I have not played in almost a year, I had made some mods (not published, just for myself) but stopped at cultures because I read they were FINALLY getting a revamp, cultures like USA which is laughably weak were getting a buff. I decided to check out the game again, the first thing I did was look up cultures to see the buffs they got and... nothing. Nothing has changed. I could have sworn a year ago a patch was coming "soon" to fix the cultures. What is the status now? As far as I can see, the garbage cultures are still garbage and the OP ones are still OP. 

a lot of cultures have received revamps. USA for example is now much stronger militarily with each Defense Agency buffing bombardment so you can easily destroy anyone with artillery, battleships and planes. Culture is not 100% perfect IMHO (I still play with balancing mods) but it is certainly better than one year ago

Americans - Humankind (fandom.com)  Is this website out of date then? It says nothing about that, and still shows the awful 1 gold bonus per trade route, possibly the worst bonus in the game. Even 5g barely makes a difference at that stage of the game. 

Yes, that site is out of date. You're better using the official encyclopedia at https://humankind-encyclopedia.games2gether.com/en-us/. For the Americans, the biggest bonus was in their special district:

A few of those badboys and you'll be blasting anyone into orbit with your bombardment and missiles.

Ok, thanks. I checked several sites and they all showed no culture changes, I guess they were all out of date sites. Thanks for the link. The fact that American Exceptionalism was not buffed is disappointing, its pretty worthless, a lot of other cultures still need some help it seems, but at least these are steps in the right direction. I still do not understand their love for the Soviets. Russians/Soviets were NEVER strong in equal numbers with anyone, they only win on massive numbers, or are saved by their enormous size and terrible winters. Germany had a much better kill ratio vs them in WW2, they don't have the same restrictions to warfare America has and STILL lost in Afghanistan, and they are failing in Ukraine. How do they get +3 combat strength is beyond me. -1 pop cost per unit and -30% unit cost would make a lot more sense, just spam a lot of units for cheap. Did they at least cap the +1 strength per weapon to like 5 or can they still go crazy with that? 

nope, the weapon bonus is till uncapped, but it only works in allied territory - the moment the soviet army steps in enemy territory the bonus drops to zero.

Well, the bonus drops to their default +3, which I also think is too much. If not for the fact that LTs generally don't have negative effects (maybe aside of nomads), I'd really think something like -2 CS would fit them better, so it's extremely hard to dislodge them from their own territory, but they have it harder to invade anyone.

I'm not sure that I like that the "balance" was making Americans similarly insanely OP but in a different field, but that's neither here nor there.

Yes, the +3  is global, and it stacks. Thats exactly why I nerfed it to +1 in my mod (vanilla improvement project).

docktorkain wrote:

Yes, the +3  is global, and it stacks. Thats exactly why I nerfed it to +1 in my mod (vanilla improvement project).

Ok thanks for the reply. I know your mod, I like a lot of your ideas and strongly disagree with others, I made a similar mod for myself, I'm working on a mod now for my personal use. Ill likely do like... + 10 money and science per military base AND airfield next to Defense Agency, but nerf the damage to 1. Not sure why America gets no science bonuses seeing as first to flight, first microchip, first to moon first to mars first (good) stealth etc etc. 

Care to say what you strongly disagree? Feedback is always nice

docktorkain wrote:

Care to say what you strongly disagree? Feedback is always nice

Sorry for the late reply. I'd have to reexamine the mod, but as I recall, I agree with one of the posters in the comments section, things like this: 

4) Charcoal Kiln: +1 Industry per adjacent Maker's -> +1 Industry per adjacent Farmer's
5) High Furnace: Added -1 Stability per adjacent Maker's Quarters 

I feel were unnecessary, while I understand your reasoning, I think it goes against the base ideas of the game (industry is industry, food is food) Would the AI understand the -1 stability from the makers quarter? It might hurt it I don't know the answer here.

I liked a lot of the changes like Taxation office going to 1 gold per pop, or Harbor being 1 food per coastal tile. I remember thinking that's what it should of been when the game came out and we had no mod tools  
As for units, I agree with some of your ideas (like nerfing the Egyptians Unit) and others I don't, 41 str for the Varangian Guards is way too strong. Personally, I think emblematic units should give an edge, not allow steamrolling so I nerfed a lot of them in my mod. I also did things like lower artillery combat strength but give is strength from attacking (they can dish it but not take it, just like real life) I could give you the full list of what I think on discord or something if you want, its a lot to type out here. However that said I appreciate what you do and overall I think your mod is a vast improvement over the base game.