Conquered cities turn against you, this is unrealistic!

[pagh80]

That was a nice idea to make an airport instead of a temple so you can get luxuries in the city but... I dont agree fully in what you are saying. I have tried(more than 1 time) to lose a enemy city, who was deep into my territory. If there where no connection too the other cities how could it reverse back??

I agree that happy faces have an effect but units have too even if you have democracy. I usually lose my cities if i remove the most of my troops... but you can allways read my post above.

 

[Rhandom]

Endureth, will you please read what we are saying. It is entirely coincidental that you haven't experienced it. I have had cities with only happy and content people, with temple library and cathedral, completely disconnected from the enemy capital, with 2x as many units in it, completely untouched by any enemy culture zones, flip 15 turns after capture.

I've had 5(!) cities on the west coast of africa, each above 100 culture produced, full of happy people, 4 to 10 spaces from my forbidden palace, flip 50 turns after capture to the russians on madagascar when I had 3X their total culture and they had one city left. Nothing I did could prevent me from losing 5 cities over 3 turns, all I could do was change which cities flipped. They weren't even core cities of the former russian empire in many cases.

Furthermore, it is quite common to have a city flip 2 turns after capture, before you have a chance to do ANYTHING with it, except fill it up with resting troops and trying to quell resistance. 2 turns after capture! The only choice is wait with no one in the city, and capture it over and over again, or ethnically cleanse it.

This aspect of cultural flips is non-sensical and makes for bad gaming. Maybe it is a bug you haven't experienced, but I've seen it on nearly every large or huge map where I've captured cities from large empires after the age of gunpowder starts. I have tried the same things you claim work, and they don't.

 

[Richard III]

Ok, I haven't played with the patch yet (promised myself I would finish some work before playing civ again) but I have to wiegh in and join the *****ers on this point, because they are quite right about two aspects of "culture flipping:"

#1. TOO OFTEN! Yeah, Bosnia, the Ukraine, bla bla. So it has happened in history. I've lived in two Canadian cities that almost "culture flipped" in their early history. But how often in history does a city successfully flip without getting butchered first? Which leads nicely to:

#2 WHERE ARE ALL THE UNITS? Let's face it, this is #^%$@ ridiculous. If you drop a nuke - yes a Civ3 simulated 10 MEGATONNE NUKE on a city, what does it do? It might - might - kill your units, 50% of the time. On the other hand, what do the unarmed citizens of the city do, even to fresh troops that have invaded that city just a year or two previously? They defeat them! ALL of them. Come on, this is ripe for a change. Kill some, sure. Kick 'em out, sure. But ALL? Here's one case where I will be a heathen and say CTP1 had it better, where the citizens would actually have to revolt and fight before the damn place could be taken.

Now, I love Firaxis to death, and I will play civ till I'm dead, so I am in no way faulting the overall game on this. But culture flipping was not thought through enough, and god help me if the patch makes it worse. Whether realistic or not, a good aspect / random feature of a strategy game should be something have to worry about, not something you have zero control over. They have to have some certain way of preventing it, or else you might as well just have a Simcity-style Godzilla come and kill one of your cities at random every 70 turns.

 

[Peteus]

I'm glad Endureth mentioned the concept of "cultural pressure". Have you seen this information from any reliable source? (i.e. Firaxis)
You're certainly not the only one who has the idea that a high-culture city near a low-culture one is what causes the flipping. I have seen no evidence of that though. In my first ever game, the Indians expanded to a mountainous area right beside my capitol, which at the time had >1000 culture and eventually came close to 20,000 before I won by domination - but that city never flipped! I've also had lots of cities flip while surrounded by my (captured) cities. So clearly the culture (or cultural income) of neighboring cities doesn't play that big a role, if any.

Endureth says:

You get the 20% chance of an automatic flip that occurs when a nearby enemy city is putting more culture in your city then you are.

Where did you hear that? I think I heard Soren (Firaxis) say that it's overall culture, not local, that makes a difference. On the other hand though, all these cities that I've lost occurred while I almost always lead in culture. It just makes no sense, that's why it's so frustrating!

Side note - I can pretty much guarantee that the "smiley faces" that you are talking about play no direct part in the calculation. Happy citizens probably do. The smiley faces and content faces in the lists under the city window have an impact on how many of your citizens are happy, content, or unhappy, that's all. They have no direct effect on civil disorder, resistors, flipping, corruption, or anything else (at least they'd better not, because that would be awfully confusing!)

 

[The Last Conformist]

For Rhandom's interest, I've got lost cites flip back to me before 1000BC, and captured cities flip back to the AI before 1AD. Infact, I can't seem to see any tendency for flips to become more likely as time progresses. However, the smaller city sizes and lower culture ratings in the early game presumeably makes early flips somewhat less likely.

 

[cutiestar]

Richard III

"Whether realistic or not, a good aspect / random feature of a strategy game should be something have to worry about, not something you have zero control over. "

I think it is something that the player has control over, that is why some people think there is far too much flipping, and some think it is ok. The guys who think it is ok are probably the ones that have it under control, basically using a good strategy, I only may get 2 flips in a whole game, considering this game runs from 4000bc till 2050 ad, 2 culturally flipped cities is extremely good, infact remarkebly unrealistic in real terms.

also i didn't hear about many Latvians getting hurt , lithuanians, belerusians, infact you seemed to be focussed on Bosnia when you made the comment about countries in real life flipping, the citizens usually getting screwed.

 

[Peteus]

Cutiestar: If you have control over cultural flips, tell me your secret please! The strategies you, Endureth, et.al. have suggested so far do not work, so you must be holding out! They probably help, but they don't prevent flipping. The only thing that does is the utter elimination of the enemy.
Two flips per game are too much, when there is no excuse for them (by which I mean well-garrisoned, rush-built up cities that are on a continent far away from the enemy's last remaining city, when I am producing ~1000 times as much culture per turn as his primitive outpost.

The "real world" comparisons you draw are inacurate. Latvia declared independance from a failing empire, and the USSR splintered more-or-less voluntarily. Or do you mean their assimilation into the USSR? That would be similar to a strong Civ in the game assimilating a weak one - but what I have a problem with is weak civs assimilating strong ones! That's what makes me fume - and what makes the game less fun to play.

I don't believe that the situations we are complaining about have ever happened in history. Empires lose control of territories when they are on the decline, and when their military is stretched too thin. Did any cities in China (with their overwhelming culture) flip back to the Chinese while the Mongols were still on the march? If they had, what do you suppose the Khan's response would have been?

If having your modern armies defeated by unarmed civilians who have no reason to rise up doesn't frustrate you, more power to you! I laud your patience. Just recognise that you are in the minority!

I love the idea of cultural flipping. I hate this aspect of the way it works in Civ III though.

 

[Endureth]

Someone please post a saved game right before one of these super cities flip on them. I'd like to see it. My room mate claims he has these problems but I know why it happens to him. He conquers very fast and usually leaves a trail of up to ten conquered cities in his trail, then he *****es when 2 flip.

Someone post a saved game.

Endureth

 

[Peteus]

Good idea Endureth! Unfortunately I'm not going to be able to help you out this game because I'm going for a UN victory, and Blitzkrieg is not good for one's global popularity!

What you describe about your roommate's situation sounds like what I see most often. I blitz half an enemy empire, capturing a city or so per turn for 20 turns. The peaceniks back home start getting riled up, so I sell the enemy a peace treaty for a punitive price. The city flips commence, despite the fact that the enemy's economy, military, infrastructure and cultural income have been shattered (not to mention his capitol burned down, maybe several times.)

So are you saying the reason you don't have flip problems is that you don't capture many cities? That's no way to rule the world!

 

[Zouave]

Hey Sid, it seems unanimous. Too much culture flipping, even in well garrisoned cities.

PATCH IT.

I am hard-pressed to think of many historical examples of such things occuring. If they were as common as in Civ III most of Canada would already be part of the U.S. After the Franco-Prussian War ending in 1871, Alsace and Lorraine would have flipped back to France, as an example. Didn't happen in the real world.

More accurate would have been Civil Wars if a capital is taken in ancient or medieval times.

 

[cutiestar]

Who ever said all these citizens were unarmed ??

Ever heard of the eastern block uprisings? ever imagined how easily a well organised city of civilians could rampage over and destroy a simple army of soldiers?

You want to say send an army unit into New York and then tell 20 million citizens to try and take over, see who wins??

Anyway just being a smart ass there, i am not sure why i don't get flipped too often, i certainly don't raze cities very often, I also don't stack the cities with units, I lost too many when I first got the game, but the simple fact is, when I first bought CIV III I was being flipped all the time, now I know the game well and know the strategies, i hardly ever get flipped, i really don't think that is a coincidence.

Good luck:crazyeyes

 

[cutiestar]

Zouave hahahahahahaha

you must be kidding, if it happened in real life most of Canada would be part of the USA.

More likely most of the USA would be part of Canada.

Where would you rather live?? infact I read Canada when all things taken into account was elected as the best country on earth to live. Ofcourse my country was excluded due to size.

Disclaimer: I am not canadian, or affiliated in any way to Canada, and I don't even watch ice hockey.

 

[RogueNine]

Actually, we were #1 in 1995. Now we're down to #3, behind Denmark (wow! Way to go Denmark! ) and Sweeden. The US was around 25 in 1995, and is at 34 now.

But yah, I'd have to agree with your POV.

 

[Zouave]

cutiestar,

Re: Your bizarre Canada vs USA comments.

Now I KNOW you are here just to pull our legs and be facetious, eh?


By the way, I'm sure all those citizens who somehow massacred veteran trained troops (during a flip) armed with the best weapons WERE armed - with pitchforks, sticks, and stones. And maybe a kitchen knife or two. Not too intimidating.

No Sid, your flipping occurs too often and too easily. This is as unrealistic and non-historical as your vanishing garrisons. At least if there is a flip show a reduction of the population size of that city - one per every garrison unit. Or are we to assume the civilians slaughtered these garrisons without the military units inflicting casualties??

 

[J Fred Muggs]

Seems to me half the complaints are based on "it isn't true to life". Hey the game isn't built that way, it is only lightly based on fact. That swordsmen killed my tank, see the problem isn't that the unit did it, it's the fact that it happens to be called a swordsmen. The same can be said for city flips. It isn't the fact they do it, it's, please tell us why they do it. It's plain that no one seems to know for sure. Add to this that the patch increased the chances for a flip, well ok, but hey how about a little info here.

I take an enemy city, starve them to death on purpose and they don't flip? Fill the starved city with my people, improve it, it isn't near the enemy, every body is happy and it flips back? What's wrong with this picture? I don't understand why the troops aren't converted when the city flips, make the game really hard, but at least it would follow some logic. Does the level that you play at make any difference how easy a city will flip? Seems to me that this is a feture that needs a little explaining.

 

[RogueNine]

True enough Muggs. I too wish there was a good description of a few features that appear in the game. I like the intended purpose of culture flipping, but sometimes it seems a tad out of hand. I'd like to know a bit more about what causes it so that I can be sure my methods are actually doing something. (How frustrating is it to rush-buy cultural buildings, get luxury resources into the city, have a bunch of military units in there, and then find out it was all for naught?)

 

[cutiestar]

How many citizens does i citizen point represent, i am thinking on a decent size continent in the game you get over maybe 500 citizen points, so maybe each one is worth 1 million people, that is realistic. ok how much is each army unit point worth, maybe 30 soldiers?

therefore 1 million people would need to be killed by each 30 soldiers to lose a pop point in the culture flip. i don't think so.

oh and 1 million rampaging people with pitch forks isn't intimidating zouave?? you have never been to a european football match have you, then you would know how even a few thousand rampaging fans with no weapons can scare the hell out of you

 

[Endureth]

Peteus, actually, I capture a fair amount of cities. Attached is a screenshot of my current game. What started out as a 12-player brawl on a large map became a 2-player grudge match.

I do have some serious corruption problems on the western island as both my palace and forbidden palace are on the eastern one. As for flips though, I think I've had 3 this entire game but I knew they were coming and was prepared for them.

Endureth

 

[J Fred Muggs]

I don't know, cutiestar, certainly can't say you're wrong. But that is the point I'm getting to, seems to me we need a little advice from the makers. For every example of someone saying they don't get a flip because of "x stratagy", someone can come right back and say that it doesn't always work.

It's possible to starve a captured city to one, add your people, make a settler/worker and there for have no enemy citizens in the captured city anymore. I've not done it, so I don't know if this would stop the flip or not. A lot of damn time spent when it is easier to raze it and settle the same spot again and just use the improvements done by the former city. I don't see any other way to do it. Even then I'd be on the edge of my seat wondering if I can get the improvements before it might flip.

 

[Rhandom]

"ever imagined how easily a well organised city of civilians could rampage over and destroy a simple army of soldiers?"

This made me laugh so hard it brought tears to my eyes. well organised civilians? simple army of soldiers? hahahahahaha... hahahah...cought, hack... ha

Civilians at best have been only able to sabotage and gather intelligence. Red Dawn was NOT a documentary. Sorry.

If you want a very graphic example of what happens to rebelling cities against trained militaries, look at Hammis. Hammis would be exactly what you were talking about, it was a very pretty Syrian city that was largely controlled by fundemantalist factions that threatened Assad's rules. After a failed assassination attempt that wounded him, he sent a small infantry force into the main fundamentalist neighborhoods, who got repulsed. Assad then brought up the artillery and tanks, and pounded those neighbors into rubble, then infantry went in again, and set demolition charges on any rubble bits large enough to hide a rebel. Then steamrollers went in, and flattened the rubble into football-field sized plains, where literally nothing rose 12" above the ground. Sure, he lost about 20% of the city, but that was pretty much the end of cultural rebellion in Syria.

This was about as heavily armed a civilian force imaginable, against about as crappy a military force imaginable.

The arguments against the culture flips don't revolve around realism anyway, they revolve around irritating, unpredictable game play that isn't well document and is quite likely bugged. You should at least get a warning that a city is becoming overly fond of the enemy.