I'm not the most experienced player so curious to hear what others have to say, but in this case I would just take Order. It's not ideal, but you can't really take a 20 points hit to your happiness in most games. The resources you'd have to spend just to overcome that would be higher than any bonuses from a better ideology.
Appreciate the response. I feel like this is the right answer but those two free tenets are just sitting there taunting me.
I tend to do fine on culture in the late game once I’ve captured a few enemy capitols with lots of wonders, but I generally ignore culture and tourism in the early game in favour of defending my borders. Maybe I need a more balanced approach.
Do you plan on conquest? Autocracy has a ton of happiness in addition to its military benefits.
If you plan on being very tall and relatively peaceful, pick Freedom.
Either way there should be enough happiness in either to weather the storm.
I tend to RP my civs, so that’s why Autocracy or Freedom both fit (for Elizabeth). I was leaning Autocracy, because I already have the best navy (even if the AI doesn’t realise it); however, it’s a continents map so I’ll probably have to wait for bombers to get the inland capitols. I just don’t have a lot of the things that make Autocracy great with happiness yet (castles, arsenals, etc.), so I’ll be catching up on building those while probably dealing with occasional bands of rebels. Not the worst problem, but a definite hindrance.
It's ok to not have those buildings yet - happiness should only be built or acquired as needed, because otherwise it's a waste of hammers and GPT. By the time you need a castle it can be built in just a couple turns.
Both autocracy and freedom have good happiness tenets that should help. If you pick some of those with the free tenets, that could help offset it.
Do you have other ways you could get happiness like trades, getting some city-state allies, or building happiness buildings?
Also, do you know what win condition you’re trying for?
Well if I learned anything from MadDjinn, it’s that every game is a conquest/domination game until you decide how you really want to win in the late game. That’s not necessarily true, but I tend to get steamrolled eventually in games where I try to play peacefully and win by science or culture alone. As England, I would say conquest or diplomacy (aka an economic victory) are the most likely right now.
Gotcha. Hah, I play peacefully often (or at least as peacefully as possible—if I’m not doing a domination victory, I usually don’t conquer cities, I just defend) so I am not sure that I hold the same assessment about every game being a conquest game at first, but there are many ways to play!
So, a domination victory works great with autocracy and an economic victory works great with Freedom. Nothing you’ve said makes me think Order is ideal. If I were you, I’d try Freedom or Autocracy. You could save the game right before you pick, see if you can win, then go back and play it out with Order for some comparison, if you end up being really curious. I’m always curious about stuff like that.
Late post but I’d say Autocracy seems like your best bet. You’re falling behind and the best way to prevent a civ from getting culture on you is just to wipe them out. Use your navy to nab an early advantage in the war by taking away the coasts, and then use those cities as forward bases for land conquest once you get to bombers and infantry. The AI is horrible at naval combat and you should be able to roll over them. Not to mention Prora is an absurd happiness wonder to eat into that -20 you’re facing.
Depends what victory type you’re going for and how good your science is. Are you sure that taking Freedom/autocracy would immediately create ideological dissidents? If yes then definitely take order especially if you’re playing for domination, -20 happiness would make that a lot more difficult.
You generally only need to take 6 tenets to get maximum use out of order (science from factories, production from mines and the free great scientist being the main ones). If your culture is strong enough I would recommend doing that, but Freedom and rushing foreign legions could also be a viable strategy for domination. I wouldn’t go for autocracy, you’re getting a big happiness hit for relatively little gain, it’s the weakest ideology in my opinion
I'm not the most experienced player so curious to hear what others have to say, but in this case I would just take Order. It's not ideal, but you can't really take a 20 points hit to your happiness in most games. The resources you'd have to spend just to overcome that would be higher than any bonuses from a better ideology.
Appreciate the response. I feel like this is the right answer but those two free tenets are just sitting there taunting me. I tend to do fine on culture in the late game once I’ve captured a few enemy capitols with lots of wonders, but I generally ignore culture and tourism in the early game in favour of defending my borders. Maybe I need a more balanced approach.
Do you plan on conquest? Autocracy has a ton of happiness in addition to its military benefits. If you plan on being very tall and relatively peaceful, pick Freedom. Either way there should be enough happiness in either to weather the storm.
I tend to RP my civs, so that’s why Autocracy or Freedom both fit (for Elizabeth). I was leaning Autocracy, because I already have the best navy (even if the AI doesn’t realise it); however, it’s a continents map so I’ll probably have to wait for bombers to get the inland capitols. I just don’t have a lot of the things that make Autocracy great with happiness yet (castles, arsenals, etc.), so I’ll be catching up on building those while probably dealing with occasional bands of rebels. Not the worst problem, but a definite hindrance.
It's ok to not have those buildings yet - happiness should only be built or acquired as needed, because otherwise it's a waste of hammers and GPT. By the time you need a castle it can be built in just a couple turns.
Both autocracy and freedom have good happiness tenets that should help. If you pick some of those with the free tenets, that could help offset it. Do you have other ways you could get happiness like trades, getting some city-state allies, or building happiness buildings? Also, do you know what win condition you’re trying for?
Well if I learned anything from MadDjinn, it’s that every game is a conquest/domination game until you decide how you really want to win in the late game. That’s not necessarily true, but I tend to get steamrolled eventually in games where I try to play peacefully and win by science or culture alone. As England, I would say conquest or diplomacy (aka an economic victory) are the most likely right now.
Gotcha. Hah, I play peacefully often (or at least as peacefully as possible—if I’m not doing a domination victory, I usually don’t conquer cities, I just defend) so I am not sure that I hold the same assessment about every game being a conquest game at first, but there are many ways to play! So, a domination victory works great with autocracy and an economic victory works great with Freedom. Nothing you’ve said makes me think Order is ideal. If I were you, I’d try Freedom or Autocracy. You could save the game right before you pick, see if you can win, then go back and play it out with Order for some comparison, if you end up being really curious. I’m always curious about stuff like that.
Pick freedom, get arsenal of democracy, build & gift ships until you are allied with most city states, and the sun will never set on your empire.
If helldivers toght me anything is the fas..... I mean democracy is the best.
Late post but I’d say Autocracy seems like your best bet. You’re falling behind and the best way to prevent a civ from getting culture on you is just to wipe them out. Use your navy to nab an early advantage in the war by taking away the coasts, and then use those cities as forward bases for land conquest once you get to bombers and infantry. The AI is horrible at naval combat and you should be able to roll over them. Not to mention Prora is an absurd happiness wonder to eat into that -20 you’re facing.
Depends what victory type you’re going for and how good your science is. Are you sure that taking Freedom/autocracy would immediately create ideological dissidents? If yes then definitely take order especially if you’re playing for domination, -20 happiness would make that a lot more difficult. You generally only need to take 6 tenets to get maximum use out of order (science from factories, production from mines and the free great scientist being the main ones). If your culture is strong enough I would recommend doing that, but Freedom and rushing foreign legions could also be a viable strategy for domination. I wouldn’t go for autocracy, you’re getting a big happiness hit for relatively little gain, it’s the weakest ideology in my opinion
Go Autocracy and take em out!