Kamino72 wrote:

Drullo321 wrote:

If you have a look at the current records in some categories like fastest win on Humankind difficulty dtandard speed, they aren't picked ever. 

For the fastest win, I guess the best strategy is to abuse of the neolithic nomad spam, thus picking your culture last when Harappans are never available.

And we can talk about several other unbalanced/broken mechanics that can outplay Harappans strenghs.

But the point is to compare and balance cultures, all other things being equal.

To be fair, it would probably be wise to start by fixing general unbalanced mechanics before reassessing and ajusting culture powers.

That is what I'm talking about all the time. The game is still new and not all mechanics and game formulas publicy available. There are alot of meta mechanics which should be adressed first. Afterwards there is a high chance the game plays differently, thus cultures feel and play differently and may or not be OP/bad anymore. 

For example, while the turks can easily outclass the swedes in science output, then general scale, especially the science output of both and each other-nonscience orientated contemporary era culture is way too high because of many other multipliers. Which those handled first, the way we look at the balance of cultures may change, same thing may happen with early cultures. 

Cause and effect. The cause should be fixed, not the effects. In this case the effects are that several cultures feel overpowered and other feel underwhelming.

I don't think the Harappans are the most unbalanced civ, to be honest. I think the Mycenean Cyclopean fortress is much more overpowered than anything the harappans do. Their bonuses are heavily dependant on having rivers, and they will give you more food, which in ancient era is important, but not as important as industry. The EQ only gives food which, if compared to the Egyptians' industry + influence, the Nubians industry + money or the Myceneans' industry +  stability is slightly underwhelming. Their emblematic unit is not even that good: you can win a fight against them if you just skip rounds and get the +2 defense bonus (the assyrian raiders are much more useful when bullying enemy scouts and they don't become useless as quickly) and their lack of a more substantial EU later in the era makes the Harappans struggle against a stack of promachoi or sabu sa qasti, not to mention gigirs or zhanche. I don't think the Harappans are OP, they are good at what they do, and the fact that the AI knows how to take advantage of that shouldn't be a reason to nerf them. I think the problem lies more in the Phoenicians, Assyrians and to some extent Olmecs being underwhelming, the Harappans are just a solid pick like many others.

Glad to see everybody don't think them OP, even if we agree they are pretty easy to play and good/very good.

But even if I don't play them, I admit I feel that more than 50% the time, AI take them as a first pick, that is odd. I can understand if people want to play them in solo, they can feel that unfair if they don't choose first. I don't think AI choice should be "random", AI need to need an appropriate culture depending of its plan/territories etc, but the autopick (feeling at least...) of harrapeans, nubians etc is a bit sad :)

I don't know if it is intended or not but the fact that there are some ancient culture obviously better than others can be a way to punish players staying at neolitic exploiting nomads specifics carateristics