20-11-2001 13:19									#1
	Useless colonies! Avatar Enlargement: We've got the solution

Jungle, not a nice place for a city, but has gems.
So I build a colony there connercted with my cities.

Then comes an AI.
Hmm, another place outside borders, let we build citiy near those gems.
My colony dissapers, and gems are in hand of an AI.

What the worst, I am actually forced to make cities in poor locations with resouces, since it is the only way to prevent AI of taking my resouces.

	20-11-2001 13:23									#2
	Support Apolyton, buy Galactic Civilizations

It would be nice if colonies would generate one tile borders.

Anyway it is strange to make 5 colonies near a cluster of gems.

	20-11-2001 13:49									#3
	Browse Apolyton AD-FREE

colonies aren't bad because yours got captured once.
Like cities aren't a bad game concept either after yours were destroyed.

I've build quiet some colonies so far.
Most of them slightly outside my borders so I could get them back easily if the AI would show up (just put a city next to them within my borders)

	20-11-2001 14:12									#4
	Increase the size of your Attachments

Just build a city on top of the gems. The gems will stay but the jungle changes into grassland. Later you use a worker to clear the jungle and get extra shields.
Gems in jungles are a blessing in disguise!

	20-11-2001 14:16									#5
	Put an end to popups!

I have to agree with player1 on this. Colonies are a good idea that when wrong somewhere...

The fact that they are automaticly assimilated combined with the way corruption works, makes it (imo) a bit to hard to get access to resources not found close to your empire.

-Alech

	20-11-2001 14:19									#6
	Support Apolyton, buy Civilization: The Boardgame

build and make cities? blasphemy.

why not conquer them

I admit this game is a conquerer game just as the others are. Sorry builders, Firaxis doesn't care about you .

I can't see a way to win without conquest. By win, I mean win the man's way- not some easy diplomatic victory that you can bribe.

	20-11-2001 15:12									#7
	Help yourself to an AD-FREE life

later in the game, when the AI expansion has ceased,
colonies get evenmore usefull !

In fact civ3 works this way:

Expand
Develop
Colonize
Conquer

First you expand to get enough resources to develop and build an army.
Then you start developping your culture, science and your army.
When you've discovered the right science you search for the right resources and colonize them.

When you have the resources, you conquer your enemies

	20-11-2001 15:27									#8
	Support Apolyton, buy Civilization III: Complete

This is was happening to several times.

From now, only colonies I build are those just near mine borders.

OK, you can clear jungles with horde of workers (more likely in ind. age)but why to have EXTRA CORRUPTION because of USELESS city.
This thing also happens on mountains & hills (you can't terraform those).

Anyway, I don't wan't, exept if I must (like now), to build such cites.
Only to take them culturaly or military (after AI clear jungles for me ).

Concept of colonies is BROKEN, because you will build city on every place insted of colony.

One tile border could be the SOLUTION.

	20-11-2001 15:56									#9
	Support Apolyton, buy GURPS/ Alpha Centauri

I wonder why they didn't incorporate smac stuff in this game. I should create another thread on this.

But the smac border system was near perfect (except ai building cities near your borders pushing yours back).

I wonder if Brian Reynolds has a copyright on stuff he programmed . I find the resemblence of civ3 to civ1 to be an indication of this. Stuff in civ2 was completely dropped (combat being the best example).

Interesting.

	20-11-2001 17:08									#10
	Help yourself to an AD-FREE life

Colonies ARE useful, but must be protected! So if you want to prevent the AI to build a city nearby, just send 8 good defenders to surround the colony and the problem is solved!

	20-11-2001 18:26									#11
	Remove this text

quote: Originally posted by campmajor! Colonies ARE useful, but must be protected! So if you want to prevent the AI to build a city nearby, just send 8 good defenders to surround the colony and the problem is solved!

exactly! or simply block their path in any conceivable way....:0
this system of colonies also allows you to take them over from AI

	20-11-2001 18:50									#12
	Suffering from ads?

quote: player1: Concept of colonies is BROKEN

why do you say things like that without countering arguments made by people like me ? I have clearly explained how you can use clonies the best, and you just simple ignore my posts and put up things like I quoted above.

Again: the conept of borders / colonies isn't broken, but you need to know how to use it.

	20-11-2001 19:21									#13
	Increase the size of your Attachments

The point is that the concept of colonies doesn't work like it is designed (or like Firaxis wanted at start).
Now, if there are workarounds, OK.

But, it's same as saying that since you know now to handle corruption by cutting trees, making poplation farms or super tax cities, that corruption is working the way it is intendend.

	20-11-2001 19:26									#14
	Got spare money?

And AI is ALWAYS expanding.
It never ceases.

But, if you put pressure on him, and prevent any type of expansion.
You can have your colonies.

At, least until is starts expanding againg, or you kill him.

But, personally I don't think that designers wanted that, as main use of colonies.

And to me, is it tiresome to go into WAR, every time AI want's to place his cities on your colonies.


This just isn't right.

	20-11-2001 19:32									#15
	Support Apolyton, buy Civilization: The Boardgame

CyberShy, your aproach is OK.

But it doesn't mean that colonies don't need some kind of fix.

Just for playbalancing reasons.

This way colonies are just some sort of quick solution which last no more then 20-50 turns.

And rerly an option (AI just takes ALL LAND)

I think that they should be permanently usefull in places which are bad for cities.

	20-11-2001 19:35									#16
	Support Apolyton buy from Amazon

I've built several productive colonies. I've found colonising a luxury in the early stages very useful to combat anarchy. It depends whether the resource you want is somewhere you would normally put a city. Colonies should always be inside your empire borders though, not outside. They can be easily protected, intruding settlers can be ambushed or diverted and eventually your culture absorbs your own work.

I'd have been happier if the concept retained its use for longer but with the founding square always generating resources and culture expanding to 3 tile radius fairly smoothly there are few places a city cannot go, especially after railroad makes even irrigable desert an acceptable city site. If the cities started with a 0 tile culture radius rather than 1 I expect we would see a lot more use of them initially.

	20-11-2001 19:48									#17
	Increase the size of your Attachments

I think that Firaxis, while betatesting, had both colonies & cities with starting radius of 0. Colonies worked fine.
But later they changed it.
Then they didn't have time to playtest and see that they CONSIDERABLY lowered usefullnes of colonies.
So, I think that by having colonies with border radius of 1, would be much more interesting for gameplay.

	20-11-2001 19:55									#18
	Help yourself to an AD-FREE life

Again I agree with player1. There is simply no way to protect colonies without resorting to war. Even surrounding it with units will not help. The AI can still build a city close and then assimilate the squares that the soldiers are standing on and force them to move.

Also, what was that about putting them inside your borders? As far as I know that can’t be done...

-Alech

	20-11-2001 19:56									#19
	Remove this text

that's right, colonies don't last forever.
again, like IRL.

	20-11-2001 20:04									#20
	Support Apolyton, buy Alpha Centauri

The thing is that Civ3 isn’t ‘real life’. What ever that is...

The way I see it colonies where intended to give a civ a way to harvest resources from unfavorable areas without using up the rather limited ‘ideal city’ quota.

I don’t have a problem with founding a city on a faraway resource in the middle of a desert because it will be corrupt. I have a problem with it because it will make ALL my cities more corrupt.

-Alech

	20-11-2001 20:52									#21
	Help yourself to an AD-FREE life

grow more culture, and build cities around the desert.
that way you can get all desert-resources without colonies and / or cities planting in the desert.

Soren Johnson said he was working on an AI tweak that would take care that the AI won't put cities in the center of your empire. (ie it looks if the city would be surrounded by your borders)

of course civ is not like real life, but that doesn't mean that everything does have to be different.

	20-11-2001 22:16									#22
	Avatar Enlargement: We've got the solution

England, France, Spain and others got colonies far away from home. And they weren't taken culturally that easily. People had the culture from the city which the came it seems. I guess it's not normal to see such.

	20-11-2001 22:44									#23
	Lose 30 kilos (of popups)

Colonies are useful in higher levels (than Monarch). Especially when You're not Religious. You just may choose different direction of expansion than building city in Jungle or Hills/Mountains. Of course You should build city near them as soon as possible - but this is not easy decision in early high-level game...

	20-11-2001 22:54									#24
	Help yourself to an AD-FREE life

quote: Originally posted by CyberShy later in the game, when the AI expansion has ceased, colonies get evenmore usefull !

AI expansion does not seize. Raze a city, and another civ will show up with a settler and escort before you can say "cheese cake".

It's annoying... you better make sure you cover ALL of your continent, cos if there's only ONE available space, some moron will settle there. Once the AI showed up on my continent with a settler and the escort consisted of three tanks, two mech inf and two marines!! We were at peace, but landing this kind of troops close to my border is not acceptable, so I kicked them out.


Fred

	20-11-2001 23:34									#25
	Got spare money?

You gotta love how the AI loves to build cities in the arctic tundra with no good squares available right up next to your borders.

No wait..... I hate that.

Wasn't there alot of effort put into reducing the advantages of ICS? Then why does the stupid AI attempt that strategy?

Then the city realizes my culture is better and they want to join my civ? I don't want some stupid tundra city to add to my already out of control corruptoin problem.

I wish you could choose to raze a city that you acquire by culture. Now that would be funny.

	20-11-2001 23:35									#26
	Put an end to popups!

I have to agree with player 1 also.

Colonies need a 1 tile border, to make them usefull. I build one colony my very first game of civ, and when i found out that it didn't have any borders, i was very dissapointed.

It's completely pointless to build colonies. Your worker time would be better spent improving the area you were thinking of colonizing, and rush a settler there to build a city.

Colonies SHOULD have borders. Think about it, real life, or game, doesn't matter. You've gone out there, and established some sort of control over an area, and sent some of your people there to work in it. As far as i'm concerned that would be MY land, and I want to keep it. Having it so the AI can just move a settler in, plop down a city, and get rid of your colony is terrible. It makes it so the only real sense of building a colony would be inside your borders. But wait.. if you have a resources, inside your borders, you don't need a colony there to harvest it... ergo, colonies are useless.

If they add a border around a colony, then they would be VERY usefull, and allowing them to be assimilated by other cultures would balance out their usefulness, because your still forced to get over there and protect your colony with your own city close by it.

Zorkk

	21-11-2001 00:00									#27
	Support Apolyton

Oh ya... sorry I forgot.... I think colonies are useless too...

If they had borders I might use them.

	21-11-2001 04:44									#28
	Suffering from ads?

quote: Originally posted by CyberShy grow more culture, and build cities around the desert. that way you can get all desert-resources without colonies and / or cities planting in the desert.

You asked us to reply to your points, so I will:

This is nothing but a work around. Building cities in a circle around the Arabian peninsula is not really an option and a bunch of new cities in the desert will increase the corruption problem in my other cities. The fact is that colonies do not work the way most people would expect them to. IMO that makes them misunderstood at best, and broken at worst.

-Alech

	21-11-2001 07:07									#29
	Support Apolyton, buy Alpha Centauri

i've found colonies to be very useful in securing needed/wanted resources in areas that can't be settled right away. as for ai putting down cities next to them, that just means that colonies need some protection.

	21-11-2001 07:46									#30
	Inflate your Upload Space

quote: Originally posted by player1 The point is that the concept of colonies doesn't work like it is designed (or like Firaxis wanted at start). Now, if there are workarounds, OK. But, it's same as saying that since you know now to handle corruption by cutting trees, making poplation farms or super tax cities, that corruption is working the way it is intendend.

Actually colonies work exactly like firaxis intended, check the manual, it describes using them to access resources right outside your borders that you didn't get because you didn't know they were there when you built the city, close enough that your cultural borders may expand to include them.

Also corruption is working as intended, but its just a little too harsh. Huge empires should have a hard time maintaining themselves, but the one shield per turn thing is ridiculous, improvements for corruption should be able to improve on this in most cities with a good government. It should get high enough to make you consider razing a city to avoid increased corruption but not so high to make practically mandatory.