Happiness issues with ICS strategy

[jagwade]

Hi, I just have a quick question regarding the ICS strategy and happiness issues that come along with it. I tend to have a pretty difficult time keeping my happiness up when I attempt an ICS strategy. MY question is how do you maintain happiness when you have around 20 cities or so?

 

[Lord Chambers]

Each city costs 3 unhappiness.

With Liberty Meritocracy, each connected city costs 2.

With a colosseum (and at least a population of 2) each city costs 0 (ignoring it's population).

At this point you need only to satisfy the number of your population. You could choose Piety's Organized Religion and add a Monument and Temple to each city for 2 more happiness. Of course you will build Theatres for 3 more happiness. With these four buildings you can have infinite size 5 cities. If every other city you found claims a new happiness resource, you can have infinite size 7 cities.

And of course, to smooth out growth issues while you build these buildings and link up roadways you can use the Forbidden Palace (-10% population unhappiness) and Meritocracy (-5% population unhappiness) and score the Notre Dame and Chitzen Itza for an additional 14 happiness.

So, it's not glorious, as each new city has a long list of buildings to create just so it can grow to size 7 without becoming a burden to the empire, but it's doable. You have some options. If you choose not to enter the Piety tree you can buy resources more efficiently with Patronage's Philanthropy, which would leave Rationalism open later on with it's boon to science and very late game equivalent happiness via Rationalism's Humanism (University and Public School not included). If you get the Forbidden Palace and Notre Dame, you have a lot of wiggle room to skip Temples and invest into more units.

In the category of almost-too-late-to-matter, there is the opener for the Order track, which delivers 1 happiness per city. There is also Commerce's Protectionism which grants +1 happiness per happiness resource you already posses (or are trading for), although it's terribly out-of-the-way for most games. At that point in the game you have access to either policy you probably don't have a ton of growing to do, so it's more consequential to keeping out of the red unhappiness for combat odds.

 

[Lord Chambers]

Forbidden Palace (-10% population unhappiness) and Meritocracy (-5% population unhappiness)

For someone with more knowledge than I, how do these percent decreases apply? Empire wide, right?

Regardless, the ICS consequence is that your size 7 cities can grow to size 8 for "free." Fifteen percent is about 1/7th, every size 7 city gets a free guy. But if you have 10 size 7 cities and 70 citizens, then you can grow to 10 size 8 cities at which point you have 80 citizens, which if we compound gives us about 1 more free guy. So how does the percent decrease apply, just total number of (unoccupied) citizens minus 15%? If so, there is a small sweetness in the bonuses.

 

[MadDjinn]

the response almost has it right, but you need to switch a coliseum for the rest wrt the per city unhappiness.

The coliseum only affects population, so it can't be used to negate per city unhappiness. So Piety/Organized Religion is a good way to handle it as those numbers are global.

You can also go with the Honour track and get Professional Army, then build walls while having a garrisoned unit. (Tradition/Honour combo)

The above are somewhat mutually exclusive though, since you can't spend the 2 (tradition) +4 (Honour) +3 (Liberty) + 2 (Piety) = 7 SPs without making a major error in SP choices.

Liberty/Piety is a good choice as you want to finish Liberty for the free GP and it's only 2 extra SPs into Piety.

Tradition/Honour is good as well. It just depends on the type of game you want.

edit:

yes the Forbidden Palace is global, same for meritocracy. So it's 15% from the total population.

 

[Lord Chambers]

the response almost has it right, but you need to switch a coliseum for the rest wrt the per city unhappiness.

The coliseum only affects population, so it can't be used to negate per city unhappiness. So Piety/Organized Religion is a good way to handle it as those numbers are global.

I understand the difference in theory, but does it make a difference in practice?

If I have 10 cities all size 2, and they are all connected to the capital and have a colosseum, I have a happiness balance of -20.

If I have 10 cities all size 2, and they are all connected to the capital and have a monument and temple, I have a happiness balance of -20.

I understand that colosseums, theatres, and stadiums (but circuses?) cannot provide more happiness than the population of the city they are built, and in that sense the happiness they provide is not global. So other than a caveat not to rush buy (or somehow build) these buildings in cities smaller than 2, 3, and 4 respectively, what's the point of what I quoted? I assume I'm misunderstanding some nuance.

 

[DaveMcW]

If I have 10 cities all size 2, and they are all connected to the capital and have a colosseum, I have a happiness balance of -20.

If I have 10 cities all size 2, and they are all connected to the capital and have a monument and temple, I have a happiness balance of -20.

In the second case, you can starve them all down to size 1 for +10 happiness.

 

[Lord Chambers]

In the second case, you can starve them all down to size 1 for +10 happiness.

In the second case wouldn't it be -10 happiness?

+10 happiness from connection to the capital
+20 happiness from buildings
-30 happiness for number of cities
-10 happiness for population

 

[jagwade]

Hey guys, thanks for the great responses. I'll be implementing these tips into my gameplay. MadDjinn - I love the videos, keep them up, very helpful.

 

[Gehennas]

Sorry for offtopic...
How ICS works in the latest patches where the minimum distance of 3 tiles between cities is allowed?

 

[weakciv]

So other than a caveat not to rush buy (or somehow build) these buildings in cities smaller than 2, 3, and 4 respectively, what's the point of what I quoted? I assume I'm misunderstanding some nuance.

regarding colosseums, theatres, and stadiums.
its not city sizes 2, 3, and 4. you cant build the latter buildings without the prior ones, so the city sizes are 2, 5, 9 as far as these buildings combating population unhappyness

 

[MadDjinn]

I understand the difference in theory, but does it make a difference in practice?

If I have 10 cities all size 2, and they are all connected to the capital and have a colosseum, I have a happiness balance of -20.

If I have 10 cities all size 2, and they are all connected to the capital and have a monument and temple, I have a happiness balance of -20.

I understand that colosseums, theatres, and stadiums (but circuses?) cannot provide more happiness than the population of the city they are built, and in that sense the happiness they provide is not global. So other than a caveat not to rush buy (or somehow build) these buildings in cities smaller than 2, 3, and 4 respectively, what's the point of what I quoted? I assume I'm misunderstanding some nuance.

The difference in practise is:

10 size 2 cities:

3*10 = 30 unhappy per city.
2*10 = 20 unhappy population

with just coliseums, you drop the population unhappiness to 0, so are left with 30 unhappiness.

If you're only at 10 1 pop cities, you'd have 10 'wasted' happiness (and the same 30 unhappiness from cities) since coliseums only add happiness up to the population limit.

with Organized religion (temple/monument), you'd drop the per city OR population unhappiness down. (It's global)

So, assuming meritocracy, you'd have +30 happiness from those two policies (and 2 buildings) and therefore would be down to 20 unhappiness just from population.

Which means it's never wasted, even if you kill population.

(this also means that you can stack other global happiness bonuses in this city and keep it at 1 pop to 'transfer' happiness from this city to another one)

 

[WeaselSlapper]

I'm making a post that explains all about how happiness, how it works and how to keep it. I still have one section left but I should have that done today or tomorrow.

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=435142

 

[Lord Chambers]

The difference in practise is:

10 size 2 cities:

3*10 = 30 unhappy per city.
2*10 = 20 unhappy population

with just coliseums, you drop the population unhappiness to 0, so are left with 30 unhappiness.

If you're only at 10 1 pop cities, you'd have 10 'wasted' happiness (and the same 30 unhappiness from cities) since coliseums only add happiness up to the population limit.

with Organized religion (temple/monument), you'd drop the per city OR population unhappiness down. (It's global)

So, assuming meritocracy, you'd have +30 happiness from those two policies (and 2 buildings) and therefore would be down to 20 unhappiness just from population.

Which means it's never wasted, even if you kill population.

(this also means that you can stack other global happiness bonuses in this city and keep it at 1 pop to 'transfer' happiness from this city to another one)

Because, in practice, you find yourself killing population down to size 1 cities frequently enough that it deserves mention.

I feel like you just explained the theoretical difference again. Is there a situation where global/local happiness matters except when a city's population is too low to reap the full benefit of a colosseum, theatre, or stadium?

Since in my games it's exceedingly rare to have size 1 cities, I think it's worth considering the colosseum before the monument/temple. The difference between local and global is irrelevant if the city is at least size 2, and that is 100% of the time I'm completing a colosseum. The colosseum requires Construction but provides 2 happiness for 100 hammers whereas the monument and temple cost 140 hammers (119 hammers after Piety is opened) and Organized Religion.

Granted, I don't think you're suggesting a build order, I just want to clarify for myself or the newbie who has ICS happiness issues, what the practical difference between local and global happiness is. None.

 

[DaveMcW]

The point is that you can keep infinite cities happy, but it will cost you a lot of policies and buildings, and require some cap on pop growth. All the tricky shortcuts have been nerfed.

 

[MadDjinn]

the practical difference is that you only build coliseums to negate population unhappiness, whereas you build the rest for global happiness. (and to counter per city unhappiness)

practically -

You can build up to a size 5 (7 with circus) population city only with a coliseum and theatre. That does not help with the per city bonus, which is the key to managing ICS.

So you're still stuck with 3 unhappiness/city to deal with. One unique luxury/city removes it and adds 1 population potential. But there are only a finite number of luxuries, so you're not getting the I in ICS.

Which means you're limited in how many cities you can make and your global happiness bonuses are being eaten up by cities and population much faster.

meritocracy and Organized religion (with monument/temple and/or monastery) negate the 3 unhappiness per city since they add to the global happiness. Now THAT puts the I in ICS.

Everything bit of happiness after that point, per city, allows for higher populations. So you can have a size 8 city if you have circus/theatre/coliseum/temple/monument/monastery.

Add Order and you'll get another pop. Or you can remove one of the buildings.
Add Stoneworks and you get another pop. (situational sure)

 

[Lord Chambers]

Is there a situation where global/local happiness matters except when a city's population is too low to reap the full benefit of a colosseum, theatre, or stadium?

So no.

 

[MadDjinn]

So no.

wow... apparently you can't read.

I can create infinite cities with global happy bonuses, though each cities pop is limited by the local benefits.

You cannot create infinite pop in one city with local benefits. (or global for that matter)

That's the core practical point.

 

[Roxlimn]

MadDjinn:

That's not altogether accurate. Theoretically speaking, you could create an infinite population capital city with India and that Tradition policy that removes 1 unhappiness per 2 pop in the capital.

Just sayin'.

 

[chgrogers]

MadDjinn:

That's not altogether accurate. Theoretically speaking, you could create an infinite population capital city with India and that Tradition policy that removes 1 unhappiness per 2 pop in the capital.

Just sayin'.

That Tradition Policy you speak of is Landed Elite and its

+1 for every 10 Population.

Or are you talking about the Monarchy that is

-1 for every 2 Population?

 

[Roxlimn]

chgrogers:

It's Monarchy. India only gets 1 unhappy for every 2 citizens as its UA. If you eliminate that in the capital with Monarchy, your happiness limit in the capital is infinite.