No horses, or coal, ever!

[Arrian]

I play mostly on Noble and like big maps with continents low to medium ocean. I play a lot in "tropical" climates and that might be part of it; horsies don't like jungle.

The tropical climate may be a contributing factor, sure. Horsies like grasslands and plains.

I also think there is a certain amount of luck involved, too. I've had a game or two where I lacked a particular resource, be it horses, coal, aluminium, oil... but then I'd have a run of games where I had the resources I'd previously lacked, but now lacked something else (or didn't lack at all... but that involved Praetorians ).

-Arrian

[Generaldoktor]

Originally posted by Arrian


but then I'd have a run of games where I had the resources I'd previously lacked, but now lacked something else (or didn't lack at all... but that involved Praetorians ).

-Arrian

Yeah, that's heaven. All the iron in the world and Praetorians too. Or maybe you're saying your Praetorians quickly secured "agreement" for you on whatever you might lack.

I don't know if it can be known horses are programmed not to appear in the tropics. Not all of tropical maps are jungle and some of the terrain choices have been criticized as illogical. (Ice next to plains, etc.)

[Arrian]

Yeah, I was saying my Praetorians allowed me to acquire anything I may have lacked.

As for your map script question (horses in tropics)... the one to ask would be Sirian.

-Arrian

[PaganPaulwhisky]

It seems to me that some resources are just less common than others although I have not done any tests to check this. It makes sense to me that certain building/precious metals should be infrequent which is what I've found when playing the game. Specifically aluminum, silver, gold, marble and stone seem to be rarest in my games. I once played a standard size pangea map that had only 1 source of aluminum!? I always seem to get horses and coal, but then again I tend to have fairly large territories. I hardly ever get silver or aluminum. I think terrain type has alot to do with some of this.

[Generaldoktor]

Originally posted by PaganPaulwhisky
Specifically aluminum, silver, gold, marble and stone seem to be rarest in my games. I once played a standard size pangea map that had only 1 source of aluminum!? I hardly ever get silver or aluminum. I think terrain type has alot to do with some of this.

1 aluminum per planet! Well no whoosh-whoosh airplanes or space journeys for your crew. (Montezuma on the moon, I wonder what he'd do?? Sorry, just an aside.)

Yeah, I'm not seeing an abundance of silver either. Look in the Antarctic; the last three games I've seen clusters of silver down there, sounds like map script programming to me, though I don't know of any real life analogy, except for maybe southern Chile and South Africa. When I put in Bismarck as an AI, he ends up down there a lot and get's all the silver !

[Rancidlunchmeat]

I always seem to find an abundance of marble, gold, gems, and silver (along with Beaver! ) in the arctic/antarctic. Which means you can't do anything at all, except be lucky enough to have one city per square because there's no food and the cities won't grow larger than size 2 unless you dump a bunch of great merchants in them.

I don't know if that's bad scripting, or if that's a decision they specifically made.. if you want the benefit of the resource, then you have to suffer with the maint costs, the distances, and the lack of a truly viable city.

[Unimatrix11]

Originally posted by Generaldoktor


Spaceship victory has always been silly to me. Societies don't collapse in competition because somebody gets the interplanetary rocket.

It's not supposed to be a simply interplanetary rocket, but an interstellar colonization ship. If something like that (along with a habitable planet) would be anywhere close to get, i guess it would trigger quite a fierce competition to get there first and claim it for the own nation. The only silly thing about SpaceRace then would be, that it is quite debateable to say the least if that is possible at all (for various reasons).

[Shaka II]

I think gdgrimm said it nicely. I also think that the resource uncertainty adds a tremendous amount of fun and variety to the game and can totally change your strategy. Sometimes you don't get to build your UU. Life's like that, we do the best we can with what we have.

But if you don't have aluminum to defend your airspace in the modern era, that really hurts. Oil would be tough to, but mech infantry are tough and with combat I and the armored unit upgrade, they're as good as modern armor and take out gun ships with ease. Rails are nice, but still not a necessity. Aluminum is though IMO.

The nice thing about being a conqueror is that you get to acquire all of these resources for yourself, denying the AI in many cases. So, I've rarely been without a strategic resource outside of the early game. One of my best games was as the Romans. I had early bronze and never even went for iron working to build praetorians since the axemen were all that was required to get the job done of taking over the Chinese and most of the Americans. And that hurts to not build praetorians, but sometimes you have to seize the moment and not look back.

[eriadoc]

I find that the particular resource I'm lacking varies per game and is directly related to whatever my UU is. If I am the Mongols, there will be no horses for me this game. If my UU requires Iron, there will be no iron for me today.

I'm only half joking

[uberfish]

Horses, no big deal, the catapults can't keep up with them anyway.

Coal can be rare for some reason. A good railroad network is invaluable not to mention the boost to ironworks, and I'll trade resources or go to war to get it.

Iron and oil are well distributed and I almost always seem to have them.

Silver only spawns in tundra, think it's an intentional bonus to an otherwise poor terrain.

[Generaldoktor]

I guess then war is the solution (to missing critical resources.) As a "builder" and "castle" type player, I've avoided a lot of war and of course that was the advertised advantage of Civ4; that you wouldn't have to conquer the world to win.

As for the person who dumps Great Merchants in polar cities to build them up; do you still get food with a GM? I thought they took that out with one of the patches, (though it seems like a good idea to me; meet Mr Piggly Wiggly!)

[Generaldoktor]

Originally posted by Unimatrix11


It's not supposed to be a simply interplanetary rocket, but an interstellar colonization ship. If something like that (along with a habitable planet) would be anywhere close to get, i guess it would trigger quite a fierce competition to get there first and claim it for the own nation. The only silly thing about SpaceRace then would be, that it is quite debateable to say the least if that is possible at all (for various reasons).

Yeah, but everybody instantly loses when your rocket takes off. I would have it where you get a huge "culture" and/or victory point boost after you accomplish that, but not win the game.

[Shaka II]

Originally posted by Generaldoktor

Yeah, but everybody instantly loses when your rocket takes off. I would have it where you get a huge "culture" and/or victory point boost after you accomplish that, but not win the game.

This would be a good idea and would save many of us from having to disable it. Maybe SS could be worth between 1,000 and 2,000 points. I don't see how leaving Earth is a victory. Earth is the victory.

[samspock]

My last game I started with Iron in my fat cross, stone to the north, marble and copper to the east (had to conqure to get it) and later quite a bit of coal, oil and aluminium. Inside my borders after I had killed off the nearest rival and took his awesome capital spot (loaded with flood plaines and a gold hill) I had about 4 irons scattered around. What I did not have any of was horses. I had to trade for them and got cut off due to war before I could finish a knight! I am usually missing stone or marble though more so than horses/coal etc.

[Yosho]

Originally posted by Generaldoktor


Yeah, but everybody instantly loses when your rocket takes off. I would have it where you get a huge "culture" and/or victory point boost after you accomplish that, but not win the game.

Seriously, you have to wonder what the distance maintance cost of having a city on Alpha Centauri would be.