Civ Add-on/Expansion Pack Ideas

[Maccabee]

Here are a few ways, any or all, that religion could be useful in the game.
1. After one's culture discovers the appropriate technology, one could choose to officially endorse (option A) a certain religion or (B) a certain religion grouping, (or none at all, such as a secular government overseeing a society whose religion or unique mixture of religions is expressed as part of its unique culture.) With the discovery of each new religious "technology", one could choose to change one's government-endorsed religion (group.)
This could work in one of two ways:
Option A: Upon discovery of Mysticism one's government could choose to endorse a specific Mystic religion from one's own culture. (For instance, European cultures would have only the Celtic Mythology to choose from, until they make contact with another culture, like Egypt, at which time they could choose to change endorsement to Egyptian Mythology. Each Mythology could have its own set of slight advantages culturally, or perhaps only a slight advantage in dealing with cultures sharing the same particular religion. ) After discover of Monotheism, one's culture could choose from Judaism, Christianity, or Islam (Did I leave any out?) OR
Option B: The choice upon discovery of a new religious tech would not be between specific religions, but between religious groups. Instead of choosing between, say, Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, you would choose whether to endorse Monotheism itself, or keep your present religious group (whether that's the Mythology, or no government-endorsed religion at all.)

 

[Maccabee]

Here are a few ways, any or all, that religion could be useful in the game.
1. After one's culture discovers the appropriate technology, one could choose to officially endorse (option A) a certain religion or (B) a certain religion grouping, (or none at all, such as a secular government overseeing a society whose religion or unique mixture of religions is expressed as part of its unique culture.) With the discovery of each new religious "technology", one could choose to change one's government-endorsed religion (group.)
This could work in one of two ways:
Option A: Upon discovery of Mysticism one's government could choose to endorse a specific Mystic religion from one's own culture. (For instance, European cultures would have only the Celtic Mythology to choose from, until they make contact with another culture, like Egypt, at which time they could choose to change endorsement to Egyptian Mythology. Each Mythology could have its own set of slight advantages culturally, or perhaps only a slight advantage in dealing with cultures sharing the same particular religion. ) After discover of Monotheism, one's culture could choose from Judaism, Christianity, or Islam (Did I leave any out?) OR
Option B: The choice upon discovery of a new religious tech would not be between specific religions, but between religious groups. Instead of choosing between, say, Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, you would choose whether to endorse Monotheism itself, or keep your present religious group (whether that's the Mythology, or no government-endorsed religion at all.)

 

[Crazy Eddie]

I don't know whether anyone else has suggested this, and it's nothing to do with the gameplay but...

Firaxis, can you please release the X-pack in a case with an empty space to put my Civ3 CD in? The paper envelope the original came in was, frankly, very poor indeed. Can't I have say, a nice 2-DVD box and give my CD a proper home?

 

[Maccabee]

Shockwave, I like your idea about natural disasters. For those who missed it, he said:
"Mother Earth Effects
Brought this up in the main forum.. The old mother earth effects from Civ1, but allow it to be on or off (much like barbarians) since some people don't want volcanos sprouting out

-----------------------------
Volcano
Effects: Mountain square.

Description: Any worker improvement adjacent and on the square is destroyed. Any cities adjacent to the volcano have a 50% chance of losing 1-5 population (Pompeii anyone?) and a 20% chance of destroying a city improvement (each improvement checked). A mountain that turns into a volcano will change the tile into an active volcano tile.

Occurence: Very rare, unless an active volcano (then becomes 'less' rare, to that tile itself)

Earthquake
Effects: Hill and Mountain Squares

Description: Destroys any worker improvement on the tile and any adjacent hill tiles. A city on the earthquake tile has a 25% chance of losing 1-2 population and a 20% chance that one city improvement will be destroyed.

Occurence: Rare

Flood
Effects: A Flood plain square adjacent to the coast only.

Description: Makes any worker improvement on that tile unusable for one turn. If it effects a city, then city has a 10% chance of losing 1-2 population, 10% chance of losing half the food stored and a 10% chance of one city improvement being destroyed.

Occurence: Rare

Fire
Effects: Desert or plains square

Description: Destroys any worker improvement on the tile. A city on the fire tile has a 25% chance of losing 1-2 population and a 20% chance that one city improvement will be destroyed.

Occurence: Rare
-----------------------------

Anyone like this idea? Could be expanded to bring back pirates, plagues of locusts, famine and disease... Most of which would be nullified once the civ discovers certain advances..."

I also would like to ask the Firaxis personnel if the game's code would allow certain semi-random tile changes. For instance, if a volcanic eruption or earthquake occurred on a coastline, could one coastal land tile change to ocean? (This would reflect the more common than believed occurences like the sinking of portions of cities, like the part of Alexandria recently discovered almost intact under the bay, or the part of Port Royal, Jamaica that sank in the earthquake in (1792?) I forgot the exact year. If we could turn this feature on or off at the game setup screen, it would add a very welcome element of surprise (and a pinch of luck) to the game. Even mighty empires can experience a major setback at the hands of nature or nature's God.

 

[Maccabee]

CrazyEddie,
What does "Fetchez la vache..." mean? (Sorry, I'm not nearly multilinqual as I would like to be.)

 

[Maccabee]

Originally posted by whb
-- 1. Different upkeep costs for different units
eg, a battleship might require a much greater cost per turn than an infantry unit. Editable from the editor, of course.

-- 2. Can't trade a tech unless you earned it yourself (not bought), or have held it for X turns.

-- 3. Bombard units auto-retaliate against bombardment.
If my city is bombarded by an iron-clad, why don't my artillery shoot back? By the start of my turn, the iron-clad will have moved out of range again.

-- 4. Domestic advisor highlights cities which will fall into disorder next turn
Same as the happiness advisor used to in Civ2 -- show the names in red.

-- 5. Governors act to stop disorder before it happens
Rather than hiring the entertainers afterwards. (It is a mundane task to check for unhappy cities at the end of each turn)

-- 6. Allow more civilisations on the smaller maps.
I played a game on tiny, and was only allowed 4 civs (inc me). We all started on the one island. Any of the other islands could also have supported starting civs.

-- 7. Cities can still revert after complete conquering of a nation
Before I invade that last Egyptian city, the 12 I have conquered are all in huge danger of flipping. Afterwards, suddenly they are all content.

-- 8. Culture of buildings decay gradually when they are destroyed
Howcome the Japanese, with only one city left (still size one and no improvements) still have all the culture points of the rest of the Japanese empire, which was completely burnt to the ground 1000 years ago with no survivors?
Also makes bombing those cathedrals more important...

-- 9. Resistors attack units in the city. If they defeat all the units, the city flips.
So resistors can still cause damage even if they don't flip the city. Also discourages garrisoning only with nearly-dead units.

-- 10. Culture flips aren't immediate -- the culture causes the city to produce resistors which attack the units. If they defeat all the units, the city flips.

-- 11. Resistors can burn down buildings (same as disorder can).

-- 12. Different faiths. (Distinguish language culture from faith culture
If the Indians give me Monotheism, then I must have the same faith as them. But if I develop it separately then in game terms I might have a different one. (To simplify things, it makes sense only to apply this to Monotheism and not to Polytheism -- incidentally it might be nicer to rename Monotheism to Religion).

If my nation and another nation have the same faith, then our 'faith' culture points are ignored when compared to each other, and only our language (science) culture points are taken into account.

Each Civ could have its own default faith set in the editor for if it discovers the advance (rather than being given it).
(Ideally, a unique one for each civ. We might need to use denominational names [Anglican, Lutheran, ...] to get around the fact that all the European nations are/were Christian. In any case, only the building names need be unique, and the English language has lots of names for those (church, cathedral, kirk, basilica....))
India could be Hindu, Persia Islamic, etc.

Countries could act more favorably to countries of the same faith, especially in the Middle and Industrial ages. City invasions by same-faithed nations would be less disruptive (fewer resistors). Wars against same-faithed nations would cause greater war weariness in the Middle Ages.
This should tail off in the modern age.

NB: you could get around the "but the user will always want to be of his own real faith" problem by not assigning the names of the faiths until the player gets the discovery. To explain: the Germans develop Monotheism, but I don't have it. An inspection of a German city might show a "Religious Building". The Germans then give me Monotheism. In the game set up screen, I had said I want my country to be Christian. Therefore, the game allocates that the Germans (and thus my country) are Christian, and allocates other faiths to other nations as it sees fit. Now an inspection of a German city might show a "Cathedral".

--
Bill Billingsley

I especially like his idea about religion, customizable of course. Great thinking!

 

[Maccabee]

Originally posted by boca
Ok.
I haven't given much thought to how these leaders will spawn,
but here's an idea.

Every time a player is the best at one of these categories (for x number of consecutive turns) there will be a small chance that you get a great leader.

For example you have been the best at science for 20 consecutive turns, there's a small chance you'll get a great scientific leader.

Same for culture, commerce and religious/social (using happines as a mesure)

How about that?

Keeeeeeewwwwwwwlllllllll!!!!!!!!!!!!1

I like it! Need more scientists and artists! Civilization is more about building than destroying!

 

[Maccabee]

Originally posted by Beard Rinker
A few posters have skirted around this concept, I thought I'd fill out a few details.

Concept

In ancient times, people were organized in city-states. The concept of a group of cities forming a country did not exist although cities close together with strong cultural ties were considered the same civilization. When settlers went to distant lands (i.e. crossed the Mediterranean Sea), this almost always resulted in the eventual formation of a distinct civilization.

Conquest of the world in ancient times was essentially impossible. The Roman empire and the territory conquered by Alexander the Great were probably smaller than continental United States. Furthermore, these empires had no knowledge of North, South America and Australia and minimal knowledge of any other parts of the world not conquered.



In industrial times, civilizations were organized into countries and empires. Rule over countries on distant continents only worked for a short period of time before the country demanded and in many cases fought for independence. Countries founded in this manor were often strong allies of the founding civilization.

Civ 4 Suggestion

Cities that are distant from the capitol can band together and form a province with a provincial capital. Corruption and waste are determined by distance from the provincial capital instead of the civilization's capital. There is no limit to the number of provinces that are formed by one civilization.

Each province is controlled by a civilization but has some degree of autonomy such as its own tax rates, treasury and perhaps its own form of government and research project. Provinces can transfer/receive funds from a federal treasury on a per turn basis or in a lump sum.

Each province has ties to its controlling civilization and all other provinces. The strength of these ties determines some of the provinces behavior. Provinces with strong ties will be happier, less corrupt and wasteful. Provinces with weak ties are more difficult to manage and may even separate. Provinces with strong ties to other civilizations may join other civilizations.

A provinces ties are determined by the following factors:
- Distance from each civilization and each province and the current era. Distance has a greater effect in the ancient eras. For example: A city 40 tiles away in ancient times will almost always demand independence from the founding civilization. A cluster of cities on a remote continent in industrial times will almost always demand independence.
- Cultural points accumulated while a member of a civilization. This effect would not be lost if the province was under the control of another civilization for a period of time.
- Population makeup. Each citizen has a provincial and national identity. A citizens loyalty is to his province first and civilization second.
- Form of government.
- Marginalization. The smaller a province is compared to other provinces and the controlling civilization as a whole, the more marginalized the population feels. Thus, conquering a large province and dividing it into many smaller provinces may result in many small provinces trying to separate (and possibly re-join each other).
- Units loyal to controlling civilization stationed inside the province. The effect depends on the type of government. With despotism this might keep the population in line whereas in a democracy it might cause resentment.
- Provincial units stationed out of the province. Again, the effect depends on the type of government.
- Amount of gold transferred to/ received from the controlling civilization.
- Luxuries found in the province compared to luxuries provided by the controlling civilization.

A province may attempt to separate in the following ways:
- Province requests to separate. Request can be granted or denied. Denying a request may silence the objectors but also may result in civil war or provincial unrest. Depending on the provinces attitude towards the controlling civilization, granting the request may make a loyal ally.
- Controlling civilization separates a province. Depending on the ties to the province, this may result in the creation of a loyal ally. A civilization may do this with the purpose of creating a loyal ally or to save resources.
- Civil war. Province separates and declares war on the controlling civilization. All units loyal to the controlling civilization are ejected from the cities in the province and all units loyal to the province convert to the provinces control. Units loyal to the province, which are not located in the province, may become rogue units and attack the controlling civilization or repatriate themselves. Depending on the provinces attitude towards the controlling civilization and the controlling civilizations response to this, it may make a loyal ally or a blood enemy. The province may be retaken or independence can be granted and units loyal to the province repatriated.

Units are loyal to the province in which they were commissioned first and the controlling civilization second. This has no effect on the behavior of the unit unless the units province of origin separates, declares civil war or descends into provincial unrest.

Provinces may descend into provincial unrest. This may result from being overly oppressive with a province or from denying a request to separate. When in provincial unrest the entire province descends into anarchy. Units loyal to the province may turn into rogue units especially units located within the province.

Provinces may be traded during negotiations.

Provinces may join other civilizations. This differs from cities being assimilated in that it usually occurs between two provinces about the same size but relatively weak in the world. In this scenario, a country might be 1/2 conquered by some larger civilization becoming a province of the larger civilization. The larger civilization runs into some problem such as going broke under communism, and the province separates, then joins its original civilization similar to modern Germany.

When attacking another civilization with only one province, that civilization may surrender unconditionally and become a province of the attackers civilization without having to conquer every city. However, if the new province is not managed correctly, it may attempt to separate at some point in the future.


Afterthought

This modification would make conquest or military domination much more difficult. A military victory would have to be very balanced and not too early in the game or it might be like nailing jello to the wall.

It might also add some interesting twists to a diplomatic victory. Granting provinces independence may improve your odds of a diplomatic victory or it may make you an easy target for your neighbor.

I would vote for this! In fact, if this were the only change in an expansion pack, I would buy the expansion just for this. It sounds revolutionary! Pardon the pun.

 

[captain walrus]

For the religion idea, I think that it should be that you can ban or allow certain religions (so you can have complete freedom of religion or Christianity and Islam only or maybe JUST Hinduism).

The ideas for provinces are great.

When a civ is completly conquered, cities should still be able to flip back to their native civ and let the civ be "reborn".

Some sort of spy sattelites would be cool.

A UN, where civs vote on issues like reduction of arms, inspecting hostile civs, etc.

And workers should have some sort of command list, so you can tell a stack of workers, for example, to build an entire railroad line from Bonn to Frankfurt and then cut down a forest and then clean up that pollution by Berlin. That way you don't have to give commands to your workers for awhile.

 

[Maccabee]

Originally posted by J-S
* Resource-specific terrain improvements (such as an Oil Refinery to be able to pump Oil otherwise than just having a dirt road lead to the site).
* Ocean terrain improvements (such as an ocean platform like the one Tokyo's harbor is on, used as a land tile).

Yesamundo! I couldn't agree more!

 

[Maccabee]

Originally posted by captain walrus
For the religion idea, I think that it should be that you can ban or allow certain religions (so you can have complete freedom of religion or Christianity and Islam only or maybe JUST Hinduism).

Walrus, I would settle for even just that!
:yinyang:

 

[Maccabee]

Good night, guys. Time to go pack my stuff and prep to move. (Of course, that means my precious computer will be packed up and I can't play CIV3 or even read your great ideas for almost a month, if I stay on schedule.)
By this time next month, I'll be muttering, "Must....unpack...my precious!"

Until then, havereem! :mutant:

 

[Beloyar]

Those ideas in the long posts are way too complicated. Just the provinces idea has at least 12 different rules that apply!

You gotta keep it simple.

Like here's one: Allow workers to breed cattle in tiles adjacent to cities, instead of being limited to what is affixed to the map.

Simple and to the point.

I also have some wishes for a Civilization V, if we live that long. Maybe we should start a new thread? Anybody?

 

[BuddhaBubba]

Originally posted by UofAzKid
What if you added new map features like the natural wonders. And have each one of them do something specific. Like on the map somewhere you had Mt. Everest and the surrounding squares produced more shields. Or like the Harbor of Rio de Janeiro makes the people of the nearby city completly happy. And in order for the effects of the natural wonders to work, a city must have it in it's original city radius.

I dunno, I am just throwing these out there. But it's an incteresting concept I think.

kewl idea!!!

then all you scenario makers could have something like a "king of the hill" game where if you capture say "Mt. Olympus, Home of the Gods" (giving bonuses to happiness I suppose) and hold it for some amount of turns ... you win the game!! and if know one holds it long enough...gamed ends normally...etc. etc.

that is all

 

[CivManiac1]

I think there should be different looks for units depending on the era they are in, that would be cool, because I hate seeing ancient units walking around in the 1980's. For example, spearmen should have their look go from the original to a horse-less knight with shield to a soldier with a harpoon or something and body armor to police officer with pistol and riot shield. It would be like upgrading the unit, but not it's stats, just it's looks. It would make gameplay more realistic.

 

[Sir Durfey]

I haven't seen so many good ideas for a long time.Guys at Firaxis may have transformed into chain-smokers. Humble Suggestions:

_An orbital space station G-Wonder and/or spy satellites.
_More units which are not designed to shoot, kill, destroy,exterminate, burn etc. Many of the units are just for destroying.
_Natural disasters is an excellent idea.
_Naval Trade
_Terrorism and biological warfare. I know that it's not politically correct but unfortunately they do exist.
_Military bases in allied countries.
_Civ_Cultural Transformation. e.g a civilisation may decide to quit being agressive and turn into a commercial or an industrious one. Penalties should apply of course.
-A single decent naval unit.
_Democracies should have advantages over totalitarian governments. Who told you that life is fair?
_If they can somehow gear up the game speed, (gods forgive me) I would like to play a bigger map.
_I want Newspaper Headlines and Wonder Movies baaack.
_And please some new Modern-Age wonders. Where is INTERNET, Skylab, Tokamak, Hubbble Telescope and hey, what about a possible Mars Project, if Kennedy wouldn't have been assasinated we might had a Mars Base now, did you know it? NASA was actually planning to land a man on Mars on 1980's but of course budget cutoff's and Kennedy's death prevented it.
_Luxuries which may be manufactured (ever heard of smtg. called Television?)

Live long and prosper.

 

[boca]

I think Civ can improve more in the roleplaying area
Here are some ideas (some had been posted before by others)

1. Geographical elements naming (Iberic peninsula, Red Sea, etc..)
2. Unit Naming (5th Cavalry group, Red Army, etc.)
3. City Governor naming
4. City Governor Council
It wil be cool to have a screen where all your Governos demand things they need or praise you. (That way you can
check this screen instead of cheking each city)
5. Different Religions
6. Non Military Great Leaders
7. Replay screen using the aforementioned names
(In 1984 the 7th Tank Regiment took the last German City in the Iberic Peninsula)

Thanks

 

[Arvedui]

I think that the idea of naming the geographic elements is wonderful, like having names for important seas, lakes, rivers, mountain chains. The names could be based on the civilization living there: for instance, the biggest river inside the Egyptian territory would automatically be named Nile.

I also love the idea of natural disasters. I missed them greatly when Civ2 came out.

I couple of ideas of my own:

I think that every time a unit is down to one hit-point but still manages to win the battle, a great leader should appear.

There should be the option of seeing a city improvement get built, like on Civ1. For instance, if London builds a barracks, we see the city of London (like when you click the eye icon) and see the barracks build up somehow. On Civ1 the city improvement just appeared out of thin air, but there may be other possibilities.

I think that when a capital city is conquered, if that civilization had conquered other nations, then those other nations should become independent and even reappear, if they had been extinguished.
For instance, Rome is a mighty empire. They have conquered the French, Egyptians, Germans, English and Babylonians. But Rome falls: some other civilization manages to conquer or destroy rome (just the city, not the entire empire). Then these French, Egyptian, German, English and babylonian conquered cities would revert back to their original civ.
This opens up one possibility: What if you are utterly conquered by another civ? The game ends for you? The game should calculate the probability of your conqueror's capital falling in the future. If it decides that it will fall, you are taken to that moment of rebirth. The game would have to simulate the geopolitical changes that would have taken place in the world.

My final suggestion. Whenever I play on a huge Earth map, I find it wrong how units are able to get so far from their country. For instance, to have European warriors go on to explore the confines of Siberia! I think there should be a limit to how far a unit could go from its country. Think of it as a matter of logistic. They can only bring so much food with them when they go out exploring forests, deserts and mountains. And I don't think it would be realistic to think that they could get food from hunting and gathering: to feed and army this way? Maybe if they got a ROP and entered another nation's territory, they could be replenished. But only then.
If they go forth towards untamed territory, they'l have to turn back eventually to reenter their territory after they have covered some distance or die from lack of food.

When you use the goto option, sometimes you can't see the number that is showing how long it will take to get there, because there are some graphics like a city mixed with it.
Also, there should be an easy way of cancelling the goto orders for all units of one type. For instance, I have a ton of swordsmen marching to Paris to conquer France. These units are still far from Paris and going under goto orders. But then I make peace with the French. The way it is now, cancelling all those goto orders is painstaking.

Finally, would anyone know how to implement the idea of the Americans not starting at 4000 BC?

That's it!

 

[Greeko]

_ Dont stop at present technology. Get rid of the future technology numbers (1, 2, etc.) and add more actual types of future technology and let there be future units, future wonders, and future small wonders.

_ Better diplomatic system (various options).
-like when you demand something you should allow the player to back the threat up with something. My glorious army, nothing, just kidding, etc.)


_ Let you set your attitude for the other civs. And let them try to get you to like them and stuff too.

_ Allow the armies to become Elite and Veteran like the units.
- Allow you to have different types of armies Guerilla, Regular, Special Forces, etc.
-When 2 armies fight let the armies have tactics and formations to choose from (attack left flank in line formation, defend in delta formation, etc.)
-Let the types of tactics be concurrent with what type of army they are.
-Choose the tactics by right clicking the army.

_ Spies can attempt to steal oppenents money.
-Spies should be able to assasinate units in the city.
- Spies could somehow hurt the population. (Bring back poision water supply!)
-Spies can assasinate the good low corruption producing governor leaving the enemy with the high corruption governors to use.

_ (Provinces mentioned in an earlier post) Allow you to choose your governors for provinces. (Different types of personalities adds to how much corruption the province produces)

_ Have a team mode in Multiplayer and have some type of way to chat to either team mates or all players

_ different types of weapons of mass destruction and their upgrades. (improved nuclear warheads, biological weapons, chemical weapons, neutron bombs: they are the same as nukes but with lots less pollution)

BETTER AI-They cheat most of the time. and Whenever I go to war with the AI they are furious with me for the rest of the game. No matter what if I give them 10,000 gold (with a money trainer i tried this) they were still furious. They should have been giving me gold because I beat them back and had the common courtesy to leave him still in the game!

 

[pesoloco]

i think there should be "amphibious" units. Units that can go into water or be on land