Why I think ICS was deliberately designed as an option

[KrikkitTwo]

We need to differentiate between "big empire" meaning "smaller bit more cities", or "more cities and more overall population". Bigger is better, as in 10 cities of size 10 is better than 5 cities of size 10.
.

I agree that 10 cities of size 10 should be better than 5 cities of size 10.
I don't agree that 10 cities size 10 should be 2x as good as 5 cities size 10 in everything.

Currently #2 works for social policies, and slightly for Great Persons... and that is it

For every other output (ignoring Capital effects) 10 cities size 10 are 2x as good as 5 cities size 10

 

[tibbles]

In general a larger civ should always be stronger than a smaller one, it has more people, more production, more resources. In reality it would be far harder to control the larger it gets, but since Civ is a computer game and the player always has total control, this primary disadvantage gets removed. CiV's puppets are about the closest you can get to simulating this and most players hate the removed control.

I think this is the fundamental problem, ICS should be stronger, the superpowers got to be superpowers by expanding everywhere. It's only flaw is being bad for game balance.

 

[Xger]

This right after the last autosave. After Delhi finished the Stasis Chamber, it built a Booster in 6 turns. All the other parts are currently under construction in other cities.

The part that I am not getting is how you are getting such a high level of science to get the tech needed for a SS victory so soon.

 

[ShaqFu]

The problem is not in ICS or horse rushes (although both needs some proper balancing). The main problem is the completely ******** combat AI. And equally ******** non-combat AI.

I'd like to hear input from a MP player (well, those that tolerate it right now) on ICS in MP. If it's as strong as it is in SP, then Civ5 turns into what FreeCiv used to be: two players trying to out-ICS each other. Hell, Civ5 ICS is probably stronger than FreeCiv's, since you get a free military unit (the city itself) + two worked tiles out of the Settler.

(This is another issue with the "well, you need a big army" argument - in Civ5, your army is at least as large as your cities! At least in Civ4, an enemy SoD could roll through your thinly-spread garrisons.)

If you're interested in some reading on ICS at its logical conclusion (Settler slugfests), the FreeCiv wiki has some great stuff (although it's called "city smallpox" there).

There's a reason players clamored to fix ICS in FreeCiv for years - it's just not very fun.

<analysis>

Good stuff, although the obvious response is, what stops the ICS player from having their cake (cities) and eating it too (buying CS alliances)? Given that ICS gets part of its fuel from Maritime CSes, it seems unfair to not apply CS bonuses to ICS empires. Besides, you're thinking small; with ICS, ten cities (and its requisite boost) is only the beginning. 5 cities can keep up in tech with 10 small ones, but good luck out-teching someone with 20 cities.

 

[Elliot]

The part that I am not getting is how you are getting such a high level of science to get the tech needed for a SS victory so soon.

Have you seen his population! He's got ~50 size 15ish cities. If he has 50 cities of 15 population all with a library that is 50*15*1.5= 1125 science just from population. Then add on specialists and maybe universities in some cities and 2k science seems reasonable.

I'm going to have to try India for my next ics game.

Paeanblack, please share some saves from that game. I'd love to check it out.

 

[Paeanblack]

I dunno. Everyone's on this "small empire" craze now, but they forget one key point:
Bigger is supposed to be better.

From what perspective?

From a gameplay perspective, "bigger" in the sense of ICS as it currently stands means much more micromanagement. Personally, I don't find that to be fun. In my India game, as soon as I realized I could beat the 200 turn mark for the space race, I started really heavy micro to make that happen. Thirty turns of clicking through 68 cities turning scientists off and on, rearranging tiles, calculating what is worth rushing, etc, etc is really boring. I had already automated two-thirds of my workers just to shave a minute off of each turn. I only kept a handful under manual control just to build some crucial railroad links.

With Civ 5, I was really excited by puppets. I think/hope the dev team shares some of my views on what level of micromanagement is fun and where that suddenly drops off a cliff. If it weren't for some gross imbalances with puppets (like not increasing SP costs), I would wish that you could turn your own cities into puppets and have some incentive to do so.

Balancing that across all types of gameplay is a seriously daunting task.

 

[KrikkitTwo]

In general a larger civ should always be stronger than a smaller one, it has more people, more production, more resources. In reality it would be far harder to control the larger it gets, but since Civ is a computer game and the player always has total control, this primary disadvantage gets removed. CiV's puppets are about the closest you can get to simulating this and most players hate the removed control.

Well the additional unhappiness+Social policy cost is supposed to model that in Civ 5.. It doesn't.. not well enough.

Adding a tech cost (more science needs to go into education/preserving, disseminating knowledge... and making sure the knowledge won't upset the Imperial order.. would be ideal)

I think this is the fundamental problem, ICS should be stronger, the superpowers got to be superpowers by expanding everywhere. It's only flaw is being bad for game balance.

No they were Recognized as superpowers by expanding everywhere. They 'became' super powers due to proper internal development (why China hasn't been a 'superpower' beyond its region until now)

 

[zzzz]

After the Colosseum is done, you build a Library. After the Library is done, I was concerned with building spaceship parts.

what do you build in the cities after col and lib? seeing you can't build spaceship parts until very late game.

besides the obvious settlers?

 

[UncleJJ]

Other than maintenance and opportunity costs for buildings, I wonder how else a size 20 city is better than two size 10's. The raw food required for a big city is way too big, I agree, but I'm not sure it should be linear.

Well the obvious answer is SPs. Having more cities increases the cost of the next SP by 30% (standard map) for each extra city. So an empire of 5 size 20 cities will have 100% + 4 x 30% = 220% of the base SP cost. Compare that with 10 size 10 cities and we get 370% of base SP costs. If the size 10 cities build monument and theatre and the size 20 build an opera house the two empires would make the same amount of culture per turn. The culture from the 5 cities is 68% more effective meaning new SPs will be gained faster and you should get more. This effect is compounded if fixed cultural sources are added such as CCS and puppets.

Are these extra SPs worth what you have to give up or the extra effort to grow big cities? Currently you have to get to Biology for Hospital to get to size 20 in any meaningful timeframe.

This leads me to another point. Is it really fair to compare 5 size 20 cities to 10 size 10 cities? I have never really had that much space available without conquering and razing. So maybe a more reasonable comparison would be 5 size 15 cities (founded and annexed) plus 5 puppets (size 5 to keep pop equal) versus 10 size 10 cities on the same map with capitals annexed and other conquered cities razed and settled. We have the same pop, same tiles and same timescales. It is much more practical to assume a few big cities associated with some puppets (growth suppressed by TPs). The puppets will help with research a bit, help a little bit with culture and cost nothing extra for SPs and probably break even in terms of gold. They will probably build some colosseums as well so happiness is probably pretty equal between the two empires.

It seems obvious to me that if that is a fair comparison of the options then even if the 10 size 10 cities are ahead on production, gold and even research, the 5 size 15 cities plus 5 puppets will be well ahead in SPs and that can affect the production, gold and research in other ways once the extra SPs come in. It depends on your strategy, for research, economy and SPs as to which is best.

The best way to get bigger cities in the game earlier is one of Ahriman's suggestions: make a building that lowers the food requirement. Right now, if I have a size 10 city and I want more population (because of excess happiness), there's no way in hell I'm waiting for my city to grow. I'm building a new city. You're absolutely right in that Maritimes are the biggest culprit of this by far.


The other problem is that more cities means more happiness, which increases the population threshold. I feel like there needs to be more aid for big cities in getting more happiness. I was thinking of high maintenance buildings that "gives happiness equal to x% of culture", or maybe even simply "gives happiness equal to x% of population". The former's harder to balance but encourages cooler specialization.

Agreed big and medium cities need a growth boost in the early game. A simple fix might be giving the granary 2 food and +25% and then reduce the Hospital to +25% when it becomes available. Small city ICS (as per Sulla) will not benefit from a granary like that but any city growing to size 10 and beyond will be significantly boosted.

Another good idea I've seen floated is to make the colosseum happiness dependent on city size, say 1 happiness per 3 pop. This severely hurts the current type of small city ICS, meaning they have to put a colosseum AND a theatre in each of their now size 6 cities. That's very expensive in hammers, rush gold and maintenance. But it helps the medium and big cities now, and encourages them to grow as each 3 pop only costs 2 happiness. A size 21 city with that colosseum plus a theatre and running 6 Freedom specialists will get 7 + 4 + 3 = 14 happiness covered (4 more than at present).

There are many ways the balance between small cities, medium cities and big cities can be tuned and altered. The worry I have is these solutions to the problems might hurt the AI and cause that to be even worse (I know that hardly seems likely ). We may have to accept a cheating AI that uses different rules for growth and happiness than the players have. I am prepared to accept that if we get a better balanced and more fun game.

 

[KrikkitTwo]

Another good idea I've seen floated is to make the colosseum happiness dependent on city size, say 1 happiness per 3 pop. .

Actually That would be interesting, especially if you applied it to ALL the Happiness buildings...
Each of them give 1 Happiness per 3 pop.... so when you have all 3, a city's population unhappiness is gone. (and Theocratic/Indian Cities get more population for being Larger.... actually that might be to exploity)

Perhaps just each of them reduce Population Unhappiness in that city by 25% So 3+ Theocracy is 5% Population unhappiness.

If you want ICS then,
With Meritocracy, Planned Economy, and Forbidden Palace
you can support as many pop 1 cities as you want... No buildings needed.
But those cities can't Grow...

To Grow your cities, you would need to have Colluseums, Theaters, and Stadiums... In the cities that you wanted to grow. (you would also want Theocracy)

Things like Circuses, Universities, would help ICS, but the Happiness buildings wouldn't

 

[Celevin]

Well the obvious answer is SPs. Having more cities increases the cost of the next SP by 30% (standard map) for each extra city.

Nah, that's covered under "opportunity cost for buildings". The difference in social policies isn't that much if you've got the gold for your new city. In fact, 10 cities producing an average of x culture will gain social policies faster than 5 cities with an average of x culture.

Let's not bring puppets into the equation. I think there's a general consensus that they need to add to social policy costs.

 

[pagh80]

After reading about Paeanblacks game i tried to see if i could achieve the same....

And i did!
I ended with 199 turns(1390AD) like Paeanblack, but only on prince.
I could easily have done it earlier, but my computer would surely crash if i made more cities.
As it was i already had to wait an awful long time between turns.
Also everytime i settled a new city my computer froze for like 15-20 seconds :-/

Spoiler :

I have to say though that ICS seems way out of balance atm. Its just too good.

PS: Im researching Lasers in 1 turn

 

[Paeanblack]

After reading about Paeanblacks game i tried to see if i could achieve the same....

And i did!

Sweet

Now I'm not so embarrassed about letting the autosaves get overwritten in my haste to recreate it. I was getting fearful that it was a very lucky shot and I deleted a work of art.

I've been trying Rome, thinking the +25% production bonus and the Legion road-building would be quite useful, but I'm having problems breaking 250 turns.

 

[Bibor]

Thank you guys for correcting me in my views. You managed to prove to me that - in its current state - ICS is completely broken. I still firmly believe that an ICS-like strategy should be viable, but in power at the same level as other strategies. Maritime city states need a major mechanics rehaul, but almost all aspects of the gameplay mechanics need balancing as well.

 

[gaiko]

I'd be curious to see this on at least Emperor + Pangaea (not continents). At this level I can't peacefully ICS for very long before I find myself in a global war with the collective AI. The usual trigger is an aggressive REX right in my face by a single AI that triggers an inevitable war. This in turn invariably turns the human into a bloodthirsty bad guy, and the global gangbang begins. Eternal war, "business to settle" (translation: destroy the human). At that point the only way out is a substantial takedown of one of the main AI opponents to secure a temporary peace long enough to deal with the other main opponent, and so forth.

Naturally this requires a constant expenditure on military rather than coliseums, settlers and maritimeCS food, slowing down ICS considerably. Conclusion: the back alley thug diplomacy is the main brake on ICS. I will keep trying Emperor + Pangaea to establish this as a predictable pattern. Of course I'm dealing with Augustus and Napoleon - again!

 

[UncleJJ]

Nah, that's covered under "opportunity cost for buildings". The difference in social policies isn't that much if you've got the gold for your new city. In fact, 10 cities producing an average of x culture will gain social policies faster than 5 cities with an average of x culture.

I think you should reconsider. You asked a question and I answered it fully, address my points properly. Perhaps the reason you don't understand the problem is invalid preconceptions

If 10 cities could have the same average culture then yes. But it is a preposterous assumption that 10 size 10 cities (including those newly founded) could easily obtain the same average cultural output to 5 size 15 cities plus 5 puppets in the same timescale. All the evidence from playing the game says this is not the case. Size 15 cities should easily outproduce at least some of the size 10 ones and so will build cultural stuff much faster including national wonders. As soon as 2 CCS are added to the size 15 option, the size 10 option has to add twice as many CCS to maintain the average, and that soon becomes impossible as the number increases. Then there are the effects of wonders, you only get to build them once. Even if both empires build 5 wonders and get Constitution, that leaves a lot of the size 10 cities without one. I reject your assumption as being unrealistic, and by a large margin.

Let's not bring puppets into the equation. I think there's a general consensus that they need to add to social policy costs.

Why not bring puppets into the equation? they exist and a smaller empire should make use of them as I suggest. To do otherwise is a weaker strategy for the option with less cities. If you go with a strategy that involves a few big and powerful cities, pursuing SPs, it makes sense to suppliment them with puppets, for control of territory and resources even if they add little culture. Similarly with CCS, they make sense with few cities and less when you have 10 middle size cities with an average size 10. That's my point about the SPs being the essential difference, and you missed it.

You may think that there is such a general consensus for adding social policy costs to puppets, and I don't. Where is your evidence for a consensus? A few people agreeing with you is not a consensus.

I agree puppets do need to be addressed in future fixes, and I agree with your point in another thread that I would like a greater measure of control over them. But simply making them add to SP costs has consequences, and could be detrimental, depending on what else is changed.

 

[tibbles]

I'm trying an emperor pangea game now, though no way I will hit 200 turn space race. 200-215 turn diplo is doable, but not particularly exciting. I got placed very center of the landmass between some aggressive civs and boxed in at 14 cities. I'm currently expanding by puppets, but I'm already to turn 140 and my research and vertical growth was just too slow. I had to waste too many turns building some horsemen instead of coliseums and libraries and luxury resource variety was atrociously bad (only 3 types in 14 cities and even most city states have the same 3).

 

[Paeanblack]

About the DoWs people are getting:

I'm playing for the most part with an "Always War" attitude on Emperor through Diety. If I catch an AI unit on open terrain with my initial warrior, I attack. If I can do significant damage and stay safe on a hill/forest, I attack. If an AI unit has just fought a Barb, I attack. Very early in the game, there is nothing to lose (except for the long-term diplo effects). You have no tiles to be pillaged, no workers to protect, and your capital can take care of its own defense against the starting AI units.

The earlier the wars start, the less time the AI has to peacefully assemble the critical mass of units that can actually hurt me. My cities are picking off his early units one by one, because exploring the other side of my territory seems to be a HUGE priority for the AI early on. On Diety, this is also one of few times I have anything remotely resembling tech parity with the AI. (I haven't tried the REX-ICS techmonster on Diety yet...still working out the kinks on Emperor)

The upside of this is that I almost never get DoW'd by an AI I'm not prepared for. I don't have to build as much military to stay even in their eyes because they've been losing units over time.

The downside is obviously the diplo hit, but I haven't seen a huge effect from that. The AI seems to respect relative army strength much more than diplo history.

I think a key part of this is hunting Scouts asap. If the AI hasn't explored a particular patch of land, it will keep sending single units to it, even if that means running a gauntlet through your ICS crossfire.

 

[Roxlimn]

How many units do you build? In my recent game, I had 4 AI neighbors. Unique luxuries are naturally near their capitals, not mine. How many units to build? Stick with Warriors or go for Spearmen?

I'm not particularly interested in weakening the AI by exploiting its predictable stupidity. Makes the game less fun for me.

 

[Paeanblack]

Been playing Rome lately, building about 4-5 warriors and buying 0-1, aiming to have them all upgraded to Legions by, say, turn 90ish. Usually, one warrior ends up dying and one becomes a spearman. This is only Emperor though. Diety would need a few more, but I don't know where to squeeze them into the REX+ICS gameplan yet.

In the India game, I built 1 scarcher, 1 archer, and 3 war elephants. IIRC I also bought 2 more war elephants. India just rocks.