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Padmewan
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Cambridge, MA
Dec 2001
time: 05:22
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This probably belongs under the "General" thread, or the "More emphasis on age" poll, but -- at the risk of invoking the dreaded businesspeak cliche -- I'm interested in people's opinion on Civ4 gameplay undergoing paradigm shifts through the ages.
That is to say, the rules of the game should fundamentally change as new technologies change the very nature of civilization itself. Some of the proposals in various topics touch on this on a more surface level - for example, that luxuries could be era-specific, that cultural points last only for so long, or, as is the case in Civ3, resources may only have limited use (saltpeter is the best example). I'm interested in more fundamental changes.
For example, Civ cities depend on food found within the city's radius. This isn't realistic in the modern era -- how much food is in the "radius" of New York City, London, or Tokyo? Thanks to modern transportation systems, the very rules of how to feed a city have changed, and the rules of the game should reflect that. For example, maybe after a certain set of tech's have been discovered, food is simply pooled across an entire civ, or traded across civ's.
The idea I'm trying to capture here is that over the centuries, civilizations have risen and fallen in part because the rules changed and the civ either failed to keep up or simply lacked the resources necessary to do so. Few of the games I've played have really captured that element of history. (For some reason, the Great Wonders conquest gets some of that flavor for me, because so many game actions depend on tech discoveries, e.g. the very ability to cut down forests, or to mine, etc.)
OTOH, changing the rules of a game is very disconcerting for the player and may be too much of a sacrifice for the sake of realism. After all, Civ is (mostly) a conquest game, not Sim-Civ. Maybe the rule I proposed above for food and cities is too radical and unbalancing -- maybe instead the city radius simply expands, like the cutural border, but maybe due to some technological advance. But I'd like to see history and technology have more effect on the rules themselves. (Besides the Mesopotamia scenario, another example I'd give is the ability to cash-rush rather than pop-rush due to gv't type).
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Brent
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Firaxis should not die. Firaxis should produce SimCiv as a separate game.
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Cmonkey
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Yes. I will take the fairly realistic gameplay models of a Simulation-esque Civilization game over the boardgame-like gameplay models of the current (and next) version of Civilization any day of the week. In other words, I'd rather play a game more like Clash of Civs or Guns, Germs & Steel than what I know out-of-the-box Civ 4 will be like. If they make Civ 4 as mod-able as I'm hoping for (and I'm certain they won't), it won't matter what out-of-the-box civ 4 is like because I'll be able to rebuild it practically from the ground up.
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Cmonkey
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I never said it had to be less user friendly. I never said it had to be complicated.
Just because something is realistic & detailed does not make it complex.
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Max Sinister
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"Complicated" and "complex" aren't the same thing either...
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Dauphin
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Caught in a tuna net
Jan 1970
time: 05:22
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quote:
Originally posted by Padmewan
For example, Civ cities depend on food found within the city's radius. This isn't realistic in the modern era -- how much food is in the "radius" of New York City, London, or Tokyo? Thanks to modern transportation systems, the very rules of how to feed a city have changed, and the rules of the game should reflect that. For example, maybe after a certain set of tech's have been discovered, food is simply pooled across an entire civ, or traded across civ's.
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Having food as a tradable resource, akin to gold, would be good. 
Transfering food between cities should be possible at all times, with greater spoilage occuring the further apart two cities are. Various technologies then reduce the rate of spoilage.
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Padmewan
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Cambridge, MA
Dec 2001
time: 05:22
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Another idea I was kicking around today was some idea of "resetting" upon hitting a new era. I was thinking specifically of cultural resetting -- that your cultural points take a big hit when you advance to the next era. After all, the fact that Egypt had one of the most ancient civilizations / temples / etc. doesn't give it latter-day cultural "points" -- for better or for worse, the U.S. dominates culturally today. Yet in Civ3 it's impossible for this to happen, since culture accrues continuously and even logrithmically.
The closest analogy to this in Civ3 are GW's that expire upon discovery of a certain tech -- in particular, the Great Library. If you have the GL, you try hard not to research Education. Imagine that on a larger scale -- you must decide whether to advance to the next era or hold on to your advantages of the current era. You could decide to hold on to the past and thus either a quick victory or eventual stagnation. Or you could opt to take a big hit but be better off in the long run.
I like giving the player these kinds of tough choices. It also happens to coincide somewhat with "reality."
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star mouse
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of the Barbarians
Aug 2001
time: 16:22
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quote:
Originally posted by Padmewan For example, Civ cities depend on food found within the city's radius. This isn't realistic in the modern era -- how much food is in the "radius" of New York City, London, or Tokyo? Thanks to modern transportation systems, the very rules of how to feed a city have changed, and the rules of the game should reflect that. For example, maybe after a certain set of tech's have been discovered, food is simply pooled across an entire civ, or traded across civ's. |
This is a good idea. Here's my ideas on this:
* If any 2 cities are connected by a railway, then the cities pool their food resources such that no city can starve if other connected cities can provide the extra food.
* If a tile is in your civ but not in a city radius, its extra production can be utilised by any city to which it is connected by rail.
* These abilities could also be conferred by a city improvement. If a city improvement is used, then all cities with that improvement can be considered "connected". It's fairly obvious that such an improvement would require a granary as a prerequisite.
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realpolitic
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Rogue States of America
Mar 2002
time: 21:22
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If you want to model population more accurately, factor in the effect of technology and birth control. The population worldwide countries increased superexponetially through about 1970. Exponential increase means the doubling time is constant, superexponentially means the doubling time for the population decreases. Europe & Russia's population IIRC has been almost constant since 1930, America's growth rate started to decline in 1960. Average per capita income has alot to do with it. So when the computer decides that a nation has reached a certain level of technology, and wealth, the program decides that population increase slows. This would also give backward nations time to catch up. South America has the greatest rate of population increase, so theocratic governments (especially in poor countries) should have greater rates of increase. The fertility in Third World countries is starting to decrease too, so maybe the slowing of popution growth when it happens in modern civs should be reflected in 3rd World civs over time too. In the real world, global warming is reflected in loss of fertility, not minied tiles, as Africa's desert is enlarging. Also AIDS, is easier to spread because of airplanes, and population density. So maybe population increase should be limited by transportation systems and global population, too.
I'm not sure what these changes would do to gameplay, but these are more realistic ways of dealing with population.
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Max Sinister
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No... but they are very religious, and if the pope says that contraception and abortion are sins, they do what he commands. Unfortunately, because else there wasn't so much poverty there. :-(
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Brent
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Maybe the game could have a struggle for power between church and state?
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22-09-2004 02:56
But that struggle is a Christian phenomenon; in Islam for example, such a power struggle is more or less impossible because of the way the religion is made up.
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