I want a Happiness Tracker!

bcaiko · Sep 19, 2013

Hey folks -

Given that this game does a fubared job of explaining anything behind its mechanics (look up "ideology" in the Civlopedia and behold the fail), I was really frustrated in my latest game when my happiness seemingly randomly jumped from +2 to -20 (causing rebels) to -15 in one turn transition.

I'm still not entirely sure what caused that - probably some Ideology unhappiness, but it had to be some other causes in there, too. No one was influential on me or even close. Frankly, I'm still unsure on how the ideology unhappiness works, since the game never explains anything.

In any event, I think a "Tracker" for things like Happiness and GPT would be very helpful. Something that just shows a list of "Happiness +1 this turn for unit garrisoned", "Happiness -1 for population growth", "Iroquois ideological influence causes -X unhappiness." I want that kind of menu. Yes, I know I can hover over my happiness this turn and see the hard, meaningless numbers...but I want a list of the reasons WHY my happiness (or GDP among other things) changed this turn from last turn.

As it is, the lack of transparency by the game coupled with the seemingly arbitrary and random fluctuations that can have dire consequences on me between turns is beyond frustrating.

Thoughts?

Jaybe · Sep 19, 2013

At a guess, you were a Freedom-loving ideologue, correct?

If so (and especially if you had several cities), I'd bet you had the Universal Healthcare tenet and your number of specialists was yo-yoing all around the place.

For a tracker of the basic numbers (but NOT the specific reasons for them): InfoAddict mod.

TheMarshmallowBear · Sep 19, 2013

Pretty sure that if you hover over the happy face, you'll get some information, it's good enough for me.

Gabriel Pyyrhic · Sep 19, 2013

bcaiko said:
Hey folks -

Given that this game does a fubared job of explaining anything behind its mechanics (look up "ideology" in the Civlopedia and behold the fail), I was really frustrated in my latest game when my happiness seemingly randomly jumped from +2 to -20 (causing rebels) to -15 in one turn transition.

I'm still not entirely sure what caused that - probably some Ideology unhappiness, but it had to be some other causes in there, too. No one was influential on me or even close. Frankly, I'm still unsure on how the ideology unhappiness works, since the game never explains anything.

In any event, I think a "Tracker" for things like Happiness and GPT would be very helpful. Something that just shows a list of "Happiness +1 this turn for unit garrisoned", "Happiness -1 for population growth", "Iroquois ideological influence causes -X unhappiness." I want that kind of menu. Yes, I know I can hover over my happiness this turn and see the hard, meaningless numbers...but I want a list of the reasons WHY my happiness (or GDP among other things) changed this turn from last turn.

As it is, the lack of transparency by the game coupled with the seemingly arbitrary and random fluctuations that can have dire consequences on me between turns is beyond frustrating.

Thoughts?

1. If you go to the ECONOMIC WINDOW and then click on the RESOURCES TAB, it breaks down HAPPINESSS for you IIRC.

A shorthand summary for this appears when you hover over the HAPPINESSS meter at the top of the main window (which from your OP you likely already know, but just in case....).

These two together are fairly comprehensive. It may not be exactly what you are looking for, but perhaps it will suffice if you are unaware.

2. To be fair I think you are being a little harsh on the game IMO. I do agree a little more math would be helpful , and a little more civilopedia editing but its not that bad and much better then it was originally.

3. BTW Also if you do a search on this forum you should be able to easily find a thread detailing exactly how IDEOLOGICAL UNHAPPINESSS works. I don't recall what it was called but did a search a few weeks ago for the same information myself. There were quite a few threads that talk about it and they are very good.

Hope this helps

bcaiko · Sep 19, 2013

Gabriel Pyyrhic said:
1. If you go to the ECONOMIC WINDOW and then click on the RESOURCES TAB, it breaks down HAPPINESSS for you IIRC.

A shorthand summary for this appears when you hover over the HAPPINESSS meter at the top of the main window (which from your OP you likely already know, but just in case....).

Yeah, you correctly read my OP. I know the latter exists, at least. I'd still like a log of the changes and the reasons why.

Gabriel Pyyrhic said:
3. BTW Also if you do a search on this forum you should be able to easily find a thread detailing exactly how IDEOLOGICAL UNHAPPINESSS works. I don't recall what it was called but did a search a few weeks ago for the same information myself. There were quite a few threads that talk about it and they are very good.

Yeah, I'm sure that'll help in the long run. The game should really explain its own goddamn mechanics, though.

Human Crouton · Sep 20, 2013

I agree that the game needs to explain itself. The tooltips show very little information about why certain things are happening. I've recently been confused by the influence per player screen. I was making 500 culture per turn, and Austria was putting 400 tourism per turn toward me, yet it claims that they were rising slowly on me.

Considering that the culture victory requires you to output more tourism over the course of the game than the target's culture, I don't see how it's possible that their influence over me is rising if I'm actually producing more culture per turn than they are tourism toward me.(And it was 400 tourism after the +/- tourism modifiers)

compwiz1202 · Sep 20, 2013

Human Crouton said:
I agree that the game needs to explain itself. The tooltips show very little information about why certain things are happening. I've recently been confused by the influence per player screen. I was making 500 culture per turn, and Austria was putting 400 tourism per turn toward me, yet it claims that they were rising slowly on me.

Considering that the culture victory requires you to output more tourism over the course of the game than the target's culture, I don't see how it's possible that their influence over me is rising if I'm actually producing more culture per turn than they are tourism toward me.(And it was 400 tourism after the +/- tourism modifiers)

Because with some situations their tourism/your culture will actually rise even though the difference between the two also rises. Like I just figured with 3000 vs 4000 which is 75%, but in 100 turns with no changes in the numbers, it will be 42600 vs 53500 which is 80%. The % will keep rising more and more slowly, ~~and you will eventually reach 99.9999999999999999999999999999999999999999...% but never 100%.~~

EDIT: Ahh now I see. If your total tourism/their total culture is less than your current tourism/their current culture, then the % percent will rise each turn and approach your current tourism/their current culture. So in the example it would actually rise from 75% to 80% more slowly each turn, and once again this assumes no changes to your current tourism or their current culture over time.

offworld · Sep 23, 2013

Human Crouton said:
Considering that the culture victory requires you to output more tourism over the course of the game than the target's culture, I don't see how it's possible that their influence over me is rising if I'm actually producing more culture per turn than they are tourism toward me.(And it was 400 tourism after the +/- tourism modifiers)

Influence is tracked as a percentage of Player A's Tourism versus Player B's culture

so consider this

start situation (turn 0)
Player A tourism to player B = 100
Player A tourism per turn = 10
Player B culture = 1000
Player B culture per turn = 20
Player A influence over player B = (100/1000) = 10.00 %

turn +1

Player A tourism to player B = 110
Player A tourism per turn = 10
Player B culture = 1020
Player B culture per turn = 20
Player A influence over player B = (110/1020) = 10.78 %

So, even though player B's culture per turn = 20, and player A's tourism is smaller at 10, influence is still rising.

I want a Happiness Tracker!

bcaiko

Emperor

Jaybe

civus fanaticus

TheMarshmallowBear

Benelovent Chieftain of the Ursu Kingdom

Gabriel Pyyrhic

Warlord

bcaiko

Emperor

Human Crouton

Prince

compwiz1202

King

offworld

Chieftain

Similar threads