What changes to Civ V would make the game more realistic?

An example might be: can't build ships armed with canons without gunpowder (which is possible in Navigation).

Another might be "Can't build units that require iron without a forge" (I think the forge currently requires a local source of iron, but I think it would make more sense to have the forge be required to build swordsman and longswordsman and such.) It doesn't make sense that a game can both have forges and not require them for making iron units.

Maybe canons require iron.

Maybe lumber becomes a non-renewable strategic resource. Lumbermills generate +1 lumber per turn but chopping a forest generates 20 or something. Lumber could be consumed to boost production in cities and is required for building pre-industrial ships (industrial and post-industrial requiring iron). To explain what I mean by non-renewable, if you chop a forest for 20 lumber and a certain ship requires 10 lumber to build, you put the 10 lumber into the ship but that doesn't come back when the ship is destroyed or deleted. The lumber is gone forever once it's spent. Maybe add a different type of forest for old-growth trees. Generates double lumber for chopping or putting a lumber mill on it as well as maybe +1 gold for the lumber mill.

Before coal coke was developed for iron smelting in England, iron forges were in competition with ship builders for lumber. The charcoal required for iron smelting consumed 4 square kilometers of forest every year for each iron smeltery.

Maybe forges consume lumber while producing units that require iron. Civ V sort of touches the lumber industry but doesn't acknowledge how important it is to history.

This is an idea I think I've mentioned before here, perhaps strategic resources should have an economical use as well as a military one. Let cities consume horses for a boost to production. After combustion, let cities consume oil for a better boost to production. Let factories consume iron for +5% production of units, +10% production of buildings. Let factories alternatively consume aluminum for +10% food in a city. (Canned goods for preserving food for longer).

Civ V grossly overlooks the domestic application of resources. The world doesn't fight over oil to fuel their destroyers, they do it to fuel their cars.

Strategic resources too, have a problem. Civ feels the need to transition away from strategic resources as the game progresses. Horses and iron obsolete out of the world as aluminum, uranium and oil take over, but this isn't accurate (except horses). We use more iron per capita today than we ever have before. In 2014, the world produced 3 billion tonnes of iron ore. Iron and steel are incredibly important, and Civ should reflect that. Perhaps iron ore sources increase their yields over time, or there are hidden iron ores sources that become visible as techs are unlocked. (Iron is pretty ubiquitous across the world, but some of it is harder to get at).

yeah more detail on these things would definitely be nice, especially the domestic use of things. I think that the domestic use is implied in some buildings and by base tile yields. You have to imagine that all the hexes are part of the city. So iron is still useful in Civ V all game because it becomes a very high production tile for the city, showing that for that city it is being used by the citizen all game for private industry. It's just not important to you as the leader anymore because the AI is no longer desperate to trade for it and it isn't critical for military. There is something to be said for details beneath your notice. I know it's fun as leader to micro everything and see everything but I think civ V purposely tried to make most of the details you mention implied to make the learning curve of the game easier.

What I think would be cool though is if stuff like internal resource consumption and private industry could be investigated by you so you could see what was happening if you chose. I loved city view of civ III where you could see your city in its location from a person's perspective and would love to see it expanded so you could take a 3D tour.

I agree with you on some of the unrealistic stuff though. I think requiring a forge and iron for iron-wielding military rather than consuming it in maintaining them would be nice as it makes it so you have to invest a bit to get the benefit. Right now you can easily get the jump on your neighbors by teching ahead and buying the new military everywhere. Requiring location of iron and construction of a forge and restricting construction to there is not only realistic it introduces some technical balance/realism. Introducing a racetrack to cities to use horses after industry for happiness/tourism would be a nice way to accurately reflect the role of horses today which are mainly used by private citizens in races and for pleasure.

Regarding the 1 UPT vs. stacks idea, and the pros/cons, I had an idea to improve the system and solve the mobility issues while still limiting stacking.

The main failing of 1UPT that everyone complains about is mobility. I like 1 UPT because it moved the game closer to being able to use actual warfare tactics where your archers can be vulnerable since they can be targeted, flanking is a thing, terrain considerations are a thing, siege has to be protected, etc. However, in some ways it is unrealistic. You can't have mixed-military. A real army would deploy a smaller squadron of archers right behind a melee wall but hexes are too big for this. But making hexes tinier is probably too tedious so I propose a combination of civ IV and V.

1. Keep hexes and 1 UPT for subclasses but allow more subclasses to occupy them:
2. New subclasses could be

- civilians
- great people
- ranged/siege military
- melee military (lumps horse & foot)
- naval melee
- naval ranged

this adds two new ranged subclasses and allow civilivans and great people to pass each other unimpeded. 1 UPT applies but only with the restriciton of one per subclass. They started to try to do this with their original 3 division but stopped short in my opinion as mobility is still an annoying issue and workers impede great generals and other GP's since they are all in the same class.

This system allows you to defend your archers with at least one layer of melee. I don't think this is OP and it is infinitely better than the Stack of Doom, but if ppl still think it is OP here's a third balancing perspective thinking of real wars:

3. When a tile is attacked all units take some damage rather than just the highest defender:
- If bombarded all units on the tile take the bombard damage because it can't be screened/defended against very well in real war and crowded units are more likely to take damage from bombardment. This is why in a real war you always bombard prior to moving in on a large force.
- If attacked directly with melee the highest defending unit will act as a screen taking 75% of the damage and the others each take 25% of the incoming attack damage.
- bombardment can no longer kill units. making them super-effective against stacked squares containing the ranged/melee combo but unable to finish any force.
- As usual if in a city all occupying units are free from damage and the city defenses absorbs it instead. However, units occupying the city need to be killed before the city can be taken and you can attack these units directly once the city defense is reduced to 0. Also once reduced to 0 the city defenses stop recovering for a few turns. You can think of it like a wall/trench that has been breached and the only thing stopping the enemy army now is the people inside.

These subrules add some much needed military realisism. In real wars you bombard to weaken, send cavalry to flank and charge and scout, and finish with a direct melee assualt. Bombardment is too inaccurate to do a lot of damage and in real life would do less as numbers thin as well. Also, I always hated how all your city military just disappeared when a melee attacked the city with low defenses. That makes no sense you definitely need to kill them first to take the city. I'm guessing they did it to prevent land/sea combination attacks since melee sea can't attack melee land, but they should work this out rather than going with the easy unrealistic route. Personally I would just allow melee sea to attack land in this scenario. They can both occupy the city so it makes sense. If it helps imagine the ship firing offshore then boarding the docks.

dunkleosteus said:

An example might be: can't build ships armed with canons without gunpowder (which is possible in Navigation).

Another might be "Can't build units that require iron without a forge" (I think the forge currently requires a local source of iron, but I think it would make more sense to have the forge be required to build swordsman and longswordsman and such.) It doesn't make sense that a game can both have forges and not require them for making iron units.

Maybe canons require iron.

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We need to both add some resources to the game and redefine some others. However, to comment on your specific points:
1. You can build (Ancient through Medieval Era) units that require Iron without a Forge. While some major empires had 'factories' that produced iron weapons and armor in quantity (China and Rome for two examples), most ironwork was done in much smaller enterprises - 'village smiths' (which is one reason why family names reflecting the Prestigious vocation of ironsmith are so common: Smith, Schmidt, Kuznetsov, etc). Once the iron has to be worked in quantities of multiple tons - like, say, to build cannon and fixtures for ships like the Frigate and Ship-of-the-Line, then a special Iron workshop is required.
2. 'Cannons' require not only Iron, but iron in quantity that surpassed anything required before. You can arm and armor an entire Roman Legion with about 150 tons of iron. The iron cannon on one medium-sized (2nd rate) Ship-of-the-Line weighed 300 tons, and instead of 40 - lb suits of armor or 3 lb weapons, they are 2 - 4 ton single castings - the 'village smith' ain't gonna cut it no more! Furthermore, once you have cannon you also require cannon in massive quantities for your city fortifications: France in the 18th century had more cannon on the walls of her fortresses and fortified cities than in the entire army and navy put together. The requirements for amounts of iron and the requirements to work it go up exponentially.

dunkleosteus said:

Maybe lumber becomes a non-renewable strategic resource. Lumbermills generate +1 lumber per turn but chopping a forest generates 20 or something. Lumber could be consumed to boost production in cities and is required for building pre-industrial ships (industrial and post-industrial requiring iron). To explain what I mean by non-renewable, if you chop a forest for 20 lumber and a certain ship requires 10 lumber to build, you put the 10 lumber into the ship but that doesn't come back when the ship is destroyed or deleted. The lumber is gone forever once it's spent. Maybe add a different type of forest for old-growth trees. Generates double lumber for chopping or putting a lumber mill on it as well as maybe +1 gold for the lumber mill.

Before coal coke was developed for iron smelting in England, iron forges were in competition with ship builders for lumber. The charcoal required for iron smelting consumed 4 square kilometers of forest every year for each iron smeltery.

Maybe forges consume lumber while producing units that require iron. Civ V sort of touches the lumber industry but doesn't acknowledge how important it is to history.

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'Wood' or lumber is, with a few historical exceptions, not a limiting factor. For one thing, there are almost always alternatives: lumber as a construction material can be replaced by brick, stone, cement, and other materials, wood for fuel can be replaced by coal or peat - they were burning coal in England to heat houses long before the Industrial Age.

The major exception is the use of what we now call 'old growth' forest: the tall, straight timbers required for the masts of ships from about Renaissance Era on, and the massive timbers required for Monumental construction (wooden churches and shrines in Scandinavia and the Far East, the 'Cedars of Lebanon' in the Bronze Age Mediterranean).

This has been explored in the Mod called, I think, "Resources Expanded" which adds Timber as a Resource required to build Trebuchets, Frigates, Ships-of-the-Line, etc. I think if they added the provision that Timber could act as Marble does for some Wonder/National Wonder construction, it would be just about right. The 'Timber' resource appears in some stands of Jungle or Forest.

'Timber' is definitely expendable - the British Isles chopped down all of their 'ship timber' very early and were importing timber from both Scandinavia and New England in the American colonies. It is 'renewable' the same way Old Growth Forest is renewable - you have to leave it alone for about 2 - 300 years which, in Game Turns is not so bad early in the game, but becomes prohibitive when your Turns are down to 1 - 5 years each.

dunkleosteus said:

This is an idea I think I've mentioned before here, perhaps strategic resources should have an economical use as well as a military one. Let cities consume horses for a boost to production. After combustion, let cities consume oil for a better boost to production. Let factories consume iron for +5% production of units, +10% production of buildings. Let factories alternatively consume aluminum for +10% food in a city. (Canned goods for preserving food for longer).

Civ V grossly overlooks the domestic application of resources. The world doesn't fight over oil to fuel their destroyers, they do it to fuel their cars.

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Exactly why "Strategic" and 'Luxury" resource categories should be done away with. The use of a given resource may be both or may switch from one to the other over time and with changes in technology and even Social Policy.
Several Examples:
Gold has been. throughout history, a primary Luxury resource. But Gold is also required for efficient connections/conductors in the manufacture of Solid-State Electronics, so it becomes both a primary 'luxury', but also a component of a Manufactured Luxury - Personal Electronics - in the post-Modern Eras.
Timber, as above, is an early building material for Wonders and Monuments, later a Strategic resource for both military and cargo shipbuilding (Each Sea Trade Route with Oceanic capability requires a Timber Resource?), but after mass quantities of steel become available, it becomes effectively a non-resource: home-building requires massive quantities of wood, but not the 'special' timbers required for the 'tall ships', and even the requirement for smaller timbers can be reduced by using other materials, as they do in Europe compared to the USA.
Silver is a luxury resource, but is also a requirement for coins - Gold is too dear, the coins that made everyday commerce and markets work was silver - the Classical Tetradrachem, the Medieval Thaler, the 'Silver Dollar'. A Mint + silver not only provides 'Gold' directly, it makes most of your other trade possible.

Most of the Resources in the game now actually have several uses: cotton = 'Luxury' clothing, also a prime component of Smokeless Powder for ANY military unit after 1880, when the smokeless powder rifles and machineguns were introduced. Copper = used to make Bronze, the first great Tool Metal AND weapon metal, later required to electrify society: telegraph and telephone cables, electric wiring for domestic appliances, city mass transit - a host of 'invisible' Happiness elements in Industrial and later Eras.

dunkleosteus said:

Strategic resources too, have a problem. Civ feels the need to transition away from strategic resources as the game progresses. Horses and iron obsolete out of the world as aluminum, uranium and oil take over, but this isn't accurate (except horses). We use more iron per capita today than we ever have before. In 2014, the world produced 3 billion tonnes of iron ore. Iron and steel are incredibly important, and Civ should reflect that. Perhaps iron ore sources increase their yields over time, or there are hidden iron ores sources that become visible as techs are unlocked. (Iron is pretty ubiquitous across the world, but some of it is harder to get at).

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Instead of by use, because the use changes with time and technology, we need to divide resources by Quantity Required.

Most of the early resources are required only in relatively tiny quantities: pack in 50 lbs of spices, and your trip is worthwhile. As mentioned above, about 50 lbs of Iron will, properly worked, equip a fully-armored warrior. The two great early exceptions are Building Materials and Food. To make a difference in a city, you have to trade in Tons of the stuff. Therefore, early in the game, any trade route carrying Food, Timber, Building Stone or Marble (and there should be both internal and international routes) will have to go by water - river or ocean/coast - to make a difference. Everything else, even a hundred pounds at a time is worth shipping: spices, gold, silver, ivory, silks - you can get personally rich bringing in a single pack load.

Until certain technological requirements arise. Each Cannon weighs 1/2 ton or more. Each warship using cannon requires 10 - 20 (Galleasses, Caravels) to 100 (Ship-of-the-Line) cannons. And, speaking of domestic requirements, each mile of single track railroad requires 200 tons or more of iron just for the rails - let alone the requirements for locomotives, cars, side tracks, etc. Industrial Quantities measured in 100s or 1000s of tons are required. And, of course, Steel still hasn't gone 'out of style' - it's required for ship construction (both military units and Cargo Ships), skyscrapers, railroads, and virtually all types of domestic transportation from cars to trucks to barges, railroad cars, and the Shipping Containers that make modern trade efficient.

So, after a certain point, the majority of resources, and virtually all of them with a 'Strategic' value, will require Industrial Quantities to be moved. I suggest that a lot of the early 'deposits' of minerals would have to be supplanted, but better technology for finding and exploiting the resources also kicks in, it just requires more effort. The difference between the hand-worked 'Solomon's Mines' (which were actually a complex of copper smelters) of Ancient Era and the square miles of Open Pit mines in the copper-rich Masabi Range in the USA show how gross the difference in scale is, and the different industrial techniques required to meet the demand.

Requiring changing techniques and quantities and more exploration to exploit the quantities of resources required has a number of benefits in the game:
1. It keeps you working on your resources - do you have Industrial Quantities available, or do you have to open up new sources?
2. It gives you a use for a Scout-derivative unit late in the game: someone to go hunting for the resources.
3. By including Domestic Consumption in resources, we can include some more of the 'trade-off' decisions that governments have to make in the Industrial Eras and on: If oil is required to run both my army and fleet and all the domestic automobiles that make my population happy, how Unhappy can I afford to make them by taking oil away from their cars for my tanks? (HINT: EVERY combatant in World War Two rationed gasoline for civilian vehicles, and the more cars people had, the more they really, really resented gasoline rationing). This kind of thing gives the gamer more real decisions to make, which is surely better than: 'click End of Turn' over and over during the End Game.

Boris' posts are like " the way the game should be played" encyclopedia, or something...
I appreciate the read, by CI X a fair number of your ideas might be implemented, but, I wouldn't hold my breath, they make too much sense.

daft said:

Boris' posts are like " the way the game should be played" encyclopedia, or something...
I appreciate the read, by CI X a fair number of your ideas might be implemented, but, I wouldn't hold my breath, they make too much sense.

Click to expand...

One of the game designers once said that each new version of a game should be "one third old, one third revised, and one third new."

By that measurement, we should be close to an entirely new game by Civ VIII !

-But, if done right I'd be happy with 'one third revised' - say, Stacking, Combat, Resources, and 'one third new' - maybe a whole new Trade System, Governments, (Okay, technically that's 'one third Return'), Settlement system (replacing Barbarian Camps, Goodie Huts and City States)

Hope Spring Eternal in the Gamer...

cannons were made of bronze not iron

killmeplease said:

cannons were made of bronze not iron

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cannon#Cannon_materials.2C_parts.2C_and_terms

Both have their benefits and weaknesses. Bronze became largely prohibitively expensive in Europe, it's much heavier than iron and much less plentiful in the forms of copper and tin which must be mined separately and alloyed properly.

killmeplease said:

cannons were made of bronze not iron

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For both the very earliest 'bombards' and the classic smooth-bore 'cannon' both bronze and cast or wrought iron were used. For game purposes the major change to 'cannon' capabilities can bypass all of that, and the introduction of rifled cannon and cast steel cannon (1860s CE) and go to the introduction of recoil mechanisms at the end of the 19th century) which allowed much faster rates of fire and longer accurate range. Since this occurred at about the same time field telephone/telegraph allowed separate observers to 'call the shots', Civ V, for once, gets it right: cannon go to modern 'artillery' with greatly increased range and the ability to fire without itself being able to see the target.
So, require Either Copper or Iron resource for cannon
Require the technologies of Electricity, Steel, and Ballistics for Artillery AND Iron resource

Also should note that the introduction of bombards or cannon dramatically increased the requirements for metal (from 50 - 100 lbs per man and horse to TONS for each 'gunne') and the expense of armies. Equipping a medieval army was expensive, but it was nothing compared to finding the tons of metal and getting them manufactured into cannon, providing the masses of gunpowder and shot and trained specialists required to make them all work: there's a good military reason why the squabbling medieval barons were suddenly replaced by Absolute Monarchs: the monarch was the only one who could afford a train of cannon, and a train of cannon made the Barons' castles stone deathtraps, not fortresses.

-And another reason to divide Resources into Regular and Industrial Quantities: the demands of the Renaissance/Industrial Era and later utterly dwarf any requirements that went before for virtually all resources except food...

well most cannons (not late 19th century artillety or first bombards) were bronze;
exotic variants are not limited to iron - there were wooden and even leather cannons
though thats more of an anecdote

Boris Gudenuf said:

Equipping a medieval army was expensive, but it was nothing compared to finding the tons of metal and getting them manufactured into cannon

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but it was antiquity/medieval when iron was scarce (thus being a valuable resource)
whereas in later eras it was not an issue anymore to dig enough ore for military or industry. so i think civ5 gameplay corresponds history very well in this aspect.

in civ series growth is logarithmical not exponential for a reason - it makes the game playable. with exponential growth you have somehow to deal with scale which should obviously change with eras passing and also do something to preserve ballance what should be very tricky i believe..

killmeplease said:

well most cannons (not late 19th century artillety or first bombards) were bronze;
exotic variants are not limited to iron - there were wooden and even leather cannons
though thats more of an anecdote

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The Scottish 'leather gun', the French 'three-barreled cannon', the Austrian 'breechloading cannon' were all exotic experiments: how well they worked is attested to by the fact that only a few obsessive and obscurity-seeking hobbyists have ever heard of them (although, some years ago there were miniatures available of the 3-barreled cannon and the leather gun - but then, miniatures wargamers will try anything - almost as bad as Civ players, come to think of it!)

killmeplease said:

but it was antiquity/medieval when iron was scarce (thus being a valuable resource)
whereas in later eras it was not an issue anymore to dig enough ore for military or industry. so i think civ5 gameplay corresponds history very well in this aspect.

in civ series growth is logarithmical not exponential for a reason - it makes the game playable. with exponential growth you have somehow to deal with scale which should obviously change with eras passing and also do something to preserve ballance what should be very tricky i believe..

Click to expand...

Ah, but it is the availability of a very strategic material like iron/steel to a specific country that becomes, literally, a matter of life and death in the Industrial/Modern Era warfare. World War Two is the classic example: Neither Italy nor Japan had access to iron ore in quantities required for a modern military, and neither Germany nor Italy had access to oil in quantities that their economies and militaries required.

Once anything becomes a Limiting Factor on decisions historically, we should look seriously at whether that needs to be reflected in the game. Anyone who had access to the technology to smelt and work iron had no trouble finding enough iron for individual weapons. Knowing what to do with it (Tech) was the limitation. When the requirements jump to 100s or 1000s of tons from about the Renaissance Era on, certain states (Civs) had a real problem with access to the Resource.

Looking at Resources this way, it is obvious that the Civ V model of One Resource Per Unit is False. Germany in the 20th century had one of the largest iron/coal/steel industries in the world, but the lack of Oil throttled its entire military in World War Two, and caused its High Seas Fleet to stick with coal-fired battleships in World War One, because it had no access to the more efficient Oil as a naval fuel.

Historically, I'd say that Civ now is missing the following Luxury/Trade or Strategic resources completely:

Olives/Olive Oil
Tea
Coffee
(Ship) Timber

And, the majority of mobile military units require both a 'building material' resource (Iron, Aluminum) and Oil from the 'Modern' Era on - including, up to the present day, most naval units and ALL air units - even Zeppelins had engines! - and ALL motorized or mechanized units: there is a reason that up to 1945, only two of all the world's armies were completely motorized: Oil as a limiting Resource.

As it is now the game (and science) runs way to fast compared to production. This needs to be balanced out (a lot!), science needs to be slowed down to avoid riflemen before 1000ad.

World leaders and civs should be moore periode correct and be replaced during the centuries. New kingdoms should "pop up" (after revolts?) as time goes by like we had in Civ4.

The historic- and classical periode needs the axeman back. The axe-warrior should be uppgradeable with techs, bronze-iron a.s.o. like the swordsman/longswordsman.

Barbarians should never have the newest tech, allways a step behind.

Workers should be able to "join the city" (for a period?) to speed up a citys production in stead of just waisting time (like they do now) when they are on auto.


Walls (and castles) should be a lot stronger. City walls could protect a city for centuries, they were moore or less unbreakable until cannons appeared.


And please; no moore swimming units or embarking. Whoever came up with this? Hang him.

Edit: Diplomacy needs to be a lot moore advanced

unfairlane said:

As it is now the game (and science) runs way to fast compared to production. This needs to be balanced out (a lot!), science needs to be slowed down to avoid riflemen before 1000ad.

World leaders and civs should be moore periode correct and be replaced during the centuries. New kingdoms should "pop up" (after revolts?) as time goes by like we had in Civ4.

The historic- and classical periode needs the axeman back. The axe-warrior should be uppgradeable with techs, bronze-iron a.s.o. like the swordsman/longswordsman.

Barbarians should never have the newest tech, allways a step behind.

Workers should be able to "join the city" (for a period?) to speed up a citys production in stead of just waisting time (like they do now) when they are on auto.


Walls (and castles) should be a lot stronger. City walls could protect a city for centuries, they were moore or less unbreakable until cannons appeared.


And please; no moore swimming units or embarking. Whoever came up with this? Hang him.

Edit: Diplomacy needs to be a lot moore advanced

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-Yes the tech tree does progress too fast relative to production - a late antiquity period would be nice to spread things out a bit.

-Diplomacy should be scaled back in the early game. Its a bit silly how on a Pangaea map you can meet every civ by 2000BC and engage in diplomacy. Perhaps early scouting should be limited in some way.

-Workers should be able to join a city up until size 3? You can take a size 1 city and settle a maximum of 2 workers into it.

- CityWalls feel about right. Taking cities is already too difficult. Many times in history walls were breached by people entering through drains or sewers or even tunneling.

-I actually like embarking units (if works well with 1upt) and is easier for the AI (doesn't need transports). The problem is that they put a -50% strength penalty on embarked units meaning they get sunk in 1 attack from a city. Then there is the amphibious attack penalty. If these penalties were both removed it would work much more easily.

Redaxe said:

-Yes the tech tree does progress too fast relative to production - a late antiquity period would be nice to spread things out a bit.

-Diplomacy should be scaled back in the early game. Its a bit silly how on a Pangaea map you can meet every civ by 2000BC and engage in diplomacy. Perhaps early scouting should be limited in some way.

-Workers should be able to join a city up until size 3? You can take a size 1 city and settle a maximum of 2 workers into it.

- CityWalls feel about right. Taking cities is already too difficult. Many times in history walls were breached by people entering through drains or sewers or even tunneling.

-I actually like embarking units (if works well with 1upt) and is easier for the AI (doesn't need transports). The problem is that they put a -50% strength penalty on embarked units meaning they get sunk in 1 attack from a city. Then there is the amphibious attack penalty. If these penalties were both removed it would work much more easily.

Click to expand...

- As it is now there IS no diplomacy, just some trading and declare war..

- Citys up to what? As in real life, a citys productivity should be upgradeable from adding workers

- No, city walls as they are now are a joke. Set defence to 3000 and we are beginning to talk

- Embarking units simply kills naval warfare or strategy.

I think rivers are not well-represented in the game currently. Most ancient rivers were too hard for groups of people to cross without finding a shallow "ford" or getting embarking technology to build small boats and cross.

It would be more interesting to me if the scouting units couldn't cross rivers and had to go around them or search for the fording points in the river (shallow crosseable areas that act like all rivers do now, consuming a turn to cross).

It would make for some interesting defense options in early war as well. Rivers were often used like this as defensive lines and territory demarcation. For convenience maybe a fording point appears at a city spot when founding so your early workers and units have an easy way to cross.

I also am in favor of extending the game in a way that technology does not race ahead of development as it seems unrealistic right now with buildings that take hundreds of years and at the end you barely have time to build everything the game is ending so quickly. Epic right now is about the closest thing I can find to "balanced" as even though the build turns are slower, the extra time gives you time to develop and take care of most buildings with steady early growth and a good team of workers. I find myself finishing more buildings from each age on epic and having better wars as well.

danaphanous said:

I think rivers are not well-represented in the game currently. Most ancient rivers were too hard for groups of people to cross without finding a shallow "ford" or getting embarking technology to build small boats and cross.

It would be more interesting to me if the scouting units couldn't cross rivers and had to go around them or search for the fording points in the river (shallow crosseable areas that act like all rivers do now, consuming a turn to cross).

It would make for some interesting defense options in early war as well. Rivers were often used like this as defensive lines and territory demarcation. For convenience maybe a fording point appears at a city spot when founding so your early workers and units have an easy way to cross.

Click to expand...

Just the opposite. People were rafting or 'canoeing' across rivers long before 4000 BCE, and even traveling to (visible) islands off shore and settling there before the nominal 'start date' for the game (Crete was settled about 30,000 years ago, so this is Really Old technology!). Rivers, in fact, were the easiest way to move large objects or tonnage until the railroad was invented. Technically, you cannot move Food between cities before the railroad, in enough quantity to matter, unless you have a sea or river route between them.

What needs to be represented is the Navigable river, the one cargo and people can travel on easily, and the Head of Navigation, where the river becomes too rough or too narrow to travel, and where, inevitably, a city or town will grow up to cater to the people who have to get out of their boats. Fords become important only when you have heavy non-swimming 'stuff' to move, like any kind of Siege Engine, motorized and mechanized equipment, etc. Even 'colonists' or 'settlers' in wagons and carts can swim their vehicles and animals across most rivers, but they will look for a ford. Scouts, by contrast, (and by definition) don't carry a lot of 'baggage' - they can chop some logs, build a raft, and cross the river in a fraction of any timespan represented by a Civ Turn.

Summary:
Rivers need to extend length of all trade routes, and make certain trade routes (bulk goods like Food) possible, along with coastal connections. Head of Navigation (which you may be able to change with later Technology - like dams, locks, canals etc) will mark where the river stops being useful that way, while Fords will mark spots where the 'river crossing penalty' is reduced or negated.
Rivers are defensive barriers, and before gunpowder, a lot of rivers would negate ANY ranged firing, because they are too wide to shoot across! + 400 meters is extreme range for a catapult, composite bow, crossbow or longbow, and out of range for self bows, slings, etc. Examples include the Columbia, Volga, Don, Amazon, Yangtze - and they all tend to become Very Important arteries for trade and commerce...
Perhaps, then, we need an early distinction between Big Rivers - navigable, very hard to cross except at Fords, hard to bridge, hard to shoot across, and Regular Rivers, which are Not navigable, easier to cross, and provide less defensive bonus and no impediment to shooting across.

Personally I think it was dumb to remove gold from river tiles for Brave New World.

In short, with Civ, like any 4X, play hinges on control of terrain and resources. The more elements and eXploitations that are tied to specific terrain features, then the more hotly (and organically) contested those terrain locations will be. The more mechanical pieces there are, the more depth that can be given to the tools used to exert control over those pieces (re: borders). Diplomacy can only be as complex as the game's economy; it is not as though CivBNW could have had an advanced diplomacy system developed for it, because there is nothing outside of research agreements and luxury trades to perform.

If the game is developed with regard to terrain and the resources exploited from it, then it cannot turn out too bad.

unfairlane said:

- As it is now there IS no diplomacy, just some trading and declare war..

- Citys up to what? As in real life, a citys productivity should be upgradeable from adding workers

- No, city walls as they are now are a joke. Set defence to 3000 and we are beginning to talk

- Embarking units simply kills naval warfare or strategy.

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Errrr there is diplomacy - it's not overly well fleshed out but compared to the early TBS games it actually works reasonably well. It has its quirks and exploits and is somewhat predictable but thats computer AI.

CityWalls - defence 3000, now I know you're not trying to be serious.
It's already too easy to block a chokepoint with a well placed city and the 1UPT restriction makes it already too difficult to besiege a city surrounded by mountains and hilly terrain. What you are suggesting would make it nigh impossible in many cases to even go to war.
As far as walls go consider the hammer cost. City walls cost 75 hammers and 0 maintenance. That is the same hammer cost as a swordsman. Basically walls strengthen a city by approximately 1-2 units for zero maintenance which is about right. Walls are not intended to be a substitute for having an army.
If you are being beaten by AI continually in war then you need to invest more in military and stop teching to Philosophy early and build spearmen instead.
If you are winning too easily then turn the difficulty up or play with some smart AI mods.

There are multiple ways you can strengthen city defences; Oligarchy, Goddess of Protection, Red Fort etc... or just you know, invest in a larger army.

What you are probably asking for is a stronger citywall building with a higher maintenance cost - probably at the Engineering Technology. There is possibly some reason to do this - there is only 1 citywall building between the ancient era and the medieval castle which is a bit silly. Historically walls could either be built to be cheap and dirty or constructed with vast resources and labor like the walls of Constantinople. It wouldn't hurt to have a couple of choices I guess. But even this would make cities in chokepoints too easy to defend - the sort of walls you are probably referring to like the Walls of Constantinople would have to have a production investment equal to a Wonder. If you are going to have a means to make a city virtually unconquerable then there has to be an appropriate cost to this including maintenance.

Redaxe said:

There are multiple ways you can strengthen city defences; Oligarchy, Goddess of Protection, Red Fort etc... or just you know, invest in a larger army.

What you are probably asking for is a stronger citywall building with a higher maintenance cost - probably at the Engineering Technology. There is possibly some reason to do this - there is only 1 citywall building between the ancient era and the medieval castle which is a bit silly. Historically walls could either be built to be cheap and dirty or constructed with vast resources and labor like the walls of Constantinople. It wouldn't hurt to have a couple of choices I guess. But even this would make cities in chokepoints too easy to defend - the sort of walls you are probably referring to like the Walls of Constantinople would have to have a production investment equal to a Wonder. If you are going to have a means to make a city virtually unconquerable then there has to be an appropriate cost to this including maintenance.

Click to expand...

In fact, there are several perfectly historical ways that City Defense could be improved in the game...
First, unwalled cities have a very low intrinsic defense, and virtually no built in 'ranged factor' - a bunch of civilians and a few City Watchmen throwing bricks from the rooftops do not a defense make! The first Walls would be stone, brick, or even mud-brick with towers/platforms for archers: that would give you some 'built-in' ranged factor and a serious increase in defense factors for the city - one unit will not be able to waltz in and take it, BUT those walls require maintenance. The interesting part is, (historically) that maintenance was not 'automatic' - once your Empire expands and a city is far away from a dangerous border and at peace, there was a tendency for Wall Maintenance to go unfunded, and the walls deteriorate: I suggest that unfunded Walls, after X turns (based on game pace and testing) would become Ruined Walls, which still give some range factor and about 1/2 to 1/3 of the defense factor of a well-maintained wall - they never disappear, but they become much less effective.

About the time Catapults and similar rock-throwing, tower-bashing instruments were invented (historically, about 400 BCE, early Classical Era) city defenses were upgraded everywhere to include towers strong enough to include their own catapults. The vibration and 'recoil' from a catapult could literally tear apart older towers built for nothing more strenuous than a bunch of archers. This would be your first Upgrade to city walls, would provide a Big boost in ranged factors and defense factors: No One is getting past this kind of city defense without their own 'siege train' of catapults and a lot of ground units to take casualties, BUT these defenses have even higher Maintenance costs - you are now maintaining a large number of War Machines as well as the towers, walls, moats, etc.

The next major historical Upgrade to city defenses, aside from mounting Trebuchets on the towers and walls in the late Middle Ages, was in the Renaissance, when the earliest gunpowder Bombards made all the towers and high vertical walls obsolete. No amount of masonry could stand up to 60 - 100 lb balls bounced off them at 800 - 1000 feet per second by the massive gunpowder-propelled weapons. These Bombards, by the way, like the Trebuchet, are too slow firing to have ANY effect on units - the average Bombard took from several hours to half a day to reload, by which time any targeted unit could have lunch, a post-prandial nap and wander off.

The answer was the Italian Trace, or Vauban Fortifications - elaborate low earth-backed masonry walls with wide dry moats, bastions, scarps, counter-scarps, etc - they are Hugely expensive, but mount hundreds of cannon of their own, so have Immense ranged and defensive strength - very few cities or points defended by such fortifications were ever taken by assault; most had to be besieged, and even a relatively tiny garrison could hold out for a long time. Maintaining all that masonry and cannon and gunpowder and shot supplies is also very expensive - it is at about this point in history that only a central government had the money to fortify - or afford a siege train of large cannon to break down the fortifications. It is also when modern banking began, partly so governments could borrow huge sums of money to pay for the fortifications and armies.

The final Fixed Fortifications for cities and borders were the concrete and steel Ring Forts or Fortified Lines (the Maginot Line falls into this category) that started to be built in the Industrial Era of the mid-19th century. These start with Cannon, but by the early 20th century included modern Artillery, so their Ranged Factor is formidable, and the larger underground, reinforced concrete 'Forts' were nearly impervious: these are the forts that required massive railroad artillery like 'Dora' or 'Bertha' to penetrate, or specialized Deep Penetration air-dropped bombs weighing a ton or more each.

Summary
All City Walls require maintenance, but they also increase their Defense Factors and Ranged Factors every time new technology is introduced to them. One of those technology increases is cheap: Trebuchets (if they stay in the game) were mounted on the same platforms that older catapults used.

Castles are not City Defenses, they are Country Defenses - they should be Improvements, like roads, that can be built in the same tile as other Food/Gold or Production improvements and stop an enemy unit from razing or entering that tile until the Castle is 'Reduced - which is not easy, because they are the equivalent in Defense and Ranged strength to a fortified City. The other effect of Castles is that they suck up some of the Gold/Food/Production from their tile to support Knights, one of which is produced by the Castle in response to War. Thus, too many castles make it hard to support a city, because the tiles are all producing less, but they add a powerful military force to a Feudal State - until gunpowder Pike-and-Shot combinations make the Knights obsolete...

The City Defense 'tiers' are:
Walls - from almost the start of the game: cities were building earth/brick/masonry walls before 2000 BCE
Machinery Towers - from 400 BCE, heavy towers mounting catapults, ballistae, and similar 'engines' give first real Ranged Factor to city defenses, plus increased Defense Factors and Maintenance costs.
Bastioned Trace - 1400s CE, complete rebuild of older walls into lower, earth-backed walls with bastions, scarps, etc. Huge Expense, Huge range factor, huge defense factor.
Ring Forts - 1850s CE - at first with gunpowder cannon by the hundreds, steel cupolas, concrete underground forts: so expensive that only a few cities ever had them (Paris) but had firepower equivalent to entire armies. When Artillery is introduced, they are mounted in these Forts, so the ranged factor (and Range) goes up again.

Bastioned Trace and Ring Fort-type fortifications could also be built separate from Cities: Bastioned Trace Forts were built around relatively small towns to provide Supply Depots or to control Choke Points - as Improvements, the same way earlier Castles had been used. Ring Fort type fortifications with modern Artillery also describes the Maginot Line or parts of the 'West Wall' facing it - but the expense of building a border-spanning set of massive concrete and steel forts was practically equal to the cost of building and maintaining a new army!