Dissent

[Howard Mahler]

I played the latest version after a 4.5 year hiatus.
I was very impressed with the many additions.

I was not pleased with Dissent.
Playing on a Huge map, I got in a war with another country, and conquered all of his cities.
Rather than his culture going away, all of his former cites now had 95%+ "barbarian culture."
(This may have been part of the problem, but what if I had only conquered 1/3 of his cities.)

After a while many of these cities started to get dissent points, and there was basically nothing I could do about it. Even with the minimum dissent from civics I was still in trouble.

I did not find it fun. Dissent as one thing to worry about among others is fine. Dissent as the primary focus of the game is not OK.

I suggest that there be additional options to deal with Dissent.
For example, -10 per military unit in the city.

 

[SpartanU]

I played the latest version after a 4.5 year hiatus.
I was very impressed with the many additions.

I was not pleased with Dissent.
Playing on a Huge map, I got in a war with another country, and conquered all of his cities.
Rather than his culture going away, all of his former cites now had 95%+ "barbarian culture."
(This may have been part of the problem, but what if I had only conquered 1/3 of his cities.)

After a while many of these cities started to get dissent points, and there was basically nothing I could do about it. Even with the minimum dissent from civics I was still in trouble.

I did not find it fun. Dissent as one thing to worry about among others is fine. Dissent as the primary focus of the game is not OK.

I suggest that there be additional options to deal with Dissent.
For example, -10 per military unit in the city.

I think the culture turns barbarian to signify the old civ's culture. The best way to deal with the dissent is to adopt multiculturalism (the foreign culture which is now barbarian will reduce dissent in your cities). If you have a big army you can also adopt Authoritarianism. It grants +1 happiness per military unit in a city. Every excess happiness in a city will grant -5 dissent in that city (so it indirectly does what you suggested, but its in a civic)

 

[Howard Mahler]

I think the culture turns barbarian to signify the old civ's culture. The best way to deal with the dissent is to adopt multiculturalism (the foreign culture which is now barbarian will reduce dissent in your cities). If you have a big army you can also adopt Authoritarianism. It grants +1 happiness per military unit in a city. Every excess happiness in a city will grant -5 dissent in that city (so it indirectly does what you suggested, but its in a civic)

Authoritarianism is only available with a tech Dogma, which in this particular game I was a still a considerable distance from getting. Even if I could have adopted Authoritarianism, I would have needed about a dozen military units in each of the worst effected cities in order to counter the dissent.

Multiculturalism is only available much, much later in the game.

 

[SpartanU]

Authoritarianism is only available with a tech Dogma, which in this particular game I was a still a considerable distance from getting. Even if I could have adopted Authoritarianism, I would have needed about a dozen military units in each of the worst effected cities in order to counter the dissent.

Multiculturalism is only available much, much later in the game.

Something else that might help is setting all the cities with a dissent problem to avoid growth until their culture has developed. Usually I'll set all cities I've captured to avoid growth immediately after capturing them. Then I build up their culture and excess happiness/health. I know espionage also can decrease dissent, but I'm unsure if it is base espionage production in a city, or if you can decrease dissent by increasing the espionage slider. If someone could explain the espionage-dissent relationship that would be appreciated.

 

[dretnoth]

acording file CivilWar.py (assets/python)
self.iEspionageDissent = -1 # Dissent change from espionage generated by a city

it means directly produced by city. Just open the file and read it. From beginning the number can be see as worthless low, but it will change when city produce a loot of SP, and i think the building Oder for spy point from production shall be 100% pretty soon.

 

[Xyth]

Dissent takes some getting used to. Rapid overexpansion without investment in your captured cities is a guaranteed recipe for civil war. There are some good tips in this thread and quite a few posts on these forums about how to best manage it. Have a look around. Good timing of golden ages is particularly important. However, the best advice I can give is that civil wars are inevitable. Struggling to prevent having any will usually be more detrimental to your civilization than allowing the occasional one to happen. The key is to keep them small. While (temporarily) losing a city can be annoying, civil wars also reset dissent in all your loyal cities and you can use this to your advantage.

Rather than his culture going away, all of his former cites now had 95%+ "barbarian culture."

I think the culture turns barbarian to signify the old civ's culture.

Yes, when a player is defeated their culture is converted to barbarian culture instead of vanishing entirely. I changed this because it makes culture much more relevant to warmongers. Wiping a player out used to be a way to avoid building cultural infrastructure, now killing off a player has significant repercussions. As it should.

I know espionage also can decrease dissent, but I'm unsure if it is base espionage production in a city, or if you can decrease dissent by increasing the espionage slider. If someone could explain the espionage-dissent relationship that would be appreciated.

it means directly produced by city. Just open the file and read it. From beginning the number can be see as worthless low, but it will change when city produce a loot of SP, and i think the building Oder for spy point from production shall be 100% pretty soon.

Dissent is reduced by the total amount of espionage generated in that city after all modifiers (including the espionage slider) are applied.

 

[Howard Mahler]

I think the effect on dissent of espionage is relatively small compared to the other items.
I would kick it up by at least factor of two.

 

[Howard Mahler]

In a game, I was Friendly with the Assyrians.
One of their cities on my border went into revolt, and some of the revolting units decided to come my way.

In this case, I was fortunate to not be caught without enough defense.

However, definitely a possibility to keep in mind.

 

[Howard Mahler]

I believe that for example the -50% dissent from the Humane trait works as follows.
If you would otherwise have +40 dissent per turn in a city, you will instead have +20.
Quite useful.
However, with high dissent in a city (for example from high barbarian culture), this just delays the inevitable.
You hope that you can find some permanent solution for this problem city in the extra time you are provided.

Also is it the case that a golden age sets the dissent in all of your cities back to zero?
It could start to increase from zero when the golden age ends.

 

[SpartanU]

I believe that for example the -50% dissent from the Humane trait works as follows.
If you would otherwise have +40 dissent per turn in a city, you will instead have +20.
Quite useful.
However, with high dissent in a city (for example from high barbarian culture), this just delays the inevitable.
You hope that you can find some permanent solution for this problem city in the extra time you are provided.

You're right about a permanent solution being really the only way to hold onto a city. When you capture a city, try turning on avoid growth. This will give you the max excess happiness and unhealthiness. Then just build happiness, healthiness, and culture buildings. If you can't build them in time, try building culture to reduce the rate of dissent. You can also try buying resources from the AI to increase excess healthiness and happiness. Keeping the dissent down after capturing a city is tough, but it can definitely be done, even without -50% dissent.

Also is it the case that a golden age sets the dissent in all of your cities back to zero?
It could start to increase from zero when the golden age ends.

I think the golden age gets rid of everything that creates dissent, so every city will have a lot of negative dissent each turn. This usually brings the dissent level of each city down to 0, but sometimes this isn't the case. After the golden age, all the positive dissent comes back into play.

 

[Howard Mahler]

The base dissent depends on Civics.
Keeping the same civics, the base dissent has increased significantly.

Does this base dissent depend on the number of cities?

If so it is really a bummer on large Pangea maps.
In my current game have in stages expanded to 45 cities and the base dissent has increased over time and is now 307!

The only way to handle this is to pick the civics only with the lowest dissent including Authoritarianism.
Requires large stacks of military units in affected cities and no growth.

Seems like dissent should not restrict player choice so much.
I am getting better at handling it, but I still think dissent is overpowered.

The AI seems to have a lot of trouble handling dissent.
Cities the AI has conquered have a good chance to eventually revolt.
(I have enjoyed pouncing and picking these up.)
There have been other civil wars in AI civs as well no involving conquered cities.

 

[Xyth]

I think the effect on dissent of espionage is relatively small compared to the other items.
I would kick it up by at least factor of two.

It's primarily meant to be a dissent-reducing tool in the mid to late game when you have good espionage infrastructure in place and you can afford to make good use of the espionage slider.

I think the golden age gets rid of everything that creates dissent, so every city will have a lot of negative dissent each turn. This usually brings the dissent level of each city down to 0, but sometimes this isn't the case. After the golden age, all the positive dissent comes back into play.

Golden Ages block dissent from civics. Dissent from other sources still applies.

Does this base dissent depend on the number of cities?

Yes, scaled by map size.

Seems like dissent should not restrict player choice so much.
I am getting better at handling it, but I still think dissent is overpowered.

The AI seems to have a lot of trouble handling dissent.
Cities the AI has conquered have a good chance to eventually revolt.
(I have enjoyed pouncing and picking these up.)
There have been other civil wars in AI civs as well no involving conquered cities.

I think you're missing the point of the mechanic a little. The AI is supposed to have civil wars from time to time. So is the human player. I've tuned it that way deliberately. They are an inevitability that every large historical empire has had to deal with. They add dynamism to a game, they make rapid expansion riskier, and they help smaller civilizations keep up better. If civil wars were easily preventable, why even have such a mechanic? Treat them as inevitable but predictable. The challenge is not to avoid them as much as possible, but to be prepared for coming disruption and to take advantage of the sudden change of circumstances – or at least try prevent your opponents from doing so.

 

[Howard Mahler]

I think with dissent as currently implemented there is a tension between recreating history and game play.

There was a board game I used to play, where you played a dynasty controlling your country.
At random your strong leader with bonuses could die to be succeeded by a weak leader with penalties.
Civ IV does not have this feature, and I am more than fine with this.

While civil wars make sense historically, I as a player am not going to let one happen in my civilization if I can avoid it.
For a large civ, this seem to require a single set of civics.

There are already plenty of penalties for big civilizations; maintenance costs go up with number of cities and distance from capital.
There are costs to going to war to either defend oneself or to conquer territory from a neighbor.

As currently implemented, dissent makes it much harder to get a domination victory.

I know I would enjoy the game more with a significantly weaker impact from dissent.

 

[Howard Mahler]

At setup there are currently choices: no barbarians, no vassal states, fewer religions, etc.

As discussed in another thread, I would enjoy the game more with a significantly weaker impact from dissent.
Apparently others do not have a problem with the current version of dissent.

If there is some simple way to implement it, I would appreciate an option at game setup for the player to make dissent less powerful than currently.

For example, perhaps one could increase the amount "dissent points" it takes to go from one level to the next.
Perhaps, dissent cost of civics could not scale with the number of cities.

If this is impractical, then I would appreciate an option to choose no dissent, just as one can choose no espionage.

P.S. I really like most of the changes that have been made during my 4.5 year absence.

 

[Woad]

The thing about dissent scaling with the number of cities encourages you to make your cities more efficient and not to make/capture too many of them. Or even better you could produce a fair amount of vassal states, that would be even more immersive. I can understand that you might want to lower it's impact because you appreciate bigger empires, but the mechanic itself is great since it prevents growing an empire out of poorly developed villages and spamming the whole continent with settlers or literally capturing every city you encounter.

 

[Xyth]

For example, perhaps one could increase the amount "dissent points" it takes to go from one level to the next.

If I were to add a "Fewer Civil Wars" option, this is how I would do it. I'll consider it, but I'm reluctant. I'd rather people take the time to master the mechanic and come to enjoy the dynamism it provides. Lower difficulty levels are already available and dissent scales with these. And it's not like people can't go into CivilWar.py and edit the parameters to suit them if they really want. Everything's clearly labelled.

Perhaps, dissent cost of civics could not scale with the number of cities.

If this is impractical, then I would appreciate an option to choose no dissent

Dissent is heavily integrated into other mechanics. The game would be most unbalanced with such options, so consider these ruled out.

just as one can choose no espionage.

Sidenote: I don't recommend using this option in HR. It makes culture far too plentiful, messing up overall balance considerably. I might try and remove or disable it.

 

[SpartanU]

I think with dissent as currently implemented there is a tension between recreating history and game play.

There was a board game I used to play, where you played a dynasty controlling your country.
At random your strong leader with bonuses could die to be succeeded by a weak leader with penalties.
Civ IV does not have this feature, and I am more than fine with this.

While civil wars make sense historically, I as a player am not going to let one happen in my civilization if I can avoid it.
For a large civ, this seem to require a single set of civics.

There are already plenty of penalties for big civilizations; maintenance costs go up with number of cities and distance from capital.
There are costs to going to war to either defend oneself or to conquer territory from a neighbor.

As currently implemented, dissent makes it much harder to get a domination victory.

I know I would enjoy the game more with a significantly weaker impact from dissent.

Although I disagree that dissent is overpowered right now, I think it's mostly because my play style is much less aggressive than yours, making dissent much more manageable for me. I think that the option to turn down the difficulty for dissent is an interesting idea; however perhaps it would also be interesting if players were allowed to spend their espionage points on their own civ to reduce dissent (this would make the surveillance tech make more sense too). The espionage points spent on your own civ would be adjusted by a multiplier and be converted to negative dissent and divided equally between your cities. This could make the espionage slider more useful for players going for a domination/conquest victory (I've always found the espionage slider to be the least useful in my games).

 

[Howard Mahler]

Dissent has not had any effect on me during the expansion phase of the game.

What prevents "spamming the whole continent with settlers" were already present in BTS: maintenance costs, the time required to build the necessary settlers workers and garrison units, plus the other civs occupying the available space.

I have never played a game in which I "literally captured every city I encountered."
There are already costs to war.
Even in BTS if one attacks or is attacked and then one manages to capture a bunch of cities it takes a while to digest the conquest.
During this time one's economy is usually significantly negatively impacted.

My point is that dissent seems to kick in extremely strongly if one is going towards a domination victory later in the game.
If one does not like the domination victory condition, then one can choose to play without it at startup.
A domination victory is already hard, particularly on larger maps, and I see no reason to make it much harder.

P.S. I do not play with vassal states; to each his own.
In any case, isn't the case that creating a bunch of vassal states is inconsistent with trying for a domination victory?
(It would be consistent with other types of victories.)

The thing about dissent scaling with the number of cities encourages you to make your cities more efficient and not to make/capture too many of them. Or even better you could produce a fair amount of vassal states, that would be even more immersive. I can understand that you might want to lower it's impact because you appreciate bigger empires, but the mechanic itself is great since it prevents growing an empire out of poorly developed villages and spamming the whole continent with settlers or literally capturing every city you encounter.

 

[Howard Mahler]

Dissent seems to kick in extremely strongly if one is going towards a domination victory later in the game.
If one does not like the domination victory condition, then one can choose to play without it at startup.
A domination victory is already hard, particularly on larger maps, and I see no reason to make it significantly harder.

Personally I have already played enough to understand and deal with the dissent dynamic as it exists.
I am not objecting to the dissent dynamic per se; I am objecting to its power as currently implemented.

Clearly this is to some extent a matter of personal taste, but it is also a numerical issue.
While still well short of domination victory, having a minimum dissent from civics of more than 300 is extremely hard to deal with.
It seems outside the range of reasonableness to me.

P.S. For example, I like the city maintenance mechanic. However, one could easily revise these costs to be either way too high or way to low.

P.P.S. I play with espionage; I was merely listing it as one of the many options the player has at startup.
I am very much in favor of such player options.
For example, in my current game for the first time I tried more natural wonders.

P.P.P.S. Thanks for all of your hard work! Overall a tremendous game.

If I were to add a "Fewer Civil Wars" option, this is how I would do it. I'll consider it, but I'm reluctant. I'd rather people take the time to master the mechanic and come to enjoy the dynamism it provides. Lower difficulty levels are already available and dissent scales with these. And it's not like people can't go into CivilWar.py and edit the parameters to suit them if they really want. Everything's clearly labelled.




Dissent is heavily integrated into other mechanics. The game would be most unbalanced with such options, so consider these ruled out.



Sidenote: I don't recommend using this option in HR. It makes culture far too plentiful, messing up overall balance considerably. I might try and remove or disable it.

 

[Xyth]

however perhaps it would also be interesting if players were allowed to spend their espionage points on their own civ to reduce dissent (this would make the surveillance tech make more sense too). The espionage points spent on your own civ would be adjusted by a multiplier and be converted to negative dissent and divided equally between your cities. This could make the espionage slider more useful for players going for a domination/conquest victory (I've always found the espionage slider to be the least useful in my games).

This is something I was considering but had to drop due to technical challenges, in particular, the difficulty of teaching the AI to make use of it. I still like the idea though and will revisit it if I can think of a way to making it work.