Civ4 Suggestions

[filerba]

What I've always hated in Civ and SMAC is the infinitely fast trains. Movement on RR ought to take 1/12 x unit speed movement points; or some such formula. Thus every unit moves the same speed by train, but still faster than on a road.

This would make airports more useful and encourage straight routes. Civ2 got especially crazy with my railroads meandering through the hills. And I really hated it that my infantry got to the front faster than my planes. So planes are infinitely fast now too, but that's a different issue.

Also Civ2 reduced the effect of RR so that the whole map wouldn't be covered with them. I liked that. Now we're back to Civ1 style but expanded so you build roads everywhere too.

 

[Mîtiu Ioan]

Originally posted by romelus
this is something completely new i'm proposing: event-based technology development system (EBTDS)

Cool idea !!!

But again - did you think how will work AI in such condition ? Not a critique, just a question ...

Regards

 

[romelus]

Originally posted by Mîtiu Ioan


Cool idea !!!

But again - did you think how will work AI in such condition ? Not a critique, just a question ...

Regards

the ai has to be more sophisticated so it behaves in sufficiently diverse ways to trigger technologies. different civs can become more distinct by modifying their behaviour tendencies - ai india would possibly develop a lot of theoretical science and art, while england would participate in enough naval action to ensure its naval technology is rarely surpassed, etc. kind of like the ai preferrences in the editor now, but more expanded.

something else i've been thinking about is an improved unit workshop. i found the workshop in SMAC fun, even though it was very limited. in civ 4 we can add in the strategic resouce dimension and create a truly great system.

example: instead of a tank being a tank unit, it is made up of several components - engine (oil), steel (iron), wheels (rubber). if a civ could not obtain any oil, it might create a hybrid monster with steam engine instead of diesel, so it gets a "land cruiser" sort of lumbering armored vehicle. the land cruiser obviously will not be as effective as a real tank, but it's the next best thing. using that kind of workshop some truly interesting units can be formed and it's fun to experiment with the "what if" version of alternative history IMO.

 

[FredLC]

What I would like to see is that the luxuries/strategic resources be more abundant and have “quality values”.

For example, iron. It could be found almost everywhere, but just a few sources have “fine iron” , a whole lot more have “average iron” and other bunch have “poor iron”.

The quality of the material would be a variant factor in the quality of the units built, so, for example, spearman built with fine iron is stronger than a spearman built with average iron.

With horses, I’d say that a knight built with “average horses” would be faster than one built with “poor horses”.

The same would go for luxury resources, as the best they are, the more happiness they generate.

This would be an interesting factor, and would make commerce far more interesting, since a civ with monopoly of the best sources of a material could sell them for a lot, and at the same time, avoid that one had an unfair advantage of being the only one able to build a particular unit.

regards .

 

[ChrisWade]

Originally posted by fredlc
What I would like to see is that the luxuries/strategic resources be more abundant and have “quality values”.

For example, iron. It could be found almost everywhere, but just a few sources have “fine iron” , a whole lot more have “average iron” and other bunch have “poor iron”.

The quality of the material would be a variant factor in the quality of the units built, so, for example, spearman built with fine iron is stronger than a spearman built with average iron.

Nice idea. I'll give my support for this one.

 

[Dinorius R.]

Here's a revolutionary idea, and it's my only request to Firaxis or Microprose or whatever they call themselves these days.

If you've learned nothing else from the bitter experience of Civ3, before you release the next Civ, please have it exhaustively playtested by a paid cross-section of your intended customers and take careful note of what they say. Amend it, delay it's release if you must, take as long as you want, but don't go public until it's done properly, runs smoothly and can be played by your test group for 2 months without anyone spotting a bug. Then most of your programmers can go on holiday with the money you'll make and not have to spend the next 12 months slaving over patches. Oh, and one more thing, write a proper manual, one that actually tells you how to do all the things you need to do, one that has an index that references each subject in multiple ways so the average Joe can find anything quickly. And OK, there's a third thing. Make sure all of the possible actions/commands appear on the screen somewhere (context sensitive is good) and that each of these have text pop-ups which tell the player what the equivalent keyboard commands are. Not just for some commands, for all of them, please. That is all.