Interface and other complaints (Civ3 is flawless and perfect types need not read).

[MarkG]

Originally posted by Chowlett
however, pressing R doesn't seem to do anything, I actually have to click the railroad button

the shortuct for railroads is shift+R

[Chowlett]

Never mind, just answered my own question with the manual - it's shift-R. Which I don't think is made clear on the button.

[Wrong_shui]

"R" is the road key
"ctrl + R" or "shift + R" is for railroad

[Akka]

Well, it happened to me. In fact, it's not "R", it's "Shift +R". The screen shortcut is just wrong.

Yes it's stupid to have pushing Shift+R while in any other Civ game it was simply R. Easier and make sense. But well, the whole Civ3 interface is a mess, so no surprise.

[Th0mas]

...It's Shift+R for railroads

[alva]

so i guess this railroad question is answered then ?!

[LaRusso]

Originally posted by Dev

Your point is?

Your point is?

You're a halfwit. Sometimes one has to troll a troll.

[Robert Plomp]

I'm going nuts moving my 30 unit army one by one.....
- No group movement is just stupid player griefing...

use the goto function.
It's the same as with civ2, thus for sure not worse.
The goto function works ways better then in civ2.

count:
civ3: +1
civ2: +0

I'm going nuts when after moving 5 units from a 10 unit stack it suddenly decides it's more much better to active a worker 5 screens away than to activate unit #6 of my current stack.
- logic....

I agree, it's silly......but again....
going nuts about such a minor thing, nah.
BTW, it happened in civ2 as well.

count:
civ3 +0
civ2 +0

I'm going nuts when i try to get a clear overview of my units in a given tile.
- Inexcusable rushing...

Civ2 had the popup that didn't show all units if you got more then 10 (20?) stacked. the 'right-click' functionality of civ3 solves everything.

count:
civ3 +1 (2)
civ2 +0

I'm going nuts when I want to semi-end the turn for a given unit but I can't, there's no way to skip a units turn without completely ending it.
- Skip turn should pull the unit from the "next available unit" rutine BUT you should still be able to manually click and move it.

The [s]entry function in civ2 is gone :-(
But 'w' and 'space' when it comes up again in the end isn't that bad, is it ? There are worse things.

civ2 worked the same way btw.
(I could think about another 100 orders as well:
- wait until all horsemen have moved
- wait until the worker finished it's road
- wait until my friends arived

it's a very minor thing to get angry about. Going nuts.... naaaah: take your medications

civ2 +1 (1)
civ3 +0 (2)

I'm going nuts when the governor starts producing a Galleon after finishing a battleship.
The 0.005 secs on screen msg about finished unit building jobs is a joke, give me a pop-up menu and kill the damn governor for christ sake.

civ3 has: shift-right click: chose new production item
civ3 has: governor that works (if you instruct him right )
civ2 continued to build whatever you just built, thus if you missed it it 'll keep on building a temple for eternity. That's for sure not a plus.

count:
civ3 +2 (4)
civ2 +0 (1)

The late game is such a management grief that I quite frankly don't bothert playing much into the industrial age when I get 20 cities, 70 workers and 70 military units ot keep track off.

same as civ2

Another thing that is immensly annoying in my world is that it doesn't update everything at the start of your turn, for example
why does it have to cycle through 5 cities that just produced something before it announces the tech advance that lets me build the new improvement I want to start building in those 5 cities ?

works as in civ2.
Your cities are done one by one. When enough science has been gathered you get your new advance. Doesn't work different then in civ2.

The civ3 interface has some more plusses:
- change production orders from domestic advisor screen
- commercial overview that actually works in the advisor screen
- Science Advisor screen that does much more then the civ2 one
- Foreign Advisor that gives a nice overview

I think there's more.....
but compared with civ2 I found only 1 thing that was better in civ2 (the 's' thingy) and EIGHT (8) improvements in civ3.
And that's just only out the top of my head.

When playing you'll allways find things that could've been better.
I tell you, with games like civilization you can improve the interface until eternity ! I'm happy that they haven't spend so much time on it that the other parts of the game weren't that good.

The thing with you is that you dislike the game, and everything you can use to backup your feeling will be used by you.

CyberShy

[Venger]

Originally posted by Dev
I'm going nuts moving my 30 unit army one by one.....
- No group movement is just stupid player griefing...

The problem is the dynamics - what if you have units with different moves or moves remaining, do you want to start leaving units behind like a car with parts falling off?

I'm going nuts when after moving 5 units from a 10 unit stack it suddenly decides it's more much better to active a worker 5 screens away than to activate unit #6 of my current stack.
- logic....

This annoys the piss out of me, especially with the games poor graphical performance.

I'm going nuts when i try to get a clear overview of my units in a given tile.
- Inexcusable rushing...

The lack of a truly informative interface is the problem. An additional information box is needed in this game for this and many other items. Think about this, Civ has always had alot of information available at a glance, until Civ3...

I'm going nuts when I want to semi-end the turn for a given unit but I can't, there's no way to skip a units turn without completely ending it.

Wait or fortify. Wait skips to the next unit but will come back to this one, fortify fortifies the unit but you CAN reselect the unit and change the orders if you decide you need him to do something else later in the turn.

I'm going nuts when the governor starts producing a Galleon after finishing a battleship.
The 0.005 secs on screen msg about finished unit building jobs is a joke, give me a pop-up menu and kill the damn governor for christ sake.

Agreed - the governor should be totally removable, and producing a military unit should mean the next item in the queue is the SAME UNIT. Freaking privateer BS, I actually had a city build one because I didn't see it.

And yes, the little joke messages during the change of turn suck $hit through a straw. What city am I supposed to be looking at? I've got 20 of them on the damn screen? Oh look, fire, guess I get to go around the map later playing Who's Rioting Now?

The interface is a step back in my opinion...

Venger

[Venger]

Originally posted by CyberShy

use the goto function.
It's the same as with civ2, thus for sure not worse.
The goto function works ways better then in civ2.

The pathfinding is better the actual mechanics are not. Expecially with the Ctrl-Shift requirements for it.

Civ2 had the popup that didn't show all units if you got more then 10 (20?) stacked. the 'right-click' functionality of civ3 solves everything.

I shouldn't be clicking for information that should already be visible. Civ requires information, and I shouldn't be clicking or pressing for it.

civ3 has: shift-right click: chose new production item
civ3 has: governor that works (if you instruct him right )
civ2 continued to build whatever you just built, thus if you missed it it 'll keep on building a temple for eternity. That's for sure not a plus.

Uh, no, you have it wrong. First, if I just build a legion, when that legion is activated I know what city it was produced in and can click it at that point.

Second, if you produce a temple, and don't change, you get a message every turn telling you "Hey chief, you already built one of these here). Which is infinitely better than what we get now in Civ3.

The civ3 interface has some more plusses:

And numerous minuses - the lack of onscreen information is appalling.

The thing with you is that you dislike the game, and everything you can use to backup your feeling will be used by you

Another fanboy hall monitor - you couldn't just address his concerns about the interface, you have to give your little whiney Civwhore commentary. You can't help it, you've apparently got whatever little bit of self esteem tied up in Civ for some reason, so when somebody points out the Emperor's new clothes you get threatened. He even posted it in the title - he wants information from people who don't have a hangup that they cannot bear critical examination of their sacred cow.

Venger

[jackshot]

Originally posted by CyberShy
The thing with you is that you dislike the game, and everything you can use to backup your feeling will be used by you.

CyberShy

Man, I knew when I the guy mentioned about wanting to stop units everybody would pile on. Yes you can use the wait command to basically do what he wants.

But his main point is true, the interface is in the way more than it should. Frankly, I don't give two ****s if Civ2 had the same silliness; first it was a different game, second it was designed years ago.

Unit grouping is a must. Everything takes way more units than Civ2, what was a interface lack there has snowballed. I still don't trust the go-to for any distance or complexity, admittedly improved as it is.

Those .005 second messages are a joke, as he said. Blink and you miss the revolution. Can they be logged somewhere?

Too many keycodes and not enough right click.

He is also right I am sick of jerked to China when the action's in Africa. Would a next unit command instead of an auto go-to be so terrible? Maybe as a toggle option to speed simpler turns but slow the important ones.

Dreamer I know.

[Evil_Eric_4]

Is there a way to turn of the pop-ups BETWEEN turns?

You know the ones---Japan is building HG BLA BLA BLA

Man -the turns take so long and then u heve to sit there and monitor the monitor and hit enter 15 times because a civ built a wonder and everyone else switches to something else--

or of course the old--- civ gets a WoW enabling adv.,promptly trades it to all others and whole world starts building said WoW--scenario.

[Zealot]

Guys, I think we should demand the Sentry function to be back again. Even if it's only with the sole purpose of not having to hit space to a damaged friendly unit inside our borders. In Civ 2 you just pressed "s" and the unit would recover until it had all hitpoints back to the maximum.

Bring back the Sleep function!

[uh Clem]

Originally posted by Chowlett


For the simple reason that science accumulates city by city. If the first 5 cities in the upkeep cycle don't push you over the tech edge, then you won't get the tech until the 6th city succeeds in doing so.

Why can't the science be summed at the beginning of the turn?

You're being an apologist for poor design.

[uh Clem]

CyberShy, your point seems to be that if something is stupid in Civ3, that's okay because the same thing existed in Civ2.

[Ludwig]

I think the original poster has some good points. I don't agree with all of them - but then again, when do you ever agree with ALL of someone else's points?

Originally posted by Dev
I'm going nuts moving my 30 unit army one by one.....
- No group movement is just stupid player griefing...

I'm going nuts when after moving 5 units from a 10 unit stack it suddenly decides it's more much better to active a worker 5 screens away than to activate unit #6 of my current stack.
- logic....

Yes. Although it smacks of the C&C series, you should be able to "drag" the mouse to activate a group of units in a given area and have those units advance to the head of the movement line. Seems basic enough.

I'm going nuts when i try to get a clear overview of my units in a given tile.
- Inexcusable rushing...

I actually like the right-click feature, but the numerical information there clicks with me. It's a CtP way to present info, but that's not the end of the world for me because I can digest information presented in that way. Maybe they could make it more pictorial, to fit in with the at-a-glance Civ tradition?

I'm going nuts when I want to semi-end the turn for a given unit but I can't, there's no way to skip a units turn without completely ending it.
- Skip turn should pull the unit from the "next available unit" rutine BUT you should still be able to manually click and move it.

The "W" key will do this. "Skip turn" is more for resting and healing units. There is an interface button on the screen next to the "skip turn" button if you don't like the "W" hotkey.

I'm going nuts when the governor starts producing a Galleon after finishing a battleship.
The 0.005 secs on screen msg about finished unit building jobs is a joke, give me a pop-up menu and kill the damn governor for christ sake.

Yes, this is bad. When you finish building a unit, the governor should keep building that unit. This complaint is fairly universal.

OTOH, the problem with giving you a pop-up menu for every city that finishes producing something [not just a building, but a unit] is that it will make the turns very, very long. The developers are between a rock and a hard place because while your feedback here is valid they ALSO seem to have gotten a lot of "There are too many damn pop-up's!" feedback from CivII. Maybe they could bring the pop-up's back but make them optional?


The late game is such a management grief that I quite frankly don't bothert playing much into the industrial age when I get 20 cities, 70 workers and 70 military units ot keep track off.

If you enjoy this kind of grief then more power to you but respect that I don't.

That's not a lot of units or cities at all. Well, the 70 workers is a lot. You probably don't want to try a huge map because I generally have 20 cities before I've even met all the other civ's.

It would be highly useful to have another zoom level available, however. The task would be more manageable if it were possible for me to zoom to a level where I could see a fifth or a fourth of a huge map at once for an overview. I end up doing double-scrolling, first to get my bearings, second to actually take action. When you're doubling up the # of units does become a problem.


Another thing that is immensly annoying in my world is that it doesn't update everything at the start of your turn, for example
why does it have to cycle through 5 cities that just produced something before it announces the tech advance that lets me build the new improvement I want to start building in those 5 cities ?

They should tranche the updates to make dependencies go first. Any Firaxis types want to comment on how the game prioritizes how to deliver update messages to you? Can the game handle a priority change?

/dev

[Venger]

I think the original poster has some good points. I don't agree with all of them - but then again, when do you ever agree with ALL of someone else's points?

I dunno, I still wonder why it is the everybody doesn't agree with everything I say, I mean, I'm always so RIGHT...

Yes. Although it smacks of the C&C series, you should be able to "drag" the mouse to activate a group of units in a given area and have those units advance to the head of the movement line. Seems basic enough.

The problem I think lies in selecting units with various move rates - this one has 2, this one has one, this one has 2 but one left, this one has 1 but has moved once on road...can lead to results we'd all hate. Maybe a way to congeal like units into a superstack or something. It'd be limited to same units or at least same move units...

Maybe they could make it more pictorial, to fit in with the at-a-glance Civ tradition?

I think we need a removable window that has this at a glance information - people could close it or keep it open at all times. I like seeing more of the map too, but Civ3 is a major step backwards in terms of on screen information.

Maybe they could bring the pop-up's back but make them optional?

I hate to say this, but maybe they could take a hint from Microsoft (AIYYEEE!!!) with a "Do not show this window again" option. I personally NEED to go to the city when it is disorder. Civ2 had alot of ways to customize the goto city on event issue, this was abandoned for no good end in Civ3...

Venger

[Chowlett]

Originally posted by uh Clem


Why can't the science be summed at the beginning of the turn?

You're being an apologist for poor design.

Because there could be events that alter the science output of a city before it is reached in upkeep. For example, if your capital builds, say, Hanging gardens, it might push another city into WLTKD, thus increasing its science output. Thus you need to calculate them in order.

[TechWins]

- No group movement is just stupid player griefing...

Yes, I couldn't agree more. There is no reason why not to include this feature (ok so maybe the game being rushed is a reason); I mean SMAC had this feature.

I'm going nuts when i try to get a clear overview of my units in a given tile.

No big deal, this is solved by the right-click, but it would be helpful to have a clear overview.

I'm going nuts when I want to semi-end the turn for a given unit but I can't, there's no way to skip a units turn without completely ending it.

This would be a nice plus for the game. In fact it really should be there. Many times I will press the spacebar (either by accident or purposely) and I will later on in that turn want to use that particular unit. *If spacebar is pressed for a unit, then end the turn for the unit, unless the unit is manually activated on the same turn*

I'm going nuts when the governor starts producing a Galleon after finishing a battleship.

I'm going nuts on how the governor always seems to want to build a wonder.

The late game is such a management grief that I quite frankly don't bothert playing much into the industrial age when I get 20 cities, 70 workers and 70 military units ot keep track off.

You must not have liked (been irritated with) Civ2 then.

If you enjoy this kind of grief then more power to you but respect that I don't.

No, I don't like this kind of grief, either. Most of the grief shouldn't have been included, but it still won't downgrade the game considerably.

Another thing that is immensly annoying in my world is that it doesn't update everything at the start of your turn

I'm going to have to agree with you one this one as well.

The more I play the more pissed I get at the downright stinking interface

Now I wouldn't go as far as saying that the interface is 'stinking', but I do think that the interface is not much of an improvement over Civ2. The only major improvement for the Civ3 interface over the Civ2 interface, IMO, is the lack of pop-up windows. Overall, the Civ3 interface is adequate and should have not included many of these griefs. It seems to me that many of these griefs can be patched, but we will have to wait and see Firaxis' dedication on patching, because, IMO, not a 100% dedication to Civ3 developing was given out by Firaxis. Which in it's entirety is a completely different subject.

[TechWins]

One more thing, I would to have seen a better terrian system, so less micromanagement would have to be done. Yes, it is an improvement over Civ2, but not as much as I would like. For example, being able to mine grassland and plains as an terrian improvement will ultimately add more micromanagement. Although, I do understand that a little micromanagement has to be included for various reasons.

[Immortal Wombat]

Cybershy, Could you do one of those little ol' tot-up-the-score things of Civ3 vs CtP2?

[Robert Plomp]

CyberShy, your point seems to be that if something is stupid in Civ3, that's okay because the same thing existed in Civ2.

nah, that's not completely right.
But I think much of the things mentioned right now were fine when people played civ2.
Like I said: I think much things improved, but there will always be more to improve. You'll never get rid of that.

I agree with the 0.005 second messages. They should pop-up (or at least be configurable to pop-up)

Cybershy, Could you do one of those little ol' tot-up-the-score things of Civ3 vs CtP2?

pherhaps you mix me up with someone else ?
I have no clue what you mean.....

No group movement is just stupid player griefing...

Yes, I couldn't agree more. There is no reason why not to include this feature (ok so maybe the game being rushed is a reason); I mean SMAC had this feature.

the problem with group movement is: what if you attack with a group. That should be prohibited in that case. And what if some units are faster. I agree, it could be solved but it goes to far to say the game has been rushed. Pherhaps they just didn't think about it, or pherhaps they didn't concidered it to be that important. I, for example, do not care. (would be nice though if it would've been added)

again: whatever you improve, there will allways be stuff left over that could've been improved more or better.

I agree with much of the suggestions...........
of course it would be nice to 'space' a unit, and change mind and move it later anyway. But is it that bad ? Nah..........

[Immortal Wombat]

Originally posted by CyberShy


pherhaps you mix me up with someone else ?
I have no clue what you mean.....

at the top of this page, you compared Civ3 with Civ2, with a +1, +0 scoring thing for each item pointed out. Try it with CtP2

[Robert Plomp]

Eventhough I bought ctp2, I think it's wasted money becasue I didn't play it much.

I think that I dissliked the intensive micromanagement for public work most. It's so good that civ3 only has 4 types of terrain work (irigation, roads and mines) (if you leave out shopping down trees and jungles )

but I can't compare it's interface (or I should play another game of ctp2) but I'm sure you can............!

[Dev]

Originally posted by LaRusso

You're a halfwit. Sometimes one has to troll a troll.

Can you read a topic line ?

You don't have to reply, as a matter of fact I'd be gratefull if you would just never post any of your spaming junk in any of my threads again.

/dev

[LaRusso]

Originally posted by Dev


Can you read a topic line ?

You don't have to reply, as a matter of fact I'd be gratefull if you would just never post any of your spaming junk in any of my threads again.

/dev

Likewise, I would be grateful if you could stop posting your spamming threads altogether. Put your whining under one of the existing whining threads. There surely are enough to cover every aspect of supposed pain you experienced while still (why?) playing civ3.

[Dev]

Originally posted by CyberShy


use the goto function.
It's the same as with civ2, thus for sure not worse.
The goto function works ways better then in civ2.

count:
civ3: +1
civ2: +0


I agree, it's silly......but again....
going nuts about such a minor thing, nah.
BTW, it happened in civ2 as well.

Explain to me HOW GoTo solves a group movement issue.
If I want to move 30 units at once telling me GoTo 30 times is not an answer.
Minor to you piss ****ing annoying for me and as I said before, what worked in Civ2 doesn't work in Civ3 because you have a lot more units around.

Civ2 had the popup that didn't show all units if you got more then 10 (20?) stacked. the 'right-click' functionality of civ3 solves everything.

count:
civ3 +1 (2)
civ2 +0

Civ3 should have both, it's a sequel it's supposed to be better.

The [s]entry function in civ2 is gone :-(
But 'w' and 'space' when it comes up again in the end isn't that bad, is it ? There are worse things.

civ2 worked the same way btw.

I find it anoying, maybe you don't but I do, comprendez ?

(I could think about another 100 orders as well:
- wait until all horsemen have moved
- wait until the worker finished it's road
- wait until my friends arived

Get real please.

it's a very minor thing to get angry about. Going nuts.... naaaah: take your medications

I don't know what you do but I play the game to beat the AI, not the interface...

civ2 +1 (1)
civ3 +0 (2)

civ3 has: shift-right click: chose new production item
civ3 has: governor that works (if you instruct him right )

No it doesn't, queing works if you set it up but that's got nothing to do with the governor, fact is that Civ3 will change whatever you're producing to something else unless you que it up.

civ2 continued to build whatever you just built, thus if you missed it it 'll keep on building a temple for eternity. That's for sure not a plus.

YES IT IS.

count:
civ3 +2 (4)
civ2 +0 (1)

same as civ2

works as in civ2.

Your cities are done one by one. When enough science has been gathered you get your new advance. Doesn't work different then in civ2.

I wonder why they bothered redoing the graphics, you'd be happy with a relabelled Civ2 box that says Civ3....

[quote]
The civ3 interface has some more plusses:
- change production orders from domestic advisor screen
- commercial overview that actually works in the advisor screen
- Science Advisor screen that does much more then the civ2 one
- Foreign Advisor that gives a nice overview

I think there's more.....
but compared with civ2 I found only 1 thing that was better in civ2 (the 's' thingy) and EIGHT (8) improvements in civ3.
And that's just only out the top of my head.

When playing you'll allways find things that could've been better.
I tell you, with games like civilization you can improve the interface until eternity

No, you simply improve it untill it works. The Civ3 interface isn't rocket science you know.

! I'm happy that they haven't spend so much time on it that the other parts of the game weren't that good.

You mean the graphics ?

The thing with you is that you dislike the game, and everything you can use to backup your feeling will be used by you.

Blah blah blah, ever occured to you that I wouldn't be wasting my time here if I disliked the game so much ?

/dev

[Dev]

Originally posted by LaRusso


Likewise, I would be grateful if you could stop posting your spamming threads altogether. Put your whining under one of the existing whining threads. There surely are enough to cover every aspect of supposed pain you experienced while still (why?) playing civ3.

You can't argue with an idiot who can't even comprehend a simple topic line.

EOD

/dev

[LaRusso]

Originally posted by Dev


You can't argue with an idiot who can't even comprehend a simple topic line.

EOD

/dev

yup, you cannot even comprehend that there are ZILLION topic lines just like the one in your thread. silly spammer

[Immortal Wombat]

Originally posted by Dev
I'm going nuts moving my 30 unit army one by one.....
- No group movement is just stupid player griefing...

Stack 'em into 3 armies (12 units per army) and move em faster
CtP2 1
Civ3 0

I'm going nuts when i try to get a clear overview of my units in a given tile.
- Inexcusable rushing...

Army manager. Granted, only being able to put 12 units on any given tile could be considered a downer, but you can see what they are.
CtP2 1
Civ3 1

I'm going nuts when I want to semi-end the turn for a given unit but I can't, there's no way to skip a units turn without completely ending it.
- Skip turn should pull the unit from the "next available unit" rutine BUT you should still be able to manually click and move it.

Possible in CtP2. The skip turn command merely ends a unit's turn, not steals it movement points.

I'm going nuts when the governor starts producing a Galleon after finishing a battleship.
The 0.005 secs on screen msg about finished unit building jobs is a joke, give me a pop-up menu and kill the damn governor for christ sake.

Don't use governors? Not a problem in CtP2 anyway, though they do tend to build too many archers. I dunno about relative abilities of governors.
Messages in a menu, and availible for viewing. No pop-up, but the city name goes yellow when nothing is building.
CtP2 2
Civ3 1

The late game is such a management grief that I quite frankly don't bothert playing much into the industrial age when I get 20 cities, 70 workers and 70 military units ot keep track off.

Ditto all civ games, but at least you have no workers in CtP2, and units are all grouped into armies 20 cities Count yourself lucky!
CtP2 3
Civ3 1

Another thing that is immensly annoying in my world is that it doesn't update everything at the start of your turn, for example
why does it have to cycle through 5 cities that just produced something before it announces the tech advance that lets me build the new improvement I want to start building in those 5 cities ?

Never been a problem, you dont get pop-ups when the city has finished something. (Is this bad?) The tech usually comes first in your turn.
CtP2 4
Civ3 2

You might say that it's minor anoynance but for me it's another 30 or whatever redundant clicks added to the already massive amount of redundant clicking & scrolling.

Ah.
CtP2 3
Civ3 2

Buy CtP2, grab a mod, help us get the AI great.