Workshops of the World! Resources and Production in the Modern Era.

[Exile]

I just spotted a thread in the Civ4 discussion mentioning the fact that, in modern economies, the relationship between resources and their exploitation isn't as direct as depicted in Civ2.

In Civ2, the resources you exploit are those within the boundaries of your city screen. If there's gold there, you can mine it. If not, you're out of luck.

But in modern economies, the resource need not be near the production facility, yet exploitation can occur.

For example, historically, the wool wasn't worth that much . . . . until is was transformed by the manufacturing process into textiles. And those same textiles could then be processed into clothing and become more valuable. But the WOOL need not be anywhere NEAR the city where the factory/processing facility is located.

Civ2 doesn't really seem to address this value-added-via-manufacturing process. Or does it? And the geographic limitations of exploitation seem embedded in the game too. Can anyone think of a way to simulate these things using Civ2?

[N35t0r]

Trade?


What comes to mind would be a SMAC-like ferrying of minerals (shields) from one city without a factory to another...

The problem with this is that you only have one build queue per city, with the rush-building limitations that this brings...

[Harry Tuttle]

Well Exile I've also thought about this, maybe not on the same line, but close to it none the less.

The idea of ferrying raw materials from a supply sector to a production sector is not new. We've seen it done in your Imperialism scenario with ultra-trade benefits from caravans. While this is a simple chain, with a caravan of raw materials getting sold once it reaches a far away port, this also doesn't really depict the creation of value, just profits from a sale of demanded goods.

A way I could see the value chain being created is through the use of events. Let's run down the units needed to create value:

Materials-
Sheep
Spun Fiber
Textiles

Value Adders-
Sheep Shearer
Loom Spinner

A sheep is randomly created on an island.

The Sheep is "unitkilled" by a Sheep Shearer. Upon "unitkilled" the unit Spun Fiber is created and can be a high cost unit or a caravan unit.

Spun Fiber is "unitkilled" by a Loom Spinner. Move the Spun Fiber unit into a city for disbandment or use it to trade into a city or continue down the value chain.

Upon "unitkilled" the unit Textiles is created. Textiles can be a high cost unit or a caravan unit. Move the Textiles unit into a city for disbandment or use it to trade into a city.

and so on and so on...


Now, if you wanted to depict a center of production that adds value, have the Spun Fiber and Textiles pop up upon "unitkilled" in a specific area since they are inanimate objects.


This is an intersting topic. For my future trade scenario I really would like to depict a definate value chain. The Civ2 engine could accomodate this quite nicely.

[Boco]

When you create a caravan by events, what commodity does it have? Does the commodity depend on location, techs, turn, and/or home city? [Edit] Just realized that it depends on at least the city. [Edit2] Just realized I was thinking of a city building a caravan in a scenario

[Cyrion]

Originally posted by Boco
When you create a caravan by events, what commodity does it have? Does the commodity depend on location, techs, turn, and/or home city? [Edit] Just realized that it depends on at least the city.

Not 100% sure, But I think I read somewhere it always comes as a "hides" caravan

[Exile]

I can't recall ever having created a caravan via event, but it seems as if I've played a scenario where that was done. Can't recall which one, though.

Yeah, Harry, I did think about the "trade = raw materials idea," and although it approximates this relationship, it's not exactly right.

And the truth is that I have no idea how or why the trade is so remarkably lucrative in AoI. Didn't plan it that way, and my testing process kept pushing the tech paradigm higher and higher because of it. Mega-trade-payoffs, unhappily do not equal the value-added thing or simulate the way that factories located in industrialized nations exploit resources from around the world. I was trying to think of some way to pass along resources, in whatever way, to manufacturing centers elsewhere in the world. The only things that I can come up with are ad hoc solutions that a perceptive civ player would be able to subvert.

(Btw, dled and played Gold Gulch for a little while. VERY innovative and adventurous. Lotsa fun.)

[techumseh]

I've been fiddling with trade on a gigamap and got similar payoffs. I think it's just the larger distances on a huge map.

I used event created caravans as slaves in Roman Civil War. It's always 'hides', whatever you call it.

[AGRICOLA]

I can't recall ever having created a caravan via event, but it seems as if I've played a scenario where that was done. Can't recall which one, though.

Both Red Front 1.4 and 1.5 as well as Second Front. Nemo did some interesting things with freights.

[Harry Tuttle]

Originally posted by Exile
(Btw, dled and played Gold Gulch for a little while. VERY innovative and adventurous. Lotsa fun.)

Thank you, that means a lot. I and the other contributors put a lot into it and I'm glad you liked it.

I think I may try to crack the trade formula soon enough. I almost figured out the bribery equation with GG. The results were very close, except for one small slack variable I wasn't able to figure out.

[Boco]

Going a bit off topic

Here's a couple of valuable references for trade. Great Libary Index #2 on Apolyton and Great Library Index #2 at Slowthinker's site contain these links:

• Calculating Caravan and Freight Delivery Payments
• How Supply and Demand Lists Are Determined
• A pattern governing supply and demand changes
• Interesting observations on the effects of roads on trade

With the knowledge of these links, you could very likely 'program' cities to produce particular commodities. AFAIK, no one's done this for a few reasons. It's a steep learning curve, and most likely you will need to sacrifice a scenario's geographical accuracy to achieve such specificity.

These links can also help you to calculate rewards for trade routes. In vanilla Civ2 these calculations are quite accurate. If there's interest and no other xls out there, I could cobble together a Payoff Calculator (did I say that ).

On topic, let's try to shoot down Harry's idea, because it strikes me as pretty good. A trigger in a 3rd world country creates a high cost, 0mf unit intended for disbanding in the 'processing' city. Triggers could be UnitKilled (perhaps with a BribeUnit modifier, e.g. bribers are 'purchasing agents'), as HT suggests, or CityProduction (employing a 'resource' city that has the unique ability to produce a particular unit or improvement). One problem is that the events hard-code links between resource and processing cities. Unless the created unit is mobile.... If it's mobile, weak, bribable, and created in a geographically important location, then you could simulate a need to keep trade lanes open. But then you're back to a slightly modified version of Civ2's original trade paradigm.

Any other thoughts on this?