While it's true that Paradox can change any number before release, we've also seen just how malleable the numbers are after release—apparently the enormous community hive mind can tear apart balance more efficiently than the smaller though more focused development hive mind. 
So I made a thread where I said that Warrior Culture was hilariously underpowered at just +20% army damage (and it could easily be +60% and still not be all that valuable), but there are other Civics I've noticed to be problematic to balance.
A big pair is Environmentalist, which reduces consumer good costs by 10%, and Mining Guilds, which increases empire mineral production by 10%. Assuming Mining Guilds increases all mineral production by 10%, if you have at least one mineral being produced per Pop you'd be better off going with it even if you had Utopian living standards (you'll note that the break point here where Environmentalist and Mining Guilds are equal is when you're spending all of your minerals before traits and ethics on consumer goods, and it just gets worse for Environmentalist the less you're spending).
Even if Mining Guilds isn't quite a 10% boost and you were fanatically egalitarian with a conservational main species, you'd still need to be spending a big chunk of your minerals on consumer goods for Environmentalist to be better.
That isn't the problem though: the problem is that with these two civics, at any point in the game I could sit down with a calculator and figure out which was better. Slaver Guilds and Mining Guilds are also very similar, though there's an interesting tradeoff of minerals for food (and the tantalizing possibility of making almost all of your minerals with slaves at the cost of unrest and troop maintenance).
I'd rather civics, Environmentalist and Mining Guilds in particular, be balanced like Parliamentary System and Cutthroat Politics are: again, I could sit down with a calculator and figure out which will give me more Influence, but Cutthroat Politics will always give me that extra Influence while Parliamentary System requires that I keep my factions happy. It ties me more closely to the faction system, but promises upside if I can manage it well.
If Mining Guilds were to, rather than giving that flat bonus instead gave a unique building that basically let us put a second, stacking mineral processing plant on a planet – or if it simply gave us +1 mineral per mining station – we'd be playing differently, as opposed to doing what we always do but getting 10% more minerals. Again, we can use a calculator to determine which gets us more minerals at a given time, but to take advantage of Mining Guilds we'd be changing our actions while Environmentalist would be the safe, sure thing.
Also I think Environmentalist should be buffed.
So I made a thread where I said that Warrior Culture was hilariously underpowered at just +20% army damage (and it could easily be +60% and still not be all that valuable), but there are other Civics I've noticed to be problematic to balance.
A big pair is Environmentalist, which reduces consumer good costs by 10%, and Mining Guilds, which increases empire mineral production by 10%. Assuming Mining Guilds increases all mineral production by 10%, if you have at least one mineral being produced per Pop you'd be better off going with it even if you had Utopian living standards (you'll note that the break point here where Environmentalist and Mining Guilds are equal is when you're spending all of your minerals before traits and ethics on consumer goods, and it just gets worse for Environmentalist the less you're spending).
Even if Mining Guilds isn't quite a 10% boost and you were fanatically egalitarian with a conservational main species, you'd still need to be spending a big chunk of your minerals on consumer goods for Environmentalist to be better.
That isn't the problem though: the problem is that with these two civics, at any point in the game I could sit down with a calculator and figure out which was better. Slaver Guilds and Mining Guilds are also very similar, though there's an interesting tradeoff of minerals for food (and the tantalizing possibility of making almost all of your minerals with slaves at the cost of unrest and troop maintenance).
I'd rather civics, Environmentalist and Mining Guilds in particular, be balanced like Parliamentary System and Cutthroat Politics are: again, I could sit down with a calculator and figure out which will give me more Influence, but Cutthroat Politics will always give me that extra Influence while Parliamentary System requires that I keep my factions happy. It ties me more closely to the faction system, but promises upside if I can manage it well.
If Mining Guilds were to, rather than giving that flat bonus instead gave a unique building that basically let us put a second, stacking mineral processing plant on a planet – or if it simply gave us +1 mineral per mining station – we'd be playing differently, as opposed to doing what we always do but getting 10% more minerals. Again, we can use a calculator to determine which gets us more minerals at a given time, but to take advantage of Mining Guilds we'd be changing our actions while Environmentalist would be the safe, sure thing.
Also I think Environmentalist should be buffed.
