Current v1.13 Development Discussion

[Leoreth]

So divorcing the health bonus from the other effects would be a solution, which I see you have already implemented with the smokehouse. What I would consider ideal is that you can keep your cities healthy, but you have to actually invest in it. It isn't just automatic with all the resources you have, you need to build aqueducts, smokehouses and perhaps a new building like sewers, things you would not build for their non-health benefits.

Yes, that is a direction I want to go into as well. Could be the solution for some happiness resources.

 

[need my speed]

Two random suggestions:

Have the happiness / healthiness bonus of a traded resource degrade depending on the distance (which in itself would depend on technologies); France buying German fur would be 1 (full) happiness, but France buying Arabian dye would be 0.5 happiness, and France buying Chinese incense would be 0.25 happiness (I'd limit the values to 1, 0.5, and 0.25, for convenience). Astronomy (or perhaps a tiny bit later) would remove this limit.

Random sidenote: The world, just before WWI, was more interconnected (trade, travel...) than our current world is (because our Africa and Middle-East are a stereotypically poor place full of violence and nastiness), I believe.

As for the second suggestion, I'm unsure if it's in-game already, but if France borders Germany, which borders Poland, and there is no other route to Poland but one through Germany, can France trade with Poland, if France has no open borders with Germany?

Because it seems very unlikely that, say, Rome can trade with China, but I've seen it happen. Maybe require not merely the knowledge of 'oh, there's a road or a coastal route here', but, for the parts that aren't covered in culture, require line of sight (units; no fog)?

 

[Leoreth]

These are good ideas, and I had some of them myself in some form. The problem is practicality within the system and transparency for the user.

Happiness is an integer right now. Sure, it would be possible to change that, but this would complicate the system from a user perspective.

Changing the rules for trade connections is more complicated, because that's one of the most expensive operations in the game. I don't want to complicate it too much further, or extend the system in a way that would require connections to be recalculated more often. That's without looking into the code though.

As an aside, I have often heard people cite the 1970 as being on par with pre-WW1 in terms of economic interconnectedness, although I have no idea how you would measure that.

 

[youtien]

Salt is not appropriate in this mod. You can get salt from sea, while inland cities are hard to get it unless there are some in land. In civ4, all cities in trade network share resource, so there's no transport issue, so it is better leave salt as granted.

 

[calad]

Ever heard about city Salzburg?

Salt is very essential resource. Historically it is more important than gold, there were no other ways to storage large amounts of food expect than using salt. Malis wealth was based on salt trade, China had almost 2000 years old salt monopoly, British Raj set restrictions on salt and later Gandhi used this.

Salt should obsolete on modern era because it has become so common, but it is very important resource and should be in game.

 

[agentxorange]

Just because salt was traded doesn't mean it fits into the mod.

 

[youtien]

Removing Vanarasi hurts too much. Now it is nearly impossible to achieve UHV with Indians. Should add one more settler.

 

[ales_]

In the meantime:
- new Indian UB: Bamboo Bowman (Archer): can enter Jungle, starts with Shock and Woodsman I

You meant UU, didn't you?

 

[Leoreth]

Yeah sorry, typo.

 

[Lokki242]

Leoreth, here's the Vancouver I founded.

Spoiler :

 

[calad]

Just because salt was traded doesn't mean it fits into the mod.

that is not at all constructive comment.

 

[agentxorange]

that is not at all constructive comment.

...wow. All I meant is it doesn't fit in the scope.

Jinx, though.

 

[Visard]

I want to suggest that seafood would lose its base health (again).
But smokehouse would give from fish and supermarket would give from clams and crabs.

Fish can be transported and traded when its salted/smoked.
But clams and crabs go bad without refrigeration.

 

[Leoreth]

Yeah, it's an abstraction. For now, I think it works as it is.

 

[NerfCothons]

On the health changes. There are elements of both waves that I liked. However it seems like the goal that you are trying to accomplish is preventing non-local foodstuffs from improving pre-refrigeration health. Gameplay-wise you are trying to reduce achievable health totals as well. To those ends preventing pre-refrigeration trade of perishables is part of the solution but a large classical empire (a la Rome) can still acquire all perishable foods and gain health benefits across an entire empire through domestic trade. In fact with the new smokehouse even higher early health totals are achievable. A smokehouse built in Rome can add health from the local Latin pigs as well as Neapolitan sheep, Magyar deer, and German cows, though now you cannot trade Spanish sheep to French Paris until refrigeration.

The way the game works local health comes from buildings while global health comes from the resource itself. Would it be possible to permit cow, pig, sheep, and deer to be workable, improvable, and usable by a local smokehouse without being added to your trade network as a proper resource until refrigeration? While lighthouse restricts the resource's benefit to coastal cities you still get the scenario where one crab resource at one coastal city benefits every coastal city throughout an empire regardless of distance. So the lighthouse health bonus could also benefit from similar restriction if possible.

Barring that perhaps the raw resource health bonus should also be delayed to refrigeration with the local building based health bonus moved up to early accessible buildings (smokehouse and harbor).

This also begs the question of what to do with bananas. As perishables they were able to cover long distances well before refrigeration though they were still limited by technology like other perishables. Perhaps they should get the same treatment as listed above but with steam power, astronomy, or guilds depending on your sense of scope.

The changes also create the minor issue that the textile industry, which makes use of wool represented as sheep, cannot pursue that resource internationally until refrigeration which is not accurate and compromises the corporation at it's key moment in history.

Just some thoughts. You don't owe me .

 

[Leoreth]

On the health changes. There are elements of both waves that I liked. However it seems like the goal that you are trying to accomplish is preventing non-local foodstuffs from improving pre-refrigeration health. Gameplay-wise you are trying to reduce achievable health totals as well. To those ends preventing pre-refrigeration trade of perishables is part of the solution but a large classical empire (a la Rome) can still acquire all perishable foods and gain health benefits across an entire empire through domestic trade. In fact with the new smokehouse even higher early health totals are achievable. A smokehouse built in Rome can add health from the local Latin pigs as well as Neapolitan sheep, Magyar deer, and German cows, though now you cannot trade Spanish sheep to French Paris until refrigeration.

It's obviously not perfectly realistic, but the whole resource trade and availability model in Civ4 really wasn't in the first place. I'm not actually that interested in nerfing empires any further, as resource control is one of the most accurate historical motivations for imperialism. At least now they don't get the runaway effect of more resource diversity plus more resources for trade as easily.

The way the game works local health comes from buildings while global health comes from the resource itself. Would it be possible to permit cow, pig, sheep, and deer to be workable, improvable, and usable by a local smokehouse without being added to your trade network as a proper resource until refrigeration? While lighthouse restricts the resource's benefit to coastal cities you still get the scenario where one crab resource at one coastal city benefits every coastal city throughout an empire regardless of distance. So the lighthouse health bonus could also benefit from similar restriction if possible.

You mean that only the city that works a resource has access to it until it can be traded? As of now, that's not really possible, because there isn't a notion of city control of resources in the code. There's only your global trade network and either a resource is in it or not.

Barring that perhaps the raw resource health bonus should also be delayed to refrigeration with the local building based health bonus moved up to early accessible buildings (smokehouse and harbor).

I reverted that change after I actually examined who was affected most by losing seafood health (there were spreadsheets involved). It turned out that against my initial impression, civs with low health to begin with suffered more than those who actually required a nerf. So it's more about the net health than the effect of those particular resources.

This also begs the question of what to do with bananas. As perishables they were able to cover long distances well before refrigeration though they were still limited by technology like other perishables. Perhaps they should get the same treatment as listed above but with steam power, astronomy, or guilds depending on your sense of scope.

From a realism standpoint, maybe. I am not too concerned by bananas because although they are often placed as an extra food resource, they are geographically much more limited. So most civs won't have bananas to begin with.

The changes also create the minor issue that the textile industry, which makes use of wool represented as sheep, cannot pursue that resource internationally until refrigeration which is not accurate and compromises the corporation at it's key moment in history.

Yeah, sheep is at this weird position where it both represent the meat and wool aspect. Like cotton, I considered making it a partial happiness resource to reflect that. In that case, it would be possible to lift the trade limitation.

Just some thoughts. You don't owe me .

Your posts are rare and always well thought out, so I feel like I do

 

[NerfCothons]

You mean that only the city that works a resource has access to it until it can be traded? As of now, that's not really possible, because there isn't a notion of city control of resources in the code. There's only your global trade network and either a resource is in it or not.

The Colossus adds one hammer to every sea tile in the city radius, could a smokehouse add one health to every cow, pig, sheep, deer tile worked by a city? Or does that particular bonus apply only to the land type and nothing more specific?

 

[Leoreth]

Exactly. Tile yields are associated with the cities that work them, but resource control is global for the entire player. The city only checks which resources the controlling player has when determining its health.

 

[youtien]

I think there shouldn't be smokehouse, because there will naturally be smokehouse -- citizens would build it and run it on their own. Unlike granary and all other buildings, all buildings in this game rely on at least some official power to build and maintain.

 

[FinalLegendZero]

all buildings in this game rely on at least some official power to build and maintain.

False. There are plenty of buildings in-game that aren't dependent on the government. Off the top of my head, there's the Forge, Market, Grocer, Bank, Supermarket, Theater, and University. There are probably others I'm not remembering at the moment.