Automated workers should not rip up roads if 'don't replace improvements' is selected

[kitfox]

I'm having trouble with my automated workers tearing up stuff that I don't want them to tear up. In a recent game, I had a city that was captured by a city state which had a road going through it to other cities in my empire (which in turn disconnected them from the empire). This lasted quite a few turns until I finally got peace with my opponent, after which I turned my attention to the captured city - only to realize that all the roads leading up to it had been erased by the automated workers! Not only does this make it hard to move units through rough terrain, but all the cities on the far end of my road now have a disconnected happiness penalty.

I consider roads to be defensive rather than just for city bonuses and often build them in unusual places to make it easier to move troops around. I would like it if my automated workers left them alone if I have the 'don't replace improvements' option selected.

 

[ridjack]

I'm having trouble with my automated workers tearing up stuff that I don't want them to tear up. In a recent game, I had a city that was captured by a city state which had a road going through it to other cities in my empire (which in turn disconnected them from the empire). This lasted quite a few turns until I finally got peace with my opponent, after which I turned my attention to the captured city - only to realize that all the roads leading up to it had been erased by the automated workers! Not only does this make it hard to move units through rough terrain, but all the cities on the far end of my road now have a disconnected happiness penalty.

I consider roads to be defensive rather than just for city bonuses and often build them in unusual places to make it easier to move troops around. I would like it if my automated workers left them alone if I have the 'don't replace improvements' option selected.

That sounds like a straight-up bug. Report it on the Github.

 

[Bascule2000]

It's not clear to me from your post which roads have gone. If the roads were in territory owned by the city state, it might have been city state workers that removed them.

 

[kitfox]

It's not clear to me from your post which roads have gone. If the roads were in territory owned by the city state, it might have been city state workers that removed them.

No, these were roads within my territory, leading up to the city that was captured.

 

[ryanmusante]

No, these were roads within my territory, leading up to the city that was captured.

Make sure to reference https://github.com/LoneGazebo/Community-Patch-DLL/issues/4134 if you do post on github.

It is closed issue labeled "Road building - various issues".

 

[lordrune]

I wonder if it's worth removing road maintenance entirely for this reason.

Plausible real world justification: if constructed roads aren't being used, they're generally not being maintained. If they are being used and maintained, presumably the economic benefits from them would always exceed the maintenance cost. And from the early-mid game onwards, route cost is negligible anyway. Might require an adjustment to an authority policy, and maybe a small economic tweak, for it all to be balanced.

Perhaps the same logic could apply to railroads.

Gameplay justification: AI won't stupidly remove roads anymore, and there'd be no reason to prevent workers building roads anywhere either (which is presently the case, you can build in city state territory but not rival player territory). To compensate you could double the length of the time it takes to build a road/railroad (maybe give a 25% reduction to worker speed when building routes in that authority policy?)

Fun justification (the way I like to play the game) you could also build roads linking your cities right up to neighbour frenemy cities just for aesthetics. Only downside would be if the AI built roads on every single tile because that would end up being real messy.

 

[Paramecium]

Maintenance free roads would lead back to the good old days of civ (Civ 4 and before), where road spam was common, so every tile in your empire would be covered in roads. I dont know, I find it good, that you have at least to think about it where you put your roads...

 

[ryanmusante]

Roads shouldn't be free. If you want free, apply this for roads and railroads.

UPDATE Routes SET GoldMaintenanceance=0 WHERE Type='ROUTE_ROAD';
UPDATE Routes SET GoldMaintenance=0 WHERE Type='ROUTE_RAILROAD';

If there still exists the issue of AI destroying roads, add to github report.