An ABSOLUTE Must-Have Feature For Civ5! "Remind me in X turns!"

[Peng Qi]

OK, it's not a must-have, but it's one of a very small list of things I've wanted since I first played Civ1.

I just want to be able to tell the game to issue me a popup with a message I write for myself after a number of turns I set. For example, in Civ4, my city is growing in 3 turns and I want to start a settler ASAP, so I put something else in the queue and wait the 3 turns to maximize my productivity and reduce the over-all number of turns the settler will actually take thanks to the jump in production I'll have after the city grows. Under my proposition, I hit a button, type "3" in the number box, then in the message box put "Switch Ravenna's production to Settler." In 3 turns, the game would give me a popup that says "Switch Ravenna's production to Settler."

That's it! It would be like the easiest thing to code ever! Sure, I could stick post-it's all over my monitor, but sometimes I'm waiting for a lot of things to finish and I'd rather not make a giant mess or keep a notebook next to me all the time when I play. Plus, knowing me and being an absent-minded person, I'd probably forget to check the notepad or post-it's anyway. Heck, I'll probably forget between the time the pop-up comes up and when I resume the game anyway to be honest.

But seriously, this would be so easy to code and it would make the game way more easy to keep track of for me. Anyone agree?

 

[timmey_o_tool]

Agreed!

 

[CTH]

Indded, agreed!

 

[kdr777]

It should also give standard pop-ups on all events that happen in the game (e.g. city X has expanded, ...)

 

[muhtesem insan]

this is reallly a good idea and easy to implement.

 

[Avatan]

But won't we be too lazy to actually write us something... I think it should be done with just a click, on some "let me know when it's done" icon or list.
You can ask the game to notify you for everything, you will drown in futiles pieces of info.

 

[Xzylvador]

^^ What they said.
Let me know in X turn.
Let me know on: production complete (instead of queue), culture growth, city growth, ..?

 

[civ_king]

Also a thing to specify an amount of time to play, if you set it to 30 minutes it will finish processing the AI then promptly save and pause the game. To try to prevent Just One More Turn

 

[muhtesem insan]

Also a thing to specify an amount of time to play, if you set it to 30 minutes it will finish processing the AI then promptly save and pause the game. To try to prevent Just One More Turn

This feature is already available. It is called willpower.

 

[fenix_27]

This is alread available in BTS. They are called reminders and are available via keyboard shortcut

CTRL + ALT + R

 

[logarithm64]

The BUG mod has a reminders feature (alt+R).

 

[civ_king]

This feature is already available. It is called willpower.

One.. More... Turn...
I just don't notice the time because I use the hot-keys for the tabs, civ is an addictive game.

 

[Sub]

As a general rule, coders hate when a non-coder states "It would be so easy to implement, all you have to do is x, y, z!" You don't have access to the source code. You don't know how easy or hard it is to implement. Things that are seemingly simple are often a lot harder to do than they appear.

With that being said, I agree that this would be a great feature.

 

[muhtesem insan]

....
I just don't notice the time ....

You can add clock in cIV

As a general rule, coders hate when a non-coder states "It would be so easy to implement, all you have to do is x, y, z!" You don't have access to the source code. You don't know how easy or hard it is to implement. Things that are seemingly simple are often a lot harder to do than they appear.

I am a software developer so i am in the business. Yes i do not have access to source code but i have common sense (and i assume developers in firaxis have it too) and unless they handled turn mechanism very stupidly, it easy to implement because it does affect any of the game mechanics.

 

[Schuesseled]

OK, it's not a must-have, but it's one of a very small list of things I've wanted since I first played Civ1.

I just want to be able to tell the game to issue me a popup with a message I write for myself after a number of turns I set. For example, in Civ4, my city is growing in 3 turns and I want to start a settler ASAP, so I put something else in the queue and wait the 3 turns to maximize my productivity and reduce the over-all number of turns the settler will actually take thanks to the jump in production I'll have after the city grows. Under my proposition, I hit a button, type "3" in the number box, then in the message box put "Switch Ravenna's production to Settler." In 3 turns, the game would give me a popup that says "Switch Ravenna's production to Settler."

That's it! It would be like the easiest thing to code ever! Sure, I could stick post-it's all over my monitor, but sometimes I'm waiting for a lot of things to finish and I'd rather not make a giant mess or keep a notebook next to me all the time when I play. Plus, knowing me and being an absent-minded person, I'd probably forget to check the notepad or post-it's anyway. Heck, I'll probably forget between the time the pop-up comes up and when I resume the game anyway to be honest.

But seriously, this would be so easy to code and it would make the game way more easy to keep track of for me. Anyone agree?

i think it would be better just to have a button/option in the city screen so that you can tell it in X turns to switch to the next item on the list.

 

[Mercade]

i think it would be better just to have a button/option in the city screen so that you can tell it in X turns to switch to the next item on the list.

Yes and no. It may seem easier to do set-it-and-forget-it, but:

1. It deprives you of the ability to re-evaluate your decision before it's actually implemented.
2. It's very specific and thus wouldn't help you for other "do/consider X in Y turns" scenarios (such a remember to cancel a deal).
3. Coding a series of specific events to deal with those eventualities would make it more complex to code and to operate.

The simple reminder note-to-self is very clean and I like the suggestion. (I'll try to ctrl-alt-R that was suggested for BTW when I'm in the game next.

 

[ukcivfan]

I think its a good idea.

 

[Souron]

I support this idea.

 

[TheGreatAnthony]

Very good idea, i can't tell you how many useless things I have built just because I wanted to go back to the queue in a second!

 

[Ramesses]

I feel like you don't really need this as long as you have reminders similar to what you get in the BUG Mod, and can type your own reminders instead. Besides, your idea does have a big drawback, which I will illustrate with an example:

Your city (Memphis) will grow in 9 turns. It takes 12 turns to build a Barracks. You want a Barracks in that city anyway, so you set it to build a Barracks for 9 turns, then switch to a Settler, with the intent of finishing the Barracks afterward.

8 turns later, a neighbor declares war. You give all your cities' production a once over. You quickly scan all your cities and change any city that isn't producing military stuff. You skip over Memphis because it'll complete its Barracks in 4 turns. Then you send your armies out to fight.

20 turns later, you find that you're struggling to keep your empire intact. You feel you might have forgotten something. Then:

*ding* You have trained a Settler in Memphis. Work has now begun on a Barracks.

DOH! You didn't remember all this time, and you didn't notice it was working on the wrong thing until just now! But now it's too late, and the reinforcements you desperately need will never make it in time.

And this is why text reminders are better than automated switching.