Let's preemptively guess bad suggestions for Civ4!

[lorddread]

Originally posted by Changmai Beagle
Actually I kind of like some of the suggestions........... I could really get into a game of mixed CTP, Colonization, MOM and EU - and perhaps even finish it this year. (Anyone remember the huge and detailed board game War in the Pacific?)

I am a big fan of Colonization, CTP and the other Civ 3 (2.5?)

If you think War in the Pacific was big, you should have playe Operation Barbarossa. It was the biggest wargame ever created. Of course it depicted 5 million people fighting..... That could have had something to do with it.

I like the ideas for Civ4, and would like to throw a couple extra in.

1. Random Leader Abilities and more importantly Disabilities.
2. Leaders should not only be able to advance the building of a wonder, but also advancing a tech or 2.
3. Since America is already in CIV3 and Canada is simply the 51 state there is no need to include it!
4. Nations should have pluses and minus's for playing them. I was playing a game where the Zulu's sucked fighting but where more advanced than I was. I liked the original Civ where this was taken care of.
5. If you drop a nuke, all countries should immediately sue for peace.
6. Once the UN is created, it should be able to call up troops from your country to fight in another. ie Peacekeeping.
7. Trading of food to starving cities should be allowed.
8. If you have a nuke, other countries without them should not be allowed to attack you. This only makes sense
9. Along with the shopping mall idea, we can take that one step further creating a new wonder called Disney Land or the such. This draws people from other nations to yours, increasing that city's wealth.
10. Immigration. Workers from nations that are oppressive, or weak should be able to immigrate.
11. Spies need to be rethought. You should be able to have more than 1 in each country. They are currently used as a 1 shot thing. Just because one got caught doesn't mean that another is currently working.

Well thats it for now. Let me know what you think

Lord Dread

[Jon Miller]

Originally posted by Stefu
Civ 4 shouldn't have cities! All squares just have populations and so on!
Civ 4 shouldn't have units! Armies should have real sizes!
Civ 4 should track every citizen's ethnic origin, so we can deal with 60% Zulus-30% Americans-10%Romans!
Civ 4 should have realistic leaders and dynasties, except for that part where leader realisitcally dies after 2 turns!

those were ideas from the Civ3 list

Jon Miller

[Dienstag]

bad suggestions:

* fix the overly-complicated combat system; remove hitpoints, and merge the attack and defend values into a single combat factor value.

* don't waste time trying to program a good AI. Everyone knows it's impossible. I think the laws of physics clearly show that an AI can only be good if it's traveling faster than the speed of light, so don't bother. Instead, focus on wicked cool battle animations!

* since the AI will be understandably bad, make sure that the game does not require more than, say, 10 decisions per civ per game. That will keep things balanced. Make sure this also applies to multiplayer games, in case one of the humans quits and the AI has to take over.

* to avoid problems like "It took 500 years to walk across my country!", you should entirely eliminate all references to years, and only display the turn number.

* more frequent reminders about building aquaducts/hospitals.

* I want more respectable advisors, like Pauly Shore, Jar Jar Binks, and a Chia Pet.

[notyoueither]

We need a Brewery Improvement for cities. Increases Happiness and decreases War Weariness. Increases Corruption (more waste).

The Budweiser Great Wonder. All cities belonging to other civs that build Brewery send some Gold each turn to the Bud civ. Licensing rights for local marketing the *King of Beers.*

All obsolete units should automatically upgrade to a similarly weak unit in the newer age. Warriors and Spearmen built in the Ancient age end up as 2-2-1 Militia units in the Industrial Era. Oh wait. You said bad ideas, right? Sorry. My bad.

[Miznia]

(I do see that some of these have already been posted, but...)

“If Civ4 is to Civ3, as Civ3 is to Civ2...”

Tech tree replaced with tech “line.” Techs are researched in the same order, and are granted to all civs simultaneously (tedious “trade” system circumvented).

AI’s ICS strategy is gone. All land is now divvied up right at the beginning, like in “Risk.”

Controversial Hit Point system is gone. Attack/Defense discrepancies between units have also been removed.

To collect taxes you need a Copper resource square.

Now, great leaders can also be converted into a tile improvement, added to a city as population, or catapulted as a bombardment attack.

Ships and Tanks now use abstracted mission systems just like Air units. But note that tanks cannot take cities, and ships cannot carry units.

17 Victory types (conquest, domination, diplomatic, cultural, religious, economic, tourism, nuclear, space race, evolution, transcendence, pacifist, architectural, health, legal, agricultural, tournament).

As soon you’ve met a victory condition, Civ4 suddenly closes.

Leaders are hideous claymation people (think “Gumby”), except that they’re all hot babes.

Population is now supported by gold instead of food: no more worries about whether such-and-such city can support how much population.

ZOC is still gone, and now you can “leap over” enemy units, too.

When units get promoted (to “veteran,” etc.), instead of getting another HP, they get another movement point.

Modern Era has 10 new techs, and 7 new spaceship components.

Units can’t cross rivers until Engineering is invented (no bridges; this is realistic).

Under Democracy, as war weariness increases, cities will flip to random AI civs instead of rioting.

Captured cities revert even when razed.


Miznia

[Dr Strangelove]

I say forget about it. Bad programming has killed the TBS genre. Evidently this less popular form of game attracts the incompetents in the design field. Let's just hope that there never will be a Civ 4.

[Jawa Jocky]

bad idea #6

Warp technology is part of the ancient era tech tree. With captain Kirk Great Leader you can win the space race before 1AD.

#7 The dominoes victory - a type-o lets you win by stacking dominoes and knocking one over so that all of them fall on your enemies

#8 Cultural victory is changed to Bacterial Cultural so that the civ with the moldest cheese wins

[Felch]

Originally posted by Miznia
STUDENT PROTESTS. Universities have a side-effect in that now and then, rioting students will put the city into civil disorder for a turn or two. Effect doubled for city with Newton’s College.

Newton's College should be renamed "UW - Madison."

[loinburger]

A new city improvement, "The Vomitorium," can be built around the same time as the Colisseum becomes available. The Vomitorium is a cultural improvement that also wastes food resources. It also allows you to develop a new weapon, "Projectile Vomit," that allows you to purchase +12 alcohol on odd numbered decades. If both you and an enemy have researched "Projectile Vomit" then you can forego the alcohol bonus for three turns and challenge one another to a duel "To the sick," in which the opponent who comes up with the dirtiest limerick within a 47-second time limit wins; the cities of the loser do not increase in population for the next 20 years, since all male citizens have been sterilized in the combat. They may also riot due to lack of alcohol.

[Mark_Everson]

Originally posted by Miznia
Now, great leaders can also be converted into a tile improvement, added to a city as population, or catapulted as a bombardment attack.

LOL! I think to increase player connection with the game, your GREAT suggestion needs to be amplified upon. In addition when you take the bombard GL option you should be able to see a video of the complete action, including splat-down. You could expand it so that when you capture an enemy GL, you could bombard an empty square with them, just to see the video.

Congrats on a very amusing thread, getting better as it goes.

[alva]

Alot of people here need to work on
their sarcasm skils!

good tread though

“If Civ4 is to Civ3, as Civ3 is to Civ2...”

Miznia
Tech tree replaced with tech “line.” Techs are researched in the same order, and are granted to all civs simultaneously (tedious “trade” system circumvented).

[Sandman]

The units should say amusing things like "erectus" when you click on them.

Oh, and if you don't give them orders they start snoring.

And if you fall asleep during negotiations, the computer player can knock on their side of the screen to wake you up.

Combat should be resolved by clicking the mouse button as fast as possible, forget about all that numbers nonsense.

[Coracle]

Originally posted by loinburger
A new city improvement, "The Vomitorium," can be built around the same time as the Colisseum becomes available. The Vomitorium is a cultural improvement that also wastes food resources. It also allows you to develop a new weapon, "Projectile Vomit," . . .

A city improvement could also include Roman-style public toilets where men and women squeeze in next to each other to relieve themselves and then clean off with the public sponge-on-a-stick in the big buckets.

It could foster a feeling of togetherness worth one Happy face.

[lorddread]

Take it from someone who has had to use an unisex toilet, it doesn't foster 1 smiley face. just the oposite. picture your wife, girlfriend, or mother yelling at you about putting the toilet seat down. now picture a total stranger doing the same thing.

[star mouse]

NEW TERRAIN

VOLCANO

* Produces 2 shields
* Cannot be mined
* The 8 Neighbouring land squares get +1 Food or +1 Production as appropriate
* Each turn, the Volcano has a 1% chance of erupting. Eruptions affect the volcano square and some 4 to 10 nearby squares. On affected squares, the volcano destroys terrain improvements, has a 50% chance of killing the labourer on the square, and has a 50% chance of polluting the square. If the affected square is a city, up to 1/4 of the city population dies and some structures may be destroyed.

DESERT HILL

Like a normal hill but produces no food. Used instead of standard hills in deserts and plains.

KELP BED

Found in coastal seas. Adds +1 food production, but takes 2 movement points to move through.

[Hurricane]

Originally posted by Miznia
As soon you’ve met a victory condition, Civ4 suddenly closes.

Leaders are hideous claymation people (think “Gumby”), except that they’re all hot babes.

ZOC is still gone, and now you can “leap over” enemy units, too.

More ideas:

* Nuclear meltdowns can somtimes spawn a "The Hulk"-unit, a green warrior with ridiculous A/D and HP values.

* During the modern age, barbarians sometimes pop up in cities, but are instead called "King Kong", "Godzilla" or "Velociraptor".

* To get rid of the spearman beats tank discussions, all units in the game are called "generic attack unit 3", "generic defense unit 9" or "vessel mark 3".

* The animated leaders are now a game in the game. Instead of just the heads, they are whole persons. To make a deal, you have to fight the other leader (a la Mortal Combat) and the better you beat him, the better deal you get.

[Tormund]

Originally posted by Stefu
Wouldn't it be c00l if Civ4 was in real time?

I can see it now...

I bought the product last year and I'm currently up to the year 3999BC. This game is really starting to get interesting. I've just managed to survey the site of my first city. This civ will really be kicking in about 5000 years.

[Tormund]

Originally posted by Miznia
MAGIC. It’s time for Civ to have magic, such as a Wizard unit, or else in the form of spells cast by the leader himself (think Black & White?). You need to build “Merlin’s Castle” small wonder, or something, to be able to use magic. Expires with Steam Engine.

This was an hilarious suggestion. I can literally use in this instance.
To add to this though.

- You would add the Great Wonder "Stonehenge" and it would double the mana production in that city.

- The English would also have the Druid Special Unit.
- The Egyptians could have the Witch and Warlock Special Unit.
- The Americans could have the Vampire Special Unit.
- The Zulu could have the Voodoo Priest Special Unit.
- The Greeks could have the Scientific Sceptic Special Unit.
- The Romans could have the Religious Sceptic Special Unit.

I can see it all coming together now.

[lorddread]

Originally posted by Tormund


This was an hilarious suggestion. I can literally use in this instance.
To add to this though.

- You would add the Great Wonder "Stonehenge" and it would double the mana production in that city.

- The English would also have the Druid Special Unit.
- The Egyptians could have the Witch and Warlock Special Unit.
- The Americans could have the Vampire Special Unit.
- The Zulu could have the Voodoo Priest Special Unit.
- The Greeks could have the Scientific Sceptic Special Unit.
- The Romans could have the Religious Sceptic Special Unit.

I can see it all coming together now.

This is terrific. Can we program this into Civ3?

[SKILORD]

Wouldn't it be c00l if Civ4 was in real time?

no... i hate real time strategy games

How about bringing back CTP space unit's + cities and water cities. What's more the FAR superior saving system in CTP. i ALWAYS loose my files with the Civ3 nonesence

[Miznia]

You know, I was just thinking about one of the victory conditions I listed...

Wouldn't a "Pacifist Victory" actually be sort of cool? I like to play a game where I just let the world happen around me. Maybe it should be a victory option if you never declare war. And if someone declares war on you, you can't capture/raze any cities besides ones you've lost.

It could work like SMAC's Economic Victory: "Hammurabi is about to win a Pacifist Victory, unless he is obliterated before retirement (20 turns away)!!!"

[notyoueither]

You mean you hadn't thought about your ideas before you posted them?

Doesn't that make them bad bad suggestions?

[Tormund]

A map could contain a number of Natural Wonders (maybe seven) that offer advantages much in the same way as the Great Wonders. The Natural Wonder just needs to fall within the boundaries of a city.

The Natural Wonder would have an economic benefit (tourism) and a happiness benefit (pride). As the world's population grows, the benefit (money and happiness) of having control of the Natural Wonder increases.

I don't see why this wouldn't work. It would also provide another objective.

[Jaguar]

Originally posted by Stefu
Civ 4 should track every citizen's ethnic origin, so we can deal with 60% Zulus-30% Americans-10%Romans!

I don't think that is such a bad suggestion. In fact, I might have been the first to suggest it. I'm one of the people who wants radical sweeping changes. Civ4 won't be much fun unless there are radical changes. You can't repackage the game forever.

BTW, the Wouldn't It Be Cool brigade is really annoying


Anyway, to go along with this thread...
Keep the warrior hammering your score from civ3. As well as the tower of Babel Theme.

[Tormund]

The next version should be called "Survivor Civilization".

It should have a vote say every 100 turns to vote off a civ. The civ with the most votes against it is eliminated and the spoils are divided up among the remaining civs.

It should have a different goal between each vote in which a civ gains 'immunity' from the vote. Say you have to build The Great Wall Wonder OR you have to defeat the most barbarian units when hordes of them start to roam the land OR you have to be the one holding the city which controls the 'special' tile.

It should have the ability to sell/trade your vote to another civ.

It should have the ability to steal a civ's vote and make it your own through espionage. ie Replacing their delegate to the vote with a clone that has been programmed with your instructions.

I can see this all coming together now. I just hope there wont be any copyright issues.

[Hurricane]

Great idea, Tormund!

The AI players would of course always vote out the strongest civ, which (unless you have the 'immunity') usually means that the crappiest civ wins in the end. This changes OCC from a difficult challenge into a sound strategy, while the hardcore players would try the difficult ICS (or REX) strategy and fail on Chieftain!

[Miznia]

The AI players would of course always vote out the strongest civ, which (unless you have the 'immunity') usually means that the crappiest civ wins in the end.

I programmed a little Java program that tried to combine Survivor and (minimalized) Diplomacy. A player could only vote for a player that they shared a border with. If you voted for someone who voted for you, the vote count for you was decreased by 1/2. Ties were broken randomly (only one loser per round permitted). If you lost on a given round, you were dead, and your territory was divided among those who attacked you. Many games were played (since a "game" is pretty short).

Maybe dumb. But I only programmed the computer to play against itself. Saves me from having to write an interface

[Jaguar]

Oh, another one:

Sid,

3 ****ING VERSIONS OF THE GAME AND YOU STILL HAVEN'T ADDED THE HOVERCRAFT UNIT? DON'T YOU REALIZE HOW ****ING UNREALISTIC THE GAME IS WITHOUT IT? FIRAXIS DOESN'T KNOW **** ABOUT HISTORICAL ACCURACY!

[Dom Pedro II]

Good Grief! It's hard to tell where the griping ends and the sarcastic suggestions begin. Furthermore, it seems like some people are actually giving genuine suggestions or advice.

Some of you seem like the real hardcore players... you'll only be happy if civilization is stripped down to the point where it features two monochrome paddles batting a little 4-bit "ball" on a black background.

But I'll play the game too.

Bad Suggestions:

Weather... there's a storm hovering over Berlin for the five centuries in the BCs!

Elections for Democracy.

Leader-controlled armies. (the AI's dumb enough)

Natural disasters... realistic, or just irritating?



Some genuine suggestions:


Expanded ECONOMIC WARFARE - No, not Corporate Branches. This is with regards to the resources. Some units and improvements would function ONLY when a civilization has access to a given resource. I.E. Destroying access to oil will leave all tanks, ships, etc. leaves them with 1/2 the number of hit points.
Improvements like factories and manufacturing plants would also stop giving production bonuses.

My REASON: I find chucking units at cities until they fall tedious.


REVOLUTIONS - make some sort of modifier for anarchy period. i.e. going from republic to democracy takes less turns than communism to monarchy. Seriously... that wait is just a pain in the ass in Civ3!

Improved DIPLOMACY - Congresses... i.e. multiple civilizations negotiating at the same sitting. Purpose? To end wars involving 3+ civilizations. It also allows for a sort of Bismarckian means of maintaining supremacy.

Ok, this is more of a thing NOT to change... leave all of that futuristic and environmental crap from the Call to Power series out.

[nationalist]

Originally posted by Dienstag
bad suggestions:


* more frequent reminders about building aquaducts/hospitals.

* I want more respectable advisors, like Pauly Shore, Jar Jar Binks, and a Chia Pet.

LMFAO!

How about Carrot Top for Domestic Advisor?