fresh water is a finite resource

[Pacifist]

We already have rain; that's what separates Plains from Grassland.

LOL I never realized that - d'oh!

Now my idea doesn't sound so good to me now

I still like my idea of making stormy seas though hehe

I read somewhere here, or maybe in another thread, someone mentioning having "water" squares having different movement penalties. I like that idea and does relate to this topic a little, so I thought I'd mention it. There's not much terrain involvement when it comes to naval warfare in Civilization At least on land, you get mountains, hills and such. Maybe create a "4th" water tile that's indistinguishable from ocean tiles? Have iceburgs too maybe

Just throwing out ideas here so my thoughts are not necessarily good ones. Just brainstorming, which means any ideas (good or bad) I put down

It's a little Off-Topic but it is still water-related
I would really just like to see "water" tiles have some effects on naval vessels.

-Pacifist-
"Heal the world, make it a better place"

 

[Hyronymus]

If fresh water really was a finite resource the human species would be dead by now. Appearently though, there seems to be certain mechanisms that serve life (in general) well. Don't forget that people just didn't settle in dry locations until the discovery of irrigration first and later (when communities got larger) drink water supply.

 

[apatheist]

If fresh water really was a finite resource the human species would be dead by now. Appearently though, there seems to be certain mechanisms that serve life (in general) well. Don't forget that people just didn't settle in dry locations until the discovery of irrigration first and later (when communities got larger) drink water supply.

Er... you're not exactly wrong, but you're not right. I strongly urge you to read the links I supplied above. The water cycle replenishes fresh water, but it only does so at a certain rate. If you consume water faster than it's replenished, you're going to run out. Furthermore, that water already has a use. If you take water out of a river, you take it away from the fish that live there, or the lake that it feeds, or the flood plain it waters. You cannot take water from one part of the system without affecting another part of the system. Nor is water at one part of the same equally valuable or accessible compared to water from another part of the system. Nor is water evenly distributed across the Earth. Finally, all those mechanisms that you refer to work well for a nomadic human population of hunters and gatherers. Once you introduce urbanization, agriculture, and industrialization, however, you're dealing with something completely different.

 

[Xen]

all thats nice and good, but considering fresh water hast run out yet, and its only in moder times thatthier threatens to be any sort of shortage, and bearing in mind this is when the game ends, its not somthign that woudl be very good to apply in the game.

 

[Hyronymus]

Once you introduce urbanization, agriculture, and industrialization, however, you're dealing with something completely different.

Well, that's something I do agree with and I wonder if you see where I disagree then.

No? You said it yourself: "Once you introduce" and the things you mentioned are indeed introduced later on, as mankind developed into technologicly more advanced monsters (read: creatures). From that point on, fresh water became a finite resource, something it never was before. From my point of view your suggestions would only make sense from after the introduction of 'fresh water threats', such as the 3 things you mentioned. This might add a nice tactical challange towards the end of the game then, killing 2 birds with 1 stone.

 

[Superkrest]

it is very true that water can be over exploited..but a perfect example of recycling is the mississippi river..it is used for irrigation for miles beyond its banks and feeds many major citys..it is said that the water that reaches new orleans is either run off or recycled at least 4 times...yet its flows are still high and sometimes too high. but at the same time you have places like the south west were ground water is being sucked completly out..so i dunno...i dont know if its fair to treat all water as finite..but i also dont think that it should be infinite..sooo..i dont know if there is anyway to properly implement it

 

[Hyronymus]

Sure there is: make fresh(!) water finite wherever there is a desert or tundra and make it infinite elsewhere until agricultural and industrial revolution hit mankind. Then you can make fresh water dependent on pollution too. To bad pollution is a goner in Civ4, perhaps tie health, happiness and growth to fresh water to meet our demands.

 

[apatheist]

all thats nice and good, but considering fresh water hast run out yet, and its only in moder times thatthier threatens to be any sort of shortage, and bearing in mind this is when the game ends, its not somthign that woudl be very good to apply in the game.

That's not true, though. In earlier times, people just didn't settle in large numbers where they couldn't get water. That sounds like a potential component for gameplay. You may own the territory, but you can't use it until you get water there. Your dominion in the ancient and medieval eras may cover a lot of area, but much of the area might be effectively unusable. It leaves land open for development later in the game. It addresses the issue of the early land grab being the determinant of victory later in the game.

No? You said it yourself: "Once you introduce" and the things you mentioned are indeed introduced later on, as mankind developed into technologicly more advanced monsters (read: creatures). From that point on, fresh water became a finite resource, something it never was before. From my point of view your suggestions would only make sense from after the introduction of 'fresh water threats', such as the 3 things you mentioned. This might add a nice tactical challange towards the end of the game then, killing 2 birds with 1 stone.

Technology is a double-edged sword. On the one hand, we are less tethered to natural water cycle because we can find other ways to get it (desalinization, reservoirs, melting icebergs, etc.). What humans could do was limited by the presence of water in previous eras, whereas today we're living on land that was considered useless desert a couple hundred years ago. On the other hand, those very factors make us use far more water than we did before. In other words, we have both less and more water.

it is very true that water can be over exploited..but a perfect example of recycling is the mississippi river..it is used for irrigation for miles beyond its banks and feeds many major citys..it is said that the water that reaches new orleans is either run off or recycled at least 4 times...yet its flows are still high and sometimes too high. but at the same time you have places like the south west were ground water is being sucked completly out..so i dunno...i dont know if its fair to treat all water as finite..but i also dont think that it should be infinite..sooo..i dont know if there is anyway to properly implement it

That's not quite true, though. There are a lot of pollutants that get dumped into the water. As far as "too high" a water flow goes, that's a rather human-centric way of looking at it. It's not whether it overflows its banks but rather whether it's higher or lower than it used to be. I'm betting on lower.

Regardless, that's a single example. The Mississippi river may be in a well-watered region that has no issues. The Colorado River definitely is not. Nor is the Amu Darya, or the Yangtze, or the Ganga, or the Nile. It might not be a problem for some, but it is for others. Any game implementation should reflect that. The UK has no water issues, AFAIK, so they don't have any water politics. Uzbekistan, on the other hand, cares a lot about it.

Sure there is: make fresh(!) water finite wherever there is a desert or tundra and make it infinite elsewhere until agricultural and industrial revolution hit mankind. Then you can make fresh water dependent on pollution too. To bad pollution is a goner in Civ4, perhaps tie health, happiness and growth to fresh water to meet our demands.

There's no need to have the rules change with technology. All you have to do is make the later infrastructural improvements that require those technologies to consume far more water than the previous ones. Alternately, or perhaps in combination, you may need those infrastructure improvements much less in the early game than you do later. As a result, you may start off with more fresh water than you need in the early game and only hit the limits of your natural supply when your population is large, inhabits dry areas, and consumes so much food that you must irrigate.

To summarize all of the above into a more succinct thesis. Water in the early game is something that just is. You need it, so you live where it is. As time passes, you get better at controlling water, which enables you to live in places where there isn't (much) naturally occurring water. On the flip side, you are also using more water, so you must control water in order to survive and grow. There will be some haves and some have-nots and some in-betweens. Thus competition and cooperation.

Edit: here's an interesting article that came out today about fresh water in the modern world: http://nytimes.com/2005/07/26/science/26wate.html?pagewanted=all