Cities defect too easily

[Hurry]

I am playing as the French, and started a war against the Germans (you heard me right, it´s time to show who is who). I´m having hordes of tanks, and have little trouble taking his cities, but the problem is that the cities revolt and defect back to the Germans unless I have enourmous amounts of units in the captured cities.

For example, his city of Heidelburg (size 17) defected even though i had 20 units in it, excluding some artillery, bombers and fighters. This is just silly. Did Germany occupy Paris with half their army in WW2? It´s not just stupid, it also begs for frequent reloads, since the occupying units are destroyed if the city defects. I lose one single tank when I fight against his well dug-in defending divisions in the city, but lose 20 when the citizens revolt. Realistic??? Good for game balance???

I finally managed to keep the city when I put about 40 units in the city.

I sure hope Firaxis could decrease the number of units needed to garrison a city in the patch. It is almost impossible to fight a expansionistic war later in the game the way the rules are now.

And last a question. Has anybody figured out how many units are required to have a 100% chance of the city NOT defecting? My very unsure guess is something like 1 combat unit (i.e. not artillery, air units or workers) per citizen OR 2 units per resisting citizen, whichever is higher.

[Sabre2th]

Strange, I've never had a city revolt on me like that. How much production do you put into your culture?

[campmajor!]

Isn't it so that your cities only defect when your culture is weak? So instead of putting a lot of units in it, you should merely start building a temple!

[m_m_x]

i agree! firaxis should fix that in the patch.
what i do now, is have a settler (almost) in every battle,so i just raise the conquered city, and build my own instead.

[Rasputin]

Build Culture !!!!! This isnt a war game its a Civ game !!!!

[Sabre2th]

Originally posted by Rasputin
Build Culture !!!!! This isnt a war game its a Civ game !!!!

Exactly.

[Fredric Drum]

Originally posted by Rasputin
Build Culture !!!!! This isnt a war game its a Civ game !!!!

Yes, but first the city must get out of resistance, then corruption levels make it impossible to build anything, so you have to rush it, which is pretty expensive if you capture a lot of cities. That doesn't always help either, maybe you need to rush temple + library in every city. I agree that the conquering strategy should be more difficult.. but 17 citizens fighting 20 units killing them all without any losses? It has happened to me, too, and it's silly. Did Paris revolt and throw out the germans in WW2? Their culture must have been superior to the German? Did ANY city do this? Has ANY city EVER revolted against a LARGE number of military units IRL?
I'm currently kicking Alexander's ass. Sure, his culture is somewhat superior to mine.. but it's their loss, really. You'd think that when they see me raze 4 cities in a row because of defection, the fifth one would think twice before they tried anything... but no.. they prefer to have their entire city wiped out. I did NOT enjoy destroying Athens, but the Greeks needed a lesson.
Besides, the AI players do this too. Before I declared war on the Greeks, they had conquered and razed most of Egypt. Now, almost an entire continent is wasteland...


Fred

[Akka]

I think that it's about 2 units for 1 citizen to be SURE that the city will not revolt. Of course, the bigger your culture, the less units are needed. I usually need only 1-3 units to keep a city. Not having any civil disorder also help a lot (or to be more exact, allowing civil disorder help a big size making the city revolt).

I do agree that it should require AT MAX 1 unit for 2 citizens to keep a city in check. And that in case of revolt, your units should not vanish, but be merely damaged and expelled from the city. It neither make sense that a city can overthrow 10 military division nor that it is balanced that you could lose your whole army just because it was located in a city you just conquered.

[Robert]

1. conquer the city
2. put 3 military units in it (more won't help)
3. take all their food

Let them starve intill they give up their resistance,
make sure the city won't be in disorder after that.
Build cultural improvements quickly and keep them happy.

I've conquered entire civilizations this way.

[Vercingettyrex]

Not sure but if this works but bumping up the luxury rate seems to help. Plus having lots of troops to quell those treacherous dissenters.

[Venger]

Originally posted by Rasputin
Build Culture !!!!! This isnt a war game its a Civ game !!!!

Exactly, the history of the world isn't replete with stories of conquest, it's a story of temple building...jeez, give us a break. Civilization has ALWAYS been a war game. Why? Because conflict is an integral part of history, and THAT is what Civ has always been - a rewrite of history with you at the controls.

Civ3 is the first game with "culture", and you want to say Civ isn't a war game? Come on...

Venger

[francoImpaler]

I can usually quell resistance in 2-3 turns with a couple of units. I have not played on diety so that could be a factor I guess. Otherwise it must be culture.

[Venger]

Originally posted by CyberShy
1. conquer the city
2. put 3 military units in it (more won't help)
3. take all their food

Let them starve intill they give up their resistance,
make sure the city won't be in disorder after that.
Build cultural improvements quickly and keep them happy.

I've conquered entire civilizations this way.

Unfortunately, CyberShy is right on the money. As sick as it is, the best strategy is to STARVE YOUR CAPTURED CITY TO DEATH. You do not need to worry about reversion, it will keep getting smaller and smaller and smaller. In fact, as it shrinks, if a worker turns up who can work without being unhappy, you can use them on ahigh shield square to get some production as you starve millions of people to death, like a Somali Warlord or Taliban leader.

Frankly, I find it offensive that this is the only way to deal with captured cities. Thanks Firaxis, I'm Joseph Mengele now...

Venger

[Monoriu]

Re: Cities defect too easily

Originally posted by Hurry
I am playing as the French, and started a war against the Germans (you heard me right, it´s time to show who is who). I´m having hordes of tanks, and have little trouble taking his cities, but the problem is that the cities revolt and defect back to the Germans unless I have enourmous amounts of units in the captured cities.

For example, his city of Heidelburg (size 17) defected even though i had 20 units in it, excluding some artillery, bombers and fighters. This is just silly. Did Germany occupy Paris with half their army in WW2? It´s not just stupid, it also begs for frequent reloads, since the occupying units are destroyed if the city defects. I lose one single tank when I fight against his well dug-in defending divisions in the city, but lose 20 when the citizens revolt. Realistic??? Good for game balance???

I finally managed to keep the city when I put about 40 units in the city.

I sure hope Firaxis could decrease the number of units needed to garrison a city in the patch. It is almost impossible to fight a expansionistic war later in the game the way the rules are now.

And last a question. Has anybody figured out how many units are required to have a 100% chance of the city NOT defecting? My very unsure guess is something like 1 combat unit (i.e. not artillery, air units or workers) per citizen OR 2 units per resisting citizen, whichever is higher.

I agree, something has to be done about city defections. There are 3 problems:

1. It happens too easily.

2. There is no way to tell if its gonna happen. I am not saying that there should be a sign that says "xxx city will defect in y turns, do something now". There should be some sort of rough indication, say, the culture advisor should tell you "the people in xxx city may leave us because our culture sucks" or something like that.

3. All military units are lost when the city defects. That's just a bad design decision. Its ok if, say, 10% of the units are lost. But the bulk should be removed to another city. Or better yet, a defecting city should generate a number of infantry type units to fight the garrison.

[Venger]

Re: Re: Cities defect too easily

Originally posted by Monoriu
1. It happens too easily.

Yep.

2. There is no way to tell if its gonna happen.

The biggest problem. I'd rather forget reversion and have the city spawn a "partisan" unit from Civ2 two hexes away.

"the people in xxx city may leave us because our culture sucks" or something like that.

I'd settle for the city being in disorder or something, as it is now, cities just leave out of the blue for no damn reason. I am convinced culture is just a politically correct add on that derides from gamplay...

3. All military units are lost when the city defects. That's just a bad design decision. Its ok if, say, 10% of the units are lost. But the bulk should be removed to another city. Or better yet, a defecting city should generate a number of infantry type units to fight the garrison.

Similar to my partisan. I think that's a more suitable system than the "your 7 armies that conquered Thebes vansihed in the rapture when Thebes defected back to the Greeks".

Venger