Refugees

I think that refugees fleeing from war zones would be a good aspect to be considered for Civ 4. Honestly, if a huge armada loaded with tanks, infantry, artillery, nuclear subs loaded with missiles, carriers loaded stealth fighters and bombers were approaching a city, as much as some may love their town many would running for the hills. Sure some people will stick it out and hope for the best or join the militia, but others will flee.

I think that neighboring cities should increase in population until they max out food-wise. If no other cities can absorb them then refugee camps should sprout up. They could be represented by small camps sprouting up around the country. Depending on a neighboring civs border civics status some of these people could spill over the border. These refugees could be supported by the civ or even coaxed into joing the sheltering civ. If the war is setted peacibly then the refugees could be allowed to return to their homes.

Thoughts?

A very good concept indeed. Perhaps very hard to implement. But in the case where there are no close boundaries with a neighbour, if I was the attacker I would first attack the refugees camps to be sure that they do not flee in another town, in order to decrease the global population of the civ and it could be a problem for the defender. Maybe a better way would be one (or several) settler-like unit fleeing in another part of the country or abroad to escape the conflict. It would be harder for the attacker to catch them then. If the refugees stay around the city it would mean death in a short term for them.
I have no real ideas but the concept is excellent, I'm waiting for other ideas to improve it.

Yes please.

Suggest alogorithm:

1. At approach units to city - between civs at war.
2. Calculation differential between threatening and defending forces - also differential between entirety civs forces.
3. Resulting from this determined quantity of REFUGEES devolve city population, appearing at city exterior.
4. Turn by turn, as city remains, and conditions persist, refugees continue to appear.
5. Each turn the REFUGEE unit, under AI control, makes it's way by the quickest route to the nearest same-civ city - whereupon arrival it add's itself to population.

More depth would certainly add - without necessarily adding complexity to play.

Civ III has refugees.......there the workers that pop up after razing a city I usually keep 5 or so cities strictly making settlers (always play huge worlds) and these "refugees" are a good way to replenish lost population due to settler production. Of course the settler is the same type civ as the refugee.

I would suggest that these refugees have cost but no skills only the one to join a city ... And if the civ loses his refugees it could have a bad influence on the happiness of the others citizens...

I had a suggestion for how refugees could work in this thread: http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=122550

Basically, it combined refugees with nomadic nations and the settler at the beginning of the game that you start with.

smac had a system for refugees..when a city was taken.. a few settelar units would flee your newly conquered city..why couldnt this be implemented in civ4?

...because from what I've read you don't want to form new cities unless you've got a real strong economy.

but if your cities are dissapearing...you need cities to have an economy