A new take on culture

[Stefu]

BTW, about cultures, I have one question. Let's say that Barbarians, for instance Vandals, take one of my cities (and indeed I hope that unlike the pitiful little pipsqueaks of Civ2 the Barbarians will be able to take over cities.) and hold it for some amount of turns. Will this city develop a 'Vandal' culture? When I take it back, will it still be Vandal? Can it rebel because of it's Vandal identity?

[Blaupanzer]

If cities convert based on cultural effects, then it will be much harder to take and hold the cities of a stronger culture. They will riot more readily, convert back if they can (taking your occupying trops with them), etc. This is the Chinese method of resistance, absorb your enemies and reemerge as an independent state.

[Mahdimael]

I'm really seeing culture as almost a "half-concept" in terms of gameplay. What I mean is that culture seems to be the side effect of normal growth. For instance, if someone builds a temple, they'll be doing it to appease the populace rather than to expand their cultural dominance. Yet an increase in culture will result. It will be interesting to see if there are "culture-only" buildings or if all culture will be derived from structures which give other benefits.

In any case, it's intruiging

[Sabre2th]

Just FYI, there really *is* an opportunity cost involved in persuing a "cultural" strategy. A lot of city improvements don't contribute anything to your culture -- granaries, barracks, city walls, and so on. The palace and the temple are the first two city buildings that contribute to culture. If you decide to go after a cultural strategy you have to make some sacrifices, and don't forget the earlier you invest in culture-producing buildings, the more culture you reap from them each turn. This gives you some interesting choices to make.

In the early stages of the game, for example, should you build a barracks first, or go for the temple? Without a temple, your culture will be based solely on the age of your palace, and you get very little from the palace. So if you go for the temple, you are taking a chance that you can defend yourself with whatever less skilled defenders you have. If you go for the barracks, you miss out on a bunch of turns' worth of culture that a temple could be generating for you.

I've played games where I employed cultural tactics and was able to assimilate some enemy border cities by spending a lot of shields putting wonders and culture-producing buildings into cities, but as a result I had a relatively weak military and had to resort to diplomacy to keep me out of war situations. This often meant I had to submit to tribute demands from civs that were militarily more powerful. I've also played games where I eschewed culture in favor of military stockpiling, but as a result my borders rarely expanded very far, and as a result I couldn't reach resources I needed. I subsequently had to rely on colonies to help me reach resources, which is always a riskier strategy than keeping your resources inside your borders.

And to answer your next question the new Civ site is almost done.

Dan
Firaxis Games, Inc.

Even if culture is just a result of growth, it has a profound effect on how you play the game and the choices you make.

[tniem]

Dan has certainly made me a lot more interested in the way culture is going to work with trade offs. It also answers the question I posed about colonies in a seperate thread, being what is their worth.

The thing that is important to figure out is whether nationality of pop points is going to be the same thing as their culture. And can I have my culture influence pop points in nations that I trade with, even if I don't share a border?

[Taliseian]

From what I've seen, it seems that the "Culture Strategy" is well thought out.

I am curious tho about the taking over of cities via culture.

Does the city fully change, or is it partial and subject to take over again if the loser builds a stronger culture.

Also, are there enough culture only (or culture limited) building to support working on culture as a Primary Strategy, or is it just an add-on to working Peaceful Tech?


Talisieian



BTW....get that damn site up, already!!!

[Sabre2th]

I think the aim with culture is to add a whole new depth to the game. Instead of playing the same old thing again, players will have to find their own ways to integrate culture into their strategies.

[Sabre2th]

BTW....get that damn site up, already!!!

I second this.

[jsw363]

I wonder if what was said on the civfanatics site "Every population point that gets built in Civilization III has a nationality. If you're France, every person that's born in one of your cities is French, and they have cultural ties to France," is true?

If so this would profoundly impact the way in which cities convert. If a French city was built on the German border and the Germans has a much higher cultural rating would that mean that the citizens created in the French city would be "born German"? Then would the city become part of the German nation when the Germans in the city outnumber the French? Or are citizens created in a city always born into the owner civilization? I guess this all boils down to whether it's possible to convert citizens or whther they stay one nationality forever.

Opinions? Anyone who can clarify this issue?

[lockstep]

as presented, cultural option might be less 'controllable' than a military one. that is, the more culture, the bigger empire, even without my control, unless i want to stagnate. that is, i cannot 'project' culture towards someone, it just evenly spreads. whereas, i can direct my military attacks with precision.

LaRusso: Looking at the 'Cultural Advisor' screenshot (http://www.civfanatics.com/cgi-bin/a...s/7-7-2225.jpg), I guess that there is a rather straightforward connection between the culture value of a given city (resulting from certain improvements and wonders) and the border size of that city. Therefore, besides from generally pursuing a "cultural strategy", it should be possible to expand your borders in a particular direction.

[Kevin Ar18]

Originally posted by yin26
I wonder, though, how good that AI is? So much hangs on that...

I agree.... I wish so much that Civ3 will have a superior AI that can handle things like culture and resources well -- not to mention that can actually make a decent siege to conquer cities.

[The Andy-Man]

culture should be ascociated with hapiness. so as to engourage more luxuries. i eman, under a monarchy which had little unhappiness, i would never ruyn any luxury rate. same with fundy. there needs to be more encourgagemnt

[Sabre2th]

Does anyone else find Andy's description a little strange/disturbing?

Warlord of Men who want to be attractive ladies and indulge on lesbian sex

[LaRusso]

Originally posted by lockstep


LaRusso: Looking at the 'Cultural Advisor' screenshot (http://www.civfanatics.com/cgi-bin/a...s/7-7-2225.jpg), I guess that there is a rather straightforward connection between the culture value of a given city (resulting from certain improvements and wonders) and the border size of that city. Therefore, besides from generally pursuing a "cultural strategy", it should be possible to expand your borders in a particular direction.

exactly. however, still, a city projects a zone of say 3 cultural influence squares whatever in every direction. you cannot control THAT, i guess...whereas you can stock your armies and attack at precisely the point you want.
say you have a cultural metropolis you may involuntarily encroach culturally on you ally's border city as well as on your enemie's....

[The Andy-Man]

sorry. i made a typo, its ment to say indulg IN lesbian sex

[SerapisIV]

I seem to remember a preview or Firaxis statement that said that each pop point will have a culture assigned to it, a culture that will remain with it for the rest of the game. Also there was mention of civs like the Romans and French starting closer then the Roamns and Chinese on World maps.

Here's the question, how many cultures are there (IIRC, there are to be 5)? What are the cultures? My guesses are:
Asian
Euro
African
Native American
Persian/Middle Eastern
How will they effect gameplay?

Another question, being that Firaxis has this sudden fetish for unique units, unique civs and such, will the cultures have unique attributes, such as more warlike, more peaceful, more scientific, etc? I hope not for the Firaxis PR dept's sake due to claims of racism and such, but I'd give it a fair chance Firaxis will.

Am I completely off-base with these ideas? Most of them are questions based on previewed info on culture and that there are 5 different types, but I'm just wondering how it will actually be a part of the game. If anyone can provide info that disputes this info (preview, Firaxis quote, etc) please do so and provide a link, I want to get this culture stuff figured out.

[korn469]

Father Beast

I wonder if they will implement the idea I had that culture dictates how often leaders will show up to help you. low culture, less leaders, less stacked armies. get trounced by the stacked armies of the cultural elite.

I personally disagree with the idea of buildings that only produce culture. I think it should just be an added incentive to certain already existent buildings. personally.

from what we know, great leaders come from military units winning battles and not from culture...also unless you switch to the nationalist government you get 1 stacked army for every 4 cities

as for culture being an added incentive to produce certain buildings...i'm fine with that except from what we know the culture buildings so far are some of the most vital buildings in the game that already have more than enough incentive to build them and to build them early...in my opinion it would be nice if there were certain buildings that either multiplied the effect of culture like the marketplace, bank, stockmarket do for gold in civ2 or would just add to culture (but would add more than normal buildings)

as for my avatar it is from a NiN website, and has nothing from that horrible movie A.I. in it

LaRusso

from all of the information present culture helps diplomacy instead of hurting it

One More Turn!

Given what Dan, and others in this thread have said. It would seem that culture could be used as more a defensive strategy than offensive. Strong culture keeps your borders strong, and expanding (even if slowly), and makes it harder for your enemies to subvert your cities.

i think you are just about right here...culture prevents players from engulfing you with little ICS cities, and it gives you a kind of DMZ to protect your cities, the larger your borders the further away you can opperate your forces in a democracy (speculating here) before unhappiness sets in, the earlier you can call upon other civs to remove their troops, and the further away the enemy has to place their bases

stefu

when one of your cities gets captured none of the preexisting buildings count toward the capturing civ's culture...so in order for the barbarians to get a culture they would have to build culture producing buildings, which might be impossible if they don't have any tech...also the citizens will remain part of your nationality and they will be very likely to rebel and rejoin your empire

Mahdimael

What I mean is that culture seems to be the side effect of normal growth. For instance, if someone builds a temple, they'll be doing it to appease the populace rather than to expand their cultural dominance. Yet an increase in culture will result.

this is my greatest fear...the current available information on culture suggests that there are no buildings that only produce culture, and that only some buildings have added cultural benefits...so far we know that the palace, temple, and library all produce culture, we also know that barracks, graineries do not produce any culture at all...the only thing that changes this is the longer a building exists the more culture it provides, but since it seems like many of the most important buildings are the ones that provide culture, you might have to rush to get these but it wouldn't really damage the "rush to alpha centauri" strategy...most likely universities and cathedrals will also increase culture...also we know that wonders increase culture so they are even more important

we can't say anything for sure till we actually play the game but culture does seem like it was made to reinforce the perfectionist strategy and to counteract ICS and bigger is always better

Sabre2th

Even if culture is just a result of growth, it has a profound effect on how you play the game and the choices you make.

this statement cannot be verified but it the only profound effect it might have is to force more players to be perfectionist instead of going for ICS...and that it only adds to the already well established game of going for tech...which would be a shame for this very interesting addition to civ3, i hope that players who want a high culture really have to try to get it instead of follow already well established build routines

as i said before the temple/barracks example was a bad example on deity, because really how many people build barracks in the majority of their cities before they build temples? very few if any at all...

Instead of playing the same old thing again, players will have to find their own ways to integrate culture into their strategies.

i hope that this is the case, but we will have to wait and see

Taliseian

I am curious tho about the taking over of cities via culture.

Does the city fully change, or is it partial and subject to take over again if the loser builds a stronger culture.

this is unknown for the moment...either way would be interesting...what we can assume is the city will change and all of the military units surrounding that city will change too, but whether that city will act like a hostile city you occupied or a friendly city you built yourself is unknown...the choice firaxis makes on this will play a big part in deciding how powerful culture is...also will culture be able to assimilate conquered cities overtime? by this i mean will culture be able to switch a city's nationality from zulu to english or will a conquered city alway be zulu...this also brings up the question when you conquer a city will the new people in it belong to the new nationality or to the old one?

The Andy-Man

culture should be ascociated with hapiness. so as to engourage more luxuries. i eman, under a monarchy which had little unhappiness, i would never ruyn any luxury rate. same with fundy. there needs to be more encourgagemnt

that is why i suggested the idea of the poet (cultural specialist)

SerapisIV

I seem to remember a preview or Firaxis statement that said that each pop point will have a culture assigned to it, a culture that will remain with it for the rest of the game. Also there was mention of civs like the Romans and French starting closer then the Roamns and Chinese on World maps.

from known information each pop point get a nationality, french, german, zulu, etc...there is no information on if culture can change a french city to german when it converts it or not...also while we know that a city you conquer through military force keeps the nationality it had when you captured it there is no information available on if you can eventually convert that nationality to your nationality through culture

Here's the question, how many cultures are there (IIRC, there are to be 5)? What are the cultures? My guesses are:
Asian
Euro
African
Native American
Persian/Middle Eastern
How will they effect gameplay?

when firaxis said there are five cultures in the game this more than likely means city styles...and that each civ has it's own culture (represented by borders)...city style and culture probably have little to do with each other, but this hasn't been verified either way

Another question, being that Firaxis has this sudden fetish for unique units, unique civs and such, will the cultures have unique attributes, such as more warlike, more peaceful, more scientific, etc? I hope not for the Firaxis PR dept's sake due to claims of racism and such, but I'd give it a fair chance Firaxis will.

there is nothing to support this (no quotes, articles, screenshots etc)...but we don't know for sure

[Warm Beer]

culture prevents players from engulfing you with little ICS cities, and it gives you a kind of DMZ to protect your cities, the larger your borders the further away you can opperate your forces in a democracy (speculating here)

I think that is a good bit of speculating, IMHO, Korn. I that makes perfect sense and will give democracies and republics a little better edge (compared to Civ 2) when it comes to military matters. I agree that with your beginning post that this may indeed be the cornerstone whether Civ3 passes or fails, although there are a few other that add some other new strategic options.

[LaRusso]

korn
what i saw on firaxis resources tutorial (including cultural borders) is that your culture growth pushes borders outwards.
now where there's expansion, there's also possibility of conflict. what i am saying that a mere passage of time may result in you engulfing a smaller ally city bordering a big one you have (speculating, like all of us....)
this is not a military offensive, but may have the same result with the added problem of not being able to properly control it....

[korn469]

LaRusso

from what i have read, the higher your culture the better the AI is going to treat you, so even if you do engulf small cities around your civ it isn't going to make the AI mad from what we know...it could, but there isn't enough information to know for sure...but if when a culture engulfs a small city it completely converts that city then more than likely there will be no conflict, if it engulfs it and doesn't totally convert it then there will be conflict but to what degree nobody knows yet...and it just might be somewhat increased internal strife

[The Andy-Man]

but wouldn't you be a lil pissed off if your neighbor swallowed one of your cities and some majourly needed resource. and you are a no military nation?

[star mouse]

Now that CIV3 seems to be in QA, it is probably too late to add radically new features to the game. I offer the following idea for culture anyway because it could be an idea for including in a future CIV3 expansion.

Some improvements such as temples and libraries generate culture as an intrinsic feature of the building. I think it would be an interesting enhancement if you could add a small culture rating to non-culture improvements by paying a premium when you choose to build the improvement. This premium might be a 50% extra cost to construction to add decorative features to the improvement such as a coat of paint or an intricate sculpture.

To see how this works, let's consider the Granary. This is an improvement that is known to produce no culture. We'll assume that its base cost is 60 shields to build. 60 shields would get you an ugly, utilitarian building made of brick, adobe or concrete that fulfils its function but is drab and ugly. If the building was enhanced culturally at the time of construction, it would cost 90 shields and be decorative, perhaps by being painted with a beautiful mural, covered in decorative tiles, sculpted with goddesses that promote fertility and plenty or perhaps a bit of Baroque architecture.