14-05-2001 10:14									#1
	One city, size one victory possible in civ 3? Help yourself to an AD-FREE life

I'm all for the sublime (winning with a single city), but not the ridiculous (that city never reaching size 2). Granted, it took 5 years for someone to figure that one out, much longer if one counts the release date of the original Civ. But consider the OCC challenge. First accomplished a bit over a year ago. Once this seemingly impossible feat was accomplished in Civ II, SMAC and CTP fell almost immediately. In short, if it is possible to win CIV III with a single, size one city, someone will likely do so within a month of the release date. A great strategy game reduced to triviality almost immediately, at least in SP.

Don't get me wrong. I'm not against the one city thing. I would actually like to see a one city approach actually being compeditive in multi player. (A bit refreshing after ics and it's relatives.) But it certainly shouldn't be easy, even in single player. And the size one city thing? Come on.

Two possible quick solutions.

1. Make gifts and tribute a lot tougher to get with one city, and the ammounts forth coming much, much smaller. Come on, who's going to value a civ with a population of one as an ally worth showering huge gifts on? In this reguard, the whole tribute thing should be reworked. Granted, gifts and tribute have always been an important part of forign relations, but it shouldn't completely unbalance the game.

2. At some point over a 6000 year time period, someone would at some point decide to attack a single city state. Most likely several times. A single large city with a powerful economy, superior technology, a strong industrial base, and good defensive terrain may be able to survive. But not a puny little hamlet facing threats such as the Persian or Roman Empires. I'd hate to see a civ game where all the AI's hate you and never trust you, but equally fristrating would be one in which just because you're powerful all nations either hate you or will betray you anyway, and all the great powers will rush to buy your favor, making their entire treasury availible to your personal use, just because you are weak, pathetic, and happen to toss them a tech every now and then. Throughout history weakness has made one a target. Civ should reflect this.