CITY IMPROVEMENTS (ver1.0): Hosted by CyberShy

[Robert]

Welcome in the City Improvements Thread.
To make clear what this Thread is about:

• City Improvements
• New ideas about possible things that improve a city

This means we talk about things you can only change IN the city-window, but has nothing to do with trade, economy, food, science or whatever else, and it has nothing to do with wonders and units as well. Just clear about City Improvements.
========================

Explanation about this Thread:
At the top I've posted 2 postings myself,
this one, and one that will be updated every day. The 2nd one is the most important one, since that one will contain in a clear way all the suggestions that are done so far in this Thread.

You can post new ideas and discuss them below, and I'll order them all in the 2nd post. This will give a clear overview to this Thread, and if you need more details, then just read the entire Thread.

Have fun, and be aware of the importance of this discussion !!

[Robert]

<H3>List of Current City Improvements:<H5>

• Baracks
• Granary
• Palace
• City Walls
• Temple
• Library
• Courthouse
• Marketplace
• Aqueduct
• Colosseum
• Harbor
• University
• Bank
• Cathedral
• Power Plant
• Stock Exchange
• Sewer System
• Port Facility
• Coastal Fortress
• Super Highways
• Factory
• Airport
• Mass Transit
• Hydro Plant
• Police Station
• Recycling Center
• Supermarket
• Nuclear Plant
• SAM Missile Battery
• Offshore Platform
• SDI Defense
• Research Lab
• Solar Plant
• Manufacturing Plant

Ordered by purpose [MBD's idea]

• Food
Granary, Aqueduct, Harbor, Sewer System, Supermarket

• Defense
Baracks, City Walls, Coastal Fortress, SAM Missile Battery, SDI Defense

• Science
Library, University, Research Lab

• Money / luxerious / Economy
Marketplace, Bank, Stock Exchange, Super Highways, Palace, Courthouse

• Production
Power Plant, Factory, Hydro Plant, Nuclear Plant, Offshore Platform, Solar Plant, Manufacturing Plant

• Hapiness
Cathedral, Colosseum, Temple

• Special
Recycling Center, Police Station, Mass Transit, Airport, Port Facility,

<hr>
<hr>

<H3>List of ideas for new Improvements:<H5>

• Theater [EnochF]
• City Clock [EnochF]
• Hospital [EnochF]
• Cinema [EnochF]
• Pharmacy [EnochF]
• Television [EnochF]
• Security Monitor [EnochF]
• Fusion Plant [EnochF]
• Base Support Structures [Trachmyr] <== read more under the 'new ideas' section
• Pastuerization Plant (Adds 25% to total food due to the reduction in losses to spoilage.) [Sieve Too]
• Pesticide Plant (Adds another 25% to total food but increases pollution) [Sieve Too]
• Doctors house [to the already suggested “Pharmacy” and “Hospital”. A series of three related improvements.] [Ralph]
• City Park [Benefit: Makes one addional citizen content. Requires: Sanitation (Maybe a new advance, something like Modern Fertilizer) Cost: 60 shields Maint: 1 gold]
• Theme Park [Benefit: Two citizens happy. One additional gold for every 4 population. Plus 5 gold for every wonder in city(tourism). Requires: Mass Media advance(if Mass Media advance not in game then Electronics), Cost: 240 shields, Maint: 4 gold
• Transmitter [Benefit: Makes two citizens content(by distraction). With the advent of Mass Media(Electronics if Mass Media not in game) provides one additional gold for every two citizens(advertising). Requires: Radio, Cost: 120 shields, Maint: 2 gold
• ISP [Benefit: Plus 20% science in city. Plus 2 science for every other city with an ISP, including cities in other civs.
Requires: Computer, Cost: 160 shields, Maint: 3 gold] [ALL above by HarryKattz]
• Medieval Fairs
• forge
• textile mill/loom
• suburbs
• highways,
• public schools
• parks
• circus [all by wheathin]
• Bomb Shelter [Protects citizens from artiliery attacks, missle attacks, and bombing runs from aircraft. Prevents the city from going down in population from these attacks.] [Travathian]
• Stationary units (Possibly custom-designed) [Isle]
• SECURITY STATIONS [(automatic genetic and/or fingerprint identification when accessing city areas/buildings everywhere): automatically "detects" spies within city limits and may have a chance of making them fail. Spies may later gain an ability to have a chance to be hidden from security stations and decrease their fail chances.] [Freddz]

<hr>
<hr>

<H3>List of other /new ideas<H5>

• Make improvements that belong to a nation or a religion or a gouvernament. [CyberShy]

examples:
# Muslim nations will never be allowed to build churches.
# Temples only work till 500 AD
# Communism disalbes churches / temples. (till another gouvernament is chosen)
# Wind Mills are typicall dutch improvements
# Mc Donalds has double the impact in the USA then in other countries etc. etc.
<hr>
• I'd resuggest in this new thread that the player be allowed to build miltiples of certain improvements [within limits, of course], with diminishing returns for subsequent iterations. [Druid2]

examples:
[lab = +100% ... lab*2 = +180% ... lab*3 = +%230% .. max build of "n".. which is set in a modifiable parameter file]

In addition to this idea: In big cities, more than one improvement of one type should be needed. I don't think there was only one Granary in ancient Rome. [Ecce Homo]

In addition to this idea: each new building of the same type will have a reduced effect, let's say 25% less than the previous one. Suppose you built 3 stables, then the first one builds a cavalry regiment using 100 shields, the second using 125 shields, the third using 150 shields. Some improvements, such as aqueducts and sewer systems, should not be able to build multiple times [Transcend]

In addition to this idea: Give cities the option to build multiple improvements when they become bigger. City of 10 can have 1 Marketplace, city of 18 can hae 2 Marketplaces, city of 26 can have 3 marketplaces etc.etc. [CyberShy]

In addition to this idea: 1 Granary in a 8 people city works 100% but one granary in a 9+ city works 70% and one Granary in a 15+ city works 50%. Now you're forced to build a 2nd Granary when your city become 9. [CyberShy]
<hr>
• That city improvements that effect science be dedicated to a technology category and the benefit gained through that improvement can only be applied to that category (or could be changed with a penalty.) [Zorloc]
<hr>
• Base Support Structures... a new city improvement
This Improvement includes ALL of the CRITICAL structures of PAST under a single name and structure, including all the benefits of it. The old buildings will be replaced, and the upkeep costs will be low. Auto upgrade or build upgrades when you move to a new age. (read more below in Trackmyr's post] [Trachmyr]
<hr>
• There seems to be some general agreement with the suggestion that some unit chassis and weapons require improvements to be built before the unit itself can be done.
In this case, extra city improvements will be needed in order to produce units - about 15 - 20 new structures need to be designed (spanning the whole of history, though). [Shining1]
<hr>
• City improvements must become inactive when technology gets better. (like wonders don't work forever) and be replaced with others. [CyberShy]
<hr>
• Allow cities (or require) to increase effectiveness in a few abstract aeras.
1) Food Production/Storage
2) Industry
3) Religion
4) Entertainment
5) Defence
6) Health
7) ect.

you can then chose to "Increase Industry Infrastructure"... which will give a bounus based on:
(level of industy) - (city size)) * percentage increase of all indusstry city improvements [Trachmyr]
<hr>
• Reduce The Number of Improvements
CivI had a reasonable number of improvements, and it was still a management nightmare IMHO to "max out" a city. In Civ2 I rarely even bother any more because there's just a never-ending list of gotta-haves. [Mark_Everson]
<hr>
• My idea: As a city grows, the player may get messages like "A private enterprise applies to build a Factory in London". You cannot take use of privately owned buildings' production, but they will give you tax income. [Ecce Homo]
<hr>
• More ancient improvements are needed,
How about public bathes like in Ancient Greece and Rome? Burial grounds, which become modern day cemetaries? In feudal times you had keeps, which watched over the surrounding area, these could be similar to a Headquarters, but not quite as powerful.[Travathian]
<hr>
• A city can select the percentage of its resources that go into each area (e.g. science, money, happiness, ect.). New technologies(e.g. Banking, Scientific Thought, ect) would increase the effect that the same amount of resources have, perhaps with a temporary decrease to simulate improving the current facilities. This would allow more realistic cities, instead of cities that do everything, you would have a science city, with alot of research, a industrial city with a high production, ect. It would also be easier to manage [Blue Moose]
<hr>
• I dont like multi-boosting improvements which boost both energy AND research, or both research AND happiness. Keep things simple.
Part of the fun in building city-improvements in CIV-2 was that i always had an exact overview what each and every improvement added to the overall picture. If we start to mess things up with “multiple-“ and “multi-boost” city-improvements, that exact overview easily gets lost. [Ralph]
<hr>
• Population growth is affected not only by available food, but also by birth rates and death rates. Thus, there should be improvements that reflect this. At the least, things such as the Aqueduct, Drug Store/Pharmacy, and Hospital in CtP should have a large effect on maximum city size, an effect that could be generated by having them result in increased food (paradoxical in that more old people would eat *more* food, but it is as close a representation as we can get). [wheathin]
<hr>
• allow upgrades, with the existing improvement counting for 50% of the cost of the new improvement. [Wheathin]
<hr>
• a. decreasing costs for improvements - as the game progresses, while established cities have much higher production levels, newly founded cities take forever to get up to speed. If the costs dropped each era, (maybe with a multiplier, and each imp has an "era" variable) it'd be easierfor your cities founded in the 1800's (like most of America) to be worthwhile before 2100.

b. Rollover on the build queue - production that's leftover is applied to the next item built... important with:

c. Allow multiple builds in one turn - so these cheap but needed imps can be finished quickly.

d. "Packages" of cheap imps for later in the game, all built one after another. (In effect, readymade queues of items) Thus, by the modern era, an "ancient package" might include Granary, Marketplace, Church, Courthouse, Colisseum, Aqueduct, Sewer, Library, Public School, and Barracks. By selecting this single "package item" in the build queue, a newly founded city could build all the ancient imps in 2-4 short turns, thus saving a player lots of needless clicks and micromanagement, and time. [Wheathin]
<hr>
• I would like to be able to contract a CORPORATION to build my units, let the religions build their places of worship and leave me the task of keeping the city safe, clean and happy [CormacMacArt]
<hr>
• I would like to see more governance type improvements, and less general type [NotLikeTea]
<hr>
• As governer, we should be building the millitary structures (city walls, baraks, etc), public services (grainaries, aquaducts, etc) and that's pretty well it. Other improvements should be controled only second hand, by influencing religions, city planners, etc. [NotLikeTea]
<hr>
• Stationary long range units as a land improvement would be cool: a unit that fire automatically when hostile units approaches.
[Freddz]

<hr>
<hr>

<H3>List of new purposes / names for old improvements<H5>

• Superhighways ==> Shopping Mall / Mall / Downtown / Commercial Centre [VaderTwo]
• use the highways as an option in the roads/terraforming area instead [VaderTwo]
• I'm in favour of retaining all CivII structures, though possibly in a somewhat modified state [Shining1]
• Granary should be made obsolete by some tech and they can all(or some) be upgraded to something more modern. [Depp]
# In addition: Change the graphics for the granary at higher techs. [HarryKattz]
• citywalls should limit city size to 6 or something [Depp]
# in addition: increase maintenance costs for city walls by 1 gold for every three population over 12. This would represent the drag on distribution caused by bottleneck gates and the expense of letting out the seams as the city grows. [HarryKattz]

<hr>
<hr>

<H3>List of people involved with this thread<H5>

• CyberShy
• MBD
• Druid2
• Zorloc
• Mo (please some more explanation)
• EnochF
• VaderTwo
• Ecco Homo
• Trachmyr
• Sieve Too
• Transcend
• Shining1
• Mark_Everson
• Travathian
• Ralph
• Depp
• Blue Moose
• HarryKattz
• wheathin
• CormacMacArt
• Isle
• NotLikeTea
• Freddz

[This message has been edited by CyberShy (edited May 26, 1999).]

[MBD]

I think it might help if you took the current list of city improvements and broke it down according to the purpose of each building (like granary and aqueduct are for city population growth.) That way you can get a sense of where additions or changes are needed.
I'd also like to be able to "look" at each city in a simplified 3-d way at any time in the game.

[Druid2]

I'd resuggest in this new thread that the player be allowed to build miltiples of certain improvements [within limits, of course], with diminishing returns for subsequent iterations.

[lab = +100% ... lab*2 = +180% ... lab*3 = +%230% .. max build of "n".. which is set in a modifiable parameter file]

......
I *love* your idea of a constantly modified summary. Also be sure to expand your list of improvements to include the SMAC improvements [space stations, etc.]. And you might need some way to indicate how the function of the improvement might change.



[This message has been edited by Druid2 (edited May 20, 1999).]

[Zorloc]

I proposed this in the Tech section:

That city improvements that effect science be dedicated to a technology category and the benefit gained through that improvement can only be applied to that category (or could be changed with a penalty.)

This matches well with Druid2's multiple improvement's proposal.

[Mo]

I would still include the library and university which would help all fields. The new improvements should be cheaper or/and have a greater affect than the library or university. This would balance it out. Also you would have to be allowed to research more than one technology at one time. This would make sure that your improvments don't go to waste while you are researching a different field.

Look at the technology thread, it also touches on those topics.

[This message has been edited by Mo (edited May 20, 1999).]

[EnochF]

Specifics.

Nix the Power Plant. Substitute a City Generator that comes along with Electrification or Electric Power, whatever it ends up being called.

Make sure that all improvements that boost production are cumulative. That's one of a few tiny areas in which Call to Power has an advantage over Civ II.

Call to Power has some worthwhile Improvement ideas. I'd keep:

Theater
City Clock
Hospital
Movie Palace (call it Cinema)
Drug Store (call it Pharmacy instead)
Television
Security Monitor (some cities are already building these downtown)
Fusion Plant

Given the choice between Library and Academy, I'll go with Library. An Academy, though, might be a good replacement for Barracks in earlier ages.

[VaderTwo]

I would change the name of the Superhighways to either Shopping Mall or Mall or Downtown or Commercial Centre, etc. and use the highways an option in the roads/terraforming area instead.

[Ecce Homo]

MULTIPLE IMPROVEMENTS: In big cities, more than one improvement of one type should be needed. I don't think there was only one Granary in ancient Rome.

[Robert]

Mo, can you explain your idea some more ?
You said that it might be a good idea to research on 2 different fields at once, so you don't waste your improvements ? But how can you waste your improvements by researching another science-topic ?
I think I misunderstand you.

If any of you have a good idea for updating the 'master-posting' and order the right info in there, please tell me.

Tell me as well when you think I did something wrong in it.

CyberShy

[Trachmyr]

I posted this in OTHER, but it was not picked up, nor was there any real feedback. So I'll post it again.

Base Support Structures... a new city improvement

This Improvement includes ALL of the CRITICAL structures of PAST ages (Ancient, Bronze, Iron, ect.) under a single name and structure.

This would include stuff like: Granaries, Aqueducts, Markets, ect. But NOT barracks and other more specailized or optional structures.

This structure will give all the advantages of included buildings (and replaces those buildings), but at reduced upkeep cost

This structure will AUTO upgrade when you enter a new AGE if you have built all included structures of the previous age. Otherwise you may pay for the diffrence, or build the upgrade (labor required depends on how many structures have been completed).

This structure builds much faster than if building all of the componets. And you can RUSH BUY at no penalty.

The result is, that in the middle and especially the late game, you don't have to fumble about building arhaic structures. You will be able to found and develop a thriving city, without the need for that city to have been there from the beginning. Personally I hate building Granaries in the 1900's.

You MUST still build structures of your CURRENT AGE or you WILL fall behind. Waiting for the AGE to evolve would also be a poor tactic.

Tell me what you think...

[Sieve Too]

New improvement: Pastuerization Plant. What does it do? Adds 25% to total food due to the reduction in losses to spoilage.

Also, Pesticide Plant: Adds another 25% to total food but increases pollution.

[Transcend]

Lots of wonderful improvements. However, they can only be once per city. It is more realistic that you should be able to build the same improvements multiple times in the city. Everyone knows that city like Rome have dozens of temples, or that New York have hundreds of supermarkets(market places). In Civ3, each new building of the same type will have a reduced effect, let's say 25% less than the previous one. Suppose you built 3 stables, then the first one builds a cavalry regiment using 100 shields, the second using 125 shields, the third using 150 shields. Some improvements, such as aqueducts and sewer systems, should not be able to build multiple times. Someone introduced the idea of region already. I think multiple city improvements would that scheme perfectly.

[yin26]

CyberShy,

I just added you to the Thread Masters' List. Can you check to make sure it's right? Also, Welcome Aboard!

------------------
CIV3 DEVELOPMENT LIST COORDINATOR

**(un)Officially Making Lists for Firaxis Since SMAC Enhancement 3!**

[Shining1]

Some points:

There seems to be some general agreement with the suggestion that some unit chassis and weapons require improvements to be built before the unit itself can be done.

In this case, extra city improvements will be needed in order to produce units - about 15 - 20 new structures need to be designed (spanning the whole of history, though).

Aside from that, I'm in favour of retaining all CivII structures, though possibly in a somewhat modified state.