Quick Answers (formerly Newbie Questions)

[MadScot]

WW

Did it look something like this, say?

(with the ruins being a city, since I just wanted a symbol of some kind)

The city wants to have culture boundaries as follows, with the colours representing the successive expansions:

But you can't own the ocean, so it would end up looking like this:

Note the two sea tiles on their own.
I didn't think I explained it well in words, so I decided on an example.

By the way, there's a section in the FAQ on how to take and upload screenshots. Or use 'quote' on a post with pictures - like this one - to see the syntax for using "IMG" tags to include multiple pictures.
edit: once I get them all working of course

 

[wildWolverine]

It was sort of like that, but instead of the two lighted squares, they were lighted, and bordered by Egypt's colors (I don't have the picture on this puter, or I'd try to post it again). Perhaps the 2nd two pics in your post would help me understand...

edit: I can see the screenshots now. That's exactly what it was -- thanks. It just looked really weird before -- I didn't realize that the two surrounded squares were not ocean squares. I'm a little slow today -- haven't had my second cup of coffee yet.

Obviously some kind of seamount activity...

 

[WillJ]

@wildWolverine: Yep, even Thunderfall was once confused by that.

@Turner: I think my MP partner, wwhill, figured it out. He said that he thinks he may have quit just before I saved and quit, which would mean that the AI took over before I saved, and obviously I can't make a human take over the AI's position upon reloading. We're going to start over (luckily this wasn't too late in the game), and I'll post here again if it works out. And of course we'll start taking precautions to make sure this doesn't happen again.

 

[Puzzlinon]

Here's a quick one about war weariness and unhappiness.

Sometimes, your Democracy will go into anarchy due to war fatigue without any particular city being in disorder. If overall approval drops enough.

(There's a different case when you have disorder for 3 turns in a city; that's not the one I mean.)

What's the exact trigger for this path into anarchy? Is it an approval percentage (below 50%, or some other figure?) Is the flip into anarchy partly random?

Is the Approval percentage on the F11 screen the best way to watch for this risk of Anarchy?

About war fatique in general... is there a specific place to see the level of war fatique?

The F11 screen approval number is a bit bouncy for that, since it varies with luxuries and tax-credits. I'd like to get the measure of the underlying war fatique specifically.

I can ask the unhappy citizens why they're unhappy, but that just tells me what portion of the unhappy citizens in a particular city are unhappy due to war fatigue, and doesn't seem very accurate as a way to track overall war fatigue.

Well, maybe the question isn't so quick, but the answer might be... I'm just wondering if there's a simple statistic or measure that I'm missing, that would tell you 'you're at stage 3 of war fatique and that's making 50% of the population unhappy' or something specific like that.

 

[DaviddesJ]

Originally posted by Puzzlinon
Sometimes, your Democracy will go into anarchy due to war fatigue without any particular city being in disorder. If overall approval drops enough.

It happens automatically in democracy when you accumulate a certain number of "war weariness points". The exact current value isn't visible anywhere, you just have to keep track or estimate.

Here's the discussion thread on war weariness. It's hard to find: someone should post a summary in Strategy Articles, or the War Academy.

 

[Ronald]

I think somebody published the actual costs for every tech, but I can't find it anymore.
Who can help me to locate this info?

Thanks

Ronald

 

[DaviddesJ]

Originally posted by Ronald
I think somebody published the actual costs for every tech, but I can't find it anymore.
Who can help me to locate this info?

By "actual costs", do you mean the multiplier for each tech, or the formula for computing the number of beakers of research you need to complete a tech?

The values for each tech are in many places. I use "Nethog's Civ3 Tech Tree" linked from the Reference section of the Civfanatics site. Edit: that version doesn't seem to have the costs, but you can get the version with costs from Nethog's Games Page. Tech cost multipliers range from 2 for Pottery, to 360 for Integrated Defense.

I can't find the exact formula for research costs now, but for techs no one has discovered, you take the multiplier for that tech, multiply by a value depending on map size (e.g., 32 for large map, 24 for standard map, 20 for small map), and then, for the human player, by a value depending on difficulty (e.g., 10/9 on monarch, 10/8 on emperor, 10/6 on deity). If you have met other players who have already discovered the tech, then there's a discount (but you're probably better off just trading for it, then).

 

[Grille]

Here's a link to Grey Fox's Tech Calc thread. In that post, there's also a link to the "formula" thread.
GF's Tech Calc thread

 

[Ronald]

Originally posted by Grille
Here's a link to Grey Fox's Tech Calc thread. In that post, there's also a link to the "formula" thread.
GF's Tech Calc thread

Thanks very much

Ronald

 

[Puzzlinon]

Thanks a lot, David! That weariness thread was just the ticket. The triggers are different than I'd supposed.

One of the tactics I sometimes use (used to use, I should say, after reading that) in a late war is an MI wall. Along an exposed front, I'd moving pairs MI's one step over the cultural line and then pillage with both. So even if the AI punches a hole through the MI, they can't get very far...

Laying out a long line of static defenders on the enemy side, it turns out, is about what you'd do to if you wanted to really maximize war weariness. No wonder the people threw me out on my keister.

 

[DaviddesJ]

Originally posted by Puzzlinon
Laying out a long line of static defenders on the enemy side, it turns out, is about what you'd do to if you wanted to really maximize war weariness.

What gives you that idea? You get 1 point each turn that you have any units in enemy territory. You don't get more points for having more units. In practice it's hard to fight an effective war without being in enemy territory! You might as well be at peace.

 

[Leha]

Originally posted by Turner_727
That's a tough one. Got your pros and cons. I would leave the trade network in tact, this way when you capture any cities you've got them hooked up to your lux's and resources. Sounds like they're pumping out quite a few defenders. I would probably start building a lot of arty to help take them off. Or just dig in for the long war. Can you base some bombers close to the front? That would help a lot, giving you more striking distance than just arty.

Thanks Turner , I wasn't here for awhile .
I've already solved the situation ( Joan's in prison )
But , as I understand , there's no quick answer wether to leave
roads or pillage them . What about cities , in all of my previous
games I allways reduced pop by artillery and bombers , destroying improvements of course , now I think that may be
it's better to loose two-three more units but take city intact ?
Do all improvements remain in captured city if I don't bombard
it ?

 

[Puzzlinon]

You get 1 point each turn that you have any units in enemy territory. You don't get more points for having more units.

Right, thanks for calling that out. I misread the thread; an early post guesses that the count matters, and it's answered (troop count doesn't matter) in a later post. If I'd thought more carefully at first, it would have been obvious; I'd have war-weariness up the wazoo after three turns if counts mattered.


I guess it's the pillager + counterattack-bait that was really getting me. I have a habit of using old cavalry as pillagers, and a number of them get stranded. They draw fire away from other parts of the battle, but they die a lot.


(ed: just typo fix)

 

[Turner]

Originally posted by leha


Thanks Turner , I wasn't here for awhile .
I've already solved the situation ( Joan's in prison )
But , as I understand , there's no quick answer wether to leave
roads or pillage them . What about cities , in all of my previous
games I allways reduced pop by artillery and bombers , destroying improvements of course , now I think that may be
it's better to loose two-three more units but take city intact ?
Do all improvements remain in captured city if I don't bombard
it ?

That depends on what you're trying to do. If you've got the units to garrison in the city to quell the resistors, then go ahead and take the city intact. Of course, you loose all culture buildings, but you might leave some other useful buildings standing. Like Barracks or Marketplaces. If the city is tied into your trade network and you have marketplaces, it's easier to hold the city after taking it when the pop is higher.

However, there is a certain elegance to bombing the city down to pop one and starting over again with you're own people. If you don't have as many troops to garrison this would be better, as there would be less chance to flip cuz of the lower pop. And if the city is hooked into the TN, I've noticed that pop one or two cities tend to get happier quicker, even with the AI pop in the cities.

So really it boils down to logistics on your end, and your playing style. I try not to limit myself to one or the other, and both work out pretty good for me.

 

[Leha]

Hm , now i see why my last captured babylonian city flipped
although i've turned all pop into entertainers , i've read in some
tread that if you turn them into entertainers they never flip and
so far it worked , apparently this city had too much pop and was
too close to capital . Good to know about "lowering pop-less flip "
Thanks .

 

[mayakovsky]

I was just reading an SG and one of the players kept saying how many tiles was within their borders. How did he know how many tiles they had? THanks.

 

[Hurricane]

He was using a very nice utility called mapstat, found here: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=18243

 

[Leha]

Sorry for asking here , I haven't seen it in "improvements" link .
What's effect of radar tower ?

 

[MadScot]

Radar tower: +25% to combat strength (attack or defence) within 2 tiles.

There was some debate about what "within 2 tiles" meant and I can't recall how it turned out. :S

 

[Turner]

The combat has to take place within two squares of the radar tower. So if your attacking unit is two squares away, and attacks someone three squares from the radar tower, the bonus does not apply. Kinda sucks, but I still use them a lot.