Mines/Railroad “improvements”

[CustodianV131]

Anyone know or we’ll see the return of the mines in “flat” terrain squares situation of Civ3

I often mine grasslands and such for the added production, but I certainly don’t like he look of it. Its just ugly and not realistic, but in Civ3 mining “flat” land makes more sense then irrigating it most of the time.

Sure, you can say just don’t mine it then, but its often the best option, even if it looks ugly/silly.

Same with railroad, its best for you game to place it everywhere. So ugly, hope they’ll also fix that.

I’ve red/seen that there will be more terrain improvements in Civ 4, but if it ends up like in Civ 3 where one improvement (mines) is the best choice to build, well keep the same problem. Same with railroad if they keep giving production bonus plus unlimited movement… why wouldn’t you build them everywhere.

Hopefully we’ll get more realistic terrain improvements in Civ 4 that are actually right for the kind of land they’re build on.

Are there more people who dislike/hate this mining/railroad “problem”?

Anyone know how Civ4 will handle this?

 

[vbraun]

From what I've seen, you will not be able to build mines on "flat land". Railroads have been completley unmentioned.

I think the terrain improvments right now are: Windmill, Farm, Vinard, Stable, Mine. I think that some of them will require it to be on top of some reasorce. Line a Vinard on Wines, Stable on Horses, and Mine on Iron.

 

[Aussie_Lurker]

In my games, I modded it so that you could only Mine plains-not grassland. Though, if I had been able to have my way completely, I would have limited mines to those 'Escarpment' plains rather than standard ones.

Yours,
Aussie_Lurker.

 

[CustodianV131]

From what I've seen, you will not be able to build mines on "flat land". Railroads have been completley unmentioned.

I think the terrain improvments right now are: Windmill, Farm, Vinard, Stable, Mine. I think that some of them will require it to be on top of some reasorce. Line a Vinard on Wines, Stable on Horses, and Mine on Iron.

Aye, maybe that will be their solution to limit the improvements to fewer different terrains. Still form the screenshot it looks to be as you say that you need an improvement to exploit a resource, that leaves the "normal" improvements like irrigation and mines. Some screenshot show sort of “worker camps” with and without irrigation.

http://www.gamespot.com/pc/strategy/civilizationiv/screens.html?page=16

Since it looks like that the tiles are bigger this time around maybe we'll see more improvements on one tile then in the pervious versions.

http://www.gamespot.com/pc/strategy/civilizationiv/screens.html?page=20

Still looking at this one makes me think we'll see the same old "problem" of great numbers of the same improvement back again. Hopefully they'll restrict them to fitting terrain at least.

In my games, I modded it so that you could only Mine plains-not grassland. Though, if I had been able to have my way completely, I would have limited mines to those 'Escarpment' plains rather than standard ones.

That would be better already. I know "flat" terrain mines also exist in RL, but not in the massive amounts seen in Civ3. Restricting flatland mines to the rocky ground grasslands would solve a lot of the issues already. (Still I think that type of terrain is gone from Civ4)

Looking forward to see what they've done with the improvements this time around. I enjoy turning the landscape/environment to my wishes in Civ3, still it would be nice if it wouldn’t ruin the looks of the game doing so. (Although that's really realistic )

Some pictures show railroad in the cities, (The first I linked has a tiny piece in the city) but no railroad on terrain so far, guess they're still working on that. The screenshots they release also progress through history, which sort of fun. Will be a while before we see modern day screenshots I guess.

 

[CustodianV131]

To illustrate the railroad/improvement blight, using the great new gallery!

Firaxis, please avoid this:

Civ2:
http://www.civfanatics.com/gallery/showimage.php?i=403&c=16

Civ3:
http://www.civfanatics.com/gallery/showimage.php?i=208&c=7

Hopefully we'll not have to add Civ4 to this list when you're making Civ5

 

[Joseph Stalin]

you are right it sure looks ugly, but i don't know how they could restrict teh use of railroad, RR make the game posible in my opinion

 

[The Last Conformist]

Ugly or not, real-world countries have been more than happy to build railroads all over the place.