New terrain features

[Hydromancerx]

In France, they are so common, that a lot of them are still is use. Some for wine, some for fungi and some... still for housing!

Spoiler :

So, caves can be require for a lot of thing, even modern one (the BatCave )

Yeah but if I had an Earth map I could probably represent the caves of France in one tile. Then again France on an Earth map may only be between 3 to 10 tiles. Depending upon the size of the map.

EDIT: Then again I may be digging myself into a hole.

But yeah a lot of other things are much more common than caves yet are represented as terrain features, resources or even terrain itself. I think it just comes with the territory when it comes to civ4 maps.

 

[Nimek]

Caves are so common that every mountain hills chain has a lot of them

I think that you could change cave requirement for buildings from caves to hills or mountains or volcano

Remember that some types of rocks are so soft that it it possible to made cave by hands and very simply tools. Like in minecraft

 

[Dancing Hoskuld]

I hope your kidding, since I just added Cave terrain feature requirement to Cave Dwelling, Neanderthal Caves, Cave Painting and Lascaux Paints.

You have removed the chance of a golden age from the early game since Cave Dwelling now requires caves in the vicinity, and you are not likely to have any.

 

[ls612]

You have removed the chance of a golden age from the early game since Cave Dwelling now requires caves in the vicinity, and you are not likely to have any.

I agree, that change unbalances things, as a civ near Caves will get a huge bonus in the Prehistoric Era.

 

[Thunderbrd]

We have a lot of early bonuses that are very specific to the starting environment. Stone is necessary for a lot of great benefits often never achieved during that era, as well as Mammoths and a number of other elements. Goody huts themselves are a huge wild card that separates the quality of a given start, as is, more than anything, the starting terrains. Whether a civ can access a golden age or not in early development is rather a lesser issue in light of these greater wildcards. Not saying it isn't powerful, especially out the gate like that, but not moreso than those already inerrant imbalancing agents.

So why not include that early golden age potential as one of them? Especially if the exorbitant build cost of that building (which I admit may have been changed since I looked at it last) has been reduced significantly. It seems a little funny from go that we're proposing every Prehistoric civilization hit a point where they were hitting a huge surge in growth and development. Seems to me it would make more sense that some do rather than all.

Furthermore, not ALL early pre-human civilizations were cave dwellers.

Note: I don't feel all that passionate about this one either way. Just stating the above for some perspective consideration.

 

[Hydromancerx]

I personally feel that since caves only have so many uses having them in early game as a nice boost to whomever is next to one is a nice random aspect to the game. We could always take off the golden age from the Cave Dwelling national wonder and make it a normal building. However I think the fact that it will be much harder to build one balances it out.

Odds are that an AI will get it since there are more of them than there are of you so that's one factor that could help the AI fight against you and make the game more challenging. Howver if you are lucky and you get it, the AI better watch out!

EDIT: You know what perhaps the golden age should be taken off the Cave Dwelling and put on a national wonder like Captured Fire. Not all civs used caves but all civs used fire. What do you guys think?

 

[ls612]

I personally feel that since caves only have so many uses having them in early game as a nice boost to whomever is next to one is a nice random aspect to the game. We could always take off the golden age from the Cave Dwelling national wonder and make it a normal building. However I think the fact that it will be much harder to build one balances it out.

Odds are that an AI will get it since there are more of them than there are of you so that's one factor that could help the AI fight against you and make the game more challenging. Howver if you are lucky and you get it, the AI better watch out!

EDIT: You know what perhaps the golden age should be taken off the Cave Dwelling and put on a national wonder like Captured Fire. Not all civs used caves but all civs used fire. What do you guys think?

I liked the Cave Dwelling the way it was before. It actually was something to shoot for as a milestone in the early Prehistoric Era, which we don't really have now that it requires Caves.

 

[Hydromancerx]

@ls612

That's why I suggested we move the golden age to the Captured Fire national wonder. Everyone can get that just like the Cave Dwelling national wonder. Then we remove the golden age from the Cave Dwelling building and just make it a normal building or even an auto-building to go with the Housing line of building that happens to have a defense bonus.

 

[ls612]

@ls612

That's why I suggested we move the golden age to the Captured Fire national wonder. Everyone can get that just like the Cave Dwelling national wonder. Then we remove the golden age from the Cave Dwelling building and just make it a normal building or even an auto-building to go with the Housing line of building that happens to have a defense bonus.

Hm, I generally avoid the Captured Fire wonder because it gives free flammability to every city. But I suppose that it would make sense, Fire was probably even bigger an advancement for early humans than caves.

 

[Dancing Hoskuld]

Hm, I generally avoid the Captured Fire wonder because it gives free flammability to every city. But I suppose that it would make sense, Fire was probably even bigger an advancement for early humans than caves.

I agree, I never build that wonder, I lose to many buildings because of it. Putting the Golden Age on it would still not make it worth building.

 

[Hydromancerx]

Here are some updates ...

- Cave Dwellings is now an auto-build Housing building that no longer gives a golden age and has stats in line with the other buildings.
- Captured Fire National Wonder now gives a Golden Age and some additional bonuses

The Captured Fire is now worth building and Cave Dwellings is an auto-build building with much different stats.

 

[GT Ranma]

*rubs chin* Is there any way to do an OR system in the game?

If you could, my idea would be:

If you have Caves you can build say, X National Wonder, and then that opens up a whole line of Cave buildings. In total giving a set bonus of , , and .

Or, if you have say Mammoths, you can make Y Nation Wonder and that opens up a new set of buildings that gives, in total, the same set of bonuses for Caves.

Or if you have Bones, then your early development is around Bones, so you have Z Nation Wonder, and your buildings are based on bones, giving you the same total bonuses.

Or would that not be possible?

 

[Hydromancerx]

Probably possible with the "expression system".

 

[Faustmouse]

Hmm... It might be combinated with the cultural heritage, couldn't it?

 

[GT Ranma]

This is just my opinion, but I would love to see something like that in game. It would give an added level of depth to the play through. (Even though the 'unique' buildings would just be clones of the other buildings, so that each nation gets a unique [I don't want to say culture, but I can't think of any other word] culture that influences the flavor of their play through. )
Coding wise, it would make the database bigger, but it would give your BC civilization something other then Civics to give it that uniqueness that is found from civilizations all over the globe at that time.
Just something to think about.

 

[Thunderbrd]

@Hydro: I would agree. For what its worth I think you made the right call entirely. Btw, has anyone confirmed that the Controlled Fire natural wonder is actually working to give a free fire pit in every city? A while back we noted it was not.

 

[ls612]

@Hydro: I would agree. For what its worth I think you made the right call entirely. Btw, has anyone confirmed that the Controlled Fire natural wonder is actually working to give a free fire pit in every city? A while back we noted it was not.

I think that the Fire Pit should give +1 health to the city with this new system, that would make it worthwhile (and make the Controlled Fire NW a more fitting replacement to the Cave Dwellings).

 

[Hydromancerx]

I think that the Fire Pit should give +1 health to the city with this new system, that would make it worthwhile (and make the Controlled Fire NW a more fitting replacement to the Cave Dwellings).

While there are health benefits from a fire pit (ex. warmth, cooked food, safety from wild animals, etc) there are also unhealthiness (ex. smoke, burns, etc). I feel that the pros and cons cancel each other out to make it neutral.

 

[JosEPh_II]

While there are health benefits from a fire pit (ex. warmth, cooked food, safety from wild animals, etc) there are also unhealthiness (ex. smoke, burns, etc). I feel that the pros and cons cancel each other out to make it neutral.

What happens more often? Warmth, cooked food, safety? Or Burns and bad smoke in your eyes? (And there is a consensus that that wood smoke is more beneficial than harmful, similar to different "Teas").

JosEPh

 

[ls612]

What happens more often? Warmth, cooked food, safety? Or Burns and bad smoke in your eyes? (And there is a consensus that that wood smoke is more beneficial than harmful, similar to different "Teas").

JosEPh

I agree, the Fire Pit should definitely give for gameplay reasons as well, it would make them worth building and the Captured Fire wonder a fit replacement for Cave Dwellings.