mod.
• Feudalism: Reduce unit support cost to 1gpt, as for Monarchy. Empires with many small towns rather than cities in the Middle Ages will then be tempted to choose Feudalism over Monarchy, if they don’t plan on waging bloody wars.

It’s possible that Communism and Fascism also have balance issues, but it’s difficult to evaluate them with the current bugs that exist in C3C.

So what do you think? What is the best way to balance the governments within the philosophy of the AU mod?

[Harovan]

Originally posted by alexman

• Republic: Increase the corruption to Problematic (same as Monarchy), reduce unit support cost to 1gpt, and remove all free unit support. This is the way Republic was implemented in the PTW version of the AU mod.

Please, not again.

[Brundlefly]

I liked bullet one for Republic. Fixed number of free units is a good idea.

[Harovan]

One or two is it for me.

[donZappo]

Whatever happened to the initial concept of having Feudalism being a communal government? I don't know if this was ever tested, or if the idea was just bounced around. Did any beta testers get to play with this, and if so, what was the problem with having a communal government during the early middle ages?

[Risa]

I vote for bullet 2. However, I'd prefer 1/2/2 free units, so that you have to develop your cities before entering republic. Otherwise beelining to Republic will be too strong.

[Mazarin]

Just an idea...but to reduce Republic's effectiveness as a late-game war government, one could give it communal corruption: It would be a good choice for people who have a limited number of well-developed cities, while warmongers with lots of crap cities that simply increase the free unit support would actually suffer huge corruption. I know, this might be too much of a change for AU-mod, but it would definetely make democracy/communism/fascism more atractive in the late game.

[nbarclay]

In my view, a fixed number of free units irrespective of map size would be ridiculous. The fundamental nature of a government should not change depending on whether you are playing on a small map or a huge one. Consider how many workers an empire on a huge map is likely to have, especially a non-industrious one. Then add in an even modestly respectable defensive military (which also needs to be bigger on a huge map).

Changing Republic to 2/2/2 has a serious drawback in that it would enhance the power of an ultra-early change to Republic in games where such a change is possible. With the right start playing on Emperor, I can research Code of Laws, still be first to Philosophy, and get Republic around 1400 BC. The advantage of doing so is mitigated somewhat by the fact that until I have significant numbers of cities size seven and over, unit maintenance is a bit of a problem. Increase free maintenance to two for towns and the biggest drawback to an ultra-early Republic strategy largely disappears.

A 1/2/2 configuration would probably be good, or perhaps 1/2/3 to avoid giving as much advantage to those of us who crowd cities together and have little use for hospitals in most of our cities. (At 1/2/3, a player who goes almost all size 12 and one who uses OCP get about the same free unit support, and the need to build hospitals for only tiny population increases undercuts the efficiency of trying to grow everything to size 13 or 14 for extra free unit support.) I suspect that I won't like what reducing free unit support does to Republic when the REX doesn't go so well, since supporting a military capable of conquest with only a few cities will get very expensive. But then I also suspect that my not liking it would be a sign that the balancing job has succeeded.

Regarding corruption, I'm tempted to suggest reducing the corruption level for Monarchy and Feudalism to match Republic and Fascism and simply writing off Democracy for nonreligous civs. If there were a way to cap anarchy at three or four turns for the human player, trying to make Democracy worthwhile for nonreligious civs might be a useful project. But considering that I spent eight turns in anarchy last time I made the switch (on Demigod level, after a very good REX but no conquest), I'm inclined to view making Democracy worthwhile for nonreligious civs as a lost cause. The one problem with reducing corruption for Monarchy and Feudalism is that doing so would take away one of Fascism's advantages over those governments.

Nathan

[DrSpike]

Hmm, here is a link to my govt balance thread, since it provided much of the initial discussion regarding republic.

http://apolyton.net/forums/showthrea...hreadid=102012

[alexman]

Originally posted by nbarclay
The fundamental nature of a government should not change depending on whether you are playing on a small map or a huge one. Consider how many workers an empire on a huge map is likely to have, especially a non-industrious one. Then add in an even modestly respectable defensive military (which also needs to be bigger on a huge map).

The real question is, how many units will a comparable empire on a tiny map likely have?

Let's see an example. Take the OCN as an indicator of the number of cities. A huge map has OCN=36, so let's say you have four times that number for a good size empire. A tiny map has OCN=14. So let's compare 4*36=144 cities with 4*14=56 cities.

Let's say you have a bare minimum of one worker and one military unit per city. That makes 288 units for a huge map and 112 for a tiny map.

In this case, the difference in maintenance per city is obviously zero for the current C3C and PTW implementation of the Republic. So what is the benefit per city if you have a 'ridiculous' 20 free units?

On a huge map, the effective unit maintenance is (288-20)*2/288 = 1.86 gpt, while on a tiny map it's (112-20)*2/112 = 1.64 gpt. Is that really that big of a deal for such a great difference in map sizes? Just to compare, the effective unit maintenance for Democracy is 1 gpt.

With 20 free units and the above example of two units per city, the break-even point between Democracy and Republic in terms of unit maintenance occurs at 20 cities. With any Republic proposal with more than 1 free unit per city, the break-even point never happens.

I say the flat 20 free unit support is the best solution for making Democracy more attractive for large peaceful empires, and Republic more attractive for small peaceful empires.

[lockstep]

Originally posted by alexman
A huge map has OCN=36, so let's say you have four times that number for a good size empire. A tiny map has OCN=14. So let's compare 4*36=144 cities with 4*14=56 cities.

alexman, this example is in your favour. If a player has four times the OCN number of cities (e.g. 80 cities on a standard map), he has in fact won the game, and likely will have hit the domination mark. IMO, the relevant figure for balancing a fixed number of free units under Republic is about 1.5 times the OCN, which means an empire with about 25% of the map's landmass.

[alexman]

So only 21 cities for a tiny map? That seems low if you consider that you can usually get 12-16 cities by 1000 BC just with REX, but maybe you're right.

But even in that case (21 cities) Democracy is better than Republic in terms of unit maintenance for 2 units per city (OK, barely, but it is ), and it still provides better corruption.

By the way, Civ3 strategy already depends on map size. The value of the expansionist, seafaring, and commercial traits, the balance between slow and fast moving attackers, the pace of technology, et cetera. I don't see a problem with having a stronger Republic on smaller map sizes.

[lockstep]

This may be off-topic, but I always saw a problem with the 100.000 culture-points victory, so I'm very glad that the necessary no. of culture points is map-dependend in C3C. Therefore, I'd rather not have a fixed no. of free units for any government.

Regarding Republic, I'm for a 1/2/2 approach so that the player gains something from having bigger cities. And to balance Democracy vs. Republic (or at least give it a try), I suggest giving Democracy the same no. of free units as Republic, but still support costs of 1.

[lockstep]

And regarding the rest of alexman's suggestions: Unit support costs of 1 for Feudalism seems like a good idea. Increasing Republic's corruption to problematic may help also, but there's no way to test this right now, given the current corruption bugs.

[Theseus]

Hmmm...

I'm coming at this one from a somewhat different angle. At the risk of getting stoned, I'd like to suggest that we really strive for two things:

1) The human player is forced to change governments at least twice.

2) For the AI civs, very low population and very high population civs are "assisted".

[lockstep]

Originally posted by Theseus
I'd like to suggest that we really strive for ... The human player is forced to change governments at least twice.

Hmm ... this would mean that Republic AND Monarchy must be made unattractive compared to other governments in the late game. Which again would mean that something needs to be done about Democracy - IMO, about its no. of free units.

[Nor Me]

1) is easy. Kill republic and almost everyone will go Despotism -> Monarchy -> Democracy.

The trouble is forcing there to be a real choice between a builder and a warmonger style goverment at both stages. The apparent 1/2/2 Republic support consensus doesn't seem to adress the early weakness of Republic mentoned in the first post.

At the moment it's generally worth a non-religous civ switching to Republic straight away only because it's going eventually to be the best goverent.

How about 1/1/1 with 10 free units for Republic. That might help warmongers on a tiny map but shouldn't cause too much trouble otherwise.

[Strollen]

What about keeping the current free support system, but increasing the unit cost to 3.

Now this really does make it expensive to use Republic to as war government but a great builder government. Although I am not sure it solves the earlier problem of being able to switch to Republic.

[Risa]

Well, I must say I actually LIKE this "early weakness" of Republic. Given its huge benefits in middle age, it's fair to penalize it at ancient times. One has to make choice from to stay a bit longer in Despotism, to waste another Anarchy in Despotism-Mornarchy-Republic way, or to stick with Mornachy.

[ducki]

Originally posted by Nor Me
1) is easy. Kill republic and almost everyone will go Despotism -> Monarchy -> Democracy.

Yuck.
If there's one "winner" path, we might as well remove the other governments so as not to make the AI "waste" time researching what it thinks are "important" techs.

I'm not saying it's not like that now.
If you're non-Rel, you pick either Republic or Monarchy and spend 3 full ages in one government.

If you're Rel, then you get to pick and choose depending on situation.

I don't think Theseus wanted to have a "winner" path - though I could be wrong. I think - think - he wants the later governments to be attractive and advantageous over the ancient ones. Republic and Monarchy should - somehow - lose their edge in the late Middle Ages or Industrial Age, prompting the player to make another War or Build decision between the later governments.

At least, that's my opinion and my interpretation of Theseus's 2-change proposal.

I could be dead wrong.

[Theseus]

ducki's on target... it just seems to me that 1) given the three early gov't choices, a player should be *desperate* to get out of despotism, and then, later, 2) the benefits of switching again to a more modern form of government should be so compelling as to be a *must*, but 3) with both gov't choices variegated according to the course of a given game (e.g., builder versus warmonger).

[vmxa1]

I wonder that if you were to make the move from despot to X and then to Y compelling, that you will just force every one to use a religious civ.
Balancing the ideal of that with making it viable to not be religious is not going to be easy.

[ducki]

I don't think that would happen, vmxa1, for the same reason that there are folks who choose not to play industrious civs or folks that play expansionist on smaller maps.

As it is now, there are some people who play Religious specifically so they can bounce between Democracy/Republic and Monarchy/Communism. There are also some people who play Non-religious civs and make 2 govt switches.

And I was actually half serious about taking out the other governments being an option. If playing the game really does come down to whether you want to be a builder or a black-hole-dark-warmonger and that decision determines whether you pick one of the two governments that become available nearly at the beginning of the game, then what purpose do the other governments serve, aside from giving an advantage to the player over non-religious AIs and a mega-advantage to the religious-civ Player?

I really do think that we should either remove the disadvantage from the AI by removing the later governments or handicap the player by making the later governments inherently better than the Ancient governments, so the player can either elect to be obsolete and slower than the AI or he can bite the bullet, endure some anarchy just like the AI, and hope to be competitive.

That's just my opinion. Others might not think the AI is handicapped by switching at least twice.

[ZargonX]

I really do think that we should either remove the disadvantage from the AI by removing the later governments or handicap the player by making the later governments inherently better than the Ancient governments, so the player can either elect to be obsolete and slower than the AI or he can bite the bullet, endure some anarchy just like the AI, and hope to be competitive.

Of those two options, improving the later governments is the way to go. Purely from a "fun" point of view, giving the player something to work towards is much more satisfying than getting your government for the rest of the game during the first years of your game. If it is made worthwhile, people will endure anarchy, and will not just play religious civs to avoid it.

[Theseus]

Hmmm... could we possibly even address late game tedium? Also give the KAIs a real shot at winning?

/me mutters: "Nah, can't be done."

[vmxa1]

Originally posted by ducki
I don't think that would happen, vmxa1, for the same reason that there are folks who choose not to play industrious civs or folks that play expansionist on smaller maps.

As it is now, there are some people who play Religious specifically so they can bounce between Democracy/Republic and Monarchy/Communism. There are also some people who play Non-religious civs and make 2 govt switches.

You may be right, I have no way of knowing, but I cannot see making two switches as a non-religiious civ. That is too many turns of anarchy. So if you make it so I am compelled to switch twice, I must take a religious civ.

Ind or not is another issue. I can address that with more workers. I have no means to address anarchy.

[alexman]

The religious/non-religious aspect of government changes is not that bad now that C3C imposes a 2-turn anarchy for Religious civs.

[ducki]

I see your point, but that's also my point(and I think Theseus) - if we make the later governments good enough to switch to, it should help the AI(since the AI switches already, as well as spending time researching tech for them) as well as presenting the player with more interesting strategic choices.

I'm talking good enough that it's worth it to endure two sets of anarchy for a non-religious civ for all of the lategame governments.

Otherwise, really, honestly, no tongue-in-cheekiness, it would be better(help the AI) if they were removed.

Radical, I know, which is why improving them is a better option for AU.

I just thought of a different way to say it...

Democracy and Communism should be balannced against each other, but they should be akin to a government upgrade, just like Knights are to Horsemen. Keep the governments balanced within their Age, but later Age governments should be head and shoulders above their predecessors, same as units. Otherwise they're pointless fluff.

[Stuie]

Something else that would help the AI (in terms of government and research) would be to incorporate Communism and Fascism into other required techs instead of making them their own optional techs. That way the AI won't waste time researching both while I make the Hoover beeline.

For instance: Make Fascism available with Nationalism, and Communism available with Industrialisation. Police Stations would also need to be moved, perhaps to Espionage.

As is, the AI wastes the initial Industrial Era research on Nationalism, then Communism and Fascism.

[Nor Me]

I was going to suggest merging the Communism and Fascism techs as part of a general thread on optional techs but I might as well mention it now.

The AI doesn't base it's research of these on the goverment it would prefer so could potentially switch twice if it gets the wrong tech first. If the human wanted to switch they would only research one.

A simple, unrealistic and unbalanced change that would achieve what most of us are looking for would be to switch the war-weariness of Republic and Democracy. If Republic had enough free units then a builder could stay in it for the rest of the game at a cost. Everyone else would switch to Democracy except if there was a very long war. The AI would chose the war-time goverment of Monarchy early on when it is competitive and would be less likely to switch to Fascism or Communism from Democracy later.

Of course, we shouldn't do that and I doubt any less radical change is going to give us what we want although we might be able to improve things slightly.