The Official Civ4 Ideas Thread

C3C is out, and there've been several threads (on both Poly and CFC) on what should be in Civ4. Just so the forum isn't spammed with ideas, here's an official thread to post all of your ideas. When you post, use the following criteria:

Remember, try to keep discussion to a minimum.

Name of Feature: This should be something generic, such as, "Canals".

What this feature should do in the game: Write several paragraphs on what this feature should do. To use the canals example, you might say, "allow ships to pass over land".

How would this feature work: List how the inner workings of this feature should be. For the canals example, it would be something like, "canals can only be built on tiles with coast on both sides, or coast on one side, and a city on the other".

Gameplay: How will this affect gameplay, and the all important comment - How will the game prevent this feature from being an exploit. In other words, balance. For example, you don't want canals crossing every single tile on the continent. It also goes deeper -

• AI - How does it affect the AI, and how will they use it?
• Processor Power - Will this take up a lot of memory, CPU time, etc.? If so, it might not be very possible.
• Complexity - Is this feature easy to grasp, or is there a lot involved? If there is a lot involved, is it optional? (i.e., logistics).
• Programming Complexity - Will this be easy, or hard to program? If it's something hard, or too complex, then it might not make it into the game.
• Multiplayer - If this feature is to be in the multiplayer realm, what changes would need to be made? For example, expansionist civs can't pop free cities in MP elimination mode in C3C.
• Exploits - Is this feature exploitive, and can it be an exploit? How would you prevent the player from exploiting this feature where the AI can't? Does it reveal information to the player before they should be able to acquire such knowledge? (i.e., revealing the map before mapmaking).
• Player Decisions - What are the reasons for and against using this feature in gameplay? To use an example - terrain improvements. You can either mine (+1 shield), or irragate (+1 food). If possible, will this feature force the player to make game choices? This includes direct and indirect affects of this feature.
• Affects - How does this affect other features of the game? Does it hinder the gameplay of other areas of the game? How would it hurt/enhance any ideas already posted in this thread?

Another important thing to remember: Each new civ series brough along some new (and very major) feature to the game.

Civ2 - Scenario Editor, Map Editor, Custom Map Sizes (I'd like to see this one back), Diplomacy features.

Civ3 - Culture (points, borders, etc.), Great Leaders, more editor features, new victory conditions.

Try to think of something that could be a new (and major) feature of Civ4.

Old Civ4 Ideas Thread

Multiplayer-

MORE THAN 8.

Enough said.

A more robust combat system that can take multiple units and combined arms within a stack into account. If you have 10 tanks going up against a single infantry unit, each tank shouldn't have to individually fight the infantry one by one, they should simply be able to swarm the poor guy and get it the battle over with.

Similarly, if the stack of units you are attacking with includes quick, blitz-type units along with strong, brute-force units, aircraft and artillery, your stack as a whole should inherently be stronger...a "whole being greater than the sum of it's parts" type of philosophy.

Stack Bombard

Airplanes move just like any other unit
You can trade units to other nations for a certain amount of time (or loan them).

and the one I want the most:

Having more extensive commercial sliders.. For you can set your science to say 94% and have 6% going to your treasury.

I've got some rather cosmetic ideas for Civ4. (Not following the prescribed format because these ideas don't actually have that much to do with gameplay...)

--Wonder and Improvement names tailored to culture groups--

By this I mean to correct the slightly uncomfortable feeling I get when I, for example, build a "Statue of Zeus" when playing as the Incas.

One might go so far as to suggest entirely *different* wonders and/or improvements for different culture groups, but I am not necessarily suggesting that. I think it would be a fine game if all civs could build basically identical improvements (as they already can of course) but if the improvements had different names and appearances in different culture groups.

--The ability to name features on the world map--

Perhaps it sounds silly, but I think it would be really neat. If there was some way to label features or areas on the map... that would just be tons of fun, at least for me--and surely I'm not the only one...

--Soundtrack tailored to cultural groups--

Doesn't it feel funny to hear a European medieval theme while playing as Korea for example?

Anyway, as to less cosmetic ideas, I was thinking it would be better if each civ had a unique unit for each era. This would require creativity, of course--how do you assign the Inca a modern UU for example?--but I think it would be interesting and fun enough to be worth it.

And I was thinking it would be good to have Great Leader types associated with each Civ trait. Military leaders are associated with the Militaristic trait, and Scientific leaders with the Scientific trait. So why not have Commercial, Agricultural and Religious leaders, as well as Admirals and Pioneers or something?

A Commercial leader maybe has a chance to pop up when a city reaches a certain gold-to-population ratio, or when commercial techs are researched, or something. He can hurry Commercial wonders or instigate a Commercial Age, when all cities bring in some percentage more in tax or something like that.

Agricultural leaders increase agricultural surplus in all cities by some percentage, or hurry agricultural wonders... Pop up conditions? Agriultural techs maybe?

Admirals would be just like military Great Leaders, building armadas instead of armies.

Religious leaders, I'm not sure--Pop up conditions I am really not sure about, and effects, I'm thinking just maybe either a great religious reformation (+1 content and/or happy face in each city for 20 years) or hurry religious wonders? (There's not that many religious wonders though. Perhaps some arguments can be made to include certain later wonders in this group, like the UN, or maybe new wonders can be designed?)

Pioneers I'm really not sure. I envision some kind of uber-scout, but that would only be useful in early stages of the game. (Though if the Pioneer can move from land to water and back, and move over ocean, then it would be very useful up to the invention of Navigation at least...) But perhaps Pioneers can have different kinds of use in the industrial and modern ages. One weird idea would be that Pioneers can found cities *inside* other Civ's borders? (This would be similar to how American "Pioneers" helped build settlements right in the center of "Indian country"...) And/Or maybe Pioneers would have something to do with building spaceships to go to Alpha Centauri?

Anyway, I'll leave it to others to discuss merits and demerits to these ideas...

I'd like to see canals and bridges.

Hi there this is the first time I've posted anything, but here is one or two of many thoughts I have had on possible Civ 4 additions.
Rivers are a resource that never run dry in civ 3 and lower. I think that each city, canal and irrigated field takes a certain amount of water from the river. The amount of water that is supplied may depend on the length and type of terrain that feeds the river. So when populataions of cites become large this can become a limiting factor. If you are also able to build a Dam across river and prevent water from following to another Civ maybe allowing your Civ to exert a certain amount of influence over them maybe even to start a war.
Also aquaducts for a city cost the same amount of sheilds if it is one square away from a river or 2+ more away. If think workers should bulid them be they canal as has been mentioned, or a aquaduct that can be destoryed by attackers. A cities population can be maintain if irrigation or roads are destroyed as long as the surrounding resources allow. But the aquaduct or canal once destroyed and the water suppy is cut off from a river the cities population reduces to 6 on the next turn. This will make home land defence more of a challenge than it is at the moment.
These ideas need more refined but I've typed enough.

Cheers

We definitely need canals, but like Chieftess said, having extreme limits to keep them from being an exploit.

A UU from ea. era would be nice. But you should be able to research something that allows you to build a bridge over costal squares, or you could build an underground tunnel or something. So you don't have to wait for Caravels and Galleons to transport units.

I really liked Civ 2 -- Test of Time, where you could go and colonize Alpha Centauri or have like 3 different worlds and ways to get to them. That was a good idea and I'd like to see that in another civ... anyway

Finally, AI that isn't still as dumb as a post when you reach Demigod, Deity, and Sid levels but still gets all its bonuses, that is the real problem with the Civ games. We should get the Civs to act like they really did. The Iroquois would be more friendly and giving. But Firaxis and Atari did a very, very poor job of doing that.

A)I would like more options in diplomacy.Examplelayers who could have the possibility to interfear on ending the war of two other civilizations.In other words diplomacy between three civ(like in multiplayer).Also units might be a part of the trade(buy-sell),like tecn.
B)Airplanes & helicopters sould have a movement on their own,like all other units or something like that.And certain naval units sould have a transport capacity.
C)Victory condition Moovies(like the one in space race).After so many hours of game it is nice to see an ending video,makes you realise that you won!
D)Maybe a variety of weather conditions that take place during the game-ages.

I think that they are enought for the time.
And...please do not release CIV4 soon!We just got C3C

Cultural Great Leaders.

This idea has been dicussed before, but the thread is now closed (Conquests Requests, Fixes and Changes forum) so here's a summary of that discussion:

A culture flip of a rival's city has a chance to produce a Cultural Great Leader. Other possible triggers include a certain percentage of cities in WLTKD, when your Civ builds a wonder matching one of your traits, etc... I prefer the first one since Culutral Great Leaders are revolutionaries, born out of resistance to oppression.

What would they do?
1) Rush a culture flip of a rival city. A flip caused by a Cultural Great Leader cannot produce another Cultural Great Leader.
2) Increase Civ-wide culture production for 20 turns.
3) Build a Holy or Crusading army
4) If the crusading army wins a battle, a "Holy Pilgramige" small wonder can be built, providing culture and acting as an instant tourist attraction (instead of waiting 1000 years)
5) Rush build certain religious or artistic wonders.

Names can be religious leaders, philosophers, artists, and anyone that has had a profound effect on the philosophy or way of thinking of a civilization.

Gameplay: Cultural conquest can now be as important as military conquest. A combination of the two could be devastating if done right.
Rush flipping a city is balanced by the possibility of it flipping back. If you get greedy and decide to flip a core city, size 20, then chances are you aren't going to keep it for long, but it could provide a strong foothold in a military campaign. Plus getting the leader in there will be difficult without an ROP or armed escort.

AI- don't know.
Processor Power - no different than Scientific GLs
Complexity - I think it is intuitive, though it does add another level of Great Leaders.
Programming Complexity - Easy. Uses mostly existing features.
Multiplayer- Improves the dynamic to take it away from total warmongering.
Exploits- It's powerful, but limited. I think it would work.
Player Decisions- Allows some agressiveness for peaceful builders, who are usually on the defensive.
Affects- No major ill affects. I think it really improves depth of play.

Although this isn't the only change I want, this is the thing I want to see that I don't think anyone else will post. I hate the way the navy works in the civ series. As time progresses, all units except the navy get significantly expanded range (ie. railroads and airports). I think that in the industrial age, there should be a new city improvement for coastal cities that works exactly like an airport, but is for ships instead. This would allow a ship to be strategicaly relocated without having to send it on a 10 or 20 year cruise. And just like an airplane the ship would have to start its turn in the departure city, and it would not be able to move out of the arival city untill the next turn.

I second the stack bombard mentioned above.

I also think that RoP needs a bit of re-thinking. For example, why not be able to sign naval RoP only, instead of permitting every unit free access to every corner of your land?

I've often wondered why not have a shunned civ to represent traditional enemies. That is, Carthage will always have a poor attitude towards Rome, France will always have one toward England, The Dutch and Spain... everyone toward the US...

Hmm. Following that principle, we'd have to put Canada in the game as a civ, just so everyone has someone to be nice to.


Later!

--The Clown to the Left

i'll elaborate on my CTP 2 thread.
1. more techs, governments and units
I don't know about the rest of y'all, but i can't stand how your empire's evolution stops basically at the modern age. i want future techs like nanotechnology, undersea terraforming, cloning, fusion, anti-matter prodution and so on. Future governments could include virtual democracy or technocracy like in CTP. I agree with the stacking ideas above, but i think as time progresses from the end of the modern age, better combined arms tactics and countermeasures should be introduced. Satellites for example, if u learn how to build them, why can't u launch them to see the whole world, and why can't your enemy destroy them? Also, terrorist would be a great modern day barbarian. random attacks in your cities due to economic, political or militaristic circumstances in the game would put an interesting twist on things.
2. increased balance and greater detail between scientific, political, economic and militaristic factors.
we all know what type of government you have, how much money, and how big your army is influences other countries in the real world, so why not make it more realistic. additional resources like marijuana could be included to introduce the black market into global economy, which influences neighboring countries, like the u.s. and canada. also, more detail with embargoes so u can pick what to give a country and what not to give.

The ability to trade units with other civs. Like giving aid or asking for aid against opposing forces with friendly people's mercenaries. This was in Civ2 and for some reason not in Civ3.

Also more civs.. way more.

1. Summary Diplomacy Screen. It would include columns for each rival civ with a list of techs, resources, luxuries, GP, cities, and workers that are available for trade. It would also list The resources, luxuries, and techs that the civ needs from the player. Each column would have the leader head at the top. The player could scroll left and right if there were more rival civs than columns available on screen. Double clicking the leader head would start regular negotiations.

2. Room for more civs on the civ selection screen.

3. "CivScript", a basic scripting language that would let tinkerers make advanced rule adjustments for scenarios. Every facet of the game should be turned into an object that could be manipulated by amateur programmers to make truly unique and custom gaming experiences.

-r

OK, lets really blue sky it.

How bout each city is its own sim-city? You get to lay it out and build it. Generic site plans available for the urban plan deprived. Don't like sim-city?, ok insert Rome, or Zeus, or the Egyptian building game. Micromanagers can go nuts! place every temple, every building of any kind that can be constructed, in advance and let it grow "organically" over time, once complete, it affects the city and the civilization. Lots more zoom levels so you can go from street corners to a view from high, high above one or more of your continents. And the cities can grow together. The word for world is city. You don't have to build roads, they grow organically between cities with something to trade. Interstates might take some direction. But what the game is about is cities and their boarder growth that makes your civilization.

Watch the inhabitants march around, use the parks and stadiums, trafic on roads learn the automobile and watch the modle T evolve to the VW bug. You don't even have to win the game to have a good time.

Changing of the Universal Suffrage wonder.

I think that it should be a "small wonder", assuming that they still keep the concept of small wonders in Civ 4, which I think they will. In real life, there is more than just one country that has granted universal suffrage, and granting it first didn't prevent any other country from granting it. Not going to say that the United States was the first country to grant universal suffrage, but still- we have it and that's all that matters. Its the same for any other country, it doesn't matter how long it took to give people freedom of self determination (ie a republic), just that they have it, and that it is never taken away.

It should be a small wonder, and having it makes all other democracies and republics that do not have it get discontent and more unhappy people. That would be realistic, and it would still mean you'd have a good reason to get it before anyone else, or at least to be not so far behind in getting it.

War for democracies and republics.

I am not advocating a return to Civ 2's way of having a council randomly say "no you can't declare war" or forcing you to end the war.

I am saying this: think of any war in world history. Almost never are both sides democracies or republics. Dictatorships, fascist states, communist states, and monarchies, there have been many times when they have declared war on each other and on republics (and democracies, but I don't think there are any TRUE democracies in the world, because in a true democracy anyone can propose a law, and everyone can vote on it, whereas we use a republic, where we elect people do do that for us. Democracies only worked in ancient one-city countries), but when has a democratic state declared war on another democratic state?

Its pretty rare.

There should be some rule making it more difficult to for a republic/democracy to declare war on another republic/democracy, at least by making extra war weariness or something.

Change in the way war weariness works.

They should make it such that you do not have increased war weariness from losing battles IN your borders, especially defensive battles. In real life, it seems to DECREASE war weariness, actually. Think of how enraged America became after Pearl Harbor was bombed, do you think that that had increased our war weariness? Hardly. Big losses on the home front should reduce war weariness, as the people rally up for their common defense.

On the other hand, losses in foreign countries, especally ones overseas, should produce a lot of war weariness. When America took big losses in Vietnam, it spawned a huge level of protests. But when we were defeating the Nazis in Germany, people were thrilled in America and strongly supported the war.

In short, I think war weariness should be like this: Heavily reduced by winning OR losing battles on your home territory, somewhat reduced by winning battles in other countries- Increased by losing battles in other countries. And increasing at an accellerating rate the more units that are lost, relative to the total number of units you have. And increasing faster the further away the troops are from your home country.