Question on culture and happiness

[Deathwing]

The guides I have read say it is easier to gain a culture victory with a small empire than a large one. I don't understand this because I thought more cities = more culture. Can anyone explain why this is?

Also just wondering how important happiness is. This game I've tried to keep over 0 happiness and have ended up with 6 cities while Japan next door has 11 (king difficulty). This is including a colosseum in most cities, so how come Japan can have so many cities but not be unhappy? And does it really matter if my citizens are unhappy because it only seems to affect food...

 

[vexing]

culture costs increase with each city you have (by 33% of base on a standard size map).
puppets do not apply to this, so more puppets = better.

the AI only has 60% of normal unhappiness from cities and settlers on all levels, with additional bonuses on levels above prince.

you want to always be above -10 happiness, there are big penalties at -10. generally i try to stay positive so i can continue growing, but beyond that it's not hugely important.

 

[Civsassin]

culture costs increase with each city you have (by 33% of base on a standard size map).
puppets do not apply to this, so more puppets = better.

the AI only has 60% of normal unhappiness from cities and settlers on all levels, with additional bonuses on levels above prince.

you want to always be above -10 happiness, there are big penalties at -10. generally i try to stay positive so i can continue growing, but beyond that it's not hugely important.

Between -1 and -9 happiness, you will have a city growth penalty. At -10 to -19, you will also have a combat penalty. At -20 or more, enemy barbarians will begin to spawn within your borders.

 

[vexing]

At -10 to -19, you will also have a combat penalty

there's also a 75% production penalty, so you can't build much.

 

[Buccaneer]

Between -1 and -9 happiness, you will have a city growth penalty. At -10 to -19, you will also have a combat penalty. At -20 or more, enemy barbarians will begin to spawn within your borders.

Such a great feature (from the patch, I assume).

 

[Civsassin]

Such a great feature (from the patch, I assume).

Pre-patch, severe unhappiness wasn't penalized enough, so in the patch they made it more severe. Overall, I think it was a good thing. Players were almost ignoring unhappiness pre-patch.

 

[Soronery]

How could you ignore unhappiness with the severe combat and production penalties?

 

[Civsassin]

How could you ignore unhappiness with the severe combat and production penalties?

You couldn't ignore it, but pre-patch is was more of an inconvenience than a show stopper.

 

[Deathwing]

Happiness can be ignored alright, first game I played I just bought tonnes of units and made more gold from conquest, never really produced anything.

And thanks it's good to know how the happy and culture work. I thought the AI was cheating on happiness XD It's like Civ 1 all over again there So for culture vic, lots of puppets and no annexing!

Thanks for the contributions.

 

[joncnunn]

AI has happinesses bonuses over the human at all difficulty levels.

The main reason it's harder to win cultural victory with a larger empire is every city other than a puppet increases the cost of all cultural policies by 30%.

So, yes it is better with fewer cities.

But of course, if your four cities can take out your nearest neighbor whose built 8 cities and make them all puppets; then you get best of both worlds with 12 cities producing culture but only four cities on the cultural cost. And a couple of Cultural CS allies and your empire will produce a lot of social policies. (If your happiness isn't very high, the puppets will generally prioritize happy structures.) The downside of this is that it appears that other than a monument that puppets generally don't build additional culture buildings.

As to global happiness level penalties
At -1; you lose the science bonus policy (if you've chosen it) and growth reduced by 75%. Since growth is the main cause of becoming unhappy in the first place, doesn't really matter if you don't have that policy.

At -10; Empire is VERY UNHAPPY. major penalty on production and combat. Avoid this if at all possible.

At -20; Empire is IN REVOLT. in addition to the above penalties, rebel units spawn in your territory.
I actually briefly reached this as a result of a peace settlement ending the second german war giving me several cities on the same turn.
Got down to merely unhappy that same turn by:

1. Calling up an AI and asking how much gold he'd take for the least useful of Germany's cities. 85 gold. Deal. He promptly razed it.
2. Every non capital city in my core empire went from 1 specialist to 3. (I had the reduced unhappiness from specialist policy)

Only took a few turns to become happy even with the specialists sent back to the fields since several of my cities were already constructing Stadiums and the puppet cities started building Colosseums as well. (My core empire already had Colosseum's everywhere (& all luxuries) before the war started to maintain order; those were indeed mostly bought with cash.)

The guides I have read say it is easier to gain a culture victory with a small empire than a large one. I don't understand this because I thought more cities = more culture. Can anyone explain why this is?

Also just wondering how important happiness is. This game I've tried to keep over 0 happiness and have ended up with 6 cities while Japan next door has 11 (king difficulty). This is including a colosseum in most cities, so how come Japan can have so many cities but not be unhappy? And does it really matter if my citizens are unhappy because it only seems to affect food...

 

[Deathwing]

Thanks that's a very concise explanation.

How does the specialists work though? Do they not contribute to unhappiness unlike citizens working the fields? I thought specialists added extra unhappiness?

 

[joncnunn]

With the Freedom social policy (first) one.

Then:
The first specialist in every city does not cause unhappiness.

In non capital cities, the second specialist does just like any other citizen. But the third specialist in those cities does not cause unhappiness either.

In the capital though, while the first specialist won't cause unhappiness, you have to add a lot of specialists there to get the second bonus. (That's if you already have the tradition policy that's already reducing unhappiness in the capital)

If you don't have freedom, yep, specialists won't help you.

Thanks that's a very concise explanation.

How does the specialists work though? Do they not contribute to unhappiness unlike citizens working the fields? I thought specialists added extra unhappiness?

 

[Deathwing]

Thanks, all game mechanics are helpful to know

 

[dubrown]

The rioters isn't really that hard to deal with so if you have some spare, up to date troops ready in your territory you can deal with rebel uprising fairly easy, and it doesn't happen every turn your at -20 or more negative.

They count as barbs so you'll have a bonus against them and they spawn as barbs I believe so it'll be on the current techlevel, i've seen modern armor as rebels at one point, usually 2-3 units spawn each time.

So in a way, you can still ignore happiness and get away with it, atleast if you have a strong army and is ahead in tech, but it's a bit more annoying these days than before. But I tend to allow happiness to drop heavily for shorter periods if I know I'll be able to handle any rebels that appear.

 

[joncnunn]

The thing is though that if your empire is in revolt (-20 and worse), your empire is also getting the very unhappy (-10 and worse) penalties of -50% combat performance + -50% hammer production in cities.

 

[Civsassin]

AI has happinesses bonuses over the human at all difficulty levels.

The main reason it's harder to win cultural victory with a larger empire is every city other than a puppet increases the cost of all cultural policies by 30%.

So, yes it is better with fewer cities.

This isn't entirely true. You can have a large empire and achieve a cultural victory pretty easily. However, the bulk of your cities need to be puppets and not either ones you settle or ones you conquer and annex. Your 33% culture increase only comes from cities you either settle or annex, and not from those you puppet. Three core cities is probably optimal if you want to win culturally and still have enough cities to build an army. I once did that with the Aztecs, and it worked out fairly well.

 

[vexing]

Three core cities is probably optimal if you want to win culturally and still have enough cities to build an army.

one city is better yet. you mostly buy instead of build the army but it's still entirely doable.

 

[Civsassin]

one city is better yet. you mostly buy instead of build the army but it's still entirely doable.

Concur. The fewer the better.

 

[dubrown]

The thing is though that if your empire is in revolt (-20 and worse), your empire is also getting the very unhappy (-10 and worse) penalties of -50% combat performance + -50% hammer production in cities.

True, but it's still not the end of the world and actually manageable against the AI. So if you're ahead and has a strong empire you can ignore happiness for quite some time without it affecting you too much, atleast when going for domination or diplo, in a spacerace the productionhit may hurt too much but the combatpenalty is possible to manage with better tactics and/or more technical advanced units. In Multiplayer though I wouldn't want to sit in that situation.