Hi, I've just downloaded this mod and I was looking through all of the different additions. I really like the new units and the various bonusses they have against other units. And the new civic system also looks very interesting. The new religion system is also interesting and makes the religions very different. The air unit interception code that was added is also far better than that in the original game. I could go on and on about good stuff in this mod. :goodjob:

Still, I have a remark about a terrain improvement, the windmill.

The windmill gives a food bonus in the classical, medieval, renaissance and industrial age, but loses this bonus (in favour of a commerce bonus) with the invention of electricity.

I think that I understand the line of thought behind this. The medieval age windmill was a machine often used to grind grain and thus a food bonus is justified. It was also used for other things like a sawmill, so a production bonus could also be justified. But that might be represented by the +1 hammer with replaceable parts (allthough it is a bit late).
In the modern age, the windmill is a machine used to generate electricity and it's a bit harder to link electricity to food than it is to link grain to food. While the machine has the same name, it's function has drastically changed. So you add -1 food, + 2 commerce with electricity.

Now there is one big problem with this. If you have build a city in an area with mainly grassland hills (no or very few land tiles that can be irrigated), then this city was quite viable by adding windmills to the hills. However, when electricity is developed, the city will starve and there is no terrain improvement that can be added to save the city from starving.

So while medieval citizens could build a large city in the hills, the city is doomed to die in the modern age. Now, I know that there are cities that have gone from greatness to insignificance during the industrial revolution, but that was not caused by a loss of capability to feed the citizens. It was caused by other cities becoming more important in the modern age and migration. So, I think this 'electricity leads to starving in windmill cities' is a bit unrealistic. And it's also not a lot of fun to see your cities starving. ;)

I see some options to correct this strange behaviour of the windmill:

1) Change the electricity -1 food +2 commerce bonus to something else and let the windmill still produce 1 food in the modern age. The disadvantage would be that modern windmills aren't used for food production in real life. Maybe we need to stretch our imagination and think about refrigerators (which run on electricity) and their effect on food conservation.

2) Change the medieval windmill. Don't let it produce food and commerce, but let it produce hammers and commerce. That would be fairly realistic as these buildings didn't produce food on their own. They were just production enhancements in the food production chain. A cow pasture also produces hammers, so this wouldn't be that weird.

3) Change farms so that they can be build on top of hills with some technology. It's not unrealistic or something. For reference, read this small article with pictures on wikipedia: Terrace farming (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terrace_farming).
It's a fairly old technology.
The farms should be a bit weaker when build on hills because otherwise you get the strange situation where farming the hills and workshops (with labor union) on the flatlands is better than farms on the flatlands and mines in the hills in the modern age.
Maybe it should just be a new improvement called terrace. It starts at +1 food and gets +1 food, -1 hammer with biology (for a total of +2 food, -1 hammer). It doesn't make it a great improvement, but it's a way to get some food in hill cities.
If this improvement is introduced, then the medieval windmill might also be changed into + 2 commerce, +1 hammer with replaceable parts, +1 commerce with electricity.

For reference for the ones who don't remember the various bonusses of the windmill:

+1 food, +1 commerce
+1 hammer with replaceable parts
-1 food +2 commerce with electricity
+1 commerce with hereditary rule

Oh, and by the way, the modern age windmill at +1 hammer, + 3 commerce (+4 with hereditary rule) cannot compete with a modern age town with the universal suffrage civic +1 hammer, + 5 commerce (+6 with free speech). Both improvements can be build on a grassland hill. The town has some development time of course. But that doesn't stop most people from building them. If you disallow cottages on grassland hills, then the problem would be gone.

A good point, and the more I think of it, the more I'm inclined to the idea of not taking +1 food from windmills. Sure, in modern age nobody grinds grain with them, but the electricity produced could power a whole variety of stuff, including stuff of agricultural value. So, basically, I'm in favor of not losing +1 food with electricity now.

A good point, and the more I think of it, the more I'm inclined to the idea of not taking +1 food from windmills. Sure, in modern age nobody grinds grain with them, but the electricity produced could power a whole variety of stuff, including stuff of agricultural value. So, basically, I'm in favor of not losing +1 food with electricity now.

It's nice to see that you agree. I wonder what you think windmills should offer in the modern age. They need to be balanced versus the mine improvement which provides 2 hammers. A food is about as valuable as a hammer in the modern age in your mod, maybe even more valuable (my opinion) and before the electricity discovery, the windmill adds +1 food, +1 hammer, + 1 commerce. They also need to be balanced versus the town improvement which has a different output depending on the civics that you use.

Edit: I just noticed the mine provides 3 hammers in the modern age (by looking in the file CIV4ImprovementInfos.xml), just like in the original game, but it is not mentioned in the civilopedia. Actually, none of the railroad bonusses are mentioned in the civilopedia.

I guess +1 food, + 1 hammer, +2-3 commerce would still not overpower windmills compared to the 3 hammers from mines.

You made some interesting points in your post Roland that got me thinking, but I can't agree with one:

Now, I know that there are cities that have gone from greatness to insignificance during the industrial revolution, but that was not caused by a loss of capability to feed the citizens. It was caused by other cities becoming more important in the modern age and migration.
Migration _is_ in fact represented in civ by cities "starving" isn't it? And the process of some cities becoming more important than other is in fact represented quite well by eg. cities with windmills loosing their population because the technology/priorities have changed with time.

You made some interesting points in your post Roland that got me thinking, but I can't agree with one:


Migration _is_ in fact represented in civ by cities "starving" isn't it? And the process of some cities becoming more important than other is in fact represented quite well by eg. cities with windmills loosing their population because the technology/priorities have changed with time.

What I meant is that it is not a loss of technological knowhow that lead to the decrease in city size in some areas during the industrial revolution (in real life). It had to do with migration. As migration is nowhere in the game, I don't think we should try to use it to explain the starvation of these cities with windmills. At least, I can't remember reading in the history books that there was a massive migration from hilled areas around 1900 because we lost the knowledge to produce food in those areas. (I don't think starvation represents migration, I think starvation represent starvation and maybe disease if it is caused by unhealthiness.)

There is always a possibility to come up with some real-life paralel to explain things in civ. But this one is a bit far fetched. Maybe I shouldn't have mentioned it at all.

In the end, it is about gameplay. A late game windmill with +1 hammer, +3 commerce is just weak compared to a mine (+3 hammers), a town (+1 hammer, + 6 commerce) or a watermill (+1 food, +2 hammers, + 2 commerce). A windmill with +1 food, + 1 hammer, +2 commerce would be fairly balanced and would remove this strange windmills with electricity leads to starvation.