06-04-2005 15:16									#1
	A couple of quick Civ4 suggestions for Friaxis Support Apolyton, buy Alpha Centauri

I haven’t participated in this forum much, but have kept an eye on it for those Civ4 tid bits. I have a few suggestions for Friaxis that I’d really like to see implemented in Civ4. I’m not sure if they or something similar have been suggested before, if so then please toss out this thread.

1. The ability to name geographical features of the map.

Wouldn’t it be great to label your map as you want! Perhaps you have a mountain range to the north of your civ, you could call them the “Smokey Mountains”, or whatever tickles your fancy, and the label would be displayed on your world map whenever you scroll past. Same goes for oceans, seas, peninsulas, lakes, forests etc.

In multiplay you could have the option of switching off other players labels if you don’t like them or don’t agree on the name of a bordering river for example.

I really like the idea of personalising my fantasy world, and this would go a long way to achieving that. (As a side note I’d also like an option of choosing your own leaderhead when you first set up a game. I’d like to choose the default, from a selection, or even put my own face/artwork in there if I wanted).

2. The ability to make notes in-game.

I often use a notebook for my PBEM games to keep track of my strategies and to provide reminders. It would be handy to have an in-game notepad that you could use. I’d also like to be able to set pop-up reminders – for example set a pop-up to appear in 15 turns time that reminds me that a peace treaty only has 5 turns left – thus prompting me to move some troops around or what have you.

I don’t imagine there would be too much involved in introducing these features, and they would add a lot of practicality to the game.

Here is hoping that someone from Friaxis reads this!
Looking forward to Civ4.

	06-04-2005 19:01									#2
	Remove this text

Nice suggestions Andydog. I also wish we had to ability to name geographical features. I'm sure you have renamed my Chinese rivers in the Easygoing PBEM to something "Persian sounding"

As an extension of this idea, it also would be nice to somehow track the historical events of the game while it's happening and refer back to those events.

Specifically, naming wars and/or battles that occured which could be referenced in the diplomatic exchanges. Assign names to eras like "The Westward Expansion" or "The Ivory Economic Boom" even "The Rise of the Mafia Corruption" and these eras could be set in length by the player. I'm just looking for something with more context and detail than ancient, industry, modern age which all players share.

So it would be nice to have a history of your civ that followed a bit more of an academic outline -- just like a college history book populated as much, or as little, with your own customization of places, people and events. Obviously, this would be a feature you could totally ignore if not to your liking.

	06-04-2005 19:11									#3
	Got spare money?

Actually, I did attempt a project like this in Civ3 Conquests, but gave it up due to time limtiations -- job, family, and home improvement maitenance will eliminate any free time, I promise you.

I would play one turn of civ. Any unit I built, I would name (1st Swordsmen Regiment, etc); any decisions or events along with any interaction with the AI, would be recorded in a notebook -- jotting down a quick description and narrative. Slowly, I was building history of my civ. In my history, I named the geographic features and would attempt to include "foreign information" of the history taken from the AI's perspective.

After the story writing, I would go to google's image library and do searches for terms that would match the events of the turn. I would paste a couple of pictures with the text.

I got to about 2500 BC before this project collapsed when my sanity returned. My notebook is sitting on my bookshelf, and the save on the hard drive patiently awaiting my return... the odds aren't good.

Now, if Firaxis can just include some version of these capabilities in the next release...

	06-04-2005 20:37									#4
	Support Apolyton, buy Civilization: The Boardgame

I like that idea. It certainly would give a real feeling of creating your own history. You could share your timeline with other civ players, you could compare the different timelines with other players who have played the same game (like the AU games). The benefits to Firaxis would be exposure to the game through this type of sharing and related discussion.

	07-04-2005 02:56									#5
	Support Apolyton

Andydog, I think over the years both of those suggestions have been mentioned, and I happen to like both of them.

I think the first idea is implemented in some form in SMAC, or is it that the geography is automatically labelled? The latter might be a more precise feature, anyways.

The second idea would be great for adding reminders; I really like that a lot. That'd probably be the only thing I'd use it for, though.

	08-04-2005 08:35									#6
	Inflate your Upload Space

I'd like to point out that yes, you could name landmarks in SMAC.

There is a reason why it is the best of the series and all you haters should quit stepping. You just can't touch this.

	14-04-2005 18:16									#7
	Support Apolyton, buy GURPS/ Alpha Centauri

SMAC did come with a long of good features that were sadly ignored/dumped for Civ 3 - let's hope we seem them back again for Civ 4 ( but upgraded of course! )

	14-04-2005 18:48									#8
	Tired of ads?

Yeah, like anyone from firaxis reads any of this...

	14-04-2005 18:48									#9
	Inflate your Upload Space

Yeah, like anyone from firaxis reads any of this...

	14-04-2005 18:48									#10
	Support Apolyton or Terrorists Win

Yeah, like anyone from firaxis reads any of this...

	14-04-2005 19:35									#11
	Increase the size of your Attachments

They do, Soren has said so IIRC, and he has replied a couple of times. The most important one was in the List for cIV finished thread.

PS: Nice triple post.