Communitas_79 Strategic Resource Poll

[Stalker0]

As people are looking at possible tweaks to the Communitas_79 map, one question is around the plentifulness (or lack thereor) of various strategic resources. So this poll is to guage how you feel about the various strategic resources on the map.

NOTE: This is for Communitas_79 ONLY. If your not playing that map, we ask you to hold off on any feedback. Feedback for other maps will not be included here.

So in the poll select the option you think makes sense for each resource:

• Too little: You think this resource is unnecessary tight in the majority of games you play on the map, you are always craving more.
• Just Right: The resource feels like a good amount in the majority of games on that map. You might want more of course, but the resource amount feels reasonable.
• Over Abundant: You always have more of this resource than you need, to the point you barely consider it a strategic resource.

 

[hokath]

I, personally, find it impossible to really formulate an opinion on these scarcity questions.
I only play a few games each version and they'll all be so different in terms of map gen/civ/policy choices/etc.

 

[Haldar]

Coal is hard to judge for me, cause depending on what map gets generated, sometimes I swim in coal, and sometimes I have 0 coal, or like 1 tile with 2-3 coal at best. with coal i'd say the issue is not the raw amount of it, but more often that it happens to spawn many coal tiles close to each other on one continent, while you can have other conitnent(s) without any coal

 

[azum4roll]

Coal placement is the most restrictive. Grass/plains AND featureless. That's asking to be clumped close together. Not really a map problem, though Communitu_79a generally has less grass/plains than standard maps.

 

[statusquo]

Usually, my observation from recent games sum up to "never enough coal, crazy amounts of aluminium"..
Thats why im always taking Autocracy, and prioritize 100% more resources, since its about same time you get Factories and Seaports

I also like the idea of places of maps that some resources could be over abundant, like Saudi Arabia with Oil, but this may be OP in some configuration..
So like if usually stacks would be 1-2 and let say one in 10 or even 15 would have 4x or even 8x..
That would justified declaring a war over such precious resource..

I usually prefer to play with mod that remove Giant Death Robots, since they just trivialize the game, and or play with mod that remove nukes or
prioritize ban of their usage, so with that configuration the only sink for Uranium become Nuclear plant, so for me, even with relatively small numbers, Uranium, just floats around without any real usage..

It is rarely that i play till very late game, but when you want a lot of Jet Fighers, and maybe prioritize Wind Power plants, it can actually sink big amouts of Aluminium, maybe
that was the purpose of those crazy amounts, but then again, having more Jet Fighters then opponents become necessity.
Tuning down the number a little, might help with Jet Fighter being "pinnacle" air unit instead somethin that you "have to mass", and prioritize Other power plants to squize more aluminium for more air..
But then again, if you have too little of Jet Fighters, opponent can build a lot of anti aircraft, and such position would be impenetrable by air..

I also would like to have more Coal piles but maybe with smaller size, more 1x or 2x stack and less 4x, there is nothing worse, than when you discover coal, it turn out any of your 6-10 cities got none..
But your opponent got 2 x4..
To some extent, maybe coal amouts are justiffied, who said, you should have Factory and Seaport/Transit station in each city? I guess its a question of balancing..

Hmmm, maybe it would be justified, that when you discover a tech that gives you some resource, you get 1x of them in your capitol by default..
I dont think that would be unbalanced, just yet another benefit of beelining specific tech..
I mean, how you can discover something that you never had in the first place ?

 

[pineappledan]

An abundance of aluminum on the map just makes sense to me because that’s a real thing IRL. Aluminum unlocks at Electricity, and before the chemical and metallurgical processes to purify bauxite into aluminum were created, which are very energy-intensive, aluminum was a precious metal like silver or platinum.

Aluminum is the third most abundant chemical on the planet, after only oxygen and silicon, but is primarily found in bauxite, a rock which was impossible to extract aluminum out of until the invention of the Hall-Heroult process in 1886. Since then the price per Kg of aluminum has steadily plummeted for almost 100 years straight, and only just started to tick up again recently. Aluminum has all sorts of extremely useful properties which make it important to have for strategic reasons, but overall it’s quite literally common as dirt.

 

[statusquo]

which are very energy-intensive, aluminum was a precious metal, like silver or platinum

Yea, honestly i dont know if thats coincidence, but it just recently heard that the tip of Washington Monument was made of Aluminium which was supposedly represent wealth and prosperity..
But that was because of high electricity cost, and it was become cheap, little bit later, when electricity was easier and cheaper to get..
Not sure if that has sense, but maybe the values should be halved, and just Power plants should also provide double amount of aluminium resource..
That would be historically accurate..And also is a building that is available same era as Aluminium starts to be needed in vast amounts..
Just thinking out loud
But as i understand, that would be annoying since it would also require updating all of the map scripts right?

 

[CppMaster]

I mean, how you can discover something that you never had in the first place ?

How can you have something without discovering it first?

 

[statusquo]

How can you have something without discovering it first?

There is a difference between "traces of something" which could be found almost everywhere and discovering "vast deposits"
Thus idea of +1 in capitol, or other "center of science"..

 

[Stalker0]

An abundance of aluminum on the map just makes sense to me because that’s a real thing IRL. Aluminum unlocks at Electricity, and before the chemical and metallurgical processes to purify bauxite into aluminum were created, which are very energy-intensive, aluminum was a precious metal like silver or platinum.

Aluminum is the third most abundant chemical on the planet, after only oxygen and silicon, but is primarily found in bauxite, a rock which was impossible to extract aluminum out of until the invention of the Hall-Heroult process in 1886. Since then the price per Kg of aluminum has steadily plummeted for almost 100 years straight, and only just started to tick up again recently. Aluminum has all sorts of extremely useful properties which make it important to have for strategic reasons, but overall it’s quite literally common as dirt.

Its true that in terms of crust abundance, aluminum is the 3rd most plentiful element (iron being number 4). However, economically speaking absolute abundance doesn't matter, only production of a material truly factors into its strategic utility.

Global Annual Production

Now we can start the picture with annual production numbers. When you look at those numbers:

• Aluminum has 65.3 million metric tons of annual production (2021)
• Iron is a little trickier, but steel (the main product iron is used for) has a production of 1,864 million metric tons (2021).
• Oil is trickier still, as there are so many types. But if we were to consider just gasoline production (to represent the refined product for useable in the stuff we use it for in civ 5), thats about ~30 million metric tonnes (2021).
• For comparison, crude oil production: 4.6 BILLION metric tonnes per year.
• And coal production: ~7 BILLION metrics tonnes per year.
• Uranium: 48,888 metrics tonnes per year (2022).

So on the supply side, sure aluminum may be plentiful in the crust, but its not even close to the most widely produced material comparing all of the "strategic resources".

Now to keep things easy, lets normalize everything down to easy to use units, to represent the access to these resources.

• Uranium: 1
• Oil (Gasoline): 614
• Aluminum: 1,336
• Iron (Steel): 38,136
• Coal: 143,184

These are rounded a bit fyi but gives you an idea of the relative production differences between the resources.

Price: Aka Supply and Demand
However, ultimately even production doesn't really tell the story of strategic utility. For that....we use the marketplace. Price is a main indicator of how "valued" a resource is compared to its availability. So looking at the prices for the various materials:

Uranium: $531,671 / metric tonne
Aluminum: $2,705 / metric tonne (2022)
Steel: $1,000 / metric tonne (2022) (Note this number is highly variable and really depends on the kind of steel you are talking about).
Gasoline: $672 / metric tonne (also highly variable as we all know)
Coal: $75 / metric tonne


If we take a metric tonne as a "strategic unti in civ 5"....uranium is by far the most coveted resource. Aluminum is number 2, with coal all the way at the bottom. If you were really trying to model strategic resource availabilities (aka value) based on real world numbers, uranium should be incredibly scarce as should aluminum. Coal should be very very plentiful.

Now....I don't think we should be changing our maps based on these kinds of numbers. My point is using "real life" as a guide here is pretty silly. Real strategic resources have "tons" of demands on them that we don't reflect in the game, nor does the game reflect the wide range of material purities. Hell there isn't any indicator of what a "unit" of strategic resource even means. I mean no one thinks it takes as much iron to make a field gun as it does an entire cruiser or battleship. I think using real life gives us an initial guidepost, but beyond that we should not be using it to say "oh I think coal should be half as abundant on a map as iron, or xyz"....that's just madness.

 

[looorg]

There rarely seems to be enough horses and iron. It should be more plentiful. Or if it's not on the map some buildings should probably add one or two. Such as stables or forged adding some more if you have at least one or two.

 

[statusquo]

I mean no one thinks it takes as much iron to make a field gun as it does an entire cruiser or battleship. I think using real life gives us an initial guidepost

I think we are comparing those resources, to more or less reflect of real world balance..
Like for example, wood is a resource, but its not a strategic one, since its very common and abundant, and in case its lacking, you can just plant more trees and eventually get more..
Strategic resources are "strategic" because they are scarse and impossible to substitute, and the only means to get more is to find more..

I think we could use some "ratios" since there are ratios in real world, we cant deny that there is x amount of this, and y amount of that, but to calculate exact formulas, i think we would have to figure out,
how much this annual production translates to real life applications.. Cause you for sure need less Uranium to fuel Nuclear plant than Coal for coal plant.. And yet there are let say 1 Nuclear plant per few
Coal plans, which would suggest, that in game Uranium should be in less amounts than Coal..
But then again it also depends of how people sees those sources of energy, technologies and natural resources of specific countries.. Like for example, there was boom for Nuclear plant, then
it kinda stopped, and now we kinda go back.. So even real life proportions doesn't tell a full story..
I think best solution would be to assume some map, lets say 5 civilizations 10 cities each, how many Nuclear plants should be available?
Or even better, assume perfect map distribution, so 1 Civ 10 cities, how many Nuclear plants such civilisation should be able to afford, and how many Aluminium Jet fighters..
Assuming with airport, you can have 6 them, should we assume half of cities should have full set of Jet Fighters or maybe you shoud afford maximum 1 Jet per City, since
its a difference between 10 and 30.. but then again lets say we assume 20, so 100 per map, but then autocracy policy that gives you 100% more would be op..
But then again all is down to meaningful decisions, so taking Autocracy means not taking Freedom or Order

Maybe instead map scripts, its rather the units needs balance, like for example, if i recall correctly, Carriers require only 1 oil and zero Steel
I would say, they probably should use 2 or even 3

As for now, i still think Aluminium should be tuned down a little, and amount of Coal could be ok, but should be little bit more dispersed, with rare larger deposits.
This way most civilisations should have more reliable access to every resource, but still scarcity would be a problem, you would have to solve by trade and alliances or war..
Like i noticed usually Coal have in 2x or 4x amounts, so replacing those 4x with more 2x and 3x Should Do the job..
But aluminium very often have like 6x or 8x, so with autocracy you could get 16x for one mine.. This seems kinda ridiculous..

Such as stables or forged adding some more if you have at least one or two.

Make sense, especially for horses, since you can breed them, not that much with steel..
You kinda don't want to make this too common , since like in medieval era, if your supply limit is 20 and you have like 20 iron, there would be no
"meaningfulness" in your decisions.. Horses are definitely not as common as wood
But then again, its not impossible that some civ have aboundance and sell their superfluous resources, like Russia sells Oil..
But then again, they are bought by countries, that don't have them, so i guess some dose of "imbalance" exists in the real world..
That is why countries like to have energetic diversity, which is not guaranteed, and if you have abundance, you should consider yourselves lucky
and not expect to be given..
Just had idea, that maybe terrains that are considered to be "weaker" should have slightly greater chance to get strategic resources, this would kinda
balance out lack of yields by future trading.. But i think to some point it is true already i think Ice, Tundra or Desert have slightly better chance to get oil for example..
Honestly i don't remember if i ever saw Oil on grassland

 

[looorg]

Make sense, especially for horses, since you can breed them, not that much with steel..

It would symbolize breeding when it comes to horses, for a forge and iron it would just be that you can stretch it further and get more out of it so they count for more. Less waste perhaps. Not that the iron would multiply on its own or anything.

 

[ma_kuh]

In the case of aluminum, you can always have the initial deposits be very thin, but scale them by era/tech (probably in the form of a building that requires aluminum). I think that highlights better production and efficiencies that leads to a resource becoming plentiful, rather than having a bunch lying around as soon as you barely learn to make use of the resource. IF that was something that even needed "fixing".

 

[Zuizgond]

I don't want games to have a relatively fixed amount of resources. I like the randomness of resource availability from one game to another.

 

[azum4roll]

In the case of aluminum, you can always have the initial deposits be very thin, but scale them by era/tech (probably in the form of a building that requires aluminum). I think that highlights better production and efficiencies that leads to a resource becoming plentiful, rather than having a bunch lying around as soon as you barely learn to make use of the resource. IF that was something that even needed "fixing".

Aluminum is one of those that you have plenty of at start but will start lacking at the end. Kinda the opposite of Oil. Maybe if we change Jet Fighter and Stealth Bomber to requiring Oil we can reduce the Aluminum amount and solve the problem.

 

[Stalker0]

I don't want games to have a relatively fixed amount of resources. I like the randomness of resource availability from one game to another.

Keep in mind that no change to the resource level would make it a "fixed value". It just affects the average on which the variation is run. Ultimately there are still going to be games where you have less of a resource or more of a resource, it just affects generally how much you get game per game.

 

[statusquo]

It would symbolize breeding when it comes to horses, for a forge and iron it would just be that you can stretch it further and get more out of it so they count for more. Less waste perhaps. Not that the iron would multiply on its own or anything.

Not directly its already occounted.. like 1 steel is needed to build Classical Era Swordsman and Atomic Era Battleship..

Maybe if we change Jet Fighter and Stealth Bomber to requiring Oil we can reduce the Aluminum amount and solve the problem.

Honestly i don't see why Jet Fighters don't use Oil
Same as tanks don't use Steel I mean, they for sure require more steel than swordsman

 

[Bison]

Personally I think coal is fine. It's an uncommon and powerful strategic that makes me want to grab the land wherever it is. By conquest or by using citadels, whatever works.
If you are not up for taking land, though, there are also many policies that give you bonus coal in multiple ways or even duplicate the ones you own. You also have the possibility of allying city states that have coal or, again, conquer or plop a citadel near their land. And don't forget about the slater mill.

If you do all of the above then you can splurge on all your coal needs.