Happiness Balance Discussion

I don't know if I like that, for example, in a 20 pop city, distress can only reach 4 unhappiness, but boredom can reach 10 unhappiness (if all other yields are fulfilled). Boredom is the only need that had meaning outside of happiness (tourism).
 
I don't know if I like that, for example, in a 20 pop city, distress can only reach 4 unhappiness, but boredom can reach 10 unhappiness (if all other yields are fulfilled). Boredom is the only need that had meaning outside of happiness (tourism).
With 50/50/50/50 distribution, your 20 pop city can have up to 10 distress, or up to 10 boredom (if other needs are fulfilled), so none of them are ever bigger than 10. The maximum unhappiness from needs in this city is 10 from distress, plus 5 from poverty, plus 2 from illiteracy, plus 1 from boredom, for a total of 18 unhappy people.
Removing completely distress (through increasing production or reducing distress modifiers) turns this worst city into 10 poverty, plus 5 illiteracy, plus 2 boredom, for a total of 17 unhappy people. Barely noticeable happiness improvement, but at least this city now has more production and can fight underdevelopment better. This kind of suggests players how to deal with unhappiness, pointing toward what is best for solving the issue.

I'd suggest to place boredom before illiteracy, since gaining more policies is more effective fighting unhappiness than gaining techs.
 
I still feel like this will have the problem where solving one need (esp. in a small city) just moves it to another kind of unhappiness rather that actually improving your situation, but hopefully to a lesser extent. I'm willing to give it a try.

I just think it's hard to strategize when the unhappiness from one need depends so much on the values of other needs. It's not clear what effect any particular change will have. If the tooltip suggests gaining some production will reduce a point or two of distress, but doing so increases unhappiness from something else, it's not intuitive.
 
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I still feel like this will have the problem where solving one need (esp. in a small city) just moves it to another kind of unhappiness rather that actually improving your situation, but hopefully to a lesser extent. I'm willing to give it a try.

I just think it's hard to strategize when the unhappiness from one need depends so much on the values of other needs. It's not clear what effect any particular change will have. If the tooltip suggests gaining some production will reduce a point or two of distress, but doing so increases unhappiness from something else, it's not intuitive.
Not so bad, actually. As long as you are aware that poverty can be hidden in distress. If you get 10 unhappiness from distress in that 20 pop city, you aren't going to solve anything without taking care of distress. This is not like the old system, where reducing illiteracy from 4 to 1 could be easier than reducing distress from 8 to 5.
With this system, taking care of distress first is almost mandatory (and the value will be typically bigger).
 
One thing this obviously affects is that :c5food:ITRs are now complete crap. Like, worse than they were before. :c5production: On TRs has always been more useful, but they help needs while :c5food:TRs don’t.

I legit wonder if this won’t become an integral part of songhai’s strategy, because they have guaranteed access to :c5production:TRs in ancient.

Still a big fan of dropping distress
 
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One thing this obviously affects is that :c5food:ITRs are now complete crap. Like, worse than they were before. :c5production: On TRs has always been more useful, but they help needs while :c5food:TRs don’t.

I legit wonder if this won’t become an integral part of songhai’s strategy, because they have guaranteed access to :c5production:TRs in ancient.

Still a big fan of dropping distress

? Distress is both food and production.

We’re not dropping distress. Too much work.

G
 
I'm in constant 150-200 with 20+ cities(late mid game - > late game), is there really a problem with happiness? I found happiness very easy passing late game.
-early game though it's a "little" challenging i didn't ever found happiness that a problem.

i would probably get some salty post for this :p BUTT...

NERF HAPPINESS!!!!!!
 
I'm in constant 150-200 with 20+ cities(late mid game - > late game), is there really a problem with happiness? I found happiness very easy passing late game.
-early game thought it's a "little" challenging i did'nt ever found happiness that a problem.

i would probably get some salty post for this :p BUTT...

NERF HAPPINESS!!!!!!

This is why mathematicians and biographers don’t go to the same parties.

G
 
I still feel like this will have the problem where solving one need (esp. in a small city) just moves it to another kind of unhappiness rather that actually improving your situation, but hopefully to a lesser extent. I'm willing to give it a try.

I just think it's hard to strategize when the unhappiness from one need depends so much on the values of other needs. It's not clear what effect any particular change will have. If the tooltip suggests gaining some production will reduce a point or two of distress, but doing so increases unhappiness from something else, it's not intuitive.
Well, the true solution to your issue is to just remove the cap on unhappiness, so that a city can have more unhappiness than it has population. Then you can absolutely see that improving on a need will have an appreciable effect on unhappiness.

Of course, there might be some other gameplay issues...
 
Well, the true solution to your issue is to just remove the cap on unhappiness, so that a city can have more unhappiness than it has population. Then you can absolutely see that improving on a need will have an appreciable effect on unhappiness.

Of course, there might be some other gameplay issues

I think the current situation is fine if we can get the UI right. Keep the need trumping order, no math. If it’s confusing to new players let’s keep working on UI changes.

On that note I also say let’s go back to the model we had in the last version, plus public works. Throw in a late game happiness adjustment if we want to make happiness more relevant at that point...and call it a day.

The last model was pretty damn good, just needs a tweak, not an overhaul.
 
On that note I also say let’s go back to the model we had in the last version, plus public works. Throw in a late game happiness adjustment if we want to make happiness more relevant at that point...and call it a day.

The last model was pretty damn good, just needs a tweak, not an overhaul.

You keep saying that. You may even be right. But it's clearly not happening in the upcoming patch, so why not wait until after that to push for a switch-back?
 
Just so you are aware, there are two major changes to unhapiness from needs incoming:
1. They are going to be proportional, limited by city population, so it will adapt better to most situations.
2. The needs priorities are now a thing (even when the city is not 100% unhappy), giving a more realistic model that also doubles as guidance for new players. Each lower priority need is aplied to whatever population is still happy. This means that poverty is less relevant when distress is high. Therefore, solving distress is usually more important, happiness-wise.

Change 1 is easy to explain in tooltips and it is not much different than the current one. Change 2 less so, it might need more shown steps, especially if we are going to use different arbitrary percentages for each need.

I say let's try both, tweak it after a couple of games, and if you end up disliking it, maybe we can ask to revert #2.
 
2. The needs priorities are now a thing (even when the city is not 100% unhappy)

I’m not sure what the difference is between this and the current needs trumping order (aka previous version).

Edit: nvm I realized this thread went so fast that I missed an entire page of the discussion, thAts what the 85 hour work weeks give you:(
 
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I'm in constant 150-200 with 20+ cities(late mid game - > late game), is there really a problem with happiness? I found happiness very easy passing late game.
-early game though it's a "little" challenging i didn't ever found happiness that a problem.

i would probably get some salty post for this :p BUTT...

NERF HAPPINESS!!!!!!
On a standard map and all cities annexed? :shifty:
 
if it reaches a point where you can annex every single city and not have happiness problems I’d take that as a sign we’ve swung too far in the other direction
I think, while Gazebo is creating the next version, we should start to talk about the balance goal.
A lot of people playing the game and a lot of people seem to have a different opinion about, what the happiness system is supposed to be. I personally see it as a control mechanic against a too fast expansion in early game and a too fast warmongering. But I have nothing against the control of a lot of cities, if you are able to guarantee an overall good development and good infrastructure in those cities, especially later in the game. I think while 10 cities on a standard map in early game should be a maximum, later on, atleast 20-25 owned cities should be possible (with the requirement, all have a good infrastructure).
 
I think, while Gazebo is creating the next version, we should start to talk about the balance goal.
A lot of people playing the game and a lot of people seem to have a different opinion about, what the happiness system is supposed to be. I personally see it as a control mechanic against a too fast expansion in early game and a too fast warmongering. But I have nothing against the control of a lot of cities, if you are able to guarantee an overall good development and good infrastructure in those cities, especially later in the game. I think while 10 cities on a standard map in early game should be a maximum, later on, atleast 20-25 owned cities should be possible (with the requirement, all have a good infrastructure).
Standard is for the average player. For those who want more controlled cities there are bigger maps. As is, each standard game is very long, over twenty to twenty five hours. I certainly would not like it longer.
 
I think some of you guys don't realise your ideas would turn war victory impossible. My last warmongering victory on standard map took me 63 cities to get all the capitals. I see myself doing it with 50 if I cut some cities, but compare that with what obviously peaceful players opinions of "maximum" are. I think the system should only be an issue early, or later on if you don't peace out a war for too long but in general, the amount of cities you can get ought to be effectively unlimited. Their usefulness wanes with each acquisition because of Science/Culture cost anyway. There's enough systems in the game, and the AI's sufficiently smart, to keep one entertained without inexplicable, inescapable happiness problems.
 
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