Anything happening on the weather front?

[Evil Capitalist]

That's a pretty good idea, but it seems a waste to use it on an event that will hapen only once or twice in the entire game. It should extend to a range of disasters. I don't think technology should have such an effect as city improvements- Japan and California pump millions into prediction and prevention.

[Lonestar]

Seems to me that any weather events should be related to the time, example:

Ancient:
1. Noah's flood. Destroys the most 'wicked' (largest) cities, a global event.
2."Fire from Heaven", an asteroid strike

Middle/Industrial:
1. Krakatoa eruption (largest Volcano eruption in modern times)
2. Tunguska incident. asteroid that blows up over empire, destroys city improvments.

Modern:
1.Global warming, ala SMAC
2.Scorched Earth: Solar activity expands deserts.

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"You may not be interested in war, but war is interested in you"

[Urban Ranger]

Too lazy to read through the whole thread

The thing about weather is it is a short term phenomenon. With drought as a possible exception, no weather pattern lasts for more than a few months. Civ turns are long, the shortest duration is 1 year. So that's why you don't see weather being too important in the game.

On the other hand, changes in climatic patterns could be interesting.

quote: Originally posted by Urban Ranger on 08-11-2000 12:58 AM Too lazy to read through the whole thread The thing about weather is it is a short term phenomenon.

That is wrong. Have you heard of El Nino? Our weather patterns here run on 7 or eight year cycle.

[UltraSonix]

I think that weather modelling in Civ3 would create too much micromanagement, so the SMAC cheap way to simulating it is enough --> "heat wave in xxx results in +1 energy/square for the next ten years", and other similar stuff.

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No, in Australia we don't live with kangaroos and koalas in our backyards...

[Gord McLeod]

quote: Originally posted by Lonestar on 08-10-2000 10:57 PM Seems to me that any weather events should be related to the time, example: Ancient: 1. Noah's flood. Destroys the most 'wicked' (largest) cities, a global event. 2."Fire from Heaven", an asteroid strike Middle/Industrial: 1. Krakatoa eruption (largest Volcano eruption in modern times) 2. Tunguska incident. asteroid that blows up over empire, destroys city improvments. Modern: 1.Global warming, ala SMAC 2.Scorched Earth: Solar activity expands deserts.

What does this really accomplish, besides putting artificial and inaccurate limits on when events can happen? There's no causal effect of the times to result in these types of events falling where you're placing them, with the exception of global warming - in most cases, that simply happens to be when they occured in real life. Volcanic eruptions, floods and asteroid strikes can and do happen all the time all over the world. Granted, the really huge horrible ones are more rare, but there's nothing preventing them from happening near the beginning or end of the game... certainly nothing humans can (yet) do about it in most cases, anyway.

[DarkCloud]

Weather Comments:

As Follows:

1.) Siberian Winter- The squares begin to change into polar squares and cooler and sparser vegetation squares (Chance of happening depends on type of world selected- Jungle, Water, age, erosion, etc)

2.) Global Warming- Discussed Earlier

3.) Ice Caps Melt- Water Rises and sinks some cities (Smaller ones, the larger ones would build dykes etc.)

4.) El Nino- Weather Patterns Altered (Not much/ chance of lots of alteration is based on pollution)

5.) La Nina- Follows El Nino

I think it would be much simpler to just have weather zones which influence the terrain found and the seasons. Around the equator you would have a tropical zone, then a large temperate zone, then a small frozen zone at the top and bottom of the maps.

[Gord McLeod]

They've had that level of 'weather' and climate since Civilization itself. That's why you get arctic squares at the north and south ends of the map, with equatorial desert and jungle in the middle, and more temperate terrain between.

[UltraSonix]

quote: They've had that level of 'weather' and climate since Civilization itself. That's why you get arctic squares at the north and south ends of the map, with equatorial desert and jungle in the middle, and more temperate terrain between.

Exactly, and in SMAC, land to the west side of a mountain range was more dry than the other side (or was it the other way around). This amount weather simulation is enough.

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No, in Australia we don't live with kangaroos and koalas in our backyards...