Practical solution to worker tedium!

[Captain]

Exactly how to implement this I'm not sure.

But here's the idea, make a RISING cost for new workers and worker maintenance.

As it is, if you just raise the cost of everything, that doesn't really solve the problem (ex. they raised the cost of settlers but that didn't stop ICS, you just had to wait a little longer)

But if the cost rose so that the 20th unit costs 50% more, and the 30th unit costs 100% more, and the 40th unit costs 200% more... (numbers don't matter, this is just an example)

Thus, while there is no solid cap to the number of worker you can use, there will be a user-chosen optimum.

Thus, you would only need to manage 20-30 workers (or less) instead of 60-100 workers because 20-30 would be more efficient. right now, the game rewards you for having an huge # of workers. Playing to win requires tedium. But with my idea, the game would reward you for choosing less tedium.
But if you don't mind micromanaging and really want that huge worker force, then you're not artificially limited by a cap.

And for realism proponents, isn't this a realistic model of the world? Each additional unit still boosts production (so it's not like corruption), but costs more and more to increase the worker force. Think of it as how the labour market is saturated and government must subsidize to entice more people since most people go where there is a labour shortage and wages are higher.

The game already counts your units, no extra work there.

Plus, the AI should be very capable of handling a simple optimization routine. (but I could be wrong here).

So, what am I missing here? Is there some undesirable result that I'm not seeing?

Comments? or any other ideas?

[BeBMan]

Nice idea, however, it could be a pain when you need lots of workers later in the game to clean up pollution.

I would prefer better commands for them in the next patch, e.g. that you could form groups that act like a single worker, only faster...

[Dida]

The best and simplest way to deal with worker tediusm is to select a worker, and hit 'Ctr-shift-A', meaning automate all workers.
NOTE: This is not in the game yet. Don't try it with your workers.

[Alex]

I definitely support the idea of forming groups of workers that could move together and work faster. In the late game, when most of your terraforming is already in place, you could create two or three groups of workers designed solely to clean up pollution. And the rest could be automated (Shift-A).

The only problem I see is: with huge groups of workers, an enemy could capture a lot of them in a single assault, crippling your "labour forces". Therefore, you would have to assign a military unit to escort workers, at least in war times.

[BeBMan]

Originally posted by Alexnm
The only problem I see is: with huge groups of workers, an enemy could capture a lot of them in a single assault, crippling your "labour forces". Therefore, you would have to assign a military unit to escort workers, at least in war times.

Hm, yes, but if you have currently dozens of workers on the same square, they are all lost in case of an attack...

[Worthingtons]

The Practical solution would be to give the AI workers a brain. Actually that completely unpractical, but you know what i mean

[Alex]

Originally posted by BeBro


Hm, yes, but if you have currently dozens of workers on the same square, they are all lost in case of an attack...

I have to admit you're right... but what I said was not so stupid...

My point is that I (and that could just be me) don't have huge groups of workers until late in the game (I use them mainly to clean up pollution, because the other tasks are quickly addressed by that time -- build railroads, irrigating the occasional empty tile...). Thus, I think that I trust in my quick reaction to an enemy attack and can protect and evade one or two workers easier than a dozen ones... Hmm... Seems like I can't even convince myself with this argument...

[kittenOFchaos]

My mod already has higher worker cost to try to prevent everywhere being developed so quick...

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?s=&postid=183762&t=422#post183762

However for the later game when you WILL have loads of workers being able to combine workers into 1 engineer unit that works uber-quick would be much better...especially as you need loads of workers already to clear pollution quickly.

[Skanky Burns]

While that "increasing cost of workers" idea would help prevent the player (and probably the AI) from building any new workers, it wont address the main problem - captured workers from enemy civs.

Thru the necessity of razing enemy cities that have significant culture, you will still end up with hordes of workers at the end of your game, even if you never built a worker of your own. I know in my games I never build workers past the middle ages.

[Dienstag]

Quick summary of what workers do:
-build roads/mines/irrigation since dawn of time
-clear jungle/forest
-build fortresses (requires Construction)
-build railroads (requires Steam Power, + Iron + Coal)
-clean pollution (requires Anti-Tox 3000 SuperShovel, which is free)
-build airfields (joking , sorry)

Stuff that workers don't do in CivIII:
-build bridges (implicity and instantly built with acquisition of Engineering tech; bridges are also invisible and indestructable.)
-build any city improvements like aquaducts or city walls, even though workers can build similar structures outside of cities (i.e. fortress, irrigation)

I think there is a glaring double standard between city production and worker output. I think there should be a more unified model (physicist in me talking here) for production of tile improvements and city improvements, since one can argue that the two blur together somewhat conceptually, anyway.

At bottom, there are three things you need to get anything done: manpower, resources, and technology. Workers empasize manpower, and cities emphasize resources, and I think both are made less reallistic for it. I'd like there to be a single model (physicist in me talking) that is fun, challenging, and still makes sense and is realistic.

That said, I agree with Captain's main thought that tedium should not be encouraged and that the challenge should be about optimizing your stuff, not just getting more and more of it. Raising worker costs is a good idea and concievably patchable, but the whole worker system is a big tangled web and it's hard to see what effect any modification would have.

If real life were like CivIII then where are all the Roman slaves?

[Kilroy_Alpha]

Why they didn't just put in public works is beyond me. Everybody wanted it - a poll was taken and well over half of those who responded definitely wanted it. I remember this poll was taken early last year so it's not like they didn't have time. And if Brian Reynolds put in PW and then they took it out after he left well, I'm upset.