Antarctica & Icy Areas

[XarXo]

In the Civ III Original Edition we have an awful earth map with no Antarctica. This icy 6th contitent probably have the biggest reserves of uranium, oil, and other amaizing resources, but in Civ III it doesn't exists.

Also, a great mistake: No icy sea tiles. Could be interesting include them using a semitransparent version of the actual ice cap tiles for the seas in the north pole and in the antarctic glaciar ocean. Specially when you, hipotetically, discover FISSION and the ships of the modern era adquire the capacity of icebreaking (cross these kind of tiles). Finally, a great special effect could be an anormal big area of these tiles allow (for example) cross the sea and invade territories that with a normal clime are unaccessible. Remember the Small Glaciar Era of the XVII-XIX centuries. Remember too that when Greenland was discovered, it was "Green", no "White" as it is now.

This, but, is dangerous so for land units the limitation should be 1 square far from the "solid" land. Also, could be the probability of die of hungry or in an accident, like ships.

Well... This XP allows a lot of new things, so, why not this one?
An enhaced clime changing could be a great feature!

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Note: The following info has been extracted from another reply in the 34th position.


About ice in Civ III (provisional proposal):

The best process is have three sets of terrain:

- Sea Ice
- Glacier (Earth Ice)
- Mountains in Ice

SEA ICE:

The idea is that a line of Broken Sea Ice appears in the border of Sea Ice, with some gulfs and islands. The apperance is the same as Glacier. Nothing is "buildable" here (no cities, no colonies, no roads...)

Resources: Seals (is a Bonus resouce, +2 food, +1 money, +1 shield). Is a good resource for tundra cities like Murmansk or Iqualuit.

Is difficult to cross (for terrain units, impossible for sea units).

There is a high death risc (ice breaking fissures, snow tempest, like ships in the sea) for terrain units. This risc decays with modern units. The mobility is 1 square per turn for ALL the units.

Its apperance is like the actual polar shelfs. Nothing is "buildable" here. Modern ships can cross these tiles when FISSION is reached (icebreaking ability).

GLACIER:

Glacier is taller than the Sea Ice, comparatively is half than a Civ III mountain.

Resources: Diamonds, Coal, Oil, Aluminium, Uranium.

Is safer than Sea Ice but not at the 100% (well, I consider that terrains like mountains and deserts should be dangerous too! Specially for large units like war elephants or tanks) .

It allows to construct road, railway, colony, air base, outpost, fortess and radar. NO CITIES. Of course, is really tought build something. When FISSION is discovered, the building difficult is divided by 2.

MOUNTAINS IN ICE:

Mountains in Ice are a black version of normal mountains, craggier, taller and wilder.

Resources: Diamonds, Coal, Oil, Uranium, Helium 3, Gold (this last one, a bit useless without a city near).

You only can construct roads and a new thing: Condensors.

A new and very rare strategic resource: Helium 3 . For obtain it you need something more than a road, a Condensor.

About Helium 3:

A new technology is proposed for Modern Times: FUSSION.

The SS Engine, Condensor building ability and possibility of see Helium 3 is learned here. Also you can build a Minor Wonder called "Supersyncrotron", it produces 1 of Helium 3 and 1 of Uranium but requires A LOT OF TIME to be build and need a minimum of 10 power plants to allow it. Having Helium 3 in your empire will give you an extra shield in the basic production of ALL the cities.

When the SS Engine is made, a source of Helium 3 disappears and doesn'r reapear. If we are using the Supersyncrotron one, doesn't disappear.

For reach it you need 3 knowledges: The Laser, Superconductor and Syntethic Fibers.

CONNECTING THIS RESOURCES TO TEH CAPITAL WITHOUT CITIES:

Condensor/Colony -> Road -> (??) Air Base / Outpost (??)

THIS PROPOSALS AND THE REAL WORLD:

Antarctica's Scientific bases can be seen as Air Bases and Colonies, could be a great idea create a special set of graphics for colonies/air bases in Desert/Plains and Tundra/Glacier.

Helium 3 is a resource with a huge potential. A mine in The Moon is proposed ONLY due that there are lots of Helium 3 in our "planetary sister".

This resource is necessary for fussion reaction, so if you don't have Helium 3 you can't build a Spaceship with the capacity of reach Alpha Centaury in less than 500.000 years .

VOLCANOES AND OTHER THREAD PROPOSALS:

I believe that these must be explained in a new thread.

[Zoid]

Maybe you should let some people reply before you rate your own thread, makes it less obvious...

[Grrr]

You rated your own thread? That is shocking.

I do find icey sea interesting though. I still need a land/sea combination landform for scenarios.

[alva]

Originally posted by Grrr
You rated your own thread? That is shocking.

I do find icey sea interesting though. I still need a land/sea combination landform for scenarios.

well you would, wouldn't you, seeing where you
come from

on topic: there has to be some 'end' to the the game, so...

[XarXo]

About rating, was my girlfriend, we use the same Apolyton account. But yes, she must vote using an own account. Excuse us.

Returning to the theme: Two huge iceberg desprended form Antarctica's shelf in this year. In a medium future we probably could see trees in Antarctica's Peninsula (well, trees... No. The 6 month of night surely kill them). But this an interesting expansion area for the game, I believe.

Finally, I want add the idea that the planet's face change a lot in the 6000 years that covers the game, for example, the Caspian Sea was a lot smaller than now, the Aral Sea actually is disappearing (but this is caused by the humans). The Sahara desert was by far smaller than now in 4000 BC... Remember the refference to Greenland in my first post. The Civ III planet is DEAD, no changes, no eartquakes.... Bfff. Could be interesting that when you discover a technology you have (for example) access to a tectonic map and see the dangerous areas. In the Incan Empire earthquakes were really common, the Incan architecture is very known for its resistance in front of this kind of disasters. Also volcanoes can make strange effects like in Pompeii, or Pintaubo/Chimborazo/Mount Saint Helen... Volcanic Islands... Why not? Iceland is an entire Volcanic Isle!! ^^ Remember the submarine volcano that destroyed the Minecian/Crete culture... ALL THIS is important!!

A *live* planet is everything that I propose...

[Grrr]

The problem with antartica is that you need a spherical map to make it properly.

[Cyclotron]

Actually, Greenland was called green to encourage immigration by the Viking peoples... it was never really green, unless we are talking really ancient times here.

If antarctica is such a big resource bonanza, why don't I see any major mining activities down there? Where are all these resources you speak of? Civ3's system is est (no polar land) because no military units have ever done maneuvers in Antarctica, and it's laughable to think that cities of thousands of people could survive down there. Plus, it removes the old Civ2 continuous poles exploit.

[Darkworld Ark]

Originally posted by cyclotron7
If antarctica is such a big resource bonanza, why don't I see any major mining activities down there? Where are all these resources you speak of? Civ3's system is est (no polar land) because no military units have ever done maneuvers in Antarctica, and it's laughable to think that cities of thousands of people could survive down there. Plus, it removes the old Civ2 continuous poles exploit.

There's a treaty protecting Antartica from mining of any type (Darn hippies!) & the miners would get cancer if they were mining Antartica (Ozone hole & all). A Antartic city might be possible in the late Modern Age, but it'd need a giant dome over it to keep in the heat & keep out the U-V Rays, maybe they could add a tech that's allow you to build dome cities on the Ecology branch...

[XarXo]

Well, this is the FIFTH time that I wrote this reply. Is amaizing how ****** could be the Internet connection in Spain!!

The problem with antartica is that you need a spherical map to make it properly.

Peters projection, for example, is flat.

Actually, Greenland was called green to encourage immigration by the Viking peoples... it was never really green, unless we are talking really ancient times here.

There are ruins of viking farms. How is possible to have farms in a glaciar place? Ahhh....

A Antartic city might be possible in the late Modern Age, but it'd need a giant dome over it to keep in the heat & keep out the U-V Rays, maybe they could add a tech that's allow you to build dome cities on the Ecology branch...

No cities: Colony + Road + Air Base (??). Is similar to an actual scientific base but with a "capitalist background" .

EDIT:

I forgot something, why not include in the editor the possibility of set icecaps at top/bottom/left/right only? And combine them? Also could be good the possibility of include custom world connections (left-right, top-left, flat or all with all). And please, don't say me that this is "very difficult".

[notyoueither]

OT but. Some loons have discussed the possibility of 'doming' Edmonton, Alberta. I guess it is feasable from an engineering standpoint as of about 10 years ago. I don't see how, but then again I'd be one of the yockels standing on one side of San Fransisco Bay 100 years ago saying 'they'll never bridge that'.

[asleepathewheel]

Originally posted by XarXo
No cities: Colony + Road + Air Base (??). Is similar to an actual scientific base but with a "capitalist background" .

EDIT:

I forgot something, why not include in the editor the possibility of set icecaps at top/bottom/left/right only? And combine them? Also could be good the possibility of include custom world connections (left-right, top-left, flat or all with all). And please, don't say me that this is "very difficult".

Well, there was that story that Hitler had his eyes on Antarctica to use as a base, and moved material down there.... And what about the Hollow Earth "theory", that could be used too.

I do wish there was away to travel, North-south rather than just east west. but for me its not that big of a deal, I guess

[Cyclotron]

Originally posted by XarXo
There are ruins of viking farms. How is possible to have farms in a glaciar place? Ahhh....

The vikings all died in a terrible cold winter... they ended up eating their dogs for survival, but most starved to death anyway when the crop froze.

Yes, what a green, green, prosperous land...

[Captain]

the green bits of greenland are along the coasts, it is habitable for part of the year, then you go into hibernation.
if you go further inland, it's a big glacier. glaciers are not the stuff of which we build communities on. no one lives there.


as for antarctica, there's a big sheet of ice over it. you'd have to carve through that just to get to the rocks below - and it's not quite so simple retrieving those rocks.
digging through ice is trickier than rock, as it glaciers and icefields have much less strength in comparison to the stresses on them. far, far too much instability. ever watch those ice-cavers? pure insanity. (the only thing potentially worse is underwater caving...)
an open pit would be best here, rather than tunneling, but that's a huge effort! ice is easier to break than rock, but how are you going to dig it out? you need machines, susceptible to the elements (-70 there on average), but that overcome, you still have no traction on the ice. there's enough to walk and drive, but enough to push tons of ice uphill?

and then you'd better be sure your investment is worthwhile. how do you check for minerals under 2 km thick ice? and it better be something very valuable, and very concentrated. gold is nice, but you need to process huge quantities of ore to get it. you'd need to ship the ore (wasteful) or process it on site (you want machinery to work in those conditions? lubricant freezes at that temp, metal becomes brittle, and people die quite easily). storms can shut you down, whiteouts are a death certificate, and if you survive there, the trip home could be in question.

say it's uranium, or oil. mine, miner's quarters, machinery, equipment, maintenance, replacement parts, lighting (6 mo dark), electrical, heating and power supplies, fuel supplies, ventilation system, processing plant, pipeline or transport "road", containers, container handlers, dock/harbour (that doesn't get bashed to pieces by moving ice or sheet fracture induced tsuanmi), ships, icebreakers, medical, death and disability benefits, creature comforts... transporting all this, gathering capital, financing charges and interest fees,... is it worth it?
well, at least the airfield comes free...

of course, you could nuke the place several times and see if that opens up a few craters for exploration. they'd be damn cold craters though. perhaps the radioactive trace elements might warm the miners, but the leukemia will probably keep them away.

but civ 3 volcanoes might be nice, just like in civ 2 there were some that created new islands.

[asleepathewheel]

Originally posted by Captain
of course, you could nuke the place several times and see if that opens up a few craters for exploration. they'd be damn cold craters though. perhaps the radioactive trace elements might warm the miners, but the leukemia will probably keep them away.

Not very dedicated miners if a little something like leukemia will keep them away. That's why they get hazard pay.

[Hagbart]

The people, mostly Inuit, who live in Greenland (55.000+) live by the coast. In the summer half of the year it is grassy, but there are no fields. A lot of people are fishing and hunting.

I think that when some of the Vikings moved to Greenland the climate was a little hotter than it is today. But it was called Green-land to atract more settlers. (Who wants to move to a country called Ice-land or White-land or something). No offense.

[Andrew_Jay]

asleepathtewheel;
you talking about the "donut" earth variety of map? I think Call to Power had that, where you basically had one "pole" which was the icy inside ring of a donut. You could walk over it in the "north" and end up in the "south".
Techs for living in Antarctica or doming cities could be good for a 5th era in the expansion.

[asleepathewheel]

Originally posted by Andrew_Jay
asleepathtewheel;
you talking about the "donut" earth variety of map? I think Call to Power had that, where you basically had one "pole" which was the icy inside ring of a donut. You could walk over it in the "north" and end up in the "south".
Techs for living in Antarctica or doming cities could be good for a 5th era in the expansion.

no, I was actually using imprecise language. I was meaning to say that I wish you could circumnavigate the world north/south rather than just east/ west. Of course, only in the late modern age. (Unless you were the mighty Inuit/Canadian tribe which has "arctic building" as their trait, I guess, (didn't want to be too politically incorrect there))

Or you were referring to that "hollow earth" comment. I was just joking about that. I find that "theory" to be one of the more amusing ones I've read about. read about it for a good laugh.

[Panag]

hi ,

with "Mike" on the team , i would noy be surpised we would see something like the ice in tibsun-firestorm , cracking when a ship goes true it , maybe a soldier can walk on it , but there should be someyhing like " the unit froze to death" , like in the jungle , ...

we should ask , ..

have a nice day

[Captain]

Originally posted by asleepathewheel


Not very dedicated miners if a little something like leukemia will keep them away. That's why they get hazard pay.

you know, now that I think about it, I'm sure there will be plenty of miners willing to go there. considering that miner's have extremely dangerous occuptional hazards even in "stable" mines (gas explosions from methane pockets, suffocation, flooding, machinery accidents...) and they do it anyways, for possibly low rewards. and remote living isn't that unappealing either, they just have to import "entertainment".
plus, considering alaskan crab fisherman work ridiculous hours over freezing waters, bash chunks of ice off the ship to prevent capsizing, with dangerous machines that maim/disfigure/kill, water so cold it's death upon submersion, huge swells rocking the boat so falling off is easy... and they still do it. of course, they make anywhere around 1000 to 10 000 $US for a week's worth of work... yeah, miners could go to alaska, if there was something worth going for.

i'm curious though, what's this north south thing? if you go further north, you don't get to the south pole, you get to the other hemisphere. if i went straight north from my home here in ontario, i'd probably end up in the ural mountains, not in antartica. how would civ keep track of this? a location +180 deg longit might work, but since all lines of longitude converge at the poles, how does that jive? (greenland looks huge on some projections and tile wise in civ, may be 40 tiles across, but in reality should be only 20 tiles...how to solve?)

[Panag]

Originally posted by Captain
the green bits of greenland are along the coasts, it is habitable for part of the year, then you go into hibernation.
if you go further inland, it's a big glacier. glaciers are not the stuff of which we build communities on. no one lives there.


as for antarctica, there's a big sheet of ice over it. you'd have to carve through that just to get to the rocks below - and it's not quite so simple retrieving those rocks.
digging through ice is trickier than rock, as it glaciers and icefields have much less strength in comparison to the stresses on them. far, far too much instability. ever watch those ice-cavers? pure insanity. (the only thing potentially worse is underwater caving...)
an open pit would be best here, rather than tunneling, but that's a huge effort! ice is easier to break than rock, but how are you going to dig it out? you need machines, susceptible to the elements (-70 there on average), but that overcome, you still have no traction on the ice. there's enough to walk and drive, but enough to push tons of ice uphill?

and then you'd better be sure your investment is worthwhile. how do you check for minerals under 2 km thick ice? and it better be something very valuable, and very concentrated. gold is nice, but you need to process huge quantities of ore to get it. you'd need to ship the ore (wasteful) or process it on site (you want machinery to work in those conditions? lubricant freezes at that temp, metal becomes brittle, and people die quite easily). storms can shut you down, whiteouts are a death certificate, and if you survive there, the trip home could be in question.

say it's uranium, or oil. mine, miner's quarters, machinery, equipment, maintenance, replacement parts, lighting (6 mo dark), electrical, heating and power supplies, fuel supplies, ventilation system, processing plant, pipeline or transport "road", containers, container handlers, dock/harbour (that doesn't get bashed to pieces by moving ice or sheet fracture induced tsuanmi), ships, icebreakers, medical, death and disability benefits, creature comforts... transporting all this, gathering capital, financing charges and interest fees,... is it worth it?
well, at least the airfield comes free...

of course, you could nuke the place several times and see if that opens up a few craters for exploration. they'd be damn cold craters though. perhaps the radioactive trace elements might warm the miners, but the leukemia will probably keep them away.

but civ 3 volcanoes might be nice, just like in civ 2 there were some that created new islands.

hi ,

maybe more random events should be included , like global warming , an earthquake every 1000 years would be fun , ...a smoking volcano , hmm , a lot of work for the graphics , and then the lava that flows , and gets a city , .....hmmm , keep talking , ...
an other random event , forest fire , flooding , ...

have a nice day

[Zoid]

Originally posted by cyclotron7


The vikings all died in a terrible cold winter... they ended up eating their dogs for survival, but most starved to death anyway when the crop froze.

Yes, what a green, green, prosperous land...

Hagbart´s right. Between 900 AD and 1350 AD there was the "Medieval Warm Period", the climate was much more hospitable in Greenland. But noone really knows why the norsemen disappeared. Climate change, raiding parties, plague?Check out this document for a possible explanation.

[Zoid]

Originally posted by XarXo
About rating, was my girlfriend, we use the same Apolyton account. But yes, she must vote using an own account. Excuse us.

OK, so that´s the explanation... Sorry for the initial threadjack

Returning to the theme: Two huge iceberg desprended form Antarctica's shelf in this year. In a medium future we probably could see trees in Antarctica's Peninsula (well, trees... No. The 6 month of night surely kill them). But this an interesting expansion area for the game, I believe.

Finally, I want add the idea that the planet's face change a lot in the 6000 years that covers the game, for example, the Caspian Sea was a lot smaller than now, the Aral Sea actually is disappearing (but this is caused by the humans). The Sahara desert was by far smaller than now in 4000 BC... Remember the refference to Greenland in my first post. The Civ III planet is DEAD, no changes, no eartquakes.... Bfff. Could be interesting that when you discover a technology you have (for example) access to a tectonic map and see the dangerous areas. In the Incan Empire earthquakes were really common, the Incan architecture is very known for its resistance in front of this kind of disasters. Also volcanoes can make strange effects like in Pompeii, or Pintaubo/Chimborazo/Mount Saint Helen... Volcanic Islands... Why not? Iceland is an entire Volcanic Isle!! ^^ Remember the submarine volcano that destroyed the Minecian/Crete culture... ALL THIS is important!!

A *live* planet is everything that I propose...

I think a live planet is an excellent idea. Something for CivIV?

[Panag]

Originally posted by Kamrat X
I think a live planet is an excellent idea. Something for CivIV?

hi ,

with some luck maybe for civ3 , we should start a thread on it , ...

have a nice day

[Andrew_Jay]

okay asleep, you meant crossing the poles on a real map. So basically you'd go to the pole and then end up at the top of the map exactly half the way across the world, as Captain described.

[Panag]

hi ,

maybe whe should thing about a world map with the N- and S-pole on it , ...

have a nice day

[civman2000]

Sorry for the rant and t's nothing personal but I'm just really annoyed:

PANAG WILL YOU PLEASE STOP SAYING HAVE A NICE DAY AND JUST PUT IT IN YOUR SIG???!!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?


Sorry , just had to get that out of my system, nothing personal

[Captain]

Originally posted by civman2000
Sorry for the rant and t's nothing personal but I'm just really annoyed:

PANAG WILL YOU PLEASE STOP SAYING HAVE A NICE DAY AND JUST PUT IT IN YOUR SIG???!!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?


Sorry , just had to get that out of my system, nothing personal

hi

I like panag's greetings, it sounds like he really means it, makes me feel better, not sure it would have the same effect as a sig.
he's even cut down on his use of commas so that alone makes his posts readable now. some still doesn't make enough sense, but hey, lots of folks don't. at least it doesn't hurt the eyes anymore.

cheers!

[asleepathewheel]

Originally posted by Andrew_Jay
okay asleep, you meant crossing the poles on a real map. So basically you'd go to the pole and then end up at the top of the map exactly half the way across the world, as Captain described.

Thats what I was trying to say, and yes I realize that this would be impossible (or nearly so) to implement, and further more, I don't even know if it would be a good idea. I was just talking out my arse (as usual).

[XarXo]

It only rests me say that the game ends at 2050, we're at 2002 and the two great seas of antarctica are in a huge scale melting process. Is possible that in 2020 we can have a big territory to exploit, in the REAL world!!

Our next frontier isn't in space or sea, is in the ICE!

[asleepathewheel]

Originally posted by XarXo
It only rests me say that the game ends at 2050, we're at 2002 and the two great seas of antarctica are in a huge scale melting process. Is possible that in 2020 we can have a big territory to exploit, in the REAL world!!

Our next frontier isn't in space or sea, is in the ICE!

Well, by 2020, there might not be that much ice to deal with, if it keeps breaking off in huge chunks like it has recently.

*note: I know this is an exaggeration (hopefully)