Where do babies come from?

[The Rusty Gamer]

Could someone tell me how population grows in Civ 3? This has probably been mentioned somewhere but I haven't found it.

I hope its not the food surplus thing again as that's not realistic.

Will it be tied in with happiness this time? When people are happy they are more likely to want to do that which helps make children.

Or is it perhaps some combination between the two?

[Alex 14]

Well i actually think the surplus idea in civ 2 was pretty interesting, i don't know, but i think happiness might have something to do with it.

how's this for balance then


the more unhappy people you have, the more pleasure they require, the more babies are born, the harder it is to keep your city stable

[Adm.Naismith]

Originally posted by Russell
Could someone tell me how population grows in Civ 3? This has probably been mentioned somewhere but I haven't found it.

I hope its not the food surplus thing again as that's not realistic.

Why not? Every one at Firaxis know that babies born under cabbages, and sure more cabbages you have, more babies you get

[Zanzin]

Originally posted by Adm.Naismith

Why not? Every one at Firaxis know that babies born under cabbages, and sure more cabbages you have, more babies you get

Makes sense to me

[Grumbold]

That doesn't explain why every time your population grows you need more cabbages to produce another new baby when the suggestion that people have something to do with the process should imply that the converse is true. Do the babies have to appear under the cabbages when no-one is looking so the more people, the less unwatched cabbages there are available

[dainbramaged13]

the system was designed for gameplay, not realism, like so many other things in the game. the problem with these forums is that so many people on here truly believe that civ games are not supposed to be fun, just simulations of the real world. if you want a sim of the world, see ggs (sorry guys, but thats what it is...) I think that is also a reason why the firaxians come here less and less after being thrown so many stupid, un-fun ideas to make the game a tiny bit more realistic.

(hey, this is fun, i think i'lll start a new thread )

[Rhuarc]

ok, I am going to show my ignorance, what is GGS? And I agree with you. The game is supposed to be fun!!! I mean yeah, we want it realistic, but now so realistic that it no longer becomes fun! I mean if you want realism, GO OUTSIDE!!!!!! That's as real as you can get! Games are meant to be fun, and if that means sacrificing a little bit of realism, well, then so be it!! Ok, I'm done now!

[The Rusty Gamer]

So why can't using happiness instead of food as a means of population growth be fun? I can't see how that would take the fun away or make it too complicated but it would also make it a bit more sensible

[Rhuarc]

Russell,
I understand what you are saying, but the reason they use food as a factor is it just makes sense. When you are starving your population is going to drop because of people dying (and I guess you could pull your idea of happiness into the explanation too by saying that if you are starving you aren't going to want to bring a child into the world) and when you have lots of food that is extra your poulation is going to grow (people get happier when there is lots of food, thereby having more children and your population grows) Now I know that this probably isn't an exact explanation. But for me this is how I see it and it makes sense to me. I would much rather they use food amounts as a way to guage city growth than happiness because it just seems to make more sense to me!

[Maniac]

Rhuarc, it's true population size won't grow if there's too little food, for the simple reason they'll die of starvation sooner or later. Thus availability of food is a limiting factor for population size. So you must have enough food; in civ words, you must have 2 food per citizen. The unrealistic part in civ is that population growth is determined by food surplus. Once you have reached a certain amount of food availability, it ceases to be a determining factor for people to choose to or not to have a child. Otherwise people in industrialized countries would have more children than people in developing countries. It's just the opposite around. They have more children in developing countries. Why? For one, there is child labour in those countries. Every child means more income. The same counts for farmers 6000 years ago. The more children, the more free work forces. Another point is that there is little social security in those countries. To be assured a quiet and peaceful life when you're old, you must have children taking care of you. This is no longer necessary in industrialized countries, beause retired people get money from the state to survive. One reason why ex-communist Russia has such a low birth rate. So actually, it's just the opposite around than what you claim. The less reason people have to be happy, the more children they will have. Of course, it's best that this shouldn't be implemented in civ3. Otherwise players would make their populace as unhappy as possible before they get riots.

Then what should be the most determining factor of population growth. Well, history (and present reality in Africa) shows us that there is a population boom if the hygiene and health of the population increases. Simply put, the less people die from diseases, the higher your population growth. This is clearly shown by the fact that, until the Industrial Revolution with its accompanying health & hygiene increase, city populations only stayed stabile because there was a constant immigration of people from the countryside. Until the 1800s, the death rate in city was very high as a consequence of epidemics.

Of course it's too late in Civ3's development to include a disease model, but I think they could include a city improvement called "Hospital", which would make population growth go 50% faster, and give each city two happy citizens. Also, it should be impossible to have a population boom until you have this facility. (You have to admit; the "democracy with 100% luxuries" tactic was too powerful.)

M@ni@c
Going back into lurker status...

[KrazyHorse]

Originally posted by Grumbold
That doesn't explain why every time your population grows you need more cabbages to produce another new

Well, if you look at the actual number of citizens that the pop points represent, you see that:
1=10000
2=30000
3=60000
....
....
41=8820000

so, it makes sense that it takes longer for your city to grow to these more elevated levels. As to why your cities become less productive per capita, I can only suggest that it has something to do with the obvious difficulty of taxing a large, powerful city at the same levels as a small town.

[Rhuarc]

Thanks for the clarification M@ni@c!! I don't have quite as good of an understanding of the system as I thought I did!!! So what is your theory on why Civ uses food to represent population growth, or uses it to make the population grow? I guess I just always figured that they were just using it as a symbolic representation of the population. But maybe not! Any ideas anyone?


Edit: KrazyHorse - I thought the population was 10,000 for each population point hence:
1 = 10,000
2 = 20,000
3 = 30,000
*
*
*
41 = 410,000

Where do you see that it isn't like that? (I'm not saying you are wrong, I just didn't think that was the way it was! )

[Al'Kimiya]

Originally posted by Rhuarc
I thought the population was 10,000 for each population point hence:
1 = 10,000
2 = 20,000
3 = 30,000
*
*
*
41 = 410,000

Only in CTP2...

[red_jon]

Originally posted by Rhuarc

1 = 10,000
2 = 20,000
3 = 30,000
*
*
*
41 = 410,000

This is the ridiculous system for CTP2, which means its impossible to get a city of 1 million people

The Civ2 system had its problems though... the number system was uneven - the larger a city gets the higher the population goes up withy each point. BUT that means that if a small city builds a settler it loses around 10,000 people, but if a large city builds one it loses a million!

My head hurts

[dainbramaged13]

joseph, thats true, but it (the civ2 system) makes more sense gameplay-wise, and it would only be fun that way. I mean, if population were represented not by people and not points, obvoiously, this would be more sensible, but as it is...

[KrazyHorse]

Originally posted by Rhuarc
Where do you see that it isn't like that? (I'm not saying you are wrong, I just didn't think that was the way it was! )

If you go into the city menu, you can see the pop at the top (I think). I also believe that this information was in the game manual. The actual formula for city pop is:

Pop=5000*(N)(N+1) where N is the "size" of the city.

[Adm.Naismith]

Originally posted by Grumbold
That doesn't explain why every time your population grows you need more cabbages to produce another new baby when the suggestion that people have something to do with the process should imply that the converse is true. Do the babies have to appear under the cabbages when no-one is looking so the more people, the less unwatched cabbages there are available

Too much people eat cabbages early, before babies are ready, not to mention a crowd stomp many cabbages.
Hence you need much more cabbages to have new babies. At least I remember reading something similar proposed into The List

[OneFootInTheGrave]

I would like to see the pop numbers trying to represent the 'real' ones, so that hte biggest normal city. (like size 41 in civ 2) would be around 30 million people and not less than 10...

a nice touch I would call it...

[Adm.Naismith]

Yes, the Civ use of pop numbers is silly: classical example where the internal numbers (useful to have balanced results modelling city growth, etc.) surface from internal coding to user interface.

My first teacher of programming looong ago would kill me for an error like this, or at least my clients would do

I want to look at screen and see my megacities at 5 or 10 million people, not apply some formula to understand what 18 pop points mean

I underline that CTP2 approach, as red_jon mentioned, isn't what I ask for: they get the other, simplest way, linking showed numbers to population but missing a realistic city growth model

But I have no hopes: it seems one of the things Firaxis doesn't care, as far as I can see from screenshots

[Maniac]

Originally posted by Rhuarc
Thanks for the clarification M@ni@c!! I don't have quite as good of an understanding of the system as I thought I did!!!

Well, I've seen this theory numberous times in my geography and history lessons over the past years. By now I understand the system better than I would wish sometimes...

So what is your theory on why Civ uses food to represent population growth, or uses it to make the population grow? I guess I just always figured that they were just using it as a symbolic representation of the population. But maybe not! Any ideas anyone?

There's no (right) theory behind it, I guess. Just one of these simple unrealistic game solutions. If we could just convince everyone that it is possible to have another food system that's both fun, realistic and simple.

[Darkknight]

Arrrg!! you cant use my joke!!

I'm pretty sure babies come from storks. See when a man and a woman get together and ask the King of storks to send them a little baby the king decides whether or not to give them one. This is why babies don't come every time a man and a woman get together .

Ye'see Don'tchya know?

[Maniac]

See my new signature!

[Theben]

Originally posted by M@ni@c
See my new signature!

Still looking...

[Ralf]

Originally posted by dainbramaged13
the system was designed for gameplay, not realism, like so many other things in the game.

I agree. If gameplay & realism can be combined - so much the better. But, if push comes to shove; then gameplay should always be the heaviest factor then designing the game.

Originally posted by Adm.Naismith
I want to look at screen and see my megacities at 5 or 10 million people, not apply some formula to understand what 18 pop points mean

No, I dont agree. I prefer simple city-size integer-numbers on the main map. Dont change it.

[Adm.Naismith]

Originally posted by Ralf
No, I dont agree. I prefer simple city-size integer-numbers on the main map. Dont change it.

Sorry Ralf, I suppose I explained myself badly.

Assuming the basic city will count 1 pop point=100 thousand people, I suppose a city of 50 can represent straight and easy a 5 million people (as 50*100,000), so 100 for a ten million megalopolis, etc.

Is 50 enough an integer number for you?

[JMarks]

Originally posted by KrazyHorse


If you go into the city menu, you can see the pop at the top (I think). I also believe that this information was in the game manual. The actual formula for city pop is:

Pop=5000*(N)(N+1) where N is the "size" of the city.

Hey, this is as close to perfection as you can get! Doesn't anyone know about triangle numbers???? The formula is (N)(N+1)/2. So they multiply this by the base number of a city, 10,000 and get your wacked out city population model.

Hey, I'm no mathmatician, but even I know about this stuff.

[Ghost:Rosenkrantz]

Originally posted by Russell

Will it be tied in with happiness this time? When people are happy they are more likely to want to do that which helps make children.
Or is it perhaps some combination between the two?

It should of course be a both I think. Where there is nothing to eat people stagger and settles other places and the same should happen if the welfare isn't too good.
-Babymaking is done whenever, whatever, whoever?
I thought it was... oh just forget it!

To historians: I don't think USA grew so large for that reason. ;-)
The big continent with lotsa resources and the liberal justice gave hungry and surpressed Europeans a chance in succedeng a hundred years ago so they simply moved and moved and ...

[Dr Strangelove]

Yes, I'm pretty sure also that growth of city poulation in Civ 1 and Civ 2 was geometric, not linear. It was reflected in the food store display: at low levels of population the bar was thin, but as population grew it widened, reflecting the larger quantities of food needed to advance to the next number.

I believe that the US population growth in the 19th century was the porportionately greatest of any nation ever. The US population grew from 3 million to 90 million during this century, but immigration (even considering the descendents of 18th century immigrants) only accounted for 25 to 30 million of that growth. That's a whopping 20 fold increase. Certainly the availability of food had a lot to do with this growth, Americans of this period tended to be taller and heavier than Europeans, but the culture of expansion was another factor. What limits our growth today is our credit economy (and the availability of birth control). It is as if the availability of money has come to replace the availability of food and land as the main factor in determinibng population growth. I suppose it might be possible to work this into the game. Perhaps "Credit Economy" could be an advancement that would increase productivity, income and trade, but then also become a major determinant of population growth.

[Maniac]

So you think the reasons I wrote in my posts are bull****?