commercial civs

[rockerjedi]

Hello all, ive not posted before, so bear with me if its a stupid question.

As an avid fan of Civ3 i was wondering why the
civilization strength "commercial" does not lead to
being able to build marketplaces or banks at half
cost, whereas this is the case for similar city
upgrades that are Religious, Scientific or
Militaristic. (eg. marketplace always costs 100 shields, whereas Library costs 80 or 40 if you are a scientific civ)

I have the latest patch 1.29f installed.

This flaw means that having commercialism as a Civ
strength isnt of a huge amount of use and so playing
as England, France, India, Greece or Rome is not as
good as it should be, handicapping a third of the
races that you can choose from.

Are there any plans to correct this flaw in a patch?
or is there a step to rectify this that i can take? a mod to download perhaps?

[Arrian]

Not a flaw, it's by design.

The commercial trait has different benifits:

1) a 25% increase in the "optimum cities number" (aka the OCN). This reduces corruption. If the OCN would be 20 for a non-commercial civ, it would be 25 for a commercial civ, meaning a commercial civ could have 5 more productive cities.

2) +1 gold per city square, and another +1 (or is it +2 now?) when the city crosses size 6 and 12.

So commercial empires are richer and less corrupt than non-commercial empires. It's still a weak trait, IMO, but not as weak as it was pre-1.29 (used to be only +12.5% OCN and less extra gold).

-Arrian

[Catt]

One other advantage of the Commercial trait that I have come to like very much -- you get to start with the Alphabet tech, the most expensive tech in the first tier of the anicent techs (unless I'm mistaken?). Setting research on a 40 turn pace for Writing -- just about every tech is going to take 36 - 40 turns, no matter your research slider -- puts you in the very inviting position to either go for Literature and the Great Library or Map Making and the Great Lighthouse, either of which (depending on the map which you've explored during those early turns, right?) offers a potentially very powerful early age research and trading strategy.

Catt

[lockstep]

Regarding your idea to make marketplaces and banks cheaper for commercial civs: It's not possible with the current editor (the trait advantages are pretty much hard-coded), and there's no hint that this will change with PtW.

BTW, industrious civs also don't get cheaper factories.

[badams52]

Just the thought of industrious civs getting reduced cost for factories, offshore platforms, manufacturing plants, etc. just makes my mouth water. But that would make the industrious trait too powerful. Personally, I always take an industrious civ, I can't live with the slow workers anymore.

Currently, I'm playing a game with France and looking at the cities, the city square gets a +3 gold bonus from 7-12 and a +5 from 13 and up. But I agree with you that the commercial trait isn't all that good. I hardly notice the improvement from the optimal city bonus.

But I vaguely remember once switching out of a commercial civ and noticing the lack of production from the outer cities. Who knows, but I would agree with you that a reduced marketplaces & banks would be a good benefit to even the trait out.

[rockerjedi]

thanks for the response

Personally id be tempted to regard the decreased corruption benefit (through the OCN) as being equivalent to either having a greater chance of leader generation, free advances at new age or no period of anarchy when switching governments, which are side benefits of military, science & religious attributes. This being in addition to their discounts on buildings.

I just think it would make it fairer & more competitive for commercial civilizations to have the discounts on buildings also.

I guess ill stick with the Babylonians then, culture vulture that i am

[metalhead]

Commercial is a very valuable trait. I think that discounting its value is a big oversight. The reason most don't think it's too powerful is because there is no tangible difference between a commercial and non-commercial civ, i.e. no cheaper buildings, no special unit like a scout, no faster workers, no nothing. From the outside, a Commercial civ functions identically to a civ with no special attributes. But, just because you can't do anything different, doesn't mean the trait is wasted. Try a commercial civ, and more likely than not, you'll end up scratching your head some time in mid-game, wondering how the hell you got so powerful. I know it happens every time I play the French or the Indians. I haven't tried the other Commercial civs in awhile.

[vmxa1]

Commercial is a valuable trait, just not one you must have or as good as a few others. I wonder if the reason it is less well recieved is that it shows up best on the biggest maps and many do not want to play those maps?

[alva]

One of the best traits IMO, especially on a level your comfortable with

[Jethro83]

Commercial is valuable when combined with a decent other trait. I find the Commercial trait to be most useful when combined with Scientific, Militaristic or Industrious.