Civ wide unhappiness for no reason?

This has happened to me before but this time I have the saves to prove it. Playing in the K7 succession game I am going along (in monarchy - no WW), then all of a sudden in one turn 24 cities decide to riot?!? I didn't settle a new city, didn't change lux, didn't do anything. The only thing I can think of is that I razed a couple cities that turn. When I as the unhappy citizens why, the reply is "100% too crowded".

Anyone know what is up with this?

Here is a zip file with the before riot and after riot turns if you want to look: http://www.civfanatics.net/uploads3/unhappy.zip

and here is a link to my writeup in the K7 succession game: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?s=&postid=671538#post671538

Wow. I've never had that happen to me before. Yikes.

Maybe they all grew in the same turn. Highly unlikely, but it could happen...If not, I have no idea.

I thought of the coincidental growth too. Problem with that is many of them were already size 12 with no Hospital.

Did you make a peace treaty recently? I've found that under monarchy that if you make "unjustified peace" that they will go unhappy and then revolt unless you get back at war with that civ. For instance if another civ, broke an agreement and declared war on you and you smack them down and take some cities, it just might not be enough as far as you people are concerned. If an AI make war with me and breaks a deal or ROP and I'm under monarchy, I give them at least 20 turns of war as a reward.

Interesting, I have never noticed that. I will try to remember it but it's not relevant in this case. I have been taking it to the Zulu. I wiped out the Greeks and Chinese. I did make peace with the Iroquoi 8-9 turns before. But they gave me a city in return and had never broken a deal with me (I delared on them when they wanted me to move my Galleys, imagine!). Again, the only thing that happened was I razed a couple cities. Strange days indeed.

I think I might know what the problem is. Reverse WW. If another civ declares war on you, your cities are happy (it's like they are supporting the government against the evil warmongers who are attacking their beloved nation), so you'll get happy people. As the war drags on, this 'reverse' war weariness wears away, so you'll no longer get the happy people (but not any more unhappiness than normal since you are in Monarchy).

I say this because I looked at the 930 A.D. save and you guys had boat loads of happy people, even when I switched luxury from 10% back down to 0%. Luxuries, luxury rate, and entertainers are the only things that will get you a 'true' happy person. Temples, wonders, and military police will just give content people. Since you had 2 luxuries you should have a max of 2 happy people in a city with no luxury rate and no entertainers. You will of course have varying levels of content people based on MP and temples, but a max of 2 happy people. In the 930 AD save some cities had 4-5 happy people with no luxury rate and no entertainers. So I think the 'reverse' weariness was strong in the 930 AD save, and the reverse weariness was wearing off (or perhaps disappeared completely, all at once) at 1080 AD and the happiness levels were returning to normal levels.

It looks like 'approximately' 20 turns ago you got other civs to declare war on you, so maybe the reverse WW lasts for 'about' 20 turns.

I think if there's unhappiness in cities that you raze, they move into your cities...

Yes Chieftess, if the unhappiness was from using the whip or drafting it would transfer to the nearest city. But then you would get a message like "We can't forget the cruel oppression" or "No more draft" or something like that, not just "It's too crowded".

I don't know where Bamspeedy found a 930AD save - it's not in the zip file...

From the two saves that are in the zip file it's impossible to tell what's happened: all the conditions for riot (unhappy faces>happy faces) exist in the earlier of the two files, or at least they do in all the cities I checked. In fact I'm a bit surprised that they didn't riot earlier.

Whatever happened, must have happened just before the 1080AD save was created. You wouldn't happen to have a 1070AD save file, would you!?

Originally posted by Gothmog
Interesting, I have never noticed that. I will try to remember it but it's not relevant in this case. I have been taking it to the Zulu. I wiped out the Greeks and Chinese. I did make peace with the Iroquoi 8-9 turns before. But they gave me a city in return and had never broken a deal with me (I delared on them when they wanted me to move my Galleys, imagine!). Again, the only thing that happened was I razed a couple cities. Strange days indeed.

Click to expand...

How long did that Iriquois war last? If you have saves back from that time you may be able to unravel events that lead back to this issue. After signing peace was there a drop in hapiness that you remember or could verify?

Originally posted by Tweedledum
I don't know where Bamspeedy found a 930AD save - it's not in the zip file...

From the two saves that are in the zip file it's impossible to tell what's happened: all the conditions for riot (unhappy faces>happy faces) exist in the earlier of the two files, or at least they do in all the cities I checked. In fact I'm a bit surprised that they didn't riot earlier.

Whatever happened, must have happened just before the 1080AD save was created. You wouldn't happen to have a 1070AD save file, would you!?

Click to expand...

it's a succession game. So I assume bamspeedy went and downloaded an earlier save from their thread in that forum. Link is provided up top.

Re Tweedledum: sorry about the saves. I didn't check them and forgot that typiclaly the happiness is totaled at the beginning of the turn. The 1070 AD and 1080 AD files would have been more relevant. I don't have the 1070 save anymore. Damn, I though I was documenting this and I guess I didn't. There were no Razes in 1060 AD so that hypothesis is out, along with Chieftesses suggestion. Also it would have been alot of transfured unhappiness to trigger 24 riots!

So Bamspeedy's hypothesis is left on the table: Yes the first thing I did was lower the lux to 0% with no problems (I note that I am running 0% lux in 990 AD).
Now, war declarations by meldor: on the Celts in 740 after demanding a city as tribute, on the Greeks in 770 after we refused to move our Galleys, on the Chinese in 840 again over Galleys. Then I declared on the Iroquoi in 950 again over a Galley. However, the Zulu did declare on us - but we were still at war with them at the end of my turn. The Celts were destroyed in 920, the Greeks in 940, the Chinese in 980 and I made peace with the Iroquoi for a city in 990.
I can't believe we get reverse WW for declaring war after an extortion attempt (but in monarchy who knows), so temporarily rule out the Celts. We made peace with the Iroquoi so that would have removed any reverse WW from that immediately (in my experience - I have tested this explicitly in the past). It looks like we may get reverse WW, while in monarchy, for getting a declaration due to refusing a demand to recognize the sovereignty of other civs. Also it looks like this effect extended beyond the time when we destroyed them. 1070 was 30 turns after war declaration on the Greeks 14 turns after we destroyed them, it was 23 turns and 10 turns respectively for the Chinese. This brings up another possiblility - that our people were actually happy that we destroyed those other civs, for about 10 turns.

Pretty strange, since I played out to 1140 I don't have any of the relevant saves anymore. This could be a good test case though starting from the 930 save, being aware of happiness and then trying peace vs, destruction.

Where the razed cities border cities? May be they had luxuries within their borders? (I did not download the save game, but am just wondering)

It was the other civ's cities that got razed so I am not sure how that would be relevant.

I agree with Bamspeedy. I've seen "reverse WW" even in despotism.

Yes, I believe that is the only viable hypothesis at the moment. The strange thing though is that I had thought that reverse WW only happened when war was declared on you. In this case (as I detail in the above post), we declared war in all cases. We were offered the option of move units or declare war and we declared. Thus, it seems that, at least in monarchy, declaring war in response to a demand to move generates reverse WW; and additionally that this reverse WW extends beyond the destruction of the civ generating it.

Is what you were saying that you think the above description of reverse WW is correct and you discount the possiblility of reverse WW generated through the destruction of another civ?

I beleve it had to do with a Lux being cut of from trade, or that the city has reached the threshold of happynes (Minumum Citizens that are born happy)

No Lux trades were cut off. We had wiped out our neighbors long before (Celts, Greek, Chinese), I am pretty sure they were our only trading partners until then. We had been at war with the Zulu for along time, and our status hadn't changed with any other civ - even if we had been trading with them (I am pretty sure only America was close enough to trade with).

I am not sure what you mean by threshold of happiness we were (are) playing at Emporer and so if I interpret you correctly that threshold was passed long ago. Twentyfour cities went into riot in one turn, and many of these were size 12 and had been for quite a while.

It must be 'reverse WW', but that one had me stumped with its strange timing a few times before.....

usually, peace treaties is the way to end it in Monarchy, the only way unless you loose cities. Here, we didn't loose anything, and not many units either.....