Ask The Civ Team - 09/14/01 Edition

[Gramphos]

Originally posted by TechWins
In Civ2 when you weren't number it would tell who was number one. Now in Civ3 it doesn't do this. Unless this Civ player hasn't found any other Civs yet.

Civ3 is based on Civ1, and as CivNet (I don't remember if the original DOS-version had Demographics) didn't show what civ was in the top; Why should it show in civ3?

[Edward]

In the early game, even all the civs combined don't "control" a majority of the world's land because the civs haven't expanded that much. (To "control" land it must be "within your borders" which is limited by the number of cities and their cultural reach.) In these early days, you could conceivably conquer all the cities in the world (thus gaining a military victory) and still not control a majority of the world's land (no domination victory).

I distantly remember someone saying that they added the domination victory so you wouldn't have to keep moving units around once it was obvious that you were going to win. It also avoids the "what tiny island is that last AI city hiding on" phenomenon. ('Though some people enjoy a sort of Sim-City-esque perfecting of the world. I guess they'd have to turn off domination victory or agree to continue the game after achieving it.)

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posted by TechWins
I'm not sure if it was only me, but I didn't see any info given out about other Civs in the demographics. The only info given out about other Civs was in the Top 5.

The Civ3 demographics screen says stuff like "you're 8th in disease". Now I know that all eight civs exist (if playing with a random number of civ opponents). Looking at the demographics chart I can get a very clear picture of where I currently stand. Population and land area are always particularly telling. Productivity can give an indication of whether you're sleazing or building up big cities. I'm sure EyesOfNight would know what direction to move based on the Civ3 demographics screen.

Single players can just opt not to use the demographics screen. Not having played multi-player, I'm not sure how much it twists gameplay. Perhaps they'll give the option to disable the demographics screen. I'm guessing they won't take the path of making it more realistic by only including civs you've discovered. Perhaps they figure that if you open up the demographics screen, you're the kind of player who likes to see this sort of info - realistic or not.

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It's interesting to note that the ordering is slightly different than it would be in Civ2. The size 10 city with no wonders beat the size 7 city with one wonder. (Size is more important in Civ3's top Five than in Civ2's wonder-centric Top Five.) Also the size 7 capitol with one wonder beat the size 8 capitol with one wonder. More than size and wonders affect the Top 5 rankings.

[isaac brock]

Of course governors aren't mandatory, but they can be useful by the end of the game when you have 45 cities or whatever always needing micro management. The continental or global basis is also a nice option. SMAC had great governors. problem was when you were changing so many cities at a time to governor you could spend upwards of fifteen minutes on it. i, being such a busy man as i am, don't have that kind of time.

[tniem]

Originally posted by Gramphos
Civ3 is based on Civ1, and as CivNet (I don't remember if the original DOS-version had Demographics) didn't show what civ was in the top; Why should it show in civ3?

The original did have demographics. Just the mention of them is a trip down memory lane.

[isaac brock]

I just got civ 1 off of that Computer Gaming or whatever magazine that had it on its CD. It listed Civ 1 under the genre "Worlds best game"