SE MODELS v3.0 (hosted by no one)

[The Joker]

Ruinexplorer:

I agree that nationalism shouldn't come untill the advance has been made sometime in the 17th or 18th century (in the real world). But that doesn't at all mean that your civ couldn't break apart untill then. Ít would simply break apart because of unloyal generals or governors etc. The chance of your empire breaking apart would be determined by a lot of factors, including your actions, wars, number of enemieas and of cause your SE settings. The Structur choise would probably be most important. If your structur was Feudalism you would have a pretty large chance of a landlord breaking off from your civ, but he would only take a few (1-3 maybe) cities with him. If your structur was Empire the chance of it breaking totally apart (split up in 3 or 4 civs of about the same size) if you didn't continue your expansion. After the discovery of nationalism a confederation would have a high chance of breaking apart if there wasn't enough contat between the provinces (trade, migration, roads etc)and you changed to another structur. The size of your empire would also have something to say in the chances of breakup.


Bidles:

I like that economic idea. It should be included.

I also completely agree with you that the models are not too complicated, as it is needed to describe a lot of detailes here that doesn't need to described in the game (maybe in the datalinks, but not all players use these).

[S. Kroeze]

Thanks for all reactions, positive or critical!
I think that the Joker and I agree on this subject: the possibility of parts of your empire declaring independence will add spice to game play; even during periods of relative calm a player will have something to worry about.

In the boardgame Pax Brittannica (quite a good game, set in the nineteenth century representing the colonization of the world by the Europeans, the USA and Japan) there are four levels of political influence in a region: interest, influence, protectorate and possession. Only the last two options involve military occupation.
Using such a political model in Civilization would add realism without being overcomplicated. Unrest or feudal rebellion wouldn't necessarily cause the creation of barbarians or a new independent civilization. The level of political control could drop, possibly resulting in expulsion of the occupying military forces, loss of control over decisions like what improvements to build in a city (these could be made by a local lord functioning like the governor in SMAC) and reduction or even suspension of tax payment.
There should remain the possibility of a reversal of fortune without use of military force: loyalty to the political centre could grow again. This could be influenced by growing trade relations and mutual economic interdependence, conversion by your priests of the locals and actions of your diplomats.

One nice consequence of the system of Pax Brittannica is the possibility of two or three powers all having influence or interest in a certain region. This doesn't necessarily cause political tension. Only if one of the powers upgrades his power in the region- for instance making a protectorate out of a region where it had before only influence- trouble arises. A protectorate automatically entails military occupation, so the other great powers have to downgrade their influence in the region, because the rules forbid two powers certain combinations of control in a region. This is a possible and realistic casus belli: the other powers either have to backdown or declare war.

I hope the following diagram can illustrate the system:

interest influence protecto posses
int no pr no pr no pr xxx
inf no pr no pr xxx xxx
pro no pr war?
pos EMP war?

no pr = no problem xxx = not allowed EMP = integrating a former protectorate in your empire has as the automatic result that all other powers lose the interest they have in that region

I begin to like this idea more and more. The greater political control of protectorate and possession (perhaps the names should be changed) can only be estalished as a result of certain specified advances. So the enormous expanded empires of antiquity are still a possibility but your actual influence over the periphery would be restricted. Now players would have the choice of either a vast sprawling empire or a close-knit well organized polis-like state (or anything between those extremes), but without the second choice meaning to be a second-class power.

I'm sorry to say so but the idea of sir/mr Biddles doesn't seem a novelty to me. Essentially its almost identical to the medieval guild system. Its undoubtedly idealistic but it would stop economic development and cause an irreparable setback for the society that implimented it.
Neither were the medieval guilds in the long term advantageous to economical development. Its nice that this system guaranteed quality of work and ensured a reasonable income for its members. In the long run it served only the interests of its conservative guild masters, always coming from the same families, who with all means guarded their local monopoly. This was one of the many conservative bulwarks that the French revolution finally brought down.

I share essentially the view of the Ruinexplorer on nationalism; I could argue that it started in the late Middle Ages. It drew most of its power from nineteenth century Romanticism. I think that the decreasing influence of religion, which before that time was by far the strongest force, is one of the causes of the rise of Nationalism.
So the more power religion has in the ages before 1700 the more I will approve of a game pretending to reflect history. I would love to have prophets, popes and puritans. In most societies religion is the core of a civilization and actually defines its identity; the Islamic civilization would be the best example. That's the reason I would argue that even after military defeat a civilization isn't dead.
Religion is always a factor in determining loyalties.

My sincere apologies to the Ruinexplorer for my style of writing. Its probably a result of my very European upbringing. And I love Marcel Proust.
If I am allowed to give some advise I would suggest to read my writing aloud. Though I realise the English isn't, perfect quite often it does make sense what I'm maintaining.

Though the explanation of Kennedy's theory on the rise and fall of great powers by the Joker is a bit simplified, essentially he is quite right. Kennedy explains the rise of a great power as a result of economic expansion. The sphere of political influence of such a power will grow, which will often cause an empire to expand and dominate its neighbours. And to defend its interests the tendency will almost inevitably be to spend an ever increasing part of its resources on defence, just to feel sure. So instead of further developing the economy which was the source of its power, the military will devour the lion's part of the budget. (The former Soviet-Union spending about 60 % of its economy on the military is a case in point; its no wonder the empire disintegrated) Other powers who are investing in their economy will surpass the original Great Power. A concept constantly reiterated by Kennedy is that of "strategic overstretch". America should consider itself warned!

By the way, I think that Civilization did quite right in this respect.
Nevertheless I would applaud a further reduction of the military factor. In the long term China is still a great power; the vast empire of Chenggis Chan was first partinioned among his sons: the successor states all were culturally reintegrated by the conquered civilizations within two centuries.

As the discerning reader -thank for his patience and interest- will have noticed, I am much in favour of a game with about 20 civilizations, major and minor; I also would recommend the concept of neutral cities/regions. Expansion by settlers (new colonies) should be the exception. Perhaps not on another continent without a strong indigenous civilization. But in the end colonization will often defeat its purpose; I consider the American civilization, though clearly an offshoot of Western Chistianity, to be almost a civilization in its own right.

-I know these remarks belong to another thread. I cant find a thread about foreign policy. Does such a thread exist?-

My suggestions for the modifying influence of temple communism/ priest-kingship: +1 Econ; +1 Growth; +1 Happ; +2 Efficiency
The temple was the centre and the historical beginning of bureaucracy; the improvement Palace would more accurately be called Temple; many extremely important "discoveries", like the development of writing are the result of the temple administration.
Drawbacks: -2 Supp; -2 Morale and in the long run an extremely conservative attitude. The great success and stability of these communities would stifle change or experiments.

What I like about Despotism in CivilizationII is just the fact that its intolerable: especially the high corruption and waste. A better alternative shouldn't come too soon. Historically Communism also has high levels of corruption and waste. Perhaps all civilizations should start as Anarchy; that would be historically correct.

[The Joker]

I love that idea about different levels of interest in an area.
Protectorate/puppet state/semiindependant province is also a concept I have always advocated for. It should simply mean that the area governs the cities and units itself (by a central government), but you get all research and tax (you set individual tax rates for each protactorate, too high giving unhappynes; and grant advances to it, too large a spand between your tech level and that of the protectorate would generate unhappyness), can see everything the protectorate can see (including units and city information), you can fortify units inside it's cities and the protectorate has the same foreign policy as you. The protectorate also chooses it's own SE settings, but you can influence it - you would propably not want too much internal conflict. Protectorates could be given to civs you have just conquored (to avoid the worst nationalistic trouble) or to national entities within your empire - like a far away colony that has developed it's own national entity due to lack of contact with the motherland. You wouldn't want to loose it totally, but couldn't afford the war it would mean if you wanted to suppress the rebelion. You could also force smaller neighbors into joining you as protectorates, or you will simply conquor them, or they could come to you and offer to become such as they are being conquored by another civ.

Another type of control I would like is direct control - Colony. By this I don't mean the 19th century European style colony, but a more general one. It would mean that you, the leader/government has direct control over the province. It would have SE effects for the province something like +1 pro +1 mil +2 pol -2 sta -1 hap -2 bur. Also, if you were a democracy the people of the colony wouldn't have a right to vote (I think the legislative power should be and AI, following the will of the people - areas pillaged by war would want peace, central areas could want war etc).

I would like to have it so that after the ancient times maybe 2/3 of your civ (determined by the size) was actually one of the two. This way your empire would consist of dusins of semi-independant areas all with different interests. You wouldn't even need a war anymore to make the game exciting. Just managing all these provinces would be challenging enough. Foreign powers would just add on to the fun!

There are numerous exambles on the two types from history: Vietnam was a protectorate for the US, but before that it was a French colony, Eastern Europe was Soviet protectorates, most of America are US protectorates today, India was a British colony etc. Protectorates can be both official ones (like Cambodia of France from 1863 or something) and ones where the country is officially independant, but in reality has no will of it's own (like Eastern Europe to the Soviet Union). There should be no distinction between the two in the game, as there is not really any difference. Also, I think that a newly conquored city should start as a colony, as the army controls it absolutely. This would have to be changed by you. An examble of this could be Germany after WW2. US and UK didn't just make the area a part of their countries, but made them "colonies" as the government had absolute power there. Later Germany became a US protectorate untill getting independance some time in the 50s.

I also agree that total military defeat should not mean exstinction. Vietnam was conquored by China for 1000 years, but got their independance back. But the only way I think this could be done good is with nationality. This should also be before the 19th century. Because the people don't care what nationality they belong to doesn't mean that the elite can't. This way people could continue having their own nationality under a foreign power. They could be assimilated by certain things like migration, luxuries (entertainers) etc. But if they stayed a national entity they could wait for the right time, making terrorist units destroying improvements of killing people in the conquoring power's cities, allie (unofficially, of cause) with the enemies of their conquores and decide joint attacks, and in modern times they could call for the UN to make trade embargoes or maybe even invasions to give them independance. They would often be satisfied with becoming protectorates, as it would take a lot of power and size to become totally independant.

The fun thing could be that YOU should be able to end up as a conquored civ. You wouldn't have much to do. You would get the amount of trade and waste the conquoring civ gets, times the percentage of the city population belongs to your national entity. So in a city with corruption and waste 10, and 60% of the pop supports you you would get 6 labour (and some raw materials) and 6 trade. You could use the trade to store for troops, and for luxuries to keep the people loyal to you. The production would be used for units (preferably terrorists, as the conquoring civ could see other units) or maybe for certain improvements (like some secret meetingplaces, to keep your national entity).

It would be hard to become independant (you would propably start out becoming a protectorate - then you would be able to build your own units and improvements) and would require the right timing, hitting just when the conquoring power is week - like in anarchy or in a civil war/other destructive war. This concept would require some excitement, as the player would otherwise just start over again if forced to this status.

I REALLY agree that large empires shouldn't per definition be stronger than smaller ones. this would be hard to implement (I agree it should have something to do with control and corruption/waste), but it would be very, very cool if done.

BTW I think there could be more than 20 civs in the game. 20 may be good for the begining, but as soon as empires start splitting up, civil wars emerge and colonies and protectorates start gaining/wanting independance there could be many more. This way there simply wouldn't be enough space on the map for those HUGE civs from Civ2. Many civs would consist of 1-4 cities, and the large ones would be maybe 20. These large ones would then have colonies and protectorates to a total size of maybe 50-60 cities, which was not all under direct control. THIS would really add to the fun of the game.

I to some point agree that colonization by settlers should be less common. But do you have any suggestions to how colonization/expansion then should be done?

I don't think a forign politics thread excist. If you have any suggestions about foreign politics you could just write them here, or at least tell me where you will write them, as I would really like to see them!!!


Ciao tutti!

[S. Kroeze]

I'm really angry at this system of writing in a box and the computer ruining my diagram. Because I think its truly important I'll try again.

~~~~~ + interes + influen + protect + posses
--------------------------------------------
inter + no prob + no prob + no prob + xxxxxx
--------------------------------------------
influ + no prob + no prob + xxxxxxx + xxxxxx
--------------------------------------------
prote + no prob + war???? + ^^^^^^^ + ^^^^^^
--------------------------------------------
posse + EMPIRE! + war???? + ^^^^^^^ + ^^^^^^

no prob = no problem
xxxxxxx = not allowed
EMPIRE! = integrating a former protectorate in your empire will have the automatic result that all other powers lose the interest they have in that region
^^^^^^^ = this combination cannot occur
The diagram shows the result of upgrading one's political power in a region where an other power already has some influence.

NB: Of course this is only a model used in Pax Brittannica; but the essential idea is very usefull: it allows political spheres of influence of different powers/ civilizations, which can to some extent be active in the same region/city. And I like very much the concept of different level of political control. Those levels are interest, influence, protectorate and possession. The last one only means incorporation in the state, without necessarily giving the region political rights. Of course one still would need the co-operation of the local elite or a very strong and expensive military presence.

[S. Kroeze]

Dear Joker,

I'm very enthousiastic about your sketch of a protectorate; its almost exactly the structure as I meant it. I think that the lowest forms of influence in a region wouldn't give you a lot of taxes, and probably no research at all. Its only the beginning of spreading your culture to a mostly less advanced part of the world, establishing trade relations, converting part of the population (let's hope the elite) to the dominant religion of your civilization, building an infrastructure etc.
Your concept of colony is interesting; could you please explain more clearly how you understand such a form of control: how it differs from my proposals and how I can relate it to historical structures. And what would be its merits in the game?

The true beauty of such a system of centres of power and periphery is the immense diplomatic possibilities it would create. In the classical game the only way of creating a revolt is by sending a spy or diplomat and actually bribing a city to revolt. But if you pay those staggering costs you can be sure of its success. Neither is realistic nor thrilling. In reality money does hardly ever triggger a revolt: general discontent, famine and political/economic/religious/cultural alignments do!

And as there exists the random possibility of your empire splitting apart, the other civilizations should know the same danger. In addition I think you should have the possibility (certainly in an overstretched, heterogeneous empire with an impetuous aristocracy or peasant/nomadic population) of toppling a government. Imagine the qualms that would cause the possibility of the following message:
"Though it grieves the nobility and hierarchy of this realm more than words can express, we, the lords of this council, entreat your imperial Highness to annul the Persian alliance, to end the persecution of the christians and to devolve his powers to the council."
The player would have the choice of carrying on his policy, which would result in anarchy and civil war, or to accede to these demands, continuing the game as his own successor with a council whose influence in the short term would be restrictive. Society/the elite would make most social and political decisions. And the possibility of bringing down in this way a foreign government and ending a lingering war from the inside would be really interesting.

Such a major breakdown of power could happen spontaneously or as a result of diplomatic intrigue.
Thats a reason I think that diplomats should have diplomatic inviolability in the cities of a civilization. Only barbarians like the Huns would violate such a principle. In this way they can easily reach the capitol of an empire; priests should have this possibility too, unless their religion is persecuted.
I fully realize that it will not be easy to give such depth to a game, but one should at least try to catch some of this atmosphere.

Its my impression that some of your (and mine too) ideas are at least considered and used by others. The road to victory should never be easy.
Adios!

[The Joker]

Hi S!

I haven't played Pax Brittannica, so i'm not sure how the lowest forms of influence would be portrayed in the game. Would you in any way decide what to build in that city, would you be able to see it on your map, including units built etc?

The colony would be under your direct control. So if you were a democracy the inhapitants of the colony would have no right to vote. It would propably be ruled by a governor of some sort who would be directly under your control, so no local governmental institutions. This would mean that you wouldn't have to discuss things with the local elite (which should be crucial in a protactorate). This would create unhappyness and unstability, but you would also be able to "abuse" the people there more than normally, by forcing them to work longer etc. There are many historical examples of colonies: Vietnam was a French colony untill the US took over in the 50s (Vietnam was ruled more or less absolutely by a French government official directly under the French government. This made it possible to more or less overrule the parliament in smaller issues concerning the colony - gamewise this would mean things like unit construction), India was a Brittish colony as it had some of the same characteristics as Vietnam, and I think that all newly conquored areas are colonies. They are not at all like the other areas of the conquoring civ, but not protectorates either. And the government have sort of absolute power in the conquored areas.

I think that in the game colonies should give you more control over the area, and more production there too. But it would also give unhappyness and a lot of unstability, making it necessary to garrisson units in those cities (maybe 1 unit for each 25,000 citizens in ancient times. Advances would reduce this number. But units could only reduce the chance of revolt, not eliminate it. 1 unit for each 25,000 citizens could reduce this chance to maybe 0.5 % per turn). The colony would give you remarkably higher police rates, also in a democracy. So you could surpress revolts easier than normally. The colony would also suffer from a lot of corruption and waste. I think that all newly conquored cities would be colonies. They would probably have units inside them, and massive unhappyness and civil unrest. The colony would make it easier to surpress this. You could later make the city an integrated part of your civ, or a protectorate. You could also give it it's independance back if you wanted (you should have some advantages in doing this).

I agree that revolts should be more complex to create.

I like your idea of internal politics a lot! It would be really interesting to fight a continous battle with the people. I would like a more "micro" form of anarchy, where there would be a real civil war in your civ. To do this, however, the game would need more turns (as we have both advocated for earlier), faster unit building (especcially before industrialization you should be able to build a unit in 1 or 2 turns if you have the weapons. This would af cause use a part of the population equivalent to the unit size) and faster unit movement. If you have a civ with more than 10 cities before industrialization I think it should propably be in a sort of civil war once every 50 years or less. This could both be just a simple peasant revolt with 2 pathetic units emerging (these could turn into more if you didn't destroy them fast) and the full scale civil war with 2 or more sides battling for power. They wouldn't neccessarily want different SE settings, just support different monarchs. If none of these sides were strong enough to destroy the others the empire could be split up. You would still have strong relations to the other part(s) of the empire, as your nationality would be the same. But with time this could change if you didn't have enough transaction with the other part(s) - this being trade, migration etc. Later you could seek the support of the people/elite n the lost areas to reconquor them (look at Germany - it has been unified and divided loads of times).

It should also be possible for foreign powers to effect these internal politics - you could support a surpressed group in a civ, causing a civil war. If you supported such a group you could say to them that you would give them weapons etc, but if they win the entire civ becomes your protectorate (this has been done numerous times in history: Persias support to Sparta, USSR's support to one side in the Afganistan civil war and many more). This would all mostly be done with smaller civs. When interfering with large ones you would propably just cause a civil war and then attack when the civ is weak.

Your idea of giving diplomats free movement everywhere is interesting. But I don't think it should be neccesary. I think that almost all of this secret diplomacy should be done in a screen like the normal diplomacy. You should be able to talk to all elites (that being protectorates, nationalities, aristocrats etc) in the civ when you have got an embassy in that civ. I also think that the exchange of embassies should be done with a proposal to the civ leader. In Civ2 it was so much trouple to move a ship with a diplomat around the world that I usually didn't even bothered.

If all those cool things we both would like included in Civ3 is to work it will have to be done with macromanagement. Civ2 already have way too much unit movement. If you would need to move diplomats and caravans around the globe to win a war or to get the industrial revolution started Civ3 would end in total obscurity.

BTW do you have any good ideas to HOW a large empire wouln't be stronger than a smaller one in Civ3, and how Civ3 could truly portray the rise and fall of great powers?
I have some, but I think more should be included:

-Huge corruption and waste for cities far away from the capital.

-Less control over cities far away (do you have any ideas to how this could be done?)

-I like the concept of some sort of bureaucracy points. These would be an expence on your national budget. The more bureaucracy points you have the lower the chance is for revolt, and the more control you can have over cities far away. But the more cities you have the more of these points would be required. So a large empire wouldn't just mean that the periphery cities were more or less useless. It would be a very large expence on your national budget, forcing you to raise taxes, which could create even more unhappyness plus it could reduce your research rate. This concept is far from perfect, but an advanced version of it could be implemented in Civ3, making the game more exciting. This could also help setting back very large civs in research, which could help smaller powers to take over.

-The chance of splitup raised if you were a large civ.

-Being a large civ would require more units around the world. If the cost of units would be both raw materials, food, credits and perhabs labour a large army could be really expensive, also in your national budget. This could cause unhappyness and less research due to raised taxes.

-CTP's State of Alert could be implemented (this is among the things I like about CTP), but better. There should be 3 levels of alert - low, medium and high. If set on low your units would get their attack/defence rates divided by 3. This would make them practically useless. If set on medium their rates would be 2/3 of usual, and on high they would be normal. However, on high an average amount of units could cost perhabs 40-50% of your country's labour and gross income plus loads of raw materials! This would make that REALLY expensive, and therefor only workable in a serious war. The major downside for large civs should be, that these would be significantly slower at moving between these states of alert. If you have 100 cities the time to go from low to high could be 20-30 turns! For a small civ with 10 cities this could be reduced to 2-3 turns. This way large civs could be not only unstabile, but unflexible.

-Better AI. Small civs should make alliances with each other if they were attacked by a large one.

-Cities should grow faster in modern times. This way cities made in 1800 wouldn't be useless.

These would all help, but I think there should more if empires in Civ3 were truly to rise and fall.

I think a major improvement could be if there were different strategies in the game: You could be satisfied with being a smaller civ in the first 5700 years, slowly building up your infrastructure and wealth, and then try becoming a world power in the latest part of the game. this should be possible. This strategy would mean that you didn't have to deal with all sorts of civil wars (or at least not as many as the big guys). You might even be satisfied with being another civs protectorate for some time. This would mean that you didn't have to worry as much about invasions, and would still give you freedom to do more or less what you wanted.

Another strategy could be a very expansionistic one, where you had a huge civ that collapsed once in a while, had almost constant civil war somewhere and had very little control over your far colonies. This could turn out to be a bad strategy in the end, but could none the less be very fun.

If Civ3 was made so that you wouldn't just start over if you could see you weren't gonna win the game it could be great. It should be fun to try to become independant, and if you became that then it could be enough for you. Even if some other civ ended up making the trip to AC.


Wow, that's one looooong post.


THE ANGER, GODESS, CELEBRATE THAT WHICH CAUGTH THE PELEIDE ACHILLES!

- Unoficcial translation of some old book ;-)
<font size=1 face=Arial color=444444>[This message has been edited by The Joker (edited December 23, 1999).]</font>

[S. Kroeze]

Dear Joker,

Reading your posts on this website always makes me enthusiastic. Though we agree not on all topics, my impression is that on many topics our suggestions point at least in the same direction. Most of your suggestions are really great and I hope some at least will be implemented. I'm sorry that I actually lack the time to participate fully in this forum. In fact I should't participate at all, but study more instead. That's why this post is short.

Some suggestions about thwarting overlarge empires:
- every civilization should spend part of its research points on education, just to preserve the knowledge it has: a larger civ should always spend/pay more on education just to ensure that no knowledge disappears; if it spends too little, has not enough libraries, advances/knowledge will disappear (like a substantial part of the knowledge of the Romans after the Great Migration); as it has more people in it, it needs more administrators, more priests, more lawyers, more scientists just to run the empire!

-we are both advocates of the principle of division of labour/conscription (as far as I know); but would it be wise policy for the Mongols in China to arm the subjected native population? Of course not! So conscription should only be possible if a majority of the population or at least the local elite supports your civilization deep down. Arming your adversaries will only bring your demise nearer.
( I think that it would be most interesting if you would be kept more or less in the dark about local sympathies)

- I suggested that there should be levels of increasing influence in a region; not necessarily the same as in Pax Brittannica but one at least should be without military occupation. So you cant move troops freely into it nor give build orders. Perhaps they will send some allies in a major war.
A large empire should lose money and manpower just to keep the periphery in control.

I like your concept of colony, but at the same time fear it is too pleasant. Without apparent support of the local elite it should not work.
Britain's power in India was substantially dependent on the support of the elite; the decisive factor ending in their departure was the fact that colonialism didn't pay anymore: from an asset it had become a burden!
There should be an incentive forcing you to abandon direct military occupation as soon as possible.
The Netherlands were the largest taxpaying, most affluent part of the Habsburg lands; after the revolt of 1568 that changed radically: instead it devoured all treasure-fleets coming from the newly conquered Americas.

Have a nice Christmas, all of you!

[The Joker]

Hi Kroeze!

Thank you very much for the nice words. I actually feel the same way about your posts. You have great historical knowlegde and some really great ideas.

Well, I better get on with it:

For your ideas for making larger not better:

I like the idea about education. Would the amount you would have to pay depend on your population or the amount of cities? (my bureaucracy points would depend on the amount of cities - it would not be expensive to have a small amount of large cities, but it would be more reasonable to have this depend on the population)

The idea about your troops having to support you is my favorite! It is pretty obvious, but I hadn't at all thought about it. I don't think it should be totally blind how large a part of the population in a city supports you (that would be like walking around in complete darkness), but there should be some uncertainty about it.

For the colony I don't think it would be too pleasant. It would require a lot of troops in larger cities, and with large maintenance costs for units this would be very expensive. I think it should mostly be used for newly conquored areas and areas with a lot of unstability in them.

I agree that occupation should no longer pay off at some point (maybe the UN wonder (which should be a real UN like the planetary council in SMAC, but with more options including embargo and joint attack) would increase the cost of occupying areas where the population doesn't support you - or it would simply increase the unstability of those areas). But I think that most former occupied areas would then become protectorates, and only pretty large or pretty powerful would become completely independant. And this would take a while.

BTW I have come up with some new ideas: If a protectorate has a revolution, and changes SE settings to some very different from yours it would often become independant of if it would propably not be able to support this it would become the protectorate of another large civ. Often a protactorate would be totally happy being one, as it would mean security and sometimes advances and money. It could simply ask a civ to become that civs protectorate. But if a protectorate of one civ suddently becomes that of another one the first civ would be allowed to go to war with the second one without that being a usual attack. In other words it would be more or less an act of war to take over another civs protectorate, even if the protectorate wants it. A great historical examble of this is the Cuba crisis. Before Castro Cuba was a US protectorate - the military government there was supported by the US. But right after the revolution Cuba became a Soviet protectorate, which almost sent the world into nuclear war.

Well, that's all I have to say at the moment. Hoping for some interesting posts that I can respond to soon.

[The Joker]

I have thought of something:

Colonization by settlers is not very historically correct. Settlers should require an advance (Colonization, discovered by the Greeks around 500 BC) to be made. Before that expansion should be made otherwise.

Here's a (not very developed) idea for that:

You should have just your one city for some time, untill you would get the message that 10,000 people had left it to settle another city. You would see that city on your map, and be able to see the information for it. But other than that it would be more or less independant. You would be a bit like allied, but closer linked together. After some time with trade etc. between the two you could ask it to join your civ (this could only happend after some ancient advance). It could accept or refuse. If it refused you make a war to conquor it. This would cost some money though, but if it was conquored it wouldn't create very much unhappyness in it. Mostly, however, it would be willing to join you. Most expansion should be done this way. It would also make it possible to have city state civilizations, like the greek. It couldn't be united, as the individual city states didn't want this. If the city states were attacked they would almost always stand together against the enemy. Smaller wars between them could come. The city states would have the advantage of no corruption or waste in them (pretty important with the ancient high inefficiency SE settings). They would combine their research. The thing being researched would be settled by a vote between the city leaders. Foreign affairs would be decided the same way. The city states could have individual SE settings.

As time passed they would, however, show less efficient than the united civs. Therefor they would often unite, most often with one city state conquoring the others, or at least break up into two or more united civs. In such a war a united foreign power could support one part with units,´money etc. in exchange for the entire city state civ becoming a protectorate of that civ.

Later in the game you could have distant settlements which would work the same way: You didn't have the ordinary type of control over them.

This new type of expansion could really make the game more realistic, and if done right more challenging and fun.

[The diplomat]

Joker: That is one of the best ideas I have read on this site!!
- It would make the game a lot of fun.
- It would prevent the expansion strategy where you just pump out settlers and build cities till you win.
- It is historically accurate, representing city-states like Ancient Greece. Before civilizations could think of conquering the world, you would first have to unite your own cities, through skillful diplomacy or conquest, like in History.

------------------
No permanent enemies, no permanent friends.

[Maniac]

*BUMP*

aargh, I've lots of reading to do to catch up. Expecting my next post in another year or so.

[CormacMacArt]

Government Model of CormacMacArt

A note before I go on, I am of the opinion that each city should be taken as being composed of a single culture and religion. Dividing up a city into different cultures and Religions adds a level of complexity that IMO does not add to game play. I also believe that government (organizational and economic) forms should actually CHANGE how we govern our civilizations and not be changes in name only.

Definitions:

CITY - a region defined by a specific set of cultural attitudes and a religion

VOTING CITY - a city that has the right to participate in the election of a representative body. This must be intentionally granted to conquered cities. This is a treaty option for the ceding of a city to another civ.

CULTURE - the attitudes of militaristic, perfectionistic, etc, on a -10 to 10 scale instead of -1 to 1

ASSIMILATION - the slow change of a conquered city's attitudes to match that of the empire's.

HAPPINESS - a percentage based on the closeness between a city's cultural profile and the REPRESENTATIVE BODY of the civ.
EQUATION: H% = (1-((|rv1 - cv1| + |rv2 - cv2| + ... + |rvn - cvn|)/n)/20) * 100
where H% is the percentage of people happy
rvn is the numerical cultural value "n" of the representative body
cvn is the numerical cultural value "n" of the city

DISCONTENT - a percentage based on the discrepancy between a city's cultural profile and the lleader of the civ.
EQUATION: D% = (((|Lv1 - cv1| + |Lv2 - cv2| + ... + |Lvn - cvn|)/n)/20) * 100
where D% is the percentage of people disgruntled by the actions of the civ leader
Lvn is the numerical cultural value "n" of the Leader, taken from the leader's profile
cvn see above
Note - a player starts out with a profile identical to his first city's. Over time, his profile is amended by his/her actions.
Note - the equation above does not take corruption into account and therefore is not complete

UNREST - a cumulative measure of the unhappiness of a city

SENATES, QUORUMS, AND PARLIMENTS - representative bodies that have some measure of power in a civ. They are elected (recalculated) every 5 years (baring war), or after the change in the number of VOTING CITIES.

SENATE - a representative body whose profile is determined by the average of each individual city profiles.
EQUATION: Svn = (c1vn + c2vn + ... + cmvn)/total number of voting cities

Svn = SENATE value "n"
cmvn = value "n" of city "m"

QUORUM - a representative body whose profile is determined by the average of each different TYPE of profile present in the civilization. Thus if an empire has 10 cities, but they can be classified into 4 profiles (eg - English, Irish, Scotch, partially assimiliated Irish), those four profiles will be averaged to become the QUORUM profile.

PARLIMENT - a representative body whose profile is determined by the average of all city profiles multiplied times their respective population points. Thus if an empire has 10 cities, the profiles of all cities are multiplied times their population size and then averaged to become the PARLIMENT profile. Thus a city with a large population has more representation than a city with a small population.

I may need to add different definitions as I see people's comments.

There would be three parameters related to the governing of the civ:

Government Form - how I interact with the people
Organizational Form - how I interact with my cities
Economic Form - how I manage my economy

GOVERNMENT FORM: AUTOCRACY; MONARCHY; REPUBLIC; COMMUNIST; THEOCRACY; DEMOCRACY

AUTOCRACY - You are the Lord of your civilization and control:
Values (knowledge, power, mores, etc.)
Religious attitude
Diplomacy (although not all your city governors may feel bound by your decisions)
Military (restricted by Organizational Form)
Direction of research
Organizational Forms: CENTRALIZED
Economic Forms: ALL
Benefits: little corruption when composed of one civilization; one unsupported military unit per city;
Restrictions: unassimilated cities must have troops stationed in them to maintain order and insure the payment of tribute;

MONARCHY - You are ruler of your civilization and control:
diplomacy
values (knowledge, power, mores, etc.)
religious attitude
military (may be restricted by Organizational Form)
direction of research
taxes (may be restricted by Organizational Form)
Organizational Forms: CENTRALIZED, FEUDAL, CITY-STATE, PROVINCAL
Economic Forms: NATIONAL BARTERING; MERCANTILISM; SOCIALISM; FASCIST
Benefits: upon switching to MONARCHY, all powers are vested in the monarch, and the assembly has no inherent powers. They must be granted to the assembly by the monarch, but once granted rescinding those powers increases the baseline for discontent to 30%.
Restrictions: unrest may develop in conquered civilizations; no conquered city may be represented in the assembly for at least 100 years;

REPUBLIC - You are Speaker of your civilization's SENATE and control:
Diplomacy (SENATE must ratify treaties and declare wars upon your request, but you are allowed some use of military force without SENATE approval)
Military
Subject to SENATE's approval
Direction of research
Values
Religious attitude
SENATE controls (but considers proposals by the Speaker):
Taxes
Organizational Forms: CENTRALIZED; PROVINCIAL; FEDERAL; CITY-STATE

Economic Forms: NATIONAL BARTERING; MERCANTILISM; FREE MARKET; KEYNES'
Benefits: central treasury; unrest slower to develop
Restrictions: loss of total control; military actions that are not declared wars will set baseline for discontent at 10%

THEOCRACY - You are the religious head of your civilization and control:
values (knowledge, power, mores, etc.)
religious attitude
diplomacy (may be restricted by Organizational Form)
military (may be restricted by Organizational Form)
direction of research
taxes (may be restricted by Organizational Form)
Organizational Forms: CENTRALIZED; PROVINCIAL; FEDERAL
Economic Forms: NATIONAL BARTERING; MERCANTILISM; SOCIALISM; FASCIST
Benefits: central treasury; corruption minimal in "loyal" cities;
Restrictions: You must choose a religion and that AI becomes your "parliment" if you
choose the Centralized Organizational Form, otherwise only those cities with that
particular religion are represented in PARLIMENT; PARLIMENT may rebel if you deviate too much from its profile;

DEMOCRACY - You are the President of your civilization and control:
Diplomacy (PARLIMENT must ratify treaties and declare wars)
Military
PARLIMENT controls (but considers Presidential proposals):
Military funding
Values (knowledge, power, mores, etc.)
Religious attitude
Direction of research
Taxes
Organizational Forms: CENTRALIZED; PROVINCIAL; FEDERAL; CITY-STATE
Economic Forms: NATIONAL BARTERING; MERCANTILISM; SOCIALISM; FASCIST; KEYNES'
Benefits: central treasury; unrest slowest to develop
Restrictions: military actions that are not declared wars, will lower happiness temporarily military actions that are not declared wars will set baseline for discontent at 10%


COMMUNIST - You are chairman of the communist party and you control:
Values (knowledge, power, mores, etc.)
Religious attitude
Diplomacy (PARLIMENT must ratify)
Military
Direction of research
Taxes
Organizational Forms: CENTRALIZED; PROVINCIAL; FEDERAL
Economic Forms: SOCIALIST - all existing corporations are liquidated first, all production is controlled as in Civ II
Benefits: If another communist country goes into REVOLT moving military units into that country, to quell the rebellion is allowed and not an act of war.
Restrictions: All food is distributed equally to each city w/waste and corruption level.



ORGANIZATIONAL FORM: CENTRALIZED; PROVINCIAL; FEDERAL; FEUDAL; CITY-STATE


CENTRALIZED
Benefits: assimilation of conquered/absorbed peoples fastest; centralized military; perceived strength in diplomacy +1; each city has the same tax burden
Restrictions: corruption increase is steepest upon increasing distance from capital, but can be controlled with Governor's Residences;

PROVINCIAL - Only cities having a population over 10 take part in elections
Benefits: centralized military; corruption slope lower than in centralized form; corruption in non-represented cities depends upon distance to nearest represented city; very low possibility of revolt for represented cities; tax percentages can be modified on a city-by-city basis;
Restrictions: discontent in unrepresented cities can turn into a full-blown civil war;

FEDERAL
Benefits: no possibility of city revolt during wartime; corruption slope lower than PROVINCIAL and levels off at a distance of 10 (Civ II, large map dist) ;
Restrictions: vulnerable to revolt from city discontent; city may hold militia separate from central military, but can only be used within city radius; cities collect more money than requested and use it to pay for militia

FEUDAL
B: very easy system to get minor civs, and cities from neighboring civs to join; corruption relative to ratio of city/capital strength (except the capital, which is lower)
R: the autonomy (control of trade, production, military & payment of taxes) and assimilation of each city depends upon the relative strength of the capital to each city; each city can independently control the production of military units; borders cities can change allegiance without notice if neighboring another FEUDAL system civ;

CITY-STATE
B: most alluring to minor or small civilizations and neighboring cities; corruption slope shallow;
R: easiest for cities to leave; as Leader of the civ, you may put items on the city's (other than the capital); only mercenaries can have veteran status, all native troops have only one year service; items can be placed on the production queue, but the city governor can delay production to third place on queue at the time of request; assimilation stagnant; each city can independently recall its military; limited in the tax% that you can levi


ECONOMIC FORM: AUTARKY; NATIONAL BARTERING MERCANTILISM; SOCIALIST; FASCIST; KEYNES'; FREE MARKET


AUTARKY - the beginning civ will start out at this, but will be unable to return to this as a choice, although a player should be able to "return" to it by choosing to eliminate trade with other nations. No trade outside of civilization and internal trade is on a one-time basis.

NATIONAL BARTERING - this is trade with other nations as initiated in Civ II, that is it takes place along side of diplomatic negotiations. It is on a one-time basis. Taxes are independent of trade income of cities.

MERCANTILISM - Trade routes can be established by the civ (visible and automatic) and by trade companies (these are the foundations of the future corporations - one per civ) if commissioned by the civ. The civ will also be able to cotrol how much revenue is received from the trade co. along with what the trade company can trade in.

SOCIALIST - production and trade are controlled by the state, corruption increases with production. Under COMMUNISM, all corporations are liquidated.

FASCIST - production done within the civ is dictated by the state. Corruption increases with production and distance from the capital.

FREE MARKET - the government has no say in production (by corporations) or trade and can make no regulations on pollution or land use.

KEYNES' - production and trade are monitored and only controlled by the state when necessary (ie. war). Each corp. in the civ is monitored as to what it is producing/trading in and to whom it is going. Trade with other nations is controlled in the Foreign relations screen. Also, regulations on the amount of pollution can be linked to taxes to the civ.


Assumptions:

1. If a civ is conquered it can attempt to found a Government in Exile in a friendly civ. The government in exile prevents the assimilation of its former capital and lasts until all former cities have been assimilated and the capital is razed.
2. Trade companies, Corporations and Banks can be formed within civs, springing up as a response to a new economic form or commissioned by the government.


I suggest that CONFEDERATION be a treaty choice.

[Maniac]

If Confederation wouldn't be a SE but a diplomatic choice, how would you represent the European Union in a scenario?
Playing with just one country/city would be very annoying. And I don't think there will be a possibility to have +-190 civs in one game.

And if in Civ2 I'm playing on the earth map and have colonized/conquered the whole Old World(=half the world!) while being a Democracy, I find it easier to picture my Democratic Empire as a Confederation of alike cultures than as something with a central power.

So the first example of Confederation was EU.
Another. How would you represent the Carthaginian Empire? All those cities had a relative independence. Or a Greek League? Every other city a different civ?
Except if that idea is used The Joker mentioned here (I only quickly browsed at it, the one of a city only becoming part of the empire through trade etc etc) those civs can't be represented without the Confederation SE choice.

[Maniac]

BTW to elaborate on The Joker's idea, what about the option to send immigrants (this could also happen automatic) to another civ's city. If after some years/centuries your ethnic group is the largest, they are much more willing to join your civ.

Just a sudden idea.
<font size=1 face=Arial color=444444>[This message has been edited by M@ni@c (edited January 07, 2000).]</font>

[Biddles]

Would the government in exile (GIE) be setup in a particular foreign city? If so could you:

1. Capture the city and execute the members of the GIE?

2. Negotiate with the foreign civ to have the members of the GIE handed over to you?

3. Send in your special forces to assassinate GIE members?


------------------
- Biddles

"Now that our life-support systems are utilising the new Windows 2027 OS, we don't have to worry about anythi......."
Mars Colonizer Mission

[CormacMacArt]

Sorry about the long delay in answering; the last time I posted it I got no replies, so I have not been looking out for them.

M@ni@c - The European Union is made up of separate entities united by agreements. There is no one civ in control of the whole union. I don't see how confederacies could be put into a SE model without, essentially, conqering the other members of the confederacy.

EU - confederacy - independant civs partially governed by a small council (ala SMAC)

As to your Old World Empire, you could govern it as a group of Democratic City-States.

Carthaginian Empire - don't know, I will have to reread the details of how it was arranged.

Greek League - see EU

I hope that answers your question! Please, do give it a good once over and try to rip the model apart; I want some good feedback.

Biddles - the GIE would be set up in the capital of the civ supporting it.

1. Yes! Before the UN, that is. Stuff like that is a no, no nowadays.
2. I don't see why not! Although I would expect that civ to take a BIG hit in reputation!
3. I like how you think! I don't see why not, but I would expect failure would be costly.

[Maniac]

Just performing a *bump*

[S. Kroeze]

Dear Theben,

This has always been -and probably will remain- my favourite thread of the Forum. I am sorry all discussion here has stopped: in my opinion the level of debating and arguing here was higher than in the Suggestions Forum. I would be sorry if it was removed to the Archives.

[Theben]

I'm glad you think so, but aside from Ming's Cheats there isn't any discussion here anymore. Perhaps moving this to the other forum will improve the dicussion there? At any rate, some discussion is better than none.

[The Joker]

Sure is a long time since I've seen this thread. I agree with Kroeze. It was truly the greatest of threads.

I am sad that the whole suggestion section is dead now.

Perhabs it would be good to move this thread to the general forum. But I feel as if even the general forum is now only a shadow of the greatness it once had. It's all a bunch of people suggesting the same ideas that we have all debated a long time ago, and very few of the suggestions now are even half as visionary as the ones us oldtimers suggested back in good old 1999.

But of cause it is propably too late now to suggest anything that will actually make it into Civ3. At least the alt. civs forum is still going strong (OpenCiv3), so I still have some reason to stay at Apolyton...

[Theben]

<center><table width=80%><tr><td><font color=000080 face="Verdana" size=2><font size="1">quote:
<img src="/images/blue1.gif" width=100% height=1>
</font><font size=1>Originally posted by The Joker on 07-21-2000 11:08 AM</font>
It's all a bunch of people suggesting the same ideas that we have all debated a long time ago, and very few of the suggestions now are even half as visionary as the ones us oldtimers suggested back in good old 1999.
<img src="/images/blue1.gif" width=100% height=1></font></td></tr></table></center>

Gee...1999 was so long ago...

One of my grievances is that people are suggesting "new" ideas from the ground up. While that isn't necessarily bad, I wish some would notice that a large section of territory's already been covered, and that they could add on to what's been said already.

As for the whole "suggesting" idea being dead, don Don and myself didn't even know if Firaxis or Microprose (at the time) would even listen to players, but that didn't stop us from creating long posts of ideas. It can still be fun, if just as pointless.