Food Distribution

[Kuciwalker]

I really think that agricultural cities should be able to supply industrial cities. Far from detracting from city planning, it would enhance it by allowing you to specialize your cities. Also, what happens in one part of your empire could have a direct effect on other parts; if your agriculture cities get captured, you starve.

[Aramis]

I've come to accept the food problem as just a part of the game I can't control.
But I have an idea for Firaxis:
The FC acts as another capitol, reducing corruption, which can affect all production in cities within its sphere of influence. Why not have a similar small wonder that acts in such a way that it is a food distribution center for desert/tundra cities?
So many things Firaxis can do; so little we can. Let's get them interested in doing a Civ IV.

[Catt]

Originally posted by skywalker
I really think that agricultural cities should be able to supply industrial cities. Far from detracting from city planning, it would enhance it by allowing you to specialize your cities.

How would city specialization enhance city planning?

Doesn't the concept of fungible city supplies -- freely available from any city within an empire -- by definition reduce the need to plan specific city locations better?

From my point of view, mobile food supplies would simply ensure that every single workable tile within a given cultural border would be worked regardless of specific city location. Yes, one could specialize cities, but to what end -- any city consisting largely of flatlands such as grasslands or plains would be best utilized as ag cities (to the extent needed) -- irrigated and producing a food surplus -- so as to feed the industrial cities situated near mountains and hills. I'd personally prefer that prospective city locations would need to be evaluated in order to determine wheher or not, among other things, adequate food existed to support appropriate and efficient population levels.

Catt

[bongo]

IMO the view that each city should grow it's own food is a bit outdated. IRL entire nations are running on a food deficit. Like oil and any other resources, if you don't have it, you can buy it.

Maybe a small wonder called National Food Reserve would be fine? Available with industrialization(so it won't lessen the value of good city placement), it would allow food to be transported along your trade network and traded to other civs.

[Kuciwalker]

Catt: no it doesn't reduce the need for good city planning. You still have to be able to work those tiles, and if you made it so that city improvements would be necessary to work certain tile improvements to maximum efficiency, you would want to plan a city so that it would fill a specific role. Thus, you NEED to have agricultural cities, you NEED to have resource-collecting (mining, whatever) cites, you NEED to have industrial cities. This also seperates resources and production - you have to have the materials, but you also need the factories to do something with them.

[WarpStorm]

I have to agree with Catt on this. It would lower the strategic challenge because it would be an obvious choice to specialize all cities. Once there is an obvious choice, there isn't a strategic choice. The whole point of the game is to make strategic choices.

[Catt]

Originally posted by skywalker
Catt: no it doesn't reduce the need for good city planning. You still have to be able to work those tiles, and [. . . ] you would want to plan a city so that it would fill a specific role. Thus, you NEED to have agricultural cities, you NEED to have resource-collecting (mining, whatever) cites, you NEED to have industrial cities.

But this sounds like an argument that one would need to control certain types of terrain, rather than emphasizing efficient city placement. I would need to ensure control of sufficient irrigable flatlands to make available the productive "verticallands" but I need not worry about specific city locations within my cultural borders -- only sufficient empire-wide balance.

It still seems to me that the proposal de-emphasizes city placement strategy and promotes (if at all) simple geographical diversity.

The above quote without my edits, but with my emphasis added:

Catt: no it doesn't reduce the need for good city planning. You still have to be able to work those tiles, and if you made it so that city improvements would be necessary to work certain tile improvements to maximum efficiency, you would want to plan a city so that it would fill a specific role. Thus, you NEED to have agricultural cities, you NEED to have resource-collecting (mining, whatever) cites, you NEED to have industrial cities. This also seperates resources and production - you have to have the materials, but you also need the factories to do something with them.

Your proposal strikes me as more interesting with the highlighted changes -- but that's an additional radical change to the basic game structure. And though I think it represents a "radical" change to the game structure, I don't think it represents much of a change to actual gameplay -- I would obviously build the required imporvements in my spcialized cities, almost without thinking about it much (i.e., "farm" in an ag city; "factory" in a shield city).

Originally posted by bongo
IMO the view that each city should grow it's own food is a bit outdated. IRL entire nations are running on a food deficit. Like oil and any other resources, if you don't have it, you can buy it.

I don't disagree that in real life cities, and entire nations, needn't produce their own food. But there are thousands of aspects of the game that are geared towards more interesting gameplay than towards realism -- in my view, a more engaging game is far more important that adherance to a more realistic simulation.

Maybe a small wonder called National Food Reserve would be fine? Available with industrialization(so it won't lessen the value of good city placement), it would allow food to be transported along your trade network and traded to other civs.

I'd be less opposed to such a change since by the Industrial Age much of the world is settled. But it would also strike me as adding an "uncalled-for complexity" in the later game, since the present system seems to work without too much problem as it is (if you buy my other arguments, that is ).

Catt

[Kuciwalker]

I think that, even if this removed a layer of strategy in city placement, it would add enormous strategic depth to war. And if you actually seperated shields and production, you've made it so that civ can really represent the Industrial Revolution.

[exeter0]

reading this thread reminds me of how much I miss CTP!

[Harovan]

Why don't you play it then? If you have lost your CD, you can have mine. Just blow away the dust from it.

[bongo]

Catt , I totally agree with you on one thing. This add unneeded complexity. IMO the game is fine now(actually there is one thing I would really like to change but that's a totally different matter)

It's just that sometimes I have cities that are totally useless except for an incredible food-production. It would be nice to find some use for all that food....I don't miss CTP but it had some interesting features. Remember the worker specialist that added shields to a city? Give me some of those and excess food will never again be a problem. (add a policeman specialist to combat corruption and the game will become dangerously easy )

[Kuciwalker]

I think it would add minimal complexity. Let me explain why.

Say you're playing on the world map, in America, and you have one or two mega food cities in the middle. You go into a "resource distribution screen". On it is a map, with cities and such. You select one or more cities, right click and pick "move food", then select another city or group of cities. You specify the amount of food per turn sent from each city. You can only do it if the city is on your trade network and is only a certain distance (along the network) away, with different costs depending on the mode of transport (harder to move across water, no cost for railroad, for example). Bingo. You could also set the advisor to automatically handle some of it or even all of it.

One thing I want to repeat about the shields: having more shields wouldn't increase your production (at least not much) under this system. You would have to have the industrial capacity to utilize those shields.

[BigFurryMonster]

Originally posted by Rob_S
So many things Firaxis can do; so little we can. Let's get them interested in doing a Civ IV.

Let's get them interested to do Civ IV as a distributed project: accept input from hundreds of thousands of Civ fans all over the world, with ideas as good as yours.