Do you folks think happiness is to harsh this version 2.7?

[Rekk]

To have no distress you need double the world median (its 55th percentile but I'm just calling it median), which just isn't possible

Note that the intention was never for you to be able to completely eliminate unhappiness. So that you would have to have double the median in order to eliminate poverty is by design.

It is not the design for a standard city to be at 20 unhappiness out of 8 population and for flat reducers and happiness sources to be the sole measures by which one can deal with it.

 

[Legen]

when growth isn't all that strong a strat to begin with by everyone in this debate's admission

No, food and growth are actually quite strong. But what makes them strong are specialists and the resulting great people; you need to pair food with them in order to profit.

This is similar to how science needs to be paired with something that lets you build what it unlocks, be it production, gold or, to a degree, faith. A civ that produces a lot of science and neglects those three yields is bound to end with plenty of bad cities; yet, that doesn't mean science is a bad yield or strat.

 

[nekokon]

So if you look at previous civ titles. For most of civs histories, growth had a "HARD CAP". You could only get a city to X size and then it stopped growing period. You needed buildings like the sewer system to grow past a certain point. But once you did, you were on your way.

In Civ IV, growth caps were softened a bit. In Civ IV when a citizen became unhappy it stopped working, effectively making your pop "useless". However, the second you got more happiness, that citizen was back in action, working to full.

In Civ 5, growth cap was softened a bit more. Now unhappiness gave you a very strong curb on growth (-75%). But once again, once you built a few happiness buildings, you were back in good standing, and rocking again.


There are two common themes in the civ games that VP has not carried over, which is why there is a key difference.

• Growth has much stronger in previous civ games than in VP. Civ 4's tiles were often very powerful (as was the slavery mechanic that converted pop into hammers), and so growth was strong. Civ 5 pop and science were linked, so a high pop civ had a strong science foundation.
• Happiness had direct and immediate ways to address it. You build X building, your happiness problem is solved, and you move on. Meanwhile, you knew exactlly how much growth would trigger more unhappiness, so you could plan for it. VP's system is much murkier, and your decisions can haunt you for many turns to come. If I make a mistake in classic civ, I just turn to my happiness tools, and I bail myself out. In VP, its "suck it up buttercup" for 50 turns or more because you "played wrong". There is no quick fix for unhappiness, heck even building PWs in every city often is not enough.

So with respect, teh design of Civ and the design of VP are quite different when it comes to happiness management. No civ game has ever pushed the kind of happiness management that is in VP, and I think there are good reasons why not

The design to have happiness acting as a soft cap is the same, as in you don't immediately get stopped when hitting the cap. VP just makes it too lenient that you can pass that cap way too far until you can feel the effect, and the way back might take just as long to emphasize the point. But again, it's just a slap on the wrist because unhappiness is capped at pop so you won't even get punished that hard.
Of course you can still feel like it's too harsh and give some feedback, but only numbers adjustment would be made, and the design itself will stay the same (thus even if it gets easier you can still get into the very same trap you're in right now, and that would be, again, on you for playing by the wrong rule and not realizing until it's too late)

 

[stii]

I didn't mean that in a derogative way, sorry. I meant, I'm really amazed that without controlling growth anyone is still able to win games on Immortal.

I mean you don't NEED to lock growth ever. There are loads and loads of things you could optimize and everyone does a different set.

Rather than locking growth you can get happy from other sources, suck up the penalty or just be so far ahead it doesn't hit you.

You need to really increases the difficulty settings before you can't almost do whatever you feel like.

 

[youngsteve]

I think one of the problems with all games, is that certain people insist playing on the hardest levels, then complain when they are too hard, & things seem unfair. Isn't that what they are there for, so only the really top players can play on them. That is why I never try, as I play games for relaxing enjoyment & not struggling against opponents with massive bonuses. Why people cannot just play on lower levels, instead of having everything changed as they cannot cope, I don't know.

 

[greenfieldpark]

Been great listening to you all debate this topic. Been very interesting and is helping me try to understand my own thoughts on the subject.

I am currently happy with happiness and here is my experience.

I play on immortal. Quick difficulty. I ussually disable culture or science victory. Just because i like games that go to the end of the tech tree and especially culture vics can happen too soon.

Also im a warmonger hence the focus on diplomatic and domination vics.

So for me i start expanding very aggressively. My infrastructure starts quite a bit behind and am punished with decreased happiness. Fair.
I lock my non capital cities at 4 pop until im done expanding and can build my cities up.

I then notice i have to routinely lock my cities around 8 pop. Then wait. Then lock again at 12.

Trading for luxuries does help increase my happiness above 50%. And my happiness varries between 45 and 75% throughout the game.

Before starting a war i lock growth prior to build happiness up. To make up for incoming war warriness and the loss of lux from the civ i declared war on and potential denouncements.

For me happiness is working exactly as it should be against my playstyle.

If i go attacking everyone then my happiness will drop due to war warriness and loss of lux.

Same with other war monger ais.

If i or the ai conquer too much thr world turns against us and we are punished. I then have to prepare for this potentiality. Which i find fun and adds strategy.

Further. Im my current game im decimating an ai who upset the whole world and was denounced by all. His happiness was so low thst he had rebels and his troops were so week i cut through them like butter.

I like that the ai now has happiness issues as well.

This is my own unique playstyle experience with happiness. Something that im always having to consider. Something that acts as a buffer against my aggression. Something that makes the game harder, more strategic, amd therefore more rewarding.

I never play tall. Dont play peaceful. And maybe if i did my opinion would be different as maybe id feel i was being penalized for no reason.

 

[Jhang]

As I have seen with civ v at least, as you get higher in difficulty, the more rigid the playstyle needs to be. If you want to be less rigid, you play a lower the difficulty. I am not saying pure rigidity, I am saying more and less. Like I have beaten up to deity before, but it demands a very rigid playstyle that I don't find very fun to explore. King has generally been too rewarding for my preferred rigidity, where Emperor is about the sweet spot of experimenting and exploring different playstyle without it becoming that kind of 'all victory conditions are available' snowball.

With that said I realized 55% is 11 annexed or built cities which is a lot for Portugal if you haven't gotten Naus to visit every city state. If you were pushing that city amount pre-2.7 it would be fine because you would have all the happiness, but I can say with the current happiness mechanics, you really can't have that many unpuppeted cities for now, at least in the mid game.

 

[josh4]

I think one of the problems with all games, is that certain people insist playing on the hardest levels, then complain when they are too hard, & things seem unfair. Isn't that what they are there for, so only the really top players can play on them. That is why I never try, as I play games for relaxing enjoyment & not struggling against opponents with massive bonuses. Why people cannot just play on lower levels, instead of having everything changed as they cannot cope, I don't know.

I'm new to deity, comfortable on immortal, and I would like to see difficulty even slightly higher probably. I don't see the anyone complaining about the difficulty. I think there are some deity players who like the current happiness?

 

[stii]

I'm new to deity, comfortable on immortal, and I would like to see difficulty even slightly higher probably. I don't see the anyone complaining about the difficulty. I think there are some deity players who like the current happiness?

I think it is important to split between too hard and not working as intended. It seems about the same as old patches in terms of keeping your cities happy, if things stack up it can be an issue but otherwise it is mostly fine.

But every city just seems to be capped at population, which is surely not how it is meant to work. All of these number for poverty and literacy and similar but none of them matter because you are at 25 for a 15 pop city so reducing any is pointless. Befoe you could make buildings and reduce things, it was hard to keep up but possible but now it is so hard you just ignore them utterly. You have a big system you don't interact with at all and just get happy from other sources.

 

[nekokon]

Unless all of your cities are overgrown the same way (extremely food heavy yet don't use specialists) unhappiness would just hover around your cap.
Stalker's situation is because of big empire size upping the need modifier by 20-25% than it should be, plus 2-3 pop over the non-food workable tiles (very important value to not overgrow your city by working extra food tile with extra pop) which adds another 15-20% more unhappiness. The math checked out.

Happiness system works as a limiter so you don't have to (and shouldn't have to) interact too much with it, else there would be too much micromanaging. Take other 4x games for example, any hard cap/limiter would just be ignored until you hit it and try to increase the cap (interact) through picking new tech/policy/perk/... Constantly changing cap (like our current unit supply) is a much bigger pain in the butt to manage (thus ppl never cap their supply in case they drop mid war, and that's extra micromanaging).
The rule is simple, you have a range of set happiness based on tech level (building, improvement) and city location (workable tile), if you know the number and preplan you don't have to think much about happiness until hitting the next threshold (tech/building/improvement), and even when you mismanaged you only get a set amount of punishment. The system as a whole works, but the specific number to set your expected range of happiness might vary and can change if it's too harsh for the current difficulty (which is the tech modifier recursive wants to change next update).

 

[josh4]

I think it is important to split between too hard and not working as intended. It seems about the same as old patches in terms of keeping your cities happy, if things stack up it can be an issue but otherwise it is mostly fine.

But every city just seems to be capped at population, which is surely not how it is meant to work. All of these number for poverty and literacy and similar but none of them matter because you are at 25 for a 15 pop city so reducing any is pointless. Befoe you could make buildings and reduce things, it was hard to keep up but possible but now it is so hard you just ignore them utterly. You have a big system you don't interact with at all and just get happy from other sources.

You put it down very well.

In this situation I think we should try very simple fix. Accept that Recursive is making happiness somewhat easier, more akin to 2.6 than 2.7. and he also cleans it up a bit surely, THEN try uncapping unhappiness from population. Of course that would require a true median of cities to be counted and other tweaks, as to not get wrecked by settling a new city with 15 unhappiness from the get go on turn 100.

 

[CppMaster]

THEN try uncapping unhappiness from population.

That's a bold proposition. Both by font style and content.

 

[Recursive]

I'm new to deity, comfortable on immortal, and I would like to see difficulty even slightly higher probably. I don't see the anyone complaining about the difficulty. I think there are some deity players who like the current happiness?

If high difficulty players want a greater challenge I'm totally cool with adding +10/20% unhappiness from needs specifically to those difficulties.

 

[greenfieldpark]

If high difficulty players want a greater challenge I'm totally cool with adding +10/20% unhappiness from needs specifically to those difficulties.

I dont want it to just be a challenge for the player. I want the ai to occasionally have difficulties too. Previous versions ai always had 100% happiness. Current game they range from 30 to 90.

 

[Stalker0]

If high difficulty players want a greater challenge I'm totally cool with adding +10/20% unhappiness from needs specifically to those difficulties.

Ultimately this goes against my personal philosophy of happiness. I don't' want the system to "challenge" me, I want it to "check me". I don't think happiness should be this extra special hill on higher difficulties, the difficulty is already supposed to challenge me with stronger AIs. To me happiness on deity should be similar to happiness on emperor, I want it to ensure I am not abusing mechanics, expanding naked and just make legions of units with no infrastructure, warring endless, making nothing but specialists without consequence, etc.

Beyond that, the system can return to the shadows!

 

[ma_kuh]

I don't' want the system to "challenge" me, I want it to "check me".

This is interesting, because one of the aspects of happiness is its utility as a weapon, specifically if you can cause a city to revolt, especially during a war, that can be a key play. But if the system becomes designed to curb excess, I think part of that is that its punishments would become less drastic, which means it can't be used in the same way.

It may also be worth ideating on whether happiness is best represented as penalties or boosts. Right now it's purely punishing as you dip below 50%, but what if it was designed to offer bonuses when above 50% (or 75%, or 100%, numbers TBD)? I think it might feel more fair, at any rate, even if the outcome is still relatively the same.

 

[ma_kuh]

If high difficulty players want a greater challenge I'm totally cool with adding +10/20% unhappiness from needs specifically to those difficulties.

There's also the option to apply -10/20% unhappiness to AIs, to better reflect who is getting the handicap bonus for difficulty.

 

[Stalker0]

This is interesting, because one of the aspects of happiness is its utility as a weapon, specifically if you can cause a city to revolt, especially during a war, that can be a key play. But if the system becomes designed to curb excess, I think part of that is that its punishments would become less drastic, which means it can't be used in the same way.

It may also be worth ideating on whether happiness is best represented as penalties or boosts. Right now it's purely punishing as you dip below 50%, but what if it was designed to offer bonuses when above 50% (or 75%, or 100%, numbers TBD)? I think it might feel more fair, at any rate, even if the outcome is still relatively the same.

The issue here is that the use as a "weapon" doesn't really exist, because there is no strategic lever to really pull here. You can't suddenly shift your play to "go full happiness" and somehow grind your enemies into submission. You focus your game to reduce happiness, because that's what good play requires. You get yields....because you need yields. You get happiness because you need to to grow and do things. So you are doing all of these things anyway, there isn't really a "I'm going to go happiness this game and cause revolts and stuff" kind of play.

Now when you use a spy to trigger a revolt, THAT is a weapon, and that's perfectly fine. You could argue that the Order tenent that gives you extra tourism when you are happier than your enemy is the exception, that's a true "weapon of happiness", something direct and tangible that a player can choose and focus on, and again, that's perfectly fine.

 

[Rekk]

The main way to weaponized happiness is through war weariness and ideological pressure. As long as a player's happiness is such that the happiness penalties from these methods can actually influence a player to react to it, then I think it's fine in that regard.

 

[CppMaster]

I don't think happiness should be this extra special hill on higher difficulties, the difficulty is already supposed to challenge me with stronger AIs. To me happiness on deity should be similar to happiness on emperor

That's just not possible when happiness depends on how much other civs develop their cities. That's why I think removing need that depend on other cities might be worth considering (and by adding unhappiness somewhere else, so it's not too easy).