[Vote] (1-36) Smooth Growth Penalty From Unhappiness

[CppMaster]

Currently, grow penalty happiness is flat for every threshold:

The consequence of that is the difference between 50% and 49% happiness is big, while there is no difference between 49% and 36%, which makes no sense and it feels artificial.

Proposal: Make the grow penalty from unhappiness linear:

Thanks to that every difference in happiness would result in the same difference in growth modifier (except 10% and below and 50% and above). The function feels more natural than artificial thresholds.
The function: Growth modifier (in %) = Happiness (in %) * 2.5 - 25, but should never be less than 0% and 100%, so clamp(growth_modifier, 0, 100)
On average the growth penalty would about the same as before, but it would smoothly decrease instead.
Link to calculations: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1jpm5R2CGyeqcMf--m6rxxLrtCwNwGpuVFcP-pAnONPE/edit?usp=sharing

 

[Recursive]

The growth penalty makes it harder for the city to keep growing and increasing Unhappiness even further. Doing it this way, while better for the player with optimal play (i.e. Avoid Growth), would be worse for players who are not so attentive to their Unhappiness total. Not saying that's a bad thing, but something to be aware of.

 

[Stalker0]

I already have to pay attention to happiness, I don't want every % point to be fret over in maximizing yields.

 

[CppMaster]

would be worse for players who are not so attentive to their Unhappiness total.

Why would that be harsh for them? If they don't pay attention to that, it will punish them similarly on average, which I included in calculation. Also if they won't fluctuate as much with growth penalty when going from 50% to 49% and vice versa.

 

[Recursive]

Why would that be harsh for them? If they don't pay attention to that, it will punish them similarly on average, which I included in calculation. Also if they won't fluctuate as much with growth penalty when going from 50% to 49% and vice versa.

A 2.5% penalty instead of a 25% penalty will not really change growth, thus they will grow and more unhappiness will be added, etc.

It's not a huge deal, just not the most friendly mechanic to newcomers. More focus will be required on Avoid Growth.

 

[CppMaster]

Oh, yeah, you're right. Especially when happiness is harder this VP version. However, I wouldn't say that avoiding growth is friendly mechanic and in the spirit of developing empire. It arificially doesn't make the city unhappy, just because it's needs can only increase when it gain a new citizen. It's one of the weirdest and unintuitive mechanics in the game. Too bad we haven't came up with anything better.

 

[Rekk]

Hence why we want a steep happiness increase right at the beginning. If you want to make it smooth, I would suggest polynomial or exponential growth from zero.

 

[axatin]

I sponsor this.

 

[josh4]

I play VP for many years, on and off, and happiness system was always an obscure mechanic for me in it's numbers. I could manage it, locking cities, etc. but I didn't understand what change from 53 to 78 % meant. It must be hella confusing to new players as well. There'a are basically two numbers that are needed right now: 50 and 35% as only they change anything. We could scrap happiness as numbers totally and just introduce a happy, sad, and angry emoji and call it a day and the system would be more clear. Let's make those other percentages matter, as tight now there's no difference if you're 50 or 100%. This also helps prioritising lux tarde, etc.

 

[Recursive]

Proposal Sponsors: axatin.

(Sponsors have indicated that they are able and willing to perform the code changes required for this proposal if the community votes Aye on it. Other coders are free to sponsor this as well. A proposal without a sponsor will not advance to the Voting Phase.)

 

[Slyceth]

Fully agree, I don't want to focus on squeezing out one more happiness for a huge change.

 

[Rekk]

This change only make unhappiness harsher.

Should have looked closer at the graphs. I mistakenly believed that the curve started earlier.

 

[CppMaster]

This change only make unhappiness harsher.

No, on average it's very similar.

 

[Stalker0]

This change only make unhappiness harsher.

Should have looked closer at the graphs. I mistakenly believed that the curve started earlier.

I was kind of in the same boat. thinking that growth penalties might accrue at higher levels.

So basically from 50% - 100% happiness, there is no growth bonus or penalty. From there, every 1% in unhappiness = -2.5% growth.

So in comparing the old and new systems:

Old vs New
49% = 40%
35% = 30%
20% = 10%

So in general this new system will be a lot kinder on growth. Now does this affect any of the other thresholds like unit production and barb rebellions?

 

[balparmak]

Since the proposal only mentions the growth, it shouldn't. Though I wouldn't mind that either when it comes to the empire unhappy CS malus, I fundamentally dislike thresholds.

I'll go even further, hard thresholds could be the main reason why (un)happiness never feels right, it's either too easy (past versions) or too punishing (latest one for many ppl). Thresholds are by design inflexible so you have to get your numbers just right, which is next to impossible when you have many interacting systems and a playerbase with different preferences. Most likely outcome is what we have: to make it less impactful when playing good (e.g. happiness doesn't matter as long as it's +50%), and punish bad plays heavily, to the point that you better restart. I'd feel much better about a gradual happiness system, even with more punishing unhappiness modifiers.

 

[patrick24]

yes correct

 

[nekokon]

Threshold creates limits allowing good players to min-maxing their strategy while still keep the general balance of the game for casual players. As in, casual players only need to hit those thresholds to get the same benefits as good player to keep up with the general balance of AIs, instead of having to do "as much as possible" and fail behind because the AIs need extra bonuses to keep up with min-max players.
We're still playing strategy games, not simulator.

 

[balparmak]

That's why we have different difficulties.

 

[CppMaster]

Threshold creates limits allowing good players to min-maxing their strategy while still keep the general balance of the game for casual players. As in, casual players only need to hit those thresholds to get the same benefits as good player to keep up with the general balance of AIs, instead of having to do "as much as possible" and fail behind because the AIs need extra bonuses to keep up with min-max players.
We're still playing strategy games, not simulator.

Gradual happiness also allows min-maxing.

 

[nekokon]

That's why we have different difficulties.

But at its core you can't make the game behave differently at different difficulties, so the only way to make things more difficult is to increase AI's bonus, thus going in the opposite direction of VP/CBP in the first place. To minimize those AI's bonus you have to keep core game balance around a tight range for both good and bad players.

Gradual happiness also allows min-maxing.

Not sure how it's possible. Min-maxing usually means to do the best within one constrain, if there's no constrain then you can only "do as much as possible" and that's not min-maxing.

If you mean gradual like this then yes it still allow min-maxing, but there're still a set threshold instead of one straight line.