The Mars Project: Ideas

[PolarisGL]

I decided on a name:

The Mars Project.

Sounds neat.

Ok, first off, I'm going to make it for FW. Second, I'm making a map now for the first step.

Then, I want to make terrain. I need some ideas for terrain and terrain ideas.

I must have permafrost; for those who don't know its a landform that absorbs chemicals in the air, and when its melted, the chemicals are released back into the air. I need canyon, regular soil and rock, water, but what else? Any other ideas?

Forests? If the scenario is a little unrealistic and lasts hundreds of years game time, forests could grow eventually. As could rivers appear. Maybe rivers should be marked as CANALS and be like canyon with waterless rivers.

Now, change terrain would be used as water pipes from the icecaps melted techology and the pipes technology. That will be a good plan.

Any other just regular ideas?

By the way, here is a preview of the units:


Any ideas are welcome!

[Geography Dan]

Weren't you going to use rivers as aquifers?


Is the map going to include Earth or not?


If you are going to include later-stage terraforming, i think there definitely needs to be a tundra-type terrain which would be the first step in terraforming, representing the introduction of genetically engineered fungi, lichen, and small plants, which would be neccessary for later forests to grow. Perhaps The terrains could be transformed into this tundra, and then the tundra could be transformed into forests or a plains-type terraing.

I'm pretty sure nearly all of Mars is permafrost, just that in some areas there are varios things on top of the permafrost, such as varios colors of dust, or extensive rock-fields, or in some areas the permafrost is cut away to create canyons, cliffs, craters, or Badlands-type formations. There are also some areas of very rough irregular terrain, kinda like a giant version of that rough type of hawaiian lava flow.

[PolarisGL]

The map is an FW map, so it won't include Earth.

[Case]

I'd suggest that you have multiple terrain files, that change over time as terraforming progresses.

For example, assign one of the multiple graphic terrain types (eg forest, hills or mountains) to canyon terrain. At the start of the terrafroming these would be dry and very unproductive. As terraforming continues replace the graphics to show them filling up with water and becoming an asset instead of a liability (though the cost of crossing them would have to remain high).

Also, as terraforming progresses the stats for exhisting terrain would need to change to reflect the alterations to the environment. For example, over time the atmosphere would warm up, causing the permafrost to turn into a swamp. To reflect this the permafrost's movement cost and production would have to rise and fall respectively.

By changing the stats of the landscape you would force the player to react to the new environment by building new cities and killing off the old ones.


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If all else fails, immortality can always be assured by spectacular error
-John Kenneth Galbraith

[our_man]

Polaris, I agree with Case: multiple terrain files and changes to the rules.txt over a gradual period of time are the way to go - there would simply be too much information to try and change the terrain via events.

This is probably so elementary it probably doesn't need stating, but remember to be careful when it comes to assigning your new terrain to slots. in my experience, the computer only builds cities on the terrain in the grassland or plains slots... no matter how enticing you make any other terrain in another slot, the computer in almost every case will never build there.

Have you decided on what Civs to use in the game yet?

[Hendrik the Great]

Some terrain suggestions could be sand dunes, which do exist in many regions of Mars, and vulcanic rock or basalts.

You could also use the forest grafics as a third kind of hill or mountain or even as canyons or none-navigable rivers in the later game.

I reckon there are some superb webpages out there with plenty of images that you can use. The pages of the Jet Propulsion Laboratories are full of them.

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Mathias' Civ II Page
http://members.nbci.com/thalys

[PolarisGL]

Thanks for the input, guys.

Case, great idea. Our_man, really? Just grassland and plains? That gives me a few new ideas. Interesting.

Not yet on Civs; I'll do that soon.

Hendrick, I found several sites that are interesting. I converted those units above from various space sites I found and Mars planning sites.

[BeBMan]

George, perhaps you can use the global warming effect of the standard civ to simulate terrain changes caused by terraforming? But this would require probably a lot of testing...

[PolarisGL]

It is a possibility if we can find out what makes global warming happen and when it happens. Doing terraforming through events is easier, but will take more time and more events (a bunch).

[Hendrik the Great]

I did some testing on this some time ago but was unfortunatly intelligent enough not to write down the results. But it is predictable the problem may be that placing terrain according to the patterns of global warming might make the job very hard.

If you want me to I can start testing again...or do you want to do it yourself?

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Mathias' Civ II Page
http://members.nbci.com/thalys

[BeBMan]

Hmm, I thought nuclear strikes increase the risk of global warming. Perhaps you could modify nuclear weapons as bio pods (or whatever) and change the pollution icon into a terrain that is "between" the normal marsscape and the later, terraformed terrains?

If this works, the mars terrain would develop faster with the use of these "nuclear" bio pods.

[Hendrik the Great]

The problem with nuclear weapons is that they can destroy already existing terrain improvements. But on the other hand that might be just what we want...

Edit: I just had great fun when I used Babelfish to translate this discussion thread into German. I haven't seen such a bad German since I was last in...well... I can't think of any place right now. But you really need to try this!

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Mathias' Civ II Page
http://members.nbci.com/thalys
[This message has been edited by Hendrik the Great (edited February 14, 2001).]

[BeBMan]

Yeah, Babelfish is great! It´s more entertaining than anything else

[PolarisGL]

...except Civilization II.

Great ideas; Hendrick, if you could test, you'd be in the readme several times and I'd be forever grateful.

Hmmm... improvements I want to be improvements and not new terrain; we'll see. I might just stick to technology being terraforming?

Thanks again.

[Case]

quote: Originally posted by PolarisGL on 02-14-2001 07:42 PM Hmmm... improvements I want to be improvements and not new terrain

I'll offer you both

If you can get gobal warming to work out then factories and manufacturing & power plants could be renamed "Greenhouse Gas Factories", and serve to cause pollution.

Another terrain idea is to have 'Highland' terrain covering the huge areas of Mars that are too high to ever be teraformed (eg the slopes of Olympus Mons). At high altitudes it is unlkly that the air pressure would ever reach the levels neccesary to create the warm, life supporting atmosphere of the lowlands.

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If all else fails, immortality can always be assured by spectacular error
-John Kenneth Galbraith