critically missing terrains

[ALPHA WOLF 64]

What terrains do people think are critically missing from the game, and how would you differeniate them from existing terrains?

everest height mountains - not settleable

frozen oceans - very minimal food, greatly reduced naval speed

swamps - disease, no tracked vehicles off road, not settleable, can be terraformed (drained) into grassland

plateaus - flatlands between mountains that have no movement penalty

manmade lakes - this would require a major change because these would only exist behind dammed rivers

woods - limited extra production and defensive value

glaciers - units degrade (freeze) for every turn spent outside of a city or fortress

I am a firm believer that it was good to remove terraforming from the game. Altho there are some limited examples of real life terraforming, none have been on the scale of a single game tile, with the possible exception of the Dutch lowlands. Also, many terrains are based on the weather, and therefore realistically cant be changed.

These are all that seem essential to me. Any additional ones?

[King_Henry]

Woods- basically forests

Swamps- sounds good

Plateaus- little food and small movement bonus

Valley- movement loss, but good for farming

All together, we need more terrain. It would make the game tougher, but in a good way.

[caralampio]

Not really a new terrain, this has already been suggested before, but flood plains should be green.
I like the idea of valleys and plateaus.

[pedrojedi]

Plateaus should be flatland high plains with no movement penalty.
Valleys are good!
I miss settling cities in mountains, but differentiating them with height differences seems a little too much. I like civ as simple as it is, even if it sometimes sacrifices some reality. If I want reality, then I'll go to the Operational Art of War.

[Louis XXIV]

Originally posted by ALPHA WOLF 64
What terrains do people think are critically missing from the game, and how would you differeniate them from existing terrains?

everest height mountains - not settleable

I'd just leave this how it is

frozen oceans - very minimal food, greatly reduced naval speed

I like the idea behind this, you could have Stormy waters as well

swamps - disease, no tracked vehicles off road, not settleable, can be terraformed (drained) into grassland

I think Swamps should be the "floodplain of Jungle." By that, I mean that all Jungle squares next to a river becomes Swamp (like all desert next to a river becomes flood plains). I would proably be something like 1 food and 1 shield. It would have the same disease. I like the "can't settle" thing as well.

plateaus - flatlands between mountains that have no movement penalty

Not sure what the difference between this and just average plains are.

manmade lakes - this would require a major change because these would only exist behind dammed rivers

I think this would be too complicated

woods - limited extra production and defensive value

Don't see a difference between this and Forest

glaciers - units degrade (freeze) for every turn spent outside of a city or fortress

Didn't Civ2 have Glaciers? I don't mind these (they could be like the Civ2 ones). Not sure if I want another disease type terrain

I am a firm believer that it was good to remove terraforming from the game. Altho there are some limited examples of real life terraforming, none have been on the scale of a single game tile, with the possible exception of the Dutch lowlands. Also, many terrains are based on the weather, and therefore realistically cant be changed.

Agreed

These are all that seem essential to me. Any additional ones?

[brianshapiro]

swamp is the only very obvious terrain thats missing , imo
frozen oceans might be interesting, could replace built in icecaps

[Wittlich]

As far as I'm concerned - There is no such thing as too many terrain types!

[Jarvin]

Despite the fact that a couple of types of terrain were left out, adding them would just make things too complicated.

[Cyclotron]

everest height mountains - well, mountains are already not settleable, I see no reason for more mountains.

frozen oceans - interesting idea... icepack or somesuch, or even shifting icepack if you wanted to get fancy.

swamps - if it's good enough for 2, it's good enough for 3...

plateaus - how are these substantially different from, say, plains?

manmade lakes - well, that's a whole 'nother story, with man-made terrains and all. Personally, I see too many exploits with being able to make your own terrain and lakes.

woods - so, like forests lite? I'll pass, forests are enough.

glaciers - maybe, but those penalties sound a bit extreme.

I am a firm believer that it was good to remove terraforming from the game. Altho there are some limited examples of real life terraforming, none have been on the scale of a single game tile, with the possible exception of the Dutch lowlands. Also, many terrains are based on the weather, and therefore realistically cant be changed.

You're the man. Very true.

[Jarvin]

We already have 2 different types of forest, the pine kind and the kind that looks like jungle with duller colors.

Maybe we could just alter the stats for one of them?

[ALPHA WOLF 64]

one important factor I left out. I'd rather see land type + land cover. A hill covered in trees is very different from a snow hil, or rolling prairie hill, but game wise, all have the same effects.

I had actually menat everest mtns should be unpassable. I think i had a brain fart when I typed that.

Plateaus are the high grounds between mtns/hills. Therefore, you could not assault directly with mounted/wheeled units without a road, whereas a plains in between mtns can be assaulted directly from the mtns.

I agree that woods have little distinction. its just that I come from wooded areas that would never be considered forests. Armor would be able to go thru woods, but not forests.

I already consider flood plains as valleys (agree they should be green). In reality (geology experts feel free to correct me), fllod plains flood frequently, and you really dont want to build too much on them, whereas valleys are also highly productive without the flooding.

I'd avoid stormy waters due to there reliance on weather which isnt a factor unfortunately in the game.

I do think its a shame that jungles and swamps seemed to have been rolled into one terrain. I wonder why?

[Jarvin]

About plateaus.
Why not make it kinda like floodplains. Any flat area, surrounded by mountains, and small enough becomes a plateau. How 'bout it?

[ALPHA WOLF 64]

Originally posted by Jarvin
About plateaus.
Why not make it kinda like floodplains. Any flat area, surrounded by mountains, and small enough becomes a plateau. How 'bout it?

Bingo!!!!!

[TheStinger]

Volcanoes and earthquake zones would be good

[Wazell]

Definitely more terrains are needed. If nothing else just bring back the swamps, and do something along that tundra/glacier/frozen ocean business. And volcanoes.

Of course, then we'll need to move on from flat terrain and have some heights too...

[Prince]

I would freak out if there were too many terrain types.

You say that tile-size terraforming never took place, but I've never seen tile-size plateaus either. Swamps could return to the game, although it would actually be 'just another shitty tile'. I think it should be possible to settle on mountains though...

[Master Zen]

What's the use of new terrain if the AI's gonna chop em down anyways, look what they do to all the forests and jungle...

Resources should be lost with a terrain change, this would disencourage people from chopping things. Chop down the jundge, get no rubber. Period.

Also, IIRC you can't settle on mountains anyway

[ALPHA WOLF 64]

Originally posted by Master Zen
What's the use of new terrain if the AI's gonna chop em down anyways, look what they do to all the forests and jungle...

Resources should be lost with a terrain change, this would disencourage people from chopping things. Chop down the jundge, get no rubber. Period.

Also, IIRC you can't settle on mountains anyway

yeah, its a shame that resources arent lost upon tile change, I gave forests the ability to be mined (think logging camp), and now the AI forests every brown tile and irrigates every green tile. its funny to see rubber with no trees, or wheat in a forest. But I do like that this way at least the world is so deforested. Plus it helps their defense as my attacks get bogged down in forests.

[ALPHA WOLF 64]

Originally posted by Prince
You say that tile-size terraforming never took place, but I've never seen tile-size plateaus either. Swamps could return to the game, although it would actually be 'just another shitty tile'. I think it should be possible to settle on mountains though...

If I remember my geography class, Tibet is a huge plateau. Also many areas around the himalayas. Those afghan cities are probably are all plateaus if the are thousands of feet above sea level.

[Odin]

Plateau- 1 food, 2 shield
Swamp- 2 food, disease (take disease away from Jungle)
Savanna (open woodlands)- 2 food, 1 shield,

[Cyclotron]

Originally posted by Jarvin
About plateaus.
Why not make it kinda like floodplains. Any flat area, surrounded by mountains, and small enough becomes a plateau. How 'bout it?

Good, but there is no need for a size restriction. There are plenty of massive highland plateaus, like Tibet.

[GePap]

Plateaus are not a different type of terrain: they are a feature of elevation. Anything, from forests to plains, can be on top of one.

I do think swamps and glaciers should have stayed and don;t see why they were removed from the game. i think that civ3 should have incorporated elevation like SMAC did, but that certainly won't make a comeback.

[Fosse]

If we increase the cost of everything by a factor of five or ten, then we suddenly have a lot more valid options for terrain values.

So if a warrior costs 100 shields instead of 10, and the highest producer of shields are mined hills (30), we have a lot more options between 0 and the max.

This would make for a more diverse and accurate map.

[brianshapiro]

GePap , i think terrain wasnt included, mainly because at the most you would have two elevations because of world size, and the placement of the elevation would be limited. Also, it would have been harder to implement multiple terrains with elevation.

[Cyclotron]

Originally posted by GePap
Plateaus are not a different type of terrain: they are a feature of elevation. Anything, from forests to plains, can be on top of one.

Forests are already on top of tiles. If you mean that plateaus should be elevated plains, that's fine, but that's still different terrain.

[star mouse]

We don't need a lot of new different terrains. All we need are a few that were left out:

* Desert Hills - like normal hills but produce no food and look good in deserts.

* Plains Hills - Like normal hills but yellow instead of green so they look good on the plains.

* Tundra Hills - Like normal hills but look good when placed with tundra.

* Swamps - I would place these next to rivers in either Jungles or Grassland. They work like Jungle. When cleared they become flood plains.

* Desert Mountains - like normal mountains except they look better in deserts.

* Plains Mountains - like normal mountains but look good better in plains.

* Tundra Mountains - like normal mountains but look good better in plains.

All of these could be implemented without adding to the base terrain. The base terrain is the colour of the tile that the terrain feature sits on, and is grasslands green, plains orange, desert yellow or tundra white. There's a graphics file that has all the possible blendings between each of these. Any new terrain created should have a base colour that is green, orange, yellow or white, so that no additional new graphics are required.

[pedrojedi]

Well, so you sugest a basic "climate" (my knowledge in geography has decreased dramatically over a few years) - grasslands, plains, desert and tundra, and a basic "elevation" - sea level and slight variations, hills and mountains. Seems good and functional.

[Wazell]

I agree that having a set of base terrains and adding mountains, forests and hills as layers over them, would be a functional and easy solution. This has been used in many games, at least Warcraft and Heroes of Might and Magic series that I know of.