YourCiv

[Elok]

I've heard a few words of support for Civ-related topics contaminating the OT, so I thought I'd dip a toe in the waters. Basically, supposing you got to be supreme lead designer of the next Civ game, with carte blanche from the money-men and everyone else, how would you set it up?

Generally, I favor verisimilitude as a design rule--limitations should as closely as possible mimic those of the real world. I like the idea of supply restrictions, in the sense that every unit needs to be supplied each turn or suffer lost health. Each civ has a supply range, which starts pretty low but increases with technology (refrigeration, automobiles, etc.), and is extended by roads and railroads. Units outside supply range of a friendly city can forage each turn, but only up to the forage limits of the tile--eight spearmen can't forage from a desert, but one scout can get by pretty well in a forest, or most anywhere.

The forage equivalence for supply differs from unit to unit (it's generally proportional to monetary support costs), so horsemen have a harder time of it. Units such as tanks can't forage at all, naturally, and an unsupplied unit can't be healed by any means. Units within supply range but also in enemy territory can still supply, but their maintenance costs are increased for that turn based on the proximity of enemy troops.

No 1UPT restrictions, nor standard stack-of-doom mechanics. I haven't really thought out the details, but ideally I'd like a system wherein units fight together; attacker picks people from the stack to attack with, and everything in the defending tile is fair game. It all gets decided in one bloody wave, except for retreating survivors. Haven't thought out the details of how targets are selected, but I like the idea of subscreen animations instead of showing it all on the little tile. I think I heard that some CTP game did it like this? Just a vague notion, really.

Minor technologies (I've mentioned this, and the supply idea, in other threads before). Most techs have little offshoots costing about one-fifth as much as a normal tech. These little offshoots (which represent minor but significant inventions) are never prereqs for anything, and convey only a straight-up bonus to the discoverer. For example, the minor techs "crop rotation" and "McCormick reaper" increase food production, while "stirrups" increase the power of melee cavalry and "smokeless powder" that of gunpowder units.

Since there are oodles of these things, the idea is to force a choice, have the player pursue those techs which fit his/her situation and style of play. Trying to get all the little techs will result in falling behind on the main tree, and even horse archers with lamellar armor, recurve bows and other bells and whistles are going to have a hard time against artillery.

I have more ideas, but this looks like being a bloated monster of an OP already. As this is still the OT, Civ topic or not, you should of course feel free to call me, or other posters in this thread, a dumbass and/or **** for disagreeing with you in any way--or for expressing an opinion you dislike--or merely in remembrance of such a thing happening in a thread that got locked five years ago. Rules are rules.

[Egbert]

I have more ideas, but this looks like being a bloated monster of an OP already. As this is still the OT, Civ topic or not, you should of course feel free to call me, or other posters in this thread, a dumbass and/or **** for disagreeing with you in any way--or for expressing an opinion you dislike--or merely in remembrance of such a thing happening in a thread that got locked five years ago. Rules are rules.

I would like to call you doofus because that is what you called me yesterday.

I like your ideas of supply range and the minor techs. I would keep it quite similar to Civ4. I would like it if there was a way to enlarge the fat cross during the game so I can have real monster cities. I would keep the cottages but make it so they can be upgraded (ie build a few things in them to get a little extra hammers or gold or whatever. Maybe have 5 things you could build in a town but only three slots to force a choice). I also like the idea of city states but I haven't played Civ5.

[Al B. Sure!]

I already talked in the Civ5 forum about how I hated set bonuses for civilizations. For example, England historically was a naval power, but they were only a naval power because the English inhabited an island. Put the English landlocked on a steppe and they wouldn't be a naval power. What sense does it make to play as the Indians on an island and rely heavily on your navy but the English who could be a continental power that never builds a navy would have a naval bonus? What sense does it make to give the Arabs a bonus with oil if the Arab civ in a game happens to be in a place with no oil? There is no inherent anything to any civilization. The circumstances of their environment affected their culture and their development.

My suggestion would be to offer you the ability to select certain traits if certain conditions are met. The conditions can be widely varied and can be based on year, technologies researched, what resources are nearby, what buildings have been built in cities, proximity to enemy, etc.

For example, if you have 3 coastal cities or have built 10 ships, you can acquire the 'seafaring' trait that gives you a bonus to sea movement.

Maybe some could offer multiple options based on the same circumstances. If you share a border with 3 different civs, you can select a militant trait which might be either offensive (higher morale for units) or defensive (defensive bonus modifier for units and cheaper walls). Or maybe you could choose a diplomatic trait in the same situation and get a bonus for diplomacy. Or maybe a trade bonus and get additional trade income. Or maybe a scientific bonus representing cultural exchange. You could even tie in some civ-specific things here like maybe the Indians can not select the offensive militant option in that circumstance or the Chinese can not select the scientific bonus. That way there would be some constraints mimicking the actual 'flavor' of the civilizations for those who want some determinism.

And some should be automatic and not selectable. For example, if you have X number of a certain resource in your territory, you become adept at extracting and using it so you get a bonus for that resource (like the Arab oil bonus in the game).

Some could be year or technology based. Like you could pick the industrious trait if you're one of the first two civs to acquire the industrialization technology.

I think that would make the game much more interesting. It would make the civs more dynamic and vary from game to game while keeping them constrained by the circumstances of their location and what happens over the course of the game.


I also don't like the game mechanic of a linear technology tree, the ability to select specific technologies to research, serial research of techs, the trading of techs through diplomacy, etc. None of that represents the actual development and diffusion of technology.

In my mind, research shouldn't be a case of selecting a specific technology. Instead, techs should be developed organically and only tangentially in the player's hands, similar to the bonuses.

Let's take a hypothetical technology like domestication. If there are no livestock in the city radius, the civilization will not develop domestication. Why should they? What sense does it make to have the government fund research in something that has no applicable basis at that time? If they expand into an area with livestock, though, then, after a few turns, they will develop domestication. The player will still have a role in all this, though, as the player will build his civilization in a manner to obtain the technologies he wants. If he really wants to be a naval power, he'll build coastal cities. If he really wants to be industrial, he'll get a hold of coal and iron resources.

Many variables can increase or decrease the estimated time until development of a technology. For example, writing might have a baseline time of development of 50 turns from the start of the game. However, knowledge of two other civilizations and peaceful relations with them might cut in this in half with the idea that peaceful relations with neighbors encourages the development of a means of communication.

Iron-working might have a baseline time of development of 100 turns if you possess iron, but each mine would decrease this time by 10 turns, being in a state of war would decrease this time by 20 turns (to mimic the military origins of iron-working), etc.

Instead of simply allocating tax funding towards 'science', the rate of technological development should be directly related to the literacy of the population, the number of libraries and schools, the amount of trade commerce, and relations with neighbors (friendly relations would encourage most technologies whereas unfriendly relations would encourage military technologies).

As for actual funding of research, its role should be much smaller than it currently is and should be set into broader categories rather than specific technologies. For example, funding could emphasize 'commerce', 'industry', 'military', 'government', etc. This funding would reduce the time to development of either one or multiple technologies within these broad domains. This would allow the player to still 'force the issue' to an extent to get the techs he wants even if they are a long way from being developed organically because the criteria have not yet been met to reduce the development time appreciably.

The development should not be serial. Techs should be being developed in parallel.

Tech diffusion also needs to be implemented. Rather than trading technologies directly through a brokered deal, technologies should spread organically, perhaps related to culture spread but maybe a few tiles ahead of it.

It would also be really cool to have culturally-flavored technologies and have the cultural origin of these techs tracked. For example, suppose as the Egyptians you are the first to develop writing and it spreads ahead of your culture to your neighbors the Babylonians who receive it as "hieroglyphics". It will be culturally tied to the Egyptians. Maybe the Egyptians will get points towards a cultural victory this way or it boosts the spread of their culture or the bonus could be mutual as in it could boost trade and technology diffusion between them or something else. Meanwhile, the Chinese on the other side of the world develop writing a few turns later independently and it's "hanzi". When the Egyptians or Babylonians finally meet the Chinese, their different writing systems do not allow those mutual bonuses that the Egyptians/Babylonians share with each other. They have formed separate cultural groups at least with regard to this technology (though likely others as well over the years).

It would be cool to track the spread and diffusion over the course of a game of some of these technologies and the spread of cultural groups.

[Hauldren Collider]

I would make it Civ IV, but IN SPACE!!!!



(Would that just be called SMAC 2?)

[SlowwHand]

When people jumped up and abandoned Civ II MP, it was all stupid.

[EPW]

I'd play a Ape-themed civ game. Maybe call it the Apolyton Civilization Game. SlowwHand could be the leader of the Texas Tamarins. Traits: Sharp aim (launch feces at enemies; inceases their warweariness) Territorial (Doesn't like others monkeying around in his borders; immune to espionage)

[Al B. Sure!]

Okay so I seriously wrote that long-ass post that was probably the longest post in Apolyton history not made by curtis whatever his name was... and no comments or discussion? Not even Elok?

[EPW]

Al B. Sure! of the Howler Hegemony
Needy (+50% happiness from trade goods, -1 diplomatic relations)
Screecher (Units get +1 city defense promotion)

[Egbert]

Okay so I seriously wrote that long-ass post that was probably the longest post in Apolyton history not made by curtis whatever his name was... and no comments or discussion? Not even Elok?

OK I'll comment.

I liked your ideas about variable traits and the suggestions for how traits might be acquired. Whether they be called traits or civics or whatever, I like the concept.

I think your ideas about the tech tree have potential but I would rather rather stay with the more predictable linear tech tree per Civ 1 to 4.

Your suggestion for allocating tax to science seems similar to what we have now (except for literacy). I'm not sure how your other tech ideas would work, sounds complicated and may be hard to keep track of.

[Al B. Sure!]

My ideas are probably more in trying to make civilization be a simulation as opposed to just a game.

A similar tech system as to what I propose was used in the Paradox games Crusader Kings and Europa Universalis: Rome. There, you never picked any technologies and the tech tree wasn't particularly linear. Techs were developed based on a number of variables with a random factor as well and were researched in parallel. Tech diffusion was also modeled in those games.

I think stuff like this is why I vastly prefer Paradox games to boring Civ. Civ is a game. It models real-life about as well as Chess modeled medieval combat.

I don't know how you guys get excited about it or how ground-breaking Civ is anymore. Paradox games are far more innovative than Civ.

[Egbert]

Yeah, but Civ is a game, not a simulation which is why I like it. I want a limited complications so I don't have too keep track of too much small stuff in my head.

I have played Victoria (a Paradox game) extensively which has inventions tied to techs. Having certain techs enable various inventions to fire but not straight away.

[Al B. Sure!]

Yeah, but Civ is a game, not a simulation which is why I like it. I want a limited complications so I don't have too keep track of too much small stuff in my head.

I have played Victoria (a Paradox game) extensively which has inventions tied to techs. Having certain techs enable various inventions to fire but not straight away.

In my mind, there's LESS to keep track of with a Paradox-style tech system. All that studying tech trees and calculating the best tech path to get swordsmen first or something wouldn't be a part of a Paradox-style tech system. The exact techs that you get and when you get them are out of your hands so it's out of your mind. All you can do is set up your society and civ in a manner to encourage certain things but that's the extent of it.

It wasn't the rulers who demanded research in pottery. Pottery just happened organically from the people out of need and ingenuity. Same with virtually all technologies until the 20th century and even now, the vast majority of inventions and ideas come from the private sector. The role that governments had in this in the past was just to try to foster development, not have a direct hand in it.

This is all obvious and known to everyone and Civ is very unrealistic in this regard. It has always bothered me and made the game uninteresting to me.

[Ari Rahikkala]

I'm a different sort of a realism scrub. I don't mind if a game simulates reality inaccurately... but I hate it when a game has different rules in single-player and multiplayer modes, making the two challenges even more unlike each other than merely switching an AI with a human would make them.

Case in point, Civ4. The diplomacy subgame isn't that bad, and it does take skill and even a sort of maturity as a player to learn to align yourself politically and butter up the rivals that could invade and kill you. But the whole mechanic of AI attitudes and the subgame of managing them disappears in multiplayer. Also in MP, religion suddenly can't create political blocs anymore, and defending yourself from early rushes rather than planning them yourself becomes vitally important.

I know a lot of changes that went into Civ5 were to fix precisely this (the removal of religion and AI attitudes, the death of stacks of death, introduction of city defense), and that Civ5 sucks. But imagine if the AI actually were competent the way a human player is, and didn't have things like the attitude system stopping it - wouldn't that be.. uh... sort of neat?

[Kitschum]

I've always dreamed of getting rid of hexes/squares/whatever or having so many they're irrelevant, and just track distances instead. I'd also like a true globe, and realistic geology and climate, including periodical floods and droughts, earthquakes, epidemics and other catastrophes.

I'd be satisfied with the game ending before the industrial age as things get way too complicated right about there to fit into a single game, maybe even stop the clock in late antiquity.

[Elok]

Al: I'm somewhat skeptical about the complexity-to-play-value ratio of some of those ideas. The idea of cultural grouping, for example; how would a player use it to earn an advantage? I don't have a real issue with acquired traits, though I would like to know how you propose to limit them to a reasonable number per player--if you can make your civ seafaring AND industrious AND mercantile AND so on, they become more like researchable techs than actual traits. And canny players will do what they can to acquire all of them.

I was never all that bothered by the ability to choose technologies in Civ, because while you're nominally the ruler, you're really more of a guardian deity or something. "George Washington" stays in charge of the Americans for six thousand years through twelve revolutions, from the time they're a bunch of wandering tribesmen to the time they launch ships into space. But really, this boils down to different people being irked by different deviations from the norm. I don't like hexes because I can't wrap my head around six cardinal directions instead of eight, for example. And the culture flipping. I hate the culture flipping oh so much. Thank God you can turn it off in IV.

Ari: I don't do MP, since I'm a pretty crappy player who tends to get games late (I've had IV for less than a year now, no plans to get V). However, while perusing the V forums it occurred to me that you could compromise with a bad AI by offering different, but equivalent methods for PC and human players. E.G., nobody can make an AI that knows how to coordinate a decent naval invasion, so the designers of V had ground troops automatically make their own boats. The equivalent-method alternative is to have humans build ships like normal, but give the AI a little crutch: when their invading units get to the coast, they pay a certain amount of cash or shield production to generate the boat there, calculated to simulate the costs of building and moving the boat. It's not perfect, but do you think it might work?

WRT AI and religion, one solution might be to do things the other way: instead of having the AI itself love you for being Hindu like it is, have the AI's people love you for being Hindu like they are, and the AI decides to be your pal to "wag the dog." This already happens to some extent, with people getting upset when you go to war with their fellow-believers, but they'll have no problem with their brothers and sisters of the faith getting massacred by someone else. Anyway, the same incentive would exist for human players, so there's no difference except the relative stupidity of the AI. Whoever you're playing with says, "Sure, I'll help you--there'll be rioting in my capital if I don't!"