Refugees

[nihonjeff]

Hi all -

New member, so forgive me if this as been addressed previously. I did some searching, and aside from gandhi rules raising it in the last unit contest, I couldn't find any other references. And perhaps this would be better served by waiting until the next unit contest, but, meh... why wait?

I would really like to see a refugee system added. It always seemed strange to me that, by razing a city, you are apparently also slaughtering its millions of inhabitants, regardless of your alignment.

Essentially, as gandhi rules suggested in Design a Unit 3, a number of Refugee units would spawn when a city is razed (I like his/her idea of a random number up to half of the city population). These units could be attacked and destroyed, or, if the attacking civ uses the Slavery civic, they could be captured and turned into Workers.

Otherwise, the Refugees would be under the control of the civ that controlled the razed city. If they are brought to a city and "Joined", they would add 1 population point per Refugee, as well as +2 Unhappiness and +2 Unhealthiness for 10 (maybe more?) turns. Furthermore, each Refugee would have the chance of being a "carrier" for one of the religions present in the razed city, which would then spread to their new home (if not already there). The controlling civ could either wait until the end of the war (when they can afford the happiness/heath cost) and resettle them, or simply foist them off on any neighbor with whom they have an Open Borders agreement.

Thoughts?

 

[Farmer Bobathan]

i really like this idea but how hard would it be to implement?

 

[xienwolf]

Not sure if I personally would want this back in the game. I seem to remember something like it in prior Civ games. Raze a city and you get workers, and workers can join a city to add 1 population to them. I was happy to see it gone.

And from the "RP perspective" of why a "Good" civ would kill thousands of millions... why would they raze a city at all? Destroying someone's home and then leaving them alive, AND making them join your empire, the ones who wiped out their entire way of life, is horrifically inhuman.

 

[nihonjeff]

xienwolf, just out of curiosity, why were you glad to see it gone? I personally don't recall it being in previous games (which, of course, could just be because I never really razed too many cities), but I could be wrong. I do remember Partisans. shiver

RP-wise, that's an excellent question. I can think of a couple reasons why a Good-aligned civ would raze. Perhaps they are the Bannor or Mercurians burning out an Ashen Veil city. And perhaps they would slaughter all the inhabitants. My feeling is that what happens to the refugees should be left up to the player, rather than just disappearing them from the game.

Also, I believe I may have been unclear. The Refugees would be under the control of the razed city's civ, not the civ that is doing the razing. The point is that they are survivors trying to flee the rampaging invaders, not join them. Sorry for the confusion.

 

[mdfairch]

When the AC count starts getting high, Good civilizations are almost compelled to raze the Ashen Veil's holy city (except in one game I played where it was also the Order's holy city ). So it's not like it's an inconceivable scenario.

 

[Mewtarthio]

Isn't there a new guild coming out in Shadow that spawns in nearby cities after a raze? Maybe that's supposed to represent refugees.

 

[nihonjeff]

Isn't there a new guild coming out in Shadow that spawns in nearby cities after a raze? Maybe that's supposed to represent refugees.

I could be wrong, but my impression was that the Brotherhood of Wardens was supposed to be a sort of civil defense league, where citizens banded together to support their city's military defenders in response to another of their cities being destroyed.

 

[MagisterCultuum]

I would probably prefer refugees being handled by random events, which are likely to happen if your cities are razed. Sometimes this means free units, sometimes population boosts in other cities, etc.

Cities running slavery should be able to capture much of the population of cities they raze as slaves.

 

[xienwolf]

Having them go to the civ who just lost a city is a decent idea, helps to balance the loss thing (though the guild may do it better), but you have to make sure they spawn in your capitol, otherwise the attackers just move one unit who hasn't attacked yet onto your refugee stack and they go to the attackers yet again.


Main reason I was happy to not have it around anymore was so that there was less "reward" for razing a city. You were also able to disband a city and get some nominal worker stack based on population level. In each case, it was just a bit of a nuisance in my opinion to have to deal with the workers.

 

[it-ogo]

Let me summarize and add
- City with unhappy citizen have a chance to generate a refugee each turn
- Razed city generates number of refugees as percent of population (others go to serve infernals and mercurians)
- Converting city with inquizitor or purge the unfaithful have a chance to generate a refugee with non-state religion promo
- Refugee has a chance to become barbarian each turn
- Refugee of another civ inside your cultural borders has a chance to become yours
- Refugee in neutral land has a chance to turn into tribal village each turn
- R can join a city raising unhappiness, unhealthiness and crime for a few turns.
- Refugee may have a dwarven and elven promotion (besides religion) and can not join city of other race
- Rival refugee can be captured
- Evil civ can turn refugee into slave

etc

It is funny but i am not sure interesting to play. Adds much micromanagement.

 

[mdfairch]

There's almost a mechanism like that already -- Manes. When an evil city is razed, Hyborem get a few Manes, which can be promoted, put to work, added to a city, etc. Would refugees really be so different? Of course, it would detract somewhat from the uniqueness of Hyborem.

Personally, I liked the "Partisans" mechanism from previous editions of Civilization. I notice that it appears in Road to War, where it fits in rather well. Balancing it properly for FfH would be rather more difficult though; imagine trying to conquer a large Elven city, and as soon as you do, it's SURROUNDED by Elven partisans -- which are, in all likelihood, on forested tiles, where they are nigh-invincible. And the city itself may even be a forested tile (how does that happen, by the way?! I've seen it a few times...), making the partisans' job of reconquering the city a bit too easy.

Still, refugees were and still are a fundamental feature of all real-world wars. One of those things that can make life extremely difficult for the neighbours of conquered cities and states. Having 100,000 refugees show up at your border... I think that dealing with that kind of thing would fit very well to the theme of dark fantasy.

 

[westamastaflash]

Basium gets angels, roughly corresponding to manes, just good guys

 

[nihonjeff]

it-ogo -- very complete list of ideas! That would be a much larger addition that what I'd had in mind -- it'd turn into a major element of gameplay rather than simply flavoring up the razing of cities. But I think it could be cool if well-implemented. On the other hand, like has been suggested by you and others, it might just bog down the game in micro-management...

As for the similarities to Manes and Angels, I wouldn't see Refugees as being promotable to combat units, or used as Workers (the exception being if they are captured by a Slavery-using civilization).

I always had mixed feelings on Partisans... They had the habit of REALLY bogging down an invading force. I wouldn't mean seeing them return if the mechanic were tweaked... Maybe instead of a swarm of them immediately spawning when a city is captured, there is a percent chance of a single partisan spawning each turn that a city is in uprising?

 

[thapagan]

Partisans are a great feature because the bog down and invading force.
I have "lost"* wars because of them.


Due to extra time, more war wearynies, diplomatics, costs, etc.
This could a late game feature for when the barbarians are gone.

You have raised city X, 5 partisan longbowman appear.
5 partisan maceman appear.
one partisan eater of dreams appears!!!

 

[westamastaflash]

xienwolf, just out of curiosity, why were you glad to see it gone? I personally don't recall it being in previous games (which, of course, could just be because I never really razed too many cities), but I could be wrong. I do remember Partisans. shiver

Aww partisans weren't that bad. My howitzers just rolled over them...