Sudden change in empire happiness

[TemplarLord]

Hey guys, I have a problem with my game and am hoping you can help me out discerning what went wrong. Here's the summary of it;

Finished a war with the Zulu in which I conquered all their cities, then called for a ceasefire. Finished my turn, and starting the next I have 37 unhappiness(down from +1 happiness) and -98 gold per turn(don't know the exact number but I was overflowing with gold each turn).

Upon starting the next turn there's a council meeting, and a I got a great writer. Also the Zulu are not dead(I picked the total annihilation option during game start. This is on a huge map with 14 Civilizations, marathon. Year is 202x something IIRC.

Mods I use are:

Palace and Throne Room
R.E.D. Modpack
Barbarians - Unlimited Exp

I've got no idea why the sudden shift in unhappiness. Since gaining the Authocracy ideology things have been going great, my empire was always happy and since I had like +20 happiness I decided to conquer the Zulu to carve a path to the Inca and the Shoshone. I'd hate leaving this behind just because of a bug.

Or is it a bug even? Maybe a feature

Thanks for you taking the time to help me.

EDIT: Forgot to mention, playing on Prince difficulty.

 

[timtofly]

Every time you conquer a city, you need to pay attention to the popup that shows how it will effect your happiness. It will let you know how raising, annexing, or puppeting changes your happiness.

 

[TemplarLord]

Hmm, see I was paying attention to that, and of the 11 cities I captured:

1 was a City-state and I liberated it
1 city I gave to another faction, Austria
2 cities already have courthouses

All cities I captured where/are being razed to a population of at least 3, but most are lowered to 1, so as to avoid unnecessary unhappiness early on.

Also, shouldn't the unhappiness effect be immediate, rather than starting after a ceasefire?

I'll try to sell some cities off to other factions as I wasn't planning on keeping all of them and see if that'll have some effect.

 

[TemplarLord]

Tried your suggestion timtofly and you were right, when I sell off 3 cities, build courthouses in 3 other cities(+1 I can't yet because of revolt), unhappiness is -17. Pretty lame this only activates after I sign a ceasefire. Or I guess it's beneficial so I can get my affairs in some order before unhappiness strikes.

Could it also be that my people aren't satisfied with me calling for a ceasefire, not the enemy? Me having the Autocracy ideology andi all.

 

[timtofly]

When ever a city is added it greatly affects happiness and adding multiple cities on one turn will actually compound the issue. The best way to avoid that is plan a "takeover" during a golden age. You definitely don't want to do it right before one. All your happiness will quickly disappear. Doing it right after is not that bad, but you do not want to stay at -10 or lower very long.

 

[TemplarLord]

Looks like there was another thing in play which I failed to foresee, this being my first game with G&K and BNW; my people are suddenly discontent with my Authocracy ideology. I'm guessing another faction, the Shoshone, have surpassed me in culture/tourism so my people saw that their ideology, Order, was superior at the moment. It's generating something like -30 unhappiness right now.

Sorry for being such a bother, but what would be the best way to counter this? I've got my empire on -8 right now, bought a couple of Barracks around a few cities, and when the troops return home I bet the empire will be happy again. But this is a temporary solution, I'd much rather have my empire content with my Ideology, and wouldn't really like adopting the Order ideology. Plus I think it would be detrimental in my situation as I've invested heavily in happiness tenets and they are a real help.

War with the Shoshone is pretty much off the table as well, I'm confident I could break them if they came to my shores but going on the offensive against them would probably be suicide as they are technologically superior and are an ocean away.

 

[timtofly]

You could try changing to Order. Other than that you need to crank up on culture and tourism yourself. You could try changing the emphasis of some of your larger cities to culture.

 

[TemplarLord]

Yeah, just got the Radio technology and am bulding Broadcast Towers, Opera houses and Museums all over the map. In addition to that I won the International games thing and got a free policy; cashed in on the level 3 tenet which gives +3 happiness in every city with a Courthouse. Operating on +20 something happiness now. Still have dissidents with -38.

All in all I have 21 cities with Courthouses in them , which should net, over time, a pretty nice bonus of +63 happiness once it's realized in its full potential.

Thanks timtofly for your help, you're a real bro.