Natural Wonders

[petey]

OK, so I've just tested out a couple of games having my scouts wander around on Chieftan, so this may be a silly question that a couple of real games could figure out, but what's up with Natural Wonders?

Is it really that if you happen upon a certain tile, you get increased happiness throughout your entire empire? Is this only for the first person to discover it or does it apply to everyone who finds the thing? It would make more sense to me that they give you a happiness boost if you can get them inside your cultural boundaries, but the popup that comes up seems to suggest that this isn't the case.

Can anyone provide some more details on these things?

 

[Ahriman]

Is it really that if you happen upon a certain tile, you get increased happiness throughout your entire empire?

Yes.

Is this only for the first person to discover it or does it apply to everyone who finds the thing?

Everyone.

It would make more sense to me that they give you a happiness boost if you can get them inside your cultural boundaries

If you get them within your boundaries, you can work the tile for a nice yield.

What I'm really hoping is that modders start getting to work on graphics, and we get a mod which adds another couple of dozen natural wonders to choose from, so we don't just see the same handful over and over.

 

[Spiceweasel]

I suspect the idea is to provide rewards for exploration.

 

[Ahriman]

Yes. I think they originally had it so only the first discoverer got them, but then found that this made them too weak/inconsequential, and meant there was no point exploring beyond your local area because *someone* else would have spotted them first.

 

[petey]

OK, that seems kind of silly to me. It really would make more sense that they only work if you have them within your borders. Getting happiness because you stumbled across a tile just seems kind of random and inane.

 

[petey]

I suspect the idea is to provide rewards for exploration.

What, because there weren't good reasons to explore the map before and they needed to add something in so that people would do it? It just seems to be totally out of place with everything else in the game.

 

[Louis XXIV]

I thought they'd be stupid, then happiness became such an issue that I decided I liked them

I think it does have a real world effect. People would explore for the sake of exploration in the real world. The game represents that psychic benefit from exploring new lands.