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  • ECONOMICS/TRADE ( vers 1.3 ) HOSTED BY: HAREL

    <u>ECONOMICS/TRADE ( vers 1.3 )</u>

    Hosted by Harel

    Hello again! Time for a new version. This time I tried to group things better, into more catagories. I think you would find it much easier to understand and read the points suggested. I also tried to combine ideas, and think of a way it can be implamnted in the game. AND tried to dig up VERY old ideas, and looked up to a year back in the old forums. ( I am still sure I forgot some ideas ).
    As ever, feel free to post anything, and if i forgot something, let me know!
    ( and guys, you have no idea how much time this took )

    A. Resoucrce managments.
    B. Economy in general
    C. Trade in general
    D. Caravan issues
    E. Trade and diplomacy
    F. List of posters


    A. Resource managment

    1. Option A: keep the shield system as normal.

    2. Option B: make two "general" values: labor and minerals. Labor is equal 1 per every citizen, minerals are produced by mines. Factories and such increase labor, not minerals.

    3. Option C: insteed of one "overall" value, minerals, use 3 basic resources: fuel, metal and exotic. Special tiles can give a bonus to a certain mineral production.

    4. Option D: have commodities, ala colonization. End amount of around 20, and evolve them as time progress ( bows replaces by muskets, etc. ). Request and demand makes the value of each commodity flux all the time: much like in stock exchange.

    5. Option E: use Imperliasm II system, with the roads, mines on the tiles, etc.
    ( In otpion B,C,D the cocnept of "labor" being different then resource exist ).

    6. You can build a "carrier" unit which function like master of orion freighter ships. They automaticly move X items to a required city. For example, if you build 3 "carrier" you can pass up to 3 minerals from city A that produce many minerals, to city B that have a great labor party. When you "activted" a carrier unit ( by giving her work ), it cost you 1 gold unit. The exchange is done automaticly: any surplus minerals are automaticly passed to were they are needed the most. ( maybe you can also pass food this way? ).

    7. Have two specialist: one to increase labor ( 2 insteed of 1 ), and a miner who gives +25% to mining.

    8. Having a large variaty of trade goods increase the happiness and economy of your people.

    9. Since the automatic delivery carrier units from A.6 are not very realistic, you should be able to group regions, a number of cities into a shared pool of resources. The higher you are on the tech tree, the bigger the region can be ( in term of range and number of cities in the region ).

    10. A development to A.9 is a new building called "regional headquarters". When you build it, you select a several cities which must be connected to the home town via roads, river, etc. Now, all those cities act like one city: bonus from wonders or city strcutres are given to all cities ( only from the home town. A minor town can't effect the other ones. So, if the minor town has a temple, NO city [ not even herself ] shell get the bonus. If the temple was at the home town, all the cities would have gotten the bonus ). Popultion, food, labor, all are pooled like it's one big city. ( seems very, very un-balanced. Maybe make the support cost for that building HUGE? )

    11. Specail resource should be handled like Birth of the federation dilitium mines. In Birth, several rare solar system had dilitium mines. You can only produce a military unit per mine, even if it doesn't have to be in the same city. Meaning? If you have two mines, you can produce up to two ships, at the same time, max. In civ III, you could have some rare tiles with special resource, like coal, oil or uranium. The name is not important. Point is, you need that support to create a military unit. ( or, maybe, only a fixed number of more powerful units ).

    12. You should be able to place several workers on each tile, but every new one would produce less then the original one ( anyone has any idea how can be graphicly displayed?

    13. Support for units, ofcoruse, would only got materials, not labor.

    14. Another idea is to scrap commodites: the items can be represnted by labor. How? If you are in industrial era and got a coal tile, insteed of trading with coal you simply get a bonus to production. A dye tile, or gold, for give a bonus to trade.

    15. An improvement to A.14: if you got a special trade tile that no other country has, you gain a very big trade bonus.

    B. Economy in general

    1. You can buy your units from a black market for a cheapr price, but it would cost you in repution ( maybe in -1 police or -1 corruption? ).

    2. You can hire mercenries ( extra morale, extra support units? )

    3. AI players as companies, and human players can play a company. In older times it could represent arsitocarts and noble-man. Maybe even allow pirates as players? You have a limited form with companies: can only create contracts with them. ( only in a free market? )

    4. To show the burden of war, you need to pay an X amount of money every turn. When you end the war, that cost is decreesed along time ( maybe this can be represented by increased supply cost? Or readiness level like in CtP? ).

    5. You should have BUDGETS, like in real life. The bonus gotten from libaries, for example would be decided by how much you put in Eductation. That money is divided between all libaries and universties. The higher the gold per institue, the bigger bonus they give. Hospitels bonus by health, wealthfare gives happiness ( divided by all the populs, like Luxary ), military would be divided between the support cost of all units and dedice what morale bonus/minus you get, etc. ( In democracy/republic, the senate should demand a minimum portion to some section. Suggested sections: Science ( labs and science rate ), Eduction ( libaries, universties ), Health ( hospitels ), Military ( military infra-structre and units ), Internal affairds ( Police, intelligence and reducing un-rest ), Wealthfare ( happiness bonus, like luxary ), Transportion ( Support of road tiles and Mans transpot building ), Construction ( reserve money to buy city building and wonders ), Arts ( support for wonder ), Argiculture ( support for farms ), Religon ( the bonus for temples ) and Trade ( caravans are bought of a pool created here ).

    6. Cities should be able to build several times, with slider bar to decide how much labor each section gets.

    7. The city tile ( center ) doesn't produce anything, but it does give +1 trade/farm/mine to all near-by hexs.

    8. Docks, railroads, farms and such can be simply bought, or use a system like CtP public works. If B.5 idea is used, you can buy the improvement from the budget pool available to that improvment section.

    9. Inter-city resoruce level should dictate the amount of minerals a city can produce without lost. In earlier times, it took lots of time to bring the ores from the distant mines to the city. High amount of resources can flood the system. You should have a "max-per-tile" output: a farm can't prodcue more then 2, a mine no more then 3, etc. As technology advance, you can build special structre which can increase the maximum level of output. A tile with a road or river in it can has a max+1 ( notice! If a farm can max produce 4, it doesn't mean she always produce 4. Only that she can't produce more. If the farm had a river, beyond the bonus to farming she could produce a max of 5 ).

    10. If commodites are used, they can be deptled.

    11. Ofcourse, you should have build queue.

    12. The economy should flux, like in real life. Every turn, a number between +1 to -1 would dedcide the level of your income ( maybe a +1 or -1 to the economy Social change? ). This should effect free market countries more then controled market ones. ( double to bonus/minus for free market, half the bonus/minus for planned one? ). The number isn't totaly random, and slowly move up and down. If you are doing well, more chance the number would go up.

    13. Buy off limiting: if you have commodities, you may only buy the resources ( twice the amount of resource in gold ), but still have to build it with labor. If still using shields, you may only pay to double the construction cost, no more.

    14. Once you gain insdustralization, you shouldn't be able to set any tax setting at any extream ( 100/0 lux, 100/0 science, etc. ).

    C. Trade in general

    1. You may "raid" trade routes. This is either standing in an area where a trade route pass, or where caravan passes in a close radii. A certain percent would be lost from money and resource profit. The amount would be dictated by the raiding unit quality, quantity and adaptbility ( a pirate can do better then a scout plane ). The raid option would be available to every combat unit: you select a spot and press R. Spys can destroy the trade routes competly, killing the caravan. Raiding is an act of war.

    2. Keep trade just like SMAC: fully automatic.

    3. You should be able to trade with barbian cities.

    4. The higher your technology level above the level of the second side, the more bonus you get to profit. However, it increase the research rate of the second side on every tech you have and he doesn't.

    5. If you use a commodity system ( see A.2,A.3,A.4 ), trade basicly gives you minerals, not money. However, you should still get a small amount of money for creating the deal. If you don't have a commodity ( using civ II old shield system ), then trade should give you some shield bonus as well. However, the goverment still guys a cut by taxes.

    6. On a general note, trade should be much more profitable. Some countries were based only on trade. AI should also use trade much more then he is now.

    7. Inertial trade: every city can have an X amount of trade routes. Cities can estibled intertial trade routes to pass to swap them between themself. Meaning? Cities around your empires which are inland, can estblish a trade route to a major harbor city. That habor city can now support her original trade routes + what the other cities passed her. This can even be a chain-reaction: from city A to city B to city C... etc.

    8. Trade inside your empire it done automaticly ( you get a small, auto bonus, like SMAC ). Outside trade is done by trade routes. This works well with idea A.7: you can move all your "trade power" to a several cities which are in a good spot to do mass trade.

    9. Black market: in a high corruption city, some of the trade routes you have turn "rouge": they give you no income. Even if you lower the crime rate they don't disappeer: you need military units to route them. ( according to idea B.3 on the pirates, they become the properity of a pirate AI and give him income ).

    10. All trade will be automaticly ruled by the trade advisor. He builds the caravans, send them, etc. You can see this moving around the map. However, you can give his special guidelines: what not to trade, what you want him to try to get the most, what you want despertly to get rid off, etc.

    11. As your market and goverment becomes more free, more of the trade options become automatic.

    12. Some wonders and city structres should increase trade profit ( local or global ) generated by caravans. Some wonders should also increase caravan speed to increase the usefullness of early trade.

    13. As strange as this sound, cities with a big food production should give a small bonus to trade. Cuisine is a very important thing for trade and tourism, and big city which makes lots of surplas food would probaly create some new sort of kitchen.

    14. Showing the trade routes graphcily would be a pure mess. Create an economic map where you see all the trade routes. Better yet, make caravan on the map invisible to all but on the economic map.

    15. Trade goods should be a conversion of minerals to goods ( by labor ) and sold automaticly for profit.

    16. How about that insteed of building caravans, we would have a building ( depot, warehouse, etc ) that automaticly generate trade? You get +1 gold per every city in a certain range from you ( increased with technology ). Like idea C.7, it would be inertial - city A is close to 5 cities and city B. City B is close to a DIFFERENT 5 cities. Therefor, since city A is connected to city B, BOTH would get +11 gold ( ten cities +the other city, A or B ), and so does all the other 10 cities. with idea E.1, you can pay to be able to use the depot of side B city to gain access to a new batch of cities, gaining a very high bonus. Side B would get a cut of all profit gotten this way ( reflects very well the great importance of harbor cities that , more then trading themself, traded for others. Like Constantinopol ).

    17. Trade technology: if you trade with a civ that doesn't have trade, he automaticly gets it. Before you discover currency, any trade is X items for X itmes ( barter system ). Only after currency are you able to trade, for example, 100 wood for 10 iron.

    D. Caravans issues

    1. Caravans should move automatcily. They generate money after X turns it takes them to move. For example, if it would take the caravan 5 turns to reach the city, then the bonus would be automitcly given. Beside building the unit and sending it, you can't control her. Since there is no path-finding or graphics, we can support tons of caravans.

    2. You should have special kinds of caravan: one on boat, a plane, etc.

    3. The caravans automaticly moves to the most profitable city upon completion ( in comptution of range, size and ETA ).

    4. Caravans are not built: you gain one per X number of popultion. They are only replaced when they die.

    5. Caravans can build "trade posts", that acts like a airport and fortress, and gives a trade bonus to near-by cities ( only on border-region tiles ).

    6. Have a better version of caravan, a one who carry finished goods. Cost more but gains more profit.

    7. Caravans can bring support to besieged cities. Side A ( you ), gives side B food when under attack from side C. You get a very big profit, and the attitude of Side B toward you is increased greatly, and your repution. Side C, however, becomes more hostile to you.

    8. You can have the caravans moes by fixed way-point.

    9. You can give caravans military support: either ordering a combat unit to protect the caravans, or build a new type of caravan: "armed covoy", which is 2/2/2 but cost about three times more.

    10. A caravan acts like a limited spy: trade routes slowly reveal the enemy known maps.

    11. Caravan, when helping a wonder, should decreese the cost of the production, not give extra shield. Thier bonus is given by offering new apporch to construction.

    12. If you got free-market, you can "hire" privateers to trade for you. You pay no construction cost, only a fixed support cost in gold. You also get a lower cut of the profit.

    E. Trade in diplomacy

    1. Free-pass trade: allow your caravans ( only ) to go over the side B to trade. Side B get a cut of the profit.

    2. Fixed trade: a swap that occurs every turn: you give X items to side B, side B gives X items to you. Can also trade food.

    3. Embargo: you may ask side B to cancel all trade with side C, in a UN meeting or on direct contact.

    4. Funded trade: side A gives side B a sum of money to build caravans. Side B trades with side C, and side A get's a cut of the trade profit.

    5. War automaticly destories all trade routes: caravan return to thier home city.

    6. Trade increase the diplomatic realtion between the two nations.

    7. Trade treaty: like Master of orion II, signing this treaty gives an automatic trade bonus. Caravans are not needed. Another way, is that you use caravans till a certain tech level ( railroads? or maybe advanced sea navigation? ), and after that it's automaticly done via the diplomacy screen.

    8. Demand monopoly: you can demand from a certain country to only buy a specfic commodity from you. Therefor, allowing you to greatily increase the cost. Microsoft rings a bell? ( see Idea A.5. ).

    9. Ask for harbor: you can pay Side B to build for you a habor or airport in his terratory.

    F. List of posters

    Special thanks: Pythagoras.

    Bab5tm, Bubba, Bulrathi, CapTVK, Chowlett, Colon, Crashn, DanS, Delcuze, Dinoman2, Diodorus Sicilus, Don don, Druid, E, Ecce Homo, Eggman, Ember, EnochF, Flavor dave, Fugi the great, Gregurabi, Gordon the whale, Hans2, Harel, Isle, Itokugawa, Jakester, JamesJKirk, Jele2, Kaiser, Kerris, Kryllon, Korn469, Lancer, Maniac, Matthew, Mark_everson, Mindlace, NotLikeTea, Prefect, Scooter, Sir David, Stefu, Technophile, Theban, Trachymr, Utrecht, VaderTwo, ZenOn, Zorloc
    <font size=1 face=Arial color=444444>[This message has been edited by Harel (edited August 02, 1999).]</font>
    "The most hopelessly stupid man is he who is not aware he is wise" Preem Palver, First speaker, "Second Foundation", Isaac Asimov

  • #2
    Thanks for the summary, Harel.

    I'd like to suggest an option between C and D in resource management: Have more than 3 natural resources, but don't worry about manufactured commodities. Natural resources can still be traded, but all the nightmare with manufactured goods, where to manufacture them, how to manufacture them, what to do with them, how to transport them, whether to store them, etc.

    The natural resources could still be grouped more or less into 3 categories, but would be further divided.

    Fuel: instead of being abstracted to oil/gas/coal, make it oil, gas, and coal. Each requires different techs to become useful, and their use makes different amounts of pollution. Shortly after these become useful in making units, they are also required by cities, with a happiness penalty if not supplied.

    Material: Here are Wood, Iron, Stone, Copper/Bronze, Bauxite, Uranium, and maybe one or two others. Wood or stone are required for the expansion of cities, and the metals are used primarily for units. Perhaps even go back further in history than bronze working, and allow units that require stone for production?

    Exotic/trade: It's not really exotic if it's growing in your civ, is it? These are numerous, and the particulars are not important. Gold, Silver, Gems, Spices, Salt are the obvious choices. Cash crops, a TI, could make similar goods: Tobacco, Silk, Cotton, Sugar, Indigo. These would all be traded as the trade goods in Civ2 (or, more accurately, CtP? I never played it). Better if the caravan never had to be built, though. Trade through roads, as in the summary. However, don't let routes go for infinite distances. It would be too easy to build a network of roads on a continent (everyone does it anyways) that would be making WAY too much money. Instead, add in a component for diminished returns over distance, but make cities in between add to the maximum distance.

    ember and I were discussing how to purchase production in a split-resource system, at the very end of the last thread. I suggested you could buy, as 1 gold per, as many resources or industry as you were already producing. ember suggested that this be a sliding scale, where you gould buy 50% of your produce at 1 per, another 50% at 2 per, another 50% at 3 per (or is this one 4 per?), etc. I think that's a good idea, ember. Still, the actual values need to depend upon SE choices. To repeat my previous example, in a Socialist economy, production is largely controlled by the government; in CIV, socialist countries get a bonus to industry and resources. However, this means that there isn't so much private industry to hire in times of need, so a socialist country would not be able to get as much of a bonus.

    There definately needs to be a limit on stored resources. AND a turn-by-turn decay. I don't think you should be able to build up huge reserves, that's not the way it really works. If terrain tiles get depleted (and it would be neat if they did) then resources above your production needs and capacity of storage facilities are considered not even harvested. Each city should be able to store 5 or 10 of each resource per each point of population, which can be increased with the production of a Warehouse facility, which would have increased capacity for all goods, to avoid complexity. (maybe just double the production of the city.)

    Comment


    • #3
      Sorry, Double post.
      <font size=1 face=Arial color=444444>[This message has been edited by Gordon the Whale (edited August 02, 1999).]</font>

      Comment


      • #4
        If you have a turn-by-turn decay of stockpiled resources and food, a maximum capacity is not as imortant. If the ecay rate is 10% and there is 100 units surplus, the max stockpile is 1000 units, and it will take a long time (never) to reach that amount. In 10 turns you have reached only 2/3 the max.
        year 1: lose 0, add 100 = 100
        year 2: lose 10, add 100 = 190
        year 3: lose 19, add 100 = 271
        year 4: lose 27, add 100 = 344
        year 5: lose 34, add 100 = 410
        year 6: lose 41, add 100 = 469
        year 7: lose 47, add 100 = 522
        year 8: lose 52, add 100 = 570
        year 9: lose 57, add 100 = 613
        year 10: lose 61, add 100 = 651
        (numbers are rounded off)

        Graneries and such could jsut affect the rate of decay, to produce a similair effect to a higher max stock.

        The point on costs more to add more resources is for illustration. The 50% blocks would be a different amount for different SE.

        On regions. The building in the capital shouldnt affect all cites, with a few exceptions. When you build a temple the AI chosses a location, based on where it would be best suited(you can change it). It builds it in that location, affecting that city. Some improvments are regional in effect, like a stock market, or superhighways. Most woders could be limited to a region to avoid some aspects of ICS.

        ------------------
        "Any technology, sufficiently advanced,
        is indistinguishable from magic"
        -Arthur C. Clark
        "Any technology, sufficiently advanced,
        is indistinguishable from magic"
        -Arthur C. Clark

        Comment


        • #5
          Just want to say cathedrals took indeed centuries to build.
          BTW, doesn't your post belong in City Improvements?
          Contraria sunt Complementa. -- Niels Bohr
          Mods: SMAniaC (SMAC) & Planetfall (Civ4)

          Comment


          • #6
            Gregurabi- Check out my post in radical ideas, fairly near the end as of now, I think, about how to look at who it is that you are being in Civilization. It makes the current system make much more sense.

            I'm not sure I like the idea of sharing city improvements within a region. (this must belong in city improvements, too... everything overlaps) Resources amd military support, I can handle, but I don't know about ALL city improvements... Maybe some (cathedral) could be shared, whereas others (granary) would have to be built individually.

            Comment


            • #7
              I like Gordon's idea of an point in between C and D on resources.

              My original idea is to have resource/commodity catagories, differentiated by tech level (or age). Thus one resource would be fuel, with a progression of:
              firewood
              animal oils
              coal
              petrolium
              uranium
              geothermal

              Additionally certain techs will be able to provide power (shields?) without using resources:
              Water/windmill
              windfarm
              Dam
              Solar plant
              etc...

              jbw

              Comment


              • #8
                A new method for populaation growth.

                The population of cities are recorded as x.xxx. This allows fractional population points. The fraction has no gameplay effect until it reaches the next number. It allows groth rates to be experesed as an increase per turn. Attacks that hit population centers can now do fractional pop. points of damage. maybe 0.1 or 0.05 per hit.

                The purpose of this proposal is to seperate growth from straight food production.
                Growth rates can be expressed as a percentage per turn, (eg 2.5%) to give a familiar sort of look. What this means for gameplay terms is that 0.025 pop points are added every year. This gives a groth of 40 turns.

                Pop is recorded as fractional points, but it is easy to convert that to a real pop number.
                The formula:
                Actual pop = 5000 x (pop points + 0.5)^2 - 1250
                Follows the civx model exactly for whole numbers, and can give good values for fractional numbers.

                Effects on population growth. All numbers are arbitray and should vary depending on SE choices and tech. This system is desigend to be compatable with the idea of villages.

                I have made use of a 'happyness rating', which is (#happy - #unhappy) / # total. This gives 0 for all content, 100 for all happy, and -100 for all unhappy. This can be applied to a city, a region, a civ or the entire world.

                Base growth: 10%
                Happyness : + city happyness / N. N depends on SE.
                villages : + 0.2% per village
                medicine : + 2%
                etc.

                Immigration. To take into account people moving around in your civ and between civs.
                The advantages of including this is that large unhappy cites will tend to slow down growth or shrink, while your smaller cities will pick up the extra people.

                In civ immigration = (city happyness - civ happyness) / Y. Y depends on SE and the overall level of transportation availabble. In cty immigation tends to have larger volume than between civs.

                between civs migration = (city happyness - world happyness) / Z. Z depends on SE and transport of all players. For this calcualtion government types can influence the happyness used. democracy might add 10 points, while communism subtarcts 10 points, to reflect that democracies never have had problems with too many people trying to flee from them.

                Wonder: Iron curtain. Prevents all between civ emmigration. (for gameplay all cities count as average happyness level)


                ------------------
                "Any technology, sufficiently advanced,
                is indistinguishable from magic"
                -Arthur C. Clark
                "Any technology, sufficiently advanced,
                is indistinguishable from magic"
                -Arthur C. Clark

                Comment


                • #9
                  Timber
                  Stone
                  Silver
                  Iron
                  Coal
                  Oil

                  I don't see why it should be any more complicated than that. Bauxite, for example, becomes a substitute for iron in the post-industrial economy. Copper is initially a "substitute" for iron, which isn't discovered until later. Just treat both as minor sources of the generalized "iron."

                  It may be hard to reduce it from these categories. In general, one can't be substituted for any of the others. The difference between coal and oil is worth starting wars over (Japan in WW2).

                  Comment


                  • #10
                    ember, I'm glad you worked out a immigration model, but couldn't you insert my SE Culture factor in it, please?
                    Contraria sunt Complementa. -- Niels Bohr
                    Mods: SMAniaC (SMAC) & Planetfall (Civ4)

                    Comment


                    • #11
                      I'm copying this, which I posted recently in the CTP suggestions forum.

                      During a war, the state may claim a higher percentage of the production output of the private factories. Thus, while the factories aren't really producing any more than they were during peace time, they're now producing more tanks and fewer tractors.

                      I think the Civ games do a damned poor job of modeling the interactions between public and private sectors. Why is the government building a church in every city? And why does the construction of this church take centuries and prevent the simultaneous construction of military weaponry and the training of soldiers? Buildings like temples, banks, etc. should simply appear when market forces bring about conditions in which they are needed/useful. They should be supported entirely by the private sector -- no drain on the state treasury. In fact, the state should BENEFIT from them through taxation. By changing the tax rates you levy against the private sector, you can encourage growth and investment (lower taxes) or siphon money into public projects (higher taxes, giving you (the state) the capital necessary for police/military, civil engineering like public roads, etc.).

                      Even SimCity has a better model than Civ1/Civ2/CTP. (Note: I haven't played SMAC.)

                      So... depending on your military readiness setting (or other factors, whatever works), you might be able to usurp a certain amount of production capacity from private industries. Modifying existing factories to produce military hardware should require some time, but once all of the adjustments are in place, weapons can be mass-produced much more quickly. Of course, this leaves fewer consumer goods, so that would have to be modeled -- unhappiness is one way, but there should be greater long-term ramifications on the economy. At a minimum, industrial efficiency should drop -- a lot of those consumer goods that aren't being produced any more would have gone back into the industrial infrastructure and fuel the economy. With their quantities reduced, industrial output should slow down -- just a bit at first, but it should accelerate as the war continues.

                      (If I remember correctly, the USSR had this problem -- after a while, they were spending something outrageous on their military -- over 50% of their GNP, wasn't it? But they got diminishing returns over time, and the economy collapsed.)

                      Comment


                      • #12
                        M@ni@c, why not add it in yourself? It's not like ember owns the idea... If he(she?) wanted to keep it exactly how he thought of it, he wouldn't have posted it in a forum. For those of us who don't want to leave this thread, explain the SE Culture choice.

                        I think it's a good idea, ember, especially as far as fractional population growth. The only thing that worries me about the i/emmigration factor is processor time. There are lots of nice effects that could be made by summin gup all sorts of things at the end of each turn, but a lot of them can end up really CPU heavy. This one only requires: determine the happiness of each city, take average by civs, take world average, compare averages, add/take away citizens. If I'm correct, you don't need to keep track of where a citizen from city a goes... There ends up being the right number anyways. However, if ethnicity/religion is implemented, which you didn't suggest but I, tentatively, am, in relation to this immigration/emmigration scheme, you end up with a lot of stuff to keep track of.

                        On resources: Splitting into

                        lumber
                        stone
                        iron
                        silver
                        coal
                        oil

                        Does represent all the necessary components. Indeed, it looks like you are dividing into:

                        Temporary building material/primative fuel
                        Permanent building material
                        Practical Metal
                        Trade goods
                        mid-grade fuel
                        high-grade fuel

                        Which is an excellent way to divide if this were a game about a single city, or in a single time period, etc. And it would work, and better than the "shield" system. But I like the idea of a city that's vital in the bronze age becoming backwater in the iron age, because those copper mines are now almost useless. Definately, no civilization will be using bronze AND iron extensively at the same time, but if both exist, and the discovery of iron working prompts a switch, that is, to me, a worthwhile part of gameplay. For silver/other trade goods, I think it's even more important to have lots of variety. These should be where those trade routes come from. They aren't exactly "resources," because you con't use them to build things, but as new deposits are discovered and trends come and go, their worth on the world market waxes and wanes. Someone who's played it, was this the system used in CtP, and did it seem to work?

                        Comment


                        • #13
                          The following is a post I made a while back in the SE thread.

                          6) Culture

                          Some threads ago, I said culture would determine population happiness. I've made that a separate SE factor.

                          1)Culture determines how much it costs for you to bribe a unit or a city.

                          2)If a neighbour civ has a lower culture rate, his cities become slowly and automatically converted to your culture. Cities converted to your culture get your city stile. If two civs already have the same city stile, I don't know yet what should represent the conversion. If the capital is converted you get a higher Diplomacy rate. If that civ attacks you, the citizens of the converted city become unhappier = lower happiness rate.

                          3)A civ with a high culture rate has more population immigration from other countries.
                          Immigration : citizens from other civs migrating to your civ. Immigration/emigration has been suggested in the 'City Growth' thread in Civ3-General/suggestions.
                          Im- and emigration should depend on your culture rate and the happiness of the concerning city.

                          4) A high Nationalism(=Probe) rate lowers emigration. This is to simulate the Iron Curtain( or whatever it's called in English).

                          5) Your culture rate determines how long it takes for conquered cities to assimilate to your culture and cause less happiness.
                          In SMAC it was 50 turns. For every +Culture you have more than the city of the previous owner, the city needs 10 less turns to assimilate.
                          If you have a lower Culture rate, the city doesn't adapt. Means more unhappiness and increases the likelyness of revolting and forming a new civ.

                          6) Can't say numbers. Testplaying needed.

                          maximum+6
                          +? : less money needed for bribing; immigrating people from lower cultures; conversion if higher culture; fast assimilation

                          -? : possible emigration and conversion if lower culture; no assimilation if lower culture
                          minimum-5
                          [This message has been edited by M@ni@c (edited August 02, 1999).]
                          I hope you have some use out of it.
                          Contraria sunt Complementa. -- Niels Bohr
                          Mods: SMAniaC (SMAC) & Planetfall (Civ4)

                          Comment


                          • #14
                            M@ani@c:
                            Sounds like your culture factor is basically anouther way of determining civ happyness for immigration purposes.
                            It looks interesting, but I'm not terribly concerend about ethnicity and such, I actually feel that it would be an complexity that would not help gameplay.
                            If you want to figure out how to calculate the various immigration percentages, feel free, but I don't really have a feel for it, so I can't.


                            Resources:
                            Building materials. Only really need one here. If you really want at modren ceramics and composits.
                            Trade goods should not be resources in the building units sense. Don't need to get 3 silver from that hill...
                            Iron/bronze
                            Advanced alloys (upgarde from Iron)
                            Ancient fuels, up to coal
                            Modern fuels, oil and uranium.
                            6 catergories, of which only 3 are used at a time.
                            Can even call them the same things throughout, but change the production value of each square with certain techs:

                            Building materials
                            Metals
                            Fuels

                            only 3 needed. To me that is the most that is managable.

                            ------------------
                            "Any technology, sufficiently advanced,
                            is indistinguishable from magic"
                            -Arthur C. Clark
                            "Any technology, sufficiently advanced,
                            is indistinguishable from magic"
                            -Arthur C. Clark

                            Comment


                            • #15
                              I am not afraid of complication, especially when it can improve play. Somewhere in the strategies forum a civer mentioned a scenario-like rules.txt change for MP:
                              • Make oil (or some other special terrain resource) worth some huge amount of shields and trade (10 each).
                              • Watch the wars fought over them!
                              Making certain resources worth extracting for trade, and some few worth fighting over, can improve play. You might make stone and brick the most generic resource (like "shields"), available as needed with sufficient labor to extract it, but it must be modeled. Timber should be separate from stone as a resource.
                              • You can't build ships, seige engines, or wagons (necessary for large scale military units) out of stone or brick!
                              • There are large areas of the world without useable timber.
                              • There are areas of the world without quarry stone.
                              • There are some areas without either; brick is all they've got.
                              • Timber can be traded economically at any tech level.
                              • Timber can be can be used for fuel and, with moderate tech, naval stores and other derivatives.
                              Coal must be separate from oil as a resource.
                              • Coal (or lignite, or even poorer substitute peat) can be extracted and utilized in its raw form at any tech level.
                              • The usefulness of crude oil and amount extractable is proportional to some function of tech level.
                              • Oil also requires investment in facilities to use and to process for use, chiefly wrt/internal combustion engines.
                              • There are large areas without coal, or oil, or both; trade ensues.
                              • Oil is so necessary to the late industrial era that wars are fought over it.
                              Precious stones, metals, etc. should be resources in their own right.
                              • They (and goods made from them) are the only trade materials that have intrinsic value out of proportion to usefulness.
                              • They inspire trade or war far more than common resources or goods made from common resources (except oil).
                              Trace metals, including uranium, could be handled as generic resources. You would never really need more than one "shield" (or whatever)/turn of each type for an entire civ. If your civ has a major source you can use more than one unit, but it doesn't get you anything special. The Soviet Union had abundant titanium and they could build entire submarine hulls. It gave the Alpha class a depth advantage, but that's it.

                              Note to users and staff: UBB numbered list function isn't working correctly.
                              <font size=1 face=Arial color=444444>[This message has been edited by don Don (edited August 07, 1999).]</font>

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