Let's make Civ 5

[Fiend777Fits]

mountains as unusable is idiotic. its not like the damn thing is bare. plus, the billygoats.

 

[Öjevind Lång]

mountains as unusable is idiotic. its not like the damn thing is bare. plus, the billygoats.

To this day, many mountain ranges are impassable. No alpine troops ever passed across Matterhorn, Mont Blanc or Mount Everest. I think the impassable mountains add spice and strategic realism to the game. Someone mentioned that people generally live on the lower slopes of mountains, but I find that irrelevant. And of course, those mountain peaks don't supply any resoucres either.

Öjevind

 

[Commander Bello]

To this day, many mountain ranges are impassable. No alpine troops ever passed across Matterhorn, Mont Blanc or Mount Everest. I think the impassable mountains add spice and strategic realism to the game. Someone mentioned that people generally live on the lower slopes of mountains, but I find that irrelevant. And of course, those mountain peaks don't supply any resoucres either.

Öjevind

But mountains don't only consist of peaks.
As others have pointed out in earlier posts already, even in the early ages people were very well able to cross mountain chains. Of course, it was hard to do so and it took some lives, but in no way it was impossible.
Furthermore, mountains always provided some ressources, which completely is missing now.
And last of all, the AI is not capable to deal with the strategic impact of mountain chains.

 

[Fiend777Fits]

i agree with the kraut

 

[Ambreville]

To this day, many mountain ranges are impassable. No alpine troops ever passed across Matterhorn, Mont Blanc or Mount Everest. I think the impassable mountains add spice and strategic realism to the game. Someone mentioned that people generally live on the lower slopes of mountains, but I find that irrelevant. And of course, those mountain peaks don't supply any resoucres either.

Mountains aren't made of a solid wall of 9000 meters tall unscalable rock! That's just not the way mountains are. Besides, I betcha if there were military reasons to do so, alpine troops might very well be able to get past big peaks such as Matterhorn, Mont Blanc, etc. It's not because it's never been attempted that it cannot be done! Where has your sense of daring gone, man? Let the player take the chance of a difficult crossing. If it fails, these troops are gone. It does work both ways. Just banging your fist on the table declaring "it can't be done" seems both pretty short-sighted and narrow-minded.

This mindset reminds me of colonial French troops in the fortifications above Quebec City. It was believed that no troops could scale the sheer side of the hill overlooking the St Lawrence River. So that side was left undefended. Sure enough, British troops climbed up that side and surprised the French defenders. It CAN be done. On the other hand, they could have tried and failed with substantial casualties. Or the French could have seen them coming and easily repulsed them. It's just the way things go. It's the "what-if's" that are interesting. The options of trying things are what makes the game fun.

 

[Ambreville]

You seem to be under the impression that what I am advocating is the unlimited ability of any troop to cross mountain chains at any time. Absolutely not! What I am suggesting consists of a few things:

Mountain Troops -- that's 20th century (per CIV III)
Great General -- OK for any troops moving with that general provided he has Mountaineering skills.
Attrition -- depending on the number of squares crossed (and/or the number of turns spent in mountains) attempt results in damage if not outright casualties.
Chances of Success -- depending on the size of an army and its equipment (cavalry and artillery in particular), chances of complete failure are greater. A single unit, or better yet, a single person (missionary, spy, etc) would have better chances of success.
Mountain CIVs -- in a separate mod for example, they could conceivably upgrade units with Mountaineering skills to be able to enter mountains. You need at least one "star" skill upgrade for that.

 

[ledhed]

Lets fix Civ IV and warlords first .

 

[petey]

I think that once you get to a some certain tech in the Industrial era, you should give Workers an option to build a mountain pass. That allows units to use mountain terrain. That way, they're impassable in the ancient eras, but when times start to get more modern, they can be passed through.

Also, the option for plagues and natural disasters would be cool, too.

 

[ProfessorK]

There are precious few "mountain passes" in the mountains on Civ4 maps. I can understand and like the idea that some ranges of mountains are impassible because it adds a element of strategy to the game, but vitually all mountain ranges in Civ4 are impassible. I just think that some should be passible at the risk of loosing units or taking damage to units which are mitigated with proper training. By all means keep some of the mountain ranges impassible, but also give would be Napoleons and Hannibals a chance, too. I think there is a middle ground.

 

[wookiee]

What we need is a future tech civ only made of robots... or aliens.. and maybe in earlier ages aliens arent allowed to build cities but only allowed to visit for short periods of time..


that would be awesome - and maybe multiple UU or a way to play by reigon/continent rather than singular civ - ex. South american: Aztec, Incan - old english empire: america, england - Gauls: celts + vikings - African: Mali + zulu(egypt too but thats too many) and u'd get the UU of the area


Or maybe if you conquer a civ u get to use its UU and some of the techs it has that you dont.

Maybe make a barbarian civ for multiplayer


Maybe a "create your own leader" thing where u can pick attrributes and create and chose form like 1 of 4 UU mods and be able to name yer units and everything..

For example you could make the cheese empire with Agressive/Imperialistic and u could chose to either
-mod archers
-mod horse archer
-mod swordsman
-mod tank
-mod maceman
etc. (but limited)
and pick a unique building
-Special Barrack
-Special Stable
-Special forge
etc.

 

[KabukiJo]

The mountains in Civ IV are like the Alps or the Himalayas, where no one lives. The mountains where people can live are the "hills" in the game. I think the impassable mountains are a great feature, no matter how annoying it is when they are in the fat cross and can't be used for anything.

Öjevind

I would agree.

I thought I read somewhere the the mountains that are in Civ4 are just peaks (Matterhorn, Everest, etc.) that, for all intents and purposes, are useless other than looking good. Yes, I'm sure there are minerals and whatnot in the mountains and spots to live somewhere on them (Nepalese, Incas, etc.) but in the overall sense of things how much impact have "mountain" based peoples had on the world compared to non-mountain based peoples (most of Europe, Asia, North and South America, Africa, etc.) (This is not meant to belittle anyone or any civilization, its just a comparison that I'm sure the developers thought of.)

I would think that the developers didn't put in 3, 4, 5 types of hills and mountains for the simple reason of K.I.S.S. (keep it simple stupid ).

The way I have looked at it ever since I started playing Civ4 is that grassland hills are lower foothills, plains hills are high hills, low mountains, and mountains are peaks.

I like the idea of letting troops pass over peaks later in the game once an appropriate technology has been researched.

These are my (rambling) thoughts...

 

[KabukiJo]

And last of all, the AI is not capable to deal with the strategic impact of mountain chains.

I would agree with this as well.

 

[Ambreville]

I thought I read somewhere the the mountains that are in Civ4 are just peaks (Matterhorn, Everest, etc.) that, for all intents and purposes, are useless other than looking good. Yes, I'm sure there are minerals and whatnot in the mountains and spots to live somewhere on them (Nepalese, Incas, etc.) but in the overall sense of things how much impact have "mountain" based peoples had on the world compared to non-mountain based peoples (most of Europe, Asia, North and South America, Africa, etc.) (This is not meant to belittle anyone or any civilization, its just a comparison that I'm sure the developers thought of.)

The idea of having mountain-based CIV's was in the context of a mod-specific scenario. No one here suggested replacing a major CIV with a mountain-based culture.

 

[Ambreville]

I thought I read somewhere the the mountains that are in Civ4 are just peaks (Matterhorn, Everest, etc.) that, for all intents and purposes, are useless other than looking good. (. . .)

I think we all know what CIV4/Warlords does/doesn't do. I understand the point of this thread is to throw out some ideas for... CIV5! Or at least some upgrade down the road. Simply quoting what CIV4 does/doesn't allow seems entirely besides the point.

I would think that the developers didn't put in 3, 4, 5 types of hills and mountains for the simple reason of K.I.S.S. (keep it simple stupid).

Well, mountain spaces were usable in CIV III, as well as mountain troops. What's so complicated about that? What we're saying here is that mountains ought to be passable/usable only under certain circumstances (related to specific unit skills or CIV tech). Considering everything else that is available in CIV4/Warlords and what was indeed available in earlier versions, why would the above ideas be any problem?

 

[dananski]

I'm seeing lots of good ideas so far.

One thing I don't think I've seen already is making construction take less time.

Playing a game on normal speed, I've reached 1700AD with an intreguing array of old units because I develop new technology in far less time than it took to build some longbowmen... I know in reality they took their whole lives to train, but that doesn't really compare to advancing the whole way through the rennaissance!

The idea of having caps on the eras so you get a chance to use your knights and pikemen a bit more was good, but what about cutting the construction times right down? Maybe make upgrades a little cheaper?

I am however in an extreme situation on my archipelego map where I get lots of money from the coast squares to do research with, but not much in the way of resources.

On the same point of time, I find it somewhat unrealistic that it takes a destroyer many years to circle the globe. I don't know the best remedy for this though, it could be:

1. Slow down the game even more towards the end when people can expect to get this technology (if I remember right, Alpha Centuri was 1 turn = 1 day)
2. Speed up the units

Someone suggested removing the workers. I think the workers are a crucial part of the game and taking them out doesn't make the gameplay better, as proved by Call To Power. There is already an 'automate worker' button, so use this if you're bored of them; maybe some more customisation of what they do automatically (e.g. stop building workshops, I prefer cottages on plains) would be good.

Whatever happened to the old fashioned spies from Civ 2? And the caravans/freights for setting up trade routes, getting food to starving cities and helping build wonders? Bring them back!

Some future technology would be good, bearing in mind that a lot of things are now seeming close to us in real life.

I liked the idea of plagues - of course it'd have to be optional or preferably a variable... But you have to be careful, as issues such as terrorism, natural disasters, plagues, riots, etc, sound like good ideas for the game individually, but might result in something too complicated...

 

[Tivoli]

What does Civ 5 need more than anything else? It needs to switch to a hex board, rather than a square board.

Some other things I'd like to see in Civ 5:

• Population sprawl, rather than Civ-style cities. Your population spreads out over time in order to pursue better living conditions (sometimes gradually expanding, sometimes establishing distant colonies). Factors that influence where your population settles would be resource availability, proximity to trade routes, governmental structures/protection, climate, etc. The player can influence these factors by searching for resources, establishing trade routes, building hospitals, providing military units, etc. And where your population settles densely is where your cities are located.
• Phased simultaneous turns. In phase 1, all players simultaneously plan all their actions. In phase 2, the computer resolves all of these actions. I much prefer turn-based strategy games over RTS, but allowing one player to perform all his actions first is both unrealistic and a big advantage.
• Armies instead of units. The age of the piecemeal unit warfare is antiquated. Armies should certainly be composed of units, but military strategy will not improve in Civ until all these units can actually act together.
• Supply lines. Armies need to be constantly resupplied --- troops, gear, food. Currently, there's no reason my army can't just march from one side of the world to the other, since units in Civ don't require resupply.
• Multiple technology trees. Segregate the religious, philosophical, scientific, economic technologies into separate trees. Sure, there will be some interdependencies, but science should not be a single category into which all knowledge pours. If I build temples, my religious technology tree should advance faster. If I build workshops, my science technology tree should advance faster.
• Readjustment of time/movement. In the Terra game I'm currently playing, it takes one turn (year) to airlift a unit to the other side of the world, but eight turns (years) to sail that unit there. Also, touching upon supply lines again, how is it that my caravel can sail around the globe for a couple thousand years, never once stopping by a harbor for resupply?
• Obsolete armies should not defeat modern armies. Sure, everyone can name a dozen or so real-world examples of how "This one time, a guy on horseback single-handedly took down a tank." But those should be exceptions, not the norm. You should be able to count on your army of modern tanks and mechanized infantry taking out an army of American Civil War cavalry/infantry with no casualties.

Lots more ideas, but I think that's a good start....

 

[amount18]

One aspect of the game that is not accurate that could easily be revamped is the fact that only one technology can pursued at one time. In real life governments allocate their research funds to multiple research laboratories that not only compete with each other to make the same breakthrough, but also to research different subjects entirely.

Although if one were to research multiple technologies at one time, say archery and horseback riding, both technologies would take longer to learn, both would be acquired closer together thereby eliminating the wait for the horsearcher (I have not recently looked at the tech tree so this example might not work, but others would.)

With a slider under the research bar the player could gain easy access to this option. I would propose a patch for Civ IV but I am not that computer savvy. If anyone would like to make this patch or mod feel free to as long as I am contacted and it is made available for both Civ IV and Civ IV Warlords.

 

[stevenbear]

I do not like repeating micromanagement when there are more than 20 cities, so I expect more from next version. I want fun, not real. My ideas are not complete.

1.Financial management. later era, more to control.
A. Taxation: different taxes and taxes rate. It can due to wars.
1)rent/property tax:after court
2)income tax: after banking
3)consumption tax: after market
4)import/export tax: after map
5)Tobin tax: after UN and via UN, not a nation income, but for UN only
6)blood tax: when there is a war

B. license and regs ration fee. In free market setting, player cannot spending on improvements or receive consumption tax, import/export tax, and income tax is less than 10%, the major government income is license fees. One improvement, one license.

C. Budgeting in city improvements and unit building.
1)health: water system, hospital, recycle center, park, aged care center,
2)education: Library, university, lab
3)production: factory, all kinds of power station
4)religion: all kinds of temples and churches
5)order: court, police station, jail, fire station, barrack
6)business: market, bank, airport, harbor, light tower, radio station, stock exchange
7)entertainment: arena, opera, museum, stadium, movie center

I appreciate that some improvements must base on others and some mustn't.

Unless in the free market, player can manage the budget directly. Then the building speeds depend on city productivity and budgeting. Player can build all improvements at the same time except the wonders.

D. Financial pressure and crisis.
Inflation: after currency, unemployment rate is high(yeah, high), crime rate is high
deflation: in gold standard, production slow down
economic bubbles: after currency, huge loss, unexpected, unavoidable

1) interest rate management: after center bank system
2) reserve rate management: after banking
3) exchange rate management: after currency
4) fund movement control: in central planning

E. units building.
1) no more workers, but national project spending
2) military unit numbers depend on budget arrangements
3) upgrade is prior than number, which is always spending the funding
4) player can build all units at the same time
5) each turn, any movement cost 1% of production cost(the cost of upgraded one), which represent the operating cost in warfare
6) each turn, any engagement in battles cost 5% of total production cost
7) each turn, in just occupied cities, involved units cost 2% of total production cost.
8) without funding, units stop, except in communism
except in free market, religion and corporation units can be “budgeting”
10) in free market, player can hire NGO warriors
11) missiles and nukes should allow to carry and lunch in some warships.

F. player can lent or borrow, except in muslin religion, interest is an issue. In muslin state, income is shared. Player can lent or borrow to his people(bankers), other nations' governors, other nations' people, or from UN. If the debt is too high, liquidation is the result----some land may be taken. I just point a way to “financial victory”.

2. .Civilization progress and match between systems
Economy system should represent the degree of government financial management: can sacrifice labor to speed up, budgeting, or free market.

Legal system should represent the degree of the corruption, non violent competition, and stability of politics. The government income is the index. And, to be coherent, some legal systems should against some political, economic, or religion systems.

The political system should restrain the decision making of player such as declare or end the war, lunch the national project (e.g. build roads between cities, wonders), and budget arrangement. In different system, the power of consultants should be different. The power means how much player must follow the advices or the Bill.

In free religion, the on matter what other systems are, the religion unit should not controllable.

3. Military management

A. Military base replace cities to build and store units except navy.

B. The building speed depends on national average productivity rather than cites'.

C. Units are teaming up. For example: army group, army, corp, division, brigade, regiment, battalion, company, platoon, section. The strength of a unit represents the number of battalions. One unit is at least one regiment, for cavalry, one unit is at least one battalion. At most 5 same units form one brigade. In division level, different units can team up, at most 5 brigades. I believe it solve the micromanagement problem in battles. The basic battle unit should be division. I love the army concept in Civ III.

D. Since units stay in the bases, we need a boundary defense improvement such as Maginot Line or Siegfried Line, which is so powerful that the air force and armies of foes cannot invade easy. The only way to break it is nuke, mass missiles, or mass fire preparation for a long time---like the city defense.

E. The disconnection in supply will kill soldier slowly. When all roads are broken or taken, the sea is controlled by foes, the supply is cut.

F. When the unit is controlling the occupied city, it is losing soldiers until the city is fully controlled.

G. Allow allies use transportation units.

H. Introduce long distance air transporter. One transporter unit can carry one brigade or 5 units. Paratrooper or special force should be useful in small mission such withdraw business people, travelers, and VIPs in dangerous places, where has war or other diseases.

I. Chemical, biological, and medium weapons should be available. Before modern age, it will not affect political reputation. They are less effect to tanks, ships and air planes but damage the food production.

J. The surrendered units----which may due to cut of supply, delay of wage payment, or loss >1/2 in defending. The unit can be any level. Keeping them cost money, but can get your wounded and trap soldiers back. It is not apply to barbarian. It is affect player's political reputation.


4. UN
More power and function should it has. It should be more active, handle more international events.

A. help the poor. During and after the war or disaster (earthquake, plague, super volcano, tsunami, etc.)

B. against evil. Fight to poverty, unhealthy lifestyle, unfair, drugs, AIDS, financial crimes. Etc.

C. punish “evil” nations.

D. Hold International events: Olympic, for example.

5. more disaster (earthquake, plague, super volcano, tsunami, etc.)

6.Business/Financial/Commercial power

A. Giant Corporation as small wonders. However, capital does not belong to any nation, it can go to another nation! Just like the king replace the capital, it can replace its company location.

B. business people want peace, but some want war to make profit. They affect players' decision if player borrow lots from them. They also hold big exhibitions and events to make nations rich. Corporation units like religion units, can control other nations' economy indirectly.

7. some famous people should make peace and maintain friendship with other nations faster.

8.Land trading must be acceptable. None strategic resource should under control in free market.

 

[pfc703]

StevenBear you talk alot of sense.
I like the idea of a more complex economy, but i think there should be default settings which allow it to run smoothly, but not exceptionally so, and then more advanced controls which can really boost production/ wealth creation etc. ie you will have an advantage if you can be bothered, but if not its not disastrous.

Currency: Different nations have different currencies, which fluctuate in value, dependent on various criteria. So, for example, my Russian Rubel is worth twice as much as your english pound, so when we trade i have more financial clout.

Apart from physical disasters, there are also economic disasters, such as hyperinflation etc.

Perhaps the economy might be effected by a new population movement factor. For example in times of war between two AIs, there might be an influx of refugees from the losing side. Population structure could be determined as well, as if you have a high number of Germans living in your cities, if you go to war with Germany you may suffer greater civil discontent. Similarly, people might be drawn to a nation with a stronger economy, or a greater cultural value, or less severe civics. Perhaps there might be religious movement, where you declare an overiding state religion, driving out alternative religions (persecution? it still happens...).

Some new civics- like deciding between federal or unitary state systems, each with distinct advantages.

Add in Atheism into the mix for religions, and perhaps differentiate between catholocism and protestantism etc.

More, and more impactual events, like typhoons in the tropics and droughts in dry areas.

Only a few scrambled ideas to chew over

 

[stevenbear]

different currency is a good idea. in the free market, currency is issued by banks and individuals. in other system, it is issued by the government(player).

to be fun, it must attect the player's income or benifits. and it can link to the national debts.