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Old January 10, 2002, 22:59   #1
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Top Things We Miss from SMAC
/rant
**Note: I hearby declare this thread to be a Civ2-free zone! I am sick of Civ2/Civ3 comparisons because I never played it! I am a SMAC-aholic! And I am not alone!**
/rant

Civ3 in many ways is an improvement on SMAC. The exploits with supply crawlers, juggernaut helicopters, grabbing multiple wonders, SE switching and oscillating SE settings are all gone. Gone is the absurd tech rush where you get two techs per turn and absolutely no chance to ever impliment any of that tech. Gone is the micromanagement where you have to visit every citizen in every city every turn and optimize production and psych. Gone are overpowered wonders that make you unstoppable.

That said, there are some simple things already programmed into SMAC that would have made Civ3 a much a better game. Here is my list:

1. Ability to transfer units to allies and to garrison units in allied bases. I hate seeing valuable trading partners and allies wiped out by hostile militaristic neighbors. In SMAC, you could transfer some units to your wimp pal Morgan or put some units in Morgan's base and counterattack the Spartans alongside him. You could also "discuss battle plans" and pick an enemy city to attack together. Why drop these features in Civ3?

2. Random events. Many SMAC players moaned about these, but they were important for several reasons. First, they provided unexpected challenges in the mid-game especially. Second, many were negative events that were triggered only for the top or the #2 player so as to level the playing field a little bit. By the same token, others were positive events that were triggered for the underdog factions. Third, random events favored builders over warmongers because many of them were negative if you lacked a base improvement and positive if you had the improvement. For example: if you have a Network Node, you get a freee tech. No Node? Then you lose all accumulated research points. If you have a biology lab, you discover a beneficial bacterium and get +1 nutrients per square for 10 turns. If you don't ahve a biology lab, you lose all terraforming around the base. This increases the incentive to build facilities. It would be a simple matter to add these to a Civ3 expansion. For example, if you have a Bank you get a "stock market boom" and 25 gold. Otherwise, you get a "financial panic" and lose half your treasury. Other random events might be small border towns reverting to barbarian encompments, midgame barbarian attacks, forest fires, plague of locusts, flooding to destroy irrigation etc. In Civ3, life is just too darn predictable from the early industrial age onwards!

3. Unit workshop. Well, OK, I can see why it doesn't work in a historial context. But at the very least and expansion could give us more units. (Maybe one from Steel tech?). An easy solution that would add to game balance would be to give each civ TWO unique units, each in a different age. Some examples:

American 2nd UU = field cannon. Extra move point, requires horses.

English = crossbow (5-1-1)

Indians = passive resister (0-0-1 but cannot be attacked and has ZOC)

Iriquois = bowed warrior (2-1-1 for 10 shields)

Zulu = guerilla fighter (4-1-2)

4. Diplomatic victory. SMAC had a real council and factions could surrender and be subservient. Why get rid of these advanced features in the next generation of the game?
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Old January 10, 2002, 23:15   #2
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Top Thing I Miss From SMAC

10. PBEM
9. PBEM vs DD
8. PBEM team play vs DD and his partner.
7. Finding DD's bases defended only by probe teams in PBEM.
6. Killing DD's said probe teams with noodlejets.
5. Repeating step 6.
4. Repeating step 6.
3. Repeating step 6.
2. Repeating step 6.

and the thing I miss most from SMAC

1. Getting by accident email from Leachim (DD's partner) addressed to DD in which Leachim asks DD "OK fathead, now what do we do?"
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Old January 10, 2002, 23:18   #3
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We, people that say Civ III is not enough, are (for the majority) not even saying that Civ III is not an amelioration from Civ II and SMAC, which you cover in your thread. We're saying it should have been better! If you wanna know why, I wont repeat myself, go there:

http://apolyton.net/forums/showthrea...threadid=39311
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Old January 10, 2002, 23:20   #4
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satyagraha!
I like the idea of the Indian Passive Resister, although you should be able to kill the resister, but you get major diplomatic penalties for doing so. Essentially, if India played it right, they could end up being totally conquorable -- but only if the aggressive civilization was ready to face war with multiple opponents in response.

-Satya (a Hindu word, meaning truth; satyagraha is the force of non-violent resistance)
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Old January 11, 2002, 14:32   #5
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Jimmytrick, SMAC is not dead and Leahcim and I are up for a rematch anytime. You confederates were the ones that WIMPED OUT of our rematch, not we Yankees!

Trifna, that thread is completely unreadable for me because I never played Civ2. That thread has nothing in terms of positive suggestions for a patch or expansion. Some of us feel that if the code was made for SMAC, SMAX or CTP (which I also never played) it should be available for use in Civ3. It seems like it would be easier to add in features from other games in the series than to redesign basic principles from the top down. Regarding your thread, someone suggested that the AI could be given free automatic upgrades to the latest units they have tech for. Since Riflemen in a size 7 city or behind a wall stop cavalry cold, this would go a long way to blocking rush. Giving us back the ability to transfer units to AI factions and garrison their cities would create options for cooperative play, especially with the enhanced diplomacy model.

Satya, glad you like the Passive Resister unit idea. I like your idea of it being destroyable, but with large diplomatic penalty. You should also not be able to stack it with military units to provide them with diplomatic immunity, as it were.
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Old January 11, 2002, 14:46   #6
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Wow!
I am so pleased to see someone else asking for a satyagrahi unit! I have mentioned this in the last few days in another thread, the one asking for input for future patches...and a thread over at CivFanatics....

I think it would contribute to the game if they added two new check boxes to the Units Tab in the editor. One box would make the unit, if killed, add war weariness to the units Civ, and the other check box would add war weariness to the civ that destroyed the unit. That way, a Satyagrahi unit could be used, and if killed, the attacking civ would feel war weariness. Too many Satyagrahi killed and the civ starts to fall apart at the seams...

I am glad to see your posts.

BTW, isn't it kinda weird that Gandhi is a military leader? Its gotta be a fantasy game if Gandhi is leading troops to war. I know Firaxis wanted familiar faces and Civs, but thats just silly.
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Old January 11, 2002, 14:48   #7
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Oh, and what I really miss from SMAC is landmarks.... bring those back, please.
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Old January 11, 2002, 15:00   #8
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"Please call off your war (vendetta) against our friends, the ... " in diplomacy.

Social Engineering - Doesn't have to be all those futuristic choices....as said in these forums before there all diferent flavors of each government type. Social Engineering was a fun way to customize the different governments.

The Sentry command for units.

The Patrol command for units. (real nice for sea units I always thought)

If not a unit customization, then more unit types would be nice.

Total surrender of an oppenent.

No sea cities...but colonies (offshore platform, etc) would be nice.

More personality to the leaders of each faction...err Civ, so that you can somewhat predict how they would act to certain situations. ("you are a wretched unbeliever")

I guess that's enough for me for now.
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Old January 11, 2002, 15:11   #9
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I miss the ZOC, the social engineering screen where we could see a preview of any change we wanted to make, I miss the F4 screen where we could spot those red heads immediately, I miss the SMAC specialists and I miss always having something to build except a unit.

Oh, and I never played Civ2 either.
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Old January 11, 2002, 15:39   #10
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Quote:
Originally posted by Viriato
I miss the ZOC, the social engineering screen where we could see a preview of any change we wanted to make, I miss the F4 screen where we could spot those red heads immediately, I miss the SMAC specialists and I miss always having something to build except a unit.

Oh, and I never played Civ2 either.
Talking about "always having something to build", in my current and still first game (I don't play the game anymore because it's too boring) I just had every available city improvement built and every tile improvement as well. What the heck do you do then? Always reforesting bores like hell, and you can neither build military units into infinity. And Wealth gives you too little cash. So what do you then? I hope somebody gives me a good answer. I just might restart playing Civ3 in that case...

And what I miss most? Too much to name: though important ones are SE and allied units on same squares.

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Old January 11, 2002, 15:44   #11
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Quote:
Originally posted by DilithiumDad
Some of us feel that if the code was made for SMAC, SMAX or CTP (which I also never played) it should be available for use in Civ3.
CTP code has absolutely no relationship to Civ/SMAC code.

Civ1 was personally coded by Sid M., although it seems to have borrowed hugely from Empire (the code for which, I believe, was "open source" at the time).

Civ2 was coded by other people (Brian Reynolds, etc...) working for the same company as Sid, with some degree of oversight on his part.

SMAC was coded by the guys that coded Civ2, again while working for the same company as Sid, again with some degree of oversight on his part, but now they all worked for Firaxis instead of Microprose.

Civ3 was coded by a new lot of Firaxis employees (Reynolds having left), but again while working for the same company as Sid, again with some degree of oversight on his part. Firaxis was the design house, under contract from a publisher (Infogames) which was the legal successor of Microprose by virtue of some chain of corporate mergers & buy-outs. Thus, it could use the "Civilization" name openly rather than hinting about as with SMAC. I'm sure that the later would have been called "Sid Meier's Civilization 3: Alpha Centauri" if either Meier & Reynolds had stayed at Microprose or Microprose had contracted Firaxis for SMAC as they did with Civ3.

CTP was a project created by Activision, an entity having no relationship to Microprose, Firaxis or Infogames. To my knowledge, nobody who had been a major player in the coding of Civ1, Civ2 or SMAC had any involvement in CTP. However, by means of legal technicalities, Activision was able to use the name "Civilization". Before Civ1, there was a board game called "Civilization" (which actually has no relationship other than the name with Sid's games, but was ported to the computer by Avalon Hill a few years ago and flopped). Activision obtained a license from whoever owned the rights to the board game at the time (Avalon Hill, I think) to use the name for a computer game. This touched off a big legal battle over whether Activision was infringing on Microprose's trademark, or whether Microprose had infringed on the trademark of the boardgame when they did Civ1. This was resolved when Microprose (or whoever had bought them out) bought out whoever actually owned the rights to the board game - and thus today Infogames ownes sole legal right to the name "Civilization", at least as far as games are concerned. However, as Activision had purchased the license to use that name on one game, the settlement allowed that game to proceed (it may also have been a "done deal" by then - this legal crap drags on like the dark ages). Furthermore, Activision programmed CTP substantially copying the "look and feel" of Sid's Civ games (probably escaping legal action over that because of how much Civ had copied Empire). This, in conjunction with calling it "Civilization: Call to Power" creates the common but utterly false perception that the CTP games are part of the Civ series (deliberately on Activision's part to increase sales, IMO). This is also why CTP2 dropped the word "Civilization" from its title.

So, in short, legal monkeyshines and deliberate immitation aside, the CTP series is no relation whatsoever to Civ3 and Firaxis has no access to CTP code (or vice cersa). The CTP programmers basically "reverse engineered" Civ2, and any attempt to copy features from CTP into the Civ series would involve a similar process. Given the legal history, I find it completely understandable that Firaxis would ignore CTP completely.
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Old January 11, 2002, 15:50   #12
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Things I don't miss from SMAC/X - Miriam's damn faction, the Believers. And orbital insertion probe teams. And planet busters with singularity engines.
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Old January 11, 2002, 16:53   #13
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1) Blind Research - a rocking cool innovation that should be an option in any civ-type game.

2) Social Engineering - allows a far greater range of ways to govern the social/economic/political workings of your society than a half-dozen cookie-cutter governments.

3) Council Resolutions - outlawing nukes and atrocities and passing sweeping environmental reforms would give the UN something to do except be a game-winner.

4) Planning concerted assaults with allies - D-Day, anyone?

5) Interceding in wars on behalf of an ally - negotiating peace treaties is yet another way to be influential in the world without conquering it, and helps maintain those lucrative trade contracts. This goes for all extra diplo options not in Civ 3 - the more, the better (provided they work, which they did in SMAC.)

6) Random Events - again, this option should be in every civ-type game. I loooove random events. (I must confess I appreciate Civ3's attempt to simulate disease via proximity to jungle and flood plains - well-intended, though you should have gone much farther.)

7) Randomized Faction/Civ Attributes - if Civ-specific characteristics are in, a way to randomize them would also be nice to enhance replayability.

8) Atrocities! - While Civ3 gives us 2 flavors of nukes (which is cool), where are the bio/chemical weapons? Where's the nerve gas? How can I wage a real war without committing atrocities? And how can there be a UN resolution against atrocities if they ain't in to begin with?

9) Selling units - a major omission from trade options; why must I aid my allies by giving them cash to fight their wars when jet fighters would be much more useful? Do we know they're even using the cash donations properly? Also, garrisoning units in allied bases to bolster their defenses.

10) Naming geographic landmarks - I can't have a colossal battle on the plains of Mediggo if I can't name it. And what about Mount Dante? Firestone River? How can I commemorate my loved ones without this ability?

These are my top ten, though I can name others - patrolling, sentry command, unit workshop (difficult to implement in Civs historical context, but not impossible). I love Civ3, and think it's the best Civ yet. But these omissions, hopefully rectified in Civ4 or one of the non-commercial group efforts being undertaken, mean that for the time being, Civ3 will reside next to SMAC on my hard drive for some time to come.
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Old January 11, 2002, 17:35   #14
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1) FP/HP system

2) Terrain-wise penalties/bonus (+25 % for vehicles in flat lands, +25 % against artillery in rocky lands, +25 % in attack for infantry in bases, etc...)

3) Diplomacy :
3a - Alliances (having a FRIEND, not just someone who will mechanically declare war if you are attacked, even if it's by another one he has a MPP with).
3b - "stop your vendetta against..."
3c - Ability to plan your wars
3d - Submission (no more 1-city civ that threat you like if you were about to be frightened by their 2-units large army ; feeling that you really crushed an enemy without needing to remove it from the face of the planet)
3e - Relationship depends on ideology, not just "now it's time to be furious about someone for no reasons"
3f - Possibility to bribe a vote for the Great Council
3g - Possibility to sell unit

4) Personnality for leaders - not just "another civ leader", it's SOMEONE.

5) Great Council (real diplomatic victory with decent results and possibility to contest them even if it's a death wish ; added possibilities that reward you once you know everyone on the planet.

6) Blind research (original, fun and realistic)

7) Social engineering/domains (allowing so much more moddability)

8) Terraforming

9) Real differents and interesting ways to win the game, each of them being a challenge (economy, transcendence, diplomacy, conquest)

10) The "sell this building in ALL cities" box.

11) The "never shows this box again" option (domestic advisor, anyone ?)

12) Interface

13) Editor

14) REAL DIFFERENT factions, each of them being able to have several different bonus/malus, possibilities, etc... Hugely better for moddability, hugely better than the 6 miserable traits we have in Civ3.

15) Atrocities : useful, but with a drawback. Sanctions for atrocities are actually something you won't take lightly.

16) Cease fire - not war, but not peace, good if you don't want to taint your reputation later but are not willing to be at war at once.

17) Trade automatically generated when you're at peace with a nation (in Civ3, seems that nobody ever trade with anybody except for one strategic ressource, that would cost less to conquer than to pay anyway).

18) Covert ops operation
18a - You can try to put the blame of an operation on another faction - great for manipulative players !
18b - You have actually an IDEA of the chances of success of your mission (a percentage, rather than "lower chances, normal chances, higher chances", that never work anyway).

19 ) More terrain improvements (farmlands, thermal hole, atmospheric machine, etc...).

And much more I just can't remember right now. Yes, all of this was present in SMAC, and was not kept in Civ3...
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Old January 11, 2002, 18:13   #15
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Great Posts!

Continuing my list:

5. Landmarks: Ability to name mountain ranges and jungles and rivers would make owning territory more meaningful.

6. Social Engineering. Was probably too complicated for casual gamers (nobody ever played SMAC, right? ). But how about this idea instead: Social Policies. After researching certain sociopolitical techs, you can adopt legislative programs or policies that have positive and negative effects (kept modest to avoid game imbalance):

A. Universal Military Service: + side: conscript units have normal morale and require no support, - side: reduces effectiveness of Universities by half

B. New Deal: +side: cities with commerce income lower than your civ average are designated "poverty areas" and get one less unhappy citizen, - side: loss of 2 gold per city in your civ

C. Laissez-faire capitalism: +side: Doubles effectiveness of banks, -side: reduces happiness from luxuries

D. Land reform: +side: Extra nutrient from each square producing one or more, -side: loss of 20 gold and 20 beakers a turn

Probably there should be a limit on the number policies that can be adopted.
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Old January 11, 2002, 18:24   #16
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I'd vote for social policy-stuff, but I don't like all of your stuff. I think that the New Deal would be overpowering (I build a lot of tiny cities defended by like a rifleman) for expansionists.

Some of the others seem overpowered, too.
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Old January 11, 2002, 19:02   #17
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*ALL* of the above!!!

heh,
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Old January 11, 2002, 20:51   #18
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Re: Top Things We Miss from SMAC
Quote:
Originally posted by DilithiumDad
/rant
**Note: I hearby declare this thread to be a Civ2-free zone! I am sick of Civ2/Civ3 comparisons because I never played it! I am a SMAC-aholic! And I am not alone!**
/rant
Yes, the AI in Civ3 is better than in Civ2...
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Old January 11, 2002, 21:49   #19
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Quote:
Originally posted by DilithiumDad: Jimmytrick, SMAC is not dead and Leahcim and I are up for a rematch anytime. You confederates were the ones that WIMPED OUT of our rematch, not we Yankees!
DD is right, jimmytrick. After you discovered the "social scene" at Mplayer (to put it euphemistically), you abandoned our game and left us high-and-dry.

DD, that's a great list. When I get time to consolidate my notes, I'll add a few items to it. Thanks for posting this.
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Old January 12, 2002, 01:40   #20
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Things I miss:

1. The ability to be sure of what the effect I was going to do (e.g. if I switch to Market I'll make another 200 ECs per turn, but five bases will riot, so I won't, knowing when number of bases would cause unhappiness)

2. Design workshop - I could actually build units for specific tasks; it would have to be different for Civ, but it could be like having swordsmen with bronze swords, then iron ones, ships with oil engines, coal ones or gas ones, etc.)

3. Formal alliances, instead of just informal ones; Other leaders who actually had recognizable personalities, the U.N. council.

4. Ability to alter the landscape.

5. Pollution with a greater effect than just leaving a certain square off-limits for a while.

6. Global warming that was actually effective.

7. The feeling in diplomacy that I was talking to a person, rather than a faceless nation.

8. Nukes that worked realistically.
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Old January 12, 2002, 02:49   #21
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Dammit, I miss Noodlejets too.

I wish they'd bring them back!

Ann Lasagnacruisers. They were good too.

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Old January 14, 2002, 11:43   #22
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General, I agee with you about more challenging consequences of pollution and global warming, and more formal alliances especially submissive pacts.

It was nice to able experiment with different SE models in SMAC, but in Civ3 with a year of anarachy in between it would be impossible for the Domestic Advisor to accurately predict the effects of a government switch.

notyou, I don't miss the air combat model in SMAC, which was unbalanced and made the game a cakewalk against the AI as soon as you got Doctrine Air Power. Air units are still useful in Civ3, but almost too weak.
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Old January 14, 2002, 11:52   #23
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Continuing my list:

7. Specialists that actually do something! Switching back and forth from city to F1 screen, I was shocked to learn that not only do you only get one measly beaker from Scientists, but IT IS NOT SUBJECT TO FACILITY BONUSES! So even with a Library, Univeristy and Research Lab you still only net one beaker. It is FAR better to get even one gold piece from working the land than to have a Specialist. For one thing, this "feature" (bug?) seems to violate the promised benefit of Libraries and Universities --they are supposed to increase all research, not just that from working the land. For another thing, they remove the strategic choice from SMAC that was always a matter of great debate --worker or specialist? Now the answer is "Worker, always, under all circumstances until all tiles are used". The only meaningful use of specialists is hiring entertainers to trigger a Golden Age (excuse me, We Love the King Day ).
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Old January 14, 2002, 13:33   #24
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Only one thing I can think of right now, real cruise missles.

I generally turned random events off after losing way too many bases to meteors.
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Old January 14, 2002, 13:56   #25
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In hundreds of SMAC games, I only had the asteroid once. I probably deserved it in that game, because I had 5 times of might of the #2 faction and it was not even 2200. The asteroid destroyed about 8 Secret Projects and 3 core bases and made the game unplayable. So if you take it easy on the AI and let them develop, you won't get the asteroid! Talk about "leveling the field", though, it really levels everything!! But many people mention asteroids as their excuse for turning off random events. The moral is that random events should not be so awful that they make you want to quit. Just a challenge to engage you in the game when things have gotten too routine.
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Old January 14, 2002, 14:00   #26
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8. "Go to --base" This command is much more important than stacked movement. It would eliminate the need for stacked movement and was already implemented in SMAC. If you pressed "G", you got a list of cities you can go to (including only those that are accessable) and could sort the lost by name or distance. If the unit was an Alien Artifact, it told you which bases had an unlinked node. An equivalent function in Civ3 might give you a list of cities and indicate which of them contained barracks. I would kill for a feature like that in Civ3! And I am certain I am not alone!
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Old January 14, 2002, 14:22   #27
DilithiumDad
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9. AI factions ganging up on the human player with multiple coordinated attacks and trade embargos. What kept the mid-game engaging in SMAC was the "AI gang-up". As explained in the Primus guide, the AI factions become increasingly hostile as you expand your empire, especially at Diety level. At a critical point, they all gang up together and declare war (except for that wimp Morgan!). The critical point is when you are two time stronger than the #2 faction. The programmers decided this was the point where the player appears to be "running away with the game" so all-out war from all AI civs is needed to put the brakes on the human. In single-player SMAC, this is a really effective challenge. Contrast that to Civ3. Instead of being nice when you're puny and weak and roughing you up when you get too big for your britches, now your culture rating is the main factor. The bigger and more powerful your faction, the more culture points you accumulate, the better your relations and diplomacy. This is OK up to the point where you catch up with the AI, but then it just creates too much predictability and boredom. If the next patch of Civ3 were to include the "AI gang up" subroutine, it would go a long way to maintaining the challenge.
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Old January 14, 2002, 15:00   #28
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Something I don't miss from SMAC: giving up a tech when you loose a base. If I had the tech lead I was always nervous about taking enemy bases - if you can't fortify well the same turn and loose the base the next turn you give up tech - agravating.



However, the planet busters were much more realistic than civ3's nukes (and CTP BTW). If you drop a 100 megaton warhead on a city of 1 million, 500,000 people aren't going to survive.
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Old January 14, 2002, 15:25   #29
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Just thought of another.

Before the infinite-missle-range bug was fixed, games were usually a nervous time when Yang and Miriam were armed with planet busters. Or even when any faction had a lot of conventional missles, you knew if a vendetta was declared, you would get treated to all of them in one turn.

Civ3 (or even post IMR bug fix SMAC) doesn't have that same level of tension. At least in SMAC, I could fix the bugfix by giving missles much longer range.

Edit section -
The 'meteor impact' which did finally cause me to turn off random events didn't actually hit one of my bases. Deirdre was the lucky recipient and it totally screwed her for the rest of the game making it one of the more boring ones I've played.
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Old January 14, 2002, 19:13   #30
Akka
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Quote:
Originally posted by Carver
Something I don't miss from SMAC: giving up a tech when you loose a base. If I had the tech lead I was always nervous about taking enemy bases - if you can't fortify well the same turn and loose the base the next turn you give up tech - agravating.

There was an option to allow or disallow the tech grabbing by city conquest, and it was an obvious option that appeared righ before you started a game.
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