Ideas for v1.18f?

[ChrisShaffer]

Originally posted by Willem


You arguing over nothing here. Quite obviously some changes will be in store regarding pollution in the new patch. So why not wait and see how they work before complaining?

Not arguing at all, Willem. What made you think I was arguing? I was just talking about changes I'd like to see in the game, whether they're included in the 1.17f patch (which I doubt based on the list) or in a later patch.

Are you trying to stifle discussion by arguing that people who want things you don't want are overly argumentative?

[Willem]

Originally posted by ChrisShaffer


Not arguing at all, Willem. What made you think I was arguing? I was just talking about changes I'd like to see in the game, whether they're included in the 1.17f patch (which I doubt based on the list) or in a later patch.

Are you trying to stifle discussion by arguing that people who want things you don't want are overly argumentative?

No, not at all. And quite obviously I misunderstood you. I apologize.

[ChrisShaffer]

Originally posted by Willem
No, not at all. And quite obviously I misunderstood you. I apologize.

Thanks.

[bahoo]

1. Wake all command OR make it so you can wake units from the military advisor screen without popping back to the main board everytime you wake one. Mobilizing for war is a pain as is, especially if you have your offensive units spread out.

2. Cruise missiles need to be loadable on to something (subs, AEGIS missile cruisers, SCUD missile launchers)

3. Get rid of out-dated units from the production screen.

4. Although I like the ability to completely repress citizens with enough troops, I'd still like to see them implement a system where by military units could defend against a revolt (fighting partisans or some such)

5. Bring back fundamentalism!!!!

[Willem]

Originally posted by bahoo
Although I like the ability to completely repress citizens with enough troops, I'd still like to see them implement a system where by military units could defend against a revolt (fighting partisans or some such)

5. Bring back fundamentalism!!!!

Yes, please bring back Partisans. With the importance of roads as they are now, they would probably add an interesting element to the game.

[Adagio]

Originally posted by bahoo
3. Get rid of out-dated units from the production screen.

Yeah!!!

How about making an replacement unit for some of the units needing a strategic resurce, like the tanks: Make a cheap version of the tank (for those who don't have the nesesary resurces) with the same attack strenght as the horse (Can never remember the name of the best horse rider ) and maybe a point more in defense, just to make it look like we actually has the tech needed to make a tank. It does look pretty ugly when knowing how to make a modern tank, but because of lack of resurces I have to settle with a horseman.

Just a thought, though I guess it will be to much for a patch, but I am allowed to dream, right

[sadistiq]

I think all of us have had this problem at one time or another:

You have a ton of cities and you're quickley converting the countryside into slick railroads, irrigation, and mines. Of course every city is producing workers at a massive rate, and every time one is finished you have to select it and then automate it.

I think there should be an option in the governor menu to have all workers automatically automated so that I don't have to waste a million hours a turn designating them automatic.

[The_Aussie_Lurker]

OK, at the risk of sounding repetitive, I have a few suggestions for the next patch (which I accept will not be along for a couple of months!):

1) Expanded diplomacy: I know it's been mentioned before, but I would like to see things like 3rd party negotiations, as well as science pacts and environment pacts!! (science pacts are where you gain the benefits of each others research facilities as well as automatic trading of advances gained! Environment pacts are where each side agrees to reduce pollution in every city by a certain amount!)

2) Allies should be able to place their units in each others cities and fortresses etc.

3) Bring Back Civil Wars in the event of a Civ losing it's capital!! This was one part of Civ2 that I always enjoyed!!!

4) Some sort of events language for all those scenario writers who are dying to get started on their scenarios!

EDIT: 5) Have enemy roads and rail count as movement on plains, regardless of the actual terrain!! (ie all movement on Roads/RR= 1mp/sqaure in enemy territory, not 1/3mp per square)

Anyway, with all of those features in, I'll be INCREDIBLY HAPPY!!!

Yours,
The_Aussie_Lurker

[Adagio]

Originally posted by The_Aussie_Lurker
2) Allies should be able to place their units in each others cities and fortresses etc.

Adn what would happen if you are allied with 2 civs (have the protection pact with both of them) and one of the civs attack the other civ, which means you have to go to war with your allied (in which you have some soldiers in some cities)?

Originally posted by The_Aussie_Lurker
3) Bring Back Civil Wars in the event of a Civ losing it's capital!! This was one part of Civ2 that I always enjoyed!!!

Oh yeah!!! And then give it a possibility to make the country split into two+ countries. And there shouldn't just pop up a new palace in some other city, you will have to build it again before your country has a capital again!
EDIT: And make that a news item as the wonders news

[Zoid]

I want the GoTo-box back, like in CIV2 and SMAC. This drawing a line buisness is absolutely crap! Especially if you have a large empire.

Bring back the GoTo-box, Firaxis. Pretty please with sugar on?

[fezick31]

Originally posted by Kamrat X
I want the GoTo-box back, like in CIV2 and SMAC. This drawing a line buisness is absolutely crap! Especially if you have a large empire.

Bring back the GoTo-box, Firaxis. Pretty please with sugar on?

CTRL+SHIFT+G brings up the goto box. They just didn't mention it in the manual (at least i didn't find it).

[LRotan]

A major thing I'd like to see addressed is the ability to keep the AI out of my territory. This, at the moment, is my biggest issue with Civ3, followed closely by the frequently strange combat results.

A land unit similar to the privateer could go a long way to keeping the AI from marching its troops\settlers on through without a care in the world. Another way would be to be able to build "walls" around your cultural borders. Something like a city improvement or small wonder that would act as an impassable barrier around the borders of that specific city, or the civilization as a whole in the case of the wonder, unless war was declared first or a RoP was secured would be enough. I'm not sure how simple it would be to program the AI to understand that if such an improvement or wonder was in place, they need to declare war if they *need* to get through or seek a passage agreement, but it doesn't sound difficult. As it stands, RoP serves really no purpose whatsoever. The AI disregards borders whenever it feels like it.

The only problem I could see popping up from this is the AI declaring war repeatedly every time it wants to go through for any reason. To avoid this, perhaps the AI should prioritize RoPs over declarations of war if they need through. Just a suggestion.

Edit: Actually, which option the AI prioritizes, RoP or declaration of war, should be dependent on their attitude toward you.

[Willem]

Originally posted by LRotan
A major thing I'd like to see addressed is the ability to keep the AI out of my territory. This, at the moment, is my biggest issue with Civ3, followed closely by the frequently strange combat results.

A land unit similar to the privateer could go a long way to keeping the AI from marching its troops\settlers on through without a care in the world. Another way would be to be able to build "walls" around your cultural borders. Something like a city improvement or small wonder that would act as an impassable barrier around the borders of that specific city, or the civilization as a whole in the case of the wonder, unless war was declared first or a RoP was secured would be enough. I'm not sure how simple it would be to program the AI to understand that if such an improvement or wonder was in place, they need to declare war if they *need* to get through or seek a passage agreement, but it doesn't sound difficult. As it stands, RoP serves really no purpose whatsoever. The AI disregards borders whenever it feels like it.

The only problem I could see popping up from this is the AI declaring war repeatedly every time it wants to go through for any reason. To avoid this, perhaps the AI should prioritize RoPs over declarations of war if they need through. Just a suggestion.

Edit: Actually, which option the AI prioritizes, RoP or declaration of war, should be dependent on their attitude toward you.

This is definitely a common complaint around here, it's one of mine as well. But I figure a very easy way to solve it would be to give Fortresses the old Zone of Control rules. I think they went a bit to far when they got rid of the old rules, they should just have reduced the use of it instead.

[Thrawn05]

How about a patch that deals less with correcting text in the civilopedia and more with making Civ3 more stable with better performance?

Isn't that goal of every patch?

[LRotan]

Originally posted by Willem


This is definitely a common complaint around here, it's one of mine as well. But I figure a very easy way to solve it would be to give Fortresses the old Zone of Control rules. I think they went a bit to far when they got rid of the old rules, they should just have reduced the use of it instead.

I agree. That also gave fortresses a real purpose, whereas they aren't nearly as effective in CivIII. The way I see them is that they're just a way to protect units that aren't in cities. All around, this would be an even easier fix than the ones I suggested and no less effective.

On a similar note, I played a game earlier today and another problem popped up with RoPs. I signed one with America as the Romans because they had several cities on both sides of my territory. It was just less of a headache to let them on through than to keep telling them to get lost and be summarily ignored. However, over a few turns they started sending workers back and forth and altering *my* terrain in the process. I had a group of four of them standing right outside of Rome irrigating one of my mines. That definitely needs to be looked at for future patches.

[DaXX]

Workers currently have the following option when you interrupt their work:

Yes. The is more important work to do.
No. carry on.


There should be a third option......

Finish work but wait for orders afterwards

[Spiffor]

About Specialists : it would be good if their output was modified by the city imrovements (i.e, a taxman in a city with marketplace and bank would produce 2 coins instead of one, 4 scientists in a library town would produce 6 science etc...). That way, having overpopulated cities would be much more useful.

It would be great if there was a way to add new specialists in the editor, with new possible functions : producing culture, food, shields... pretty anything a city can produce. For example, I want the "artist" specialist in my modded game : I click "add" in the specialist screen, name my specialist, and make him produce 1 culture per turn. If we can add specialists (and make them produce anything we want), some mods could have the SMAC feeling, where better specialists are found when you progress in the tech tree.

For now, it is possible to condition a specialist to a tech, but not to an improvement. Conditioning specilists to improvements would be nice also : for example, my "mass entertainer" could exist only in cities with a "cinema" (custom building).


In the Editor, about buildings : I don't know if it is even possible, but adapting the production modificator would be fun. For example, if I want a "mill", medieval like factory, I add it (I assume Firaxis is already aware the editor must make it simple to add buildings), check the "raises production by X%" box, and set this to 20%. Same thing for marketplaces / libray like buildings.


A small thing about rules : I'd like seeing Railroad being extra productive on forests : for now, when you discovered railroad, you can chop down every forest : the remaining railroaded grassland, if mined, will give you 2 food and 2 shields, instead of 1 food and 2 shields in the forest. Railroaded forests should produce 3 shields instead of 2, so that you have to hesitate before chopping a forest.

[Spec]

I would add a new governement, it would be:

Masochism
Your citizens grow to like cruel oppression! Using "the whip" makes citizens happy!

Thanks Roy!

Spec.

[Willem]

Originally posted by Spiffor
About Specialists : it would be good if their output was modified by the city imrovements (i.e, a taxman in a city with marketplace and bank would produce 2 coins instead of one, 4 scientists in a library town would produce 6 science etc...). That way, having overpopulated cities would be much more useful.

Actually, the whole Specialist thing needs to be reworked, especially the Taxman. It's ludicrous to pull someone off the land who's producing 3 food, 1 shield, and 1 gold, in order to create a Taxman who only produces 1 gold. The only time they're of any use is if the city is overpopulated with no more land left to work, or a very marginal city, like one built in the desert.

It would be great if there was a way to add new specialists in the editor, with new possible functions : producing culture, food, shields... pretty anything a city can produce. For example, I want the "artist" specialist in my modded game : I click "add" in the specialist screen, name my specialist, and make him produce 1 culture per turn. If we can add specialists (and make them produce anything we want), some mods could have the SMAC feeling, where better specialists are found when you progress in the tech tree.

I fully agree. I'm rather disappointed to see the same old specialists in the game. There should be much more variety as time goes by, to reflect the increasing complexity of societies, and ones that can affect more than just the basic 3 areas. I'd give some examples, but then I'd just be repeating myself.

I also thought it would be cool to have a Wandering Minstrel unit, one that just wandered from town to town. And while he was in a city, 1 citizen would be content, and 1 culture point would be added. There could be an upgrade path similar to the Worker, so that by the modern era it would become a "Superstar", or some such thing.

[Willem]

Originally posted by Spiffor

In the Editor, about buildings : I don't know if it is even possible, but adapting the production modificator would be fun. For example, if I want a "mill", medieval like factory, I add it (I assume Firaxis is already aware the editor must make it simple to add buildings), check the "raises production by X%" box, and set this to 20%. Same thing for marketplaces / libray like buildings.

You can adjust the production values now, though the increases only work in increments of 25%. So a 1 in the "Production" box is 25%, 2 is 50% etc. And Mike has already mentioned to another poster with the same idea that adjustable increases for Science etc. would be a good idea. He mentioned though that other things are more important right now, like starting locations and unit/city placement. I suspect that eventually your wish will come true.

Railroaded forests should produce 3 shields instead of 2, so that you have to hesitate before chopping a forest.

There's a way around that now. Simply add a mining bonus to your Forests. The problem is that when the AI civs improve the land, they use the same as the "A" terraform command instead of the "Shift A". Since the game considers Forests an improvement, the "Shift A" command won't allow a Worker to cut down the forest, whereas the "A" will. I've tried it in my own game and my workers will mine the forests, but the other civs will just chop them down.

[Dracleath]

Here's one that should be easy: Fix the diplomatic advisor crash when you try to put in more than 16 selecable civiliazations. How hard can it be to just have it default to a picture if one isn't availible for that civ?

[candidgamera]

Originally posted by jimmytrick
6. leaders of various sorts...these should be randomly spawned (in the ancient times think of these as specific groups such as a royal family or religious sect) and should die out...while alive they should be able to give certain types of bonuses...military, shield production, culture, happiness, less gold coruption, higher wonder improvement, ... these leaders might be subject to being assainated, discredited, bribed or kidnapped by said aforemention spies...etc..

18. more military units including naval and aircraft, and anti aircraft special unit abilitites

23. for strategic goods like coal...collect them one per turn per tile of resource...and make the civ build storage facilities (say allow five free per city beyond which a civ has to build depots that could be captured or destroyed) and use them when building units that require them..

I could go on and on like this but I know no one will have read past number 4 anyway..

For 6. I'd refine to being caused by completion of non-battle type events - like a ship that goes all the way around the world. or first transcontinental railroad. Maybe combined with the MOO2 mode of appearance.

18. definitely - and radar (like OP in SMAC), antiair, antiship ratings to go with.

23. like it, mixed with establishing a cost based on a "world market" availability of a given resource - there are x of coal in the world and you only control x - y of that coal so you can build units based on what's in the depot/turn - what you own, but to buy more costs more based on "the world market value". Probably heresy to suggest something like this. Like the incentives of resources but like to see the concept refined - and I can live with the possibility of a world with 2 oils only - - just an alternative history. Trade of resources/luxuries could go to trading depot contents too - I need 5 aluminums for 5 fighters.

Of course having played too many wargames too many times I'd go for requiring a barracks to build basic units after a point and special training barracks for certain units - like naval air, tanks, or cavalry, fighters, bombers - just can't build a billion of them in a vacuum

[GePap]

The following are dies that could be placed in a patch:
1. Real long-term defensive alliences, like Civ, Civ2, SMAC, and MOO2 all had, thus allowing you to build long-term friendships with another civ, and improve your chances of simple trades

2. Allow the basing of military units from one ally into the cites of the other(s), like in SMAC

3. Partisans, which would be more important now that we can crush Cultural reversion.

4. A 'stop making war' demand , like in SMAC and MOO2.

All of these would bring in lots of more diplomatic intrigue than the game currently has.

[candidgamera]

Must confess some of my ideas above are fantasy for a patch - maybe civ4.

Diplomatic option would like is to give units to an ally - you could proxy war this way without necessarily giving the aided guy your tech. Should have impact of course eventually on relationship with the guy fighting the guy you aided - like having spies discovered.

[Optimizer]

Who will compile these ideas? Anybody?

Make gov-specific buildings operational only under their respective government! In that way, they would become really useful!

[DaXX]

ok i already posted this somewhere else but i should post it here if this is the official place....


Units should be able to GoTo boats.... not sure why they can't, if that's an intentional thing or just a drawback to the interface at the present time.... so i have to move the unit to the square next to the boat and then use the cursor and move it onto the boat by hand.

PLEASE FIRAXIS HELP

[DaXX]

catapults receive the "artillery bombardment failed." message way too often

[Willem]

Originally posted by DaXX
catapults receive the "artillery bombardment failed." message way too often

I agree. It's rather a pain having 10 artillery fire and only 1 of them actually does anything. Plus when it does, quite often there's no message as to what I hit.

[LRotan]

Originally posted by GePap
1. Real long-term defensive alliences, like Civ, Civ2, SMAC, and MOO2 all had, thus allowing you to build long-term friendships with another civ, and improve your chances of simple trades

I couldn't agree more here. Alliances shouldn't be 20 turn things just for the purposes of a war. That's what MPPs are for. Alliances IMO should be pseudo-permanent things entailing lasting friendships and such.

[Willem]

Barbarians should be tougher. I set mine on Raging and I still think they're wimps. They should at least raze a size 1 city with no culture if they beat the defending unit. In the event of a raging horde of Horseman, this should be done by the very last unit in the stack, while all the rest do the usual pillaging thing. Maybe this could be tied into the Raging setting.

As well, I'd like to have the option in the editor to select the combat experience of the Barbarian units. The current Conscripts don't give my Veteran units much of a challenge, though I realize many people wouldn't share my preference.