Productive Scale needs some Enhancements

[calmon]

I played a good amount of MP games and i used a large range of different scales. But one scale is an autoset to me: Sloth 3 - whatever i play. Even with resource haevy nations i go rather to an Awe Combat Pretender/Bless Strategy than to use the productive scale.

The main problem with productive: Its ok (and not more) in early game but quite useless in mid/lategame. With a good amount of fortresses and conquered neighbored provinces gold is the limited factor and not resources. In addition mages becomes important and they don't need much out of your forges.

Well there were already a boost/nerf but i think its not enough. The productive scale should be further improved and the sloth scale further worsen.

Maybe with something like in productive dominion your armour/weapon is well maintained and oiled so you got a bonus. In sloth everyone is too lazy and there is a malus for armor/weapon.
Equal to the magic/drain scale and the MR malus/bonus.

Or in productive provinces your army is supported more effective and needs less upkeep (more in sloth)

Or maybe just some code friendly increased income bonus.

[CUnknown]

I love your idea about armies needing decreased/increased support $ per turn if in a Productivity/Sloth dominion (maybe 10, 20, and 30%?) However, I don't think the code can handle this, especially if mages wouldn't be affected by it (and they shouldn't be).

Perhaps a simpler idea would be to just increase the amount of resources/cash it gives, like the last thing you said.

Another idea might be to increase/decrease castle construction time. If it was 1 turn per level (minimum 1 turn of course), that would be huge! A 3-production nation would be cranking out expensive castles instantly, whereas a 3-sloth nation would never be able to build castles anywhere near the front lines.. a 6-7 turn construction time would turn a risky move into basically something that is not worth even trying.

Or a 10% per level increase/decrease in all building (castle, temple, lab) costs? That would be a nice bonus as well.

[Sombre]

If production scale helped with buildings, that would make it more useful, that's for sure.

It could also help with construction spells the same way that growth scale increases the potency of some spells. So in production 3 you get more mechanical men or whathaveyou.

I don't think it should run over into forging, because that's too hard to balance, but improving construction summons would be neat.

[llamabeast]

Hmm, I often take production. Almost always in fact. Interesting.

[Lazy_Perfectionist]

Play Late Era Atlantis, and tell me gold is still the limiting factor. The most expensive commander outside of capitals is sacred, 130 gold. All your ice infantry cost 10-16 gold, but lots of resources. You do have Mournful, but those are often neglected in favor of troops that have morale.

That said, I really do like the idea of having scales affect production. But 8 turns? That'll be brutal.

[Zeldor]

It would be 9 for C'tis biggest fort http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/tongue.gif Gold reduction or defense/admin increase for forts would be nice.

[SlipperyJim]

Production is more important early in the game than late in the game, I agree. But that doesn't mean it's underpowered. An early-game advantage can easily snowball into a late-game advantage by allowing you to expand faster than your opponents.

Anyway, the main point here is that mundane troops become less and less useful as the game progresses. But that's always been true since Dom:PPP ... it's just a part of the game.

[DrPraetorious]

As with Drain, I'd suggest a staggered scale:

Prod-3 - -2 turns to build forts, fort cost -30%
Prod-2 - -1 turn to build forts, fort cost -20%
Prod-1 - -1 turn to build forts, fort cost -10%
Sloth-1 - +1 turn to build forts, fort cost +10%
Sloth-2 - +1 turn to build forts, fort cost +20%
SLoth-3 - +2 turns to build forts, fort cost +30%

This would, at the very least, discourage people from taking Sloth-3 and get them to take Sloth-2 instead.

It would make Sloth-1 and Prod-2 very rare/undesirable choices, as with Drain, which bothers some people but not me.

[Twan]

SlipperyJim said:
Production is more important early in the game than late in the game, I agree. But that doesn't mean it's underpowered. An early-game advantage can easily snowball into a late-game advantage by allowing you to expand faster than your opponents.



Yes but with the 120 points for constr 3 you can take an awake SC pretender instead of a dormant god, and it snowballs as well.

Personnally I don't use sloth 3 all the time but even with ressource heavy nations rarely takes more than prod 1.

Another idea (simple as the code is there) : actually only growth/death affect population, when most other factors (except magic) are affected by 2 or more scales, even if one is more powerful (ex : supplies by temperature and g/d, income by all, etc...). Let's say production now gives +/- 0,1 population in addition to actual bonuses, it would make it a good pick to reduce the death effect or attain maximal growth, and would give an endgame interest to production (production... of childs http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif ).

ps : the fort idea is better, but harder to implement I think

[Zeldor]

DrPraetorious:

I think that even only cost reduction would be nice. But then it should include temples and labs.

[BesucherXia]

I think some new methods "exchanging" resources into gems can help a lot, since gems are definitely more valuable than gold in later game.
Like a special spell or command to force labors asssiting mages searching gems: the more productive, the more chance to collect extra gems later.

This can also be great trait for some limited nations (ulm be the first in my mind). As someone like me finds LA of too less content, why not employ some ideas alike to expand it (means new nations & new strategy)?

[DrPraetorious]

Cost reduction would be nice, no question.

But would that *ever* be enough to get you to take Productivity instead of order? I kinda doubt it, with rare exceptions - LA or EA Ermor, Abysia with some strats, it'd make Productivity worth considering as Pangaea, although still not worth it.

The key, I think, rather than nerfing Order, is to give positive scales a synergistic benefit.

So the population increase from Growth is multiplicative with the money bonus from Order. There are a set of really cool events that require Order - making Order/Fortune worth considering. If Productivity made forts faster to build, that would be very multiplicative with order and with order+growth, as you could then usefully spend all that cash you were raking in. If they're just cheaper or more expensive, you'd tend to take Order/Sloth since you have the money to afford the forts anyway.

[Micah]

One issue with the fort idea is that it's dominion dependent, so high-production nations with low dominion scores could have to go to a good deal of trouble to get their dominion in place to build an expansion fort, while bless-nations can avoid the sloth penalty the same way. Only Awe-based SCs with sloth are likely to feel the effects of the change, since they tend to have a ton of dominion spread. It would be nice for production to matter more beyond the first 10 turns though.

[CUnknown]

I don't think we need Productivity to be competitive with Order. It is okay, imo, for some scales to be better than the others, it's just that the disparity in this case is a little extreme. Especially in the late game. As in, Productivity is a worthless waste of points once you reach endgame, and Order to recruit and maintain mages is very valuable.

So, a nice little benefit like decreased castle construction time and/or cost would go a long way to removing the problem here, I think.

[Reverend Zombie]

What if the pretender-point cost for prod/sloth were decreased, and its benefits kept the same?

[zlefin]

would increasing the resource %/level from 15 to something like 20, or 30 help at all?

I haven't gotten to late game MP to hvae experience, so i cna only hypothesize here.

Part of the issue is that mages and summons get better per cost over the game, but troops never do (aside from improved buff spells). Though i can't think of any good way in the code to make better troops available with research.

Are you guys pondering without any mods, or sometimes considering how it plays with conceptual balance mod?

cuz alot of the very heavy armor units suffer major defense and mobility penalties for it. and cutting down on those may make the production moer useful late game. or is it just that castle proliferation provides enough resources.

Have you tested how useful prod scales are if you adjust the base resource value so resources are simply less common?

i'll see if i can come up with any other ideas.

[DrPraetorious]

Points cost for individual scales cannot be modded; I believe we've been told that this is not going to change.

The prod/scale level of sloth is already so high that if you raised it, sloth-3 would become unviable for any nation that even uses its troops. A nation with sloth-3 already has half the army of a nation with no sloth - making this penalty bigger just discourages people from fielding heavy infantry.

This would have the undesirable effect of making a choice unviable (which is not good), and also of encouraging strategies where you don't use troops at all, or don't use heavy infantry.

It would be nice if the positive productivity scales were bigger than the negative sloth scales.

[zlefin]

how about having some magic sites that allow recruitment of units made entirely out of resources? some sort of mechanical constructs or so. that way gold as a limiting factor wouldn't be an issue. pure upside for having production scales. at least if you find one of the sites.

what about putting in siege weapons to the game? like catapults and stuff, with very heavy resource costs.
just soem more ideas.

[DrPraetorious]

I've got a mod nation that has both of those things - it's late age Carthacia.

There are already a few specific nations that want productivity - LA Man, for exmaple, cares a *lot* - but that doesn't address the broader issue of not enough people taking Productivity-3.

People taking Sloth-3 a lot doesn't actually bother me, by the way - it's the lack of interest in Prod-3 outside of a few specialized nations that concerns me.

[Sir_Dr_D]

I agree that the construction time/cost of forts should be affected by the production scale.

I also think that growth/death should effect maintaince cost of troops. So with growth you can more easily afford larger armies.

The magic scale needs a boost as well. Right now in the long run you get more magic research from creating another fort and lab from your order income, then if you took turmoil/magic. If magic did something else like effect your gem income (silghtly), effect the cost of labs, or increased the chances of a recruitable mage getting a random path, it would make things more interesting.


With changes like the above it would no longer be a no brainer to take order 3 every time.

[KissBlade]

I have to agree that in base game, sloth 3 is auto for me. When cb bumped it to 15% it made me more wary of it but base, I just look for a forest/mountain neighbor. Oh no.

[Micah]

How about bumping the gold modifier to 4% instead of the current 2? That would certainly increase the effect of the scale, as sloth-3 it would offset nearly 2 points of order instead of just one. Might sting enough to make it less of an auto-pick, and would help out nations that do take production, which are generally somewhat hindered due to the points they have to spend on it instead of a bless/SC.

[Folket]

I like prod 3. I use it in several games and it works fine. I think it nice to have in a endgame as well as I can recruit my armies where I want them and do not have to waste time shuttling armies around.

[Sir_Dr_D]

Production can help you a lot in the early game. And if your best troops and sacreds are capital only, production becomes more valuable.

[K]

Sir_Dr_D said:
The magic scale needs a boost as well. Right now in the long run you get more magic research from creating another fort and lab from your order income, then if you took turmoil/magic. If magic did something else like effect your gem income (silghtly), effect the cost of labs, or increased the chances of a recruitable mage getting a random path, it would make things more interesting.



Magic scales does effect gem income. Random events that give you gems happen far more frequently in a Magic dominion, and there is an event where you lose gems that only occurs in a Drain dominion ("Magic is fading and some of your gems have lost power", or something like that).

[Twan]

I don't think magic or growth need a boost. For many nations magic 3 changes the main researcher type (allow to use a very cost effective mages instead of expensive combat ones for research and stay in the race for uniques items/summons ; and you gain lots of gold with the smaller cost/upkeep). And growth is teh endgame scale (of course less usefull in games of short duration but the best to have if you plan to play 60 or more turns).

Also the two have synergic effects not only with order (more mages or more income/pop) but with luck (awesome events adding pop or regular income with growth ; luck 3 growth 3 even with turmoil 3 beats order 3 by far in the long run).

[mathusalem]

I disagree with you Twan, when you said "luck 3 growth 3 even with turmoil 3 beats order 3 by far in the long run".

It's depend first of the map's size : luck is more useful in little map, but the game will be shorter.

And *if* you are right and the combo T3G3L3 beats O3, you have paid 3 scales more for what ? a probability. I prefer certitude http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

[vfb]

I just got 6000 free gold this turn from two provinces, plus one of the items was a clam. Woo hoo! Of course, I'll never get a double-3000 gold event month in MP http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/frown.gif.

Turmoil-3 Cold-1 Growth-1 Luck-3 Drain-3 in one province.
Turmoil-3 Growth-1 Luck-3 Drain-3 in the other province.

[mathusalem]

and you never get a 3000 gold when you need it http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

[Sir_Dr_D]

Twan said:
I don't think magic or growth need a boost. For many nations magic 3 changes the main researcher type (allow to use a very cost effective mages instead of expensive combat ones for research and stay in the race for uniques items/summons ; and you gain lots of gold with the smaller cost/upkeep). And growth is teh endgame scale (of course less usefull in games of short duration but the best to have if you plan to play 60 or more turns).

Also the two have synergic effects not only with order (more mages or more income/pop) but with luck (awesome events adding pop or regular income with growth ; luck 3 growth 3 even with turmoil 3 beats order 3 by far in the long run).




But magic and growth are concidered secondary to order. After someone has taken order, and they have points left they may take magic or growth. But how many people would take growth or magic, but have not put anything on the order scale.

[Tharsonius]

Sir_Dr_D said:
But magic and growth are concidered secondary to order. After someone has taken order, and they have points left they may take magic or growth. But how many people would take growth or magic, but have not put anything on the order scale.



Looks like I'm one of the few people who did it - in 2 of my MP games running http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/fear.gif

Still learning the game...

[WonderLlama]

Sir_Dr_D said:
But magic and growth are concidered secondary to order. After someone has taken order, and they have points left they may take magic or growth. But how many people would take growth or magic, but have not put anything on the order scale.


I would also do this, with magic. Getting the right magic scale for my researchers is my single top priority. Of course, that's going to be very different depending on the research score of my preffered national research mage. I won't always want magic at all. But then again, I haven't yet played a serious strategy in which I couldn't afford my preffered magic scale and order. And I'm also a newbie.

[llamabeast]

I also often would put Magic-3 ahead of Order-3 for certain races. Don't think I would ever put Growth ahead of order though.

I'm not sure these things are half so cut-and-dried as people are making out. Maybe I just play sub-optimally. I tend to do fairly well though.

[Baalz]

Yeah, all the scales obviously are strat/nation dependent, but I think the people who "never" take a certain scale is more a testament to the player's temperament and playstyle than anything else.

Luck/Order loses some synergy but can be a reasonable choice in certain situations - say Arcoscephale. You've already got a pretty good magic diversity and great initial expansion, your ROI for investing in a pretender is lower. Though of course others would play it differently I think you have a hard time making the case that Luck/Order is not a competitive strategy.

Similarly, productivity can situationally be very useful. I know everybody is typically down on MA Ulm but leaving that argument aside for a second I can't imagine trying to play them with a sloth scale. Another example would be a Sauromatia strategy with an early/mid game built around the cap-only poison archers which I've personally employed to good effect. Even after you've captured every border to your cap you're still recruiting the max every turn and putting each unit to good use. You've got some great resource intensive heavy cavalry at the rest of your castles. Again, there are obviously other ways to play it but this is a competitive strategy compared to an expansion pretender particularly when you remember the income boost that is bundled with productivity.

Magic/growth vs order, again, situation. If I'm taking a race who's prospects are tied to MR rolls (like, say, R'yleh) I generally consider the magic scale to be more important than order. If I'm gonna have a lot of expensive old mages I usually prioritize growth over order once you consider the opportunity cost of mage replacement and long term population growth.

[CUnknown]

I agree, Baalz. No one is trying to argue that Productivity is never useful.. it's just that it is less so, more often, than the other scales except maybe growth. Especially in the late game where productivity is basically worthless, even for MA Ulm.

Take this example. Order is generally accepted to be the best scale by most people. I'd go so far as to say that any strategy which uses Turmoil is suspect as far as being competitive. I mean, you can't just take Turmoil off the cuff without a specialized strategy (such as Turmoil/Luck, and/or Pangea's menaeds) and expect to compete. The points you get from Turmoil simply aren't worth being spent anywhere else than on buying back your Order again.

Think about Productivity/Sloth again. Imagine if someone said, "Any strategy using Sloth is suspect as far as viability!" http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/confused.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/tongue.gif http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/biggrin.gif

That is just so funny it makes me giggle. Like for 60-70% or more of strategies, you can take Sloth and just spend those points elsewhere and be probably even more competitive.

I'd say Magic is somewhere in the middle. You can take Drain, you can take Magic, it sort of doesn't matter -- I mean it depends on your strategy and your race.

So, it seems clear that Productivity could use a boost. Back to the Ulm situation, if we boost Productivity, Ulm gets boosted as well, cause they always take Prod-3. So, it's a win-win.

[VedalkenBear]

Actually, I'd have to say that even when I play Ulm, I don't generally take Production-3. I certainly don't take Sloth, but I find that I don't need to take Production at all and still do fine.

That should say something about how subpar the Production scale is.

[DrPraetorious]

All of the level-3 negative scales are a *major* drawback.

For most strategies, Sloth-3 is the least major. There are obviously a few situations (Pangaea) where it isn't much of a drawback at all, but that's got to be figured into the game. It's still a huge penalty, though, as EA Ermor, for example, I generally do take Sloth-3, but it's not like I'm happy to get -50% principes out of my forts. If you made sloth-3 any *bigger* penalty it would be completely impossible to play as a sloth-3 nation unless you had an awake SC pretender to expand, and *that* is not desirable either, so I don't think Sloth-3 needs to be made any worse. It's just understood that, for many nations, Sloth-3 is the least-crippling of the major drawbacks you can take.

OTOH, Productivity-3 is taken quite seldom. I take it as LA Ulm, LA or MA Jotunheim, and LA Pangaea, and I take it near-last among the positive scales that I do take.

So Productivity-3 should be better. I think reduced fort construction time and building costs would be an ideal benefit - the fact that a construction time penalty for Sloth wouldn't really come up much doesn't bother me, b/c I actually want to reward Productivity rather than punish Sloth.

[Sir_Dr_D]

I like Micah's suggestion earlier. Since the devs aren't likely to chnage the production scale the only way we can mod it is to make the production scale change the income by 4%.

[vfb]

CUnknown said:
Take this example. Order is generally accepted to be the best scale by most people. I'd go so far as to say that any strategy which uses Turmoil is suspect as far as being competitive. I mean, you can't just take Turmoil off the cuff without a specialized strategy (such as Turmoil/Luck, and/or Pangea's menaeds) and expect to compete.



What strategies would you choose Turmoil for? I'd be really likely to go Turmoil3 & Luck3 in MP with EA or LA Mictlan, or LA Ermor. I'll go Turmoil3 & Luck3 in SP with almost any nation, just for the fun events.


The points you get from Turmoil simply aren't worth being spent anywhere else than on buying back your Order again.




Points you get from Turmoil can be worth it to get a nice double bless when your sacreds are dirt cheap.

[HotNifeThruButr]

As far as I can tell, the problem is that

A. Gold/research is always a suitable substitute for resources. The effect is about the same if you, for example, took a handful of resource-heavy Hastati out of your army and put in a gold-heavy Hydra or took a handful of armored soldiers out for a mage that can hurl fireballs/summon monsters.

B. Gold/research has uses beyond the function of resources, which it can already substitute for. You can build fortresses with gold and researched summons are powerful enough to make all troops look like chaff.

From a theoretical point of the view, the only way to fix the scale problem, then, would be to make it so resources has a unique function. This can be done with modding, by manipulating the spell book and the units that may be recruited.

If summoned monsters were less powerful, the "early game" would be effectively extended, since troops would be useful for longer, though this wouldn't make it go on forever, since summons, as a rule, get more powerful while troops do not. The same goes for modding troops to be more powerful.

But those are inelegant solutions that do not solve the problem, only applies shoddy bandaids to it. I would prefer it if Resources were given a whole different function to fulfill that is unique to it and can't be subsituted by gold or research.

What if Resources were directly used to build fortifications instead of or along with money? Perhaps you pay your cash for a castle, but to physically construct it and presumably to arm it with your national weapons, you need resources taken from the province?

Perhaps labs and temples cost resources along with gold?

Perhaps there is some sort of building, maybe an Arsenal that only consumes resources? Perhaps it had a useful and desirable function?

[Sombre]

Turmoil - Luck is more attractive when running something like Worthy Heroes 1.8, which makes Hero units well worth having. But it isn't a major factor I guess.

I went with turmoil 3 luck 3 in a recent game using pythium MA and did very well - I got virtually all good events about gems, gold and items, while qm got bad events + freespawn events with the same build using Pangaea (for the screaming women).

[vfb]

LA Ulm has 3 nice heroes even without the WH mod, I'll take Luck-3 with them just to get a shot at snagging the Blood Marshal.

[CUnknown]

Yeah, you would never take Turmoil without Luck. That would pretty much be suicide. But taking Sloth without ... what? is perfectly viable and is just about no problem whatsoever, especially in the late game.

Taking Turmoil, more than any other negative scale imo, requires that you do x, y, or z to be viable. Taking Sloth requires you to do not a whole lot of anything to be viable.

I would never take Turmoil for the purposes of a double-bless. Just take a single 9 bless and throw in a 4 and keep your cash money. I almost can't imagine a situation where that wouldn't be better, unless you were planning on Turmoil/Luck anyway. And in that case you pretty much bought Turmoil to pay for Luck, not for your bless. But of course this is just my opinion.

I disagree that Sloth shouldn't be made worse. It should hurt you as much as any other negative scale, as much as Misfortune-3 (which can be a killer), Drain-3 (no research sucks), Turmoil-3 (we already went over that one), etc.

Sloth shouldn't be made any worse than Productivity is made better, though.

[Wokeye]

HotNifeThruButr said:
I would prefer it if Resources were given a whole different function to fulfill that is unique to it and can't be subsituted by gold or research.



What about increased weapon/armour stats for troops, thus making regular troops 'upgradeable'? This way they'd be more useful in the midgame too?

What about training for troops? Using a general's turn + resources to give experience to lesser troops?

[Tharsonius]

DrPraetorious said:
For most strategies, Sloth-3 is the least major. There are obviously a few situations (Pangaea) where it isn't much of a drawback at all, but that's got to be figured into the game. It's still a huge penalty, though, as EA Ermor, for example, I generally do take Sloth-3, but it's not like I'm happy to get -50% principes out of my forts. If you made sloth-3 any *bigger* penalty it would be completely impossible to play as a sloth-3 nation unless you had an awake SC pretender to expand, and *that* is not desirable either, so I don't think Sloth-3 needs to be made any worse. It's just understood that, for many nations, Sloth-3 is the least-crippling of the major drawbacks you can take.




Why sloth-3 especially for EA Ermor? How do you expand early? SC pretender? You can use gladiators, but then you need new reenforcements for every indi province you take, that will slow you down too.

[VedalkenBear]

Re: Turmoil and Luck, I seemed to get the best results out of the Void Gate when I have them both. So Rlyeh is quite possibly a nation that can use the scales.

[mathusalem]

but without a lot of gold, you'll have a lot of problem to mass troops with R'lyeh.

[Sombre]

If you're looking to have fun with crossbreeding luck-turmoil makes sense too.

[Baalz]

It's kinda funny that so many people are anti-productivity. Without a doubt there are *many* situations where your initial expansion is resource constrained. If you don't have an expansion pretender, and your unit recruiting is resource constrained (a fairly common scenario, pretty much anybody who is relying on heavy infantry/cavalry) then 50% more resources means 50% more troops means 50% more expansion. To those saying productivity isn't very worthwhile, I ask how worthwhile is it to have 50% more provinces on turn 12? Sending out an expansion force every 2 rounds instead of every 3 for your initial expansion is *huge*. The usefulness often does scale back rapidly at that point, but many have argued that the benefits of a strong start often outweigh longer term strengths. Longer term benefits include needing less castles (depending on your commander recruitment needs), and having a heavier mix of units than you'd normally have. *lots* of nations have very heavy infantry who's resource requirements usually relegate them to just being the core of a larger force, with productivity that core is larger.

[Kristoffer O]

Tharsonius said:

Sir_Dr_D said:
But magic and growth are concidered secondary to order. After someone has taken order, and they have points left they may take magic or growth. But how many people would take growth or magic, but have not put anything on the order scale.



Looks like I'm one of the few people who did it - in 2 of my MP games running http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/fear.gif

Still learning the game...



And you learned it well. I have Turmoil 1 and Death 3 in my current game. Luck and some magic as well. Edit: and some prod.

The problem with all these forum fan boys is thet they don't know how to relax.

Death 3 id fun! Everyone will succumb to Unity, He Who Is At The Center. Everyone will get old (particulary my abysian mages). This is democratic. No mages will stay in power for more than a year! Take that Putin!'

In other words. Winning doesn't have much to do with your scales. It is your feel and flow that makes you a winner! Scales are mostly there to annoy and encourage you.

Edit: Also, there is a lot of considering going on here. Just relax and let the considerers consider themselves to death while you win the game. Works fine. And when it doesn't, just sign up for a new game http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/happy.gif

[CUnknown]

Baalz, I trying not to disagree, honest!

But..but.. are you really saying that Productivity is worthy, is the same way that Order, or Magic, or even Luck are worthy?

I agree that early expansion is extremely important. Productivity can certainly help with that, but so can other things: an awake combat pretender, cheap bless troops, good archers like Longbowmen, low-resource effective troops like Ilithids or something like that, etc.

If I had no low-res cost units, no longbows or Marignon crossbows, no cheap bless troops, and I still felt the need for a good early expansion, I would invest my points in a good combat pretender -- and that's a gift that keeps on giving past turn 12. And of course rapid early expansion is not always even necessary.

There are other, better ways to get what Productivity gives you.

[Baalz]

Well, everyone is entitled to their opinion, but I might argue that there are *other* ways to get what productivity gives you. I'm not saying productivity is "da bomb", just that it is a viable alternative in a lot of situations to going with an expansion pretender or taking order-3. If you're going with lower resource troops (certainly a viable strategy) you'll often need more of them to be effective so you're spending more gold and have more upkeep whittling away the benefit of order over productivity. Sometimes you don't have the option of recruiting elsewhere - cap only troops or good indies so your recruitment is permanently resource constrained. Sometimes you are both gold and resource restricted - ie you can afford 10 infantry but if you had more resources you'd get heavy infantry rather than medium. How much more effective is a LA Arco heavy elephant than 10 light infantry? It's not a linear progression, sometimes the sweet spot just requires a certain amount of resources.

Order-3 vs Prod-3, 15% more gold and lower randoms vs 50% more resources. Does the higher resources combine to boost your expansion, reduce your troop cost, and reduce your castling needs by 15%? Perhaps, as I said it's a situational decision. Perhaps I want to take luck scales. Perhaps I need an imprisoned pretender for other reasons. Perhaps I've got really crappy non-cap national mages and don't plan to put up many castles to recruit them. Do I always take productivity? Of course not, but I think the people claiming it's never a competitive choice are silly.

[calmon]

Thanks for all the responses!

Well different strategies always play a main role in building the pretender with his dominion. I agree that with some stragies and special nations productivity 3 makes sence.

However for most nations this bonus is to small for the invest in my eyes. Maybe a small/medium buff can help this scale being more used in a positive way.