Black hairs and martial law

[Father Beast]

I was playing a game on "Lost cause" (also known as deity +2)where your first citizen is a very unhappy person. I can upgrade him to red with a military unit, but even with the ML max of 3 (in despotism/Monarchy) I can't make him content. is this a problem with this difficulty level? or a shortcoming with martial law, that it will only give 1 upgrade?

[DaveV]

There's some funky code controlling the black hats. My experience has been the same as yours, that even three martial law units can't change a very unhappy to a content. You need elvis, luxuries, or some sort of happy improvement or wonder.

[drake]

Why would anyone subject themselves to such torture? What a bunch of sadists

[SlowThinker]

{happiness}
{}{SlowThinker}

------------------------------
This is a post with keywords. See The Great Library: a hierarchical structure" thread.

[DaveV]

Like EST, my experience with the black hattted citizens is from Deity games with lots of cities rather than the super difficulty levels. While EST's advice is sound, I just hate building temples in size 1 cities, since it will sap your cash. Two ways of coping with the unhappiness that don't need a temple:

1) Hire elvis immediately. This is what I always used to do. A city on grass will take 20 turns to grow to size 2, at which point you should be able to work a second (1-food, if desired) square. During those 20 turns, the city will produce 20 shields and 20 arrows. A city on wheat will grow to size 2 in 10 turns; a city on buffalo will never grow but will produce lots of shields; a city on wine will never grow but will produce a lot of arrows.

2) Let them eat cake (ignore the riots, and let the city grow). A city on grass, with a 2-food square to work, should grow to size 2 in 7 turns. You can hire elvis at that point and save 13 turns over case 1. Well worth the lost production if you're able to work a special.
[This message has been edited by DaveV (edited May 01, 2001).]

[Father Beast]

Thanks EST and DaveV, I never thought of just leaving it in disorder. I was using temples, which would make the black hat a redhead, and my units could make him content. I always rushed to fix a city in disorder, since as a democrat, I live in fear of my government collapsing. leaving a city in disorder allows it to grow? who knew? I never thought it would do anything!!

[East Street Trader]

Don't play "lost cause" (sounds awful) but I do expand a lot in Monarchy in some games so I regularly get cities whose first two citizens are both going to be blackhats (by the way I sort of like the way they look, especially in the more advanced stages and especially also the woman icon).

What I do is to have a cheap unit to hand, disband it and immediately rush a Temple. That allows the city to get going and by the time the second one arrives martial law units and some early trade arrows mean you can just about keep it growing.

[catullus]

Seems to me that the hanging gardens might be nice to have.

C.

[East Street Trader]

Must try that DaveV (in Monarchy - I don't think you could do it with representational gov.t - but I doubt you'd have the blackhats then anyway).

You get food, shields (and luxuries) even in anarchy. So (when changing gov.t say) you turn luxuries to max and re-assign workers favouring shields and food over arrows. (Tedious as, post oedo, they're going back so quickly.

Had I given rioting cities any thought I might have guessed they'd be the same. But seemingly not so. Interesting.

[EOL]

I don't think you get any shields in rioting cities, only when changing governments in anarchy with cities that aren't rioting.

EOL