The ressources system should be modified in the following way: there should be more ressources, and all (or most) Strategic ressources shoudl be Era specific, while Luxury ressources should be (most) creatable on the right kind of terrain (more terrain types should also be added).
Meaning: for the luxuries, Wine becomes at some point of the game a ressource anyone can create on Hills, meaning everyone can have wine with the right technology (just as it is in the real world)
And for Strategic ressources, Iron and Horses should no longer be needed after the Ancient Era, Salpeter no longer after the second,.... Not beeing able to build Cavalry because one has no horse tile is just ridiculous, ressources should only be that important for a shorter period of time...

Originally posted by aeldrik
The ressources system should be modified in the following way: there should be more ressources, and all (or most) Strategic ressources shoudl be Era specific, while Luxury ressources should be (most) creatable on the right kind of terrain (more terrain types should also be added).
Meaning: for the luxuries, Wine becomes at some point of the game a ressource anyone can create on Hills, meaning everyone can have wine with the right technology (just as it is in the real world)

I like the idea of being able to create resources once you have the proper tech, but wine is a bad example. Sure, anyone can grow grapes, but only certain types of soil produce grapes capable of making wine that is actually luxury-status. That's why certain parts of the world are famous for their wines and not others.

And for Strategic ressources, Iron and Horses should no longer be needed after the Ancient Era, Salpeter no longer after the second,.... Not beeing able to build Cavalry because one has no horse tile is just ridiculous, ressources should only be that important for a shorter period of time...
What confuses me is that they seemed to realize this for saltpeter (Riflemen don't require it because its "common" by then) but not for horses (Cavalry still require horses, even though they've been domesticated for thousands of years and anyone who wants can breed their own). They should be consistant: either the need should disappear sooner (Cavalry don't need horses, since they're "common") or the resource should become creatable (create a horse-farm on a tile in your territory). The former would certainly be simpler and easier than the latter, but either way, not being able to make cavalry for lack of horses is indeed ridiculous.

I thought it ridiculous that I couldn't build RR as I had no iron - in the industrial ages! I have some reservations concerning the luxuries, though. One part of luxuries is that they are given, they can't be made. The luxury-bar represents "artificial" luxuries. I think that what is "ment" by wines and dyes and silks is that they are in abundance somewhere so that the people can use them spontaneously.

And what about gems? Surely the artificial making of gems would come VERY late and they are very costly. Anyway, I think that luxuries should not be created, as it would take away an essential part of the game.

Maybe have asystem like this, but figure a better way to impliment it. Whats the point if you sit on a ton of resources if your enemy can make them anyway.

Yeah, I don't like this idea at all. Better to simply remove all resources and replace them with improvements, since that's essentially all this does.

the point is the ressources are still as Important as they were before the change, but only for a limited Time!!
Say for example you don't have Iron, it means you won't be able to build anything requiring it for the whole game, ridiculous, my systems makes the ones without Iron suffering only as long as they don't have the necessary techs, meaning it takes about 10-15 techs to be able to produce it withtout the ressource tile... that way you could produce Pikeman without having Iron, but only someone with Iron could produce Swordsman....

The part of creating the ressource oneself on the map, allows for an important gameplay aspect, which is that an invading army can occupy the tile and cut off the supply!!

Ah, I see your point now. But I would advice against it. First I thought that why not just take off the requirement of iron from pikemen, as they did with rifleman? But that would indeed drop off a strategical part. But to be honest, how could you cut off all the horses of a modern country, or saltpeter, or even iron? There are simply too many stables around to effectively deal with. I think it's a fine idea, but also that it wouldn't work.

What if you held, say horses, for several hundred years, you could get a message like 'Sir, our people have mastered Animal Husbandry (sp?)' or whatever, essentially meaning you always have horses. The 'tech' wouldn't be in the tree, but would be 'learnt' as you held Horses within your boundaries. This would be more difficult to explain with other resources, but it would allow people to get around this problem, although I don't see why a Civ that has not had Horses in their boundaries should just 'get' them. On the other hand, it would negate a fun new strategy concept that didn't exist in Civ2 and may possibly make the game less fun.

not having to have certain resources takes the strategy out of the game, its frustrating when you dont have one but otherwise everyone would be equal and thats just boring

for civ4 they should just put more resources on the map(or give you the option of adjusting this in the options menu) and the amount of units, or whatever else, you can build depends on how much of these resources you control

Originally posted by SFGiantSLO
not having to have certain resources takes the strategy out of the game, its frustrating when you dont have one but otherwise everyone would be equal and thats just boring

for civ4 they should just put more resources on the map(or give you the option of adjusting this in the options menu) and the amount of units, or whatever else, you can build depends on how much of these resources you control

Check out my new resource system in this forum, it addresses this problem. Welcome to CFC, by the way! :)

@AdHHH: I think that whether you have had horses in the past or not, horses would be found in such abundance that they would no longer be needed. Horses are traded around. Even though Finland has never had any horses as "a resource", we do have them a lot now. Same should apply to other old resources, such as iron. Simple trading (that is not connected to civ's) will deal with this effectively. If it is thought this way, you would not need any techs that would allow you to "always have horses".

I still advocate that the best way to deal with this is simply to remove horses from being a prerequisite to cavalry. If this was done to saltpeter too, however, it would result in cavalry having no resources as a prerequisite... perhaps saltpeter should not be removed, then?

or do like in the real world, and have it so, in the right conditions you can make copies of biological resources, and as we improve in technology we find more sources of the non biological ones.

What if there were a building that needed horses to be built, but after that supplied hoses for the cavalry.

having Buildings as prerequisites for units would be great, but there are other threads on the subject, so I won't discuss it here, even though it would be, IMHO, a working solution...
I am just looking at it in a general way, more than just looking at horses, the actual system, in which they are less ressources than CIVs on the map is just not working, it is just absolutely ridiculous that a CIV cannot build Pikeman or Med Infantry or Knight at any time because it has no iron.... at some point in history Iron is just so common, just as they did for Salpeter, that it should no longer be needed for anything...
can anyone explain the logic between being able to build rifleman without Salpeter (as it has become so common) but still not being able to build Cavalry without Salpeter!! that is what needs to be changed!!!

I would also like for certain resources to show up before the tech that discovers how to use them. Bronze working could reveal sources of iron, horses could be seen always, etc. Just how did we figure out how to use iron if we couldn't even find the stuff?

can anyone explain the logic between being able to build rifleman without Salpeter (as it has become so common) but still not being able to build Cavalry without Salpeter!!

I guess it has something to do with cavalry and rifleman being of a different era. In techs it is a very small difference, but in idea the it is acceptable. All middle-age-units need saltpeter (frigates and such), but no industrial-age-units. But I agree with you, cavalries should be made without saltpeter, or riflemen should need it.

I think it would be fine if a resource became "obsolete" somewhat like an era after discovery. So horses would be needed to build knights, but not after that, iron was no longer needed after pikemen and knights, saltpeter would still be needed for rifleman (just on making saltpeter more valuable, this is just a suggestion), but not to infantry. This should also go with many of the modern resources: perhaps coal is not needed in modern times as it is common enough? Oil on the other hand should of course not disappear (even though it is found in middle of industrial ages). It should vary between resources, of course.

What this would of course allow is building of cavalries later even though you have not had horses. By simply making some units not dependant on something would in effect prohibit us from building the dependant ones even at later times. Cavalries are effective until tanks, and should be buildable without horses sometime in the early industrial ages!

Originally posted by rcoutme
I would also like for certain resources to show up before the tech that discovers how to use them. Bronze working could reveal sources of iron, horses could be seen always, etc. Just how did we figure out how to use iron if we couldn't even find the stuff?

This is a mighty good point there. It would also allow us to plan our next settlements according to resources more quickly. :goodjob:

Yep I was thinking of this yesterday.
Take fur - technicly its a luxry resouce but would people want fir coats in 1990? I don't know about you but I think its kind of silly. Then agian expireing resouces would create problems.

@M37: fur coats are still quite wanted and a luxury Item...

I'd say the main change is that Dyes, Incense, Silk, Spices have become common, because they can be produced chemically or naturally in a lot of places through modern technology.-... this change is not reflected in the game, but I'd say it 's not as important as with Strategic ressources,... that's where I think the change is mostly needed...


the Idea of having the ressources appear a few techs earlier is very good, and would be very realistic... I really hope they implement something like that

I'm coming into this rather late, but couldn't there be a technology to create a unit called a "prospector" that would have the ability to "prospect" a tile with a small chance that a necessary resource be discovered there (and if it wasn't, then it could never be found there). Another possibility would be the ability to build deeper or more extensive mines (governed by a tech you'd have to explore to get it) that would allow you to extract the necessary amount of a scarce resource, provided of course, you built enough deep or extensive mines?

I always felt that you should be able to find oil in coastal and sea tiles once you discovered the "offshore platform" technology. Of course, you'd still have to transport an engineer (or other suitable unit) out there by boat to "colonize" it (build the oil-drilling rig).

Some types of resource (wine, for example) might change from a luxury item (over time) to a food resource item. Although, as has been stated above, only the right soil types produce fine wines, I have seen less-fine (but acceptable for the table) wines produced in upstate New York, Texas, and Washington State. The latter was branded as "Fairchild Wine" (after the air base) and had a B-52 on the label. I always thought their slogan should've been "Fairchild wine. Drink this and get bombed!" (Alas, after a brief google, I could not find a picture of the Fairchild label -- I always thought it was hilarious to see it in the Package Store on base).

--SSgtBaloo

Don't like it.

Some of the best games ever are the ones where I'm stuck resourceless, and have to steal or trade for whatever I need. Then you'd need to come up with about 20 more resources that make sence around the units of the time, not an easy task when you can't use horses/iron/coal/rubber/oil.

Having the ability to create luxs out of nothing is almost as bad. Later in the game when Lux prices are actually starting to go up, and you can make some cash with your spares wouldn't be a factor, because every single nation would have all 8.

Then you have to think about the AI: Would it understand that it shouldn't pay for Iron in the Industrial Age? Would it pay for it when it was on it's last tech in the Ancient? And knowing how little of a priority it puts on connecting it's luxs & resources, would it ever bother creating new luxs to help out it's unhappyness?

I'm not a big fan, don't have those luxs/resources you need, either conquere them or trade for them. Devalueing the whole system isn't the answer for not having them.

OK, I think the best solution is to have improvements and or wonders which can substantially reduce the 'disappearance chance' of certain resources. For instance, a 'stable' improvement or 'Horse Breeding' Small Wonder could be built. It requires the horse strategic resource but, once built, it would halve or even quarter the chance of that resource disappearing! Of course, there is still a remote chance of it disappearing, but this would be a freak event-or as the result of GROSSLY overusing the resource. Other examples include rubber and saltpeter!

Yours,
Aussie_Lurker.

I agree with Khan, the resource system in Civ3 is far, far better than that in Civ2 (where all resources were bonus!). If you don't want a resource required for a unit, you can change the unit in the editor.

As for iron being plentiful, just why do you think the USA banned the sale of scrap iron to Japan just before WWII? It certainly was not because Japan could just create the stuff out of thin air!!! I actually believe that the makers missed the boat (so to speak) when they took iron out of the requirements for certain units. In my mods, you can not build Battleships and Cruisers without a source of iron.

You can go ahead and build guys with rifles (since the amount of metal is small) but things requiring large amounts of metal (like railroads) should require a large source of iron.

The only change I'd like to see made to the resource system is: Instead of a flat disapearing percentage chance, i think that it should be based on the amount of units/improvements being built using that resource.

@Genghis: how can you trade when there aren't enough resources for all the players on the map./... ever tryied an MP game with just another Human player? the game ends as soon as only one player has Salpeter.
Firaxis also added great options in CIV3 to allow for pacific games with victory, but the resource system ruins it, just because you have to attack your neighbours to get the resources.
I'd be more than happy with an option in the Map customization Menu that would allow to set the number of ressources independently from the number of players (that really should be possible) in CIV3-4 , but I sure hope they'll come up with a more elaborate and more equal system for CIV4....
Remember, the main reason Firaxis brought up when introducing the resources, was to make player protect their land tiles, this will still be necessary if they were more resources on the map, huge empires only having ONE source of Iron/Horses/Salpeter is just ridiculous...

Personally, what I want to see is the concept of resource SIZE-with a larger size resource having a MUCH lower chance of disappearing! In addition, the chance of a resource vanishing should be based on the size of your empire (either # of cities in trade network or total population points in network), the scarcity of the resource, the number of improvements/units you build WITH that resource in a single turn, the number of people you're trading the resource with and the number of improvements/units that require the resource on an ongoing basis (like coal for a power plant or oil for tanks, for instance!) and, lastly, how much you're exploiting the square the resource is on (I'd like to see you be able to vary the # of food/shields you can 'extract' from a hex per turn!). This way, when a resource disappears, you can feel confident that it did so as a result of YOUR actions-not because of some arbitrary RNG!
By the same token, a civ should be able to invest some of its budget into 'prospecting'-as a means of increasing the chance of a resource appearing in a given square! This way, the chances of more abundant resources being found will be significantly increased, though at a cost.
Last of all, it would be great if having access to a resource increased your chances of discovering certain techs-like iron giving a greater chance of discovering 'Iron Working', or Uranium giving a bonus to getting 'nuclear fission'!

Yours,
Aussie_Lurker.

OK, sort of a random set of thoughts, here...
Resources becoming available before a use is found for them is silly in that things such as Saltpeter weren't considered valuable until knowledge of what could be done with it was discovered.
Aluminum was worth nothing to a nation until it became a usefull resource. Until then, it was merely a curiosity, nothing more.
How many cities would build themselves near a source of some worthless metal when there was coal and game aplenty in a different location?
Having resources buildable after a peroid of time makes sense for some resources, but you simply can't produce metal or coal out of nothing. Horses, wheat, grapes...these are things that can be reproduced, if a quantity of them and the technological concepts for their reproduction become available. Then there is the consideration of quality to take into account. Sure, Washington can produce wine, but how good is it compared to wine from other places?

The more complicated the calculations added to the system, the larger the game, and the slower the game play. But, then again, games become larger and larger as bigger, better, faster computers become more commonly available.

Coal, Iron, Aluminum...these things get used up. Some are reuseable, while others are completely gone, once they've been used.
Having a limit, based on usage, makes sense, but then more resources would have to be spread around, or the ability, to recycle, rebuild, or simulate resources would have to be added to the game system, as appropriate for any given resource, else all resources would eventually become exhausted, and then the game would run down due the lack of the needed resources to build military units.
Having only some resources become visible upon the discovery of its value, while having the rest remain undiscovered would make the addition of Prospectors or the Prospect order for Workers a sensible one, but having a Prospector able to discover a resource merely by looking might imbalance the game by allowing one civ to successfully discover Iron, Coal, Uranium, and Aluminum all in the same place, while another civ fails time and time again to find any resources at all.

How about if they put 2 diffrent kinds of units.
First would be "normal" ones, that dont need resources, or at least stop needing them when they become common. So that evryone could build, lets say, cavalery after some time.
Second would be "spetial" units that would need specific resource to be biuld.
Something like enchansed pikeman, or sword man or anything else.
E.g. you have iron, that means you are more "used" to work with it, giving you certian "mastery" over it, so you can build better units that requier it, or maybe build them faster.
Thou not all the resources should be treated in the same way. Horses, iron may have become common, but uranium certianly did not.

This ofcuorse would change the whole UU system, but i think it would be more logycal.

And about luxuries. I think that they work good as they are now. They are just optionals after all.

There reaches a point where some resources become readily available and if you were to have a shortage in your own country you could easily buy the resource on the open world markets, that is; once those markets have been established you shouldn't have to depend on the whim of a single country not giving in to your request for the resource.

Maybe if there were lets say United Nations sanctions set up against you, maybe that would be a possible exception.

So maybe there should be a global markets great wonder that would make the above possible. The Civ that builds the wonder would gain some extra benefit, but all Civ's that have discovered trade would be able to buy resources, buy 20 turn contracts, prices subject to world supply.

Example maybe if there are 5 Civ's and 5 coal deposits in the world there would be a factor (multiplier) of 1.00 applied to the price of coal, if there were 5 civ's and only 4 coal deposits in the world then a factor (multiplier) of 1.25 applied to the price of coal, price would be adjusted to show the tight supply.

There reaches a point where some resources become readily available and if you were to have a shortage in your own country you could easily buy the resource on the open world markets, that is; once those markets have been established you shouldn't have to depend on the whim of a single country not giving in to your request for the resource.
This concept is already covered in Civ III.
Any resource your nation doesn't have access to can be bought from a rival nation. The price is determined by availability and the amount of benefit that the rival nation percieves you will recieve from the resource.
"Commonly available" is a relative term.
Just because most nations in the world have access to a resource doesn't mean that they'll trade it for next to nothing, and it's not like they can just grow a new resource if they're trading it away to someone.
Maybe certain resources can be grown (with the proper technologies), but even artificial diamonds aren't nearly as much a luxury as real ones, and synthetic oil isn't nearly as versatile or as useful as 'natural' oil.

Might as well add my 2 cents:
As far as resources are concerned, greatly increase the number of resources in the map, so each civ should have on average well a lot of each. When that's done, set the effectiveness of each resource/luxury to a certain level, say one unit of one luxury providing happiness to so many citizens. This way having one source of furs provides less benefit than say five sources. Similar to strategic resources. The more you have, the more you could build. Say for instance you had 4 iron and 5 coal resources. You could build 4 railroad lines per turn or 3 rr and some pikeman. Well you get the idea. This way fairness is observed. If you have few resources, you can barely get by, but with many, your civ can grow and develop quickly.

Just thought of another idea to tag along: The ability to build storehouses (or whatever is appropriate) to store resources that are not used that turn. The storehouse could store say 20 units max of a resource like iron (one added to the store each turn when the resource is not used somewhere else) and when you need to build say rr, you could take it from the store if you have no other source.

I thought of something else. Perhaps units that can't be built without a certain resource could be, but only at double shield cost, and if an appropriate replacement technology were researched. That way, if an opportunity to trade for the desired resource came up, it still might be worthwhile, but you wouldn't be SOL if you couldn't otherwise get access to it.

Example: The Incas have no iron available to them, and none of their potential trading partners is willing to sell any to them at a price they can afford. If the Incas want to build swordsmen, they must then research "Iron Substitutes" technology. Once they have learned that one, they may then build swordsmen (or any other unit that requires iron), but at twice the normal shield cost. Possibly the units manufactured with this technology would be less effective than if Iron was available. In this case, they should be made upgradeable once the Incas do secure a source of iron.

How might this be applied to terrain improvements, like railroads? Suppose that once you'd researched "alloys" (or some such appropriately named technology) you might be able to build rails, but it takes twice as much time to do so unless you have iron? Also, rail segments built with "alternative" technology might be given a small percentage chance of "breaking" (disappearing) and then having to be repaired (rebuilt). Even a relatively small percentage chance of such an occurrence would result in having to assign labor units to repair broken rail segments on a nearly continuous basis, especially in a large, iron-deficient nation. If iron became available, you could assign laborers to upgrade inferior rail segments to iron, taking some small, yet not insignificant amount of time to do so. (And the substandard rail segments could be in a nifty bronze color, too.) :D

--SSgtBaloo

This concept is already covered in Civ III.
Any resource your nation doesn't have access to can be bought from a rival nation. The price is determined by availability and the amount of benefit that the rival nation percieves you will recieve from the resource.
"Commonly available" is a relative term.
Just because most nations in the world have access to a resource doesn't mean that they'll trade it for next to nothing, and it's not like they can just grow a new resource if they're trading it away to someone.
Maybe certain resources can be grown (with the proper technologies), but even artificial diamonds aren't nearly as much a luxury as real ones, and synthetic oil isn't nearly as versatile or as useful as 'natural' oil.

I think you missed my point, I'm suggesting that you shouldn't have to approach a nation to obtain a resource once global markets are set up.

I am saying that you should be able to buy the resource on an exchange at current market price.

If I don't get along with a nation that has a resource I need, it shouldn't stop me from having access to the resource if I have the cash.

I should also be able to sell my resources on the exchange for cash which would drive down the price. If I decide to hord my resources, then the price would be driven up.

The exchange could be a wonder that is built and the Civ that builds the exchange would gain some addtional benefit as well.

Just thought of another idea to tag along: The ability to build storehouses (or whatever is appropriate) to store resources that are not used that turn. The storehouse could store say 20 units max of a resource like iron (one added to the store each turn when the resource is not used somewhere else) and when you need to build say rr, you could take it from the store if you have no other source.

I like this idea as well.

I thought of something else. Perhaps units that can't be built without a certain resource could be ...if an appropriate replacement technology were researched....
Example: The Incas have no iron available to them...If the Incas want to build swordsmen, they must then research "Iron Substitutes" technology...they may then build swordsmen (or any other unit that requires iron), but at twice the normal shield cost. Possibly the units...would be less effective...In this case, they should be made upgradeable once the Incas do secure a source of iron.

How might this be applied to terrain improvements, like railroads? Suppose that once you'd researched "alloys"...you might be able to build rails, but it takes twice as much time to do... Also, rail segments built with "alternative" technology might be given a small percentage chance of "breaking" (disappearing)... Even a relatively small percentage chance of such an occurrence would result in having to assign labor units to repair broken rail segments... If iron became available, you could assign laborers to upgrade inferior rail segments to iron... (And the substandard rail segments could be in a nifty bronze color, too.) :D

--SSgtBalooI can't think of a single rail system that had been built without the use of Iron, or a steam engine, for that matter.
The idea behind Civ technologies is to use technologies that existed.
Different nations used different weapons made from bronze. There were swords made of it, axes, spears, etc. The makers of civ didn't have the luxury of adding every different unit that ever existed in the history of the planet.
Without the use of Iron, Bronze was the next best thing. Other metals, such as orichalcum were devised, and abandoned.
Let's just stick to the historically relevant resources and technologies.I think you missed my point, I'm suggesting that you shouldn't have to approach a nation to obtain a resource once global markets are set up.

I am saying that you should be able to buy the resource on an exchange at current market price.

If I don't get along with a nation that has a resource I need, it shouldn't stop me from having access to the resource if I have the cash...
Yep, you're right, I misunderstood.
Probably something like a mini-wonder that allows those nations that build it to participate. It would have to be based on something we already have, and there would still be the possibility of a trade embargo. I sort of think that using the system would look a lot like the current trade system for Civ III...might be a bit confusing.

i think if there were more resourses, or at some point you didnt need them, it would take away a lot of the reason of going to war. id personally like to see a few more resources and buildings that require resources, like in the mesoamerica conquets. Id also like to be able to buy more than 1 of a resource from another civ. say i buy 5 gems from one civ and trade one of each to 4 other civs.

This idea could be modded into civ 3 now.

For each unit that needs resources, create three versions. Version A has standard cost, needs the resource, and comes with the original tech. Version B costs much more (maybe x 1.5), but needs no resource. Version C costs standard, needs no resource, but comes a few tech levels later.

Of course, this idea may make upgrading units hard to work in to it.

I think this is a killer idea, I can't believe I never noticed this thread until now. Thanks for someone for bumping it up.

I'd do three things:

1. Have more different kinds of resources and luxuries.
2. Have discrete supplies of resources that are needed for everything.
3. Make resources become obsolete by era / technology.

Issue 1 is important so that way resources can become MORE strategic. Make it impossible for one person to have every resource they need within their borders, so they are forced to trade and develop relationships with the world around them.

Issue 2 is important so that way you can't survive from just one square of a resource, and there's an actual incentive to practice conservation. Instead of pumping out as many Swordsmen as you can once you discover Iron, you stick with a few Archers to conserve your Iron supply, just in case the going gets tough. Maybe you'll trade your excess supply. And maybe you'll rethink the idea of expanding to 25% of the continent if you don't have enough Iron to support the infrastructure you need.

Issue 3 was the one suggested. This prevents the game from being too complicated. Limestone is only necessary in the classical age. Plastics make Wood obsolete. (Just to give examples). This way you only need to focus on 8-10 resources at a time, instead of something like 40.

Great ideas, DH_Epic, and many of them fit in with the resource ideas I have been putting up here almost since day 1! ANYTHING that encourages a more cooperative approach to gaming should be given priority in the new game! I also think that Civ3's abstract 'resource disappearance' model could still work in conjunction with DH's discreet quantity system. In this, the chance of a resource disappearing would be directly linked to how much you use it! This would include the # of cities in your empire and the number of units and improvements you build in a turn which depend on said resource. Some units and improvements might require a resource on an ongoing basis (like mechanised units and power stations), in which case the TOTAL number of improvements/units you currently have will determine the chance of the dependant resource 'running out'! Whilst on that issue, does anyone feel that a power plant should be able to 'power' more than one city? Perhaps you have one city with a 'coal station' for instance, which can power six cities if those cities are connected to that city via a road/rail connection? I would like to hear your thoughts on that!

Yours,
Aussie_Lurker.

Here is an overview of how to solve this on a resource-by-resource basis. For this model resources can stack in tiles.

Iron/Coal/Aluminum/Uranium

Over time certain metals became more plentiful to humans thanks to improvements in refinement and mining techniques. Each square that has a resource also has a minimum tech required to utilize that resource.

Iron - Iron Working would allow you to see the most basic sources in mountains and hills. Construction would allow for more efficient and deeper mines, showing Iron in more squares. Engineering would lead to even more squares. Chemistry allows for blasting and Metallurgy makes Iron refinement easier. By the industrial age many many Mountain and Hill squares would have Iron.
Coal - Chemistry shows surface level coal. Combustion shows some deeper shafts. Other techs would lead to more squares where coal would be. By late-industrial age most of the coal fields would be discovered.
The rest go in this fashion.

Horses

Once horses are introduced, either trhough battle with an enemy, or otherwise, they can quickly be put into Stables(small wonder). Stables allow horses to always be present.

Saltpeter

Once metallurgy and one source of saltpeter is somehow known, then it exists everywhere.

Rubber

Rubber farms can be planted, but planted ones have a good chance of disappearing unless in the 'right' square(randomly chosen squares before game).

Oil

Some technology would allow for more oil to be found and exploited. There woudl be more in the fields, but it would deplete faster.

I'd rather see certain techs just pave the way for "infiniteness" of resources. For example, metalurgy allows you to build any units or improvements that require Iron without having any iron within your borders.

The end result is the same, but it also means you can cut out strategic resources that become more cumbersome to keep track of. This way you could have many many resources and shift emphasis off iron and limestone onto saltpeter and coal and onto oil and penecillin.

The lux resources should be kept as they are, I think this system is balanced well.
The strategic resources should be changed:
For a resource in countrol you gain a number of horses, Irons,..., per turn which would go into a pool. Mining would improve the resource gain. Building a unit which requires the resource should use a resource unit up. You can trade resources from the pool, either a fix number or x/turn. Having no access to a resource should make the unit more expensive (at least 50%). Of course the resource gainig and trading price have to be balanced with the improved cost so that it still pays off to control a resource. It should also pay off to trade instead of accepting the increased price. But it would not cripple you totally if you lack a strategic resource.
To be discussed is if each resource has a limited amount of units, so that a tile can be used up and then appears elsewhere.

Btw, rails have to be changed fundamentally, I would prefer a city improvement where units can travel from one city to another city in one turn but not infinitely everywhere.

1) Some nations still have to import a consideralbe about of Iron, so I think a system where more sources appear makes sense. Maybe nations that could not mine it before now found some mineable sources in country. Renewable resources would become infinite pretty quickly, but not non-renewable.

2) I would prefer roads give you the ability to transfer units between cities in one turn. THat is what roads did for the Roman empire and part of their great success.

When it comes to roads and transportation, I lean towards good gameplay instead of realism. I think that transport is almost TOO easy in Civ, especially when railroads come along. I don't know how this came up though.

Also, non-renewable resources wouldn't necessarily become infinite... but they could theoretically become obsolete. For example, if you put a lot of research into hydrogen power, oil could become obsolete soon after. You could leverage your supply of oil, then, to hold lesser nations at ransom.

schwick, infinite move rails are bad enough, but roads too?

Infinite and obsolete in civ terms resutls in the same thing. We both agree that after having horses so long you should automaticlaly have enough to trad eto whoever and use how you wnat. We also agree that getting Iron should be relatively easy in the Modern Age.


Well it looks like this topic of forking [offtopic], but I care not. I never saw how the infinite RR movement was not fun. I would be more pissed off if RR movement was restricted. Trasnportaiton is slow enough as it is, no need to slow down. Road networks really should allow you defend more then 'slgihtly easier' in the ancient era. If trade happens over one turn between nation, why doesn't military movement.

I can't speak for whether roads need to change, but Railroads are definitely too much. Not that it's unrealistic, but it's pretty unstrategic.

The positioning of your troops doesn't matter. You can have 90% of your troops on the west side of your empire, see a threat coming on the east side and fight the threat. You can pump out a new troop and have them hit up the enemy in the same turn. There's no strategy, whoever has more troops wins, since configuration doesn't matter.

That is how WWI was fought, very slow and stagnant. THat is why aircraft and armour were so important. Theorhetically your aircraft should knock out critical RR, except currently palyers RR everything. Maybe that should be rethought.

Yeah, I think the problem with railroads is that they go everywhere and are totally expansive. Not to say that they should eliminate this, but it becomes doubly unstrategic when you can bring an invasion to your enemy's doorstep with a snap of fingers... with no real way to slow it down.

Some limitation seems necessary, if only to make the game more strategic. Infinite railroads all over the map by the modern age makes the game really dull.

I do think the RR intrustion exploit needs to be fixed. Or they need to allow troops to reinforce defensively, so you could face off against a RR intrustion.

Infinite movement is evil. It makes it too easy to defend your empire and opens up all sorts of exploits.

This is definitely a case when realism has to take a back seat to gameplay. Being able to move units all the way across the map in 2000 BC would ruin the game!

Yeah, I even think that roads happen a little too fast with a few too many benefits.

In particular, sea travel needs to be encouraged a lot more.

Personally, I'd like to see teh folowing:

- Roads delayed until construction(?), reflecting all-weather paved roads.
- Highways as mush faster roads.
- Airports, Rail depots and Harbours allowing a RTN (rapid transport network) function somewhat similar to civ2 airports, except no per turn limit. Instead of teh per turn limit, they cost gold per unit moved.

Construction? That's 1/4 of the game through before you can build any roads. ;)

What if roads functioned to build trade routes and acquire resources until construction, but after construction they gave the 1/3 movement bonus? (Or maybe only 1/2?)

Scale up with technology... automatic upgrade system of some sort so you don't have to build every single type. (probably don't want to have to build roads, then stone roads, then ashphault roads, then railroads, then highways)

You'll notice I removed rails from teh terrain improvement model. The way they affect unit movement is fundamentally different, as the units are no longer moving under their own steam. It also prevents enemy civs from using your rails.

As for road with construction, I was using taht as an example. Perhaps a specific road-building tech which would come reasonably early, but not at the start.

I don't want free upgrades scaling with technology, as that gives the leader a ridiculous advantage, and also leaves teh status of roads in unclaimed territory in question.

Actually leaving roads until the last 3/4 of the game would make expansion a lot slower, along with map restrictions for settlers. Maybe units should not be able to fight the same turn or enter hot LZ if they use the infinite movement of a RR, representing the fact they were not in a hurry. This would force you to have advanced knowledge of attacks to effectively be ready. Also, the movmeent affects of roads should scale over time, and ships should be able to move between ports a lot faster, or have a large ZOC(zone of contact) within an coast, sea, or ocean.

I'd definitely have a faster movement for warships and transports, but the RTN ability of harbours in my model would allow empires to surround inland seas and still get stuff moved quickly while minimising fiddly actions with loading and unloading ships.

The exact cost/unit for RTN use needs to be decided, but it should be only slightly more expensive than if you were maintaining an equivalent force of transports. Basically it is a trade between cost and convenience. It should work out cheaper for transport ships only if you are constantly using them every turn. Of course, RTN network is only good for your cities that have harbours; you'll still need the transport shiips for a navy assault.

In RoN, units were assumed that have transports built-in so you would not have to play the units-to-transport game. For this purpose you would have to pay a gold fee(10 gold or something similair per unit) to generate the transport.

Maybe harbors should speed up the movement of ships in waters near that city?

I liked the idea that ships moved really fast through 'charted' areas but slowly charting new areas. Charting would occur with Map Making and act like roads. CHarting would require a spot be spotted at least a total of two times on non-consecutive turns. Sea-techonology would increase the efficiency of the charted land, increasing MP gains from 1/3 to 1/10.

A bit off, but speakign of wines, a lot of people might be surprised how much wine my state of Washington produces. Great Reislings and others. There are a lot of wineries in this state and even some near where I live here...not far from Microsoft in Redmond. Chateau St. Michelle, Columbia Wineries, etc.

Shields essentially represent raw materials, that's why forests yield more shields (wood) than a grassland and that's why mountains yield more shields (stone, minerals) than plains.

However, the classical concept of shield output ignores the fact that different communities explore different resources depending on their environments and on their needs...in other words, different civilizations came across with different solutions to the same problems.
Maybe egyptians lacked wood, because they lived in desert areas...but they were able to build things using other materials, such as clay (houses) or reeds (small boats). So, by classical standards (i.e. previous CIV games) a floodplain would be poor in "shields" but for egyptians, floodplains were as rich in "shields" as a forest for romans.


What if non-essential techs could increase the output of various terrain types? If you lived in a desert, you would research 'mud bricks'(avaliable with Pottery), which woudl increase shield output per desert tile. If you had lots of forests around, you could research 'lumberjacking' to get a shield bonus from them. That way you chose what to research based on need.


This would turn the game even more realistic and would present the civers with an interesting and flourishing tech tree...each civ would find a specific path to reach the same goals, depending on the resources available and terrain types.

This would emphasize even more the idiosyncrasies of each civilization and culture just as it happened in the real world.

What was said for shields can be also applied to food.

I've noticed a problem with all this terrain-balancing optional tech stuff.

A powerhouse player will be able to scoop them all easily. Historically, they'd all be coming early enough that they'd be very cheap after all. Onc you reach the industrial era they is no solid excuse for not having all of them.

And at that stage you're either back to square one of deserts not being as industrially useful as forests, or you have homogenised the benefits of all the terrain types. It seems like we're discussing a new set of techs that won't actually add anything to the whole game.

What would be nice is a way for a specific viv to be given a bonus on certain terrain types, kind of like the traits but more so.

Anyone considered that maybe desert should be less productive than forest? After all, wood is all ready for use as a construction material, while sand needs water (not common in deserts) before it can be used to make mud bricks. Similarly, mountains, while they have plenty of rock, it isn't exactly accessible rock.

I think just giving every citizen (or tile?) a flat 1/2 shield of production in addition to what currently exists will balance things quite well.

rhialto

first of all, desert isn't only sand, for instance, only a tiny fraction of Sahara is sand, the remainder is rock and stone (where do you think the egyptians got all those blocks anyway?)

second, yes mountains have lots of rock, but those rocks have minerals that can be extracted for numberless purposes...

My point is: if a civ has lots of rock nearby, its buildings will be mostly made of stone, but if other civ as lots of forest nearby, its buildings will be mostly made of wood...I think in previous civ games the terrain outputs are too absolute, they don't consider the adaptability of human communities to different resources...

Nevertheless you emphasized an important point...maybe the optional techs I refer to should bring benefits only in extreme situations. For instance, only for civs starting near deserts or near tundra...also, maybe such techs required the presence of specific terrains in a civ's territory to be researched...if you don't own desert you don't know what it is and you can't research special ways of exploiting the desert resources...

and maybe industrialization should put such special abilities aside since the raw materials will be substantially different from the ancient times...

I remember that this idea was to prevent that civs starting in harsh environments had more chances to be succesful...generally if you start near tundra or desert you have much more difficulties to reach the same level of your opponents.

This idea was also to reflect the adaptability of human communities to different environments through the development of special abilities...of course this would apply only to ancient times...in the modern times everything would be more homogeneous...

Do you agree? Do you have something else in mind?

How about a radical change :D :

Shields become defined as "wood," "stone," or whatever the material may be, but one unit of one resource is equivalent to one unit of another resource. When used for production, each resource unit is essentially one shield. However, over time, the continued use of certain resources will allow civs to become more proficient at using those certain resources, and each resource unit will begin to count as more than one shield for the accumulation of shields. To make this reasonable, use of fractions for quantifying shields and other things, a simple fix Sirian has suggested in another thread, will be necessary.

Thus, civs will become more adept at utilizing their environments, but only if they have lived and adapted to it for a sufficiently long time.

Thus, civs will become more adept at utilizing their environments, but only if they have lived and adapted to it for a sufficiently long time.


hmmm...yes...this could somewhat solve the potential problem raised by rhialto...in these conditions it would be very unlikely that some civ "scoop them all easily" as rhialto mentioned :)

Well, yes, I am aware that desert is mostly rocky, not sandy (we need a new terrain type, 'sand seas'). But this discussion was talking about desert in the context of making mud bricks, for which sand is the natural ingredient, not rock. In any case, I'd argue that wood is a lot more harvestable than rock, and in the context of desert rock mining, the workers need far less support too.

But terrain specifics aside, my general point about scooping the terrain bonus techs still stands.

Hmm, perhaps teh optional techs would only function on a city by city basis. You can have the best desert resource extraction process in the world, but if you city has mostly plains and forest, the people in that city won't be interested. Set it so only one of these techs can provide its bonus for any particular city, depending on the majority terrain type.

But this seems kinda complex to be easily moddable.

Well, as I have put forward in other threads, perhaps a civ should be able to extract variable amounts of resources (food/shields) from a particular square. This might represent the city going that EXTRA bit further to eke out a living from the tile, but coming at a cost of potential pollution (mostly in the industrial/modern era), and the risk of the tile becoming degraded.
So, as an example, a desert tile with a shield output of 1 could be boosted to 2 by the player but, if he/she leaves it too long, then the tile could cease to produce any tiles at ALL (representing the resource potential of the tile being tapped out!)

Yours,
Aussie_Lurker.

Originally posted Apr 17, 2004, 03:18 PM #16
by Shyrramar

I think it would be fine if a resource became "obsolete" somewhat like an era after discovery. So horses would be needed to build knights, but not after that, iron was no longer needed after pikemen and knights, saltpeter would still be needed for rifleman (just on making saltpeter more valuable, this is just a suggestion), but not to infantry. This should also go with many of the modern resources: perhaps coal is not needed in modern times as it is common enough? Oil on the other hand should of course not disappear (even though it is found in middle of industrial ages). It should vary between resources, of course.

I think this is just opposite to what happens in real life. When resourses become more common, they do not become obsolete. Who can imagine bulding tank or battleship without iron?

I suggest instead resourses should gradually become more and more available. How it can be done? If, say, a civ discovers Iron Working, then not all iron deposits become shown on a map, but a only a small portion. And later as time goes by new and new iron deposits should become available. The similar thing exist already but the proportion of resourse deposits available instantly/ appearing later should be different. It will be like civs do some geosynoptics. (By the way, how about an idea to make an ADVANCE "Geology" and a BUILDING "Geological expedition" which increases a chance of appearing of previously hidden resourse deposits?).

And with more and more deposits available their price in international trade must also sharply decrease which will make resourses more common instead of making them obsolete.

In my mind units and improvements should be even more dependable on resourses. Units requiring iron should also require coal (coal should appear at the very start of the game. In a charcoal form it was one of the very first natural resourses manufactured and used by man), as temperatures required for iron ore melting can not be achieved from wood burning. Bronze should require copper and tin. Gunpowder (before invention of smokeless powder) was produced from mixture of saltpeter and coal powder. Etc, etc. And more complicated units should require even bigger number or resourses.

I would also agree with idea by Aussie Lurker that depletion of resourses should have place and be dependable on rate of resourse consumption.