REGIONAL MENU & CITY MENU IDEAS - hosted by Shining1

[Theben]

Doh! I forgot to include space for the specialist bars. I guess they should take up a space above the construction section. This should still leave enough room for many items. Also the construction section needs stuff:

1) When opening the small window into the larger one, there should be a box to indicate how much prodution you wish to allocate there.
2) It should also allow you to scroll up/down to other choices, like civ2, or double-click on the pictured item to get an even larger window showing all items, like SMAC.

A disease indicator is necessary. This should be in the growth rate box.

<font size=1 face=Arial color=444444>[This message has been edited by Theben (edited August 11, 1999).]</font>

[ember]

My take on the city window. This assumes (Regions / Deployment / Villages / split resources and labour) are implimented.

LEFT SIDE OF SCREEN: City stats

Very top
City Name, pop x.xxx (yyyyyy), Rate of growth zz.z%, q turns to next full pop point.

x is pop points, y is the number of induviduals calculated from x. y = 5000 x^2 - 1250.
z is the growth rate in hundredths of a pop point per turn.

upper area
Specialists box. has a spot to set the ratio that new pop is sent to the field for every pop kept in the city if you don't keep track yourself. Also the Happyness indicator.
[i]Has icons for all the workers (peasents/workers/middle class) and various scientist / merchant / happy guy / soldier support guys(who count as workers for all other purposes)[/b]

middle
lists: stores
FOOD: 124 (+25) Grannary: 243 (-17)
food recieved / surplus then stored / decay
RESOURCES: 89 (-6) GOLD: 156 (+14)
resources stored / net loss or gain after decay, gold in city / net loss or gain per tuen. These numbers only matter in a siege, when a city is forced to be it's own region, or when captured.

then raw production
LABOUR: 160, 70 * 2.00 + 20
GOLD: 42
SCIENCE: 55
SUPPORT: 24
list the total output of it's citizens followed by the raw output and multipliers and bonuses colour coded by source.

lower area
left side, lists city improvments, and HP left/HP max.
right side, a list of all improvments that are currently in the regional queue and targeted for this city, and how many turn they are expected in.

bottom
List all units on left, and all units that are in the process of deploying to/from thsi city.


RIGHT SIDE OF SCREEN: Regional stats

very top
Capital name, pop x.xxx (yyyyyy), Rate of growth zz.z%

x is pop points in the region, including villages, y is the sum of the coalculated induviduals, and z is the total growth per turn.

upper area
idicator for overall happyness and village/city ratios and slider for dividing prodcution between units/improvments/woders/capitalization. As well as a spot to buy additional production for one area.
Lists totals of all cites various production counts.

center
Small map of the region, with the city currently viewd highlighted, on left, on right a list of all cities in the region.

lower area
Toggle area includes wonder in production
only one at a time per region
unit queue, improvment queue, place to set unit and improvment priorities.
for units and improvments, the player sets the build priorites for various unit types and structures, given in a ratio of number built to number built of all others. The computer then sets up a 8-16 spot build queue (with turn of completion and destination of each item listed). The player can modify this queue as they wish, incuding the destination. Whenever the priorities are modified, so is the queue. Items in each list are built sequentially, with multiple completions per turn allowed. When a region has no place to put improvments, the priority is temporarily set to 0.
terrifoming settings.
set the priority on building farms, roads, RR, highways, mines, terraform by enginners stationed in the reserves in the region.

Botom area
Lists all units in the reserves in the region (not placed at a specific location.) as well as destination for each unit (none means it isn't going to get deployed)
Deployment occurs from this screen. All new built units are placed in the reserves unitl they can be deployed. Enginnering type units in the reserves cost full maint, but they can build farms/mines/improve paths/terriform while there, in fact this is the only place to do so. Millitary units stationed in the reserves have reduced maint. costs, but take a full turn to deploy, ehre they are velnerable. Units can be sent to the reserves of neighboring regions as well, or deployed to any city or bse in the region and any appropriate ships stationed within a certain range (like carriers)

More thougts
Some of these panes may have to be made into toggles, depending on screen size.
I agree with alot of Theben's suggestions, this assumes different consepts incopirated. Villages locations and future terraform loccations are set by 'flagging' on terrain view toggles in the main map.
One idea that would be good to incprirate to any Automation suggestion is the idea of priorities. These allow you to not just say, to the auto build - build tanks and infantry as well as buildings, but say, build 1 tank for every two infantry and 2 econ structures for every science one.


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

"to / or \ slash, that is the question"
-me
<font size=1 face=Arial color=444444>[This message has been edited by ember (edited August 11, 1999).]</font>

[Theben]

2 more buttons, a martial law button & a CE (civilization effects) button.

The martial law button basically changes the city (only) from a more free political SE (republic, democracy) to a more totalitarian one (police state, etc.). If a totalitarian govt. declares martial law then it gets a large bonus to it's POLICE rating.

A button that shows how the various civilization effects (social effects in SMAC) +technology+ the building's effects add together to effect the city.

Not sure where they should go; just stick 'em in there somewhere.

[Shining1]

Excellent work.

[Maniac]

Theben, I suggest that the martial law makes all citizens content for ten turns, similar to what nerve stapling does in SMAC.
You could only declare martial law if you have a positive or a 0 police rate.
<font size=1 face=Arial color=444444>[This message has been edited by M@ni@c (edited August 19, 1999).]</font>

[Theben]

Maniac, I never really liked the nerve stapling. It was just too easy to do with too few side effects; also it had a very standard effect no matter what city it was used in. Thats' why I proposed this alternative. I have no objections to your idea if "nerve stapling" is kept; I'd just rather see it not kept.

[ember]

I'll give a summary of my region/city/production/growth/terrain ideas as an integrated system.

This system encompasses villages, regions, split labour and resources, fractional pop growth, and is intended to be used with CLAS-D combat.

CITIES

Cities represent the industrial, economic, population and military centres in a nation.

All citizens in cities are some form of specialist, even if it is "serf."
All economy and labour are produced in cities. All population growth occurs in cities.

All food and resources are produced in villages. Villages are population points that have been moved from the cites to surrounding tiles. Villages use some food to support themselves, and send the rest of the food and all resources to the region, to be distributed among the cities.

Labour is the work needed to build things. It must be used immediately.
Resources are what things are built out of. They can be stored. Stores of resources and surluss food "decay" at a rate governed by SE and structures and tech. 5 to 20 % a turn, to prevent loopholes that would alow people to stave off sieges indefinatly. You can only stave off a siege as long as your food and resources hold out.

Cities would get a happyness bonus depending on how many turns worth of food are stored. If there is a shortfall happiness takes a big penalty. In a siege a city surrenders when it would have food riots. Cities under siege are considered a region of one city and no villages.

This is the "village system model." It requires approximately 2 times as many population points as normal. You set a ratio of village to city for each region, and the new population is divided between the two areas. You can set "flags" to tell where you want new villages to form, or let the AI do it.

REGIONS

A region is a area that can easily share resources...

In ancient times a region would be approximately the size of a current city.
As time progresses the size increases in both number of cities and land area allowed.
A city sized region using these rules will be very similiar to a current city.

In a region is based on with cities it includes. Borders are drawn between regions. All villages in the region pool their resources and excess food. Efficiency depends on tranportation infrastructure. The food is distributed to all cities on a need basis, extra is used to increase happiness, (and thereby population growth). Resources are stored in cities, but the actual location only matters when regions are redrawn or cities captured.

Each city has to have its own structures, with a few exceptions (stock exchanges).
In the regional menu there are four catergories where all labour from the region can be divided. All building is done by the regional menu. Details can be found on the layout can be found earlier in this thread. There are some limits based on SE choices. Resources are used for building as needed and available.

Resource uses are:

WONDERS: Only one wonder can be produced at a time. The location is set when building is started.

CAPITALIZATION: The Labour --> Money rate depends on SE and economic structures in the region. Resources can be sold independently of cities, or traded.

UNITS: Labour is used to build units. All new units are placed in reserve, and can be "deployed" the same turn. Explained later.

The units list is a build queue. Items can be directly added or the AI can build a list based on priorities you assign each unit type. The priority of a unit is a ratio of how many of that type to build to how many of each other type. If armour has priority 3 and mech inf 2, then 3 armour will be built for every 2 mech inf, over the long term.

IMROVEMENTS: Similiar to units. When all cities in a region have a structure the priority is counted as 0, so no more are built. The destination city is chosen by the AI, and can be changed by the player.


VILLAGE PLACEMENT

Villages can only be established adjacent to existing ones and within your borders.
Borders only extend into shallow water, usually 1 square, or 2 max.
Coastal villages, while really on land are represented at sea in a coastal square. Ships can only attack coastal villages, only the one that is represented by the square they are on.

MOVING VILLAGES

moving a village takes as long as it does to 'deploy' a unit. In this time no resources are produced, but it feeds itself.

DEPLOYMENT

All new units are placed in the reserves. Other units can be sent there also. Each turn you can deploy units to cities/bases/certain ships in the region. You can also send units to other region's deploy lists. The units cannot defend or be used until the next turn, but can be destroyed. Units in the reserve list cost less to maintain than deployed troops. This is the only way to move air and missile units.

Terraform units can normally only build forts, bases, and other transport and military TI's. When they are placed in the reserves they can build farms, irrigation, mines and other economic, terraforming and transport TI's, anywhere within the region. This prevents players from using their former types anywhere not near their population, except as combat engineers. It also makes them less vulnerable to airstikes. They still can take damage when cities are hit.

POPULATION

The population of cities are recorded as x.xxx. This allows fractional population points. The fraction has no gameplay effect until it reaches the next number. It allows growth rates to be expressed as an increase per turn. Attacks that hit population centers can now do fractional pop. points of damage. maybe 0.1 or 0.05 per hit. To simulate casualties of war, lose 0.001 pop per HP lost by units supported by the region.

The purpose of this proposal is to seperate growth from straight food production.
Growth rates can be expressed as a percentage per turn, (eg 2.5%) to give a familiar sort of look. What this means for gameplay terms is that 0.025 pop points are added every year. This gives a growth of 40 turns.

Population is recorded as fractional points, but it is easy to convert that to a real pop number.
The formula:
Actual population = 5000 x (population points + 0.5)^2 - 1250
This formula follows the civx model exactly for whole numbers, and can give good values for fractional numbers.

Effects on population growth. All numbers are arbitrary and should vary depending on SE choices and tech. This system is desigened to be compatible with the idea of villages.

I have made use of a "happiness rating," which is (#happy - #unhappy) / #total. This gives 0 for all content, 100 for all happy, and -100 for all unhappy. This can be applied to a city, a region, a civ or the entire world.

Base growth: 10%
Happiness : + city happyness / N. N depends on SE.
Villages : + 0.2% per village
Medicine : + 2%
etc.

Immigration: To take into account people moving around in your civ and between civs.
The advantages of including this is that large unhappy cites will tend to slow down growth or shrink, while your smaller cities will pick up the extra people.

In civ immigration = (city happiness - civ happiness) / Y. Y depends on SE and the overall level of transportation available. In cty immigation tends to have larger volume than between civs.

between civs migration = (city happiness - world happiness) / Z. Z depends on SE and transport of all players. For this calculation government types can influence the happiness used. democracy might add 10 points, while communism subtarcts 10 points, to reflect that democracies never have had problems with too many people trying to flee from them.

Wonder: Iron curtain. Prevents all between civ emmigration. (for gameplay all cities count as average happyness level)

TERRAIN

First step is determine the form of the terrain. Form never changes during the course of the game.
These are:
Deep ocean
Ocean shelf
Glacier
Mountain.

Flat
Hills
Major Rivers

Navigable rivers cannot be in hills, so to keep things simple they will be their own landform. Otherwise it is basically the same as flat.
Flat terrain gives a food bonus, hills have a defensive bonus and allow mines.

Vegetation:
Vegetation can only be applied to the last 3 landforms. The first 4 do not support vegetation types.


Plains
Grassland
Taiga (Evergreen Forest)
Boreal Forest
Rain Forest
Tundra
Desert
Swamp

Combinations to note:
hill + grasland = plateau
river + grassland = flood plains, the most fertile standard terrain type.
flat + grassland = no irrigation reguired.
taiga + hills = shield, like the canadian shield or siberia. This is the best resource producing terrain.
swamp + hills, acts as fresh water lakes, these cannot be changed to anything else. (just as a place keeping way of programming it)

Landform cannot be changed by your engineers.
Vegetation can.

Allowable changes:
Grassland <--> Boreal Forest
Taiga <--> plains
Swamp --> Grassland
Jungle --> Plains
Irrigated desert acts like Plains.
Irrigated plains acts like Grassland.
Tundra can't be changed to anything else.

Terraforming model.
Economic TI's are auto built by enginners in cities. A former type unit is fortified in a city. While it is there, it can automatically build farms and mines as well as changes the vegetation in friendly squares. You can change the terrain view mode "T" and click on squares to set their priority and change preffered. If villages are used, can only do squares surrounding friendly villages and cities. Squares do not have to be near the city the engineer is in, just connected by roads, or in the same region.

Engineers outside of cities act like normal civX, but they cannot build farms/mines. (to prevent building away from your pop centres). When acting this way they can build paths (along with most millitary units) as well as Roads, highways and RR, and military TI's

Nothing can be built on deep ocean/glaciers.

military TI's:

Bases act as both fortress and airbase, coastal bases can have ships enter as well. Units can be 'deployed' to bases.
Forts act as a scout unit and stop the first enemy unit to step on it. also offer some defense bonus.
Sonar acts as a fort in the water.

economic TI's:
Farms / modern farms, built on any plains, grassland or desert.
irrigation, built on desert or plains, makes it act as the next stage better, without changing it.
mines / modern mines, built on any hills or mountains. Farms can also be built if it is a grassland/plains square.
fisheries can only be built in continental shelf, which usually only extends one square from land, but sometimes more.

transport TI's:
Paths, built by and most military units as well, MP/2 move
Roads, MP/4 move, and give a trade bonus (and allow resource sharing) when connecting cities.
Highways, modern roads, MP/8 move, more resource sharing.
Rail-roads, MP/8, take 50% longer than highways to build, but enemy units act as if on path (or road?) when using.
Tunnels, connect two squares of land under a shallow ocean square. Allows land units to cross water.
Canal, connect two ocean squares over flat land. Can connect a city on a river to the sea if 1 square away.
When a unit enters a tunnel/canal it uses 1 full MP and goes directly to the other side, units cannot rest in a tunnel/canal. Both can only be used by the owner. Neither can be pillaged by sea units.
A tunnel is built by having an engineer on each end of the desired location. Both then build the tunnel. To use you press a key.

COMMENTS
The idea behind this is to make the economic model have a more accurate and flexible representation, but mostly invisibly. Regions attampt to reduce micromanagement.
CLAS-D, which this is intended to be used with, attempts to to the same for combat.

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

[jer64]

I think it would be cool to add some features like:

Civilization techs. can be destroy in a global nuclear war, its realistic. Since, if you hit each of the enemy cities with a nuke, it should kill all of their citizens immediatly. And INCLUDING THEIR CITIZENS + DATABANKS, ETC...

Yours: Jari T.T. aka Jer

[Theben]

Okay, folks. This got cut down quite a bit &/or edited, so don't be shocked if you don't recognize your post. Many said the same as other posts, and were combined, some were repeating what the author said earlier, some were difficult to follow, and 1 or 2 made no sense. However, comments and critcisms are still welcome.

***REGIONAL/CITY MENUS AND IDEAS version 2.0(?)***

1. Cities

1.1) A city has many different areas in which to improve... Housing, Industry, Economy, Recreation, etc. Allow levels in each area, similar to Birth of Federation in that there are multiple granaries, etc.

1.2) Have slider bars to control what % of resources goes to mines, farms and others. The player simply chooses what % of PW to enhance the city, and the computer does the rest based upon population and workforce. PW could be sent to other territories or traded (like “resource routes). Have a % chance that a square in use is improved automatically for free (farmers build farms with or without government help).

1.2.1) Agreement: There should be some chance that settlements auto-upgrade the land. Irrigation, Farms, and Paths (early roads) only.

1.3) Settlements may also automatically use pre-allocated PW to improve a level if that area is becoming inefficient due to # of people using it. As inefficiency rises, a larger % of available PW will be used to enhance that area.

1.4) Auto-improvement of a square could be affected by SE/GOVT choices, or at least the cost of such improvements affected.

1.5) When new tech that can benefit a settlement is discovered, that tech must first be implemented. This costs money and is based upon the size of a city (it is harder to incorporate new tech into larger, more stable cities). Once the tech is implemented, it provides its benefits to the settlement. Tech may be implemented on a city, regional or national level.

1.6) The workforce is handled on a city or regional basis, depending on SE choices. The workforce determines not only what one produces but also how cities develop (A city with Level 8 Industry due to a lot of factory workers as opposed to a city with Level 8 Religion due to lots of clergy). Tiles need to be reduced in size to allow this to be effective.

1.7) Population

1.7.1) The population of cities are recorded as x.xxx. This allows fractional population points. The fraction has no gameplay effect until it reaches the next number. It allows growth rates to be expressed as an increase per turn. Attacks that hit population centers can now do fractional pop. points of damage. To simulate casualties of war, cities loses a % of pop per HP a unit suffers, if it is supported by this city.

1.7.2) Population is recorded as fractional points, but it is easy to convert that to a real number.

1.7.3) The formula:

Actual population = 5000 x (population points + 0.5)^2 - 1250
This formula follows the civII model exactly for whole numbers, and can give good values for fractional numbers.

1.7.4) Effects on population growth:
All numbers are arbitrary and should vary depending on SE choices and tech.

1.7.5) Happiness rating:
# happy - # unhappy/ # total
This gives 0 for all content, 100 for all happy, and –100 for all unhappy. This can be applied to a city, a region, a civ or the entire world. (Theben- Formula is hard to follow to conclusion)

Base growth: 10%
Happiness : + city happiness / N * N depends on SE.
Villages (see below): + 0.2% per village
Medicine : + 2%, etc.

1.7.6) Immigration: Large unhappy cities will tend to slow down growth or shrink, while your smaller cities will pick up the extra people.

1.7.7) In civ immigration = (city happiness - civ happiness) / Y * Y depends on SE and the overall level of transportation available. Same-civ immigration tends to have larger volume than between civs.

1.7.8) Between civs migration = (city happiness - world happiness) / Z * Z depends on SE and transport of all players. For this calculation, government types can influence the happiness used. Democracy might add 10 points, while Communism subtracts 10 points.

1.7.9) Option for happiness control: Send gold to the city and it is converted to happiness, depending on SE/govt. This could be set in the city menu or from the F1city listing, for the turn or on an ongoing basis.

1.8) Terrain:

1.8.1) Forts, bases, and other transport and military TI's can be built on the regular map. Other TI’s require the engineer to be in the regional reserve or fortified in a city. One can change the terrain view ("T") and click on squares to set their priority and to make changes if desired. If villages are used, engineers can only alter squares surrounding friendly villages and cities. Squares do not have to be near the city the engineer is in, just connected by roads, or in the same region (See TERRAIN & TERRAIN IMPROVEMENTS for further information).

1.8.2) The outlying terrain of cities should be developed so one can create suburbs and industrial areas, but don’t go too far, like another Sim City.

2. City Menus:

2.1) Option 1:

2.1.1) There is a standard window for the Menu. Like any normal MS window it can be moved aside to view the map beneath. These had an order from left to right, top to bottom, but really they can be put in anywhere.

2.1.2) Toggle with 3 choices: food, production, and trade. Tells the AI where to put people in the event of sudden growth or decline in pop. Each has it’s own priority level: 0 (no priority), 1, 2, and 3 (highest). In the event of a tie the AI will choose the tile that grants the greatest production of all 3 categories; if there’s a tie it's the one closest to the city. The AI will also switch if settlers/PW alter a tile to change output.

2.1.3) Citizen icons. The player can tell their culture by their race & dress; the icon should include a face and upper torso. Over their heads there will be a symbol denoting each citizen's religion.

2.1.4) The city's HAPPINESS indicator, which was described by Theben in the SE/GOVT thread.

2.1.5) The big 3: Growth (food is now a factor of growth), production, and trade. Above these there will be the % modifiers currently affecting each category.

2.1.6) The city’s radius, showing squares that are worked. Use SMAC-style method of counting tile production. These numbers should be x10 of the numbers used in civ2/SMAC; this allows fine-tuning modifiers to these resources. Costs should also be x10.

2.1.7) City stores: Saved food, money, the city's total unused research points, and production. If the city is captured, the food, money and production are also captured; some research would be “captured” (points add to enemy total) and the rest lost. A little of each may escape to a nearby city of the same civ, or to an allied city if no cities of that civ are nearby. Next turn the allied civ will return the supplies, with deterioration & distance reductions, subject to piracy, etc. Research may be both “kept” by ally (add to total) and returned. If a city is under siege, it may only use what are in its stores if it needs extras. Cities cut off from the capital do not add research points until the siege ends, but in the meantime the research points are “stored”.
An empire split in two or more may combine the resources of the connected cities only. The SUPPLY grid will determine if cities are connected. In case of a successful rebellion, part of the research is lost but most of it goes to the new civilization.

2.1.8) Support: Units have varying food, production, and money costs. Any modifiers to support will be shown here.

2.1.9) The Growth Rate: The total food allocated to growth and everything else that affects growth will be displayed here (including the Disease indicator, in MISCELLANEOUS), as well as the # of turns until the city grows another point.

2.1.10) Specialist bars, described above.

2.1.11) Items under construction: These will be shown as small buttons with only the unit/building name in it, turns until completion, a button in it to “increase production rate” (below), and a 2nd small button that will allow one to set the production to auto. This will set it to produce what is in the player’s queue for that button only. If no queue has been built then it will default to auto-preferences that would be selected in the PREFERENCES screen or in a .txt file. There should be several auto-queues- offense, defense, explore, research, etc. Clicking on the name of the item enlarges the button to a window to show the picture of that item, the # of “shields” already allocated to production and the amount needed to complete it, as well as a unit workshop button and another "increase production rate" button. A box to indicate how much production you wish to allocate is necessary. It will also show if this item is under player control or being built by the people (under strong FREE MARKET SE's). There will be an option to "purchase" the construction points back from the people. Allow players to scroll up/down to other items, or double-click on the pictured item to get an even larger window showing all items available. This allows for several items to be under construction at the same time.

2.1.12) Increasing the production rate is done by buying "extra" shields. The max one can buy is based on the amount of production per turn. FE, an item has 7 shields added/turn. At a cost of x # of coins it can be increased 14/turn. The max multiple is x3/turn. Increasing production from x2 to x3 costs more than from x1 to x2. If enough money is allocated then the additional purchasing power will carry over until next turn. The player decides if they want to have a x2 or x3 multiple when cost carries over from one turn to the next. SE choices will affect this; i.e. a totalitarian civ would have lower costs. This eliminates unrealistic instant purchases & benefits large cities over smaller ones.

2.1.13) City Structures: As before, with “damage indicators” for each set of buildings. Above the DIs is the city's “free repair rate” (both explained in CITY IMPROVEMENTS & MISCELLANEOUS). A system similar to Birth of the Federation, where planets(cities) had multiple buildings each, with additive effects, should be used.

2.1.14) In the box with change city name, maps, etc., their should be a happiness button that breaks down how your city is affected by the various modifiers.

2.1.15) The martial law button: Changes that city (only) from a freer political SE (republic, democracy) to a more totalitarian one (police state). If a totalitarian govt. declares martial law it gets a bonus to its POLICE rating. Disliked “nerve stapling” from SMAC as it is too simplistic.

2.1.15a) Disagreement: Use the “Nerve Stapler” function anyway.

2.1.16) A box that shows how the various civilization effects (social effects in SMAC) + technology + the building's effects add together to effect the city.

2.2) Option 2:

This list was put together assuming top to bottom, left to right, but, as above, can be placed wherever. It also agrees with most of the above- in fact they are compatible in many areas- but this version assumes different concepts incorporated, including Regions, Deployment, Villages, and more detailed split resources and labor.

2.2.1) When the player clicks on a city, one side of the screen shows the normal citizen allocation, happiness, resource collection, and structure list, trade (except on regional level), and unit status. The other side would be the same for all cities in a region (if you want national regions it would be optional) and would have the resource allocations listed: one button for food, one for structures, one for wonders, one for units. It would also have sliders for the different production areas. If one clicks on the name of another city, the left side would shift to that city’s info.

2.2.2) City Name, pop x.xxx (yyyyyy), Rate of growth zz.z%, q turns to next full pop point. x= pop points, y= # of individuals calculated from x. y = 5000 x^2 - 1250. z= growth rate in hundredths of a pop point per turn.

2.2.3) The Specialist box: A spot to set the ratio that new pop is sent to the field vs. pop kept in the city. Included here is the Happiness indicator. Has icons for all the “workers” and various “specialists”.

2.2.4) Stores. These numbers only matter in a siege, when a city is forced to be it's own region, or if captured.

FOOD: (Food received + surplus then stored) – decay;
RESOURCES: Resources stored +/- net loss or gain after decay;
GOLD: Net loss or gain per turn.

Raw production:
LABOUR, GOLD, SCIENCE, SUPPORT
List the total output of its citizens followed by the raw output and multipliers and bonuses, color-coded by source.

2.2.5) City improvements, with HP left/HP max (see CITY IMPROVEMENTS & MISCELLANEOUS).

2.2.6) A list of all improvements that are currently in the regional queue and targeted for this city, and # of turns until they are expected to arrive.

2.2.7) List of all units, and units in the process of deploying to/from this city.

2.2.8) Capital name, pop x.xxx (yyyyyy), Rate of growth zz.z%, where x= pop pts. in the region, including villages, y= sum of the calculated individuals, and z= total growth per turn.

2.2.9) Indicator for overall happiness, village/city ratios, and a slider dividing production between units/improvements/wonders/capitalization. Also a spot to buy additional production for one area.

2.2.10) List totaling all cities various production counts.

2.2.11) A small map of the region with the city currently under view highlighted, and a list of all cities in the region.

2.2.12) Unit queue, improvement queue, and place to set unit and improvement priorities.

2.2.12a) For units and improvements, the player sets the build priorities for various units and structures, given in a ratio of # built to # of all others built. The computer then sets up a 8-16 spot build queue (with turn of completion and destination of each item listed). The player can modify this queue as they wish. Whenever the priorities are modified, so is the queue. Items in each list are built sequentially, with multiple completions per turn allowed. When a region has no place to put improvements, the priority is temporarily set to 0.

2.2.13) Terraform settings set the priority to build farms, roads, RR, highways, mines.

2.2.14) List of all units in the reserves of the region, as well as the destination for each. Deployment occurs from this screen. All newly built units are placed in the reserves until they can be deployed. Units can be sent to the reserves of neighboring regions or deployed to any city or base in the region; ships stationed within a certain range may as well.

3. Regions

3.1) Regions would have a maximum size. Regions would form the primary borders of a society, contested regions would have interior borders similar to SMAC.

3.2) The maximum size of a region is directly related to your current tech level. Early game: 10 or 20 tiles max; late game: up to 50-100 tiles, with 5-10 cities each.

3.3) Reasons for regions:

• Links cities together.
• Exchange resources easily (so you still can do fast building).
• Move units to another nearby city quickly.

3.4) Regions should grow over time.
As technology improves, certain advancements would increasingly define regions and allow increased resource sharing. Various improvements could also help define & unify them.

3.4.1) Agreement: Wants city/region radius to grow as city/region grows. It would also be nice to have a more flexible city radius.

3.5) Divide the map into NxN regions. Each of the civilization can choose their starting regions, or it can be random. This will allow for quick contact of civilization or ample room for expansion, whichever the player desires.

3.6) Regions should be pre-defined at game start, usually bordered by mountains, rivers, or some other rough terrain. The program would have to make sure that there is enough food producing and resource producing terrain in each region.

3.7) Have region size based on the map size, in order to avoid too many regions on large maps.

3.8) Doesn’t like the idea of regions, but if there needs to be regions, the player should decide what set of cities and/or tiles constitutes a region, not the AI.

3.8.1)Agreement: Player should select Regional areas.

3.9)Regions by Era:

3.9.1) ANCIENT:
All cities build their own units and structures. Allow cities to use "resource routes"- like trade routes, but are used to send production &/or food to other nearby cities, linked by roads, rivers, or the ocean. FE, Rome sends some “shields” (has coal & forests) to Naples (agricultural) which sends some food back. Limit of ~4 units of production? Long distances can be spanned by sending something to city A and having that city send it to city B. Routes do not cost resources to make, but increase corruption/inefficiency in the receiving city.

3.9.2) RENAISSANCE:
Regions are formed. Production/agriculture is pooled within the region. Units/structures/wonders are built from a central menu (accessed by clicking on ANY city in the region, or main menus) and can only be placed within the region. "Resource routes" can be created between regions, limit per route of ~20. Regions would contain a maximum of 6-8 cities.

3.9.3) MODERN:
Full deployment and resource sharing. Highly centralized civs can be treated as one region. "Resource routes" can only be created with allies.

3.9.4) Reasoning: Players will need to only deal with individual cities in the early game. Late game regionalization will greatly reduce micromanagement.

3.9.5) Early game- 2-3 cities could be a region, mid-game 5-10 cities, and in the late game whole continents.

3.10) Regions vs. Cities:

3.10.1) Regions handle production, food distribution, and tile improvement. Cities handle worker placement, happiness, economics, local defense, and city improvements after they're built. Trade depends on the system implemented. Regions could trade with other regions.

3.10.2) Only the gathering of resources, city growth, and unit movement are done at a local level. All the regional level does is allow you to set production for all cities, or pool some resources.

3.10.3) Focus all production on the region, but the various structures would still have a physical location. FE, when finishing a temple, a deployment list pops up and the player chooses which city they want their temple to go to.

3.10.4) Use workers in the regional screen to expand the city radius. Once the pre-requisite tech is discovered, one can move citizens to any square within the region. Thus, most of the endgame will be managed through the regional menu screen.

3.10.5) A production center might not even farm a single square, like NYC or Tokyo. Some improvements, like a stock exchange would only be needed in one city per region.

3.10.6) In the early game, use individual city works. Later on switch to regional development.

3.11) "Command and control" tech that allow a civ to develop from city-state to the satrapies to feudal states to the early then modern nation states. The development from city and region is linked to government and the development of communication from runners, horsemen, pigeons, and torches to printing, telephones, satellites, etc. The expanse of the region and the power a civ controls depend on:
1) Type of government;
2) The building of Comm stations (from towers to satellites);
3) The use of leader units (training at the capital tends to lead to more obedience);
4) The economy.
Random bonuses could be AI mayors that are exceptional leaders.

3.11.1) Agreement: Infrastructure needed for determining regions; efficiency, tech allows for better resource sharing. Combat could split regions.

3.12) “City improvements” now affect all tiles of the region that they are in. If a region happens to contain two or more city tiles, both sets of city improvements continue to affect the region, but the region has to support both city tiles and all their improvements.

3.12.1) Disagreement: Dislikes having city improvements on each tile.

3.13) Regions perhaps should be limited to government issues only - providing political infrastructure (Governor, regional capital, etc) and the potential for public works within that region.

3.14) Regions should be limited to resource sharing, regional developments (stock exchanges, etc.) and production of units. City improvements should be handled at the city level. Terrain improvements should be handled through PW. Roads and defenses could be build by any military unit or by Public Works.

4. Regional Menus

4.1) Option 1:

4.1.1) Regions can be any shape and include ocean no more than 2 tiles from shore. Every tile in a region can be worked by a member of its population. Improvements are built in a "region screen" which resembles the current city screen. Each region must contain at least 3 cities and no more than 10, the largest becoming the "capital" of the region. This city becomes marked by a star with a circle around it, and clicking on the capital gives one access to the Region Screen. Terrain improvements are built via PW, and can be built on any tile in the region.

4.1.2) Any member of a city’s population can be transferred to work tiles outside the city radius but inside the region (a minimum # of citizens must stay in the city). Eventually every tile in the region may be worked and there will still be excess population for specialists.

4.1.3) A civ’s government/SE choices determine the geographical mode of management.

4.1.4) To manage the transition from city management to regional management, have the AI simply pool all the resources of each individual city, then add in the extra resources of regional tiles and government bonuses (FE, 3 temples make 6 content in the entire region).

4.1.5) A civilization would encompass every tile within its borders. If another nation claims a tile currently being worked by a citizen outside of a city radius but within its borders, the borders of the region will become disputed. This would be an act of war. In order to claim a tile, the player/AI would have to position a military unit there and then make a claim.

4.1.6) As long as part of the region currently contains enough tiles not part of any other city’s radius, then a new city can be settled there. It will be part of the region and can be managed as such. As soon as this new city is built, region-wide improvements will need to be restructured (a % cost of the original improvement?-Theben). The player would be able to build improvements in the new city with the collective building power of the entire region.

4.1.7) Allow for uncentralized civs to have regions that are not considered same nation; they are 2+ nations working together.

4.2) Option2:

4.2.1) In ancient times a region would be approximately the size of cities in current civ games. As time progresses the size increases in both number of cities and land area allowed.

4.2.2) Borders are drawn between regions. All villages in the region pool their resources and excess food. Efficiency depends on transportation infrastructure. The food is distributed to all cities on a need basis, extra is used to increase happiness/growth. Resources are stored in cities, but the actual location only matters when regions are redrawn or cities captured.

4.2.3) Each city has to have its own structures, with a few exceptions (stock exchanges).

4.2.4) In the regional menu there are four categories where all labour from the region can be divided. All building is done by the regional menu. There are some limits based on SE choices. Resources are used for building as needed and available.

4.2.5) Resource categories are:

4.2.5a) WONDERS: Only one wonder can be produced at a time. The location is set when building is started.

4.2.5b) CAPITALIZATION: The Labor --> Money rate depends on SE and economic structures in the region. Resources can be sold or traded.

4.2.5c) UNITS: Labor is used to build units. All new units are placed in reserve, and can be "deployed" the same turn.

The Units list is a build queue. Items can be directly added or the AI can build a list based on priorities the player has assigned for each unit type. The priority of a unit is a ratio of # of units of that type vs. # of each other type. FE, armor has priority 3 and mech. inf. 2, then 3 armour will be built for every 2 mech. inf.

4.2.5d) IMROVEMENTS: Similar to units. When all cities in a region have a structure the priority is counted as 0, so no more are built. The destination city is chosen by the AI, but can be changed by the player.

4.2.6) Deployment:

4.2.6a) All new units are placed in the reserves. Other units can be sent there also. Each turn you can deploy units to cities/bases/certain ships in the region. You can also send units to other region's deploy lists. The units cannot defend or be used until the next turn, but can be destroyed. Units in the reserve list cost less to maintain than deployed troops, except engineers. This is the only way to move air and missile units.

4.2.6b) Terraform units can normally only build forts, bases, and other transport and military TI's. When they are placed in the reserves they can build farms, irrigation, mines and other economic, terraforming and transport TI's, anywhere within the region. This prevents players from using their former types anywhere not near their population, except as combat engineers. It also makes them less vulnerable to airstrikes. They still can take damage when cities are hit.

4.3) Option 3:

4.3.1) Regions require a special improvement in a central city. The palace counts as this structure. The region surrounds the capital city with a radius of ~10 squares, providing a geographical map that allows management of build orders and deployment of forces in that region.

4.3.2) Each city icon on the regional screen has these options:

• Enter city menu screen.
• Exempt from general build orders
• Set production for city (go directly to the build screen)

4.3.3) All cities within this radius are part of this region, and once the appropriate infrastructure is in place (roads, trading post, etc.) cities within that region may share resources. A city’s production can then be set from the regional window and all cities in the region can be given build orders. The geographical view in this menu will allow one to organize the distribution of resources, troops, and infrastructure. Armies in a region may be viewed and ordered through this menu.

4.3.4) Roads allow one to exchange N amount of resources each way per turn (influenced by SE effects). Railroads allow infinite amounts of resource transfer and let one begin building city improvements with all the resources of the region, and then place them in a city of the region. Resource transfer MUST be to and from the capital of a region, to avoid becoming overly complex. This depends on having a network of roads and RR’s established between the region capital and the outlying cities. All regional production takes place in the capital.

4.2.5) All regions are linked to the palace, and can contribute resources to this city, or vice versa, provided the requisite tech has been discovered. This is handled through the 3rd and final city screen, the capital menu.

4.2.6) Disagreement: No need for a 3rd “Capital” menu.

Note that many of the ideas in these options can be used together.

5. Villages

5.1) Option 1:

5.1.1) Villages are akin to the “supply crawler” of SMAC; i.e. it brings in the resources of the tile to the city. Villages are built only outside the city radius. They need to be limited in some manner. Splitting resources and labor would work well, or no more than 1 village per citizen in the city.

5.2) Option 2:

5.2.1) Villages add +50% to resources gathered in that tile, but are expensive to build. They are built within city limits.

5.3) Option 3:

5.3.1) Villages can only be established adjacent to existing ones and within your borders. Borders only extend into shallow water, 2 max. Coastal villages, while really on land, are represented at sea in a coastal square. Ships can only attack coastal villages, the one that is represented by that square.

5.3.2) Moving a village takes as long as it does to 'deploy' a unit. In this time no resources are produced, but it is self-sufficient.

5.3.3) All food and resources are produced in villages. Villages are population pts. that have been moved from the cities to surrounding tiles. Villages use some food to support themselves, and send the rest of the food and all resources to the region, to be distributed among the cities.

5.3.4) Future village and terraform locations are done by ‘flagging' on the main map. Players can also let the AI flag possible sites.

5.3.5) The village system model requires approximately twice as many population points as civX games do. You set the ratio of village : city for each region, and the new population is divided between the two areas.

6. Miscellaneous

6.1) Specialists:

6.1.1) Slider bars that represent the total pop of the city, with worker, merchant, scientist, and clergy. Clergy replace the "elvii".

6.1.2) The structures in the city will determine how many of the people can become "specialists" and the rate that they will switch. These include marketplaces, banks, etc. for merchants; libraries, universities, for scientists, etc. Technology & SE choices would also be factors; i.e. Writing, Literacy, and Knowledge SE, for scientists. Workers are the standard and have no structures.

6.1.3) Move the slider bar to the % “specialist” desired, up to the current limit. The current level stays put for that turn. Each following turn, the % of citizens employed in that field increases, based on the above. Workers are exempt. When increasing workers, the shift is immediate. The player can switch back w/o penalty until the end of the turn. Then the citizens’ new jobs are set.

6.1.4) Like SMAC, later tech may give increases in their “field” and in other specialists’ fields.

6.1.5) Names for ancient workers: Serf, Architect, and Mason.

6.2) The Exodus:

6.2.1) Moving whole cities as a build option based on the population of the city. With a geometric increase in cost, because you can't move, FE, the population of New York easily. Call this construction "Exodus", similar to Capitalization. An Exodus will allow a city to be moved anywhere within the radius of the city on the turn it is built.

6.2.2) Reasons:

• Overlap with another city (esp. on archipelagoes)
• "Blind" placement, where you find a better spot after further exploration.
• Accidental placement, i.e. the player made a mistake.

6.2.3) An exodus should give the option of joining two cities together, when they are within each other's city limits.

Agreement: Supports “Exodus” idea.

6.2.4) How about time, not production? Say, 5 turns/pop to move 1 square.

6.2.5) What about moving the city radius? Move up to 4 squares that overlap on other city’s radius into an area adjacent to the 1st city’s radius, that no other city can gather from; requires RR advance?

6.3) Splitting Labor/Resources:

6.3.1) Resources come from the terrain- wood, iron, limestone, etc.

6.3.2) Resources are freely shipped throughout your empire (or within a region), and can be shipped between regions on “resource” routes. Resources are stored for when they are needed, but reserves decay over time, approx. 5-20%/turn. Resources can be bought/sold to/from other empires or abstractly like capitalization.

6.3.3) Labor comes from your population. Each pop. point produces a certain amount of labor, modified by government, tech and improvements (like factories). Pop points not devoted to gathering produce double or more labor (worker specialist?).

6.3.4) Labor cannot be moved from its city/region, must be used immediately, and cannot be saved.

6.3.5) All citizens in cities are some type of specialist. All economy and labor are produced in cities. All population growth occurs in cities.

How it works:
6.3.6) Food from agricultural cities (all pop devoted to resource gathering) is sent to the bigger cities to support industry (most pop is devoted to labor) and mining communities (all pop devoted to resource gathering, but in forested/hilled areas). Production from the industrial centers is used to build infrastructure for all areas, and military units. This could lead to different war strategies, as resource tiles and/or certain cities become targets.

Agreement: Likes the concept of differentiating resources and separating resources from labor.

6.3.7) Let resources and food be placed into a national pool, like CtP’s PW. This would allow the nation's food to be averaged out over all cities. In earlier years, it may be unrealistic, but this could be rationalized in game terms by giving a bonus upon the discovery of certain tech (e.g. refrigeration).

6.4) Food vs. Growth:

6.4.1) Food is now a factor of growth, not the sole determinant (it is still an important one).

6.4.2) All food is pooled and distributed to a neutral happiness level automatically (loss could occur due to an inefficient transport network). The neutral food happiness level corresponds to slow, steady growth- maybe 2.2 food/person. Having more than this much food increases happiness and hence growth, having less decreases happiness/growth. At a certain level (~1.5 food/person) starvation begins. Happiness penalties are SEVERE and pop losses are inevitable.

6.4.3)Inventions like contraception will slow growth rate slightly, but they will also allow you to slow it dramatically where population has started to outstrip food supply.

6.4.4) This idea allows the modern phenomena of overcrowding. The population will grow well past the point of sustainability and then begin to collapse, but with disorder, riots, and eventually rebellion in starving cities.

6.4.5) Aqueducts/hospitals increase growth.
Cities near oceans and on rivers have boosted growth, while cities by mountains and deserts are reduced.

Agreement: The population growth rate should not be solely a function of excess food.

6.4.6) Disagreement: Trade routes &/or transport hubs are more important (more trade =happiness). Ocean/River cities tend to have more than mountain/desert.

6.5) Food, production, and/or gold should be required for terraforming.

6.6) Graphics should represent evolving city/region settlements on tiles which expand as settlement expands (villages?).

6.7) Incorporate into ALL automations the idea of priorities. This would allow the player to auto-build tanks and infantry as well as terraforming.

6.8) Use CtP’s design for build queues, and their City Report interface. In CTP, a player can postpone city management until whenever they’re ready, because they can see all their cities in one report, rather than zooming in to one city at a time. There is still room for improvement in the City Report of CtP. FE, one can't tell at a glance how many specialists one’s cities have, the player still has to visit cities sequentially.

6.9) Players should be able to build custom report screens with a REAL scripting language (make sure you don't use the Win32 API, because when Linux, Mac users, etc., get the game ported we won't have that API). To be able to produce a custom report, covering EVERY conceivable bit of information the game is willing to divulge, binding this to an arbitrary keystroke sequence and/or mouse selection/button, would be great.

7. Questions

Only Regional menus? It simplifies micromanagement without losing flexibility. Switching between a regional menu and a city menu is redundant.

Both City and Regional menus? Only Regional does lack flexibility. There will be times the player will need to access the city itself.

Should new tech makes the regional menu more and more relevant as the game progresses?

Should City Improvement bonuses and SE bonuses be the same?

Is the idea of city management best linked to a regional basis?

Might changes to the city menu do instead of having regions?

Thanks To:
Isle, Ember, Theben, Trachmyr, Boom Boom, Maniac, Mingko, EnochF, Travathian, E, Mbrazier, mhistbuff, yin26, Hans2, Gregurabi, and any others from List 1 I’ve not mentioned here. Special thanks to Shining1 for TMing this thread in the beginning.
<font size=1 face=Arial color=444444>[This message has been edited by Theben (edited October 29, 1999).]</font>

[Theben]

I know this needs some tweaking, but I don't have time today. Maybe tommorrow.

[Theben]

bump

[Krenske]

Hello now that my life as a Y2000 fixer is almost complete I now have some time for little things like having a life.

So I have decided to jump on to this thread with an idea or 3.

Idea 1. Simple region defining.
Many of the ideas put forward will appear to create a lot of large circular regions. I believe most regional definitions over history are based at least partly on geography. As such so should the regions within Civ. When regions begin the regions will consist of a capitol and all cities within a certain movement distance. This considers the need to communicate and trade within the region. Assuming movement improvements for tiles are relative and not absolute then regions will naturally follow most geographical boundaries. Egypt will have the delta, upper and lower egypt just because that is what movement allows. The same with other river based regions. At the same time mountain ranges will become natural borders between regions. Once a region is set it more or less becomes permanent until super regions are formed later.

Idea 2. Sharing within region.
At a certain technology level (eg, simple food storage) the food resources available within the region will be able to be shared between the cities with the surplus being averaged over all cities. Science will still accumulate civilisation wide but production will be split into public works (terrain improvement) city works (city improvements) and regional production.
Public works will be used as public works in CTP, anywhere within the Civilisation. This is really a type of national level resource allocation. The government is effectively allowing the development of its land using its monetary resources. Public works can also be used (at considerable cost) to create a new town/city within the civilizations borders.
City works are used for the creation of city improvements or the creation of new cities (high cost). The combined regional city/civic works production is available for use in the various cities of the region. If the player defines a temple a granary and a marketplace in a city of the region and none anywhere else then the regions entire civic works production is split between these three. This allows greater flexibility in where production should take place and how it should be spent. This pool can not be saved for future use though. This simulates the flow of money and resources to important projects even though they are in other cities of the region.
Regional production is the creation of units at the regional level. When a unit completes construction it can be placed in any city within the region.
The region will have a 3 part slider feeding production towards the three areas described above. Obviously only excess city production is fed to the regional level. This reduces the number of queues being tended by the player and will also greatly decrease individual item contruction times to a more "realistic" level. (with 9 cities devoting most of their production to troops then the region could produce 2-3 units in a year rather than each city produce for a decade)

Idea 3. Super regions or national production.
At some point, (probably with the techs national beureacracy and fast communications) The regions will expand greatly into super regions and later again to just the national level. The regional civic improvements pool will become a national pool not unlike public works. The user can just define civic works wherever they want and the incoming production is split between the active works across the nation. If you have too many improvements at once then all will proceed slowly but if only a few are defined then they will be completed rapidly.
The regional production queues will at a point become simply the national set of building queues (eg one for every region). This allows for the creation of a army rapidly and in some considerable mass.

These ideas strive to keep the number of queues and micromanagement to a minimum. As well the level of management may be kept approximately the same for most of the civilisations history. This is because as the civiisation grows the regions expand/join to cover the new cities.

A very important factor for this system of civic improvements as listed above is the need for a very powerful city list screen allowing for sorting and grouping as well as mass selection and build ordering. Eg If you just got the cathedral improvement then it would be desirable to be able to grab all cities with a population of 7 or more and order a cathedral in each. This though is really a interface suggestion.


<font size=1 face=Arial color=444444>[This message has been edited by Krenske (edited January 06, 2000).]</font>
<font size=1 face=Arial color=444444>[This message has been edited by Krenske (edited January 06, 2000).]</font>

[Theben]

bump 'cuz I want to reread it w/o going through the "links" thread.