RADICAL IDEAS (ver1.1): Hosted by Rong

Rong · May 22, 1999, 19:05

Introduction

This is the second installment of the "Radical Ideas" thread. For group charter, historical notes, click <a href="http://apolyton.net/forums/Forum28/HTML/000030.html">here</a>. In short, our mission is to initiate, discuss and refine radical new ideas that would make Civ3 truly a quantum leap, not just incremental upgrades.

Rules of Thumb

Since our discussion will most likely touch game design issues, before we begin, I'd like to preach a little the "Sid Meier Doctrine" of game design, which you can read about in <a href="http://www.gamespot.com/features/sidlegacy/index.html">The Sid Meier Legacy</a>. There are three important rules of thumb, among others:
<ul>[*]When fun and realism clash, fun wins.</li>[*]Complexity is never a substitute for depth.</li>[*]It's better to have one good game than two great games.</li>[/list]So before you post your new idea, step back and think. Is this going to make the game more fun? If you find yourself saying, no way this can be fun, then no matter how realistic it seems, try to revise your idea first.

On the second principle, my rule of thumb is, you can go on and on explaining your idea, but in the end, if you can't sum it up in a short paragraph (preferably 20 words or less), then it's probably not such a good idea, or at least needs some reworking.

Last but not the least, don't try to cram two games into one.

Of course, these are just rules of thumb. If you think your idea has the potential to be both fun and simple, feel free to post it and we can discuss and refine it later.

Group Guidelines

To keep the group organized, or mainly to keep my job simple

, there are a few guidelines I'd like to propose:
<ul>[*]Try to post one idea at a time. Don't lump everything together in a long post. It's hard to read. Or at least break them up into subsections.</li>[*]If you idea is already implemented in Civ/CivII/SMAC/CTP, then it's probably not that radical.</li>[*]Try to give a short summary of your general idea, but do explain it in detail so we won't misunderstand you.</li>[*]If your idea falls into a more specific thread, try to discuss it in that thread (e.g. OSxAI, regions).</li>[*]Try to post ideas, not implementations. You can provide a possible implementation to help explain your idea, but trust Brian and Co. for the actual implementation.</li>[/list]I'd really appreciate it if you follow these guidelines.

The "Simple" List

Now back to our regular brainstorm session. Some of the easy to explain ideas:
<ul>[*]OSxAI. Open Source Extensible AI. This discussion has moved to the AI thread.</li>[*]Public Alpha/Beta. For more details, see <a href="http://apolyton.net/forums/Forum28/HTML/000056.html">yin's letter to BR</a>, but feel free to continue the discussion here.</li>[*]<a name="sphere">Spherical maps</a>, a la <a href="http://www.populous.net">Populous</a>. Maybe the Graphics thread can pick this up?</li>[*]Historical leaders appear from time to time that would give you certain bonuses.</li>[*]Cede cities. Give newly conquered areas independence. Perhaps only under certain government types.</li>[*]Nation state. More realistically model the modern nation state. Possibly reducing micro management.</li>[/list]Other ideas are interrelated and have received lots of attention with mega long posts. Now I am going to attempt the impossible: summarize these ideas, make them coherent and easily digestible. Let me know if I have succeeded.

Population Grid

The basic idea is, population should be based on tile (be it square, hex, or whatever), not city. Each tile would have its inherent population/food/production/science/trade and whatnot, and the population can expand into neighboring tiles. A city then simply becomes a tile, or a few tiles, with high concentration of population, perhaps fortified, along with other facilities (temple, granary, etc.).

If you have a hard time picturing this, it's kinda like SimCity on a grander scale.

And here is a nice picture of the concept, courtesy of Fugi the Great:

Benefits:
<ul>[*]Easy to model the rise and fall of civilizations. A new civilization can pop up in populated, neutral tiles.</li>[*]Easy to model nation state since now you have continuous population, not discreet cities.</li>[*]Easy to model borders. Now your frontier doesn't have to have a city.</li>[*]Giving away or selling land to another country would now be possible (Louisiana Purchase).</li>[/list]Issues:
<ul>[*]Too much micro management? (May be solved through Regions. See the CITY INTERFACE thread. Or take a hands-off self evolution approach, a la SimCity.)</li>[*]Performance. Would it be too slow?</li>[*]How to handle other aspects of the game (building units etc.)?</li>[/list]
Real Time vs. Turn Based

Similar to Railroad Tycoon. You have the option to pause the game at any time to give orders, view status screens, and conduct diplomacy. Also you can specify in the game option when you want to be interrupted by events such as buildings completed, armies commissioned, civ advances achieved etc. Once you release the game, your units (or armies) will carry out your orders.

Issues:
<ul>[*]Too difficult for multi-player to work?</li>[/list]
The Rise and Fall of Civilizations

The question is how to model the rise and fall of civilizations. The original Civ is probably only appropriate for the Chinese. All the other civilizations didn't last that long at all.

One solution is through the "Population Grid" method (see above).

Perhaps allow not only AI civ's to start during the game, but also allow the player to choose where in the timeline/tech tree to start.

Issues:
<ul>[*]If I am a wise leader, why would my civilization fall?</li>[/list]
Abandoning the Squares

Instead you could use tiles the size of a pixel. This would allow for:
<ul>[*]Unrestricted free movement.</li>[*]More realistic cities, with circular resource zones and varying size.</li>[*]The possibility of making the world a sphere (You can't do it with squares, as it is impossible to map them onto a sphere without warping them)</li>[/list]In any event it would be nice if the size of squares were decreased (making the cities and city-zones larger, making units move faster). That would make it possible to have far more possibilities for game development (It would require efficient automation however).

War and Military vs. Civ Stress

A good way to represent the stresses of war or large military build ups on a civilization would be to have military units take a population point off of a city in your Empire. Not only would you have to support the army financially, but it would also place stress on production by physically subtracting a person from the civilization.

Do Away with Wonders

99% of the time, the civ in the lead gets the wonder, which just continues to put them further ahead. In civ2 if I built the Pyramids first, I was invincible from that point on. etc.

Issues:
<ul>[*]Wouldn't that reduce the fun?</li>[/list]
The End

The other ideas, either I felt they are against the rules of thumb, or they don't fall into the group charter. However, if you feel I have misunderstood you, feel free to repost them. But please do read
the group guidelines first.

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The radical invents the views. When he has worn them out the conservative adopts them.
- Mark Twain

[This message has been edited by Rong (edited May 25, 1999).]

[This message has been edited by Rong (edited May 26, 1999).]

yin26 · May 22, 1999, 19:09

Rong,

This is an awsome summary! Your quote from Twain is brilliant. Congratulations on (ver2).

Yin

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CIV3 DEVELOPMENT LIST COORDINATOR

**(un)Officially Making Lists for Firaxis Since SMAC Enhancement 3!**

Rong · May 22, 1999, 19:26

Yin,

Thanks for the encouragement. Man, this thing takes a lot of time. People just like to go on and on and on.

Then again, I should have thought about that before I agreed to be the thread master.

Possibility · May 22, 1999, 19:48

Replying to Darkstarr’s and Fugi the Great’s reply to my original message in the Radical Ideas thread v.1 about native inhabitants in some of the squares. I suggest you fully reread that thread (I know it was long and you may not wanted to have read it all &#61516

. I did not say there would be natives in ALL squares. Just some. In the very beginning there would be very few but they would grow.

Fugi, you analyze the process of where these people would grow and expand to if all the neighboring squares were already occupied. Well, you forgot one major component. If this is happening in your own empire, you can control were they expand to just as in the civ1/civ2/smac. When your city grows by 1 you always look into the city and check to see if the computer put that person down in the proper square, if he didn’t, then you move him to a better spot.

For my original proposal, lets say you have city of size 42, that would be an average of 2 people per square, but say 1 of the squares is a polar cap (glaciers) and produces nothing. The computer (as the same in civ/civ2/smac) would choose the best other square to put those people in, so you most likely now have 2 squares with 3 people in them. For other squares, some may be deserts and produce nothing, so putting a 3rd person on a grasslands square may produce more then a 2nd person a desert square.

You say this may require a lot of micro-management, but I say a smart programmer would implement short cut buttons that would maximize the different production for you. Like in CTP, you could have a little button that would maximize food production for a city, an identical thing should exist as well then for this civ3, but with more maximizing options, say maximize food+production, food+trade, production+trade ect…

Someone also mentioned fog of war would be gone because if you had these people per square, they could see for you. Well, if they could see for you, then that would mean that they are in your empire, your own citizens, and this INSIDE your borders. And you can always see everything inside your own borders. Think about, a country should always now what is going on in its own borders.

Another thing, I also said that if your city maxis out in population (like a city hitting size 8 w/ an aqueduct in civ2), you could take some of your people and move them outside the city radius. This action would require some gold. Plus, you could NOT move them outside your borders. Moving people to squares outside a city would be the equivalent of a supply crawler, but maybe with some restrictions. I would propose that if you moved a person outside a city, in order to use the resources he is producing, you would have to connect that square to the city with a paved road. This brings into another idea, have 2 kinds of roads, normal roads and paved roads (like the Romans built). Paved roads would be able to be built with construction or masonry. They have an added movement bonus plus allow the use of squares outside a city radius to be used by the city it is connected to.

For example, you have a desert with an oasis on it 3 squares away from the city center, thus it is outside the city radius. You go and connect that square to the city with paved roads. So you now take one of the people from the city and move him to that square, this action may require say 10 gold. In that square, the one person produces 5 food, 3 trade, and 1 resource for example. Now the 1 person living there will require 2 food to sustain them selves, so you have the option to transport 3 food, 3 trade and 1 resource back to the city. The further this square is away from the city, the less of that production you would actually get (that would be affected by current technologies and your government). Or you could just transport the 3 trade and 1 resource back to the city. Then the 1 person in that square could grow.

In a couple of turns, they grow and now there are 2 people working that square. They combined produce 7.5 food, 4.5 trade and 1.5 resources. Now if you keep letting them eat all the food and expand, they could expand to a maximum of 6 people.  3 people make 9.17 food, 5.5 trade and 1.83 resources, 4 people make 10.42 food, 6.25 trade and 2.08 resources, 5 people make 11.42 food, 6.85 trade and 2.28 resources and 6 people make 12.25 food, 7.35 trade and 2.45 resources. The 6 people eat 12 food so now they have stopped growing. The number that limits the amount of people per square could be limited either by food or another factor, say overcrowding, for example, until a certain tech is discovered, you may only put 4 people per square.

If in this case the limit was 4 people per square, once the square was able to hit the 5th population, they would spill over into the next square. For natives (neutrals that don’t belong to any empire) the pop. limit for squares would be lower so they would expand into more squares faster. Once they had maybe expanded into 2 adjacent squares from a central square, they form a new city and thus a new empire and any other neutral natives that would now be in that new empires borders would also belong to that new empire.

Possibility
May the possibilities remain infinite.

May 22, 1999, 21:56

Rong, this probably violates the rules. If so, my apologies.
Just commenting on the "Get rid of Wonders" idea. A couple of ways to deal with the "stronger get stronger" problem could be to add a production penalty based on the amount of wonders a civ controls (say 50 shields per wonder) to the base amount of the production needed for the wonder.

And two: to reduce the abilities gained by the wonder over time as it becomes less "wonderesque". There are many wonders that this couldn't be done for, of course.

HarryKattz · May 22, 1999, 22:47

This is my first post. I haven't had time to read all the messages, so my apologies if it's already been suggested.

I've always been in favor of getting rid of wonders, but until I read this I thought I was the only one. Getting rid of wonders will be very unpopular.

So, instead, I suggest an option at the start of a game to disable all wonders or select which wonders to disable. The default should be all wonders enabled.

This kind of option allows everyone to have what they want. That's always a radical solution

Darkstar · May 23, 1999, 02:46

re: People Per Tile - Possibility, as I had said, I didn't want to add to my micromanagement chore when playing CivIII. I did read your message through, but couldn't find it for a SECOND reread. It sounds like you do wish to add to the work of the human. Think... at FIRST, there wouldn't be people in every square, but as time rolls BY, they would fill the livable land on any land mass like a vapor fills a container. While that might seem realistic, we want fun over realism. With your newest input, it sounds as if I will have to monitor every square. And still build a city, as that is the center.

The problem with paved ROADS is how do you tell the computer which city is using which tile when more then one city is on the same paved road? I don't mean to be dense but...

Either eliminate the city entirely, and make a mechanism to move people between squares, or forget about people per tile AND cities. As I will repeat, while I see the realistic echoes of such, I don't see this simplifing the game for play on the mid to upper levels. Just more things that I have to waste my time on. Having to have cities would double the load. You saw click on this city, and set a person on this tile. Wouldn't I have to have the whole world displayed in this interface if it only takes a paved road to make the square usable. Maybe instead you right click on the square, select option "Send to City Center..." and that lists where you can legally send it? that would be better... But what determines which City/Region a people belong to?

And lack of aqueducts shouldn't prevent people from living in that square, just HAPPILY AND HEALTHILY in that square. As the pop density is over their comfort zone, some people migrate out to the neighboring tiles. If they bring that tile over its pop comfort zone, some other will move in the next cycle.

Now, what is the advantage of the city centers in people per tile system? I see none. Build a Factory in a tile, a Mill/Granary in another, etc. etc. etc. This does away with Cities, and therefore a collection of tiles that have to be conquered to win by Conquest. How do you do that now?

I do agree with you that we are after similar things, but I think that much more detailing needs to be stated to make the people per tile... GAMABLE. But I could just being extra dense. Some days are like that.

So, I ask, why should we have 'City' Tiles? What function do they serve? When does a tile cross from being Wild to Village/Town/City?

In SMAC, you can only see in tiles that are within 2 squares of a city/sensor/unit with Deep Radar. Otherwise, you can only see what is in tiles that are adjacent to your military units. So I can't see what is in the wild tiles within my own borders without sending a patrol.

re: Doing away with wonders - That would spoil a LOT of fun for me, and many others. I just don't think that there should be any Leonardo's Workshop wonders. I found that one offensive as it really contributed to the "whoever owns this on, wins." factor. In Civ, Darwins Voyage and Woman's Sufferage were the big two to have. All other Wonders were by matters of play style. The Rich get Richer, the Poor get Poorer is a fact of life. If I am ahead, anything that helps me stay that way is good. As the AI in SMAC rarely builds Wonders in mid to under levels, this shouldn't be a problem to the average player. I think that the Wonders thread might be more appropriate thread to continue this discussion.

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-Darkstar
(Knight Errant Of Spam)

Travathian · May 23, 1999, 03:33

As someone posted in the Wonders forum, I believe . . . disallow the building of multiple wonders at the same time by the same civ, or even more than one city working on a wonder at one time.

This is soooooo obvious if you think about it. What else do you think Egypt could have done while building the pyramids? Build the great Hanging Gardens at the same time? Yeah right.

That, and I always thought it was cheesy to have a two cities working on the same Wonder, only to have the second switch at the last second to a different wonder as soon as it was available. What did the Americans in NYC do one night after working on the UN Building for 20 years, and suddenly the Eiffel Tower sprang up right before the UN would have been finished?

Also, disallow or limit the rushing of wonders. I know this will be unpopular, but then again, back to the Pyramids, you can only spend so much money to speed things up, there is a practical limit to how many people can work on it, and some time factors simply cant be changed(mortar to dry, foundations to set, bad weather etc).

Also, if you lose the race to build a wonder, then the resources should be put towards a new wonder or city improvement immediately with some serious penalties, half maybe? (the UN Building to Eiffel Tower example again) This demonstrates the practicality of what to do with all of those raw resources which have been gathered for the project which now must be diverted to something else.

Granted, this doesn't totally solve the problem of the lead civ getting all of the Wonders, but I think it should definitely help the underdogs catch up if they plan well, and add a bit of realism (I know everybody hates that).

Certhas · May 23, 1999, 05:17

Ok, my first post here

I just learned that Firaxis will develop CivIII and jumped in joy, nad now I want to contribute.
My idea is easy, have multiple planets. We reach Alpha Centauri at the end of Civ, so why don't we start to colonize the planet?
We would find new materials, allowing new technologies, and after a time we would get to more advanced technologies, allowing more regular space travel. And then, we get to other planets, as do our oponents.
Of course we need a kind of automisation for this. I'm think among the lines of planetary gouverners, that manage a planets microcosmos. Furthermore, there shouldn't be to many planets avaible, perhaps about 20, whith 4+ civs rushing for them would mean ~ 5 planets per civ. Apart from planets, that would be managed the same way as earth, you could have smaller planets around other suns, that are not capable of supporting life, but instead are just mines or something like this.
Then, after a while we find some strange ruins on some of the planets, and get alien technology, and finally, we are the first civ to travel to another dimension

Actually it would have fit better for SMAC, I guess, but neithertheless, I think it would be fun.

Possibility · May 23, 1999, 17:53

Darkstarr, you have a reading problem. Reread my threads again and then reread them again, and maybe you should reread them one more time still. You missed about 3/4 of what I said in them.

You say what is the point of a city. Well, what is the point of a city in smac? I have played multiplayer games where people have made over 10 supply crawlers per city!!! If you listened to what I said, the people are not intrinsic to the squares, you move them about with free will. If they are inside a city, then they behave IDENTICLE to that of civ/civ2/smac. But also with a little indication on the overhead map of which squares are in use, to make the over head map seem more lifelike maybe. As in smac, say you want to make a borehole outside the city radius to cut down on Eco damage for the city, so you make a supply crawler for it. Well, say in civ 3, you have grassland with a dear on it outside the city radius, so you make paved roads to it, and these would be very expensive, not just something simply built. As in smac, when you raise and lower land, it costs gold, I would propose the same thing happen when you make paved roads, they would cost gold and take a long time to build (relative to normal roads) (remember that the Romans were the only civilization in the ancient past to make extensive use of paved highways and such, they were relatively hard and expensive to make). This would limit their use. Then you just move some people there. You select a city, right click on it and select an option for move people, you pick how many people you want to move, then you pick the destination square, so you pick the square with the dear on it. This will require lots of gold to limit its use, its rather expensive to move people around you know, but this would still be cheaper then making a settler. So now you right click on the square and select and option to transport the stuff being produced there, you will have 2 options, transport all minerals, food (minus the amount the people there need to eat, thus they will not grow), resources and trade, or the second option, transport the resources and trade only, so the people there will eat all the food and grow. Then you select the destination city. In the early game, maybe a square that is 4 or 5 spaces away from a city would lose half its resources and stuff in the transit, so the further away the city is from the destination, the less of the food, resources, and trade you get. If you desire for these people that you moved to this square to grow (you let them eat all the food), and if they spill over into another square, then maybe you should build a new city there or connect that new square to a city with more paved roads.

So, if you listened to what I said, Within your own borders, almost all your own people will be INSIDE a city, and behave just as a person inside a city does in civ/civ2. People INSIDE a city DO NOT grow and spill over into other squares as the natives or people that are outside of a city do. They are controlled by the player and the city as a whole will grow just as in civ/civ2/smac, ok, you guys got and understand that now?

And if you think about it, the first thing an invading army will do is kill anyone they find working in a square outside of a city radius, the person will hit “P” and then a little window will pop up asking what terrain improvement to pillage, with options like [irrigation, paved roads, villagers]. So people living outside a city will very susceptible to invading armies and thus their growth would be controlled. Plus, most players will cover then entire islands with cities, leaving very few squares open. When I play smac, there will sometimes be a single square or 2 squares in a small gap between 2 of my cities, and I don’t want to place a new city there, so I will make a borehole on that square and use a supply crawler, well instead of a supply crawler you put some people on that square and they will grow to the max limit that that square can support and they WONT spill over into any other squares because all the surrounding squares are city squares, if you want to move them back into a city, grab one or more of the people on the square and move them back into a city.

What I stated is that people INSIDE a city radius behave just like a city in civ/civ2. You DONT control them on the overhead map. You control them in the city view. And if you think about it, it would be only a minor increase in city management. Cities in my proposal would have much higher populations (well, more people icons, but still the same populations). While thinking about this, I determined it maybe more micromanagment, but I was also thinking that in civ2/smac you mostly just let the computer decide where to put the people in the city. If you built a new tile improvement (i.e. Farm) then you entered the city screen and clicked on the center city square so that the computer would readjust the people and the computer would usually picked the best squares for the people to work on. If say you wanted to sacrifice food production and needed some more minerals, then you usually only moved 1 person from one square to another. Well with more people per square, you would on average only be moving the top person from one stack to another square. Or like I said, you would just hit one of the buttons that maximizes a certain type of production. So you build a new farm and then enter the city as usual and then click on what ever little button you desire for what you want, like [food], [resources], [trade], [food+resources] where food and resources are both equally maximized, [(food)+resources]  where food and resources are both maximized with more emphasis placed on food production and so on. So all the city management you would have to do is just click on one of these buttons (the value of these buttons would be determined on how good the programmers are). If there is something you would want to change on the city screen, simply select the person you want to move and move him to another square just as you would in civ/civ2/smac. To make life even easier, I would suggest that when you grab a person, or 2 persons, or more to move, that all the squares in the city will show what the benefit of moving that person, or 2 people to that square will bring. So say you have 4 people working a grassland square, you grab 2 of those people (while in the city screen) and then all of the squares will show a +food, +resources, +trade based on the amount that those 2 people added to that square will increase the production by that amount. So while holding a person, with the mouse pointer, to move them to another square, all 21 squares in the city screen will have a +food#, +resouce#, +trade# listed on them. So you then put him down in the square with the highest + values because that square would be the most productive. This would make city management very easy, only a negligible increase over city management from civ/civ2/smac.

As an added idea about the armies killing the people living in a square, when an army moves into a square inside a city radius, in civ/civ2/smac, the computer automatically moved the person working that square to another to another empty square in the city, or turned them into a specialist if there were no more free squares. The other player would have no idea about this cause he could not see which squares in the city have people on them, well, in this civ3, the other player should know, he would see people on them, but like in civ/civ2/smac, the computer would automatically move the people inside the city radius to another square, so an invading army could not kill anyone in the city. Now when that military unit attacks the city, the city will lose ONLY people that are working, IN THE CITY SQUARE, the very square the city is on. Like in the civs and smac, when you attack a city, and it has no walls, its population is reduced, when there is no one left, the city is destroyed. For my proposal, for this combat, the people that die from the attack are ONLY the people in the exact square the city is on. So if all the people in the exact square the city is on are killed, the city is destroyed, even if there still more people in the city. So, for example, there is a city of size 4, with 2 people in the city square and 2 more each in a different city square. The city is attacked twice and is destroyed, those 2 remaining people continue to stay in the square they were working but are now NOT inside a city. If they are still with in the empires borders, the owner can select them and move them to another city. If they now fall outside of the empire's borders, they revert back to neutral status and will grow and such as neutrals do and maybe later form back into a new empire. And now that these 2 people are outside of the city radius, if the owner of them does not move them out of there, the invading army can now go to those squares and kill them.

Possibility
May the possibilities remain infinte.

Possibility · May 23, 1999, 17:56

Damn I can blab on and on, I cant beleive I keep writing so much

Possibility

Freddz · May 23, 1999, 21:44

Rong, well presented.

Transcends idea of pausing the game with space as in Baldurs Gate is BRILLIANT and seem to have gotten some support here (I have high pitched vocal support for that idea

) I think the threadmaster should state if an idea did get good support... Now, a problem was Multiplayer. I think this would solve it:

This idea could be very possible in Multiplayer with a bit of testing(but please point out flaws in my thinking). Also, I think it could make the MP game more interesting too. The setup:

1. You have the real Game time ticking.

2. Every 10 minutes or so(adjustible) each player has a restricted NUMBER of pauses(say for example 30 sek long, but adjustible) that they can use up whenever they want. Those pauses freeze the Game clock. During a pause every player can work with their bases and units.

3. When the 10 minutes are gone each player gets a new number of Pauses for the next 10 minutes or so.

4. WHY this could be interesting(reasons are often as important as the idea itself):

Well - this idea, besides putting a lot of speed and pressure, gives room for "Pause tactics" in MP games.

For example: Shall I use my last pause now or wait for a better opportunity? Shall I wait and attack until opponent have used up his pauses, thereby forcing him to change unit orders when under real time pressure to save his cities? Do I have to save time just in case of a nasty surprise?

Also, "the time you have during a pause/and or the number of Pauses you have" during a given time could be affected by: Civil Disorders, the more cities under disorder, the harder it will be to govern properly; The size of your empire, the bigger the better; A peaceful nation will be more stressed during war thereby suffering a penalty here...

Of course in Single player games, a player can have the option to be able to pause as much as he wants(with reduced score of course

)

Lastly, this idea probably require something I want(anyway): Build buttons you can click on without entering a in a city menu. But as I said, I want that feature anyway. I think this could be important mentioning when presenting the idea. But as I said, please point out flaws and suggest modifications to this idea. As long as you want the pause idea in general of course

Freddz · May 23, 1999, 22:28

Instead of SMAC factions special abilities or Civ starting abilities and/or special abilities, I think the Civs should have a chance of GROWING special abilities depending of HOW the Civ is governed and or WHAT government choices your people have lived with for a long time. You, as a player, grow these traditions through your choices.

Two clarifying exmples:

1/ A nation which is constantly warring could get Morale bonuses after a time. Maybe production bonuses on units too. They could also get a negative modifier on something else if unlucky since their people has had a strong tradition on putting violence first.

2/ A peaceful nation could get science bonuses if lucky, and could be well liked by other peoples making it harder for other leaders to make war "on those friendly neighbours". Civil disorders could erupt easier in those nations when someone declares war on them. They could also get negative morale modifiers and so on.

Comments: The civilizations would arguably be more individual with a system like this, and would force a player to consider new tactics when faced with a change that affect the entire nation. New government choices could be neccessary, new tactics and so on.

The idea bears some realism too if one analyzes more deeply: Compare Vikings and Swedes: Once extremely warlike, now arguably one of the most Anti-war like nations in the world. People here would be a lot more shocked than people in the USA if Swedes sent in troops to war in Serbia (I was gonna say we were chickens, or morally wrong sometimes, but then I realized how stupido war really is

).

Eggman · May 23, 1999, 22:41

I don't know if this is the right place for this but here goes. Also, other people have suggested this as well but I had the idea too so here goes.

I would like to see MINOR CIVILIZATIONS in Civ3. These would basically would be exactly the same as normal civilizations except:
1) They could randomly start up at any time where ever there is useful empty land that no one has a claim to.
2) They would have penalties to growth, production, etc. that would prevent them from competing with the major powers.
3) They wouldn't try to win the game. They could be given a variety of minor power AIs that could include barbarian (pillage and make a nuisance), survival, isolationist, make friends with big powers, trade, conquer my minor neighbors and become a major power, etc.

Minor powers simulate all those weaker civilizations that never quite made it to the status of the English, Chinese, Egyptians, etc. Under the current game, it is assumed that the major civilizations are the ONLY civilizations. Meanwhile, huge tracts of valuable land remain unoccupied for thousands of years (and sometimes forever) with no development happening. By the time the major civs arrive, there should be SOMETHING there, even if it is relatively backwards.

Minor powers would be useful to conquer or trade with. They could be diplomatically negotiated into alliances/ protectorates/ colonies. They could also conquer their neighbors and get promoted to major power status.

Ecce Homo · May 24, 1999, 00:49

Certhas, I thought about that idea too. Please post your thoughts in the Space Exploration thread.

[This message has been edited by Ecce Homo (edited May 23, 1999).]

Trachmyr · May 24, 1999, 18:18

Removing the emphassis on cities

The position of CIV,CtP,SMAC, and other games of this genere, is that the CITY is the center of society, and the primary focus.

Instead, I counter, that it is the network of all human populaces, all structures (mines. roads, barracks, factories, ect.), and how they interact that decide if a nation is to succede or fail.

Regions
Regions, by their definition, is the combined character of a geographical location. To represent this, regions must be added to CIV3.
Various methods of creating regions has been discussed in other threads. I prefer computer generated, fixed regions. These would conform to terrain and natural boundries (rivers, mountains, Ocean). Regions would also have a maxinum size.
I do not believe that fixed regions would subtract from the game, since real-life regions have remained the same thoughout history, though their names have been changed, and they have been contested.
Regions would form the primary borders of a society, contested regions would have interior borders similar to SMAC.

Habitation and Population
Before cities were constructed, people were nomadic... or semi-nomadic. This needs to be represented in CIV3. My suggestion would be to treat NOMADIC POPULATIONS as a mobile city, but not "improvable".
Eventually settlements were built, which grew into towns, which grew into cities.
I believe settlements should be reprented with evolving grapichs which expand to additional tiles as the settlement expands.

The concept of city improvements is simply an abstract for the implementaion of new technology within a city. I believe CIV gamers can handle a more realistic aproach to city development:
1) Technology implementation- When new technology which can benifit a settlement (let's say an Aqueduct) is discovered, that tech must first be implemented. This cost revenue (an alternative name for GOLD), and is based upon the size of a city (It is harder to incorporate new tech into larger, more stable cities). This expenditure reprensts the cost of materials, the cost to educate engineers, and incentives to implement the technology. Once the technology is implemented, it provides it's benefits to the settlement (in this case a reduction in negative health modifiers due to overcrowding and allowing larger cities). Technology may be implemented on a city, regional or national level to reduce micromanegement.

2) City improvement. A city has many diffrent aeras in which to improve... Housing, Industry, Economy, Recreation and so on. I suggest abstract level to each aera. Thus a city with a level 4 Indusstry typically can produdue more than one with a Level 3 Industry. Improvement require Public Works, similar to CtP. To increase in an aera, a certain number of PW must be spent. Like-wise any nessacary tech must have been implemented. (In our example above, an aqueduct will allow habitation Level 4 & 5 to be reached. If the city was at Habitation 3, it would need x amount of public works to reach 4 now that Aqueducts have been implemented.)
Settlements improve semi-automatically... they only use PW to improve a level if that aera is becoming inefficient due to # of people using it. (# of factory workers for Industry, total population for Habitation). As inefficency rises, a larger percent of available PW will be used to enhance that aera. You may also set Priority numbers to the diffrent aeras. This allows a more "hands-off" approach and highly reduced micromanement (you simply choose what percent of PW to enhance the city, priorities are optional, the computer does the rest based upon your population and workforce). As city level in these aeras increase, the settlement will expand to empty tiles, become denser or expand upwards. If you run out of room, you city will stagnate.

Workforce
Your workforce is handled on a city or regional basis, depending on your "National Goverment Level" (Independant/Regional/Federal).

Workforce determines not only what you produce/build but how your cities develop as well (A city lith Level 8 Industry due to a lot of factory workers is much different than a city with Level 8 religion due to lots of clergy. Detroit vs. the Vatican)

All other projects utilize PW, from mines to roads to Wonders(which appear on the map)

Other conepts will be included, and i'll expand on them later (Goverment, Stockpiles (National vs. Regional) and army production to name a few).

The result will be a highly graphical representation of you NATION, not just cities. Also Micromanement of city improvement is eased, to allow for more detailed workforce, supply and economy.

One final note, tiles should be reduced in size to allow this to be effective. I suggest 1/4 size at maxinum.

Goob · May 24, 1999, 18:43

Concerning The Rise and Fall of Civilizations: To answer Rong's stated question about "If I am a wise leader, why would my civilization fall?"

Unless we are actually portraying immortal leaders then that question doesn't really apply to the game. If we are portraying immortal leaders then we don't have to worry as much about modeling reality because from the get go we are way off base.

An Idea:
We are immortal advisors, we are assisting Kings/Queens/Emporers/Presidents/etc., the game behaves similarly to previous CIVs, except the abilities of the "factions" are modified additionally by the attributes of the Ruler. The ruler would have abilities in Warfare, Diplomacy, Economy, and maybe some other areas. Bonuses in the attributes will help you in those areas (as S.E. settings in SMAC do) while penalties will hurt you. Every set number of years The Ruler will die or lose office and an heir/replacement will come along, with random abilities. Sometimes you will get truly phenominal leaders with high bonuses - The Alexanders, Julius Ceasers, Saladins, of history, other times you can get the King Johns... and you must suffer through a period of penalties. (Note: This idea comes from an old game called Medieval Lords)

This idea falls into the category of a game modeling the rise and fall of empires throughout history. This would emphasize the Wargame aspect with some attention to resource management and the progression of ideas.

Goob
(this was held sometime before being sent- I actually did some work today...

The idea needs ironing out before any real discussion, but feel free to tear it apart or ignore it as it is.)

[This message has been edited by Goob (edited May 24, 1999).]

meowser · May 24, 1999, 18:49

At the start of a CIV type game, you choose a civ and a leader and whatever other game options you want and begin play and essentially "rewrite history".

This is what I propose. At the start of a game, when you choose the leader you want, you have the option of choosing from among several options that define the characteristics and abilities of your leader.
I haven't done an indepth analysis yet but for starters you could determine skill level on a point system of say 100 on the following attributes:

foreign diplomacy
domestic diplomacy
military strategy
political influence
tolerance to new ideas

the default would be to allocate 20 points to each attribute.

Thus when dealing in diplomacy, war, domestic, etc, you would have bonus modifiers or negatives depending on the traits of your leader. Thus if your leader is a military genius, you have a bonus modifier when fighting the enemy.

You can also gain/lose points based on several different things. For example, after the 5th "I love the king day" you gain a point in domestic diplomacy.

CIV III, like the CIVS before it will have different ages. Something like Ancient, Medieval, Renaissance, Modern, Post Modern.

Now here is where it gets interesting, when you enter a new age you have the option to choose from among five children to become the next ruler you control for your civ. Each of these children have different attributes that reflect your civilizations demographics and have been influenced by the type of game you have played to this point. While playing your civ game, you could also have the option to actively groom your successor, by deferring any points you may have accumulated to any one of your successors attributes instead of keeping it for your present leader (however any negative points you earn go solely to the current leader).

At any time in game play you should have the ability to see what your attributes look like and how your descendants attributes look like. With the exception of game start up, you cannot adjust these attributes manually unless their is a cheat mode. Grooming a successor would not be considered adjusting but training by deferring the point that would have went to your leader now going to your successor.

When you enter a new age there should be some other incentives other than the attributes that influence whether or not you keep the same ruler or choose a successor.

For example say that you committed a lot of attrocities as a ruler. It gets diminished or becomes non-existent if you name a new successor. Then again by keeping your current leader, you have the so called "experience factor"

At the end of the game, replay should be vastly enhanced. Not only do you have a map depicting how your civ grew and expanded but other features somewhat similar and seen in SMAC. For example:

Accomplishments of Ruler (such as Despot) George Washington of the Americans in the Ancient Age:

Conquered the following civ:
First to discover:
Wonders Created:
Demographic Rankings:

Accomplishments of King George Washington II of the Americans in the Modern Age:

Conquered the following civ:
First to discover:
Wonders Created:
Demographic Rankings:

and etc.

Diodorus Sicilus · May 24, 1999, 19:17

- First Post in this Thread-

I want to be able to 'write' a history of the Civ I've played in the game.
This requires that I be have the option to name the ruler in addition to having a Default ruler (already in the CtP and CivII games) but also that the ruler occasionally changes because the government changes (Friedrich the Chieftain becomes King Friedrich I who is overthrown when Revolution turns me into a Republic and Prime Minister Friedrich takes over, etc).
This requires that terrain features be named, or capable of being named: rivers, bays and peninsulas, islands, mountain ranges, etc., so that the game can record when Discoveries are made.
This requires/provides that anytime a combat takes place that involves more than one unit on both sides, that is a Historic Battle and gets recorded (gimme a Default Name of the Battle, maybe after the nearest City and a field to enter my own Title if I was involved and Won).
Result: at the end of the game, or whenever exhaustion sets in, you hit Historical Summary and get a TimeLine history: Battles, Government Changes, Discoveries, Wonders, etc.
During the game, along this same line, your population could rename your ruler, or you could be given a chance to adopt a new Honorifc Title, based on game events:
Friedrich the Great
Ivan the Tolerable
Igor the Inconceivable

It's mostly 'Mind Candy', but I think these kinds of Bells & Whistles would add a lot to the enjoyment of the Game Process

Alkis · May 24, 1999, 22:06

Civilization acting as a NATION.

From a certain date onwards, or from a certain discovery onwards, or after you switch to a certain goverment, I don't mind about that, your Civilization acts as a Nation.

This means:
Your whole production is summed up and you can build whatever you like, wherever you like.

Example:
You have 16 cities and a TOTAL of 226 shields per turn.
You can decide to build:
13 cities --- Nothing
New York --- 5 Musketeers (x30 = 150 shields). To appear there next turn.
Boston --- Univercity (allocate 60 shields)
Atlanta --- Library (allocate 16 shields)

This will reduce micromanagement considerably. Please note that you don't need this in the beginning of the game because micromanagement is easy.

About Trade.
Each city retains its own trade.

About Food.
Each city retains it's own food output for purposes of growing bigger, unless a nearby city is starving, in which case you have the option to send them food or let them starve.

[This message has been edited by Alkis (edited May 24, 1999).]

Du_Chateau · May 24, 1999, 22:21

This is what irratates me. That the map is flat. Maybe the map should be a globe.

Example:
If the Americans wanted to invade the Russians they could go through the arctic circle. Unfortunately in Civ II you can not go across the artic circle.

I do not know if this idea is posted any where else

Travathian · May 24, 1999, 22:40

I disagree Alkis, take the US for example.

Which cities are the big industry cities, and how is it they help out a little tiny town across the continent? Imagine El Paso TX is at war with Mexico. Do you think with all of the industry throughout the US that suddenly tanks will start popping up in El Paso? No . . . they are made elsewhere and shipped there. You cant just assume the whole industrial base can be manipulated in such an extreme manner.

Now, I do like the idea, and I do think it can work, but more along the lines of this:

A certain percentage of overal resources can be redistributed. Things which affect this percentage are certain techs, wonders, city improvments. Something like railroad, assembly line, diesel engines all affect the transportation and manufacturing of things. Possibly in the beginning of your 'nation' only 5-10% of your resources can be reallocated. Then certain techs will raise this, to a reasonable maximum, say 40-50%.
This can show how realistic it is that an entire nation can work on a Wonder, while the smaller cities dont sit idly by.

Rong · May 25, 1999, 01:32

Du_Chateau,

Your idea is on the list. You can reach it by clicking <a href="#sphere">here</a>.

Du_Chateau · May 25, 1999, 02:00

Thanks for pointing that out

russellw · May 25, 1999, 02:06

Alkis, here's how your idea can work.

In your example, you decide to build 5 musketeers. You place one in New York. Now, New York has a red box around it and they can't produce units there for X turns.The rest of the units you have to place elsewhere. If the cities in an area are small, they all turn red, representing a combined effort. If the city (like New York) is large, it can produce more than one unit per turn, or it can get rid of that red box faster.

This method is the one used in Command HQ (by Dani Bunten Berry). Some other things from that game that may work well if you're abstracting Civ to the nation level:

- Planes attack instantly, up to their fuel limit radius. Planes also intercept automatically if it it is in their radius. This helps prevent the "cover your units with bombers" strategy.

- Planes do half damage to land units (but can't completely kill them)...unit strength goes from 10 then 5 then 2.5, etc. Planes do a third damage to naval units but can kill
them. This is to prevent air power from overwhelming like in SMAC.

- Spy satellites are positioned in geosynchronus orbit and view a certain part of the map (until the satellite killers get them).

Alkis · May 25, 1999, 09:21

Well, actually I put the 5 Musketeers there just to emphasize. If the makers of the game want to keep the one unit per city/turn thing I don't mind. The general idea is to reduce micromanagement and also to outpicture a Civilization acting as a Nation.

BigBopper · May 25, 1999, 10:41

first post in thread

a comment on leaders:

I think that each civilization should be able to recruit a number of diffrent leaders. Mayors/goveners for cities and generals to lead armies. Each leader would have diffrent attributes that bestow bonuses on his or her respective posts. Generals would add attack and/or defense bonuses to a stack. Mayors/Goveners would add food and/or production and/or happiness bounuses.

This adds a whole world of posabilities to Civ III. Civs trying to recruit/steal leaders , leaders that have a low loyalty rateing would have a greater chance of being recruited by another civ, and a greater chance of them revolting and takeing part of your civ. Thus leaders would add advantages but come with dangers (ie strings attached).
Leaders could improve with time/experince but as they get better would cost more to support.

P.S. for those that recognize it yes the basic idea is from MOO2, but hey I'm all for takeing the best ideas from one game and useing/expanding them in another.

CormacMacArt · May 25, 1999, 10:44

Civ I & II do not even model China well. China was taken over by the Mongols; in Civ this is the end of the game. In the Firaxis forum (general) I listed the several other ways that a civ can fall, if those are used then a way must be allowed for my civ to be conquered or fall and return. Perhaps "Government in Exile"? The Hebrews are a great example of complete decimation and successful Return.

Rong · May 26, 1999, 00:59

I just added a picture in the summary post. Fugi, now you can explain your idea more clearly.

Ecce Homo · May 26, 1999, 19:11

New idea: CAPITALIST COMPANIES AS PLAYERS

One part of Civ that I regard as unreal is that everything in the world seems to be owned by the state! There are no private capitalist interests, which only would make sense in a communist society.

Imagine that there were a bunch of AI players that were not civs, but Companies.

The Companies start with an amount of gold and an office in a civ's city. They can employ citizens to build improvements in this city. They will likely start building Caravans (à la CtP) to earn more money, and found offices in nearby cities. As time goes on, they will be represented in many cities in different civs, where they will employ some citizens and own some land + city improvements, which can be traded with the civ leader. The leader taxes the companies at a set rate. If the civ leader feels threatened, he can confiscate a company's property in his cities.

In the ancient era, companies will not own many things else than caravans, ships and some land for production. In the Renaissance, they will get more growth potential through Banking. They could even be powerful enough to rebel and found city-states (like in northern Italy or the Netherlands). In the Industrial age they will own factories and make great profit, which they will re-invest to grow even more. Civ leaders will have to control the capitalist interests in their nations.

Each civ has got a common policy for companies - a SE choice.

Maybe companies could even be human?

I have got an equivalent idea for religion, but I want to see how they develop one by one.