an alternative model for the use of railroads
- Thread starter Shigga
- Start date
i agree with the existence of RR hubs in reality, in europe we have them also, brussels, franfurt, paris, etc etc, but, in reality if you bomb a track, it is something harder to repair then in civ4, in reality you can bomb a kilometer of track and it will take weeks to repair, so there you have your strategical impact for reality, but in civ 1tile of tracks are destroyed with 1 bomb, but represend maybe 300km of tracks, and like i said, in game you repair them in 1 turn if you want to, so you must bomb just massively around a city to isolate it and have a benefit of bombing the infrastructure.
sometimes, no, almost always, it is impossible to write algorithms for doing 100% reality, so, if you cannot program reality on the first place, ie railroads and their strategical impact, you also shouldnt look on the existence of hubs and connections from everywhere if this would unbalance the art of strategy. you cannot write a routine for RR which not represent the reality and then for the rules to apply look to reality and use them on the un-real routine.
i guess you're right in real its also hard to bomb infrastructure, but lets say this, in 1945 it was like 10.000kg bombs to tackle down one railway station, now it is 1 bomb(cost 10.000) where you can bomb the same damage. So one can think alot of reasons for having more then 2 connections or not, i just have the idea that, and i played alot of MP games, it is not a matter of strategy in the game, the RR are more something to keep busy your 150bombers, while doing the attack with other units.
so, because i loose alot of heavy bombers to tackle down the infrastructure, it doesnt make sence to do so, so i noticed, noone actually attacks RR because everyone knows, it doesnt have any impact, you need 200construction turns of 10cities to destroy RR which cost 100construction turns of 1city to build enough workers to keep up the Railroads. SO noone is interested in going over to some strategical infrastructure bombing campaign, unless you are so strong you dont know what to do with the bombers.
as comment on the last one, on the trade routes..for me that would do it if they were always there..but my friend is kind of a ***** in playing these kinds of games. if in civ4 there is an option of infiltrist or spies or any other kind of char able to destroy buildings in a city(targeted specific buildings) trade should not be free for everyone..there should be some building to enable it, because my friend is the kind who will use it very wisely to destroy my building so i cannot build, ie, tanks with half of my empire because he is destroying my trade buildings..which can be tactically very wise!! which makes the game more interesting for me, and i guess for alot of others too
however, there shouldnt be to much tactics, we're no generals
sometimes, no, almost always, it is impossible to write algorithms for doing 100% reality, so, if you cannot program reality on the first place, ie railroads and their strategical impact, you also shouldnt look on the existence of hubs and connections from everywhere if this would unbalance the art of strategy. you cannot write a routine for RR which not represent the reality and then for the rules to apply look to reality and use them on the un-real routine.
i guess you're right in real its also hard to bomb infrastructure, but lets say this, in 1945 it was like 10.000kg bombs to tackle down one railway station, now it is 1 bomb(cost 10.000) where you can bomb the same damage. So one can think alot of reasons for having more then 2 connections or not, i just have the idea that, and i played alot of MP games, it is not a matter of strategy in the game, the RR are more something to keep busy your 150bombers, while doing the attack with other units.
so, because i loose alot of heavy bombers to tackle down the infrastructure, it doesnt make sence to do so, so i noticed, noone actually attacks RR because everyone knows, it doesnt have any impact, you need 200construction turns of 10cities to destroy RR which cost 100construction turns of 1city to build enough workers to keep up the Railroads. SO noone is interested in going over to some strategical infrastructure bombing campaign, unless you are so strong you dont know what to do with the bombers.
as comment on the last one, on the trade routes..for me that would do it if they were always there..but my friend is kind of a ***** in playing these kinds of games. if in civ4 there is an option of infiltrist or spies or any other kind of char able to destroy buildings in a city(targeted specific buildings) trade should not be free for everyone..there should be some building to enable it, because my friend is the kind who will use it very wisely to destroy my building so i cannot build, ie, tanks with half of my empire because he is destroying my trade buildings..which can be tactically very wise!! which makes the game more interesting for me, and i guess for alot of others too
however, there shouldnt be to much tactics, we're no generals Yes, a tile scales up to be quite large in the real world, but so does a bomber unit. A bomber unit isn't a single bomber dropping a single bomb; it's many bombers dropping many bombs. There's no conflict between the size of the railroad improvement and the size of the unit destroying it.
As far as trade goes, I have no clue what you're talking about with your devious friend destroying your improvements. To effectively model trade, you'd have to build a trade route from every city to every other city. That should just happen; you shouldn't have to build a trade route. Furthermore, it's just wrong. You can't control trade and economies like that. Witness the decline of centrally-planned economies compared to decentralized, capitalist ones. There's nothing special about any of the trade routes in the world; they just happen to be the routes that are best according to time, distance, effort, and political issues. If an existing trade route is somehow severed, traffic will just re-route to take a somewhat longer, harder, and/or more dangerous one, with a proportional drop off in the amount of trade, but it won't just stop.
As far as trade goes, I have no clue what you're talking about with your devious friend destroying your improvements. To effectively model trade, you'd have to build a trade route from every city to every other city. That should just happen; you shouldn't have to build a trade route. Furthermore, it's just wrong. You can't control trade and economies like that. Witness the decline of centrally-planned economies compared to decentralized, capitalist ones. There's nothing special about any of the trade routes in the world; they just happen to be the routes that are best according to time, distance, effort, and political issues. If an existing trade route is somehow severed, traffic will just re-route to take a somewhat longer, harder, and/or more dangerous one, with a proportional drop off in the amount of trade, but it won't just stop.
apatheist said:
................Ok now what everyone remembers from history class is that rail road was invented for the purpose of speeding things up like, MOBILITY! For things like, exploration, expansion, trade, warfare, and ya know, the usual, and all.
Kurioku said:
Not exactly sure what your point is. I'll retry mine. I don't think things you can do in Civ should be like computer processors, i.e., one is 100 MHz, then you get one that's 300 MHz, then you get one that's 500 MHz, then 1.5GHz, etc. Yeah, it's cool that one is faster than the other, but they're basically the same thing. I think that when you step up a level you should get something more interesting than a MHz bump.
apatheist said:
OH, no worries there should you have. I got your point, and to say that it is little different, you should take the step up to realize just because the two relative ideas are of similar plain, it is the form in which they animate this sevice to the demands of reality that is still the point.
Yes mag levs may be more or less other kinds of railroads, yet they are improvosations to newer methods. By your logic, nothing differs from anything because it is at purpose that you stop and say, well, that's life. After purpose, is method. aka advancement.
Dudedudeyo
Chieftain
How about this
Roads=x3
Railroads= built specailly(with limits)x6
Paved road=x5
Highway=uupkeep very high x8
Roads=x3
Railroads= built specailly(with limits)x6
Paved road=x5
Highway=uupkeep very high x8
I think there needs to be more differentiation between the types of infrastructure. With the list you have, there's a clear "X is better than Y" thing going on.
You should have multiple options available to you and you choose the best based on what's available to you and what you need. After all, in our modern world, we still have dirt roads, plain ordinary paved roads, railroads, and highways, each according to the need.
1) Road: slow to travel, quick to build. I figure normal terrain move cost divided by 3, so 3/3 = 1 for mountain, 2/3 for hills or jungles, 1/3 for plains and grassland, etc. Takes 2 turns to build on grassland. Requires no resources. Can build roads at the beginning.
2) Paved road: faster travel, slow build. 1/3 fixed move cost over all terrain, taking 6 turns to build on grassland. Requires stone. Replaces ordinary road (4 turns to upgrade). Can build paved roads with Construction.
3) Railroad: infinitely fast, but slower build and only goes city-to-city. 0 move cost between cities, 1/3 move cost when passing through a city, and cannot merge/split between cities. 4 turns to build on grassland. Requires iron to build, access to coal or oil to use. If no access to coal or oil, has no effect. Rail can be built on the same terrain as another type of road. Can build railroad with Steam Power.
To elaborate on the city-to-city aspect... You can build railroads wherever you want, but you can only get on in a city (which costs 1/3 MP). If you get off the railroad, you can't get back on until you get to a city. Thus, unconnected railroads are useless. Railroads with only one end in a city are only one-way (out). Passing through a city is like getting dumped off the first railroad and boarding the second one.
4) Highway: really fast with no restrictions on placement, but really slow to build. 1/12 fixed move cost over all terrain, taking 10 turns to build on grassland. Replaces ordinary road (8 turns to upgrade) and paved road (6 turns to upgrade). Can build highway with Automobile.
All construction times are with non-industrious workers in despotism in 4000 BC.
You should have multiple options available to you and you choose the best based on what's available to you and what you need. After all, in our modern world, we still have dirt roads, plain ordinary paved roads, railroads, and highways, each according to the need.
1) Road: slow to travel, quick to build. I figure normal terrain move cost divided by 3, so 3/3 = 1 for mountain, 2/3 for hills or jungles, 1/3 for plains and grassland, etc. Takes 2 turns to build on grassland. Requires no resources. Can build roads at the beginning.
2) Paved road: faster travel, slow build. 1/3 fixed move cost over all terrain, taking 6 turns to build on grassland. Requires stone. Replaces ordinary road (4 turns to upgrade). Can build paved roads with Construction.
3) Railroad: infinitely fast, but slower build and only goes city-to-city. 0 move cost between cities, 1/3 move cost when passing through a city, and cannot merge/split between cities. 4 turns to build on grassland. Requires iron to build, access to coal or oil to use. If no access to coal or oil, has no effect. Rail can be built on the same terrain as another type of road. Can build railroad with Steam Power.
To elaborate on the city-to-city aspect... You can build railroads wherever you want, but you can only get on in a city (which costs 1/3 MP). If you get off the railroad, you can't get back on until you get to a city. Thus, unconnected railroads are useless. Railroads with only one end in a city are only one-way (out). Passing through a city is like getting dumped off the first railroad and boarding the second one.
4) Highway: really fast with no restrictions on placement, but really slow to build. 1/12 fixed move cost over all terrain, taking 10 turns to build on grassland. Replaces ordinary road (8 turns to upgrade) and paved road (6 turns to upgrade). Can build highway with Automobile.
All construction times are with non-industrious workers in despotism in 4000 BC.
frekk
Scourge of St. Lawrence
Colonel said:
Nobody but nobody redeploys heavy military equipment any great distance by highway. Tanks etc just chew up the asphalt. Virtually all redeployment of heavy equipment is by rail or air. Even today.
frekk
Scourge of St. Lawrence
apatheist said:
In the real world, destroying railroad capacity was never very succesful because the enemy could always reroute everything on branch lines ... rail networks are so sprawling and there are so many different ways to make connections it isn't much use.
Exception, there was a campaign during the Civil War whereby the Union soldiers would send bands deep into Confederate territory, tear up the tracks and wrap the rails around trees. The Confederates had only 1 factory that could build or repair rail, so it was quite succesful. But the South was not industrialized really. By the 20th century it became more or less a waste of time to try to prevent the movement of military units along rail lines.
However, bombing rail yards and bridges did have one effect in WW2, and that was that it greatly harmed industry. Rail capacity could always be found for military movements but industry had a much more difficult time coping with losses, because it needed more than just a route from one side of Germany to the other, it needed all the track it could get.
