The Ultimate ICS Thread: Revived (author: korn469)

[yin26]

Since this has become a hot topic again, I thought I'd post this for some people to consider. --Yin

The ultimate ICS thread: analysis and solutions

1. What is ICS?

ICS also know as infinite city sprawl, is a strategy in civ games where a person seeks to create an endless amount of cities radiating out from a central hub. these cities generally lack the overall infrastructure of a so called perfectionist strategy where cities are spread out and are highly developed. the perfectionist strategy calls for maximizing each city's production. ICS is about optimizing your civ's overall production.

2. Why is ICS a problem?

ICS is a problem for a multitude of reasons, but the biggest problems arise from the current civ models for city production, unit support, the happiness model, and the growth model. i will address each model one at a time

city production:

the civ model for city production is base squares worked equal number of workers per city plus one multiplied by the total number of cities
or
(W+1)xC where w=workers per city and C=total number of cities

additionally each city is a production center

for example we have two civs: the green civ is a perfectionist civ with one size 10 city, the yellow civ is an ICS with ten size 1 cities

the yellow civ started with one colony pod and spent 270 minerals building nine more, each of the yellow civ's city have no infrastructure...

the green civ's city has the following alpha centauri infrastructure...a recyling tank, a recreation commons, a hologram theater, a tree farm, and one 1-1-1 police units costing 260 minerals...

all citizens of both civs are workers, and all citizens are working a forest square; there are no special resources or economy or industry bonuses

the yellow civ's total output is:
base square: 20-10-11 (+1 for HQ)
workers: 10-20-10
total: 30-30-21
surplus: 20-30-21 (minus people eating)

the green civ's total output is
base square: 3-2-3 (+1 for HQ)
workers: 20-20-10
total: 23-22-13
surplus: 13-22-6 (minus people eating and maint.)

additionally the yellow civ has ten production centers while the green civ only has one

unit support:

using the same stats for the yellow and green civs, if both civs have zero support ratings in the social engineering table, gives us

the yellow civ can support 20 units for free
(2x the number of cities)

the green civ can support 2 units for free
(2x the number of cities)

happiness model

using the same stats for the yellow and the green civs we get the following happiness scores

on librarian on a standard map at zero effic.

the green civ has a total of 10 workers seven of them are drones before base facilities and garrison units
four are taken care of by base facilities
three are taken care of by the police garrison unit (assuming the green civ has a police rating of +3)

the yellow civ has no drones

the growth model

with adequate food and a pop boom the green civ could only grow one citizens per turn, while under the same conditions the yellow civ could grow ten citizens per turn

also it cost ten food per worker to grow a base by one citizens so at size one the yellow civ's bases would only need one tenth of the food to increase by one citizen compared to the green civ

Solutions and analysis:
this is only the first installment of proposed solutions, and only a brief analysis for now...i intend to further explore causes, effects, and solutions for ICS plus add in more analysis

Re: city production:

although i am unsure of what to do about the (W+1)xC problem, i do have one proposed fix for this...advanced cities after building some facility should be able to produce more than one unit per turn...in Alpha Centauri i would suggest that each factory facility (genejack, robotic, nanoreplicator, quantum converter...) should add a new building slot...so if a city had all five of those facilities it could produce a maximum of six units at once

Re: Unit Support:

this is quite simple to fix. add in global unit support. give one point of support for each population unit. a side note to this is unis get more advanced and costly they should cost more support.

Re: Happiness Model:

though not as easy as a fix as unit support (which could be implemented in various ways but would still have global unit support as its crux) civs with a roughly equal population should have roughly equal drones reguardless of cities. Also, and this though not completely related to overall happiness, does have direct consequence to the problem. A city should not be able to have more specialists of any kind (i'm mostly refering to doctors/empaths/transcendi) than it has workers (until it's of a huge size like 20+), and a city should always have to have at least one worker.

This would stop people being to escape drone riots at will by simply turning workers into specialists to avoid drones. currently it is possible to ALWAYS avoid growth related drones only using specialists, without units or facilities if you are paying attention. This model would also help enfore the pacifism penalty. Currently a size one city with the only citizen turned into a doctor could support an entire army and suffer no pacifism penalty. With supply crawlers ferryingminerals back it could easily support 10 needle jets which normally would incure 20 drones due to pacifism. Also, pacifism drones like unit support should be global (working in the same way as ineffic. drones do)

Re Growth model:

this is fairly simple...do not base the growth model entirely on food surpluses

korn469

[splangy]

ummm this is civ 3 not alpha centuria

[yin26]

The same principles apply...

[yin26]

Some of the other ICS threads could really use this information. Trust me...so I won't let this thread drop for a while.

Originally posted by yin26
Some of the other ICS threads could really use this information. Trust me...so I won't let this thread drop for a while.

I believe this problem as you call it, is going to corrected by the new model. That is, it will take a city size 3 before you can build a settler, plus a city size 2 before you can build a civ worker. Until we know how fast the city can collect enough food to gain 1 pop. point, why should we worried? When the city start out, the city worker will only be able to work the first 8 tiles. This will be the big item. If each tile produces one food item, per/turn, then it could take a long time before we gain a pop. point. However if each tile is producing two or three foods per tile, per/turn, then we would gain a pop. point a lot faster, and therefore be able to produce settler a lot quicker. If I remember correctly Dan M. said they (Firaxis) are going to slow down the number of cities that you can build.

[yin26]

Yes, "slow down" is all the Firaxis 'fix' will seemingly do. ICS will still be with us...but slower. Not sure if that's a fix or an annoyance. We might well just have much slower (and potentially boring) early games.

One thing I like about korn's suggestion is to simply allow bigger cities to produce things simultaneously. In fact, the inability NOT to produce more than one unit a time has always been a weakness of the game, IMO. So giving this ability to bigger cities makes perfect sense and offers a substantial equalizer against a slew of tiny cities producing at a fraction of the rate.

[KrazyHorse]

The point is, if an ICS player's expansion is slowed, but the growth of a perfectionist civ is not slowed (or even just slowed less), then ICS becomes less attractive comparatively.

[yin26]

Slowed? = Yes

Less Attractive? = Perhaps

Fixed? = No

But let me just say that making expanding your cities too much of a hassle would also slow the game to such a degree that it might be horribly boring for too many turns.

[KrazyHorse]

It's just a matter of scale. Eventually, ICS becomes so difficult to support that a more balanced approach to gameplay will win 90% of the time.

[yin26]

Yes, scale is my point. 10 cities can produce / support a lot more and a lot faster than 1 10-size city. This is scale. Not only that, but those 10 cities have the added bonus of taking up more map and getting to better resources faster.

We won't know until we play, of course, but I'm willing to bet that the computer will still fall for the same old tricks. What this might help with, however, is against a human player who will be more clever in using a mix of ICS / Perfectionist strategies. That's fine by me.

[korn469]

well from what i have heard i think that firaxis is trying their best to make ICS a thing of the past, however i am not completely sure if all of their ICS safeguards will work

first let me point out that their is a difference between expansion and ICS, all good players will expand and the players who expands the most should have an advantage over a player who neglects expansion...however ICS is more or less an exploit of the game mechanics, it is not really about expansion it is about taking advantage of how cities work...

2 pop settlers and the seperation of settlers and workers will curb ICS to an extent but this alone will not end ICS, it will however for all practical purposes take away the extra production square from founding a new city...but this is only one of the reasons that ICS exists

the second way that firaxis is attacking ICS, is by supporting military units with gold...this has been mentioned in various previews and if it is true, then it could curb ICS more than 2 pop settlers, because this will take away all of the free support units that exist in civ2

in civ3 if two civs have the same population and the same form of government and the same number and types of units in their army, then they should have to pay the same amount of upkeep on that army...

i'm not saying that a democratic and a communist army should cost the same to support but i am saying that two 20 pop communist civs should have to pay the exact same upkeep on their 10 rifleman army, if one civ has a single size 20 city, and the other has twenty size one cities it shouldn't matter...and i really have my fingers crossed on this one (in civ2 the twenty size one cities would provide twenty times the amount of support, which causes ICS)

firaxis also has another ace up it's sleeve with special resources...if implemented correctly, special resources could really hammer an ICS empire, and by being done correctly, i mean that if a single special resource node is supply ten cities who are all building legions then that iron deposit should deplete at a much higher rate than if just one city is using a an iron resource node to build legions

then there are two other X-factors that are present in civ3 that could make ICS as widespread as in every other civ game, and that is population growth and wonders...

the fact that ten size one cities need the same exact amount of food to grow by ten population points as one size ten city needs to grow by one population point is going to encourage ICS...firaxis needs to reaxamine this and make changes as appropriate

then there comes wonders...

wonders could be really interesting and could add spice to civ3, like for example if sun zu's war acadmy gave all cities with a baracks some special benefit...instead of sun zu's just counting as a barracks in every city

all of the wonders that simply "counts as buildingX in every city" breed ICS, bore the players, and are really less than wonderful

it is my dream that civ3 will NOT include any wonders that simply count as a certain building in every city (or even in a certain number of cities)

if all wonders could grant certain special abilities to a civ, that did not duplicate the effect a building but instead either enhanced the power of a certain type of building or just let that civ do something special then i would be a very happy person...we need more wonders like the network backbone in civ 2.3 (SMAC) and less wonders like the command nexus

so i hope that ICS won't exist in civ3, but until we have more information i'm really not sure if firaxis has done enough to end ICS or not

[yin26]

The MAN himself shows up! Thanks, Korn. I think your explanations and comments on this topic have been outstanding. I'm glad I dragged you back in here.

[Imran Siddiqui]

Yin, you know this was a subtle ploy to get Korn back in here .

Nice analysis, korn... very interesting.

[To_Serve_Man]

I agree with Korn469.. the new features that are going to be added to Civ3 will change ICS. I wont re-state them, Korn already did it very nicely.

But my real problem is, why do we need to get rid of ICS? ICS should be part of Civ3. Theres more than one way to skin a cat. There is more than one way to play Civ. Theres no need to Solve ICS. There needs to be news ways to promote different types of games styles.

[polypheus]

Originally posted by To_Serve_Man
I agree with Korn469.. the new features that are going to be added to Civ3 will change ICS. I wont re-state them, Korn already did it very nicely.

But my real problem is, why do we need to get rid of ICS? ICS should be part of Civ3. Theres more than one way to skin a cat. There is more than one way to play Civ. Theres no need to Solve ICS. There needs to be news ways to promote different types of games styles.

As has been said many times, in Civ2, ICS is the optimum strategy to use. It is not merely one of many possible successful strategies, but is the optimum strategy. This is mainly owing to the game mechanics as described well by korn469.

By "solving ICS", most people mean that it is solved in such as way that an ICS strategy is risky and not necessarily optimum most of the time but not making it impossible either.

The point is that ICS should NOT be the optimum strategy to use all the time.

[korn469]

ICS is not even really a strategy, it is the optimum way to take advantage of the game mechanics...ICS is not even really about expansion, it is just about having tons and tons of cities

the 2 pop settlers alone will cut down on the most aggressive ICS players, but it will still come down to the fact that 10 size one cities are much better than one size 10 city, because they can rapidly become ten size 4-6 cities, in just a few turns with the power of "we love" pop booming

i think that ICS has already caused a great deal of damage to the multiplayer aspect of civ2 because the game almost always boils down to a ICS slugfest...basically ICS is civ's version of the tank rush...the tank rush didn't do anything for RTS games, and they have been trying to solve the tank rush problem since C&C

the main reason that ICS CANNOT be defined as a strategy is because a few simple tweaks of the rules will stop ICS dead in it's tracks...you can still be an expansionist civ without using ICS, and tweaking game mechanics will not stop players from expanding in civ3 (nor should it)...however those game tweaks will stop ICS because it is an exploit and not a strategy

for example firaxis could change settlers to require 4 pop points, and this would not stop people from building new cities and expanding, but it would prevent them for building city after city, as close as possible, because the total number of cities (and not total population or infrastructure or anything else) would no longer be one of the keys to a successful empire (when built ICS style)

i really think that the firaxis team recognizes the problem of ICS (especially in multiplayer) and that they want to remedy it

[To_Serve_Man]

Originally posted by korn469
ICS is not even really a strategy, it is the optimum way to take advantage of the game mechanics...ICS is not even really about expansion, it is just about having tons and tons of cities

i think that ICS has already caused a great deal of damage to the multiplayer aspect of civ2 because the game almost always boils down to a ICS slugfest...basically ICS is civ's version of the tank rush...the tank rush didn't do anything for RTS games, and they have been trying to solve the tank rush problem since C&C

the main reason that ICS CANNOT be defined as a strategy is because a few simple tweaks of the rules will stop ICS dead in it's tracks...you can still be an expansionist civ without using ICS, and tweaking game mechanics will not stop players from expanding in civ3 (nor should it)...however those game tweaks will stop ICS because it is an exploit and not a strategy

for example firaxis could change settlers to require 4 pop points, and this would not stop people from building new cities and expanding, but it would prevent them for building city after city, as close as possible, because the total number of cities (and not total population or infrastructure or anything else) would no longer be one of the keys to a successful empire (when built ICS style)

i really think that the firaxis team recognizes the problem of ICS (especially in multiplayer) and that they want to remedy it

No way. ICS is a gameplay strategy just like anyother way one plays the game. Everything you said can be applied to any other playing style. ICS (and Tank Rushs, etc) are they way they are because players experiment with new ideas and game strategys, and use them. By making new additions to the game, Civ3 is not destroying ICS, its mearly changing it.

[korn469]

ICS is a gameplay strategy just like anyother way one plays the game.

ICS is an exploit, just like building around a city so you can't be nuked...there is a difference between expanding your empire and using ICS, a big difference, the reason people do ICS is because it works, because of the adavanttages to having another city outweighs the benefits of building up your empire

ICS is great for fighting wars, because it allows for a huge military because of the way unit support is handled in civ, and because of all of the extra production you get from having all of those free squares...2 pop settlers and global support will more than likely end ICS (i hope) but it will not deter people from expanding or building lots of cities

if ICS was a real strategy it could stand a few changes in the rules and would still be viable...but since ICS is an exploit a few rule changes will virtually end it...i mean 2 pop settlers and global unit support are some huge nerfs from firaxis that will make building cities obsolete...but those changes alone could end ICS

i think you are confusing rapid expanion with ICS which it isn't...if you don't expand and do it quick enough in civ you should pay the consequences...but by expanding you don't have to ICS, you can pick good locations for your cities because growing them might actually be of some value now

ICS means that you don't need infrastructure in your cities (besides a very very basic few after you build lots and lots of settlers) because you don't plan on them growing...and this isn't a strategic choice...basically ICS is unbalanced to the point that by not adopting ICS you are putting yourself at a great disadvantage with no positives...strategic choices means you sacrifice one thing to gain an advantage in another area...with ICS this doesn't happen, either you exploit the rules or you needlessly make the game harder on yourself

if the firaxis team makes the correct choices they will destroy ICS, and that in my opinion will be for the good of civ3

[Hasdrubal]

Originally posted by korn469

then there comes wonders...

all of the wonders that simply "counts as buildingX in every city" breed ICS, bore the players, and are really less than wonderful

it is my dream that civ3 will NOT include any wonders that simply count as a certain building in every city (or even in a certain number of cities)

This is my favourite part of your already impressive post.



Firaxis has got one more means of stopping ICS: the Culture Model.

Though I'm still quite unaware of how this model will work, it is by no means sheer speculation that this could in theory be the most potent weapon against ICS. The sheer thought of the influence that even one huge, well-developed city could exert over a zillion tiny, ICS'ed enemy-villages should make all the ICS-ers out there tremble with fear.

I hope that the developers will look into this means of stopping ICS. It could be developed into a far more subtle, strategic counter-measure against ICS than a plain alteration of the rules.

[korn469]

Hasdrubal

you are right...culture could have been specifically created to counter ICS, we don't know all of the ins and outs of culture so it's only a theory right now, but we do know that a strong culture, which would come from having cities that are highly developed, have a direct corelation to a civ's borders, and that culture alone can cause small boder cities to switch alliances

culture could have a number of other uses, one of which is ease of special resource gathering which is required for producing most military units, all of which could combat ICS, especially when you add in 2 pop settlers and global unit support

sometimes like this i get excited when i realize that civ3 will be a significant upgrade from civ2...so as we learn more i'm sure we'll be able to theorize with increasing accuracy

hopefully an upgrade that will make ICS an exploit of the past

[Grumbold]

Originally posted by korn469
we do know that .... culture alone can cause small boder cities to switch alliances

I really would appreciate anyone posting a link to anywhere this is stated by a Firaxian.

[campmajor!]

What is ICS really about?

If you just build settlers, will you not be weak for attacks?

In my opinion you must build some military units as well, because if you don't your cities are to vulnerable....

But my strategy is also to expand as fast as possible, just a little bit more balanced. The old cities in the middle of your empire take on other tasks, like building Wonders, but my cities on the bounderies of my empire all build settlers to expand!

I cannot understand perfectionist people who say they only need 10 cities.

So why is ICS bad?

[korn469]

Grumbold

check out this link

http://www.civfanatics.com/civ3infocenter.shtml#culture

and here is a screenshot from the culture advisor

http://www.pczone.co.uk/guest//newne...7-7-2225.pjpeg

[dennis_caver]

Yes, Firaxis did slow down ICS to the point of a poor strategy, but
it is more realistic to pay more for workers and settlers.

But it does make the beginning 4000-00 B.C. very slow and actually
boring. I personally would rather play with ICS. I like those Elephant
raids and building a Empire early in the game with conquest. Also if
everybody is doing it , including the AI, then ICS is less effective, but
it is not realistic.



Now back to realism. During the B.C. time frame, Empires were built
and small civilizations disappeared from history. These empires were
created by building new cities, but primarily they were expanded
by conquest and SUBJUGATION. For realism and empire expansion,
subjugation should be part of the Civ III diplomancy. When a large
civilization encounters a small one, one of the choices of the large
civ is to attempt to coerce the smaller to join the great empire.
Something like this happened alot in history. The coercion may
actually start out as a attack but a negotiated surrender could
include subjugation.

I think this would be more realistic and bring back the fun in the
beginning of the game.



Cavin forever,

Dennis

[yin26]

Yes. I think this 'fix' will make the early game horribly slow, which is something I detested about CtP. Perhaps Korn should pay those guys a visit to get a much better solution?

[korn469]

ok a city harvesting a 2 food square will take 12 turns to grow, and it will be able to build a settler on turn 13, which will then found a new city using ics about turn 16...a city harvesting 2 food on all squares will hit size 3 at turn 27 and will be able to make a new settler on turn 28 and will found a new city about turn 33...so in civ3 this means you will have about half the cities at turn 100 that you would have in civ2, and it might be less than half, because of the workers poaching some of your pop points

except for one little thing...the number of shields, and not pop points is usually the limiting factor for building settlers early game, so maybe it wouldn't slow you down as much as you think...just going to estimate and say that in civ3 using ICS you'd have about 2/3rds the number of cities you'd have in civ2, and not using ICS but just expanding you'd have about 3/5ths the number of cities as an ICS player would have in civ2

so would that in and of itself make the game horribly slow yin?

though one non ICS way to speed up the begining of the game would be to start with 2 or maybe even three settlers, a worker, and a military unit

dennis

i'm all for more diplomatic options

[yin26]

Well, according to your calculations, I'd say: 1/3rd slower! (for ICSers). This is a serious consideration: Has this 'fix' come at the price of game pacing? If so, have we traded a negative for a double negative?

Ultimately the game design itself will determine whether there are things sufficiently interesting enough to do while you plod through the 1/3rd slow-down time. I can't imagine what that might be, though, since the game really starts once two or more civs contact each other...and now that contact will come much slower...

[Rasputin]

seems to me that we reaaly ahve to wait till Civ 3 appears before we will be able to judge whether ics is fixed or not.. ICS i beleive was never in syds original concpet, it is jsut players discovering the basic programming in civ 2 didnt encourage city development just city building. ...

[Grumbold]

Originally posted by korn469
Grumbold

check out this link

http://www.civfanatics.com/civ3infocenter.shtml#culture

and here is a screenshot from the culture advisor

http://www.pczone.co.uk/guest//newne...7-7-2225.pjpeg

Thanks Korn. I would point out that civfanatics admits to having "gathered from numerous previews and articles, both official and unofficial" so its not straight from Firaxis. While this remains a strong arguement it is possible it is just as much local myth there as here at Apolyton since it all comes from the same early previews, not from the culture details on Firaxis website.

I have reservations about some of their culture "facts" and certain others e.g. "Civ 3 will have contoured maps" are plainly not supported by the most recent information released. I suspect they are only reporting whatever thoughts were (mis)interpreted from a Firaxian interview and any mechanism for how hard and far a cultural border can be pushed is likely to remain open to change until late beta anyway.

It's a little early to be treating culture push as a fact and I'm very sceptical about its reliance on the nearest city's ratings. You don't see Switzerland encroaching into France because Geneva is nearer the border than Paris! Having it affect how fast one culture is absorbed by another after capture is another matter entirely and I applaud that concept.