How do Sell/demolish improvements?

[Arrian]

I thought the purpose of a hydro plant was to provide power (same as coal plant and nuke plant). If true, then the Three Gorges Dam provides the benifit of a hyrdo plant, just not the plant itself... which doesn't matter. You've got the power, captain!

-Arrian

[Traelin]

Originally posted by Arrian
I thought the purpose of a hydro plant was to provide power (same as coal plant and nuke plant). If true, then the Three Gorges Dam provides the benifit of a hyrdo plant, just not the plant itself... which doesn't matter. You've got the power, captain!

-Arrian

I actually wish it gave you the Hydro Plant like Hoover did in Civ3, for two reasons.

1. So that the Hydro Plant is removed from my build list.
2. So that the Nuke Plant won't blow up because it's still considered the active power plant.

Let me take it one step up the ladder of details...what exactly does "Power" buy me in Civ4, as compared to Civ3? In Civ3 a plant just stacked on top of a Factory. What does Power do for me?

I love this game and am happy with 99% of it, but one thing that really irks me is the Civilopedia. Sheesh we've had good search engines for years now, why can't we just integrate a full-text search engine into Civ4 Help? That way I can do a search on "Power" or any derivation/stem of the word, and not bother you all on Apolyton.

[Arrian]

"Power" increases the factory bonus from 25% to 50%.

-Arrian

edit: and yeah, I agree with you that I wish hydro plants (any power plants, actually) got dropped from the build list once you have the Dam.

[DeepO]

Originally posted by Arrian

edit: and yeah, I agree with you that I wish hydro plants (any power plants, actually) got dropped from the build list once you have the Dam.

The idea is that you can lose the TGD, without losing your previously built power plants...

DeepO

[Traelin]

Originally posted by DeepO

The idea is that you can lose the TGD, without losing your previously built power plants...

DeepO

Oh OK, that makes sense. So in actuality it's giving you the freedom to build them, in case of a loss of TGD. But still, why doesn't the TGD trump a nuke plant in a city? At least let me sell/destroy the nuke plant so that I don't have to suffer with it forever. Either that or you'll find a lot fewer ppl using them when they've experienced what I did LOL.

[sophist]

Or just disable them.

[ieolus]

Originally posted by DeepO

The idea is that you can lose the TGD, without losing your previously built power plants...

DeepO

But it also means the original problem of the coal plant's negatives still affect the city, hence a reason to be able to "decommission" a building.

[Jalinth]

The Main reason I wish I could sell off buildings is to get rid of the Nuclear plants. I had a meltdown in my capital, then built the 3 Gorges Dam. I wanted to get rid of all my nuclear plants on the continet, but could not. A few turns later I had another meltdown in a different major city.

Also I think the meltdowns are ever so slightly more powerful then then should be. The effect of the cites was roughly like that of being hit with an ICBM. From Pop 18 to 13 and a bunch of buildings gone. IMO of course. Still that is a discussion of another thread.

[Edit: I realized after I posted I missed the whole 3rd page. That's what I get for having to many windows open at once. Still my point remains]

[Harovan]

You shouldn't risk to get a meltdown once you built the TGD. This is a typical example of not overridden negative effects and clearly a design flaw.

[Martinus]

Originally posted by DeepO
Foresting: I did it all the time in Civ3, and frankly, I'm glad it's gone.

SR, remember the dotted map of already forested tiles I created in GS just to get the bonus from each tile exactly once? That is not a hoop someone should need to jump through to get maximum efficiency. And if it is in, there is no other option than to use it.

Make a forest consume a worker, thus costing more than you can gain? Sadly, that is not entirely true. There will always be cases where this is exploitable. You basically have the option to invest a lot more in rushes than normal. This investment can come at a time where you need it (e.g. for rushing the Internet or Space elevator: just make sure you've got plenty of workers beforehand, and forest and deforest a complete city in one or two turns... voila, instant Internet).

Also, and this might be one of the biggest problems: it basically is a trade between different 'investments'. Workers are partly built using food, which transform into hammers (and given bonusses you might receive a lot of hammers too, in the right circumstances a forest can give you the equivalent of 100+ hpt). That in itself is not really a problem, only the AI will never be able to do it.

And don't tell me this kind of MMing is fun, and yes, it is MMing. You need to do a lot of different actions, planned out over years, to get an efficient result.

What does the current system give? A more equal bunch of tactics available for players and AIs alike. A hugely increased strategical decision, where saving forests for health and lumbermills is truely a cost to your early game. No difference between MP and SP. No problems with e.g. players building forest-highways in their empires for Woodsman II defenders, something the AI can't deal with. Less workers to run around with, so a faster gameplay. Etc...

So was it possible to include the foresting? Sure. And there are arguments in favour of it. I think the right choice was made, though.

DeepO

Very good points, there!

Anyway, the only incentive for having forests in Civ4 is environmentalism, as it gives happy faces (you can build hammer-generating improvements of various kinds on all tiles now, so it is no longer a necessity to keep some forests around just for that).

If you think you will be using environmentalism in late game, then keep the forests. I use mercantilism, and later state property, so I just chop them down as soon as possible (and then try to get control of the UN so some start ass civ doesn't vote a Kyoto treaty equivalent ).

[Martinus]

Originally posted by Sir Ralph
By the way, chopping forest giving bonuses is an exploit in itself in games against the AI. The AI does not carefully aim its chops. It chops when it chops. Even if there is only one shield - oops - hammer in the queue left.

Doesn't matter anymore due to hammer overflow.

[TheDarkside]

I made a building demolition mod for anyone interested... just ironing out a few deployment details. I hope no one else did this already! Even if so it was a good learning experience of modding Civ 4

I'll post it soon

[TheDarkside]

my Building Demolition mod:

http://apolyton.net/forums/showthrea...hreadid=142091