Ideology Problem

Tony.Uk

TonyUK
Joined
Jun 22, 2007
Messages
217
Location
Hemel Hempstead, Hertfordshire, UK
Playing on Emperor as Nebeltweezer, got to Order before any other ideology, and slightly behind on Science.

Somewhere around 1875 I was +23 happiness. Then all of a sudden China gets Autocracy and then -20 unhappiness. Do I have to change to autocracy, or what other options are there, other than DOW China, which will take too long.
 
China has too much cultural influence over you and that is what is causing the sudden loss of happiness. From the sounds of things it looks as if you have 'Unknown' influence with them and they have 'Familiar' or better influence with you. (Check the 'Culture Victory' tab and the 'Influence by Player' tab in the culture panel and take time to mouse over and explore all the details there to get a better idea of what's going on).

The only ways to counter this is to:

  • Declare war on China and capture their Great Works/Wonders and destroy their culture buildings until their influence over you drops and your influence over them rises
  • Try and have your Ideology voted in as the World Ideology to help alleviate the pressure
  • Grab as many happiness policies, tenets, beliefs, buildings and luxuries as you can to offset the unhappiness
  • Pump up your Culture as much as possible to try and get China's influence to drop
  • Pump up your Tourism as much as possible to try and gain as much (or more) influence with China as they have with you
  • Best option (short of converting to Autocracy) - a combination of all of the above

With regards to DOW - it's probably not a good idea to pursue this option at first, not just because it will take too long but also because your units will have a combat penalty equal to twice the value of your unhappiness as a percentage. You could try bribing other civs to declare war on China though.... :)

Of course, the last option of all is to just switch to Autocracy and be done with it. You will lose your Order tenets but you will be able to swap them for an equal number of Autocracy tenets.

PS. Be warned that if other Civs who have cultural influence over you also take Autocracy, the problem will get worse. However, if other Civs who have more influence over you take Order, matters should improve. A lot of players make the mistake of ignoring Culture/Tourism if they're not going for a Culture Victory without realizing the massive impact that this can have once Ideologies kick in.
 
I had this happen to me in my last game. India was freedom and I was Order. My happiness started declining and I didn't know what was going on. Discovered the tab about ideological pressure. Went from -10 to -20 and got really scared. This is what I did. Took me about 30 turns on marathon to turn it around.

1. Pay them gold to open their borders but don't give them open borders.
2. Install a diplomat in their capital.
3. Buy luxuries from them to boost your happiness but don't trade/sell them your luxuries.
4. Get the tier 3 order tenet that gives you boost to tourism if happier.
5. Build happiness buildings, acquire more happiness from luxuries from other gives or city states.
6. Coup their city state allies giving them happiness resources.
7. Establish at least one trade route with them.
8. Get order declared world ideology.
 
Ok Jlafeur, I had not thought of this at all. Will have to reload and give it a try. The other problem is that China have built most of the World Wonders as far as I can tell. And my other problem is that I am always reluctant to DOW anyone unless I see a clear opportunity. China is nearest to me but has Great Wall and still quite far away on scrambled middle east map.
 
Jlafeur's advice is sound and should work well if you have a decent amount of cash and if you pick the right Order tenets.

The Open Borders trick is because you get +25% Tourism against a Civ who you have Open Borders with - so if you get this as a one way deal, you're getting the bonus against them but they don't get the same bonus against you.

If a Diplomat sits in the capital of a Civ with a different Ideology to you, he will spread propaganda which gives you another +25% boost to Tourism.

Having a trade route established with a Civ will grant you another +25% boost to Tourism - but this works both ways - there's no way to make this a one-way only deal like with diplomats or Open Borders.

The biggie here is the level 3 Order Tenet which boosts your Tourism by +34% with any Civ that you have more happiness than. Check the 'Culture Victory' tab to see how much happiness other Civs are generating and work to get yours higher than theirs. This is actually quite achievable with Order as you have Tenets available which will add happiness to Monuments, National Wonders, Workshops, Factories, Plants, Observatories, Public Schools and Research Labs.

Some other tips - try to group all your Wonders (including National Wonders), Great Works and Landmarks in the same cities and then build a Hotel and an Airport in those cities. Each of these buildings will convert 50% of the Culture that they generate into Tourism.

If you can nab the Internet technology, get it - it will double your overall Tourism.

Finally, if you have a lot of Cities and if you have Telecommunications, try to build the CN Tower - it will give you a free Broadcast Tower in every city which will massively boost your Culture and should loosen China's influence on you.

Good luck! :)
 
I was literally just about to post a similar question. Glad I ran across this thread!
 
Thanks again Alziel

Well I lost the game mentioned to a Science Victory by China and I thought Nebby was a science monster!! China also had the most culture. Being focused on science buildings how do you come out on top with culture as well. Also I was never able to get any Wonders since China got most of them. On emperor I hardly ever get them except with an engineer available.

I assume your comment about Great Works, writers etc, means you build these in different cities, and not in the same cities? I am not sure there is any choice with Landmarks unless they are moved by swapping.

On to another game now with all your comments in mind. Have not won on Emperor yet.

Regarding open borders it seems to make sense not to open yours unless a very good reason to
do so and trade them once you get tourism started.
 
Of course, the last option of all is to just switch to Autocracy and be done with it. You will lose your Order tenets but you will be able to swap them for an equal number of Autocracy tenets.

Really? I thought I would lose all of my tenets and have to start again in the new ideology tree. That is why I have stubbornly stuck with my ideology. Is this not so?
 
Really? I thought I would lose all of my tenets and have to start again in the new ideology tree. That is why I have stubbornly stuck with my ideology. Is this not so?

You get a number of tenets in the new ideology equal to the number you earned in the original, but you're not compensated for the free "early adoption" ones. For example, if you were the first person to get an ideology, took Freedom, got your two free tenets, then picked 3 more as your next 3 SP choices, only to realise the rest of the world was Order and you were at -100 happiness. You switch to Order, and you get 3 tenets to chose immediately.
 
You get a number of tenets in the new ideology equal to the number you earned in the original, but you're not compensated for the free "early adoption" ones. For example, if you were the first person to get an ideology, took Freedom, got your two free tenets, then picked 3 more as your next 3 SP choices, only to realise the rest of the world was Order and you were at -100 happiness. You switch to Order, and you get 3 tenets to chose immediately.

Gotcha, Thanks!
 
I had this exact same problem on my last SV, and basically boosted my culture and tourism enough to stem the decline and even reverse it a little bit, enough to hover around 5 happiness until I won.

-As advised above, make sure your open borders are one-way.

Good culture boosters:

-If they aren't already gone, spam some archaeologists and grab some artifacts/built some cultural sites in your borders.

-Built opera houses in all your cities, so you can build the hermitage (national wonder +50% cultural output) in your biggest cultural output city, put all your great works in that city. Then head for Broadcast Towers. Put some specialists in your guilds if you haven't already (I'm assuming you've unlocked secularism, so it's a science boost as well), to up your GWAM production.

-Build Hotels in each city that has any wonders/great works/landmarks, etc. They're cheap to build as well.

-The Eiffel Tower is amazing for this happiness + culture + tourism - grab it if you can. As is Neuschwanstein and a castle in each city, depending on where you are science-wise.
 
You get a number of tenets in the new ideology equal to the number you earned in the original, but you're not compensated for the free "early adoption" ones. For example, if you were the first person to get an ideology, took Freedom, got your two free tenets, then picked 3 more as your next 3 SP choices, only to realise the rest of the world was Order and you were at -100 happiness. You switch to Order, and you get 3 tenets to chose immediately.

Wow, I never realized this - I assume all was lost. That's less painful than imagined.
 
If other civilizations in the game all choose the Order ideology would that help alleviate the pressure, as all their Tourism and Culture combined would override China's.

Or is the Ideological pressure mechanic only a Civ to Civ basis and doesn't consider the ideology of other Civs?

In my recent Brazil game I had the most culture and tourism of anyone however I was suffering unhappiness because I was one of only 2 civs out of about 9 who adopted Freedom instead of Order.
 
If other civilizations in the game all choose the Order ideology would that help alleviate the pressure, as all their Tourism and Culture combined would override China's.

Or is the Ideological pressure mechanic only a Civ to Civ basis and doesn't consider the ideology of other Civs?

In my recent Brazil game I had the most culture and tourism of anyone however I was suffering unhappiness because I was one of only 2 civs out of about 9 who adopted Freedom instead of Order.

The short answer is 'Yes' - but of course, it's a little more complicated than that.

Each Civ has a level of Cultural Influence on other Civs in the game. The level of Cultural Influence is based on their cumulative Tourism since they met the other Civ as a percentage of the other Civ's cumulative Culture from the beginning of the game.

Here are the possible levels of Influence based on that percentage:

  • Unknown - <10%
  • Exotic =>10% but <30%
  • Familiar =>30% but <60%
  • Popular =>60% but <100%
  • Influential =>100% but <200%
  • Dominant = 200% (the game stops counting at this point)

Ideological pressure is calculated by the difference between your level of Influence on a Civ and their level of Influence over you. For each difference in level, the Civ being influenced will receive one point of Ideological pressure.

So if you are Freedom and you have Exotic Influence with an Order Civ but they have Popular Influence with you, they will inflict 2 points of Ideological pressure on you.

This same calculation is made for every Civ in the game and then all Ideological pressure points are calculated for each different Ideology. The Ideology that supplies the most pressure points will be the one that your people will favour (and will switch to if you are forced into a revolution). I'm not absolutely sure what happens in the event of a tie but I believe from my observations that the Ideology which has been around for the longest will win out or that the Ideology of the Civs with the highest Tourism pressure will win out.

So taking all this into account, if you have very poor Tourism/Culture but a lot of other Civs who have high Tourism switch to your Ideology, their pressure will offset the pressure from any Civs that have opposing Ideologies. If the balance tips in favour of your Ideology, your people will settle down and become 'Content' and you will stop losing happiness.

All of the above can be augmented by having your Ideology voted in as the World Ideology. Doing this will immediately add 2 points of pressure for your Ideology to all Civs on the map, regardless of Influence levels.

Check the Culture panel and go to the 'Culture Victory' tab for more details. If you mouse over a Civs ideological status ('Content'/'Dissidents' etc) you will get a pop-up which breaks down the Ideological pressure that the Civ is getting and it will sum this up by saying which Ideology that Civ's people prefer.

Sorry for the long read - hope it makes sense!

PS: In case anybody is interested, the unhappiness that is inflicted is based on the number of cities or the amount of population that you have. For each point of Ideological pressure inflicted on you, you will get 2 points of unhappiness for each city that you have or 1 point of unhappiness for every 10 points of population that you have. Whichever total is higher. So generally, the bigger you are the worse the unhappiness hit will be (standard size map/speed).
 
The short answer is 'Yes' - but of course, it's a little more complicated than that.

Each Civ has a level of Cultural Influence on other Civs in the game. The level of Cultural Influence is based on their cumulative Tourism since they met the other Civ as a percentage of the other Civ's cumulative Culture from the beginning of the game.

Here are the possible levels of Influence based on that percentage:

  • Unknown - <10%
  • Exotic =>10% but <30%
  • Familiar =>30% but <60%
  • Popular =>60% but <100%
  • Influential =>100% but <200%
  • Dominant = 200% (the game stops counting at this point)

Ideological pressure is calculated by the difference between your level of Influence on a Civ and their level of Influence over you. For each difference in level, the Civ being influenced will receive one point of Ideological pressure.

So if you are Freedom and you have Exotic Influence with an Order Civ but they have Popular Influence with you, they will inflict 2 points of Ideological pressure on you.

This same calculation is made for every Civ in the game and then all Ideological pressure points are calculated for each different Ideology. The Ideology that supplies the most pressure points will be the one that your people will favour (and will switch to if you are forced into a revolution). I'm not absolutely sure what happens in the event of a tie but I believe from my observations that the Ideology which has been around for the longest will win out or that the Ideology of the Civs with the highest Tourism pressure will win out.

So taking all this into account, if you have very poor Tourism/Culture but a lot of other Civs who have high Tourism switch to your Ideology, their pressure will offset the pressure from any Civs that have opposing Ideologies. If the balance tips in favour of your Ideology, your people will settle down and become 'Content' and you will stop losing happiness.

All of the above can be augmented by having your Ideology voted in as the World Ideology. Doing this will immediately add 2 points of pressure for your Ideology to all Civs on the map, regardless of Influence levels.

Check the Culture panel and go to the 'Culture Victory' tab for more details. If you mouse over a Civs ideological status ('Content'/'Dissidents' etc) you will get a pop-up which breaks down the Ideological pressure that the Civ is getting and it will sum this up by saying which Ideology that Civ's people prefer.

Sorry for the long read - hope it makes sense!

PS: In case anybody is interested, the unhappiness that is inflicted is based on the number of cities or the amount of population that you have. For each point of Ideological pressure inflicted on you, you will get 2 points of unhappiness for each city that you have or 1 point of unhappiness for every 10 points of population that you have. Whichever total is higher. So generally, the bigger you are the worse the unhappiness hit will be (standard size map/speed).
Thanks. That was an excellent, very clear explanation. Wish you would write a BNW manual!
 
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