Domination Victory - Deity - Tips for a noob pls

[Grasp]

Ok a few thoughts after looking at your pictures.

1. The point of going Liberty is to get the GP as soon as possible for the early game boost, as well as for its happiness boost, neither of which you got.

2. You only had 1 city. Although I admit I wasn't specific, you definately want 4 cities with a Tradition start and more than that with Liberty before you start attacking.

3. You took my advice for spamming artillery abit too literally, but that's probably my fault. You need to have a balanced army that - compared to most conventional setups - would lean heavily enough towards Artillery to be called "spam", but you can't get anywhere if you literally ONLY get Artys. You still need a balanced composition in addition to copious siege units. I will make a large post with pictures to illustrate examples from my most recent Deity German playthru

What GP should i grab?
And for artillery.. i had already lost the game.. i tryed to build as many as i could to help persia beating the others and to try to steal their territory but it was too late, so i ended up stacking them in my city and i gave up^^



If you guys have time, i could gave you my initial game save and you can play my map.. This would help me to understand when to settle, where and how to counter their super fast expansionism..
Here's the link if you are interested ^^ http://speedy.sh/WTNh6/AutoSave-Initial-0000-BC-4000.Civ5Save

 

[Idleray]

Here as promised an overlook on an example Germany Deity Standard Pangaea playthrough.

I get an excellent start with 3 silver (minable, has good pantheon) and also stone. Your starting 50 turns is always about getting the techs to maximise your resource output, so in this case you get mining, masonry, as well as the techs that enable stoneworks. If you have 2 or more pasture-type tiles, getting stables is also good early.

Spoiler :

The earliest save I could find was T72, as you can see I'm about to settle my 4th city, and I've already finished Mathematics and am rushing for Hanging Gardens which is a huge boon if you can get it. In this case I was confident enough to go for it. It turns out I was beaten by 1 turn, but no matter I loaded and chopped a nearby tree, which shaved 1 turn off and gave me the coveted Wonder.

Spoiler :

At T105, everything looks to be in order as I beeline for Education.

Spoiler :

This is an awkward situation in which I get a cultural policy before I have the technology to get Commerce, so I get a point in Patronage instead thinking of getting Consulates, which is a staple before the patch that nerfed it. It didn't work out later and I never found the spare culture to invest any more in Patronage.

Spoiler :

At nearly T150, I see I luckily got my own little corner of the world to keep busy in, my two neighbours Monty and Gaja fight it out and ignore me. This is about as ideal as things get on Deity

Spoiler :

From my tech path here you can see my general plan of beeling NC, Education then Artillery. I went and got Oxford University, unlocking Printing Press and thus was confident of grabbing Leaning Tower of Pisa in which I succeeded.

Spoiler :

A view of Berlin at T203. I've just finished Heroic Epic and am about to use all the gold I've saved up to buy an Artillery every turn at a 40% discount courtesy of Commerce + Big Ben.

Spoiler :

Looks like Shaka is going to get absolutely huge here. He's the endgame boss.

Spoiler :

T220 and the invasion of my first victim the Aztecs has begun in earnest! Note the unit composition.

Spoiler :

16 turns later and I've finished conquering Aztecs (leaving them on 1 city) and have also taken Jakarta. Note I'm beelining towards Plastics both for the Research labs and the Infantry which I will get before anyone else thus cementing my military superiority

Spoiler :

to be continued...

 

[Idleray]

A look at my social policies so far. There's the semi-wasted point in Patronage (that I couldn't probably have spent any better). There's the all-important -25% buy cost Commerce policy, and the rest I've put into Autocracy for

Spoiler :

I avoid Shaka as he is the endgame boss and Go for Assyria instead, namely because
a. Assyria and Korea are putting ideological pressure on me and I want that to stop, while Shaka is also Autocracy
b. Assyria and Korea are tech leaders, and I do not want any potential run-away spaceship if I fight the Zulus first

Spoiler :

Here you can see I've converted nearly all the tiles in conquered Puppet state territory into Trading Posts, both to control their growth and to give me more gold to spend on troops

Spoiler :

At this point I am at my limit in terms of Happiness. I cannot keep going on like this taking hit after hit with each puppeted city. I am not a big fan of razing cities especially because an upcoming Autocracy tenet gives me super-courthouses.

Spoiler :

As you can see I am wringing every ounce of Tourism I can out of the Great Works I capture, swapping them out of conquered cities immediately and going for theming bonuses. I also have a Diplomat with Korea.

Spoiler :

-26 Happiness from Pressure, which is hurting me real bad. Just wait till I get Hotels and capture their great works!

Spoiler :

However for the time being I've (almost) run out of solutions for Happiness. But the show must go on! So I pull the trump card: selling cities which gives me the twin benefit of more Happiness and more cash to buy more Happiness buildings.

Spoiler :

I now have 10K gold to annex these Aztec cities and rush-buy Courthouses plus Barracks/Armory/MA for max local happiness in each city! I can also buy oodles of new units to speed up my conquest.

Spoiler :

With Assyria Conquered, I turn my attention to the huns

Spoiler :

As you can see I am saving Clausewitz's legacy for the very end. In the meantime I continue to take Happiness tenets. I got Industrial Espionage in the hopes of stealing some tech off the tech leader Korea, but my agent got killed and the tenet was a waste.

Spoiler :

 

[Idleray]

Here's the finale. Though this doesn't trace to the very end game, it just catches up to where I am right now. It's pretty much won in the last picture (T324). I still need to continue playing and finish this game.

While Assur riots, I take out all its great works and slot them in my Capital/cities with Broadcast Towers

Spoiler :

The conquest of the Huns is proceeding speedily. Meanwhile Zulu also initiates an agreement with me to attack Korea, which couldn't suit me more.

Spoiler :

A view of the Capital on T290. Note the tourism output. Ideological Pressure, with the help of World Congress proposal for World Ideology: Autocracy, is gone. Although I only have 1 Happiness, I can afford to play on the edge because whenever I dip below 0 I can annex a city somewhere and rush-buy a Courthouse(+3 from lvl 2 Autocracy tenet) which pushes it positive again.

Spoiler :

Seoul has been captured. With the SV threats gone, the final war is about to begin. My Range + Logistics Rocket Artillery are already in position to unleash a deadly barrage on Zulu-controlled Jeonju, while my Panzers can run circles around his marines all day. Notice how I have 3000 Faith saved up. It's about to be used because...

Spoiler :

I am about to complete Rationalism and take a free tech + buy 2 GS

Spoiler :

I liberate an Assyrian city just coz I can and because I'm hitting the Happiness wall again, this time without any Ideo Pressure. By this stage I have been nuked by the Zulus about 3 times, but because of the NPT passing I do not expect anymore (and they don't hurt that much anyway)

Spoiler :

Good Luck Commander! Among the many many uses of XCOM squadrons, is that you can land them on an enemy strategic resource (like Aluminium) and pillage it on the same turn. Time to cripple Shaka's military

Spoiler :

Another crippled Alumunium mine, the culprit having already moved into position to capture Matsotsheni

Spoiler :

And... that's the end. i hope this has been useful to you as a rough comparison for progress on a typical Deity Domination game. I am by no means as good as some of the other veterans here, and I committed many sins from rerolling my start and making many Save/Loads during the later game (mainly to reposition troops for minimum loss)

 

[joshua43214]

What GP should i grab?
And for artillery.. i had already lost the game.. i tryed to build as many as i could to help persia beating the others and to try to steal their territory but it was too late, so i ended up stacking them in my city and i gave up^^



If you guys have time, i could gave you my initial game save and you can play my map.. This would help me to understand when to settle, where and how to counter their super fast expansionism..
Here's the link if you are interested ^^ http://speedy.sh/WTNh6/AutoSave-Initial-0000-BC-4000.Civ5Save

The site itself reports this as a unsafe download.

Please upload the save to this forum itself

 

[Cromagnus]

Go Tradition unless you are a Civ that is geared towards Liberty (Poland comes to mind, but other Civs with good UBs like Maya, Persia will work too)

(Assuming Tradition) Value food above all else, even production, in your Capital after you unlock 4-food farms.

Any war before Artillery will most likely only be won with the help of Great Generals and lots of luck.

Convert all farms in conquered territories into trading posts to control growth in puppeted cities.

Make sure you get at least a Hotel in your capital if you are getting pressured.

Agree with most of what you wrote, but disagree with the above recommendations.

#1) Liberty is *almost always* more effective for domination because of a few things.
The benefits of Tradition do not apply to your puppeted or annexed cities. The benefits of Liberty do.

Reduced tile improvement time is super-effective. If you can get Pyramids (which you should definitely try to get) you can pillage-heal your front line units in one turn, which is insanely powerful. And more importantly, you can get farms, mines, etc. up faster, which really helps early on.

To control unhappiness, you want only the population you absolutely need. Tradition is designed to grow 4 cities fast. Only your capital gets the happiness bonus from Monarchy, so any other city you build is detracting from your overall happiness during Domination.

That being said, Tradition can be really effective. If I do go Tradition for DV, I try to maximize population in my capital and stagnate my 2nd-4th cities while they produce things.

#2) I would say value food above all else even before you get 4-food farms. But you need the mines ready to go when you start your domination run. Don't neglect them!

#3) I disagree that you can't (or shouldn't) fight early wars. Just don't take cities. You can maybe take one capital, but the goal of your early wars is XP for your units. You can get double-tap units or XBows with Range if you keep a neighbor in perma-war until you're ready to start your domination run.

#4) Re: Trading posts. I somewhat agree, somewhat disagree. You have to have a lot of workers for this to be feasible. It's faster IMHO to pillage the farms before city capture with horse units, and then move on. With Liberty/Pyramids, maybe you have time to build some trading posts, but realistically, you need to *press on*, and you want your workers near the front lines. Resist the temptation to save farm pillages for the units that need them and just pillage ALL farms with horse before city capture.

But, and here's the kicker, except for capitals, you should only be keeping cities temporarily unless they provide some huge advantage. I keep them long enough to move my units to my next target and then I sell them to someone I have open borders with. Always move the great works out first and check for wonders. Accidentally selling Petra = major oops... ;-)

#5) A hotel in your capital does what exactly? Tourism doesn't help with ideological pressure. Culture does. Why do you even have Refrigeration unless all your oil was coastal?

EDIT: Ok, that's not quite accurate I guess. AFAIK, Tourism helps you pressure *them*, but culture defends you from their pressure. So Tourism is only useful for CV. Have I been looking at this all wrong??

Post-patch Tourism will be more useful. (Your level of influence on AIs will give you other benefits) But right now, AFAIK, the only value of Tourism is CV.

 

[Grasp]

The site itself reports this as a unsafe download.

Please upload the save to this forum itself

Oh, i'm sorry. Uploaded again ^^

Thank you too Cromagnus. You guys have so many wonderful tips to tell me, but i still can't understand when should i build my first settler..
I usually start building monument, granary and so on.. 10 turns are gone to learn pottery, so the granary starts at turn 11 (if i decide to build only half scout) or turn 13/14 waiting for the scout. I can't really remember how many turns takes the granary (obviously also depends on how many hammers do you have..) but lets say it's done at turn 22? 24? something like that.. Then i should aim for a pantheon, i'm not fan of religions, but pantheons are very good, so it's another 4 turns? 5? And now is about turn 27/28. If i'm not wrong, settlers takes about 12 turns at this point.. So, assuming i'm not building pyramids I can have my first settler around turn 40.
In my game, at turn 40 (without pyramids..) england and persia were already sorrounding my city.. So i guess it's too late to build the settler at turn 28..

Idleray, thank you, the screenshot are very helpful, i can learn a lot about timings and placement, but as i said before, i still need to understand the start. Any game starts "from the start" . If you are bad at the start, it's over..
I forgot to mention... i also had a lot of jungle tiles, so i had to wait untile bronze working.. and i beelined for NC before, so i had to wait a lot..

Cromaggus, you said:
EDIT: Ok, that's not quite accurate I guess. AFAIK, Tourism helps you pressure *them*, but culture defends you from their pressure. So Tourism is only useful for CV. Have I been looking at this all wrong??
You know, i'm noob so it's only a theory, but could it be becouse if you "attack" them with tourism they lose their supremacy in the ideology and your happiness grows up?
I mean, if you have -20 happiness becouse order is dominant and you have autocracy, you defend yourself with culture ok, but you still have -20 happiness.. Instilling your culture with tourism would diminish the unhappiness i guess.. am i wrong? Happiness is the key point of dominance victories, so i think it's worth..

 

[Cromagnus]

I usually start building monument, granary and so on.. 10 turns are gone to learn pottery, so the granary starts at turn 11 (if i decide to build only half scout) or turn 13/14 waiting for the scout.

I think you're building your granary too early.

Let's assume you don't get a culture ruin or enough faith for a pantheon from scouting. I would build scout, monument, shrine. EDIT: Or possibly scout, monument, scout, shrine, if you're on Pangaea...

After that it depends on how you approach liberty. In this order, you'll have a monument by turn 16 or so. This will get you your first liberty policy by turn 20, and your 2nd by turn 27. You have your 3rd policy by turn 42. If you choose to favor settlers before workers, that means you get your first settler for free at turn 42 and a second one you build fast. If you went for workers instead, you'd have your first free worker by turn 27, so you're building one right after you finish your shrine.

But, honestly, by turn 27 you can just steal a worker, so I'd focus on the settler first.

This way, you have two settlers out by turn 50, and should have enough money to buy your second worker. Then, shortly after that you get a free worker, and build your 4th.

The thing is, if you're building settlers, that granary isn't doing you any good. And the sooner you get settlers the better.

But that's just my approach. Some people prefer to go for workers first to get their capital up and running. If you do that, it means buying your first settler while you wait for your 4th policy to give you a free one. This delays getting your 2nd and 3rd city out by about ten turns in my experience, unless you get a culture ruin...

 

[joshua43214]

Well, aside from the awful lack of hammers, this is just another typical start. There are a ton of luxuries, you just have to go get them. No especially good places to drop cities, so you just have to grab some real estate and depend on population to get things going. Having to run off and get both trapping and bronze working early makes things hard, but you just do it.

I loosely followed the guide for Poland http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=501378
Stole a worker from Persia, then harassed his borders to the west and he just expanded to the east. Did not trade or sell embassies and only William got a scout down to scout my territory and he sent a couple of settlers. Notice how I have one cordoned off, but he beat me to the coast. Will probably drop 2 or 3 more cities once the NC is up depending on how I feel. There is a ncie spot over by the silver, and I should put a filler in to lock down my territory, and I need a coastal so I can meet the other civs. Might run down to grab CB's and take William's coastal.

I will probably miss the Oracle since it will finish on T85, but going for it anyway because the great library went late (T38). I have sold all lux's down, and got a DoF from Persia after I sent him a TR, might sell the lux's coming up to him and buy my next settler to grab the silver and hopefully discourage William from my territory. What makes this map hard is the lack of hammers, but it has tons of food and lux's to compensate. My big issue now is not near enough workers, and not enough hammers to crank them out.

Lizzie and William are both vulnerable to CB's or x-bows. Persia will probably need artillery to dislodge.

Spoiler :

 

[Idleray]

Agree with most of what you wrote, but disagree with the above recommendations.

#1) Liberty is *almost always* more effective for domination because of a few things.
The benefits of Tradition do not apply to your puppeted or annexed cities. The benefits of Liberty do.

Reduced tile improvement time is super-effective. If you can get Pyramids (which you should definitely try to get) you can pillage-heal your front line units in one turn, which is insanely powerful. And more importantly, you can get farms, mines, etc. up faster, which really helps early on.

Liberty is good too, I'm just more comfortable with the way Tradition usually pans out; giving you a good amount of Tech due to the higher pop in your cap which is usually where you have your NC.

To control unhappiness, you want only the population you absolutely need. Tradition is designed to grow 4 cities fast. Only your capital gets the happiness bonus from Monarchy, so any other city you build is detracting from your overall happiness during Domination.

While this is true, Liberty only gives you +1 Happiness per city and the other bonus only applies to unoccupied cities which doesn't really help during the early part of your domination game, when you're not ready to annex. I find Tradition halved unhappiness in capital to be almost as good in the long run, providing anywhere from 15 or more Happiness and its effects kick in early in the game too.

#2) I would say value food above all else even before you get 4-food farms. But you need the mines ready to go when you start your domination run. Don't neglect them!

Of course, Perhaps I was a bit too literal here. I wouldn't be building farms on hill tiles either, in fact I was only recently aware that this is possible! The purpose of having many 4 food farms is mostly so you can work as many mine tiles and have as many specialists as you can.

#3) I disagree that you can't (or shouldn't) fight early wars. Just don't take cities. You can maybe take one capital, but the goal of your early wars is XP for your units. You can get double-tap units or XBows with Range if you keep a neighbor in perma-war until you're ready to start your domination run.

I agree.

#4) Re: Trading posts. I somewhat agree, somewhat disagree. You have to have a lot of workers for this to be feasible. It's faster IMHO to pillage the farms before city capture with horse units, and then move on. With Liberty/Pyramids, maybe you have time to build some trading posts, but realistically, you need to *press on*, and you want your workers near the front lines. Resist the temptation to save farm pillages for the units that need them and just pillage ALL farms with horse before city capture.

That's a pretty good idea that works into my strategy. Instead of turning farms into trading posts, its better to pillage them while you can, since it makes no difference except more gold in your pocket and more hp to units.

#5) A hotel in your capital does what exactly? Tourism doesn't help with ideological pressure. Culture does. Why do you even have Refrigeration unless all your oil was coastal?

EDIT: Ok, that's not quite accurate I guess. AFAIK, Tourism helps you pressure *them*, but culture defends you from their pressure. So Tourism is only useful for CV. Have I been looking at this all wrong??

Post-patch Tourism will be more useful. (Your level of influence on AIs will give you other benefits) But right now, AFAIK, the only value of Tourism is CV.

As per your edit, Tourism means Influence, and Pressure = Your Influence level on them minus Their influence level on yours. So if you are both at "Exotic" with each other there is no net pressure from either of you. You can crank your culture as high as you want but it's still not gonna be enough to prevent someone else from getting a measly 10% of your Culture in Tourism, so it is in fact best to maximize your own Tourism until Pressure disappears. This doesn't mean cranking out your own great works, as I said before. You only need those with your Musicians. Just make sure to swap out captured works so they are giving you max Tourism.

For me I look at Tourism as a generator, so it deserves fair priority.

 

[Doc Skillz]

I couldn't fill Liberty, (what's the point grabbing Collective Rule when i already am surrounded). The same for meritocracy and representation.

Once this happened, you'd lost the game. Reload and implement a new strategy.

I got so many benefits grabbing an early consulates. The problem is that Persia annexed all the surrounding CS's...so I lost all those benefits.

So, you had no benefits?

I have to build settlers and get that free settler asap, but how? They are so fast to settle and they always move the settler with at least 2 armies. I tried to steal settlers moving around my city but their army was too strong for my warriors.

Capturing a settler converts it to a worker. Getting that initial settler from the LIBERTY tree is not too difficult. You need 25 culture to open the tree and another 90 culture to reach the free settler. Trying to steal settlers from an aggressive AI is a good way to encourage them to crush you into the ground.

I also used scouts/warriors to block the way of their settlers, trying to gain some time, but they still managed to settle soon.. Maybe should I try to build a stronger army at the start to steal their settlers?

Capturing settlers converts them to workers. Since your build order left you with ONE city, you would have an influx of workers with nothing to do.

 

[Grasp]

Ok, I did my 2nd game.. I was soooooooooooooo close to win T_T very very close, but Germany won by science victory :\
I know that diplomacy victory isn't a real victory, but i really was so close :\
I also was fighting to win by domination, but i made peace with my contender without thinking the consequences.. i grabbed 3 times 2 of his cities, trying to raze becouse it was too dangerous trying to keep the cities and i ended up requesting peace when he got the cities back.. damn, i was sure i had those cities, i didn't check T_T
Btw, i'm going to post some screen so you can see and maybe give me some more advice. The map is the same as the 1st time.
I had a good start, but i my population didn't grow up becouse i had many problems with happiness.. Btw, let me post the screens..

 

[Grasp]

1.
At the top-right corner of Krakov, I found El Dorado, i was the first, so I got 500G and i bought a settler!

Spoiler :

2.
England forgot to settle near me, so i managed to grab my 3rd city!

Spoiler :

3.
I settled my 4th city, revealing 2 tiles of the reef barrier!

Spoiler :

4.
Now i'm starting to lose a lot of money.. i'm forced to buy so many tiles to prevent Ai from settling in my way.. really yoo much gold spent.. i surely bought at least 20 tiles..

Spoiler :

5.
Still managing to stop stupid settlers from settling-.-

Spoiler :

6.
Netherland got rid of England on my left side and i'm still managing to stop that stupid settler on the bottom left -.-

Spoiler :

7.
Ok, finally the settler is gone... i move my archers... and... F..K!!!!!!!!!!! Netherland came with his settler and settled -.-!!!!!

Spoiler :

8.
I'm almost ready for the war!!! My target is netherland, they have so much gold income, i really want to hurt them.. Maybe the poor persia was a better choice :\

Spoiler :

9.
The first round of the war!

Spoiler :

10.
I grabbed 3 cities but my gold income seriously dropped.. Breda is impossible to defend, he start moving all his ships and everyturn he takes the city back :\

Spoiler :

11.
I'm feeling quite confident now, ships aren't coming and the cities are free to take..

Spoiler :

12.
I was sure i had maastric and breda when i made peace with william.. I guess i was wrong looking at the screen

Spoiler :

13.
I called for Persian help.. hoping in.. something..

Spoiler :

14.
Netherland was the superstar but... german won :V

Spoiler :

:V

 

[joshua43214]

I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but you never had a chance judging by the screen shots.

You are either not properly using your policy tree and taking Autocracy to get your missing techs, or you are not focusing on science enough. You are not going to defeat the unit spam the AI can produce when your are facing infantry with rifles, and the AI is about to annihilate your entire army with bombers...

 

[tommynt]

I checked the forum for domination victories and I found something, but you never mention if the civ is easy or hard to play. I think i need something easy to play at the moment..
What do you suggest? Thank you.

i d bet quite a sum that there is 0 chance that u win your 1. deity game without cooked settings like disabling science or diplo win or without constantlyy reloading after things went wrong.

Apart general strategies there is just more to civ, the details ...
the turn 165 ss says it all - cities still not conected - unworked tiles ... in turn 165 I usually got my factories up just for comparision.

Try your win with the strat from poland strategie guide and make sure to get enough workers!
After universities u can make a detour to xbows to kill 1 neighbour if u want to or go straight to arties then - but u need them at turn 150 not turn 250

 

[Grasp]

Ok.. i know... it's the worst possible way to win.. but i won LOOL
I sold all my cities and traded my gpt for cash and i bought all the CSs and i won by diplomacy lool
I'm not so exited, it feels like cheating T_T

Spoiler :

Btw, at turn 150 you already have universities and artillery? woa, i guess i should improve so much to get a real victory.
You are right about tiles not worked and city half connected, but i had a lot of problem with that stupid settler, i didn't want him to settle near my city, so i bought so many tiles and i wasted a huge amount of gold.. :\
Btw i sureley improved, the first game was horrible.. ^^
Again, you are right, my units were too weak compared to the others.. I should really try to let them settle near me and focus buying structures, i can always grab their city later..
If you have any other suggestion, i'm more than happy to learn something ^^

 

[Doc Skillz]

I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but you never had a chance judging by the screen shots.

You are either not properly using your policy tree and taking Autocracy to get your missing techs, or you are not focusing on science enough. You are not going to defeat the unit spam the AI can produce when your are facing infantry with rifles, and the AI is about to annihilate your entire army with bombers...

Yup. Buying the tiles you selected enraged Persia. It would have been better to use the gold to secure the luxury resources (copper and gems). In the SS's I also note that the Persian settler could have settled between YOU and the CS...so really your land-grab accomplished nothing.

Next, I noticed that your military (though substantial) was a bit behind (as far as technology) to compete with other civilizations. You are getting better at building a balanced force...but you have WAY too many of the wrong kind of units.

Improvement from your last game...but still it needs to be thought out a bit more.

 

[Cromagnus]

As per your edit, Tourism means Influence, and Pressure = Your Influence level on them minus Their influence level on yours. So if you are both at "Exotic" with each other there is no net pressure from either of you. You can crank your culture as high as you want but it's still not gonna be enough to prevent someone else from getting a measly 10% of your Culture in Tourism, so it is in fact best to maximize your own Tourism until Pressure disappears. This doesn't mean cranking out your own great works, as I said before. You only need those with your Musicians. Just make sure to swap out captured works so they are giving you max Tourism.

For me I look at Tourism as a generator, so it deserves fair priority.

I'm almost certain this is incorrect. Your tourism has no effect on their Influence on you. I'm almost certain you can both be Influential on each other, and be impacting each other's happiness simultaneously.

Influence is 100% a comparison of your total culture vs their total tourism, and vice versa. If your culture is growing faster than their tourism, their influence on you is falling. If your culture is growing slower, their influence on you is rising. Your tourism has no impact on that.

So, pre-fall patch, AFAIK, hotels are a total waste if you aren't going for a CV. After the patch, Influence has advantages. Perhaps not enough to make a hotel worth building though, unless you're going for CV. When I think about all the things I need to be building at that stage of the game... yeah, I'm not wasting my time on hotels.

 

[Idleray]

I'm almost certain this is incorrect. Your tourism has no effect on their Influence on you. I'm almost certain you can both be Influential on each other, and be impacting each other's happiness simultaneously.

Influence is 100% a comparison of your total culture vs their total tourism, and vice versa. If your culture is growing faster than their tourism, their influence on you is falling. If your culture is growing slower, their influence on you is rising. Your tourism has no impact on that.

So, pre-fall patch, AFAIK, hotels are a total waste if you aren't going for a CV. After the patch, Influence has advantages. Perhaps not enough to make a hotel worth building though, unless you're going for CV. When I think about all the things I need to be building at that stage of the game... yeah, I'm not wasting my time on hotels.

From a cursory search on the forum,

here and
here

I get

Public_Opinion_LEVEL = Sum_Of_Influence_Difference_From_Civs_Following_Di fferent_Ideology - Sum_Of_Influence_Difference_From_Civs_Following_Ow n_Ideology + World_Ideology_Pressure

You can reduce Influence difference with a another civ by:
- increasing your culture output (slow) or via GreatWritter bulb (culture spike)
- increasing your tourism output (slow) or via GreatMusician bulb (tourism spike)
- reducing his tourism modifiers towards you ( declaration of war should drop trade routes open borders and diplomats? )
- decreasing their culture and tourism output (conquering some of their cities//repossessing some of their great works in the same time or paying another civ to do it for you).

Ideology pressure = Other Civ's influence level on you - Your influence level on them

And this is also confirmed by my own experience and checking.

To me, Tourism(up to a certain level) is part and parcel of Happiness management.

 

[Cromagnus]

From a cursory search on the forum,

here and
here

I get





And this is also confirmed by my own experience and checking.

To me, Tourism(up to a certain level) is part and parcel of Happiness management.

If this is true, then the UI is misleading. It shows only two things:

1) A bar with their total tourism and your total culture.
2) A list of modifiers to their tourism output

These are the only factors in the UI that go into % of Influence, and % of Influence (supposedly) determines the happiness modifier.

The final happiness is determined by adding up the Influence for each ideology, and the Ideology with the most influence on you determines your happiness level. But you don't influence yourself... so you don't add into that equation. I think.

Heck, I dunno, I don't have proof but that's how it feels. Maybe you're right. But it doesn't feel right. The docs say "culture = defense, tourism = offense"...