FYI: Zero Resistance rates does NOT Stop CF.

[Kryten]

Originally posted by XCalibyr
When you capture a major city, you leave as many forces there as you can, both to control the population and to defend against retaliatory attacks. You do not leave as many forces as you can five miles away from the city limits so that you can take back the city. You're not supposed to lose it in the first place! That's why you leave a sizeable force there.

Now, in Civ3 terms, you're partially correct - at this point, the smart thing to do is leave a minimal force in the city and park your troops outside to retake in the event of a flip. However, give it a bit of thought, and you'll realize how completely illogical that is. And therein lies Zouave's point - the cultural flipping is not logical in theory and certainly not executed in a logical fashion.

Yes XCalibyr, what you say is right. Culture-flipping in WW2 is illogical, unrealistic and has no basis in the real world. However, (and taking in Zachriel's last comments), let's look at the Napoleonic army Spain. The French has two choices; either garrison a few cities with huge forces in order to stop a flip while the rest of the country is overrun by the British & Spanish, OR, spread their forces to hold as many cities as possible and run the risk of cities flipping and their garrison surrendering and becoming prisoners of war. What a perfect example of culture-flipping being used to simulate real world events such as the Peninsular War! (and these Spanish cities were not flipping because they love British culture, far from it, but because they HATED the French!). This is something we could never simulate in Civ1 or Civ2.
But you're right, the same mechanism DOESN'T work for WW2.

And, as Exile_Ian said, I DON'T WANT TO TALK ABOUT HISTORY!!!
Sometimes culture-flipping is a good way to simulate history....and sometimes it is NOT.
And people have got to realize that you can't make one shoe fit both feet!!!

 

[Zouave]

Originally posted by Kryten
. . .Culture-flipping in WW2 is illogical, unrealistic and has no basis in the real world. However, (and taking in Zachriel's last comments), let's look at the Napoleonic army Spain. The French has two choices; either garrison a few cities with huge forces in order to stop a flip while the rest of the country is overrun by the British & Spanish, OR, spread their forces to hold as many cities as possible and run the risk of cities flipping and their garrison surrendering and becoming prisoners of war. What a perfect example of culture-flipping being used to simulate real world events! (and these Spanish cities are not flipping because they love British culture, but because they HATE the French!). This is something we could never simulate in Civ1 or Civ2.
But you're right, the same mechanism DOESN'T work for WW2.

And, as Exile_Ian said, I DON'T WANT TO TALK ABOUT HISTORY!!!
Sometimes culture-flipping is a good way to simulate history....and sometimes it is NOT.
And people have got to realize that you can't make one shoe fit both feet!!!

First of all, so-called "Culture Flipping" is illogical under ANY circumstances, but even more so in historical scenarios.

Second, I always said Firaxis was good at marketing. They well know that the teaching of History is now a joke in our public schools, so they dumbed down the game and made a mockery of much of History. . . because there are lots of people who "DON'T WANT TO TALK ABOUT HISTORY". Unfortunately, the marketing of the game as "Sid Meier's Civ 3" was fraudulent - this is NOT a descendant of Civ 2 but a different type of game.

"You can't make one shoe to fit both feet". (?). Firaxis ignored the foot that was the tradition of Civ 1 and 2 and whipped up something different, while all of us WASTED OUR TIME on the forums discussing the upcoming Civ 3 after Civ 2 came out. We got stuff in Civ 3 we NEVER ASKED FOR. So, thanks for nothing, Firaxis. Now go talk about your sales to your Infogrames bosses, as if we care. And Sid, your name's cachet is shot for good.

Third, as for those historical examples. . . I dare say in game terms Saragossa in Spain might have "Flipped" to France owing to the superiority of French "culture" at the time.

Pick whatever historical period you want, and see how impossible and absurd Flipping and razing really is. American Civil War? World War One? Frederick the Great's campaigns in the Seven Year's War? In the latter Prussia had the WEAKEST "culture" of all the surrounding states - Russia, Austria, and France. But they STILL WON due to his MILITARY prowess. That's reality - but forget the real in Civ 3.

So enjoy the FANTASY of Flipping. But I've waited nine months for scenarios, but without an OFF switch for CF they can NEVER be historical - just illogical fantasy.

 

[mad_stork]

Originally posted by whosurdaddy


because foreign nationals do not begin assimilating until they have been a part of your empire for at least as long as the enemy empire (I confirmed this in an e-mail from Firaxis).

Does this mean at least as many turns or at least as many years? I hope it means turns......

 

[Kryten]

Hey! I thought I was on your side Zouave (....well, at least partly) in that I too wish to find a way of stopping culture-flips because they can sometimes disrupt historical scenarios!

But I do admit that I could be accused of distorting the true meaning of 'culture' as it was originaly intended in Civ3. I just want to use it as a useful tool to SIMULATE certain political, religious, and treacherous acts of rebellion that are necessary to make some (but NOT all) scenarios work correctly.
I'm not really interested in the true CAUSES, but just the EFFECTS.
I don't care who had the better clothes/music/architecture; all I'm interested in is the fact that the several cities of south Italy 'flipped' from Rome to Hannibal, or that Spanish cities kept on rebelling unless they had a huge French garrison in them. I'll leave it to the player to think of their own reasons for why that city 'flipped' in that particular scenario.
But....and I do agree with you.....'flipping' has no place in WW2, or in many other scenarios.

You know, I'm in a bad position here. I have you on one side who dosen't want 'flipping' in any situation, and I have Zachriel on the other side who seems to want it in all situations.
Me....I just want to use it in some scenarios but switch it off in others.

I feel like a referee at a football match who is hated by both teams! (And hated by all the sports fans as well!)

 

[Zachriel]

Originally posted by whosurdaddy
. . . foreign nationals do not begin assimilating until they have been a part of your empire for at least as long as the enemy empire

That is not correct (unless I misunderstood your claim ). In GOTM9, I captured Hakodate in turn 169 (530AD) and here it is in turn 231 (1150AD), just 62 turns later. All but one citizen is Egyptian.

** WARNING ** GOTM9 ** SPOILER **
http://www.zachriel.com/gotm9/ad0470-Trespassers.htm

 

[whosurdaddy]

Originally posted by Zachriel


That is not correct (unless I misunderstood your claim ). In GOTM9, I captured Hakodate in turn 169 (530AD) and here it is in turn 231 (1150AD), just 62 turns later. All but one citizen is Egyptian.

** WARNING ** GOTM9 ** SPOILER **
http://www.zachriel.com/gotm9/ad0470-Trespassers.htm

Well here is the exact e-mail from Firaxis -

Before the percentage chance [to assimilate foreign nationals]even comes into play, the citizen must have been a member of your civilization for at least as long as they were a member of the old civilization. This means it could be many turns until the 90% chance [90% assimilation rate that you have set in your game] gets used (especially for ancient cities).

Barry Caudill
QA Manager
Firaxis Games
mailto:bcaudill@firaxis.com

- So perhaps Hakodate was a city relatively recently established. And maybe when u captured the japanese city, its population was relatively low (remember all new citizens added due to pop gorowth or whatever will be of your nationality).

 

[Zouave]

Originally posted by whosurdaddy


Well here is the exact e-mail from Firaxis -

Before the percentage chance [to assimilate foreign nationals]even comes into play, the citizen must have been a member of your civilization for at least as long as they were a member of the old civilization. This means it could be many turns until the 90% chance [90% assimilation rate that you have set in your game] gets used (especially for ancient cities).

Barry Caudill
QA Manager
Firaxis Games
mailto:bcaudill@firaxis.com

So perhaps Hakodate was a city relatively recently established.

CONCLUSION: Culture Flipping is worse than even I thought.

So, if I capture an enemy city in, say, 1800 AD, that was established in 800 AD, there is NO chance of assimilation at such a rate in the game. Thus CF is always a very real possibility; therefore, it behooves the human to exterminate the population by "razing". Yikes.

"For at least as long". (?). In YEARS or number of TURNS??

How in Hell did Firaxis come up with this crazy stuff??

BTW, Hakodate is FIFTEENTH on the list of Japanese cities and hence was likely recently established.

 

[whosurdaddy]

Hey everyone, I found this post in and old thread over at Apolyton. It was posted by a fellow named The Rusty Gamer , and he was trying to mod Civ3 to make it like Civ2, so here's what he wrote ...

"Cultural effects have been turned off, no cities overwhelmed and wanting to join etc. Other civilizations are not interested in your culture.

I've had to use cultural points in the early stages to give the full 21 production squares. It would've been nice to have been able to automatically give 10 culture points to a city but this isn't possible as far as I know. What I have done though, is allow early buildings (Palace, Barracks, Granary, Temple, Walls) each give 1 culture point, but all other improvements give -1 so culture won't keep growing for very long, just enough to get the production squares. The border factor is 25 so you will need 25 culture points. It will eventually halt - culture never goes negative."

I'm about to put his recomendations into action and see if they help at all.

 

[Zouave]

Originally posted by whosurdaddy
Hey everyone, I found this post in and old thread over at Apolyton. It was posted by a fellow named The Rusty Gamer , and he was trying to mod Civ3 to make it like Civ2, so here's what he wrote ...

"Cultural effects have been turned off, no cities overwhelmed and wanting to join etc. Other civilizations are not interested in your culture. . .

Post your results, how it effects CF, and what exactly you did.

It would be far simpler if Firaxis just allowed us to control this CF stuff as we can now with corruption and AI trade.

 

[Zouave]

Originally posted by Kryten
Thanks for posting your findings Zouave.

It's a shame that it didn't work, but I think that it's too early to thrown in the towel just yet as we haven't exausted all the possibilities.

As MeestaDude says, have you tried increasing both the initial and continued resistance chances to 100%?

And what about a variation of Furry Spatula's idea: how about making ALL buildings (including the Palace) generate zero culture, with the exception of the Temple which only produces 1 culture per turn? This would make city boundaries grow much more slowly it is true, but may have the added side effect of reducing another one of your pet hates....city boundaries that 'flip' on to your irrigated/mined land. And it does mean that the AI will try to colonize the gaps between cities, but adjusting the optimal city percentage may compensate for this. It would certainly make a much more challenging game!
And removing or eliminating 'flips' would also reduce the need to raze cities as well.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I should point out to everybody that I am not against culture-flips in an ordinary 'random' game of civ, as they are rarely a problem for me because I'm more of a 'builder' than a 'conqueror'. I just tend to treat them as another challange to be overcome, even if they are not quite 100% accurate (....but hey, tell ONE THING that IS a 100% accurate in this game! It is only a simulation after all. Although it's true that some things are better simulated than others....).

My main concern is with scenario creation. And many scenarios NEED MORE culture-flips to simulate real world events such as Persian cities flipping to Alexander the Great without a fight, or the cities of southern Italy and Syracuse flipping from Rome to Hannibal during the 2nd Punic War, or the cities of Greece flipping to Mithradates. . .

As I've said many times, those cities did not "flip" because of "Culture". They flipped owing to fear of being slaughtered by an overwhelming military force. But surrendering is not an option in Civ 3. Many cities begged the Mongols for mercy; the Aztecs were another. But maybe that wasn't PC enough for the Firaxis crowd who wanted to push "Culture" at us. I wonder about their political orientation.

As for reducing all culture points to zero for improvements and the like, then we are left with assimilation and proximity of the enemy capital - the latter is MUCH too important in Civ 3 especially as the capital hops around every time you conquer it.

As for posting a large military outside a town. Well, what town of '1' will flip with nine military in it? Mine did and the legionaries vanished. Game over. What town will flip with a huge force over on the next tile? None, they'd be too afraid to - except in Civ 3 where citizens are so stupid they guarantee their own deaths by flipping no matter where the enemy main force military is, even nearby. NOTE: the closest example to a "flip" in WW II (even though it was NOT) was when Warsaw revolted in 1944 - which they didn't do until the Soviet Army was nearby. (We remember Stalin left them hanging and allowed the Germans to defeat them).

Yes I well know that razing is a cousin of CF - and equally absurd maybe worse. You drop a nuclear bomb on a city and there is more of it (and its population) left than if one damaged unit razes it. And no pollution either!

 

[GeneralTacticus]

OK, then, OKINAWA. Filled with Japanese nationals. In the goofy Firaxis CF model it surely would have flipped with all the U.S. Army troops vanishing.

Same point applies. Most of the local inhabitants died rather than be captured, or in Civ 3 terms were kiled by bomberdment (and there sure was a LOT of that).

Pick whatever historical period you want, and see how impossible and absurd Flipping and razing really is. American Civil War? World War One? Frederick the Great's campaigns in the Seven Year's War? In the latter Prussia had the WEAKEST "culture" of all the surrounding states - Russia, Austria, and France. But they STILL WON due to his MILITARY prowess. That's reality - but forget the real in Civ 3.

Zouave, are you EVER going to address the list of examples I posted a while ago? Just so you don't have to go looking:

The Ionian Greeks flipped from Persia. Ancient Israel flipped from the Romans. The West Bank and Gaza have been trying to culture-flip from Israel for years. Israel itself flipped from the Arabs. Persia flipped from the empire of the Medes. Kosovo attempted to flip from Serbia to Albania. Slovenia flipped out of Yugoslavia. America flipped away from Britain. Various tribes in the Aztec empire flipped to Spain when the invasion began. Texas flipped from Mexico. Both Hungary in 1956 and Czechoslovakia in 1968 flipped out of the Soviet sphere, and the Soviets sent in troops to reclaim them. Care to elaborate on how these are NOT historical examples of culture-flipping?

or the cities of southern Italy and Syracuse flipping from Rome to Hannibal during the 2nd Punic War,

What? One of the reasons that Hannibal was trying to inflict such dramatic defeats on the Romans as Cannae was that he thought that Roman subject cities would revolt and join him, but they never did. The closest thing to that was the fact that 12 out of 30 cities refused to supply soldiers.

 

[Agamemnus]

About Israel and other such cases: I think it's more a matter of immigration that culture flipping... almost like the CivII capture-the-capital deal: When a civ is weak, it tends to get either conquered or divided, and parts of the divisions are conquered or colonized..

Didn't Syracuse revolt? And then the Romans had to raze the city? And Archimedes died as a result? I think the general responsible for razing the city was Metellus, who was also responsible for razing Corinth..

And Cumae as well?

Side note to Zouave: THat's because Stalin didn't like Jews as much as he didn't like Hitler.

 

[GeneralTacticus]

Didn't Syracuse revolt? And then the Romans had to raze the city? And Archimedes died as a result? I think the general responsible for razing the city was Metellus, who was also responsible for razing Corinth..

No, they just refused to surrender.

 

[Agamemnus]

Syracuse was part of Rome at the time..

 

[Zachriel]

Originally posted by whosurdaddy

- So perhaps Hakodate was a city relatively recently established. And maybe when u captured the japanese city, its population was relatively low (remember all new citizens added due to pop gorowth or whatever will be of your nationality).

Good point! However, Hakodate was established in turn 100 (570BC). The population was five upon capture, though one died of starvation (those were terrible times during the war ). That means it was 69 turns old when captured and only 62 more turns it was nearly fully assimilated. Yes, any new citizens would be Egyptian, but the Japanese citizens would remain until assimilated (or made into workers, which I didn't do).

Here's what I do know about Hadodate. In turn 198 (820AD) while building the aqueduct and with an overall population of six, there were four Japanese nationals. Then in turn 199 (830AD), there were only three, then in turn 201 (850AD), there were only two. By turn 226 (1100AD), there was only one. This last one never assimilated even by turn 491 (2000AD.)

Apparently, each citizen remembers its own age! Good information whosurdaddy. I wonder why that last citizen never assimilated. I was good to him. I gave him everything he could ever ask for, luxuries, banks, palace, universities for his children. What more could he ask for?!?

 

[Flavor Dave]

Zoauve...I'm not a Russian, so therefore there is no such thing as a Russian. Pretty absurd, right?

Other posters: here's a long list of historical events that are analogous to Civ 3 culture flips.

Zoauve...City X didn't culture flip from Civ y to Civ Z, so culture flipping is stupid.

Pretty absurd, right?

Citing one city that didn't flip, doesn't mean that no other city in human history has ever flipped.

If you want to press your point, you'd be alot better off engaging other people's posts.

In my last experimental/fun game, I didn't rush build a temple in either of my newly acquired German cities, even tho my nearby cities were fairly culture deficient. I just wanted to see what would happen. I kept a large garrison (including an army of spearmen) in Berlin, which had a courthouse and the Oracle, and was building the FP. I had only a couple of units in Hamburg. I just wanted to see what would happen.

One time, Hamburg flipped. I replayed the turn, but after buying a temple. It didn't flip.

If I had been smarter (well, if I had a faster PC), I would have replayed the "flip" turn several times, both with and without rushbuilding the temple, to see what would happen.

Anyway, this experience told me some things. One, rush buy culture (actually, I already thought that, this confirms it). Two, for me, garrison size didn't hurt me. Some seem to think a city will flip if it has a big garrison more than a small one.

 

[Kryten]

To GeneralTacticus:-

Syracuse was an ally of Rome during the 1st Punic War, but in 215 BC following the death of Hiero the pro-Carthaginian party seized control, and after a long seige the Romans sacked the city. You could quite legitimately claim that they were an ally not under direct Roman control, and you'd be right, so I withdraw them from the discussion.
However, after the battle of Cannae, many towns in Apulia such as Arpi and Salapia, and all the towns in Bruttium (with the exception of the southern Greeks cities), plus most of Lucania and Samnium, left the Roman 'confedereracy' and opened their gates to Hannibal (not through fear of his army, but because they HATED the Romans!)
Of course the most famous revolt was that of Capua, the 2nd largest and richest city in Italy after Rome herself.

Capua was tied to Rome by various legal arrangements since the Latin War of 340 BC. They were given a limited form of citizenship, were allowed their own army/coinage/administration, but were not allowed to gain territory or go to war without Senate permission and had to supply the Roman army with soilders whether they liked it or not. So they were not allies the British-American-WW2 sense. They were in fact a Roman subject client state, and had been for over a hundred years.
And when Hannibal came along they jumped at the chance to change sides (although you are quite right, the none of the inner core of Latin cities joined Hannibal, which is what his strategy was all about).

 

[Zouave]

Originally posted by Kryten
. . .after the battle of Cannae, many towns in Apulia such as Arpi and Salapia, and all the towns in Bruttium (with the exception of the southern Greeks cities), plus most of Lucania and Samnium, left the Roman 'confedereracy' and opened their gates to Hannibal (not through fear of his army, but because they HATED the Romans!)
Of course the most famous revolt was that of Capua, the 2nd largest and richest city in Italy after Rome herself.

Capua was tied to Rome by various legal arrangements since the Latin War of 340 BC. They were given a limited form of citizenship, were allowed their own army/coinage/administration, but were not allowed to gain territory or go to war without Senate permission and had to supply the Roman army with soilders whether they liked it or not. So they were not allies the British-American-WW2 sense. They were in fact a Roman subject client state, and had been for over a hundred years.
And when Hannibal came along they jumped at the chance to change sides (although you are quite right, the none of the inner core of Latin cities joined Hannibal, which is what his strategy was all about).

Hating the Romans has nothing to do with Firaxis' arbitrary "Culture Flipping" forumula. Opening their gates to Hannibal does not mean huge Roman garrisons vanished - they were destroyed in battle as at Cannae.

Much of the peninsula was filled with cities with no love for Roman, including what wa sleft of the Etruscans. They had not been assimilated yet.

There are, as I have always said, ways to incorporate the strength of a Civilization (including "culture") into the game in a manner that makes SENSE. Firaxis has not found that way.

 

[Zachriel]

Originally posted by Kryten
To GeneralTacticus:-

However, after the battle of Cannae, many towns in Apulia such as Arpi and Salapia, and all the towns in Bruttium (with the exception of the southern Greeks cities), plus most of Lucania and Samnium, left the Roman 'confedereracy' and opened their gates to Hannibal (not through fear of his army, but because they HATED the Romans!)
Of course the most famous revolt was that of Capua, the 2nd largest and richest city in Italy after Rome herself.

And the garrison was probably mostly conscripted local men. Certainly Rome lost access to the manpower available in the disloyal cities.

 

[MummyMan]

What are some of the things that determine whether a city flips or not? My real question is if technology plays a role or not.