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Civ 4 the List: General Ideas

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  • Civ 4 the List: General Ideas

    Introduction

    Here's the section for General Ideas, Ideas that either transcend all the other categories, or just don't quite fit under any of the other topics.

    Thanks for reading,
    -List Threadmaster DarkCloud

    Summary

    Well, the best way to read this section is to read the titles, as varied as they are because they’ll give you some idea of what you’re up against. The ideas are so varied that it’s hard to give a summary to this section. This is where everything that did not quite fit went to ‘fit’ itself.

    Related Threads

    Growth - Should it be Related to Food, frenzyfol
    Terrorism, grap 1705
    Advisors and Magistrates, skycommando
    Get Rid of Building Every Improvement Everywhere, polypheus

    Index

    1.0.0- Radical Ideas; Game Structure
    2.0.0- Animation/Theming/Graphics
    3.0.0- Automation/Programming
    4.0.0- Characterization/Historical/Realistic
    5.0.0- Maps/Display
    Conclusion

    The Ideas

    1.0.0 Radical Ideas; Game Structure

    1.1.0 Scenario/ Civ-Splitting/ Complete Reworking of Civ-Rules/Structure

    *From another thread, the first time you play Civ4, only a few large, major civs are available to start with, such as Chinese, Semites, Indoeuropeans. To keep from having the same exact group of civs for the whole game, there would be breakoffs. Indoeuropeans can split into Romans, Celts, Germans, Slavs, Indians, etc. The idea for winning the game would be to have the culture group created by you and your breakoffs control the world. On your next game, either the first generation of breakoffs or all breakoffs for that last game are available to start with. The civs you identify with would tend to be created because of the civs you previously chose. Ingame, give the player a message when a minor civ breaks off, asking if you want it to become a playable civ for future games. When this happens, give the player a readout of the civ's stats to edit if desired, or stats could be filled out later in the editor.

    *Traits chosen for your political party become standard traits for breakoff civs. Maybe combine and balance political traits with civ traits.

    *Semites can split into Hebrews, Egyptians, Hyksos, Berbers, Babylonians. Hebrews split into Israelites, Arabs, Midianites, Edomites. Judah can split off from Israel. Maybe Israel splits into a separate civ for each of Jacob's wives. Maybe Rachel and Leah start as one splitoff. Leah splits into Judah, Simeon, Reuben, etc. Judah splits into Zarah, Phares, and Shelah, or Sephards and Ashkenazi. Arabs split into Libyans, Saudis, Iraqis.

    *There can be confederacies, such as Switzerland, and the Philipines can be treated as one too. A confederacy is a group of minor tribes that start near each other. It is assumed that they will use diplomacy to merge eventually. The Philipines would only show up on a large Far East or random map. They could also have their own scenario. The Swiss could be a cohesive civ on any map or a confederacy on a large random map. They could have their own scenario or be part of a German scenario.

    *Using a similar system to GalCiv, have standard traits for each civ plus the player chooses extra traits for a political party or a specific leader, and these bonus traits could be lost with a change of politics. The player can set a number of points for all civs in the game.

    Macroculturegroups: Africa, Asia, America, Europe.

    Africa: East, North, West, Central.

    Asia: Arab, Mesopotamia, Central, Far East, Caucasus, Southeast, India, Himilayas, Palestine.

    America: Eastern Woodlands, Great Plains, Southwest, California, Mesoamerica, South America

    Europe: Iberia, German, Celtic, British Isles, Scandinavia, Slavic, Italic, Balkan, Alps.

    Independant medium- level culture groups: Pacific, Arctic, Siberia (with overlap).

    Currently I say anywhere from 8 to 64 Major civs and about 200 minors. I don't care if the civs I like have uniqueness, but I want most of them to have plenty of city names.

    (Ed: This idea would work as a special scenario for civ and would really change the game mechanics. Personally, I don't think it would add much, but it would certainly inject a more arcade-feel into the game and be something completely new!)
    -Brent

    In pregame setup, be able to specify that each culture group start on its own landmass, or group them by hemisphere. Maybe be able to give each civ its own landmass. Be more precise with culturally linked starting locations. Maybe have an optional small cookie cutter starting region for each civ that could be inserted into random maps, but on large maps make sure most of thje map is random and disallow cookie cutter starting regions on small maps.
    -Brent

    1.2.0 Weather

    I think it would be kewl to add climate values to terrain types and setting a probability to that tile that weather behaves a certain way during an action and possibly during a non-action. Having earthquakes, storms, tornadoes, tsunami's could be cool, especially during a battle. There would have to be an indicator for you to know what that probability is at that time
    -Japher

    1.3.0 Events

    Events
    -El Awrence

    1.4.0 Border Wars

    Border skirmishes, international incidents, whatever you want to call them. Reduce the chance of an AI declaring war when that exploring warrior gets knocked off or settler team gets bopped from 100% to, well, something less. Basically, it gives the victim a chance to avoid severe harm by backing down, while retaining the opportunity to open up a can on the perpetrator, depending on the situation. It also adds an element of decision, not only with the obvious "Carthage just knocked off my settler, but do I really want to tangle with mercs before I have iron?", but also with how close you may want to tread to the Celt borders and whether or not you want to chance Persia declaring war by hitting the settlers about that grab that juicy spot you've had your eye on.

    Multiple incidents between two civs would have a cumulative effect, increasing the chance of war each time. Attacks within the victim civ's borders would be grounds for automatic declaration, to close some exploit possibilities. Non-war declaring attacks would not be eligible for MGL generation, and possibly not for promotions, either, though I could see a case for allowing them. I have no idea how much tweaking it would take for the AI to be able to use it effectively, but it doesn't seem like it would be much.
    -Solomwi

    1.5.0 Multistates Idea (A la Europa Universalis)

    You start on a POPULATED world with 50-100 tribes.But you will choose only 7-8 main nations (like in "European Universalis"), who will actively develope.All others are just tribes whose business is only protect their home. Every tribe has it's own special units , techs (CONNECTED to global tech tree) and buildings.
    -$TaLuHgPad

    1.6.0 Multinational Corporations

    I think a great feature that could be impliment in Civ 4 is the appearance of Multi National Corperations - they are after all the pinnicle of globalisation.

    Basically my way of implementing would be allowing an advanced City in the Modern age have a small chance each turn that a MNC will setup HQ in thier city.

    The Following things will be eligibility Criteria:
    The Presence of a Bank
    The Discovery of a certain modern age tech
    No resistors
    City size at least 7

    While the following would significantly give you better chance of attracting an MNC:

    The Presence of a Stock Exchange
    The Presence of any Economic wonders (Ie Adam Smiths,Internet ect)
    A High amount of Trade in the City
    A larger population
    The presence of capitalist specialists
    The peace rating of a Country (ie the less war, or preferably no war the better)
    The peace rating of the City (Is it on a warfront? has it been in resistance or disorder?)
    A high national GNP
    The City having Capital status

    Possibly there could be more factors, either way the better the city is geared up trade wise, and the stability overall of the location will give a good chance on any given of getting an MNC. MNC's will provide several trade benefits, at it's simplest they could provide Gold Per Turn benefits, possibly they also could be prerequisites to a Wonder like Wall Street for example. This isnt a gimmick, MNC's are absolutly crucial to the commercial sucess of nations and would compliment a Builder style of play giving players an extra factor to consider.
    -Worthington

    1.7.0 "Managed" Empires over "Expansive" Empires

    Anyone find it annoying that you can't have a small, powerful civilization. As time goes on the Civ. with the most land wins. Management should have a greater impact than geographical size. At least that's how I feel.

    I think that this can exist in many ways:

    • How divided your empire is (the wider...)
    • Frictions (intern and extern) because of conflicts with foreign ideologies
    • Management (think of the Turcs at the end)
    • Cost of newly acquired territory (think of Israel vs Palestine, Soviets in Afghanistan...)
    • etc.

    -Andromel/Trifna

    1.7.1 Traits as a way toward "Managed" Empires

    Micro management trait: Empires with this trait try to manage all details of there empire. As a result does it take them longer to make new cities(settles needs much longer to build) and shall they improve there land at a slower speed. But this micro management improves the efficienty of there cities and terrain improvements allowing them to produce more food/trade.

    city state trait: this empire is completely build arround 1 or a few gigantic cities who have a great amount of autonomy. The huge amount of autonomy of the cities makes there population very happy and let your cities develop there own culture and science increasing the effect of both. But people love there own city so much that it is very hard to convince them to move to another city dramatically lowering the cultural assimilation rate of newly conquered cities.
    -kolpo

    1.8.0 Dark Ages

    Now these may have been suggested before (dark ages almost definitley) but just in case they haven't I figured I'd submit them. Right, firstly I was thinking that all civilizations have their downs as well as ups, so what about a negative version of the golden age? ie, if you suffer many defeats, get into financial trouble (ie. you have to sell off quite a few buildings) you get put into a dark age, where tech slows, cash flow dries up, production grinds to a halt etc.

    Now this could make the game quite punishing, so maybe only include it at higher difficulty levels and maybe make it much less likely after the industrial revolution (or maybe replace it with depression, which only affects finances).
    -Comrade Raoul

    1.9.0 Relating Population Growth to Avaliability of Resources

    1.9.1 Food/ Arable Land

    Personally, I would, for simplicitys sake go with the historical factor of growth being directly related to the proportion of arable land. Those lands with more avaliable food had larger populations than those which did not.
    -DarkCloud

    Food shortages or even only small food surpluses cause extra unhappy citizens.
    The reasons that even small food surpluses would cause an amount of unhappy citizens would be because you can see the food output as the average output over many years, which in overal would be slightly surplus, but while in fact it's a variation of good harvests and famines. The latter would cause unhappiness. These effects could be reduced by building a granary.
    -Maniac

    1.9.1.1 Food is Auto-Traded Throughout the Empire

    Players should be able to vector surplus food towards other cities, via a central 'food pool'! (Therefore, no city would starve, because its surpluses would be sent to nearby cities.)
    -The_Aussie_Lurker

    1.9.1.2 Raw Food into Processed Food

    The second system is by converting 'raw' food into 'processed' or 'manufactured' food. Like increasing food rations, this increases happiness, but reduces population growth (consider processed food as luxury foods and fast food!)
    -The_Aussie_Lurker

    1.9.2 Wealth

    I think that, based on what I see in the real world, population growth should be in part inversely proportional to a city's wealth. Just have a look at some of the poorest cities in the world, and you see that they also have VERY high population growths as well!
    -The_Aussie_Lurker

    1.9.3 Trade

    Many cities grew overnight in what would be Civ 3 terms... the reason for that was trade much more than nearby fields. Food should be something that you provide for the many people who choose to live in your city, not the only reason tha they are there.
    -Fosse

    1.9.3.1 Allow Food to Be Traded!

    Civ 2 Trading Framework worked much better for this desired feature. If you have a "bread basket" city producing bunches of food, you could send a caravan with food to another city in your empire. I miss that ability.
    -Shogun Gunner

    1.9.4 Rural/Urban Population Contribuites to Food Levels

    I was wondering, would it be too complex to separate rural from urban population? The rural pop. would be the one which farms, fishes, and hunts for food; collects mineral resources; and collects lumber. The urban pop. would consist of specialists, artisans, merchants, labourers, and other urban-type occupations. Urban labourers would be the ones who convert resources into 'shields' or production. The other occupations would have their own uses.

    Early city growth would come from rural-to-urban migration (urbanization), triggered by food surpluses. Both (urban and rural) populations would also grow with births minus deaths.

    Certain advances and city improvements could increase the rates of urbanization. Advances which increase the rate of food production, such as crop rotation or the heavy horse plow, would increase urbanization as would industrialization. Improvements, such as factories, would also increase urbanization on a local scale.

    Improvements in nutrition, medicine, sanitation, etc. would decrease death rates (while things such as pollution could increase death rates). Birth control and education would decrease births.

    As far as larger-scale migration goes, people should be drawn to cities along trade routes (including major ports), cities near certain resources (like gold), capital cities, etc.
    -Xorbon

    1) Assume that population goes up as a 'decimal-like' system, rather than a direct integer (as per my earlier post).

    2) Each terrain improvement will have a 'maintainance' cost and a 'population' (read staffing) cost. Also production, education and resource city improvements will have a set 'staffing cost' as well.

    3) A city will be able to build multiple libraries, factories, banks etc. Though multiple copies of an improvement will be subject to the 'law of diminishing returns'.

    4) Each city will have both a city SIZE (which determines if a city is overpopulated or not) and a city population no.

    5) When a city is first built, the vast bulk of your population will be required to forage for food, fish and resources (i.e., working the hexes in your city radius)-this population requirement will increase as you build farms, mines and fisheries on these hexes.

    6) As you build more improvements in your city, though, more of your population will be needed to man these instead. At the same time, as you upgrade your mines, fisheries and farms through the ages, the population costs for these terrain improvements will decline.

    7) The combination of effects described in (6) can very adequately represent the movement of population from rural to urban centres. A time might even come where a city recieves almost ALL of its food and shields from outside sources, and can therefore focus ALL of its population on commerce and/or education.

    8) Of course, due to monetary or resource constraints, you may have too much population for the total number of terrain/city improvements. If this happens, then unemployment will result-which will make the people in that city unhappy.

    9) Another problem is that your population could potentially get larger than your current city size, which will lead to crime and pollution (both of which will lead to unhappiness!)

    10) Migration should occur along trade routes, from high population to low population areas. The rate and direction of these movements, however, would be influenced by some of the factors mentioned by Xorbon-such as happiness, bonus resources, crime/pollution levels/unemployment levels and the like.
    -The_Aussie_Lurker

    1.9.5 Social Engineering Population Growth

    It should be possible to alter population growth through social engineering. For instance, you should be able to set a base 'fertility' rate, from 0-4. Also, the more secular your society, the lower the base fertility rate will be. Lastly, the amount of money you assign to education/science, welfare and health will also impact population growth. Of course, this all comes together with both food and available fresh water to determine TOTAL population growth!
    -The_Aussie_Lurker

    1.9.6 Other Factors

    Growth should be based on real world formulas, with the avilability of food being one of the factors, but not the only one, You should be able to outpace your food supply as your population grows-and thus causing instability.

    1.10.0 "Staffing Buildings" (a la Colonization)

    I would love a system in civ that allowed you to assign workers like in Colonization-each building not only has a resource cost but a staffing cost (so a tiny city will not have a stock exchange no matter what you do), a minimum pop to meet and a number of pop. points minimal to use. You can always assing more pop. point to it, to diversify the economy and increase a specific output. You could also use certain squares of terrain more heavily than others-so fi you want 10 citizens working at a food rich square, you can and production increases. Obviously, tech levels determine how many people you need as a minimum to start a specific structure, how many can staff, how many can be assigned to a structure or square, and what the returns are: example, early in the game you might assing 5 people to farm a square, but the returns decline rapidly with each new on and there is a cap to total production-in the future, a single person would be sufficient to do the same work and even more as technology improves-freeing population up from economic production.

    Obviosuly you need pop points to staff military units, so again, some tiny city in the middle of nowhere, no matter how reasource rich, will not the be the grand military center of your empire.
    -GePap

    2.0.0 Animation/Theming/Graphics

    2.1.0 Animated Leaderheads

    Please, get them out. Hundreds of megabytes for NOTHING. I'd find the atmosphere much more immersive with a simple realistic portrait and richer messages (as opposed to the jokey junk in Civ III).
    -Fosse/GePap/DarkCloud and hopefully many more players

    3.0.0 Automation/Programming

    3.1.0 Game Reporting

    Be able to specify in what order your cities will report: chronological by founding, geographical, alphabetical, by size, by what is reported, other criteria. Have similar options for units.
    -Brent

    3.2.0 Unit Automation

    Be able to automate any aspect of the game.
    -Brent

    3.3.0 PDA Capability

    It would be well taht Civ IV possess utilities for PDAs, in this it could pick up information of the game and with tools, continues playing and later update them to the PC.

    Personally I have created applications in this sense or to allow the use of the code of autosave so that the user can take out more yield of the own game by means of the creation of such applications (always without spirit of lucre).
    -Amom76

    3.4.0 Statistical Editing

    Civ IV should contain more stadistical establishing and intimized ranking, as well as, graphics of progression and comparative of the same one and even others as production of shields or culture of a certain city.
    -Amom76

    3.5.0 Statistics

    Civ IV should posses a database of the games and to offer summaries, stadistics and graphs of differents aspects of the game during the game.

    The database of game of Civ II are very limited, I don't only want to know how many points I obtained in a game. I would like to see a classification of my orderly game for territories or literacy, culture.. and even to observe then in a graph.
    -Amom76

    3.6.0 Tailoring the Game at Startup

    Be able to enter in the desired game length and have the game make suggestions for pregame options. The game can take into account game lengths and options for games you've previously played. It can also scale research and build times for you, and movement rates.

    Have the game make suggestions during setup based on the options you've chosen so far, like which civs would be good rivals for the one you're playing as based on history and game characteristics. Let it make suggestions concerning number of civs and terrain.
    -Brent

    3.7.0 Pattern of City Development

    I think it is really hard and boring to build in EVERY city "defendingUnit1-barrack-granary-marketplace-cityWalls-temple-factory-bank-..." scheme. So my idea is to make some pattern and add to city option "pattern option" - you choose one of the saved patterns and your city developes by this pattern scheme.
    -$TaLuHgPad

    3.8.0 Improving City Governors

    When a City is managed by the Governer there should be an option to switch to building a Worker if the city will lose a Citizen due to low food. There should be 3 options, Automatically Switch, Prompt or No Action
    -centimetre

    3.9.0 Growing City Radius

    I'd like to see the city radius not be based on the traditional "two squares away" map. it should grow as the city does. if the map is going to be three dimensional, this shouldn't be a problem.
    -self biased

    3.10.0 Enemies' Moves

    Is a "Dont watch allies/peace/enemies moves" (except combat) too much to ask for? (wasn't for SMAC)
    -Blake

    4.0.0 Characterization/Historic/Realistic

    4.1.0 Realistic Population Lists

    Have one settler unit represent only 1000 people, or be able to change this in the editor, along with the amount of land a square represents and such things.
    -Brent

    4.2.0 Food Bars for Units

    Settlers should have a "food bar", like a unit's power bar, and this should deplete for each turn the settler is outside of its borders. 7 or 8 turns and an ancient settler is dead.

    As technology improves we should get new settlers that last longer, and units like galleons where settlers can ride without their food bar depleting.

    Such a mechanism would make for a more rational expansion of empires.
    -Heffalump

    I think settlers should deplete their food bar every turn even if they're on a galleon. For a long time, people on open sea had big problems with scorbic. Since galleons are faster then settlers on land, this alone is an improvement.
    -Max Sinister

    4.3.0 Plagues and Famines

    The original Civ had these. I'd like to see them come back, in a more rigorous way. Plagues should spread along trade routes and linger, depressing commerce and construction and occasionally killing off a population point. Medicine, Chemistry, and Sanitation would all help combat plagues.

    In addition to people-plagues, there should be blights and hordes of locusts and rats that strike at grain-stores. Pottery would help reduce these. Construction would help more. Electricity (refrigeration) would help a whole lot.
    -StefanJ

    How about an exchange of diseases when you encounter civs from another landmass?
    -Brent

    You could probably get away with having plagues start most often in ports and jungle cities.
    -StefanJ

    5.0.0 Maps/Display

    5.1.0 Map Display

    Be able to choose what to show and what not to show on the replay map: terrain, cities, etc. Be able to limit the replay map to areas you have explored. Be able to watch explored territory grow.
    -Brent

    5.2.0 Exploration/Contacts Become Outdated

    I'd like to see contacts with certain other civs being limited to a certain amount of time. It would simply run out after a certain time, and you would have to establish or buy the contact again. This may be affected by:

    Distance between my capital and the other civ's capital - the further we're apart, the shorter the contact period will be.

    Trade - if we're trading resources, contact should remain stable.

    Borders - if we have a common border, contact should remain stable.

    Embassies - if we have established an embassy, contact should remain stable.

    Technology - if we have certain (communication-type) techs, contact should remain stable.

    Units present - I figure each civilization would have a supply / contact radius, determined by transportation and food technologies. Rivers and coastlines would be natural channels of supply and communication.

    Outside of this, units would have to forage (slow movement, susceptible to disease and disaster) and communication would be spotty. A unit that stumbles on another civ would get only a brief traveler's tale sort of report.

    Alliance - Could expire after a certain amount of turns without contact between the two civilizations.

    This will make contacts with your immediate neighbours more valuable, since you need them to (re)gain contact with their neighbours. Also, it will encourage trade. And - it may become profitable to establish a colony (city) far away to keep in touch with other civs.

    This may also influence your World Map -- some detailed information will simple go away after some time.
    -BigFurryMonster/StefanJ

    5.3.0 Ease of Game Display

    You see, in civ, You don't know what game is the sav, until You open it. I think it would be very nice if it was like in Imperialism II, when if You click on a sav, You get information about it, and a screenshot of the game.
    -Heresson

    Conclusion

    Well, as you have read, the General Ideas have been varied and broad, contributed by a lot of people with differing opinions. I have tried to ensure that most of the ideas did not contradict each other, but there are many options for Firaxis to follow if it so wishes.

    The main demand, I think, was to make the game more accessible and more streamlined, whether it be with images of the map displayed for saves, or for streamlining the production process with a system of saved 'patterns' or just an expanded "city manager/governor" system a la that imployed by Alpha Centauri.

    -Respectfully Compiled: DarkCloud

    Tags: the list, civilization 4, general ideas
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      -DarkCloud
      List Administrator

      PS: Here's a link to the Civ III-Ideas List compiled by Apolyton Fans on July 14, 1999 - Civ III List in case you wish to compare it to the current creation

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    • Civ 4 the List: Wonders
      by Fosse
      Introduction The concept of the great Wonders of the World in Civ is as old as the series itself. For years, civvers around the world have built Pyramids, Great Libraries, Magellanic Voyages, and trips to the Moon. And, as Civ has gone from I to II to III, wonders have been added, removed, or have changed in some way. With Civ3 came the idea of Small Wonders that each nation had the oppertunity to build individually, further widening the effect of these great projects. As Civ4 looms over the horizon, how will the concept of Wonders of the World evolve further? Summary As you can see, I'm still coming up with ideas already proposed and boiling them down into a list. The links I have found to all threads in this forum pertaining to wonders has been included. If you have some more links, or brand new ideas, please feel free to post them in this thread. Related Threads http://apolyton.net/showthread.php?threadid=75460 http://apolyton.net/showthread.php?threadid=106609 http://apolyton.net/showthread.php?threadid=107349 http://apolyton.net/showthread.php?threadid=117222 http://apolyton.net/showthread.php?threadid=107895 http://apolyton.net/showthread.php?threadid=111317 http://apolyton.net/showthread.php?threadid=114759 http://apolyton.net/showthread.php?threadid=115569 http://apolyton.net/showthread.php?threadid=117740 http://apolyton.net/showthread.php?threadid=117222 Table of Contents New Wonder Ideas Changes to Existing Wonders New Wonder Concepts Conclusion The Ideas I. New Wonder Ideas This section goes on the idea that the concept of the ‘wonder’ in Civ will not change from Civ3 to Civ4, that players will still accumulate production in a race with other civs in their attempt to build a wonder. Listed at those specific ideas for a brand new wonder. Statue of Liberty No so much a new wonder, but bringing back a great one from Civ2. A civ with this wonder, in Civ2, could switch to any government type, irregardless of possession of the prerequisite tech, with no anarchy time. In Civ2, it was rendered mostly useless by the fact that one could switch governments without penalty every four turns (the classic Odeo years).Arrian Banaue Rice Terraces >Ancient - allows irrigation on hills (weak, needs more benefit, maybe cut irrigation time or allow hills/forests/mountains to act as irrigated square for the purposes of irrigating next to it).Solomwi Channel Tunnel Modern/Late Industrial - allows ground units to move across single tile straits without ships.Solomwi Machu Picchu Late Ancient - allows settlement on mountains.Solomwi Attitude/Reputation Wonders Bring back some of the old ones from Civ2 that could modify relations with neighbors. (Eiffel, Marco Polo, etc.)Solomi Apian Way (Small Wonder) Originally Roman Empire, huge boon to trade (25-50% for every city connected by it) and unit movement along its length (4 tiles instead of three like other roads). For those who love micromanaging, the Wonder could cost a city less to "produce," but workers would return to existing roads for an additional one or two turns per tile, resulting in a straighter road graphic or a different color. Building the AW from scratch would take 25% longer than normal roads. The benefit would be only on city-to-city connecting roads, not on every city radius tile, but it would also apply to roads to Resources and to your civ's borders in anticipation of expansion by settlements or conquest. The benefit would continue until replaced by Railroads (not the Tech but actual construction). For those who despise micromanaging, give the option to pay more and have the work magically appear when the Wonder is produced. The entire cost would then be based upon X base plus y for so many tiles to link all cities with one road at the time of the Wonder's completion, meaning if you add more cities while in production, the cost continues to go up - but again, you dodge the microM. The Round Table (Great Wonder) A la King Arthur, this would make representative forms of government faster to discover and to implement with shorter or nonexistent anarchy. Lewis & Clark (SW) This would double Movement Points of all units exploring black-out tiles, except when barbarians have been uncovered, so you'd have to deal with them normally. Speed wouldn't be affected by another civ's units. Pony Express (SW) Faster communication improves Science and Culture and would reduce corruption in far away cities on the same continent. It would also speed up building the first Road between each city. Any additional city tiles worked for roads would still take the normal time. International Red Cross (GW) This would be a major diplomatic boost, as well as better treatment for captured units and faster healing for battle-wounded units. Recover...
      August 31, 2012, 17:58
    • Civ 4 the List: User Friendliness/ The Manual / Help Files
      by Trifna
      Introduction User Friendliness- what makes the game easy to play. The Manual- the guides to Civ I and II provided historical information and pull-out charts that gave the game character- will Civ IV have such things? Or will the manual merely be a cheap on-line PDF? Help Files- how easily can the owners of the game find their way around it once accessing the game itself? Summary While this wasnt the most glamours of sections, it is in some ways the most important because without easy accessibility, Civilization would be both unfun and impossible to play. Many ideas which could fall in this area were included in other sections, thus its sparseness can be explained by the universality in where these help information can be put in. Table of Contents The Ideas Conclusion The Ideas Historical Garbage: Forget the historical stuff about units. Most people never read it and it doesn't enhance gameplay.-Kuciwalker (It should be noted, however that a significant group of civvers actually appreciates these historical things and the fact that they are in the game makes it more educational and acceptable to teachers and parents trying to teach their children through learning. It also makes the game more 'intellectual' and provides a good reference.)-DarkCloud Generating Civlopedia Entries IN THE EDITOR:: Make it easy to generate Civpedia entries IN THE EDITOR.-Kuciwalker A "?" to click on and point at elements: I propose that somewhere at the top of the screen there would be a litte interrogation mark to click on. If you click on it, there will be a bunch of very visible interrogation marks each place on the present screen you can get a little text explaining how it works, what it is and everything that's nice to know. This would help many, without even bringing the need of a complete tutorial (though a tutorial can always be nice, and it could use the information put with this interrogation marks system).-Trifna "Hovered on" information: I also think that there should be, in the options tablet, a checkbox that when clicked, will cause the mouse button (when it's hovering over an object) to describe the object in a short description-DarkCloud Improved file save/retrieve: Would it be too much to ask to slightly improve the file save and file retrieve dialog boxes? I feel like I'm back in Windows 3.x with the spartan [...] file operation box. What I would like to see is a page ripped from Microsoft's book on this. First, make the box a little bit bigger. If I'm doing some file operation, go ahead and cover most of the screen. It's not like I'm playing the game while opening/closing a game. Second, I need to see some properties information displayed regarding my file saves. A small thumbnail of my map would be nice. Also, some information like: When was the file created (game started) Date last saved How many civs active Current scores/perhaps a histograph? Whether the game is SP, MP or PBEM Speaking of PBEM. Could a seperate interface be developed for keeping MP and PBEM games organized? I create seperate folders, but I think with minimal effort, a little nicer front end could be developed to make it easy to store, organize and launch games.One last thing...the manual makes it a point to say that it doesn't store email addresses. This is a pretty simple thing that would help the player tremendously.-Shogun Gunner Using the standard Windows open-file box: Why not use the standard Windows open-file box, with an extra part to display some info about the actual savegame you have selected?-Kuciwalker Mini-map, and opening a game in one click: A mini-map thumbnail is essential.I'd also like a way to open games with one click from the main menu.-MattH For a printed manual: The manual should be printed, not digital! I find it much nicer to be able to paw through actual paper.-MattH ...Digital is transient... paper is for all time-DarkCloud Being able to pause at any time: Be able to pause the game in the middle of anything it's doing to look at settings, etc. When it's cycling through automated or AI units. Be able to change orders in the middle. Be able to more easily observe what the AI is doing before it's finished.-Brent Conclusion This section is pretty explanatory and compact, but basically people want ways to easily determine what different sorts of data is on the map and to easily plunge into a game of civ....
      August 31, 2012, 17:55
    • Civ 4 the List: Units
      by lajzar
      Introduction This is meant as a discussion of two principal aspects of the game: what units should appear in the game, and the effects of the various unit attribute flags. Of secondary importance is finding a way to integrate unit statistics with whatever combat method is chosen; it is generally agreed that balancing stats will depend a lot on how combat (stacked vs 1:1 vs other) is implemented. Summary One recurring theme across the various lists for each generation of civ was for a unit workshop, similar to smac. I believe this would be bad for civ. While it could reflect the historical range of units if constrained with a uitably detailed complex ruleset, this rulset would be unreasonably complex for a game, forcing an extra level of management. In addition, it would make it extremely hard to mod the graphics, and all but impossible to create mods with fantasy units. Most people agree that civ3 had far too few units in the game. The big jumps in the capabilities at each critical tech gave an overwhelming advantage to teh tech leader, as well as giving a somewhat disjointed view of history. With assymetric units, there is clearly a strong desire for these functions to be implemented. The main debate is on whether or not units are the best means of implementing these functions. This a decision that should be made on a group by group basis. There is very little desire for religious units or lawyers, but worker functions are evenly split on whether units are the best method to put them in the game. Related Threads Civ4 Idea: Armies instead of Units Stacked vs. Single Unit Combat - The Battle Continues Some sort of unit design allowed? Civ4 Units Table of Contents 2.0 Miscellaneous Thoughts 5.0 Units Conclusion The Ideas Organized by: Lajzar...
      August 31, 2012, 17:52
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