Cities reverting to AI... (RANT)

[Grim Legacy]

Originally posted by Chris Woods
It really needs to be changed that cities won't 'despose' (or whatever) if [city_size] < [number_of_garrisoned_troops]. This would still reflect the difficulty in integrating enemy cities near the heart of their empire by requireing a large amount of troops to be dedicated to maintaining the city while allowing the standard cultural takeovers to be effective. (It's not reasonable to garrison that many troops in every settlement you have.)

As it stands, taking cities is basically absurd. I've reached the point where my settlers almost outnumber my infantry in an offencive engagement and I raze anything without a useful wonder. You can always add the workers you get from razeing the city back into it once things have settled down.

The alternative (with what we have currently) is to genocide the enemy (take or raze all his cities very quickly) thus eliminating him as an option for the cities to revert to. This can be extremly difficult sometimes, and I have often had cities revert back when the AI's nearest city is leagues away and their cultural borders are no where near eachother.

Chris Woods

I agree with you.

As for your last paragraph: I was thinking of 'removing' the other cities first, before taking the wonder cities, but with your far-away reversion story... I may be looking for eradication instead. Quite a hassle.

[rah]

Originally posted by Grim Legacy


In your testing, you had turned every laborer into an entertainer. And this helped.
To my displeasure, I already do this by default, to starve the city. There is a remote chance I left 1 worker to gather shields, though, so I'll check that out.
I may try population migration too, never tried that.

As for my own city that reverted: it had expanded its borders twice already (110 culture)... and there was no disorder or foreign nationals.

I never play religious civs though, maybe that's a big difference there.

Yes you have to check every turn for those resisters that stop resisting, I forgot to change them, one turn,to entertainers and the city did revert. But when I went back and changed it, it didn't revert. So please verify if you can. But the point was that is was not automatice, it can be influenced. I don't think the random number generator has any effect because i would use the way back machine and try some artillary barrages to change the seed number it would have no impact on whether the city reverted or not.

Your city changing is disturbing. I've never seen one go once it had over 100 culture. The only difference I can see religious having an effect is that with cheap temps and cath, your overall civ culture is probably higher then non religious civsl.

Was that city part of your core cities, or was it really out there?
Was it pre or after patch?
What difficulty level.

I have put new cities on enemy continents and not lost one yet.
Hmmm, as always more testing will be needed to truely understand the mechanics involved.


RAH

And i keep all entertainers even after resistance has ended until the culture has gone up and I've attained at least 50% of the pop as mine. I do also practice the +1 garrison principle.

[Padmewan]

Starve the City

As people noted earlier, starving the city by turning everyone into entertainers works. (I've also prevented reversions by turning everyone into tax collectors, which is more beneficial).

You have to make sure you switch them every turn. The AI will automatically put them back on production next turn. Whenever I had cities revert, it was because I stopped paying attention and let the AI manage the citizens.

[Blaupanzer]

Factors HAVE to include some random measure. I had a Zulu city jump to me at size six. (Me: Babs, then at regent, more culture than any two other civs combined. Zulus last on culture histograph.) I filled it with culture, held it for centuries. 100 or more turns later with 400+ culture and only 4 Zulu citizens left out of 12, it reverted back. Garrison = 3. Waybacked 10 turns. Made garrison 4. Two turns past the previous reversion date, it reverted again. By then my culture was three times theirs. Zulu capitol 3 squares closer than mine. Can't explain this; don't know how to prevent it; not clear whom to ask.

[rah]

I have never been able to change the outcome of a revert or not revert by going back and changing the seed number. Only by changing other things have I been able to influence it. These two statements tell me it's NOT random.

UNLESS the probability of the event is so high that changing the seed is unlikely to change the outcome. And since I've tested this over 30 times the probability of the event would have had to be close to 97-99% for me not to have experienced it.

The changing garrison to 4 is interesting. I usually try to keep no more than 3 foreign nationals in a city since I'm only likely to have a garrison of no larger than 3 on cities unlikely to be attacked. (carryover from old CIVII days) Hmmm. But I've always played Religious and never had a problem.

[inca911]

Define "Troops"

Hiya! A couple quick notes and clarifications.

According to the Firaxians (aka Soren), the following factors affect reversion:

Distance to capitals.
Total ratio of your culture to the other civ's culture.
Total ratio of the culture generated within the individual city under your reign vs. culture generated in the city under the AI's reign.
Garrisoning of troops.
Happiness (WLT*D). (not well quantified or reliable)

As a rule of thumb, Soren stated that you need one offensively capable unit for each potential defector to prevent reversion. Bombard-only capable units do not count (I don't know if naval units count, but I act as if they do not). So if the city is pop 23, you better have 23 units to spare to guarantee reversion does not occur. I have followed this guideline and I have *never* had a city revert back to the AI. Bombardment down to pop 1-3 is my mode of operation unless I want the entire city (in which case I use outdated units like warriors to provide a garrison even in the modern age!).

Note that rushing cultural improvements does not really affect the total ratio of your *generated* culture vs. what the AI has amassed in that city over the years so rushing cultural improvements is not a reliable method to use. In your example, you take Moscow--likely with a very high culture generated from the AI (strike one), probably near his new capital as well(strike two). It has a pop of 43 and you put in 25 units (only count as 25 if they are all offensive capable) making you 18 units short of guaranteed control. You starve the population (any actual population decline occur yet) then rush a settler so the city is at 41. Next turn rush another settler so you are at 39, and add 10 more units bringing your unit total to 35 (still 4 short!). I cannot rationalize your other examples, but based on Soren's rough guidelines, I would not expect to keep such a large city as pop 43 Moscow with only 35 units. Even without consideration of only offensive capable units making a difference, every factor is against you. Bombardment or massive unit commitment is the only way to go. Your cultural contributions in rush-building temples, libraries, etc are meaningless in the relatively short term and certainly a capital like Moscow will have enough culture to attempt a reversion even when the Russians are nearly dead.

Some of your examples are indeed a bit fishy, but it all is governed by cold analytical code and Soren's tip has kept me completely immune to cultural reversion, even though I tend to play the militaristic and industrious Chinese (and I don't pop-rush in Despotism)!

[rah]

"Total ratio of the culture generated within the individual city under your reign vs. culture generated in the city under the AI's reign."

Then that would tell me to rush those improvement (temps/caths) imediately. Getting it off 0 has to be big. Doing a simple compare 0 divided by any number (0) vs. any other ratio has to make a difference. And pop rushing them even makes the most sense. Eliminate negatives to increase positives. Gotta help. And your overall culture for that ratio comparison will also be improved. Every little bit helps.

RAH

[Skanky Burns]

Size 43?!? Arrrgh

If i were you, i would bombard that city to a nice managable size, like 2 or 3. If you simply must have a massive population in that new city, bring in some loyal settlers and have them increase the population after you have captured the cities. Rushing cultural buildings will always help, but in the case of a previous capital with 3 wonders no less, the only effect will be long-term.

[Master Marcus]

I don't know how random the defection engine is, but perhaps the citizens happiness - WLTKD or not - is more important sometimes than culture facilities and garrisons. In a game post-patch one of my well-garrisoned and cultured city ( superior in culture points than nearest Babs cities ) defected and the ONLY LOGICAL REASON I can think of is that I had at that time only 2 luxuries, not enough happy citizens and experienced a short civil disorder. I don't remember having lost a single non-conquered city to the AI in previous pre-patch games ( Regent, Monarch ).

[inca911]

Originally posted by rah
"Total ratio of the culture generated within the individual city under your reign vs. culture generated in the city under the AI's reign."

Then that would tell me to rush those improvement (temps/caths) imediately. Getting it off 0 has to be big. Doing a simple compare 0 divided by any number (0) vs. any other ratio has to make a difference. And pop rushing them even makes the most sense. Eliminate negatives to increase positives. Gotta help. And your overall culture for that ratio comparison will also be improved. Every little bit helps.

RAH

Likely it is not a true ratio, or if it is a true ratio, then they certainly have code to account for possible divide by 0 errors. It could be a simple differential determination. The point is that rushing cultural improvements will only help in the long term, but not in the short term. A Temple that has been in the city for several thousand years has generated a ton of culture that a rush-built temple and library will not even come close to approaching for a long, long time.

Master Marcus:
Happiness does indeed play a factor, but nobody (sans Soren) really has a handle on that. Certainly civil disorder will increase the chance of defection.

[Grim Legacy]

Originally posted by rah

Yes you have to check every turn for those resisters that stop resisting, I forgot to change them, one turn,to entertainers and the city did revert. But when I went back and changed it, it didn't revert. So please verify if you can. But the point was that is was not automatice, it can be influenced. I don't think the random number generator has any effect because i would use the way back machine and try some artillary barrages to change the seed number it would have no impact on whether the city reverted or not.

I double-checked. There were no laborers, only entertainers in the city. Resistance had been ended already (at peace with victim's nation). Garrison of 8 units, size 4 city. Temple present, libary rushed... too late.

Was that city part of your core cities, or was it really out there?
Was it pre or after patch?
What difficulty level.

Yes part of my core. 9 tiles from my capital. 1 city between reverted city and my capital (my own city Orleans).

After patch.

Deity.

[Grim Legacy]

Re: Define "Troops"

Originally posted by inca911
As a rule of thumb, Soren stated that you need one offensively capable unit for each potential defector to prevent reversion. Bombard-only capable units do not count (I don't know if naval units count, but I act as if they do not). So if the city is pop 23, you better have 23 units to spare to guarantee reversion does not occur. I have followed this guideline and I have *never* had a city revert back to the AI. Bombardment down to pop 1-3 is my mode of operation unless I want the entire city (in which case I use outdated units like warriors to provide a garrison even in the modern age!).

Yes I am aware of this. I do not count artillery as troops. I was speaking of Tanks and Infantry units only.

Note that rushing cultural improvements does not really affect the total ratio of your *generated* culture vs. what the AI has amassed in that city over the years so rushing cultural improvements is not a reliable method to use. In your example, you take Moscow--likely with a very high culture generated from the AI (strike one), probably near his new capital as well(strike two). It has a pop of 43 and you put in 25 units (only count as 25 if they are all offensive capable) making you 18 units short of guaranteed control. You starve the population (any actual population decline occur yet) then rush a settler so the city is at 41. Next turn rush another settler so you are at 39, and add 10 more units bringing your unit total to 35 (still 4 short!). I cannot rationalize your other examples, but based on Soren's rough guidelines, I would not expect to keep such a large city as pop 43 Moscow with only 35 units. Even without consideration of only offensive capable units making a difference, every factor is against you. Bombardment or massive unit commitment is the only way to go. Your cultural contributions in rush-building temples, libraries, etc are meaningless in the relatively short term and certainly a capital like Moscow will have enough culture to attempt a reversion even when the Russians are nearly dead.

Well the first part of my first example *is* understandable, no argument there. What baffles me is what happens when I go to the extreme to prevent reversion... and get next to zero results. Note the drastic measures I took in the second attempt at Moscow.

[Grim Legacy]

Originally posted by Skanky Burns
Size 43?!? Arrrgh

If i were you, i would bombard that city to a nice managable size, like 2 or 3. If you simply must have a massive population in that new city, bring in some loyal settlers and have them increase the population after you have captured the cities. Rushing cultural buildings will always help, but in the case of a previous capital with 3 wonders no less, the only effect will be long-term.

Heh. It was size 68 !!! 5 cattle, pure grassland...

Note that when it reverted in my final attempt, it was size 4, and had 1 persian and 1 iroquois citizen (in other words: not even native russians!).

[Barchan]

My favorite part about this whole affair is that the game essentially sets you up for the fall. "There are resistors," says your scowling advisor as he then proceeds to suggest you place a heavy garrison there to quell them. Then your heavy garrison is swallowed whole when the city promptly reverts back to its original owner. Your advisor is then strangely quiet as to what you should do next….

[Grim Legacy]

Originally posted by Barchan
My favorite part about this whole affair is that the game essentially sets you up for the fall. "There are resistors," says your scowling advisor as he then proceeds to suggest you place a heavy garrison there to quell them. Then your heavy garrison is swallowed whole when the city promptly reverts back to its original owner. Your advisor is then strangely quiet as to what you should do next….

Well, one of the cooler hidden Espionage options also allows you to bribe the opponent's Military Advisor -so this should level the playing field.