Innovative Idea Group

[Swosh]

Hi, I just wanted to share a small suggestion about the innovative idea group.

Currently the Innovative idea group has:

Patron of the Arts
-1% Prestige decay


Pragmatism
-25% Mercenary cost


Scientific Revolution
-5% Technology cost


Dynamic Court
+1 Possible advisors


Resilient State
-10% Reduce inflation cost


Optimism
-0.05 Monthly war exhaustion


Formalized Officer Corps
+1 Leader(s) without upkeep


Bonus:
-25% Advisor costs



Now I find the "Inflation reduction" and especially the "Mercenary cost reduction" a bit out of place in this idea group. What I mean is it really has nothing to do with the word Innovation what so ever and therefore shouldnt be in the Idea Group. Information about the word Innovation can be found here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Innovation

Now what i really had in mind as a replacement for those ideas would be:
1) "Idea cost reduction", which currently is in the Humanism Idea group. I don't really think Humanism has anything to do with "idea cost reduction" and would therefore suggest to put it in the Innovative idea group instead where i think it fits perfectly.

2) "Development cost reduction", Im not totally sure about this one but, I still think its a better fit than "Inflation Reduction Cost"


I would appriciate all feedback. Please let me know what your thoughts are.

 

[grommile]

If you're going to yank something from Humanist, you need to say what you want to replace it with. (Bearing in mind that... um, really, there's not a great deal left that can reasonably be put into Humanist that isn't there already.)

 

[Swosh]

True, but I couldnt come up with anything that i would give Humanism that really fits that arent allready there except maybe "Tolerance of the True Faith" but that might be too much reduction to revolt risk concidering it allready has -2% reduction allready. What do you think? any suggestions?

 

[Necrow]

1. wouldn't it become hard to balance? Innovative already has reduction to tech costs...
2. Economic is getting this as a finisher, right? Still could be good to have such an idea someplace else too, to create options, although, just like the above point, it would result in a group that reduces mana costs in a lot of significant places, perhaps borderline OP?

nothing to do with the word Innovation

Sadly this argument doesn't hold, does it? I agree that Innovative is quite unfocused and sort of a 'jack of all trades', but you could argue that not only states that are well administered use mercenaries effectively, that war exhaustion reduction has little to do with diplomacy and not only plutocratic states focus on trade (or that all plutocratic states were strong traders). If you read idea descriptions in game you'll find that somehow paradox manages to justify most idea placements.

 

[Swosh]

1. wouldn't it become hard to balance? Innovative already has reduction to tech costs...

I doubt it, its only 5% tech cost reduction so if they add for example 10% idea cost reduction, then both together is equal to 10% tech cost reduction which is the same as many nations has as a nation idea (France, Bohemia etc...)

2. Economic is getting this as a finisher, right? Still could be good to have such an idea someplace else too, to create options, although, just like the above point, it would result in a group that reduces mana costs in a lot of significant places, perhaps borderline OP?

Well i would hardly say that is more OP than stacking for example military ideas...

If you read idea descriptions in game you'll find that somehow paradox manages to justify most idea placements.

That is true for the most part but, I wouldnt really say that Pragmatism has a lot in common with Mercenary cost reduction as opposed to either development cost reduction or idea cost reduction.

 

[Titanius Puffin]

The odd thing about Humanism vs. Innovation is that the two tendencies went hand-in-hand more or less.

A lot of the areas that were innovative were at least somewhat touched by humanism. Areas where humanism lost out to religious zeal didn't contribute quite as many inventions over time.

The Netherlands, Scotland, Tuscany, and to some extent France, tended to contributed more to human understanding (and human innovation), while countries like Castile or Austria tended to be adopters rather than discoverers.

 

[Necrow]

both together is equal to 10% tech cost reduction

Nope, 10% idea cost reduction is 40 mana per idea, 5% tech cost is 30 mana per tech, close but not completely
Edit: and 10% of tech cost is 60 mana/tech

stacking for example military ideas...

But then you're stacking multiple idea groups, you have to wait between unlocking them and you're making a choice of dedicating multiple idea slots to military.
Further, as Common Sense introduces development some play styles will revolve around this and trigger a race for saving as much mana as possible just to pour it into development. Tech cost and idea cost reduction in one group would allow for mana savings in two major parts of the mana game - whatever you do, whichever nation you'll play, you'll 1: tech up, 2: unlock ideas.

wouldnt really say that Pragmatism has a lot in common with Mercenary cost

Fair point, even though it still attaches value to the name of the idea - you know, now they could just change the idea name to fit both innovative and mercenary costs better

 

[Swosh]

Nope, 10% idea cost reduction is 40 mana per idea, 5% tech cost is 30 mana per tech, close but not completely
Edit: and 10% of tech cost is 60 mana/tech

Your forgetting that there is a lot more technology than ideas to unlock 33 technology in in all catagorys (admin, diplo and military). ideas there are only 7 in each group to unlock and you can only pick a total of 8.
If your going to calculate how much you save for the entire game with 5% tech cost it would be as follows:
30 each (600 x 0.05) x 3 (admin, diplo and military) x 28 (assuming you take innovative as your first idea group which is now at tech 5) = 2520
As for the calculation of idea cost for the entire game with 10% it would be:
40 each (400 x 0.1) x 7 (total ideas in a group) x 8 (total amount of idea groups) = 2240

As you can see 5% technology is slightly better than 10% idea costs but, if you should change an idea group to another in game it would be roughly equal. Even the nation designer has that implemented thats why normally people say 5% tech ∽ 10% idea cost, same as other things 5% discipline ∽ 10% morale.

But then you're stacking multiple idea groups, you have to wait between unlocking them and you're making a choice of dedicating multiple idea slots to military.

Wasnt that the oppostite of what you mentioned in your previous post, that you could then stack Innovative and Economic?

 

[saegoto]

Pragmatism
-25% Mercenery Cooldown (merc pool is growin faster)
to be more unique compared to Plutocracy and Administrative

Dynamic Court
+1 Building Slot
advisor pool is a waste of idea slot in 1.12 CS

Resilient State
-30% Policy Duration (it would took 7 years instead of 10. 84 monarch points instead of 120)
-10% infaltion reducion is a worst single idea in whole game. 7,5 adm cheaper cost (for 400 adm) if u even use inflation button

 

[Swosh]

hmm ... thats a intresting suggestion, I like your thoughts about the Resilient State and Dynamic Court to mix things up a little, I still dont think mercenarys really fits into innovation idea group tho... how about something like:

Reinvention / Creative Thinking
-10% Idea cost

and maybe,

Resilient State
-20% policy cost

 

[Necrow]

As you can see 5% technology is slightly better than 10% idea costs but, if you should change an idea group to another in game it would be roughly equal. Even the nation designer has that implemented thats why normally people say 5% tech ∽ 10% idea cost, same as other things 5% discipline ∽ 10% morale.

Fair enough.

Still could be good to have such an idea someplace else too, to create options

I said to create options, so that perhaps you shouldn't have to pick Economic to get development cost reduction

 

[Necrow]

dont think mercenarys really fits into innovation

But if innovation is what makes a state more modern, and a great lot of countries today rely on professional armies - much akin to mercenaries - rather than conscription (Map: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Conscription_map_of_the_world.svg), then I'd say mercenaries fit right in.
On the other hand, cost could be replaced with mercenary maintenance though it would still remain in the shade of Administrative.
Could be replaced with General maneuver: reasoning is that Leonardo da Vinci was invited to Milan as a military engineer, and he designed various pontoon bridges - this would simulate that, since the stat can make you ignore river crossings if it's higher than the enemy's. Other military changes could be bonus to movement speed on owned provinces - the old paved roads building had this effect on a provincial level - don't know how desired such an effect would be though, might be as useless as the reduced prestige decay currently up there, or a no-brainer desirable.

I can agree with the building slot - after all city planning was a thing - even though mostly for aesthetic reasons. I'm only afraid that it might be another 'save all kinds of mana' idea, as it reduces the amount of development to have the same amount of buildings and later on when development is high allows more buildings per province. imagine how many buildings Russia could build. Hard to balance well.
Other innovations of the EU4 period were in banking: nobody cares for reduced interest per annum; no idea how the public considers passive inflation reduction. Economic already triggers the National Bank event that lets you set loan size.
No reason to replace with National tax. Maybe production, but you get that in many other ideas. Trade you have a whole diplomatic group for.

I don't see how ship related ideas would fit in innovative.

-20% policy cost

This would mean that policies cost 0,8 mana monthly. Little at first glance. Up to 5 policies can be active at a time - total of 1 mana/month saved.
The reason I don't think that multiple ideas that more or less for sure reduce the mana you spend across all the types in one idea group is good: it very easily can be turned into a definite pick every game. If it already has tech cost reduction, don't give it idea cost reduction or development cost reduction as well - or it becomes a 'pick one group and reduce mana costs everywhere'.

 

[saegoto]

we also don't have +1 leader siege idea in any idea groups

 

[Necrow]

we also don't have +1 leader siege idea in any idea groups

It used to be in offensive, but was changed to siege ability when the stat was introduced. You can get it as part of Offensive + Innovative policy (together with 10% siege ability). Mentioning because it's something that devs would consider when rebalancing the idea group.

 

[Swosh]

The reason I don't think that multiple ideas that more or less for sure reduce the mana you spend across all the types in one idea group is good: it very easily can be turned into a definite pick every game. If it already has tech cost reduction, don't give it idea cost reduction or development cost reduction as well - or it becomes a 'pick one group and reduce mana costs everywhere'.

I totally agree with you about the concept that an idea group shouldnt have too much monarch points reduction, however i wouldnt say that having 5% tech cost and 10% idea cost which is slightly worse than 10% tech cost is too much monarch point reduction. Concidering the Administative group has 10% Admin tech reduction and -25% core creation cost I wouldnt really say that should be a problem.

Also Concidering some countrys (France, Bohemia etc...) has 10% tech cost reduction in only 1 national idea and you have to use 2 ideas in a group to achive the same thing, your basically wasting 1 idea in order to almost achive what they have.

 

[Swosh]

This would mean that policies cost 0,8 mana monthly. Little at first glance. Up to 5 policies can be active at a time - total of 1 mana/month saved.

True, but if you have 5 policys active at once your monarch powers is really going to be drained anyways. Im not saying 20% is the right number though i just liked the idea, it would have to be tested first to find the right precentage. Also i think it would be less abusive than for example the policy time reduction where you could then add for example military policys while at war and then just instanly remove it afterwards.

 

[Necrow]

10% Admin tech reduction and -25% core creation cost

That's in one group only though, and a large part of the group is devoted to mercenaries which makes it quite situational imo. You're right, some countries do have such ideas, but that's what makes them unique, right? And you're not always playing France or Bohemia. You don't always have to match their tech costs. And imagine what France, Bohemia or other nations with similar NI might achieve. I'm also afraid that if you have cost reduction for all tech groups and for ideas then the idea group risks becoming a must-have in second to every game. If you look at innovative now, theoretically it reduces mana costs in 4 places (numbers 3, 5, 6 and 7; the inflation is useless, the war exhaustion might be converted to time instead (or core-costs) and the leader is situational, Kings and Heirs can lead too after all) but only one reduces in all - paper, bird and sword. Don't forget that the group also triggers events that further decrease tech costs or give mana.

Do you really find that your monarch point pool is drained/brought to a stall that quickly with policies on? My experience has been somewhat different. And it's not a lucky abundance of good rulers. I'm wondering if it's possible to even implement a reduction to policy costs. Also base time for disabling a policy is 10 years. Doesn't feel like a switch: on - off freely at will. Nonetheless you're right cost reduction would be less abusive than cooldown reduction.