Global Warming, Civil Wars, UN Peacekeepers, and Coalitions

[apatheist]

You've highlighted enough drawbacks that I wouldn't cry if it was taken out.

With respect to global warming... global warming doesn't have a uniform effect. That's why "climate change" may be a better term. Making one part of the world hotter affects weather patterns, evaporation rates, ocean circulation patterns, etc., which can cause other parts of the globe to cool. It wouldn't correlate to highly polluted areas, but it would cause disruption all over. Some would benefit more than others, but it would be unpredictable.

In fact, some climatologists claim global warming could cause an ice age. There is an important circulating current in the North Atlantic. This current brings warm water from the Equator north along the African and European coasts. It pulls cold water deep into the ocean at the northern point, from where it moves southward. Melting ice caps could decrease the salinity of the northern water, which means it wouldn't sink, which means the conveyer would cease, and warm water would no longer move north from the Equator, leading to an ice age in Europe.

 

[10Seven]

You've highlighted enough drawbacks that I wouldn't cry if it was taken out.

The suggestion to change the thoughts to a CLIMATE CHANGE MODEL as opposed to a GLOBAL WARMING MODEL seems a very good one - it suggests a more global and time-spanning model - considering that the Earth has experienced cooling too. Imagine playing Civ over such a time-period - could yours survive an ice-age? What if your Civ's once lush lands are becoming barren - will you conquer your neighbours and their productive lands, collapse into subsistence, or develop methods and technologies to counteract?

A climate change model doesn't need to be about 'who wins'. In the game of Civ, who wins seems to me less important than the journey - I for one by far prefer a thousand-year war against a superior foe, which sees my civilisation, after much heroics, and tales of one unit holding off scores, ultimately and utterly destroyer - rather than an overwhelming win.

What a climate model could add, apart from the obvious realism/immersion, is another area for the player to affect their experience, and for their experience to be effected.

However, I really think such a model far beyond the current scope of Civ4 - perhaps Civ6, or as a player mod to Civ4, it would certainly be a possibility, and one I think would enrich the game a great deal.

 

[apatheist]

I think it's also worth exploring ways a civilization could collapse. Maybe forgetting technologies is excessive, but in the game as it stands, you can only go forward. You can only go backward relative to other civs, but it should be possible for you to go backward in absolute terms as well. Indeed, that would be necessary to model things like the Great Depression. Plagues would be one way for that to happen; a plague might invade your lands and kill 1/3 of your citizens.

 

[10Seven]

I think that's an interesting idea - imagine our Civ, with low levels of literacy/stratified literacy - manufacture of cars, for instance, occurs in a central location - all in all, the Civ appears well developed.

But what happens during an invasion, or a powerplant meltdown - the city is destroyed, and, thus, a good deal of knowledge is lost.

It could force the civ, during an invasion, where once they had armoured cars, to fall back on horses and rifles.

Perhaps, as each city represents it's share of learning, the loss of this, to whatever reason, affects knowledge - in the simplest way, it chops some learning off your research, and could even lose a previously learned technology.

 

[apatheist]

To do it effectively seems like it would need to have citizens have varying education levels and wealth. Thus, if your nation had a few wealthy, educated people, but mostly poor illiterates, you'd be more vulnerable to this kind of setback. As we progress in the game, wealth and power should be expressed more and more in terms of the quality of the citizens and the infrastructure we construct, and less about the quantity of citizens, the amount of food we grow, etc. Compare early 18th century France or Russia to the Dutch or English.

 

[Atrebates]

cfacosta has made enough good points to show the drawbacks of GW as a game element, (RL not least because polluters are protected from GW by the crap they throw into the air, it cools the land beneath it), I think now it should be killed as a game element. Atthough maybe the Coalitions of the thread title would be a good way to combat polluters.
I don't like the idea of forced regression, most of the time conquering a civ (to take one example raised) gets harder as you reach the older centralised cities in prime locations that throw out huge numbers of units. Knowledge would generally be moved before an army assaulted the city (although if it must be included then modern techs that facilitate the internet should eliminate it)

@froglegs
FFS chill! I was not 'debating' your point, in your post (as I said good post , so not serious) I just responded to the real/ political part, the misconception that it is only a political issue irritates me. That was not the point you raised so apologies if it pissed you off and sorry for the offence

 

[apatheist]

Atrebates, not forced regression. More like the Red Queen from "Alice in Wonderland:" you have to run faster and faster just to stay in one place. If you don't progress fast enough, you stagnate.

If there's a worldwide plague that kills 1/3 the people in all nations, you should have to do more than simply grow more people to recover. Losing a tech was just an example. Maybe tile improvements that are unused should deteriorate over time. If you lose 1/3 of your people, 1/3 of your tile improvements would fall into disrepair and have to be rebuilt.