Opinion on Space feature for Civ 3

[Trachmir]

I could live with generally applied benifits to cities with specific improvements, or specific units. but for some ideas for improvements/units:
Genetic Institute: Lowers disease & improves happiness slightly
Fiber-Optic Network: Provides shielding vs. EMP (if added to nukes...)
Nano-Recycler: Reduces polution, reduces all production cost by 10%

A Hybrid Farm can be a tile improvement

For units:
Mass-Driver Artillary: Longer bombardment range
Scramjet: Hypersonic (faster) Interceptor
Stelth Deystroyer: I have a freind who is actually stationed on one!

Some of the names sound a bit funny, but so did the the Internet and E-mail when first emerging.

[EnochF]

What the hell is a nano-recycler? Sounds about as probable as a cyber ninja to me.

No one can agree which future techs are silly and which aren't. So, let's keep them to a minimum.

[Dale]

I'm not into the future sci-fi type thing in CTP1 & 2. I'd be happy to trade from 2100AD onwards for another 1000 years in anchient time. Whether it's more turns in the earlier ages or just another 1000 years of turns from 4000BC doesn't matter. I prefer the historical view to the future view.

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Rommell to a sub-commander outside Tobruk: "Those Australians are in there somewhere. But where? Let's advance and wait till they shoot, then shoot back."
[This message has been edited by Dale (edited February 09, 2001).]

[Cyclotron]

EnochF is right. We won't have any of these potential problems if we leave sci-fi fantasy wierdness out of CivIII.

[joseph1944]

Mr. Roman and everone else
Since I was around in the 50s (started High School Sept. 1958 age 14) and 60s let me try to clear a few thing up about space. The US was very committed to space in those days, especially after the Russians sent Sputnik into space in 1957. When President Kennedy came to power (Jan 61) he wanted the US to beat the Russian with human space flight, butt after the Russians were the first he changed the race to include the moon. President Johnson was a big supporter of the space race also. This is were thing went wrong for the US and Moon Colony's. President Johnson got us into a war in Vietnam (BTW I was on a bus going from Long Beach Naval Shipyard to down town in March of 1965 and a sailor from the USS Maddox was also on the bus. Someone on the Maddox was a short timer 60 days or less so one of my guys from my ship hear him and ask me to tell them how short I was and I said 14 or 15 days of course everyone said bad thing to me for being short, I than asked the sailor from the Maddox about the North Vietnam attacking them and he said they pick up the torpedo boat on radar about 25 miles from their ship and was given permission to shoot at it and sunk it at about 20 mile from their ship. The torpedo boat was never close enough to fire his torpedo at the Maddox. Funny the story here was the boat fired on the Maddox. Old well.) When Pres. Nixon came to power in 68, his biggest job and was to get out of Vietnam. It was later reported that he Nixon couldn't care less about space travel or space colonies. The Vietnam war did two things to this country, it drained resources away from space travel and we had a social revolution in the U.S. Under Nixon, Congress cut funding to space program and Nixon supported it. Since we had beaten the Russians to the moon a large number of our Congressman and Senators wanted to get rid of the space program and give the money to social programs. I'm not sure how President Carter fell about the space program. We do know now that when President Reagan came to power he was only interested in defeating the Soviet Union. In the late '70s I remember seeing a report that said H. E. W. (Housing Education and Welfare) was spending more money in one day than entire space budget for that year. (The Whitehouse later broke up H. E. W. into two Department. Department Education and the Department of Housing and Welfare. To hide how much money was being spent.) Also in the late '70s NASA thought it was going out of business and came up with the shuttle to us save itself. Of course the U.S. Air Force helped NASA at every turn stating that they needed the shuttle to repair all the special satellites that are in orbit. President George Bush Sr. was the latest President to show any interest in space travel when he indicated he would like to see the U.S. sending a man to Mars by the year 2015. Even today there are still people in our Congress who would like to get rid of the space program. NASA had a very tough time getting the Congress to approve the space station. Now that other countries are helping with the space station it will survive. With all of our social upheavals of the past we are lucky we still have a space program. Now I believe you can see why we have not built a moon colony. And President Clinton did nothing for space as far as I can remember, if anybody else can remembers him doing something please indicated.
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[This message has been edited by joseph1944 (edited February 10, 2001).]
[This message has been edited by joseph1944 (edited February 10, 2001).]
[This message has been edited by joseph1944 (edited February 10, 2001).]

[Roman]

Joseph1944,

I completely agree with the reasons for delayed space exploration/colonization you have presented (though I would also add a vast overestimate of progress of space technology and an even larger underestimate of expense). This goes far to prove my point that technologies that seem promising or likely now, may in the near future be killed by changing attitudes, circumstances, expense or sheer nonviability.

[Roman]

quote: Originally posted by EnochF on 02-08-2001 08:57 PM What the hell is a nano-recycler? Sounds about as probable as a cyber ninja to me. No one can agree which future techs are silly and which aren't. So, let's keep them to a minimum.

I completely agree.

[Biddles]

Roman, thanks for the serious answer. I couldn't see why people were so opposed to future techs. The thing is, I actually agree with you. While I loved the techs in SMAC, they just wouldn't work in Civ3.

However, I do think that the tech tree needs to be made to end around 2060 (Alpha Centauri SS date). I don't want to hit 2001 and all of a sudden have no techs to discover, but have 60 or so years left. To do this there is going to be some geussing as to what are plausible techs for the next 60 years.

Firstly, I think anything starting with the prefix nano should be thrown in the trash. That's SMAC, not civ. Fusion should be included. It has been achieved (if not economically) in various research labs. Anyway, thats what powers the Spaceship. Some limited genetic techs should also be included (hybrid rice, influenza treatment etc.), but not anything like "human engineering". Trachmir's tech's of "Fiber optic network" and "Hybrid Farm" are great ideas. We currently have the technical know how, but haven't implemented it in that way. Things like "electronic economy", where all transactions don't use hard cash anymore, are the kinda tech's I'd like to see. It is completely plausible, and isn't to sci-fi.

As to whoever said space cities were to late in the game, they are completely right. I never had important space cities. Besides, if we assume that they come into play around 2020, that's 40 years of playtime with space cities (CTP was way longer then civ3). They just don't add enough to the game to bother about them.

[Roman]

quote: Originally posted by Biddles on 02-10-2001 07:33 AM While I loved the techs in SMAC, they just wouldn't work in Civ3.

I completely agree with you on this one.

quote: Originally posted by Biddles on 02-10-2001 07:33 AM Firstly, I think anything starting with the prefix nano should be thrown in the trash. That's SMAC, not civ.

quote: Originally posted by Biddles on 02-10-2001 07:33 AM Fusion should be included. It has been achieved (if not economically) in various research labs.

Fair enough.

quote: Originally posted by Biddles on 02-10-2001 07:33 AM Some limited genetic techs should also be included (hybrid rice, influenza treatment etc.), but not anything like "human engineering".

I see you understood my post very well. This is exactly what I advocate. We know genetic engineering will allow us to do many things in the future, but Civ3 should stick to the things that are possible now like "hybrid rice" and some drugs.

[Roman]

I am opposed not only to the space cities, but also to the entire space layer. Even if some current space technology is included in Civ3 (such as spy satelites), it can be done without the unnecesary complication of the space layer.

[David James]

There seems to be pretty widespread agreement that space cities a la CtP is a bad idea (I just bought the game and haven't got that far along yet) and already I can see why - just looking at the tech tree and units chart, etc.

I'm with Theben on this one - the game could end with a successful manned space flight to Mars. To be able to launch such a project would require a few space improvements such as shuttles and an orbital production facility (or rather facilities) and perhaps a space station (maybe limit one per civ, ie like the palace/capitol) that would serve to actually assemble and launch the ship - so it would be like having just one "city" in space. Of course the station would have to be built using the orbital platforms (and shuttled parts) whilst the platforms would be built from shuttled up parts (or other existing platforms). This seems realistic enough whilst also being a significant, game-ending endeavour, with all the features of a space race. I'd axe the possibility of space warfare though (other than spy satellites) so the only way to win is to get to Mars first or to conquer the other civ on the ground. Finally, this has the advantage of limiting future techs to a few realistic near-future techs.

What do you think?

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Yes, as a matter of fact, going to Queen's does make me better than you.

[bagdar]

Mars is certainly more reasonable, but let's not forget that the odyssey to Alpha Centauri is an integral part of the CIV experience. Let's reserve that much fantasy to the game. To conclude: NO Future Techs. Keep it as it is!

[Biddles]

You can't have no future tech's and a manned mission to alpha centauri. The thing is as long as the neccesary future techs are reasonable and not into the sci-fi realm, this hould be okay.

[David James]

Maybe I should clarify a bit... by 'future techs' I meant futuristic techs like cryonics, alien archeology and cloaking in CtP, not the out and out 'future techs' of Civ2, though they'd be gone as well I guess. Frankly, I can't see how there's enough technological depth in Civ2 to be able to justify building a spaceship capable of interstellar travel, albeit at high sublight. I mean come on - according to the tech tree we could get to Alpha Centauri right now! I can accept getting to Mars with more or less current tech and within the confines of the Civ2 tech tree, but not to Alpha Centauri.
Let's be realistic and keep it to the present and plausible near-future: let's make the endgame a race to Mars.