My $0.02 re the health/resource issues... Given the timeframe of the scenario, do you think it is realistic that cities should be growing like mushrooms after a good rain (like they can in other CIV games)?
Is it realistic that they all start the same size? Or that London and Malta seem closely matched population wise? There isn't enough of a gap between the big and small cities, the reason for that being that some of the cities cannot grow large enough.
Given the theme of the scenario (warfare, resource shortages), do you think that the focus should be on maximizing city expansion? I think the scenario would become quite unbalanced if the health is tweaked much at all.
Seems slightly unbalanced to me as it is, Germany has been compensated with stronger units and a fascist industry; yet they easily capture cities from the poor nations(Low Countries, Poland etc) and end up producing far more and far stronger units than anyone else. Playing the game on a normal level seems to almost always result in Soviet and German domination. In fact in two or three turns any aircraft I produce is shot down, I don't think I've ever shot a German aircraft down. Not to mention that you lose buildings every turn aswel and can only replace one or the other.
Basically factoring all this in means open play mode doesn't really work, you can't wait for someone to join your side as they all end up friendly(ish) with Germany so it ends up being a one on one, and no country is up to that against Germany, let alone when they're fighting other countries too. Maybe it's better balanced in historical mode.
Certainly health IS a game issue, but one that appropriate decisions can help mitigate in some instances. Does EVERY city need EVERY factory, or can you customize? Is it realistic for tiny atolls to be producing much of anything?
I already am heavily customized in my smaller cities, mostly the middle eastern ones which are so important, which is fine, it's the larger ones that should be able to produce more, especially in comparison and considering changes in tactics you need variation in what you can produce.
As it stands now, the few health resources become strategically important, and that's what all those military units are for. Same for oil: the Middle East remains of strategic importance to this day because that IS where the oil is.
Important yes, and they should be, but the game doesn't work on a realistic basis, it unfortunately creates problems with resources, in real life the Americans would provide a lot of resources, from units to supplies, losing the middle east oil would be devestating but there were alternatives, it wouldn't take a country out of the war entirely, but as the game cannot adequately implement this, it becomes a game of lose the oil and it's over.
You can't build units and buildings at the same time, if your oil gets cut off you no longer have access to building certain units, so as you can see total realism isn't likely to be possible.
Generally speaking the mod all works, and is to a good degree enjoyable, but it has it's problems, to be fair that's probably as it's made with historical mode in mind more than the other two modes.
I should point out there is a small bug with bombing civil buildings/factories, when you lose something you have to rebuild it twice.
