VoiceOfUnreason
Deity
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- Dec 5, 2005
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- 3,663
Seems more likely to me that they simply carried over the mechanic from Civ 4.
Cultural Victory - 1838 - Emperor - France
- Thread starter Celevin
- Start date
Seems more likely to me that they simply carried over the mechanic from Civ 4.
KrikkitTwo
Immortal
- Joined
- Apr 3, 2004
- Messages
- 12,418
Well looking at conquest of a city.
Once you have done this you have gained a specific benefit
1. Denied City, resources, etc. from the enemy.
Now If that's ALL you want to do, then you can Raze... you have no additional costs
However you may want
1. The Territory (Resources, Roads, Unit Combat+Healing bonuses)
2. The productive output of the city.
For a Normal city, those come with costs
Unhappiness
Building Maintenance
Social Policy costs
For an Annexed city, you get the full benefit of the city and
full penalties plus
Extra unhappiness that can become extra maintenance+one-time hammer cost
Another option to get the full benefit is to found a city there after razing.
The disadvantage is growth time (of population, buildings, and territory)
[Maritimes have a significant effect of minimizing the first effect]
Ideally, annexing would be preferable to raze and resettle.
The puppet however, is unique.
You still get the full benefit of the city, but not the full penalties
You lose control, and you Don't have social policy costs.
The problem is in balancing the 3, Puppets came seriously out of whack, because of the need for a small empire to have something to do with cities.
So what a puppet is designed to be is
1. A city that you conquer and keep
2. That does Not add to Social Policy Costs.
Those are the only two things that are needed.... since this is a city that does Not have one of the "costs" of a normal city, and it is conquered and conquered cities have additional costs (to make up for their free pop/buildings/territory)then it needs either
1. additional costs
or
2. lesser benefits
The problem with #1 being added is that the ones they chose are basically Random
#2 would be far likely to be better
To fit with the decreased cost of "No social Policy cost", changing the "no control" cost to "No culture added to social policies" should be enough.
Possibly no "Benefit from Social Policies" as well.
That would be the "Minimal Puppet Fix".
Puppets provide no Culture to social Policies, can't build units, can't build Wonders
+No extra cost of to social Policies from Puppets.
Once you have done this you have gained a specific benefit
1. Denied City, resources, etc. from the enemy.
Now If that's ALL you want to do, then you can Raze... you have no additional costs
However you may want
1. The Territory (Resources, Roads, Unit Combat+Healing bonuses)
2. The productive output of the city.
For a Normal city, those come with costs
Unhappiness
Building Maintenance
Social Policy costs
For an Annexed city, you get the full benefit of the city and
full penalties plus
Extra unhappiness that can become extra maintenance+one-time hammer cost
Another option to get the full benefit is to found a city there after razing.
The disadvantage is growth time (of population, buildings, and territory)
[Maritimes have a significant effect of minimizing the first effect]
Ideally, annexing would be preferable to raze and resettle.
The puppet however, is unique.
You still get the full benefit of the city, but not the full penalties
You lose control, and you Don't have social policy costs.
The problem is in balancing the 3, Puppets came seriously out of whack, because of the need for a small empire to have something to do with cities.
So what a puppet is designed to be is
1. A city that you conquer and keep
2. That does Not add to Social Policy Costs.
Those are the only two things that are needed.... since this is a city that does Not have one of the "costs" of a normal city, and it is conquered and conquered cities have additional costs (to make up for their free pop/buildings/territory)then it needs either
1. additional costs
or
2. lesser benefits
The problem with #1 being added is that the ones they chose are basically Random
#2 would be far likely to be better
To fit with the decreased cost of "No social Policy cost", changing the "no control" cost to "No culture added to social policies" should be enough.
Possibly no "Benefit from Social Policies" as well.
That would be the "Minimal Puppet Fix".
Puppets provide no Culture to social Policies, can't build units, can't build Wonders
+No extra cost of to social Policies from Puppets.
ccubed
Chieftain
- Joined
- Nov 21, 2005
- Messages
- 65
Quick question for OP or others who have tried this. Do you just stop researching ANY techs after Biology? I just tried this with India, but I'm only half way through my conquests and I've exhausted the techs other than those requiring Iron Working. I made the mistake of gambling on a research agreement before thinking things through (I'm just hardwired to slingshot to Renaissance as fast as possible) which got me Bronze Working. Which is a good tip for those trying this strat out. Unless you have a random seed and want to reload (which I didn't.) I just got Biology and think I'm stuck unless I want some unsightly Armories.
So did you just stop teching altogether at this point?
Edit: well I guess you CAN'T just stop teching. Even if you don't choose something it just takes the topmost researchable tech and goes to work on its own. Just got Iron Working and Engineering shoved down my throat.
So did you just stop teching altogether at this point?
Edit: well I guess you CAN'T just stop teching. Even if you don't choose something it just takes the topmost researchable tech and goes to work on its own. Just got Iron Working and Engineering shoved down my throat.
Txurce
Deity
Why do you think they're called "puppet" states, and not "anarchist" or "indie" or "resisting" states? Because while not nearly as cooperative as annexed cities, they have strings which can be pulled. Celevin pulled them, in a very creative way that also happens to illustrate one way the game needs fixing.
They're puppet states because you control them, but they're not annexed or native states because you don't control them completely. Celevin's manner of doing it, by his own assessment, is completely broken. Therefore, we should not do it until it's fixed, unless you are the type of player who likes exploiting broken mechanics, in which case, by all means.
ccubed
Chieftain
- Joined
- Nov 21, 2005
- Messages
- 65
Sorry to quote myself, but I have just discovered I'm a moron. I had clicked on a tech down on the bottom tree to see how long it would take to research when I hit Bio. I never unchecked it, so my research was on autopilot. I didn't know you could just queue up a long term research item and just let it go.
Btw, to further confirm that I may be mentally infirm, I also just discovered you can queue up building/unit/wonder production.
So, DID the OP just stop researching?
Txurce
Deity
That is exactly what I said, and why I corrected you.
I happen to agree with this, but you're stating the obvious. People will do what they want. No one here needs you to repeatedly state what you think is okay or not.
KrikkitTwo
Immortal
- Joined
- Apr 3, 2004
- Messages
- 12,418
That would be worse.
There needs to be some reward for conquering... since there is a cost
At a Minimum you get
Cost=Military
Benefit= Enemy doesn't get city (outputs or territory)... but enemy no longer pays city costs either
Razing-> No city costs, no city benefits
Raze+Resettle->Normal city costs, Normal city benefits* (this probably needs to be weakened as an option.. by either making Razing harder, or making Annex/Puppet give better benefit-cost ratio)
Annex-> Normal city benefits+costs: +Free Pop, Territory, Buildings, -Short term Unhappiness+Build penalty, Long Term Maintenance.
(I might remove the Maintenance of the Courthouse... perhaps change it so the cost depends on the population of the city as well.)
That would make Annexing > Raze+Resettle most of the time [ you could also increase the # of surviving buildings+population to do that... and nerf Maritimes]
The issue then is Puppets
"Minimal" puppet rebalancing would reintroduce control (still no Wonders/Units allowed)
and give 0 Culture.
What might be Better is to make Puppets the option over Razing.... ie they give (almost) no benefits, and have no costs
So if you want the output of the city
Annex or Raze+Resettle
If you just want to deny the city to the enemy
Puppet (no costs at all... only benefits=production for buildings, or Raze
Puppet would get the benefit compared to Razing that
1. It would be available for Annexing later... and would improve itself in the meantime
2. It would provide control over the territory (major beneft gaining resources, blocking enemies)
3. It would provide defense
The disadvantage of Puppet compared to Razing would be
1. No resettling (but then you compare to annexing)
2. City can be reconquered.
So the Warmonger would attack and get his vast number of puppets, but wouldn't have any benefits from them, until he was willing to take the happiness hit.
Do what you want in your own games.
This thread was not about using or not using puppets. It was about abusing a potential weakness in the mechanic to show its flaws to the developers. I'm used to developers reading forums of games I play, so I often did this in the past. The best way to illustrate these things isn't through theorycraft, which hardly ever works, but through an actual game where the distorted results can be shown.
I am willing to lay money down that this culture victory is possible by 1500 AD on Immortal, possibly Deity, through my approach. I haven't done it that early, but I think I've shown it could be done, and how to do it. That's all I needed to get across.
This thread was not about using or not using puppets. It was about abusing a potential weakness in the mechanic to show its flaws to the developers. I'm used to developers reading forums of games I play, so I often did this in the past. The best way to illustrate these things isn't through theorycraft, which hardly ever works, but through an actual game where the distorted results can be shown.
I am willing to lay money down that this culture victory is possible by 1500 AD on Immortal, possibly Deity, through my approach. I haven't done it that early, but I think I've shown it could be done, and how to do it. That's all I needed to get across.
Zhahz
PC Gamer
Disagree about them being the lamest part. You get lots of science, culture, happiness, and gold out of them with zero SP cost hit. A lot of the later SPs are way more powerful and hard to get unless you control your SP costs. You stay small, you puppet, or you go nuts with culture buildings and blossom late after you get broadcast towers up everywhere.
Happy hit for annexing is trivial, IMO, it's the SP hit that sucks. If you could control puppets atll they would be idiotically overpowered. You can already somewhat control them by TPing them to offset their maintenance "tax" incurred by all the crap they build. The only change I'd like to see with them is for them to not build military buildings since they can't build units. Ultimately though, if I'm using puppets I plan around all of this and it's not really that big of a deal.
I can generate tons of culture with a sprawling empire that has no puppets but WITH puppets you don't get the SP cost increase and generate nearly as much culture. You just took it a step further by tweaking your research path. A good idea.
Lastly, the scoring system in Civ 5 bothers me more than puppets.
IMO winning earlier especially by some means other than domination is a lot tougher than sitting around milking the crap out of the tech tree and everything else.I don't think thats really fair though. Exploiting clearly broken mechanics is kind of lame sure, but there are so many arguably broken mechanics that I'm not sure its reasonable to just not use them. Civ is a strategy game, and so when I play I want to make my choices based on whats the most effective. Its so awkward if I'm trying to factor in both the effectiveness of each choice, but then trying to avoid "exploiting anything".
With puppet states, sure maybe I don't want to totally exploit puppet states by controlling what they can build like this. But so what do I do now? Do I not use puppet states at all? That doesn't seem right. Maybe I should only use puppet states... sometimes? Well, whatever, okay, I'll use puppet states, but I'll try not to exploit controlling their tech. But I usually don't invest heavily in the bottom of the tech tree anyway. Am I at some point obligated to research the ability to build barracks even if I don't want the tech, just to avoid this "exploit". But come on, I don't really not want to build barracks, I'm obiously biased because I know that enabling barracks will have additional side effects. So am I just supposed to somehow pretend that I don't know about that? For me, it makes any strategy, whether it expoits puppet AI or not feel artificial, since I wouldn't be basing my decisions on my actual understanding of the game.
Same goes for other areas. Should I not build a lot of horseman because I know the AI can't handle them? But where do I draw the line? Am I obligated to not build any horsemen? Hell, should I not even declare war since I know I'll be exploiting the bad AI? Slingshotting tech can be pretty cheap, but what do I do? Should I intentionally avoid use GS's or great library techs in an optimal way? Should I waste them on the cheapest tech available? Should I just try to avoid getting free techs at all?
Sure, a lot of that was just silly, but the point is, the whole fun for a lot of people is trying to understand the game's complex rules and systems and optimize our strategies around them. I think we all agree that broken mechanics and bad AI are a problem that should be fixed, but in the meantime, I'd rather try to do my best within the current (admittedly broken) system than bury my head in the sand and try to pretend that I don't understand how the game works while making strategic choices.
ccubed
Chieftain
- Joined
- Nov 21, 2005
- Messages
- 65
Well I finished a game with India using the ignore the techs past Bronze Working for as long as possible tactic. It was harder and weirder than I thought it would be. It was also my first game on King difficulty level. Would have won culture at 1902, but I accidentally got Domination early because I didn't notice that I was taking over the last capital. Doh!
Early on, it was hard to get the war machine rolling with only warriors and elephants. Pikemen later helped, but they are pretty expensive for what you get. I also found the odd quirk that if you bypass Iron Working, and thus can't mine it yourself, when your allied city-states have access to iron, you can still buy Catapults if you have the tech. Also found that Cavalry suck. It's sad watching guys with rifles on horseback get mangled by some medieval dude with a long pointy stick.
You really have to have other civs around you and be able to get quick access to city-states for this strat to work, I think. I played on a small earth map, and the first run I ended up alone on North America. It didn't go well when I finally met the rest of the world. It's odd that you need to rush tech to get your Social Policies in order, only to need to slow tech to avoid the bottom tree. In the meantime, you need to take over every city you can. Very odd equilibrium there. You need decent timing to avoid going too long after you've taken over a ton of cities and are forced to finally start taking those bottom techs. It sucks to see 7 or 8 cities all jump on the Barracks, Armory, Military Academy bandwagon.
I also ran into the snag that the other civs didn't expand as much as I thought they would. I think I only ended up having about 15-20 puppets at the end, and I wiped out every one else. Topic for another thread: how often do you accidentally win by Domination when you don't pay attention to the little star on that city you just took over.
Overall, I think it's a fun way to play and definitely has it's pluses and minuses. You really are making sacrifices to make this work, and it's much harder than just straight up conquering.
Now I need to find a wacky space ship strat!
Early on, it was hard to get the war machine rolling with only warriors and elephants. Pikemen later helped, but they are pretty expensive for what you get. I also found the odd quirk that if you bypass Iron Working, and thus can't mine it yourself, when your allied city-states have access to iron, you can still buy Catapults if you have the tech. Also found that Cavalry suck. It's sad watching guys with rifles on horseback get mangled by some medieval dude with a long pointy stick.
You really have to have other civs around you and be able to get quick access to city-states for this strat to work, I think. I played on a small earth map, and the first run I ended up alone on North America. It didn't go well when I finally met the rest of the world. It's odd that you need to rush tech to get your Social Policies in order, only to need to slow tech to avoid the bottom tree. In the meantime, you need to take over every city you can. Very odd equilibrium there. You need decent timing to avoid going too long after you've taken over a ton of cities and are forced to finally start taking those bottom techs. It sucks to see 7 or 8 cities all jump on the Barracks, Armory, Military Academy bandwagon.
I also ran into the snag that the other civs didn't expand as much as I thought they would. I think I only ended up having about 15-20 puppets at the end, and I wiped out every one else. Topic for another thread: how often do you accidentally win by Domination when you don't pay attention to the little star on that city you just took over.
Overall, I think it's a fun way to play and definitely has it's pluses and minuses. You really are making sacrifices to make this work, and it's much harder than just straight up conquering.
Now I need to find a wacky space ship strat!
That's a problem with the rate that you get social policies, not with puppets. In my mind, whether you're big or small, you should be getting policies at relatively the same rate given around the same number of culture buildings. Puppets and city states *greatly* get in the way of this and influence smaller empires to the point where some of the best culture wins are at 1 city.
You hit on something I have been trying to word but haven't been able to get across very well. If puppets are taken out, the policy costs will have to be rebalanced. They will have to be dropped from instead of 30% per city to maybe 25% or 20%.
This right here is some of my exact thoughts. It's why I post these exploits and try and get the word out.Thecos said:
I absolutely hate purposely not doing some strategies because they're uneven, and gimping myself even more than if I didn't know about them at all.
Becephalus
King
- Joined
- Nov 30, 2005
- Messages
- 725
If the combat AI worked a simple fix would be to give Puppets 0 hp. So any unit can take them at any time. Would force you to more actively garrison them. Of course for that to matter it would have to be possible to lose a war (ok its a tiny bit possible).
CornPlanter
Emperor
I disagree. I like being able to control them indirectly.
You need to state why. Why is it fun to control them indirectly, when the best way to means ignoring 1/2 of the tree completely?
Txurce
Deity
I think you're talking about controlling them for a cultural victory, whereas he's talking about controlling them in general.
It doesn't matter.
There will be other ways to game it with this method of indirect controlling, the playerbase will find a way, and it will involve turning a tech into a detriment. It's better to get rid of the problem entirely.
Txurce
Deity
Agreed. Do you have a specific idea on how to do that - how to change the puppet-state dynamic?
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