Is it more fun to play with culture flipping on?

[Evincar]

I play with it on, but I would like it a lot more if it wouldn't make my armies vanish into thin air...

 

[sadu]

I always play with it on - it's a good dimension to the game.

However, It can be a wee bit harsh sometimes. I had one game when my forbidden palace city flipped on me, which really ripped my nighty.

And lol @ making civ more random - there is soooo much random stuff that can turn the tide of the game anyway. If anything it would be nice to have your advisor pop up and say "city x is in danger of flipping lord".

 

[planetfall]

It makes no difference. At lower difficulty levels it is fun to flip AI cities as they usually have lower culture. At higher levels, AI responds by putting culture in treatened cities and it is hard to get to flip. Best bet is to rush, or use civil engineers.

Greatest reason to keep on, when the AI sooners in the midst of your territory, you know you will eventually get it back with all it's production. Often cheaper to just let be, than get to war at wrong time.

Evincar, yes that is annoying. Happened to me last week also even though I know better. I was hurried. Put armies by cities and starve the buggers. Use CpRStatutil to help predict which cities and when they will flip. If city is really really important, CpRStat will tell you what you need to get 0.00% chance of flip.

PF

 

[Volum]

I sometimes turn it off because i dont want my cities changing sides, but those times i turn it off i always end up wishing i could culture flip an enemy city. So i always have it on.

 

[searcheagle]

THe biggest problem i have is that there is no warning and that occupating forces disappear.

Warning would tell an event like this was likely and how likely it was.

Occupying forces would hold a city in your territory. However, they could take hit points for being in such a city.

 

[morchuflex]

Always ON.

Removing it would be breaking the game as badly as would be, for instance, removing troop maintenance costs or the Despotism penalty. It belongs to Civ3's core concepts. I don't mind if people remove SGLs, for instance, but removing culture from the game is just absurd.
And yet, as everyone else, I hate loosing cities that way. But with a good utility program, you can learn how many troops you need to make sure a city doesn't flip.

Furthermore, Planetfall made some good points: despite what some people seem to suggest, the AI doesn't get any help on harder levels concerning culture flips. If their cities are harder to make flip, it's because overall the AI builds faster, so their cities are more likely to have Libs and Temples, preventing flipping.
Still, even on Emperor+, I routinely see AI cities flipping to my empire. In a recent game, I had left 4 empty spaces within my borders. The AI colonized them by unloading settlers from ships. I was pissed... But being much closer to my capital, and surrounded by my cities, 3 of these "parasites" quickly switched to my benevolent rule. Only one didn't change loyalties.

 

[Quilty]

I like it because it poses an extra challenge. In one game I invaded another continent and the first city I took was close to the capital... I decided to heal all of my critically-wounded units in the newly-captured city, including a battleship, and lost them all when the city flipped on the next turn. I was able to recapture it, but I just rushed a spearman and surrounded the city to protect it, and waited for reinforcements for several more turns before taking out the rest of the civ.

I also like it because I cannot stand AIs who march all the way across your territory and settle on a good spot right outside your border that you wanted to expand into. I rusha temple or library or both in the cities nearest the frontier to cause the culture flip.

 

[planetfall]

THe biggest problem i have is that there is no warning and that occupating forces disappear.

Warning would tell an event like this was likely and how likely it was.

So why don't you have a warning? Go to utilities forum and get CRpSuite. You will know each turn what the chance is for each city flipping. When it gets above 1.0% you'ld better move that army out of the city and just by it. The other advantage, is it will tell you when you have excess forces in a city.

PF

 

[The Omega]

Cultural flipping normally has no effect really on my game. I've only had my own cities cultur flip a few times, and they were quickly conquered. MOst of the time, though, it's enemy cities that culture flip.

 

[Zelda's Man]

I always play with it on because I think that it is just such an interesing part of the game. No other game I know of has this culture feature. The only bad thing is that it seems like the chance of flips is too great when you have more culture compared to when your culture is less than your opponent's. Certainly makes things tougher for warmongerers. Give peace a chance, huh?

 

[Zhargon]

So much depends upon the way one enjoys the game ... I play with flipping off because I prefer things to be a bit more "realistic", despite the inherent anachronism and time relationship problems of Civ, and prefer conquest.

Occupying, thus flipping, an undefended town is fine, but when it is defended? Troy, Megiddo, Constantinople, Quebec, Badajoz, Stalingrad are examples of an obvious few well known sieges where towns haven't flipped, in the face of the enemy, and there are many other examples throughout history, mainly because the citizens or affluent townspeople will tend to defend their interests, which usually revolved around their town of residence.

There may be examples of flipping in history (I'm not aware of any), so for me 'flipping' is silly, and I turned it off when I first came across it. I also dislike space options, natural disasters so I know I'm bound to be in the minority, but choosing between the various options has always been the strength of the Civ-type game.

 

[Luthor_Saxburg]

Always on. Even though it's annoying on emperor+ I would find it like cheating if I turned it off.

I HATE Cultural Flipping Cities!

I would still play with it if it wasn't for one detail: A city that changes sides "swallows" armies in it... no matter what size! Once I had half of my attacking army vanished because of this! So, after that game... I turned that option OFF!
I could accept a city changing hands, but I don't think it's reasonable to have huge armies vanishing because of it. If it would rebel and move the army somewhere else, I would play with it, but like this is too much of an hassle to worrying about not putting too many units in the newly conquest cities...

In 3C3 Deity I've never had a city changed to me BUT what I've seen happen is to have one city trying to change and the AI REFUSING that city. (this was in COTM_08)
Only happened once in my whole CIV life! Sometimes you've got to love those AI's!

 

[Peepers]

For me, culture flipping enhances the story of the game. If I'm at war, the chance of a captured city flipping adds an element of risk that seems appropriate for war. Sure, the challenge of avoiding detrimental flips increases as the difficulty level, but so do most of the other aspects of the game. It is an interesting and innovative game mechanic that helps set Civ3 apart from other sim/strat games.

Long live culture flipping!

 

[Tomoyo]

I like it on. Without it, culture is almost completely useless, other than for expansion. Well, culture is already almost completely useless, anyway.

 

[Eberhard]

I'm new to the game, and more of a builder, so take what I say with a grain of salt, but....

So much depends upon the way one enjoys the game ... I play with flipping off because I prefer things to be a bit more "realistic", despite the inherent anachronism and time relationship problems of Civ, and prefer conquest.

Occupying, thus flipping, an undefended town is fine, but when it is defended? Troy, Megiddo, Constantinople, Quebec, Badajoz, Stalingrad .....
There may be examples of flipping in history (I'm not aware of any),

I think flipping is as close as CivIII can come to Stalingrad. The Germans invaded and occupied and built no local culture, with the local German troops not available for any other duty during the conflict [as good as destroyed], and Germany received no large benefit for their commitment to Stalingrad [occupying a city with resistors and corruption], and the Russians were in control again the next year, when the German troops actually were cut to a fraction and captured.

Yeah, it's a str-e-t-c-hed viewpoint, but war is not cut-and-dried and flipping is in that vein. More realistic, perhaps, than cut-and-dried invade-and-take.


I like flipping, and find [on the lower levels] that a city will sometimes flip to me as I have a huge force in the nearest city, about 2 squares away, because impatience got the better of me as I was trying to flip it; rushing two or three cultural improvements and waiting what seems an interminable amount of time, and then deciding, oh, well, let's take that to shorten the border instead of flipping it, I'm ready to fight....

 

[Bluetooth]

I always play with culture flipping on, but I don’t think I’ve had any culture flipping city since I bought Conquest. In Vanilla games it happened quite often and most of the time in my favour.

If I could choose between the partisan units from Civ 2 and culture flipping I would choose the partisans. Not that the partisans were funnier but it was a tough job to get rid of them and you had to plan carefully before attacking a city.

 

[poolking]

I didn't realise you could turn it off, I prefer to leave it on and see the enemy cities flip to me without having to expend any forces.

 

[Richard Cribb]

Always ON.

Removing it would be breaking the game as badly as would be, for instance, removing troop maintenance costs or the Despotism penalty. It belongs to Civ3's core concepts. I don't mind if people remove SGLs, for instance, but removing culture from the game is just absurd.
And yet, as everyone else, I hate loosing cities that way. But with a good utility program, you can learn how many troops you need to make sure a city doesn't flip.

Furthermore, Planetfall made some good points: despite what some people seem to suggest, the AI doesn't get any help on harder levels concerning culture flips. If their cities are harder to make flip, it's because overall the AI builds faster, so their cities are more likely to have Libs and Temples, preventing flipping.
Still, even on Emperor+, I routinely see AI cities flipping to my empire. In a recent game, I had left 4 empty spaces within my borders. The AI colonized them by unloading settlers from ships. I was pissed... But being much closer to my capital, and surrounded by my cities, 3 of these "parasites" quickly switched to my benevolent rule. Only one didn't change loyalties.

You hit the nail on the head, I also always play with culture flip on for those very reasons.
Admittedly it can be frustrating sometimes, once in an emperor game I lost Beijing three times(!) due to flipping before finally keeping it for good. But as also mentioned, sometimes the boot is on the other foot. And it surely makes the game more interesting.

 

[Own]

cultural conversions...
it depends on how i feel like playing. If I feel bloodthirsty and not like a builder, I'll play with it off, incase they flip me
but usually the only conversions is when I convert a city

i agree

 

[mikehunt]

I gain far more cities through culture flip than I lose