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Once again, I'd like to bring back ye olde argument about culture flipping and losing armies. Up until last night, sure culture flipping was a pain but I had never really had an entire war turned around by it. So for most of the discussions, I was like yeah, yeah, culture flipping only really seems to work for little piddly cities on the edge of my empire.
So here is the scenario. I am the Indians stomping the Japanese. Japanese have Pikemen, I have War Elephants and plenty of them. I have run through three cities already and I am starting on one of the size 12 cities next to their second capital (I took the first one
)
I have roughly 12 war elephants attacking which should be sufficient. I take the town losing a few/damaging a few and send up 6 to the capital. There are of course more war elephants on the way so I wait a bit to get a full battalion again. So, I have 4 elephants garrisoning a town of 10 now.
One turn later while I am waiting for the other elephants to get to the capital and the wounded ones to heal, it culture flips. Arrghh, stupid Japanese. Of course, I had 4 more elephants en route so I re-attack and take the city back quite easily. Then, I attack Tokyo and take pretty huge losses (stupid capital bonus) and retreat now down to 4 wounded elephants. Next turn, bam, culture flip again! WTF???
Now, my force which was quite decent is now down to a paltry 4 elephants out of 12 (+4 in the back). Culture flipping took out 8 of my war elephants. That is just not right and cause my to bang the table quite a bit last night.
I mean come on, what is the deal? If one unit can raze the town, I firmly believe that 4 of them could keep a city in line. Besides, at worst case, my troops make the elephants stampede, burning down half the city or something. Eventually I did retake the city (and promptly razed it to the ground in honor of my 8 elephants that perished at the hands of the peasants).
My point is and I know this has been rehashed quite a few times, the culture flip system has got to change for how armies are dealt with. Here is my humble suggestion to avoid future calamities like the ones suffered by the Indians above:
- Option A: Check the rebellion
If a city wishes to revolt, you have the option to tell your troops to just let loose and to do an Assyrian number on the populace. Start cracking heads and stacking skulls and make an example of the population. As a result, your overall reputation suffers because you are just a bad-ass (Despot, despot, you're a despot, etc.). Inject war-weariness in a democracy, etc. or whatever.
If you have just a few troops in a giant city or the city is still resisting, do some sort of population vs. unit roll. In the worst case, the city gets burned to ground, something that you shouldd have done in the first place when you took the city.
If all goes well, your military scares the bejeezus out of the population and they fall back into line. For any other cities in a similar situation, it sets an example (i.e. your head will be next in the pile of skulls, jabrone).
Option B: Withdraw military
Take all of the military units and pull them 1 square out of the city. If you are at war with the civilization, you start to take collateral damage (i.e. some sort of random calculation). For units with no hitpoints (artillery, catapaults, etc.), they get destroyed. Ships have a chance of moving one square out (into the sea). Airplanes have a chance of being rebased at the nearest city. For both ships and airplanes, they may take damage (signifying the lack of fuel/supplies/etc.). Workers of a different nationality stay (and go to the new civ), workers of a your nationality evacuate. With the random damage thing, your workers may be captured.
This is kind of like the whole seceding Hong Kong back to the Chinese. The units withdraw and everyone is all friendly like.
Now, one could spice this up a bit further and add the option to sell/etc. all improvements while leaving. Take a hit on the reputation but one can easily set back the city for the new civ.
So here is the scenario. I am the Indians stomping the Japanese. Japanese have Pikemen, I have War Elephants and plenty of them. I have run through three cities already and I am starting on one of the size 12 cities next to their second capital (I took the first one
) I have roughly 12 war elephants attacking which should be sufficient. I take the town losing a few/damaging a few and send up 6 to the capital. There are of course more war elephants on the way so I wait a bit to get a full battalion again. So, I have 4 elephants garrisoning a town of 10 now.
One turn later while I am waiting for the other elephants to get to the capital and the wounded ones to heal, it culture flips. Arrghh, stupid Japanese. Of course, I had 4 more elephants en route so I re-attack and take the city back quite easily. Then, I attack Tokyo and take pretty huge losses (stupid capital bonus) and retreat now down to 4 wounded elephants. Next turn, bam, culture flip again! WTF???
Now, my force which was quite decent is now down to a paltry 4 elephants out of 12 (+4 in the back). Culture flipping took out 8 of my war elephants. That is just not right and cause my to bang the table quite a bit last night.
I mean come on, what is the deal? If one unit can raze the town, I firmly believe that 4 of them could keep a city in line. Besides, at worst case, my troops make the elephants stampede, burning down half the city or something. Eventually I did retake the city (and promptly razed it to the ground in honor of my 8 elephants that perished at the hands of the peasants).
My point is and I know this has been rehashed quite a few times, the culture flip system has got to change for how armies are dealt with. Here is my humble suggestion to avoid future calamities like the ones suffered by the Indians above:
- Option A: Check the rebellion
If a city wishes to revolt, you have the option to tell your troops to just let loose and to do an Assyrian number on the populace. Start cracking heads and stacking skulls and make an example of the population. As a result, your overall reputation suffers because you are just a bad-ass (Despot, despot, you're a despot, etc.). Inject war-weariness in a democracy, etc. or whatever.
If you have just a few troops in a giant city or the city is still resisting, do some sort of population vs. unit roll. In the worst case, the city gets burned to ground, something that you shouldd have done in the first place when you took the city.
If all goes well, your military scares the bejeezus out of the population and they fall back into line. For any other cities in a similar situation, it sets an example (i.e. your head will be next in the pile of skulls, jabrone).
Option B: Withdraw military
Take all of the military units and pull them 1 square out of the city. If you are at war with the civilization, you start to take collateral damage (i.e. some sort of random calculation). For units with no hitpoints (artillery, catapaults, etc.), they get destroyed. Ships have a chance of moving one square out (into the sea). Airplanes have a chance of being rebased at the nearest city. For both ships and airplanes, they may take damage (signifying the lack of fuel/supplies/etc.). Workers of a different nationality stay (and go to the new civ), workers of a your nationality evacuate. With the random damage thing, your workers may be captured.
This is kind of like the whole seceding Hong Kong back to the Chinese. The units withdraw and everyone is all friendly like.
Now, one could spice this up a bit further and add the option to sell/etc. all improvements while leaving. Take a hit on the reputation but one can easily set back the city for the new civ.
and razed it the second time I took it but I didn't think it would happen twice, much less only 1 turn afterwards. Sheesh. 
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