Whip + Chop -> Win

[Tiberias]

Am I the only one bothered by the fact that nearly all advanced early-game strategies are based on whipping and chopping (either Axes, or Pyramids, or Artemis, or Settlers, etc.)?

Forget about advanced forms of government, technology, diplomacy, trade . . . enslaving your population and cutting down every stand of woods in reach is the key to success, who would have guessed?

It looks as if BTS delivered a tiny nerf to Slavery, but it's not much. If early game strategy is going to be any more advanced than "whip + chop [insert unit or building here]", some fixes to make whipping and chopping more of a trade-off might be order. I'm not opposed to either of the two, but I think that they should really only be useful for very specific circumstances, either finishing up a mostly-complete Wonder, or getting a unit out for a desperate defense.

Some potential fixes might be:

• Substantially increase unhappiness from whipping, so that the city has a very real, long-term penalty to productivity. Whipping should, in effect, be a city borrowing heavily from its future productivity. The fact that players can set up cities to whip unit after unit, or building after building, is an indication that the penalties are too light.
• Limit whipping to only buildings, or perhaps buildings and workers. Whipping settlers makes absolutely no sense whatsoever. Even if military units could be whipped, it should be as for Conscription where there's an (additional) population penalty and they start out with zero experience.
• Double the time for chops.
• Substantially cut the bonus from chops prior to Iron Working and Replaceable Parts.

I realize implementing any of the above would unleash a tidal wave of complaints, but I actually think it would increase the complexity of early game strategy, not decrease it. Like the old "settler rush", the "chop + whip rush" is just too easy a strategy, the downsides are limited and the upsides--easy early conquests, dominating the Wonders--are too big to pass up. Not until rushing strategies involve serious trade-offs will early game strategy become more interesting.

 

[seasnake]

I think there are some significant penalties that help balance the effect:
1) The loss of population, you get one free unit/promotion in exchange for turns without a tile's production.
2) The unhappiness does add up if you abuse the whip too often, I've ticked off an entire city until they couldn't stand me anymore and refused to work. Sure, I built up my army but it made the city useless
3) The new national park/forest preserve makes damaging a lot of forests a long-term loss to what could have been a perfectly happy/extremely healthy city, when most cities are suffering from health and unhappiness in the later game (expansive is usually ok).

But most of all I think it's accurate. The pyramids and great wall were built be countless slaves and loss of life, yet the Egypt and China didn't shut down from employing slaves. And chopping is always good in real life in the short term, the wood becomes houses, buildings, clears land for towns, etc. Early pioneers logged everything in their path for those reasons.
I think if you have nukes and a lot of chopping it can speed global warming later in the game, so that's kind of a fix.

As far as strategy, the question becomes 1) when do I whip, 2) when do I chop? If you chop all tiles to get one wonder, you won't be able to chop to make anything else. You need to decide do you need the hammer rushes now or later.

 

[Common Sensei]

Random events provide an avenue of drawbacks for Slavery. There is a chance every turn that your capital will suffer a slave revolt, and one of three things happens:

You lose 2 population with no production benefits and city riot that turn.

You lose some gold and 1 population with no production benefits and city riot that turn.

You do nothing and risk the revolt continuing and starting the process over next turn.


Running slavery means you're playing with the RNG. I had one game where I only had one revolt, another game I have six.

 

[the_elf]

Random events provide an avenue of drawbacks for Slavery. There is a chance every turn that your capital will suffer a slave revolt, and one of three things happens:

You lose 2 population with no production benefits and city riot that turn.

You lose some gold and 1 population with no production benefits and city riot that turn.

You do nothing and risk the revolt continuing and starting the process over next turn.


Running slavery means you're playing with the RNG. I had one game where I only had one revolt, another game I have six.

I've been hit with that event a lot, actually. In fact, it almost seems like it triggers more often the later in years that you continue to run Slavery.

I also believe the disadvantages are balanced with the advantages.

 

[snipafist]

Most successful early civilizations chopped down whole forests to fuel expansion, and all early civilizations were slave states (to varying degrees) because it was a successful means of getting a lot of work done with very limited cost. Any civilizations that didn't use slaves and heavily deforest were defeated by those that did. As far as Civ 4 goes, I think it's reasonably balanced. Chopping and whipping are valid only in specific sorts of circumstances for specific types of projects or units. Over-relying on it is detrimental. It's mostly used to give a crucial edge, which is fine by me.

 

[Tiberias]

But most of all I think it's accurate. The pyramids and great wall were built be countless slaves and loss of life, yet the Egypt and China didn't shut down from employing slaves. And chopping is always good in real life in the short term, the wood becomes houses, buildings, clears land for towns, etc. Early pioneers logged everything in their path for those reasons.

You're right, in that many civilizations utilized slavery, and many of the Wonders were built through slave labor. The problem is that it's not just used to speed-build a Wonder here or there, it's the cornerstone of many, if not most, early game strategies. I realize that the game isn't supposed to be 100% realistic, but it just doesn't make sense that everything--not just Wonders, but military units, settlers, buildings, everything--is being slave-rushed.

One serious problem with whipping is that it doesn't scale correctly. Early game, when a city is growing like mad, say six turns to grow, maybe less, the loss of a population unit is not much at all, especially if it saves ten or twenty turns on production. Late game, when population growth is slower, it actually hurts more, which feels backwards. Same for unhappiness--unhappiness penalties early game are easily absorbed due to the low population (a result of all that whipping!), while late game any unhappiness means non-workers.

If nothing else, whipping should decrease population growth (slavery cannot be good for the birth rate no matter how you add it up), and the unhappiness penalties need to be much larger, to compensate for the population loss from the whip.

Chopping also doesn't scale correctly. The amount of Hammers from chops early in the game, relative to the cost of units/buildings/Wonders, is far higher than later in the game. That means that there are huge incentives to chop like mad early in the game, but leave forests standing late in the game. Right now there is scaling for chops, but it's not much. I don't have the game handy, but the scaling for chops should be much more dramatic, on the scale of 10 / 25 / 50 / 100 , depending on era.

As far as strategy, the question becomes 1) when do I whip, 2) when do I chop? If you chop all tiles to get one wonder, you won't be able to chop to make anything else. You need to decide do you need the hammer rushes now or later.

That's exactly what I'm complaining about. The question is not IF the whip + chop should be used, but WHEN and HOW MUCH. I would much rather see more variety in the early game, where the trade-offs are so significant that players actually have to decide if it's even worth it.

 

[Optimizer]

I counter early chopping in my house mod, by halving the production yield, and giving 50% bonus with Paper and Assembly Line.

 

[Zhahz]

You already get less per chop pre-mathematics, and get less per chop without a forge.

You get a happiness penalty per whipping and reduces population, meaning you have to balance whipping vs hurting a city too much. The fact that incredibly food rich cities can grow ridiculously fast (for lots of whipping) doesn't mean the whipping mechanic itself is broken - maybe there should be a cap on city growth instead.

(ie, it makes sense that a food rich city can support more population, but makes less sense that a food rich city inspires people to mate more to fill that potential population figure)

Any given city only has so many forests to chop, you can use them for early production, late production, or not at all - it's a choice you make.

You can reduce a cities health by deforesting.

IMO, since it's a game, as long as the AIs also use the whip and the chop, then it's fair. It's not like players are gaining an advantage the AIs don't also use. Whether or not the AIs whip and chop intelligently could be up for debate.

 

[Kennigit]

Slavery can be useful, but you can still easily make it by on higher difficulties without abusing it. Granted that an occassional whip is needed/preferred, but it doesn't need to be nerfed or weakened.

Chopping is part of the game, and I see nothing wrong with it. I haven't played enough BtS to say for sure, but the AI seems to be chopping less and developing their cities much later than previously on Warlords, making it too easy to beat the AI with your chops + their decreased bonuses.

 

[seasnake]

That's exactly what I'm complaining about. The question is not IF the whip + chop should be used, but WHEN and HOW MUCH. I would much rather see more variety in the early game, where the trade-offs are so significant that players actually have to decide if it's even worth it.

Well, the thing is you haven't earned any other civics so that limits you right there. As far as whip not whip, well, it's beneficial. I would hate a civic that doesn't have enough benefit to make it worth your while, and slavery does. So you kill.
And you have to chop to build most improvements. Consider it a little bonus for being a starting civ.

 

[Michlo]

I wouldn't know. I'll never use slavery and I'd never chop all the trees in my cities down.

 

[Wolfwood]

I never use slavery and I always automate my workers. The first because I roleplay and not powerplay a leader and the second because I just cannot be bothered to learn the differences between all the possible things that the workers can do. If they chop automatically, I let them - which in turn means that there's practically no forests left when the national parks thing comes around.

BTW: I'm still able to win on Noble even though I don't use the much-recommended strategies. I wonder if the new AI uses them a lot when trying to be "more human"?

 

[Astax]

I don't understand what the problem is? There is alternative to slaving like mad if your city has a ton of special tiles. But other than that I think slaving is fine. It lets you get rid of excess pop as well as gives you the extra production you need. All in all it is good. It is the only civic you can get early on, and why shouldn't it be useful?

Chopping has been nerfed a lot already. And once again I feel it is more than balanced. It requires micromanagement and it separates the boys from the men. Knowing how to chop and slave properly is a skill one acquires through a lot of play.

 

[[Comrade]RaVE]

Getting setup in game makes slavery a good choice, but after a while I like doing as much as possible to speed up science and development. Chop-rushing and slave-rushing are really only good, to me anyways, in the early parts of the game.

Historically it makes sense. I don't understand those people in MP who play on slavery the whole game, though.

 

[agoodfella]

how did input those bullet points?

i know, nerd alert, but i'm curious nonetheless

 

[jackdog]

is it true that if you continue to run slavery you have increased risk of the revolt event happening, this has seriously hampered by recent game as capital has done it three times in about 20 turns and its my only real powerhouse.

 

[yavoon]

extreme human cruelty+environmental degradation=conquer the world.

yah thats about right.

 

[frob2900]

I never use slavery and I always automate my workers... ....If they chop automatically, I let them - which in turn means that there's practically no forests left when the national parks thing comes around.

At least turn on "Automated workers leave forests" and "Automated workers leave old improvements" if you are going to automate them (which is a bad idea btw.)

And use some slavery. If not for powerplay then for roleplaying the ancient world

BTW: I'm still able to win on Noble even though I don't use the much-recommended strategies.

That's pretty much the highest skill level you will win easily without at least some slavery+worker management.

 

[IronCrown]

Yeah, after all Noble is the level for players that "cannot be bothered to learn the differences between all the possible things that the workers can do".

 

[DrLaban]

You can beat the game at much higher difficulties that noble without slavery. Look for some of the SGs in Stories and tales (or maybe strategy and tips). It's harder, but slavery isn't essential.

Personally i save as many forests as I can in my cities, I think forests provides a nice buffer against unhealth and I don't think it's always optimal to chop all the forests you can.