when does a civ split into two?

[Lucky]

No and YES!
We have the final answer!
But first things first.

The restart civ option has NO effect! You just need a free slot and due to restarting civs you might have none. But no effect on the splitting itself!
And it is not at least one more city but you need a lower power rating than the civ to split. This of course implies number of cities, army strength, civ advances but over the course of time!

So here is the final list of requirements to split a civ. Works every time!

• Free slot for another civ!
• They must have a higher power rating than you!
• They must have at least 5 cities!
• You must take their capital!

You get the power rating from your foreign advisor. He tells you what your power and your reputation is. You can also view it in the histograph!
Everything else is secondary but most of it play a certain role for your power rating!

 

[mep]

Can a split cause the initial number fo civs to be exceded?

 

[Lucky]

Yes!

For my tests I used a small map with 3 civs. Then when a split occured it were 4 civs, of course.
But there can´t be more than 7 civs!

 

[Civman10]

how do u view the histograph and how do u get the save to work that i have downloaded off u on this forum

 

[Sodak]

No, powergraph does not matter. Most splits seem to be when a larger is split by a smaller civ. But I've seen the supreme Mongols split the much weaker Spanish (both AI). The Mongols were tops in power and # of cities for certain.

 

[Magnus]

I have seen civs split by barbarians... Oh the humanity!

 

[MajorGeneral2]

On the subject of exceeding 7 civs, I once hypothesized that the eigth flag on the cities.gif screen may be a clue to have an eigth civ. So I edited the Game.txt file (just like adding the extra difficulty and barbarian levels) and ...
Nope, how disappointing! The option was there, and I gave a civ the eigth color in the Rules.txt, but nothing came of it.

 

[Lucky]

Originally posted by Civman10
how do u view the histograph and how do u get the save to work that i have downloaded off u on this forum

The histograph can only be viewed when you retire your game.
Or you use the cheat mode, make the whole map visible and go to the civ score screen (F9). Click 2 times and it will show up.
But generally you should have a feeling of whether the other civ is stronger! And if your foreign advisor doesn´t tell you that your power is supreme it means someone is stronger than you and you can split that one. If you are weak or lower you can split everyone else!

And those savegames require at least Civ2 Fantastic Worlds, I´m playing with that version. They can also be viewed with Civ2 MGE. Sorry if you don´t have either!

Originally posted by Sodak
No, powergraph does not matter. Most splits seem to be when a larger is split by a smaller civ. But I've seen the supreme Mongols split the much weaker Spanish (both AI). The Mongols were tops in power and # of cities for certain.

I don´t know which Civ2 version you are playing but with both FW and MGE my results are 100% correct. And the histograph shows your power rating relatively to others.
Please show me the save where that happens what you described and prove me wrong.

But every time I tested the weaker civ splits the stronger one. The other way around doesn´t work.
Even if the weaker civ splits the stronger one and in the next turn I let the ex-stronger civ, which now has less cities, equal science and less units, try to split the ex-weaker one it doesn´t work.
The power rating doesn´t change so rapidly.

So go to your game, use cheat mode to select the so called stronger civ, view the power rating in the foreign advisor, check the other civ and see whether it´s power rating really is lower. If so, please send this save or try to reproduce the results.

Originally posted by Magnus
I have seen civs split by barbarians... Oh the humanity!

Barbarians are always weaker so they can always split any civ. But not your own, only AI civs are slit!
What I almost forgot: Your own civ is never split by any AI!

Originally posted by MajorGeneral2
On the subject of exceeding 7 civs, I once hypothesized that the eigth flag on the cities.gif screen may be a clue to have an eigth civ.

The eighth civ are the barbarians! They need a city and unit flag of their own, therefore 8.

 

[Sodak]

Originally posted by Lucky
I don´t know which Civ2 version you are playing but with both FW and MGE my results are 100% correct. And the histograph shows your power rating relatively to others.
Please show me the save where that happens what you described and prove me wrong.

I've only seen a few splits in CivII. The example I gave was about 3 years ago, so the save game is long gone. I think I was playing MGE by then, but might have been at CiC still, I don't recall.

The situation was as follows: The Spanish were at one time supreme, but they ran out of space to expand. The Mongols surpassed them in the late game as I and some other AIs reduced spanish power. When the Mongols attacked the Spanish, they were in fundy and just rolled over them. When Madrid fell, Spain was down to about 15 cities, the Mongols had at least 80. They were broke and had few units left. The Mongols had swarms of units and thousands of gold. The Spanish split into two dinky civs.

I don't doubt that powergraph position is a factor, I just think it's too strong to state it is a rule that the sacking civ must be lower on the powergraph.

You've tested plenty, I believe you, but being arrogant isn't necessary. If a stronger splitting a weaker civ has only a tiny chance of happening, you'd have to test a lot to get it to happen even once. Proof of weaker always splitting stronger doesn't disprove the inverse.

 

[Lucky]

The way you describe your old savegame leads me to the following conclusion.

As you stated yourself the Spanish had once been supreme in power. Then you and other waged some wars, took some cities and ended that threat!
As I have written before the power rating given in the foreign advisor screen does NOT change rapidly, only over many turns.
So I think that the Spanish power rating was indeed still higher than the Mongol rating.
This is also what I tested, see my example above. Split of a more powerful civ, then of course weaker. This splitted civ still cannot split the other civ, because although it has become weaker in a common sense its rating has not (yet). This can last several turns. :crazyeyes

And about the powergraph:
Sorry if I haven´t been totally clear about that. I am not sure whether it really represents the overall power rating over time, I just used it as an indication of the power rating!

Again, as long as you can´t show me a save to prove me wrong, I strongly believe my conclusions are right. I even looked at the game code a bit and from what I could understand my 3 points mentioned above are the only triggers for a split.

Btw, the game code once made partly (tiny part) readable with debuggers and decompilers is quite interesting although a little confusing at times. And I could read only a small part, seems like they used different languages. But all event triggers are in some kind of script language embedded in the code.

 

[Sodak]

You may be right. It's been a long time, so I don't remember exactly how long it took for the Spanish to get squeezed into a weak position. It took many turns, tho. It was on a large real-world map - the big one of europe that came with the game, iirc. The Mongols started in India, the Spanish in Egypt. They did share a border somewhere in between, but the conquest took many many turns.

The only idea that I had in a previous discussion of this example is that the relative power position may be kept from the turn that the 2 civs go to war. That would make this example moot. In other words, because sacking a capitol will almost necessarily entail giving that civ a beating, the conqueror can be expected to be more powerful on that turn. If the comparison is instead made upon the declaration of war, the weaker civ could become supreme (as the Mongols did) and still trigger the split. What do you think?

 

[Lucky]

That is the point I am not sure about.

I don´t know how the power rating is actually calculated, what factors influence it and whether time/turns somehow effect it!?

 

[Duke of Marlbrough]

I don´t know how the power rating is actually calculated, what factors influence it and whether time/turns somehow effect it!?

Here's some links to posts way back when I had more time to actually think about things like this.

Thread 1

Thread 2

The thread that started the first two

Happy Reading!

 

[monkeyman116]

I remember an instance where a civ had 2 cities, 1 its capital. I took it and the other city declared independance. Thus the number of civs didn;t grow, but there was a new kid on the block. Crazy.

 

[andycapp]

The specific conditions for a Civilization splitting in two in Civ1 are detailed in the Civ1 Game guide CIVILIZATION or Rome on 640K a day by Jonny L Wilson and Alan Emrich. From my observations there would seem to be little or no difference for the conditions for a civ split in Civ2.

Here is what Wilson and Emrich say in their guide.

"If a computer player's capitol is captured, but the player still has other cities left in its civilization, a civil war will break out if all of the the following conditions exist:

- There is at least one civilization not in the game that can form a "rebellious" faction (ie. the Babylonians have been wiped out so the Zulus are waiting in the wings)

- There are greater than four cities remaining in the civilization that has just had its capitol captured

- The civilization that has just had its capitol captured is larger than your civilization

When a civil war occurs, the civilization that just lost its capitol will get a free palace, instantly creating a new capital city. The "rebel" civilization will also get a free palace and the cities will be divided between the two warring factions."

The only observations I would add to these are that I believe there might be a time limit on when a civ split can occur prior to 1750 AD (approx).

The 'rebel faction' created from the split always seems to get a lesser division of resources and is consequently weaker.

Hope that helps.

 

[Lucky]

Originally posted by andycapp
The only observations I would add to these are that I believe there might be a time limit on when a civ split can occur prior to 1750 AD (approx).

The 'rebel faction' created from the split always seems to get a lesser division of resources and is consequently weaker.

No and no.
There is NO time limit.
In my tests I even split a civ in the 20th century!
And the rebel faction is NOT always weaker.
When I split a civ with only 5 cities close together sometimes you get a 2/2 division but it is also possible that the rebels get ALL 4 remaining cities. The split popup will say that there is a civil war but when you click ok you will get the notice that Civ X has been eliminated.

 

[andycapp]

Originally posted by Lucky

No and no.
There is NO time limit.
In my tests I even split a civ in the 20th century!
And the rebel faction is NOT always weaker.
When I split a civ with only 5 cities close together sometimes you get a 2/2 division but it is also possible that the rebels get ALL 4 remaining cities. The split popup will say that there is a civil war but when you click ok you will get the notice that Civ X has been eliminated.

You may well be right Lucky. My observations about a time limit and allocation of resources are just that - observations.