THE dumb question.

[UnOrthOdOx]

Never heard of "merchant prince", either.

I don't really fancy myself a "merchant".

[Krill]

UnO the Bloodletter

Not even sure if I'm going to buy it either; then again, I'm not even sure if I'll have time to play teh game in my last year at uni...anyone know when teh demo comes out?

[snoopy369]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Merchant_Prince_(series)

It's worth looking at ... it's not 'merchanty' so much as 'Machiavellian'. Hence the final decent game in the series, Machiavelli

[conmcb25]

Re: THE dumb question.

Originally posted by UnOrthOdOx
So, I'll just ask it.


Having never played the first....

WHAT is Colonization?

How is it different from Civ?

Why should I be excited? (or for those that know me from CIV, should I even bother to watch this game?)

n00b

You have to pay attention to trading and developing market products a lot more than in CIV. Developing your colonies leads to more cash, more cash leads you to more units, more units allow you to kick the mother countries but.

More or less.

So if you have to play an "early rush" stick with CIV.

[Jeje2]

Differences:

Never forget the one square city radius when comparing Civ & Col..
This leads to the fact that it just is impossible to have only one city which makes everything you need. You must build more cities.

There were four nations to choose from - each wih it's anvantages.
Britts - easier to get immigrants to docks
Dutch - Trade (Better prices for goods from new land)
France - (I have forgotten)
Spanish - War advantages on natives

Then also there is practically no research in the game.
(Instead you had the founding fathers - each giving some new/better advantage for reaching your final goal)

----
I still play Col randomly (Civ NOT) as it just feels like my type of game. - yes it requires micromanagement a lot, but Col just feels right for me.

[snoopy369]

France had a religious bonus to converting the natives, I believe.

[Dale]

Nah France was just a simple native diplo bonus.
- Natives always started as "friendly" on first contact rather than "neutral".
- Diplo effects on natives halved.

[Lord Avalon]

Didn't the Dutch have a bigger ship?

[Ironwood]

I've been playing Colonization lately, so I can answer these questions.

Civilization and Colonization both share the movement of units around a map, founding cities, military units attacking other military units, ploughing fields and building roads.

* Getting More Population

1. Immigrants will line up at the docks in Europe. You send your ships to Europe, pick them up, and bring them to your colonies. Certain buildings (churches and cathedrals) generate "crosses," and colonists can be placed to generate more crosses. Accumulation of crosses is what causes immigrants to line up at the docks. You can also pay money ("recruit") to get them to come faster.

2. Native converts. You have the ability to turn colonists into missionaries, either in Europe or in any colony with a church or cathedral. You can then move the missionary into native settlements (camps, villages, or cities, depending on the tribe) and found a mission. The mission reduces tension between the settlement and nearby colonies, and occasionally causes the village to spawn a convert, which is better working in the field, but not so good in town. You can also use missionaries to get the natives to declare war on other Europeans.

3. Local population growth: If a colony accumulates 200 food, a new colonist spawns (much like civ). Is not the most common way to get more population due to native beggars that periodically show up wanting food. If you don't give it, you'll likely end up with hostile natives.

* Getting more money: In Civ, you just get money from roads and stuff. In Col, you have to develop resources and sell them. There are the resouces that come from colonists working the land, and then there are resources you get from colonists in town converting land resources. Examples: Cotton->Cloth. Tobacco->Cigars. Lumber->Buildings/Cannons/Ships. Ore->Tools, Tools->Guns, Tools->Buildings/Cannons/Ships. Oh, and the more you sell to a particular place (particularly Europe), the worse the prices get: rising supply results in lower prices.

* Military units: You can take any colonist unit and turn it into a military unit by giving it guns. Giving the soldier horses makes a dragoon: faster and more powerful. You can also build cannons. At sea, you can build privateers or frigates (caravels, merchantmen, and galleons are purely transport units). Privateers are weaker, but faster, and sail under an indeterminate flag: you can attack other ships with these during peace, and just deny knowledge of their activities when other Europeans complain.

* The Indians: Unlike Civ, in Col, the map is already pretty well inhabited when you start the game. One of the challenges is dealing with the natives. You and the three other European powers start out much like in Civ: a single soldier (colonist with guns) and a pioneer (colonist with tools). The natives have camps, villages, and cities all over the place, but even within a single native nation, their activities are much less centrally coordinated. Nevertheless, pissing them off, particularly early on, is still not a smart thing to do. Having large colonies and/or many military units nearby cause exclamation points to appear over the settlements, which indicates the rate at which alarm is being generated. Generate enough, and they start raiding (entering colonies to steal your stuff). Generate a lot, and it's all out war.

* The European Powers:
1. English: Need 2/3 less "crosses" to generate an immigrant.
2. Dutch: Start with a merchantman (faster, more cargo capacity than caravels) and prices collapse more slowly in Europe (you can get more money longer).
3. French. Start with a hardy pioneer (works faster than a normal colonist at pioneer jobs) and generate native alarm at half the usual rate.
4. Spanish: Start with a veteran soldier (get a 50% bonus when used as a soldier) and get a 50% bonus when attacking native settlements.

* The Founding Fathers: These are the closest Colonization analogue to wonders, or maybe technologies. One of the jobs colonists can do is working in the town hall, generating "liberty bells". These serve two purposes. First, the colony where they are generated gradually becomes more productive (sons of liberty membership goes up, and all colonists get +1 to production at 50%, +2 to production at 100%). Secondly, they also accumulate toward certain goals. First, it's the Founding Fathers, each of whom grant special bonuses, such as making Lost City Rumors (Col's "goody huts") always yield positive results, or reducing native alarm. During the Revolution, they go toward triggering foreign intervention: you get a whole lot more military units when this happens. After the foreign intervention, they contribute to your final score.

As you can plainly see, I like this game a lot. And honestly, if you can DOSBox the old one, I even wonder if I'd bother getting the new one! I honestly don't know how I would improve it.