Civ Choice

[vmxa1]

No great preference so here is a vote:

Montezuma
Qin She Huang
Mansa Musa

[nbarclay]

My apologies if this is redundant (since I haven't had and probably won't take the time to read through the flood of messages thus far in this thread), but I think the Financial trait is likely to prove a game-breaker. Directly, it means extra wealth. Indirectly, it can transform some of that extra wealth into a larger and hence more productive empire than is practical without the Financial trait. I haven't played enough yet to be positive, but my impression is that Financial is powerful enough to make it worth taking any Financial civ over any non-Financial one (at least assuming they haven't changed the rules in the latest patch).

Nathan

[DeepO]

FIN is indeed very powerful... however it's also the most obvious one. More teams will play it, I think, which negates much of its appeal. By not chosing it, we might be more unpredictable, and by e.g. focusing on GLs we might offset any disadvantage towards FIN teams.

That's of course true for most traits, which is why I'm such a proponent of SPI: lots of options, and while it perhaps might not be the 'best' civ in all respects, there's a lot of fun to be had in figuring out new and exciting ways to leverage the trait to the best. Switching civics all the times to squeeze out a few hammers here, and a few beakers there seems more GS-style to me than running a 'flat' trait like FIN (or e.g. IND)

DeepO

[Arrian]

There is a reason that FIN civs are #1 and #2 right now in our voting.

-Arrian

[nbarclay]

DeepO, I don't see how choosing an offbeat combination of civ traits would add significantly to our ability to gain advantages of surprise in the game. Whatever traits we choose, the other teams will know our traits and therefore will know what options our traits give us. It's not as if we could hide our traits and take advantage of a trait our rivals don't know we have in order to do something unexpected.

Has anyone on GS actually used the Spiritual trait's civic-switching ability effectively enough to feel like they can get more advantage out of it than they can the steady, almost beginning-to-end power of Financial? "A few hammers here, and a few beakers there" sounds good until you consider that Financial can give extra beakers and/or hammers (via using extra income to pay for an extra city or two or working more production tiles and fewer wealth tiles) practically throughout the game - including during the time before the techs for more advanced civics are discovered. (Most of the best civics aren't available until long after the critical early portion of the game.) Unless someone feels confident he knows how to make Spiritual as effective as Financial, I think it would be better to go with a bird in the hand than with something that might be a bird, maybe even two, flying around somewhere where we're not quite sure what we see. If most of the teams go with Financial, and if Financial is in fact the most powerful trait by a non-trivial margin, those that don't could find themselves in trouble (all else being anywhere near equal).

Nathan

[Dominae]

Financial may be the best trait, but I do not think being non-Financial would be such a big disadvantage. The traits are more balanced than Civ3/PTW (Industrious) and C3C (Agricultural).

Civ4 MP is a lot more Hammer-intensive than SP. While the Financial research-fiends may look impressive on paper, most games I have participated in have been decided on raw production advantage. Prioritizing Cottages early often spells disaster, and spamming them later on (to pay for additional territory) is also dangerous. With fewer Cottages, Financial loses a lot of its appeal. There's still the bonus to coastal cities, but these are no means guaranteed and somewhat of a luxury.

Compare to Philosophical, which can retool military cities for GP generation in times of peace. While Financial is better in terms of raw power (if you're left alone to abuse it - see above), Philosophical is a lot more flexible.

I would rate both these traits above Spiritual, but Spiritual is a fine second trait.

Even if other teams know that were are Philosophical or Spiritual, there's so much we can do with those traits that other teams will not be able to anticipate our every move.

[DeepO]

Originally posted by nbarclay
DeepO, I don't see how choosing an offbeat combination of civ traits would add significantly to our ability to gain advantages of surprise in the game. Whatever traits we choose, the other teams will know our traits and therefore will know what options our traits give us. It's not as if we could hide our traits and take advantage of a trait our rivals don't know we have in order to do something unexpected.

That is true for all traits, except for SPI. It's the most varied trait...

Has anyone on GS actually used the Spiritual trait's civic-switching ability effectively enough to feel like they can get more advantage out of it than they can the steady, almost beginning-to-end power of Financial? "A few hammers here, and a few beakers there" sounds good until you consider that Financial can give extra beakers and/or hammers (via using extra income to pay for an extra city or two or working more production tiles and fewer wealth tiles) practically throughout the game - including during the time before the techs for more advanced civics are discovered. (Most of the best civics aren't available until long after the critical early portion of the game.) Unless someone feels confident he knows how to make Spiritual as effective as Financial, I think it would be better to go with a bird in the hand than with something that might be a bird, maybe even two, flying around somewhere where we're not quite sure what we see. If most of the teams go with Financial, and if Financial is in fact the most powerful trait by a non-trivial margin, those that don't could find themselves in trouble (all else being anywhere near equal).

Nathan

I've played quite a bit of civic-swapping games, yes, and they really can make a difference. There's also a more flat bonus: normal games will at least require 5-8 civic switches, which means 5-8 turns of anarchy. As said somewhere in this thread, that's about 2-3 GAs...

If I'm talking about a few hammers here, a few commerce there, I'm talking about each turn a little bit of gain. What is most important here, is that you gain the ability to better 'transform' food to production to commerce and vice a versa.

FINs have one specific path: they have more commerce, and have to somehow leverage that to gain in the other two areas. SPI can chose to go that route too (not so good, though, but MMing e.g. representation is a valid options until late in the game to maximize what you get from science), but can more efficiently swap between other types... too much food? swap to slavery, and rush. Too little production? Police state and Org Rel. Etc.

SPI can be at least as good as FIN, IMHO, but I've not played enough games yet to fully make a definate list of what's best in all circumstances. I know SPI is the most flexible of traits, runs for the whole game, and is fun because of the versatility. Those are to me better reasons than to have the utmost efficiency in one area.

Besides, my #3 choice was Mansa, being SPI/FIN. And Qin (our current #3) would play well, even if I prefer a SPI leader.

DeepO

edited to correct my one vote

I agree with Dom, though: PHI is the other flexibility / unpredictability trait.

[Theseus]

I've used SPI's civic switching in SP to pretty good effect for two things: 1) in and out of military production... repeatedly, and 2) for Wonder production in the capitol.

It's pretty great.

And I'm basically a newbie.

I am very much with DeepO's sentiments on this: SPI lends flexibility, has perhaps untapped brilliance, and will be a heckuva lot of fun.

[notyoueither]

2nd post updated with voting for civ leader.

Current Voting for Civ Leader:

Mansa Musa 21: Arrian 3, dejon 2, DeepO 1, Krill 3, Aro 2, Dominae 3, Theseus 3, Solomwi 2, asleepathewheel 1, vmxa1 1
Saladin 16: dejon 3, DeepO 3, Aro 3, Dominae 1, Theseus 1, Solomwi 3, NicodaMax 2
Qin Shi Huang 10: Arrian 2, Krill 2, Dominae 2, asleepathewheel 2, vmxa1 2
Montezuma 8: DeepO 2, Theseus 2, NicodaMax 1, vmxa1 3
Elizabeth 4: Arrian 1, asleepathewheel 3
Asoka 4: dejon 1, NicodaMax 3
Isabella 2: Krill 1, Aro 1
Alexander 1: Solomwi 1

--

Arrian: 1. Mansa Musa, 2. Qin, 3. Elizabeth
dejon: 1) Saladin, 2) Mansa Musa, 3) Asoka
DeepO: 1. Saladin, 2. Montezuma, 3. Mansa Musa
Krill: 1. Mansa Musa, 2. Qin, 3. Izzy
Aro: 1. Saladin, 2. Mansa Musa, 3. Isabella
Dominae: 1. Mansa, 2. Qin, 3. Saladin
Theseus: 1. Mansa Musa, 2. Montezuma, 3. Saladin
Solomwi: 1. Saladin, 2. Mansa Musa, 3. Alexander
asleepathewheel: 1. Elizabeth, 2. Qin, 3. Mansa
NicodaMax: 1. Asoka, 2. Saladin, 3. Montezuma
vmxa1: 1. Montezuma, 2. Qin She Huang, 3. Mansa Musa

[asleepathewheel]

I'm almost convinced to switch my number 1 vote to Saladin...

[nbarclay]

I got to thinking, and it occurs to me that some of the traits get more powerful as the difficulty level goes higher. Perhaps most notably for the purposes of discussion here, unless my eyes and/or brain have been playing tricks on me, the number of civics you can change at once without more than one turn of anarchy goes down as the difficulty level gets higher. (I still haven't played above Monarch, so I don't know how bad it gets on the highest levels.) Do we know yet what difficulty level we'll be playing on? And if so, what do we know about the anarchy parameters associated with that level?

The Financial trait is one that's power in absolute terms does not go up with higher difficulty levels. On the other hand, with the worse upkeep costs on higher levels, the extra income it brings becomes a higher percentage of total net income.

[Arrian]

I doubt we will be playing any higher than Monarch (our preference, it seems). I figure most teams will vote for Noble or maybe Prince... leaving it to us to try and drag them upwards.

-Arrian

[Blake]

Okay in some defense of ORG.
At emperor and higher, civic upkeep starts at 2, reducing early research by 2/turn. ORG eliminates that early upkeep, effectively giving you an extra 2 commerce for early research, which is nothing short of huge - in the vicinity of a +25% bonus - this is like getting to work an Oasis in terms of start quality. I think this must be a consideration if difficulty is Emperor+. I don't think Asoka can be beaten to a religion at those difficulties, a fin leader can get at best +2 commerce early on (found on +2 comm tile, work +2 comm tile), it's far more likely the Org leader will get their +2, so at least statistically, Asoka is the best bet.

I could not in good conscious vote for Asoka at below Emperor difficulty though, so my vote is very settings-dependent.

edit: votes changed.

[Krill]

That is the problem, this game is not going to be on Emperor, no matter how much some on this team will want it on that setting.

The most likely settings would be prince and Noble, so ORG does take a beating...


That is why I voted for Monarch. We have a better chance to get Monarch, than Emperor. We sure do not want to get Noble.

[Arrian]

Agreed. I love the ORG trait, and if I thought the game would be played at a higher level, then I'd have lobbied harder for it. But Noble or Prince seem likely, possibly our team preference (so far) of Monarch. Emperor seems highly unlikely.

Given that, Asoka becomes less inviting.

-Arrian