A review of the Happiness System

[Stalker0]

So how happy are we with the happiness system? Its gone through a great many iterations and changes, so where do we stand with the current product?

My thoughts compared to where I saw it many months ago.

Pros:

1) Much more stable. I know others may have differing experiences, but I have found the current system swings less than the old models did. In the past, I would see crazy swings of unhappy, especially with famine mods (which look to be good now, woot!). In this one, I generally feel I know where my happiness is.

2) UI much improved. The system will always be more obscure than the base system, but the UI has come a long way. The city tooltip on the main screen, the detailed happiness look in the detailed city screen....all great additions.

Cons:

1) Luxuries have gone from super important to a nonfactor. The base game makes luxuries super important, some would argue too much. For a while I thought the system had a nice balance with scaling luxuries, but I think its gone too far. Luxuries aren't really important unless you get the full Industry policy.

2) I feel very little control over my happiness, especially early game. Right now happiness just feels like something "that is". I don't feel a lot of direct control over it. The early buildings that reduce needs....they are so minor (5% in many cases) that I don't bother. Sometimes a library reduces my iliteracy....sometimes it doesn't. Whether true or not, I don't feel like happiness is a part of my main game play. I choose a policy every so often to get happiness, I take my luxuries when I can get it, I make sure my cities are connected (as that kills you on unhappiness)....but otherwise I basically ignore it.

3) The success of other parts of the mod may have removed some of the value.

One of the things I liked about the system when it first came out is it gave me good incentive to build buildings when I wouldn't before. I will build walls to help my defense and lower my unhappy!

But the mod has done such a good job with balancing buildings and the like I don't see the need anymore. I don't build walls to fight unhappiness....I build walls because you need freaking walls if you want to defend your city!

The espionage system actually makes putting spies in non capitals worthwhile, so now constabularies are more generally useful. The unit purchase system makes spreading barracks, armories, and military academies good to build in several places.

Buildings are so front-loaded now that they have value in satellite cities without the unhappiness reduction. A library in a size 3 city with a specialist still provides 3 science....up to 6 or even 8 in later stages of the game....and only 3 less than a big size 18 city. So it pays to build those libraries and markets.

I don't need a system to drive me to build buildings anymore....I want to do it all on my own. And with that drive gone....what does the system really provide that is better than the old one?

 

[Enginseer]

The only problem I have is the lack of a happiness modifier for production. Sure, I may like spending time in a farm for thousands of years or reading books and doing experiments, but I want real work, real employment! Dang it!

 

[Strigvir]

The only problem I have is the lack of a happiness modifier for production. Sure, I may like spending time in a farm for thousands of years or reading books and doing experiments, but I want real work, real employment! Dang it!

Gr8 idea, the only way to counteract unhappiness is to build structures. So you want slow down even that, while all other thresholds still continue to grow up.

 

[DrNooooo]

It's grown on me quite a lot from when I started the CBP but I still don't like it overall - and for many of the reasons you're saying.

Besudes what you mentioned about reducing the value of Luxuries and it being too variable, my biggest problems with it are really unavoidable parts of the system:

- It is intimidating and unintuitive for new players
- It introduces extensive and difficult to understand micromanagement - in comparison to "this building gives +1 Happiness," buildings that reduce crime or reduce boredom have less clear effects
- The Happiness system is still largely binary, as it has always been. You're either happy or not, with little reason to worry about minor increases or decreases.
- It makes some things not work - you can't tell anymore how much Happiness you'll lose from puppeting or annexing a city, which is often your biggest Unhappiness source.

But it comes down to this - what problems does the new Happiness system solve in comparison to the old one? I'd have to play again with the old one to find out, but I don't really see any. As you said, the CBP is balanced well enough that it's redundant with every system - if you're playing well and building what you need, you'll be happy. If you're behind in some area due to overfocus, you'll face the consequences even without the Happiness loss. So what's the benefit?

 

[void_genesis]

I feel that not every aspect is of equal importance to all civs on any particular play through. This also applies to the happiness system, so civs focused on golden ages (Persia) or rapid expansion or conquest need to pay more attention to it than

The current happiness system does function as a brake on preventing you from overspecialising, over expanding, or over conquering. In that respect the current happiness system works well I think because it prevents these things in the early games, but the brakes come off if you play well in the early game.

I love the monopoly system on luxuries but think it could use some balancing as some effects are more powerful than other. The bonus science on amber is particularly amazing, especially since amber isn't all that common when it occurs. The 10% gold or golden age length ones are a bit meh and usually occur on ones that are harder to get a monopoly on. So revisit these sometime and make them more diverse and balanced ideally. The link to corporations in the late game is just icing on the cake.

One suggestion to throw in the mix....could we add more happiness effects to the unique abilities of some civs or policies? I can only think of Persia with its golden age focus at the moment. Other civs could get particular benefits that scale with their happiness that synergise with their play style.

 

[Finarvi]

I like new happiness system. It makes many buildings valuable to build, it gives you more feeling of a (at least simplified) kingdom management.

The one problem is that from certain point you don't have to worry about unhappiness (at least if you're leading) and with loads of bonusses you're getting during game from policies/wonders/religion/buildings happiness can grow very fast... And even conquering cities doesn't counteract it as it usually gives me even more happiness.

 

[MSteele]

Would having different levels of happiness with an associated modifier be out of the question?

Spoiler :

 

[Stalker0]

Would having different levels of happiness with an associated modifier be out of the question?

Spoiler :

Technically this is how the system works now:

For every 1 happy you gain a 1% bonus to Food, Science, Faith, Gold, and Culture (I think I have them all)...up to 10 happy. For every -1 happy you have a -1% bonus to the things I mentioned...up to 30 unhappy.

I like new happiness system. It makes many buildings valuable to build, it gives you more feeling of a (at least simplified) kingdom management.

One of my points, and I would love to hear your counterpoint, is that I feel the Mod has evolved beyond the new of the happiness system to encourage certain buildings. I feel that the buildings overall are good and don't need extra incentive.

Which buildings do you build because of happiness, as opposed to building it because you want the benefits of the building?

The current happiness system does function as a brake on preventing you from overspecialising, over expanding, or over conquering. In that respect the current happiness system works well I think because it prevents these things in the early games

I would argue the exact opposite imo. I find the old system was much harsher early game for over expanding or over conquering, as you generated a lot more unhappiness through those methods...and the growth penalty of the old system was much harsher early game (that loss of growth was crippling).

As for the note on overspecializing....that is an interesting question. On the one hand, the bonus from specialists in the mod is huge compared to your base bonuses. For example, the scientist on a library provides as much science as the base library bonus of a Pop 18 city....and it just gets stronger from there. But on the other hand, you get a small penalty to a lot of areas. I will have to do a little number crunching on the value of specialists at some point. Right now I use them like hotcakes, but that may not be the best way to go.

 

[MSteele]

Technically this is how the system works now:

For every 1 happy you gain a 1% bonus to Food, Science, Faith, Gold, and Culture (I think I have them all)...up to 10 happy. For every -1 happy you have a -1% bonus to the things I mentioned...up to 30 unhappy.

Ha! I didn't know that and I thought I was being clever.

Sorry for the wasted bandwidth, I'm a total scrub nub.

 

[Finarvi]

[...]
One of my points, and I would love to hear your counterpoint, is that I feel the Mod has evolved beyond the new of the happiness system to encourage certain buildings. I feel that the buildings overall are good and don't need extra incentive.

Which buildings do you build because of happiness, as opposed to building it because you want the benefits of the building?
[...]

Well, for example I used to build XP buildings only in 1-2 cities, now they're valuable in times of piece too with their disorder reduction. Another example are defense buildings in inner cities. +X/Ypop buildings are good even in small cities as their % of bonus reduce unhappiness by the simillar % ammount, no matter how large city is (unhapiness is based on population too).

 

[MasterEcabob]

I think the the luxury pop bonus could use a nerf again. Right now, on a tall game, I'm getting +14 from luxuries and a whopping +18 from the pop bonus...and I only have seven cities! Between that bonus, the tradition national wonder bonus, and another +10 from religion, I've been consistently at +30 happiness the entire game.

On the more positive side, I must say that I'm really enjoying the system. One thing I like is that I take a hit for not connecting my cities, or for having all my tiles razed. And last game, I did end up building a few zoos to boost a smaller city's science output past the illiterate range, which was much more interesting than simply getting a +1 happy for the building like vanilla.

I do think the extra gold from happiness could be toned down a bit...as a 10% boost means that I never have money problems, until I dip into unhappiness, at which point I am instantly massively in the red.

 

[Gazebo]

It's not perfect, but let's not forget how utterly simple the base game was (in terms of happiness). It was, essentially:

Expand, grow, find luxuries.

Small empires never had happiness issues, whereas big ones always did (up until ideologies, at which point happiness stopped mattering at all).

Now, you have to manage a lot more things, sure, but the process of expansion and happiness management allows for more nuanced play.

Are most people sitting at extremely positive happiness in the late game? The current system values are tuned for the AI, but if players are getting huge happiness values from the industrial era on I can increase the tech scaling value a bit.

1) Luxuries have gone from super important to a nonfactor. The base game makes luxuries super important, some would argue too much. For a while I thought the system had a nice balance with scaling luxuries, but I think its gone too far. Luxuries aren't really important unless you get the full Industry policy.

Nonfactor in terms of happiness? I mean, you get quite a bit from the population luxury bonus, but yeah, +1 happiness from them was by design. I didn't like the expansion model of vanilla civ. It forced odd choices.

The point of the monopoly/corporation system was to make luxuries more of an economic element than a happiness one. I think we've succeeded on that front.

G

 

[Funak]

Are most people sitting at extremely positive happiness in the late game? The current system values are tuned for the AI, but if players are getting huge happiness values from the industrial era on I can increase the tech scaling value a bit.

Pretty much from the late-early or early midgame (usually around the time I run out of space to expand) happiness becomes a non-factor for the rest of the game

Nonfactor in terms of happiness? I mean, you get quite a bit from the population luxury bonus, but yeah, +1 happiness from them was by design. I didn't like the expansion model of vanilla civ. It forced odd choices.

The point of the monopoly/corporation system was to make luxuries more of an economic element than a happiness one. I think we've succeeded on that front.

Main problem with the monopoly/cooperation thing is that it doesn't promote trade at all. I usually find myself sitting on my luxuries or giving them away to the AI for free if they ask.

I mean the EUI leader panel thing where it showed the luxuries they have available for and the ones they want to buy from me stopped working a long time ago in CPP and it doesn't even bother me because luxurytrades are just not important at all.

 

[Stalker0]

It's not perfect, but let's not forget how utterly simple the base game was (in terms of happiness). It was, essentially:

Expand, grow, find luxuries.

Now, you have to manage a lot more things, sure, but the process of expansion and happiness management allows for more nuanced play.

Are most people sitting at extremely positive happiness in the late game? The current system values are tuned for the AI, but if players are getting huge happiness values from the industrial era on I can increase the tech scaling value a bit.

I've bolded a key piece I want to discuss, and its one of my main points. I don't feel like the current system is actually providing more nuanced play, its more of a nonfactor than I felt the original system was.

At different periods of this system's implementation, building a key building I felt was a big part of the gameplay, one I had to pay attention to. I don't feel that way right now, I deal with the unhappiness I have, I make small adjustments when a key factor is high (such as isolation...which is a significant factor)...but otherwise I build the buildings I want to build because I want those buildings.

The original system may have been simple (though I don't even think that's a bad thing) but it was effective. I had to balance expansion with happiness infrastructure. It encouraged trading. It reduced the speed of conquest.

Now the original system wasn't perfect, it certainly could use some tweaking. I think part of its flaw was certain policies allowed a player to bypass the happiness system. And I think that may be happening in the new system as well...

I think the reason that late game happiness is not an issue is partly because of policies. There are several policies that provide a great deal of happiness...and as happiness is a rare resource in the mod its a big deal. Piety and Rationalism both have ones that scale to every city, allowing a great deal more expansion than would otherwise be possible.

 

[Stalker0]

Main problem with the monopoly/cooperation thing is that it doesn't promote trade at all.

This. I actually like the monopoly aspect quite a bit, but I don't understand why I can't secure it through trading. Is it too hard for the AI to understand?

 

[Gazebo]

This. I actually like the monopoly aspect quite a bit, but I don't understand why I can't secure it through trading. Is it too hard for the AI to understand?

Correct. Also, it'd be odd if you could build an HQ with a monopoly from a trade, the lose it, then get it back, etc. Making it 'static' (i.e. from owned resources) is simply easier to plan for DLL-wise (and way easier to teach the AI).

I've bolded a key piece I want to discuss, and its one of my main points. I don't feel like the current system is actually providing more nuanced play, its more of a nonfactor than I felt the original system was.

At different periods of this system's implementation, building a key building I felt was a big part of the gameplay, one I had to pay attention to. I don't feel that way right now, I deal with the unhappiness I have, I make small adjustments when a key factor is high (such as isolation...which is a significant factor)...but otherwise I build the buildings I want to build because I want those buildings.

The original system may have been simple (though I don't even think that's a bad thing) but it was effective. I had to balance expansion with happiness infrastructure. It encouraged trading. It reduced the speed of conquest.

Now the original system wasn't perfect, it certainly could use some tweaking. I think part of its flaw was certain policies allowed a player to bypass the happiness system. And I think that may be happening in the new system as well...

I think the reason that late game happiness is not an issue is partly because of policies. There are several policies that provide a great deal of happiness...and as happiness is a rare resource in the mod its a big deal. Piety and Rationalism both have ones that scale to every city, allowing a great deal more expansion than would otherwise be possible.

I don't feel it is quite as bad as all that. I think, with time and more games under our belt(s), we can more clearly balance the system. The framework of the system is solid, and there are plenty of variables for us to modify. If we decide there's a wee bit too much happiness in policies, we can bring that down a bit.

Ultimately, it is easy to forget how far we've come, in that the systems are all interconnected in ways that seem second-nature to the CBP now, but didn't exist at all a year ago.

Edit: Don't get me wrong - if it turns out there are fundamental flaws in the system we can fix them, however I (personally) feel quite strongly that the system functions properly, and that it simply needs to be tuned for player needs a bit more. One thing I've considered: would anyone be interested in difficulty factoring into global averages? Right now difficulty makes no impact (aside from AI cities being a bit more robust), so this is one area where we could ramp up complexity, especially late-game. Food for thought.

 

[Stalker0]

Edit: Don't get me wrong - if it turns out there are fundamental flaws in the system we can fix them, however I (personally) feel quite strongly that the system functions properly, and that it simply needs to be tuned for player needs a bit more.

One other concern I have is the way the system makes "the rich get richer"....if I understand it correctly.

A player that has a really good start and gets better bonuses and infrastructure also gets less unhappiness (and would actually impose more unhappiness on their opponents)...which then translates into even more bonuses.

 

[Gazebo]

One other concern I have is the way the system makes "the rich get richer"....if I understand it correctly.

A player that has a really good start and gets better bonuses and infrastructure also gets less unhappiness (and would actually impose more unhappiness on their opponents)...which then translates into even more bonuses.

Ah, but getting ahead in techs, or growing too quickly, can outpace your infrastructure for buildings and whatnot. So there's an upside and a downside.

G

 

[Stalker0]

Ah, but getting ahead in techs, or growing too quickly, can outpace your infrastructure for buildings and whatnot. So there's an upside and a downside.

G

I don't see how?

More happy = more production. More Happy = More Growth = More Production. I can build buildings quicker and get all of those bonuses I am looking for.

I have never seen games where I outeched myself into a happiness hole. I have seen cases where I was doing so well early game that my happiness was much better than in other games.

 

[Gamewizard]

One other concern I have is the way the system makes "the rich get richer"....if I understand it correctly.

A player that has a really good start and gets better bonuses and infrastructure also gets less unhappiness (and would actually impose more unhappiness on their opponents)...which then translates into even more bonuses.

You should be rewarded for having a good start, no? If all of your starts are good then I would bump up the difficulty.

edit - The higher the difficulty, the more units you should theoretically need, which means fewer buildings, which means more unhappiness.