Firaxis wants to remove "unfun"? Eliminate WORKERS!

[dh_epic]

While I don't call "the city screen" and "palace improvements" part of the game... I'm glad that people are understanding the problem here and offering alternate solutions.

While I leave the UI ultimately in the hands of the developers, by virtue of the fact that it's not about user-controlled path finding is a distinct improvement. I like the idea of costs, as an alternate strategy for how to manage your workers, with less micromanagement... the question is if it adds more complexity. I don't know, but I leave this to debate among those in the "anti-worker" camp.

I will say this:

AI Automation is not a sufficient solution.

Why?

Because AI Automation is the reason I micromanage on deity level. The AI automation is inefficient, let's say 75% as effective as if I managed the workers myself. If I want to beat my AI opponents, using the same AI to automate my civ is the most hazardous thing to do.

That's why I'd get rid of workers. Because the micromanagement game is repetitive and boring for the many casual gamers, and inescapable for the few like myself and others on this board who play at the highest difficulties. And an inevitability in power politics is knowing that the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.

At the highest level, I'd rather my most important decision is whether to be a tyrant or hero to my people, or how to wage war... not how to economize movement points and turns.

 

[sir_schwick]

I do think that improveing terrain should have a noticeable cost. This way you require a decent economy and tech level before you can get good roads or cities. It would also keep what I call "Roman Roads" in the very early game. Rome had the vast resources required for a proper roading project.

 

[Aussie_Lurker]

A very simple solution that I have posted here before!

1) You have 'points' for doing terrain improvements.

2) Each terraforming job has a point value, which limits the number of jobs you can have going at any one time.

3) You build 'worker' units, which are 'attached' to the city that builds them, to do your terraforming jobs at faster than the 'listed times'.

4) You can shift workers around, to different cities, via the trade network. These workers go via a central pool that will appear in your 'trade screen'.

5) This trade screen is also where you can trade workers to other civs.

6) If you have an unprotected terrain terraforming job ongoing, and that tile gets overrun by an enemy, then you have a chance of losing workers to that enemy. The chance and number lost being dependant on how many workers you assigned to the task!

7) Slave workers you capture go into your city's 'central worker pool' for later allocation to terraforming jobs. They 'require' less food than your normal workers, and have no maintainance costs. However, they would pose a risk of a 'slave revolt' in that city.

8) Aside from terraforming, workers and slaves have other uses. Firstly, slaves and workers can be 'sacrificed' to produce shields towards construction projects (improvements and wonders, not units)-though this might cause great unhappiness! Secondly, if you have a slave market in the city, then your city gets bonus income and production for every slave the city has.

9) Terrain improvements outside of a city radius come out of the national 'public work point' budget. Any workers/slaves currently available in the trade screen can be used to shorten the length of these jobs.

The benefits are: (a) less micromanagement-as you are prompted to assign the workers to the job when you select it. (b) Workers can still be lost to enemy attack, so defending your terrain improvements whilst they are being built will still remain an important strategy-as will attacking enemy hexes currently under development. (c) So long as the city is on a trade network, you can move its workers between cities much faster than you currently can in civ3, meaning that you don't have to wait 100 years for your workers to travel just a few tiles!! This way of vectoring workers also helps to reduce micromanagement.

EDIT: BTW, I also find it VERY amusing that those who most often complain about my ideas because, as they say, it will 'increase micromanagement' are often the very same people who poo-poo our ideas to remove the micromanagement aspect of workers! In my opinion, workers should still have a population and income cost for the city which builds them. As for instantaneous travel, well RR's allow the equivalent of teleportation and, given the minimum turn length of the game, I don't think its unrealistic to get workers from one end of your nation to another!
However, from a 'strategic' standpoint, you could add one, or all, of the following restrictions to worker movement

a) Have a lag time between moving a worker to the central pool, and moving to from the pool to its destination city.

b) Increase the risk of 'losing' a worker according to the relative distance between the donor city and the 'capital' (be it provincial or major) and again between the capital and the recipient city.

c) Boost the base risk in (b) according to the number of enemy units that lie between the cities mentioned in (b).

Yours,
Aussie_Lurker.

 

[dh_epic]

Aussie, you're too good, you know that?

I can't believe I didn't think of it -- of course enslavement would still be possible. A little worker unit, or 2, or 3, or 8 would appear on the tile you assign, permitting some of your precious workers (and population) to be enslaved still. A nice little strategy worth saving.

The key is that you spend less time playing the "movement points game" -- a very important game to play at the deity level, but a very mechanical process that you could teach a monkey or robot to do, and is no longer fun the 50th time you do it.

E.g.: Assigning 3 workers to build a road from Rome to Pompeii will take 6 turns and 4 gold.

And you can assign mass amounts of workers to a task, and have more "virtual" infrastructure improvements, like trade routes, since it no longer depends on a specific square.

E.g.: Assigning 3 workers to build a sea trade route from Sicily to Memphis will take 2 turns, and will cost 5 gold per turn to maintain.

It's something you can do easily with just the mouse (instead of mouse + keyboard), and lets you focus on the empowering decisions, not the tedious mechanical ones.

 

[thestonesfan]

Great idea! I think most of us would be happy with that one.

 

[Colonel Kraken]

I like what Epic and Aussie advocate here. I get frustrated (same as when Civ III was in development), when talking about the 4TH! iteration of the Civ series that we're still talking about all the exact same game mechanics, just sprucing 'em up a little.

Why must our thinking be confined to the exact same old formula? Some will say because it works. Well, I say, it's time to move on and make the Civ series a true civ experience. Retaining all these little pet nuisances, like workers, is a block to thinking of new and grand ways to experience the civ series.

Aussie, please see my comments in your great thread here.

 

[geishapunk]

In my opinion this will result in the opposite! More micromanagament!!!

This is because you have to enter all that cities to give your worker pool the orders or shifting the workers around the pool cities. The, next problem. What is about Cities that are connected, but only by sea or with roads of other CIVs? No i think this solution is not that plain simple and workable as you think.

The worker concept is not perfect, nor could be any concept. But your solutions sounds like more annoying micromanagament to me.

 

[sir_schwick]

In real life most construction is done under contract. Slave labor did help in the old days, but slave labour was much mroe a part of everyday labour then specific construction. Here are my thoughts. Each city adds to the amount of jobs that can be done at one time. These jobs cost more if they are external to roads, your territory, or there are too many jobs servicing one city(bueracracy cost). Each job services one tile, and you cannot combine the same job workers on a tile. If you want faster results, you have to subsidize the contractors(increased costs). This eliminates having to find workers in a worker pool. Also, you can't build more workers, the market of skilled labor is limited by factors such as tech level(Construction really adds to numbers of jobs), commerce generation of city(wealth), size of city(maintenace of current structures) and growth of city(need for new construction).

Salve labour and capturing:
W/e a tile is being worked, some little graphic will show what is happening. Raiding of that tile will increase your construction costs(security and risk pay). It will also destroy work on the tile, and may make citizens in nearby cities unhappy(security breach). Slave labour can be forced out of your citizens(bad idea though), or conquered cities. In the Ancient Era civs often raided each other for slaves, so you could take a size 7 city and get 7 slaves in your labour pool.
Slaves count as a job each, but they cost much less, make you unpopular with the slave groups ethnicity and nation, and take much longer. There is a chance of revolt if your slave labor pool is large compared to population. Also, it increases trade for your civ until slavery becomes immoral.

 

[Colonel Kraken]

Great ideas, sir_schwick! I like anything that makes it seem more like you're the head of a civilization instead of the tyrant of a collection of cities.

 

[Aussie_Lurker]

Actually, Geishapunk, it won't result in more micromanagement because it will ALL be done via the main trade screen.
Envisage this: You open your trade screen and, at the top, you have all of the resources, commodities and workers/slaves currently in the 'central pool' (just to note, the central pool is just a neccessary ' game construct', and has no real life analogy!) for disbursement and trade. Under this, you have a list of the cities currently in your trade network and, just below each city name: a shield, food and worker symbol. Next to each symbol will be a xX-indicating how many of each you have available ikn that city. When you click on the symbol, it will ask you how many of that item you wish to shift to your 'central pool'. You enter the number and, whoolah, it appears in our central pool. Next turn (if a lag is imposed). You can click on the shield/food/worker symbol under the 'Central Pool' heading. Again it will ask 'how many you want to shift' You enter the number then click on the city you want it to go to. OTOH, this turn you can go into your diplomacy screen, and those workers/shields/food will come up on your side of the 'table' for trade purposes! All the information in ONE PLACE, and movable with just a couple of clicks-no dragging of cursors, no checking to see where your worker currently is, and it all happens so QUICKLY!

Yours,
Aussie_Lurker.

 

[Sark6354201]

Alright, this is a bad idea. Ever played Call to Power? BORING. BORING. BORING. Of course that is just my opinion, but cmon. I don't want to click around and have stuff appear and I certainly don't want to goto one screen and assign different stuff then hit end. It's a game and the worker part of it is fun, I want to build a road? I'll move my worker and send a swordsman to protect him from marauding huns and seljuks in the area, it's the basis of civ and should never be changed. This is one of the reason Call to Power is not Civilization.

dh, VERY few people play Diety, I mean give me a break, I would say 97% of all civ players dont play it. I've played Civ a long time and am much better at it then your average Joe, and I've only beaten Emperor once. So to your average player and even me, who aren't as good as some of the people here (or you), automated workers do a decent enuf job for the most part. I like to have some workers under my control for specific tasks and others for more mundane ones like moving around and irrigating.

If you don't like workers, go play Call to Power, where a lawyer can stop the production of your most important industrial metropolis for a whole year apparently, and during war time.

 

[geishapunk]

@AUSSI

This is maybe workable for small empires with lets say 20 cities. But mayor empires with 100+ cities... and than you sit in front of this list trying to designate your working actions...... wow.... more growth in micormanagament than i ever thought.....

PLUS transfering the workers the way you described is far more work with the mouse than simply moving worker stacks...

So in my opinion this would result in more micromanagament an more unfun....

 

[sir_schwick]

I do agree that having to designate between local workers and the 'national pool' would add to micromanagement. The physical worker unit is illogical considering that most developement was a case of need or economic viability. Farming communities built irrigation because it would help increase their yield and eventual pay. The real exception to contracted or self-created improvments would be the Roman Road system. This was built by Roman legions(the first effective combat engineers). Now I would like to see a Combat Engineer unit. These guys could build stuff real fast(roads, forts) and would have marginal combat value, plus 2 movement.

You who complain about the designation system, go back up and check my post.

 

[geishapunk]

I do agree that having to designate between local workers and the 'national pool' would add to micromanagement. The physical worker unit is illogical considering that most developement was a case of need or economic viability. Farming communities built irrigation because it would help increase their yield and eventual pay. The real exception to contracted or self-created improvments would be the Roman Road system. This was built by Roman legions(the first effective combat engineers). Now I would like to see a Combat Engineer unit. These guys could build stuff real fast(roads, forts) and would have marginal combat value, plus 2 movement.

You who complain about the designation system, go back up and check my post.

Thats just one point that adds to micromanagament. Second is the designation of the work to do. How should this be in your concept? In the city screen or at the advisors screen? Both is more micromanagament, because you allways have to switch between map and screen, plus with many cities you will loose the the overview completly.

Is it possible that no one stated this out until yet? IMO there is one big advantage coming with the worker system:

You manage the improvements directly on the map! No switching between screens, no looking for the map (because you are on the map), no calculating about worker points (what the workers are able to do is easy to have in mind). An easy but complex system.

I must admitt that the more i think this over the more i dislike. The more annoying it sounds.

 

[Aussie_Lurker]

OK, my last word on this matter is that I still prefer the system that I've laid out here-though I confess to some personal bias in this ! However, if they DO stick with the existing worker-based system, I will not be all that upset. i.e. I would still go out and buy the game in a heart beat !

Yours,
Aussie_Lurker.

 

[thestonesfan]

Yeah, I wouldn't be too shook up over it either.

As long as I don't have to spend the Modern Age moving them from one polluted square to another. That sucks.

 

[dh_epic]

Thats just one point that adds to micromanagament. Second is the designation of the work to do. How should this be in your concept? In the city screen or at the advisors screen? Both is more micromanagament, because you allways have to switch between map and screen, plus with many cities you will loose the the overview completly.

To me it's dead simple.

ALLOCATING WORKERS TO YOUR WORKER POOL

Imagine a little "+ / -" button beside each city. (Replace that stupid "Intelligence Agency" button, because it should be put in the Civ screens, and not hidden in one city in your empire). Doesn't have to be plus and minus, but the idea is that you use this to draft people into the worker pool, and put them back.

I have a city with 6 people, and they're using the city squares as in every other civ game. I press +, +, the city still has 6 people, but now only 4 are working city squares, and 2 people have been added to my overall worker pool. Demand increases for roads: +, +, the city now only has 2 people and production is very slow, but my roads are happening slightly faster. Demand for roads decreases: -, -, -, and now only 1 person is outside that city's main production force, building infrastructure.

DRAWING YOUR ROADS, IRRIGATIONS, AND MINES

As simple as MS paint. You pick the irrigation paint brush, and you lay down some translucent irrigation tiles near your city. Your workers will get through them, turn by turn. You pick the road paint brush, and drag a road from one city to another. Your workers will work through it, turning it from translucent to opaque: a planned road, to a real road.

You decide that you need to raise the priority of one particular improvement. You can select "road" tool and "high priority" tool, and lay it down. Or you can select the "raise priority" tool on an existing "future road". Or select the "lower priority" tool on other roads.

You want to create a trade route? You select the trade route tool. Your trade routes, which are otherwise invisible, suddenly become visible as indiana jones style dotted red lines. You click on one city and much like an MS paint line tool, it waits for you to lay down the second point in your trade route. You click on the second city, and it tells you the cost and asks you to confirm that you want to build the trade route -- maybe it even tells you how much money you can expect to make from the trade route per turn. Clicking on a foreign city, it might ask him for permission -- and you guys might split the cost, and receive different benefits!


UI EFFICIENCY BENEFITS

I see this as WAY more efficient than moving around workers for a lot of reasons:

- no more path finding (no need to economize movement points)
- no more searching around for a worker
- go to / keyboard movement are no longer needed to perform "work"
- queue up mass amounts of improvements


MAINTAINING STRATEGY

- a worker still comes from a city, thus slowing that city's production
- workers can still be captured if a work in progress is attacked by an enemy
- still have to prioritize your improvements based on what is needed sooner
- (if people like it) need to control gold-spending as you build infrastructure
- (if people like it) "virtual" infrastructure, like trade routes or supply lines


Plus the fact that if you spend fewer hours of your game playing with workers... the makers of Civ will see that as a few more hours you could spend playing with something else: provinces, economy, foreign policy, government, a future age, I dunno what people want, but the sky is the limit.

Plus micromanaging movement points is no longer an advantage that expert players can exploit over the dumb AI (even at Deity), or leverage over "lazy" players who automate workers. This is KEY to a good multiplayer experience.

 

[Colonel Kraken]

Absolutely stupendous, dh_epic! What a wonderful idea! After reading the slide-show, however, I can't help but think that this "new" Civ IV is going to be a glorified Civ III which was a glorified Civ II. Same, same; just a little fancier. :sigh:

--CK

 

[sir_schwick]

DRAWING YOUR ROADS, IRRIGATIONS, AND MINES

Thanx for the analogy dh. That is very very simialir to how jobs would be allocated in my system. My worker pool is automatically allocated, because the specifics of the creation of jobs is a Micro-economic rather then a Macro-econmic issue. A priority system for jobs(might add complexity) would also be cool, since your construction managers would try to get the lowest bidder.

 

[dh_epic]

Thanx for the analogy dh. That is very very simialir to how jobs would be allocated in my system. My worker pool is automatically allocated, because the specifics of the creation of jobs is a Micro-economic rather then a Macro-econmic issue. A priority system for jobs(might add complexity) would also be cool, since your construction managers would try to get the lowest bidder.

Hey no problem. I assumed it went without saying, but I give credit to the stuff you wrote. I just felt obligated to summarize / tie it together, since that's just something that a lot of thread starters do.

I think the important facts to show, regardless of the details, is that if the developers tinker with it enough:

1. it can be balanced
2. it can reduce micromanagement
3. it can free up the user's time to handle new, more interesting features
4. (a by-product of 2) the arms race between user exploitation of game details and AI cheating at the high levels will become less necessary, letting the AI be more "natural"