BORDERS (ver1.1): Hosted by CyberShy

[Gilgalad5]

If you're going for realism, borders should not exist until at least around the time when one acquires gunpowder / invention. Surveying techniques were simply not accurate enough to establish them before this. But yes, in the modern era borders would add a lot to the game and remove annoyances.

This issue depends a lot on whether population is going to be spread out in every hex/region/square... which I for one think it should.

[civbuilder]

With regards to borders, i like the idea of draging the borders to how you want them, the idea of not having true borders until a certain time is also a very good one. I believe however that instead of lacking borders until that time it might be better to simply have uncertain borders which rather than being a simple line, could be a line of squares, a 'buffer zone' rather than a border. This would maintain most of the advantages of a border (knowing if anyone is in your territory ETC) but would perserve historical accuracy. Eventualy this could become a normal border, either when a certain advance is made or after a period of time. Perhaps it could also make this 'fringe' of your civilisation a focus for renegade activity (like the American West) whereby you might find criminals staging barbarian style attacks from until your border is standardised. Because it makes your edge cities more vulnerable to attack this might be interesting.

Also on the subject, perhaps you could make a declaration of your territory, or territory that you claim (like the Irish Republic claiming Northern Ireland until recently). I believe this is possibly better than the simple drag box idea, because you would be able to drag your boundries over a new region of land and then have to justify your claim. If you claimed a piece of land for no real reason and could not enforce your claim, no one would take notice. Possible reasons for claiming land might be; that it has special stratigic importance, that it is an area of high *place your civilisation name here* activity, that it historically belonged to you or that it is a site of great cultural importance (perhaps if we are to have custom religions for each civilisation some can grow 'sacred sites' for whatever reason, and these then give an advantage to that civilisation provided it remains within its borders). After making your declaration other civilisations could contest it, ask you to step down your claim or state thier own claim for the any area you have claimed which lies within thier borders. Perhaps if a UN authority exists they could judge the claims and award the land to whoever.