What to do with health resources and no happiness resources

[Dominae]

Originally posted by couerdelion
I’m still not sure that I’ve quite figured out what to do with no happiness resources are this level. Without Mysticism or Industrious trait, there are few obvious ways out without going quite deep into the tech tree.

Did you read any of the responses in this thread?

[couerdelion]

Well the best I can make of them is

Get writing, build libraries and then appoint scientists and work you way through Alphabet to Drama for theatres. And then use the culture to allow growth, which improves commerce and reduces military costs.

It all sounds a little slow but I guess I need to try it out. I can see this would be a common problem on Terra maps.

[darrelljs]

Hmm...I think more options than that were discussed. Here is what I noticed:

1. Trade health resources for happiness resources. Make contact as early as possible and make trades as they become available, even if it is for health resources you only have one of.

2. Conquer more land to gain access to resources.

3. Religion(s), especially if Spiritual, can give you some cheap happiness.

4. Run specialists (and whip) to keep the population at the happy cap. If you have the Pyramids (which gives 9 happy faces by itself) you are probably better of settling or building Academies. If not you are probably better off lightbulbing and trading.

5. Prioritize Drama and use the culture slider. With Theaters you get 2 happiness per 10%, which is a real bargain. If you are primarily using specialists you can do this without losing too much research power.

6. Run Hereditary Rule.

I don't think any of these are unknown tactics, what's interesting is which to apply given how the game shapes up. For example, I seem to be in a minority but I use HR quite a bit, even as a non-Financial leader. One good example is Rome on the Earth map. In vanilla you are Expansive and there are a ton of health resources in the vicinity, but only Silver, Wine and Dyes by way of happiness. I'll often use The Oracle on Monarchy and run HR for most of the game. Of course the density of specials means each troop is allowing you to work a more valuable tile on average, but still the first two German cities founded ended up being mostly cottages, and it is well worth it to get those cities up to size 15+.

Darrell

[couerdelion]

Sorry, I guess I summarised the thing that I could try out which I would not otherwise have thought of. The trading option was the one that ultimately got me out of trouble but Pyramids (and Representation) was a shorter term one that my luck in generating a GE provided (also vastly changing the research outlook).

Of course, trading requires Writing and trade links (so perhaps Sailing) but suffers in the Terra environment from the general shortage of resources - there are not enough to go round. Add to this the fact that you have to wait for Calendar for most of the happies to be developed and the trading solution becomes a lot more limited.

HR works if you have lots of food and river tiles. It takes awhile to payoff with less favourable terrain since each population costs about 0.5 in maintenance costs and something in the region of 0.5 in military costs. So you need at least a 2/0/1 tile just to break even.

Finally, whipping can be rather self defeating if all you are doing is controlling a population limit that is already stuck at 3. After reaching size 2 you're stuck there for a while so your only option is to run specialists of build workers/settlers

[wodan11]

I went back and reread the OP, couerdelion. One area where you did differently than I would (usually) is using Oracle on Metal Casting. I almost always use it to get Theology or Code of Laws. Both give a religion (which would give you shrine money), and they will give you another religion for temples. In addition, CoL will give you courthouse money too.

In any event, in hindsight, may I suggest the next time you have a game with low happy resources, you give this a try.

Wodan

[couerdelion]

Several reasons for selecting Metal Casting

1) It’s more expensive
2) I needed Writing for Code of Laws and Poly/Mono for Theology.
3) Forges are cheap for an industrious civ.
4) Forges also allow me to appoint a specialist which might get me a GE (Pyramids)
5) When I get to trade, there’s bound to be some metals out there so the +1 bonus for the forge helps the happiness situation

Regarding the benefits of CoL/Theology

1) Neither give gold. You need a prophet to build the shrine
2) Courthouses don’t help much when you have a small empire

But they do give some happiness which can be doubled with a temple. If my first GP had been a prophet, it would have lightbulbed Theology. If I had got writing then Code of Laws would have been a decent alternative but more so because it opens up Philosophy and Civil Service.

[wodan11]

Re: Metal Casting:

1) So? Consider: if you got CoL, then you would get courthouses, which would reduce your expenses, which in effect is generating more commerce which you can turn into more research. This is pretty much identical to the benefit of getting the added cost of Metal Casting for free (from Oracle).

2) Plan ahead for the Oracle tech. Obviously, yes, you need Writing. So, be sure and research it before the Oracle finishes. Writing is good on its own merit, and is required to get Theatres, which goes back to your original problem.

3) What you need to consider is your problem. You are having trouble with happiness, money, and research. Hammers is the least of your worries. Heck, you were complaining that you were looking for things to build, and were building wonders you otherwise wouldn't bother with. You don't need hammer boosters, you need commerce boosters. CoL is much better than MC. You get a shrine, and you get something to build that will help your base problem: Courthouses and Temples.

4) Agreed. However, you could do the same thing by building the Great Wall. Or, you could simply devote an early production city to building the Pyramids the long way. You have "extra" cities doing nothing and building useless wonders anyway. Slow down your empire growth and start your 2nd or 3rd city on Pyramids. While it's working on it, you can get your empire to the same size you would have anyway.

5) Agreed. However, you need Writing to trade. See above. And, it's just +1 all things considered. Going the other path gives you easier access to Theatres, Markets, Colosseums, etc. Ultimately as much happiness as you need that way. Much better than a mere +1.


Re: CoL/Theology

1) Courthouses DO give gold, in effect. See above #1 rationale.

Also, you'll get a prophet from the Oracle GPP, if you do it right. Plus, you're building temples (you are having happiness problems) and you can always set a prophet specialist in that city. I think you're focusing a lot on getting a GE to the exclusion of other possibilities.

2) Bullcrap. Sorry. Depending on skill level, a civ of 5-6 cities will have maintenance of 3-5 each city. Courthouses will reduce that by an average of 2 per city. That's 10-12 commerce, which = a notch on the slider at that point in the game, and will turn into ~20 beakers per turn with Libraries. Or, that could equate to a notch on the culture slider (happiness).

You're right that a larger empire will get more from courthouses. That doesn't mean that courthouses are worthless in a "small" empire. Don't compare to some hypothetical situation... we need to look at the pure benefit for the situation we are in NOW. To wit: We have hammers to burn; we want more commerce; we want happiness.

3) Also remember that CoL will allow you to build temples to a new religion.

Wodan

[couerdelion]

You do not get a shrine with Code of Laws. For the shrine money you need at least a holy city and a prophet. After 13 GP - most of these with a 20-30% prophet chance - I failed to generate a single prophet so here I would still be without that shrine.

You do seem to overvalue Courthouses. If I build 5 courthouses and save myself 10-12 gold per turn then I consider myself to be throwing away production. And you’ll have to explain to me how your libraries can turn 10-12 gold into 20 beakers. The best I can managed is 16 which is still a very poor deal for the 600 hammers you’ve spent developing a legal system. Here I think I’d rather have 17 axemen.

As it was, I would have been happy to have as many as 5 cities here. In the situation I was in, the choice of Metal Casting was a much stronger option that Code of Laws.

[Quillan]

First person to Code of Laws founds Confucianism, which means a shrine available to build. Has anyone founded that religion yet?

[wodan11]

Quillan replied about the shrine already.

Generating a prophet is within your control. The reason you made 13 great people without a single great prophet is because you built all those non-essential wonders, and because you were running engineers (as you stated). The key to GP usage is focusing your GPP on the points that will get you what you want. (We can talk about that if you like.... what do I (and others) do to get the GP we want.)

Don't get me wrong... I'm not saying I have all the answers... hardly. I'm just trying to point out what I would have done in your situation. If it helps your game, great. Just take it as suggestions, that's all I'm asking.

10-12 gold +25% = 14.5-16. With even one scientist specialist (you may choose to run more, of course), that is where you get about 20 (or more). Why run a scientist? Because you don't care about production or food, you want commerce, beakers, and happiness.

I guess I don't get it... I'm pointing out alternatives, and you keep saying Metal Casting is better. If that was true, then why did you start this thread in the first place?

MC has its benefits, obviously. However, IMO those benefits were not what would help you out of the hole you dug yourself into....

Wodan

[couerdelion]

The reason for the thread was to find out what people others do when they are seriously constrained with their cities due to the happiness cap. Limiting population size means that per population city and unit costs are much higher. For non-capital cities, the cap hits at 3 which means there’s not a great deal of commerce that each city can produce. City growth is rapid at this size too so this also needs to be constrained. In general it’s a vicious circle and I wanted to see if there are any good escape routes that I had missed.

Re: GE’s. These were not generated deliberately. The first GE was one which should have been a Prophet (to be used to lightbulb Theology for religion/future shrine and possibly to run Theocracy early in the game). Instead the 10-20% chance of a GE hit and I got the Pyramids (for Representation, +2 happiness, plenty of beakers) so I figured I got the best deal going there.

In fact, it would be hard for me to consider any of those Wonders not good value. Perhaps not essential but if we talk of essential things then I could probably argue that Barracks are not essential. If I were to pick the “worst value” wonder, then I guess it would be the Colossus but it would be wrong to say that I did not get a lot more back than the 170-odd hammers I spent on it. Wonders like Great Lighthouse, Great Library, Temple of Artemis and Pyramids gave a HUGE return.

[wodan11]

Originally posted by couerdelion
For non-capital cities, the cap hits at 3 which means there’s not a great deal of commerce that each city can produce.

Exactly. So, each point of commerce represents a larger percentage of your civ's economy. Thus, reducing costs is even more critical in this situation. In particular, your city maintenance costs are the same as they would be if you weren't hampered by happiness, and thus courthouses are even more critical.

Probably my fault if I didn't say it very clearly before, but that's exactly what I was trying to get at. Does wording it that way make what I'm trying to say any clearer?

City growth is rapid at this size too so this also needs to be constrained. In general it’s a vicious circle and I wanted to see if there are any good escape routes that I had missed.

IMO courthouses are much more useful to that situation than forges. Just my two cents.

Wodan

[wodan11]

Here's a hypothetical.

	Civ X	Civ Y
Happy limit	3	5
Total Commerce	100	200
City Maintenance Costs	50	50

Civ X has 50% of its commerce eaten up by City maintenance costs. Civ Y has only 25%. Thus, city maintenance is much more of a problem for Civ X.

If you reduce City Maint for Civ X, you effectively increase the commerce Civ X has available.

Wodan

[couerdelion]

By my reckoning you get the same for each civ. By reducing costs by 25g you get to increase the beakers for both of them by the same amount. The fact that Civ X sees a larger proportional increase may not be so important because Civ Y has to spend a smaller proportion of its total production to get its reduction in those costs.

In a low city size, I think it might be the military costs that become rather more burdensome.

[wodan11]

Originally posted by couerdelion
The fact that Civ X sees a larger proportional increase may not be so important because Civ Y has to spend a smaller proportion of its total production to get its reduction in those costs.

Again, you had production to spare. Production is not a concern. In fact, in this situation it would be worth getting Alphabet simply so that you could Build Research.

The proportional gain is more important because Civ X has to spend a larger proportion of its total commerce to pay maintenance.

In a low city size, I think it might be the military costs that become rather more burdensome.

All costs are burdensome when your civ is of low city size and thus struggling with commerce.

I guess either I'm not explaining myself clearly, or you understand but simply don't agree.

My suggestion is to take that game, open the 4000BC autosave, and begin again using my alternate path. See what happens and compare the progress of the two at, say, 1000AD.

Wodan