Announcement

Collapse
No announcement yet.

Is there too much desert in Civilization?

Collapse
X
 
  • Filter
  • Time
  • Show
Clear All
new posts

  • #31
    Originally posted by Dis
    deserts in my maps aren't too bad.

    What would really be amazing, although perhaps too complex for too little gameplay value, would be to reflect rainfall patterns and mountains. But considering we don't fully understand the rainfall patterns of earth yet, it's unlikely we could implement it on a new world. For instance, mountains in the southwest tend to sap up moisture. In some cases as in California the west side will be more fertile and green than the east side (death valley). But this doesn't hold true in all cases. It depends on the location of the water source. As in the case of the Himalayas in Asia.
    One problem with something like that is that land use in civ is extremely simplistic. Most base tiles are either no food, 1 food/1 hammer or two food. It's hard to talk about high quality vs low quality land with such a limited spectrum of quality. (as a quick aside, what's the rationale for making plains be 1 food/1 hammer?). Of course, to really have, say, 4-5 levels of "quality" would perhaps overcomplicate the game. More realism isn't neccessarily more fun or more tactically interesting.

    On the other hand, I'll toss in the obligatory comment that SMAC managed to indeed have 3-4 base levels of "rainfall" (depending on how you define base) each of which gave more food. Sure enough, with this broader quality spectrum, it managed to model rainfall patterns based on mountains, at least to the extent of modeling "rain shadows." Areas to the east of mountains were usually drier, and areas to the west were usually wetter (and better for growing food).

    Comment


    • #32
      One thing to keep in mind in Civ IV is that map isn't supposed to represent as much as the globe as previous versions. I would guess at most it's supposed to represent at most only 60 degrees away from the equator (on a normal map.) (My number may be high). On the ice age maps the northern and southern extents are smaller.

      But in any case the percent of land being desert within this narrower range is higher than it would be if the map was supposed to represent out to +/- 75 degrees previous versions of civ appear to have done.
      1st C3DG Term 7 Science Advisor 1st C3DG Term 8 Domestic Minister
      Templar Science Minister
      AI: I sure wish Jon would hurry up and complete his turn, he's been at it for over 1,200,000 milliseconds now.

      Comment


      • #33
        I for one would prefer more "realistic" terrain. now I'll often see a desert right next to a jungle. not really that common in our world. deserts should be clumped together to make large deserts, the 1-patch desert is just annoying and mostly unrealistic. 1-patch deserts should only occur near deserts or in other dry terrain (plains). it would be more interesting to see maps where noone settled in a huge tract of land simply cause it was worthless. creating some natural borders would be for the better imho.

        there was a tectonics map that did a fair job at this a way back...
        Diplogamer formerly known as LzPrst

        Comment


        • #34
          Completely and totally agree with LzPrst.

          It's not the amount of desert that bothers me, its the generators placement of it.

          Comment


          • #35
            Desert does not represent just "desert", but also other "unusable" terrain. I don't have a problem with its "excessive" occurance.

            Comment


            • #36
              What other "unusable" terrains is desert supposed to represent?

              The base features imply a soil water level so low you can't form effective irrigation, and that's desert in my book.

              Originally posted by Jaybe
              Desert does not represent just "desert", but also other "unusable" terrain. I don't have a problem with its "excessive" occurance.
              1st C3DG Term 7 Science Advisor 1st C3DG Term 8 Domestic Minister
              Templar Science Minister
              AI: I sure wish Jon would hurry up and complete his turn, he's been at it for over 1,200,000 milliseconds now.

              Comment


              • #37
                I totally agree that desert should not, ever, appear next to jungle.

                Whether desert should be allowed to be a 1-tile or 2-tile placement, that happens in real life. But, I also agree that that is the exception, not the norm, and it would be nice to have the big inhabitable deserts implemented as the norm. Since most mapscripts also run of a certain total % of desert placement, having the huge deserts should also result in a decrease of the oddball little deserts.

                Wodan

                Comment


                • #38
                  Originally posted by wodan11
                  I totally agree that desert should not, ever, appear next to jungle.
                  I've been thinking about this and the only way I can even conceive of it is a beach. e.g., an extended narrow island that is mostly jungle and has a huge beach on the end of it. However, we should remember that each tile is, what, about 500 mile across (which is 250,000 square miles!!!). I really doubt a beach would be that big. In real life, the island would be jungle with a strip of beach around the edge. Even if the beach was 1 mile wide, that's still a far cry from the 498 miles of jungle.

                  Wodan

                  Comment


                  • #39
                    Realism is all well and good, but I have yet to see a desert large enough to be much a natural barrier (though I do tend to play mostly small/standard maps). If it's not going to provide a barrier of some kind, it's only impairing the AI and I see no point in having more than token amounts of desert on the map.

                    And no, desert should never appear next a jungle.

                    Comment


                    • #40
                      The closest real-life scenerio I can think of for desert being near jungle is a part of South America where west of the Andies is desert and east is rain forest. On a global view, it would be represented by one tile Flat/Desert-next tile-Plains/Mountain Peaks-next tile grassland/flat + jungle.
                      1st C3DG Term 7 Science Advisor 1st C3DG Term 8 Domestic Minister
                      Templar Science Minister
                      AI: I sure wish Jon would hurry up and complete his turn, he's been at it for over 1,200,000 milliseconds now.

                      Comment


                      • #41
                        However, there is entirely too little dessert in the game.

                        Only banana splits.
                        And indeed there will be time To wonder, "Do I dare?" and, "Do I dare?". t s eliot

                        Comment


                        • #42
                          If 500 miles is the diameter of your squares, then the Sahara sits next to the jungle (i.e. within 500 miles from one square center to the next) all the way across North Africa. And the world has lots of desert and unusable rocky soil, including in the Balkans in Europe.
                          No matter where you go, there you are. - Buckaroo Banzai
                          "I played it [Civilization] for three months and then realised I hadn't done any work. In the end, I had to delete all the saved files and smash the CD." Iain Banks, author

                          Comment


                          • #43
                            DP,
                            Last edited by Blaupanzer; January 11, 2008, 15:21.
                            No matter where you go, there you are. - Buckaroo Banzai
                            "I played it [Civilization] for three months and then realised I hadn't done any work. In the end, I had to delete all the saved files and smash the CD." Iain Banks, author

                            Comment


                            • #44
                              Well 100 miles. Whatever it is.

                              You're nitpicking the point.

                              Wodan

                              Comment


                              • #45
                                1. Nits need to be picked
                                (nit: noun, the egg or young form of a louse (as in lice), or other parasitic insect, particularly the egg of a head louse).
                                Fortunately, rarely to be found in my neck of the (non-) woods.

                                2. While the world has lots of rocky/unusable soil, it is often in smaller areas. The extra desert acts to consolidate these small areas. OTOH, everything in Civ is a generalization in the first place.

                                Comment

                                Working...