Improve Workers Please!

[IBNobody]

I've played a few games, and I have a few suggestions for the improvement of workers.

1. Have a switch that lets you hide all workers, both friendly and hostile. Let them move around WITHOUT having to watch them. In late era games, I spend most of my time watching my workers build railroads or watching my enemies shuffle their workforce around. THIS IS A SIGNIFICANT DELAY ON PLAYTIME AND LENGTHENS THE GAME IMMENSELY!

2. Allow us to tag squares for irrigation/mining and have the automated workers improve these squares based on YOUR decisions on what the city needs. Thus, if a mountain city needs food, you can tag surrounding grasslands for irrigation, turn your workers loose, and not have to worry about them building mines. This improvement method would be faster than having to do things manually.

- Nobody

[Pembleton]

Originally posted by IBNobody
I've played a few games, and I have a few suggestions for the improvement of workers.

1. Have a switch that lets you hide all workers, both friendly and hostile. Let them move around WITHOUT having to watch them. In late era games, I spend most of my time watching my workers build railroads or watching my enemies shuffle their workforce around. THIS IS A SIGNIFICANT DELAY ON PLAYTIME AND LENGTHENS THE GAME IMMENSELY!

2. Allow us to tag squares for irrigation/mining and have the automated workers improve these squares based on YOUR decisions on what the city needs. Thus, if a mountain city needs food, you can tag surrounding grasslands for irrigation, turn your workers loose, and not have to worry about them building mines. This improvement method would be faster than having to do things manually.

Wow 2 great suggestions. Refreshing to see after all the idiocy on this board.

I tried automating my workers but immediately shut it off after seeing what they were doing. Besides, look at the AI's cities. Roads in every square regardless of whether it's being worked, and irrigation and mining in a regular pattern. I'm not blaming this though. Programming this better would be quite difficult.

I guess automating them is one way of giving yourself a handicap...

And to add to your first suggestion. There should be a way to shut off military movement for *certain* civs as well. Sometimes I want to see what one civ is doing but I don't want to have to wait 20-40 seconds for a civ that has 30 military units doing a "run around in circles dance" every turn when I am at peace with them.

Edit: I pride myself on spelling and grammar but some of the mistakes in this post I made were pretty dumb.

[fossicker]

I cannot agree with point #1 enough.

I actually think the city workers are alright, they seem to make alright decisions. I usually don't use the automation in the beginning but in the later game I used it a lot, but only to improve current city (shift-I). All in all works pretty well.

But to be able to not see them while they move around would make the end game go a lot faster.

[IBNobody]

I agree with you Pembleton...If we could hide the enemy troop movements, things would be great! What would be even better is if our military advisor would inform us if an enemy unit had the intentions of crossing our border.

As a player, I can always tell when an enemy civ is planning an invasion - they mass their troops outside my border. If we can hide enemy movements and have the advisor give us a warning, things would speed up tremendously.

- Nobody

[IBNobody]

Another improvement would be to show the maximum population sustainable by a city in the unit window when a settler is selected.

Showing the fat X instead of the 8-tile square would also improve settling.

- Nobody

[PGM]

Originally posted by IBNobody
1. Have a switch that lets you hide all workers, both friendly and hostile. Let them move around WITHOUT having to watch them. In late era games, I spend most of my time watching my workers build railroads or watching my enemies shuffle their workforce around. THIS IS A SIGNIFICANT DELAY ON PLAYTIME AND LENGTHENS THE GAME IMMENSELY!

I disagree. How disturbing would it be to capture workers without seeing them, etc.. I don't want to be declared war on by someone just because I accidently captured one of their invisible workers.

Originally posted by IBNobody
2. Allow us to tag squares for irrigation/mining and have the automated workers improve these squares based on YOUR decisions on what the city needs. Thus, if a mountain city needs food, you can tag surrounding grasslands for irrigation, turn your workers loose, and not have to worry about them building mines. This improvement method would be faster than having to do things manually.

This one I like very much. It would be kind of a terrain governor. Very nice.

[Seraphim]

Couldn't agree more. I HATE having to twiddle my thumbs while I want for 40+ workers shuffle aimlessly on the map for over a minute. Even turning off show automatic moves doesn't help


We need a switch!

[IBNobody]

I disagree. How disturbing would it be to capture workers without seeing them, etc.. I don't want to be declared war on by someone just because I accidently captured one of their invisible workers.

The only ways you'd catch one are...

...If you're romping through their territory.
...If they're romping through yours.
...If they're in neutral territory.

The idea behind being able to turn off workers (or enemy moves) is that you don't want to be bogged down by auto-workers or troop shuffling outside your borders. (If something threatening is happening, your military advisor should tell you.)

To solve your problem, though, why not have it so that moving units can view hidden workers outside your territory, and that any intruding worker/unit into your territory is visible?

- Nobody

[EnderSword]

Well, how 'bout instead of actually making them invisible We just don't see them move, but still see where they are when moving other units, managing cities etc...

Simple, eh?

[yin26]

If they are invisible, they could appear if you bump into one and you have the option: "Capture this worker?"

I agree we need a LOT of graphic toggles. I don't want to see AI troop movements most of the time. Just zap them to the location, please. I would also like to shut off the graphics for roads/mines, etc., according to my preference. Yes, I'd need to toggle them on occasionally.

So, two things: Increase game speed by reducing the number of units we have to watch roaming around and reduce screen clutter by being able to toggle off various graphics according to your taste. I know about the Clear Map option, but something a bit more refined, please.

[kimmygibler]

I hhate to say it, but mabye this was one of the advantages of ctp's improvement system. No workers wandering about...

I would also like to select options for automted workers similar to the governor options:

Build Irrigation: Never/Seldom/Often --> This Worker/Workers on Continent/All Workers
Build Roads: Never/Seldom/Often (you get the picture)

In the late game after my infrastucture is built I'd just set my workers to ONLY clean up pollution and not touch the land!

OR at least the ability to assign workers to CLEAN POLLUTION ONLY and a toggle for DON'T CLEAR FORESTS.

[haze111]

shift-p will set a worker to clean pollution only

[IBNobody]

Workers can be automated to perform a number of jobs, such as pollution cleanup and road building...It's just hard to predict what they'll do.

- Nobody

[Travathian]

I'd rather not hide ALL workers, how about just automated ones? Even late in the game there are some I control manually that I'd want to see.

Also, I noticed there's a build a road to x city worker command. Is there a command to build a road from current location to a then chosen spot on the map?

I also concur about options to 'teleport' enemy units. But I'd prefer it be able to choose allies/enemies and right of passage or not.

I also concur with Trachmir about the options for workers similar to those of city governors. Late in the game I want roads/rails/pollution but don't want the silly computer spending time irrigating my mines and mining my farmland. Just add a worker section under the domestic advisor, or even another tab under the governor section.

btw my last game was taking 10+ min a turn for auto movement and computer mvmt, and I have a damn fast system. ridiculous.

[Kc7mxo]

No NO NO NO NO NO

No public works. I hate that!

I love the concept of workers. I really LOVE the idea of stealing them!

The problem with the public works system is both its lack of control, and its minimization. I like my workers. Don't touch them.

The problem isn't the workers themselves, its the massive number of them that end of getting accumalated by both players.

Plus now that we have borders creating an area where we can see everything all the time, we are forced to watch more moves.

[IBNobody]

I'd rather not hide ALL workers, how about just automated ones?

That works for me.

Also, I noticed there's a build a road to x city worker command. Is there a command to build a road from current location to a then chosen spot on the map?

Yup. The RoadTo command (Ctrl-R?) changes the cursor to a square tile overlay. When you click on a tile, the worker starts building in that direction.

The IrrigateTo command (Ctrl-I) is also quite nice for bringing water into an area.

I also concur with Trachmir about the options for workers similar to those of city governors. Late in the game I want roads/rails/pollution but don't want the silly computer spending time irrigating my mines and mining my farmland. Just add a worker section under the domestic advisor, or even another tab under the governor section.

If we could have this AND the ability to tag certain squares for improvement (useful in the early game), I'd be happy.

- Nobody