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On one hand Firaxis can ignore my fellow Apolytonians and I, and simply patch the bugs, and in about a years time release an add-on and expect us to pay money for it. This however won't sell, as all those who are really likely to buy it are so disillusioned with Civ3. Thus this would be a flop.
OR
They can give us what we want, and we will go on saying Civ3 was released Beta, blaming Infogrammes, but also start leaving Civ2, and actually multiplaying and scenario creating. The company keeps it's reputation, and can possibly sell more units of Civ3 to all those people we have scared off buying here at Apolyton. Furthermore, if Firaxis gives us a decent Scenario Editor and a decent multiplay feature spectrum, it will have given us what we wanted. I for one have already noticed that large factors of "THE LIST" were included in the final released game, the only failures being Customization and Multiplayer. If Firaxis does give us these options, it has the ability to create large scale add-on packs at a later date, which are likely to be bought, and which are likely to be succesful.
So if Firaxis has some half completed features lying around, if it is wise, it will get them up to scratch, give us what we want, and eventually possibly earn money. It will definately get rid of the negative publicity we are creating!
The following is a list, which I call the "LIST V3 - THE PATCH" which contains all major aspects of gameplay we want fixed in the next patch. If you have any good ideas, post them in the thread below, and I will add them to the top few messages. In this way, Firaxis will not need to read through our millions of posts all over Apolyton.
Having read most of the threads of the last few weeks I found the key issues that need resolution are:
-Corruption
-AI
-Editor
-Multiplayer
-Difficulty Levels
-Minor Issues
-Fix for bugs in this thread
CORRUPTION
Because "World Domination" and "Military Victory" are two of only six possible ways to win a game, they should be plausible, even on a 255x255 map, where currently, any city on the other side of the world you take will be 99% corrupt. Tell me, is Hawaii this corrupt because it is so far from Washington, NO! Also the whole way that corruption works is fundamentaly WRONG, as according to any historic dictionary, corruption is the theft of taxes by dishonest taxmen. Therefore, it should not affect anything but taxes, I mean, nobody steals from their luxuries, seriously! This type of corruption is reflected in gameplay by the distance to capitol modifier, which is theoritically correct, however it is to extreme, and affects too many things. The distance to capitol modifier should be based on turns, either by the newest ship accross the ocean, and/or the fastest land unit accross the fastest route. Rail should always be counted as one turn. For instance, the distance from Hawaii to Washington would be 4 turns on a steamship, and 1 turn by rail to Washington. That is 5 turns away, not as in Civ3 terms about 40, leading to total corruption. A modifier such as this would reduce the corruption problem over time. Governments should each have maximum distances and caps on their corruption levels, with Democracy being above 90% efficient.
Local corruption should be caused by unhappy and resisting citizens, it can be in any form, shields, gold, taxes food, whatever. It should be solved by the military police modifiers and by courthouses/police stations. It should never exceed 10% except under Anarchy.
ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE
As Civ3 is currently only a single player game, AI needs to be up to scratch. The way that the AI spreads to conquer the entire earth is a real improvement over Civ2, but there are one or two issues which need fixing.
-Firstly, the AI should not build cities on Tundra, Desert or Jungle unless resourses are nearby, or there is not other territory available. The AI needs to be less expansionistic, and a little more perfectionistic, as currently even the capitol is often lucky to have a library by the year 1000AD.
-The AI needs to be more respectful of Peace Treaties, for at the current moment, it simply ignores them if it can see an isolated, easy to take city.
-The AI needs to have better trade ideas, I mean, it should always trade Spice for Ivory and Fur. It should also be a little easier in trading cities.
-The AI needs to build fortresses and fortify it's units, rather than aimlessly walking back and forth, it will reduce tedium too.
-The AI needs to be able to switch it's tile production so that it can produce shields if city growth is halted.
-The AI needs to upgrade it's units more, it might be an idea to give the AI free upgrades.
-Lastly, this is an idea for ALL games, but I think it is necessary. Tech should seep out civilizations gradually, say that techs move accross land by 1 movement point every two turns after you recieve a tec, from your capitol, this means that if you have a 10 tile mountain range between your capitol and your neighbour's, the tech will cross it in 60 turns. Later with railroads etc the tech will move almost instantly, giving a nil lead in tech, making the game extremely difficult. This happens in reality all the time, I mean, didn't Japan buy a US plane, pull it apart, put it back together, and design their own.
EDITOR
This function speaks for itself really, but the following is a list of desires, some we can do ourselves with dodgy third party add-ons, but a legitimate add-on would be nice.
-Ability to name Civ Start Locations to a specific Civ.
-Ability to place cities, terrain imps, units, on the map and edit them.
-Ability to load *.SAV files.
-An in game "CHEAT MENU" to test Scenarios.
-Ability to add "Anything to Anything" for instance, the effect of the pyramids on a tech Crop Rotation. All effects need to be able to be used with each other. Another example, when Nationalism is researched all musketmen are upgraded by the tech.
-Ability to have a totally seperate Tech tree for each Civ, with totally different units.
-Ability to overide *.flc files with a simple *.pcx file with a tile for each direction.
-Event trigger system.
-Ability to overide ANY rule in Civ3
-A minor - Fix the hardcoding of the culture until next level in the city view, if this is changed, the display still shows of 10, of 100 or whatever.
MULTIPLAYER
Really important!
-Games should use only ONE set of rules, not necessarily the one on the computer it is being played on.
-Hotseat and PBEM are probably the easiest to make, and the most important multiplayer functions, this would allow us to play at least. I believe that realtime LAN and Internet games for Civ3 are idiotic, because the game takes too long, so these are regarded as lower priority.
-Games should be saved and emailed by the program itself, preventing someone from saving the game and loading it in the editor to cheat. A little like the Save restricted to end feature of SMAC.
DIFFICULTY LEVELS
-At the current time, the game does not actualy get more fun on higher difficulty levels, it simply gets silly with all the AI cheating. I believe that the tech seepage which I mentioned under the AI section of this post is a good solution, and the speed should be edited for each difficulty level. This will prevent the concentration on technology to get a lead and then crushing the AI with superior weapons.
-AI cheating should be reduced to an acceptable level.
MINOR ISSUES
-Warrior vs Stealth Fighter situations. Not only should the warrior be unable to win, it should not exist in the first place. I mean, we don't see warriors at the current time fighting wars. A solution is above, give the AI free upgrades, and allow tech seep. This will make the situation highly unlikely. Also upgrades should occur automatically if a unit is stationed in a city with barracks for 5 turns. Another nuisance with upgrades is the fact that if the upgrade all function is used all fortified units are woken, this should not be the case.
-Workers: Automation preferences like in SMAC would be nice, and a priority system via this, ie clean up all pollution, then irrigate, then build roads, or whatever the user wants. Automated workers should stack properly. Automated workers should have the option of not being animated. Impossiblize the size six strategy which uses the fact that a city at size seven's foodbox is twice as big as that of a size six. With this, if a granery is present, a city can regrow immediately after producing a worker at size 7, which in ideal conditions allows a worker to be created every turn. Workers should have free upkeep in a democracy. When ordering one worker to destroy a mine, the next should not ask again.
-The problem of the computer recognising quantity of units over quality, I mean, the computer thinks an "army" of 200 workers and 50 Warriors is a lot more powerful than and army of 100 modern armor. A modifier system for each era of unit would solve this problem, that is all non-combat units recieve a Quantity x 0 modification, all ancient units a Quantity x 1 modification, all medieval units a Quantity x 2 modification, all industrial age units a Quantity x 4 modification, and all modern units a Quantity x 8 modification. Therefore, for the computer to think that my modern civ and an ancient civ to be equal, they must have 8 times as many combat units as me. This will also stop the AI from getting false ideas about my power.
-Razing cities. This should be possible, but should not be essential and easy as it currently is. A fix to the corruption problem will do wonders, as it will make it worthwhile to keep the cities, and a reduction in idiotically placed cities will also help. To further reduce the chance of it occuring, one should have to "battle" each citizen as they gather up arms to defend their city, which will make them into a unit of one age older than the current unit that civ has, so if they had mustketmen, you must battle all the citizens as Conscript Pikemen. It should be possible to raze a city at a later time too, not only when you capture it. It would be useful to raze cities which the enemy would otherwise have guaranteed. The action should only be available under certain governments.
-Barbarians should stay on pace with the era, getting not quite up to date weapons throughout the game. This will make them more of a challenge.
-Diplomacy screen - It would be nice to see what items are tradable here. It should be possible to see all 16 civs. It should be possible to see the reputation of ones Civ. When talking to an opponent, it should be possible to use a slider to change your attitude. If playing against humans, it should be possible to type your own messages. Ability to edit the duration of deals, not just 20 turns, and a message when a deal is about to end. When using the quick diplomacy screen, (Shift-D) it would be nice if the attitude could be shown.
-Domestic Advisor - List sortable by city name. Ability to rush buy directly from here. Total number of cities somewhere. Prefrence to stop her asking to build Aqueducts/Hospitals all the time!
-Science Advisor - Ability to see which techs other civs have, appropriate tech must be reached first, ie embassy.
-City view - Out of date units should not be included in the build options. Civiliopedia should be accesable from the build options.
-Units - Increase naval movement rates. Group movement. Armies should not be unloadable, but should be upgradable.
-Coastall Fortress - Increase power or give a new better option.
-When a Capitol is conquered, civil war should be an option, as in Civ II, also palaces should not be rebuilt for free.
-Deforestation should increase global warming. Option for no pollution.
-Presion Bombing should have a choosable target.
If you have any other IMPORTANT issues detail them below, and I will include them in here after sufficient debate, if plausible and relevant.
OR
They can give us what we want, and we will go on saying Civ3 was released Beta, blaming Infogrammes, but also start leaving Civ2, and actually multiplaying and scenario creating. The company keeps it's reputation, and can possibly sell more units of Civ3 to all those people we have scared off buying here at Apolyton. Furthermore, if Firaxis gives us a decent Scenario Editor and a decent multiplay feature spectrum, it will have given us what we wanted. I for one have already noticed that large factors of "THE LIST" were included in the final released game, the only failures being Customization and Multiplayer. If Firaxis does give us these options, it has the ability to create large scale add-on packs at a later date, which are likely to be bought, and which are likely to be succesful.
So if Firaxis has some half completed features lying around, if it is wise, it will get them up to scratch, give us what we want, and eventually possibly earn money. It will definately get rid of the negative publicity we are creating!
The following is a list, which I call the "LIST V3 - THE PATCH" which contains all major aspects of gameplay we want fixed in the next patch. If you have any good ideas, post them in the thread below, and I will add them to the top few messages. In this way, Firaxis will not need to read through our millions of posts all over Apolyton.
Having read most of the threads of the last few weeks I found the key issues that need resolution are:
-Corruption
-AI
-Editor
-Multiplayer
-Difficulty Levels
-Minor Issues
-Fix for bugs in this thread
CORRUPTION
Because "World Domination" and "Military Victory" are two of only six possible ways to win a game, they should be plausible, even on a 255x255 map, where currently, any city on the other side of the world you take will be 99% corrupt. Tell me, is Hawaii this corrupt because it is so far from Washington, NO! Also the whole way that corruption works is fundamentaly WRONG, as according to any historic dictionary, corruption is the theft of taxes by dishonest taxmen. Therefore, it should not affect anything but taxes, I mean, nobody steals from their luxuries, seriously! This type of corruption is reflected in gameplay by the distance to capitol modifier, which is theoritically correct, however it is to extreme, and affects too many things. The distance to capitol modifier should be based on turns, either by the newest ship accross the ocean, and/or the fastest land unit accross the fastest route. Rail should always be counted as one turn. For instance, the distance from Hawaii to Washington would be 4 turns on a steamship, and 1 turn by rail to Washington. That is 5 turns away, not as in Civ3 terms about 40, leading to total corruption. A modifier such as this would reduce the corruption problem over time. Governments should each have maximum distances and caps on their corruption levels, with Democracy being above 90% efficient.
Local corruption should be caused by unhappy and resisting citizens, it can be in any form, shields, gold, taxes food, whatever. It should be solved by the military police modifiers and by courthouses/police stations. It should never exceed 10% except under Anarchy.
ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE
As Civ3 is currently only a single player game, AI needs to be up to scratch. The way that the AI spreads to conquer the entire earth is a real improvement over Civ2, but there are one or two issues which need fixing.
-Firstly, the AI should not build cities on Tundra, Desert or Jungle unless resourses are nearby, or there is not other territory available. The AI needs to be less expansionistic, and a little more perfectionistic, as currently even the capitol is often lucky to have a library by the year 1000AD.
-The AI needs to be more respectful of Peace Treaties, for at the current moment, it simply ignores them if it can see an isolated, easy to take city.
-The AI needs to have better trade ideas, I mean, it should always trade Spice for Ivory and Fur. It should also be a little easier in trading cities.
-The AI needs to build fortresses and fortify it's units, rather than aimlessly walking back and forth, it will reduce tedium too.
-The AI needs to be able to switch it's tile production so that it can produce shields if city growth is halted.
-The AI needs to upgrade it's units more, it might be an idea to give the AI free upgrades.
-Lastly, this is an idea for ALL games, but I think it is necessary. Tech should seep out civilizations gradually, say that techs move accross land by 1 movement point every two turns after you recieve a tec, from your capitol, this means that if you have a 10 tile mountain range between your capitol and your neighbour's, the tech will cross it in 60 turns. Later with railroads etc the tech will move almost instantly, giving a nil lead in tech, making the game extremely difficult. This happens in reality all the time, I mean, didn't Japan buy a US plane, pull it apart, put it back together, and design their own.
EDITOR
This function speaks for itself really, but the following is a list of desires, some we can do ourselves with dodgy third party add-ons, but a legitimate add-on would be nice.
-Ability to name Civ Start Locations to a specific Civ.
-Ability to place cities, terrain imps, units, on the map and edit them.
-Ability to load *.SAV files.
-An in game "CHEAT MENU" to test Scenarios.
-Ability to add "Anything to Anything" for instance, the effect of the pyramids on a tech Crop Rotation. All effects need to be able to be used with each other. Another example, when Nationalism is researched all musketmen are upgraded by the tech.
-Ability to have a totally seperate Tech tree for each Civ, with totally different units.
-Ability to overide *.flc files with a simple *.pcx file with a tile for each direction.
-Event trigger system.
-Ability to overide ANY rule in Civ3
-A minor - Fix the hardcoding of the culture until next level in the city view, if this is changed, the display still shows of 10, of 100 or whatever.
MULTIPLAYER
Really important!
-Games should use only ONE set of rules, not necessarily the one on the computer it is being played on.
-Hotseat and PBEM are probably the easiest to make, and the most important multiplayer functions, this would allow us to play at least. I believe that realtime LAN and Internet games for Civ3 are idiotic, because the game takes too long, so these are regarded as lower priority.
-Games should be saved and emailed by the program itself, preventing someone from saving the game and loading it in the editor to cheat. A little like the Save restricted to end feature of SMAC.
DIFFICULTY LEVELS
-At the current time, the game does not actualy get more fun on higher difficulty levels, it simply gets silly with all the AI cheating. I believe that the tech seepage which I mentioned under the AI section of this post is a good solution, and the speed should be edited for each difficulty level. This will prevent the concentration on technology to get a lead and then crushing the AI with superior weapons.
-AI cheating should be reduced to an acceptable level.
MINOR ISSUES
-Warrior vs Stealth Fighter situations. Not only should the warrior be unable to win, it should not exist in the first place. I mean, we don't see warriors at the current time fighting wars. A solution is above, give the AI free upgrades, and allow tech seep. This will make the situation highly unlikely. Also upgrades should occur automatically if a unit is stationed in a city with barracks for 5 turns. Another nuisance with upgrades is the fact that if the upgrade all function is used all fortified units are woken, this should not be the case.
-Workers: Automation preferences like in SMAC would be nice, and a priority system via this, ie clean up all pollution, then irrigate, then build roads, or whatever the user wants. Automated workers should stack properly. Automated workers should have the option of not being animated. Impossiblize the size six strategy which uses the fact that a city at size seven's foodbox is twice as big as that of a size six. With this, if a granery is present, a city can regrow immediately after producing a worker at size 7, which in ideal conditions allows a worker to be created every turn. Workers should have free upkeep in a democracy. When ordering one worker to destroy a mine, the next should not ask again.
-The problem of the computer recognising quantity of units over quality, I mean, the computer thinks an "army" of 200 workers and 50 Warriors is a lot more powerful than and army of 100 modern armor. A modifier system for each era of unit would solve this problem, that is all non-combat units recieve a Quantity x 0 modification, all ancient units a Quantity x 1 modification, all medieval units a Quantity x 2 modification, all industrial age units a Quantity x 4 modification, and all modern units a Quantity x 8 modification. Therefore, for the computer to think that my modern civ and an ancient civ to be equal, they must have 8 times as many combat units as me. This will also stop the AI from getting false ideas about my power.
-Razing cities. This should be possible, but should not be essential and easy as it currently is. A fix to the corruption problem will do wonders, as it will make it worthwhile to keep the cities, and a reduction in idiotically placed cities will also help. To further reduce the chance of it occuring, one should have to "battle" each citizen as they gather up arms to defend their city, which will make them into a unit of one age older than the current unit that civ has, so if they had mustketmen, you must battle all the citizens as Conscript Pikemen. It should be possible to raze a city at a later time too, not only when you capture it. It would be useful to raze cities which the enemy would otherwise have guaranteed. The action should only be available under certain governments.
-Barbarians should stay on pace with the era, getting not quite up to date weapons throughout the game. This will make them more of a challenge.
-Diplomacy screen - It would be nice to see what items are tradable here. It should be possible to see all 16 civs. It should be possible to see the reputation of ones Civ. When talking to an opponent, it should be possible to use a slider to change your attitude. If playing against humans, it should be possible to type your own messages. Ability to edit the duration of deals, not just 20 turns, and a message when a deal is about to end. When using the quick diplomacy screen, (Shift-D) it would be nice if the attitude could be shown.
-Domestic Advisor - List sortable by city name. Ability to rush buy directly from here. Total number of cities somewhere. Prefrence to stop her asking to build Aqueducts/Hospitals all the time!
-Science Advisor - Ability to see which techs other civs have, appropriate tech must be reached first, ie embassy.
-City view - Out of date units should not be included in the build options. Civiliopedia should be accesable from the build options.
-Units - Increase naval movement rates. Group movement. Armies should not be unloadable, but should be upgradable.
-Coastall Fortress - Increase power or give a new better option.
-When a Capitol is conquered, civil war should be an option, as in Civ II, also palaces should not be rebuilt for free.
-Deforestation should increase global warming. Option for no pollution.
-Presion Bombing should have a choosable target.
If you have any other IMPORTANT issues detail them below, and I will include them in here after sufficient debate, if plausible and relevant.