Changing the UN Mechanics

Ugh! I am so frustrated!

One of the things you have to do as a modder is play a lot of Civ. You need to test what you do to the game to see if it works. One of the blessings of this is that sometimes you wind up with a really great game.

This was one of those games. I was playing as Asoka and trying for a peaceful space victory because I needed to test the Future era. I had a whole continent to myself, I was a production and military powerhouse. I had happy citizens due to Hereditary Rule and lots of troops in my cities taking care of them. Then...

Lincoln built the UN and decided that he had to have everybody switch to Universal Suffrage. I voted no because I hate to defy (though I should have), but the resolution passed and there I was. Stuck with cities with 29 unhappiness and shrinking fast. In running HR, I had built very few happiness buildings, and it wouldn't have mattered anyway, the unhappiness was too large. I also couldn't change out of US, and believe me, I wanted to.

It totally ruined what I would consider to be a great game of Civ.

tl;dr

I'm thinking of modding the UN and Emancipation mechanics to be a little more fair, or at least a little less brutal to the player, however I lack essential experience in some of the game mechanics. (I'm usually not playing for optimal game, I'm testing something or other and often don't pay attention to the deeper strategy and mechanics.)

So I throw the questions out to you guys.

1. Does it (the US mechanic or Emancipation) need to be changed?
2. Are they unfair?
3. How would we change them if we could?
4. And what would we change them to?

Some ideas would really be appreciated. I'm angry enough to mod out the UN entirely.

Discuss.

The UN isn't unfair usually. In many cases, you can be elected as the resident yourself, because it comes so late, which means you'll have a lot of pop and had enough time to build up good diplomatic relations.

The other possibility would have been to simply defy the resolution, it's usually not difficult to handle an additional +5 . You had problems with that, because your cities were extremely large, this anyhow is only needed in highscore games, in a Space-race, it's perfectly ok when cities are size 16-24, and one should have happiness for at least 30 pop because conquesting the map gives the fastest finish. Your cities were probably so large, because they had too much time to grow, if you win faster, all of them automatically will be smaller, so they can handle the extra easily.

The AP should be modded, because it's sometimes impossible to deny the AI an accidental AP-victory, when all circumstances are right. The UN is fine as it is.

Lemon Merchant said:

Ugh! I am so frustrated!

So I throw the questions out to you guys.

1. Does it (the US mechanic or Emancipation) need to be changed?
2. Are they unfair?
3. How would we change them if we could?
4. And what would we change them to?

Some ideas would really be appreciated. I'm angry enough to mod out the UN entirely.

Discuss.

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1. I always figured the Emancipation happiness penalty thing was a way to keep Caste System from being too powerful in the late game. Caste+State Property Workshops are almost OP, once you have Chemistry and all the other Workshop bonuses. So, I'd be hesitant to mod that out.

As for the UN - I thought about perhaps making it possible to subsequently defy a (or, some?) resolution(s) that had passed, and taking the +5 from then on... but that seems like something that could be exploited, particularly when it comes to the Non-Proliferation resolution. And I'm not sure how that work for the "Assign City" resolution. And it would also, I guess, mean everyone else could swap out of the offending civic, which could be a way of exploiting the Spiritual trait and/or Cristo Redentor.

(So... sorry, Lemon, but I think you should just chalk this one up as a learning experience. I always defy in the rare cases that I don't have control of the UN and there's any doubt in my mind whether the resolution would be crippling. I started doing that after I had some painful experiences like yours.)

2. Not excessively unfair, IMO. Gonna stand on the hoary old "Game Balance" argument here. The AP diplo victory, on the other hand...

3. I think that if you defy UN Peacekeeping, you should get attacked by a blue-hatted barbarian horde. I'm half serious. Also, the real UN has a security council with vetos. Perhaps if you aren't either the UN leader or one of the top 4 nations in military power, you *can't* defy a resolution?

4. Not sure/Not applicable.

That's what you get for relying on an obviously backward civic. Theatres and Coloseums are cheap and can give you a temporary respite at the cost of 20% of your commerce until you have found a more permanent solution.

You had a single point of failure in your grand strategy.
Something came up that attacked and destroyed you at this single point. You knew exactly what it would take for that attack to come and succeed - the U.N.'s rules are clear, and you saw them coming.

Knowing where you are weak is exactly what this or any other strategy game is about. Sometimes you accept that single point. Sometimes you need to dissimulate that it isn't there, like in international relations and geopolitics. In this case, though, you just didn't see it, but it was very seeable.

Well then, I guess I'll just have to accept my obvious stupidity and inability to play the game and forget about it.

I don't think anyone was saying either of those things in their responses. Certainly, that's not how I intended my response to be received, at any rate. We've all made missteps like the one you made with the UN, and all you can do is laugh them off, learn from them - and (if you like) reload. If you're enjoying the game, there's no point in letting one bad decision ruin it. IMO, anyway.

Lemon Merchant said:

Well then, I guess I'll just have to accept my obvious stupidity and inability to play the game and forget about it.

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I am critiquing the black and white manner in which you've responded to this outcome.

The U.N. defeat you experienced was -not- stupid, not in the same sense that guys hastily use the word to talk about broken , imba, or braindead games, anyway. With proper appreciation of the manifold dimensions of strength, weakness, and attack that exists in this and every nice strategy game, it is visible that the dynamic along which you were destroyed, and hastily destroyed, folds into the general nature of all other dynamics in that game.

The U.N. exists. With a certain resource, players can use it to influence and weaken each other.
You set your strategy on a single point which you did not have defenses for: You relied on one of the things that can be attacked - like relying on a certain city, or relying on getting a certain wonder, or relying on any one thing - and, furthermore (because relying on one thing is not categorically bad), your defenses were punctured. So your strength collapsed.

If you made that gambit knowingly, you would learn something about risk reward. But you made that gambit unknowingly, so instead you learned something about the game.


You may at this stage argue that U.N. ought not be in the game, as a design debate, or be radically different. That would take place with design language and design measures-of-goodness. But the situation is absolutely -not- one of the game not being 'great'. If you amend your statement to qualify it that it was your evaluation and opinion of your experience that was not desirable, then I have no issue with that statement. But as long as it ambiguously seems that 'the game is bad because "nonsensical junk can happen that makes play impossible or strength between turns to be arbitrary", ' I must oppose the persuasive effect of your discourse.

It seems to me that the only mistake you made is not defying the resolution?

I have used her rule in exactly the same way before, when isolated and going for science having my cities well garrisoned and keeping people happy.

So definitely not stupidity just 1 mistake

However i dont think that makes the mechanics broken, as the option to defy is there.

twilson1972 said:

I have used her rule in exactly the same way before, when isolated and going for science having my cities well garrisoned and keeping people happy.

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Her rule

Personally I never use Hereditary Rule once Representation becomes available.

Imp. Knoedel said:

Her rule

Personally I never use Hereditary Rule once Representation becomes available.

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I dont often, but i had a massive neighbor who was behind in tech but building tonnes of units, and in that case a massive military served two purposes.

twilson1972 said:

I dont often, but i had a massive neighbor who was behind in tech but building tonnes of units, and in that case a massive military served two purposes.

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Yeah well that's North Korea for you, minus the massive part.

Horseshoe_Hermi said:

I am critiquing the black and white manner in which you've responded to this outcome.

The U.N. defeat you experienced was -not- stupid, not in the same sense that guys hastily use the word to talk about broken , imba, or braindead games, anyway. With proper appreciation of the manifold dimensions of strength, weakness, and attack that exists in this and every nice strategy game, it is visible that the dynamic along which you were destroyed, and hastily destroyed, folds into the general nature of all other dynamics in that game.

Click to expand...

At no point did I call the UN, or the game stupid.

The U.N. exists. With a certain resource, players can use it to influence and weaken each other.
You set your strategy on a single point which you did not have defenses for: You relied on one of the things that can be attacked - like relying on a certain city, or relying on getting a certain wonder, or relying on any one thing - and, furthermore (because relying on one thing is not categorically bad), your defenses were punctured. So your strength collapsed.

If you made that gambit knowingly, you would learn something about risk reward. But you made that gambit unknowingly, so instead you learned something about the game.

Click to expand...

Fine. My bad. My obviously sub optimal play is clear at this point.

You may at this stage argue that U.N. ought not be in the game, as a design debate, or be radically different. That would take place with design language and design measures-of-goodness.

Click to expand...

I would never argue that the UN does not need to be in the game. It needs to be there for realism, and the challenge that it poses to players.

But the situation is absolutely -not- one of the game not being 'great'. If you amend your statement to qualify it that it was your evaluation and opinion of your experience that was not desirable, then I have no issue with that statement.

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Civ4:BTS is nearly flawless, and I never said otherwise. The game that I was having, i.e. the experience as you call it, was great. My mistake in not defying caused me to get frustrated and to consider that the game was ruined at that point. Since I don't reload, it was. I quickly lost over a stupid error. I consider that the loss of a great session of play.

But as long as it ambiguously seems that 'the game is bad because "nonsensical junk can happen that makes play impossible or strength between turns to be arbitrary", ' I must oppose the persuasive effect of your discourse.

Click to expand...

The game is not bad due to nonsensical junk. Where did you get that from my post? I'm expressing a frustration with a mechanic that seems to arbitrarily punish the player in the late game. Look at Emancipation. The UN votes this civic in every single game unless you control the UN. I would like to have the option of not only defying the resolution, but to accept it and then switch out later to Caste System for instance, if I need to, taking the defy penalty at that time. I would like greater flexibility in how the UN handles the civics it controls, not blindly beelining one civic constantly. In every late game where the UN is built and I don't control it, I can count on being railroaded into Emancipation. It's frustrating that the UN can't suggest CS or Slavery, or some other civic. No, I must suffer a defy penalty along with the Emancipation penalty, it seems for no other reason than to hamper the player's progress and give a bonus to the AI. It's a challenge to be overcome, but I would like other options. That is what I was saying, and that was the intent of my post. Not to gripe about the game being unfair. I would like to have a constructive discussion on whether the UN mechanics as they are are fair (which for the above reasons, I don't think they are. I think they're limited.), or if something can be tweaked to make them more fair or flexible, perhaps giving a greater challenge to the player.

Lemon Merchant said:

*Whining about how the most overpowered civic in the game isn't overpowered enough*

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For goodness sakes, if you want to oppress your people in the modern era against their will and that of the international community you really should struggle to keep your subjects in line.

I wonder, how cities can habe 29 only because of US (Emancipation doesn't contradict HR) . You must have had size 40+ cities, how did they grow that large but still not win you the game? In my Spaceraces, the largest city is not even size 30 when I win.

Seraiel said:

I wonder, how cities can habe 29 only because of US (Emancipation doesn't contradict HR) . You must have had size 40+ cities, how did they grow that large but still not win you the game? In my Spaceraces, the largest city is not even size 30 when I win.

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I seem to recall 29 in one of my cities, but I could be wrong. I never made a save at that point, but I don't think that my cities were more than 30 pop. The unhappiness was in the twenties, though. I know that for sure.

You had 29 unhappiness but also 20 happiness so 9 at that point, right? Unhappiness is usually counted in # of unhappy citizens, not total unhappiness. If you really had 29 , you would have needed to not run Emancipation and on too, you would have needed to draft and/or whip excessively.

As it must have been US that drove you out of HR, did you think of whipping out Markets and then switch to emancipation? Markets cost 4 pop and give up to 4 , so this would have given you 4 +3 +something like 7-9 more . Markets are usually good in Space Races anyhow.

Mass unhappiness from UN were usually from saying never to either HR or UN itself. Other than that I haven't experienced mass unhappiness from UN except if you had a majority of win vote for Universal Suffrage world civic that ruined your hereditary rule unit stacks in local cities that kept happiness that way.

reddishrecue said:

Mass unhappiness from UN were usually from saying never to either HR or UN itself. Other than that I haven't experienced mass unhappiness from UN except if you had a majority of win vote for Universal Suffrage world civic that ruined your hereditary rule unit stacks in local cities that kept happiness that way.

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She already told that she didn't defy and that the UN vote wrecked her HR.

What sense does your post then make? Have you even read the first post before you posted yourself?

If you truly want to emulate real life, just make the UN useless, except for gathering coalitions against countries hated by the US.