Civilization V Analyst: Cities & Government

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*This page last updated: 14 May, 2012 11:20 PST.

General Notes

• Happiness is now global instead of per-City, so changes in Happiness affect the whole empire. Happiness is displayed on the top bar of the main screen as a net positive or negative value. Positive happiness contributes toward a Golden Age, while Unhappiness slows population growth (in the form of a penalty to surplus food).
• Happiness is decreased for each extra citizen, each city, and especially each annexed foreign city. It is increased through Natural Wonders, luxury resources, and certain Buildings, Wonders and Social Policies.
• If an empire has enough unhappiness to become Very Unhappy (-10 happiness), cities stop growing altogether and can no longer produce Settlers, and military units receive a -10% combat penalty.
• The Commerce system with its classic Gold/Research/Culture sliders is gone. Gold, Research and Culture are now all generated independently.
• Gold has more uses: buying city tiles, rushing production, maintenance costs on units, buildings and roads, and unit upgrades are more important. Gold is needed to influence city-states and placate enemy civilizations.
• If you are out of gold, and your income is negative, it comes out of your research. Basically for every 1 gold deficit you have, you lose 1 research point. If the gold deficit goes beyond -5 gold per turn, the game may start to disband your military units.
• Cities can choose Wealth as a production option upon discovery of the Currency technology (as in Civ IV), converting production to gold at a 10% rate.
• Trade Routes are connections between each city and its Capital, facilitated by roads or a Harbor building. The value of the trade route in gold per turn depends on the combined sizes of the city and the Capital. Trade routes can be interrupted by blocking roads or blockading harbors. A city that has an active trade route is indicated by the three-arrow symbol below the city bar.
• Culture is a global value can be spent like money on Social Policy items, but still determines automatic local city tile expansion.
• Science now comes mainly from your population, though specialist populations, buildings and unique tile improvements also contribute. 
• Golden Ages still provide +1 Gold and Production on tiles that have at least one of either. Golden Ages can be triggered by  accumulating Happiness points, by expending a Great Person, or through certain other game effects (like completing the Taj Mahal wonder, or by selecting certain Social Policies).
• There is a yellow diamond icon on the main screen that displays progress towards a Golden Age in terms of points of surplus Happiness accumulated. Every turn the empire has positive net Happiness, this value is added toward the total. 
• Great People are still produced much like in Civ IV with points generated from Wonders and other special effects, except that each Great Person type has its own pool, so multiple types can be worked towards at the same time.
• In addition to the standard view of the map, there is now a Strategic View that displays a 2D wargame-style hex map. This replaces the "globe view" of Civ IV.

Cities

• Cities have a Combat Strength and can defend against attacks on their own. A unit can also be Garrisoned inside to increase that strength (adding a portion of its own strength). A unit that moves into a city is automatically garrisoned. Cities always defend with their full strength, even when damaged.
• A City has a 2-hex Ranged Attack with a strength equal to its Combat Strength. The strength of this attack does not decline as the city takes damage.
• A City at full health has 20 hit points (whereas units have 10). The city's health must be reduced to 0 to capture it. Cities heal at least one point each turn, even during combat.
• A city may temporarily have both a unit garrisoned and another unit occupying the city tile (if, for example a new unit was produced by the city), but the additional unit must vacate the city before the player will be allowed to end the turn. Another unit cannot be moved in to a city until the previous unit is moved out. (If there is no room for the unit to leave the city, then it must be Disbanded.)
• A unit stationed in the City cannot both attack and be garrisoned at the same time. If a city is captured, the garrisoned unit is lost.
• The City Bar displays current production and progress, population and growth progress, strength at top, garrisoned unit icon (if any) at top left, and status icon(s) underneath. Observed status icons include:
  • Connected to Trade Route (triangle of 3 arrows)
  • Trade Route Blockaded (red and yellow version of trade route icon)
  • In Revolt (red fist)
  • Puppet city (marionette)
  • Annexed city (three link chain)
• Cities now expand one tile at a time, with a maximum radius of 3 tiles. The maximum workable area of a city is 37 tiles, but the city can continue to expand the nation borders even beyond this area, even though such tiles will not be workable by the city.
• A city's local Culture production controls how quickly a city will add a new tile, and the population automatically chooses which tile to expand to, favoring whatever available resource the AI thinks your city needs. 
• The player may choose to purchase additional tiles for gold. Spending gold to expand one's borders is now "an important part of the game." (Jon Shafer) The price for purchasing a tile depends on how easy or hard it would be for the city to claim the tile normally. Cost increases with distance from the city, roughness of terrain and obstacles such as rivers.
• You may only purchase tiles that are in unclaimed territory. The only ways to acquire foreign-claimed tiles is through city conquest or a Great Artist's "culture bomb."
• There is still a City Screen in which the player can manipulate population on tiles, assign citizens to Specialist Buildings, modify/rush/queue production, or purchase additional tiles.
• Specialists are citizens assigned to work in a building that has slots to employ them, such as a Library or Market. Specialist types include:
  • Artist: generates culture and Great Artist points.
  • Merchant: generates gold and Great Merchant points.
  • Scientist: generates science and Great Scientists points.
  • Engineer: increases production and generates Great Engineer points.
• Unemployed citizens (those not working a tile or assigned as a specialist) produce 1 hammer.
• Capturing a city provides the conqueror with a pillaged amount of gold, as in previous games.
• When a city is captured, you may choose to Annex, Raze, or Create Puppet.
• Annexing the City into your empire causes it to become a normal City that produces quite a bit of extra Unhappiness. This extra Unhappiness does not reduce over time, and can only be eliminated by building a Courthouse in that city. After a Courthouse is built, the Annexed city thereafter behaves as a normal, unoccupied city.
• By turning the city into a Puppet, it will generate Gold, Science, Culture, etc. for you, but you may not choose what it produces or customize the City. It will contribute much less Unhappiness than an Annexed City, and will not increase the cost of your Social Policies and Great People. If you choose this, you may later Annex the City at any point. However, when you Annex this city you will still face extra Unhappiness from Annexation until you build a Courthouse, so this is only delaying the inevitable.
• Razing a city takes multiple turns; one turn per population point. The city is Annexed during the process, so you will take the Unhappiness hit from occupied population until the city is destroyed. You may choose to stop the razing process at any time.
• You can't raze a city you founded, a City-State, or another civilization's Capital. But you can choose to raze any other occupied city at any time (there is a button for it in the City Screen). A puppet city must be annexed before it can be razed.
• Cities no longer flip from culture, and cultural borders between civilizations do not shift due to additional culture once established, except for by a Great Artist's "culture bomb."
• City Health (from Civ IV) is no longer a factor.

Social Policies

The Government/Civics system has been dramatically overhauled. Rather than having different forms of government or civics that the civilization can choose and switch between, Civ V uses a system called "Social Policy" which consists of 10 separate trees in which the civilization can spend Culture and unlock bonuses. These bonuses are cumulative, and the civilization does not "switch" between policies, but rather chooses which trees to invest in. 

• You start the game with access to the Tradition, Liberty, and Honor trees, and other trees unlock at certain eras. 
• Some trees are incompatible with others. You can't have both Freedom and Autocracy, or both Rationalism and Piety. It is possible to switch between mutually exclusive trees, but we don't yet know how this works.
• Purchasing all the options in five of the ten trees will unlock a Utopia Project wonder which can then be built to achieve a Cultural Victory (assuming your rivals don't destroy you first). 
• Social Policies don't affect your relations with other civilizations (as Civics did in Civ IV), but some can help increase your Influence with City-States.
• The cost of the next policy increases each time you purchase a policy. This cost appears to be the same regardless of how deep in the tree the policy is.
• Each city you own will increase Social Policy costs by 30%. Puppet cities don't count toward this total.
• The Advanced View button at top right shows you all of the trees rather than the background artwork.

Jon Shafer: 'With the policies system, we wanted to keep the feel of mixing and matching to construct one's government that was part of Civ IV, but we also wanted to instill a sense of forward momentum. Rather than having to switch out of one policy to adopt another, you build upon the policies already unlocked. The thought process we want to promote is "What cool new effect do I want?" rather than the feeling of needing to perform detailed analysis to determine if switching is a good idea.'

Tradition

Tradition is best for small empires. Adopting Tradition greatly increases the rate of border expansion in cities and also grants 3 Culture in the Capital. Adopting all Policies in the Tradition tree will grant +15% Growth and +2 in each city.

• Aristocracy: +15% when building Wonders and +1 Happiness for every 10 Citizens in a City.
• Oligarchy: Garrisoned units cost no maintenance and cities with a garrison gain +100% Ranged Combat Strength.
• Legalism: Provides a free culture building in your first 4 cities.
• Monarchy: +1 Gold and -1 Unhappiness for every 2 Citizens in the Capital. (requires Legalism)
• Landed Elite: +10% Growth and +2 in the Capital. (requires Legalism)

Liberty

Liberty is best for civilizations which desire rapid expansion. Adopting Liberty will provide 1 Culture in every City. Adopting all policies in the Liberty tree will grant a free Great Person of your choice near the Capital.

• Collective Rule: Speeds the training of Settlers by 50% in the Capital and a free Settler appears near the Capital.
• Citizenship: Tile improvement construction rate increased by 25% and a Worker appears near the Capital.
• Meritocracy: +1 Happiness for each City you own connected to the Capital and -5% Unhappiness from Citizens in non-occupied Cities. (requires Citizenship)
• Representation: Each city you found will increase the Culture cost of policies by 33% less than normal. Also starts a Golden Age. (requires Citizenship)
• Republic: +1 Production in every City and +5% Production in cities when constructing Buildings. (required Collective Rule)

Honor

Honor improves the effectiveness of one's army in a variety of ways. Adopting Honor gives a +25% combat bonus VS Barbarians, and notifications will be provided when new Barbarian Encampments spawn in revealed territory. Gain Culture for the empire from each barbarian killed. Adopting all policies in the Honor tree will grant Gold for each enemy unit killed.

• Warrior Code: +15% Production when training Melee units and a Great General appears outside the Capital.
• Discipline:  +10% combat strength for military Units which have another military Unit in an adjacent tile.
• Military Caste: Each City with a garrison increases empire Happiness by 1 and Culture by 2. (requires Discipline)
• Military Tradition: Military Units gain 50% more Experience from combat. (requires Warrior Code)
• Professional Army: Gold cost of upgrading Military Units reduced by 33% and +1 Happiness from every defensive building (Walls, Castle, Arsenal, Military Base). (requires Military Caste)

Piety

Unlocks at Classical Era. This branch cannot be active at the same time as Rationalism.
Piety increases the Culture of empires. Adopting Piety reduces the time to build Culture buildings by 15%. Adopting all policies in the Piety tree will reduce the Culture cost of future Policies by 10%.

• Organized Religion: +1 Happiness from every Monument, Temple and Monastery.
• Mandate of Heaven: 50% of excess Happiness added each turn to the amount of Culture that may be spent on Social Policies.
• Reformation: Culture increased by 33% in all cities which have built a World Wonder and the empire immediately enters a Golden Age. (requires Organized Religion)
• Theocracy: Temples increase a cities Gold output by 10%. (requires Organized Religion)
• Free Religion: +1 Culture for each Monument, Temple and Monastery. Also gives 1 free Policy. (requires Mandate of Heaven, Reformation)

Patronage

Unlocks at Medieval Era.
Patronage enhances the benefits of City-State friendship. Influence with City-States degrades 25% slower than normal. Adopting all policies in the Patronage tree will make other players' Influence with City-States decrease 33% more per turn than usual.

• Aesthetics: Minimum Influence level with all City-States is 20.
• Philanthropy: Gifts of Gold to a City-State generate 25% extra Influence.
• Scholasticism: All City-States which are Allies provide a Science bonus equal to 25% of what they produce for themselves. (requires Philanthropy)
• Cultural Diplomacy: Quantity of Resources gifted by City-States increased by 100%. Happiness from gifted Luxuries increased by 50%. (requires Scholasticism)
• Educated Elite: Allied City-States will occasionally gift you Great People. (requires Aesthetics, Scholasticism)

Commerce

Unlocks at Medieval Era. 
Commerce provides bonuses to naval empires, and those focused on Gold. Adopting Commerce will boost Gold output in Capital City by 25%. Adopting all Policies in the Commerce tree will grant +1 Gold from every Specialist.

• Naval Tradition: +1 Movement and +1 sight range for naval combat units.
• Trade Unions: Maintenance paid on Roads and Railroads reduced by 33%. Harbors and Seaports gain +1 Gold.
• Mercantilism: -25% cost to purchase items in Cities (requires Trade Unions).
• Merchant Navy: +3 Production in coastal Cities (requires Naval Tradition).
• Protectionism: +1 Happiness from each Luxury Resource (requires Mercantilism).

Freedom

Unlocks at Renaissance Era. This branch cannot be active at the same time as Autocracy or Order.
Freedom is best for small, focused empires. In particular, it provides bonuses for Great People and Specialists. Upon adopting Freedom, the rate at which Great People are born is increased by 25%. Adopting all Policies in the Freedom tree will increase the base yield from Great Tile Improvements by 100% and length of Golden Ages increased by 50%.

• Civil Society: Specialists consume only half the normal amount of Food.
• Constitution: +2 Culture from each World Wonder.
• Universal Suffrage: +33% City Combat Strength.
• Democracy: Specialist Population in Cities produce half the normal amount of Unhappiness. (Requires Civil Society)
• Free Speech: 8 units are maintenance free. (Requires Constitution)

Rationalism

Unlocks at Renaissance Era. This branch cannot be active at the same time as Piety.
Rationalism improves the ability to use and generate Science. Adopting Rationalism boosts Science gained from research agreements by 50%. Adopting all Policies in the Rationalism tree will grant +1 Gold from Science buildings.

• Secularism: +2 Science from each specialist.
• Humanism: +1 Happiness from each University, Observatory and Public School.
• Free Thought: +1 Science from every Trading Post and +17% Science from Universities. (requires Secularism).
• Sovereignty: +15% Science while your empire is Happy (requires Humanism).
• Scientific Revolution: Gives 2 free technologies (requires Free Thought).

Order

Unlocks at Industrial Era. This branch cannot be active at the same time as Freedom or Autocracy.
Order is best for large, sprawling empires, increasing the strength of the empire based on the number of Cities it contains. Adopting Order will increase Happiness by 1 per City.Adopting all Policies in the Order tree will grant +1 Food, Production, Science, Gold, and Culture per city.

• United Front: Causes other civilizations' city-state influence points to decay 33% faster.
• Nationalism: Militaristic city states grant units twice as often when you are at war with a common foe.
• Planned Economy: Factories increase a cities Science output by 25%.
• Socialism: Gold maintenance costs of Buildings reduced by 10%. (requires Planned Economy)
• Communism: +2 Production per City and +10% Production when constructing Buildings. (requires Socialism)

Autocracy

Unlocks at Industrial Era. This branch cannot be active at the same time as Freedom or Order.
Autocracy is for militaristic civilizations, dreaming of world conquest. Adopting Autocracy reduces Unit Gold Maintenance costs by 33%, allowing an empire to field a larger military. Adopting all Policies in the Autocracy tree will grant a 20% attack bonus to all Military Units for 30 turns.

• Militarism: -33% cost for purchasing units.
• Police State: -50% Unhappiness in Annexed Cities. (requires Militarism)
• Populism: Damaged military units deal +25% damage.
• Fascism: Quantity of Strategic Resources produced by the empire increased by 100%. (requires Populism, Militarism)
• Total War: +15% Production when building Military Units and new Military Units start with 15 Experience. (requires Police State, Fascism)

Advisors

There has been some hype regarding the return of "Advisors," but they appear to be the same kind of tutorial pop-up messages we've always had... just now with pictures of people on them.

There appear to be four different advisors: Science, Economy, Military and Foreign.

Recent videos do show them to be a bit more of a context sensitive help system: if the game thinks you're lost, it may pop up a hint box, and there are question buttons you can click to investigate the matter further. In one example, when the player hesitated to found a city with his first Settler, the advisor popped up a dialog suggesting where and how to found a city. The dialog included question buttons: "What are cities?" "How can I found more cities?" "Where should cities be founded?", a Find Settler button, and a Thank You (dismiss dialog) button.

The various advisors also tag items in your build menu and research screen with colored icons representing their respective recommendations.

Page by Arioch. Last updated: 14 May, 2012 11:20 PST
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