Happiness is a city management mechanic which can affect all of the resources your town generates. Each town in the civilization keeps track of both happiness and unhappiness. The percentage of happiness to unhappiness is known as your '''Happiness Percentage'''. When your happiness percentage falls below certain pre-defined thresholds your town will begin to experience penalties. Additionally if you maintain a positive happiness ratio your town may experience rewards. Typically, rewards and punishments come in the form of multipliers that either boost or nerf the resource output of your town.
Adding residents of other Civs to groups, Structures, Towns and Wars can all produce unhappiness. Structures, Trade Goods, Wonders, Terrain, Policies and Civics contribute to your town's happiness. In order to keep your town running smoothly, you must balance your unhappiness sources with your happiness sources to makes sure your town remains content.
Your town's current happiness percentage is calculated using the following formula:
Happy Percentage = Happy Points / ( Happy Points + Unhappy Points)*100.
Happy points = Happiness*Happiness rate.
It is not possible to get over 100% happiness, since the best you can hope for is 0 Unhappiness points which would result in the maximum of ( Happy Points / Happy Points )*100 or 100%. Happy Points and Unhappy points come from various sources, listed below.
Batiments
Civic
Trade Good Buff
Some unhappiness sources will come from the entire civilization. These sources of unhappiness are applied to every town in the civilization equally.
Some sources of civ-wide unhappiness are:
These sources of unhappiness only affect a single town, and will vary from town to town:
| Source | Unhappiness |
|---|---|
| Per Town | For every 5 Towns you have, the unhappiness for those 5 towns will increase by 1. Ex: Town 1 to 5 gives 1 unhappiness, Towns 6 to 10 gives 2 unhappiness, ... |
| Per Resident | For each Resident inside your town which isn't the founder you gain 1 unhappiness (the first 10 residents do not produce unhappiness) |
| Residents outside your Civilization in Town groups | For each resident which isn't inside your civilization and is inside a town group you will gain 0.5 unhappiness |
The farther away you build your town, the greater distance unhappiness it will have. If your cultural borders are not touching, you will experience a much harsher distance unhappiness penalty. The following formula is used to calculate distance unhappiness.
We take the distance of Culture Zones between your nearest claimed Culture Zone from your Capitol and the nearest Culture Zone from your Town. For the first 5 Culture Zones you will receive 1 unhappiness per zone, for the next 5 you will receive 2 unhappiness per zone. Whenever your Town grows in culture, it will be re-calculated.
For example: You are 9 Culture Zones away. You will receive 5 unhappiness for the first 5 zones, and 8 unhappiness for the next 4 zones.
In total, you will receive 13 Unhappiness.
As your Happiness Percentage goes up or down, your town will fall into one of these states. Each state effects your Beaker Rate, Coin Rate, Temple Rate, Growth Rate, Culture Rate and Hammer Rate.
| State | Happiness Threshold |
Rate |
|---|---|---|
| Revolt | 0% - 19% | 20% |
| Unrest | 20% - 39% | 50% |
| Unhappy | 40% - 49% | 75% |
| Content | 50% - 69% | 100% |
| Happy | 70% - 84% | 115% |
| Elated | 85% - 91% | 130% |
| Ecstatic | 92% - 99% | 150% |
| Delighted | 100% | 165% |
| Overjoyed | 100% (Golden Age) |
180% |
Overjoyed is only possible with a Golden Age