Strategic Oil Reserve

[Roman]

Firaxis has already informed us that it will include the concept of resources and the possibility of cutting them off for the enemy into Civ 3. Now, it would probably be reasonable to enable players to stockpile these resources (oil or anything else) for the case of such an emergency.

This could be done in the way of dedicated city improvements (maybe wonders) being able to hold a certain amount of a commodity, or they could make it possible to just stockpile resources without dedicating improvements for this purpose. I just think stockpiling in whatever form should be in if the concept of different resources is going to be introduced.

[Gen. Thomas Jackson]

I like the idea. I think that these strategic reserves should be built on the map. This would allow for a civs enimes to cripple a nation by first imposiong an embargo and then attacking the commodity reserves. The Allies did the same thing to Germany during WWII.

They also could be used to boost public opinion during an eleciton year.

[UltraSonix]

Stockpiling resources sounds like a good idea, though it would mean that we're getting closer and closer to RTS civ3... attacking the enemies' minerals and gas area...

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No, in Australia we don't live with kangaroos and koalas in our backyards... Despite any stupid advertisments you may see to the contrary...

[Gen. Thomas Jackson]

I disagree UltraSonix, the stratgic resource reserve would not be a step closer to an RTS Civ 3. If the game incorporates embargoes as a diplomatic function, usage of certain resources to build and maintain units, and of the trade of certain resources then the strategic resource reserve would be an addition to the TBS mold. It would allow for the systematic destrucion of an enemy civ's economic and military might. One could send Heavy Bombers to attack the reserves. This like, I said before would duplicate the Allied Bombing Offensive aginst Germany and Japan during WWII. A nation must have certain materls in order for its economy to survive. I think that most Civers would like to see an increased inporantce on trade and resources in Civ3. Modern War involves the destrucion of the enemy's capability to wage war. That involves to producion and maintaining of certain resources. I use my units in Civ2 to attack materaial produciotn areas. Also, if resource produciotn and trading belong in any from of stratagey game it is TBS. The scope of TBS games are far greater than that of most TBS. i have a strong dislike of RTS games but, this would make Civ better not turn it into a RTS game.

[Hannibal3]

Yeah, I've been saying this for a while now. I never thought about a specific reserve of supplies, but it sounds good to me. I really think it would expand the game by allowing us to avoid fighting the enemy directly by taking out their ability to supply and construct units. Economic warfare is civilization's future.

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"...The highest realization of warfare is to attack the enemy's plans; next is to attack their alliances; next to attack their army; and the lowest is to attack their fortified cities." - Sun Tzu

[MidKnight Lament]

Raingoon came up a with a great energy model a while ago that included the use of oil. I've copied it below.

It was a rather popular model, and I believe it made it into EC3.

I don't mean to stifle your own discussion by posting this, but perhaps it will help focus it a little.

quote: It works like this. Energy resources, depicted as BARRELS, would be distinct from production resources, which would remain SHIELDS. Energy could be derived from coal, oil, or uranium, depending on your current level of technology. Production resources would be derived from the same resources as they always were. The difference being that now the player has the choice of saying how much coal or oil is converted to shields and how much is converted to barrels. Uranium would only be used for energy. For example: Coal depoits might produce barrels at a one to one barrel ratio, oil fields three barrels to the same one, and uranium five barrels to one. The lower the ratio, the more frequently occurring the resource will be throughout the world. Energy barrels would be stored and controlled globally -- that is, not locally in any one city, but rather in a "STOCKPILE" that would represent the energy reserves of your entire civ. On the game map, there would now be COAL DEPOSITS, OIL FIELDS, and URANIUM DEPOSITS, distinct from any of the previous seeded resources. These new tiles would be capable of producing moderate (coal) to heavy (oil) to HUGE (uranium) amounts of barrels. Another idea might be to vary the amount a player is able to extract by the current level of technology they possess, in addition to the type of resource from which it was originally derived. These geological sites would be seeded proportionately around the map, but not so abundantly that the search for them and the ownership of them wouldn't be extremely competitive. So, assuming a new Production/Energy relationship, leave the production side with its shields, for now. For the purposes of this model production stays the same. On the new energy side, I've already described where the energy barrels would come from. Now I'll try to suggest where they would go. Barrels would go to, at your discretion, Trade, Unit Supply, and Transportation. First, Trade. Very simple. You have two options -- either convert barrels to trade arrows that feed your trade stream (on which your science, tax and luxuries still depend), or trade barrels directly through diplomatic negotiations with another civ -- by the barrel. The latter would add a new layer to diplomacy, and the former a greatly simplified trade stream feature. I.e., where before trade arrows were counted and adjusted per individual tile, now you could create huge masses of trade arrows simply by adjusting a slider in your ENERGY STOCKPILE screen. Great, huh? Secondly, unit supply. Pre-modern units would require what they have always required to build and maintain -- shields. But to build modern units would require not only shields, but barrels as well. Additionally, maintaining these units now would require ONLY barrels. "Maintaining," in the case of modern units, means supplied via a supply line. Thus, the strategic trade-off of a powerful modern army is its dependency on its supply of energy to make it run. I'll leave it for another model to decide which units need supply lines and which don't, and what the rules of supply lines might be. Suffice to say, your ENERGY STOCKPILE were empty, and your last tank across the world was dependent on 1 barrel per turn coming from your last oil field, losing possession of that field would cut off your tank's supply. On the next turn that tank would find itself reduced to the defensive equivalent of a phalanx. The turn after that its attack would be that of a militia. And it wouldn't move. Cool, huh? Lastly, Transportation -- the building, using, and maintenance of a transportation infrastructure -- also consumes your energy barrels. This excludes pre-modern roads. Movement along these roads is a function of the unit and its own supply of energy, if needed. It DOES mean, however, that barrels would be needed to fund the upgrading of MODERN roads (increased trade and movement benefits), ALL rails, and travel by rail. As in pre-modern roads, unit travel by air and sea would be a function of those units' supply. So, there is now a direct link between your railroad infrastructure and your available energy. How would railroads work? When traveling by rail, the unit(s) are assumed to be traveling by train. Their normal supply cost, if any, doesn't count while that unit is moving on a train (along a railroad). Instead, there is an energy cost for operating that train. And whether there are one, two or ten units on the train, the cost is the same. No longer can a player willy-nilly build railroads to their heart's content and cross their continent 10 times in a turn without an opportunity cost somewhere else. Of course they can if they want, IF they got the gas, and IF they choose to spend it that way. But the availabity of resources found on the game map, and the cost of processing them into barrels, SHOULD require a great deal of strategic skill to maneuver oneself into such a position that he could afford to waste valuable energy going sightseeing on his railroad. Too, railroads will have to be planned carefully and economically. Your ability to begin construction projects would be dependent completely on your energy stockpile. So, to be clear: when a tank is moving across grassy plains from Kansas City to Los Angeles, it is expending 1 barrel per its maximum movement, 3 squares, over that terrain. But when that tank moves onto a railroad, the train it is on consumes, say, 10 barrels per tile, but there remains no limit to its maximum movement, save the player's energy reserves (btw, numbers herein don't represent anything more than my own crude guesses at ratios). Needless to say, railroads would not function if there were not enough fuel in the stockpile. To offset this choice, MODERN ROADS, or HIGHWAYS, could be introduced to the game. This would offer a medium alternative between pre-modern roads and rail, wherein there would be a "highway maintenence" cost added to a unit's normal movement supply cost. It would be FAR less than rail travel, but the distance traveled per turn, though greater than normal, would be limited. Certain technology upgrades would be linked to an increased ability to move, or a decreased barrel cost to move the same distance -- i.e., future train travel might cost much less after the discovery of Atomic Power (allowing for URANIUM MINES), and subsequently Fusion might allow for a sharp decreases in the cost of rail travel. A player presumably would have to have at least one Uranium mine feeding his energy stockpile to get this effect. I believe this model will enhance other areas of the game as well. Already I can see how it would effectively eliminate the problem known as "I.C.S.", or "Infinite City Sleaze," that strategy of overwhelming opponents with innumerable small cities. Players who have over-expanded their empire in earlier centuries will find the energy demands of modern military units and transportation to be cost prohibitive over such great distances. Unless they have the barrels they will find, as the cost of infrastructure and defense rises, their borders will shrink rapidly as more balanced nations take them over. The wise player will thus never build beyond their projected ability to support the energy demands of their infrastructure. This solution has the virtue of imposing the new economics of the game world as a cure for I.C.S., rather than creating false penalties. I believe the ONLY reason players were able to get away with I.C.S. in the past is because ENERGY was not modeled in the game. In summary, energy is in fact, as we know, the currency of not only war, but peace. All infrastructure depends on it. It is distinct from, though married to, production. I hope this leads to some useful discussions here, and with the Civ 3 design team. An ammendment to the model could be that resources would be separated by PRIMARY (Coal, Oil and Uranium) and SECONDARY (Solar, Hydro, etc.) resources. The latter would all be the low-yield/plentiful variety, capable of powering ONLY a very small Civ, or a large civ's infrastructure. As such, Coal might well become a defacto secondary resource by the end of a game. Some suggestions for SECONDARY resources have included Wood (found in forests) Solar Power (found in deserts), Hydroelectric (rivers?), and Geothermal(?)... Again, Coal might be the first PRIMARY resource, but with the discovery of Oil become the first of what will become SECONDARY resources in the modern world. Again, by "primary" I only mean capable of sustaining a modern superpower. And by "secondary," I only mean "NOT capable of sustaining a superpower."

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- MKL
Shameless Plug: http://www.poetic-license.org

[Gen. Thomas Jackson]

I had heard of that model but had never really read it until now. That is a great model. Imagine beging able to stop a tank attck by cutting off their supply of oil. One could select how much energy would gp into the reserves. I think that each reserve should be limited on how much energy it can hold. Forceing the player to build several, preventing the AI from doing somehthing stupid like building only one and have that taken out on the first day of a war. Or from having the AI build just one and making it imposibly well defended ,execpt for a nuke. The strategic reserve would allow civs that aren't that productive in terms of barrels.

[UltraSonix]

MKL very politely trashes the thread - it's a very good model, hope the reason Firaxis is taking so long to do the game is because their putting it in...

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No, in Australia we don't live with kangaroos and koalas in our backyards... Despite any stupid advertisments you may see to the contrary...

[Dienstag]

Question about the Strategic Oil Reserve:

I read somewhere recently that the United States has a reserve of 571 million gallons of oil, and that it consumes oil at nearly 20 million gallons a day (sickening, isn't it?) Seems that, with no sources of oil other than the reserve, the U.S. would run out of oil in about a month. So my question is: just what effect would the SPR have in a Civ III game if it's effects were on the order of a month?

[Roman]

Of course you are right, Dienstag, about the size of the US Strategic Oil Reserve and their consumption, but the length Strategic Oil Reserve would last would have to be adjusted for gameplay terms. Anyway, there is nothing preventing the US to build a larger Strategic Oil Reserve if they want to.

[MidKnight Lament]

It's quite a long proposal, I know, and that's probably off-putting for a lot of people who can't be bothered reading it, but it's well worth a look. I'm quite a fan of it actually. Kudos again to raingoon who thought most of it up himself.

[Stuff2]

quote: Originally posted by Gen. Thomas Jackson on 09-25-2000 05:02 PM I like the idea. I think that these strategic reserves should be built on the map. This would allow for a civs enimes to cripple a nation by first imposiong an embargo and then attacking the commodity reserves. The Allies did the same thing to Germany during WWII. They also could be used to boost public opinion during an eleciton year.

Built on the map, maybe. But not visible for other nations. To get to know where to find oil reserves you have to use your secret intelligence.

[Stuff2]

quote: Originally posted by Dienstag on 09-26-2000 08:58 PM Question about the Strategic Oil Reserve: I read somewhere recently that the United States has a reserve of 571 million gallons of oil, and that it consumes oil at nearly 20 million gallons a day (sickening, isn't it?) Seems that, with no sources of oil other than the reserve, the U.S. would run out of oil in about a month. So my question is: just what effect would the SPR have in a Civ III game if it's effects were on the order of a month?

If USA gets in an oil crise, obviosly they won't give away oil for any purpose. I mean. The states won't give you unlimited oil to spend an vacation in the mountains. The oil in that reserve will almost entirely go to :
- Emergency services vehicle
- Food distribution
- Military vehicles
- keeping the indoor temperatures over freezing point

So the American oil reserve will probably last much more than a month. If you live near your work the gov will probably tell you to take the bike if you complain in not getting any oil from them.

[UltraSonix]

quote: OPEC and oil embargoes.

This is getting into the area of "trade wars", a concept that I think is excellent and should definitely be in the game (as you guys have read many times ). Since Firaxis is supposedly putting in this "oil reserve" system, and they're commited to revamping the trade model, oil embargoes could well be in the game!

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No, in Australia we don't live with kangaroos and koalas in our backyards... Despite any stupid advertisments you may see to the contrary...
[This message has been edited by UltraSonix (edited September 30, 2000).]

[MidKnight Lament]

quote: Originally posted by UltraSonix on 09-30-2000 10:04 PM Since Firaxis is supposedly putting in this "oil reserve" system,

Uuuuuuuuum, I'm not sure about that. They've read the proposal, and yes they said they're going to concentrate on trade, but I'm not sure how much of the above system will be implemented.

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- MKL
"I'm OK. How are you? Thanks for asking, thanks for asking."
Shameless Plug: http://www.poetic-license.org