Burn the bridges

[Bereta_Eder]

I build a bridge to get me units move with ease through the river.

It gave me an extra arrow too! In rep and demo 2 arrows more for a grand total of 4 arrows on a normal river square with road!

Is my civ 2 copy bugged?

P.S. Manual says railroads (not raods of course) increase only the shield output... altought I don't trust it generally.

[Theben]

You sure you don't have the Colossus or a superhighway in that city?

[Dis]

must be superhighways. I am not reading that clearly

[East Street Trader]

paiktis

You always get one more arrow in a plains/grassland river square if you build a road there. Same for rivered trade special squares but not IIRC for woods and I think not for swamp, jungle, glacier etc. I have heard of rivered hills and mountains but never seen any. Guess it would not apply there either. Where your fourth arrow is coming from I don't know. As already suggested Superhighways or Collosus would do it.

This is an extra reason to build a city on a river square because, even before discovering bridge building, the city square is treated as having a road and you get the extra arrow.

Bridge building is off the usual early tech paths but it is nevertheless always worthy of considering because of the ability to road river squares (if there is some perfectionism in your play). The more cities with river squares you have (especially the capital and core cities) the higher bridge building goes up the priorities.

[DaveV]

A road (or bridge) will increase trade by +1 in:

Grassland
Plains
Desert
Any river square
Any trade special

[East Street Trader]

Thanks for the correction DaveV.

Forested river is an excellent square to work at any time. Roading it after the Bridge Building advance must make it prime estate indeed. If I have been failing to build roads on such squares (as I think I must) I've been missing a trick.

Founding on (or converting to) forested river is good value from a defensive point of view as you get the bonus for both forest and river. The extra arrow is good at the start with an extra shield to come the minute rr's are discovered (you get an automatic rr in city squares just as you get an automatic road).

edit to add a post script.

I have a recollection of testing the extra arrow for a road in any trade special square point and finding one where you didn't (seals or ivory I think). I'll try again over the week end and post the result if no-one has beaten me to it.
[This message has been edited by East Street Trader (edited February 08, 2001).]

[La Fayette]

Go on testing EST!
I back you wholeheartedly.

[Bereta_Eder]

While we are waiting for the EST's test let me just say that: THE MANUAL SUCKS. Where are the glories of Civ 1 manual. I remember I've read it a thousand times and I found only very few and minor inconsistencies with the game.

After all that time of playing I've only recently discovered the river extra trading arrow because I was relying on the manual.

[Ribannah]

quote: Originally posted by paiktis22 on 02-08-2001 02:23 PM After all that time of playing I've only recently discovered the river extra trading arrow because I was relying on the manual.

You can find the info on page 77, under "A note about rivers". Not that hard to find.

"Citizens working terrain through which a river flows gain a bonus arrow icon".

The random map generator will not create rivers on hill or mountain tiles, but you can put them there yourself when you create your own map or make changes. Also, an Engineer can change rivered grassland into rivered hills, which is even better than planting forests (but takes a bit longer to accomplish).



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If you have no feet, don't walk on fire

[Blaupanzer]

Ribannah, ease up on Paiktis. Suspect Paiktis is referring to the fact that bridging a river gets that second trade arrow. The manual reflects some of Dave V's note about roads, but not the part about all river squares. At least, not in so many words.

[Bereta_Eder]

Thank you Blaupanzer! Yes about the SECOND arrow. Hell, I knew about river arrows from 1992 or so with Civ 1 princess!!

In my very humble opinion the CIV 2 manual is close to being a crap. But it is pointless to start fighting over that. It's just my opinion when I compare with Civ 1 manual.

Fingers crossed for CIV III

[Ribannah]

The poster gives a clear overview of the effects of roads etc. One plus one makes two, there is no special counting rule for rivers. The result is also obvious from the city map.

My point is, that while some game manuals do suck bigtime, the manual of Civ2 is more than adequate, and they made a great effort to add in-game info as well.

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If you have no feet, don't walk on fire

[Bereta_Eder]

quote: Originally posted by Ribannah on 02-08-2001 07:26 PM The poster gives a clear overview of the effects of roads etc. One plus one makes two, there is no special counting rule for rivers. The result is also obvious from the city map. My point is, that while some game manuals do suck bigtime, the manual of Civ2 is more than adequate, and they made a great effort to add in-game info as well.

I disagree, the manual is really mediocre. This is the point of view of someone who has a clear knowledge of the Civ 1 manual where everything was in place and it even had a pleasant reference to relative historical facts to go with the PRECISE info.

It is the same with Civ 2. The improvements in the game are really nice but the overall feeling and atmosphaire is inferior to civ 1. (newspapers, sequences when you catpured a city, no nosence city view etc)

About one and one makes two, this is not the case here.

If I remember correctly bridged rivers in civ 1 didn't yield that nice extra arrow. Continuity princess! Hang on to my civ 1 knowledge 1 plus 1 makes 2,5 or 1,5 take your pick!

In civ 2 manual I have to search the whole thing to find the info I'd want because that damn book is as unorganised as your average greek public service institution!
City map is so obvious you miss the info!

[East Street Trader]

Rare (and refreshing) to see a spirited defence of the Civ2 manual. (You didn't write it by any chance, Ribs?)

Rarer still, these days, to open a new game and to find any manual - good, bad or indiferent - inside.

I rather think one of the clearer messages which Apolyton sent to the Civ3 developers is that a good (or even half way decent) manual is much appreciated by commited gamers.

[Scouse Gits]

This seems a good place to reiterate a little piece of Paul's wisdom ... To maximise a city's productivity, forest the rivers and irrigate the (non-river) forests. ... and don't forget to build your road before you forest!


____________
Scouse Git[1]

"CARTAGO DELENDA EST" - Cato the Censor
"The Great Library must be built!"
"A short cut has to be challenging,
were it not so it would be 'the way'." - Paul Craven

[This message has been edited by Scouse Gits (edited February 09, 2001).]

[Bereta_Eder]

quote: Originally posted by Albert B on 02-09-2001 12:00 PM Paiktis, I think you have a trait common to most people, which is we tend to remember the past being better than it was.

I admit you must have unveiled the 50% of the reason of my point of view! The idea actually crossed my mind when I was writing it...!

Oh MY GOD, Am I becomming (how do you say it in english?) an OLD Whining FART?!

[Albert B]

Paiktis, I think you have a trait common to most people, which is we tend to remember the past being better than it was. I can't give much of an argument as to whether the civ 1 or civ 2 manual is better but I can tell you that the civ 1 manual was far from flawless. I don't think I ever read the civ 1 manual, I learned to play by playing with a friend already slightly familiar with the game and then used a lot of trial and error. (This actually was a lot of fun as my friend or I would occasionally make 'grand discoveries', like finally finding out that there was a luxury rate as well as the normal tax/science , but I digress.) The point is that eventually I picked up a strategy guide and it pointed out a ton of mis-quoted facts, wrong information and various other deficiencies of the original manual. I don't have specifics right now because the guide is at home and I'm at work, but if you are interested in proof, I would be more than happy to look into it for you.

The real point of this: "the grass is always greener on the other side..." and to remember that the "golden years" weren't necessarily as golden as you may remember. Oh, and also, who needs the manual any more, there's far more knowledge right here on this web site than could ever be put in a single manual !!

Albert

[debeest]

There's a rivered hill square down by the Persian Gulf in the Rome scenario. Until recent games, I don't think I'd ever seen one anywhere else, but recently I've seen at least one in a completely randomly generated 2.42 game. They do occur naturally.