How is power calculated?

[Viklas]

When calculating the power graph, are only units considered, or are there additional considerations? Also, *how* are the units considered? Does the graph just add up the hammer values of all military units? Combat values? Something else?

 

[Byrath]

I am quite sure it is only based on military power, and I would guess it to be based on hammer value of units. I'd love to hear more definitive information on this though.

 

[zafyro]

mouseover over your score and you got a detailed informaton. is based on land [culture] power [army and production] tech [science] and population [growth]... you can perfectly not have a single unit and be nº one... but someone is going to topple you from there soon

 

[Viklas]

mouseover over your score and you got a detailed informaton. is based on land [culture] power [army and production] tech [science] and population [growth]... you can perfectly not have a single unit and be nº one... but someone is going to topple you from there soon

That's the score. I'm talking about power... the (presumably) military only graph that you can see in the F9 screen. Basically, I'm trying to use that graph to determine how much in danger I am, militarily. Score is completely useless for determining how secure your position really is... I've been #1 in score, then lost half my empire because I wasn't built up enough militarily.

In fact, if you're #1 in score in the early & mid game, it's likely that you're in trouble militarily. (You probably spent too much time building wonders, expanding, and building research buildings.)

 

[Shillen]

It would be nice if someone could write an article about all the figures on that screen. I know there was one article like that for civ3 which was great.

 

[kb2tvl]

I do not know the exact method to calculate power. I do know that power increases if you cash upgrade units or build new units.

 

[Seven05]

This is pure speculation since I haven't bothered to test it out, perhaps you can if you're really curious

Each unit is a "power" and "asset" value assigned to them in the xml file (units\Civ4UnitInfos.xml) with these two lines:

<iAsset>0</iAsset>
<iPower>0</iPower>

Later units have increasingly higher power ratings than the early units and most units within an era are fairly close.

Buildings have the same two lines defined for each building, leading me to believe that certain buildings will also affect your power rating if these values are even used for that. The only buildings with any "power" value on them are Walls, Castle, Barracks, Drydock, Forge, Factory, Heroic Epic, Iron Works, West Point, Mt Rushmore, Red Cross, Scotland Yard and Chichen Iza.

Should be easy enough to test with the world builder if you're really curious.