Plagues

[d_bertelli]

One thought to make the game more realistic would be to have plagues sweep through periodically, 1) with greater frequency prior to the discovery of sanitation and medicine, and in the midst of prolonged wars 2) sweeping across continents and oceans with a particular logic, and 3) causing significant ramifications with some frequency when new continents are contacted.

The bubonic plague had a huge impact on the history of Europe and Asia for 400 years, and European diseases and African diseases (brought in with the slave trade) are thought to have wiped out 90% of the native population of the Americas. More soldiers died of disease in World War I than died of battle; the same was probably true of the Napoleanic wars. AIDS is currently devastating the productivity and stability of Africa (witness the disintegration of Zimbabwe).

There might also be options for civilizations to combat plagues (e.g., the equivalent of funding the World Health Organization under the WHO to wipe out small pox).

Would also offer an additional educational element ala the impacts of global warming...

[Kuciwalker]

This was added to C3C.

[Trifna]

The problem with many events is that if we have to manage each of them it gets very micro instead of global, macro. GalCiv has, I think, the best way to look at it: random events that are more or less frequent depending on certain factors.

For example, if there's more foreign trading in a city, it would have a greater chance to get a random event about a new plague. And if a city trades alot with another that has plague, it may get a glimpse to this random event too... So the player doesn't need to manage everything constantly, but it is still there.

So it's up to you to manage the whole thing, but it doesn't get into a micro-management fest. It stays GalCiv-esque.

[Maquiladora]

Random events were added to Cradle mod (IIRC) for CtP2 a long time ago (long before civ3 in fact) and they were annoying. These kind of random things arent enjoyable unless the player can really prevent them. Like having earthquakes, its realistic but can be unfair and definately annoying.

[MrBaggins]

Yep... no negative feature should be random, without some ability to avoid it by game choices. Those choices might not be available in the game path that you've taken, but thats become a value judgement, rather than a "act of god" aka reload.

For instance.


You plant a city by a volcano. Its very fertile... but could be destroyed by the volcano. Thats great... a value judgement.

OR

You experience plague. 25% (random chance per city) of your nation is effected, if they've not built improvement X. Thats fine... maybe even if improvement X isn't available for a while... its just weathering a storm then.

BUT...

You experience plague. X% of your nation is effected, period. Not good, even if X is a small value. No one wants to be subject to these whims. You'd be reloading in a heartbeat, if possible. If not, you'd probably stop playing pretty quick. A player wants some method of X being 0.

The moral of the story is every negative event like this should be avoidable, if a player plays right. A player will only put up with a small degree of unavoidable random negative problems... like disasters.

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by Trifna
The problem with many events is that if we have to manage each of them it gets very micro instead of global, macro. GalCiv has, I think, the best way to look at it: random events that are more or less frequent depending on certain factors.

For example, if there's more foreign trading in a city, it would have a greater chance to get a random event about a new plague. And if a city trades alot with another that has plague, it may get a glimpse to this random event too... So the player doesn't need to manage everything constantly, but it is still there.

So it's up to you to manage the whole thing, but it doesn't get into a micro-management fest. It stays GalCiv-esque.

GalCiv-style events don't work for civ - GalCiv has a backstory, civ does not.

[The_Aussie_Lurker]

I feel that there should be both Good and Bad random events and, like others here, I think that there are things you can/should do to either reduce their effects or even increase the events effects! For instance, city walls and high population cities in Civ3 increase the chance of plague. By the same token, building hospitals and aqueducts should reduce the chance of plague, as should the Longevity Small Wonder and Genetics Advance!
Some positive events could be a 'Renaissance', a 'Trade Boom' (where all of your trade routes provide double their gpt), mercenaries coming to join your cause or a sudden scientific discovery (in the same era, but even if you haven't researched it's prerequisite)!
Just like negative events, though, there should be player controlled factors which increase/decrease the likelihood of them occuring!!

Yours,
Aussie_Lurker.

[Trifna]

Well this is exactly like in GalCiv: any random event comes from a player's decisions. If he does certain things, he get more/less exposed. A "Renaissance", volcano erruption or anything else shouldn't just pop from no-where.