@#$@ Anarchy!

[TheArsenal]

Last night’s game: Because I was always well in the hunt for wonders, I waited until I was a few turns from Motorized Transportation to switch from Republic to Democracy. When I did I got nine turns of anarchy.

Nine.

First off, I can never remember it lasting more than 7 (but I’ve never made a gov’t switch that late with a non-Religious civ.). Is this a change in C3C, or has it always been variable? If so, what determines those variables? Empire size?

It is definitely a strong incentive to play a religious civ. There’s no way in the world I would switch govs more than twice without one.

[Fatwreck]

know the feeling, I just meade the switch from despotism to republic and got 7 turns of anarchy

think I´m gonna stick to religious civs from now on...

[CerberusIV]

I usually change to Democracy in the very late medieval and it always takes 7-8 turns. The only time I tried to go commie in the mid Industrial took 8 turns.

AFAIK the bigger your civ the longer it takes so the penalty is greater the better you are doing.

At monarch I change government twice but never more than that unless religious.

[Oncle Boris]

Unless you switch gov repeatedly, even the 7 turns anarchy is not that bad. When you calculate the extra money, it almost usually pays in the long run.

It's just that watching your civ vegetate is so irritating.

[SirOsis]

Yes it is. Especially when the AI decides that it would be a good time to launch an invasion.

[Boracks]

Yup, switched to democracy late in order to get a wonder done and had it tell me nine turns. Brutal but worth it. Mind you, I had made sure things were relatively stable before going for the switch.

[Jaybe]

Firaxis increased anarchy of religious civs by 1 turn. Anarchy of non-religious civs also increased, though I do not know that was desired (perhaps it was just "expedient").

[gunkulator]

Does anyone else think that Civ3 Anarchy is overly harsh? I mean, no production, no trade, mass unhappiness and starvation - that's a pretty bitter pill to swallow. And for what? The heinous crime of Switching Gov'ts! You can betray your allies and wage war in democracy with less of a penalty.

What was wrong with the Civ2 Anarchy model? It also had no gold or science plus starvation, however waste was only 100% in remote cities.

C3C has added new gov'ts but who wants to waste the time switching? By discouraging gov't switching, Firaxis has limited gameplay similar to the way Espionage has been nerfed to be all but useless now.

[Brundlefly]

I'm playing Hittites on 1.12 and my late-medieval switch from Monarchy to Democracy took only 4 turns

[pvzh]

Why on Earth anyone want to switch out of republic if you are not religious? I mean really? 7-9 turns of anarchy for mere 10% decrease in corruption at best. Even if it was 10% increase in output of shields/commerce it would take 7/0.1 (70) to 9/0.1 (90) turns to reach even point. The game will be over by that time more or less.

If you are not religious stick to one choice (republic) or monarchy if luxuries are problem and you need to wage an eternal war.

[TheArsenal]

Originally posted by gunkulator
Does anyone else think that Civ3 Anarchy is overly harsh? I mean, no production, no trade, mass unhappiness and starvation - that's a pretty bitter pill to swallow. And for what? The heinous crime of Switching Gov'ts! You can betray your allies and wage war in democracy with less of a penalty.

What was wrong with the Civ2 Anarchy model? It also had no gold or science plus starvation, however waste was only 100% in remote cities.

C3C has added new gov'ts but who wants to waste the time switching? By discouraging gov't switching, Firaxis has limited gameplay similar to the way Espionage has been nerfed to be all but useless now.

It’s pretty harsh - and as mentioned, particularly harsh when the AI launches an invasion. In the game I’m playing, I have fairly aggressive neighbors who have not liked me since the dawn of time. So to absorb any potential AI shenanigans I built up a much larger defense force of infantry and arty than I normally would that close to getting tanks. But generally I don’t even do that and have been burned. I can get away with creating an oversized defense force going from Republic to Democracy, but a switch from Despotism to say Republic with a large army and I have to run 10% science for too many turns while I get my economy up to speed. Hate that.

I don’t mind Anarchy, because you can get around by playing a religious civ, but nine turns is just insane.

[Arrian]

The last government switch I made, last night, took 8 turns. I feel your pain.

I was going despot -> republic. I just waited a long time. I had managed to research code of laws and philosophy before the AI, taking republic as my free tech, but then I researched most of the rest of the ancient age tech tree in despotism, while REXing. The reason I did this was that just across a small strait, on somebody else's landmass, was a source of ivory that I wanted to claim. I decided that I wanted to build on it, get the harbor built (all coastal tiles, trade possible right away) and have Zeus built to make sure I got it, BEFORE switching governments. In retrospect, that might have been overly paranoid of me. I would still have gotten Zeus.

Empire size does matter, apparently. I do not know whether it's based on actual size (# of cities) or size relative to the other civs. Either way, a late-game switch in a relatively successful game is likely to be painful for non-religious civs. Which is why I almost never do that.

-Arrian

[Jaybe]

IF the increased anarchy was intentional, then it was obviously a balance/CHOICES issue. If you have a large empire do you want to use a representative government, get a roaring economy yet risk a major war; or do you stay with the other gov types?

Personally, I will sometimes just stay in monarchy if I am anticipating warfare; or I might go democracy during the rail-building period and voluntarily switch again when I anticipate warfare approaching (offensive or defensive).

WHAT are you going to DO?!? Those choices are what the game is all about.

[ErikM]

Originally posted by Jaybe
IF the increased anarchy was intentional, then it was obviously a balance/CHOICES issue. If you have a large empire do you want to use a representative government, get a roaring economy yet risk a major war; or do you stay with the other gov types?

Personally, I will sometimes just stay in monarchy if I am anticipating warfare; or I might go democracy during the rail-building period and voluntarily switch again when I anticipate warfare approaching (offensive or defensive).

WHAT are you going to DO?!? Those choices are what the game is all about.

With all my due respect, what choices are you talking about? With 8 turns anarchy, there is absolutely positively no way I'd ever want to leave Republic unless I'm playing a religious civ.

For this matter, it is not very clear to me what would be the reason to ever leave Republic even if your civ is religious.

Democracy reduces overall corruption by something like 5% but has a major drawback in an increased war weariness. In C3C, it will also have higher unit maintenance costs. [5 units per city/7 units per Metro is cheaper to maintain in Republic rather than in Democracy. I cannot recall ever exceeding this level when Demo becomes available]. Decidedly not worth it.

I have not tried Communism in C3C yet and it looks like it offers the lowest corruption, but reduced commerce would pretty much negate any gains from the reduced corruption. And pop rushing is a major drawback of course. Why would someone want to kill 5 citizens to rush build a tank is beyond me. So Communism is also not worth it.

Fascism we won't even discuss as it looks downright silly.

So for all practical purposes late governments may not even exist. If so, what are the "choices" offered by long anarchy? None whatsoever. Despotism->Republic and maybe, just maybe, Despotism->Monarchy->Republic if your civ is religious. That's it. Long period of anarchy actually reduces my choices rather than expands them.

For government switching to be worth it, either late Governments should be significantly better or the anarchy period should be seriously shortened.

FWIW, I'd advocate max 4 turns anarchy (as in Civ II) and no anarchy at all for religious civs. However, shorter anarchy period is a part of the AI advantage on higher difficulty levels so I do not think it would be even considered by Firaxis.

[asleepathewheel]

I've switched to communism before as a non religious civ. Helped tremendously as the war weariness was killing me. Plus its really a boost for some outlying cities production wise.

If you're going to be at war most of the game, you need to think of an alternative to republic. Communism is great. Sure you can't rush anything, but if you're at war you are probably just churning out tanks or whatnot. Before I would switch, I would of course try to have a good infrastructure already built up, banks, unis and factories.

Communism + mobilization=scary

[Jaybe]

Quote:

Originally posted by Jaybe WHAT are you going to DO?!? Those choices are what the game is all about.

Originally posted by ErikM
With all my due respect, what choices are you talking about? With 8 turns anarchy, there is absolutely positively no way I'd ever want to leave Republic unless I'm playing a religious civ.

So, you have made your choice. My choices may be different, for better or worse. Also, I had intended to point out in my previous post that I play at Regent (my current game is my first at Monarch).

BTW, JesseSmith (Firaxis) has indicated that the goal is to limit anarchy to 8 turns, weighted to 3-5 turns. Back just before the beta-patch came out. It is still topped over at CFC.

[Konquest02]

I think it also depends on the difficulty levels... I was teaching one of my friend to play civ and she just got 2 turns of anarchy while playing the Mayas. She was playing on Warlord.

Never seen nothing like it on the higher levels...

--Kon--

[ErikM]

Originally posted by asleepathewheel
If you're going to be at war most of the game, you need to think of an alternative to republic.

Not necessarily... If you are on a defensive side and can avoid major disasters (like losing cities) you can warmonger almost indefinitely in Republic. If you are weaker than AI and refuse their demands they are very likely to declare war on Emperor+ even if they have no means of actually harming you (ie they are on a different continent). If you never end these "phony wars", -30 war happiness basically stays forever which goes a long way towards maintaining happiness in "real" wars.

Originally posted by Arrian
Empire size does matter, apparently. I do not know whether it's based on actual size (# of cities) or size relative to the other civs.

I *think* I've read somewhere that it is
[1-4 turns from RNG] + [1-4 offset turns based on the city count]
(don't remember if the second term is randomized or not).

With an ultra-early Republic path in C3C it seems possible to get Republic at a point where you only have 5-7 cities. Anarchy is really quite bearable if your empire is that small. In my first try-out C3C game with the Byzantines (Demi) I revolted to Republic circa 1500BC with maybe 6 cities and get only 3 turns in anarchy. Never had less than 5 turns anarchy with vanilla Civ but it was impossible to get Republic that early there.

If this can be pulled off consistently, then religious trait loses a lot of its appeal in C3C.

[asleepathewheel]

Originally posted by ErikM
Not necessarily... If you are on a defensive side and can avoid major disasters (like losing cities) you can warmonger almost indefinitely in Republic. If you are weaker than AI and refuse their demands they are very likely to declare war on Emperor+ even if they have no means of actually harming you (ie they are on a different continent). If you never end these "phony wars", -30 war happiness basically stays forever which goes a long way towards maintaining happiness in "real" wars.

!

I wasn't laying down a golden rule, I was just making a suggestion.

And I can't say that I've played many games on emperor and up where I was mainly the defender throughout the game. i find that passive defense is the surest way to a loss.

[lethe]

Originally posted by ErikM

Not necessarily... If you are on a defensive side and can avoid major disasters (like losing cities) you can warmonger almost indefinitely in Republic. If you are weaker than AI and refuse their demands they are very likely to declare war on Emperor+ even if they have no means of actually harming you (ie they are on a different continent). If you never end these "phony wars", -30 war happiness basically stays forever which goes a long way towards maintaining happiness in "real" wars.

I'd like to state that the opposite is more true. You can wage an eternal offensive war in republic, but not a defensive one. (However keeping a 'phony war' going is always a good idea. Just Wag the Dog.)

You get +2 war weariness points _each_ time one of your units is attacked. But only +1 ww point if you end your turn with 150 units in enemy territory. (It's 1 point for having any amount of troops in enemy territory.) Yes, this means that it's possible to go from no war weariness to anarchy in one single bad turn in democracy.

Even with a slow moving force you can maneuver things so that you in general only get a single point of ww from each city you take. Attack from the corner, one turn in enemy territory, next turn you take the city.

The real danger is that you mess up positioning so the AI SOD gets to attack your SOD. Though that usually means so heavy losses that it's time to sue for peace anyway.

[ErikM]

Originally posted by asleepathewheel
i find that passive defense is the surest way to a loss.

I agree. But I was not arguing about being passive - some civs will make demands even if they cannot realistically harm you. A typical example is a civ on a different continent in Ancient/Medieval. Worst case scenario, they will land 2-3 troops from a galley/caravel, which is hardly a major threat.

I refer to this as "phony wars". They cannot do you any harm and you cannot hurt them either for a long time due to insufficient naval capacity. You cannot trade with them for resources prior to Astronomy/Navigation, so they are useless for practical purposes. They, however, provide you with a 30 war happiness points for the duration of hostilities. Which will be gone if you make a peace. Thus, there is no reason to try to end this particular conflict. Moreover, you can use 30 wwp bonus to wage an agressive war on your immediate neigbours.

In fact, phony wars are one of the best deals in Civ III. Negative war weariness gives you 25% extra happy citizens (iirc). This is better than Sistine+cathedrals. Correspondingly, your phony war enemies are remarkably more useful than your so-called allies. And thankfully, you can always count on the likes of Bismarck to demand proverbial 30gp from you If Bismarck is not particularly close, this may be a beginning of a beautiful game-long relationship

[Xorbon]

7 to 9 turns of anarchy is way too much. It should be reduced to 3 to 5 turns. If designers want to reduce frequent gov't changes (I heard somewhere this was a reason for increasing anarchy time), 7 to 9 turns of anarchy isn't the answer.

I propose having 3 to 5 turns of anarchy, at which point the player picks a gov't type. Then, there would be several turns of increased corruption/waste and/or some other penalties (to represent a period of time during which things settle down from being in anarchy).

[Commander Bello]

As far as I remember, the additional 1 turn of anarchy was introduced, since prior to C3C you could have almost 0 turn of anarchy with religious governments.
I think, it was done somehow like switching before turn's end (with at least 1 unit to be moved). Then, as soon as the next turn came back to you, you already were able to choose the government.
For any non-religious civ, the turns are calculated with an algorithm (3-5 turns + 3-5 for empire size), or something like that.

I agree to everybody who is complaining about the duration of anarchy. It is much to high. At last, we are talking about an epic game of 540 turns. Since in most cases you won't have any chance to change governments prior to turn#100, and it wouldn't make any sense after turn#500 (since everything should be decided then), you have 400 turns in which you might change governments.
If you do it 3 times (which doesn't seem to be that often), you will easily spend 24-27 turns in anarchy. That would be almost 10% of the "useable" time...
Much to high, and definetely something which should be reconsidered. At best, already in a patch to come...

[vmxa1]

I was looking to do a switch in a recent game and it was going to be 9 turns. This was a Sid game, so no way I could take that big of a hit. I wait until it was a 6 turn one.

[gunkulator]

IMHO, anarchy should either be reduced in length or reduced in its effects. I can live with no commerce and starvation but why NO production at all in anarchy? Besides the danger of AI invasions, anyone in a wonder race is unlikely to ever want to change gov'ts.

The way things are right now, Religious really means you have the choice of any gov't, while non-religious means you only get one de facto alternative to despotism with maybe a second choice under special circumstances. That's limiting gameplay quite a bit.

[GarP2]

Originally posted by ErikM

I refer to this as "phony wars".. ...They, however, provide you with a 30 war happiness points for the duration of hostilities. Which will be gone if you make a peace. Thus, there is no reason to try to end this particular conflict. Moreover, you can use 30 wwp bonus to wage an agressive war on your immediate neigbours.
...
In fact, phony wars are one of the best deals in Civ III. Negative war weariness gives you 25% extra happy citizens (iirc). This is better than Sistine+cathedrals. Correspondingly, your phony war enemies are remarkably more useful than your so-called allies.

Stupid Question: What is war happiness?
Better Question: Can someone recommend a good thread on war weariness?

In my current game (Dutch), two of the other 3 remaining AI tribes declared phony war on me very early in the game, and occasionally land 1-3 units on my continent in a half-hearted attack. But I have been in Monarchy most of the time, while they are in Republic. We are just ready to go into the industrial era, I am several techs ahead (regent), and they seem anxious to get the war over with. However, I just ask what I know will be an unreasonable price (an optional tech that I passed over - republic , they get insulted, and the war continues. I've been going on the assumption that this is harder on them than it is on me (not to mention the 10 or so immortals and 5 or so galleys that I've killed). Is this true, and how does that work quantitatively? I'm not trying to hijack the thread and will settle for a link or even a "get lost!".

GarP2

[vmxa1]

You do not suffer any WW in Monarchy so you do not have to be concerned. They will suffer some WW as the war goes on and if they get Feudalism will likely switch.

If you ever noticed after someone declares war on you, the level of happiness goes up. This is the concept of people ralling around the flag. At regent, it may be hard to see as you have two content citizens to start. At EMP or higher you only have one, so it will be seen quickly.

[vmxa1]

Here:

Bamspeedy from CFC

Length of war did not seem to be a factor (only the # of turns you end your turn with units in their territory).

War weariness kicks in at various thresholds.
First threshold: 25% of your people become unhappy (Republic)
50% unhappy (democracy)
Second threshold: 50% unhappy (Republic)
100% unhappy (Democracy)
Third threshold: 100% unhappy (Republic)
Government overthrown (Democracy)
*Republic can never be overthrown

Units you lose, cities you lose, ending your turn in enemy territory contribute to WW.

Universal Suffrage makes 1 person content in all cities (1 person that would have become unhappy because of war weariness).

Police Stations allow 25% of your people to not become unhappy from WW. (so, in republic at the first threshold, you would see no unhappiness).

I guess I should add:

+1 for each turn you end your turn with a unit in their territory
+2 for each unit you lose
+15 if you have a city of yours razed (or captured?)

*possible ones, that haven't fully been checked:
pillaging, starvation of your citizens due to enemies having control of your former cities

First threshold: 30 war weariness points (WW)
Second threshold: 60 WW
Third threshold: 90WW (Democracy)
120WW (Republic)

[Theseus]

Originally posted by vmxa1
I was looking to do a switch in a recent game and it was going to be 9 turns. This was a Sid game, so no way I could take that big of a hit. I wait until it was a 6 turn one.

Huh? How did you know?

Re the general discussion: I played out AU 501 staying in Monarchy, and that was just fine. Admittedly, with the AU Mod... but changing govs was just going to be too painful while in the thick of competition. Needs balancing.

[GarP2]

Thanks vmxa1, that's perfect! Since I kill the units as soon as they land, they must get 1 ww pt for ending their (?) turn in my territory, and 2 more pts for losing the unit. So if my estimate of kills is correct (I'll check tonight), they should be in stage 1 ww, i.e., past the first threshold, and hurting a little. Also means that greater expansion of borders beyond the city means greater cost to the invader.

Would this be considered an exploit, since the AI seems compelled to carry out some sort of periodic attack, even if futile? (sorta serves 'em right for declaring war and attacking me - kinda like the monkey trap of strategy games)

GarP2

(edited for spelling)