would you like to see a different border system?

[Martinus Magnificus]

Personally, I don't like the way borders are handled in Civ 3. It's unrealistic and frustrating to lose control over a resource just because a rival civ builds a temple in a neighbouring city. Instead, you should be able to hold territory and prevent borders from moving by military force.
Moreover, cities should keep their cultural influence in terms of borders, when captured. The way it is now, gaps appear when you conquer a set of enemy cities. What's that supposed to mean? These tiles become neutral? Not very realistic, if you ask me.
So, what I would like to see is a reworked border system, although I realize it will probably not be done in PtW.

Any comments?

[Zachriel]

Re: would you like to see a different border system?

Originally posted by Martinus Magnificus
Personally, I don't like the way borders are handled in Civ 3. It's unrealistic and frustrating to lose control over a resource just because a rival civ builds a temple in a neighbouring city.

Over the time scales involved in Civ3, dynasties may rise and fall. Minor changes in your borders may occur over these long time spans.

Instead, you should be able to hold territory and prevent borders from moving by military force.

Either build culture, or declare war and take what you need. A resource on a contested border may not be very reliable over a long period of time.

Moreover, cities should keep their cultural influence in terms of borders, when captured. The way it is now, gaps appear when you conquer a set of enemy cities. What's that supposed to mean? These tiles become neutral? Not very realistic, if you ask me.
So, what I would like to see is a reworked border system, although I realize it will probably not be done in PtW.

When you first capture a city, you exert control over the city itself and the immediate surrounding areas. However, you may not control the hinterlands. Consider Afghanistan. The Coalition controls Kabul, but there are pockets outside the main cities that are either uncontrolled, or under the control of local warlords.

In fact, Afghanistan resembles many medieval political situations. Afghanistan may be a country, may even once have had a nominal king, but each county or district has strong independence. These districts may even fight local wars over borders, wars that are not represented in the grand strategic level of the game. Afghanistan, like Europe in the Middle Ages, like Greece in the Ancient Age, like America in the Industrial Age, is riven with tribal politics.

We sometimes forget this fact of history because most of us live in strong nationalistic societies.

[wrylachlan]

Yes the border system is flawed. But it does serve its purpose, which is to make culture important in the game. Are there tweaks to the system that I would like to see? Sure. I'll address the two issues you seem to have separately.

1.) Lack of military control over borders.
I think this is a really simple fix: have military units exert cultural control over the square they are on. If you don't want to loose that resource garrison troops around it so that your neighbors border won't encroach.

2.) The weird "neutral territory" that appears between cities when you take over.
This is a little more difficult to deal with, but here's an idea:
a) make every square "connected" to the city whose culture occupies it.
i.e. the squares around boston are considered "suburbs" of Boston.
b) when a city is captured, it's suburbs remain under control of the original culture.
i.e. when the russians invade Boston, Dorchester doesn't suddenly become russian, nor does it become neutral, it stays American.
c)a military unit exerts a zone of cultural influence 1 square around it in suburbs of a city that has already been captured.
i.e. The russians march into Boston taking the city. The eight squares around it become russian automatically. The squares that are 2 away from Boston maintain their American nationality. If Russia wants to control those squares, it must garrison troops in a ring around Boston.
note: I suggest a radius of 1 aquare instead of just the square the unit is on, because I think that requiring a garrison for every tile would get really boring really quickly.
d.) once a city has been captured, every turn there is a percentage chance that it's suburbs will culturally assimilate to the conquering nation. This percentage is affected by the ratio of the cultures of the nations involved.
i.e. Ten turns after taking Boston, Framingham reverts to Russian control and russia no longer needs to garrison a unit there to control the tile. If Russia had an extremely low culture, it may have taken 25 turns before Framingham turned.Conversely a super high culture could have cut the time to say 7 turns.

Ramifications of this proposal -
This would cut down on RR rushes, since you would need to garrison troops between cities in order to control the RRs.
Slightly more realistic, and strategic.
Kind of complicated, but intuitive also, I think.

What do you say?

[OPD]

I've heard some talk of watch towers. Will they have any sort of cultural sphere?

[Carver]

Originally posted by OPD
I've heard some talk of watch towers. Will they have any sort of cultural sphere?

From what's been announced, no. The watchtower just watches, it removes the fog of war for the area it sees and prevents barbarians from spawning there. It would be nice if they (or something else in Civ3) could extend cultural borders without you having to build cities. But...oh well.

[Robert]

Pherhaps the borders aren't completely realistic, there is no better alternative.

If borders would NOT depend on culture, your neighbours could keep on building new cities near your border, and keep expanding into your territory.

For the sake of culture that's no option, since you would cultural take over their tiny cities anyway.

The borders like we know them today in the 'real world' are there only since about 200 years. Before 1850 borders were a subject of change all the time. The people who lived in an area decided themselves to which city they felt attrackted.

ie. if the german city 50 miles away got more culture, thus more attraction, it might be a more 'home-town' feeling than a french 30 miles away city.

Of course it's never possible to control reality in a game, but I think the way it's been handled in civ3 is playable, and as realistic as possible.

Border negotiation would be cool, but far too complex.

[statusperfect]

Maybe border negotiations for resources that are only one square into enemy territory after discovering nationalism? I belive those resources are what make people frustrated about the current system.