Through The Ages-Part V-Actions: Civic Cards

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Civil Technologies
Three civil technology cards exist to increase actions: Code of Law, Justice System, and Civil Service.
Code of Law

		TIP	Action Cost	Recipe
	Expedient	3	5	Turn 1:Take RevIdea-A            Take IdlBusSite-A Turn 2:Play IBS-A Philosophy            Take RevIdea-I   Turn 3:Play RevIdea-A            Play RevIdea-I            Play Code of Law
	Efficient	5	2	Turn 3: Build Philosophy Turn 5:Take Code of Law            Play Code of Law
	Expected	4	4	Turn 3: Build Philosophy             Take RevIdea-I Turn 4:Play RevIdea-I           Take Code of Law           Play Code of Law
	Max Benefit = 14

Analysis
Code of Law provides one of the best ways to gain actions.  At half the Science cost of Monarchy, Code of Laws is relatively cheap on the Science.

In all cases it is required to build a philosophy.  For the Expedient this is built on Turn 2 using Ideal Business Site.  For the other processes, the Philosophy must be built on Turn 3 without using a card.


Justice System

		TIP	Action Cost	Recipe
	Expedient	9	4	Turn 9:Take Justice System            Play Justice System
	Efficient	10	2	Turn 10:Take Justice System            Play Justice System
	Expected	11	2	Turn 10:Take Justice System            Play Justice System
	Max Benefit = 9

Analysis

Justice System occurs about halfway through the game, at best.  It may provide a maximum benefit of 9 actions if played around turn 10, but most likely the benefit will be less.  Despite costing only one more Science than Code of Laws, it is inferior in generating Action points.







Civil Service

		TIP	Action Cost	Recipe
	Expedient	9	4	Turn 9:Take Civil Service            Play Civil Service
	Efficient	10	2	Turn 10:Take Civil Service             Play Civil Service
	Expected	11	2	Turn 10:Take Civil Service             Play Civil Service
	Max Benefit = 8

Analysis

Civil Service is the last Civic Special Technology card which provides actions.  Despite being a late game technology, Civil Service provides an almost immediate return on its investment.  This means no matter when the Civil Service comes out, it is guaranteed to generate its Action cost in return, at least as long as no other Civic cards are already in play.  Even so, if the game is guaranteed to last one more turn, Civil Service is will generate an action profit.



Switching Civic Cards

Analysis
If a player switches civic cards there is the risk of losing actions needlessly.  The chart to the left displays the results of a change to the civic actions.  From the chart, going form Justice System to Civil Service  or from Code of Laws to Justice System results in an overall loss when compared to just the Code of Laws.

The best gain is to switch from Code of Laws to Civil Service, granting a total yield of 17 actions.



Conclusions
Basically, if concerned with Actions, all three Civic cards provide a decent return.  Their largest drawback is the science cost.  The earlier Age Civics provide greater overall return than their later Age Civics.  However, switching from either Age I to the Age III Civil Service will provide a net increase in almost all regards.

In the case of switching from Age I to Age II will always result in a net loss of actions.  The best return begins with the Code of Law and switches to the Civil Service.  At most, civic technologies will provide an additional 17 actions to a player's game.