What? No forest planting?

[polarnomad]

Originally posted by Fried-Psitalon
Believe it or not, adding the ability to plant forests removes a big strategic decision, because you have to decide whether or not you want those forests way down the line as it stands now. If I have the ability to chop forests and then replant, there is one right answer: chop em all now, replant em all later.

That's silly. The main thrust of CIV is that there is NEVER one right answer. You want your forest to regrow? Leave another forest tile beside it, don't put a road through the deforested tile, and hope.

CIV is about careful decisions, not "perfect answer" schemes. Realism was sacrificed in this case for gameplay.

Well, I guess my brain doesn't work the same way as some peoples'... Chop down ALL the trees! I guess I'm too much of a greenie to do that even in a game!

Yeah, I understand that realism must be sacrificed to a certain extent in order to benefit gameplay. My comments about liking the idea of reforestation were less of a complaint about it's absence and more of a desire to include the option in a mod or something.

But I do get your point... and am anticipating playing CivIV with held breath. So far I love what I'm seeing!

OTOH, what might be interesting is if the act of chopping down large areas of forests and not reforesting were to cause desertification! That would be REALLY cool.

[James]

People been planting stands and glades of trees where they want them for a long time. Is a good practice in farming. Sad that this is removed.

[Jubala]

[duplicate post from another thread also discussing this]

How about creating a tech called "Forestry" or something that enables you to build a new unit called "Forester" that can plant a forest and is consumed in the process? It would take this unit some time, say 4-5 turns or so, to do this and it wouldn't go any faster with more foresters. Don't know about cost, but say same as work boat, half of worker or 30 shields, whichever is lowest. That should pretty much kill the chop/plant exploit and give the player the option to plant forests when needed/wanted.

[The_Aussie_Lurker]

I still say the best way to approach it is to have regrown forests work like cottages. At first, they provide NOTHING at all if you 'work it', but you have to work it in order for it to GROW. As it grows, it provides increased benefits until it reaches full growth. This would then still make chopping trees a strategic decision because, in order to get benefits from regrowth forests, you have to sacrifice development in other areas for some time.

Yours,
Aussie_Lurker

[Navyman]

Instead of replanting a forest, why not have a "building" that can be built at the city called "Park" or "Green space". A lot of modern cities have green zones around them for exactly this reason.

In this manner, the city "pays" to have the mess it created cleaned up, instead of having workers clean up their mess.

[Aro]

I don't have the game yet...

But I'll play vanilla, as soon as I get it!

I've downloaded and played every mod I found for Civ III, just for fun. but soon I return to vanilla. In fact, I like the way the firaxian minds work...

Great post, Fried-Psitalon...
I can't wait to get the game!

[Grumbold]

I accept its a strategic choice, but it is not compatible with automated workers, so there needs to be a better one. Whether or not automated workers will massacre your forests, no way will they leave a tile bare for regrowth.

Having a worker or a forester unit, if you need something more expensive, die to make a forest is a big enough penalty isn't it? That way you get a similar strategic choice while enabling a level of terraforming that should be in the control of an industrialised civilisation.

[MattPilot]

BUMP for regrowable forests.

Having it grow like cottages IS the best dang way to do it.

Fried was talking about long term strategic decisions. Well, if we do it like cottages, where it takes +50 turns for a forest to regrow fully (while being worked), i think you still have the long term strategic decisions + the realistic ability to regrow forests!


Say first stage provides nothing. After 10 turns, it becomes something bigger and you start getting +1 food (say from animals). Then again after 10 turns +1 hammer + 1 Food. And so on....... until it becomes a "normal" forest square.

PLEEEAAASSE GIVE us this in a patch/mod

[Dominae]

The "Forest Cottage" idea could work, I suppose.

Back to Fried's post: he's right. The decision to leave or chop Forests is a very difficult one. Lumber Mills are very powerful improvements, given you have the Forests available to exploit them. And Railroads increase the ouput of Lumber Mills. So production-wise there are some major advantages to keeping Forests around. They're also useful for Health concerns.

I guess it comes down to what's more fun: a game of strategic choices, or the option to do cool stuff like chop and reforest an entire continent. Personally I'm with the former.

[polarnomad]

Then at the very least, automated workers shouldn't go tearing through forest land if you don't want them to. Perhaps the option to curtail unnecessary clearcutting could come along with monarchy to simulate organized forest management as a historical development.

[Dominae]

Originally posted by polarnomad
Then at the very least, automated workers shouldn't go tearing through forest land if you don't want them to.

Completely agree. Another solution is to not automate your Workers!!

[polarnomad]

Originally posted by Dominae
Another solution is to not automate your Workers!!

[chutney]

I love the idea of making forest planting work like cottages/towns. (But maybe a bit quicker. ) Should this happen the same time as the Lumber Mill improvement? That would seem to match it up nicely with the historical examples everyone shared.

(Oh, and I stand corrected about forest re-planting. The only trees in west Oklahoma were planted deliberately or on a creek bank.)

[Grumbold]

Welcome to the world of circular logic

[ayronis]

I think the forest cottage idea is a very good one, (and one they probably hadn't considered) but in the meantime, I think they made the right decision for game balance.