Question About Pollution?

[Guest]

I've asked this question in another thread that pertained to pollution; though the thread was not about this particular question. It wasn't answered; so I've started a new thread in hopes of getting an explanation.

What does that "one pollution" exactly mean?

What are the actual chances that a city cotaining an improvement that produces "one pollution" to have a pollution blob suddenly show up on a city square? What are the numbers regarding pollution and it's distribution according to the games logistics?

[pedrojedi]

I someone could get some percentage, it would be perfect!

[Jaybe]

Disclaimer: The following is my understanding, but is not verified by testing.

With a Factory you get pollution (2); Airport (1); Manufacturing Plant (1 or 2, I don't recall having built one).

Each population point above 12 (1).

I do not recall (yet) what the reductions are Recycling Plant and Mass Transit.

[pedrojedi]

The reductions are BIG. Some super-producing cities of mine, with tons of pollution, got to the usual limit, 4 pollution, after building those 2.

[bigfree1]

Originally posted by Jaybe
Disclaimer: The following is my understanding, but is not verified by testing.

With a Factory you get pollution (2); Airport (1); Manufacturing Plant (1 or 2, I don't recall having built one).

Each population point above 12 (1).

I do not recall (yet) what the reductions are Recycling Plant and Mass Transit.

This is no help whatsoever.

I need numbers which represent the chances of pollution appearing on my cities tiles as compared to the number of 'pollutions' it produces.

Telling me that an Airport contributes to pollution is not adding anything to the already known facts that I'm sure is demonstrated by my formulating the question in the first place, thank you!

Maybe only someone who programmed the game knows; I sure wish they'd give us a clue to how it all works.

[bigfree1]

Come on, someone from Firaxis has to know this. What does it take for them to notice a thread? Do we throw them a bone or what?!

[WarpStorm]

I'm pretty sure it's a 1% chance of a tile in the borders of the city getting polluted per turn.

I'm surprised Firaxis shows up at all after all the bashing they've gotten on this site. If all that hatred were directed at me I don't think that I would bother with coming around.

[wilbill]

Originally posted by WarpStorm I'm surprised Firaxis shows up at all after all the bashing they've gotten on this site...

True enough. I've also been a little surprised that they've been willing to share the nuts and bolts details and formulas the game uses for some of its decision making - the Culture Flipping formula for example. They could easily have left us guessing on these things. After all, a certain amount of uncertainty is what makes Civ 3 a game.

[Catt]

I can't help you with the specifics on what, precisely, one pollution shield means in terms of chances for a polluted square. But if I told you it was either 1% or 10% would it affect your decision-making with regard to city build priorities / city growth? Would it affect your decision-making significantly?

I can say that the Mass Transit System (Ecology) eliminates all but one pollution shield caused by population (one each for eacg pop point above 12); and the Recycling Center (Recycling) eliminates all but one pollution shield caused by city improvements. If pollution becomes a tremendous problem in certain cities, the combination of these two improvements can dramatically reduce the incidence of pollution (i.e., a size 30 city with the Iron Works, Factory, Coal Plant, Airport, Research Lab, and Manufacturing Plant would still only generate two pollution shields).

Catt