looking for your opinion on Fascism - part II

[Ision]

It appears that the intent of my first thread has been lost. What I was looking for were opinions on changing Fascism to 'paid labour' , not on the value of the Government as it stands now.

I ask this because I have noticed that the AIs tend very strongly to this government over Commie, and therefore was looking for a way to help the AI - but not to the extent that at Emperor or above you can no longer compete.

Secondly, I was looking for a way to increase the chances of a KAI. But this is less important than the first goal.

Another option I was looking at, perhaps less radical than the 'paid labor' , is to Flag the 'Standard Trade Bonus' under Governments in the editor. this would give Fasicsim the economy and science reseach power of "Republic' while maintaining it's strong war time ability.

Perhaps this would be a better method of helping the AI without unbalancing the game too far against the human at Emperor or above.

Any and all opinions are welcome.

Ision

[Ision]

* error - please excuse

[furrykef]

The problem was/is that it's hard to know how balance Fascism if we can't even agree it's out of balance in the first place. I think it may still be a bit too early to tell.

Although, if we were to agree it is out of balance, I just thought of something, though I don't think the editor can be used to test it: maybe under Fascism the unhappiness from pop rushing could be less severe (perhaps no longer cumulative?). This might lead to a strategy like the old "despot pop rushing" that existed before vanilla 1.17f, but it wouldn't be so early in the game, so I think it wouldn't be a no-brainer "if you don't do it you will lose" strategy.

Then again, I rarely actually make it that late into the game, so I don't know...

- Kef

[Theseus]

I'd like to see more experience with AI civs' performance under Fascism before messing about with it.

This is just a gut call, but I maintain my thesis that it was designed for the AI. KAIs in particular.

[ChrisiusMaximus]

Ive seen some very heavy use of Fascism by the AI in several games now and they seem to have hundreds of units running around. Not necessarily large AI empires either!!

I think theseus may be right, its helping to create KAI.

I still find it easy enough to maintain democracy and have not dabbled with it yet.

Dont know about emporer and above but I think the AI's that Ive seen using this form of government are really quite strong already.

[lockstep]

Originally posted by Ision
Another option I was looking at, perhaps less radical than the 'paid labor' , is to Flag the 'Standard Trade Bonus' under Governments in the editor. this would give Fasicsim the economy and science reseach power of "Republic' while maintaining it's strong war time ability.

I suspect that the combination of trade bonus and no war weariness is way too powerful. A human player could build up a medium-sized empire and focus on improvements until the early industrial age, then switch to Fascism and go for a killing spree.

Anyway, at the moment we don't really know how good/bad the AI performs under Fascism.

[nbarclay]

Originally posted by lockstep


I suspect that the combination of trade bonus and no war weariness is way too powerful. A human player could build up a medium-sized empire and focus on improvements until the early industrial age, then switch to Fascism and go for a killing spree.

Very much agreed. One of the biggest obstacles to industrial warfare is that infantry/artillery combat leads to serious war weariness problems in Republic or Democracy, while going with some other government sacrifices a lot of commerce needed to compete in the tech race. A government with the commerce of Republic or Democracy and no problems with war weariness would give players the best of both worlds. Massive free unit support on top of that would be icing on the cake.

In games where AIs really need help, we humans rarely leave them enough gold to take much advantage of cash rushing, and my impression is that AIs are a bit reluctant to use cash to rush build in any case. So while switching Fascism from pop rushing to cash rushing might be useful to human players, I'm skeptical that it would help the AIs use it more effectively (unless, perhaps, they're stupid enough in their pop rushing choices that they would be better off not rushing at all).

Nathan

[Jaybe]

The AI needs a hardcoded budget setting where x% of their surplus/gpt-from-other-civs goes into an "upgrade and cash-rush" account. This should be inviolate except to extortion.

x% could be 10-20% if less than 100, 5% if more.

[nbarclay]

Originally posted by Jaybe
The AI needs a hardcoded budget setting where x% of their surplus/gpt-from-other-civs goes into an "upgrade and cash-rush" account. This should be inviolate except to extortion.

x% could be 10-20% if less than 100, 5% if more.

I disagree, at least where cash rushing is concerned. I only cash rush if either (1) I have left-over gold on four-turn research or (2) I have some extra special reason. Setting aside a fixed percentage for rushing would not be good strategy.

[Cerbykins]

On the more 'realistic' side of things, pick the most likely:

Mussolini's in trouble - he needs his tank regiment finished off, or he'll be wide open to invasion...

1) "Hey guys, I REAAAAALLY want this regiment built quick - so here's a back-hander, get it done real quick - thanks guys! "

2) "Build it now, or die. I'm the dictator, you are NOT. *gets out his whip*"

Guess

I can't say arty/infantry style fighting has ever posed a problem for me, but then I insist on dropping ALL defenders to 1 point, and the city to near rubble (for purposes of this issue, the defensive value is gone). Therefore, the risk of losing LOADS units (and so building the WW) is gone.

If you want Fascism ramping up, I still think a few more free support points is the way to go... - but hey - it's just me