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Suggestions...
My first post on Apolyton 
... woo...
Suggestions for Civ3. I'm not going to go and read 1000+ posts to find out what has already been suggested and what not. Since I'm sure most of these have already been suggested, please just add another vote to the list.
1. Replace The Cure For Cancer with The Human Genome Project. Same general effects and the HGP is actually being worked on today, while the CFC is still years away.
2. Change nuclear pollution into 'radiation' squares. Same effects as pollution with following modifications: twice the time to clean up, and deals 20% damage to any unit except engineers in the square. Also, has a 1/20 chance each turn to change the square into a desert.
3. More realistic nuclear fallout (even though it has never happened, science can provide a more likely scenario then the one in Civ2). Once, I just kept power nuking the world until it turned into one gigantic swamp. I would have thought it might have become a wasteland/desert.
4. More realistic nuclear weapons. I suggest three stages : the first one like the one from the other games. The second stage, the kiloton nuke, would reduce a city to one, fill all the surrounding squares with radiation/pollution, and turn the square the city is in into a desert. The third stage, the megaton nuke, would destroy the city completely, turn all squares in the city radius into deserts, and fill them all up with radiation. This is more realistic of what would happen should a modern day nuclear weapon be used.
5. Internet wonder. +1 happiness (whatever) in every city, even ones not in your empire, and you gain any technology developed by two other civs. Late game, of course.
6. Here is my big suggestion. 'Era Units.' When a new 'era' is acheived, the units actually change pictures to better reflect the new technological developments, even though the unit itself does not change.
Let me give an example. When the industrial age is reached, and guns are developed, then the units change pictures to use guns. Instead of some ancient warrior with a spear, a militia unit would change into a dude, probably with torn clothing, holding a small rifle or handgun. When automobiles are developed, the horseman changes into a soldier on a motorcycle. They would still remain a 1/1/1 and 2/1/2, but their pictures would change to reflect the current state of world wide civilization.
Also, this helps solve some visual problems, like a group of crusaders walking up and destroying a tank. If those guys were in jeeps and had machine guns, I could see a large group of them taking down a tank. However, a bunch of religious guys with swords just don't really stand a chance.
Likewise, if that phlanax consisted of several guys in a bunker with grenade launchers instead of warriors with pikes and shields, I could see them winning against larger, more powerful foes, or even having that one in a hundred chance of taking down a bomber.
This, of course, all draws from the fact that I feel Civilization is more abstract anyway. Technology spreads quickly, except certain civs/nations simply don't have the infrastructure to support certain efforts, and have to 'develop' infrastructure on their own, or be given the ability to do so by others. A third world country, civ terms, might only have militia, but those people would still have guns, regardless of the fact that they would be very poorly trained and few in number (hence the 1/1/1 unit). They most certainly would not have spears.
Thoughts?
... woo...Suggestions for Civ3. I'm not going to go and read 1000+ posts to find out what has already been suggested and what not. Since I'm sure most of these have already been suggested, please just add another vote to the list.
1. Replace The Cure For Cancer with The Human Genome Project. Same general effects and the HGP is actually being worked on today, while the CFC is still years away.
2. Change nuclear pollution into 'radiation' squares. Same effects as pollution with following modifications: twice the time to clean up, and deals 20% damage to any unit except engineers in the square. Also, has a 1/20 chance each turn to change the square into a desert.
3. More realistic nuclear fallout (even though it has never happened, science can provide a more likely scenario then the one in Civ2). Once, I just kept power nuking the world until it turned into one gigantic swamp. I would have thought it might have become a wasteland/desert.
4. More realistic nuclear weapons. I suggest three stages : the first one like the one from the other games. The second stage, the kiloton nuke, would reduce a city to one, fill all the surrounding squares with radiation/pollution, and turn the square the city is in into a desert. The third stage, the megaton nuke, would destroy the city completely, turn all squares in the city radius into deserts, and fill them all up with radiation. This is more realistic of what would happen should a modern day nuclear weapon be used.
5. Internet wonder. +1 happiness (whatever) in every city, even ones not in your empire, and you gain any technology developed by two other civs. Late game, of course.
6. Here is my big suggestion. 'Era Units.' When a new 'era' is acheived, the units actually change pictures to better reflect the new technological developments, even though the unit itself does not change.
Let me give an example. When the industrial age is reached, and guns are developed, then the units change pictures to use guns. Instead of some ancient warrior with a spear, a militia unit would change into a dude, probably with torn clothing, holding a small rifle or handgun. When automobiles are developed, the horseman changes into a soldier on a motorcycle. They would still remain a 1/1/1 and 2/1/2, but their pictures would change to reflect the current state of world wide civilization.
Also, this helps solve some visual problems, like a group of crusaders walking up and destroying a tank. If those guys were in jeeps and had machine guns, I could see a large group of them taking down a tank. However, a bunch of religious guys with swords just don't really stand a chance.
Likewise, if that phlanax consisted of several guys in a bunker with grenade launchers instead of warriors with pikes and shields, I could see them winning against larger, more powerful foes, or even having that one in a hundred chance of taking down a bomber.
This, of course, all draws from the fact that I feel Civilization is more abstract anyway. Technology spreads quickly, except certain civs/nations simply don't have the infrastructure to support certain efforts, and have to 'develop' infrastructure on their own, or be given the ability to do so by others. A third world country, civ terms, might only have militia, but those people would still have guns, regardless of the fact that they would be very poorly trained and few in number (hence the 1/1/1 unit). They most certainly would not have spears.
Thoughts?