You got a great point about the Franks, Scaesar. It makes no sense the Franks have +50% Food and the Mexicans are +20% Food. I have a different proposal for the Frank growth LT: 
Crown Lands: Reduce pop food consumption by 20% (because ofc they're hunting in the crownlands so you don't need to have as much food infraestructure).

I made a small table to show the effects of this proposed LT:

As Docktorkain pointed out I think current Franks and Mexican LT are too similar, the LT proposed by Docktorkain would be interesting since it would promote megacities, that being said it seems to me this is a bonus more adapted to Mexican considering Mexico is one of the most populated city in the world while France don't even have the biggest population in Europe. 

Now don't get me wrong, yes at the time of the Franks it was a different story and France was one of the biggest agrarian culture of Europe but I still think Mexican should get the -20% food consumption while the Frank can get the +20% food or whatever. 

docktorkain wrote:

You got a great point about the Franks, Scaesar. It makes no sense the Franks have +50% Food and the Mexicans are +20% Food. I have a different proposal for the Frank growth LT: 
Crown Lands: Reduce pop food consumption by 20% (because ofc they're hunting in the crownlands so you don't need to have as much food infraestructure).

I made a small table to show the effects of this proposed LT:

I ship it.

Another idea that popped up in discord is to swap Aztec's LT for the following LT:

Flower Wars: Steal pops when you win battles or capture cities.

The exact amount of pops would likely require some testing to get right, but some of the ideas presented include : 1 pop per enemy army involved in the battle, 1 pop per 2 enemy units involved in the battle, 1 pop per territory in the captured city, 10% (or some other %) of the captured city's population. 

Also, since the Aztec had famous floating gardens, it was proposed to give its EQ a food bonus per lake on its territory (or a food lake adjacency, making it a land quarter that benefits from water tiles).

I'm in the % school of thought, having Aztec taking 10% (or more) of the city they capture would make Aztec the perfect response to having an Agrarian/High pop empire as a neighbors. That way you could build a big pop of your own by sieging and fighting thru slavery which would be great considering that Victor has seen the birth of "meta" revolving around high pop cities. 

8roomsofelixir wrote:

With the current game pace, Phoenicians really suffers from having a slow start. Their EQ, Haven, unlocks much later than other cultures' EQ, which also needs twice the Industry to build due to being a Harbor; and their EU cannot participate in land battles at all. As a result, Phoenicians can be very vulnerable on the land due to having no EUs, while their development would also stagnate due to slow EQ.

I would suggest that allowing Phoenicians able to build Havens from the very beginning, to make the Haven being effective much earlier.

In addition, it would be better to change Bireme into a Transport Ship, made it unlocks earlier while being weaker than Triremes. This way, the Phoenicians would be able to embark on Ancient and exploring the (costal) world easier, which offers a unique gameplay style unlike other Ancient Cultures, while in line with IRL Phoenicians who explored and settled the Mediterraneans much earlier than others.

- Edit: Another interesting way to do this would be allow Bireme to put outposts on coast, encouraging the unique playstyle of an early and peaceful costal expansion of Phoenician players.

As for the "vulnerable on land" issue - maybe the Phoenician LT can be about "discount on unit buyout cost", for buying a quick army when in trouble.

Agreed with the EU changes. It's effectively - early / late Ancient era expansion potential that might be welcome depending on what your start is like.

I agree that expansionists and militarists are a bit weaker than others in common. Huns and mongols have too strong EU though, their ability to attack twice should be reworked. Also expansionists affinity is pretty hard to use successfully, I think it should be reworked too.

Celts EQ is pretty OP compared to otheres cultures in Classical era, I would suggest to remove the +1 per pop food ability and give them another buff instead.

Poles, Assyrians, Mycenaeans, Hittites, English EQ are weak and have lack of benefits. Their EQ can be used only in defensive way mostly while their playstyle is supposed to be aggresive (except English). My suggestion is to add the ability to replace Garrison so their EQ can be built at any place in the region at least.

Romans EU is too far at research queue, must be moved in "Standing army" imo.

Oh also. I don't know why I think this. But I just do. I think the bonuses for the Goth's and the Celt's EQ's should be switched. I can't quite put my finger on why though.

Here's my list of cultures that feel really strong or really weak. These could change depending on how the devs balance systems without touching the cultures themselves.

Ancient

Harrapans: By now we all know how strong pop buyouts are, and the bonuses you get from the Harrapans are relevant for the entire game. The culture sets you up for early and frequent buyouts, and helps you build pop later in the game as specialist slots get stronger. Runners also let you bully other civs the moment you advance in age.

Olmecs: This one is borderline, but food AND influence production from the EQ is very strong in the early game. Javelin throwers are pretty damn good too. Olmecs bonuses just don't scale quite as well as the Harappans.

Hittites/Myceneans/Assyrians: I group these all into the same category because they suffer from the same design problem. The early game is where you need to setup to snowball your advantage - these cultures give you nothing for FIMS and focus on being militaristic. The problem here is that you can't conquer the only city of an opponent, you can only vassalize. While the money income is powerful, in no situation did I find it made up for my lack of FIMS up to that point, and the gold income only helped me buyout the infrastructure I would've had anyway playing any other civ. Assyrians suffer the additional problem of it being difficult to get expansionist stars (particularly in early eras), and for the 2 militarists it may be difficult to find enough units to kill for all 3 militarist stars.

Classical

Celts: One of the most overpowered cultures in the game. EQ gives you insane food, plus a little extra faith to help you get your religious tenets. Everything else about this civ is just a bonus. You'll be spamming the agrarian ability every few turns with this civ, which lets you buyout stuff with pop constantly.

Huns: Look, the Hunnic Horde is insanely good. Huns are the only militarist/expansionist culture that I think really needs tuning down. You can practically take over the world in classical with the Hunnic horde.

Goths: Changes in this version really hurt the Goths. The EQ is ok for the classical era, though it doesn't get adjacency bonuses. The bonus from ransacking is useless with how long it takes to do in Victor. Same with their EU getting bonus strength when ransacking. And fighting in enemy districts with cavalry almost never happens with the changes to walls.

Medieval

Franks: Where to start? Tons of food, and an EQ that gives faith AND science AND influence. The EU is decent if you have access to resources. In a game that emphasizes diversity in achieving victory, the Franks are insanely good.

Ghanians: They make a lot of money. Lots of money. Too much money.

English: This may be somewhat controversial, but the production boost on farmer's quarters is not that valuable, often constituting under 5% of my production and making no meaningful difference to production times. Particularly later in the game, the production on maker's quarters and pops really scales up, and you don't need very many agricultural quarters. Strongholds and longbows would be ok if the AI were good, but let's be honest, who is struggling against AI armies? May be better against players, but remains to be seen.

Early Modern

Dutch: Show me the $$$. Everyone is aware of the Dutch insanity by now.

Joseon: They produce a ton of science with their trait, and the EQ gives a decent boost too. But what really makes them good is that the transition from early modern to industrial units and techs is enormous. Having access to industrial techs in early modern is really, really good.

Ottomans: By this point in the game, there is basically no outpost that isn't attached, and the religion game is basically over. Influence is nice, but not nearly as valuable as in previous eras. Janissaries are decent units, but the infantry line starts upgrading so fast around this point in the game that there is a narrow window to actually use them.

Poles: I like the idea of a defensive culture, but really they don't have a lot going for them. They get no FIMS bonuses to propel them, and the value of cavalry has decreased because they can no longer cross walls. Again, perhaps has a niche in multiplayer, but I would never pick this culture against AI.

Not as bad, but worth mentioning

Carthage: Not absurdly powerful by itself, but the buyout cost reduction really propels more gold-focused strategies.

Khmer: All around good. More industry per worker, an EQ that gives food and production that scales with how big your city is, and a pretty good EU.

Romans: Expansion stars hard to get, +1 unit slots isn't that impactful since you can reinforce, praetorian guards come too late in the tech tree and require a resource that is fairly hard to get by classical, and the triumphal arch isn't really that impactful.

Ming: I've found I have more civics points than I actually need by this point. EQ scales based of commons quarters, but you really don't need very many, if any, commons in this build.

Spanish: Suffer from many of the same issues as Ottomans, but play even more heavily into faith. Redeeming factor here is the trait, which is actually pretty decent if you're playing an aggressive game

Zhou: They are a decent culture, but as an aesthete they have no way to generate influence. In later eras this isn't a problem because you can combo with other cultures (like if you have good gold income, you can take venetians if you need influence later in the game), but for the Zhou they have no way to generate influence except getting specific religious tenets. You really want to get your primary fame stars, so it makes it hard to pick the Zhou. 

In general, per pop yields are too strong because of how they scale later into the game, particularly when you can benefit from them in multiple territories in the same city. Adjacency bonuses are decent in the early game (nubians, egyptians, greeks, aksumites, and even Franks I all found reasonably useful EQs), but later game cultures that utilize adjacency for their EQs need better adjacency bonuses, they just can't compete with pop bonuses. The same thing goes for bonuses based on territory.

I don't have the playtime or expertise to comment on the balancing issues other than that I agree that gold and the cultures that exploit gold are to powerful right now. Overall I really like the new ideas this game is bringing to 4x games, and it specifically addresses many issues which have caused me to grow tired of Civilization in recent years. The ability to modify your faction over time by selecting new cultures is awesome, and I think it's the main selling point for Humankind versus it's biggest competitor, the Civ series. Counting every available permutation of cultures, the number of 'civilizations' available to players is astronomical compared to say Civ 6 where you simply pick a civ/leader and that is your civ for the whole game. However, does this not present an issue if you would like to play with many factions in one game? You would be incapable of playing a truly massive game with 12 or 16 or more factions for example, since you need a different set of cultures for each era and factions are not allowed to have duplicate cultures. I think it would be good to have an option to allow duplicate cultures, and to also make more apparent through visuals and synergies the differences between 2 different factions that chose slightly different cultural progression, for example Nubian->Carthaginian versus Olmec->Carthaginian. I think there could also be some replay value added by introducing some role play elements to the initial leader selection by allowing you to choose some starting traits and flavor options for your faction. Not as in depth as say the empire creation menu in a game like Stellaris, but maybe at least the ability to pick some positive/negative modifiers with a point system, and a color scheme and an emblem that will stay with you throughout that playthrough but become distorted over time as you advance through various cultures. I think leaning into the role play elements will also help differentiate Humankind from Civ 6 and give another reason for players to make the switch. I don't know how much if any of this is viable given how close the release is, but maybe it could be worked as a DLC or expansion.

The cultures I'm most concerned about balance and design wise are the Huns and Mongols, which I'm sure has been a long time headache for the balancing team. Its been obvious that they need tweaking, but I've been concerned with HOW they should be nerfed without loosing what I felt made them fun to play. 

From my experience they are weaker compared to Lucy OpenDev, but they are still really strong... however I'm not so sure if I could call them overpowered. When playing the Huns and Mongols I was actually loosing units this time around which is good. They aren't as invulnerable, and I found the AI has had the most success killing my horde units by using Archers, Crossbows, and sticking to their city. Still I'm able to take out armies much larger than my own with these units through using certain tactics. While this is preferred and expected, I think the amount I can take on is a bit too high. Huns and Mongols no longer gain food through killing units, not sure if that's a bug or an intentional nerf. They can only gain food and multiply through ransacking which usually takes around 7-10 turns, it's quite a slow rate. For a while, I've suggested replacing their free rider ability (the one that allows them to essentially attack twice) with the move and fire ability, but now because the Hun and Mongol horde units have only one range, I actually really like the free rider ability. A tactic I used to get the most out of the horde units is to shoot a unit, but then move else where on the map rather than staying and shooting twice. This way I can move a different horde unit in that spot, shoot once, and repeat to get lots of attacks on one unit rather than just two with one horde unit. This tactic is very fun! It feels like I'm performing a Cantabrian circle attack. The biggest imbalance when fighting Huns and Mongols (mostly the Mongols) is when an army that is technologically behind has to fight the horde. This leads to huge slaughters that I have no issue calling overpowered. 

What I really loved about the Huns and Mongols in Lucy OpenDev was their ability to multiply, and what I love about them in this OpenDev is the tactics required to succeed and take out larger armies. Those are the traits I want preserved when balancing the Huns and Mongols. One solution I had hoped for was to keep the ability to gain food through killing, and simply halve the combat strength of the horde units, making them more of a strength and numbers zerg type faction. I am aware that may not be as feasible to implement now, so if that solution isn't possible and alternative fix I propose is to just lower their attack strength, or give them some kind of penalty when defending. Make them more fragile units that have to rely more one hit and run, and have them suffer when fighting head on.

One last culture I feel is too weak are the Goths. Their legacy trait (+5 strength when ransacking.) doesn't seem to work, and their emblematic quarter could also use a buff.

Lastly I feel that Greek Hoplites have too much combat strength. They are a classical era unit with that is a little bit stronger than medieval pikemen. (Hoplites have 32 strength, pikes have 31 I think.) Further more they get more combat strength from their phalanx bonus. I think their strength should be lowered closer to the combat strength of the swordsmen. I think 26 strength for Hoplites is a good number.

Overall, except the first game where I did not really use the quarters, I enjoyed every culture I played.

I think the one EQ per territory is a good thing, they really feel special and you have to think on how to get the maximum benefit out of them.

Had an idea on how to fix the "per district" emblematic quarters that exist and can break the game. Have it specify that you need specific districts to get the bonus, like +1 influence per maker's quarters in the city rather than just all districts. For this to work though Amplitude also needs to re-introduce the old adjacency bonuses that encouraged placing multiple different districts, instead of carpeting entire regions with just one kind.

As for fixing -per population effects(those are even more broken). This one is a bit tougher since it naturally scales so well. I mean it might just be better to not have bonuses for general population at all, and instead keep it to when population is working specific resources. +1 per pop on industry/science all that.

Honestly, the best way might be to remove per population effects from cultures and give it to the general tech tree, so everyone can use them. It already sorta works with stuff like the school and university which gives science per population.

Seriously name a single "+x per population" district that's not overpowered.

Scaling might be important but it's probably best left to infrastructure.

I like a lot that you just posted, really really good points. I'll just say a couple things about a few random topics you mentioned.

Assyrian raiders. I think the intention was to have the Assyrians required to ransack and raze in order to get the money needed to use their expansionist ability to annex. I imagine amplitude's thought process was that making expansionists too good at expanding in the ancient era would be a really big snowball for later. They were right though but it was the Olmecs with their influence bonus who became that culture (There's a problem with early game influence in general, and I don't think nerfing the Olmec's ability to generate influence would solve the bigger issue). But yeah I agree raiders need a bit of love and raiding in general

Javelin Throwers/Markabata. I think they're too good, especially Javelin throwers, they can defeat warriors in hand to hand combat if they're in a forest. I think they should have a base CS of 19 and a forest bonus of 2. Markabata aren't as bad and they also come a bit late in the tech tree, but I wouldn't mind if their CS got lowered by 1.

Praetorian Guards. I like the idea of buffing the Praetorian guard's CS more, the fact that they're unlocked at imperial power is nicely thematic, but it's important that their strength is increased to reflect their later unlock time.

Aesthete. I suggested being able to influence bomb your own territory to generate influence, tourism yields should be better explained for sure. It's one of the better abilities the only issue with it is that its main uses don't help the Aesthetes get their era stars, making Aesthete era stars be sphere of influence based may be a good change.

Agrarian.  Should be fine with changes to forced labour, I'd also remove the +5 stability every time you gain a pop with this, to further disincentive forced labour.

Builder. Two things hold back builder mode, the time it takes to switch off, and the new restrictions to city centre yields. I'd say make Builder mode toggle-able whenever you want, or shorten the turns required to wait to 1 or 2. You said it stops science and money income which sucks but early on there isn't really much of that to feed into builder mode, so what little you're getting isn't powering up your industry as much as it should. Enabling City centres to extract money and science again should fix that. Oh and the current passive of +5 stability every time a district is built is something thematic and useful, since stability is what prevents you from making mega cities, in theory. I do hope they fix stability balance later but builders getting the chance to build bigger cities only makes sense.

Expansionist. As time goes on we're getting more and more expansionist affinity ideas, I'd totally be fine with tweaking the current one but expansionists really need some passive bonuses in order to facilitate their expansion. What needs to happen is expansionists have to overtake Aesthetes as the most capable expanders, once that occurs they should be in a good position as the best cultures for expansion. I already gave some ideas for their affinity in this thread.

Merchant. Trade Diplomacy just needs to be more engaging and I'm sure the merchant affinity will be fine. Currently a bit op but that's more due to money in general being out of whack. Would also allow better trade with independents for merchant cultures, since players could always deny opening up trade with them.

Militarist. Again they need some passives in order to make use of their armies. I saw a suggestion that their armies should could as population in whatever city they're in and could work tiles. Would be very cool and useful but not really appropriate for all militarist cultures. I have other ideas too for economic bonuses. Also I think their raise levy ability should have their militia start with swift for 1 turn, giving them 2 extra movement.

Scientist. Same change as builders, make science mode faster to switch off, I'm fine with them being able to research a full tech tree ahead though. The bigger issue is the CS difference keeps getting wider as eras progress, unit upgrades start getting 10 more CS, then 14 more CS. It gets out of whack and for scientists to not be overpowered, this power difference between eras needs to be scaled back a bit.

Assyrian Raiders. Making their Pillager ability less ultra-specific would be a fix I'm relatively happy with, even if I think I'd prefer something new. For better or worse, we don't really have to worry about Expansionists being too good at expanding right now. I don't think I played the Olmecs yet, so unfortunately I can't comment on them right now.

Javelin Throwers/Markabata. I like that they remain viable for a while, but I definitely agree their CS could be toned back a bit. I think there's a balance to be had there.

Praetorian Guards. I'm torn. On one hand, while I'm playing as Rome I want to have my Praetorian Guards for as much of the Classical Era as possible, but on the other hand, Imperial Power is an absolutely perfect place for them to come in thematically.

Builder/Scientist. I think the problem to me is that because you have little to gain from turning either mode on during the Ancient Era, and much more to lose, it makes it almost worthless for Ancient Cultures, and it's not something that I think reducing the time until you can turn it off would fix. It has places you might want to use it in the later game, but I would prefer they have an ability that is, if not equally useful every era, at least viable each era, and doesn't require you to sacrifice your other yields. 

Expansionist. I went back and read some of your suggestions. One thing I don't really care for is the idea that only Expansionists can trespass without war declarations. It would feel like something that only exists because of their awkward ability. That said, I think that trespassing should not require a war declaration for anyone but should still definitely generate a "Trespassing Grievance," and then I can easily see saying that Expansionists take less (maybe even zero) damage from trespassing. I definitely like the idea that martial pursuits of some variety, whether it's based on building units, winning battles, or ransacking, should generate influence to allow them to expand better.