Could civ4 have a "utopia" victory?

[The diplomat]

if there were ever a civ4, what about a "utopia" type victory?

I am not talking about acheiving actual utopia.
I am not talking about completing some futuristic wonder.

I am actually talking about a sort of Social Engineering type victory based on the idea of SMAC's "future society".

There would be different "future societies" like a militaristic utopia, a democratic utopia, an environmentalist utopia etc...

Each "utopia" would have certain requirements in order to reach them.

To win that type of victory, the player would have to meet the requirements for the "utopia" they chose to aim for, and would have to keep those requirements for a certain number of turns. At which, the player would be allowed to switch to that "utopia" and would be declared the winner.

[Flanker]

I like that idea. I never thought about it myself, I still see going to AC as the "real" winning concept, because that was how it used to be back in the ol' days...

However, these goals has to be pretty hard to reach in my opinion. Or maybe the goals would be slightly different between the difficulty levels. For example, a militaristic utopia would need a huge army, and many militaristic barracks. Maybe it would also need to have fought a certain number of succesful wars and so on. A democratic utopia might have a high number of happy citizens, a low corruption level and a lot of city improvments. An environmental utopia could have zero pollution, environmentally friendly techs, a lot of environmental city improvements and, if possible, also the possibillity to make other civs more environmentally caring.
This are only suggestions of course, I thought it was such a good idea, so I just wanted to develop it a little bit further. Was it something like this you had in mind?

[Rotten999]

I've always invisioned a "cultural victory" as being a utopia. If they expand on it, the c. victory has to go. I'm not sure how many people would mourn its loss.

Wouldn't a militaristic utopia be more like a dystopia? I think that would step on the toes of conquest/dominantion, as well.

[The diplomat]

Originally posted by Flanker
This are only suggestions of course, I thought it was such a good idea, so I just wanted to develop it a little bit further. Was it something like this you had in mind?

yes, I think you have the jist of it.

The player would have to meet difficult requirements but when they do, the civ would be considered to have reached a "utopia", ie an ideal society of some kind.

Obviously, going to AC would still be the main victory option. But I think the notion of building an ideal society would fit really well in the civ concept. it would give an additional victory option that would give the player a lot of satisfaction as they could envision what kind of society they built.

[Flanker]

I think of an utopia as the fulfill of a certain objective that mankind has with it´s society. But of course that doesn´t mean that all cultures and nations share the same goals, that is pretty obvious in the world today. So a militaristic utopia might be a utopia for a war-mongering civ-player, but rather a dystopia for a peace-loving one. In real world, some people consider capitalization as the ultimate economy, while other thinks communism is the best.

And yes, you might be right in that c. victory counts as the current utopia victory. But this was just suggestions how to make it more complex.

[Inverse Icarus]

militaristic utopia. a perfect society of genocidal maniacs. i like it.

[The diplomat]

Originally posted by Rotten999
Wouldn't a militaristic utopia be more like a dystopia? I think that would step on the toes of conquest/dominantion, as well.

I added the "military utopia" for several reasons. Originally I thought of this new type of victory to give an additional victory option for the builder type. But that would not be fair for the conquest type!
Furthermore, I thought that the game should not force one type of "utopia" on the player. Each player might have very different visions as to what type of society they want to build. For example, one player might see a society with no pollution where everybody lives in harmony with nature as being a really cool future society to build. But another player might want something different.
So, I figured that I should add a military future society just to cover those players who might want to build that type of society.

I don't think that a military "utopia" neccessarily steps on the toes of the conquest victory. In fact they compliment each other. The military "utopia" would allow the military oriented player a victory other than conquest without comprimising their playing style. So, if for whatever reason, the military oriented player wanted to win another way than conquering the whole world, they would not have to completely change their strategy away from war and become a super pacificist builder!
The military "utopia" would NOT involve conquering the whole world. It would simply involve building the "perfect" miltaristic civ.

This "utopia" victory option is really for the perfectionist style. it would be for the player who likes the build the "perfect" civ. So far, there isn't really any victory designed for that type of player.

[Inverse Icarus]

technically, from their vantage point, wouldn't nazi germany be considered a militaristic utopia?

[Jethro83]

Originally posted by UberKruX
militaristic utopia. a perfect society of genocidal maniacs. i like it.

[shuddering]Ooooh, that's going to be a dangerous thing.[/shuddering]

Such a 'utopia' couldn't possibly work, as everywhere you look there will be discontent. A utopian sort of society is one which is built on an ideal that all can agree on, and all can be happy with.

A society based on 'genocidal maniacs' would cause much fighting between certain groups within the society, leading to something like what we see in gang-related violence, only worse. Nobody could possibly be happy about that. Even the ones with the most power would have objections, as they would continually have to put up with the lesser groups gnawing away at their arm.

[Rotten999]

I do like the idea, believe it or not.

Perhaps Orwell's 1984 world would be the militaristic utopia. Constant wars, total government control, ministry of love, etc.

Perfectionists should get something, yes.

Nazi Germany lost, so they don't get a victory.

[Thrawn05]

How about this, every citizen in your civ must be Happy non stop for X turns. Not one content, not one unhappy. Everyone.

I leave it up to everyone to hash out what X should be. I would go with the theme of Civ3 and say 20 turns, but that would too hard I guess, even with the Chapel and Bach's wonders.

[Flanker]

How about this, every citizen in your civ must be Happy non stop for X turns. Not one content, not one unhappy. Everyone.

That would be a real challenge, it sure would. Even harder in the late game, when your cities have more pop than can be working on the city square tiles. The ones that are left over are some kind of experts and are regardes as content citizens. How could one deal with that problem?

[The diplomat]

Originally posted by Thrawn05
How about this, every citizen in your civ must be Happy non stop for X turns. Not one content, not one unhappy. Everyone.

This could be a great way to implement the idea. It makes sense: if your entire population is completely happy, then your society has acheived for all practical purposes a "utopia". We could leave what kind of utopia up to the imagination of the player. This would be much simpler than trying to implement and balance a utopia for militaristic, environmentalist etc...

Flanker brings up the issue of specialists. I would suggest that specialists be treated as happy citizens. Of course, we need to prevent the player from simply converting the entire pop to specialists to win. I would suggest, a "no famine in any city" requirement for a "utopia" victory.

This victory would probably be very difficult. We would need to balance the specifics so that the victory is not impossible. But I think it would give an additional incentive to the player to reduce unhappiness. And it would be a great challenge for the perfectionist player. I really like this idea!

[Thrawn05]

Originally posted by The diplomat


This could be a great way to implement the idea. It makes sense: if your entire population is completely happy, then your society has acheived for all practical purposes a "utopia". We could leave what kind of utopia up to the imagination of the player. This would be much simpler than trying to implement and balance a utopia for militaristic, environmentalist etc...

Flanker brings up the issue of specialists. I would suggest that specialists be treated as happy citizens. Of course, we need to prevent the player from simply converting the entire pop to specialists to win. I would suggest, a "no famine in any city" requirement for a "utopia" victory.

This victory would probably be very difficult. We would need to balance the specifics so that the victory is not impossible. But I think it would give an additional incentive to the player to reduce unhappiness. And it would be a great challenge for the perfectionist player. I really like this idea!

I would of said that the number of specialists could not be greater then 1/4 or 2/3 of the total population as well as the population not dropping (of course, specialists that are made because you have no room for any more workers do not count). The only problem is that if you have the longentivity wonder, some cities are stuck in a purpetual famine, because that extra pop point you recieved in the growth is one too many.

I was thinking about what I said about the X number of turns, and I realized that if you start a new game, and you have a couple of 1 pop cities, and that due to the difficulty level you are playing, you might trigger a utopia victory too early. There should be some means of a minimum requirement to start the count.

I have a few suggestions for that. These are just suggestions for what ever seems to be the most balanced in the game for us to enjoy.

1: You require that you are an age ahead of all other civs
2: Your population in all cities is at least 30.
3: You research Communism (A fail attempt in real life, but what the heck)
4: You reach 2050 without attacking an enemy unit or having to defend yourself from the enemy (barbarians don't count).
5: You build every wonder in the same city (or some large fraction, like 8/10 or 9/10).
6: You take over at least X cities without losing Y cities. (X and Y are determind by the map size and number of civs). I would say Y should be 0.
7: You are the first in Family size, life span, population size, etc.

It should be noted, that #4 is for the end of the game and does not start any count.

[korn469]

I would of said that the number of specialists could not be greater then 1/4 or 2/3 of the total population as well as the population not dropping (of course, specialists that are made because you have no room for any more workers do not count). The only problem is that if you have the longentivity wonder, some cities are stuck in a purpetual famine, because that extra pop point you recieved in the growth is one too many.

I was thinking about what I said about the X number of turns, and I realized that if you start a new game, and you have a couple of 1 pop cities, and that due to the difficulty level you are playing, you might trigger a utopia victory too early. There should be some means of a minimum requirement to start the count

i pretty much agree on the utopia victory, but here is the specifics i'd go with

*all of your citizens happy for 20 consecutive turns
*no cities in famine during that time
*no more than 1/2 of your total number of citizens are specialists
*you don't lose any cities during that time
*you must have discovered a certain tech to trigger this victory type, or a certain wonder must have been built by any civ to make this actually go into effect

and why wait for civ4 this seems like it should be simple enough to implement in the expansion pack, we should start lobbying for it now

[The diplomat]

Originally posted by korn469
i pretty much agree on the utopia victory, but here is the specifics i'd go with

*all of your citizens happy for 20 consecutive turns
*no cities in famine during that time
*no more than 1/2 of your total number of citizens are specialists
*you don't lose any cities during that time
*you must have discovered a certain tech to trigger this victory type, or a certain wonder must have been built by any civ to make this actually go into effect

and why wait for civ4 this seems like it should be simple enough to implement in the expansion pack, we should start lobbying for it now

I think these requirements sound really good.

And you bring up an excellent point about a possible expansion pack. Why not at least ask Firaxis to consider this idea for an expansion? Why wait for civ4?

I think we should at least ask Firaxis to consider this idea for a future expansion pack. This would be an excellent new feature!

[Tarquelne]

Originally posted by korn469
i pretty much agree on the utopia victory, but here is the specifics i'd go with

I'd add a minimum # of cities to that, to make sure you have a _civilization_ that's a utipia, not a city, or an "enclave" of just a few cities.

Or, instead of a minimum # of cities, a minimum (either relative or absolute) civilization score. (The score would represnet a minimum amount of "global influence".)

Otherwise it might be _too_ easy for a small, perfectionist civ to win. Don't get me wrong, I like the idea of being able to win with a small, perfectionist civ... as long as it isn't _too_ easy to win. The tech requirement and the "don't lose any cities" requirement might already be enough, though.

It might be fun to assume that utopian civs _must_ be peacefull. If so, add minimum number of turns since another civ's city was razed and/or captured.

This is alot more complicated, but I think it would be very entertianing: When you satisfy all the requirements for a "utopian" civ you don't automatically win, you just get a HUGE bonus in the culture formula - so high that cities start flipping over to you in fairly large numbers. You can still be stopped, and there should be some way you can loose your "utopian" status. But if not stopped you'll win a pacifiistic version of Domination victory.

[IthacaMike]

Originally posted by korn469


i pretty much agree on the utopia victory, but here is the specifics i'd go with

*all of your citizens happy for 20 consecutive turns
*no cities in famine during that time
*no more than 1/2 of your total number of citizens are specialists
*you don't lose any cities during that time
*you must have discovered a certain tech to trigger this victory type, or a certain wonder must have been built by any civ to make this actually go into effect

and why wait for civ4 this seems like it should be simple enough to implement in the expansion pack, we should start lobbying for it now

This is my variation on the theme.

For 20 consecutive turns:

*all of your tribe's citizens are happy (If the counquered French are unhappy, who cares?)
*you don't lose any cities, settlers, or workers during that time
*you have at least half the map size's optimal number of cities

*all of your cities are at no more than +/- 1 on food production (As close as Civ3 can get to steady state)
*you create no cities, settlers, or workers (again, steady state)
*you are performing no research (what you want to _improve_ perfection? :-)

In addition you must have built a certain small wonder, perhaps called "Our Perfect World."

Mike

[Thrawn05]

Originally posted by The diplomat
And you bring up an excellent point about a possible expansion pack. Why not at least ask Firaxis to consider this idea for an expansion? Why wait for civ4?

I think we should at least ask Firaxis to consider this idea for a future expansion pack. This would be an excellent new feature!

Indeed, I've been thinking of my suggestions in terms of Civ3.