Civ III Site Updated

[Dan Magaha FIRAXIS]

The site has been updated, and it's a pretty significant one. We've got a new game update that deals with resources and we have a "slideshow" that walks you through how resources work.

We've also got a new edition of ask the Civ team.

And oh, by the way, we have some official screenshots for you as well.
http://www.firaxis.com/civ3

Have a good weekend,

Dan
Firaxis Games, Inc.
[This message has been edited by Dan Magaha FIRAXIS (edited May 11, 2001).]

[markusf]

sweet. I will check it out.

[markusf]

where is the windowed mode in the screen shots?


I have finished reading through everything and it looks pretty good. I am glad to see strong influences from master of orion showing up in this game.
I still think there should be a public beta test of civ3 especially on the multiplayer side. I am sure you will find many people willing to help that are programmers and familier with defect tracking/reporting.. like me hint hint

Markus www.civ3online.com
[This message has been edited by markusf (edited May 11, 2001).]

[tniem]

Oh my god! You weren't kidding this is pretty significant. Will be back when I am through with all this stuff about colonies, borders, and other things. But by golly am I excited.

Tell the gang that they have done a great job to this point!

[tniem]

This is somethig that I haven't been able to figure out for sure so I am asking the community and Firaxis if they have time. I have now read the pages multiple times and am confused by the borders. Obviously as the borders expand due to culture, the better your chances for gaining resources such as coal, iron, and oil. But what about regular resources such as food, shilds, and trade? Do I know need to have culture and borders to simply maintain the normal level of production in the past?

My guess is yes, that when you originally build a city you can only farm, mine, etc in your own city. And as culture is added that radius expands. But what about that huge border radius around Rome? Can I place workers anywhere within that border? I would guess not. And by looking at the gallery it has the standard Civ, Civ II, SMAC border tiles shown where the city is going to be founded. So I wonder how exactly does workers in a city work?


Also if luxuries and resources can be shared within your own nation's trade community can more than one nation build colonies near these resources and also gain their advantages? Or do they have to trade with you?

I would say that only one nation can build colonies on a resource and force the world to trade with you. But that is just my belief.


That's it for my questions.

[Dan Magaha FIRAXIS]

quote: Originally posted by tniem on 05-11-2001 05:55 PM This is somethig that I haven't been able to figure out for sure so I am asking the community and Firaxis if they have time. I have now read the pages multiple times and am confused by the borders. Obviously as the borders expand due to culture, the better your chances for gaining resources such as coal, iron, and oil. But what about regular resources such as food, shilds, and trade? Do I know need to have culture and borders to simply maintain the normal level of production in the past? My guess is yes, that when you originally build a city you can only farm, mine, etc in your own city. And as culture is added that radius expands. But what about that huge border radius around Rome? Can I place workers anywhere within that border? I would guess not. And by looking at the gallery it has the standard Civ, Civ II, SMAC border tiles shown where the city is going to be founded. So I wonder how exactly does workers in a city work? Also if luxuries and resources can be shared within your own nation's trade community can more than one nation build colonies near these resources and also gain their advantages? Or do they have to trade with you? I would say that only one nation can build colonies on a resource and force the world to trade with you. But that is just my belief. That's it for my questions.

The way it currently stands, your borders are seperate from your "workable city tiles". The number of city tiles you can work does increase as your city grows, but it doesn't expand nearly as far as your city borders do. Even if your city has only the beginning 1-square (no) border, you can work the requisite number of surrounding squares. But until those squares actually fall within your borders, the enemy can come onto them and do what he pleases. Once you've got borders around those squares, you can tell the other players to get out (and in most cases, they listen).

As for colonies, the resources go to whoever builds a colony and connects it with a road first. Consequently, colonies become key while your borders are expanding, and if you leave them unguarded or weakly guarded, you will pay the price. Also, since colonies need to be connected to a city with roads, an enemy can destroy your roads and sever the connection to that resource.

This can be disastrous, especially when you're relying on goods to pacify unhappy citizens. I had a game going this week and the CPU destroyed my roads at a key juncture and sent four cities into revolt.


Dan
Firaxis Games, Inc.

[This message has been edited by Dan Magaha FIRAXIS (edited May 11, 2001).]

[java4me]

tniem has a lot of the same questions that I have. I was also wondering on, how far can the borders extend? What is the limit? And also what would happen if two cities crossed over each other? Would the same thing happen in Civ2? I need these questions answered.

But those screen shots are just mouth watering!!!

The more and more i read on Civ3, the more anxious I get about the game coming out!!!

[tniem]

quote: Originally posted by Dan Magaha FIRAXIS on 05-11-2001 06:07 PM The way it currently stands, your borders are seperate from your "workable city tiles". The number of city tiles you can work does increase as your city grows, but it doesn't expand nearly as far as your city borders do. As for colonies, the resources go to whoever builds a colony and connects it with a road first. Consequently, colonies become key while your borders are expanding, and if you leave them unguarded or weakly guarded, you will pay the price. Also, since colonies need to be connected to a city with roads, an enemy can destroy your roads and sever the connection to that resource.

Thanks for the prompt reply. Great work Dan getting all the new Civ III stuff up and the Sim Golf stuff in one week. I propose now that you put new information, screen shots, etc up one week for Civ III and the next for Sim Golf, giving us a new update from the company every week. Of course that is if you aren't already busy from all the work of two games...
[This message has been edited by tniem (edited May 11, 2001).]

[markusf]

quote: Originally posted by tniem on 05-11-2001 05:55 PM Obviously as the borders expand due to culture, the better your chances for gaining resources such as coal, iron, and oil. But what about regular resources such as food, shilds, and trade? Do I know need to have culture and borders to simply maintain the normal level of production in the past?

Yup looks that way to me. You can only harvest your own city square until you build a temple or other improvements. Its brillant and solves so many problems. The biggest one of which is ICS. It looks like you won't even be able to produce a settlar until you have a temple built.(your city needs food to get to size 3) The other thing this solves is that someone won't be able to build a ton of units right off the bat and try and go hunting down others. Because getting your city up to size 3 is going to be your number one task...


Markus
www.civ3online.com

[SerapisIV]

Dan, what the heck is the psychodelic peace flag in the city window of the last resource tutorial screenshot?

Thanks for the update by the way

[Grumbold]

Sounds impressive. I haven't had time to absorb the detailed stuff but one brief impression: If cities are going to have that huge fixed wall size, please fill the inside with tightly packed hovels until the improvement buildings displace them. It looks more like a lightly populated scout camp with all that green space inside the walls than a bustling hive of commerce

[SerapisIV]

Oh yeah, and does a colony take up a whole settler? Or can a simple worker build one? Because if a colony takes up 2 pop, why not just build a new city? Also do the borders depend on an individual cities cutlture or the whole nations?

[markusf]

quote: Originally posted by SerapisIV on 05-11-2001 06:17 PM Oh yeah, and does a colony take up a whole settler? Or can a simple worker build one? Because if a colony takes up 2 pop, why not just build a new city? Also do the borders depend on an individual cities cutlture or the whole nations?

Let me guess, worker settlars build colonies and the settlars that take up 2 food build cities.

[java4me]

There are two seperate units, the settler which only makes cities, and the worker who makes colonies, roads, etc...

[Bereta_Eder]

I like what I read