Please Explain ICS

[Virtual Alex]

Can someone please explain how to play ICS (Infinite City Spam) style? or point me to the correct thread? I am a civ 2 and civ 3 vet so I am very familiar with what ISC means and how to play it in those games. However the way unhappiness works in this game makes it seem a little weird. In previous civ games unhappiness would only effect one city at a time, and it was easy enough to keep a city below it's "happy cap" so you never needed to deal with building happy buildings. Usually it was between size 3-6 depending on difficulty. But in this game every city always contributes 2 unhappiness to your empire (1 for city and 1 for pop right?) so you are required to build happiness buildings to keep up because unhappiness is a problem right away. So how is it done?

You just spam cities and build a circus asap and cap them at lvl 3?

I guess if you expand rapidly it's likely you will snag many luxuries and that would help, but I don't think there are enough in the game to truly support an ICS in the way I remember.

 

[HermannLombard]

If you scroll down you'll see lots of threads with "ICS" in the subject line.

The big gun is a few pages back: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=388793

Be aware that some of that advice will be made obsolete or weakened by the patch coming this week, since one of the main goals of the patch seems to be to nerf ICS.

 

[biohazard72]

ICS typically entails:
- settling to the happiness cap - target luxuries and resources early on
- spacing cities 3 tiles apart (minimum spacing), possibly deviating to nab luxuries faster
- aggressive roading for trade route gold, Meritocracy bonus (if you use Meritocracy)
- Maritime city-states for food
- spamming Colosseums as soon as they are available
- spamming more Settlers after Colosseums complete (second wave expansion)
- spamming Libraries and Universities for science

That alone should be good enough advice to get you in a good tech position mid-Renaissance, even on Deity. On any other difficulty you'll be miles ahead.

 

[MouseyPounds]

Lots of small population cities with their unhappiness offset by coliseums and wonders/policies is the core of ICS. See pi-r8's ICS, Civ V Style and Paeanblack's Thoughts on REX+ICS for explanations and discussion. alpaca's Play With Me 2: Iroquois Zero-Culture ICS may be instructive too.

Note, however, that there is a patch incoming in less than a week which in part looks to be trying to counteract ICS.

 

[DaveMcW]

You just spam cities and build a circus asap and cap them at lvl 3?

Cap them at pop 2 actually, until you get some of the "+happy in every city" bonuses.

2 pop is enough to spam more settlers, work a couple mines to build colosseums/libraries, and run 2 scientists.

 

[Virtual Alex]

Thank you all

 

[Antarion]

Cap them at pop 2 actually, until you get some of the "+happy in every city" bonuses.

2 pop is enough to spam more settlers, work a couple mines to build colosseums/libraries, and run 2 scientists.

i bet with the upcoming patch pop 2 or max 3 will be the optimum for a heavy liberty strategy or the tree will be inferior and complete useless. im doing some tests actual with arabia (imho the best liberty nation next to france) and even pop 2 is good enough for a funtional city. watch out to get some hills in the radius so you can maximize your early production.

liberty is all about massive production bonus early on, which leads either to buildings everywhere or a good amout of units. since buildings are mostly worthless in small cities except maybe baracks or later on marketplaces next to a city full of gold tiles you rather build up a strong military to defend your well improved road network (thats how i play pure ics with arabia, just settle your earliest cities 2 tiles away from your next city)

 

[atteSmythe]

I don't see much/any reason not to go straight to 4 post-patch, if you have the food tiles for it. A size 2 city without a colosseum is -4 happiness. Build one, and the city remains -2 happy regardless of whether it's size 1, 2, 3, or 4. Size 4 will get you 2-3 extra science and 2 extra gold for the same happiness penalty. (Edit: compared to size 2, of course)

 

[diz2]

I don't see much/any reason not to go straight to 4 post-patch, if you have the food tiles for it. A size 2 city without a colosseum is -4 happiness. Build one, and the city remains -2 happy regardless of whether it's size 1, 2, 3, or 4. Size 4 will get you 2-3 extra science and 2 extra gold for the same happiness penalty. (Edit: compared to size 2, of course)

No disputing that 4 is a good size to get to, but the happiness bank usually does not allow it right away. Post patch the happiness bank should be even tighter, because you won't be able to use surplus happiness from your size 2-3 cities to founf more cities. I think will translate to a lot fewer pre-colliseum cities being doable at any given time, and more/faster vertical growth in your post-colliseum cities.

In other words, it won't resemble current ICS all that much...

 

[biohazard72]

The biggest difference now with ICS might be waiting 10-20 turns for growth consolidation as first-wave Colosseums finish up, rather than an immediate second-wave settling.

Libraries having no slots and later Universities also introduces Workshops back into the fray before Universities. The first great person you'll likely produce is a GE which will be used on Forbidden Palace (if it's still strong - otherwise likely Taj, Hagia Sophia (space games), or Statue of Liberty).

 

[atteSmythe]

No disputing that 4 is a good size to get to, but the happiness bank usually does not allow it right away. Post patch the happiness bank should be even tighter, because you won't be able to use surplus happiness from your size 2-3 cities to founf more cities. I think will translate to a lot fewer pre-colliseum cities being doable at any given time, and more/faster vertical growth in your post-colliseum cities.

In other words, it won't resemble current ICS all that much...

Pre-colosseum doesn't change much, though. The only difference will be the change to Meritocracy, which is one happiness at most. The biggest change, IMO, is post-col, where a size 2 city isn't neutral any more. But, you're at no further penalty anywhere 1-4, so early vertical growth is encouraged.

 

[diz2]

Pre-colosseum doesn't change much, though. The only difference will be the change to Meritocracy, which is one happiness at most. The biggest change, IMO, is post-col, where a size 2 city isn't neutral any more. But, you're at no further penalty anywhere 1-4, so early vertical growth is encouraged.

Hmm, maybe I misunderstood. I thought they were setting it so that excess happiness from a city didn't carry over to the happiness bank. All other things being equal, this means you're going to have less happiness in the happiness bank once you've built small cities with colliseums, nd less ability to add new cities within the happiness cap.

So, in the past a size 2 or 3 city with a colliseum would have provided you excess happiness that would have allowed you to found a new city (horizontal growth). Now without the excess happiness from that city you can't afford the horizontal growth, so you may as well take the vertical growth. The number of pre-colliseum new cities you can afford will thus be smaller as you will be working with only the excess happiness created by luxury, natural wonders, SP, etc.

As a result, the 2-3 pop ICS sprawl does not build momentum as colliseums kick in.

At least, I think that's the idea.

 

[bryanw1995]

Cap them at pop 2 actually, until you get some of the "+happy in every city" bonuses.

2 pop is enough to spam more settlers, work a couple mines to build colosseums/libraries, and run 2 scientists.

unfortunately, the patch that is coming out within the next 2 days removes both scientists from libraries and caps happiness from buildings at the city pop (so a size two city with a circus and collosseum would only get 2 happy faces from those buildings instead of the current 7. also, meritocracy and forbidden palace have been nerfed by an unknown amount.

wait for the patch to be out for a few days and see what sort of strategies emerge. I think that ics will still be possible and often even still a good move, but it is going to be more situational than "every single time without fail".

 

[atteSmythe]

So, in the past a size 2 or 3 city with a colliseum would have provided you excess happiness that would have allowed you to found a new city (horizontal growth). Now without the excess happiness from that city you can't afford the horizontal growth, so you may as well take the vertical growth. The number of pre-colliseum new cities you can afford will thus be smaller as you will be working with only the excess happiness created by luxury, natural wonders, SP, etc.

Yeah, I think we were talking about different eras, or I was tired and sick last night and didn't know what I was talking about. Either way.

A size two city starts at -4 unhappiness, so with nothing but a colosseum, it's only happiness neutral. With meritocracy, it's happiness positive by 1.

Post-patch, that size 2 city will still be -2 happy, or somewhere between -2 and -1 happy with Meritocracy (depending on implementation). The difference is that a size 3 or size 4 city will still be between -1 and -2 happy.

So currently, a size 4 city is -1 happy with colosseum and meritocracy, or -2 without. And after the patch, a size 4 city will be...between -1 and -2 happy. So while size 2 cities were definitely harmed, size 4 really wasn't (and actually got a bit better, since theocracy is now 25% instead of 20%). And, while currently a size 4 city is more of a strain on your empire than a size 2 city is, after the patch, they'll have identical happiness impact, so you might as well go for four and gain the benefits of that +2 pop.

That's what I was trying to say, anyway, I think.