Laws of Civilization

[bengalryan9]

We all know that there are certain things that always seem to happen when loading up a game of Civilization. I thought it might be fun/humorous to codify a list of these Laws of Civilization in a thread. Feel free to add to the list - be creative and have fun with it!

Here are a few to start:

Law of Interest - the likelihood of facing an early rush from the AI is directly proportional to how interesting the map looks. The more fun the map looks, the more likely you are to get blitzed early.

Trajan's Law - the more you want to use a unique unit, the less likely you are to have the necessary strategic resource available to you.

The Barbarian Camp Codex - if you move all of your troops to the front to try to defend yourself against an AI rush, a barbarian camp WILL spawn directly behind you 1-2 tiles outside of your lands

 

[Kibikus]

The Dam Directive - One turn before you finish your dam, you get hit by a thousand-year flood that wrecks your districts.

The Tribal Tenet - When you get a eureka/inspiration from a goody hut, it's right before you're about to get it naturally anyway.

The Religious Regulations - it takes waaaaaay more time to choose a funny name and symbol for your religion, than to pick the actual beliefs.

The Petra Principle - The less desert tiles an AI has compared to you, the more likely they'll build Petra (up to 100% if they have 0 desert tiles).

 

[sonicmyst]

The Leader Principle - all AI leaders will praise you for meeting their leader agenda but still does not want your friendship.

 

[lotrmith]

The Cult of Ignorance: The stronger your initial campus placements look, the fewer scientific city states there are.

The Wonderful Balance: The closer a Natural Wonder is to your starting location, the more likely it is to be one of the crappy ones, like those that can only be worked and do not buff the workable and improvable tiles around them.

 

[Tech Osen]

Splendid Isolation: the more your random civ is suited for early conquest the more likely it is that you're starting alone on an island.

 

[Republic of San Montuoso]

The Fake Pearl: When finding a bended river as Matthias with five tiles on the other side of the river, at least three of those five tiles are taken by luxury/strategic resources, OR the core of the river is taken by impassable features.

The Cursed Blessing: Two or one turn before deciding to place a district with a 6+ adjacency, a strategic resource will pop on the very same tile.

The Petra Principle Chichen Corollary: Apply this rule to Chichen Itza and low jungle AI cities.

Liang is Late (aka the Dam Directive II): The Megacolossal eruption that will destroy all of your improvement and kill 90% of your population will happen the turn before Liang is installed in the city.

 

[Naeshar]

The Political Philosophy Paradox: The direction you choose to explore contains no citystates. Whenever you switch you would find one. You find third citystate the moment after you research PP, or you suzerain one and find several at once.
The Pre-game Decision Law: Whenever you plan a victory condition before launching a new game, the game is unsuitable for it.
The Quests Distraction Directive: Each game you play is the same because you follow the quests given by boosts, citystates and chasing era score.

 

[NukeAJS]

The Curse of Private Snowball: Combat that says you will destroy a unit in the preview will result in that unit still having 1HP at the worst time possible. Likewise, combat that says a unit will have a small amount in the preview of health left will die and your unit occupies that tile at the worst time possible.

 

[Josephias]

The Strategic Placement Plan: Strategic resources would appear appropiately in the tiles you reserved for anything else, specially if no other location is possible (canals, wonders), or other positions are worse (see the Cursed Blessing)

The Dock Dilemma: Once you place a wonderful high-adjacency dock, you’ll discover no Water Wonder can be placed without ruining its adjacencies.

The Surprise Settler Situation: when you have your settler ready and moving towards your next city location, an AI setller will appear moving towards the same place, with ETA one turn before you.

 

[Hans Castorp]

Darwin's Theory of Natural Wonder Selection: Any four-tile natural wonder will be located at the other side of the world to the civ that spawns Darwin, and in the territory of someone with whom they are at war. Conversely, any civ with easy access to a four-tile natural wonder will be be beaten to Darwin by an AI that started next to Mount Kilimanjaro and is desperate to activate him there.

E pur si muove: The only hex bordered by 5 mountain tiles on any continent will be in the territory of a city-state that surrounds it with a million units, slowly rotating positions, while Galileo watches longingly wondering whether the wait is worth it.

 

[Equilin]

The Amazon Conspiracy: After harvesting a food resource to grow your city, a forest fire will pop up right after in that city or 1 tile away, ready to spread in.

 

[bengalryan9]

The Pre-Planning Principle - any time you identify a particular victory condition you'd like to go for when starting a game, expect to see the AI leaders that will make it that much more difficult to achieve. Cultural victory plans will be met by Peter and Mvemba, religious victory plans will be met by Saladin and Peter, and if you're going for domination expect to see Monty's eagle warriors, Amanitore's archers, or Tamar's walls right next to you.

Kupe's Law - AI Kupe's capital will always end up on a one or two tile island in the middle of nowhere.

 

[PhilBowles]

The Dam Directive - One turn before you finish your dam, you get hit by a thousand-year flood that wrecks your districts.

And once you've completed your dam, a stretch of river that previously flooded incessantly will never flood again, denying you the mitigation era score.

The Religious Regulations -

it takes waaaaaay more time to choose a funny name and symbol for your religion, than to pick the actual beliefs.

Thus Spoke Zarathustra: Until you have the We Are the Champions achievement, you always take Zoroastrianism as your religion as it's the only one with an associated achievement.

The Leader Principle - all AI leaders will praise you for meeting their leader agenda but still does not want your friendship.

Unless you're already friends with them, in which case they'll continually complain that you aren't meeting their agendas but beg to renew your friendship every time.

The Wonder of Astrology: Upon researching Astrology, you'll immediately find a nearby Natural Wonder that could have given you the eureka if only you hadn't sent your units exploring in every other direction.

 

[tedhebert]

The Hello Neighbor conundrum:

No matter how big a map you chose and how much you reduce the number of civs, 5 of them will spawn within 6-7 tiles of your starting location and the rest of the map will be open for barbarian business

The Wonderful Balance: The closer a Natural Wonder is to your starting location, the more likely it is to be one of the crappy ones, like those that can only be worked and do not buff the workable and improvable tiles around them.

I would add: And if, by miracle, one of the great ones is close, a CS will have founded its city right on top of it

 

[Snarf054]

The Unintentional Pacifist- You decide on turn 50 your neighboring civ has to go. You remember this again on turn 300 when it's no longer worth the effort.

The Shell Game- No matter what the direction you send your scout leads to barbs and the direction you send your warrior is all goody huts.

Gotcha- The first time you move your scout more than one hex at a time they will run into a barb sword and two archers.

Really Gotcha- As soon as you mass your entire army on your northern border, your southern neighbor invades.

 

[Bibor]

No Camping Law - If you take the camp pantheon for all the deer, unbeknownst to you, they're all adjacent to a volcano.

Mountain Valley Law - The more mountains surround an area, the more likely some exotic resource will grow in it.

 

[AntSou]

The Volcano Consistent-Volatility Paradox - Resources and Features next to a volcano will be destroyed exactly two turns before you're read to harvest them.

 

[bite]

Darwin's Move -

No matter which direction you send your warrior out on, it will be in the opposite direction of where the first barbarian camp spawns

 

[Futumch]

The Religious Regulations - it takes waaaaaay more time to choose a funny name and symbol for your religion, than to pick the actual beliefs.

I stick to my favourites - Worms, Crabs, Cows and Atheism using the symbols for Aquarius, Cancer, Taurus and Leo respectively.

The Scout Conga - bonus Scouts earned from goody huts will follow in the footsteps of their pathfinding bretheren, instead of striking out on their own.

 

[bengalryan9]

The Partisan Principle - No matter how many amenities you have, no matter how far ahead you are in science and culture compared to the rest of your world, no matter how large your empire is... there are always citizens ready to rebel in each of your neighborhoods.