Growing forests

TL; DR: Allow workers to grow forest tiles.

Reason: Right now grassland/plain hilly terrain is the worst one for food.

1. Grassland with Biowell = +4 food.
2. Floodplains with Biowell and Vivarium = +5 food, +1 energy.
3. Plains with Biowell = +3 food, +1 production.
4. Desert with Biowell and Vivarium = +3 food, +1 energy.
5. Desert Hill with Biowell and Vivarium = +3 food, +1 production.
6. Tundra with Biowell (and optional Mass Digester) = +3 food (+1 energy).
7. Any forest tile with Biowell = +3 food, +1 production.
8. Grassland, Plains, Tundra Hill with Biowell = +2 food, +1 production.

Personally, I'm sick and tired of rolling yet another hillside start. It seriously gimps your colony development.
Implementing ability to grow forests is basically the most simple way to fix it.

How I imagine it being done: a worker plants a forest for, say, 3 worker turns, and forest emerges some time later, e.g. in 9 turns. If you try to build an improvement that conflicts with a forest then forest is cancelled and player sees a confirmation request about it.

Probably this ability shouldn't be gained from the beginning of the game, but should be obtained pretty early. Either Ecology or Alien Preserve would be just alright for that.

And, on a side note, I think that the amount of turns to chop a forest is way too big. Massively forested terrain at start is also not fun at all, especially if it covers valuable resources that are supposed to jump-start your colony. Probably reducing time to chop from 10 turns to 6 turns on standart would be alright.

tIn the same tine, even deserts are good!

However, perhaps the lesser improvements should be instant speed, no workers needed?

Pay 6 or whatever gold - forest chopped!
Pay 7 gold - you have your farm!

(OTOH, we play almost exclusively quick speed but some ppl play marathon, ppl are different)

I like forest and miasma. It foes npt have to be equal.

However, post-chainsaw-deforestation insta chop sounds reasonable.

silvertuerk said:

tIn the same tine, even deserts are good!

However, perhaps the lesser improvements should be instant speed, no workers needed?

Pay 6 or whatever gold - forest chopped!
Pay 7 gold - you have your farm!

(OTOH, we play almost exclusively quick speed but some ppl play marathon, ppl are different)

Click to expand...

As if buying buildings and units hadn't made things cheap enough.

"Hey, you need this brand new Ectogenesis Pod, but afraid you won't be quick enough? No problem! Just play some gold to chop every forest tile, gain 20 production for each and you're done here";

"a worker? who needs this nowadays - just build third or forth explorer to grab more lucky pods with gold and just build every piece of your infrastructure with it".

Well, at least reducing the turns necessary to chop down forests and clear marshes should be in order.

I'd rather they make terrascapes better and have those be the best choice for the worst tiles.
Although I do think harmony should have more bonuses from the natural world including forests.