Why can't we transport food?

[Trachmyr]

One thing I miss about caravans is the ability to transport food.

I suggest this ability be added in a patch. How it works would be simple, if a city is suffering a shortage then it automaticaly borrows food from a "connected" city with a SURPLUS. It can only be used to cover shortages, and if there isn't enough food to go arround then those with the biggest needs gets food first (if that's a tie, the older city gets the food (The one that appears first in the list)... Those with the largest surpluses donate food first, in a tie bigger cities give food, then younger cities.

This ability could be made one of the special abilities of certain governments (democracy & Communism), and the "tag" is available to new governments created (Facism would get it, City-State wouldn't).

It might even be possible to trade excess food on a turn by turn basis if a civ has a severe shortage (They contact you: "We have need of x Food Supplies, we are willing to pay xx gold this turn. Will you help us?", or you ask them when you have a shortage). Although this is probaly asking for too much.

[Trachmyr]

*bump*

Any thought on this? Anyone agee/disagee? Comments (Please )

[adaMada]

very very very much agreed.

I once had a city that was either constantly in disorder or constantly starving after I'd captured it. I was able to pull it through, but I only really needed three turns -- If I'd been able to import food for a few turns, then they'd have been connected to the rest of my trade network/temple would have been built. As it happened, I was able to mix between disorder and starving and keep it alive until it was connected to my network, and then luxuries managed to keep it afloat, but I'd have felt much better if I'd been able to import some food for those three or four turns...

-- adaMada

[Rust]

No thanks to automatically. I starve out cities that i've just conquered so i dont have to station so many troops to keep them from defecting. However an option from a specific city to specific city would be nice.

[Trachmyr]

Ok, I see your point about Starving cities.... but even in the way I suggested it above, the city has to be connected.

But I can see the use of a toggle button "Import Food" next to the draft/hurry Production Button.

Suggestion REWRITE:

Cities will have the option to import food from within your empire to battle starvation. A toggle button, appearing next to the "Draft" and "Hurry" buttons, will allow this city to participate in your civilization's food network. When activated, any turn that this city faces starvation, the city will import food from other cities participating in your "Food Network" that have a surplus. A city can only import food to cover starvation, not for growth. A city will only donate food if it has a surplus. Cities that have the largest needs import first (older cities win ties). Cities with the largest surpluses donate food first (smaller cities then younger cities break ties). The Governor can control this toggle if you allow him to, available in the governor menu.

This may be considered part of more advanced governments, such as Democracies and Communism, thus this option is only available to them (or any new governments created via the editor with this ability selected).


Thoughts? Comments?

I know this seems like a minor issue, but it breaks the Starvation/Growth cycles that can plague the late game. It will reduce micromanegent of workers to insure that cities produce "even" amounts of food.


It could be used to create a few cities with massive population... by using a worker/settler to "join population", then supporting it with food from other cities. I don't believe this would be an abuse of any kind, as the cities supporting the "extra population" wouldn't be able to grow as large, and we all know that specialist citizen are pretty much worthless (except entertainers).

[Grumbold]

The only reason I can think of for not allowing food (and to some extent, shields) to transfer from city to city is AI and balance. The game would have to be carefully balanced to make sure that one huge city was not going to break some part of the game. Its also a lot harder to make the AI understand when it is a good idea to transfer than a human player. They just spent a lot of effort taking out or adapting ideas that the AI didnt handle well.

[Trachmyr]

I don't see how this would be a problem for the AI, unless there are unusual cirumstances (Pillaging/workers joining cities (which the AI dosen't seem to do), the worst starvation will be -1. So this trade network will just even things out a bit... I see it as more helpful to the AI than problematic. In the case of pillaging, the food will stop being imported as soon as the irrigation is repaired. The only thing that would need to be done for the AI is to make sure that workers improve a city based upon it's actual food production not it's food+import.

Can you come up with a scenario that might break the AI?

[Grandpa Troll]

Ok, I agree about transporting food

Because in real life if a city were in need, say in North Carolina where I live, which happened after many of the Hurricanes, we had food and supplies shipped in . I think that pehaps even if it were for a substantial penalty, as in spoilage of the transported food due to distance but still having the ability., but I think that would be great to re-instill that aspect

I also miss being able to convert production to completing Wonders

I am just a 42 year old wanna be Empire Builder whom loves this game and well, still learning but totally agree this should be added back in!

Yours in Civin

Troll

[Grumbold]

I'm not concentrating on your "only for starvation" concept. If food networks are manipulable it is to allow cities to grow in harsh environments to exploit resources, or because they are the capital (like Rome, which reached reputedly 1,000,000 residents because of the grain ships from Egypt.) If food can move, it can move where you want it to move, and similarly raw industrial resources can be channeled to industrially focussed cities.

Possible exploit: take a city that has irrigated grass squares and mined hill/mountain squares. Grow it to size 7 on grass tiles then switch it to producing from the industrial squares. It now has a huge food shortfall paid for by other cities and lots more shields than normal. Instant Wonder or spaceship building city. The AI would have to know how to min/max this with the best players, or the rules would force you not to adjust production if it would lead to starvation, causing player frustration if they needed a short term surge in industrial output.

[Green Giant]

That sounds like a good idea. Although I really don't have food shortages that much.

[Trachmyr]

Originally posted by Grumbold
Possible exploit: take a city that has irrigated grass squares and mined hill/mountain squares. Grow it to size 7 on grass tiles then switch it to producing from the industrial squares. It now has a huge food shortfall paid for by other cities and lots more shields than normal. Instant Wonder or spaceship building city. The AI would have to know how to min/max this with the best players, or the rules would force you not to adjust production if it would lead to starvation, causing player frustration if they needed a short term surge in industrial output.

Well I have two thought on this... First off I think that "strategy/exploit" should be legal, and it would be excellent if the AI could understand it. However, I also realize that FIRAXIS isn't going to code the AI to do this since the game is already released. So, perhaps we can reach a compromise that limits the maximum number of imported/exported food to 3 per city. This puts it back in line with the ability of civ2 caravans, and requires no additional AI strategies. This way the maximum exploit would only be about 4 shields.

Sound better?
(Edit: Actualy the max. amount of food imported/exported can be a function of the government... say demo/com=3 and mon/rep=1 while des/ana=0)

[Grumbold]

I'd like it to be unlimited but for the sake of the AI I accept it probably isn't going to happen. One for the Civ IV wishlist

[Chowlett]

This is fair enough in modern times, but in ancient days I see spoilage of food being a slight problem... This would be quite a good addition, but it would have to be reduced in effectiveness until the advent of, say, refrigeration (assuming that still exists) perhaps with an earlier trigger as well to make it intermediately effective.

[Trachmyr]

Thinking about it... one way for it to be unlimited w/o hurting AI strategy is by allowing production to be imported/exported.

How about a new building option similar to "Wealth", call it "Export Production". When selected, the shields produced by the city are halved... then divided equally amongst all cities not producing "Wealth" or "Export Production". The AI will just need to know that when many cities are building improvements/units or any Wonders are being built... Set a portion of the cities to "Export Production" (the % depending on the average time to completion of other cities). Thus the human ability to use food to make industrial cities won't be that powerful (and that strategy is risky... imagine what will happen if you pillage the roads!).

I agree that this is something that FIRAXIS won't be likely to add, so I'll be content with just importing/exporting 3 food per city.

And to those who don't think starvation is a problem, get about 30 cities to max/near max size and build the LONGEVITY wonder.

[El hidalgo]

I agree with this idea. I would like to see the ability to export shields as well. After all, shields represent the productive capability and use of trees and metals, correct? These should be able to be traded (either between cities in your civ or with another civ) just as surely as coal, rubber, oil, dye, etc. That way a civ located on floodplains and grasslands could make a good bargain with a civ located in forested and hilly terrain. *Sigh*, I guess it was just not meant to be (though it would be great if it can be added). Good point about food spoilage. Maybe a salt resource could reduce this.