Abandoning a City

[Kevin Ar18]

There should be an option in Civ III to abandon a city.

What would happen, is your people would be put into settlers (since all settlers do is settle cities and not any type of work this would make sense.)

Also, you should have to option to pillage/destroy the city structures. However, you would not be able to destroy quite everything.

The enemy civ would then be able to march into a burned out city and take control. But before they could use it they would have to send settlers in to resettle it with people.

[Inverse Icarus]

couldnt you take over an enemy city, (say a size 20 city) and abandon it, load all the settlers on transports, and create a huge island nearby?

sound cheap to me, but p[erhaps i misunderstood.

[manofthehour]

You should be able to destory some cities and get 1 settler, but not above size 5 or 6. CTP2 you could do this but only up to size three. What good is a size 3 city going to do you 5000 years in the game with no improvements?

[Kevin Ar18]

Originally posted by UberKruX
couldnt you take over an enemy city, (say a size 20 city) and abandon it, load all the settlers on transports, and create a huge island nearby?

Thats a good point.
But how about this?
You can only disband a city that YOU founded (thus it's people are truly part of your Civ).

But then again that could cause some problems too.

Perhaps abandoning a city should be much more limited than my first suggestion, ideas?

[manofthehour]

Yes there should be a limit to either a max of how many settlers you get out of abonding a city or not being able to abondon a city past a certain size.

[rah]

If CivIII is going to discourage ICS by harsher happiness problems for a lot of cities similar to CTPII(based on government). There had better be a disband city option. This helped ruin CPTII, making world conquest a boring evening of starving cites. You should be building and not have to worry about disbanding civs as you conquer them.

RAH

[Mo]

In SMAC there was to option to destroy a city and kill all the occupants, however I think that one should be able to abandon a city if it is small, and only if it has belonged to you for a long time. However I also think that cities that don't fall in the above group, should have an option. I would propose that you can grant them independence, and generally they would be friendly to you.

[manofthehour]

You would have to kill all of the occupents. Mabey you could make the pop. workers or slaves and than burn the city.

[Inverse Icarus]

you could always disband a city the civ2 way, keep building settlers till it disbands itself.

although i understand your reasoning for wanting a button that disbands a city, i feel this system is tried and true. the slow manner of it makes it difficult.

but i have a compromise

theres a button that says "disband city".

when clicked, it takes 5 turns to generate one settler (reguardless of production), and removes a population point each turn.

in effect, it is a 5 population to 1 settler ratio, to make a size 20 city only worth 4 settlers, after 20 turns. so the enemy has the ability to recapture the city and stop your stupid rampage

i also suppse while in "disbandment" mode, the city should have no trade or production, it should be, in effect, a dead city.

[imgod2u]

I think you should be able to strip a city of everything worthwhile and then abandon it. That has been the traditional thing to do in real life. And I think it makes sense. You can't really take buildings with you, but you can take all the food, equipement, and tear down a lot of stuff for resources. Take what you can carry basically.

[bagdar]

Abandoning cities is an absolute must!!!

[Stefu]

I think that this is the way it should be handled. When you have a city, you can click the 'abandon' button. Then city would sell it's city improvements (though not for as much money as you'get otherwise) and you'd get special settler that has little number on top of it, marking how much population is contained in that settler. Settler would start with same amount of population as were in abandoned city (if there were 20, then settler has 20 people), and each turn, there's a chance it loses one or more people, depending on your level of technology. When it finally gets where it should be, then amount of people left in settler is amount of people that would inhabit the new city. That way, you can move a city, for instance, one step, and not suffer much damage, but longer treks will be harmful. Also, this would avoid "take over 20-size city, create 20 settlers, settle the whole Africa" symptom that was talked about, since there would be only one settler to move around.

[Eli]

Originally posted by Stefu
I think that this is the way it should be handled. When you have a city, you can click the 'abandon' button. Then city would sell it's city improvements (though not for as much money as you'get otherwise) and you'd get special settler that has little number on top of it, marking how much population is contained in that settler. Settler would start with same amount of population as were in abandoned city (if there were 20, then settler has 20 people), and each turn, there's a chance it loses one or more people, depending on your level of technology. When it finally gets where it should be, then amount of people left in settler is amount of people that would inhabit the new city. That way, you can move a city, for instance, one step, and not suffer much damage, but longer treks will be harmful. Also, this would avoid "take over 20-size city, create 20 settlers, settle the whole Africa" symptom that was talked about, since there would be only one settler to move around.

"oh darn, I dont like that city location, let's move it one square right"

[Inverse Icarus]

why dont we remove EVERYTHING that ever pissed us off in any game of civ we ever played?

maybe some of the annoyances were but there on purpose?

[Stefu]

"oh darn, I dont like that city location, let's move it one square right"

Look, it may not be historic, it may not HEY, WE HAVE NEW SMILEYS, COOL be realistic, but all I know is that it's darn annoying when I have constructed a perfect layout of cities and then there's one annoying bugger of a city captured from an enemy that doesn't quite fit in.

[Grumbold]

Being able to destroy a city while getting virtually no return on it and also harming your international relations should be a possibility. To do it painlessly and gain settlers you should certainly have to build them slowly in the traditional way.

[colossus]

Abadoning city is rare in history. More often a city disappears when razed down by war, or it suffers a long period of decline before finally turned back to village(city->town->village).

Having the option of razing a city to ground when capturing it is more reasonable. You get more gold(than just capturing it), some culture penalty and the satisfaction that it disappears from the scene, but no settler. Forced migration often meant most people died in the process in history.

[Zulu Elephant]

How about, when you disband a city thats been in your civ for a long time (something to do with culture), it's population points are distributed across your nearest cities

If its been recently captured by you, these points could go to the civ that you captured the city off

Maybe you could stop them rejoining their old civ by killing them all at a reputation penalty

[tmarcl]

Originally posted by Eli


"oh darn, I dont like that city location, let's move it one square right"

I'm not sure if you were being sarcastic, but that's exactly why I'd want to do it. As someone else mentioned downthread, it's annoying when you've got perfect city layout, only to take over another civ, and have cities all clumped.

My solution would be to allow city disbanding, but *no* settlers. Instead, have the city population disbersed to neighboring cities. If the disbanded city has been yours for 3 or more turns, the population goes in to your closest 2 or 3 cities, if it was taken from another civ, they go back to the enemy civ.

Marc

[Kc7mxo]

Picking up a city and moving it a square is a stupid idea. You think that everyone in new york could just pick up their skyscrapers and move 30 miles inland just cause they got tired of looking at the sea?

and turning the city into a large number of settlers resource free ain't a good idea either.

if we really want to abandon a city, how abotu we just settle for vacating the premises, and then the next fellow who takes it won't get any tech or gold from the person who abandonded it? That is the reason people desire to abandon cities isn't it?

[Eli]

Originally posted by tmarcl


I'm not sure if you were being sarcastic, but that's exactly why I'd want to do it. As someone else mentioned downthread, it's annoying when you've got perfect city layout, only to take over another civ, and have cities all clumped.

I was just pointing on a problem that could arise if you use that suggestion.

[The_Aussie_Lurker]

Actually guys I think the answer is quite simple. You should be able to abandon a city under only a couple of conditions:

1) If you are about to be or are being attacked by a superior force and you want to prevent them from gaining your population and or improvements or

2) If your city is being ravaged by a plague or disease and you want to move to cleaner pastures (though you might have a chance of bringing the plague with you!)

When you abandon a city, you wouldn't get settlers, the population points would simply turn up in surrounding cities after a certain lag-time (based on distance) Also, the strength of your culture in the city should have some inluence on how long or how easily you can abandon a city. Lastly, the city would not disappear, it would simply be a Zero population city!

This would allow you to pull off a "Russian Gambit"-ie. the Russians abandoned Moscow and burned it before Napolean arrived! With no food in the city and winter approaching Napolean was forced to retreat back to France!

Anyway, just a couple of ideas.

Yours,
The_Aussie_Lurker

[manofthehour]

When you abandon a city, you wouldn't get settlers, the population points would simply turn up in surrounding cities after a certain lag-time (based on distance) Also, the strength of your culture in the city should have some inluence on how long or how easily you can abandon a city

I like this idea except that you should get 1 settler and that is it and than the other pop. will migrate.

[Kevin Ar18]

if we really want to abandon a city, how abotu we just settle for vacating the premises, and then the next fellow who takes it won't get any tech or gold from the person who abandonded it? That is the reason people desire to abandon cities isn't it?

That is exactly the reason I suggested this idea. There's been time where I wish I could have abandoned a city so the comp doesn't get my stuff.

However, I have found one MAJOR flaw to this idea since suggeting it. If you can abandon a city and destroy all its structures inside it, then it could cause big problems when people try to conquer and get new cities only to find they can't because of abandoned cities.

This option definitely needs to be scaled down if done at all.

[Grumbold]

There is absolutely no precedent for being able to totally abandon cities. The civilian population is too large (and usually too obstinate) to emigrate completely. Some will flee in fear if a war gets too close to their homes but all too many will stay and work reluctantly for the new regime. The only possible way to completely dismantle a city would be by slaughtering the inhabitants as Ghengis Khan did to ensure swift capitulation from other cities offered the same 'surrender or die' choice. I can't think of a single historical example of a city completely slaughtered by its rightful owner. You are looking for a quick fix game solution to a game problem. I don't believe that it should be provided (but I also think it stupid that any city can reveal the scientific secrets of your country if captured too.)

[rah]

Don't get me wrong, I don't want to abandon cities usually, It's just that in CTPII once you got to too many cities per government type, it was literally impossible to control the unhappiness problems. Rumor has it that CIVIII is looking at a similar model to discourage ICS. Nothing like being unable to conquer another enemy city becuase it will make your capital revolt. More servere and unable to fix as in CivII.

If that is going to be included, the least they can do is give you a simpler way to disband cities. I don't want anything from them. Realistic NO, but limiting the manageable number of cities for each goverenment, isn't realistic either when you get to Democracy.

RAH

[The_Aussie_Lurker]

I'm afraid I must disagree with the assertion that no historical precedent exists for totally abandoning a city. The rulers of Moscow DID completely evacuate the city before Napolean arrived, and they did set fire to the city as well (or else Napolean did, that part I'm not so sure of?!) What I am certain of is that the desertion of Moscow left Napolean without a source of food and this forced him to retreat to France (of course, had he won a decisive victory at Borodino, he wouldn't have needed to pursue the enemy to Moscow in the First place!).

The_Aussie_Lurker.

[dainbramaged13]

I think that we should all just shut up about this - firaxis has much more important things to worry about in my mind - in other words, there is already a fine way to disband a city (bulding settlers, and since they take up 2 pop points now, it should be easier; or workers) ; so why should we worry about it when there are more important things on hand (such as ocean resources )

[colossus]

Many people seem to consider the value of city of its population. But truthfully, most cities importance lie in its geographical position. Once dislodged, the former citizens could hardly rebuild their former city. The lost infrastructures are of secondary importance only. But the lost trade routes, the hinterland supporting the city, the political security of the city(the king's favour, for example) deal the mortal blow to the remnant's of the city. The survivors, barring the wealthiest and most powerful ones, are most likely to disperse back to the country side, where they can expect to eke out a living and adaption is easier.

[Kevin Ar18]

Basically the only reason I wanted an option to abandon a city is to prevent the AI from taking as much stuff from me when I know I'm gonna lose a city.

But as I brought up in another post, I realized this was not a good idea for one reason. That's the whole fun of attacking - to conquer cities and all the stuff in them. Just completely abandoning a city would be terrible. Even partially messing up a city might not be too good an idea either.

However, for a size 2 town, it might be nice to be able to instantly take up those 2 people into a settler unit and evacuate the town (because settlers requre 2 people).
This size is probably representative of a very small village where people could leave it pretty quick. However, taking from the suggestion of someone else, the settler leaving this size 2 settlement would only be able to survive a few turns.