Micromanagement. - Page 2

Satis5d · October 5, 2001, 16:56

One small thing that I would like to see in this game is a worker who could be qued to work just within the city radius. If I had all the time back that I've spent telling settlers and engineers to build roads and irrigation, mines and railroads - you know the obvious stuff, I'd have days added to my life. The problem is, whenever you save time by automating the settlers they inevitably end up 50 squares away from their home city building irrigation for a city I don't even care about. A unit that would automatically build roads, then irrigation, then mines, then railroads, then farmland would be nice. Then when it's done all the obvious stuff you could tell it to do the discretionary stuff like change jungle to grassland.

A man can dream can't he?

hexagonian · October 5, 2001, 17:06

Quote:

Originally posted by Akron
It was a headache to decide how to distribute PW points to different cities, and there was always one city that I'd forget to improve. Or I may forget to use PW for a few turns.

...and it was a headache to move a slew of settlers around once you had a bunch of cities, and then tell them what to do once they moved on the tile you wanted them to improve.

Quote:

Originally posted by Akron
Or I may start putting down farms but later realize that I need a fortress on one of my borders, but I won't have enough PW left.

...and its a bad thing to have to make a decision based on a priority and on limited funds?? Seems like this would force a player to take an overview look of his empire and then have to consider carefully what to build where, based on the funds available - forcing him to carefully manage what he has - which is what all civ games should be striving to do anyhow.

PW eliminated the movement aspect. And not being able to upgrade every city because you do not have settlers to handle improvements is a different approach and creates a different strategic mindset to how you manage your empire.

But it's a preference issue. Nothing wrong with preferring one way over another...

Mars · October 5, 2001, 17:19

I'm pretty sure farmlands are still in, i saw iggration in some of the screenshots. So, there probaly are still farmlands.

Lorizael · October 5, 2001, 17:32

Quote:

Originally posted by Mars
I'm pretty sure farmlands are still in, i saw iggration in some of the screenshots. So, there probaly are still farmlands.

Yah, but not everyone liked the idea of having to essentially re-do all of their irrigation with the discovery of refrigeration. Maybe Firaxis was listening to their fans.

In this instance I hope they didn't though. I'm selfish.

As before I say (like most things in CTP) PW was a good idea that was implemented poorly.

SITS · October 5, 2001, 17:52

I don't have a problem Micromanaging if it has a purpose and a reward.

Nemo · October 5, 2001, 20:12

the only good part of PW was that ou could build mulitple tiles at a time. the bad was youcould only do it within your empire's visible range.

JellyDonut · October 6, 2001, 02:48

Quote:

Originally posted by Lorizael
We haven't seen any modern screenshots really.

http://www.civ3.com/images/screensho...snumbertwo.jpg

Nemo · October 6, 2001, 03:13

is that a modern age or industrial age? (or are they the same thing?)

TheRussianKing · October 6, 2001, 03:15

Quote:

Originally posted by SITS
I don't have a problem Micromanaging if it has a purpose and a reward.

right, but the correct way to say this is:
I dont have a problem with micromanagement BECAUSE it has a purpose and a reward.
All those lazy players that don't like micromanagement should play games like Red Alert. The only micromanagement that involves is having to look after ur construction completing!
PW system was much better, because it costs you production rather than pop. And using workers is even worse than settlers because at least when your whole city radius is done you can build a new city. And if you are afraid to lose production or if you dont have enough to produce things already, then you should learn how to play

. If you have workers, they flood the terrain and you'll have to move around too many units, whereas PW gives you unlimited building until u run out of Prod.
Thank you all My supporters, and all those against: let us play!

Crouchback · October 6, 2001, 05:08

JellyDonut,

I don't call 1670 AD modern. We need, we deserve something from later than 1900.

David

SITS · October 6, 2001, 08:47

Quote:

Originally posted by TheRussianKing

right, but the correct way to say this is:
I dont have a problem with micromanagement BECAUSE it has a purpose and a reward.
All those lazy players that don't like micromanagement should play games like Red Alert. The only micromanagement that involves is having to look after ur construction completing!
PW system was much better, because it costs you production rather than pop. And using workers is even worse than settlers because at least when your whole city radius is done you can build a new city. And if you are afraid to lose production or if you dont have enough to produce things already, then you should learn how to play

. If you have workers, they flood the terrain and you'll have to move around too many units, whereas PW gives you unlimited building until u run out of Prod.
Thank you all My supporters, and all those against: let us play!

Not all mircromanagement is purposeful or rewarding - some of it is just irratating. One of the wonders I try my best to get is LW so I don't have to keep upgrading individual units. At least with SMAC you could upgrade all units of a certain design if you had enough money.

I've never played CTP so I won't comment too much but I prefer workers going round and doing things, worring about them being attacked etc. Late on in the game I would like to turn them over to automatic if it was halfway decent.

SerapisIV · October 6, 2001, 10:02

Quote:

Originally posted by Crouchback
I don't call 1670 AD modern. We need, we deserve something from later than 1900.

Yeah but it's 1670 with a fully developed trans-continental railroad. I'd rather see that shot then 1800 and still marching knights around the map.

Nemo · October 6, 2001, 15:43

Quote:

Originally posted by SerapisIV

Yeah but it's 1670 with a fully developed trans-continental railroad. I'd rather see that shot then 1800 and still marching knights around the map.

i dont think the year has much to do with it. i mean, i would often have musketeers and cannons by 1 ad on easier levels.

JellyDonut · October 6, 2001, 16:00

Quote:

Originally posted by SITS

Not all mircromanagement is purposeful or rewarding - some of it is just irratating. One of the wonders I try my best to get is LW so I don't have to keep upgrading individual units. At least with SMAC you could upgrade all units of a certain design if you had enough money.

Well, in Civ III LW just halves the cost of upgrades. It's powerful nonetheless, but you still have to upgrade each unit.

Akron · October 6, 2001, 16:05

I don't think we seen a real modern screenshot yet. They wouldn't take out that cool skyscraper architecture in the modern age. These dirty, ugly factories show that it's the industrial age, not the modern age. So we have no way of knowing whether there is double irrigation either. I certainly hope there is, partially because the plain irrigation graphics in Civ 3 look so bad.

JellyDonut · October 6, 2001, 16:27

Well, I guess you're right. The screenshot of the week isn't modern. Why else would it be called industrialagesnumbertwo.jpg ?

TheRussianKing · October 6, 2001, 22:31

Quote:

Originally posted by Nemo

i dont think the year has much to do with it. i mean, i would often have musketeers and cannons by 1 ad on easier levels.

Yeah, and I get to Explosives by 300-400AD in Deity.

Micromanagement is very important. I always use the technique, never let the dumbass PC take my country over for me!

JellyDonut · October 6, 2001, 22:48

Micromanagement is good until a point where it just becomes tedious. I hope governors can alleviate this problem. In Civ II you could have the domestic advisor take over production orders for a city, but I never chose that option because the dumbass wanted Aqueducts in size-5 cities and Cathedrals in cities with Shakespeare's...

old dog · October 7, 2001, 09:01

Quote:

Originally posted by SITS
I don't have a problem Micromanaging if it has a purpose and a reward.

Exactly! I think that quality AI and your "sense of micromanagement" are closely interrelated.

In Civ 2, I need to get my caravans to my capitol to build the Great Wall. Is it micromanagement? "Yes", if I am sure that I'll succeed. It's just a pain of a job to move them all there. "No", if I'm in serious doubt, if there's a tension about getting them all there in time.

City governors, better unit "go to" performance, build queues, etc are very nice, don't get me wrong. But the real key to avoiding the sense of drudge micromanagement is to have an AI that is unpredictable and competitive enough so that there is a real sense of purpose in what you are doing.

In the end, AI is everything.

TheBirdMan · October 7, 2001, 09:19

Quote:

One of main reasons of criticism was taht you can't build improvments outside your cities (CTP1).......... .

Yes you can! But you have to make a road/railroad to where you want to build your improvement (radar/sonar/airbase etc) - fairly reasonable as you have to transport material.

If you wanted to make improvements on an island or something far away from you, then you had to move a settler to the place, build your city (compare that to make a temporarely camp) build your improvement and then disband your city - you will get your settler back and have him ready for next task.

Of course the is a risk for starvation - that your city dies and you loose your settler, but that's life (or more correct, the opposite).

Edit: I take it, that you think the installations things more than of improvements.