Balance issues

[joncnunn]

I might mention that in the history books the Americans won by fighting where the British Ain't.

Kings army coming at you and no good choke point? Scatter; circle back and retake the lightly garisoned town. When the army turns around to retake that town, abandon it capture another town he left underdefended.

[snoopy369]

Originally posted by Dale
You can reject every offer other than tax hikes with zero negative effect.

Literally zero ?? Then why are they in the game?

[Dale]

I'm about to post a mod proposal I think a lot of people might like.

It'll address that and the REF.

[kibbles7272]

so far i am halfway through my first game and my tax rate is only 6 percent, this could be because i got off to a slow start selling things, i only had one town and i made cigars

now i am making furs in another town so isend 100 of each cigars and furs, seems okay

but...i bought 200 tools on my last trip andmy tax rate went up by 2 percent, i didnt know it would go up from buying from europe

i think if you do purchases or selling of 200 ot more at a time, its more likely your tax rate will go up

also, in the civpedia if you look at the english units it says specifically that you don't want to fight them (regulars) under siege but rather out in the wilderness, while there might not be chokepoints on your map, i think you can station soldiers in forest or hills near plains and when they come near you can take them down

i also dont see the massive military buildup that people talk about, though i have not produced alot of liberty bells, i make them only to expand my borders then i stop, but i have noticed when you do build up some bells the king immediately adds more forces, i guess i would wait til i have decent army and then bump up liberty bells, the bad thing about that is you miss out on founding fathers that require them

the game does end in 300 turns according to the civpedia, that seems too short and i wonder if epic or marathon adds more turns, but if it makes things longer to produce whats the point

this game is really fun so far. my biggest gripe is the lack of feedback from the interface

1) when you look at the founding fathers available it shows how much they cost in some sort of icon, when you mouse over the icon it doesnt say what sort of points they represent

2) native villages have demands for certain goods, the civpedia says after you visit them, the mouseover of their town will tell you what they want, this does not happen, it isn't shown and you are left clueless about what trade goods might be viable to natives, unless you have a very good memory or want to view the event log constantly, since they change their demands at times

the game is excellent IMO but i find the lack of tooltips disturbing

[conmcb25]

Does anyone know or have a good theory and what prompts tax hikes?

Im close to halfway thru, and my tax rate in over 40%, and I don't have a single liberty bell yet.

Obviously somthing else must trigger it, selling more and more goods in Europe??

[Krill]

Question: are cities tied to only using the 8 nearest tiles to the city, and the city tile, or can you expand the city radius as in CIV?

[snoopy369]

You can only use the 9 square radius, yes.

Selling goods in europe definitely causes tax hikes.

[Machismo]

Originally posted by conmcb25
Does anyone know or have a good theory and what prompts tax hikes?

Im close to halfway thru, and my tax rate in over 40%, and I don't have a single liberty bell yet.

Obviously somthing else must trigger it, selling more and more goods in Europe??

One of the dutch characters gets tax increases less frequently. It happens in regular intervals but the size of the increase is random (1 percent to as much as ten percent). That slight decrease in frequency is a massive bonus for you as it could allow you a significant increase in your income.

[Krill]

Originally posted by snoopy369
You can only use the 9 square radius, yes.

Boo all the more reason to ICS. Stupid decision (especially if the excuse is "We wanted to stay true to the original").

[snoopy369]

Actually, I don't see why this is a problem. The game is smaller, 9 square radius is fine, and I rarely want to use more than that anyway. One major balance issue with using more than that, is the huge amount of food you'd be able to make - remember, in Col, food is much easier to get (but it takes longer to grow). You'd end up with +70 food and get a new citizen every 3 turns.

No, 9 tiles (8+city) is fine, works very well with the col game mechanics. I end up with 12-15 size cities easily, and have no 20s only because there's no strong reason to do so. I think you're doing just what you are saying they are doing, and staying true to the Civ 21 square standard for no particular reason

[Krill]

Actually I'd prefer it if Civ didn't stick to a maximum 21 tile city radius. I would just prefer it if I didn't have to ICS...