Too many meltdowns!

[Grumbold]

I had 2 nuclear meltdowns while stable and at peace in the one game where I tried the nuclear approach. I simply don't like that possibility. I can handle meltdowns while in anarchy or if the city is bombed by the enemy, but blue-sky disasters just seem to make nuclear an option that nobody in their right mind would take.

[Dis]

We've only had 1 real meltdown (TMI doesn't count) in 50 years of nuclear power.

Here's a list of all the nuclear reactors. Though that number has varied throughout the years, with the 50's having the fewest number of them.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_nuclear_reactors

[Drachasor]

Aye, 3MI does not count. That release an extremely miniscule level of radiation that was nowhere near dangerous. That's what happened when the workers did the *wrong* things at the nuclear plant. Nuclear Reactors today are very safe. We have safeties on top of safeties and redundant system on top of redundant system. So does every other country. It was just Soviet Russia that was lax.

The only way to justify meltdowns is to say that somehow take the place of nuclear waste. This is silly however, as there are many ways of handling such waste. One can use fast reactors (which generate power, of course), for instance, to make sure the nuclear waste will only last on the order of decades (or so) instead of millenia. While some of these reactors generate (and then use) weapons-grade nuclear material, you can make them so that any weapons-grade material is hopelessly mixed in with other particles.

Meltdowns are silly, a holdover from previous games. They don't really fit into the Civ IV redesign which got rid of pesky things like corruption and waste; meltdowns are of the same order. Getting nuclear plants later on in the game and having them be more expensive than coal plants is more than enough cost--are they more expensive currently? I've never built them because of the meltdown issue.

-Drachasor

[Drachasor]

Originally posted by Bill3000
Yeesh. I guess I shouldn't build nuclear power plants when I can build them, then. It's sad, as nuclear power is MUCH safer in real life.

Quite. In the game however, it is almost always much easier to handle the unhealthiness increase from coal than risking a meltdown. The last thing you want is your production center having a meltdown in the middle of a war (especially if you are being invaded).

-Drachasor

[laurentius]

There seems to be no difference in the frequence of meltdowns from emperor->immortal.

[Xerxes712]

Thanks for more info. I think also there is no affect by difficulty level. I do not see anything in the XML settings.

It has a constant of 1000, and if a meltdown occurs, it is the same as a Nuke Explosion! In fact it is called RNDNUKEXPLOSION.

Maybe change this chance by a factor of 7? I am going to do some test over a hundred turn 'one year' interval using a sample of 20 cities to try to get down the facts. Maybe it is statistical (the unlucky report a problem), but it would seem people report a 1:144 chance over the 1:1000. That is Nuclear plant per turn one year.

You must consider that if you built early 1850, the 'turn' are more than 1 year, they can be two or even five years per turn. Giving the illusion of high failure. I do not know if the game mechanics only consider raw turns, or actual number of years elapsed per turn.

Really to balance the game, it is the coal plants only that should lead to global warming increase, to offset the chance of the 'clean' nuclear plant 'blowing up'.

Plus with global warming as the 'end game breaker' for all players, the sea water level should rise to flood the coastal cities. I survived extreme global warming by using coastal cities and the ocean which is not affected.
_____________
I digress somewhat for a personal comment on the tone of the game. I enjoy it alot, but it seems to be very Politically Correct; and does not show the truth of history.

There seems to be a huge anti-nuke (Liberalism) slant built into this game. Well, if you do not build Coal plants which causes some REAL global warming lets say, and nuke plants are bad -should we set back and go without no cars, no electricity -everything that makes modern civilization work?

Is not France almost 100% Nuclear powered? I see no meltdowns in their country (except the small cultural Jihad going on over there). "I feel your pain", we have are own problems here too. Welkommen to the club.

The UN victory reads like the New World Order. Why can I not get everyone to agree on my cultural civilization view? Instead of a left wing eutopia, I want every one to follow my example of a State Religious Police State. A right wing eutopia?

[Imminence]

I second this. I suspect a slight manipulation against everything "not green". Personally I love woods and stuff, but for a game they should either calculate meltdown-"chances" correctly or just implement something, which makes nuclear power plants obsolete, e.g. fusion power.


The game is not properly designed IMO, because the global warming - which is a negative thing, without any doubt - just causes random generations of desert tiles.
There should be also a melting of the glaciers in the extreme south and north as well as the flooding of coastal regions. Tundra regions should benefit a bit, because the ice there should melt and thus give access to some sea food.

None of those occure actually. I even saw a desert popping up between frozen tiles in a tundra region

[Xerxes712]

I ran some exciting tests last night. I do not see anything from the ordinary chance.

For a given Nuke plant. You have 1:1000 chance per turn. I ran 7 nuke plants and after 100 turns, none melted down yet. 70% chance for one failure; lucky so far no meltdown.

For 20 plants, even odds would be after 50 turns you have had one meltdown.

I wonder for the script Phython, add some logic to the Global Warming effect. As you say, check for tile type, then apply more appropriate terrain.

Basic land--desert

Coastal---'barren' water tile (swamp TGA pic). simulates rising sea level flooding your coastal city.

Ice packs: just removed so they are now passible water. Tundra-- grassland, etc.

I think this can be easily scripted in, as long as we have a command to query the tile type, so as to return what to replace it with. This can be progressive.

As the lush green tropics turn to desert, and coastal areas are just none producing swamp/water. You move north.

Ice packs plainly melt into ocean, later into barren ocean.

Tundra--grassland--plains--desert.

Coastal into water log barren tiles.

Would be neat.

[Dis]

Originally posted by Imminence
I second this. I suspect a slight manipulation against everything "not green". Personally I love woods and stuff, but for a game they should either calculate meltdown-"chances" correctly or just implement something, which makes nuclear power plants obsolete, e.g. fusion power.


The game is not properly designed IMO, because the global warming - which is a negative thing, without any doubt - just causes random generations of desert tiles.
There should be also a melting of the glaciers in the extreme south and north as well as the flooding of coastal regions. Tundra regions should benefit a bit, because the ice there should melt and thus give access to some sea food.

None of those occure actually. I even saw a desert popping up between frozen tiles in a tundra region

nothing like the SMAC model of rising sea levels. A little more difficult to implement as you have cities on the coast. But I'm sure they could add a city improvement like levees. And if you don't have it, you lose 50% of your population (like SMAC) and one is automatically built.

The main problem is there is no elevation as in SMAC. But I'm sure they could figure something out. Such as not flooding hill or peak tiles that are on the coast, but flood all the others.

[Imminence]

IIRC I have seen this in CTP II four or five years ago.

[JoshPSU]

multiple meltdowns

I built all of my nuclear plants at the same time, using cash to hurry them. I can't remember how long it was, but after a lag time, I started having them about once every two turns, in different cities.

I wonder if the meltdown works the same way as the great person, accumulating risk over time, and then hitting you in the end.

The worst part is that you can't take these plants offline! Once they are built, you are stuck, and you will have an inevitable meltdown!

[bobshkibob]

i agree, in both civ 3 and civ 4 meltdowns were FAR to common. The US has now been running dozens of nuclear plants for 30-40 years and not a single person has been killed because of them let alone blowing a metropolis to dust. If they are well funded they are very safe.

Idea: No meltdowns after a civ has discovered some tech, Fiber Optics or Fusion maybe?

I do like the idea of allowing spies to sabotage nuclear plants resulting in a meltdown. This would be a much more realistic way to include the danger factor.

[Supercilious]

I named a city Luv Canal after it was surrounded in polluted squares and it's nuclear reactor had been melted down three times.

That city was cursed.

[Dis]

Originally posted by bobshkibob
i agree, in both civ 3 and civ 4 meltdowns were FAR to common. The US has now been running dozens of nuclear plants for 30-40 years and not a single person has been killed because of them let alone blowing a metropolis to dust. If they are well funded they are very safe.

Idea: No meltdowns after a civ has discovered some tech, Fiber Optics or Fusion maybe?

I do like the idea of allowing spies to sabotage nuclear plants resulting in a meltdown. This would be a much more realistic way to include the danger factor.

actually there have been americans killed by nuclear reactors. Though you can argue they weren't commercial power plants, but prototype reactors.

hmm, searching wikipedia I can't find it. They mention the Idaho accident, but mention no one dying. I could have swore 2 people died in that accident.

oh well, here's a list of nuclear accidents if anyone cares to read. Kind of scary when you see so many nuclear bombs were lost off of B-52's and such.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_accidents

edit: here I found it.

http://www.radiationworks.com/sl1reactor.htm

[Skeeve]

The Meltdown rate currently built into the XML files is probably there to encourage the player to build Nuclear Power sparingly.

Yeah - I find the rate to be unrealistic, but so far I only build these in about 1 in every 3 cities to spread out the risk.

I'm sure the meltdown rate is very editable in the XML, without use of Python or SDK.