Desires For Future Civ3 Patches (A thread saving thread)

[jbrians]

Originally posted by codemast01
All air units have problems.

Lets ignore the fact that air cannot sink ships because many have already mentioned this.

This is dumb, I agree. But, ships generally can return fire against aircraft, which would need to be modeled as well to be fair.

* Precision Strike is not useful when you can't decide what the target should be.

Yeah, this ability is totally useless without. It also reminds me that cities lose way too many improvements when they are taken over.

* Instead of keeping ground units from being destroyed by air, why not have ground anti-air units like a mobile Surface-to-Air missile. This is much more realistic then pretending that 2000lbs and 1000lbs bombs can only seriously injure (BUT NOT KILL) ground forces.

I think this is very accurate. As we are seeing in Afghainistan, you can weaken a ground force with air power, but you have to bring in troops of your own to finish them off.
-Brian

[mbarloewen]

Originally posted by jbrians


Yeah, this ability is totally useless without. It also reminds me that cities lose way too many improvements when they are taken over.

I agree.

I think that more buildings should survive when you conquer a city.

[admiralk]

Basicly this is all I want thats not in the list.

*Easier to get leaders. If a leader is going to be a major part of the game then it should be much easier to get them rather then get lucky and get one. This will add more strategy to the game and make it avalible for the Civ to have armies as an important part of every attack force. (For instance a Civ can get a leader from means other than military. Throughout history Leaders come for unmilitary situations such as education. Maybe by making it possible to get a leader the first time you have a golden age or by building a wonder that relates to your civ it can carry out this)

Although a little major for a game to change i think it is nessasary.

[Jrad]

Just a thought-it may be better to make the Forbidden Palace an improvement based on the amount of cities you have rather than a small wonder. Think about it-it gets buildable when you reach x cities...why not let more be built, for a more expensive price? This would patch up holes and prevent overkill at the same time yet allow for more balanced corruption.

[paranoidandroid]

Originally posted by Ozymandous

...snip...

Nuclear plants on the other hand should require ocean squares as mentioned.

I must be missing something here. Why should nuclear plants require any access to water at all, and if they do, why must it be ocean?

(EDITED)

Heh, me dumb. I do think that nuclear plants should work just fine with an aqueduct, however.

[Skanky Burns]

Units
12-8-?? If spare automated workers are available, they should ALL help clean up pollution as happened in version 1.07, rather than just sending two workers to do the job.

[Jrad]

Because real life nuclear plants require water to run, but I think they should require simply irregation...

[LdyMox]

- I have had problems with building my spaceship. Once I build my last module there is no way to get the spaceship screen to come up and thus launch

- Fix the graphics glitch made by the last patch. The little black box outlines when you operate at a higher resolution

[wapamingo]

I do not know whether this has been asked or suggested...

but I am tired of looking at a city production and the number displayed is for waste+actual production, as opposed to dividing these into to. I do not want to waste time actually counting each and every blue shield in order to see the actual production potential.

cheers,

[Optimizer]

Bill3000 said:

- allow city improvement to count as a resource in the city it was built (For instance, a Steel Mill could count as a Steel resource)

Well, don't bother about adding new resources. Just allow city improvements to provide some of the existing ones, just like in the real world.

Suggestions for standard improvements:

• Stud - provides Horses, requires Horses (so you can trade for them once for all)
• Saltpeter Mill - provides Saltpeter
• Charcoal Stacks - provides Coal
• Fuel Plant - provides Oil, requires Coal
• Rubber factory - provides Rubber, requires Oil
• Vineyard - provides Wine, requires Wine, increases happiness

They should be rather expensive, but a civ with good infrastructure would need only one.

[Redstar]

"not to worry though you can change 5000 tons of bricks into a bronze statue, or the babylonian equivalent of a herbaceous border with no penalty.
"

I guess its all in the experience.
for me....i try to build a wonder(early stage)...some1 beats me to it. Then i rush out and buy a tech so i can build another. I get beaten to that 1. So then i try to build another and get beat..or i have no other options...i lose a ton of production in what is usually my biggest city at that time.

Now i agree totally, that realistically it makes no sense you should be able to change wonder production without major penalty.

But, i think you should be able to change without cost because the AI cheats!!

Now, here, i have no idea if that is really true. It just seems that way by how fast some of the other civs build those wonders.

[codemast01]

Unit movement points should vary with the size of maps. This is especially important for sea and air units. Sea unit movement take far too long (compare to reality). Air units cannot attack very deep into large landmasses. However if there were airbases or the ablity to land in allied cities, this wouldn't be a big problem. It is a problem when you have to attack from a carrier.

Secondly, although I haven't seen it happen many times in CivIII, I'd like to support doing something to keep older units from beating modern ones. (How long do you think the Taliban would last if they had been armed with spears instead of AK-47s). This brings up a problem that will not likely be fixed with a patch. With the exception of high-tech weapons (planes, carriers) all nations have basically the same weapons. The only difference is the training and skill of the soldier. Something should be done to reflect this in future Civ games.

[CharlesUFarley]

Originally posted by El_Presidente
*Idea*
How about Firaxis release a finished game. Y'know one that works. It's all very well releasing a beta version then patching it, but it's not really something you expect a 'respected' (*chortle*) development team to do. I look at the list of bug fixes and improvements there are so many, why could you not have spent a few more weeks in development and fixed before the retail release. It's very sad, I'd have thought that with all the great games Sid has made he'd (and Firaxis) would have the decency to treat their loyal fans with some respect.

Every time one of the Firaxis team posts a update everyone thanks them for keeping the community up to date, but I can't help but think, why should people support you when you blatently try to rip them off?

Mabye when you've fixed all the problems added some decent scenario support tools and added the MultiPlayer (without extra expense, as promised) I'll consider playing Civ3.

El' makes a good point. I dont mind the patches and the fact that the game was released "unfinished". But, I think Firaxis should give us more updates on where the coders are devoting their energies right now, so that we know whats being worked on, and what isn't.

And second of all, I think to solve a major problem for Firaxis ... instead of making patches and modifications to the game, as per the request of the community. Why dont they just add to the editor, by making ALL those options and features that people are complaining about "TOGGLE" able. In other words, instead of "hard-coding" it in. Take all the features and put it in the Preferences menu, or in the scenario tools.

Eg.

Stacked movement On / Off
AI free units On / Off
Air units bomb ships On / Off

etc.

Charles.

[TheRascalKing]

Hey, they should make it possible for you to take cities built on 1-square islands without having to wait for Amphibious Warfare.

This game has so many annoyances...good thing you can change a lot of it in the editor.

Oh, as a note, I don't think that they should change anything that could be manually changed using a patch. That is, I hope they don't change the mod files I've created at all when I patch civ3. Go ahead and change some of the variables civ uses, but don't mess with my mod files!

[SentryMode]

PLEASE bring back Sentry Mode. Why in the world was it ever removed?

[TechWins]

The Reference Post is update, however, the list only includes ideas from pages 1 and 3. I accidentally started off with page 3 on my new updates instead of page 2, sorry. I plan on implementing the rest of the ideas in the next few days, if all else goes right. Believe it or not it takes quite a long time doing this, and that is why it takes me so long to update the Reference Post, as well as other factors, such as activities in life.

EDIT- I forgot to mention that I had to delete a lot of text in the Reference Post because the maximum amount of characters you can have in a post is 20,000 and the Reference Post now has 20,000 characters. I'm not sure how I will continue to update the Reference Post with this character cap. The only two things I can think of are a) Zip the Reference Post, but I don't really like the idea of having to do that or b) Have Mark give me the capabilities to post messages over 20,000 characters.

[ChrisShaffer]

I'm guessing number of pages is determined by your preferences for number of articles per page...since I only show two pages. Could you let us know which posts weren't included?

[Goth]

I haven't read EVERYTHING on the board, but am nonetheless suprised that no one else has mentioned this...

As much as I love the strategic resource system (great idea guys), it's major drawback is the random disappearance of the resource. I understand that to make it disappear based on the amout of use is not practical in a patch so I offer a simpler suggestion.

If you have the random number generator run 10-20 turns (and the duration from 10-20 turns can be randomized) AHEAD of the disappearance of the resource then a small pop-up warning can be generated. For example, in 1958 the random number generator determines that the resource will disappear -- generating a message like "Our mystics have determined that one of our oil resources will disappear in 17 turns." (17 determined randomly between 10 and 20). Then, you have some warning that you'd better find more oil. It seems more realistic and is certainly less frustrating.

[Quantum]

I have a suggestions for worker unit commands. If I have a stack of five workers that I want to irrigate a grassland tile that was previously mined (only the AI
would mine grassland!) I should only have to tell one worker that I want to destroy the mine. Instead, I get five different pop-up boxes that ask me if I am sure I want to destroy the mine.

Yes I am sure I want to destroy the mine.
Yes I am still sure I want to destroy the mine.
Yes I am still sure I want to destroy the mine.
Yes I am still sure I want to destroy the mine.
Yes I am still sure I want to destroy the mine!

[Colonel Kraken]

Originally posted by Quantum
I have a suggestions for worker unit commands. If I have a stack of five workers that I want to irrigate a grassland tile that was previously mined (only the AI
would mine grassland!) I should only have to tell one worker that I want to destroy the mine. Instead, I get five different pop-up boxes that ask me if I am sure I want to destroy the mine.

Yes I am sure I want to destroy the mine.
Yes I am still sure I want to destroy the mine.
Yes I am still sure I want to destroy the mine.
Yes I am still sure I want to destroy the mine.
Yes I am still sure I want to destroy the mine!

That is TOTALLY funny!

eh-hem, sorry

[CharlesUFarley]

Originally posted by Goth
I haven't read EVERYTHING on the board, but am nonetheless suprised that no one else has mentioned this...

As much as I love the strategic resource system (great idea guys), it's major drawback is the random disappearance of the resource. I understand that to make it disappear based on the amout of use is not practical in a patch so I offer a simpler suggestion.

If you have the random number generator run 10-20 turns (and the duration from 10-20 turns can be randomized) AHEAD of the disappearance of the resource then a small pop-up warning can be generated. For example, in 1958 the random number generator determines that the resource will disappear -- generating a message like "Our mystics have determined that one of our oil resources will disappear in 17 turns." (17 determined randomly between 10 and 20). Then, you have some warning that you'd better find more oil. It seems more realistic and is certainly less frustrating.

Thats a good point, and a good suggestion as well. But here is a better idea for them.. how about in the editor, or preferences menu, whichever they find more suiting... you have "toggle" switches for the resources... so that players can set them to whatever they want...!

Resources
ON/OFF (On = the resource(s) never disappear)
TIME LIMIT (# of turns available/years whatever)
ERA LIMIT (Only available in certain eras, set which era)

etc etc.. you get my meaning?

Charles.

[bahoo]

My requests for the future patch:

1. Allow units to fight off deposers. They have guns and stuff, surely they can take on a few peasant revolutoinaries.

2. Allow cruise missiles to go on something. They have a terrible range and can only fire from cities, they're particularly useless. We shot them at Afganistan, I reckon from a boat or sub or something, I'm sure somebody knows, but definetely not from a city.

3. Radar artillery should get 2 movement, being as they have treads and tracks.

4. Helicopters should be able to load on carriers to drop troops off. Additionally, you should still be able to make infantry once you get mechanized infantry so you can load them on helicopters.

5. You should not be able to draft mechanized infantry as you should actually have to build the armored personel carriers.

6. The price on espionage should be feasible, it seems to me it's way cheaper to research techs then steal them. On top of that you should be able to do more espionage missions like in CivII, where'd they all go?

7. The AI should once in awhile give you a fair deal, especially if you're on good terms with them. Why is it they always want a luxury + tech just for a luxury?

8. ICBM's should do more damage.

9. There needs to be a long-range large payload bomber, such as the B52 stratofortress (I think that's what it's called).

10. Need to be able to build airstrips. All major wars WWII onward focused on getting airstrips or slapping them down on an island.

11. There ought to be some optional techs to build biological and chemical weapons.

12. What happened to fundamentalism??? Bring it back.

13. And finally, give me my wonder movies!

[TheRascalKing]

Originally posted by bahoo
My requests for the future patch:

1. Allow units to fight off deposers. They have guns and stuff, surely they can take on a few peasant revolutoinaries.

2. Allow cruise missiles to go on something. They have a terrible range and can only fire from cities, they're particularly useless. We shot them at Afganistan, I reckon from a boat or sub or something, I'm sure somebody knows, but definetely not from a city.

3. Radar artillery should get 2 movement, being as they have treads and tracks.

4. Helicopters should be able to load on carriers to drop troops off. Additionally, you should still be able to make infantry once you get mechanized infantry so you can load them on helicopters.

5. You should not be able to draft mechanized infantry as you should actually have to build the armored personel carriers.

6. The price on espionage should be feasible, it seems to me it's way cheaper to research techs then steal them. On top of that you should be able to do more espionage missions like in CivII, where'd they all go?

7. The AI should once in awhile give you a fair deal, especially if you're on good terms with them. Why is it they always want a luxury + tech just for a luxury?

8. ICBM's should do more damage.

9. There needs to be a long-range large payload bomber, such as the B52 stratofortress (I think that's what it's called).

10. Need to be able to build airstrips. All major wars WWII onward focused on getting airstrips or slapping them down on an island.

11. There ought to be some optional techs to build biological and chemical weapons.

12. What happened to fundamentalism??? Bring it back.

13. And finally, give me my wonder movies!

You can change a lot of this stuff in the editor. Open up the editor and open up "civ3mod.bic" from your main civ directory. Go up to "Rules" and choose "Edit Rules". You'll find that you can manually and easily modify your suggestions numbered 2, 3, and 5, and add fundamentalism, but that's a little tricky. With difficulty and the proper copy-tool downloaded from the files section, you can also (but with difficulty) add units, techs, and city improvements.

[Gramphos]

I want an option in the editor to set where in the icon sheet the era specific icons start (or an option to set icon per era).

[lilbro]

General Idea:

I would like to see the number of years that go by in a turn the same as Civ 2. I was recently trying out Civ 2 and only 20 years go by in one turn at the start of the game. In Civ 3, 50 years go by.

Not sure if this has been mentioned yet.

[korn469]

EDITOR CHANGES

1) allow the player to set which terrain wheeled units can't move over

2) allow the player to set which terrain a settler can found a city on

[TechWins]

Just to let everybody know, the new thread for this can be found here. Please visit that thread instead. MarkG said he was going to "top" that thread, but then again that was two days ago. Hopefully he'll remember to do it when he sees the thread.

[korn469]

tech wins those suggestions came directly from looking for a solution to your tundra problem

[TechWins]

I'm glad to hear I was your inspiration, Korn. It's not that I don't want any cities to be built on tundra; it's just that the AI does an overkill on expansion and builds far too many cities on tundra because of that. I figured lowering the value of tundra would prevent as many cities being built on tundra by the AI, which from my experience it seems as if I was correct.

AGAIN, EVERYBODY VISIT THIS THREAD INSTEAD!

[Gramphos]

Originally posted by TechWins
AGAIN, EVERYBODY VISIT THIS THREAD INSTEAD!

Have you PMed Ming/Markos about it?