Possible Gameplay problem

[Lawrence of Arabia]

Lets say that there are only 2 civs left on the planet. The Americans and the Russians. (no pun intended) The Americans have all of the Uranium, Petrol, and s=Steel and the Russians have the rubber and iron. The American player wants to conquer the world, but he cant, because he doesnt have all of the resorces to build a modern army, and he can't trade with the Russians, because they're at war. This could have severe consequence cause it could send both civs back to fighting in the stone age. I hope im wrong, but this could have severe implications in the gameplay.

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Its okay to smile; you're in America now

[ajbera]

I actually feel this is a cool possibility.

You will be locked into a kind of stalemate, and will have to be more creative in your next move, as opposed to just an all-out attack. You could try for a more benevolent victory (diplo or scientific); you could engage in a war of espionage, trying to weaken strategic cities of the opponent so they can rebel and be acquired by your troops; or you could wage war with the units you have, hoping to gain cities that have the resources you need.

The only thing it does is prevent an immediate, full-scale attack with state-of-the-art units. You'll have to think a little bit to gain the resources you want to launch the attack you want. Or you may decide that war is too costly, and try to win another way.

The resource model is something I am looking forward to.

I like the sound of it. Scrounge everything together that you have for that final assault on the enemy in an effort to take resources or risk regression. Love it! Sound like something that could happen.

[Greg_was_here]

Isn't that true that monopoly of resources is possible in civ3?

Wow, such a strategic depth! I love it!
I just dream that I make a deal with my allies to cut oil supply to my enemies. haha, oil embargo can really happen in civ3!

Lawrence,

your assumption is a bit extreme but even if that happens I really like that because that's how the real world works. No resource, no industry.

[Ilkuul]

OK, accepting that Lawrence's scenario would probably be a rather rare/unusual one, I agree that it would be a strategy problem rather than one of gameplay. Nevertheless, it very likely would be a difficult and perhaps discouraging situation for the many 'average' players out there. Most of the folk on these forums are 'grand masters' of civ by normal, everyday standards, and I think we need to recognise that. I am certainly not a grand master by any standards, and I would definitely not like to find myself in the sort of situation he describes. While some of you would obviously thrive on that kind of challenge, if I did not have Apolyton to fall back on I might well get discouraged and think 'to heck with this game, it's not worth the bother'. Firaxis needs to consider the ordinary person as well as the Apolyton expert, so I would hope they have taken steps to make sure this kind of impasse only occurs very rarely!

[airdrik]

Actually, if the resources are spread like I suggested (1-2 areas of large accumulation + 8-10 other single squares per resource), then that situation would turn out in the americans taking control of the resources in their territory under the control of the russians, and the russians doing likewise, thus both civs have some of everything. It just might take a few turns to be able to start extracting the resources taken from the other civ.

[airdrik]

If that is the case, then either one could build a funcitoning army, though neither will have certain elements in it like anything armored (as they require a metal, a rubber, and a fuel), but they can still both build infantry and artillary (which only require a metal). The russians can build an ubgraded infantry (rubber for boots) which have +1 movement, and the americans can build planes but they don't have rubber for landing gear so they always take a random number between 2-4 damage whenever landing. The americans have two severe advantage as they can build nukes and a navy (they have uranium, steel, and oil for nukes and steel and oil for the navy) so they could just nuke the russians, transport their infantry over and take the russians rubber and start hauling out the armor.

One way to fix this would be to have large consentrations in some areas, but also have scattered resources elsewhere. Only by locating and taking control of all these scattered resources can one gain a monopoly on them. You don't necessarily have to build a city by one, only an extraction facility (built by workers) which adds that resource to your stockpile. These facilities can't guard themselves, so if hostile civs are arround, you will need to provede them with defences. In case of emergency, the facilities can be easily converted to fortifications (a command available to any land unit, though converting them back requires removing the fort and re-building the facility).

This also adds to the imperialistic aspects, as you can build extraction facilities in or near other countries, and thus have some leverage for negotiations. The technology to extract from a certain resource comes with the technology to use that resource (ex. to extract iron from an iron resource, you first need iron working).
[This message has been edited by airdrik (edited April 30, 2001).]

[jdlessl]

Agree with airdrik on pretty much everything. This is not a potential gameplay problem but a potential strategy problem which, if not solved, could your civ into a smoking ruin.

Previously, no civ ever actually needed to deal with one another. Each had everything it needed, except maybe more land. Now civs have to take into account resource availability when dealing internationaly, barring the occasional freak civ which is surrounded by gobs of resources. Of course, then they'll have problems anyway because everyone will want what they got. Ooo, I like it.

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Jared Lessl