Does Civ 3 "really" attempt to simulate history?

[Ironikinit]

Originally posted by steelehc

I guess the US destroyed the Japanese economy in WW2 by invading the Home Islands, then? And NATO invaded Serbia in the 1990s to, right? And the atomic weapons used on Hiroshima and Nagasaki were delivered by troops on the ground?
The point is, air power can win a war if used right, and regardless, planes should be able to sink ships.

Steele

Destroying an economy is different than destroying military units. Further, a player can damage the AI's ability to fight with air power very much under the current model. Resources can be cut off, population centers reduced, units surpressed.

You are surely aware that ground troops opposed the Serbs and that atomic weapons have another place in the model.

Strategic bombing rarely, if ever, sank a ship. Tactical bombing, yes, and it would be excellent if people figured out a way to reflect tactical bombers (divers and torpedoes, etc.) in the game.

For further evidence of the inability of air power alone to win wars I refer you to the US and UK campaign against Germany.

[Trifna]

Only party would be my opinion, which is sad since what is based on reality (or a coherent system, which reality is) has more strenght.

[GePap]

Not a simulator as such

Civ wa never meant to be a 'true' historical simulator like EU. In EU you always use that same map, and that map is a real world map. The same players are always present, with the same starting locations and same strenghts.
This is not true for any civ game which: can vary starting locations on varied maps and the character and number of challengers always changes. The concpt of time is also different. In a simulator, time remains constant, not in civ.

So civ was never meant as a true simulator in the sense that you play the same historical era, or event, over and over to see al the different possible outcomes.
Yet this fact does not mean that the game of civ should include patently unrealistic things in it. Let me clarify that highly abstrated notions are no the same as highly unrealistic. The notion of airpower not detroyingg land units is an abstraction, but one that is generally true to history. Airpower not destroying naval vessels is an abstraction that is unrealistic.

What civ tries to do is far more ambitiuos. Civ tries to allow us to resimulate all of HUMAN history since the invention of farming and large settlements. The ambiguity sets in because real cultural names and technological names, and unit names are used. This make some people believe that it should be a true historical simulator ala EU. SMAC was the same as civ, creating a new world inhabited by humans (as opposed to alies of some type) and having a hand at its development through a huge span of time. The difference is that being set in the future, on another world, freed it from the ambiguities.

[PapaLenin]

You did notice, that a turn in Civ3 lasts at least a year, did you? How far can you go by railroad in 1 year? The answer is: practically everywhere, where a railroad exists. That's what the game does.

Take a train and in one year travel from the most western part of Russia to the most eastern part 10000 times. If u can do that in one ear ill pay the trips. And tell me also aren't planes faster than trains- so why can't u say make 55 bombing flights on enemy territory in one turn cause it's one year- or attack 25 times with tank, or sai with battleship one time around the world!!! So think about that!!!

[Zachriel]

Originally posted by Ironikinit
Destroying an economy is different than destroying military units. Further, a player can damage the AI's ability to fight with air power very much under the current model. Resources can be cut off, population centers reduced, units surpressed.

You are surely aware that ground troops opposed the Serbs and that atomic weapons have another place in the model.

Strategic bombing rarely, if ever, sank a ship. Tactical bombing, yes, and it would be excellent if people figured out a way to reflect tactical bombers (divers and torpedoes, etc.) in the game.

For further evidence of the inability of air power alone to win wars I refer you to the US and UK campaign against Germany.

Unit destruction can be defined as the loss of unit cohesion.

Nukes are a special case. The first and only nuclear war to date was Japan 1945. Those nukes were used as terror weapons, not against military units. As terror weapons aimed at civilians, they were very effective, and probably would be very effective against any "normal" military unit.

Conventional bombing, on the other hand, does not normally result in the destruction of unit cohesion -- and has been shown to be the same result even with smart bombs. The modern strategy discovered in Kosovo is to use partisans to draw the enemy out into the open, then hit them with smart bombs. Before the use of partisans in that conflict, the Serbs refused to withdraw, and simply stayed out of sight. This technical knowledge was applied from the beginning in Afghanistan.

[vee4473]

yeah! what he said!