{The List} Terrain and terrain improvements

[Nikolai]

Thanks for the kind words. Your suggestion is followed.

[DarkCloud]

A simpler, and in my opinion more elegant, idea has been propsed many times: Remove the tile production boost from railroads, remove infinite movement (say, 1/5th movement cost... a tank can move ten tiles), and add an upkeep to rail tiles.

Fosse- I almost wholeheartedly agree with you except for the removal of the production boost- the production boost simulates a real effect of railroads near cities- now I know it might increase rail building -but many people built rails back in the day for jsut that reason... they covered the lands.

I would also like to suggest a predecessor to railroads- the Canal-- that could increase troop movement. It would prove invaluable to slow-progress tech games and would have to be discovered before railroads. Canals would become possible with the discovery of the Lock and work as railroads when built along rivers!

-
Good work on the updating nikolai

[DarkCloud]

Oh, by the way- have you checked out this thread on hex squares yet- (I'm not sure if it's too useful, but if you haven't seen it, it might prove interesting )

http://apolyton.net/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=94361

[Shadowstrike]

Perhaps some sort of climate change model as the game progressed? Not only dealing with global warming, but also with changes in the Earth's orbit and external factors which caused changing sea levels, desertification, warming, etc.

Upkeep for terrain improvements? I dunno, that might be problematic, but roads, railroads, irrigation systems, etc. don't upkeep themselves.

What about land reclaimation, such as in the Netherlands? It would be of rather limited use, though.

[DarkCloud]

Welcome back to Apolyton Shadowstrike! Are you planning on staying for a time and helping out with the list? There's still sections to be claimed!

--
As for the climate change idea- I fully agree with it- the Sun's numbers of sunspots have changed from time to time ,and at one time parts of canada had grapes growing in them (much warmer than nowadays)... Maine and the Northern coast of America were the Viking's "Vinland"... and Britain was once much warmer than it is nowadays. back in the times of King Arthur, it was a great place to live in.

Basically ,the game should model in terms of climate:

Sunspot Numbers (These seem to be cyclical and effect the temperature on the earth. A lot of sunspots means a very warm year, very few sunspots mean a very cold year)
Weather Patterns (These shift from year to year "el nino", "la nina", etc. and can make an arid place wet and a wet place arid... they are currently playing havoc with China, India and the US)
Sea Levels
Irrigation Altering Climate (In lands around irrigate areas, the squares should gradually alter and perhaps become more desert
Desertification deserts should expand and contract
Glacierification Perhaps there should be a new impassable terrain type (Glacier) that can expand, contract based upon global temperatures.

These ideas would be even better for Alpha Centauri II and it's global environment control wonder of the world

[Fosse]

Originally posted by DarkCloud

Fosse- I almost wholeheartedly agree with you except for the removal of the production boost- the production boost simulates a real effect of railroads near cities- now I know it might increase rail building -but many people built rails back in the day for jsut that reason... they covered the lands.

But then the problem isn't solved. If you agree that rails covering every tile is a problem (and I don't know if you do), then leaving the production boost in place will mean that it is always better to lay down the railroad spaghetti. Unless the upkeep is extremely high, but that just creates its own problem.

Besides, there are better ways to have rails "increase production" than just having it add another shield or food to a tile. Why not keep the upkeep, remove infinite movment, and remove the production bonus, then give every city that is connected to your civ via rail an X percent production and comemrce increase (raw materials move faster for production, finished goods move faster for commerce), and a Y percent production boost for every city that is connected to another Civ via rail?

The values could be tweaked so that it is always beneficial to connect a city, but not always beneficial (except perhaps from a military standpoint) to have more than one connection.


Plus, with this system you can really target another civ's transportation and it will have the appropriate effect. In Civ 3 if you destroy a rail tile... nobody cares. With this model, if you destroy the right rail tiles you could cause catastrophic damage to their economy AND slow their armies.

[TheBirdMan]

Originally posted by Fosse



Besides, there are better ways to have rails "increase production" than just having it add another shield or food to a tile. Why not keep the upkeep, remove infinite movment, and remove the production bonus, then give every city that is connected to your civ via rail an X percent production and comemrce increase (raw materials move faster for production, finished goods move faster for commerce), and a Y percent production boost for every city that is connected to another Civ via rail?

The values could be tweaked so that it is always beneficial to connect a city, but not always beneficial (except perhaps from a military standpoint) to have more than one connection.


Plus, with this system you can really target another civ's transportation and it will have the appropriate effect. In Civ 3 if you destroy a rail tile... nobody cares. With this model, if you destroy the right rail tiles you could cause catastrophic damage to their economy AND slow their armies.

[wrylachlan]

The Uglies
That's very similar to the idea I proposed on page 2 about rail construction. Give an overall percentage production bonus for being connected instead of a per tile bonus. In order to make it work you need a per tile upkeep, and a rule of diminished return for each rail-road - the first connection gives a 5% bonus, the second only 3%, the third 1% (which might be less than the cost of upkeep).

To expand on this, to totally prevent the uglies, disallow the building of single tile rail-roads. Instead workers can only build RR between two cities(or a city and a colony).

The Movement Problem
I agree that infinite movement has to go, and that a movement bonus would be the best way to go. However I also have a problem with units getting on railroads in the middle. I think they should only be allowed to board in a city or colony, and disembark at a city or colony. While on the railroad, they're sitting ducks.

This would cause me to actually defend my RR at the front or risk a sneak attack on my reinforcements before they arrive.

[wrylachlan]

Originally posted by skywalker
Given that you probably AREN'T defending your coastline, I would assume that most amphibious assualts are going into cities. So one-move units landing doesn't unbalance ship moves because I still can't actually attack that turn. It is only the ability to attack the same turn you lanch from port that is unbalancing. That is why only Marines can do it under this - Tanks and MA take a turn to land, making it impossible to attack that same turn.

You bring up a good point, and I think you're right, but I think you're right because of a couple of corollary issues.
1)The differential between defending against an amphibious assault vs. defending against a land assault is not high enough. If cities had a greater defensive bonus against amphibious assaults, it would become more important to land your assault vehicles. To prevent this, a defender would be more likely to defend his coastline.

2)Infinite Rail Movement - Because you can move anywhere in your territory, it becomes less important to build defensive units and position them strategically.

[wrylachlan]

Nikolai -

You can cut out a lot of the back and forth discussion between skywalker and myself in your summation. I can sum up my position as follows:

There should be a landing movement penalty which Marines (or any other amphibious-flagged unit) is immune to. Additionally Wheeled units either can't land except in cities or colonies, or get a heavier penalty outside of cities or colonies. The penalty itself can be a flat 1 turn penalty or a variable turn penalty based on the terrain (I favor this option).

[lost viking]

Roads and railroads

I agree, there are better ways to give the boost to cities. I don't like the web of roads and railroads either and you don't see it in real civs.


Infrastructure factor

My idea is to calculate an infrastructure factor and use that for boosting trade / productivity in the cities connected. For instance: if all cities are connected by roads you can gain a 50% boost to trade. However, until all cities are connected you will only get a fraction in the cities connected based on cities connected/all cities in your civ.

The same for rails where you could boost production the same way and add to trade as well.

As airports are part of the trade network they could give a boost too, but I think only if they are in cities of a certain size - again you don't see airports in every city in real civs.

If your civ is on several isles / continents you would need a port to connect the parts to the trade network / infrastructure.


Max production in road/rail squares

Normally you would not be able to use land both for roads/rails and farming/production, so there could be a penalty for building a road/rail in a tile, say that tile can max produce one food/one shield. That way you would have to be more careful planning the infrastructure. (I guess you could say you pay for upkeeping that way).

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by DarkCloud

Fosse- I almost wholeheartedly agree with you except for the removal of the production boost- the production boost simulates a real effect of railroads near cities- now I know it might increase rail building -but many people built rails back in the day for jsut that reason... they covered the lands.

I would also like to suggest a predecessor to railroads- the Canal-- that could increase troop movement. It would prove invaluable to slow-progress tech games and would have to be discovered before railroads. Canals would become possible with the discovery of the Lock and work as railroads when built along rivers!

-
Good work on the updating nikolai

If you add the production bonus, it becomes economic suicide to do anything except cover every single tile with railroads.

I'd like to see an "industry" or "settlement" improvement that comes with industrialization and can be created like an outpost or airfield - it eats a worker. It gives a big shield and trade bonus but cuts all food production. This would also require the ability to ship food between cities.

[Fosse]

Originally posted by skywalker
If you add the production bonus, it becomes economic suicide to do anything except cover every single tile with railroads.

Bingo.

And in resopnse to wrylachlan's post: I certainly didn't think of most of the ideas I advocate on my own. Certainly credit is due to those who first proposed them... I just don't give it! (I've also proposed dozens of terrible ideas that others have shot down and changed my mind about!)

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by wrylachlan
You bring up a good point, and I think you're right, but I think you're right because of a couple of corollary issues.
1)The differential between defending against an amphibious assault vs. defending against a land assault is not high enough. If cities had a greater defensive bonus against amphibious assaults, it would become more important to land your assault vehicles. To prevent this, a defender would be more likely to defend his coastline.

There is a defense bonus - in the sense that Marines are far worse attackers than Tanks. So it would still be far more cost-effective to land your Tanks and attack. Thus, make it take a turn to unload tanks (or better, just make unloading outside of a city take all movement) and other multi-move units, and everything's fine. If you land Tanks, your attack force is ALWAYS vulnerable (especially because any escorts are unable to fortify).

2)Infinite Rail Movement - Because you can move anywhere in your territory, it becomes less important to build defensive units and position them strategically. [/QUOTE]

[marcthornton]

Rivers become more improtant...

Rivers need to become a bigger part of the game, there should be some wider rivers say 3/4 of a tile, or multiple tiles, with fish, in them at locations, etc.

You should need a large river in the city to build the dam imporvement.
You also would not be able to cross these until after getting engineering and then building a bridge across them. This would not be automatic it would cost more worker time. If this is a variable width, it could cost more at a wider spot. You should need to upgrade your bridge to allow the railroad or mechanized units to cross it as they put to much strain on the bridge you built in the middle ages.

This would add to the terrain value in the game. Your enemy may need to come up and build a bridge that you can see before being able to cross at your unprotected point.

A dam could be a minor improvement also that generated either cash or productivity(shields). Cleaner than a coal plant, etc.
marc.