How do you want the "rise and fall of empires" idea implemented in Civ-3?

[Urban Ranger]

I disagree. I don't see what's wrong with being able to see the endgame, with you winning. Wouldn't you like to win a game you spend a lot of effort in, or would you rather be defeated by random chances, with no way of stopping them? Clearly, these events that trigger disintegration of empires are necessarily random. It is also clear that if these events can be stopped by civ advances or whatever, then players would push ahead with acquiring these advances, rendering this "rise and fall" business meaningless.

[Urban Ranger]

quote: Originally posted by S. Kroeze on 07-02-2000 10:20 AM -The Chinese Manchu empire also went through a revolution and disintegrated. Korea and Mongolia became independent. China proper was ruled by local 'warlords', who were de facto autonomous. Only after a civil war was the country reunited, but Taiwan became independent.

Huh? This doesn't bode well with regards to your knowledge of Chinese history.

[Ralf]

Some interesting ideas jdlessl – they need some further work on, but definitively interesting.

I have to agree with Urban Ranger on one point though: I don’t like having to many random percentage-risk game-loosing disasters in Civ-3. Most players (including me) would simply quit-and-reload earlier saved games, until that percentage outcome is in ones favor. Spineless and pathetic i know – but most would do just that.
Playing Civ to the end should be much more of a challenging struggle than it is – but not though introducing random catastrophes though – at least not random ones.

On the other hand (Urban Ranger) i think you miss the point somewhat: you say, “Clearly, these events that trigger disintegration of empires are necessarily random”.
No, I don’t agree. A very large part of the “rise and fall” idea evolves around trying to combat that unchallenging and (in the long run) rather boring “bigger is always better in each-and-every area” syndrome.

Huge amount of well-managed cities can (and should) give you an advantage in resource gathering power and the number of military-units available for conscription – yes.
But WHY should it automatically give you a non-overcomeable advantage in light bulb- and money-gathering power as well? Why cant it be more unavoidable (but foreseeable) financial and unhappiness-related problems linked to governing really huge empires? Problems that in itself is enough to make your empire disintegrate?
Why cant small empires be given advantages that big civ-empires just shouldn’t have? For example: huge individual 25+ cities should be easier to achieve within a small 12 city empire, but almost impossible to achieve within a huge 25 city empire.

* No obvious science-rate advantages above 15 cities (science-improvements are limited by exact numbers, let say 15 libraries, 8 universities and 4 research-labs).

* Trying to cram every available city improvement into each-and-every large-empire city leads to unavoidable financial difficulties. This is because all money-generating improvements above marketplace (like banks, stock-exchange and super-highways) also are limited by exact numbers. It can be combated by trade and tax-collectors somewhat, but only so much.

I dont know if above is the best solutions - my major point is however: How do you want win the game in Civ-3?
Just barely, in a close wolf pack-style civ-race – or as in Civ-2 and SMAC: running far, far ahead while the distance between you and the second best AI-Civ constantly increasing?

[This message has been edited by Ralf (edited July 05, 2000).]

[S. Kroeze]

Dear Urban Ranger,

I am still looking out with anticipation for your reference book on Chinese history. I hope it will be published soon. Perhaps you can give me a discount off?
For the time being I'll manage with the piece of bungling of Fairbank('China, A New History',1992). I don't know for sure but it could be his chair is still vacant. I hope his successor will be more worthy of a Harvard professorship. I wish you all the best in your approaching working environment!

Sincere regards!

S. Kroeze

PS: Would you also deny my essential point, namely that the Manchu empire disintegrated!

[This message has been edited by S. Kroeze (edited July 05, 2000).]

[Steve Clark]

Just to give a quick flippant answer: ideas like this are best implemented in SCENARIOS, not in the main game. I am all for different modes of winning (an idea on the EC3 list) but since Civ is an abstract-based game (as oppose to a historical simulator), the player should be able implement strategies that will win and that would include keeping your civ growing for 6000 years!

BTW, just to be more flippant; while I find most of such discussions entertaining and enlightened, Firaxis cannot take many of these intellectual discussion seriously, IMO. If they would, it would only appeal to those 12-14 customers that mostly spend time in this forum. You have to keep in mind that Civ3 must appeal to the masses and be playable at ALL levels of experiences, not just to the relatively few hard-core civers.
This, BTW, is a classic debate among all game developers. They must balance those that think, for example, Civ2 is way too hard at Chieftain and those who think Deity is way too easy. You are not going sell 500,000+ copies otherwise. If you want to implement ideas like rise and fall, as I said earlier, build a scenario and make it challenging for those relatively few who would play (ie. Red Front).

[Adm.Naismith]

Steve, about your point:

quote: You have to keep in mind that Civ3 must appeal to the masses and be playable at ALL levels of experiences, not just to the relatively few hard-core civers. This, BTW, is a classic debate among all game developers. They must balance those that think, for example, Civ2 is way too hard at Chieftain and those who think Deity is way too easy.

I share your vision, still I think that's exactly what game level are for.

The trouble with Civ (and almost with any game on the market) is that rules are the same for every level, simply the computer throw at you more enemy units, set some variables (needed resources, upkeep costs, etc.) more in favour to enemy and so on.

So the learning curve is always the same, stepped or not. You are simply less frustated because you can win also if you make some big mistake.
Of course developers use this approach because is easier to debug and balance, still I think they miss the old boardgame concept of basic and advanced rules.

Instead of forcing the player to learn every complex rule of game immediatly, they left newbies to make practice with simple rules, then switch to a more deep model when they like it.

In a model like this (that's a bit like taking actual game options and rearrange them in predefined frames) you can left the more challenging rules (as Rise and falls) to the advanced level.

The only real trouble can be to program the AI to cope in a decent and balanced way with different set of rules, but that shouldn't be very different from actual manage of different game options, should it?

------------------
Admiral Naismith AKA mcostant

[Urban Ranger]

S. Kroeze,

Why do you need to wait when all you need has been published in the form of 25 Histories? For modern history, there are other original sources available. Whether it is John King Fairbank or John Q. Normal, he has to go back to the original sources.

To answer your question: No, the Qing Dynasty did not disintegrate. Outer Mogolia eventually seceded from the ROC, but otherwise the country was pretty much intact, dispite the vieing warlords.

Taiwan did not become independent either. If your source shows otherwise, please let me know.
[This message has been edited by Urban Ranger (edited July 06, 2000).]

[Urban Ranger]

Ralf,

I understand your concern, though most of the solutions I have seen are half-baked. My observation is this: the advantage of small empires over big empires is they are agile.

Why are large empires slower? Partly due to an overinflated ego and partly due to burreaucratic morass, I reckon.

How do you represent that in Civ3? There are several things:

1. Large empires are slower to develop applications. As I pointed out in a previous thread, civ advances should be divided into discovery/invention and applications. Large empires could make discoveries and inventions but they would be slow in finding uses for these new things, as they don't see there is a need for them.

2. Readiness. It takes $$$ to keep a unit on full alert, so most units just sit around until mobilized. Active units could also require more maintenance.

3. Interal strifes. However this should not happen when the large empire was built up through expansion and not conquest, esp when there is a strong ideology inside the empire.

4. Peasant unrests - caused by high tax rates.

5. Defensive forces - an empire cannot commit all its units in a small area. A minimum number of units must be placed around the empire to prevent barbarian attacks (real or imaginary) or hostile invasions.

6. Elimate the Settler unit, i.e., the player cannot direct the building of cities. They grow by a set of laws.

[Steve Clark]

Adm., very good points. Do you see that Firaxis would take the time to program different set of rules depending on difficulty levels or do what every strategy game developers do by just changing the magnitude of the variables? They have said that the game will be customizable (eg, rules.txt) so I'm led to believe they will keep the main game simple but allow users alter the main game and to develop challenging scenarios with events such as rise and fall.

And I think that's been my point, I personally prefer a very robust scenario builder to allow many new ideas in the tech tree, events in the way AI acts and reacts, etc. No matter how great the main game is, most of us here will get tired of it eventually and it will be the scenarios that will keep the game fresh for a long time.

[Stormdancer]

Hmm. The idea of forming cities by rules is interesting, but would also be annoying. Especially if the AI made it's typically narrow-view mistakes. It's very hard for the game to know what you're thinking, after all.

How about a compromise, where you basically point out a location where you would like to build a city, and the chance that a city is built there is better?

--Stormdancer

[Urban Ranger]

Stormdancer,

I don't mean the AI controls a settler unit instead of you. That would be totally dumb.

As it has been suggested somewhere else before, the empty areas are not actually empty but populated with people. Now it shouldn't be too difficult to extrapolate that idea into population movement within your civ. People move about inside an empire, some move out from cities for all sorts of reasons (persecution, population pressure, looking for gold, etc.) and some move into cities. Now if there are suitable areas, people tend to move into those areas, first forming villages, then towns, then cities, then metropolises.

Clearly, in the ancient times, people tend to gather around areas where natural resources, esp. food resources, are abundant. Forests are also important because it proves wood, which is a building material and also a fuel.

It shouldn't be too hard to set up a set of rules so cities are grown instead of built.

[Sirotnikov]

I think the main point is this:

The rise and fall of empires is needed for keeping game interest near the end of the game. Then your goal becomes surviving. If that is to be implemented fully, the game will become open ended or impossible.

Why? you ask?

If we make it so that our 25 city empires (In my recent game I had 124 cities. honest. I played prince ) will be entangled in other problems we would never be able to achive the end goal. You simply can not have an interesting finish. What can surprising can happen when you have 60 cities and your opponent has 3? If the tide turns now, the game goal (conquest) is not complete, and as soon as you're again close to finishing the game, it again becomes boring. So there is no inteeresting way to win by conquest.

The solution is simple: Instead of conquering the world go for the space race.
The space race on the other hand, If your civ is not that much better, can provide excitement since nothing is certain until the the very last moment - the arrival to alpha centauri. Even if the other civ sent their ship you can make your ship smaller and faster and still hope to succeed.

And what if I'm ready to send my space ship but the french are still discovering the automobil?

The only solution For that is making the goal tougher to achive. And still there will be people who are so good they will achieve most of the conditions required for victory early on. There is no real solution for that.

If we change the game so everything can change right until the final moment, then the game will be very upsetting. It may be even unachieveable. If you're bored once you achive the goal you want a new chllenge. What can it be? something setting you back. You loose half of your nation, it's wealth and it's science knowledge. So you again have to climb to power. That's the same as starting a new game. So you're basically fooling yourself. You are realling starting a new game. It's just the same civ and your neighbours remain the same. If you want a totally different challenge like managing citys from falling appart, you get that challenge. So? what's the point? You're still ahead, youre just trying to stay that way. That will ruin all chances of conquest victory and as for other things, as soon as the other nations will become progressed they will meet the same challenge. And since you're dealing with it for a longer time you have an advantage. If it is made that there is no advantagein facing the problem longer, and everybody else is only catching up and as soon as they catch up they're in the same position as you, then you're job is simply no falling back too much. then it's a pretty much open game. It just has a time limit. You can do same same thing another way. Simply share your tech and cash with all other civs. no need for changes in game play. Then you're in almost the same level.

There is no other way to make the game more challenging. If the new challenge sets you back or keeps you in place until others catch up, then you might as well start a new game. That way you start at equal level. Or play a scenario, that way you can all start at equal level just with all the fun techs like stealth and robotics or even falling behind the AI.

If the new challlenge will not set you back then it is no good. Maybe the difference between you and your enemies won't grow but it will remain as they will have to face the same challenge. If not then the challenge falls in the previous categories.

[Adm.Naismith]

Steve, I understand your "mod & sceneries" feel as a way to get a challenging game.

I simply never enjoyed sceneries in a game like Civ (or Simcity or Railroad Tycoon for other examples).

I think sceneries fit very well for wargames, but for Civ they spoil the game of that feel of research and build from scratch I love so much. Just my personal preference, of course.

May be I'll recover from dust my copy of SMAC and I'll give a chance to one of its sceneries.

------------------
Admiral Naismith AKA mcostant

[Steve Clark]

Adm., I fully agree with the excitement of building from scratch and discovering new techs. That is why I think one of the best Civ2 games I've ever played was Kull's Seeds of Greatness scenario (as part of the Ancient Age). He completely redid the tech tree and you start in 4000bc with 10 years increments. I believe Civ3 will provide one static tech tree and it will be up to scenario builders to customize it for a particular era or event. Only in a scenario can you do this.

[Ralf]

Steve, can you give me a hint where to download that "Seeds of greatness" scenario? I have searched around but i can’t find it.

Sirotnikov (quote): "Simply share your tech and cash with all other civs. No need for changes in game play. Then you're in almost the same level.
There is no other way to make the game more challenging".

Thanks for the tip. That was certainly a thoughtful and inspiring suggestion. This is the kind of stuff the Firaxis team should read about. Don’t even bother to TRY to make the game more challenging to play – any such attempts are doomed to fail Great!