New PC.IGN preview

[Frozen_Vomit]

I dont know if it was mentioned here before, but the admin of Civfanatics has found three hidden screens:

http://viewer.ign.com/media_page.jsp...e/aciv3019.jpg

http://viewer.ign.com/media_page.jsp...e/aciv3021.jpg

http://viewer.ign.com/media_page.jsp...e/aciv3024.jpg

The last of those three is pretty interresting i think: It is the prove that sea blocades are in
__
Edit: ok just saw that somebody has posted it before, sorry

[Comrade Tribune]

Originally posted by Grumbold
Very interesting review. The screenshots give lots to think about, especially because the reviewer says he's played a lot of Civ in the past but is still well behind on the tech progression. He's playing badly but is still winning? Is he playing on chieftain or is the AI equally stupid?

Not necessarily. He might be a very warlike player, who focuses on not so much developing techs, but keeping others from doing it. If you refine this kind of strategy, you can conquer the world with relatively low-tech units in CivII, right up to Deity.

This is not entirely unrealistic, in fact there is a lot to say for this approach. You end up with a world where the Atomic bomb has never been invented.

[Comrade Tribune]

Originally posted by albiedamned
A dedicated builder like me will always fill up his cities with all the improvements and run out of stuff to build! So hopefully Wealth is available reasonably early.

I hope the same, but for very different reasons. (I am a dedicated non-builder. )

[Comrade Tribune]

Originally posted by Pggar
Have you seen the hidden screens fouded by Thunderfall from Civfanatics

Lyons

Evil French

Trade and Trade Routes

The last link says you can 'blockade a harbour', stopping its trade. Verrry interesting!

[Pseud0nym]

The following is about the quote in the review; 'Leaders can enter a city and complete any single improvement in a single turn.'

Originally posted by art_vandelai


I expect you'd lose that Great Leader then if you decide to rush a wonder. Decisions, decisions!!!

Man, I hope so, otherwise Great Leaders would be unbelievably broken. What? The iroquis are almost finished building the great library? I think not! Cool, just got mysticism; I think the oracle would look good in m city; there we go, instant oracle... They would also be incredibly powerfull if they could just rush other production w/o any penalty. Say found a new city, then produce a defensive unit and citywalls in two turns w/o using gold? Or crank out 5 nukes in 5 turns? I can't believe they would put in something that unbalancing.

[Ozymandous]

Originally posted by Comrade Tribune


Not necessarily. He might be a very warlike player, who focuses on not so much developing techs, but keeping others from doing it. If you refine this kind of strategy, you can conquer the world with relatively low-tech units in CivII, right up to Deity.

This is not entirely unrealistic, in fact there is a lot to say for this approach. You end up with a world where the Atomic bomb has never been invented.

And usually no electricity, sanitation, flight or any of the other modern "marvels" that make life much more comfortable and advanced civilization past the "beat animals with a club and then roast them over a fire" phase.

Although beating a nice steak with a meat mallet to tenderize it and cooking it on a grill does have its good points..

[El hidalgo]

¢?? Originally posted by Pggar
Have you seen the hidden screens fouded by Thunderfall from Civfanatics

Lyons

Evil French

Trade and Trade Routes [/QUOTE]

Hmm, for sea trade (3rd screen) it says "you need a visible water route" between the two cities in order to trade. I wonder exactly what that means. Is Lisbon visible to Los Angeles on a standard earth map? Is Lisbon visible to Varna on the Black Sea? Is it visible to Rome? Lisbon is probably visible to New York, and no doubt it is invisible to Baku on the Caspian. How about to Lagos?

[El hidalgo]

Originally posted by Sikander


I guess the assumption is that you can pump water from far away, or perhaps from an aquafer (like a well).

I don't like the idea that everything is atop an aquifer... or that you can pump water from "far away" when you're sitting on an island with no rivers or freshwater lakes... desalinization plants, I could get into that.

[El hidalgo]

Originally posted by UKScud
I think that fresh water irrigation will make most people think twice about locating their capital city on a sea edge. Pros: Once you have a harbour your trade with other Civs is gonna be easier. Cons: City growth is going to be sluggish without irrigation, and since settler production ultimately depends upon whether you can afford those two pop. points, I think it will slow down your own civilization growth.

That's what will make locations such as those of London, Alexandria, New York, and Shanghai very valuable! I like it.

[Dan Magaha FIRAXIS]

Originally posted by El hidalgo
¢?? Originally posted by Pggar
Have you seen the hidden screens fouded by Thunderfall from Civfanatics

Lyons

Evil French

Trade and Trade Routes

Hmm, for sea trade (3rd screen) it says "you need a visible water route" between the two cities in order to trade. I wonder exactly what that means. Is Lisbon visible to Los Angeles on a standard earth map? Is Lisbon visible to Varna on the Black Sea? Is it visible to Rome? Lisbon is probably visible to New York, and no doubt it is invisible to Baku on the Caspian. How about to Lagos? [/QUOTE]

That would be "a viable water route", meaning a route that you can actually traverse, taking into account whether you can actually safely navigate sea and ocean tiles (which depends on your technologies and wonders).

Dan

[Ozymandous]

Originally posted by Pseud0nym
The following is about the quote in the review; 'Leaders can enter a city and complete any single improvement in a single turn.'



Man, I hope so, otherwise Great Leaders would be unbelievably broken. What? The iroquis are almost finished building the great library? I think not! Cool, just got mysticism; I think the oracle would look good in m city; there we go, instant oracle... They would also be incredibly powerfull if they could just rush other production w/o any penalty. Say found a new city, then produce a defensive unit and citywalls in two turns w/o using gold? Or crank out 5 nukes in 5 turns? I can't believe they would put in something that unbalancing.

Great Leaders are RARE so you shouldn't have to worry about people getting them that often. Of course the decision then becomes "do I want to spend X number of turns constructing this wonder or use one of my 2 great leaders to finish it in a turn?"

[El hidalgo]

Originally posted by Dan Magaha FIRAXIS


Hmm, for sea trade (3rd screen) it says "you need a visible water route" between the two cities in order to trade. I wonder exactly what that means. Is Lisbon visible to Los Angeles on a standard earth map? Is Lisbon visible to Varna on the Black Sea? Is it visible to Rome? Lisbon is probably visible to New York, and no doubt it is invisible to Baku on the Caspian. How about to Lagos?

That would be "a viable water route", meaning a route that you can actually traverse, taking into account whether you can actually safely navigate sea and ocean tiles (which depends on your technologies and wonders).

Dan [/QUOTE]

Ah, that's very different! OK, that makes sense, but it does say 'visible' in the screen shot! Thanks for clearing that up, Dan! Now hopefully that typo is cleared up as well...

[SerapisIV]

Originally posted by Dan Magaha FIRAXIS
That would be "a viable water route", meaning a route that you can actually traverse, taking into account whether you can actually safely navigate sea and ocean tiles (which depends on your technologies and wonders).

Dan

Does this mean that an enemy ship blocking an ocean strait or bay opening is not a possible blockade method? Do embargos have to be done diplomatically or can they be performed physically by units?

[randomturn]

anyone notice that the IGN preview lists the Persians as Militaristic, Scientific? The official Civ3 site lists them as Scientific and Industrious, but they put that up a while ago. I wonder if Firaxis changed them for play-balance reasons... I was already looking forward to playing as Scientific, Industrious. I can always custom-create a civ to play with, of course...

[Faboba]

Originally posted by Pggar Hmm, for sea trade (3rd screen) it says "you need a visible water route" between the two cities in order to trade. I wonder exactly what that means. Is Lisbon visible to Los Angeles on a standard earth map? Is Lisbon visible to Varna on the Black Sea? Is it visible to Rome? Lisbon is probably visible to New York, and no doubt it is invisible to Baku on the Caspian. How about to Lagos?

Visible just means it that you have seen the water route. IE if you walked by land to India but never went by sea uoi'd never trace a route around South Africa cause you wouldn't have seen, you need to see all the coast line to send it around the continent.

As for needing Map Making, Navigation or Magnetism we must assume there are three depths of sea, with Magnetism required to bridge the vast oceans such as the Pacific or Altantic, Map Making to trace around coastlines and Navigation for distances like The East Indies to Australia or thereabouts. You get what I mean.

[Lawrence of Arabia]

If you look at the different screenshots, you can see that the 'unit selected' symbol appears to be different sometimes. I wonder why...

[Lawrence of Arabia]

Heres somethng I deduced

If you have a cavalry unit which is defending with its back to the river, attacked by a cavalry unit, the defender cannot retreat.

if You have a cavalry unit which is attacked by a cavalry unit whos back is to the river, the attacker can't retreat

Units being attacked from acoss the river will probably get a defensive bonus

This hasn't been mentioned, but since the preview said that rivers act as barriers, this would make a barrier

[Comrade Tribune]

Originally posted by Lawrence of Arabia
Heres somethng I deduced

If you have a cavalry unit which is defending with its back to the river, attacked by a cavalry unit, the defender cannot retreat.

if You have a cavalry unit which is attacked by a cavalry unit whos back is to the river, the attacker can't retreat

You have overlooked a tiny, yet important detail in your deduction, Watson. (Sorry, I just couldn´t resist. )

Cavalry can never retreat before cavalry. Only the faster unit can retreat, not an equally fast one.

[Lawrence of Arabia]

So then make the attacker on 1 a warrior
on 2 the defender to warrior

[Comrade Tribune]

I agree about the def bonus, and I also believe that crossing rivers will cost an additional MP (like entering woods).
I don´t think rivers will prevent retreat.

[Adm.Naismith]

Originally posted by Comrade Tribune
I agree about the def bonus, and I also believe that crossing rivers will cost an additional MP (like entering woods).
I don´t think rivers will prevent retreat.

IIRC, only fast (2+ MP) attacking units can retreat, and I remember in SMAC Rover always retreat to the original (before the attack) square.
If Passing Rivers is an obstacle (i.e. it cost 1MP) you probably can't pass it + attack + retreat in a single game turn.

Just guessing.

[Admiral PJ]

Sea Blockades - Great,
BUT why not Land blockades too, in other words sieges.
If you surround a city all its trade with other cities stops and it can't make money/research etc.. maybe food starvation should be easier too.
Sieges have always been a major tactic in warfare - I don't feel civ has simulated them properly.. perhaps civ3 will help.
Some cities have even surrendered rather than starve to death - after having to eat the 100th rat you begin you want a more varied diet.

Anyone seen my new thread I made about IGN? probably got knocked into the unknown

[Lawrence of Arabia]

BUT why not Land blockades too, in other words sieges.
If you surround a city all its trade with other cities stops and it can't make money/research etc.. maybe food starvation should be easier too.
Sieges have always been a major tactic in warfare - I don't feel civ has simulated them properly.. perhaps civ3 will help.

This has always been a viable strat in Civ2 and Civ1. If your troops occupy a city square, the workers cannot work there, thus, they make les food, production, etc

in Civ3, if you surround the city, and cut the roads, the city will lose all its luxeries, and go into city disorder. Then its easy to take.

[Acemo]

I think that the overall world shows the viable water trade routes. I think I saw one of the screenshots that the world map has white lines drawn between cities. I assume that these are the viable water routes. It might also show routes that are greyed (or blacked) out, perhaps these are the routes that are currently blockaded?

[JohnDavid]

In the screen shot of the 3 unit army, I noticed that the hitpoint bar appears to show the combined hit points (about 12) of all the units in the army. Considering how armies do pool their hit points, one would expect the hit point bar to reflect the combined total.

[UKScud]

Sieges have always been a major tactic in warfare - I don't feel civ has simulated them properly.. perhaps civ3 will help.

Given the abstract scale of each tile in Civ, I don't think realism is likely.

However, the effects of seige warfare can be simulated.

Bombardment - especially important now as you can also hit city impovements. How many people would rather go after a city improvement than a military unit?

Starvation - has always been a viable tactic, occupying surrounding tiles and destroying agricultural improvements.

Pinning military units - which could be doing the same thing to you elsewhere.

Economic Denial - gold, luxuries, and resources, resources, resources! If the saltpeter can't get in, they can't build cannons and musketmen. How many times in Civ2 did you sit outside a city whilst it churned out unit turn after turn?

Incidentally, I know you can't rush build wonders...but what about military units...other than drafting.

Drafting - now that's gonna make seige interesting....would YOU risk it, if you were being seiged?

[Adm.Naismith]

Originally posted by UKScud
Incidentally, I know you can't rush build wonders...but what about military units...other than drafting.

Drafting - now that's gonna make seige interesting....would YOU risk it, if you were being seiged?

As you pointed out, rushed buildings are possible (and probably military units too) via Forced Labour or Payed Labour. While the latter is like the old know Civ II method of rushing paying with gold, the former make your people unhappy and sometimes they died because of the extra work. See a Dan Magaha post some days old, around here for details.

[UKScud]

rushed buildings are possible (and probably military units too) via Forced Labour or Payed Labour.

Yup, I recall this now. I always thought it sucked that in Civ2 the other Civs always seemed to have bundles more money than me throughout most of the game. This always meant that they could rush buy when it came to beseiging a city. Before you know it you have a whole bundle of extra troops in the city ready to defend!

...leaving you thinking "Where the hell did they come from!"

I reckon that the whole resource model is so important that most of your confilicts will end up based around resource denial or seizure.

Hey! Now that's realism!