Civilizaton Abilities

TechWins · August 9, 2001, 20:43

Here's a link to click on the Civilizaton Abilities. I really like this idea. It will add some diversity to the game. As long as you can randomize these each game. Will you be able to randomize these? Another question is do all techs have an effect? Under the tech it shows effect 1 does this mean that there could be an effect 2? Those questions are intended for Firaxis.

The question for all of you is what do you think of the Civilization Abilities?

TechWins · August 9, 2001, 20:48

I just realized that there is an effect 1 and 2. For some reason I can't seem to look at it. My screen space is only 14" and you can't scroll down on the picture. could somebody who can see the whole picture tell me what it states?

Dan Magaha FIRAXIS · August 9, 2001, 20:49

Quote:

Originally posted by TechWins
Here's a link to click on the Civilizaton Abilities. I really like this idea. It will add some diversity to the game. As long as you can randomize these each game. Will you be able to randomize these? Another question is do all techs have an effect? Under the tech it shows effect 1 does this mean that there could be an effect 2? Those questions are intended for Firaxis.

The question for all of you is what do you think of the Civilization Abilities?

You get both effects if you're in that slot, and since the default rules give each Civ two categories, you actually get four effects. This can all be changed with the editor as well, BTW.

At present, I don't think there's any option to randomize these, but I could be wrong.

Dan

TechWins · August 9, 2001, 20:54

Thanks Dan for the reply. I sure hope there is a way you could randomize this. It would make each game different enabling you to play endless amount of game. If you can't randomize you might get bored because each game you would have the same civ doing the samething every game. So I strongly suggest that there be a way to randomize special abilities and that's including civ specific units.

Could someone tell me what the 'effects 2' are?

SnowFire · August 9, 2001, 21:46

Techwins: I don't think there's any distinction. Civs with trait X get these two benefits, period. Which one is 1st and which is 2nd is irrelevant. That's how I interpreted it at least, and DM seems to back that up.

Anyway, now to the whining that everybody knew would come when the differences were announced. I'm actually glad that they've implemented Civ differences like this- it's really more of a focus than an outright speciality. Also, with 16 civs, and 6*5/2 = 15 possible combinations and 16 civs, and not wanting to have a "Scientific and Militaristic" civ (understandable, it would probably be hailed the best immediately), that means we'll need 2 repetitions. Both the Aztecs and Japanese being militarisitc and religous, fine. However, both the English and the Germans being Commerical and Expansionisitc? Bah, I say! At least one of them could have dispensed the Expansionism for Scientific. I mean, the Russians are scientific, and they only got into Science really in the last century, and even still generally lagged. The Scientific Revolution went off in France, Germany, England, and America, and none of these are Scientific? At least the English deserve to be. Sure, they were expansionists, but only later on, and I know I'll probably replace that with science. Or you could do the same for Germany, I mean the Germanic tribes were expansionistic- conquering Gaul, overthrowing Rome, conquering England, pushing the Slavs out of the Baltic States- but that's not the German state, which never really did get many colonies or expand that much.

Ah well, that's why there's editing. And good thing to hear about the "up to 4" feature as well, that way us snooty patriots can make the Americans Commercial, Scientific, Expansionistic, Industrialists. On the whole, a quite tasteful way to add different Civs, I approve.

Inverse Icarus · August 9, 2001, 23:13

IMHO, that "Religious" category is SEVERLY OVERPOWERED.

halving the costs of temples / cathedrals?

no anarchy?

jeez.

Dan Magaha FIRAXIS · August 9, 2001, 23:27

Quote:

Originally posted by SnowFire

Ah well, that's why there's editing. And good thing to hear about the "up to 4" feature as well, that way us snooty patriots can make the Americans Commercial, Scientific, Expansionistic, Industrialists. On the whole, a quite tasteful way to add different Civs, I approve.

Actually, with the editor, you could put a civ in all six categories, none at all, or any combination in between. With the default rules, though, each civ belongs to only two of the six categories. But since each category bestows two distinct bonuses, you really get four different bonuses per civ.

Dan

EDIT: terminology -- said "all six abilities" when I meant "all six categories"... doh..

shum00 · August 9, 2001, 23:30

Effect 2
Mil-Battlefield promotions more likely
Com-Lower Corruption
Exp-Civilization starts with a scout
Sci-Reduced science improvement costs
Rel-No Anarchy Between Governments
Ind-Extra production in city center

ChrisShaffer · August 9, 2001, 23:56

Quote:

Originally posted by UberKruX
IMHO, that "Religious" category is SEVERLY OVERPOWERED.

halving the costs of temples / cathedrals?

no anarchy?

jeez.

It doesn't say "half cost" for religious buildings, it says production costs reduced. Can't say whether that's reduced by 10% or 75% until we learn more....

SnowFire · August 10, 2001, 00:13

Uber: It doesn't say "half costs." That said, I hope it's something strong like that, otherwise I suspect the building modifiers will be a pretty weak ability.

And no Anarchy is pretty pathetic, actually. How often do you change governments?

It's pretty hard to judge the focuses when we don't know how good each one is. But if I had to rank them sight-unseen...

The starting tech is almost irrelevant, they're all so basic that they won't matter in a span of a very few game years.

The "extra X in city center" is quite nice. That's a bonus that will help you in each city a good bit early on. It's not huge, but definitely noticeable, and it always helps you- not just when buildling a certain type of building. Think of how many resources you'll save from building costs over the game- maybe 10-100 resources depending on the strength of the bonus and how big you build the city. Now if you got a resource every turn, how many cities stand for longer than 100 turns? Hopefully a lot.

The expansionistic bonuses are probably the worst. Starting with a scout is one unit. You could just build one just as easily. Your sole advantage from that is slightly better placed cities earlier on since you already know the terrain your settlers are moving into. The only way that scout could help is on a very small map when you find an enemy capital before he's built defenses and crush a close enemy civ easily. And the bonuses from barbarian villages would have to be DRAMATICALLY better to really make a long-term impact anywhere near as big as even the "extra production in city center" bonuses.

The religious bonuses would come next. A building cost decrease in religious buildlings is okay and especially nice for early cities, but I frankly couldn't care less about no Anarchy- unless Civ3 gives more of an incentive for switching governments all the time.

The Scientific and Militarisitic bonuses are okay.

The real action is at the Commercial and Industrial bonuses. You get extra production in all your cities- always nice- and the other bonuses rule. Lower corruption- unless it's a truly pathetic bonus- will give you a lot of extra trade, and most importantly it grows with your empire- even a pathetic bonus will be giving you at least 10-20 extra trade arrows by the later parts of the game per turn, a heck of a lot more useful than that early scout. It could easily help even more. And as for workers going faster... your city improvements will be online all the quicker, and you'll have more. Plus the +1 resource will be an even better help than +1 trade to young infant cities.

So, sadly enough, my vote goes to the Frogs for best Civ.

I reserve the right to be completely and utterly wrong, but assuming this is a "conservative" sequel and the bonuses are what I suspect they'll be, that's my vote. If it's a really nice building discount (like half costs), then it might be a bit more even.

Dan Magaha FIRAXIS · August 10, 2001, 00:18

Quote:

Originally posted by ChrisShaffer

It doesn't say "half cost" for religious buildings, it says production costs reduced. Can't say whether that's reduced by 10% or 75% until we learn more....

It *did* say that, before I realized it was an old table and pushed the new one out

Dan

TechWins · August 10, 2001, 00:50

Thank you shum00 for understanding what I meant. Snowfire and Dan didn't understand what I meant.

I like what the civ abilities will do, add to gameplay.

Moral Hazard · August 10, 2001, 02:26

The French are Industrious?

Yep that 35 hour work week sure helps. Commercial doesn't make a whole lot of sense either IMNSHO.

I would have made them scientific and um.

Question will we be able to add new abilities(Categories) through the editor? Like say Diplomatic or cultured, I'm guessing yes.

Edit: Refined question.

Wojit · August 10, 2001, 02:54

I sure hope them abilities are balanced a tad more.
It's already been pointed out, but - By George! Extra scout? Bonuses at barbarian villages?
The extra scout is an insanely temporary bonus, and the villages will probably be mostly all claimed by halfway through the game.

Nemo · August 10, 2001, 03:11

i was wondering why Firaxis choose the Americans to be an Expansionist over Scientific? Was there a historical reasoning for it, of was it for play balance?

-just curious

MarkG · August 10, 2001, 03:15

Quote:

Originally posted by Nemo
i was wondering why Firaxis choose the Americans to be an Expansionist over Scientific? Was there a historical reasoning for it, of was it for play balance?

expansionists. another word for imperialists

TechWins · August 10, 2001, 03:20

Some of the civ abilities need to be modified. Like why aren't the English industrious? They were the first ones to enter the industrial age you know.

Urban Ranger · August 10, 2001, 03:22

Expansionistic abilities aren't that shabby. It depends on the desity of goodie huts and the bonus. If the shift is good enough to eliminate barbarians hordes, an expansionist could collect a huge army of units from goodie huts and go on conquering.

This is basically a short term ability that one has to use to pummel one's opponents before their abilities let them run away.

Special abilities go a long way dictating a nation's long term strategy. For example, the Chinese should play a defensive game, with bronze working and masonry in the beginning, they are hard to crush. They need to rely on their scientific and industrial strengths to outperform their opponents. On the other hand, the Zulus should go recklessly expanding and crush anybody they find as fast as they can.

CyberGnu · August 10, 2001, 03:25

Firaxis, what were you guys drinking when you wrote the list? Since when are the french industrious? And Russian scientific, while Americans aren't? Have you ever read a russian scientific publication? It's useless! And in the meantime, 75% of the worlds science is published by authors working in america...

(Caveat, I'm not american myself... I just thought it looked really odd... And if I might flaunt my bias for a sec, where are the Vikings?!!!!)

Oh well, I guess it is all editable, right? Can I edit the french to 'evil smelling' and 'cowardly'?

CyberGnu · August 10, 2001, 03:27

BTW, TechWin, I had the same problem as you, but if you right click on the window, select 'select all', copy, and then paste it into excel you can see effect 2 just fine...

CyberGnu · August 10, 2001, 03:33

Moral Hazard, didn't see your post until now

Hmm, I would actually make them commercial and Expansionistic. As a civilization they are as expansionistic as they get, they are just not very good at it...

TechWins · August 10, 2001, 03:50

I've already done that awhile ago CyberGnu but still thanks for the advice.

Yes the abilities are editable.

I'm glad that there aren't any negative effects included. I hated it in SMAC when I started out and no matter what I had something wrong with me.

What exactly is the City Center? Is that just the term for where you place your food/shield/trade allocations?

I'm not very familiar (I'm only somewhat familiar) with Japanesse history but in when were the Japanesse militariastic besides the WW2 stage. I've always though of the Japanesse of being an isolated on purpose civ. They may have had some war rivals and had started some wars but I don't think a few scuffles like that really makes them militariastic. Then again if they're not militariastic what other option would have been chosen for them?

I think these civ abilities will be the first thing I will edit with the game. The basic concept is good it's just that some of the marked abilities aren't correct. Maybe I should say they aren't as correct as other markable abilities.

Urban Ranger · August 10, 2001, 04:05

CyberGnu,

Do remember that the Russians launched the first satellite and sent the first man into space.

TechWins,

Surely the Japanese were/are a militaristic bunch. Ever after the Meiji Restoration they were looking outward for territories to conquer. They occupied and eventually annexed Korea. They took Taiwan. They fought the Russians. Even now their defense budget is the second largest in the world.

Buck Birdseed · August 10, 2001, 04:06

I'd switch the American and British abilities. The Industrial Revolution did happen in Britain...

TechWins · August 10, 2001, 04:12

Quote:

Surely the Japanese were/are a militaristic bunch. Ever after the Meiji Restoration they were looking outward for territories to conquer. They occupied and eventually annexed Korea. They took Taiwan. They fought the Russians. Even now their defense budget is the second largest in the world.

Wouldn't this mean that the Americans should be militariastic? We took over almost half of a continent, some by military action and some by diplomatic action. We have several territories and a huge defence budget. So the Americans have been militariastic over the span of our history. While the Japanesse have only been militariastic about as long as the Americans) but that is only a small portion of Japanesse history.

Urban Ranger · August 10, 2001, 04:18

Not really. Before that they had these big fights for the position of Shogun, as all these feudal lords had huge armies of samurais. They also had a fairly warlike tradition in the form of Shinto.

The US is of course militaristic, but it was even more expansionistic for a large part of its history.

LaRusso · August 10, 2001, 04:45

Quote:

Originally posted by CyberGnu
And Russian scientific, while Americans aren't? Have you ever read a russian scientific publication? It's useless! And in the meantime, 75% of the worlds science is published by authors working in america...

well, dunno about distribution patterns in serengeti....
russian basic sciences are still top notch - maths, physics, etc. their engineers still beat american ones for every buck invested - take a look at new airplanes, tanks, etc. true, their home appliancies suck but overall their contribution to rocketry and space flight science is enough to put them where they are

well americans should definitely be scientific, but then they could not be expansionist which would suck big time

Alex 14 · August 10, 2001, 05:38

The site still has a few problems:

1) Sidebar link glitch.
2) Civ-abilities scroll bar. (looks like they miscalculated the window size or forgot to incorparate a scrollbar.

TechWins · August 10, 2001, 05:47

Alex what does that have to do with anything? Actually I'm glad you posted it here instead of making some poll about it.

I would like to say boohyah grandma my very first thread has been mentioned in the Civ3 news.

Grim Legacy · August 10, 2001, 05:59

Though I will certainly try to enjoy the Civ's special abilities, I do have reservations at this time. Not only because the concept failed for me in Alpha Centauri.

Seeing the discussion here, there is already disagreement concerning the accuracy of the alloted traits.

Also, I am not sure whether the concept does justice to historical biases. Many of these traits are more in place for a limited timeframe, not for *all* of a civ's history.

I get a sort of cartoon-esque feeling from these special abilities.