Recovering from whipping

[gavenkoa]

https://civilization.fandom.com/wiki/Whipping_(Civ4) says:

Each new whip adds 10 turns (scaled) to the unhappiness counter; the unhappiness caused in the city is simply the numbers of turns left, divided by 10 (scaled), and rounded up

Does that mean whipping should be aligned into 10T frames (normal speed)?

I understand that in early game without emergency only settlers & workers should be whipped as they block city grows.

Also whipping should be at least size 2 if city has unhappy citizens because you'd expect city regrows next turn after whipping which leaves unhappiness. With at least -2 whip you get +1 unhappy and -2 citizen so total is +1 happy ))

I think that work boat / warrior / granary / library / monument / failgold should be used as fillers between whipping...

But sometimes I wont to get granary faster (for city growth), or library (for cultural border growth or for earlier 2 scientists).

what production should be used to fill time between whipping in earlier game?

 

[Gr8scott]

1. Example of whipping unhappiness: the first time you whip, you have 10 turns of +1 unhappy face. Suppose that, 5 turns later, you whip again. You now have (10 - 5) + 10 = 15 turns of unhappiness left, 5 turns with +2 unhappy faces followed by 10 turns of +1 unhappy face. Therefore, whipping only once every 10 turns (or more infrequently) ensures you only ever suffer +1 unhappy face. However, if you have a higher happy cap than tiles your city wants to work, there is no need to maintain a strict 10 turn schedule. There are also other ways to manage this unhappiness (see below)

2. While workers/settlers are good things to whip, it is not true that they are the only whips which make sense in the early game. Granaries and libraries often make sense to whip because many cities lack the production to build them early on.

3. Regarding production in between whips: often, the turn right after whipping you will have a sizable chunk of overflow production. It is often sensible to spend a turn putting this overflow into a worker, settler, or failgold. The builds you've identified are all good things to "fill the time" between whipping, but if you really don't need any of these you should weigh your options carefully. Especially without a granary, it can be better to slow-build workers and settlers rather than whipping them. In the classical era, you can resort to building wealth while regrowing if you really have nothing you want.

4. Regarding managing unhappiness from whipping, there are a couple of tricks that can help. Firstly, unhappy citizens don't "eat" food when the city is building a worker or settler, so a city that has been whipped mercilessly can often still contribute by building these. Also, the whip anger is cleared completely when a city changes hands. This is often hard to exploit in the early game, but sometimes if you are about to begin a war you can give an unhappy city away and recapture it shortly thereafter (it will not have any defenders until the AI sends/builds one). Keep in mind, though, that you will lose any cultural buildings by doing this.

 

[lymond]

I think you read some old stuff, my friend. I will say that I have no problem stacking some whip unhappiness. Ideally you are 2pop or 3 pop whipping which gives more bang for you buck in terms of citizens used>production>unhappiness..

If you've stack some unhappiness just build a worker or settler for a while until one goes away. Queue up something..whatever..warrior..start a gran or library..to start growing when you can.

You do not need to wait 10 turns to whip again. You can also, as I explained early, grow into unhappiness and whip that off.

Whipping gives one loads of production early game relative to a city's base hammer output early. 30H per citizens. You don't always want to wait for unhappiness to wear off before setting up another whip. It's about opportunity costs. The unhappiness is just something you manage along the way.

 

[krikav]

Depends on alot of things, if early game just with capital and perhaps 2 more cities, then yes you usually want to keep within the 10 turns, but that is mostly a consequence of a very low happycap and a desire to being able to work more tiles.

Later in the game, some cities chief task in life is to be on a 4->2 pop cycle for a forseeable future, and if you have 10 in happycap stacking up whip anger to 6 is absolutely no problem.
Whip anger becomes a problem only when the cities you whip start to become unable to work the tiles they need to work to reach pop4.

In my recent game with Isabella: https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/nobles-club-cxxxviii-isabella-de-españa.517672/page-5
I had 100+ turns of unhappines in almost all cities.

Thousands of years after the medieval warfare, the citizens still remember my cruel oppression.

 

[gavenkoa]

If you've stack some unhappiness just build a worker or settler for a while until one goes away

vvv Got it. vvv

unhappy citizens don't "eat" food when the city is building a worker or settler

It is important info. I still need to prevent city overgrowth as city is in unhappiness. I used to set "Avoid Overgrowth" in city advisor and built buildings losing +2F for up to 10 turns ((

some cities chief task in life is to be on a 4->2 pop cycle for a forseeable future

Why is it important to be at 4 size (besides to be even number)? Because on average you have 2 food resources and recovery is quicker with +5/+6F then +3/+4F?

Does that mean 2=>1 whip is for emergency (for defense or to squeeze at least something if you know you definitely lose it in 2 turns)?

You can also, as I explained early, grow into unhappiness and whip that off.

I practiced this but not efficiently. For example on Immortal capital happiness limit is 5, 3-whip is great, now I see that after getting size 6 I should switch to settler and get it few turns earlier!

 

[AcaMetis]

Every pop whipped is worth the same amount of regardless of how many are whipped, and whipping doesn't change based on that either. However, growing population takes increasingly more for every pop you grow. 2-pop whips are an efficient middle ground between regrowing a city quickly, but not so quickly that repeated whipping causes you to stack whipping anger too quickly. That's not to say that there won't be times you'll 3-pop whip things (growing a city to size 6 to whip a non-Creative library or a non-Imperialistic Settler are common examples) or 1-pop whip things (usually emergency units, maybe a Granary if you're Expansive/put in a chop), but you can get the most out of your whips by consistently 2-pop whipping.

As always, it depends on the situation whether it's best to whip, and whether to wait on overflow/grow an extra size first.

 

[gavenkoa]

It is true that whipping of Wonders is less effective than Units / Buildings?

https://civilization.fandom.com/wiki/Whipping_(Civ4) says that whip value decreased from 75% in early game to 50% in late game...

 

[AcaMetis]

When whipping wonders (and I guess projects as well) directly every pop is worth less than they are when whipping buildings/units, so it is less efficient to directly whip a wonder compared to, say, whipping a worker and letting the overflow go into the wonder, since overflow is not reduced due to whipping inefficiency. Mind you that it can still be worth it to whip wonders directly at times - spending a turn building a worker (dry/hard whips, whipping something that you've got no production invested in, are also less efficient in terms of per pop), another turn whipping that worker, and another turn investing the overflow is three turns spend on whipping into a wonder, as opposed to whipping that wonder and finishing it right that turn. Especially on higher difficulties whipping a wonder directly can mean the difference between getting it and missing it, so don't be afraid to whip wonders directly if you really must have that wonder.

 

[lymond]

It's important to be at size 4 simply because a city can only whip half its population. 4>2, 6>3, etc. You can two pop whip at size 5 as well, ofc, but you can't 3pop until size 6. Very early 4>2 settler whips are usually nice simply as you generally are not growing that fast yet..no gran..and you can time some chops to speed up settler whip option (very easy with IMP trait though) and a follow-up chop to complete a new worker with OF from the settler whip. Very early 6>3 whips are really dependent on significant early food, but become very optimal at a certain point after the granary is in.

I don't know the math, but whipping Wonders is less efficient. The only reason to whip a particular Wonder is simply to make sure you get the important Wonder...like GLH.

 

[ArchGhost]

I understand that in early game without emergency only settlers & workers should be whipped as they block city grows.

You can whip whatever you want at all times. The question of whether it's efficient or not is something else entirely. But this is a strategy game. If you would gain something by trading efficiency for completion of a build earlier, then that tradeoff is beneficial.

1pop whips are often inefficient when not combined with previous overflow...but if you NEED to whip a warrior or archer to keep a city against barbs, then that's definitely a gain, not a loss. Whipping overflow into a wonder can also be worth stacking up some more unhappiness if you really need to get it, etc.

what production should be used to fill time between whipping in earlier game?

Warriors and barracks are common. You can also regrow on walls or an early wonder as these are often never intended to be completed. A little bit later, regrowing on a Library or Granary while waiting to whip the other happens a lot to me, as at some point you don't want to actually complete more units (warriors, etc) due to unit costs.

You can also grow to happy cap and then just slowly build workers/settlers until they hit a whip threshold (2pop, 3pop, etc) if you don't wanna grow into unhappiness.

After you connect up resources, and trade for more, whipping can be a lot more lenient, as if you have the happy space to grow up to 10-15 in your cities, you can whip them into the ground mercilessly for units into cycles of repeatedly growing only to 4 or 6 before whipping again. Even with all the stacked anger, they won't reach a size where it restricts their ability to be productive for a long time. I've had cities with over 100 turns of anger many times in games.

 

[Kaitzilla]

It is true that whipping of Wonders is less effective than Units / Buildings?

https://civilization.fandom.com/wiki/Whipping_(Civ4) says that whip value decreased from 75% in early game to 50% in late game...

Whipping wonders gives a penalty yes.
1 population lost to the whip no longer gives 30 when whipping a wonder. (Normal Speed)

The penalty depends on the Wonder's hurry cost modifier.
Here are the iHurryCostModifier from the BTS XML folder in case anyone wants the full list of 48 Wonders.

iHurryCostModifier = 50
Palace
Forbidden Palace
Globe Theatre
Hermitage
Heroic Epic
National Epic
National Park
Oxford University

iHurryCostModifier = 100
Angkor Wat
Chichen Itza
Colossus
Cristo Redentor
Great Library
Great Lighthouse
Great Wall
Hagia Sophia
Hanging Gardens
Mausoleum of Maussollos
Notre Dame
Oracle
Parthenon
Pyramids
Shwedagon Paya
Sistine Chapel
Spiral Minaret
Statue of Zeus
Stonehenge
Taj Mahal
Temple of Artemis
University of Sankore
Versailles
Ironworks
Moai Statues
Mt. Rushmore
Red Cross
Wall Street
West Point

iHurryCostModifier = 200
Kremlin
Eiffel Tower
Statue of Liberty
Broadway
Rock 'n' Roll
Hollywood
Three Gorges Dam
Pentagon

iHurryCostModifier = 300
Apostolic Palace
United Nations
Space Elevator


All that means is that after putting 1 or more into a build, whipping a iHurryCostModifier=50 wonder will produce 20 per population whipped.
Whipping a iHurryCostModifier=100 wonder will produce 15 per population whipped.
Whipping a iHurryCostModifier=200 wonder will produce 10 per population whipped.
Whipping a IHurryCostModifier=300 wonder will produce 7.5 per population whipped.

Whipping at 0 in a build is penalized and you generally only get 66% or 2/3rds of the hammers you would normally expect.

Production Modifiers like Forge + Factory + Coal plant only apply after the penalty from whipping at 0 and/or whipping a wonder is applied.
A city with +100% production bonus whipping a United Nations complete with 0 in the build can expect (7.5*2/3*2) = 10 per population whipped.


The Kremlin wonder has a huge effect on whipping, but it is too complicated to explain exactly how it works.
Just treat your 1pop whips like 44 (instead of 30) and your 2pop whips like 89 (instead of 60). This is for whips with more than 0 already invested.
Kremlin whipping with 0 invested is penalized to 2/3rds, and 1pop whip is 30 and 2pop whip is 60


Projects like Internet and Apollo can't be whipped.

The kind-hearted wiki you linked made an error about whipping Globe Theatre.
It will produce 20 per population when whipping, not 22.5.

 

[Anysense]

I knew about 2/3 for early WW, but I had no idea that some have 1/4 modifier I was wondering why whipping UN is so hard. Did not bother to research it though, prefer rushing it with GE.