Railroad Madness

[Essex]

Just wondering if anyone else has noticed that railroads on irrigated plains, grasslands, and floodplains squares will give you an extra food (at least under democracy havent tested other government types)? This isn't in the civilopedia or the manual that i could see but perhaps its in the readme. Another odd thing about railroads is if you have a mined grasslands with shield and then put a railroad on it you get three shields but a railroad on a forest leaves you still producing 2 shields :crazyeyes . Basically this tells me i should have a railroad on every square (except forest). The odd thing is that Sid changed railroads function in Civ 2 so people wouldn't have boring railroad dominated maps which i thought was great but now we are back to boring railroad dominated maps.

 

[aoLhaTer]

i just build them everywhere, cant hurt
plus u cant beat 0 turns to get to anywhere on the continent

 

[hoyatables]

It was pretty cool that I had a rail-dominated empire - made me stick out against the un-industrialized fools. But aethetically it does kinda stink. I had my workers automated (shift-A so they wouldn't undo what they did) and after they mined and irrigated it all, they literally lined up across the empire and marched downward laying rail. It was pretty darn impressive, I have to say. Darn near blanketed the whole thing.

 

[Scary Penguin]

Johnson notes this someplace on Apolyton. It's a mistake in the Civilopedia, not the game.

IIRC, Railroads add one food to irrigated squares, and one shield to mined squares. (I think they also add a shield to forested squares).

 

[damunzy]

I just checked, no extra shields on Forrests. So does railroads make Forrests pretty useless then? Basically since railroads don't help Forrests we should now make mines instead...

 

[Keiju]

Oih but it sux that u can travel with 0 travel time in your continent if u have railroads to everywhere...there isnt any realistic in it and it makes it too easy to def your country in the later game, like in huge map where your empire is really big...and then your naval units are like turtels on land...fs. I hope this will be fixed on patch because i dont start to edit them on my own.

 

[Not Todd]

Best thing about universal railroads is getting workers to pollution immediately.

 

[Agni Neres]

Originally posted by Keiju
Oih but it sux that u can travel with 0 travel time in your continent if u have railroads to everywhere.... I hope this will be fixed on patch because i dont start to edit them on my own.

This is the way its always worked, so its unlikely to change in a patch. At least now, the world is not one big connected blob! Ocean-going vessels are necessary again!

Cheers.

 

[dozenlong]

Rails rule! Don't get caught without coal

 

[donsig]

Railroads may not up your shield production from forested squares and this may be because forests are quite different than in Civ II:

A forest can be cut down and this adds ten shields to the nearest city's production. Forests can also be replanted, recut, replanted, etc.

So forests do have their uses.

 

[Dark Sheer]

I believe that the way rail increases your resources is kinda bugged

First, it sometimes increase your resources by 50%, other times it just doesn't. And this is not terain specific too. I have tried these combination with the results:

1) Irrigated plain gives 2 food and 3 with rail

2) Irrigated grassland gives 3 food and 4 with rail

However, if you change the rules, the results varies:

1) Hill give 1 food and irrigation give +1 food. Rail has no effect, still 2 food
2) Hill give 2 food and irrigation give + 1 food. Rail gives 4 food (result same as grassland)
3) Forest give 2 food (no irrigation of course). Rail has no effect.

Unless someone can prove me wrong....I did say the formula for increasing resource with rail is somewhat buggy :rocket2:

 

[shirleyrocks]

Originally posted by Dark Sheer


1) Hill give 1 food and irrigation give +1 food. Rail has no effect, still 2 food
2) Hill give 2 food and irrigation give + 1 food. Rail gives 4 food (result same as grassland)
3) Forest give 2 food (no irrigation of course). Rail has no effect.

I'm not sure I followed you, Dark Sheer. You can't irrigate a hill?

 

[Kuratko]

I also think the railroads are too powerful. The movement really should not be unlimited, could be large value, like 10 or 15, but not infinity. This is too unrealistic. I did not like it in Civ II either. And also, increasing both shields and food is too much. Its both unrealistic and ugly to have all your countryside covered with the dense net of railroads. I would rather suggest that railroads increase only shields and maybe another terrain improvement (farms?) could be introduced to increase food.

This might be a matter of personal taste but the really bad thing is that you cannot edit the effect of railroads in the editor. Or can you? I did not find out how. FIRAXIS: This should be enabled!!!

 

[Nero Would]

As I understand it, a railroad increases the effect of tile improvements only. So it adds one food to a tile that is irrigated or it adds one shield to a tile that is mined. Since you can't irrigate and mine the same square, the only addition you can get from a railroad is either 1 food or 1 shield.

 

[ironfang]

This is a great post! Follow its guidance.

ironfang

 

[shennessy]

I dont get all the unrealistic stuff....

How long does it take to move via rail from the tip of florida to the edge LA. Much less than a year. But every turn in CIV 3 during the 1900s is a year(right?). So how is it not realistic that a tank put on a train can't make it anywhere in the world in one year if the destination is connected via railroad.

Look there are alot of things in Civ 3 that are unrealistic representaions and symbols for a game (not a simulation) based on how history has formed our culture and world. Every time you think something is unrealistic just ask yourself does this make the game more or less fun to play. Does moving units within one year anywhere on the map that is connected via railroad make the game less fun for you? Some may say yes, but I am sure many more will say no. You need to up the speed of the units in the late game to keep it flowing.

I think modern navel units also need this kind of speed increase. Once airports are in play transports are only good for invading a new continent. And even when they unload you get a whole turn to crush the invaders because they have 0 movement when they unload. I think 20 movement would be good for modern navel units. The flow of the navy in the late game is just way to slow, to the point that ships are only good for defending a port from AI ships. I may just have to download the mod if this is not changed in the patch.

 

[Kuratko]

Originally posted by Nero Would
As I understand it, a railroad increases the effect of tile improvements only. So it adds one food to a tile that is irrigated or it adds one shield to a tile that is mined. Since you can't irrigate and mine the same square, the only addition you can get from a railroad is either 1 food or 1 shield.

I get it, I did not mean it is unrealistic because it increases both. I mean I do not like it because it makes people (including myself) to railroad every square in the city radius. And this is what I feel unrealistic. An UGLY.

Originally posted by shennesy
Look there are alot of things in Civ 3 that are unrealistic representaions and symbols for a game (not a simulation) based on how history has formed our culture and world. Every time you think something is unrealistic just ask yourself does this make the game more or less fun to play. Does moving units within one year anywhere on the map that is connected via railroad make the game less fun for you? Some may say yes, but I am sure many more will say no. You need to up the speed of the units in the late game to keep it flowing.

I can agree to that. It is exactly that it makes the game less fun for me. Again, I did not attack the speed of railroads itself but rather the imbalance it brings as the naval units become hopelessly slow and compare also the unlimited movement on railroads with the range of airplanes and missiles. Either increase the ranges of naval and air units or tone down the railroads.

What I attack mainly is the fact that you CANNOT tone down the railroads in the editor if you wanted (other than removing them completely). I want a variable for railroad movement cost settable in the editor.

 

[ironfang]

Well. I agree some what. I believe that modern naval vessels need to be sped up a little (maybe 2 moves more), but you understate the usefullness of transports and overstate the use of Air ports.

I am in a game now where I have invaded another continent that has 5 different civs on it (Huge world map mind you). So I had to spear head the assualt with an air craft carrier, 8 battle ships, 3 bombers, one fighter, and 3 transports with tanks, infantry, and cavalry.

I took the city, and built an air port. The next turn I air lifted in only 4 infantry (I only had 4 air ports in my main land). I held the city but ended up with a battle line not too far from that city. I had to assualt and destroy the enemies interior production capabilities. How? Transport. While rail was a HUGE advantage on my turf, it proved a HUGE advantage on the enemies turf when I invaded them. I had to invest in a new strategy. Bomb rail improvements, bomb rail improvements, bomb rail improvements, in order to cripple their ability to swiftly counter attack.

Then I had to move in with transports, backed with bombers and fighters... it got ugly to make a long story short. Sea movement... could be a little better on a huge map anyway.

ironfang

 

[RedDwarf]

Lets think about this guys, realistically does it take a whole year for modern naval units to move around the world? Realistically a modern naval unit like a carrier with a nucular reactor could move around the world as many as 3 times in a year. And an older one could move at least once around the world if it could refuel at ports.

Why has this concept not been implemented in any of the civ games???

One of my favorite scenarios is to choose a huge map with many islands this gives me enough isolation to build in peace early on and then make a gigantic navy to ward off would be aggressors. But later on its just not as fun, when the navy seems very sluggish.

 

[Ruffin]

Naval units should be based like aircraft.

As for rails, most rail transport has been superceded by highways and hardtop road networks. The rail covered Civ map doesn't look much different from an aerial view of suburban sprawl. What's the difference?