New Abilities

[gentleriser]

There was speculation about this in another thread, but as that thread was exceedingly long, I decided to start a new one.

What new unique civ abilities could there be that would merit inclusion in an expansion pack?

Suggestions (some mine, some lifted from other thread):

1-Agricultural: city centre square produces +1/+2/+3 food for town/city/metropolis.
2-Artistic: cities celebrating "we love the king day" produces +2 culture/turn
3-Maritime: ships treat ocean and sea squares as roads (1/3 Movement cost); 1 ship / harbor free.
4-Adventurous: settlers and workers have 2 Movement instead of 1.
5-Xenophobic: citizens nearly immune to cultural assimilation. Units always promoted (regular/veteran/elite) after killing enemy units. May not capture cities of 50% foreign citizens or more, these are always razed.
6-Colonist: settlers cost 25% fewer shields; cities on separate continents may enjoy "continental" effects if connected by harbors.
7-Pioneering: Waste penalty for distance from capital greatly reduced.
8-Urban: 1/2/3 buildings have no maintenance cost per town/city/metropolis (most expensive first). Aqueducts/Hospitals produce 1/2 content faces.
9-Sacrificial: each sacrificed citizen produces 2x normal shields. All gov't types sacrifice as their hurry method.
10-Pacifist: all your units may retreat as fast units do, fast units have improved die roll to retreat. Opponents' fast units also have improved die roll to retreat from combat against you. Defensive units cost 25% less.

Thoughts?

-GentleRiser

[ixnay]

If they were to add 2 of those, I would bet they'd go with agricultural and maritime...

[asleepathewheel]

you've got some interesting ideas here. hopefully we will get 2 of them. I'm hoping that the second xp will feature sci-fi/fantasy stuff which would open up even more unique traits. I think the real problem is how to balance the trait, so that it wouldn't be overpowering. Like for example, your adventurous traid: I see that as being too good-early expansion would be explosive, establishing cities much much faster than other civs. Of course, What could be done is to only give the civ the kickass trait. I think one one awesome trait could be balanced by 2 moderate traits, since the civ would be (probably) less flexible in the long run.

[dunk]

I don't like Xenophobic. It makes Militaristic look like garbage. Promotion after every victory? Makes drafting the best way to build units.

Why not the opposite of Xenophobic? Hmmm.... Welcoming or somesuch. Other civs cities flip to you like flies to sh*t, or same flipping for other civs on a cultural par with you just like "in awe of" or somesuch and of course, resitance is lowered. Also, goody huts give settlers with 2x frequency.

Urban could be... extra 50% pop size born content. All content-making improvements produce one extra content face.

Sacrificial scares me.

Colonizing and Pioneering should be the same... combine those.

Artistic needs more... maybe culture buildings all produce +1 culture/turn.

I don't think the Agriculture bonus should be on the city tile. Maybe a third of your tiles producing two or more food get one extra food, but the city tile doesn't count.

Adventurous is good.

Maritime is good.

Pacifist seems ok. Maybe make AI civs actually forgive you for transgressions 3000 years previous.

[Adagio]

Seems like some good ideas, though the Colonist isn't that good, makes it posibel to build more cities even faster...

[Stuie]

I'm hoping for two new abilities, and I would think Agricultural and Maritime make the most sense. Balance needs to be maintained, however. Free harbors would be too much. How about:

Maritime - Reduce price of Harbors, cheaper ships, extra trade from sea squares.
Agricultural - Reduce price of Granary, faster irrigation, one extra food in city square.

Advantages, but not unbalancers.

[Dom Pedro II]

I think Isolationist would be better than Xenophobic... I don't think either will make it, but hey, you never know.

[ScreamingViking]

"Peaceful" civs should have half construction costs on defensive city improvements, but double the war weariness penalties. Or maybe something like defensive units imposing zones of control to seperate other warring nations as a thirs party ("peacekeepers"). Don't know if it's logistically possible in the programming of the game, but just a suggestion...

[Cyclotron]

Originally posted by dunk999
Why not the opposite of Xenophobic? Hmmm.... Welcoming or somesuch. Other civs cities flip to you like flies to sh*t, or same flipping for other civs on a cultural par with you just like "in awe of" or somesuch and of course, resitance is lowered

I offer the word "metropolitan."

[Grrr]

Colonist? Only if they make settlers for all other civs cost 25% more.

[Gangor]

I don't think that so many abilities are needed. If there's too much to think about some players may become confused, and from a design point of view it would make it harder to ballance all the abilities.

I suggest two extra abilities:

Agricultural - +1 food in city square; granary and aquaduct half price.
Suggested civs: France, Russia, China, India, Ethiopia, Incans.

Sefaring / Maritime - Galleys / Caravels only lost half as often; harbour, coastal battery and offshore platform half price.
Suggested civs: England, Vikings, Greece, Phoenicians, Polynesians.

I suggest both abilities start with pottery (granarys and a prequisite to map making) and that expansionist should start with the wheel.

[Jethro83]

Interesting ideas.

Here's my opinion.

Agricultural: Cities produce extra food (bonus functions similar to the way factories work with shields). Cost of granaries reduced. Starts with Pottery

Maritime: Reduced cost of Harbours/Coastal fortresses. Ships treat all coast/sea squares as road. Transport capacity +1. Starts with Alphabet/Pottery (not sure since both lead to Map Making)

Isolationist: Greatly increased Resistance to assimilation. Greater chance of flip-backs following enemy conquest of friendly settlements. Starts with Warrior Code.

Artistic: Cities produce more culture. Starts with Alphabet.

Pioneering: Corruption/Waste by distance reduced. Cheaper settlers. Starts with The Wheel.

[Tiberius]

My 2 (euro)cents:

1-Agricultural
- free tech: pottery
- efect1: city centre square produces +1/+2/+3 food for town/city/metropolis;
- effect2: can irrigate without nearby river (?? not sure about this) or workers can irrigate faster or cheaper granaries

2-Artistic
- free tech: alphabet
- efect1: cities celebrating "we love the king day" produces extra culture points per turn or palace produces 4 culture instead of 2 or cultural improvements produce one extra culture point;
- effect2: reduced cultural improvements/wonders (libraries, universities, JS Bach's Cathedral, etc) costs;

3-Maritime
- free tech: map-making
- efect1: +1 movement bonus for ships;
- effect2: reduced maritime improvements/wonders/units (harbors, offshore platforms, etc) costs

4-Adventurous: I don't like it; I'd combine it with colonist

5-Xenophobic/Nationalistic
- free tech: warrior code ??
- effect1: citizens more rezistent to cultural assimilation and espionage missions and cities have greater chance to flip-back following enemy conquest ;
- effect2: less war weariness or ??;

6-Colonist
- free tech: the wheel
- effect1: settlers cost fewer shields or settlers have 2 movement points or colonist civ starts with 2 settlers
- effect2: cities on separate continents may enjoy "continental" effects if connected by harbors.

7-Pioneering: I'm afraid I don't understand this one

8-Urban/Metropolitan
free tech: masonry
effect1: 1/2/3 buildings have no maintenance cost per town/city/metropolis (most expensive first) or aqueducts/hospitals are cheaper;
effect2: reduced unhappiness caused by "crowdiness";

9-Sacrificial: too strange to me (btw, except the aztecs, who would be sacrificial?)

10-Pacifist
free tech: masonry
effect1: reduced defensive improvements/units costs;
effect2: double war weariness penalties

11-Diplomatic
free tech: alphabet
effect1: can obtain better results/prices in negotiations or other nations are more friendly towards a diplo civ;
effect2: espionage missions have greater chance of succes

I'm sure we'll see at most 2 new abilities, if any; anyway, having a good list to choose from doesn't hurt, right ?

[Spiffor]

Like many others here, I'm for agricultural and maritime

Now, what should they be, to be good but not unbalancing ?

First, I'd like to see what the others Civ-traits are :
Militarist : military buildings twice cheaper. units gain experience more quickly
Expansionist : allows scouts. goody huts always positive
Industrious : extra shields in city/metropolis. workers twice faster
Commercial : extra commerce in city/metropolis. Less corruption
Religious : religious improvements twice cheaper. Revolutions in 1 turn
Scientific : scientific improvements twice cheaper. 1 free tech each era.

So, how could these 2 new traits be balanced ?
Agricultural :
I like the idea of having extra food on city/metropolis tiles, since it's in the spirit of commercial and industrious, but not unbalancingly powerful : with 2 extra food, you only have one more pop. point than normal at your max pop, and only a slightly faster growth in later ages. If there was an extra food on a town tile, this bonus would be insanely powerful though : +50% demographic growth at the beginning of the game, under despotism !
So, I'm for a not too powerful food increase. But I can't see any significative 2nd advantage : having growth improvements (harbours / granaries) twice cheaper is not that useful, since a bigger pop will mean trouble very soon. Irrigating twice faster is not as brilliant as industrious. I thought about systematically irrigating in one turn, but it's almost useless in industrial era. I thought about irrigating on every land type, but it would be too good, like irrigating without fresh water. I didn't think of otheres ideas, so I think that twice cheaper growth improvements are the least worthless second trait.
The starting tech for agricultural Civs seems obvious to me : pottery.

Now maritime :
I love the idea of 1 more tile of sea movement. Given how boats are sluggish, it would give maritime Civs a big advantage. I'd refine the idea by giving them a percentage of boat movement surplus : in mods where boats have much more movement points, the 15 movement battleship will be somthing like 18 movements rather than only 16 (anyway, you get the idea). So, faster boats is a must.
The second advantage is not that clear : free harbours is too powerful, half-priced harbours is too weak. Cheaper boats can be incredibly powerful on sea maps, but it might not be unbalancing if the cutoff is not too big (maybe 10-20% ?). Maybe all buildings which have to do with the sea should be half-priced ? (harbours, offshore platforms, coastal fortress). But they are not coherent with each other, not like scientific buildings are. Maybe maritime units should access to a special ancient sea unit, the coracle (no prereq.) or a special pirate trireme. At last, maybe they could have sea trade right from the beginning, but it would useless quite fast. Given these choics, I'd go for maritime improvements twice cheaper.
I think the starting tech of a maritime civ should be alphabet, as it is on the way to have mapmaking, and agricultural already has pottery. They shouldn't have mapmaking right from the star. Heck, even scientific don't have literacy from the beginning.

To sum up :

Agricultural
- Extra food on city / metropolis
- Granaries / harbours twice cheaper
- Starting with pottery

Maritime
- Faster ships (rather proportional to their normal speed)
- Harbours / coastal fortresses / offshore platforsms twice cheaper
- Starting with alphabet


Now, what should be the Civs with these new attributes ? There can be 28 different combinations, so 4 will be left out
Those who don't change :
Rome : commercial militarist
Egypt : Religious industrious
Babylon : religious scientific
Aztecs : militarist religious
Zulu : militarist expansionist
Iroquois : expansionist religious
America : expansionist industrious
Germany : militaristic scientific
Russia : expansionist scientific
Greece : commerical scientific

Those who change + XP civs :
China : agricultural industrious. Well, most populated country in the world + great wall basically. I always had a problem with them militaristic, as they hadn't showed such a great prowess in their history (conquered by Mongols, beaten by the Europeans and by the Japanese, failures against the Koreans etc.)
Japan : militaristic industrious. To compensate the loss of China. Plus, hard work for the community is a very important tradition in Japan, which deserves the title "industrious" much more than the French for exemple
India : agricultural religious. Well, again, very highly populated country, because of the culture of rice and the moonsoon, which occupies a great deal of population. The "green revolution" is also one of their few utter successes of India these last 50 years.
France : agricultural commercial. Basically, France is the biggest agriculture in Europe, and the second exporting country in terms of living agriculture (far from the Americans, but there are not so many of agricultural exporters). Agriculture has always been one of the main concerns of French policy.
England : maritime expansionist. I hesitated between the expansionist and the commercial trait. Eventually, the fact the Brits had the largest empire in the world helped me choose.
Persia : commercial industrious Persia was at the core of the silk road, and had for a long time the role of an interface between western and easter merchandises. It also allows me to give scientific to Korea
Arabs : commercial religious. During their golden age, the Arabs were many things : scientific, commercial, militaristic, religious etc. But what really lasted long was their ability in business and the importance of their religion.
Vikings : maritime commercial. Well, all has been said about it.
Korea : scientific industrious. Ditto.
Spain : maritime religious. Basically, their golden age was closely linked to their transactions with the new world. But I fear that many Spaniards won't agree with these traits.
Mayans : agricultural scientific. We all know the Mayans were the most advanced Civ of America. I think they needed a pretty solid agriculutre to feed these cities so close to the jungle.
Mali : agricultural expansionist. I'd say agricultural, since they could feed big cities, which was pretty rare in precolonial Africa. Apparently, they could have been religious, but India is already so. Plus I heard they had the biggest empire of precolonial Africa, hence the expansionist... I lack data though.
Carthage : - I don't know anything about Carthage, except for its elephants. I don't know if they used the Mare Nostrum much, nor that I know if they had a good agriculture or a complex road system.

I should write how I imagine the wonders being changed, so that every Civ can have a peaceful GA, but I feel lazy right now.

[civman2000]

phoenicians (IMO a better choice than carthage although there is VERY little difference) would be commercial and either expansionist or scientific...expansionist would probably be better for civ purposes because there is no commercail and expansionist civ with england changed...

[Inverse Icarus]

i really think "wheeled settlers" that cost more but have 2 moves (like a horseman) should be availible to all civs, but my friends dont like the idea.

[realpolitic]

Most of the abilities Gentleriser talks about are potentially destablizing, the abilities of Civs in CivIII affect a small percentage of production or commerce. Even the 120 shields a Scientific civ saves building Libraries & Universities are still a drop in the bucket compared with the total build needs of a Civ. Also, any Agrocultural advantage is likely to spin out of control as its effects are cumultive.

[Grrr]

The main point is that the new abilities should promote equality between civs, not destablize them.

[Dom Pedro II]

Yes, I don't even like having all of these abilities.

I mean, agricultural really just means a civilization that hasn't industrialized... this basically encompasses all civilizations before the industrial revolution.

Maritime civilizations I think could be good, BUT at the same time this could be accomplished with UU's.

I think that any two abilities a civ has should be able to be countered by any other two abilities of another civ (balancing). I think its fine the way it is.

[Spiffor]

In my preious post, I thought about 2 of these new abilities, so that they aren't destabilizing. I think that the abilities I defined are pretty reasonable. No Super-duper ability, just a little something to add some flavour and variety among new civs.

[Carver]

Originally posted by gentleriser
3-Maritime: ships treat ocean and sea squares as roads (1/3 Movement cost); 1 ship / harbor free.

I like the idea of a maritime trait, but yours is way too unbalancing. 1/3 the movement cost? Maybe this should come with cheaper vessels and harbors.

[Inverse Icarus]

Originally posted by Grrr
The main point is that the new abilities should promote equality between civs, not destablize them.

there arent going to be new abilities, that would make for more "code", and firaxis isnt a big fan of coding.

[asleepathewheel]

Originally posted by UberKruX


there arent going to be new abilities, that would make for more "code", and firaxis isnt a big fan of coding.

and you know this based on? I think they will add one or two. or else the civs will be redundant.

[Inverse Icarus]

the civs are redundant already. japs / aztecs?

[Grrr]

I don't think a Maritime civ is a good idea particularly.

Lets say the Vikings (Maritime, Expansionist) start in the middle of the jungle. What's the point in Maritime abilities then.

[Inverse Icarus]

Originally posted by Grrr
I don't think a Maritime civ is a good idea particularly.

Lets say the Vikings (Maritime, Expansionist) start in the middle of the jungle. What's the point in Maritime abilities then.

navigating the rivers! give them rivers as roads and completely unbalance the game.

[asleepathewheel]

Originally posted by Grrr
I don't think a Maritime civ is a good idea particularly.

Lets say the Vikings (Maritime, Expansionist) start in the middle of the jungle. What's the point in Maritime abilities then.

Well, what's the point of expansionist if you find yourself on an island? each has trade offs.

[asleepathewheel]

Originally posted by UberKruX
the civs are redundant already. japs / aztecs?

So that's one redundant pair. I think they would try to keep that at a minimum. You however don't. More pointless speculation from both of us. We shall see soon enough, anyway.

[Grrr]

Originally posted by asleepathewheel

Quote:

Originally posted by Grrr!! I don't think a Maritime civ is a good idea particularly. Lets say the Vikings (Maritime, Expansionist) start in the middle of the jungle. What's the point in Maritime abilities then.

Well, what's the point of expansionist if you find yourself on an island? each has trade offs.

An expansionist Civ on an island has still got advatages, while a landlocked civ that is maritime is useless.

[asleepathewheel]

Originally posted by Grrr

Quote:

Originally posted by asleepathewheel Quote: Originally posted by Grrr!! I don't think a Maritime civ is a good idea particularly. Lets say the Vikings (Maritime, Expansionist) start in the middle of the jungle. What's the point in Maritime abilities then. Well, what's the point of expansionist if you find yourself on an island? each has trade offs.

An expansionist Civ on an island has still got advatages, while a landlocked civ that is maritime is useless.

Unless you're playing on pangea, there will be water around. even on pangea, i usually end up near water. whereas if I am expansionist on an island, I get maybe 1 goody hut and have a scout. how great is that?