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
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VOLCANOES AND OTHER THREAD PROPOSALS:
I believe that these must be explained in a new thread.
