Culture Flipping - Historical Examples

In real life, are borders determind by treaties or by culture generated by the cities? culture flipping keeps that d*%& iroquis settler from building a city in my heartland before my borders expand and then remaining there for a thousand years. culture flipping seems as if it was intented for this purpose. Not realistic, but neither was that settler building a city in my heartland.

Michael York, check the reply before yours.

Culture flipping of border makes sense, in regard to what he explains about the bedouin tribes and indian/pakistani ones.

Originally posted by Flavor Dave

I think I see the problem here. You don't have a very sophisticated understanding of how civ empires relate to RL empires. Because Canada, in civ terms, is part of America.

1. The RL border is devoid of military units. In Civ, no matter how good of an ally another civ is, you ALWAYS put troops on the border.

2. If the UN voted to make the US or China king of the world, it wouldn't even be an issue how Canada would vote, because they're in our "culture." The question would be how the "Aztecs" (Latin America) and the "Persians" (the Muslim world) and the "Zulus" (Africa) would vote.

3. Canada is a military ally. They had troops in Afghanistan, yet were not attacked on Sept. 11. If an attack on New York City and Washington DC causes Canadian troops to see action, and that isn't an example of cultural assimilation, then I don't know what is.

The problem is that you're not being subtle or supple enough in translating the 200+ nations in the real world to the 6-16 Civ empites.


Here's another way to look at it...today, there's Europe and America. I'm not sure which camp you'd put Britain in, and whichever one they belong in, they could "culture flip" the other way if things break a certain way.

Here's another RL example (altho maybe a weak one.) Before 1989, the US had many troops in "Europe." The alliance was very tight. But with the collapse of the Soviet threat, "Europe" culture flipped back to independence. *AND* the military forces of "Europe" were greatly reduced (i.e., the "American" military units disappeared, and were replace by a lone mech. inf. unit in "Rome," "Paris," and "Berlin."

Try to be less literal minded, and I think you'll see what we are all trying to explain to you.

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This logic is extremely flawed; Canada is not considered part of the American civ. If that were the case there should be some Canadian city names or some sort of reference to this in the game. It's fairly clear that you are playing as an individual country and that is what the deisgners intended. That is why the expansion is adding civs, the game is not trying to represent every single country/empire that ever existed with just 16.

Originally posted by Reichsmarshal
This logic is extremely flawed; Canada is not considered part of the American civ. If that were the case there should be some Canadian city names or some sort of reference to this in the game. It's fairly clear that you are playing as an individual country and that is what the deisgners intended. That is why the expansion is adding civs, the game is not trying to represent every single country/empire that ever existed with just 16.

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Herr Reichsmarshal-

Unfortunately, the game simply does not stick rigidly to either the "player as civilization/cultural grouping" or "player as nation-state" viewpoint.

The naming convention within the game is broadly consistent with the "nation-state" concept. But certain examples can be given against this - the "Greek" civ being a case in point. Not only was there no "country" (in the sense of a nation-state) such as Greece for the bulk of Greek history, and particularly for the classical period, but the game chooses to depict Greece as led by Alexander of Macedon, barely by some definitions Greek (although clearly of Greek culture).

Indeed, to even attempt to use modern nation-state concepts in dealing with game mechanics is flawed, as until the advent of nationalism 'countries' were a different beast entirely.

There are times within the game when I rationalise the rules through consideration of the state concept, and times when I think of myself as leading a cultural tradition. The whole thing is artificial - whatever makes the game work for the player is fine.

(For example, I always think of the high corruption at a distance in a 'democracy' as being due to other nations in my cultural grouping doing their own thing, rather than what the mother country wishes. I don't think Canadians are that corrupt, but they sure don't spend their money on what the British (or French or American) government wants! )

*rolls eyes* Canada is not considered a part of the american civ, true. BUT it is ALSO true you are not an individual nation in the later ages, even if all your citys are named after those of one nation.

The countries of the world generaly tend to align in a number of "block" ; each civilization in the later ages is one of these blocks. For example the English Commonwealth as a whole would be a block (with Canada having CFed to America), etc.

It is *RIDICULOUS* to say that a civ in the later ages is the equivalent of a nation. Each civ is BASED on a nation (for cities name, etc), but it is NOT a nation.

Your point does not stand Reichmarshal. The game *DOES* try to represent every country existing at any given moment in your game ; however having only 16 country in a modern time in a earth-related game is ridiculous. Morevoer, most countries have spheres of influence - smaller nations that tend to follow them, act in concert with them generaly.

This is what a civ in the later age represents. Not a nation. The american civ in the game was not made to include Canada, but IRL Canada would be part of the American "Civ". This is the distinction you failed to make.

QUOTE]Originally posted by Oda Nobunaga
*rolls eyes* Canada is not considered a part of the american civ, true. BUT it is ALSO true you are not an individual nation in the later ages, even if all your citys are named after those of one nation.

The countries of the world generaly tend to align in a number of "block" ; each civilization in the later ages is one of these blocks. For example the English Commonwealth as a whole would be a block (with Canada having CFed to America), etc. [/Quote]


There is very little indication in the game that it is trying to have every civ represent every real life bloc. The main civs where this is the case are the Persians and the Romans, since they have a substantial amount of foreign city names (which were not even always truly Roman in culture like Jersualem and the fact that Persia has Kandahar, it also shows cities that they were in the civ's empire at their powerful point).

If the game was truly trying to represent everyone, Germany would have Austrian and possibly Swiss cities. The game would cover Spain and South American also. Furthermore there are culture groups in the game like American, European, Mediterrianan, Middle Eastern, and Asian.

It is *RIDICULOUS* to say that a civ in the later ages is the equivalent of a nation. Each civ is BASED on a nation (for cities name, etc), but it is NOT a nation.

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They add other countries/provinces later in the game and are perhaps influenced by them, that is not how it would be if you only built your own cities and got no goodie huts though.

Your point does not stand Reichmarshal. The game *DOES* try to represent every country existing at any given moment in your game ;

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This is true (except for the "your point does not stand" )

however having only 16 country in a modern time in a earth-related game is ridiculous. Morevoer, most countries have spheres of influence - smaller nations that tend to follow them, act in concert with them generaly.

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The game does not try to be 100% realistic that would be impossible in a game since it is often a juggle of realism and game balance. Although civ's in rl do have a sphere of influence it does not always make them part of the same civ or prove that the designers were trying to represent this.

This is what a civ in the later age represents. Not a nation. The american civ in the game was not made to include Canada, but IRL Canada would be part of the American "Civ". This is the distinction you failed to make.

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Your "civ" can be homogenous or hetergenous depending on what you do. Some civs are not represented at all currently in the game regardless of what mental gymnastics are used to rationalize it (such as certain parts of Africa).

Originally posted by Oda Nobunaga
*rolls eyes* Canada is not considered a part of the american civ, true. BUT it is ALSO true you are not an individual nation in the later ages, even if all your citys are named after those of one nation.

The countries of the world generaly tend to align in a number of "block" ; each civilization in the later ages is one of these blocks. For example the English Commonwealth as a whole would be a block (with Canada having CFed to America), etc.

It is *RIDICULOUS* to say that a civ in the later ages is the equivalent of a nation. Each civ is BASED on a nation (for cities name, etc), but it is NOT a nation.

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The concept of "Civ" is highly abstracted. This is one of the ingenious ideas that makes Civ what it is. Sometimes the game feels like specific countries; other times cultural blocks, such as Western Civilization, the German Confederation, or Christiandom; still other times an allied collection of City States. In a similar vein, sometimes the map distances seem strategic, other times tactical -- another great concept that makes Civ what it is.

The worst part about culture flipping is that extremely high amounts of units can dissappear irrationaly. If most of them escaped or you could actually prevent flips that would be obviously better than it currently is.

4 points that almost anyone can agree with:

1. Enable some indicator on how likely the city is to flip. It could be green for "fairly safe", yellow for about a 30% chance or so, red for 50% +. You have to admit that is would be much more realistic and interesting with that addition. It would be VERY possible to have some spys gauge opinon.

2. Reduce the use of culture flipping as a war tool. The name is "CULTURE". It should be much more likely during peace than war.

3. Prevent instant flips and loss of any units in armies. Losing an arming over a flip is a waste of a leader (many say the army is too , rush wonders instead). If it did not always immeditatley flip it would be way more manageable.

4. Most importantly MAKE IT BASED MORE ON CULTURE!!!!!!! If "Egypt is an admirer of your civ's cutlure" they should be flipping to you not away from you!! If they are in awe flipping should be very unlikely. On the flip side if you have worse culture it should be more likely. All too often it seems the reverse is the case.


What most players hate about flipping is that if 3 cities flip simelotanelouly you can lose 60% of your offensive power. There is no reason for that.

I generally raze cities now, since they are have almost no improvements when I take them and it makes it much easier to focus on winning the war that way. The computer civs should place their cities in better spots also.

Originally posted by Reichsmarshal
The worst part about culture flipping is that extremely high amounts of units can dissappear irrationaly. If most of them escaped or you could actually prevent flips that would be obviously better than it currently is.

4 points that almost anyone can agree with:

1. Enable some indicator on how likely the city is to flip. It could be green for "fairly safe", yellow for about a 30% chance or so, red for 50% +. You have to admit that is would be much more realistic and interesting with that addition. It would be VERY possible to have some spys gauge opinon.

2. Reduce the use of culture flipping as a war tool. The name is "CULTURE". It should be much more likely during peace than war.

3. Prevent instant flips and loss of any units in armies. Losing an arming over a flip is a waste of a leader (many say the army is too , rush wonders instead). If it did not always immeditatley flip it would be way more manageable.

4. Most importantly MAKE IT BASED MORE ON CULTURE!!!!!!! If "Egypt is an admirer of your civ's cutlure" they should be flipping to you not away from you!! If they are in awe flipping should be very unlikely. On the flip side if you have worse culture it should be more likely. All too often it seems the reverse is the case.


What most players hate about flipping is that if 3 cities flip simelotanelouly you can lose 60% of your offensive power. There is no reason for that.

I generally raze cities now, since they are have almost no improvements when I take them and it makes it much easier to focus on winning the war that way. The computer civs should place their cities in better spots also.

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Indeed.

The ILLOGIC of "Culure Flipping" is that if the garrison was ejected all they would have to do is next turn attack back in and retake the city or town. That is why I suggested such units be ejected in DISORDER, with several hits points lost, and be unable to attack at all for two turns. That should give the other civ time to get troops into the Flipped city/town. If they are too far away to do this it never should have flipped to begin with. The town should be in some form of disorder after a flip, and lost a population point.

Of course there should be an indicator of the status of a city.

The rest of your points are valid, too.

I once lost almost all my offensive unitsin an Ancient flip. Game over. Three hours wasted.

You miss one thing. CF is "a war tool" you refered to. The insanity of "razing" is a demented cousin of CF and should be eliminated after the Ancient period. As the game is now, CF is indeed a war tool, and thus instantly razing big cities with disappearing populations and the tile becoming grassland is oftimes necessary.
Razing in the Modern Era is crazier than CF itself.

Changes are very much needed, as I have said since December.

Firaxis will NOT make those changes. They will push this down our throats no matter what.

So I edited Culture resistance levels down to zero. If it doesn't stop CF I won't play it, and certainly not buy PTW if they don't give us some options on CF as they did with corruptions. And the same goes for that stupid Settler Diarrhea.

Originally posted by Zouave
The ILLOGIC of "Culure Flipping" is that if the garrison was ejected all they would have to do is next turn attack back in and retake the city or town. That is why I suggested such units be ejected in DISORDER, with several hits points lost, and be unable to attack at all for two turns. That should give the other civ time to get troops into the Flipped city/town. If they are too far away to do this it never should have flipped to begin with. The town should be in some form of disorder after a flip, and lost a population point.

Of course there should be an indicator of the status of a city.

The rest of your points are valid, too.

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Firaxis should have spent more time on Culture Flipping than for cities to instantly disappear from your control, along with your units, and stick a few of theirs in it automatically. Nearly anything similar would have been better than random like they have it now.

Originally posted by Trip

Firaxis should have spent more time on Culture Flipping than for cities to instantly disappear from your control, along with your units, and stick a few of theirs in it automatically. Nearly anything similar would have been better than random like they have it now.

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Well, that's the sad result of not playtesting games before release.

The weird part is why they now refuse to if not eliminate CF at least make it a little less illogical.

The good (or bad) thing about civ is that we don't know what a civilization is supposed to represent, we don't know if a military unit is 1 guy or 10,000 people, we have no idea how big a population unit is. This makes arguing whether Canada is part of America in civ, whether the garrison is large enough quell the revolt in real life, etc, almost impossible. Maybe that was how they intended it?

Not to drag this OT, since this is a history thread, but gameplay > realism IMO. Is it good gameplay that a PRNG decides whether a city is kept and 30 Mech Infantry dissappear? IMO, no. I think EU2 modeled resistance, loyalty of the people etc much more effectively with revolts, where the rebels have actual armies and you need to tie up your precious armies defeat them - kind of like the American Revolution in RL.

Also, a warning would by no means take away the significance of culture flip. The idea would not be to take units out of the city, but to put more in so you crush the revolt (possibly losing A FEW units in the battle that would occur). Think about it: if you just invested >1000 gold into a city to rush temple, library, cathedral, etc would you really move units OUT and lose those turns, that gold, without a fight? I wouldn't, unless I had a chronic unit shortage and the odds of me getting a force there to quell the revolt was not favorable.

Originally posted by Zouave
Well, that's the sad result of not playtesting games before release.

The weird part is why they now refuse to if not eliminate CF at least make it a little less illogical.

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We can only guess what Jeff is smoking *ahem*.

I really wish they did give us more options regarding it, even the ability to modify how often (if at all) culture flipping occurs.

The Mongol Hordes swept through vast territories in a relative quick time period. Granted they wiped out entire cities out of the way, and many revolts did occur they nevertheless built the largest empire the world has ever known.

I predict if such a thing as Culture Flipping existed during their time - in the same capacity it does in the Game – the Mongols would have never made it out of Steppes.
If they did, it would have been gradual, waiting for every city to like them, or for them to build HUGE armies to place in each city before they progressed to the next one.

I enjoy having culture flipping in the game, but I think it should be a rarity. Instead something like reduced production, riots, or rebellions (Partisans) would be more appropriate. IF it does flip without a fight and my huge army all of a sudden disappears its too unrealistic and I find it hard to imagine how people can justify it. The formula should be changed, so a much smaller army can maintain order.

teturkhan: Without CF, the Mongol Empire would still be around.

Originally posted by teturkhan

I enjoy having culture flipping in the game, but I think it should be a rarity. Instead something like reduced production in the form of riots, or rebellions (Partisans) and so on. Having a huge army all of a sudden disappear is so unrealistic and I find it hard to imagine how people can justify it. The formula should be changed, so a much smaller army can maintain order.

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Exactly. As it stands now, the only way to beat culture flipping is to ethnically clense all enemy citizens from conquered territories or your cities WILL FLIP (unless you have 148 thousand units garrosing the city).

Also, if another civ accepts a city culture flipping towards it, it should be an act of WAR. Countries do not just annex large tracts of other countries during peacetime without any repercussion.

Seemes like the game was rushed, so instead of creating a real resistance model, they just decided whole cities would suddenly and wholy flip to other nations.

Still, I would find the game playable if they made it an option to TURN THIS SILL THING OFF (otherwise, I love the game, even though it definitely lacks many bells and whistles, showing furthermore how it was a rush job).

Also, if another civ accepts a city culture flipping towards it, it should be an act of WAR. Countries do not just annex large tracts of other countries during peacetime without any repercussion.

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Very true. Either that and/or allow the Civ that lost the city 1 turn in which they can try to recover the city without it being an act of war. This is what the Soviets did in Hungary and Czechoslovakia.

Exactly. As it stands now, the only way to beat culture flipping is to ethnically clense all enemy citizens from conquered territories or your cities WILL FLIP (unless you have 148 thousand units garrosing the city).

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No, you don't have to go that far. My rule of thumb is to put about as many units in as there are people + enemy held tiles in the city radius, and to try to capture those tiles ASAP. Building culture in the city helps a lot here.

Originally posted by GeneralTacticus


Very true. Either that and/or allow the Civ that lost the city 1 turn in which they can try to recover the city without it being an act of war. This is what the Soviets did in Hungary and Czechoslovakia.

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THIS WOULD BE TERRIFIC! I hate it when I have to re-declare war on a civ after fighting an exhausting 400 turn war because the city I was fighting for decided to culturally flip back to them.

This whole thread has now been officialy thread-jacked since we're no longer talking historical examples.

Originally posted by Reichsmarshal
The worst part about culture flipping is that extremely high amounts of units can dissappear irrationaly. If most of them escaped or you could actually prevent flips that would be obviously better than it currently is.

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The degree of debate on these boards is so high precisely because nothing "would be obviously better than it currently is" to all participants on the board.

4 points that almost anyone can agree with:

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I actually strongly disagree with the first three points, but admit I may be in the extreme minority (so may not be "almost anyone" ).

1. Enable some indicator on how likely the city is to flip. It could be green for "fairly safe", yellow for about a 30% chance or so, red for 50% +. You have to admit that is would be much more realistic and interesting with that addition. It would be VERY possible to have some spys gauge opinon.

2. Reduce the use of culture flipping as a war tool. The name is "CULTURE". It should be much more likely during peace than war.

3. Prevent instant flips and loss of any units in armies. Losing an arming over a flip is a waste of a leader (many say the army is too , rush wonders instead). If it did not always immeditatley flip it would be way more manageable.

4. Most importantly MAKE IT BASED MORE ON CULTURE!!!!!!! If "Egypt is an admirer of your civ's cutlure" they should be flipping to you not away from you!! If they are in awe flipping should be very unlikely. On the flip side if you have worse culture it should be more likely. All too often it seems the reverse is the case.

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I'm not sure I fully understand point 4 (as I think total civ culture plays a fairly strong role in the CF calculation), but more or less agree that total civ culture should play a strong role in the chance of a flip.

As I said above, I fully accept that I may be in the extreme minority on this, but I think CF serves an important game balance function. Without the threat of CF I have little incentive to build anything other than expansion units (settlers and workers) and military units. While the AI invests shields in culture, I will invest solely in conquest. I will simply keep building cities and armies, and mercilessly, almost without pause, beat on all my neighbors all the time. I will pack my cities very close together, and they will not get larger than 12 (and in most cases 6) population. With the luxury resources I acquire through warfare I will not need the contentedness factors of temples and cathedrals. My army of workers will build an extensive road network and I will generate much commerce - no need for libraries and universities in order to move up to my next conquest tool. Since culture flipping is not a threat, I willregularly garrison my wounded troops in cities (for 2 HPs repair instead of 1, full repair if a barracks survived my assault, and for the city defense bonus), and I need not ever worry about my logistics lines (the movement restrictions of enemy territory) being interrupted by a flip. My blitz will not be slowed.

Culture flipping mitigates (but does not eliminate) the benefits of the above approach - it serves to help balance the military / cultural / scientific aspects of the game, just as the threat of military destruction serves to mitigate the benefits of going all culture all the time, at the expense of national defense. CF operates as a deterrant (one of many in the game) to turning Civ 3 into soley a war game (there are better war games available). Your examples of how to "fix" CF work against the mitigating effect that CF provides.

CF imposes penalties on those who neglect culture -- and sometimes these penalties are harsh indeed. Extensively softening the potential penalties, through predicitve indicators which allow easy counter-tactics (only when needed ) or preservation of "flipped" units, works against what one can argue is the primary raison d'etre of culture flipping. Why preserve culture flipping as a game concept at all if you want to take these steps?

okay, true nobody cared for the Mongol's culture... and probably everyone in the Mongol Empire couldn't wait to over throw these overlords... but hold on a second! The Mongols wouldn't of even had an empire to begin with! - The way the game is set up it is virtually impossible to go on a conquering rampage with low culture rating - unless you leave a HUGE garrison in each city.

If my culture is weak - I should be able to offset this with a powerful army - period.

BTW, the Mongols lost in the end because of internal fighting - once the conquered people saw the weakened Mongols they didn't hesitate to revolt... Military Revolt btw