Comprehensive revamp of trade and infrastructure

Here are the basic ideas from all of my trade/infrastructure posts, as well as some others....

Basically, I felt that not nearly enough attention was paid to trade in Civ2. In Civ3, we need realistic trade which is important to the players' prospects in the game. A player without a good trade set up should not be able to prosper. Exports and imports should be CRITICAL in the later stages of the game.

First, resources. Resource tiles should produce a fixed number of resources per turn.. For example, a bare iron ore rock could produce 1 iron ore, 2 if connected by road, 3 if a mine is built on it, 4 if the mine is connected by road. Rail and ship should not increase the rate of production though, beyond that of road. For this to work, and be realistic, the 'shield' concept should be done away with. Units will require specific resources (eg. phalanx : 20 bronze, knight : 20 gold, 40 iron, tank : 60 steel, 30 diesel)..

IVANMV had an ingenious idea: the resources are spread unevenly thruout the world. Certain countries get more oil, some get more iron, some more uranium etc.. This will make imports and exports very important. If you do not have the resources you need, say, to finish a nuke (200 uranium, perhaps), you will have to trade to get it.. You could buy it, or exchange it for a price set by the supplier.. If he has a monopoly, he could set the price at 4000 food or something like that. Other countries might set their engineers on building several steel mills. They could then import/mine iron ore, send it to their steel mill, and then export the finished steel at a much higher rate.

Some of the production that each city gets (say, 33% or 50%) goes into the national treasury. This way, parts of your empire don't need to starve while other parts produce excess food.

An important improvement to the infrastructure engine would be totally revamped rail, sea and air routes. These routes would be point-to-point, rather than just to anywhere or nowhere. So, engineers will not be able to build railway tracks wherever they feel like. The tracks will HAVE to run between 'stations' and/or cities. Units will be able to move, in one turn, only as many stations (in any direction) as there are within x no. of spaces, the x being given by the prevalent train technology. This also prevents unlimited movement. For units to use rail, the must embark and disembark only at stations of cities. They are prohibited from using foreigners stations & rail unless the foreigner is an ally, or they pay a fee. If the foreigner is someone with whom you are at war, even that wouldn't be allowed.
Apart from units, resources also use stations and railway lines. A station can be built near a mine that is outside the city radius, and the resources (4 per turn?) are sent to specified city. Perhaps 2 resources go into the national treasury. Also, and engineer can build an oil refinery and a station next to it. Then oil from an oil well can come thru a station and rail to the refinery, which produces diesel from the incoming oil. Track from this station can take the diesel to a city, a port, or a foreign station (for possible export).
The stations could have 'station radii' or catchment areas, specific to their size/status/technology.

Shipping routes can be operated similarly. Port can be built on the coast, preferably on a railway line next to a station (for access to the 'hinterland'), and ships, built at cities or the port, carry goods and passengers to other domestic or international ports, or to offshore establishments (like oil rigs and such). So, from a port, you can build an oil tanker using funds from the national treasury, set up a circuit to and from an oil rig, and make it bring back 2? 4? oil each time it returns (which of course depends on distance). This oil is then taken to an oil refinery (by ship or rail) or exported to another port. Passenger ships also operate between ports, enhancing tourism, migration etc.
You should be able to build port improvements in he port out of the national treasury, like customs houses, immigration control etc., which yield trade, tourism and other benefits.

Airports can also be built by engineers, outside cities. These should also be improvable, with air force or passenger facilities, missile silos, SAM sites etc. Perhaps, if corporations are implemented, the would offer to pay you a fee for their airlines to ply between your airport and another.. Again, tourism benefit. Cargo planes could also fly.

Seeing that rail is so important, they must be relatively expensive to build, requiring funds from the treasury as well as time.

For those fearing too much complexity, the system should be largely automated and intelligent. It should know what to take where, with only minimal input from the user. The user could perhaps control everything from a revamped Trade screen, with special emphasis on imports and exports. From here, tax rates of different commodities could be set. For example, to stimulate the steel industry, iron ore could be made tax free; to increase public health, tobacco could be heavily taxed. For simplicity and manageability, the total number of resources should be kept small, perhaps only to iron, steel, uranium, gold, oil, diesel, bronze(?), food, luxury items(spices?), tobacco (or liquor), electronics.
For those who would rather manage their trade themselves and concentrate less on war, there could be different levels of automation, from almost complete, to minimal.

So, what do you think? Please reply with suggestions, criticism, whatever..

------------------
-Shiva
Email: shiva@mailops.com
Web: http://www.crosswinds.net/india/~shiva
ICQ: 17719980

[VetLegion]

I see lot of ideas from railroad tycoon

Anyway, If your this model worked it presents following difficulty:

In civ games you always have FULL control over your empire. The loss of controll is represented by citys corruption and waste level. However, with unit building and resources you have full controll.

Now, If unlike civs "shields" we had iron, bronze, coal...it would present the problem when someone has say "bronze monopoly" early in the game, and to build horses he needs only, say food and labour, then he effectively becomes dominant civ even if you have phalanx technology, you cannot build them because of lack of bronze resources. He storms you with horses.
And then, what would the resources be? There should be a limited but balanced number of them.

I for one would like to see this work, but frankly I dont know how excatly.

In my previous phalanx example, the history-suggested solution would be: improvize! Give player a unit workshop and he should manage to put up a decent defensive unit. But now that we need tech+resources this becomes more difficult, as there is great possibility that player has one and lacks other.

"The poor traders greeks, although brave and stout people, fall prey to the primitive romans whose only luck was to sit on the worlds biggest supply of iron, while greeks made fortune for centuries, exploiting silk"

see what I mean? How will we awoid the situation of ore monopoly? will we scatter many deposits all over or what? In real world, trade always happened, often between warring sides. But in civ world of player control, how would this be represented?

[The Joker]

I agree with VetLegion. I would love it to work, but I see great problems with the idea. Not only Vet's examble, but also the fact that the game would be extremely complicated (having perhabs 10 or more raw materials and far more manufactured goods). I do not see how it could be done with such simplicity and easy-to-manage-icity that it could be used in a civ game.

I have also become one of the followers of raingoons Energy concept, as it has many of the features of this ideas, and is still far easier to use and manage.

[Urban Ranger]

Another side effect of this monopoly system is everybody will become an expanionist. It is the only way to reduce the chance of becoming a victim, and it is the only way of increasing the chance of achieving a monopoly.

------------------
audentes fortuna juvat

Ok, perhaps the resources thing is too complex..

But what about the idea on rail & transport etc?

------------------
-Shiva
Email: shiva@mailops.com
Web: http://www.crosswinds.net/india/~shiva
ICQ: 17719980

[raingoon]

I like the gist of your ideas, particularly what you've said about monopolies. Sid's last letter mentioned that monopolies would be in the game, but you've pointed out the importance of "price setting" and I hope they heed that over at Firaxis. A player who has a resource to sell should be able to set whatever price he/she wants, and thus a real market will exist in the civ world.

Rail and Road ideas sound right, but I think it all goes back to a workable resource/commodity model in the game. For simplicity and gameplay, I've suggested in my energy model that all processed commodities become generic units of energy. What must vary from unit to unit is the amount of energy required to build it.

The model works like this: Earlier units require very little energy to build at a time when very low yield resources should be widely available (wood, animal power, etc.). This ensures a fair start for all and it's also accurate to history.

Later, more energy-demanding units such as destroyers will require an energy resource that yields at a MUCH higher rate, specifically oil. It isn't that "oil" literally is what you need for destroyers, it's just that the game is balanced such that no other resource would give you enough.

Somebody worried that these resources in the game would make everyone expansionist. I think that's not the case. Far more efficient would be to have a manageable sized civ that sends out explorers who locate energy resources, and then sends out the necessary military to secure and defend them as small colonies.

Resources would also make the game more historically active... Once a civ starts to boom industrially, to sustain the boom, they would need to seek out new resources..
This is what Britain, France and the other colonialists did. Perhaps colonies should be given a different status (not just normal cities, and not wholly under your control - misrule could breed independence)...

------------------
-Shiva
Email: shiva@mailops.com
Web: http://www.crosswinds.net/india/~shiva
ICQ: 17719980

[The Joker]

I think a great effect of having energy in the game is the colonization that Sir Shiva and raingoon described. This would be needed when larger amounts of energy was needed due to the industrial revolution.

And of cause colonies should have a different status than your normal territory. The different statuses your cities could have would be: Integrated (the normal civ style way), colony, protectorate (semiindependant) and occupied territory (when you have just conquored a city).

I've been wondering... is it sensible that resources are always visible, as happens in Civ2?

I mean, to add historical accuracy, some terrains could look useless at the beginning of the game, but later, you could find out how to obtain energy from them... you even would have to build a mine or some kind of improvement to reach hidden resources. Oil extracting in the USA began in the 1850s...

How does this sound?

[raingoon]

Jgv, sounds just right. It'll be a lot more fun to locate the resources, and competition for finding them first should be fierce.

Yes, you should have to look for some resources (you shouldn't be able to see uranium in 200o BC!). Perhaps you should have to initiate exploration for a particular resource in a tile - like oil exploration.. If there is oil nearby, for example, you would probably want to go in for oil exploration, in the hope that you are sitting on top of some huge oil field...

And the status of colonies etc. outlined by Joker seems pretty good.. Perhaps you would like to start a new thread on that?

------------------
-Shiva
Email: shiva@mailops.com
Web: http://www.crosswinds.net/india/~shiva
ICQ: 17719980

[MidKnight Lament]

Searching for some resources like oil and uranium is a good idea as long as it doesn't become a chore.

Perhaps we could have a command to allow a unit to systematically search tiles in a particular area. It could probably be done plenty of other ways too, but we certainly don't want to have to do all the searching ourselves or it could get monotonous.

It's a good idea though. If we have uranium (three cheers for the Energy Model!!!) it makes sense that you should have to search for it. Oil is similar.

- MKL

Engineers could have the ability of seeing hidden terrain resources. Or maybe they could have this ability after obtaining some techno .

I don't know. Just an idea, but I think this can be worked out...

BTW, is this post too far from the original discussion? We could open another thread if you want...

[MidKnight Lament]

It should definitely be linked to a certain advance/s. And I'm thinking there should be a special unit or option which does the searching rather than just an existing one like an engineer. This unit (if it were a unit, but that's up for debate) should require an action to actively search for resources. Personally, I don't think passing over territory is enough. As long as the specific action is easy to use, and doesn't involve a lot of micromanagement.

- MKL

[MidKnight Lament]

And back to the original post, Sir Shiva is dead right here...

quote: Originally posted by Sir Shiva on 03-15-2000 11:36 AM A player without a good trade set up should not be able to prosper. Exports and imports should be CRITICAL in the later stages of the game.

No one becomes a superpower by being totally insular. China did an ok job of it, but they've got a huge population.

- MKL
[This message has been edited by MidKnight Lament (edited April 04, 2000).]

Looking for resources could be done later by remote sensing satellites.. I have tons of ideas for satellites but I think I'll start a new thread..

Back to the topic, I think that this resources model will only work if the transportation system that I outlined in the first post is implemented..
Your thoughts on that?

PS. How does one become a chieftain/emperor?

------------------
-Shiva
Email: shiva@mailops.com
Web: http://www.crosswinds.net/india/~shiva
ICQ: 17719980

[MidKnight Lament]

It's based on number of posts you've made.

Check out the faq at http://apolyton.net/forums/apolytonfaq.shtml for the numbers.

- MKL

[tniem]

I like the idea of having monopolies of raw materials, but I think that it should be stretched to finished products also. If you have Iron working before another civilization, you should be able to sell iron swords and set the price. This way you could make money off of being more advanced. I can see it know, a type of triangle trade, I get iron from the English, make it into swords and shields, to sell to the Russians. The Russians are of course fighting the Aztecs and so they too need swords. I make lots of money and then when the two nations are tired of fighting, I kill them with my next technology.

[The Joker]

Personally I am not sure how looking for ressources should be done. It should be something that you would have to use some ressources (gamewise - money, units, production, trade or something) on doing, but it should be a too tedious job.

Colonies etc:
Maybe I will start such a thread... I have been advocating for that ever since I first arrived at this forum, so many people propably already know the ideas. But I will consider it.

[MidKnight Lament]

Trade is a tricky one. Ideally it would be best if we had responsive markets in raw materials and finished goods. We would have to put resources into converting one to the other. We'd be able to create monopolies and cater for niche markets. I haven't played Imperialism, but Colonization springs to mind with a few of these.

We were only able to nuture that sort of system because we looked after a small number of cities though. It's going to be hard to get the comlexity in trade that we're looking for without tedious micro-management when we're looking after 30 or more cities.

I'm still unsure how trade should best be handled... Still waiting for someone to come up with an excellent idea. Sounds like Firaxis already have an idea how they're going to do it.

- MKL

[Gord McLeod]

As far as locating hidden resources goes, maybe have some type (or types) of Prospector unit that can move about the terrain and search for a variety of special resource types. Make them smart enough to know the types of terrain to search for a given type of resource, and to avoid hellish micromanagement, allow them to search not only the square they're sitting in but every square in their range of sight. One square diameter, two with the appropriate upgrade or replacement unit.

[The Mad Viking]

Some thoughts:
1. Buying units- I don;t understand how you can just buy a unit for cash. Who built it? Where did they get the production? To me, this is the most important change to make. You can't buy anything that someone hasn't produced. Resources, energy and factories somewhere, make that armor unit or that offshore platform. You would need to increase production rates to compensate. Money is just a representation of goods owed.

2. Trade in commodities - I think this is a good idea and need not complicate the game very much. Every turn, a trade screen opens that shows your reserves, your production, your projected use, and the price last turn for each commodity. (Say 12 commodities total) You slide what you want to buy / sell / keep, and set a price you want to get / pay. It defaults to your last turn, so like tax rates you don't hve to do anything. The computer adjudicates. Sometimes you pay a little more, maybe get a little less, depending on how much is for sale, how many sellers etc.
3. Monopolies and markets
Using the solution above, a monopoly will get a better price, but he will have to sell some to realize it. Seeding of resources should be far less even than civ2, but still distributed well enought that cornering a market completely would be virtually impossible until you had at least half the map.
In practice, a two countries at war have often continued to trade - often without their knowledge! This is the nature of markets. Nations A and C are at war. Nation A is selling to B, but unbeknownst to A, B flips it to C. Meanwhile C sells something to B and B flips it to A. Voila, warring nations trade, and the neutral middleman gets richer.

4. Resouce mapping
Absolutely resources have to be seeded more randomly, with occasional dense concentrations of some resources in a relatively small area.
Absolutely resources that cannot be used should not be visible. But I personally see no need for prospectors; when the resource becomes available, it will show up on any explored tile. I personally think we should assume that prospecting is going on and that little interest would be added to the game by re-exploring every time a new advance makes something valuable. Oil reserves, for example, could pop up over time, first when oil well technology is developed, then when offshore drilling is developed they could appear offshore, then when tarsand extraction, some more land sites show up. These would be linked to advances (e.g. machine tools, miniaturization, superconductor) and fully automated.

[MidKnight Lament]

This raises plenty of questions in my mind.

- Does prospecting require a specific action, or does passing over terrain with a prospector suffice? (I would say an action).

- With all this resourse finding (I'm assuming there would be more than one resource to find) do we want different prospecting units, or one unit who's abilities grow as you discover certain techs?

- Do we need a resource overlay (or perhaps one for each resource?) so that we can clearly see where we have and have not discovered resources? Remembering them would be difficult, and placing them on the normal screen could get cluttered, I'm thinking.

- With resources, are they simply present or not, or do they have limitations (quantities)? Monopolies, and fighting for resources would be much more realistic if resources could be anywhere from sparse to prevelant in a certain tile, but is this too complex? If each tile does have a limitation, how would we represent it on an overlay?

- Would the overlay be on a seperate screen, or would it simply become active when it's a prospector's turn (I would suggest so)?

Just some thoughts.

- MKL
[This message has been edited by MidKnight Lament (edited April 06, 2000).]

A resource overlay would be cool..

I'm not sure how we are going to implement the prospector.. Maybe, as Viking suggested, resources should show up with technological discoveries, but perhaps not all of them show up.. If you want a monopoly, you would STILL have to search for resources (to find even more)..

Someone help me out here - I'm going to start tuping out the 'Final Drafts' of all of ideas that I originated or helped develop (Transportation, Migration, Air warfare, Tile improvements etc.) and put them up for new threads.. They will be comprehensive, incorporating everything discussed.. So could you guys try and put what we have discussed/suggestions into point form? I won't remember them all while typing..

PS. No comments on the transportation model?

------------------
-Shiva
Email: shiva@mailops.com
Web: http://www.crosswinds.net/india/~shiva
ICQ: 17719980

Just a little point before you make a final draft on this.

Mad Viking,

I think you need to search for hidden resources. Although you know how to use oil, you don't know where it is until you make a hole in the desert, so that should be depicted in the game as some kind of unit/action (or even money investment) and should not be authomatic. It's not so micromanagament after all, and I think it would add some fun to the game.

Thanks to all who have discussed on this point.

[Gord McLeod]

I'm big on options in games like this. It occurs to me that things like prospecting might be a case where we should push for options and toggles. Much like there's an option for simplified combat, maybe there can be simplified trade and simplified resource discovery. That way the game will appeal to a broader base of gamers - those who love micromanagement can use the complex systems, those who are into wargaming can turn everything (except maybe combat) down to its simplified form, and those who enjoy a mix can tailor the micromanagement to only those systems they want to use in depth. I realize this makes a bit more work for Firaxis, but I think it'd be worth it.

[tniem]

quote: Originally posted by The Mad Viking on 04-06-2000 09:26 PM Some thoughts: 1. Buying units- I don;t understand how you can just buy a unit for cash. Who built it? Where did they get the production? To me, this is the most important change to make. You can't buy anything that someone hasn't produced. Resources, energy and factories somewhere, make that armor unit or that offshore platform. You would need to increase production rates to compensate. Money is just a representation of goods owed.

Mad Viking-

At least in capitalistic Democracies not all productivity is controlled by the government, in fact a small percentage is. So I would think that purchasing a unit or weapon or improvement or whatever would simply be hiring contractors which have the goods from the society to make what you want. This is why I would like to see corporations added to the game as long as I don't have to build them.

However, in early governments when the king controlled everything, your right there is no where to buy the goods and that needs to be thought out. Or maybe this is where the country folk come into the game for the first time, when you buy something your hiring the farmers that are not represented in the game. A historical backing for this might be the Egyptian farmers who were expected to serve a set number of days every year working on the pyramids or what not.

[MidKnight Lament]

quote: Originally posted by Gord McLeod on 04-07-2000 05:26 PM I'm big on options in games like this.

Me too. Big time. Anywhere where it's practical, give us the option in an Advanced Options Dialog Box at Startup. And you're right that this is a good case for one too.

- MKL

OK, here are the resources that should be in the game:-

Resource Use
_________________________________

Bronze Ancient Military
Clay Ancient Building
Gold Ancient Luxury
Iron Anc/Medieval Military
Spice Medieval Luxury
Stone Med/Industial Building
Wood Anc/Med Shipbuilding
Steel (from Iron) Indust. Military/Ships
Spice/Jewellry? Indust. Luxury
Concrete (Clay+Stone) Modern Building
Steel Modern Military/ships
Petrol (from Oil) Modern Military/Improvements/Trade
Consumer goods (steel+other stuff) Modern Luxury
Uranium Modern Nuclear
Titanium Future Stuff/Modern Space



------------------
-Shiva
Email: shiva@mailops.com
Web: http://www.crosswinds.net/india/~shiva
ICQ: 17719980

[Earthling7]

It is a good idea. They just need to make sure it's workable.

I like the idea of manufacturing finished goods out of recourses, but to simplify matters, how about this: You have 10-12 different materials, bronse, iron, oil, silk etc. You will need bronse for phalanxes etc, iron for legions and iron and oil for tanks. There would be no manufacturing. You could use the rew materials directly. However, the materials would not be available everywhere. Oil can be found in the middle east, US, Norway etc. No one country controls all the oil in the world. Resources would be limited to a few areas worldwide, giving most civs opportunity to find them. Also, with modern units requiring iron AND oil, you might have one, but not the other. Same with the other civ. You would have to trade and benefit from each other.

------------------
Greetings,
Earthling7
ICQ: 929768