Colonies

[Jake5555555]

It has always seemed strange to me how in civ you can just build a settler and create a new city, after all, it seems to me that all a country can really do is make bases or colonies, which can or cannot become cities depending on whether people want to move there.

What should be done is you send out a "settler" who creates a colony. This colony will have a one square cultural radius, like a small city, and will send resources, including food, shields, commerces, and any bonus and strategic resources to the mother city. The colonies would have a defensive bonus, and would be a good way to defend a contested area. If there are sufficient resources and you cities have enough bonus population, people will move to the colony. Once it has a large enough population, a colony can become a city in it's own right.

 

[casual_moose]

Seems like a cool idea. Seems more realistic than an automatic city, and maybe it would have a chance of failing and not becoming a city. And it could open up more possibilities, like you could force people to go to the colony, causing un-hapinnes but a boost in population or something.

Anyone else have opinions? How to make it better, etc?

 

[snipelfritz]

Perhaps, there could be two "settler" units, a basic settler costing 2 laborers to make, and a colonist costing 1 laborer to make. A colonist would make a colony (didn't see that one coming, didja?). When a colony has a population of 2 or 3. It would become a town and begin growing in cultural radius.

The only problem I see in this is that it may be hard to get a colony with a population of 3 without any cultural radius other than that one square.

 

[rhialto]

A colony is a city with a population level of 1. Why make an additional distinction? With your proposal, the overall change in teh game is almost insignificant. Any pop1 city that grows has effectively become a city in either the standard or your modified rules, and a pop1 city in standard rules isn't exactly a powerhouse of industry anyway.

 

[Aussie_Lurker]

I think the key issue we should be looking at is HOW 'colony/village' populations grow. As it stands pretty much ALL population is due to the amount of food the city produces. It should be much more complex than that-incorporating factors like wealth, access to food AND shields, city size, immigration/emigration, government type, social policies and the like! This would be a darn site better, and would also make population growth a little more difficult to Micromanage!

Yours,
Aussie_Lurker.

 

[rhialto]

You mean something like in the original Master of Magic game?

 

[Aussie_Lurker]

Huh???

Was that addressed to me Rhialto? If so, then I'm afraid I don't know what you mean, as I have never played ANY of the Might and Magic Games.
I just think that population growth and, more to the point, DECLINE should be better modelled. Cities which are wealthy and have excellent access to luxuries may have a lower population growth to natural births, but recieve a greater intake via immigration. Also, though, there might also have to be minuses to the ledger. Lack of food, disease and poverty will increase the rate of population decline. Over all of this, of course, is your national fertility. Each civ will have a fertility rate based on its civ traits and the setting you apply in your social engineering settings!
Hope that makes sense.

Yours,
Aussie_Lurker.

 

[rhialto]

That's OK - I haven't played Might and Magic either. The system you are proposing is, except for the fact that it also has industry and trade as a growth variable, exactly how Master of Magic turned colonies into cities. It was one of the less exciting aspects of MoM.

 

[Spatula]

I don't like the idea to be honest. A settler represents what, about 200,000 people? Seems enough to make a new town to me.

 

[llib_rm]

Perhaps an adjustment to the tiles available to work would better describe the concept of a colony. For example:

Culture < 10 = 5 tiles
10 < Culture < 100 = 9 tiles
100 < Culture = 21 tiles

...where the number of tiles available does not get reduced after a change in city ownership. Certainly puts a focus on builders and may slow down domination wins.