Courthouse "bug"...

[elprofesor]

Annexed cities are a much better use of your scarce happiness resources than puppeteed cities are. Puppet cities are always on gold focus, which means they take forever to build what you need, plus they prioritize defensive and gold buildings, so you'll have to wait a lot to see science buildings up (or cultural buildings, if that's what you want because you've gone piety, for example). And you can't build/rush buy units in annexed cities.

From a happiness point of view, an annexed city is much more efficient, event without the cheap 3 happiness of the curthouse. You'll choose when to build the happiness buildings (and that includes happiness buildings from SPs, which puppets tend to ignore), and you'll do it faster. You may even buy them if needed.

By the way, to those that say that it's a big no-no for SP adquistion costs, take into account that this depends on your sources of culture. If most of your culture comes from CS or from a heavily specialized city (covered with landmarks, for example), then it's a bad idea. Otherwise, your annexed city needs only to provide 15% of the cpt your capital makes to be culture-neutral (I know this is an oversimplification, I do it just to remember you that 15% is not that much at all).

I far as I'm concerned, it's a bug, and it would be a very bad idea to allow courthouses to be built everywhere; we'd be back to ICS times.

 

[MkLh]

Annexed cities are a much better use of your scarce happiness resources than puppeteed cities are. Puppet cities are always on gold focus, which means they take forever to build what you need, plus they prioritize defensive and gold buildings, so you'll have to wait a lot to see science buildings up (or cultural buildings, if that's what you want because you've gone piety, for example). And you can't build/rush buy units in annexed cities.

From a happiness point of view, an annexed city is much more efficient, event without the cheap 3 happiness of the curthouse. You'll choose when to build the happiness buildings (and that includes happiness buildings from SPs, which puppets tend to ignore), and you'll do it faster. You may even buy them if needed.

By the way, to those that say that it's a big no-no for SP adquistion costs, take into account that this depends on your sources of culture. If most of your culture comes from CS or from a heavily specialized city (covered with landmarks, for example), then it's a bad idea. Otherwise, your annexed city needs only to provide 15% of the cpt your capital makes to be culture-neutral (I know this is an oversimplification, I do it just to remember you that 15% is not that much at all).

I far as I'm concerned, it's a bug, and it would be a very bad idea to allow courthouses to be built everywhere; we'd be back to ICS times.

In domination/conquest -type of games (these are quite much only ones where annexing/puppeting -problem plays a big part) techs you needed are mostly produced by great scientists farmed on your core cities and RAs. Usually you just need to get mech infantry, all other research is more or less icing on the cake. Social policies are often much more important. While it's possible to match increased SP costs, it costs a lot, and puppets may build culture buildings too.

Production just isn't that important as it use to be. There isn't unlimited space for units anymore. You want to fill the battlefield mostly with your highly promoted veteran units. When you need new units, it's best to build or buy them in your HE city.

 

[KillingMeSoftly]

I tend to puppet because I love Social Policies. Even without the happiness bug, there's strong trade-offs between puppetting and annexing. Another reason I don't annex very often is precisely because of the bug. Making use of the bug feels cheap to me, I wish it was either fixed or incorporated as a real feature. But even then as others have said, it would make your conquered cities better than your settled ones, which is weird. I feel there's already plenty of incentives to annex cities without the bugged happiness boost.

 

[Alpedar]

When I play India, I just can't anex. Anexing and not building CH is stupid. Building CH = superadvantage. If I wanted that, i could have played on setler.
When playing as anyone else, is same, but smaller.

 

[woodshadows]

am i missing something, why does india get 6 happiness from a courthouse?

 

[KrikkitTwo]

am i missing something, why does india get 6 happiness from a courthouse?

Courthouse removes ALL city unhappiness, a non-occupied Indian city gets 6 unhappiness.



Ideally they would
Either

1. Allow the Courthouse to be built in ALL non-Puppet cities, and Balance it appropriately (increase the hammer cost/gold per turn cost, or change it in some other way.)
AND/OR
2. Make the courthouse not give an annexed city a benefit over a settled city, and balance it appropriately (reduce the gold per turn cost, or hammer cost)

Then balance puppets to compensate.

 

[Horizons]

The reason the courthouses generate all the is because of the Jailhouse Rock, duh!

 

[Strategist83]

I still believe people have blown this whole thing out of proportion.

An annexed city with a courthouse increases SP costs. A courthouse costs GPT.

It's just not that big of a deal. Yes it is clearly better to eventually convert most cities to annexed status. This seems to follow common sense.

Actually no, it hasn't been blown out of proportion.

Annexed cities/cities you control are far more valuable than puppet ones. Puppets have, to name just some, the following problems:

- They're locked into gold-focus mode, which more frequently than not is detrimental. This means, for example, that they'll prefer working silly trading posts rather than bonus tiles with pastures. You thus get less out of the city - puppets mean you are paying the price of your most valuable resource, happy citizens, working the wrong tiles.

-You can't control what they produce, meaning they'll waste tons of production points on stuff you don't need. Really need that happiness building? Too bad, city governor is going to build a castle because city was a former capital - and build it at the horribly slow rate of a gold-focusing city.

- You can't control puppet city growth, either. Once again, it will work the wrong tiles and collect lots of food, growing stupidly huge and clogging up the happiness you needed for other cities.

For these reason (and more), puppets are really a very bad idea in many situations. When you couple this fact with the facts that a) this ridiculous Courthouse bug which makes the Courthouse a Colosseum on steroids and b) social policy cost increase is, I say again, far less significant than in initial versions of the game, you'd be a fool to keep cities as puppets if it can be at all avoided. Thus, Courthouses are extremly overpowered.

Also, while it's true that the Courthouse has a high maintenance cost, as I mentioned this goes hand in hand with an extremely low production cost.

Finally, as was mentioned, just think about how absurdly game-breaking this is for India players. Really, fixing this should be highest priority for the dev team. However, I'm not sure they even know this bug exists - or even cares much that it does.

 

[MkLh]

Courthouse removes ALL city unhappiness, a non-occupied Indian city gets 6 unhappiness.

Yeah, with India it may be a bit over the top. But should we change the concept if it's broken with one of 18 civs? Sounds more reasonable to balance individual civs to fit into game concepts than other way around.

 

[Alpedar]

Courthouse as described and inteded, does not do this, what it currently do is bug. That it manifest much more for one civ is just coincidence.
If bug was not present, anexing (and building CH) is strategic choice that have lot of benefits and two drawbacks, maintanence and policy cost. City working better tiles pays CH maintanence, and policy cost change is sometimes significant, sometimes not.
This bug adds +3 (or +2.4 on huge map) hapiness not limited by city size. This alone is so advantageous, that it pays its maintanence many times.
Without this bug, annexed city is worse than settled city, but it already is. Maybe some tweak to CH would be good, but current state is unacceptable

 

[The Pilgrim]

Yeah, with India it may be a bit over the top. But should we change the concept if it's broken with one of 18 civs? Sounds more reasonable to balance individual civs to fit into game concepts than other way around.

It is broken with all civs. You're not supposed to match AI's happiness on higher levels. That's ridiculous. But that's what's going on.

 

[markovnikov]

wow, I've read 3 pages of thread and not only am I unconvinced there is a bug here, I don't have a clear idea of what this bug is supposed to be.

So the courthouse is supposed to eliminate unhappiness in a city caused by it being taken over. Fine so far. What is the problem? From this thread the issue seems to be:

1. It also gives an extra 3 happiness on top of removing conquest unhappiness.
2. This effect is not mentioned in civpedia.

Is this correct?

 

[jmick175]

wow, I've read 3 pages of thread and not only am I unconvinced there is a bug here, I don't have a clear idea of what this bug is supposed to be.

So the courthouse is supposed to eliminate unhappiness in a city caused by it being taken over. Fine so far. What is the problem? From this thread the issue seems to be:

1. It also gives an extra 3 happiness on top of removing conquest unhappiness.
2. This effect is not mentioned in civpedia.

Is this correct?

The bug is that in addition to removing the added unhappiness caused by being annexed (essentially making it the same as a city that you settled)--which is what it is supposed to do, it also REMOVES THE PER CITY UNHAPPINESS that you get based on the number of cities.

So, if you are playing as anyone but India you and you have 3 settled cities, you will have 9 just based on the number of cities (in addition to whatever unhappiness you have per citizen). But if the cities are 1 that you settle and 2 that you've captured and built courthouses, you will have 3 based on the number of cities plus the unhappiness per citizen.

If you are playing as India, those same three settled cities would give you 18 based on the number of cities plus the per citizen unhappiness. If they are 1 settled and 2 captured with courthouses, you will have 6 based on the number of cities plus the per citizen unhappiness.


The bug is that the courthouse is REMOVING THE PER CITY that should be caused by every city that you own.


edit: So. To answer your question.
1) Yes, if you are playing as a non-India civ. If you are playing as India, it gives an extra 6.
2) Correct.

So from a happiness standpoint, a captured city with a courthouse is more powerful than a city that you settled. That is the bug.

 

[Becomedeath]

So from a happiness standpoint, a captured city with a courthouse is more powerful than a city that you settled. That is the bug.

How do you know it's a bug? Did you develop it? Did you program it? Unless you did you cannot say that it's a bug.

I also don't see it as a bug.

In the early game, the cost of pushing up your social policies for a few extra happiness points simply doesn't pay off. In the later game, you're not capturing cities which can rival the power of your own home grown ones, so to say that it makes captured cities "more powerful" is just absurd.

Looking back over the bugs thread and forums, this has been an point of discussion since launch. Many other issues have been resolved. I put it to you that if they were going to do anything about it, they would have by now.

And again, I really don't see how this makes your game play any worse and therefore don't really see what the problem is.

 

[The Pilgrim]

to say that it makes captured cities "more powerful" is just absurd.

It's first grade level math. You can ignore this fact, and believe that whatever makes game easier is a feature instead of a bug. Broken code, which allows many exploits, can also be considered as feature following the same logic. I'm still waiting for your answer about how Oxford bug is buggier than this one.

Numbers are numbers. Bottom line, it doesn't even matter whether this one is intended or not. If it's undocumented feature, it must be nerfed.

 

[Becomedeath]

Civ is predeominantly a single player game. Nobody in their right mind builds a single player game around it's multiplayer feature.

With both of these points, the only person you're cheating by exploiting their power is yourself. And if you're willing to cheat yourself then you are trully lost. That's simple first century philosophical ethics.

I see the courthouse as a balancing feature for large empires.

Numbers are numbers. Bottom line, it doesn't even matter whether this one is intended or not. If it's undocumented feature, it must be nerfed.

This is laughable nonsense. Numbers can say whatever you want them to say, they're entirely open to interpretation, heck, my job is making numbers say what people want them to say instead of what they do. And if it's an undocumented feature, the first response should be "it should be documented". Outside of a major religion I don't think I've seen a call for destruction because "it is not written"!!! DESTROY THE UNHOLY COURTHOUSE FOR THE CIVILOPEDIA MENTIONS NOT ITS ABHORENT POWERS OF DARKNESS!!!! Really?



The courthouse doesn't actually make my game substantially easier as I prefer to have large puppet empires with production points selectively placed along them, the overall impact of the courthouse is negligable in my games. I've played games making full use of the courthouse and found that it took more than it brought to the table.

Perhaps, the developers foolishly thought we were able to self manage and didn't tighten the code as much as they could have.

If you want to exploit Oxford Uni, then to be honest with the effort you've had to go to build universities everywhere and throw up the wonder and get rid of the city and then build it again, if you think it's cheating, you're going out of your way to do it and if you don't think it's cheating, who really cares what you do as you're only ruining it for yourself.

With an issue that's been in open discussion for a year, if it were my development team I'd be reading the forums and saying "well they can't decide what they want, so let them build a mod for it if it's that much of an issue" and with something as long on the fence as the Courthouse, I'd be very suprised if that wasn't the view being taken.

As for Oxford, it's your foot, shoot at it if you like.

 

[The Pilgrim]

Civ is predeominantly a single player game. Nobody in their right mind builds a single player game around it's multiplayer feature.

First of all, it's not. It's both. And I'm sure most of the hard core MP players actually think the opposite. So that's purely your personal opinion.

With both of these points, the only person you're cheating by exploiting their power is yourself. And if you're willing to cheat yourself then you are trully lost. That's simple first century philosophical ethics.

Exactly. So when one convinces himself that a bug is actually a feature and feels more comfortable to exploit it, he's cheating nobody but himself.

This is laughable nonsense. Numbers can say whatever you want them to say, they're entirely open to interpretation, heck, my job is making numbers say what people want them to say instead of what they do.

I've noticed that's what you're doing. My job, on the other hand, is to filter all the noise from deceptive numbers and determine what they're supposed to say instead of what some other people and circumstances try to make them to. So no need to sell anything to anyone. I'm a pain in the ass buyer.

And if it's an undocumented feature, the first response should be "it should be documented". Outside of a major religion I don't think I've seen a call for destruction because "it is not written"!!! DESTROY THE UNHOLY COURTHOUSE FOR THE CIVILOPEDIA MENTIONS NOT ITS ABHORENT POWERS OF DARKNESS!!!! Really?

Really. Why would anybody document something that already has been nerfed and doesn't exist anymore?

The courthouse doesn't actually make my game substantially easier as I prefer to have large puppet empires with production points selectively placed along them, the overall impact of the courthouse is negligable in my games. I've played games making full use of the courthouse and found that it took more than it brought to the table.

Well, I've played games when I wasn't under +10 happiness while resisting and ~ +20-30 most of the time having enormous empire. On immortal level. It doesn't matter. If you get even one more than you should, it's a bug.

Perhaps, the developers foolishly thought we were able to self manage and didn't tighten the code as much as they could have.

Speaking of nonsense... Haven't you pointed out two sentences ago that if someone did a lousy job the first thing we should do is demanding to fix it? Your theories work both ways, you know...

If you want to exploit Oxford Uni, then to be honest with the effort you've had to go to build universities everywhere and throw up the wonder and get rid of the city and then build it again, if you think it's cheating, you're going out of your way to do it and if you don't think it's cheating, who really cares what you do as you're only ruining it for yourself.

Well, so you don't care about cheats and exploits and don't think something need to be done with them. Fine. Can you understand that many people who play GOTM/HOF games and MP do care about these things? Good luck telling them they shouldn't.

With an issue that's been in open discussion for a year, if it were my development team I'd be reading the forums and saying "well they can't decide what they want, so let them build a mod for it if it's that much of an issue" and with something as long on the fence as the Courthouse, I'd be very suprised if that wasn't the view being taken.

So they should stop sitting on the fence and make their mind. And if it's too hard for them, they should pay modders for doing their job instead.

As for Oxford, it's your foot, shoot at it if you like.

Can I conclude that you believe this is another 'feature' and not a bug? You didn't answer direct question once again.

 

[Becomedeath]

Multiple Oxfords also make your life and game easier. Why not to glorify this 'feature'?

I presume you mean this.

I'm not glorifying any feature, I'm simply arguing that the mechanics of the courthouse are not as detrimental to the game as is being made out. The Courthouse "issue" is available to everyone except the AI and given the AI's bonuses in higher levels and the insane level of simplicity in earlier ones I would tend to point this towards the "it's there if you want it, but technically you're not supposed to do that" pot rather than the "OMG this is broken and gives a clear advantage to, erm, well me really" pot. Any video game will have points like this where you can bend the rules to suit your uses rather than use them as intended. This is no more severe than that. It's a bendable rule.

You can use the courthouse to fix all happiness problems in your empire, or you can use them as they're supposed to be used (i.e. to annex puppeted cities that you need to manage your empire) and take the penalities that they bring.

With the Oxford issue, it's not as simple as this. Unlike World Wonders, National Wonders are replaceable, as Oxford has a one time payoff this would require the Civ to kow that Oxford had been built, and then lost. Equally, it brings about the issue of what happens when your Civ captures the opponents city with an Oxford in it, shouldn't you get a bonus tech then?

However, as I've already said, with courthouses you have a clear use for them. They fix happiness in a city. Do it too much, and you can kiss that next social policy goodbye, so be fore you annex your empire be sure you want to do it.

With Oxford, you have to put significant effort in to acheiving it's duplication benefits that it's quite easy to argue that the effort involved doesn't justify the pay off. However, to answer your question (as you seem to be determined to have a direct answer rather than an implied one): There is not a sufficent level of negative pay off to consider this to be a feature, even a not fully functional one. It's clearly something that warrants attention, however, I would speculate that given the process to actually use such an exploit it's clear that those who wish to exploit it are simply not interested in playing the game on it's own merit and the majority don't build multiple Oxfords anyway.

I'm willing to put good money on the fact that the vast, nay, overwhelming majority of the player base does not spend their time sacrificing a city capable of building a wonder to get a free tech. I wouldn't be keen to allocate much time to investigating and fixing an issue that fell into these criteria. I would allocate time, but it would be so far down the list that you'd need a telescope to even know it was there.



Turning to another issue, with Multiplayer, both sides have the same advantage, so what's the issue?

Turning to HOF\GOTM, I doubt that Friaxis has balanced their game around the expectations of 3rd party websites however, this still remains in the single player format and those who win by cheating, are still cheaters. It states clearly in the rules that you are not permitted to exploit such game mechanics. However, as it's clear you have less faith in the individuals ability to police themselves than even I do, perhaps the top three saves for both HOF and GOTM should be posted to allow the community to review their efforts?

 

[The Pilgrim]

Well, I'm not in the mood for running in circles.

What can be used one way, but shouldn't because it's supposed to be used in a different way and relies on players' morals for not abusing it, is exactly what it is - an exploit. By definition. Sure, everyone should decide for himself whether to abuse it or not. I think, having that said, we can dismiss Firaxis from any duty of supporting their products with clear conscience. Cuz the games are the way they are and we can use them the way we want.

 

[LegionSteve]

Personally I don't care what Firaxis do about this since I only play VEM where this bug is already fixed. As far as I'm concerned the only useful thing Firaxis can do is release the source code for the dll so someone competent can continue to develop the game.

But just to point out, the argument that it is an exploit that you can choose to use or not, is wrong. If you want to annex + courthouse a city for legitimate gameplay reasons (e.g. it is a good production city and you want it building units) you cannot do that without invoking the courthouse bug.