check the March 27 entry...

http://www.frictionlessinsight.com/

:eek:

Here's what it says:

Tentative Civ IV Feature Changes 3/27/04

Civilization fans may be eager to know that Soren Johnson of Firaxis games made a few comments about Civilization IV in his talk on game franchises at the Game Developer's Conference. All the features under consideration are tentative, and given the game's long development schedule may or may not make it into the final version. Still, the focus of Johnson's talk was on removing "unfun" aspects of games to create sufficient conceptual room for improvements. Some of the features under consideration are:

Improved interface and help screens
Replacing game concepts such as pollution, rioting and corruption with more entertaining concepts that maintain game balance (he described the current pollution model as "playing whack-a-mole").
Adding concepts of religion and civics
Introducing more sophisticated concepts of unit experience and upgrades.
Johnson emphasized that the game is still a long way off, and is being coded from scratch to produce a better final experience. He also mentioned that the team is paying attention to a list of suggestions submitted by fans that is longer than the New Testament. He didn't say how long it took the Firaxis team to slog through it.

For the people that don't feel like scrolling... [edit- Curse you soren!! Beat by a minute.]


"He described the current pollution model as 'playing whack-a-mole'." I couldn't say it better myself!:lol:

Thanks for the info!

I suggest for the webadmin(s) to post this on the main site.

EDIT: once I think about it, it's kind of strange that people post civ IV (better yet, cIV :lol: ) in a civ III board. Perhaps the mods might consider starting a new one. Subforums may include ideas, others news...

Already done. ;)

And yes, I DO agree that pollution is like playing, "whack-a-mole".


EDIT: once I think about it, it's kind of strange that people post civ IV (better yet, cIV :lol: ) in a civ III board. Perhaps the mods might consider starting a new one. Subforums may include ideas, others news...

I was just talking to Thunderfall, and he said he might do that.

Yeah, lot of Civ4 stuff coming up. So much for one thread.

Originally posted by soren
I suggest for the webadmin(s) to post this on the main site.

EDIT: once I think about it, it's kind of strange that people post civ IV (better yet, cIV :lol: ) in a civ III board. Perhaps the mods might consider starting a new one. Subforums may include ideas, others news...

Are you 'Soren Johnson' the 'A.I. guy'???

Religion concept sounds great, finally! :)

Originally posted by Mr Black


Are you 'Soren Johnson' the 'A.I. guy'???


No, I'm not.

(And even if I were, I'd be hesitant in admitting so, since AI critisim runs rampant these days.)

Heres hoping that they also introduce the idea of banned resources (i.e. contraband and the black market), as well as a much MUCH better naval game system (with proper trade routes, piracy and embargoes!)
Of course, this is just the tip of the iceberg for me ;)!

Yours,
The_Aussie_Lurker.

you can get embargoes already in Civ3.

I'm curious as to what exactly the whole 'religion' thing will work out. Would that mean you can choose a religion for your Civ? if it does that brings up the whole idea of crusades and holy wars

But its groovy we're started to get little bits and pieces about what cIV (I think that way's better to :lol:) will look like, and I also like the idea of a new cIV thread

Mmmh, it will be a long way before I'm getting really interested in what they say about Civ4 (what I'd like is a really good last C3C patch), but I want to say this : I'm feeling good that they start the writing from scratch. I don't know how that may turn out in terms of gameplay, but I have kinda enough of the current game, I want another Civ experience. :) I wouldn't want a game really far from what it is right now, but some deep change could be welcome. And I'm happy they consider religion as a future feature : Civ3 culture was the beginning for this, now they have to really set up a religious system. Lastly, good to hear that some boring aspects will be gone or reworked. Indeed, this pollution system is weak, and I have had enough dealing with it since Civ1 (10 years for me now).

Let's hope some good news later, though, as I said, I'm not in a hurry ; I want some C3C stuff now. ;) And I hope the game will be widely tested for months ; Firaxis should consider extending the beta testing phase, to a point never seen before. :scan:

I think they should extend the beta testing phase to places other than America :D

Anyone have an idea if allowing fixed government traits will be incorporated? The rut of all civilizations being Democracies is really old. :rolleyes:

I think cIV should be changed to a platformer with each tech a new pick up to allow better jumping, faster speed, etc to finally overthrough the evil Montazuma (or leader of your choice). Each new level is a new era with new enemies and a new civ leader as end of level boss.

Just Kidding!

Religion, yeah cool, but as discussed on SEVERAL posts it needs to be handled in a Non-inflamatory way, obviously. Some people will think "yeah, whatever, another scared over-reactionist" to this post but given current global events, and the constant mis-understandings on all sides, I just think a little caution is needed.

Don't get me wrong, I would like to see religion playing a greater part in the Civ series. However, there was a suggestion on the civ 4 that civs could be (mainly negatively) bias between different religious groups would be somewhat ill-advised.

To be fair though, Sid and his "crew" have managed to steer us OK so far, even including fascist governments. I'm sure they will do this religion thing correctly.

I think religion will be ok in this sense. I mean, its a computer game isn't it?? its fantasy. I think for that reason the Isralli's (sorry not sure if thats spelt right) should be in the next game.

As Genghis Khev said, Fascism is now part of it, nd there's other things. There is the possability that people will complain about religion because of the whole possibility of a Jihad or crusade or whatever but this game's about Civilization (hence the name no?) and religion has been important to every civilization that I can care to think of, so a religious element should be in it.

It'd be groovy in my opinion

It has to have EVENTS in the scenario building tools.

the team is paying attention to a list of suggestions submitted by fans that is longer than the New Testament

Intesting. :hmm: :lol:

Originally posted by kryszcztov
And I hope the game will be widely tested for months

C3C was widely tested (hundreds of testers) for over 6 months before release. One of the problems is that games development was still going on till the last minute.

Originally posted by steviejay
I think they should extend the beta testing phase to places other than America :D

In both PTW and C3C there were quite a few non-Americans on the beta test. I don't know where this idea comes from.

Religion is actually already included in the game, disguised as culture. -> You build Temples etcetera hence people start believing in your religion (and/or way of life) and become eager to die for you, or pledge allegance to you. At risk of starting a painful subject; aren't those Northern Irish folks who resist the English (such as IRA) doing so partly because they are catholic and therefore want to join Ireland? Sounds like a culture flip to me...

I'm pretty excited too about the religious aspects of cIV. The Age of Discovery religious aspects were very tantalizing, and I really enjoy playing mods where "Holy Site" resources are required to build religious improvements and units. I'd like to hear more about the "civics" ideas he mentioned. I haven't heard as much about what the possibilities could be there. But more complexity, more realism, is always good.

Originally posted by kryszcztov
Let's hope some good news later, though, as I said, I'm not in a hurry ; I want some C3C stuff now. ;) And I hope the game will be widely tested for months ; Firaxis should consider extending the beta testing phase, to a point never seen before. :scan:

I'll remind myself (and others) to bring 2 gallons of tea/coffee to work everyday. :)


and to the other post above, C3C was tested by people around the world (mostly Europe).

If it were longer than the OLD testament- then I'd be worried ;)

All I can say: hope they learn from SMAC's Civics, (hey they seem to want to):)diplomacy, and events (after all a Firaxis game ;)), and especially its modular upgrade system, TOT's interlinking of maps, CTP1&2s multilayered maps (for real submarine and sea bottom envrironment and skies) and experience levels (i.e. also army alertness levels) - these alltogether are the best features of all other top games in this genre :)

... just my 2 cents for the Book of Books :D thanks 4 the info :)

events should be part of the game, like in Civ 1. I liked the newspaper clips :) "New Delhi suffers earthquake, citizens killed".
ah, the good ole days...

CTP sucks. I hope they DON'T learn from their submarine cities . what a stupid thing

What is that sort of reluctance everyone has when it comes to religion? Let's face it, it has played a huge role in many continents and in almost every country's history. I mean, it's like cause n°1 for 3/4 of European wars in the middle ages up to the XIXth century... forgeting religions would be denying the essence of civ, which is to develop a civ your way, INCLUDING regimes, foreign affairs, cities development...

One nice thing they could do is a displomatic way to convince a civ to wage war to another WITHOUT having your own civ involved... Just for the fun of being the "puppet master" of the world. It could also help to make nice Cold War/colonial wars scenarios...

Originally posted by LzPrst
events should be part of the game, like in Civ 1. I liked the newspaper clips :) "New Delhi suffers earthquake, citizens killed".
ah, the good ole days...

YES!!!!! That is one feature I miss so much! Civ3 *sort of* has it... but its just a pop up window. Bleaugh. Those newspapers, city view, palace building, and we love the king parades were silly little things that made the game so much fun, and I think they've suffered the way they've been shunted off to the side in Civ3.

Also, I'd like to see more Civ-specific music, like in Civ1. Civ3 just has a generic track for every Civ. Maybe at least they could have specific music for different ages and cultural groups.

Also, let's hope they take a page from CTP's book with the turn announcements. There's nothing worse in Civ3 than having click OK 100 times just to cycle the turn. A popup list with all the turn events that appears when the turn finishes cycling would be perfect.

I'm not sure I get the "Wack a Mole analogy" :confused:

Anyway, the ideas sound interesting. I like how they got rid of some needless complications in Civ3 (Marching fatigue, city support, settler food support, ZoC). But I'm not sure if I like (or even understand) getting rid of corruption and disorder.

Originally posted by Chieftess


I'll remind myself (and others) to bring 2 gallons of tea/coffee to work everyday. :)


and to the other post above, C3C was tested by people around the world (mostly Europe).

Mmmh, looks like we disagree... BTW philosophers don't drink coffee. ;) I know C3C was beta-tested for months, I also read Sullla's review (before it was half-deleted). I think some people made an excellent job in the testing, I also think some other folks didn't do much (some said they didn't), a few months later, and the game is unplayable. I won't hide my thinking : the beta-testing failed. It sure helped to debug stuff, to help the team to make clever choices, but as for making a decent product for sale, it didn't do what it should have done. The blame on whoever had control on the beta-testing... So me thinks a better beta-testing is needed, after a playable version is out, not while it is being finished (and sorry, Sullla's review proved that everything was mad and fast in the testing, I see why those 2 bugs weren't detected).

This post isn't for bashing, I had enough dealing with Civ3's faults. This is to tell Firaxis to do things well, not fast. :)

Originally posted by Aussie_Lurker
Heres hoping that they also introduce the idea of banned resources

rofl, great idea. A drug trade!

Originally posted by kryszcztov

I think some people made an excellent job in the testing, I also think some other folks didn't do much (some said they didn't), a few months later, and the game is unplayable. I won't hide my thinking : the beta-testing failed.

I wouldn't call the game "unplayable" as I play it nearly every day.

Beta-testing no matter how good does not ensure that bugs will be found or fixed. In particular fixing is totally up to the programmers.

The beta testers were there to see if the game was fun and balanced and occasionally find bugs.

Sullla probably wasn't aware of this, but in addition to the beta testers, there were QA test teams from Firaxis, Breakaway, AQ, and Atari looking at it (these are professional testers whose job it was to find bugs, not players recruited).

Originally posted by Rhye
CTP sucks. I hope they DON'T learn from their submarine cities . what a stupid thing



You are right about the underwater cities (or the space ones :rolleyes: ) but they should put some resources at the bottom of the sea (oil for instance ;)) and the layered maps were really cool, allowing to really go two floors down with your subs :D (but you could only use your missiles in the middle layer) whaere the chance of getting discovered was much greater than at the bottom (CTP one was- well- unfortunate, to say the least, but it featured some brilliant ideas that reemerged in CTP2)

I would like to see civ4 with faster turns on huge maps, more diplo agrrements, and please fix the if you conquer i civ you signed an allince aganist you get a rep hit bug!
the rep hits should be changed. it should be able to be forgiven and rejoin the rest of the world in trading after sometime. If your trading with someone one who attacks your MPP partner it should not be a rep hit for you if you automaticly declare war

Originally posted by Louis XXIV
I'm not sure I get the "Wack a Mole analogy" :confused:

Anyway, the ideas sound interesting. I like how they got rid of some needless complications in Civ3 (Marching fatigue, city support, settler food support, ZoC). But I'm not sure if I like (or even understand) getting rid of corruption and disorder.

Whack-A-Mole is an arcade game, usually a redemption game (where you get tickets for prizes based on score) that has a 3x2 grid, and a hole in each section. A motorized mole pops out, and you need to whack it with your mallet to score points.

Pollution pops up, and like a mallet decending on the popped-up mole, workers converge on it as soon as possible to clear it. Although you don't get points for clearing pollution, but you do fix the cities so production/commerce/food doesn't go down.

I'd also like to see some kind of message log, where you can view the pop-up messages that scroll by to quick. First SGL I got, I didn't know where it came from because I was looking away when it popped up.

pollution should not take up tiles, but should have an antihappyness affect, maybe a gold/shield per turn cost

Hi,

Firaxis people please think in the Events and we really need real diplomatic options (locked peace, locked war in alliance and alone, and a milion more things......)

Originally posted by Turner_727


Pollution pops up, and like a mallet decending on the popped-up mole, workers converge on it as soon as possible to clear it. Although you don't get points for clearing pollution, but you do fix the cities so production/commerce/food doesn't go down.

Ah, I see now.

I never really thought about it before, I guess I took it for granted about pollution (although I can't think of one instance in real life where pollution worked like that ;) ).

Oil spills?

Excuse my ignorance but what is civics in this case? Any ideas?

Oh, and speaking of culture flips, I think that there should be special revolter units for that, that will "attack" the troops inside the city from inside, nullifying the effect of walls. I mean, a modern armor division COULD have a chance of fighting off a bunch of resistors. And good to see there will be a religion. I think it will be alittle like governments. It will also probably mean that BC/AD thing will have a certain point... or that it will lose whatever point it had if religion will depend on scientific research.

Civics should be (as far as I understand it) teaching schools of governemnt; in SMAC there was a possibility of customizing ones Government form (and your allies would take even their diplomatic stance towards your empire according to your choices- religious civs would warn you repeatedly if you are atheist- and even break alliances or declare war if you ignore their pleads for too long (according to your relative power).

I.e.
A1) Industrious A2) Leisurelike A3) Environmentalist
B1) Religious B2) Tolerant B3) Atheist

Hi,

I am very satisfied by the developers support that is given to Civilization! The beta testing must have been a lot of work, I have not experienced any bugs that really make the game unplayable (except maybe this menu display error after about 50 restarts - but hey that's my problem). And then those great Add-Ons beeing released later on. I LOVE IT!

I know CIV IV will probably blow me away, since I, II and III did :king:

The biggest wish I can think of is an improved multiplayer gameplay. If a player drops he should be replaced by an AI that has a simmilar skill ;)

now i forget the point of my post but well.

Originally posted by Turner_727
Oil spills?

Randomly appearing? :p

btw, I think civics is pride in ones government.

Something that pisses me off is after you capture a city, hold on to it for a few turns an lose it to some stupid rebellious defectors. Normally, I could be mistaken, but normally the people with the guns make the rules. Even if the the resistors won, the troops would shoot their way out of the city and some poulation points should be lost (like if a size 15 city rebelled, it would be reduced to 11 and your troops would be end up 2 or 3 spaces away. This is a little nit picky though.

I also think terrorist would be awesome. They could be kind of like spies, but they could blow stuff up!

I also think terrorist would be awesome. They could be kind of like spies, but they could blow stuff up!
No, we don't want anything to do with terrorism. The next thing you guys will ask is: "How about a Suicide Bomber as a UU (Unique Unit)"?

Sort of like if they made guerrilla units stealth (sort of like the ninjas in the Sengoku scenario).

One thing I'd really like to see is options for major rise and fall of empires. That way, Rome could collapse, The British Empire could split into separate states, you know, things like that. Countries unite split all the time in history, changing names constantly. Rome became many separate countries, then later became Italy. France was once the Kingdom of the Franks. Germany wasn't a nation until the late 1800's. America has only been around for just over 225 years. Even recently countries like Yugoslavia have split into pieces. I think Civ 4 should illustrate the fact that civilizations are not concrete things and are subject to constant change.

OK, first of all, I don't think that a stronger focus on religion needs to be controversial in order to work! You just have broad religious categories throughout history, which your empire can change to over time. For instance, you might start off as 'paganist', then move to 'Pantheist-then you might become 'monotheist', and even to 'Reformist/Orthodox'. Each religion should have its own list of Wonders (Small and Great), Improvements, units and benefits/penalties. You should also be able to change to these religions in much the same way as you change your government (though the lag time for changing should be MUCH longer). Religion should also introduce new concepts like religious schisms-where, if you become 'aware' of a new religion (either through 'tech' advancement or discovery of a new civilization), then there is a % chance/turn of citizens converting to that religion. Like CtP, a city which contains such a 'heretic' would have a special symbol over it. Such converts could have several effects 1) If enough of them appear in one city they can force that city to 'break away' from your empire-becoming independant or part of a bordering empire which shares that religion, 2) If there are enough of them in your empire, they can force a change in the 'State' religion 3) They can cause violence and even anarchy/revolution or 4) they can become 'colonists' breaking away from your city to found a new civ under their religion. In fact, the chance of a 'convert' randomly appearing could, to some degree, work in the same way as plague spread in C3C-with the chance being increased by city size and connection, by trade route, to other 'infected' cities.
It should also be possible to 'forcibly' convert foreign citizens to your religion-either through a subset of espionage, or via cultural 'Great Leaders'!
Anyway, they are just a few starting thoughts on how religion could work in Civ4! Hope to have more ideas later!

Yours,
Aussie_Lurker.

maybe for differt units for differt religons (they look differt but have the same stats)

I think that the best way to deal with pollution, in civ4, is as follows.
Basically you have a pollution 'Bar' for each city-broken up into sections-no pollution, annoying pollution, harmful pollution and Lethal pollution.
In many ways, pollution modelling would be the same-as in, the more mines, farms and factories etc you have, the worse pollution gets. Once a city's pollution reaches the annoying stage, then peoples happiness starts to drop-(btw, I think that happiness should work on a 1-100% scale-with 0% being frenzied, and 100% being total adoration, though it should be nearly impossible to reach these extremes ;)!) At this stage, though, happiness drops will be quite small. Also, there is a small chance of a tile, in your city radius, becoming less productive.
If it reaches the harmful stage, then happiness drops become more extreme, and could threaten to cause violence or even a revolution-demands for pollution control measures would be assured. Also, there is a much increased chance of tiles becoming less productive, and even a small chance of the tile becoming unproductive-minor terrain changes, within your radius, are possible at this level as well. Lastly, there is a slight chance, per turn, of one of your citizens dying from pollution effects.
When you get to lethal levels, things are REALLY bad. Happiness drops are extreme, and could even lead to a civil war. Lost productivity is almost guaranteed, each turn, with an equally increased chance of a tile becoming totally unproductive. More extreme terrain changes are also almost certain! Also, you have a much greater risk of citizens dying from the pollution.
You can reduce pollution by either reducing the proportion of your budget going to industry-which will reduce producivity, or upgrading your industries to a cleaner, but more expensive, variety. Lastly, you could pass environment laws, or place more money into your environment budget-which would not only reduce the immediate pollution levels, but will increase the speed at which polluted tiles are cleaned up!
On a final note, these pollution levels would also exist at both a regional and global level, with harmful levels of city-based pollution contributing to regional pollution, and harmful levels of regional pollution contributing to global pollution. All other effects would be the same, but obviously effecting a much larger area in each case!

Yours,
Aussie_Lurker.

Originally posted by Do_Sa_Nim
Something that pisses me off is after you capture a city, hold on to it for a few turns an lose it to some stupid rebellious defectors. Normally, I could be mistaken, but normally the people with the guns make the rules. Even if the the resistors won, the troops would shoot their way out of the city and some poulation points should be lost (like if a size 15 city rebelled, it would be reduced to 11 and your troops would be end up 2 or 3 spaces away. This is a little nit picky though.

Resistors are a pain to deal with, even in real life, but they attack enemy units, not make them disapear. When I city is resisting, they should damage and destroy units before flipping the city back. They would also destroy improvements, especially ones that were built by the occupying regime. There probably should be some more modern tech (maybe Guerrilla Warfare) that allows more effective resistors, and probably resistor units (like the Partisans of Civ2) that pop up when a city is captured. Only these unit would probably be more for mayhem (pillaging road squares and being a general pain in the ass) than for capturing cities. The army, in turn, would try to stop the resistance from gaining the upper hand in the city, and would try to cause them to submit. The amount of troops would certainly be a factor, but not every resistor would need to be killed for the population to loose hope and give up the fight.

On a related note, populations should welcome cities more with open arms, especially if they belonged to them in the past, or the previous owners were cruel to them (I'm not saying that citizens who were pop rushed by the last guys wouldn't resist the new ownership, that's definately not true, they just shouldn't blaim you for the actions). Also, when you capture a city from a third party that either was pop rushed, or is still in resistance, the resistance should end immediately (or their won't be any immediate resistance). Over time, depending on how you treated them, they might want to be free from you to, and a delayed resistance will begin (probably start with unhappiness, than go to rioting, then active resistance). Once there is active resistance, you can, of course, crush it with military force. But "democratic" governments are probably limited in their ability to use such harsh methods.

Originally posted by Louis XXIV


Randomly appearing? :p

btw, I think civics is pride in ones government.

It may appear random in the game, but we really don't know what's going on in that city. Each city has a certain chance to produce pollution each turn. The more industrialized, the bigger the chance. Seems to me that Supertankers holding millions of barrels of oil is pretty industrious.

Besides, pollution is just the game equivalent of real-world mishaps. Exxon Valdez, Chernobyl, Three Mile island. . . with 'random' pollution based upon how big the city is population wise. Cars, trucks, trains, airplanes. . . Pollution in civ is just a simplization of real-world concepts.

And I have no idea what Civics is. Sounds interesting, tho.

Originally posted by rschissler

No, we don't want anything to do with terrorism. The next thing you guys will ask is: "How about a Suicide Bomber as a UU (Unique Unit)"?

I remember at least three terrorists having been custom made (not counting some rebel units). There is also a Suicide one amongst these (think it is supposed to act like a ground missile).

So, let's compile a wish list and make it beat Old Testament and New Testament in size taken together. Okay?

Yes, we need Civil Wars restored (Civ II). And thanks for explaining the Civics. But can't we already make custom governments in the editor? Yes we can.

Religion should also affect international relations - before Nationalism. After nationalism, it should lose much influence, and be replaced by Idealogy (democracy, communism, fascism, etc).

Would've been nice to make a UN somehow more resemblant of the SMAC Planetary Council, by the way.

Originally posted by das
So, let's compile a wish list and make it beat Old Testament and New Testament in size taken together. Okay?

Yes, we need Civil Wars restored (Civ II). And thanks for explaining the Civics. But can't we already make custom governments in the editor? Yes we can.

Religion should also affect international relations - before Nationalism. After nationalism, it should lose much influence, and be replaced by Idealogy (democracy, communism, fascism, etc).

Would've been nice to make a UN somehow more resemblant of the SMAC Planetary Council, by the way.

:D definitly- second all points !!! (and yes), it would be much more interesting to have civil wars also at changing state form, instead of the traditional transition period where work is halted and poupulation drops due to starvation

Originally posted by das
So, let's compile a wish list and make it beat Old Testament and New Testament in size taken together. Okay?

No problem, I'm sure I could think of a ton of ideas (I actually haven't been paying attention to the wish list, but I can always think of new stuff).

Yes, we need Civil Wars restored (Civ II). And thanks for explaining the Civics. But can't we already make custom governments in the editor? Yes we can.

Civics isn't the government itself, it has more to do with patriotism (unless I'm thinking of a different definition of civics, it could be something I'm not thinking of).

Religion should also affect international relations - before Nationalism. After nationalism, it should lose much influence, and be replaced by Idealogy (democracy, communism, fascism, etc).

I agree, but I think the most important factor about religion in real life is its affect on controlling your rule. Sometimes religion is great at helping you rule (the Medieval kings had a divine right to rule), sometimes religious leaders will have a significant influence on your absolute power (Second half of the New Kingdom in Egypt, a priesthood ruled half of Egypt, and this continued until the Egyptian queen married a priest to unite the 2 ruling powers).

Would've been nice to make a UN somehow more resemblant of the SMAC Planetary Council, by the way.

Of course there should, I actually took this for granted ;)

I personally dont want religion not because of controversial reasons, but because I dont see how it can fit in the game in a good way.

But if religion is on the table, you have to also put these things on the table:

art
philosophy
literature
politics
...etc...

but brianshapiro, most of them already are in the game in the form of wonders or governments or things like that. And religion needs to go in, they need to try to work a way to fit it in, I mean, they were able to fit fascism in.....

I'm not certain how it could be fitted in (although if Fraxis are willing to pay me a few thousand pounds I'm sure I could try :lol: ) but I think it needs to be just because of the significance.

Maybe there could be a wonder where you get to be the Holy Roman Empire (stealing from the scenario) where you're like.... the head honcho for the other civ's that are in your religion, you can go to war on people and call it a crusade, so other nations would follow you and declare war, or if they don't they get a kind of War Weariness from their population who are angry that their government isn't doing what their religious leader wants them to.

I would like to see them poll the fans to see what they would like to have added or improved. They are the ones paying for the game, afterall...

Please see above for how Religion can EASILY be fitted into the game (geez, don't you guys READ my posts :rolleyes: :D ). To recap, though:
1) Religion and culture should still be linked as they were in civ3 (i.e. religious improvements and wonders should still generate culture-and happiness).

2) Religious and/or Cultural Great Leaders-can be used to boost your empires culture or, a la CtP, they can wander off to other empires to preach gloom and doom (thus decreasing happiness levels) or even to convert citizens/units to your religion and or philosophy.

3) The ability to have a state religion-in much the same way as you have a government. Religions should be BROAD not specific (i.e. Monotheism, Polytheism-not Islam/Christianity)

4) Your relations to other nations should, as was suggested above, be a factor of both your culture group AND your religion-at least in pre-nationalism eras. i.e. Two European Monotheisms will get on better than an Asian and European Monotheism, but the latter will get on better than a European Montheisnm and a European Polytheism!

5) Under certain government types, it should be possible to declare a 'Holy War', as opposed to a standard war, against a civ with a different religion and/or culture. Such wars have a better chance of being approved by your citizens and by other civs (if they are 'Related' to yours by religion and culture). In addition, there is a chance, each turn, of these aformentioned civs joining in your crusade.

6) If you change to a new religion, or refuse to change to one that has popular support, there is a chance of a 'Religious Schism'. This is like a Civil War, but one driven by religion and not government.

7) (i) After you 'discover' a new religion, there should be a chance, each turn, of one of your cities population 'Converting' to that faith. Converts will have, in the city screen, a symbol over them denoting their new faith. The spread of conversion should work, in some respects, like plague in C3C-with larger cities being most 'at risk' etc.

7) (ii) Converts can either increase the chance of cultural conversion to a neighbouring empire (if it shares the same religion as your converts!); cause your city(s) to break away and become independant (religious schism), or try and force you to change religions; break away, as settlers, to try and found a new civilization.

8) Religious Specialists (Clerics/Priests)-sort of a slightly more potent version of entertainers (increasing happiness) and reduces the chance of conversions in that city.

9) Prior to the Industrial Age, it should be possible to commit acts of 'Religious Espionage', these would take the form of religious 'propaganda', as a means of converting enemy citizens. You should be able to spark a Religious Schism, plant a church (spy ;)) in an enemy city and the like. Obviously these will cost money, and the chance of success should be, in some respect, dependant on your cultural strength vs. that of your enemy.

Just as a side-note, planting a church in an enemy city both makes it easier to commit 'religious espionage' and increases the chance of natural conversions to your faith (if applicable).
Anyway, this is a more succinct re-hash of what I've said above-and shows that, in my opinion, religion can be easily incorporated into the game.

Yours,
Aussie_Lurker.

Originally posted by Aussie_Lurker
OK, first of all, I don't think that a stronger focus on religion needs to be controversial in order to work! You just have broad religious categories throughout history, which your empire can change to over time. For instance, you might start off as 'paganist', then move to 'Pantheist-then you might become 'monotheist', and even to 'Reformist/Orthodox'.

Except that some countries never "advanced" i.e. India is still pantheist. It is already slightly offensive that the Civ series makes Monotheism an advance over Polytheism. If they want to enhance the current culture model, that's OK, but introducing "real" religions into a fictional game is a big mistake IMHO. I'd rather see them spend the time developing a more sophisticated government model. However, if they do, then they ought to introduce a more realisitic combat system too. From the brief remark "Introducing more sophisticated concepts of unit experience and upgrades", it sounds like they are still planning to keep the one on one combat again.

I pray that 32MB of video will be capable of playing this game... otherwise I will be depressed for years.

I think we are all agreed that for religion "monotheism, polythiesm, philosophcal beliefs (i.e. Budism or the like, not a religion per say but a defined belief stucture), etc are infinitely better than Real World religion names.

I would also include:
Atheism (no god),
Secular Society (all religs. toterated but none supported),
Astrology (Sun / Moon / Star based relig) and
Wicken (Paganism / Earth Worship).
To name a few!

EDIT: Would Occultism (Woship of "evil / non-benign" deity) be a step too far?

Hey Playshogi, I do agree with your point about Monotheism in Civ. Of all the things I felt they needed to change in the game, it was to make ALL religious 'techs' non-compulsory! I don't really see, in game terms, monotheism being an advance on polytheism. In fact, I think that monotheism appears in the game WAY to late-the Jews were monotheistic almost 2000 years BCE, after all. In my own Civ 3 games, I moved monotheism BACK to the ancient era, and made it dependant on 'Code of Laws' and 'Polythiesm'. I then had a 'Late Monotheism' which required 'philosophy' and 'Polytheism'-to represent Islam and other, later, montheistic faiths. I also added two branches of Eastern Philosophy (Religion), one which reflects the Bhuddist and Taosist Ideals, and one which is more in line with the Polytheistic beliefs of Shinto and Hinduism. I made ALL of these techs non-compulsory and made them dependant on different religious resource! Also, when I have C3C, I will probably give these techs 'flavours', in order to encourage different civs to favour the pursuit of certain religious techs over others! I confess that this is a bit of a hack job but, if I can do all of that, with the tools available in Civ3, then imagine what civ4 could do for religion in the game ;)!


EDIT: BTW, Ghengis-Khev. I hope that the ability to become a 'Secular' society, or more religiously tolerant, will be in some way represented through societal 'Influence', and the passing of laws in the game!
Yours,
Aussie_Lurker.

Well, I've said this before [not since several months ago, however. x.x] but one thing that I'd really want to see is a system of 'provinces'. I've said stuff about this in the main cIV thread, and since its been awhile, I've probably lost much of the original idea, however... basically, it would be a set up where every few cities become organized and seperated into 'provinces' which have their own 'provincial capital' [in other words, if the current model of corruption still exists, these would be weaker versions of Forbidden Palace. If not, well, they'd still have the other uses I shall mention!] and their own organized needs. To form these provinces, roads [or harbors, or later airports] would need to connect the cities together, to a regional capital [usually the greatest city in the region at the time] and you may possibly have to build the capital, though I am not sure.

This system would allow many large changes in the game, and would allow much deeper depth to governmental form, civil wars, and political relations, allow intranational diplomacy as well as international diplomacy also. These provinces would all have their own needs, and their own level of 'closeness' [pardon the clumsy word] to the capital province. This would depend on if it has access to the resources of the capital, how much infrastructure it possesses, how culturally affluent it is related to the capital, how it is doing related to the other provinces, whether or not there seems to be 'favoritism' towards or against that particular province [or, if more resources are used to help the other provinces than that one, or if more are used for that one than others] distance from the capital, levels of total happiness, and how productive the province is, and whether it was originally created by that nation or conquered, and how long it has been part of that empire. It isn't as simple as 'it's productive and well infrastructured, so it's loyal', in fact, sometimes it may be opposite. A highly culturally affluent, somewhat far away, heavily infrastructured and populated area may become dissatisfied with being ruled by a capital so far away, and may desire to become its own state, and bring smaller nearby provinces with it.

To add to this, each province would have a relationship to each other, and foreign nations, to better represent regional feelings, which can be different in different areas. Each of these provinces would answer to you, would say what it needs, what it wants, what and who it likes and dislikes, and what it would desire to do then. Depending on how you treat them, their closeness to you might slip away, depending on the other factors as well, and also depending on government form.

Here's where government form may become quite distinct from how it is now, and far more interesting. Depending on the government, your control over the provinces, their power and influence over you, and even to an extent HOW you control your nation change. For instance, in despotism, you control everything with an iron fist, and the provinces have no say, they're just together out of organizational purposes, as well as tax purposes. Yet if they get too far away from you, they may want to start their own little kingdom, and if you don't want that, you'll need a military presense there, from your capital province. [btw, yes, that would mean a very revised version of the old CivII idea of units being funded by particular cities, but in this case, you don't have city unit limits (dealt with the same way as in Civ III) but the city you build a unit in is still it's home city, and province, and if it is from, say, a province which shall rebel, it will also rebel, and if it's from your capital, it is most useful for keeping other grumbling provinces in line, etc]

In other forms of government, like the city-state format, each province is really its own country, that you barely control, almost like an alliance for purely defensive reasons. If there's a war, they may not allow you to send troops from the province [they cannot be moved from ithe home province if it doesnt want to fight] for instance, and outside of war, it might allow a nation to stay together that wouldnt under despotism since the provinces would basically get their own needs first, and wouldnt really need to rebel. [maybe differences in commerce, maybe first used within the province, with some taxation (maybe) being sent to the capital?]. Later on, more complex forms such as Feudalism, Republic [Roman style] Monarchy, Communism, and Democracy could do things a bit differently. Also, overseas imperial colonies could be done differently this way too. However, I must leave now, so I cannot continue for this moment. But, please tell me what you think, ask whatever questions about it you want, and do give me feedback on what you think, please! Well, later!

To continue:

When it comes to changing governments, this system of provinces could make that more interesting as well. When you desire to change the government, for example, those who benefit from it [or just some of the population. x.x] will not be happy, and they may fight you for it, leading at least to the loss of all government for awhile while it the government is reformed [may take different amounts of time for different areas] if the resistance is too much, one or more provinces may decide to rebel, to reestablish the old government, and force you to go back. Or, if worse comes to worse, become it's own country with the government it desires. Also, some places may initiate a revolt if you dont go to a government they desire.

Of course, remember, it wouldnt be fun if rebellion were constant, so, basically, I'd say they shouldn't be that common, though they should happen, and also in other non-player countires, often enough so that it is noticed. It should be a fun dynamic, not an annoying constant frustration, and reward doing well by your nation's people.

The provinces would have differing relations with each other, as well. Some provinces may end up in competition with each other, for instance, or not send troops to defend a certain one during a war [if provincial influence is strong enough to prevent it] or argue over border disputes [especially who gets the rights to the special benefits of owning the resource at the edge of the provinces] or even, if things get bad enough, to skirmishes using their units without your permission.

Well, that's all I have for the moment. I need to study what I wrote in the past to get all my ideas back. So... please give feedback on these, I'd appreciate this.

Aussie_Lurker, people keep banging on about the mysterious and elusive "Civics". Perhaps "Secularism(?)" has a home here?

Originally posted by Herr_Doktor
One nice thing they could do is a displomatic way to convince a civ to wage war to another WITHOUT having your own civ involved... Just for the fun of being the "puppet master" of the world. It could also help to make nice Cold War/colonial wars scenarios...

i heartily second this idea [with the caveat that the opposite should be possible as well: instigating peace between neighbors]. i can't count how many times i have wanted to urge treaties between two enemies [but i can't remember why right now].

hmmm...

change regent back to prince.

i know it may seem sacrosant, but revamp the idea of the tech tree. maybe make it more fluid and uncontrolled, like real life.

No more spearmen vs tank battles (with the upset). it is impossible. (make cities/units surrender if to badly outnumbered, outmoded?)

I like the idea of provinces, though idea has to be thought out carefully b4 implementation.

ok, heres my big demands :)

1- The military system needs to be fixxed, the whole idea that everytime you fight one unit or the other is completely wiped out is absurd...i dont think its wrong that it happens upon occassion but in reality most of the time there is a winner and a loser with the loser retreating and both sides hurt...
2- the province idea was amazing...i dont think ive heard a better idea of how to organize things than that thus far...it would add so many dynamics to the game and the same time make many of the current ones make more since if it was properly incorporated
3- diplomacy wise...I really must have multilateral negotiations...if there is one thing i hate its when i make a mpp with two nations and they go to war the next turn....its so stupid....i think you should be able to negotiate with as many nations as you like at once... this would add a dimension to the game that is sorely needed....for example how much easier would it not be to have a real world war with 2 or 3 *distinct* sides going at it in a normal game? and trade embargoes would make more sense
4- the trade system has got to be changed....there must be defined trade routes and such which can then be privateered, cut off, or undermined....history is littered with wars that were over trade routes....and changes in the course of the world that resulted from blocked ones (for example the discovery of America)
5-rebellions and civil wars must be put back in...there must be a separation of the two though....rebellions are for provinces or cities who want to break away and form their own nation or join another....civil wars are for changes in gov or reforms in society (i.e.- you didnt spend enough on luxuries so your citizens revolted because of thier low standard of living)
6-i was never around for civ 1...too young at the time to play....but the idea of interesting little tidbits and popups like sewspaper clippings sounds good...i already derive great joy from having my cities celebrate we love the king day and such ...so that would be even more interesting and fun
7-the naval game must be revamped...it just stinks...dont ask me how to do it...just needs to be done
8-the whole air system at the moment must be reworked...who ever heard of a lone bomber bombing a city....its a stupid thought...its not how they're used...actually all military units are used in tandem with eachother....so i suppose you should be able to time units to attack into different areas at the same time and the same hex at the same time...i guess land wise that would mean putting unit directions...so you could flank, attack the rear...and so on
8-production scales...in general most things do not take years to build when being built by the state and such...they take less time like training a civil war era infantry unit would have taken a minimum of a month and max of 6 (prolly not the exact numbers but you get the point)
9-is it not true that a city can build multiple things at once...YES IT IS! that also annoys me about the game...why cant you use your shields in a split up fashion at least (actually i dont like shields i think it should just be a number which can be done in decimals) to produce multiple things? like it makes no sense at all to not be able to produce a rifleman and a temple all at the same time...
10-im in awe that atari has the guts to bring in religion...i honestly didnt think the company had it in em (to be fair i didnt think any company did) but now that they have they need to do a good job with it....it influenced and still influences the world in alot of ways....a good example of modern times is the iraq situation....the sunni's dont like the shiites and the americans are infidels and so on and so forth....
11-military units should be given automatic names according to their city of creation (ie-the 1st and 2nd New Orleans Regiments) and then upon making a veteran type status the user should be given the oppertunity to give them a nickname (ie-our 1st New Orleans Regiment now becomes the New Orleans Tigers)
12-governments must be reworked...the bottom line is that with the current system one gov will always be better than the others and therefor the comp will gravitate to it automatically...there needs to be that check and balance type thing...communism is absolute but your people tend to be unhappy so you better be able to back up your harsh rule with an iron fist or they may revolt and break away (real world example-USSR)...democracy is good until your people realize they can vote thier way into the treasuryand pay themselves....republics are good..as long as the other provincial reps are on your side and wut you want is in thier best interest....the original american model is awsome except that pesky congress keeps getting in your way or helps you if more provinces would like the idea....fuedalism is great..till you wanna pass a reform or tax sumbody...theocracies are great until your people change religions or get annoyed by having to go to the temples everyday
13-railroads should not defy the laws of physics....enough said....
14-im thinking that nukes need to be beefed up sum.... i just dont think thier power is shown to its full extent..furthermore i think the pc needs to be more sparing when using them....when a war gets bad it shouldnt immediately resort to them...i mean it just doesnt work that way....
15-nukes need to find a way into spy and terroism missions....think how easy it would actually be to sneak a nuke into a city and then detonate it....its a scary thought but thats my real fear these days....
16-culture specific unit lines if not civ specific....
17-the way certain units work should be rethought...the basic attacker, defender, bombarder process is not a good one... combined arms must be taken into consideration...when you assault that one hex you're not just assaulting that musketman but also that cav and the artillery and the other 2 musket units along with the 2 pikes there....also unit strengths should be used but units should get flagged as certain types....for example...in the medieval ages....you would have a hvy cav, lt cav, hvy inf, lt inf, militia, each with its own advantages and capabilities against certain things...actually napoleonic europe is the best example...
18-diplomatic annexation.....again the point is made...
19-economics needs to take a much greater role in this....its not an all up thing...nations rise and fall on thier economies....revolts are triggered on thier downturns...incredible works on thier rises...
20-i also agree that pollution needs to be fixxed sumhow....not sure hows best...
21-i have always thought it wierd that when you conquer a city it is automatically part of your nation then...why cant it be given back at the end of a war unless you demand it in return for peace...essentially automatic annexation doesnt make since to me....annexation was always deliberate.. you could even tie it in with the provinces...annexing whole provinces or districts...
22-should fuedalism not be able to be undermined through dealing with the individual lords? it was a trademark of the medieval ages that nobles could change sides whenever they wanted because they had thier own armies...
23-i always thought the civ money scale was wierd...this is just sumthing that is me...but i have always wanted real dollar amounts...that are realistic according the economics of your country....
24-should international issues not be a subject of your citizens contentedness...or even national issues...do you allow abortion?...what are your environmental rules?...do you allow slavery? (if so which race and this should also be a larger issue as well through some method or another)... should your nation interfere in the so and so's and john doe's war? and so forth
25-the UN has to be fixxed into a realistic entity not just sum stupid wonder that means nothing except a diplo victory with like the top 3 nations and progressively a civ can demand a veto right with the rest just having votes on various issues....like to send UN troops...and if you want to send UN troops and its approved then you can temporarily make some of your troops UN and use them in a police action however that may be....
26-international media....ever since the moveable type printing press the media has a had a huge role in the politics and feelings of peoples...this needs to be implemented sumhow in such a way you can interact with it...like in particularly bad situations you can keep the press out of things by blocking them out or only allowing them to see good things....all the way to bribing them or controlling them totally in an autocracy....
27-is it not true you can have irrigation and a mine in the same area?....'nough said

thats all i can think of for now but im sure more will come to me later....lol

I like your ideas Bobby Lee. Its just I think that the air force system is just fine. I do believe that there should be combined forces in attacks. Also, I think that somehow morale and training should affect units. Its covered a little with the hitpoints, but some tiny armies have completely wiped the floor of larger less trained armies in history. I think that you should be able to drill units to increase their stats. (Not so much as to have a warrior able to take out a rifleman). Also morale affects how people fight. If the war has been going bad for you I think that units should then have less fight in them. If anyone thinks my ideas are stupid thats ok.

OK, I tried to post this yesterday-and it TOLD me it was posted successfully :mad: !
Anyway, what I tried to say yesterday was that I hold out TWO hopes for what civics might be:

First, I hope it is the power to enact laws and legislation-such as emancipation declarations, martial law, secularist (religious tolerance) and the like. These laws would have numerous 'in-game' effects: such as increasing/decreasing happiness, increasing/decreasing corruption, increasing/decreasing cultural/religious conversion rates.
The second aspect of civics I'd like to see are concepts like 'Factions', 'Factional Influence' and 'Absolutity'.
These concepts are as follows:

Factions: basically breaking your civ down into the sectors which comprise it-such as workers, the military, religious groups and the administrati. Each faction will have its own agenda, its own happiness, and its own degree of 'influence' over your decision making. Also, each faction is capable of contributing a varying amount of revenue-per head of population-to your coffers.

Influence: represents the % chance that a given faction may try to thwart your goals, or try to force theirs upon you! These goals can range from your choice of government and religion, to the types of improvements you construct.
Factional influence is determined by several factors:

1) Your Civ Characteristics (commercial, industrious etc).
2) The number and type of city and tile improvements you build.
3) Your Government/Religion Type.
4) Laws, Edicts and Small/Great Wonders.
5) Self-adjustment by use of a slide bar (up to the min./max. allowed by your government type.)
6) The number and type of resources you possess.
Basically, whenever you try and change your research path, sign a diplomatic agreement or build a great/Small Wonder-there is a chance that one of the factions will try to oppose you. This will almost ALWAYS be the most powerful faction at any given time.
In addition, each city's level of factional influence will both effect the build decisions of the Governer of that city and the chance of your build queue being opposed. Lastly, every turn, there is a % chance that the most powerful faction might approach you to DEMAND that you do something for them (like go to war, change government, increase luxuries, changing building priorities or research a given tech). You can ignore their demands/opposition, but it will impact on their happiness-in which case you could end up with a revolt by that faction. Each type of factional revolt would have a different effect on your civ (for instance, a military result might cause you to lose control of your units for x-turns, or new units might not get built for x turns!
As mentioned above, each city will also have varying amounts of factional influence-so building an improvement in one city might be supported, but building the same improvement in another city might be opposed-because a different faction is in control there!

'Absolutity': Each government type will have an Absolutity Index, or AI, which modifies the influence of your factions-up or down-and thus altering the amount of 'absolute' power you wield. Governments with a positive AI are more democratic than those with negative AI's. Also, though, the AI alters the happiness of the factions in a similar direction. i.e. more democracy grants greater happiness, and vice versa. To make things more complicated, though, some government types might increase, or decrease, the influence of ONE faction, whilst leaving the rest untouched (or even moving them in the OPPOSITE direction!) For example, a fuedal government might increase the influence of the religious, military and wealthy factions, whilst decreasing the influence of the workers.
Lastly, a governments AI can also be altered, up or down, by different small/great wonders, different religions, and the enacting of laws and edicts-again, just to name a few!

Anyway, those are just a few of my thoughts! The main benefit of my ideas, IMHO, is that, in combination with Civil Wars and War Weariness, it might give the player the feeling that his civ contains REAL people-with their own dreams, demands and agendas! For instance, just because YOU might want to go to war with your neighbour, doesn't mean that the Workers and Merchants of you civ will want you to and-if they happen to be in ascendancy-then they might just try to thwart such plans! It certainly would be a welcome change from the current situation where you feel like your people are merely passive observers of your civs progress-only kicking up a stink every so often ;)!
Anyway, I'd like to know what people think of this idea and, if you would care for any clarifications, I'd be more than happy to give them.

Yours,
Aussie_Lurker.

I think Firaxis should not listen to ideas from hard-core players for Civ4. :)

These ideas will in general make for a game that only the hard-core elite will like. This is a death knell for a franchise. Hard core ideas should go into an expansion (since the casual players who buy the most copies of a game aren't likely to buy an expansion unless they become part of the hard core elite).

I love the way anytime Civ IV is even mentioned, people start posting their Civ IV ideas. Any news from Thunderfall on that Civ IV forum since February yet Chieftess?

Originally posted by genghis_khev
EDIT: Would Occultism (Woship of "evil / non-benign" deity) be a step too far?



Yes a bit too far! :D I don't think that any civ ever decided to worship absolute evil. Even gods such as Baal were "good" once they had their blood baths. Only some sects or early tribes did (Haschaschins or Indian sect whose name can't remember for example.)
"Paganism" is not really good, because it designates all the "non-christians" religions, which is A LOT. "Animism" might be better, for it designates spirits and minor deities such as nymphs or nature thingies (the chessnut tree, the spring, etc...).
Also I don't really understand the meaning of "atheism" as a state-religion. Which country did ever claimed that religion was banned? Even the USSR did not!
"Philosophical belief" is good, because it also includes religions such as taoism or confucianism.



To Ant509y:



Whow you DO have a lot of ideas ;)
Now in my opinion, it's maybe too much. Do you honestly think that a newbie could make his way through this system? So it might be better as a game option such as "capture the princess" or so.
Another thing is that it's too difficult to put it as a permanent thing. Many govts do not suit this configuration. Centralized states, dictatorships, etc... did not allow ANY kind of parallel movment. How about a sort of "event" which automatically triggers when, as a republic or a democracy, you reach a level of cities (15-20 cities perhaps). The computer would then designate "interior borders" which definite provincial capitals (you wouldn't choose). These provinces would have various effects, but according to the type of govt: city-state republic would have rebellions, and war thingies you said (like as if u had to have ROP in ur own territory, or incresing war weariness...) and in democracies taxes or so... What do you think?

One thing that has always bothered me is this: why do all cities have to produce their own food? I think that civilizations should have something like a 'food bank' in which all surplus food is placed (stored at the capitol, perhaps). If a city is running a deficit of food, AND it is connected to the food bank somehow via road, harbor, airport, etc, then it will draw whatever food it needs from there.


S.

Bottom line: Keep the good, improve the bad, don't fix what ain't broken.

Please don't screw it up by adding some big new not-so-needed change. We don't need another [Warcraft III] or [Master of Orion III] disaster that scars/destroys the series.

To Herr-Doktor:

Thank you for responding! I have been developing these ideas for a long time now, you must understand.

Though you may be correct, still, even in ancient despotisms, if it was large enough, you DID need to have governors and seperate smaller domains to remain effective, did you not? Though in things like despotism and other govs in which you have full or near full control, the demands of the provinces would have very little effect, and since you start out in despotism, provinces might help with organization and so forth. Maybe. Though who knows, maybe a comprimise with what you said could be done...

Also, even though it may SOUND complicated, much of it would be done automatically [like the setting up of the provinces, pretty much...] also, though I wouldn't mind my ideas going in full, I don't want it to be too complicated to bog down the game much. And I'm just saying it would be more interesting to have your people do something different than rioting in the streets. Instead, they could be [or, their governers, unless you have troops 'stopping them'] telling you they'll rebel unless you help them! Remember, much of the likes/dislikes will be compliled by factors by the computer, and the player would just have to react to [or, if they get better, anticipate..] their demands. And you could put things like civil wars/rebellions as optional, and if you REALLY wanted, you could put provinces as optional, though that might need a lot of simplicifaction of the idea...

Also, thank you for the words, I hope others give their opinions of it.

Originally posted by warpstorm
I think Firaxis should not listen to ideas from hard-core players for Civ4. :)

These ideas will in general make for a game that only the hard-core elite will like. This is a death knell for a franchise. Hard core ideas should go into an expansion (since the casual players who buy the most copies of a game aren't likely to buy an expansion unless they become part of the hard core elite).

Amen! The best thing about the original game (Civ "1") was that it could hook you even if you weren't really into computers and didn't really like computer games. My wife played tons of Civ, the only other games she ever touched were Minesweeper and Solitaire. Civ 1 was so easy to figure out how to play, so addicitive once you started, but so "deep" that it never got boring (well, it took a really long time, anyway). I worry that the franchise, in an effort to get "deeper" and satisfy the desires of us civ-fanatics, has been losing the broad appeal that made the original game so successful. And what good is a game that we like a lot if it doesn't sell well and so they never make any expansion packs and never contemplate Civ 5 :lol: ? Seriously, I hope they give thought about how to make the game better for casual gamers as well as people like us, and don't take too seriously all these ideas that we post.

I'll quote another post since the sentiment is expressed well and it bears (frequent!) repeating:
Originally posted by sourboy
Bottom line: Keep the good, improve the bad, don't fix what ain't broken.

Please don't screw it up by adding some big new not-so-needed change. We don't need another [Warcraft III] or [Master of Orion III] disaster that scars/destroys the series.

I think there shall always be things to add as imagination is limitless.

As for the rebel nations, the only problem here is how do we determine how they are called and what are their traits and stuff. It is very easy if it's a nation that already existed. But we can't have five Greeces running around (Greece and Greece signed a military alliance against Greece. Greece declared war on Greece. Greece declared war on Greece, honoring their MPP with Greece.). A solution could be city names. Traits, city names and UU from the dominant nationality, technology from the civ they rebelled from. Government - anarchy, ofcourse! Rulers and great leaders could be the same but with different names or if someone here or in Firaxis wants, with different pics and texts too. But that would be somehow strange.

Another thing about culture flips - I think these should be not only due to culture, if due to it AT ALL. Rather per preffered government (I think citizens should get idealogy and religion stats as well), per nationality and per religion, as well as patriotism. A patriotic Russian city won't rebel and join China just because they built a bunch of wonders and cultural improvements in several cities nearby. They probably won't even know about these. Now, an originally German city occupied by the Ottomans, or at least some of the people in it, won't just surrender because Ottomans built a mosque there. They would resist, well, unless they are discontent with their government. Ofcourse, later generations probably won't care much. Also I think we should have, like in Europa Universalis, rebel units - unaligned partisan-type people who will try to establish their own country.

after all of what has been said since when i last responded i would say that politics inside your country are a must both with regions and at time with specific types of organizations (though i think we're better off if we make those like the medical type pplz demand more funding and refuse to heal any government units until they do or the Priests are protesting your recent laws and are making your people discontent and such)....but they should be able to be turned off for newbs....

as for the rebel factions...normally all civs could have a list...sumthing like the leaders list which have a list of possible names for rebelling nations...even the US has a long enough list to support the few times it should happen in game...then those names could refer to a sort of secondary civ list which would specify if there are different traits, UU's, who the leader should be, etc.....plus i think it also important that there is a non alighned rebel type faction (thanks Das, twas a a very good thought) these would be for minor rebellions or revolts that do not intend to establish a different nation or are only temporarily revolting (like the peasants have all revolted and have decided to cut off all trade to the capital for the next 5 turns...they have established a military style group to enforce this or they want to destroy a particular improvement or sumthing...)

I had a thought as well...what if you could put your military units under an AI general and give him instructions on what to take...saving your efforts for the more important areas....you could use this for like taking that minor city to the east that you dont want to bother with and is relatively unguarded but it has to go down cause its in your flank....maybe this is a bad idea leaving anything of this nature to an AI but i think it has potential

I also think it is important that we remember that morale and training have affected the outcome of battles and wars on numberous occassions and smaller armies have cleaned the floor with much larger ones....in some cases it wasnt even just the training or morale sumtimes that infantry was just plain better for sum reason....but it wasnt anything different in its makeup or size or armament....the Southern Units in the US civil war are an excellent example

i think all civs should get multiple UU's if that is possible....for civs like the Romans it could be difficult

that is all for now :)

Hmm... A.I. generals... you know, I shall say this is a good idea on ONE condition: If the A.I. is actually intelligent in the next Civ. If so, having A.I. generals could in fact be quite useful. It would also be interesting to see that play against you during a civil war. "A.I. General Lee has decided to join his home province out of duty, and takes his army with him". Ouch. Interesting, but ouch. Just like in the real world, very painful. But it could make you limit your use of those intelligent A.I. generals.

Also, this general system could be the basis of the A.I. military capabilities. Each general [from different provinces] would have his/her own misions, and overall personal goals... sometimes conflicting with each other. [For instance, like Howe and Burgoyne's differing objectives during the American Revolution. Howe was ordered to assist Burgoyne, but due to his ambitions to take Philadelphia, abandoned Burgoyne to his fate at the hands of Benedict Arnold and the rest of those guys. It would be interesting, I think.

Ant509y, I think generals are a good idea, but too difficult to implement. I do have a different idea to represent them, which uses the established GL and unit promotion architecture. Basically, "commanders" would be produced under the same conditions as a GL, except maybe a bit more often. The commander, however, would not be another unit, just a higher rank than elite. It would not include an HP bonus for the unit. Instead, it would give every unit within its stack a +X attacking and defending bonus. Commander bonuses would NOT be cumulative.

I do not like the idea of the AI fighting for me!!! It would send lone unit wandering randomly thru' enemy territory! Come on, we've all seen this!! ;)

If the AI was beefed up alot it may be a fun option to "hand the war over to your Generals" which would decrease WW, as the Gov. could claim some sort of "Deniability" if the war went bad. If the Gov kept control and the war was a big sucess then it would bring a period of post-war happiness.

Have stacked combat that makes the use of combined arms for battle resolution, rather than the single unit combat resolution that is currently in place. Single unit combat is antiquated gameplay and tedious to boot...

Allow a player to lock-group units and workers for movement purposes, and in the case of workers, to speed up production of tile improvements. The current setup allows for a mass group movement, but the ability to lock a group would allow for more streamlined gameplay. How many times have you wanted to subdivide a large stack to move to two different locations. The current setup does not allow a player to do this easily, but a lock feature would allow this...

Eliminate infinite rail movement - it kills any need to think strategically, and for a game that prides itself on strategy, it is an abomination. Rails and roads should also only improve movement and not commerce. In a related vein, create a separate set of commerce-increasing improvements, and add a multi-tiered tile improvement setup (Mines/Advanced Mines...)

Create sea-based tile improvements.

Here are a few things I'd like to see:


Give a stack of workers the same command
Place boundaries around automated workers (clear jungle but only inside this boundry)
A corruption model which doesn't result in totally corrupt cities on the fringes. It would be reasonable to expect that a city would have one uncorrupted shield per population (assuming of course it has that much production to begin with). If that is too much, maybe one shield per 2 citizens.
The ability to trade shields and surplus food, both within your empire and to other civs. Example selling iron for 10 SPT.
A new building (warehouse?) which lets you save excess shields from a build and get a jump on the next build. Example 25 shields in the bin, producing 10spt, with a build which requires 30. After the build, 5 are left in the bin for next time.
Ability to produce more than one unit / improvement in a turn, if there are enough shields. Example, city making 100SPT can build any combination of units and improvements totalling 100 shields, in one turn.
Decrease the micromanagement load on large empires by also having strategic controls. (yeah, this is a little vague maybe we can all figure out something)
For mod and scenario creators, the ability to set AI strategy (attacker, builder, etc.)
Some way to directly view your reputation, and the reputations of the AIs.
An optional advisor which says how your rep will be changed by diplomatic and military actions.

What I'd like to see:


1. Restore the Civ 2 diplomat/spy unit. I think the current
espionage system stinks.

2. Restore the Civ2 caravan/frieght unit. It wouldn't
necessarily have to operate the same way, but I
think it would be superior to the current trade system.

3. I endorse the many calls for event scripting! And having
a "cheat mode" that allows one to tweak mods while
testing them. And have that mode be flagged so that
a cheater would be obvious in MP games.

4. Like MOO2, have a single screen at the end of a turn that
shows all construction, etc. completed during the turn,
with a notation (color coding?) for those cities whose
build queues have emptied, and need attention..

My thoughts are that more random factors would be helpful:

MILITARY

(a) friendly fire (every now and then a unit attacks a unit from the same civilisation; most likely to occur in jungles)

(b) mutinous troops, every now and then, they decline to attack
or if fortified run away without even engaging combat

(c) fog (EMP), night etc where neither side can see

(d) for ancient foot armies, limited food supplies; after so many turns away from city or fortress; units take damage and die; unless caravan resupplies them

(e) horse units have to stop on grasslands or plains maybe every fourth term to eat or risk starving; with mounted units reduced to foot units

(f) for modern armies, limited ammunition and fuel; after so many part battles artillery and tanks run out of ammunition, after covering so many squares, mechanised infantry and tanks have to be refuelled by tankers (like modern mini-caravans); if not supplied within so many turns; they become ordinary infantry units

TRADE

combine civ2 caravans (bonus only) with civ3 (ongoing routes)

FOOD

cities joined by roads and harbours share a food bank

more types of food squares e.g. potatos, rice

occasional famines with particular crop failures

RESOURCES

should distinguish between raw material (iron ore) and processed material (steel) requiring improvement


CITIES

disasters; such as they should catch fire, be flooded
(e.g. if by sea or on lake or river)

munitions work; increase supply of weapons

oil refinery: must have one to process oil

blast furnace: must build one to process steel

enrichment plant: required to produce usable uranium
(for nuclear power plant or weapon)

occasional diseases that stop production from animal scares,
kill injure your cavalry

food can be imported as a trade item
occasionally there would be famines

aircraft factory to produce aircraft


LAND

a real spherical map would be nice
more types of animal squares e.g. camels, horses, llamas, elephants
love ToT muliple worlds

MOVEMENT & WEATHER

there should be a prevailing wind that changes;
this would influence archer and cavalry battles;
and blow sail ships about; freak rains would undermine
railroads and turn roads to mud; hot weather occasionally
melt frozen ground; sandstorms prevent troops from
moving in desert

SCIENCE

research should not be so controllable; only able to set direction e.g. artistic, civil, social, theoretical, weapons

WEAPONS

am in favour of having new mine laying ability and the ability
to carry and lay a mine (land and sea)

loved the ToT invisible units and the Civ2 partisans

DIPLOMACY

combine both aspects of Civ3 embassy and Civ2
diplomats (but not too powerful)

OTHER

I loved the Civ2 wonder movies
preference option to see building completed (cf Civ1)
city view should show part build buildings

RELIGION

Abstract (Greeks: increased Science)

Bloody/Sacrificial (Aztecs, Carthaginian?, Vikings, Zulus: reduced Science and reduced War Wearyness, populations reduced by 2 on capturing cities, half captured slave workers killed off)

Earth/Gaian (Incas, Indians and Iroqois: improved happyness, reduced shield production)

Harmonious (Babylonians, Indians and Tibetans: improved happyness, increased war wearyness)

Mechanical (English, Germans, Hittites, Romans: increased shield)

Mystic (Egyptian, Persians)

Philosophical (Chinese, Russian: reduced unhappyness)

Rationalist (French and Americans: increased commerce and science, increased unhappyness and war wearyness)

Zealous (Arabs, Japanese & Turks: reduced war wearyness, no banks or stock exchanges)

Maybe each tribe could have two religious traits!

Just a few random ideas:

1) Civ traits is a nice system to see return but I hope there would be more different traits plus each civ having their own unique ability besides a UU that differentiates them from another civ with the same traits.

2) I think it is about time elevated terrain was created in civ for a more 3D world. Somehow merge the terrain concepts of SMAC and Civ3 while keeping it simple.

3) More UUs not sure how to implement this yet,

4) Much stronger AI personalities; ie the babs should pursue culture more agressively and a civ leaders agenda should affect how the deal with you in negotiations. The different civ3 chat lines were nice and unique but had no real affect.

5) Male and female civ leader for each civ; why must I be forced to be Joan'of'Arc? Why not choose between King Louis as well. Sorry if i spelt that wrong French civers.

6) More cultural power for defense: Building strongly needs to offer defense before you are attacked Currently your cities may flip back if your a strong culture civ but if the enemy takes bases because of your paltry defense and then razes them you have no culture flip defense any more.

7) Wonder movies and animated advisors like civ2. I can't believe I'm asking for graphical features from an 8 + year old game :crazyeye: Hell the advisors weren't very useful, but neither are civ3 ones, but at least the civ2 ones were entertaining :)

Originally posted by warpstorm
C3C was widely tested (hundreds of testers) for over 6 months before release. One of the problems is that games development was still going on till the last minute.


You're saying that hundreds of experienced game testers and Civ players missed the bombard bug, and other show-stoppers, over 6 months of testing? I think not. I agree with your comment about development though. Rushed, last-minute, incomplete. Whatever internal procedures they have for code quality were probably left in the dust. I hope this time they really do draw from the pool of incredible talent they have available and get some hardcore gamers, especially Civ players, testing their betas. I also hope that the game publishers/distributors took a nice financial beating the last time they rushed Civ III out and decide that the $$$ is there for the making if they just lay off the Firaxis team and let them deliver their best stuff from the get-go.

I hope this time they really do draw from the pool of incredible talent they have available and get some hardcore gamers, especially Civ players, testing their betas.

Yes most people would be only to happy to test and report on a beta version. I understand that firaxis is wary releasing a beta, concerned that noone will buy the retail. Just lock out many civs and restrict the ai opponants. Creates a tighter testing area then anyway. Easier to compare results etc. Beta versions should be public though to make them exclusive to hardcore civers would be foolish as the majority of the market are pre-monarch diff players.

I wish I had time to write all of the ideas I've had or at least second all of the good ideas I've read here that inspire me, but here are some that I felt should be posted (sorry if some are repeats):

World
- Realistic spherical world with more dynamic changes in geology; over 6000 years, islands vanish, mountains grow, rivers change dramatically, deserts appear and disappear (In 4000 BC, most of the Sahara was actually lush tropical grassland.)
- I'd like to see multiple zoom levels on this world, so it's possible to view just a few cities up close or your whole country, or the whole planet.
- I'd love to see cities get much larger, from tiny hut settlements to huge metropolises. Settlers could be much cheaper, and cities could start out much smaller and have a risk of dying out on their own. Also, I'd like the city graphics to represent what is in the city, not just the size of the city. Even if this is not done for ordinary buildings, I think it should at least be done for wonders. Large wonders like the Great Wall or the Pyramids should be visible on the main map (outside of the city icon).
- More natural disasters! All the time!

Religion
- I don't think religions should be restricted to what Civ you use, like the traits are now. Civs should be able to choose their religion, or have it changed through interaction with other civs. You could maybe set a "state religion," but with distance from the capital that power could be less effective (like corruption gets worse farther from the capital) so that cities that are far away from the capital and close to another powerful religion could be converted to that religion (and maybe that will aid in that city doing a culture-flip). I liked EdwardTheKing's religion post, and think that's a great idea, except that I just think religions should not be linked to specific civs, and that civs should be able to change religions like governments. Religion should be something that can be influenced by the player (like building temples and imposing a state religion) but is ultimately determined by the citizens of your empire.

Government
- Governments should be customizable, not just flat all-encompassing rules. There could be a government "template" like Republic or Communism or Monarchy, etc., but it should have many little facets that are selected by the player. For instance, free medicare (which could increase happiness and growth but cost money), free market vs state-controlled market, representative government vs. non-representative. That way governments could change gradually over time, and change would be more frequent, rather than having one or two major revolts in an entire game.
- Like I stated about religion, government should be influenced by the player, but ultimately determined by the citizens. Obviously a fascist government would not be effected by citizens, but a democracy would be very effected. The citizens could demand certain government aspects (like petitioners do in Sim City) and you could choose to either appease them or oppose them. Rulers who do not listen to their citizens would face more riots and possibly be overthrown or have a civil war or something like that. There needs to be more stuff like that in Civ.

Trade
- Everything should be tradeable, from food to goods, to shields, to military units.
- I liked the way trade routes worked in Call to Power 2, with illustrated routes on the map, and the option to pirate them. Also, I liked that the distance of the route provided a trade bonus.
- You should be able to buy more resources for more happiness. For instance, if China is selling me spices, I should also be able to buy French spices, and Indian spices. Maybe extra spices give less of a bonus, but I think they should still be trade-able.
- There should be a lot more resources, and maybe increased value for having multiple resources. Say for instance I have saltpeter. Maybe 1 saltpeter gives me the ability to create musketmen in 5 cities but to create musketmen in 6 to 10 cities, I need 2 saltpeters. More resources should pop us as time goes on, so that once gunpowder is invented, there's a few saltpeters, but by the time rubber has been discovered, saltpeter is all over the map (sort of how Civ3 justifies that infantry doesn't need saltpeter because by this time, it common all over the world), only this illustrates it in game mechanics rather than just fading out the need for it. That way a tiny island civ would have to either buy saltpeter or buy the actual military units, but either way it's more realistic and illustrates how civs are all dependent on one-another.

Production
- I definately want to see the option to build buildings at the same time as military. This allows for more types of buildings and more types of military units, making the game more versatile.

Civs
- I want to see the option for Civs to change names mid-game. Civs can split in two, you know? For example, say you play as Rome. Mid-game maybe your civ has a revolt and halfway-through it splits into Rome and Byzantines, forming a new Civ. Well eventually you decide you want to rename Rome to Italy. Same country, you just gave it a new name. Why not? You can rename cities afterall.
- Splitting of civs is a big thing for me. I want this to happen a lot, even if it's just one-city rebellions that need to be quashed. Each Civ could have a list of names of civs that can form from it. For example if you play as England and there is no USA on the map, say England gets to big... it could split into England and the USA. Then later it could split again -- in to England and Australia. Or Canada. You get the picture. This allows for more playable Civs. The civs can even share the same city name list or have their own new ones.
- Along the lines of splitting civs, I loved that nationality played a part in Civ3, but what if the nationality could revolt and change back into a civ? Say again that you play as England. Say you conquer India completely, eliminating it from the game. But then say that you treat the newly conquered territory really bad and they revolt and try to split from you. Rather than change into the USA, since there would probably be a majority of Indian people rather than English people in the cities, it could split away and turn back into India, bringing the civ back into the game.
- Allow 1 golden age per era, not just per game. If the science method mentioned below is implemented, this would make golden ages more random and less in-the-hands of more experienced players.

Science
- I love the idea of science not being controllable. You just get to pick the field (like military, cultural, civil, social, etc.) If this idea is implemented than you could even base science on resources, like no shipbuilding if you dont have wood, no guns if you dont have saltpeter (you'd have to trade for these resources to discover the tech on your own). That way civs that lack in some areas could excel in others. Say you're an isolated island civ and you don't know anyone else... why on earth would you discover advanced military techniques if spearmen suit your civ fine? You could just research advanced literature, government, and things like that. Then later if another civ meets you, you could trade civs, or they could use their advanced military to try to conquer you. You may have been the only civ in the world to have an advanced government at that time, and the information could be lost to the ages when you get conquered. Things like that have happened throughout history.

Well that's all the time I have to write right now, I'd love to keep going. I'll post more later I guess.

I know this....
When I am done with a scenario, I would LOVE to have a better overview of what happend, special occations, how GOOD I was..
PLEASE.. for heaven sake, dont forget to make a complete list of all LOSSES taken and all KILLS made. I really really want to see these numbers. It is actually painful to be finished with a scenario after 3 days, and only 1 minute of hailing me after I am done. I want to go to the hi-score list to review my wins.. (and also defeats) I LOVE to have it stored on my computer for ALL time.

ok ??

Originally posted by brianshapiro

...
art
philosophy
literature
politics
...etc...

literature is an artform, therefore the list becomes:

art
philosophy
politics

and i should add

sports
environment

Keep civilized

David

Originally posted by Serutan
What I'd like to see:


1. Restore the Civ 2 diplomat/spy unit. I think the current
espionage system stinks.

2. Restore the Civ2 caravan/frieght unit. It wouldn't
necessarily have to operate the same way, but I
think it would be superior to the current trade system.

3. I endorse the many calls for event scripting! And having
a "cheat mode" that allows one to tweak mods while
testing them. And have that mode be flagged so that
a cheater would be obvious in MP games.

4. Like MOO2, have a single screen at the end of a turn that
shows all construction, etc. completed during the turn,
with a notation (color coding?) for those cities whose
build queues have emptied, and need attention..

I disagree with 1 & 2. I really prefer to have an abstract system in those game aspects... having more units moving around slows everything. Also, i remember when the computer subverted a tank from me with a warrior (when did warriors had diplomatical abilities?)

But i really agree with 3 & 4. Specially 4, it's easy to forget what you've done.

Originally posted by EdwardTking
My thoughts are that more random factors would be helpful:

MILITARY
(d) for ancient foot armies, limited food supplies; after so many turns away from city or fortress; units take damage and die; unless caravan resupplies them

(e) horse units have to stop on grasslands or plains maybe every fourth term to eat or risk starving; with mounted units reduced to foot units

(f) for modern armies, limited ammunition and fuel; after so many part battles artillery and tanks run out of ammunition, after covering so many squares, mechanised infantry and tanks have to be refuelled by tankers (like modern mini-caravans); if not supplied within so many turns; they become ordinary infantry units

FOOD

cities joined by roads and harbours share a food bank

RESOURCES

should distinguish between raw material (iron ore) and processed material (steel) requiring improvement

SCIENCE

research should not be so controllable; only able to set direction e.g. artistic, civil, social, theoretical, weapons

RELIGION

Abstract (Greeks: increased Science)

Bloody/Sacrificial (Aztecs, Carthaginian?, Vikings, Zulus: reduced Science and reduced War Wearyness, populations reduced by 2 on capturing cities, half captured slave workers killed off)

Earth/Gaian (Incas, Indians and Iroqois: improved happyness, reduced shield production)

Harmonious (Babylonians, Indians and Tibetans: improved happyness, increased war wearyness)

Mechanical (English, Germans, Hittites, Romans: increased shield)

Mystic (Egyptian, Persians)

Philosophical (Chinese, Russian: reduced unhappyness)

Rationalist (French and Americans: increased commerce and science, increased unhappyness and war wearyness)

Zealous (Arabs, Japanese & Turks: reduced war wearyness, no banks or stock exchanges)

Maybe each tribe could have two religious traits!

The religion idea is amazing... but some names may not be adequate. Zealous is intended to represent islam & shintoism... i'd rather prefer Faithful. And Observant instead of Mechanical... that last one sounds too little religious

I agree with food for units... but do modern units doesn't eat?

Everything else is pretty fine, except from bringing back such units as caravan and diplomats. Abstract system is fine, as i stated in another post in this same thread.

Keep civilized

David

One thing they HAVE to bring back is individual music for each civ. That was one of the coolest flavor parts of Civ1. I loved hearing "The Battle Hymn of the Republic" whenever America contacted me. I loved hearing Beethoven's 9th when cities celebrated "We Love The King Day." I loved that each civ had it's own song. There are tons of copyright-free musics that have an ethnic feel that the developers could use for this if they don't want to hire a composer. But I want civ-specific and era-specific music instead of this "generic universal soundtrack" crap.

Originally posted by Kaboth
7) Wonder movies and animated advisors like civ2. I can't believe I'm asking for graphical features from an 8 + year old game :crazyeye: Hell the advisors weren't very useful, but neither are civ3 ones, but at least the civ2 ones were entertaining :)

You are Einstine sir. The E to the MC squared. Like a double clock speed micro-processor. We're number one in SCIENCE!!! (Very rough Quote!).

:rotfl:

That speach made by the modern science advisor in Civ2 made me giggle every time! I would actually go to the advisor screen in dull moments just to get him to say that! It was even better when the Entertainment Advisor (i.e. the Elvis Impersonator) chipped in afterwards with "Yeah man, that was good!".

Ahhhh, happy days! You have to bring them back for Civ4. PLEASE!!!

I really agree with this. Those features may have been just as useless as the ones now, but seriously, they added so much color to the game. Wonder movies, animated advisors, and special music. Headlines, Pliny's frequent trips around the world... come on, those are classic!

hi here are a few things

A- Nation flags a captial need to fly a flag of each nation for example london need to fly the english flag.

B- farmland you can farm any where but if you are by fresh water you can irrigate the land making it have more food

C- religion and religious GLs that can expand culture or convert a noncaptial city to your cause you can not convert city bigger than size 8 i have read a few good religion ideas i like them.

D- villages can appear on the map around a city if a city is to crowed for example berlin had 12 population and could grow no bigger with out hospitial people would move out a build small villages thay provide 1 food 1 trade 1 production for the parent city you can farm mine rode build fort over villages and they will still be there but you may pillage them but it will make your people mad

E- roads should look different in each age Acient they wiil be dirt roads middle ages they should be cobble stone industrial pavement streets morden highways this will be graphic only

F- more than one UU for each nation for example germany will have the panzer german spearman and crusader

Originally posted by playshogi
Except that some countries never "advanced" i.e. India is still pantheist. It is already slightly offensive that the Civ series makes Monotheism an advance over Polytheism. If they want to enhance the current culture model, that's OK, but introducing "real" religions into a fictional game is a big mistake IMHO. I'd rather see them spend the time developing a more sophisticated government model. However, if they do, then they ought to introduce a more realisitic combat system too. From the brief remark "Introducing more sophisticated concepts of unit experience and upgrades", it sounds like they are still planning to keep the one on one combat again. \

Bosy pantheism is counter productive. Any relgion that requires thousands of tons of grain to feed a few cows and rats is. Now if these sacrifices are neccesary or not is up to the individual but lets just understand why monotheism is much more affluant than poly or any other except atheism.