Don't know if these things have been said before but...

[Dracon II]

these are all good ideas. I hope Sid Meier is reading this...

One more thing, civs generally seem to advance at (relatively) the same rate as each other... by the middle ages there usually aren't any civs that are isolated from the rest of the world... which sucks 'cause it'd be really nice to see imperialism develop similar to how it did in reality.

[Leon Trotsky]

I found this text particularly interesting:

http://www.focaal.box.nl/previous/Forum%20focaal39.pdf

[Era Vulgaris]

Re: Don't know if these things have been said before but...

Originally posted by Dracon II
I just have two points (to begin with).

...In the current incarnations of civilization... it is conceivable that a stone age warrior can walk around the globe willy nilly. First of all... this flies in the face of the fact that the warrior could not possibly keep in viable communication with his host nation, nor relay back map information. The warrior, after succeeding generations, would most likely be divorced from his civilization of origin and simply evolve a new culture. Let's face it, leaders back then didn't have such a stranglehold over their citizens that they could control them even from the other side of the world!
The ability to travel long distances and to explore large areas should be contingent upon the level of transportation and communications technology in a society....

Good point, however one way of looking at the roaming warriors is this - that the passage of time in the early game, ie around 50 years/turn, means that the lands discovered during ancient times actually take many hundreds of years to explore. Therefore by the time you've explored a good amount of territory, 1000 years may have passed. The one, two or (very occasionally) three units of warriors and/or scouts roaming around during this period represents the various expedtions that may occur over a long period of time.

[Badtz Maru]

The Civilization games have never been about realism. They are made to be fun and easy to learn. A 'realistic' game on the scale of Civ4 would not be very fun for most people.

[Pythagoras]

Originally posted by Badtz Maru
The Civilization games have never been about realism. They are made to be fun and easy to learn. A 'realistic' game on the scale of Civ4 would not be very fun for most people.

I agree. This game is an abstraction of reality primarilly for game purposes. Its not a historic simulation.

Maybe something fun would be to restrict your knowledge through your cultural borders. No unit can move outside of those borders, thus you could only build cities within cultural borders. THAT would be an interesting mod.

[TheArsenal]

Originally posted by Badtz Maru
The Civilization games have never been about realism. They are made to be fun and easy to learn. A 'realistic' game on the scale of Civ4 would not be very fun for most people.

Yep. For a Huge map, at least, a limitation on how far a unit could travel would be burdensome. The huge world is not being discovered too quickly because you can’t sacrifice the hammers to send teams of explorers/warriors out to do so and the FOW hangs out for a good while. And if you are building that many explorers/warriors/galleys/caravels, you aren’t building something else useful. Choices. Best thing about this game.

[Badtz Maru]

Originally posted by Pythagoras


I agree. This game is an abstraction of reality primarilly for game purposes. Its not a historic simulation.

Maybe something fun would be to restrict your knowledge through your cultural borders. No unit can move outside of those borders, thus you could only build cities within cultural borders. THAT would be an interesting mod.

That's how Rise of Nations works - the only time you can place a city outside your borders is if it's on a different continent, and then it can only be near the coast. It's an interesting mechanic, sometimes you'll delay putting up a second city until you can get the border expanding techs to allow you to put it in a more ideal location, and it penalizes you for rushing to build cities as soon as you can.

For more realistic exploration while still being simple enough to fit the Civ game style, you could have your explored area expand to always be a certain number of squares past your cultural borders, with that number of squares being increased by certain techs. You'd also automatically get maps of neighboring nations if you are trading with them, have open borders, or have close borders for an extended time, as in history it's pretty hard to block the spread of that kind of common knowledge from one civilization to another. Trading maps would still be a useful function, though, because you'd then get the maps of your neighbor's neighbors.

I prefer the gamey unrealistic method used currently, though, because it gives you something to do in the early game.

[Strategist83]

I think limiting how much scouting can be done early on is a very good idea.

[madmaxxam]

Definately something that I've thought of. Hopefully when the SDK comes out it's something that someone could put in a mod. Shouldn't be too hard, work out an algorithm to find the current distance from the nearest area within your cultural borders. Also, open border agreements could then allow you unlimited exploration of your open border buddies land (no maximum distance). More incentive to sign or not sign open borders.

[Dis]

Didn't armies such as Alexander and Ghengis Khan operate far out of their core cities? Granted they conquered the cities as they went- essentually expanding the civilization. But it seems like they operated very far from their capitols.

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by Pythagoras
Maybe something fun would be to restrict your knowledge through your cultural borders. No unit can move outside of those borders, thus you could only build cities within cultural borders. THAT would be an interesting mod.

That would be ahistorical, though.

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by Dis
Didn't armies such as Alexander and Ghengis Khan operate far out of their core cities?

So were Imperial China, Rome, Russia, etc., etc.

[LordShiva]

In case it slipped anyone's mind, invading armies operate, by definition, outside their nations' borders

[Dis]

Originally posted by LordShiva
In case it slipped anyone's mind, invading armies operate, by definition, outside their nations' borders

even in civil wars?

[Pythagoras]

Originally posted by Dis
Didn't armies such as Alexander and Ghengis Khan operate far out of their core cities? Granted they conquered the cities as they went- essentually expanding the civilization. But it seems like they operated very far from their capitols.

Well in my view such a mod would make exceptions for wars... Though what those would be is presently beyond me. Maybe sending forces beyond your cultural borders would be linked to some technological advancement.

Anyway, I thought it might be a fun idea even if it is ahistorical.

Or here's an idea, akin to the OCC, there could be the "Cultural Borders Challenge" in which you attempt to win by only staying inside your cultural borders. I dare leave that to the professionals, though.