Province System: Creation

[Algernon Pondlife]

[part 2]

HI,

I've managed to break away from real life again. Thanks for the encouragement Ant509y. I recognize the issue of getting our foot in the Firaxian door. I will make a couple of points about that later.

First another little point or two: an unhappy city in a province should have a chance of making the rest of the province unhappy gradually. Provinces will have their own characteristics which should make them stronger/more willing/better able in some types of developments than other.

By the way I like thinking of adjustments on percentages and in probabilities (especially probabilities because it takes the calculating down uncertain paths - less predictable) rather than a straight "this is 10 extra shields" kind of thing. So that is why I talk a little generically about effects. I'm not so interested in the implementation method as in the enrichment of the game by whatever means.

Now, what do provinces do for the game? Basically an extra dimension of authenticity. There have not been that many empires in history that maintained stability without recognizing local variation, sometimes to the point of local independence. Once there are provinces in the game many things can be explored. Things like seccession leading to the emergence of another civilization or to a whole chunk of territory suddenly joining your neighbour (or vice versa of course). Cultural stuff can be enriched. different government types can lead to different degrees and success of integration and cohesiveness. In short practically any of the ideas already proposed can happen.

Sometimes you have to use your imagination. Effects can be implemented in a fairly abstract way. But if provinces are on the board, however simply they are implemented, then there is the possibility of future development and also the very clever mod-makers will find extra possibilities. So the trick is to get firaxis to see value in implementing a model for provinces.

Three aspects spring to mind; fitness, cost and marketing.

The developers have a perception of what the game is. We all wish they had our perception, but then there would have to be about 1.5 million games. They may have a very firm idea of what the game should do or they may have a fairly flexible notion, built from just an underlying theme (of course marketing have the most flexible perception of all; to them, if the name Civilization sells a product then stuff anything inside the box - sorry marketers, I exaggerate a little). So changes need to be consistent with the developers aspirations if they are to get a real hearing.

All changes have costs, and costs imply risk. First the concept has to be translated into a specification, the specification has to be integrated into the rest of the game, the implementation has to be made to work as predicted in an already complex little universe, it has to have a balance that doesn't invalidate the way the game works, then (and this is very important too) the AI has to accomodate the new situation and make good sense of it, not just the AI enemy, but also the AI assistants have to be good enough to meet player expectations. The list goes on, but the bottom line is the greater the change the higher the risk and cost

Marketing are our friends. I'd better repeat that: marketing are our friends.
Marketing work out whether it will sell and how many and at what price, and then they allow the business to make a decision to go ahead. The whole of Civfanatics (plus that other lot with a big brash forum) are a tiny part of the market for these games. If we were all there were we would have to pay a fortune for each new version. And, worse still, we are not likely to be typical of of buyers in the wide world, at least because we are serious enthusiasts willing not only to play the game but to talk and think about it all the time.

So, we depend on marketing making sure it will sell to 1.5 million people or so. Otherwise they will stop making it. So marketing have to look at all the innovations and consider whether they are a selling point that will bring back the punters and even attract new ones. Otherwise they are going to worry if it is something the reviewers will go to town on and actually put people off buying the game. Of course marketing are deep thinkers and they can sometimes be pesuaded that something will have long term impact. It may not immediately sell more copies day one, but once people are using it the addiction will be fuelled.

So we have a winner here. Any self-respecting civ developer will see the "rightness" of provinces. Initial implementation can be relatively light (we won't howl (will we/) if our favourite idea is not in from the start). Its a seller - "Now with provinces in full technicolour", "Civilization just got civilized", "Learn to cope with moaning provincials; send punitive expeditionary forces to quell your far flung provinces".

In terms of presentation, I'm not one for being prescriptive about the detail. I like to offer the developers the big idea and show some of the things that can be done with it. I know some of you think out very specific ways that it can work and I applaud you for that. But can I suggest that the detail bits play second fiddle in any offering to the developers. I', sure they don't mind some of the brainstorming being done for them but at the end of the day that is what they are good at and it is probably something they enjoy as a challenge. So up front should be the big idea - provinces - next should be a list or description of the kind of things (so not prescriptive) it could involve. and then quietly any good ideas as to specifics but without any sense of these being vital. For example many of us (self included) have talked numbers about cities in a province; truth is we don't really know what will work well. So we shouldn't be shouting to the developers that there is this minimum or that maximum; for all we know single city provinces might work very well in a mixed environment.

I'd better stop now or this will get too long for anyone to want to read it. Everything I say is just my perspective and I know I'm not always in the mainstream (you should see some of my comments on other threads in civ4 and before). I know that if not enough people want the kind of game I want then it will not happen. But I still like Civilization (civ 1 in hindsight) and I still like the Hartland Trefoil original boardgame) and civ3 has spawned TAM and GLC (incomplete as it is) and MEM all of which are phenomenal subsets of the game (and, as it happens, closer to the original boardgame concept).

Cheers

Diatomite

 

[Ant509y]

Well. I have nothing to say to that, but this: Nice! ^_^

 

[mitsho]

just one more addition:
It shouldn't be necessary to build provinces. There also should be a pro not to do it. Want an example. France is a very centralized country and the Byzantine Empire is also an example...

mfG mitsho

 

[dh_epic]

Oh yeah, absolutely. If you have a small, centralized empire, having no provinces might be the smartest thing you can do.

But in the Industrial Age, when France founds Quebec and Montreal in the New World... you can bet that's a province. I'd even argue it should automatically be a province, just without the benefits of the palace (until it is built). Because it's an ocean away.

And as for the marketing speech, I would agree -- I think provinces could be marketed in a way that has a lot of "zing". Whether its benefit to realism, efficiency in gameplay, or new gameplay concepts it permits.

 

[Algernon Pondlife]

There is no logical way to make provinces compulsury. On the other hand there could well be pressures (or possibly incentives) driving the player in that direction especially for some forms of government. Don't forget also that there is no firm definition of the degree of autonomy implied in the concept. To take a contemporary example, would English counties be considered sufficiently in charge of their own destiny to be described as provinces? Or perhaps the recent moves in the direction of self-government by Scotland and to some extent Wales would give us a better British model for provincial structures?

I don't think it necessary to come to conclusions about specifics like that right now. But it illustrates the breadth of possibilities inherent in the basic idea.

Cheers

Algae

 

[dh_epic]

I always saw provinces as a solution and cause of problems.

It's a solution in that it reduces corruption -- keeping government more watchful and in direct contact with its people. Not unlike a forbidden palace, a provincial palace keeps a province running efficiently.

But it also reduces centralized control, thus inviting the potential for one province to split when the going gets tough.

Under a centralized power, it takes a lot more dissent to break through the threshhold, but when it does break through, it's much more deadly.

 

[finally]

mitsho:
I am not an expert on the Byzantine Empire, but I believe it was divided into different "themes" (military provinces), like Macedonia and Anatolia. France may be very centralized at the moment, but there have been a lot of more or less autonomic duchys and counties in France during its history. Actually, I can't think of any big empires without provinces in one way or another.

Maybe centralized civs like France and the Byzantine Empire should be seen as examples where the cultural assimilation of the provinces has succeeded instead of empires with no provinces. I think the level of centralization in a civ should depend on culture and military in some way (you have probably discussed how this will work already).

I would like to see compulsory provinces, but that is just because I want provinces to be used. If civil war is the only way to stop a civ from growing, then provinces should be the only way for a civ to grow. Otherwise you can build a civ without provinces and continue to grow faster than your competitors. Then civil war wouldn't be much of a solution to the famous "big is the only way to go"-problem. Unless, of course, the advantages for building provinces are big enough, the disadvantages for not building provinces are big enough, or if there are other ways to stop a civ from growing. But it's hard to speculate in advance because we don't know how the different solutions we suggest will affect the game balance. I have a feeling that it would be harder to implement the AI for the non-compulsory province system, but on the other hand, that's not my problem

 

[Ant509y]

A sort of great encouragement should be needed to nudge people into using provinces, definitely. Perhaps if a city is not in a province, it is very susceptible to outside forces? I'm not sure what kind of things they could do to make provinces very attractive. Making provinces absolutely mandatory isn't something I would do at all. But the advantages of a province must, instead of being a sort of 'bonus', should give the feeling of something you need to do well in the game, the way culture is now, in a sense. Am I making sense with that?

 

[wisewood]

Provinces/states should be in CIV4 definetly! Provinces add a lot of fun and interesting deatails to the game...I would like to have provincial addvisors..SO that they advince me what their province needs...Like hospitals, or more military, and so on. Great idea...even roman divided their empire into different states...and greeks had their city states....

 

[Ant509y]

Yep. That's why we want 'em. Oh, and... this thread is officially back from the dead! And it isn't even dawn yet, at least not where I live... lol

 

[batteryacid]

Provinces should definitely be part of civ4- but things like ethnics etc. or some kind of hidden mechanism in the forming of provinces would make things more complicated and most of the players would be frustrated when provinces are forming without having control over it.

The simplest solution: Build some kind of provinical palace, cities are automatically in the province whose provincial capital is nearest.

Provinces can riot if there are more than a certain amount uncontent citicens in the Province (should be less than 50%), unhappiness inside the cities of the provinces should be also influenced by war near/in this province (War weariness should then first appear in provinces near the battlefront and it should take a lot of time to come to more distant provinces, enabling the player to have a functional core around the capitol for a long time.

Further ideas:
Specific buildings for provincial capitols (improved taxing, lower corruption in the whole province, perehaps buildings which influence the cultural output in the whole province etc.)

Different goverments should also have different benefits for provinces

perehaps: more ressources on the map, but with resources not distributed in the whole coutry but only in provinces (forcing the player to trade more)

 

[dh_epic]

Throwing out this picture as sort of an alternate way of thinking about provinces.

You can imagine each of your regions having a different psychology, a different attitude towards things. I figure using America as an example hits home with a lot of people.

http://us.news2.yimg.com/us.yimg.com/p/nm/20040826/poverty_census_graphic.gif

 

[PeteAtoms]

I kinda just skimmed through this thread (great ideas, im all for em) so if i suggest something thats already suggested i apologize:

1.Change the names of governors of cities to mayors and then make the governor the "automated leader guy" of the whole province so you could tell the governor to do stuff in provinces and then then mayors of individual cities, if there wer conflict between the governor and mayor i think that the mayor would prevail (just for more micromanagement without acually "micromanaging")

2. Definitely the Provincial Advisor Screen (its a must)

3.On the Provincial advisor screen you should be able to toggle the different luxury and tech output sliders for each province, you could see the income of each province and adjust as needed and as for the tech advancement, you would advance in the overall total of tech research being done. This way if one province os on the verge of rebelling you could boost the luxury output, or if a province is full of universities and libraries you could boost scientific funding.

I dont know what level of priority you put these on (personal opinion i guess) but thats just my 2 cents.

 

[Exel]

I don't understand what purpose would the provinces serve in Civ4. How would they in any way add to the gameplay? Other than by complicating things unnecessarily, that is...

In most countries provinces are just what you described in the "Again, Provinces" thread: administrative bodies. What do we need them for in Civ4? We can do everything ourselves, we don't need to distribute our powers to n+1 bureaucrats. That's the whole point of a computer game in the first place; doing things yourself. The way I see it provinces would only add to the micro management without introducing one single benefit for gameplay.

 

[dh_epic]

There are lots of gameplay benefits.

Three big ones, in my mind:

- Keeping enemy nations as provinces, even colonies
- Provinces have their own cultural differences, creating more domestic issues and strife (How do we handle those peasants down in India, my King of England?)
- Provincial improvements, that affect a region

It would open up a lot of strategy, more than anything. It doesn't have to be something you manually set up or maintain, but borders that are drawn automatically based on the cultural make-up of your Civ. You then try to keep your provinces happy, and go after your enemy's provinces. Maybe the best way to strike at England isn't to invade London, but to give weapons and money to peasant uprisings in India.

 

[Exel]

There are lots of gameplay benefits.

- Keeping enemy nations as provinces, even colonies

That would be handy, yes. But for that (as well as for colonies) there could be some automated thingy without you having to slice up your own core territory.

- Provinces have their own cultural differences, creating more domestic issues and strife

For most smaller countries no, they don't. Nothing major on the Civ scale anyway. Provinces would become important in domestic matters only in the cases of eg. federation (USA, EU), annexations and colonies (Commonwealth, USSR) or otherwise multicultural civs. But I see no reason to spread the administrative tasks to a provincial level just for the heck of it.

 

[dh_epic]

Yeah, as much as I'm for provinces, I'm actually against the idea that users should have to carve it up themselves. That's too much effort.

I also disagree with the term "provinces" and more prefer "regions", since only the largest or most pluralistic nations can be said to have regions -- the only real reason I see dividing up the empire as a useful concept.

I think we agree for the most part though. (Although not everyone will agree with us.)

 

[Exel]

Even with such colonial/regional uses I still think that the province system would complicate things too much in relation to its benefits. As such I don't think it should be implemented (unless someone comes up with much more/better additional pros), and nor do I believe it will, considering the Civ4 design principles declared by the project leader (forgot the name, sorry).

 

[dh_epic]

Hey that's okay. I think the big thing people like about provinces is how it lays the ground work for Civ joining / splitting, civil wars, and all that kind of stuff, which is a huge part of history. Some people aren't into it, because they feel like the threat of civil war would make the game too demoralizing. I try to look at it the other way, instigating civil war would be a great way to mess things up for a rival!

But I think you're right, Soren has yet to voice his interest in provinces, and might offer more complexity than he wants to add to the game.

 

[finally]

Basically every civilization in Civ 3 have had significant ethnical minorities within their empires and these minorities have been of major importance for independence movements, civil wars, revolutions etc. A big empire equals problems with different ethnicities, cultures and natives that haven't been properly considered in civ 3, except for cultural resistance which isn't that much of a problem and maybe corruption and riots which are poorly designed concepts.

I think it would be much more interesting to have ethnicities as a balancing factor that makes it hard to expand (in the early phase of the game), instead of the corruption model, because the gameplay choices are more interesting. How do you want to treat your minorities to make them assimilate to your culture? Do you want to give them certain freedoms/independence (as vassal states maybe), crush their rebellions with your military, initiate a "nationalism" propaganda? This can be implemented in many ways and a provincial system is one way.

I'm all for the easiest possible solution. A connection between barbarians and ethnical minorities, automatic forming provinces (depending on ethnicity and geographical location) and maybe an extra added slider where you can decide the level of freedom/liberty you want to give to your people, or maybe different government affecting how minorities are treated. In my opinion domestic issues is the area that needs most improvment in civ 3. Maybe some people find it terrifying or boring to deal with these issues, but if you learn how to deal with them like corruption and riots in civ 3, you shouldn't need to worry. I just hope for an expansion and improvement of these concepts.