Terraforming

[Cranberry]

What I'd really like is Terraforming that works in Civ4. The is a Terraform mod on the web but I absolutely fail to get it to work. Terraforming in Alpha Centauri was a big part of my pleasure.
Any comments ?

[mkorin]

I was just thinking on the train this morning how much I miss engineers from CivII. The upgraded worker that allowed you to do basic Terraforming. Of course the Alpha Centeuri was even better. I'd like to see engineers back in the game.

[Kuciwalker]

Terraforming was silly and is thankfully gone.

[TimeTraveler]

I like terraforming quite a bit. And I certainly wouldn't mind seeing workers able to eventually undergo expansive projects like turning desert into plains and plains into grassland. As, say, a means of countering globa warming. Perhaps then some players won't be as afraid of throwing nukes around.

Maybe a Terraforming tech could require Ecology and... something else. Like Robotics or Fusion?

Suppose we have a unit that can plant forests at their own expense, and cost more than it would to chop the forest. It'd give a means of replanting forests where necessary without having it more worthwhile to plant and chop all the time instead. It may also add use to the tundra regions.

[Willem]

Originally posted by Kuciwalker
Terraforming was silly and is thankfully gone.

Not only was it silly, it was also unbalancing. There's no way the AI is going to be able to make the same kinds of decisions as to how to go about it that the human can. It will end up changing things that don't really need changing, and vice versa. It would give the human a big advantage in the game.

[mkorin]

No, what is silly is that according to the game at no time in human history can mankind irrigate a desert or change a flood plan to habitable or at least make trails through mountions, let alone using explosives to reduce them to farmland. Mankind has done all of these things. Why does Firaxis force us to live with bad terrain. Sure, make it take longer, to balance the game. However, don't give me that sad excuse of the AIs not being able to make use of terraforming. They already upgrade their areas foolishly, it couldn't be much worse with limited terraforming.

Mike

[Lord Avalon]

And digging canals!

[Kuciwalker]

Terraforming results in everything being the same.

[Six Thousand Year Old Man]

I'd love it if you could do SOMETHING with those crappy desert tiles. Even if it took 30 turns of terraforming to get one food (or 1 hammer), it'd be better than nothing. You can't really call that an exploit - based on results/time, that's a poor use of a worker compared to just about anything else.

I agree that being able to swap hills into plains, or desert into grassland, is unrealistic and probably gives the human player an advantage.

[Xorbon]

The only kind of terraforming I'd ilke to see is tree-planting to create forests. Perhaps with the caveat that new forests don't produce extra shields for the first while to mimic the fact that it takes a while for a forest to mature.

Civ 2 terraforming was just silly.

[zeace]

I want bridges/tunnels that can span coast tiles... Creating one should cause any "all cities on this continent" bonuses to spread through the tunnel too.

[Tokyo Sexwale]

I'd be happy if you could just turn the stupid global warming off. It's such a pain if you're playing a game where you switch off the Time win and play far into the modern era.

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by Xorbon
The only kind of terraforming I'd ilke to see is tree-planting to create forests. Perhaps with the caveat that new forests don't produce extra shields for the first while to mimic the fact that it takes a while for a forest to mature.

That completely destroys a major early-game strategic decision.

[Xorbon]

Yes. It does.

But you'd still have to deal with the production hit until you get the tech that allows you to plant trees.

Besides, it's annoying when I capture AI cities and they've clearcut everything.

[Ijuin]

On irrigating deserts: How about with Civil Service (which is required to let you irrigate away from rivers anyway), Deserts give +2 food when irrigated instead of +1?

Forests: Replanting a forest should take twice as long as chopping it, and you should only get the bonus hammers from it ONCE (so no IFE). Maybe Civil Service should be required to replant forests, to represent the large coordinated effort of deliberate reforestration?