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In our sample game we look at playing as Austria and aiming for a Diplomatic Victory. And our focus is on puppeting City-States, but I misunderstood and instead of making a Diplomatic Victory easier, it makes it harder. I still managed to get my Diplomatic Victory, but a Science or Domination Victory would definitely have been easier in this scenario.

Playing Civilization V, Part 13

Playing for a Diplomatic Victory, Part 2

So, how do you solve a Happiness problem? For a full discussion, you can check out this section of the Civilization Wiki. In Civilization V you have these options:

• Trade for luxuries – Luxury resources are the best way to get a quick hit of Happiness, and trade is the best way to do this quickly. But to trade you have to have met the other civ, so my drive to explore pays off here. Every luxury resource I can obtain adds +4 Global Happiness to my Empire. Note that only the first unit of the resources adds happiness. So if you have multiple copies of a luxury resource you should keep one and trade the others if you can.
• Buildings – Buildings like the Circus (+2), Colosseum (+2), Zoo (+2), and Stadium (+4) provide local happiness in the city that builds them. That still gets added to your total happiness number, but local happiness can never exceed the size of the population. So if you have a city with 5 population, building a Circus and a Colosseum might make sense, but building a Circus and a Stadium would not since 2 of the Happiness would not count. Buildings take longer than Trade deals, so if you need a quick hit start with trading for Luxuries.
• Wonders – Chichen Itza (+4), Notre Dame (+10), Taj Mahal (+4), Eiffel Tower (+5), Neuschwanstein (+1 for every Castle you have), Prora (+1, plus +1 for every 2 Social Policies you have adopted), and CN Tower (+1 per city). Wonders are even harder to build, and you may not get them since you are competing with other players. But there is a National Wonder worth getting, the Circus Maximus (+5)
• Social Policies – Every policy tree has policies that can add to Happiness or decrease Unhappiness, which is just as good.
• Natural Wonders – Each Natural Wonder grants +1 Global Happiness to each empire that has discovered it. So again exploration is key.
• Mercantile City States grant +3 Global Happiness to each Empire that is at least Friends with it.

So you have a lot of options here, and they are listed in order of how you should pursue them. Trading for Luxury Resources can be done quickly and provide an immediate boost, so you should be actively trading all along. Buildings and Wonders should definitely be pursued, but here you will probably be balancing demands for other investments as well. Natural Wonders are nice, but you need to explore the whole map to max that out. I was able to trade one of my Whales to Patchacuti for one of his Ivory, which helped push my happiness up. Then with Askia I traded one Spice for one Copper. I also made a small gift to the City-State of Manila to make them my ally. Once 5 turns have elapsed, I can take them over via Diplomatic Marriage. And I have started on Colosseums in several of my cities to push up my Happiness further.

Meanwhile I continued my exporations, and became the first to discover all of the the other Empires in the game. This makes me the host for the World Council, which is good for one additional vote. I will keep exploring since there are probably some Natural Wonders out there worth finding yet. And indeed on the next turn I found Mount Fuji, pushing my Happiness to 24. Then I Puppeted Manilaa, and over a couple of turns it dropped to 18. But a Colosseum got built, and