Make City Flipping an option

[darthx86]

Originally posted by DeepO
An example: the AI knows that it is best to counter defensive units with mobile units. It doesn't know the reason for it, it was hard coded by Soren to do it like this. However, when it has to pick which unit it uses to attack a defender, it does this based on changeable parameters. It will use knigths to attack spearmen over horseman, as knights have a far better chance of winning.

The AIs' primary objective is acquiring land, and this runs counter to preparing for culture flipping. You've seen it - how often has an AI dropped off a settler and one (ONE!) defender on the only square on the coast that is not within your culture border?

You're not saying you don't plan on culture flipping, are you? I always plan my border cities to have a larger culture than normal, just to try to take an enemy city if possible, and to prevent them from deflecting. Further, all of my newly acquired cities are heavily garrisoned, to improve my chances of keeping them. Cities with wonders are even more heavily garrisoned, as the culture in those was far greater, and the risk is higher.
This is a kind of planning that I'm sure is also included in the AI, and it does not depend that much on parameters. Therefore, it is much more basic to the AI than editing attack values is.

Yes, I understand and plan for culture flipping, and I'm a little annoyed at the inferences by subsequent posts that I don't understand how it works... Even on huge maps, I tend to keep my civ to around 30 cities or fewer in a contiguous pattern (usually as a Republic).

Now, to get back to my original point: Civ 3 was released to be fun - it's a game. The reason it came with an editor is to allow players to tailor it better to their tastes. Some people like the challenges provided out of the box, while others want to tweak it to match their style of play. To this end, who cares if it unbalances the AI? If that's how they want to play it, then why stop them?

(PS: I actually like the idea of the culture flip. I'm about to start a new game with the 1.21f, and if it works as well as my current one, I'll be very happy.)

Edit: clarity

[Fitz]

Well, the capitol factor can probably be estimated. If ranged from 1/4 to 4x the average number (2000), and we can assume 2000 to be equidistant.

So, we can estimate 1 of three ways:

1) we can assume there is a 1/4 and 4x cap on the number. Take the ratio of the distance of your capitol to the distance to their captitol (specifically {your distance/their distance}) and multiply that by 2000, then apply the cap if necessary (500 or 8000).

2) assume that the formula for capitols is graded to the map size, so that if you were at the maximum distance and they were at the minimum, it would = 500, and vise versa it would = 8000. This may or may not be the case, and is certainly the hardest to figure.

3) Play it safe for losing flips (but not gaining) and use method 1 only if you are standing to gain the city. If you stand to lose the city, start with a base 2000, increase by considerably less than the ratio if you are closer, and decrease by more if you are further (basically using method 1 for further, and 2 for closer).

Regardless, in an attempt to make clear all those brackets, and make sure you multiply etc the right numbers, here is a algabraeic formula:

{[(N + S)*C*H] - T}*R/D

N = number of foreign nationals
S = number of 21 city squares under foriegn control
C = City Culture factor, 2 if forign civ has generated more culture in this city, otherwise 1
H = Happiness factor, 2 for disorder, 1/2 for WLTK day, otherwise 1
T= number of garrisoning troops
R= national cultures ratio (their total culture divided by your total culture)
D= Capitol distance factor (500 to 8000, 2000 average). Lower if they are closer, higher if you are.

BACK ON TOPIC: On the issue of making flips an option, I certainly think it should be made optional in the editor or start screens, provided it can be done relatively easily (ie 2-3 days worth of coding changes). The more options the better. And scores should be left the same.

In fact, I find that culture flipping increases my militaryness and inhumaneness when playing the game (same with resource dissapearance). If my city flips, you can bet I take it back. If a city I just conquered flips back, next round I raze it, and since I razed one city, I figure that civ is a write off as far as relations go and raze them off the map. I do try and keep cities when possible, but it can be really hard to keep a city (ties up at least 20 troops for a size 10 city just conquered that they had any culture in).

[darthx86]

Originally posted by cyclotron7
Combat is random. Everything in a game must be random, or you would know the outcome ahead of time. Culture Flipping isn't confusing either, because we know the general formulas that go along with it. In terms of what we know about it, flipping is much less "confusing" than diplomacy or espionage.

Human players can plan for it. Human players should plan around it. If by "plan" you mean "know the outcome beforehand," then I could say with equal correctness that combat in any Civ game ever can't be planned for.

I agree with you and DeepO on both of these points. My point is that, barring obscene difficulties in programming, I don't consider Phat's request unreasonable. Different people play the game differently. I'drather not get into a long discussion (debate) about what is/isn't fair, easy/difficult, balanced/unbalanced, etc. The point is that they released an editor which allows human players to tailor the game to their style. If this feature ruins the fun for them and is easy to change programmatically, then why not add it? I didn't really have an issue with stacking units, but enough people b!tched and that was added...

There has to be a logical limit. You can't please everyone with a game, and you can't try to by making every feature in the game capable of being turned off. There is virtually no chance that Firaxis will spend time adding a toggle to remove a critical part of the game.

I agree that you can't please everyone, but disagree that it's a critical part of the game. It certainly adds an element of chance and excitement, but when it's poorly implemented as it seemed to be in the initial release, it can ruin the fun for a player.

[Cyclotron]

Two quotes from this thread by Darthx86:

Since culture flip is confusing and (at best) random, human players can't plan on it.

Yes, I understand and plan for culture flipping...

Okay, I have officicially lost you. Either that, or you aren't human.

Anyways:

Now, to get back to my original point: Civ 3 was released to be fun - it's a game. The reason it came with an editor is to allow players to tailor it better to their tastes. Some people like the challenges provided out of the box, while others want to tweak it to match their style of play. To this end, who cares if it unbalances the AI? If that's how they want to play it, then why stop them?

Please see my previous post on a logical limit. I could think of a million things that it is possible for people not to like in Civ3, and Firaxis can't spend time just making toggles for features people don't like (but apparently can live with, and play around). Strategies and mods are for tweaking...

In conclusion: It's not about letting you do what you want (which is fine), it's about priorities for the game developers. This is not likely to be one of them, since culture and flipping are such integral parts of the game.

[simwiz2]

Originally posted by Stuie
Also reminds me of the many tales of ancient cities under siege that were betrayed by small groups in the city that had ties to the besiegers. They would unlock the gates and let the besiegers in, no battle necessary. Flip.

That is already represented IMO with resistors, because cities with resistors get no defense bonuses. In civ, a flip is not simply "defense bonus of walls negated because gate was opened" it is the city flips with NO ATTACKING FORCE to be let in in the first place, and with no chance for your army to fight.

Then there are cases such as Hong Kong (a British possession) being handed over to China. Sure it was a pre-arranged deal, but still.... it flipped from England to China.

No. Hong Kong was handed over by treaty, as in the human giving the AI a city as a gift. It did not flip spontaneously without consent of the leader and take the entire garrison with it.

[DeepO]

darthx86,
Sorry, I didn't want to infer you didn't plan for it, I was only pointing out that what you said couldn't be like you played it.

Originally posted by darthx86

Do you think the AI is really smart enough to control the game from a high enough level to plan for culture flipping? Nope... The Russians will follow the Russian gameplan according to various stimuli, as will the Zulus, the French, ad nauseum.

I don't think any AI is smart, rule-based systems are just as smart as the people who made it. But I am fairly sure that the gameplan as you call it takes culture flipping into account. One of the stimuli is exactly whether a city is under the influence of a foreign culture, so why wouldn't an AI player use this info? Besides, I have observed numerous times that, to a certain point, an AI border city is faster on acquiring culture than my opposite border city, only with the third or fourth cultural building does the balance shift. And at that time I'm definately going for extra culture, certainly when those cities are only 2 squares apart.

The AIs' primary objective is acquiring land, and this runs counter to preparing for culture flipping. You've seen it - how often has an AI dropped off a settler and one (ONE!) defender on the only square on the coast that is not within your culture border?

Dropping off settlers on one square of open land does not happen that often anymore with the latest patches, and will never happen if your city is only 2 squares away. When it does happen, the nearest city is 3, or even 4 squares away, and once that city has build a temple (and gets its first border increase) the AI has a big chance of keeping it. Besides, if I have the chance, I do it too, and I even take more risk than the AI. I will, in certain cases, drop a city just along side a newly founded AI city, and rushbuild every possible cultural building in it. Those are the sites where you have the most chance of flipping to you, as many of the squares in the 21-radius are foreign.

Now, to get back to my original point: Civ 3 was released to be fun - it's a game. The reason it came with an editor is to allow players to tailor it better to their tastes. Some people like the challenges provided out of the box, while others want to tweak it to match their style of play. To this end, who cares if it unbalances the AI? If that's how they want to play it, then why stop them

Sure, I agree. But the next thing you know is that people start whining that the AI is no good. And try telling then that it is their own fault... therefore I can understand the decision to make attack values editable, while keeping the basic concept of flipping in the game.

The risk of an unbalanced AI is not that it will allow cheating in one sort of way (which it does, BTW), but more that it becomes unstable, and, in the gravest of cases, unplayable. Where's the fun in that?
Okay, this last point might be an exageration(sp?), I have more confidence in the robustness of this AI, but I strongly feel that if Firaxis decides to make culture flipping an option they should at the same time make sure that the game is playable as well. If they can't guarantee that, keep the option out.

DeepO

[DeepO]

Originally posted by Fitz
Well, the capitol factor can probably be estimated. If ranged from 1/4 to 4x the average number (2000), and we can assume 2000 to be equidistant.

I agree, I thought so myself. And that isn't the most important part of the formula. What is important is that now you can calculate precisely how many garrison units it takes to totally negate the chances of flipping. While in general this number is much too high to do it with every city, certain cities (like those with wonders) are worth all those spearmen, warriors and horsemen I keep running around

DeepO

Edit: this was kind of an obsolete comment, as I just noticed you mentioned it already in your cut-away thread.

[darthx86]

Sorry for the late reply (my ISP is undergoing a change in service, and as a result, there are some connectivity issues).

Anyway, the points I was giving earlier that were basically:

1. Unit stacking was not in the initial, yet enough people complained (er, requested), and the programmers added that functionality while removing the forest exploitation.

2. IIRC, the original request was to add this function to the XP, so therefore, the programmers already have the code open and are hacking away.

3. Adding a single toggle is nowhere near the complexity of rewriting the entire AI... that's why I mentioned the point about not bothering with the adjustments to the AI. People who go into the editor already know they're making changes to Firaxis' intended game balance, effectively tipping the scales (usually to the human player).

Just wait until the XP is out and we try to iron all this out in a multi-player environment!

/out - time to start a new game!

[Coracle]

Originally posted by cyclotron7
. . .In conclusion: It's not about letting you do what you want (which is fine), it's about priorities for the game developers. This is not likely to be one of them, since culture and flipping are such integral parts of the game.

And that's why it is a non-historical failure for those of us opposed to ILLOGICAL and non-historical concepts Soren dreamed up over one too many beers

[Coracle]

Originally posted by Austin
It's been brought up in a number of threads about culture flipping that there "has never been a historical example of a major culture flip"

I would just like to point out that a large number of Rome's aquisitions, especially in the east, came about as a result of culture flipping.

For example, Asia province, Bithnia and Cyrene were ALL "culture flips", the rulers of these kingdoms willed them to Rome because they felt that their people would benefit from being affiliated with Rome. Asia province in particular was the "milk cow" of the Roman republic.

I know that Pontus was a military aquisition, but I think that Cappadocia and Cilicia might also have been "flips". That's the equivelant of all of modern day Turkey, and it was one of the most economically powerfull parts of the ancient world.

Did the Seleucids actually fight Pompey for Syria, or did it roll over too? I'm pretty sure all those little guys like Oshroene simply rolled over for Rome without much of a fight.

Austin

Wrong. Here's why.

First of all, the MANNER in which Culture Flipping is implemented in THE GAME is screwed up:

1. In reality. big garrisons do not vanish into thin air without even knocking off some population points and putting the city in disorder.

2. Individual units, or even dozens of units, can NOT make a city and its population vanish as though all the buildings and people were teleported to the Klingon home world. Razing is a total crock.

3. Cities that have been part of one big culture for millennia do not change civilizations. Period.

4. No city population would ever "depose" the government with a huge enemy army a few tiles away ready to attack them. Not unless they are all retarded.

5. No city would ever flip when the only city left to the defeated civ is its capital and the other side massively outnumbers you in everything. Proximity to the enemy capital is far too important in the game.

6. Enemy capitals, location of which is crucial for flipping, do NOT just hop from one town to the other as these towns and cities are conquered.

So in the game mechanics IT SUCKS.

Historically??

The Roman legions - THEIR MILITARY - caused cities to go over to them, not the writings of Tacitus, Suetonious, or Juvenal. Same with the real Mongol, Assyrian, and other armies. MILITARY INTIMIDATION did it, not the number of poets and libraries you had.

For those who doubt this, just look at Germania. After three Roman Legions were destroyed (XVII, XVIII, XIX) in 9 A.D. the Romans were never able to conquer, SUBDUE, and COLONIZE barbarian Germania - that despite Roman culture right next to it for centuries. So Culture Flipping is a non-historical crock.

Culture should do only one thing - quicken the pace of assimilation, as happened in Gaul.

Culture Flipping is Soren's idiotic brainstorm.

[MarkG]

coracle, the next time i see a personal insult, you'll find yourself unable to post

[Tuberski]

Originally posted by MarkG
coracle, the next time i see a personal insult, you'll find yourself unable to post

He's been personally insulting Soren ever since he logged on.

[Phat_Phal]

What happens, I go to sleep and wake up to this....what a mess.

Someone mentioned about ancient cities converting or flipping their culture over. Thats all fine, thats not the culture flipping I'm worried about in my games. The culture flip that I'm worried about is in those big cities where millions live and they all decide all of a sudden to get a magic wand and say Ab bra ka dab bra and all my armies are gone in their city and it converts to the enemy.

I just want to say before a game. I don't want this happening. And just turn it off.

[Cyclotron]

Originally posted by MarkG
coracle, the next time i see a personal insult, you'll find yourself unable to post

Whoa! Does that mean I can report him whenever he insults Soren personally?

[Cyclotron]

Originally posted by Phat_Phal
What happens, I go to sleep and wake up to this....what a mess.

Someone mentioned about ancient cities converting or flipping their culture over. Thats all fine, thats not the culture flipping I'm worried about in my games. The culture flip that I'm worried about is in those big cities where millions live and they all decide all of a sudden to get a magic wand and say Ab bra ka dab bra and all my armies are gone in their city and it converts to the enemy.

It's an armed rebellion. Your armies are trapped in a metropolis of hundreds of thousands of angry civilians with weapons (even if they are sub-par). The only magic wand would be a rifle...