DESIGN: New ideas about the implementation of colony’s !!

[The Big Mc]

We all know that for many a year the ctp community has wanted to impalement colonies now we have the source code we can start to look at ways to implement this

Now here comes the clever bit

A colony would be use full for the following reasons

Production (rare materials)
Food
Gold
Goods
War (provides a medical centre for troops )

Now to get the production into a city we use a array of colony ids there owners and the city that the stuff goes to

Now when the code looks fro the resources the city has it looks in the coloney array and scans around the colony to see if they have a good then the code makes it look like the city to which the colony belongs has the good and sends it

When the code comes to do gold/food/comers we do the same make the city serch for these colonies at the same time as it calculates it own stuff

A colonies itself would be a small tile imp with a small zone of control about the same size as a city fo size 1

So lets open the floor to random swipes at my idea

[MrBaggins]

Firstly... WHY would we want colonies implemented?

Whats the game benefit? How would you propose a player make them? How would you prevent abuse and "Infinite colony sleeze" hell?

[Solver]

I understand that they would be similar to SMAC crawlers? Those were a great concept... but the AI didn't use them nearly enough. Also, good use of these things basically was overpowered for the human.

[MrBaggins]

I've played everything Civ-like except SMAC. A friend even offered to lend it to me.

Could you explain the crawler concept, Solver?

[Solver]

Crawlers were special units. They could be used to speed the completion of a Secret Project, like Civ 1 Caravans (Secret Projects = wonders). Or, they could be deposited on any tile not used by a city, and then gather ONE type of resource for its host city. So, if you placed it on a tile that produces 2 food and 2 production, you could get *either* 2 food or 2 production more for city that produced the Crawler.

[MrBaggins]

Hmm... how was the choice made?

[MrBaggins]

also, can you explain the exploit/abuse aspect better? I can see they were powerful... no pop loss for a "partial city" basically, right? What didn't the AI do to exploit them?

[Martin Gühmann]

Originally posted by Solver
Crawlers were special units. They could be used to speed the completion of a Secret Project, like Civ 1 Caravans (Secret Projects = wonders). Or, they could be deposited on any tile not used by a city, and then gather ONE type of resource for its host city. So, if you placed it on a tile that produces 2 food and 2 production, you could get *either* 2 food or 2 production more for city that produced the Crawler.

Sounds similar to the CTP1 cows, the only problem was that soon you have them the city radius was full of them of course in stacks of nine units. OK I am not shure if the boni were additional but this way you would have been protected from spies and also from enemy units for some turns.

-Martin

[MrBaggins]

Cows. Right. A.K.A. Wall of Beef. They were great... I have fond memories of play testing those...

(but they were horrifically unbalancing, since they made you invulnerable to special attack, plus gave you mad growth)

[Solver]

When you put the Crawler on a tile, you hit the O button and got the choice of which resource to harvest....

The abuse was that Crawlers, being special units, required no upkeep. And, good players would build many dozens of them. One popular approach would be to build 5 or so crawlers for a city, put them all on harvesting food, and turn all citizens in city to specialists... no starvation because of crawler food, and huge science income.

Another use was, obviously, getting extra production in. An easy way to make a size 5 base produce as much as normally a size 12 base would be able to.

The AI simply didn't build nearly enough crawlers. Maybe a few in a game, but nowhere near the many dozens humans made.

[The Big Mc]

I am just fed up to my back teeth of building a piddley little city in the frozen ground to try to trade goods colonels would only allow one per tile so there’s no chance of them over helping the human and would be a tile imp not a unit so no wall of beef

The other point I am making is that later on in the game you stop your city growing because you can't feed them all

However your concern is not without a grounding what if we make it so that a city can only be associated with 5 food or production colonies but could have limitless good collecting colony’s

[MrBaggins]

Huh?

So each city can be linked to 5 production-or-food-or-income-for-no-population-requirement-colonys. Lets see... that would limit the player to 200-300 of these powerful colonies or so by mid to late game.

I.E. No limit at all.

They have to be toned down. I like the idea, to allow good collection... and maybe a "fortress" idea... where units could be built, and garrisoned, but no resources generated.

[Solver]

Right... and in SMAC, you could build as many of these as you want. It was typical in the early game to boost production with Crawlers and get a bigger army, and in the late game, add huge amounts of income, in order to speed up tech discovery.

[J Bytheway]

Originally posted by Martin Gühmann
Sounds similar to the CTP1 cows, the only problem was that soon you have them the city radius was full of them of course in stacks of nine units. OK I am not shure if the boni were additional but this way you would have been protected from spies and also from enemy units for some turns.

The bonus did not stack. 9 cows were no better than 1 as far as the food income was concerned, and the defense against enemy units by haveing the extra 8 would be minimal.

[The Big Mc]

So people what colonels just for goods and war makes my life easier

[Ekmek]

Colonies would be good if they had an upkeep, as an improvement. I think they'd be used in lieu of cities when your type of govt reached its limit. Which would be great for a colonization scenaio/mod where the Euro powers had a maxed out city limit so they'd have to make colonies (a later tech would let those colonies become cities or allow the city limit upped)

I like the harvester idea, but only if it was one to a tile,and had an upkeep cost. THis could also be a great way to fix the corporate branch. So you set up a corporation in an enemy civs area. Kind of like McD's sprouting up everywhere, another way to get dragged in a war.

[Gilgamensch]

So long as the AI can't use them (which would be the case):

I would say, no way!

It will be just to the advantage of the human.

Allthough as a twist, we could allow them, so long you are not leading , one the human starts leading they will be passed over to the last or second last player (could be AI or human player) this might happen every ~40 gameturns..........

[The Big Mc]

actually the code is almost there for the colonies the ai only has to scan for a good then place the colony at the side so i would say ai implementation would be easy

rough code

make location( x, y)
if location1 has good;
get neighbour (random);
make colony ;
ai public works = - colony cost;

[Gilgamensch]

Maybe for founding colonies, but what shall be the priority for building them?

Or shall it be for free? Not a good idea?

Shall the colony be paid of with PW?

[The Big Mc]

Goods close to your city which is out side the city zoc and which the empire does not posses

coloneis would be a tileimp so they would be paid for by pw or you could add a gold charge but that is for the user to decide

[Gilgamensch]

tileimp, sounds good.

The AI seems to be better with tileimps than with cityplacing/handling.

I would say it shall be (if) a mixture of PW and gold. And actually it shall not be cheap either.

[The Big Mc]

of course

we could also add the tile imp flags for

collects gold
collects production
collects food

for later moders to use

[Gilgamensch]

Sorry misunderstanding:

I meant it shall cost PW and gold.........

for what to collect:

User shall choose.

But the 'income' shall never be more than twice the city-production. (suggestion)

[The Big Mc]

the colony itself will be a tile imp so the mdoer can select how much this imp will cost

[MrBaggins]

Collects HOW MUCH food? HOW MUCH Production? HOW MUCH Gold?

And if you have an unkeep... of gold and production, say, won't this be semi pointless, anyway? I mean... if you get a significant advantage, then its unbalanced, as per SMAC. If its not advantageous enough, then there is no point.

Cities are the best mechanism for basic resource (food/prod/comm) gathering, since there are many checks and balances (not enough, but still...) on them.

[The Big Mc]

The colony implemented will only collect goods

The food production gold will only be flags not implemented in the final colony mod but will be there for other moders who want them

[MrBaggins]

Well, right... you did mention the flag bit. I get that. My question is, still, how do you think that this bonus should be calculated? Based on terrain? Flat value?

[The Big Mc]

Tile based would probably be the best way to go

[child of Thor]

For it to be a TI it would have to be more like a modified fortress - with the ability to open the good to the trade system in the game. TI's need to be within your city boudaries, except for the fortress.
The advantages could be kept low using high cost in PW to place plus as a TI it can be pillaged by the enemy - so it would require defending.
My feelings are that this would a nice addition IF the general trade system can be improved to the point whereby trade goods are more than just a means to get more money(as its easy to get alot anyway), along the lines of having them as prerequisites for certain build items? Those are my initial feelings, but i agree with Mr.Baggins that it shouldn't just be a way for the player to get lots 'more' for the sake of it.

[The Big Mc]

i also have a master plan for goods goods in my idea have bonus effects for the city collecting them as well as the city buying them

wood for example will increases production in the host city however this effect would be limited to the first and second age then the good wood becomes a luxury item and gives the host city a happy bonus

same for over goods

However some goods will have to be removed altogether i still can't understand why there is the giant squid good it is totally inedible and it is not like you can make a chair from it