Policies

[Pyramid_Head]

So, Wealth of Nations offer us a lot of Policies after completing the Idea. The trick is - now they drain MP. In the recent stream almost no one used them. And I agree - wasting one adm point to get +10 tax income or other bonus is just not worth it. Even if it'll be +30% tax income it will not be worth it. MP is way too valuable to be wasted on a minor bonus. I just hope devs will rework them into something actually useful.

 

[jecjackal]

Ummm what?

 

[Heliocon]

Ummm what?

^ what he said. I am confused...

 

[Pyramid_Head]

Upcoming Wealth of Nations expansion. After completing the Idea you got bonuses, like Forced March ability. Now you get an option to enact various Policies instead, like +10 colonial range or others. But each policy will reduce your MP per month by one.

 

[jecjackal]

Where did you hear this from? I haven't seen a DD.

 

[balmung60]

That sounds like a terrible trade-off. Maybe if it cost 1 MP per year.

 

[Pyramid_Head]

Stream from developers about an hour ago.

 

[Yxklyx]

More uses for money would seem a better way to go. It's often the case I end up with way too much money - rather than too many MPs. I think we should have more decisions that we have to pay for.

 

[Light85]

Even if it'll be +30% tax income it will not be worth it.

It'll be worth it if your tax income is high and +30% tax allows you to upgrade your advisor to the next level and still have some surplus from it.

But all in all, this is yet another buff to the western technology group. Not playing expansionist will usually mean that you have some MP overflow (unless you like to throw them at years ahead penalty) and policies will be a good way to spend them. All other technology groups (other than perhaps eastern) won't have such luxury due to tech penalty though.

So no, if anything, other technology group needs a buff and buffing western further is simply ridiculous as they already roflstomp everyone other than eastern.

 

[kvk]

Seems like a really stupid idea I hope there is a way to get rid of one after you have picked it (if not it's gonna be like you're stuck with terrible rulers forever)

 

[kebzero]

The implementation in the beta, as best as I could grasp it from the stream, is as follows;

* The Decisions that are currently enacted based on a string of conditions (completed Idea groups, certain advisors, monarch stats, finances, one-time monarch point cost) are being transformed into Policies.

* Each combination of any two completed Idea groups enable one Policy. If you have completed, say Administrative and Diplomatic Ideas, that will give you a different policy than if you complete Administrative and Economic. If you complete Administrative, Diplomatic and Economic, you get access to three policies (the combinations of A/D, A/E, D/E). That means there are 105 possible policies, I think, and you get access to more the more Idea groups you finish, at a max of 28 policies per game if you complete all eight idea groups.

* The policies require an upkeep cost in monarch points, similar to excess diplomatic relations and army/navy commanders.

* These Policies are toggled - that is, you can enact one, and later remove it when you're short of points, get a worse monarch or don't need the policy anymore.

Apparently, the reasoning behind this mechanic is that players have an abundance of monarch points (can't say I've ever experienced that luxury), and that the new system will mean an active component where you enact a policy for when you need it. This latter part I like - you can now enact the Witchcraft Act while converting Rome, then remove it (and its global RR component) once the job is done, or enact a policy to boost discipline while fighting an important war, etc.

However, this system can quickly gimp non-Western nations even further, as those nations struggle to keep up as it is.

 

[Rider_of_Doom]

And again, more improvident stuff for EU IV... The game becomes more and more a big and neverending building lot.

 

[Galu]

They are testing it so It may change. So feedback here is important.

Anyway I think it may be nice tool. However for the non-western countries it gona be another disadvantage. Also If it will cost 1 MP/month even western tech barly will have points to spend on it. Especially admin points during vast conquest... I can`t even imagine spending adm points on anything else than coring actually, most points go there...

 

[Tub]

It's kind of bad that there's a constant MP cost. As if they weren't already the biggest limiting factor in the game.

However, if they add more ways to get MP, late game - higher skill advisors, for instance, that wouldn't be ridiculously expensive based on the current cost formula - this'd be great.

 

[Cymsdale]

Toggle discipline bonus policy right before a battle, toggle off afterward. Exploits lol.

 

[Light85]

I can certainly see some advantages to the policy system for the ability of being able to toggle it on when needed, and toggle it off when not.

But there are quite a few clear disadvantages:
1) Tying it to monarch point is a pretty poor decision overall. Abundance of monarch points? What a joke. If you play anything outside of western that would never happen. If you play expansionist that would never happen. If you play western but get gimped by RNG and get a succession of sucky-stat rulers/regency, you wouldn't have it either.
2) Make Western nation more OP, as though they are not overpowered enough.
3) More micromanagement. I'm pretty sure there will be plenty of scenarios where you would want to toggle the policies on and off in between months to be optimal. No thanks, not another curia controller mini-game please. Decision is nice as it's set once and forget.

With that said, policy is not entirely a bad idea but I do think that to implement it, the game needs another new resource (like culture points of Civ V) that is unrelated to monarch points and tech group. Maybe give all nations a set amount of policy points per-year (base is same for all tech groups) with a cap on how much could be stored. The amount could be dependent on empire size (should be harder to enact policy for large empires so less points) and government type. It also shouldn't be possible to boost it by either buildings or monarch points in any way.

 

[balmung60]

Hmm... Just kicking around a few ideas in my head.

First off, how about a soft cap on policies like diplorealtions and generals, so you can have X policies active at no cost. However, you do have to pay upkeep for policies over this cap. Ways to increase the cap, if any, could be ideas (perhaps as part of a change to Aristocratic or something), tech (say, one extra policy every 5 or so levels of ADM tech), and events (giving something like +1 upkeep-free policy for the life of the ruler or 20 years or something.

Tying into this policy soft-cap idea, to keep it from being a "MOAR power to Western" feature (or at least too much of one), each -1 MP a tech group gets gives an upkeep-free policy (so Hordes, Chinese, and Indian get one free policy and Sub-Saharan, Mesoamerican, and South American get 2 free policies).

Part of why I think there needs to be at least some amount of "free" policies is to encourage players to even try them in the first place. If there aren't any, I imagine that many players will simply ignore them in favor of not risking their precious MPs.

 

[Tub]

Hmm... Just kicking around a few ideas in my head.

First off, how about a soft cap on policies like diplorealtions and generals, so you can have X policies active at no cost. However, you do have to pay upkeep for policies over this cap. Ways to increase the cap, if any, could be ideas (perhaps as part of a change to Aristocratic or something), tech (say, one extra policy every 5 or so levels of ADM tech), and events (giving something like +1 upkeep-free policy for the life of the ruler or 20 years or something.

Tying into this policy soft-cap idea, to keep it from being a "MOAR power to Western" feature (or at least too much of one), each -1 MP a tech group gets gives an upkeep-free policy (so Hordes, Chinese, and Indian get one free policy and Sub-Saharan, Mesoamerican, and South American get 2 free policies).

Part of why I think there needs to be at least some amount of "free" policies is to encourage players to even try them in the first place. If there aren't any, I imagine that many players will simply ignore them in favor of not risking their precious MPs.

I'd love this. This right here, this is what we need.

It's shame the devs will never see it :glare:

 

[Nidhoegger]

Why not use money instead of MPs? Maybe 10 gold for the First policy, 50 for the second, 80 for the third and so on. That way, One would use them only as Long as one has enough of the resource and one finds a use for the tons of gold one gest later on.....

 

[MrCommander]

The implementation in the beta, as best as I could grasp it from the stream, is as follows;

* The Decisions that are currently enacted based on a string of conditions (completed Idea groups, certain advisors, monarch stats, finances, one-time monarch point cost) are being transformed into Policies.

* Each combination of any two completed Idea groups enable one Policy. If you have completed, say Administrative and Diplomatic Ideas, that will give you a different policy than if you complete Administrative and Economic. If you complete Administrative, Diplomatic and Economic, you get access to three policies (the combinations of A/D, A/E, D/E). That means there are 105 possible policies, I think, and you get access to more the more Idea groups you finish, at a max of 28 policies per game if you complete all eight idea groups.

* The policies require an upkeep cost in monarch points, similar to excess diplomatic relations and army/navy commanders.

* These Policies are toggled - that is, you can enact one, and later remove it when you're short of points, get a worse monarch or don't need the policy anymore.

Apparently, the reasoning behind this mechanic is that players have an abundance of monarch points (can't say I've ever experienced that luxury), and that the new system will mean an active component where you enact a policy for when you need it. This latter part I like - you can now enact the Witchcraft Act while converting Rome, then remove it (and its global RR component) once the job is done, or enact a policy to boost discipline while fighting an important war, etc.

However, this system can quickly gimp non-Western nations even further, as those nations struggle to keep up as it is.

I would like to throw in another idea here:

What if you tie policies to money. Think about it. In the late game, when you have unlocked policies, you are flush with cash. MP is simply too valuable to be used for anything other than technology, ideas, or expansion. But money is ridiculously abundant. You can even provide an ingame reason for it. For example, in the situation of the +10% discipline policy, the government has decided earmark extra money to train the military.