Post -Apocalypse Alt History Brainstorming Thread

[rightfuture]

bump for Astax

 

[Cyrusfan]

In the case of nuclear winter, might you enact something like the FFH End of Ice Age mechanic?

 

[rightfuture]

I think Hydromancerx had a post this week looking into using the FFH script to test blizzards at first.
There have been a few good ideas, that haven't been fully explored yet.
Here's my Weather discussion thread.
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=439763

If you like the idea, Please help me bring more attention to it, so that the ModTeam will make it more of a priority.

A good way is to also vote the idea up by just repeating your post elsewhere
like the ideas/discussion thread
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=377892

and since the idea comes from a mod
the C2C - Integrating mod ideas thread.
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=439576
I've promoted this idea there myself. It would be good to have a repeat voice.

To have the best chance of getting the ModTeam's attention
post a list of your favorite ideas (that have already been listed - 2nd look discussion) in the Idea Inspiration and Organization thread. I count it as a vote there as well.
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=464235
All you need to do is make a number list of your favorite (already listed) ideas and post it in that thread. Weather is one of the major features listed in the First post.
The ModTeam is keeping up with this one, as I'm making it a master list of ideas, don't post new ideas there though. Yours qualifies since it is already listed.

Discussing the idea some more is always appreciated.
Once I learn how to mod better, I will be one of the first to try to get it in. You could help me if you like
I'm hoping the ModTeam picks it up soon.
It would make for a great nuclear winter in the Post-Apocalyptic age.

 

[Kreatur]

I would like to bring an old idea of mine back to duscussion. the idea of linkin post apocalyptic buildings and units to primitive civics. for example the urban crossbowman can only be build if the civic for example primitive ore tribal is active. let me explain why: an apocalypse means the complete breakdown of the governement and the sosciety. everything that counts its the fight for survival. the social rules don't exist anymore and the people fall back in more primitive forms of living together (gregariousness ? ). to represent this without creating a mechanic to force you to change your civic to (for exampe) primitive ore chifdom, the post apocalyptic units are some sort of a catchpenny.

later after the most difficult part of the apocalypse is over you can establish more modern forms of governement again.

at the first time i suggest this, there was a complain that there a different apocalypses and not every kind of them destroy sosciety. but if an apocalypse dont destroy it, its just an disaster not a devastation.

 

[rightfuture]

Kreatur that is a good idea.

I like the idea of timeslipping in different areas,
certain lost technologies being forgotten, even rediscovered, or actually era slippage. Depends on the type and severity of the event.
Hope we explore lot's of different scenarios.
I agree that we need to defend the idea together. I think it would be fun and realistic to be able to play all sorts of different scenarios.

Keep up those ideas, I'm working hard to get them a 2nd light. We have to champion ideas a bit ever now and then, since only so many can be implemented at a time. Please feel free to help me as much as you want to. I now have several working idea threads, for different purposes. You can promote your ideas in all but the idea organization thread, until I get your ideas into it. I am open to your ideas and help, and will eventually help you get them more attention. The idea could also end up as a modmod if someone wanted to attempt it.

 

[rightfuture]

@RightFuture, I think that the future timeline link from the previous discussion page was rather generous about how long it would take for our current governments to collapse...america in 2030's? Really? The collapse of the west is unfolding in front of our very eyes, and they say it's still 20 years away.

bump for Prophet Iacobus
from the
C2C - Future - Discussion and Integration thread
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=469503

The sooner we work out this era and how to implement it, the sooner we can get it into C2C.
Please keep up you discussion if you want to see an excellent post-apocalyptic possibilities in C2C.

 

[Prophet Iacobus]

Timeslipping and population effects are cool, but only if they can be scaled differently for different events of course...and the idea of post-apocalyptic units is cool to say the least, but a nation out of the radius of more local disasters (Nuclear fallout, etc.) would be able to wipe you out too quickly.

 

[Prophet Iacobus]

Also, Apocalypse should not just occur in the modern era, but AT LEAST until we become a type one civilization (toward the middle of the transhuman era).

 

[Prophet Iacobus]

Also, Apocalypse should not just occur in the modern era, but AT LEAST until we become a type one civilization (toward the middle of the transhuman era).

So they should be able to happen from late industrial to middle transhuman...that's just me though.

 

[jmmendesp]

I think this "Apocalypse" should be as dynamic and gradual as possible, instead of an event that just happens instantly when you click next turn and the trigger is finally activated.

 

[rightfuture]

I think this "Apocalypse" should be as dynamic and gradual as possible, instead of an event that just happens instantly when you click next turn and the trigger is finally activated.

I agree, and it should be able to happen gradually or to different sets of civilizations. Maybe some countries are set back in different ways, like with revolutions. Maybe some techs are lost, or forgotten, but others are not. Maybe some of the technologies are not easy to recover for some countries. Maybe some eras are lost ('blasted back to the stone age') or set on a path to be potentially lost. Maybe the Apocalypse happens instantly or is a trigger to slow decline to it. Certainly scenarios can be imagined where the world communication degrades to the brink of nuclear warfare, like the Cuban missile crisis.

For C2C to stay varied and fun it is important to be able to optionally play many possibilities (especially popular ones). Random triggers and timing could also be built in to keep it fun and interesting. It's all about the 'What If'?

 

[Hydromancerx]

At the moment the post-Apocalypse units are triggered if you don't have the correct resources. They should not show up if you have access to modern resources. Thus during a crisis reestablishing resources would be key to getting stuff back to normal.

More advanced methods of applying this could be added in the future but that's still a ways off.

Ex1. Modern Gunpowder units require Ammo and before that Sulphur. If both of those are not assessable then all you can make is Urban Crossbowmen.

Ex2. Same as above but you have access to Iron then you can build a Wrench, Machete or Hatchet Warrior (aka post-Apocalypse Maceman Swordsman and Axeman).

 

[Il Principe]

I agree, and it should be able to happen gradually or to different sets of civilizations. Maybe some countries are set back in different ways, like with revolutions. Maybe some techs are lost, or forgotten, but others are not. Maybe some of the technologies are not easy to recover for some countries. Maybe some eras are lost ('blasted back to the stone age') or set on a path to be potentially lost. Maybe the Apocalypse happens instantly or is a trigger to slow decline to it. Certainly scenarios can be imagined where the world communication degrades to the brink of nuclear warfare, like the Cuban missile crisis.

Another idea fo that ( and a far off one at that ): Apocalyptic events shoudl be world wide ( for balance pruposes and also it´s not realy an apocalyps if it´s just local). But in galctic era ( with multimaps and all..like I said: a bit in the distance) a "world2 wide apocalpys could hit single planets or maybe soalr systems, which would be quite problematic for them in the time when geting a relief ship with blueprints and materials there would take some time.

 

[Hydromancerx]

Another idea fo that ( and a far off one at that ): Apocalyptic events shoudl be world wide ( for balance pruposes and also it´s not realy an apocalyps if it´s just local). But in galctic era ( with multimaps and all..like I said: a bit in the distance) a "world2 wide apocalpys could hit single planets or maybe soalr systems, which would be quite problematic for them in the time when geting a relief ship with blueprints and materials there would take some time.

Good idea, however very far down the line. We need multi-maps first.

 

[Dancing Hoskuld]

...Apocalyptic events shoudl be world wide ( for balance pruposes and also it´s not realy an apocalyps if it´s just local). ...

Now that is a strange idea if I have ever seen one. Most have been regional in the past. Eg England when Rome fell and trade was cut to the continent, Europe during the plague. and so on.

 

[rightfuture]

Plenty of sci-fi has a global apocalypse. I've read dozens of books on the subject.
This is not a new idea.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_apocalyptic_and_post-apocalyptic_fiction
"Apocalypse is a Greek word referring to the end of the world"

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/apocalypse
"Note : The Apocalypse is supposed to come at the end of the world or of time."

I'm sure people would like the option of playing it in many different ways. Locally,Regionally, and globally. I think they would also like to have it's possibility occur in different time periods, perhaps randomly, perhaps not.

 

[jmmendesp]

At the moment the post-Apocalypse units are triggered if you don't have the correct resources. They should not show up if you have access to modern resources. Thus during a crisis reestablishing resources would be key to getting stuff back to normal.

More advanced methods of applying this could be added in the future but that's still a ways off.

Ex1. Modern Gunpowder units require Ammo and before that Sulphur. If both of those are not assessable then all you can make is Urban Crossbowmen.

Ex2. Same as above but you have access to Iron then you can build a Wrench, Machete or Hatchet Warrior (aka post-Apocalypse Maceman Swordsman and Axeman).

Thinking a little more the subject, it seems to be like the mod has several features already in place that will be really useful when implementing the Apocalypse.

If we think about it, what are the most talked about causes for a possible apocalypse?

Major natural disasters - Check (Random Events)
Resource depletion - Check
Disease - Check (Work in Progress, but the foundation is there)
War - Check (Civ always has plenty of that
Destruction of the ecosystem - Check (Nukes, Global Warming, etc.)

One idea of mine about triggering the apocalypse would be as follows:

Take all of these factors (and more that would be added later on), and add their values to create sort of an "apocalypse counter". To make things more gradual, there would be several phases. Once the global counter reaches X, maybe there's a global research penalty, or something. Once it reaches Y, every tile gives 1 less food, something like that.

Of course, for it to be a cool and, specially a FUN feature, it would need to be much better than this, but those are my 2 cents for now

P.S. And yeah, definitely like the fact that it's tied to resources as you detailed in your post.

 

[rightfuture]

there is a counter used in the planetfall mod, used to calculate the amount of alien reaction to human intrusion. kind of like an incresing alien apocalypse.

 

[Thunderbrd]

I've been reading the comments here and have been thinking about the issue at hand but I'm not coming up with any solid ideas. One thing that would be REALLY tough to implement but would seem logical would be the loss of technology in patchwork pieces that would result from a truly apocalyptic event. When we lose how we store all of our information, and we lose those who know the technologies we've built other techs on, all we would have left would be the remnants of those technologies and we'd have to try to replicate them with back-engineering. This could lead to a whole different spin on an old technology, new discoveries we hadn't come across in the original generation of the knowledge, and perhaps completely new and unusual paths to traverse through technological achievements. Capturing the element of this tech loss and alternative recovery seems to be the ultimate thing to achieve in designing these scenarios.

The problems with trying to design such a system based on the model we currently have, however, are numerous and range from 'How do we determine 'when' techs are eliminated? What techs would be eliminated and what feature would govern those selections? Would all techs based on an eliminated tech be eliminated as well? How do we then work in the fact that much of the remnants of our techs would be repurposed and back-engineered in an off kilter manner? On and on the list of questions can be proposed.

So while this would be the ultimate method of resolving a major apocalypse, I can't say I can currently fill in all the answers enough for a true mod proposal.

Perhaps an apocalypse (loss of tech, blasting apart of a civ into multiple fragments starting over, etc...) could occur once all sources of knowledge (libraries, computers, etc...) are destroyed, along with a good percentage of population that would've maintained an understanding without the references.

Another problem arises in this method though... modern man would be more likely to understand concepts like computers (whether they could duplicate them or not would be another issue entirely) and be completely lost on more fundamental techs such as refining, alloys, tanning, etc... that allowed us to work up to things like computers. We'd want to get back to 'what we have now' as quickly as possible but would find, in frustration, that there are so many steps along the way that we've forgotten. Thus, many technologies, like firearms and cars, might be in use for some time to come after an apocalypse, but would gradually fade away as we begin the long hard road through relearning all the steps that can take us back to producing such things again. We may, however, find we can take quantum leaps through the tech tree while other fundamental understandings are completely lacking. This would be difficult to represent at best.

 

[Hydromancerx]

@Thunderbrd

That's why I am thinking that the techs do not need to be removed but the infrastructure has collapsed. Thus its more about not having the old resources you once had. Things like science and trade networks could also be penalized somehow to simulate the lack of scientific progress and lack of regular commerce.

There can be so many types of scenarios. For instance what if say solar panels or wind turbines survive you could still get limited electricity.

And with say Atomic warfare you would not really need any triggers the fact your cities are getting devastated means you have lost tons of buildings, units and improvements. Not to mention all the fallout.