Culture-Flipping Exposed

[lockstep]

Originally posted by Catt
This would ruin the game-balance function of culture flipping, IMHO, and would be a huge step backward.

As long as the provided information is only about the probability of a flip and not the fact that a flip WILL occur the next turn, I don't see what's wrong with it.

Similar to the pollution check box, Firaxis could include a 'defection box' in the city screen, e.g. to the right of the garrison box.

[Catt]

Originally posted by lockstep


As long as the provided information is only about the probability of a flip and not the fact that a flip WILL occur the next turn, I don't see what's wrong with it.

True! Much better to have an indicator than a true warning system that identitifies flips in the making. I still don't care for it though - seems to me to be much like an indicator that informs you of the chances of your wounded knight defeating that healthy spearman fortified in a city across across a river - helpful but largely redundant to the information already available.

Similar to the pollution check box, Firaxis could include a 'defection box' in the city screen, e.g. to the right of the garrison box.

I've never really bothered to understand the pollution box. Does the accumulation of "pollution shields" in the city view continue until pollution occurs, or is the number of "pollution shields" visible in the city view an abstract rendition of the chance of pollution striking the city on any given turn?

Catt

[Coracle]

Originally posted by Catt


True! Much better to have an indicator than a true warning system that identitifies flips in the making. I still don't care for it though - seems to me to be much like an indicator that informs you of the chances of your wounded knight defeating that healthy spearman fortified in a city across across a river - helpful but largely redundant to the information already available. . .

What information is that? Are you refering to that arcane CF formula?? Maybe you have time for that kind of tedium but I surely don't. I do not need one for battles as we have, unfortunately, INDIVIDUAL unit battles - not STACK battles. And luck should always be a part of the process anyway. In stack combat we should have realtime tactics anyway, which I hoped for after Civ 2.

But in a town/city I expect my governor to have enough brains (and it won't take much) to tell me the status of that town/city. Thus, an indicator or warning.

CF should be able to be toggled OFF for "historical" scenarios where it is even more ridiculous than normal.

We got the ability to edit corruption and AI trade in the Editor. Why not this stupid CF?

Well, there's always autosave.

[Catt]

Originally posted by Coracle


What information is that? Are you refering to that arcane CF formula?? Maybe you have time for that kind of tedium but I surely don't.

It's really not arcane, nor should it create any tedium. I suspect the average third-grader could have it down to a few seconds thought in any given circumstance after becoming familiar with the basics. Thought process: (1) How many foreign citzens (resistors count as two)? (2) How many city-radius tiles controlled by the other civ? Then, 1 + 2 = Total. Assuming roughly equal total culture and roughly equal distance to capital, then 2 military units per "Total" should be sufficient to absolutely prevent a flip. If capital distance or total culture favors your opponent, figure more than 2. Don't have a sufficient garrison to prevent a flip and/or don't like risking your army when its a close call? - don't garrison the city - keep your forces outside the city. Really not that complicated.

But in a town/city I expect my governor to have enough brains (and it won't take much) to tell me the status of that town/city. Thus, an indicator or warning.

I know you're a big fan of "realism" in the game. Is it possible that "city governors" or others responsible for specific wartime objectives have, in the real world, miscalculated or been blind to danger which in retrospect should have been obvious? Do human commanders make mistakes?

CF should be able to be toggled OFF for "historical" scenarios where it is even more ridiculous than normal.

I don't disagree. But I'd much rather Firaxis spend valuable programming time (assuming they don't have an unlimited supply ) on improving the AI to present an ever more challenging opponent. As you point out, there's always autosave if a historical scenario takes a funny twist.

Catt

[stankarp]

Catt

I think you are missing a big point. We all know the formula for culture flipping, but try doing that "simple " mental exercise 100 times every 2-3 turns.

You must be some sort of glutton for punishment.

One big point that Coracle made is the fact that the army goes with the flip, thats what is so unrealistic. Thats what really pissed me off too. Now with the 1.29 patch, it is easier to avoid, but it would still be nice in the interest of simple playability and to make the game more fun and less tedious to have a decent empire/city interface like CTP1 and 2.

Not a big ask. I am sick of having to browse over the whole map or endlessly click on the domestic advisor screen and strain to interprit those silly faces to try to stay ahead of problems.

[DeepO]

Originally posted by Catt
Thought process: (1) How many foreign citzens (resistors count as two)? (2) How many city-radius tiles controlled by the other civ? Then, 1 + 2 = Total. Assuming roughly equal total culture and roughly equal distance to capital, then 2 military units per "Total" should be sufficient to absolutely prevent a flip. If capital distance or total culture favors your opponent, figure more than 2.

I hate to have to correct you, Catt, you know I'm fully on your side on this one. But Capital distance is of no importance when you're calculating how many troops you'd need to absolutely prevent a flip. It is only important to determine how big the chance is when you have a chance.

The correct rule of thumb should be: (foreign citizens + foreign tiles)*culture ratio.

This number is further multiplied by 2 if you just captured the city, multiplied by 2 if the city is in disorder, and divided by 2 if there is a WLTKD.

Stankarp, this mental excercise is not so hard to make, and certainly does not have to be done every 2-3 turns. If you have insight in the formula, you just guess at it once, and further 'see' when it will be a problem. The main thing to keep in mind is that the culture of you towards your enemy is one of the biggest factors; so if your culture is 10 times bigger than his, you can do whatever you want, and CF is very unlikely. OTOH, if your culture is less then one tenth of your enemy, you have problems. This is not something you have to calculate every turn, culture does not change that easily. It is more something to keep in mind when you are planning an attack: you check the military strength, and the next step is to check the culture too.

Further, when you get into situations like the 'size 1 town' of Coracle which is completely surrounded by enemy territory, you have to realize that this will be a problem. No need to start counting, but if you see that a third of your city radius is enemy territory, you have to realize this is a risky situation. If you want to prevent it by using troops, it is good to calculate a little, if not you keep your troops out. It's as simple as that.

I agree completely that the 'Your city is going to flip in 1 turn' warning would break the game, but a warning like the pollution warning is a nice idea. You only need something like the glowing sun to guess at the global warning. It would give people a chance of knowing when they are in trouble with a current city. However, Im quite sure that people will start complaining that you have to descend to the city view whenever they want to see the chance... it will never be allright for everyone.

And regarding the vanishing troops: it would be nice if you would get a number of your troops back in case of a flip, all battered up and unready for an attack, but the game rules as they are now are also good, you just have to play according to the rules, and not complain when your view of how it should be is not like the rules say it is. There is no reason why you want to keep 8 legions with one less HP in a city, these will heal just as fast outside of a city. So if it is dangerous, don't put them in cities and you will never lose them.

DeepO

[lockstep]

Originally posted by Catt
I've never really bothered to understand the pollution box. Does the accumulation of "pollution shields" in the city view continue until pollution occurs, or is the number of "pollution shields" visible in the city view an abstract rendition of the chance of pollution striking the city on any given turn?

Definitely the latter. IIRC, it's the chance (in %) that pollution will strike on the next turn. A 'defection' box would probably have to use another scale, e.g %-chance that a flip will occur the next five or ten turns.

[Catt]

Originally posted by stankarp
I think you are missing a big point. We all know the formula for culture flipping, but try doing that "simple " mental exercise 100 times every 2-3 turns.

I cannot fathom why you would need to run the calculation 100 times every 2-3 turns. CF is dangerous primarily on the periphery of an empire. On the interior, once cultural border pressure is eliminated, the only significant variable regarding garrison size that may change from turn to turn is the number of foreign citizens - and this is NOT going to change frequently (unless it goes down due to starvation and therefore lessens the risk of a CF, or unless you're adding captured workers to the city - not exactly the smartest tactical decision for someone worried about a flip in that city). DeepO already made the point that total culture ratios do not swing wildly from turn to turn. I tend to briefly "run the numbers" only on a significant change in circumstances such as: (1) I conquer a city; or (2) cultural borders shift. I just set what I think is the appropriate garison size (even if it's one or no troops), and move on to the next objective. There is no conceivable reason to "run the numbers" on existing cities every turn.

I would also vigorously disagree with your assertion that "we all know the formula for culture flipping." It is apparent that I had the formula slightly wrong in my "rule of thumb" shorthand (and you didn't correct me ) -- although I deliberately disregarded the WLTKD effects, the civil disorder effects, and the city-specific culture effects for purposes of the shorthand analysis, I misplaced the function of the palace distance in the formula.

And I would submit that a brief review of Coracle's posts, as well as those posts from some of those complaining most loudly about culture flipping, indicate a fundamental lack of knowledge about the formula. I think many, many posters have no idea that foreign culture-controlled city radius tiles are as important as foreign citizen population in the CF formula. And I believe that many people think that total culture isn't really that important - that the number of troops comprising the garrison is the most important factor (Ha! - not by a longshot). In fact, in Coracle's most recent posted example from a few posts down, he also displays that he doesn't understand that bombarment / artillery units (catapults, or any unit without an A/D value) don't count as a "garrison" for CF purposes - this tidbit shouldn't really be arcane should it (?), since such units do not contstitute "units" for garrison purposes in other aspects of gameplay (i.e., military police happiness effects).

One big point that Coracle made is the fact that the army goes with the flip, thats what is so unrealistic.

You're mixing apples and oranges to some extent since I didn't respond in any way to that particular point. The gist of my post was a counter-argument to one of the two arguments Coracle (and others) like to make: that somehow an "arcane, tedious, arbitrary, contrived formula" (pick whichever perjoritive term or terms you like, but calling a mathematical formula "arbitrary" strikes me as tedious thought coming through in language ) must be laboriously calculated using one's scientific calculator during each turn of the game. It just isn't so - at least for anyone (i) able to add, subtract, multiply and divide, and (ii) familiar with the CF formula - we're not taking about figuring the cosine of some value nor are we taking division out to 6 decimal points. My point was that the calculations are quite easy to do on the fly and on a "rule of thumb" basis.

Bringing up "realism" as the second argument that is commonly made against culture flipping is a different kettle of fish. I won't try and support or defend the "realistic" nature or lack thereof with regard to disappearing troops or culture flipping in general - others have done so many times before and are certainly better qualified than me to do so. But I will argue that injecting a realism argument to the discussion is a total red herring - the game designers have said quite clearly on more than one occasion that "realism" gives way to gameplay all the time in the game. They deliberately deviated from a more "realistic" feature or function on thousands of occasions in an effort to make a more engaging game. [Even if they hadn't made the statement, could anyone playing the game reasonably believe that the game designers strove for a close adherence to "realism" in all aspects of the game??]

Go ahead and argue that the game is not engaging, but attacking the game (and the game designers) because something is unrealistic is like attacking an electric can opener because it makes a bad hair drier. It's pretty easy to find flaws in a product when the criteria against which criticism is measured is not the same criteria against which the product was designed.

I certainly brought up "realism" in an abstracted way in responding to Coracle's point re: a warning system, so I may have been to first to muddy the waters . I have made the above stump speech that "realism" is an intellectually dishonest argument for attacking the game designers, and is a very suspect argument for attacking the game, in a number of threads in which Coracle participates - he doesn't counter the argument, he just ignores it and moves on to the next "realism" argument. The city-governor-should-know-better "realism" argument just goes against so many instances of recorded history that it was very hard to let that one slide by unchallenged .

Originally posted by DeepO
I hate to have to correct you, Catt . . .

Thanks for correcting me!

[Theseus]

Originally posted by Catt
Go ahead and argue that the game is not engaging, but attacking the game (and the game designers) because something is unrealistic is like attacking an electric can opener because it makes a bad hair drier. It's pretty easy to find flaws in a product when the criteria against which criticism is measured is not the same criteria against which the product was designed.

BUT...

An electric can opener and a hair drier can be combined with a microwave to make a great alARMY!

[Explorer579]

I have never seen a civilization regaining a city through "cultureflip" after it has been destroyed. I don't think I would like to have it in future civ versions.

[Tattila the Hun]

I once bombed a 12+ city into 1pop, obliterating all improvements from it. I take the city, 1 pop is resisting, but I'm in a hurry, so I only leave a token of 2 infantry to defend it. I rush a temple after the resistance is over, and start grinding library. 2 turns pass, and the town flips. My spies tell me it has 2 riflemen posted, but all my heavy hitters are on the front, not able to reach it in time, so I have to resort in extensive bombing and 5 swordsmen. I commence sorties. "Harbor of Pleasantville destroyed" "Colosseum of Pleasantville destroyed"

Hmmm... I'm sure there weren't harbor or colosseum in Pleasantville...

I wonder if I remember this correctly...

[hahntsak]

1. troops: i found [by retoring a an earlier save that its more a differnce in troops in the 21 square area like culture control.
so if you were to go back and and build the temple after you put some military and then knossos can remain greek instead of going to those pesky romans. [particularly since it's 4 tiles from a roman city.... put troops right on the border - the romans get annnoyed because of the border nbuild up - why? because veii is 2 tiles from said border and your culture plus your troops can cause the city to just flip toward you. if your culture copletely surrounds a foreign city line troops within your territory completely around it [this is called "laying seige" as opposed to attacking directly] workers can't leave [you weant those settlers=2 and workers as servants to your empire [hehehe]

use an embassy to investigate a city to see if you can flip it...

2. slamming: a) placing a city deliberately in a foreign city's 21 tile zone [often in their 9 tile zone] in an effort to willfully force that city to flip and then abandon one of them [the smammer city or the just flipped slamee]
caution: slamming probably will not flip their capitol.

b)slamming a foreign colony: gee your indians had iron right their but those japanese made a colony and put a guard on it. hmmm, you could attack it, but you'd still need a worker to make your own colony - just slam the thing and you get instant access and order the japanese to vacate your territory.

X, F FOREIGN EXISTING
N, O YOUR NEWX STUFF

XXX
XXXXX
XXFXX
XXXXX
XNNN
NNNNN
NNONN
NNNNN
NNN

this is not really slamming.

XXX
XXXXX
XXFXX
XXXXNNN
XXNNNNN
NNONN
NNNNN
NNN


this looks more like it, but check this:

XXX
XFX
XXXNN
NON
NNN
and then move trops in and build that culture up to flip F and then abandon F or O . if you dump O then you have to build its culture quickly. caution if you build a city in a foreign powers curent zone [even on an island] it's an "act of war" / causus belli
so take care.


this is a real cheap shot and when you do it enough times against the same civ they get real mad at you...i wonder why?[grin]- after all you take none of your troops outside your territory...hehe...

if you try this in multiplayer, they will probably catch on with your first placement of the first slam and declare war on your butt. but AI is so dumb it takes six or so cities in a row to get a clue...

[DaveMcW]

Culture slamming is fun on lower difficulties where it is easy to get a large culture lead. But on the highest difficulties the human player is the one getting slammed after they fall behind.

[hahntsak]

Originally posted by DaveMcW
Culture slamming is fun on lower difficulties where it is easy to get a large culture lead. But on the highest difficulties the human player is the one getting slammed after they fall behind.

yeah but human players will still recognize it sooner than ai. the ai doesn't slam as much as a human. usually if if the ai setler does find the 3x3 clear with a middle spot that can build on, they won't bother. if i see ai city with resource on outer part of 21 tile area i get right on their border, then my border is cropped till i a)move in troops [i move them in so i can concentrate on building improovements] b)choose culture improvements first that city.

culture can be concentrated in slammer cities. let the clear ones build other stuff [military].