JackTanner
Chieftain
Hello,
I'm a new member here at civfanatics. I've only been playing cIV for about a month, but I'm really impressed with how easy it seems to be to mod this game! The support and tutorials at this site are great and well written, and I have had no trouble at all making a few small mods in XML, Python and with the SDK in C++. There is a much larger mod that I would like to begin working on.
I want the game to simulate at least a few real world ecological problems. I will describe some of the goals I have below. I have a lot of ideas, and a fair amount of experience as a programmer, but I would like the opinions of all of you on how feasible these ideas are.
The goals (in order of importance/attack):
1) Deforestation - In the game rampant deforestation has little negative effect (and is actually a pretty good strategy). Tree cover in real life acts as a buffer for humidity changes in local weather systems, prevents erosion, and buffers other man-made ecological problems. Deforestation is a major problems in parts of the world today and has contributed towards (or been the primary cause of) collapses of civilizations in the past. This part of the mod will cause major consequences for taking out too much of the forest.
2) Finite Resources - I'm not positive, but I thought that in civ III you could run out of resources... in civ IV you can't and it doesn't make any sense, its just easier to play. Copper, Iron, Gold, Silver, Coal, Aluminum, and Oil all eventually run out in the real world. I get the feeling this would be easy to do, but hard to do well. I'm not sure what a good way to do this would be that wouldn't just take all the fun out of the game... Anyhow, it could certainly add some spice to the game. There could be new technologies for cyanide heap leach mining, open pit mining, ocean oil rigs, mechanized coal mining etc... Sounds complicated eh?
3) Global Warming - Certainly a hot topic now days, and probably the easiest thing on this list to add to the game. As long as we are on a map that is actually trying to model a world, why not try to model some systemic climate changes? Industry of various kinds might increase the global temperature, this could be moderated by extent of worldwide forestation and water cover. Negative effects might include unhappy faces in cities, rising water levels and melting polar caps. Put your city too close to the ocean? Whoops! Should have left some of those forests! UN resolutions, certain techs, some new civics and perhaps a wonder could reduce the effect of global warming late in the game.
4) Invasive Species/Diseases - This one was suggested by a colleague who I was discussing the mod with. The premise is that contact between ecosystems often leads to species moving in. Those species might be the stoats that kill the indigenous birds of New Zealand, the malaria and yellow fever that decimated the Americas when the Europeans arrived or the kudzu (a Japanese vine) that is a major problem around where I live. The reason this is last on the list is I don't have many good ideas on how to implement it. Civ IV is a very homogenous environment. Ideas would be welcome.
This is likely to be an ambitious project, and I would love to have all of the input I can get. Also, I'm not certain that this is the right place for a post like this, would there be somewhere better to put it?
One final question: are there any mods out there that try to do something like this? (Anything even remotely close?) I haven't seen anything so far, but I certainly have not been exhaustive in my search. Basically, if it has anything to do with how the player interacts with the environment I'd like to take a look at it.
- Jack
I'm a new member here at civfanatics. I've only been playing cIV for about a month, but I'm really impressed with how easy it seems to be to mod this game! The support and tutorials at this site are great and well written, and I have had no trouble at all making a few small mods in XML, Python and with the SDK in C++. There is a much larger mod that I would like to begin working on.
I want the game to simulate at least a few real world ecological problems. I will describe some of the goals I have below. I have a lot of ideas, and a fair amount of experience as a programmer, but I would like the opinions of all of you on how feasible these ideas are.
The goals (in order of importance/attack):
1) Deforestation - In the game rampant deforestation has little negative effect (and is actually a pretty good strategy). Tree cover in real life acts as a buffer for humidity changes in local weather systems, prevents erosion, and buffers other man-made ecological problems. Deforestation is a major problems in parts of the world today and has contributed towards (or been the primary cause of) collapses of civilizations in the past. This part of the mod will cause major consequences for taking out too much of the forest.
2) Finite Resources - I'm not positive, but I thought that in civ III you could run out of resources... in civ IV you can't and it doesn't make any sense, its just easier to play. Copper, Iron, Gold, Silver, Coal, Aluminum, and Oil all eventually run out in the real world. I get the feeling this would be easy to do, but hard to do well. I'm not sure what a good way to do this would be that wouldn't just take all the fun out of the game... Anyhow, it could certainly add some spice to the game. There could be new technologies for cyanide heap leach mining, open pit mining, ocean oil rigs, mechanized coal mining etc... Sounds complicated eh?
3) Global Warming - Certainly a hot topic now days, and probably the easiest thing on this list to add to the game. As long as we are on a map that is actually trying to model a world, why not try to model some systemic climate changes? Industry of various kinds might increase the global temperature, this could be moderated by extent of worldwide forestation and water cover. Negative effects might include unhappy faces in cities, rising water levels and melting polar caps. Put your city too close to the ocean? Whoops! Should have left some of those forests! UN resolutions, certain techs, some new civics and perhaps a wonder could reduce the effect of global warming late in the game.
4) Invasive Species/Diseases - This one was suggested by a colleague who I was discussing the mod with. The premise is that contact between ecosystems often leads to species moving in. Those species might be the stoats that kill the indigenous birds of New Zealand, the malaria and yellow fever that decimated the Americas when the Europeans arrived or the kudzu (a Japanese vine) that is a major problem around where I live. The reason this is last on the list is I don't have many good ideas on how to implement it. Civ IV is a very homogenous environment. Ideas would be welcome.
This is likely to be an ambitious project, and I would love to have all of the input I can get. Also, I'm not certain that this is the right place for a post like this, would there be somewhere better to put it?
One final question: are there any mods out there that try to do something like this? (Anything even remotely close?) I haven't seen anything so far, but I certainly have not been exhaustive in my search. Basically, if it has anything to do with how the player interacts with the environment I'd like to take a look at it.
- Jack
.
