BNW would make canals even more useful

[poom3619]

They could always do what they did in Civ IV allow a structure (in was Forts in Civ IV) to permit naval units to enter a hex. You could just string these together to form a crude canal.

The problem I have with this is mainly aesthetic; it's a scale issue. Real canals are much, much smaller than real rivers. Having rivers that are small and not navigable, but allowing canals that are visually much larger and navigable breaks the sense of scale. If they want to add canals, I think they need to make rivers navigable first, and I don't see how they can do that without completely changing the way rivers have always been modeled in Civilization.

I think SMAC have river in tile which could be adapted to Civ5. But if ships can technically sail on river. I can foresee a graphical glitch which ship sail on land

 

[jacer21]

And what if that entire continent was connected by two tiles instead of one?

What I'm trying to say is that it would easily be exploitable (eg. build canals surrounding enemy city, move ships, declare war). It also makes more sense to limit canals to 1 tile from a realistic perspective, there's a reason they built the canal in panama and not across the entire US.

 

[blash]

how about having exponential costs to a canal?
<basecost>^length gpt where <basecost> is between 5 and 10.
that would limit the canal length.

allowing a fix amount of canal tiles with a (national?) wonder is a nice idea too.
ofc you shouldnt be allowed to build canals in enemy territory.

scalability-wise we already have enough issues with infantry, vehicles, planes, ships and buildings, i dont think that a canal being slightly bigger than a river would cause too much harm.
however it might create odd unit stacking visuals and maybe even defensive advantages to allow naval and ground units to be placed on the same tile.

 

[darkimpaler]

Canals would be cool, just not like they were "implemented" in Civ4 with fortresses acting like canals.
It would me cool to build canals with a limited # of tiles, and with an high maintenance cost.

 

[obro]

I like this idea allot. To many times did a city state block me from making a city on a proper spot. Instead of making a city on a good position to allow ships to go through I had to go all the way around just because I couldn't make my city so close to the city state. If I could raze them that would not be the problem but for some reason we are not allowed to do that.

 

[bagas12]

There is a mod that make citadels behave like canals, they could make something like that.
Citadels or a improvement that let ships cross the tiles

 

[turingmachine]

What I'm trying to say is that it would easily be exploitable (eg. build canals surrounding enemy city, move ships, declare war). It also makes more sense to limit canals to 1 tile from a realistic perspective, there's a reason they built the canal in panama and not across the entire US.

There's no exploit; it worked fine in IV.

Why would you be able to build canals surrounding an enemy city? Much like all improvements you'd only be able to use the ones/build in your own territory. 1 tile is also useless from a gameplay perspective. 2 is a fine length and once you actually have them you and look to build them, you realize 2 tiles splitting a continent is a lot less common than you think.

 

[Dunkah]

Yes there is already a Canal Mod Per Se. It's Whowards DLL - Various Mod Components mod. It uses Forts and cities. It works awesome and if you wish to use canals I would recommend that Mod.

Land and Sea units are allowed to share the hex.

 

[Matthew.]

I like the idea of increasing maintenance per tile. Theoretically there isn't a limit. Throw enough manpower, money, and resources at it and you could build one across the entire US.

Not that I'm suggest we should be allow to spam them across Pangaea maps, but I don't see the need to be particularly specific about the number of tiles. This is a game where you can drop nukes all day long without repercussion. There is a sandbox element to the game, and being able bridge those smaller land connections would be a lot of fun.

Also, like I said above, just have it operate similar to how transporting air works: Have the naval unit "travel" from one end of the canal to the other in a single turn, but takes up all movement. Can't be exploited, can't sit battleships in the middle of a landmass, etc.

 

[mitsho]

How would that work btw.? It seems to me that trade units work with range, not movement points? If a naval unit can't go around a land because its range is too short, would it need a canal or would it be able to reach a city on the other coast via sea as well?

It doesn't seem to me that the way of a trade route has any importance except for defense? So why would canals help there? (I'd say as well that they should have an importance)

 

[blash]

Also, like I said above, just have it operate similar to how transporting air works: Have the naval unit "travel" from one end of the canal to the other in a single turn, but takes up all movement. Can't be exploited, can't sit battleships in the middle of a landmass, etc.

that would actually solve almost all problems we have come up with (abusability as well as comparison to rivers).

 

[God of Kings]

What about China's Grand Canal (which linked Nanjing with Beijing)? It is not a short canal.

What about the Erie Canal linking Buffalo with the Hudson River?

 

[Tsar NicholasII]

I'd love a canal feature in the game! I'm thinking this:
You must own the land or be Allies with the City-State who's land you will be building a canal tile through.

Ships moving through the canal will be vulnerable to attacks by land units and will have like a -400% combat deficiency

Canal tile improvements will be very costly, like 4-5 gold per tile or on percentage based on your GNP

This way canals won't be build all over your continent and navies won't be used as literal land ships, what do you think?

 

[Hawaiian]

Another option would be that a boat can't end its turn on a canal land tile. So it has to pass through it in one turn. If an enemy land unit is on top of a canal tile, you cannot pass through it. Kind of simple solution, I think.

 

[Halps]

There is a mod that make citadels behave like canals, they could make something like that.
Citadels or a improvement that let ships cross the tiles

That's a great idea. It would surely limit the number/length of canals on the map if you have to sacrifice a GG for each tile.

 

[Hawaiian]

I don't quite think it should be necessary to sacrifice a great person for the canal. It seems that if two tiles is the limit (so the max distance across a continent would be 3 spaces if a city was used as well) and ships can't end a turn on the canal tile but must pass all the way through in one turn, then it would be great!

 

[spyroware]

Well the vast majority of canals are not used for large ship traffic and medium sized vessels became able to use canals only after steam (there are no winds in canals).

The only way to properly implement canals is to bring back the trade route feature betwen cities on the same river, and allowing you at some point in late reinassance to connect two different rivers together with a canal. Maybe this connection would give some small production % boost to the cities on the newly connected river, like an early RR.

 

[blash]

Well the vast majority of canals are not used for large ship traffic and medium sized vessels became able to use canals only after steam (there are no winds in canals).

The only way to properly implement canals is to bring back the trade route feature betwen cities on the same river, and allowing you at some point in late reinassance to connect two different rivers together with a canal. Maybe this connection would give some small production % boost to the cities on the newly connected river, like an early RR.

i think most people in this thread are referring to "big ship canals" like the panama canal though.

 

[Jman5]

It already works in game if you settle a city on a 1 tile thick coast. Ships can pass through. Am I missing something here?

The problem is that cities carry a lot of baggage.

Culture per policies increases, you have one more city to build national wonders pre-requisites, the production cost of a national wonder goes up, you get a 4 happiness penalty immediately after settling and have to then deal with further unhappiness from growth, and you have to defend it.