Free Palace Jump

DaveMcW · March 12, 2003, 14:21

After weeks of testing I have found the exact palace jump formula.

When the capital city is razed or abandonned, each city in the empire scores
1 point for each of your citizens

1/3 point for each foreign citizen

1/3 point for every neighbor town (1-6)

2/3 point for every neighbor city (7-12)

1 point for every neighbor metropolis (13+)

The city with the most points is the new capital!

Only your civ's cities within 8 squares (a 17x17 area) count as neighbors. The old capital does not count at all.

If there is a tie for the most points, the palace jumps to the first city in the database, which is usually the oldest city. After some old cities have been razed the database gets out of order and it's impossible to tell where the palace will go in a tie.

(Edit: Now takes foreign citizens into account)
(Edit2: Now takes cities and metropoli into account)

DaveMcW · March 12, 2003, 14:22

Example

I finished the Forbidden Palace in Antium a few turns ago, now I want to jump my palace far away to Kyoto. I add my road-building crew to Kyoto, bringing it to size 5. Then I abandon Rome.

(5) Kyoto
(1/3) Ravenna 2
(1/3) Pisae 3
(1/3) Tokyo 5
6 points

(4) Neapolis
(1/3) Cumae 3
(1/3) Veii 4
(1/3) Antium 4
(1/3) Pompeii 7
(1/3) Tokyo 7
( 0 ) Nara 9
( 0 ) Pisae 9
5+2/3 points

(4) Veii
(1/3) Antium 3
(1/3) Neapolis 4
(1/3) Nara 5
(1/3) Pompeii 5
(1/3) Cumae 7
( 0 ) Tokyo 9
5+2/3 points

So Kyoto is the new capitol!

The southeast settler could have built a city, giving Veii and Neapolis another 1/3 point and causing a 3-way tie. Kyoto would still win because it was founded in 4000 B.C.

Arrian · March 12, 2003, 14:44

Quote:

After weeks of testing I have found the exact palace jump formula

Great job!

-Arrian

alexman · March 12, 2003, 15:41

Great job! Thank you!

Your formula definitely agrees with my experience.

BRC · March 12, 2003, 15:46

Nice work Dave! Definately helps the peaceful approach. I can't believe nobody else had searched for this yet (including me). This is very useful info.

Dominae · March 12, 2003, 15:51

Very nice formula to know. Thanks for putting in the time and effort (weeks?!?). I assume you tested for effects of Culture as well? If so, it is really quite surprising that it has no effect (from personal experience, not from a game design perspective).

Dominae

DaveMcW · March 12, 2003, 16:11

Quote:

Originally posted by Dominae
I assume you tested for effects of Culture as well? If so, it is really quite surprising that it has no effect (from personal experience, not from a game design perspective).

Yes, most of the work was eliminating things that have no effect like culture, distance from old palace, and continents.

Catt · March 12, 2003, 16:22

Let me add to the chorus of

Great work and thanks for sharing the info.

Catt

badams52 · March 12, 2003, 23:41

Maybe those folks over on CFC would like to know as well, Dave

Hurricane · March 13, 2003, 05:19

Great work, Dave.

This info is also very good to have when capturing enemy cities. This way you can predict where the capital will jump and use it to your advantage.

Chemical Ollie · March 13, 2003, 15:34

Now I just hope I can remember this when playing. But I rather use a great leader, as I normally want to keep the old capitol city even after the palace is moved.

DeepO · March 13, 2003, 15:44

Thanks for this!

I can imagine it took long to test...

DeepO

Ephesos · March 13, 2003, 16:14

Brilliant!

I'll have to remember that one.

Harovan · March 13, 2003, 17:37

Sounds like a hell lot of work!

Excellent job, thank you very much!

Master Zen · March 14, 2003, 03:59

Really interesting DaveMcW

I think most of use took the "formula" for granted, not bothering to actually discover what it was. It's glad to know people like you dwell deep to find what appently looks like the most basic things.

Good job

Hurricane · March 15, 2003, 06:31

I hate to spoil the fun, but look at this screenshot.

The sneaky Greeks stabbed me in the back while I was busy fighting the Russians and quickly took half of my empire. This included my capital Paris, which they razed (with Sistine Chapel and everything

). According to the new jumping theory, my capital should have jumped to Zimbabwe, which at size 11 and 10 cities within 8 tiles should get 11+10/3=14 1/3 points. But the capital instead went to Orleans, size 9 and only 7 cities within 8 tiles (9+7/3=11 1/3).

The red dot marks the place Paris used to be. The red line shows cities within 8 tiles of Orleans, and the white line cities within 8 tiles of Zimbabve.

Note that Zimbabwe also has more culture (201 against 168), so that can't explain it.

Any ideas why this happened?

This is on v1.29f.

DaveMcW · March 15, 2003, 15:55

Do you have an autosave before you lost Paris?

Hurricane · March 16, 2003, 07:44

Yeah, here it is. Note that is it at the beginning of my own turn, so you need to move some units into Orleans, otherwise it will be captured before Paris. In this case, however, Avignon becomes the new capital.

Maybe the fact that Zimbabwe isn't originally French has something to do with it? Zimbabwe has only 1 french citizen, while Orleans and Avignon both only have French citizens?

Verto · March 20, 2003, 00:23

Thanks for taking the time to work out the formula and sharing it with the rest of us.

Dominae · March 20, 2003, 01:27

Whatever happened with Hurricane's counter-example? Does the formula need revision after all?

Dominae

theNiceOne · March 20, 2003, 03:16

The formula certainly needs revision, since we have an example of where the formula doesn't predict the palace jumpå correctly. It may be that cities originally founded by another civ are treated differently.

From DaveMcW's post it didn't look like he had tried with cities founded by other civs - only with foreign citizens, so it may easily be that foreign-founded cities have a lower priority.

I hope you find the anser Dave.

DaveMcW · March 21, 2003, 13:33

Sorry for taking so long.

I confirmed that foreign citizens only count for 1/3 point, but there is another factor I haven't identified yet. Possibly foreign neighbors.

VJ · March 22, 2003, 06:58

Formula works good enough for my needs. Good work.

Artifex · March 25, 2003, 04:23

Hmm I tried this and it didn't work either.

I poured a bunch of settlers into a new city I wanted to be my new capital..I bought it up to pop 11.

My next highest cities were only pop 5.

my new capital ended up being a city right next to my old capital with a pop of only 5.

Thier were foreign cities around my pop 11 city..

So I think Dave is onto something. Foreign neighbors bordering a city might negate some pionts from it or something to that effect?

It is the only explanation I can come up with.

The initial formula definently does not work though.

I hope a new formula can be found.

Hurricane · March 26, 2003, 07:26

Just a wild guess (I still believe in the foreign pop&neighbor theory): Maybe the period you have owned the city has an effect? So that a new city will have less points than an old city? This will be hard to prove in a test scenario, and might therefore easily be overlooked.

Artifex · March 26, 2003, 13:45

I was thinking that foreign pop in your city doesn't count or is reduced for the calculation. My city had about half forigners in it..I added a bunch of captured settlers to bring it up to 11.

HolyWarrior · April 17, 2003, 01:38

Quote:

Originally posted by Hurricane
Yeah, here it is. Note that is it at the beginning of my own turn, so you need to move some units into Orleans, otherwise it will be captured before Paris. In this case, however, Avignon becomes the new capital.

Maybe the fact that Zimbabwe isn't originally French has something to do with it? Zimbabwe has only 1 french citizen, while Orleans and Avignon both only have French citizens?

Hurricane, that's it right there. According to the formula, foreigners only count 1/3. So if Zimbabwe has only 1 French citizen, then instead of counting pop 11, it would only count 1+10/3=4 1/3. That would be enough to knock Zimbabwe out of the running.

Hurricane · April 17, 2003, 09:06

Quote:

Originally posted by HolyWarrior

Hurricane, that's it right there. According to the formula, foreigners only count 1/3. So if Zimbabwe has only 1 French citizen, then instead of counting pop 11, it would only count 1+10/3=4 1/3. That would be enough to knock Zimbabwe out of the running.

Yes, DaveMcW adjusted his formula after my post.

conmcb25 · October 17, 2003, 16:08

Palace jumping brought to the top.

I was wondering if someone had come up with a formula for this and viola! I found it. Could we add this to Theseus's must read thread? Thanks

Datajack Franit · October 17, 2003, 16:21

All those cities in such a small peninsula

Good job