TERRAIN & TERRAIN IMPROVEMENTS (ver 1.1): Hosted by EnochF

[cloneodo]

I dont know if this has been suggested before or even if it goes in here, but here goes anyway.

Each engineer (terraforming unit, whatever) should have its own menu, in which you can choose which tiles are to be terraformed, with checkboxes for farms, roads, fotress etc.

All you would need to do is click on each tile, or multiple select with control, or drag a square over tiles to be terraformed.

These would then turn a different shade (only when the engineer menu is up). You would then check the relevant checkboxes. (The closest thing I can think of is sort of like SimCity Zoning Controls). Then just click on the GO button, and it would go and terraform, farm, irrigate, etc.

Perhaps also an option to copy one engineers map, to another engineers.

There could also be some stats in the menu saying how many turns total it will take to complete all terraforming.

Also, if you choose to automate the engineer, it will show you the same type of menu with shaded tiles. Maybe with a MAX TILE option.

If anyone doesnt understand, i'll try explain again.

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"I refuse to be smart!"

[loinburger]

Improving w Units:
I agree that there should continue to be settler/engineer units, particularly engineers. Modern armies use engineers all of the time in order to build bridges or blow them up. (I suggest that engineers, not settlers but engineers, be given a pillaging bonus--whereas a regular unit could only destroy one TI per turn, an engineer could destroy two). However, I loathe having to build an arsenal of engineers for peacetime building, particularly if I'm in a democracy and it makes my citizens unhappy (I think that engineers should only cause an unhappiness penalty if they leave my borders, not if they leave their home base). The answers proposed so far sound great--better autoimprovement AI and engineering build queues--but frankly I don't think that I could ever trust the computer's AI for autoimprovement and build queues still present the problem of the extensive support I would have to provide my engineers. So, I think there should be both Public Works and Engineers. PW should cost money, should probably require some tech advances to be made, should become better with newer tech advances/city improvements (Bureaucracy as a tech advance and Civil Engineering Academy as a city improvement). This way you won't be wasting food and population on settlers in the early game, nor time in the later game, on peacetime TI's when you should be worrying about other things.

Road Improvements:
-Path: 1/2 movement, can be built any place once "roads" tech is discovered, allows horse/chariot/tank/etc. to move in mtns., swamps, etc. Trade bonus if between two friendly cities.
-Road: 1/3 movement, can be built only on plains/mountain passes/hills/grassland/etc. until Explosives tech advance. Requires "roads" tech advance, of course. Trade bonus if between two friendly cities.
-Improved Road: 1/5 movement, replaces all Roads automatically, improved trade between interconnected cities, requires "highway" (or whatever) tech advance, more difficult to bombard to smithereens than a normal road.
-Railroad: 1/10 movement until "bessemer steel" (or whatever) tech advance, at which time it provides 1/15 or 1/20 movement. Improved trade between cities. CAN BE USED BY ANY CIVILIZATION, NO MATTER WHO BUILT IT!!! (has any of you ever seen "The General" with Buster Keaton? Two rival civilizations used the same rail lines in that movie quite effectively). Improved trade between interconnected cities.
-Maglev: Unlimited movement, requires advanced techs, CAN ONLY BE USED BY CONTROLLING CIVILIZATION, improved trade between interconnected cities.
-Tunnel: Built on shallow water, can only be one tile space in length total, allows Improved Road/Railroad/Maglev to be built on the sea space (acts as a Path).
-Vacuum Tunnel: Can be built anywhere (sea spaces, land spaces, don't matter). Acts as a maglev. (for transporting units across the ocean quickly--much more expensive than Maglev, so only a moron would build this on land instead of building a Maglev).

-Paths would never become obsolete, they'd be used at first for mountain and swamp roads but later they'd still serve as ways for tanks to get through swamps/mountains.
-Trade bonuses would only be granted for paths/roads/whatever that connect two or more cities together. The trade bonus would be computed automatically at the city and the square containing the movement TI would not necessarily have to have a citizen on it in order for the trade bonus to be given. This would help the game aesthetically as not every tile would have to have a road. I also think that with the Suburb (or whatever) tech the city's squares should be treated as if they have a railroad in them in regards to production (railroads give a production bonus, as they should, but the "urban sprawl" need not be shown to be present).
-Since enemy Civ's will be able to use your roads and railroads, this means that they can go marching into your territory with greater ease. You should be able to set up "road blocks" on your rail lines and road systems (no need to on the Maglevs and Vacuum Tunnels). These road blocks can be created by any unit-the take 2 turns to make (1 turn for engineers/settlers) and negate the map tile's TI bonuses. The TI still exists and can still be bombarded/pillaged-doing so removes the Road Block, as the TI it is blocking is also gone. A TI can be removed by any unit-doing so takes 2 turns (1 for an engineer) and returns the TI to full working order. This will slow down an enemy advance which is using your own rail system/road network against you, and would also keep a mountain village protected from horsemen in the early game.
-Later in the game, with the proper techs, movement TI's should be able to be built underground. Doing so would cause enemy Civ's to be unable to use your TI's until they have captured them (they probably don't even know they exist) and will also decrease the chances that bombardment/artillery will destroy your TI's.
-Destroying a movement TI by bombardment becomes steadily more difficult the more primitive the TI is--it's pretty difficult to destroy a Path, after all. Improved Road is the exception to this, as it is more difficult to destroy than Road (although if you've got an Improved Road, you don't have a Road, as the one replaces the other). Pillaging a Path will take 2 turns instead of the usual 1. Pillaging any movement TI (except a Path) will reduce that TI down to a Path. If the TI is built underground, however, it will always be reduced down to nothing (a Path underground will only take 1 turn to pillage).
-TI's can be built without their prerequisites, but having a prerequisite will reduce the build time of the new TI. However, having a Road (or Improved Road) will aid in the construction of a Maglev just as much as a Railroad will. Underground facilities are always built from scratch (with a whole lot of turns tacked on).

[Zakalwe]

Re: the Railroad Sleaze

To prevent the devastating of enemy civs in Civ2 by getting a few howitzers on their railway network, a simple solution would be (since Civ3 will in all likelihood include borders) to forbid rail movement by units outside their home territory. This is not strictly historical, but IMO it solves more problems than causes.

Another possibility is to rule that whenever a combat is fought in a tile, there's a chance of railroads being damaged/destroyed.

Finally, the (ab)use of other civs' railroads could be solved by adding a small feature: railway gauges. When your civ starts building its first railways, a pop-up window appears, asking if you want to build standard-gauge railways or have a unique gauge. Standard gauge would allow the use of other civs' railroads (perhaps with the above restrictions), while a unique gauge would force you to convert rails (half construction time) to your gauge. There should also be a slight penalty to trade with civilisations having different gauges.

Zakalwe

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"Ambitions that fall sort of their aim have all along helped produce excellent histories" - Ernst Breisach, Historiography

[NotLikeTea]

I want to see no "Terraforming" tech.

What is terraforming? Making something more like the Earth (terra). We can terraform Mars, we can terraform Planet, but we're already on earth, so we can't terraform our own planet.

Maybe "Geologic reconstruction"?

[Maniac]

I think Forests and Jungles should be terrain improvements, not terrain. This would allow Forest to grow on Grassland, as it did in Europe before it was harvested and burned for Farms.

[Maniac]

In the beginning Forests would produce 1 Food and 2 Minerals +1 Trade for a road, so 1f-2m-1t.
A certain improvement (Supermarket?) would increase Forest production to 2-2-2.

In the beginning Jungles would produce 1-1-0, with a road 1-1-1. Through discovery of certain technologies ( a bit like Fungus in SMAC ), it would increase to 1-3-3 to reflect the increasing value of exotic wood.

If you wunder why I post such small messages; it's because I don't want to type 10 minutes and then get a message you didn't type the right message.

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M@ni@c-SMAniaC
depends on what site I am.

[loinburger]

I've said it once, I'll say it again, I loathe the idea of having to control a rail system in order to be able to use it. Historical accuracy? Nope, rival civs would use each other's rail sytems all of the time. That's why I've suggested by roadblock idea.

A better way to prevent "rail rushing" would be to have rails be limited in their movement bonus (1/10 to 1/20 is what I have suggested previously) and have Maglevs provide the unlimited transport. A Maglev could not be used by a rival civ as it would have nothing to power it with. Problem solved.

[Maniac]

I meant : a message you didn't enter the right password.

[Maniac]

Forest should only be able to grow in Grasslands, Plains and Hills. Jungles should only be able to grow on Grasslands, Plains and Swamps near the equator. This is to avoid planting forests in the Sahara and Jungles on the polar cap.

In the beginning Oceans should produce 1-0-2.
There should be 2 city improvements( Harbor and Fishery) that each allow oceans to produce 1 more Food. Offshore Platforms should be a terrain improvement, adding 1 Mineral( and one trade?), resulting in 3-1-2/3.

[Maniac]

What TI's should there be?

Forest/Jungle/Offshore Platform( see my previous posts)
Irrigation /Mine/Farm/Fortress/Airbase/Road/Railroad(same as in Civ2, sorry if I forgot one)
Radar(= SMAC sensor)
Canal(can only be 1 square long, can be used to combine two seas and to connect a city, that is 1 square off the sea, to the sea)
Condenser(transforms the square to something more fertile)
Solar Collector/Wind Mill(instead of Superhighways I would use this)
0-2000m = +1 trade
2-4000m = +2 trade
4-6000m = +3 trade
6-8000m = +4 trade

Want to help me complete the list?

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M@ni@c-SMAniaC
depends on what site I am.

[Maniac]

Road Movement Bonus = terrain/3
Railroad MB = 1/5
Highway MB = 1/10
Maglev MB = unlimited movement

Railroads should increase Minerals with 50%
Perhaps Maglevs with another 50%
Together increasing Minerals in a square with 100%

New TI = Genetic Farm(with genetically engineered food). Together with Farm, it increases Food production 100%

Rivers should have a 1-0-1 bonus. That extra food reflects the fertile ground braught on by the current.
It also makes the Egyptian and Babylonian civs more realistic.

A volcano gives a 1-1-1 bonus. It can appear on any terrain, so also in the Ocean.

Grassland should also have special resources.

Now I really hope I entered the right password.

[EnochF]

Glad to see people getting excited about the list again. Over the last couple weeks, things have been kind of slow around here, but ever since we got some feedback from Mr. Reynolds, we're up and running full speed. Keep it up!

Harel: naw, I just agree with you.

[ember]

Historically high altitude discourages trade. In a civ game the unit of commerec will be trade not energy. One thing I do not like about SMAC is that the terrain is to changeable. I do not bother buiding sea formers/sea bases becasue I can alywas jsut raise some more terrain out of the ocean. The best I could sea happening on that idea is for a square of shallow ocean being converted to grassland by a 'dike' TI. This would not affect any other square and would not move the continental shelf.

I do not feel that having rockyness\moistness variables can sufficiently model earths various terrains.

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"Any technology, sufficiently advanced,
is indistinguishable from magic"
-Arthur C. Clark

[Theben]

As SMAC is concerned I'd rather not have various lvls of terrain; just keep the "flat" tiles like in civ2.

Technophile,

A while back myself & others posted ideas on how to deal with enemy railroads/maglevs. I like your other ideas but I disagree with you here. I haven't seen your movie (a movie? yeah, that's accurate) but I'm fairly certain that moving a armored division on enemy rails is unrealistic. See under "roads" in the summary.

[Harel]

Double post... sorry
<font size=1 face=Arial color=444444>[This message has been edited by Harel (edited July 18, 1999).]</font>