Global Warming Improvments

[Inspector Javert]

Global Warming was ridiculous in Civ IV having no basis in the actual theories about what caused Global Warming.

It was essentially put in to discourage long term nuclear wars and to make having Nuclear Power Plants more risky.

I think that needs to change in Civ V and here's my idea.

Global Warming stays in but doesn't just cause tile changes, it can cause sea levels to rise and more frequent natural disaster random events.. The amount of global warming is determined by the amount of pollution put out by certain buildings (ie coal plant, factory). Once the pollution reaches a certain point then the various ill effects begin to kick in.

Additionally there should be a way to bring the pollution levels back down and thus stop global warming.

Nukes should cause adverse effects completely separate from global warming: they should cause nuclear winter which would have the reverse effect of Global Warming, (Perhaps a "Nuclear Option" for reversing it?) Causing the sea levels to drop and land to turn to tundra and ice.

Nuclear Meltdowns shouldn't contribute to nuclear winter but should instead cause long term in the city where the meltdown occurred

What do you guys think?

 

[Camikaze]

That would seem to be the ideal way to have global warming; sea level changes. However, I'm not sure how practical it is. Given in Civ there are only really three altitudes on land (plains, hills and mountains), if you raised sea levels, they'd have to completely cover all the plains tiles, or something, or it would be inconsistent. So more altitudes are needed for this to be viable.

As for nukes, it would be best if they simply resulted in lots of tiles turning to tundra. This would have to have some pattern though, and not be completely random, as in Civ 4.

 

[Mobius13]

It should be more gradual, increasing droughts (loss of food production) and more severe weather events before rising sea levels

 

[Verarde]

And then eventually the ice at the north and south of the map would melt, which would cause the sea to rise. Possibly having more equatorial grasslands tiles turn to plains, and plains to desert and for the northern and southern parts you would have grassland --> tundra. They are probably other terrain I'm forgetting about.

Personally, I am in favor of having global warming not be as much of a factor, in fact maybe not at all, simply because of the incident with the scientists being found out by a group of hackers,

 

[Soundwαvє ▼]

They should create coastal land tiles... that works as coastal tiles but has land.

Global Warming should be caused by:

Pollution and population... the unhealth, as we have today.

Global Warming should cause:

Spread Desert along deserts (So if you have a desert tile, it will become another one.

More disaster events (related to clime).

Loss of food, health and some organic resources (Fish, cows, sheep, seafood).
---

How deal with: After x (10?) turns... you can't stop it. And after you search a tech you will be able to see the prevision to global warming (how many years until it), with a 10 turns error margin.

 

[climat]

Severe deforestation also can cause climate change.

 

[Soundwαvє ▼]

And then eventually the ice at the north and south of the map would melt, which would cause the sea to rise. Possibly having more equatorial grasslands tiles turn to plains, and plains to desert and for the northern and southern parts you would have grassland --> tundra. They are probably other terrain I'm forgetting about.

Personally, I am in favor of having global warming not be as much of a factor, in fact maybe not at all, simply because of the incident with the scientists being found out by a group of hackers,

Actually we really don't know what will happen!

The temperature can rise so fast, like 3 Cº until 2050, or even become stable for some more years, but there is a huge chance to increase.

And also there is some falsifications of results to make things slighter to don't scare! And those are much more evidential than this of hackers, but it also doesn't mean that the hackers are right.

Anyway global warming is a reality, you can't just say that we aren't causing anything on earth, the problem is to decide if this is minimal or not, and by minimal I mean 1 Cº increase in 100 years, what is a lot!

 

[Soundwαvє ▼]

Severe deforestation also can cause climate change.

Not at all... deforestation by cutting trees don't causes nothing. The problem is the deforestation by fire. And civ uses the first.

Trees should define the limit:

60 Tree/Jungle Tiles = Support 60 Unhealth points
Plus Coastal tiles
Plus the difficulty = Easy (40 support).... and decreasing

 

[climat]

Hmm, that seems arguable.
Deforestation by fire is surely more harmful than logging. But severe logging also can bring results like soil erosion, lack of water (and drought) and more carbon dioxide in the air just because it removes trees.

 

[Silurian]

When a forest is chopped down and turned into grassland the unused timber is burnt or left to rot.
This creats green house gasses

The local effects of global warming are very un pridictable for civ to model!
Increased or decreases in rainfall.
Heating the sea. Reduction in the speed of ocean currents leading to local colling of the sea.

Maybe have a "tax" on all civs that comes in after so many coal power staions etc are built and forest and jungle chopped.

 

[Camikaze]

It's quite hard to implement a realistic AGW feature in Civ, largely for the reason that you can't implement game features in which the actions of one civ lead to penalties for another, without any viable way of stopping it for the civ that will suffer the penalties. So, if you were to implement a realistic global warming feature as a function of pollution, or something, then it would not necessarily be the polluters that would bear the brunt of any effects. Which would make it suck as a game feature. So in order to penalise those that do pollute, you have to sacrifice realism. Hence the dilemma.

 

[Koning]

I'm more in favour dropping the concept of global warming. The concept is too controversial and politicised at the moment. Worldwide greenhouse gas levels are rising, on which human activities have an effect. However, the relative effect of greenhouse gasses on the earths temperature compared to other factor (solar, geological, ocean currents e.g.) is not wel understood and might be quite small. Some scientists are even convinced there will be global cooling in the next decennia, just like in the 1940-1970 period. How manageable is the temperature of the earth??

This all distracts from a more important issue: the pollution and over-exploitation of the earth. Sustainability,renewable energy, minimizing environmental impact are more fruitful issues to tackle I think!

Finally in civ terms: If pollution is too high in cities or in case of nuclear fallout, environmental degradation could happen (grassland->plain->desert) Could maybe also happen when all forests are chopped in a wide radius of a city.

 

[Silurian]

Camikaze@
There would be diplomatic and maybe trade problems for the big poluters.
But if the game ends in 2050 there would not be much effect yet from global warning just the start of the cost of trying to stop it.

So maybe take it out of the game and have some local pollution effects that are not confined to the city.
But not the polluted tile followed by worker clean up.
Maybe city improvements generate pollution chance points - then you get " Toxic spill pollutes river - farms next river -1 food for 1 turn" etc

 

[TheDS]

In Civ4 terms, I think having a global increase in city Unhealthiness would do it. That has the same effect as a drought/famine. The number of Forests, Jungles, forest/jungle Preserves, and National Parks would have an effect on countering the pollution, which gives you a reason to set aside woods to be left uncut, or even to build Preserves. (I never build Preserves except in the NP city.)

An industry-heavy, wood-stripped world would have lots of Unhealthiness per city. Keep some of the woods around, and Preserve it, and you've got less unhealth. Go Nuclear instead of Coal for power and you can virtually eliminate pollution.

 

[Camikaze]

Camikaze@
There would be diplomatic and maybe trade problems for the big poluters.
But if the game ends in 2050 there would not be much effect yet from global warning just the start of the cost of trying to stop it.

Well, trade and diplomatic penalties could work as some solution to the problem, but you'd still have a negative effect for Civs who haven't contributed to whatever has caused global warming. It doesn't really matter if another Civ has a greater penalty, it'll still suck if you have a penalty of any kind.

So maybe take it out of the game and have some local pollution effects that are not confined to the city.
But not the polluted tile followed by worker clean up.
Maybe city improvements generate pollution chance points - then you get " Toxic spill pollutes river - farms next river -1 food for 1 turn" etc

Well, again, that's a solution, but not the ideal one. Global warming really should be in the game in some form (assuming it's a reasonably good representation). The game goes for another 40 years (another 40 turns) from now, and global warming is predicted to be the dominating issue of that period. So it makes complete sense to have it in some form, and not much sense to simply ignore it, even if it'll be hard to implement.

 

[awesome]

if you raised sea levels, they'd have to completely cover all the plains tiles, or something

i don't know, when you start a custom game and choose higher sea levels, i'm pretty sure there are still plains tiles, it's just coastal plains that get covered up, i think. i guess that i could be wrong, though.

 

[Camikaze]

i don't know, when you start a custom game and choose higher sea levels, i'm pretty sure there are still plains tiles, it's just coastal plains that get covered up, i think. i guess that i could be wrong, though.

Doesn't that just change the percentage of tiles that are water on the map? Unless different plain tiles are allocated different elevations, it would seem to make sense that if one was covered by rising seas, they all would be. At least to the degree that the water could get to the tiles.

 

[Silurian]

Most of the world will not be effected by permanent flooding caused by global warming in this century.
I live next to the sea and the tides are up to 6m plus wind and low pressure can add another 2m or so.
A 1m rise in sea level would only have temporary consequences, like the storm in France, for most people.
Unless there is sudden loss of ice from Greenland it will just cause a drain in resources up grading flood defences, building new ones as in Holland
In the game gold!

Small island states that may be wiped out by a 1m rise are not in the game.

 

[Camikaze]

That's my point. The only way in which to replicate a non-random rise in sea levels is to cover the lowest tiles with water; plains tiles. But given that there is no variation in altitude of various plains tiles, this cannot be done with randomness, which is a poor way of doing it.

 

[David7]

I'd just like an option to turn off Global Warming the best.