Happiness/entertainers/rel buildings

[kaskavel]

OK, let me see if I got those things straight. Correct me or add things as you see fit.
1. Temples produce content faces at a ratio of 1 content face per gold. Using the luxury slider produces happy faces at a ratio of 1 happy face per commerce. We could claim that "one mood movement" of a citizen is worth 1 gp. You should not pay more than 1 gp per face. Or perhaps you would in a histographic victory?
2. Using temples has the following disadvantages. A. wasting shileds in order to build them. B. The temple will be destroyed if city is captured and then reclaimed (not important). C. Sometimes the gain from the temple will end up being useless. Void. You may end up being "overhappy" and since you cannot arrange the slider to -10%, you cannot take those gp back, unless you sell the temples.
3. Using temples has the following advantages. A. Gaining culture. B. Unlocking cethedrals. C. Gaining the option to use Sistine Chapel. D. Perhaps point 4 below (not sure) E. Since buildings produce content faces, they may sometimes produce a WLTKD effect that the luxury slider would not have.
4. I am confused in another issue that may factor in and seems to favor buildings over the slider. Since one method creates happy faces and the other one creates content faces, a city may under different circumstances have no content faces in order to make optimal use of luxuries or have no unhappy faces in order to make optimal use of temples. Then, the effect is "reduced", but I am not sure at what rate. Since both military police and trade luxuries create happy faces, there seems to be an argument in favor of buildings. The building produce content faces that MP and luxuries then turn them into happy ones. Or not? I am not sure by which order do those different changes take place.
5. The way I see it, the disadvantages of the temples are straightforward. It is the advantages that may or may not matter in a specific game. Culture is not important for expanding the working region (a library can also do that) but it may be important for cultural victories, cultural flips and fighting over border tiles exploitation. In some games those may be important, in others, not at all.
6. Cathedrals offer 3 faces per 2 gold, improving the total ratio (for the combo of temples-cathedrals) at 4 faces per 3 gp. Hm. 220 shields (60+160) invested per city, which offers 1 content face (which translates into 1 gp gain) for the rest of the game. I can guess most people (but not all) would not be interested in such a long investment, unless running a religious civ or specificaly running the game towards the round limit.
7. Sistine chapel further increases the combo to an amazing 7 faces per 3 gp at the cost of building the wonder of course. Even in a pangaea map, Sistine is stronger than Bach if cathedrals have been massively built.
8. It seems to me, that if someone has (for whatever reason) built temples everywhere by the time cathedrals enter the game, he shouldnt stop. He should build cathedrals as well and give priority to the Sistine chapel. He has already paid the shield investment for the temples and it is a pitty not to further pursue the improved ratio the cathedrals and Chapel have to offer.
9. Although temples and cathedrals create sufficient dillemas, the colosseums do not. I do not think anyone should ever built them, unless they go for a cultural victory. I think the design of this buildings needs some changes.
10. The entertainer offers one face at the cost of one tile. That is an extremely bizzare designer decision and I am surprised it survived through the years the various game upgrades. It should obviously offer AT LEAST 2 faces in order to be, in some circumstances, a reasonable player option. It would also close some of the gap between human players and incompetent AIs who tend to overuse them.
11. I think the player should study the happiness mechanics without trying to achieve a WLTKD effect. Different cities reach different sizes and have different corruption levels, creating a huge mess. There is a lot of effort in calculations and micromanagement for too little a gain if he does such a thing.
12. The more compact the distrubition of the cities size and the corruption level of those cities are, the more favourable the luxury slider becomes. A communist empire with 80 cities at population 15-20 makes excellent use of the slider, because all cities take more or less similar amounts of happy faces, resulting in minimal waste of commerce. A formation of having 20 metros in the core and 50 underdeveloped science farms around may favor using religion buildings in the core.

 

[justanick]

1. Temples produce content faces at a ratio of 1 content face per gold.

During anarchy they are free. This does sort of matter as means to prevent riots during anarchy are limited. Still, overall temples are a bad idea unless their culture is somehow significant.

Using the luxury slider produces happy faces at a ratio of 1 happy face per commerce.

Uncorrupted commerce that is. Uncorrupted commerce that could instead get the bonus from say libraries. This can mean that temples create a small net positive for your economy.

4. I am confused in another issue that may factor in and seems to favor buildings over the slider. Since one method creates happy faces and the other one creates content faces, a city may under different circumstances have no content faces in order to make optimal use of luxuries or have no unhappy faces in order to make optimal use of temples. Then, the effect is "reduced", but I am not sure at what rate. Since both military police and trade luxuries create happy faces, there seems to be an argument in favor of buildings. The building produce content faces that MP and luxuries then turn them into happy ones. Or not? I am not sure by which order do those different changes take place.

Buildings and military police create content faces. Luxuries and luxury slider and war happyness create happy faces.

Content faces turn unhappy citizens into content ones. This usually puts a limit on how many of them you can use. If you have 20 citizens in a metropolis this will however not matter unless some unlikely exception applies.

Happy faces turn content citizens into happy ones. If all content faces have been used up and there are unhappy citizens left but no content ones, then a happy face can instead be used to turn an unhappy citizen into a content one.

One content face turns one unhappy citizen into a content citizen. One happy face turns one content citizen into a happy citizen. Two happy faces turn one unhappy citizen into a happy citizen.

6. Cathedrals offer 3 faces per 2 gold, improving the total ratio (for the combo of temples-cathedrals) at 4 faces per 3 gp. Hm. 220 shields (60+160) invested per city, which offers 1 content face (which translates into 1 gp gain) for the rest of the game. I can guess most people (but not all) would not be interested in such a long investment, unless running a religious civ or specificaly running the game towards the round limit.

It can make sense to sell of temples after a cathedral is built. You need temples for building cathedrals, not for maintaining them. So that gives 6 content faces for 2 gtp.

Artemis + cathedrals can work out fine.

8. It seems to me, that if someone has (for whatever reason) built temples everywhere by the time cathedrals enter the game, he shouldnt stop. He should build cathedrals as well and give priority to the Sistine chapel. He has already paid the shield investment for the temples and it is a pitty not to further pursue the improved ratio the cathedrals and Chapel have to offer.

That impression may be wrong. In the long run 8 luxuries with market places give 20 happy faces. That is more than enough to prevent riots. And just as a reserve in case of war weariness or for the WLTKD the costs are hardly warranted. So avoid the sunk costs fallacy.

10. The entertainer offers one face at the cost of one tile. That is an extremely bizzare designer decision and I am surprised it survived through the years the various game upgrades. It should obviously offer AT LEAST 2 faces in order to be, in some circumstances, a reasonable player option. It would also close some of the gap between human players and incompetent AIs who tend to overuse them.

Well, the luxury slider is for all cities the same. So with this lack of finer tuning there may be one city where the entertainer still makes sense via lowering the luxury slider.

But yeah, scientists are usually the specialist of choice and even they are usually a poorer choice than citizens on proper tiles.

 

[kaskavel]

During anarchy they are free. This does sort of matter as means to prevent riots during anarchy are limited.

Wow. You mean that temples do produce content faces during anarchy? I was not aware of that and I am a bit surprised to hear so. So, temples technically offer some food during revolutions. Cities that needed a scientist will now need nothing and cities that needed an entertainer will now need a scientist. It should balance out as a gain in food. Depending the size of the cities and the presence of fresh water, it may or may not add up to a significant amount...

Still, overall temples are a bad idea unless their culture is somehow significant.

I know this is the dominant opinion. I still do not see that very clearly though, there are various pros and cons that I find difficult to compare. And you just added a couple of arguments in favor of buildings that I had never thought (the anarchy and the uncorrupted loss below)

Uncorrupted commerce that is. Uncorrupted commerce that could instead get the bonus from say libraries. This can mean that temples create a small net positive for your economy.

Nice, I hadnt thought of that

Content faces turn unhappy citizens into content ones. This usually puts a limit on how many of them you can use. If you have 20 citizens in a metropolis this will however not matter unless some unlikely exception applies.

OK...So
1. What happens if a cathedral runs out of unhappy citizens to turn?
2. Who starts turning unhappy citizens first? The happy faces producer methods or the content faces producer methods?

One content face turns one unhappy citizen into a content citizen. One happy face turns one content citizen into a happy citizen. Two happy faces turn one unhappy citizen into a happy citizen.

Meaning that happy faces producing methods do not care if they run out of content faces but content faces producing methods do care if they run out of unhappy faces?

It can make sense to sell of temples after a cathedral is built. You need temples for building cathedrals, not for maintaining them. So that gives 6 content faces for 2 gtp.

Yes, I thought about that, but it seemed a bit extreme to me and I didnt mention it. But I guess it makes sense if after some point the temple turns out to be useless

Artemis + cathedrals can work out fine.

I had never thought of that either. It even sounds a bit like cheating now that I am thinking about it. I use to ignore all ancient wonders most of the time.

That impression may be wrong. In the long run 8 luxuries with market places give 20 happy faces. That is more than enough to prevent riots.

Well, you guys are always saying that like it is the simplest thing in the world. If you can always afford to trade up to the 7th-8th luxury (or even worse, if you can always afford to conquer them), then it really doesnt matter if you are building temples or not. You may as well be building coastal fortresses everywhere as well and it wont matter. I am trying to work out games that I cannot so easily do all that for one reason or another, including self-restrictions, difficult objetives etc.

And just as a reserve in case of war weariness or for the WLTKD the costs are hardly warranted. So avoid the sunk costs fallacy.

Sorry, what do you mean here?

Well, the luxury slider is for all cities the same. So with this lack of finer tuning there may be one city where the entertainer still makes sense via lowering the luxury slider.

But yeah, scientists are usually the specialist of choice and even they are usually a poorer choice than citizens on proper tiles.

Yes, obviously. But still, dont you agree things would be better if the entertainer offered two happy faces? We would have more interesting decisions to make and it would reduce the impact of AI's obsession in using them all the time

 

[tenny]

1. Temples produce content faces at a ratio of 1 content face per gold. Using the luxury slider produces happy faces at a ratio of 1 happy face per commerce. We could claim that "one mood movement" of a citizen is worth 1 gp. You should not pay more than 1 gp per face. Or perhaps you would in a histographic victory?

A happy face is worth more than 1 gp. You not only get more commerce from the additional citizen, but also shields and food, so your city growths. Aditionally, you might benefit from bigger city sizes.

2. Using temples has the following disadvantages. A. wasting shileds in order to build them. B. The temple will be destroyed if city is captured and then reclaimed (not important). C. Sometimes the gain from the temple will end up being useless. Void. You may end up being "overhappy" and since you cannot arrange the slider to -10%, you cannot take those gp back, unless you sell the temples.

These disadvantages are already more than enough to never build them, except maybe when religious. You are investing 60 shields to get 1 happy face, which under normal cirumstances just might produce only 1 shield per turn. So that is already an huge investment for the beginning of the game
to just pay back in 60 turns. Furthermore, your cities are probably quite small when you build temples instead of using the luxury slider, so it will take more turns to build the temple in the first turn. And then they also need 1 gold as upkeep.

4. I am confused in another issue that may factor in and seems to favor buildings over the slider. Since one method creates happy faces and the other one creates content faces, a city may under different circumstances have no content faces in order to make optimal use of luxuries or have no unhappy faces in order to make optimal use of temples. Then, the effect is "reduced", but I am not sure at what rate. Since both military police and trade luxuries create happy faces, there seems to be an argument in favor of buildings. The building produce content faces that MP and luxuries then turn them into happy ones. Or not? I am not sure by which order do those different changes take place.

There really is no issue with happy/content faces. It is just a design choice which makes the things more complicated. You get unrest in your city, if it has more unhappy citizens then happy citizens. So, happy or content faces do not make a difference, but have the same effect.
Your maximum population in a city which does not suffer from unrest is (Citizens born content)+(happy/content faces from buildings)+(happy faces from luxuries)+(luxury spending).

6. Cathedrals offer 3 faces per 2 gold, improving the total ratio (for the combo of temples-cathedrals) at 4 faces per 3 gp. Hm. 220 shields (60+160) invested per city, which offers 1 content face (which translates into 1 gp gain) for the rest of the game. I can guess most people (but not all) would not be interested in such a long investment, unless running a religious civ or specificaly running the game towards the round limit.

220 shields for 4 faces, so if each happy face give you 1 shield, it is still 55 turns till it pays off. And you have to research cathedrals first. At this time, 55 turns is a lot. So, you are right.

7. Sistine chapel further increases the combo to an amazing 7 faces per 3 gp at the cost of building the wonder of course. Even in a pangaea map, Sistine is stronger than Bach if cathedrals have been massively built.

Which you still have to research and build first. Which comes at 600 shields, and it only gives a bonus in those cities that have already invested thouse 220 shields.

11. I think the player should study the happiness mechanics without trying to achieve a WLTKD effect. Different cities reach different sizes and have different corruption levels, creating a huge mess. There is a lot of effort in calculations and micromanagement for too little a gain if he does such a thing.

What do you mean? You can calculate how luxury slider, corruption, happy/content faces from buildings and luxuries come together to determine how big your (content) cities will be under which circumstances.

12. The more compact the distrubition of the cities size and the corruption level of those cities are, the more favourable the luxury slider becomes. A communist empire with 80 cities at population 15-20 makes excellent use of the slider, because all cities take more or less similar amounts of happy faces, resulting in minimal waste of commerce. A formation of having 20 metros in the core and 50 underdeveloped science farms around may favor using religion buildings in the core.

I would argue that the best governments for the luxury slider are indeed the Republic and Democracy, since they have a lot bigger commerce-per-capita-ratio. By the time the corruption effect of communism is better than the Republic, you already have enough territories (and trade partners) to simply put the luxury slider to 0% and live with marketplaces. And in a smaller empire, Republic and Democracy have actually better corruption than communism.



The problem with the religios/happiness buildings in civ 3 is that there is a critical infrastructure which costs a lot of shields, and if you build them before military you will have a significant disadvantage in military, which do need relatively small amounts of shields.
If I spend, say, 1000 shields on infrastructure and 300 shields on military, another player who only spends 700 shields on infrastructure will have twice as much military as I do.

 

[tenny]

OK...So
1. What happens if a cathedral runs out of unhappy citizens to turn?
2. Who starts turning unhappy citizens first? The happy faces producer methods or the content faces producer methods?

Nothing. If the city grows, the additional citizen would be born unhappy. With the cathedral, the citizen will be born content.

Meaning that happy faces producing methods do not care if they run out of content faces but content faces producing methods do care if they run out of unhappy faces?

Content faces do not "care if the run out of unhappy faces". Because they do not. When a city grows, every new citizen will be born unhappy under normal cirumstances. With buildings creating content faces, they will be born content instead.

 

[justanick]

Wow. You mean that temples do produce content faces during anarchy?

Indeed.

1. What happens if a cathedral runs out of unhappy citizens to turn?
2. Who starts turning unhappy citizens first? The happy faces producer methods or the content faces producer methods?

The content faces apply first. Once they run out of unhappy citizens, they run out of usefulness, they are simply wasted then.

Meaning that happy faces producing methods do not care if they run out of content faces but content faces producing methods do care if they run out of unhappy faces?

You mean the right thing, but use the wrong words. Happy faces and content faces are a way to increase the overall happyness of citizens. Riots occur if you have more unhappy citizens than happy ones. Faces and citizens are different things.

Well, you guys are always saying that like it is the simplest thing in the world. If you can always afford to trade up to the 7th-8th luxury (or even worse, if you can always afford to conquer them), then it really doesnt matter if you are building temples or not. You may as well be building coastal fortresses everywhere as well and it wont matter. I am trying to work out games that I cannot so easily do all that for one reason or another, including self-restrictions, difficult objetives etc.

If you build temples and cathedrals in 20 cities that is equal to 55 cavalry. This buys you a lot of territory in a war. The timeframe between having built cathedrals and having military tradition plus salpeter and horses is too short for cathedrals to pay off.

Sorry, what do you mean here?

If you made a mistake by building temples you should not double down on that mistake by building cathdrals.

Yes, obviously. But still, dont you agree things would be better if the entertainer offered two happy faces? We would have more interesting decisions to make and it would reduce the impact of AI's obsession in using them all the time

Yes, i get that point. Not sure if that would be better, but it certainly would make entertainers less of a niche which can be considered good.

 

[justanick]

There really is no issue with happy/content faces. It is just a design choice which makes the things more complicated. You get unrest in your city, if it has more unhappy citizens then happy citizens. So, happy or content faces do not make a difference, but have the same effect.

There is the exception of WLTKD. You only get that when there is no unhappy citizen. That can occasionally mean that content faces are preferable to happy ones. Usually it makes no sense to worry about WLTKD. Every bit of happyness beyond avoiding unrest is essentially wasted.

Nothing. If the city grows, the additional citizen would be born unhappy. With the cathedral, the citizen will be born content.

Content faces do not "care if the run out of unhappy faces". Because they do not. When a city grows, every new citizen will be born unhappy under normal cirumstances. With buildings creating content faces, they will be born content instead.

I might disagree on the language here. Citizens above a threshold (of 1 in case of Emperor) are born unhappy. Content faces turn them content.

 

[tenny]

1. Temples produce content faces at a ratio of 1 content face per gold. Using the luxury slider produces happy faces at a ratio of 1 happy face per commerce. We could claim that "one mood movement" of a citizen is worth 1 gp. You should not pay more than 1 gp per face. Or perhaps you would in a histographic victory?

Also, I wanted to add that a temple actually does only create 1 content face, if the luxury slider is set to 0%.

Let's say that you have a city where you have only 1 citizen born content. This citizen and every other citizen produce exactly 1 gold.
If you build the temple, this city now will have up to 2 content citizens.

However, if you raise the luxury slider to 80% you will get 5 content citizens in that city without the temple ( 1/(1-0.8) = 5, check: 4*0.8+1=5).
When you build the temple now with 80% on the luxury slider, the city will actually grow to 10 (2/(1-0.8)=10, check 10*0.8+2=10)

So you might say that the temple in fact creates 5 content citizens.

This is also why Republic is so powerful. In the above example, you would have a bigger city, but with regards to commerce you would still only make
10*(1-0.8)-1=1 commerce in that city. With republic, your citizen would make 2 gold per turn, so you would only need to raise the luxury slider to 40%, while also making higher commerce per capita: (10*(1-0.4)*2-1 = 11 net commerce from that city.

Of course this is only a rough estimation of the real numbers, but it just to show the principle. Switching to republic and founding more cities closer to each other, especially on rivers, will decrease the relative cost for keeping that city content, while also increasing the output per capita.

There is the exception of WLTKD. You only get that when there is no unhappy citizen. That can occasionally mean that content faces are preferable to happy ones. Usually it makes no sense to worry about WLTKD. Every bit of happyness beyond avoiding unrest is essentially wasted.

Oh yes, I forget about that

 

[kaskavel]

A happy face is worth more than 1 gp. You not only get more commerce from the additional citizen, but also shields and food, so your city growths. Aditionally, you might benefit from bigger city sizes.

Well, yes, but that is not what I meant. If someone offered you an option to create happy faces for 1,1 gp per face per turn, you should decline the offer. If it is for 0.9 gp per face, you should accept. That is what I meant. But what Justanick noticed about uncorrupted commerce has now changed my estimation anyway...

There really is no issue with happy/content faces. It is just a design choice which makes the things more complicated. You get unrest in your city, if it has more unhappy citizens then happy citizens. So, happy or content faces do not make a difference, but have the same effect.

I am aware of that, but I was (and still am) somewhat confused about what happens when there is a lack of content/unhappy citizens to turn. If there is no lack of them, yes, it doesnt matter if you get a happy face or a content face, the city that used to have 3 happy-3 content-4 unhappy citizens is going to balance with both kind of faces. According to Justanick, if a content face producing method runs out of unhappy citizens to turn, then its effect is wasted and if a happy face producing method runs out of content citizens to turn, it moves on to the unhappy citizens and turns them content without problem. I am far away from my PC these days, but I am pretty sure the civipedia says something different. Something like "If it runs out of the correct type of citizens to turn, it moves on to the next kind of citizens and the effect is "reduced", implying something like "2 faces turn 1 citizen" or "4 faces turn 3 citizens". This is not what Justanick says though and I remain confused

220 shields for 4 faces, so if each happy face give you 1 shield, it is still 55 turns till it pays off. And you have to research cathedrals first. At this time, 55 turns is a lot. So, you are right.


Which you still have to research and build first. Which comes at 600 shields, and it only gives a bonus in those cities that have already invested thouse 220 shields.

No, it is even worse. At least I though it was even worse when I wrote that comment. You do not get 4 faces. You could have gotten 3 faces from the slider for 3 gp anyway. You invest 220 shields in order to get the 4th face for free, so you need 220 rounds to get 220 gp.
Of course, this not correct as Justanick noticed. When using the slider, we do not sacrifice 1 commerce for a face, we sacrifice 1 uncorrupted, unworked commerce for a face. This complicates the issue. If we wouldnt have used the slider, this commerce would have made use of the library and the university, doubling up its value. When using the slider, it seems we are paying 1 gp per face early AA, 1.5 gp late AA and early Med age, 2 gp per face for the rest of the game until MA and perhaps 2.5 per face after labs are available. Since most games have the player struggle early on but later trading/conquering 7-8 luxuries, it may not matter a lot of course most of the time. But the general conclusion seems to be that the slider is much stronger early in the game.

What do you mean? You can calculate how luxury slider, corruption, happy/content faces from buildings and luxuries come together to determine how big your (content) cities will be under which circumstances.

I mean it is not worth it a priori trying to figure out a happiness pattern that will include WLTKD. It is complicated and chaotic and the reward is too small.

I would argue that the best governments for the luxury slider are indeed the Republic and Democracy, since they have a lot bigger commerce-per-capita-ratio. By the time the corruption effect of communism is better than the Republic, you already have enough territories (and trade partners) to simply put the luxury slider to 0% and live with marketplaces. And in a smaller empire, Republic and Democracy have actually better corruption than communism.

70 gp for 70 faces are....70 gp no matter if you have 200 or 1000 to spare. It also doesnt matter if you waste them on 70 lux or 70 temples. But I do think that some other things matter, some of them have to do with the government type indirectly. Under communism, cities have similar size and same corruption, so they end up with similar happy faces from the slider. Under republic, democracy, despotism or monarchy though, the slider is going to produce many happy faces in core cities and less happy faces in medium corrupted cities and so it works less well because the player either has to go higher than necessary in his core cities or less than necessary in his medium ones. (corrupted cities and farms do not care much about the slider's movement). Also, regardless of government type, unbalanced size in cities do not help the slider work properly. If the player has a lot of cities in tundra regions for example at size 10 and a lot of metros at size 20, the slider will cause the first ones to lose unnecessary commerce. It is more attractive to build cathedrals in the metros only.

The problem with the religios/happiness buildings in civ 3 is that there is a critical infrastructure which costs a lot of shields, and if you build them before military you will have a significant disadvantage in military, which do need relatively small amounts of shields.
If I spend, say, 1000 shields on infrastructure and 300 shields on military, another player who only spends 700 shields on infrastructure will have twice as much military as I do.

Yes, the main argument against rel buildings is very clear and straightforward. And quite persuasive. Still, I am interested in a detailed comparison for a variety of different situations that may arise in a game. For example. You kill 1-2 civs and conquer your small continent completely at the end of ancient age and you are unable to make contact with the rest of the world. What are you going to do now about happiness? Buildings may now be objectively better.

 

[justanick]

Yes, the main argument against rel buildings is very clear and straightforward. And quite persuasive. Still, I am interested in a detailed comparison for a variety of different situations that may arise in a game. For example. You kill 1-2 civs and conquer your small continent completely at the end of ancient age and you are unable to make contact with the rest of the world. What are you going to do now about happiness? Buildings may now be objectively better.

That may happen.The best exotic example is a huge archipelago at Sid for very expensive techs. You cannot expand your terrtory, you cannot import luxuries. Then temples and cathedrals compete against building wealth. The primary goal is to travel oceans safely.

 

[tenny]

According to Justanick, if a content face producing method runs out of unhappy citizens to turn, then its effect is wasted

If your city is not growing, then this is true. But why build buildings that create content faces in cities that are not growing anyway? If it is growing, the next citizen born will be content.

I am far away from my PC these days, but I am pretty sure the civipedia says something different. Something like "If it runs out of the correct type of citizens to turn, it moves on to the next kind of citizens and the effect is "reduced", implying something like "2 faces turn 1 citizen" or "4 faces turn 3 citizens". This is not what Justanick says though and I remain confused

What the civipedia says might be worded in a confusing way. But what justanick says is true.

70 gp for 70 faces are....70 gp no matter if you have 200 or 1000 to spare. It also doesnt matter if you waste them on 70 lux or 70 temples.

The total population you can support in a city is equal to:

(happy/content faces from buildings, military police, wonders, luxuries etc)/(1-average commerce per citizen * luxury slider percentage)

If a city has (average commerce per citizen * luxury slider percentage) = 0.8, an additional temple will allow the city to grow by 5 citizens,
if (average commerce per citizen * luxury slider percentage) = 0.5, an additional temple will alow the city to grow by 2 citizens.

So higher average commerce per citizen = less relative cost to grow to maximum size, while each citizen has a higher commerce output.
On the other hand, building improvements that increase happiness do not save so much money, because the luxury slider is smaller to begin with.

Under republic, democracy, despotism or monarchy though, the slider is going to produce many happy faces in core cities and less happy faces in medium corrupted cities and so it works less well because the player either has to go higher than necessary in his core cities or less than necessary in his medium ones.

Core cities will grow bigger than cities that are not in the core, but that is actually another advantage of Republic & Democracy over communism.
The luxury slider does favor core cities in Republic & Democracy, but that is only because there is less corruption there. So, the benefit of the output by the luxury slider is basically the same. On the other hand, you do not have to build all the infrastructure in every city, but only in the core cities, which are the powerhouses.

You kill 1-2 civs and conquer your small continent completely at the end of ancient age and you are unable to make contact with the rest of the world. What are you going to do now about happiness? Buildings may now be objectively better.

Maybe, but in that specific case you are simply running out of other things to build, and therefore the main disadvantage, the shield cost, does not exist.


Another issue with building happiness improvements is that you will have to build the improvement before you can grow your city. With the luxury slider, you can just adjust it as the cities grow.

 

[justanick]

Another issue with building happiness improvements is that you will have to build the improvement before you can grow your city. With the luxury slider, you can just adjust it as the cities grow.

It is always an option to use high luxury slider in the first roughly 150 turns and once a combination of marketplaces with luxury goods and buildings like temples come online the luxury rate can gradually be lowered from perhaps 40% to zero in the end.

 

[WeirdoJoker]

It is always an option to use high luxury slider in the first roughly 150 turns and once a combination of marketplaces with luxury goods and buildings like temples come online the luxury rate can gradually be lowered from perhaps 40% to zero in the end.

It wasn't until Emperor that I had to get used to being even above 20%. Of course, in my current game luxuries are limited pending trade with overseas civs I haven't even met yet, much less can trade with, so 30-40% is understandable. It wouldn't be so bad, but my galleys are really good a suiciding in the ocean...

 

[Spoonwood]

The entertainer offers one face at the cost of one tile. That is an extremely bizzare designer decision and I am surprised it survived through the years the various game upgrades. It should obviously offer AT LEAST 2 faces in order to be, in some circumstances, a reasonable player option.

Use of entertainers can be reasonable when playing for maximum score and playing all the way out to 2050 AD. If you have the AIs under control, an entertainer can give you an extra happy citizen or turn an unhappy citizen content. You can observe the use of entertainers in some of the 1000 AD Hall of Fame saves for histographic games.