Some ideas to improve mods

[Optimizer]

What units would need Military Organization?

[Arkatreides]

Well in order to have enough units to make everything work I copied the Legion (needs Iron), War Chariot(needs Horses) and Bowman (doesn't need anything) which are one step up from the Swordsman, Chariot and Archer. It's basically a tech you pick if you want good units without moving all the way to the middle ages first (kind of like Military Tradition at the end of Middle Ages)

[Harlan]

Nice to see this thread is helping inspire some good debate. Too bad I don't have much time during this Thanksgiving vacation except to periodically check in on forums. I'll get around to finishing off the last age of the tech tree ideas later .

Some quick thoughts for Cian:

2. Yes, that I can wholeheartedly agree with. But the only concern I see is that by adding more prereqs to the gov techs you further limit the speed in which one can access them, and that can make all the difference early on.

That's the main reason for this change - to make Republic harder to get.

3. I disagree with you here- there's no reason why someone cannot begin to logically persue a humanistic form of thought without first believing in gods.

Look at the history of philosophy in ancient Greece, China, India. It arose in specific response to religion. Technically it needent be that way, but there's a clear pattern of how it actually happened in all the major civs.

3. The Chinese developed magnetic loadstones without ever building a comparable ship to those featured in Navigation- they never were able to get anywhere with it though, due to an edict by the Emperor.

I don't see what the point of this is - the tech is not called "Compass".

4. Any reason why? It seems to me federally backed and fully integrated economic systems didn't appear until after democracies mobilized their resources to assist in their development.

Not sure of your point here, and which idea it was connected to (of the two economics ones).

1. Except that Steam Power should be a prereq for Industrialization...

It already is - I was just adding a second.

4. I don't see why this should be as it you say- replaceable parts mainly concerns itself with the assembly line, in my opinion, and in that electricity assisted it.

The main idea here is to connect Electronics with the rest of the tech tree - one can go absurdly far without it.

6. No- I see no reason that people must know how to fly to advance to other things...

Take a look at the Modern Age techs. A very high number of them have to do with flying, and space. You obviously shouldn't be able to do something like a Stealth Flighter without having Adv. Flight.

[Cian McGuire]

2. Yes, that I can wholeheartedly agree with. But the only concern I see is that by adding more prereqs to the gov techs you further limit the speed in which one can access them, and that can make all the difference early on.

That's the main reason for this change - to make Republic harder to get.

I see then... but why should it be harder to obtain? The way the game is set up you have crippling corruption/waste if you try to expand too much or you cannot field the number of units (not to mention garnering the techpoints for all the necessary researches) with Despotism. The only way not to fall behind early on is get the essential techs (Bronze Working/Ceremonial Burial) and then make a beeline for whichever government you're aiming for. By restricting the access of one you would tend to make people more favorable towards the other goverment, and as it's Monarchy, possibly through the early game into a fragfest

3. I disagree with you here- there's no reason why someone cannot begin to logically persue a humanistic form of thought without first believing in gods.

Look at the history of philosophy in ancient Greece, China, India. It arose in specific response to religion. Technically it needent be that way, but there's a clear pattern of how it actually happened in all the major civs.

True, true- I can concede to that...

3. The Chinese developed magnetic loadstones without ever building a comparable ship to those featured in Navigation- they never were able to get anywhere with it though, due to an edict by the Emperor.

I don't see what the point of this is - the tech is not called "Compass".

Yeah, but Magnetization symbolizes the ability to find lodestone or make new magnetized compasses to help aid in rudmentary navigation- and the Chinese show that one was possible without the other.

[QUTOE]4. Any reason why? It seems to me federally backed and fully integrated economic systems didn't appear until after democracies mobilized their resources to assist in their development.

Not sure of your point here, and which idea it was connected to (of the two economics ones).[/QUOTE]

Um... Basically my point was that flourishing economic systems (Economics) didn't develop until there were adequate democratic institutions to help support them. Basically that in this case of Chicken & Egg, the Democracy seems to have come first (not necessarily directly, but enough that Economics shouldn't be a prereq).

1. Except that Steam Power should be a prereq for Industrialization...

It already is - I was just adding a second.

Ahh... okay.

4. I don't see why this should be as it you say- replaceable parts mainly concerns itself with the assembly line, in my opinion, and in that electricity assisted it.

The main idea here is to connect Electronics with the rest of the tech tree - one can go absurdly far without it.

Now that I can understand- but is it not possible to do so without rearraging earlier advances?

6. No- I see no reason that people must know how to fly to advance to other things...

Take a look at the Modern Age techs. A very high number of them have to do with flying, and space. You obviously shouldn't be able to do something like a Stealth Flighter without having Adv. Flight.

I see, but why can't Adv. Flight be pushed into Modern Era anyways? I was sorta surprised to see it in Industrial anyways

[Arkatreides]

And here is my tech tree for the middle ages. As I mentioned above, chemistry and printing press are missing as I needed two extra techs in the ancient era.

There are a lot of techs that are not needed for advancing, but considering that there are not that many units, the middle ages should probably be quite short anyway. And looking back at Earth's history, precious little was invented during the middle ages (Hence the Dark Ages )

[Arkatreides]

Oops, a few things are wrong. Navigation should be required for advancement and will also yield an advanced version of the Caravel. And Military Tradition has somehow been pushed off the screen.

[Optimizer]

About Magnetism

Since Civ 1, Magnetism has allowed the most advanced sailing craft. I don't like that, because if compasses played a great role in naval history, it was well before ships started carrying guns.

The physical nature of magnetism was not understood until mid-19th century (Faraday, Ørsted and Maxwell).

Long before that, at least before Columbus, compasses had been commonly used in navigation.

The discoveries that made large ships able to cross the oceans safely were tools such as chronometers and telescopes. Maybe Physics should make Galleons available?

By he way, Theory of Gravity should be merged into Physics.

[Harlan]

Arkatreides,
Unfortunately I'll have to wait a day or two before I can take a close look at your tech tree. I'll be especially interested though to see what you come up with for the Modern Age.

[Alexandre Madeira]

Some cool ideas here

[The_Aussie_Lurker]

My 2 cents worth

From everything I've read on these forums. I have a few ideas I'd like to put forward for the tech tree (and related improvements etc!)
Now I realise that some of my ideas have already been slated elsewhere, and that some are just plain IMPOSSIBLE with the current editor, but I put them all here for completeness!!

1) Woodworking (Carpentry): Allows timber as strategic resource, leads on from bronze working (to make the tools neccessary!) Allows earliest sea-going vessels (the naval equivelent of a scout?!)

2) Move military academy back to Fuedalism or even monarchy!

3) Have military tradition enable the Small Wonder-"National War Memorial", which also requires the civ to have lost at least 3 units in battle! Effect: reduces War Weariness.

4) Have democracy enable the Small Wonder Federal Court or Supreme Court (Other requirement-at least 5 courthouses!) Effect: Reduces ALL Corruption nationwide (on same land mass)?

5) Move U.N back to Radio (as it was going to be originally!), and have radio enable the improvement "Media Outlet" (an amalgam of the local TV/Radio/Telephone network) Effect: Increases happiness, increases resistance to propaganda and REDUCES distance corrruption.

6) Somehow make TMP a minor wonder (as it was supposed to be!)

7) Have The Statue of Wonder: A great wonder available only to Democracy and Republic governments. Effect: Reduces war weariness.

8) Have a new minor wonder "War Rallies" available only to fascist and communist governments (Requirement-5 media outlets) Effect: Reduces war weariness, reduces susceptiblity to propaganda nation wide.

9) Have the Fascist tech enable Fascist governemnt; the Stormtrooper unit (resource required: Saltpetre??) and the "Improvement" forced labour camp (Limited to despotism, fascism and communism.) Effect: Increases forced labour rate and improves assimiliation rate of foreign nationals.

10) Reduce Universal Sufferage to a minor wonder available only to Democracies and Republics (Also requires at least 5 libraries??). Same effect.

11) Have music theory enable "Bach's Well Tempered Clavier"

12) Have Theology enable Government: Theocracy and Unit: Religious Crusader (like knight, but with higher attack strength and movement!)
Possible Strategic resource (religious zeal??)

13) Move Tac nukes back to Roketry and ICBM's to Space Flight.

Anyway, just a few ideas: I'd be interested to know what you think.

Yours,
The_Aussie_Lurker.

[The_Aussie_Lurker]

A few more ideas

Sorry guys, but I had a few more ideas for mods (once the editing tools have been improved):

1) Have engineering enable the "Sewer Channel" improvement. Effect: Allows city size 3, creates population pollution.

2) Move hospital back to medicine. Effect: Allows city size 4, reduced chance of disease.

3) Have sanitation allow improvement "Sewerage Retreatment Plant". Effect: Increased happiness, reduced population pollution, reduced chance of disease.

4) Have a more advanced disease model: Allowing for the following factors

a) Terrain: Rivers, Jungles, swamps, flood plains=high; Mountains, coastal, deserts=low; Forest, hills, plains=average

b) Population: Higher pop=higher chance of infection

c) Pollution: Higher pollution=higher infection chance

d) Connection to infected cities via trade routes: the more trade routes, the higher the chance of infection.

e) improvements: recylce centre, hospital, sewerage retreatment plant all reduce infection chance.

Anyway, thats it (for now). Like I said, I know a lot of these are not do-able (yet?!) but this is just what I'd like to see!!

Yours,
The_Aussie_Lurker

[The_Aussie_Lurker]

Sorry to be a pain, but it's me again.

Just a couple more things more my grand "Wish List"

1) Editing roads so that they don't grant enemies their full movement benefits, but at least allow the enemy to treat all terrain as Plains!! (ie. 1 MP/square moved!)

2) MORE POWERFUL NUKES!!!! Capable of literally destroying cities!!!

Anyway, thats all for now.

[Wyrmo]

Originally posted by Harlan
I just came up with an idea I’m very psyched about – I hope someone will use it. Playing my first game or two, one thing I immediately noticed that bothered me: the map eventually turns into an endless grid of roads and then later railroads. I don’t like that at all.

Have you ever seen an aerial photograph of a densly populated area? (landscape, not city) Roads and roads EVERYWHERE. So for having tonnes of roads all around your cities is just realistic. Though roads should cost something in maintainence. say, 1 gold per three or four units or something.

Here’s a solution I came up with. Divide the Worker unit into two types: Worker and Miner. A Worker could do most jobs but mining, and miners vice versa. Then make the Worker unit a “Wheeled” unit, so it can’t go on Mountains or Jungle. This way, roads and railroads on Mountains and Jungle are completely impossible, but one can still Mine mountains.

Now jungles and mountains become serious barriers. This is a very good thing, I believe.

It is a stupid thing. We have built roads through dense forests and over steep mountains for ages. Look at the alps. Lots of roads there, and I would definatly class that as mountainious areas

Hopefully when the editing features are refined, one will be able to specify which terrain types one wants to be impassable. If this is the case, I’d make Forest also impassable to Worker units. So now there is a much stronger incentive than before to deforest. This also resolves the annoying graphical feature of roads and railroads on top on forests, instead of actually going through them.

I agree that roads and railroads should go through a clearing or something in forests, but still I must say that Civ3 has the best looking road-net of all Civ-games so far. Not all those straight lines making you belive that all your ppl are BORG or something

[Optimizer]

Originally posted by Wyrmo
Have you ever seen an aerial photograph of a densly populated area? (landscape, not city) Roads and roads EVERYWHERE. So for having tonnes of roads all around your cities is just realistic.

Same thing with railroads. The thing is that the graphics should be more discrete.