Civ3 + CtP = perfect game

[Ray K]

First things first. I want to say that, as someone who has spent many hours playing Civ, Civ2, and CtP... Civ3 is clearly the best of the bunch.

Firaxis has definitely hit a home run with the addition of culture and I commend them for it. This one change fixes a lot of the shortcomings of the earlier Civ games (Wonder obsolescence & city borders, for example), and is a big reason the game is going to be remembered as a great one.

The legacy of unique Civs is a legacy of the original Master of Orion, and it was also a great feature to add. Finally, we can have elephant units within a reasonable sense of historical reality!

The air units make a lot more sense now with 'missions'. Another solid rethinking of the game.

About the subject line. I know that a lot of people don't like CtP, but I enjoyed it once it was patched and I became accustomed to the interface. Just because it was a hybrid Civ does not mean it did not have good features. Activision added some innovative features that are definitely worth incorporating. In fact, I wish we could pull out the best features from CtP and add them to Civ.

Here are some CtP features that should be part of the Civ line:

1) public works - an end to the micromanagement of workers. This was a huge improvement and I sorely miss it from Civ3.

2) the combat system that allowed ranged attackers to fire first - brilliant and simple! Of course, all new units are essentially 'ranged' with the advent of gunpowder, but this is a very nice feature for pre-gunpowder combat.

3) religious governments - a big part of history that really should be included in the Civ line. There are 'religious' Civs, so maybe this would be redundant. And don't forget Facism.

4) future techs - these have been around since the original Civ, but CtP was the first to make them useful. I wouldn't expect to see imaginary techs like in CtP, but researching generic future techs could give you generic bonuses like in Master of Orion.


Once the corruption levels on the small maps was balanced to match the other map sizes, this game has been thoroughly addictive.

It would be nice to have some way to speed up production, like having a worker be able to help with production in a city (maybe 1 worker/city to prevent abuse).

[Roland Ehnström]

I agree. Eventhough CtP has a terrible reputation in this forum, it does have some very good points - like the PW's (although a worker is perhaps more fun ) and especially the combat system (this is the best part of CtP IMO).

Peace!
-- Roland

[Grundel]

I also agree. I like the combat and the public works as well. Micromanagment in late games can be a nightmare, and public works gets rid of that.

[Dida]

I hate the worker, which is very hard to manage, especially during the late game when you've got 70 cities and 100 workers. Public Works was a better way to handle that. But, the problem with PW is that you can only build improvements within your own border, which sucks. So, a combination of PW and worker would be the best. To build outside of your border, use workers.
The combat system in CTP is certainly better than in Civ3. In Civ3, you have to move each and every units in the stack separately, which is tedious. And the ranged unit doesn't seem to have any effect, as they are subject to be captured by enemy troops, and bombardment cannot kill units.

[Kc7mxo]

Well. Nyah nyah nyah. I love the worker. And I hated the public works system. So nyah.

Can you capture public works? hah. capturing workers is my favorite thing about civ3. Though I do have some problems figureing out what the heck to do with the little buggers once I reach critical worker mass. heh heh.

I think that civ 3 will be very good, once firaxis fixes the most glaring problems. Bugs and imballance issues aside, its definetly an ejoyable game. Just wish that . . . . well, thats for another thread.

[Auslander]

I can't see how PW was better than the worker. Talk about micromanagement. You had to go around to every city square and tell it build something. Each time. (A)utomate the worker and no more micromanagement. Now that they stay within your borders and return to your city when there is nothing else to do make workers a nobrainer.

Public works. Ha!

[d_dudy]

i liked ranged combat and unit stacks in ctp alot.

pw was fine with me, too. either way, you're using a portion of your production for tile improvement.

there's a critical worker mass?

[Apockoffork]

yeah there is critical worker mass. If you are on a small island all by yourself like i was. At the end of the game i had all the cities the way i wanted them so i just automated workers so they would get rid of polution. The extra workers ened up builing railroad on every single square on the island and clearing , irrigating and so on. I didn't care but when they were done they unautomated themselves and stuck themselves in a city which was annoying beacuse i would have to reautomate them every turn. SO HAH their is worker criticall mass.

[Dida]

Originally posted by Auslander
I can't see how PW was better than the worker. Talk about micromanagement. You had to go around to every city square and tell it build something. Each time. (A)utomate the worker and no more micromanagement. Now that they stay within your borders and return to your city when there is nothing else to do make workers a nobrainer.

Public works. Ha!

laying down a rail road across your empire takes only 10 seconds, if you ever played CTP, and were able to perform mouse clicking like most human is capable of, it should be easier than workers.

[MonarchyMajor]

here is the problem I have with civ 3. it doesn't feel comfertable. i think some of us if many have come upon this feeling. A feeling of your really in the game! presonally civ 2 and ctp 1 did this for me. ctp2 was actaully good except the demplomacy was really bad. but he graphics really made the game real and "friendly". When i play civ3 to long, the graphics and colors make it feel depressing sometimes.

kind of where reply here, but maybe some of you understand me, sometimes graphics can make some what of s difference

[dexter4dxm]

Originally posted by Kc7mxo
capturing workers is my favorite thing about civ3.

[Auslander]

Originally posted by Dida
if you ever played CTP, and were able to perform mouse clicking like most human is capable of, it should be easier than workers.

mouse clicking as in plural. Shift-R then select location builds a road between those two spots. Like I said, less micromanagement. Workers have better automation. They can be set to clear forest only, build irrigation to nearest city, automate cleaning up polution, and more. What does PW have? Mouse clicking.

Again how is that less micromanagement?

[Baloo]

IMHO, both PW and Workers have their strengths and disadvantages. PW’s strength lies on managing localized area, like city or small continents. At that scope, a fully automated, assigned PW (who says PW cannot be automated?) works a whole lot better than Workers. When your empire get bigger where your cities and precious resources are everywhere, you have to click everywhere in the map like mad. So this is where the Workers shine.


Here is an idea to mull for:

The problem with Civ III workers lies in the fact, IIRC, that they only improve with the type of government but don’t improve with technology and Ages. Ok let’s read back your lecture notes on High School or College Economics. So exactly why do people work significantly “faster” and efficient than their predecessors? It’s the Technology. Several Techs should give improvements on Workers work rate and efficiency. A modern age Worker should work 200% times (or any rate bigger than 100%) faster than his counterpart in the Middle Ages (keep in mind he or she has gadgets to do some works). Also certain techs, like electronics, computer or steam engine will improve the worker even better. This will eliminate the need of hundreds or so Workers in late game to clean up pollution or making rail tracks.

Will this unbalance the game? Oh hell, sure. That’s why keeping up with the latest expensive technology should be one of the main points of the game. Captured workers will retain their tech levels. If a tech lagger civ captures a worker from an Advanced civilization, that captured worker will perform magic for his new master.

Oh one last point, type of Government will still determine the availability of Workers in your civilization. Communism and Monarchy will enable you to get cheaper Labors and can still be effective via technology. Democracy will make the Labors a bit expensive, but more productive individually because of government-wise and tech-wise. So at the end it will balance out.

[tulcas]

I don't see why Firaxis didn't take the opportunity to make the best of both worlds, both the worker system and the PW system do have their downsides. By why not implement a PW type system where workers are real units that can be controlled individually or can be fully automated OR can be assigned to chartered duty.
Chartered duty basically being similar to the PW system in CTP namely you lay down what you want on the map, but unlike in CTP it doesn't appear until a worker assigned to charter duty comes along and builds what you ordered...just my thoughts.

[Ray K]

Originally posted by Kc7mxo
Well. Nyah nyah nyah. I love the worker. And I hated the public works system. So nyah.

Well, the ONLY historical rationalization for using workers over public works is if you want to model slavery. After all, when you capture a worker from another civ and put him to work, that's what you're doing.

Public Works is a much more elegant solution than workers. As an abstraction, the ability to eliminate micromanagement is much greater with PW.

Saying that you like workers because you can capture them is the same as saying you prefer caravans because you can stop them as well. I don't think anyone wants to go back to caravan micromanagement!

Another KEY benefit of a Public Works system is the elimination of road sprawl. Idle workers are a waste of a resource, so we end up putting railroads everywhere. With PW, every tile improvement costs money, so you are less likely to put railroads everywhere. The resulting map on CtP was much cleaner.

Using city improvements to boost production and food (i.e supermarkets) was also a necessary component to eliminating road sprawl. Activision certainly did right on that one.

[Auslander]

Originally posted by Ray K
Another KEY benefit of a Public Works system is the elimination of road sprawl. Idle workers are a waste of a resource, so we end up putting railroads everywhere. With PW, every tile improvement costs money, so you are less likely to put railroads everywhere. The resulting map on CtP was much cleaner.

Even though improved tiles allow for more production and farming and have improved transport capabilities?

In my experience PW is far greater effort. Not only did you have to build an improvement once, but over and over again. Some of those improvements such as mines and fishnets have 3 or 4 layers of upgrades. You have to scan the map every turn and remember to upgrade each one of these things. Now if there was an upgrade all tiles with x improvement then that would be one thing. But as it stands the ability to give tasks to the worker, which by the way are more than just "automate" now, are a more efficient.

PW is more micro-management in my book.

[Grumbold]

Well I'm going to assume that all the previous posters loved the CtP combat system too since all the complaints are about PW

PW is a love/hate thing. I prefer the worker but you're not going to convince anyone to convert from their side of the arguement. I certainly agree that CtP had it right when making (rail)roads useful only for movement so the tiles stay cleaner and the incentive to create guarded routes is stronger. If worker AI is ever perfected you could have the best of both worlds. Limited clicks required without the ability to save up PW points to auto-develop a super city from scratch in one fell swoop.

In CtP if you wanted to enslave workers you just went to the cities to get them. Slavery was too powerful a tactic, not too weak

[Ray K]

Originally posted by Auslander


Even though improved tiles allow for more production and farming and have improved transport capabilities?

It's been a while since I played CtP, but I do not believe that production and farming were improved by railroad. There were improvements for this purpose

In my experience PW is far greater effort. Not only did you have to build an improvement once, but over and over again. Some of those improvements such as mines and fishnets have 3 or 4 layers of upgrades. You have to scan the map every turn and remember to upgrade each one of these things. Now if there was an upgrade all tiles with x improvement then that would be one thing. But as it stands the ability to give tasks to the worker, which by the way are more than just "automate" now, are a more efficient.

I think those complaints are irrelevant to Civ3 since there are not multiple layers of upgrade in Civ3. There's roads, railroads, and either mines or irrigation.

I wasn't a big fan of the double irrigation approach in Civ2 for the very reasons you suggested.

[Kautilya]

Overall CTP2 , out of the box, was a pretty ordinary game because of the terrible AI. The mods probably solve that problem but I have had too much trouble running them so I have given up on the game. But there are indeed several areas where it is better than Civ3.

CTP2 graphics were better than Civ3 IMO. I took a look at the screenshots and it was easy to distinguish between the units which is not always possible in Civ3. I really don't understand why Civ 3 graphics are so mediocre.

Also the CTP2 combat system was superb. Not only did stacked combat really reduce micromanagement but the concept of mixing up the different kinds of units in one stack; ie ranged,flanker etc was really cool.

Civ 3 is much too stingy with stacks; there are so many restrictions on how many stacks you can make and the no. of unit in each stack are too small.

I find moving large numbers of units from one place to another quite boring so this substantially reduces my enjoyment.

CTP2 had some cool management features; you could change a whole group of city production orders at once with the national manager IIRC.

And finally CTP 2 is much more modifiable with SLIC.

So, yeah I agree that a game which combined the best features of both would really rock.

[BigBopper]

CTP/CTPII had some good features, but taken as a whole they don't hold a candle compared to Civ III. While Civ III needs lots of bugs squashed it still has that fun factor that I thought that was missing from CTP/CTPII and even SMAC. Any ways, to get to the topic of the post, there are ideas that CIV III needs to steal from the CTP line. Unit stacks is one of them, even if they fight seperatly, it would make movving bunches of units around much easier. Secondly, I like the idea of the future techs, perhaps not in the quantity of CTP, just take us 50 years or so in the future. (Fusion power, and Genetic Engineering anyone) Last but not least I think that the PW system and the worker system should be combined. I would like to be able to lay down "plans" and then have my workers who are assigned to that duty work on those improvements. (this idea is talked about earlier in this thread) I know I said my last item was last but I lied, Workers need to be more specialized. I.E. workers that just build roads and railroads (and not just between cities (ctrl N)) and workers that are on pollution duty, they would go into a suspense mode when no pollution was around.