Research Request(s)

[Thunderbrd]

There is no ability in Civ IV to allow a resource to be available only in the city it is in.

This remains high on the list of priorities to address at some point. I feel it should but it's more difficult to establish than one might imagine in the code.

 

[Dancing Hoskuld]

This remains high on the list of priorities to address at some point. I feel it should but it's more difficult to establish than one might imagine in the code.

What I would like to know in game is if a resource is local, available from another city in your nation or imported from outside your nation. The trade and buildings don't mesh well at the moment as you can only build some buildings if the resource is in the vicinity of your city but they should also be available at the first point of import if they are not available in your nation, ie you should be able to smelt copper if you have no copper ore in your nation but import it. Olives to Olive Oil is another example. Or Wheat to Grain etc.

 

[Thunderbrd]

What I would like to know in game is if a resource is local, available from another city in your nation or imported from outside your nation. The trade and buildings don't mesh well at the moment as you can only build some buildings if the resource is in the vicinity of your city but they should also be available at the first point of import if they are not available in your nation, ie you should be able to smelt copper if you have no copper ore in your nation but import it. Olives to Olive Oil is another example. Or Wheat to Grain etc.

Those would be good statuses to define as well and in many ways, vicinity is the best we've got with that.

 

[raxo2222]

This was a design decision by Hydro. I did disagree with it at the time but most building lines were his part of C2C. It is part of the idea that you can build stuff due to the technology you have but it has uses that only become available later. In this case you can build huts way back in the stone age but you can only have a bicycle shed when you get bikes.

There is no ability in Civ IV to allow a resource to be available only in the city it is in. In C2C vicinity tags and the like make it possible but those did not come until long after. In fact the ones which could be used for this did not become available until this year.

Having a building that gives the yield return to the city and then a replacement building that makes it possible to trade the good might work but then you would have the same confusion.

Well Cloth issue is by far worst one - Weaver Hut/Cloth unlock at Weaving - it can be your third or fourth tech you can research and Wool - first material you can make cloth from is accessible at Animal Husbandry, this is where you can actually build Weaver's Hut.
This delays Rope by 3 columns.
Essentially you have use for wool and fiber from silk/hemp/cotton/flax unlocked much earlier than those resources themselves.
What else is suitable material for cloth?

Milk exactly mirrors situation:
Theoretically you can have it at Animal Husbandry, but you can't make it until Glassware (X31), where you can finally actually build Dairy Barn after you build Glass maker or something.
It delays Cheese by 2 columns and Ghee Oil by 6 columns.
Just like can't carry milk in barrels/pottery and then use it immediately as food or make cheese/ghee oil from it.

That is you have uses for milk before you can make milk.

For me unrealistic resource trading is least concern.

By the way I don't think situation with some resources was that bad, when Hydro developed building chains.
That is max 5 columns between resource being unlocked and being able to build hut.workshop/factory producing that resource.
That is if resource was unlocked by tech, then you had to research less than 5 or so techs after discovering resource to build factory/workshop/hut producing resource.

 

[Dancing Hoskuld]

Milk exactly mirrors situation:
Theoretically you can have it at Animal Husbandry, but you can't make it until Glassware (X31), where you can finally actually build Dairy Barn after you build Glass maker or something.
It delays Cheese by 2 columns and Ghee Oil by 6 columns.
Just like can't carry milk in barrels/pottery and then use it immediately as food or make cheese/ghee oil from it.

That is you have uses for milk before you can make milk.

Cheese is not a problem if you have milk. In fact it should be available without anything but the things that provide milk i.e. any herd mammal in other words. That milk can also be used in the city as food. Therefore there should be something at Animal Husbandry that provides that food. I think it is covered in the yields on the map plots but not in the herd buildings as changing them to match was considered OP.

Milk for trade, butter and hence ghee oil have bigger problems when you want to make them or trade them. The phrase "Cleanliness is next to Godliness" comes from butter production; you need a high level of cleanliness to make the stuff, barrels and pottery just don't make the grade. It needs to be glass or stainless steel.

If you buy in glassware from somewhere then you can make milk etc earlier otherwise you will have to wait until you can make glass. Both should be possible. Moving the milk maker to glassware just punishes those who are behind even more. It is currently possible that a behind nation is the only one that can provide milk products and so they can make a healthy trade with other nations and get ahead if someone trades glass to them.

This means that glassware should be visible/enabled for trade right from the start of the game.

 

[tmv]

This means that glassware should be visible/enabled for trade right from the start of the game.

Wouldn't you say that glass requires some knowledge to handle safely? "The Gods Must Be Crazy" comes to mind here.

 

[Dancing Hoskuld]

Wouldn't you say that glass requires some knowledge to handle safely? "The Gods Must Be Crazy" comes to mind here.

It is not glass you are handling but glassware. Handling a glass flagon is not much different from handling a pottery bottle. Both are fragile. They both replace gourds as far as containers are concerned.

 

[tmv]

It is not glass you are handling but glassware. Handling a glass flagon is not much different from handling a pottery bottle. Both are fragile. They both replace gourds as far as containers are concerned.

Yes, but they are also very hard, compared to anything you can have at the start of the tech tree. Something like a coke bottle could also make a very dangerous club - and that is if the bottle doesn't break (if it does, you have something comparable to obsidian).

 

[Dancing Hoskuld]

Yes, but they are also very hard, compared to anything you can have at the start of the tech tree. Something like a coke bottle could also make a very dangerous club - and that is if the bottle doesn't break (if it does, you have something comparable to obsidian).

Stainless Steel is a poor man's obsidian at least where medicine is concerned. However there is nothing in the game that lets you use glass as a weapon.

 

[tmv]

However there is nothing in the game that lets you use glass as a weapon.

You are right, there isn't. And that's alright right now because by the time you can have glassware there are far better options for weapons, like Bronze. But if you introduce glassware (possibly) at the beginning of the tech tree, these items would immediately be the best weapons your civ could have - kind of like the opposite of apocalypse weapons, where your resources are suddenly far behind the possibilities of the tech tree.

That might be an interesting idea to keep a civ that is extremely behind in the tech tree alive for a while, like a glassclub warrior with comparable stats to a Stone Maceman (upgrading to Obsidian Maceman or O. Swordsman) but without any tech prerequisite.

Sorry for going off topic, but it would seem strange to me that a "primitive" civ that gets glassware uses it to store milk, but doesn't realize that it outperforms their weapons by a lot.

 

[raxo2222]

Well I revised resources and their producers/consumers.

No idea how to gracefully resolve issue of cloth - it s one of earliest resources, but Weaver's Hut, unlocked on Weaving along with Cloth, is unbuildable for well over half of Prehistoric era.

Bamboo Worm Gatherer needed Bamboo in vicinity as if it was natural resource.
Changed requirement to Bamboo Grove building - it needs Bamboo feature in vicinity.

Added Leather as alternative for Capture the Flag building.

Removed Helium 3 (was alternative to Hydrogen) requirement of Microgenerator/ Plasma Generator Factory.
Helium3 is space only natural resource.

Radio factory was moved to Radio from Electronics tech and recosted.
Now it requires Glass AND Copper Wires or Transistors or Semiconductors.
Radio resource reveal/enable tech was moved to Radio tech.

Replicator Plant and Personal Replicators were moved to Nanobotics from Rapid Prototyping tech, and recosted.

Added Straw as alternate to Cloth and Leather for Rope Weaver's Hut.

Straw Gatherer can use Grain or Grass now.

Water Bottle Factory was moved to Assembly Line from Plastics tech and recosted.
Now it can use Glassware as alternative of Plastics resource.

 

[Dancing Hoskuld]

You are right, there isn't. And that's alright right now because by the time you can have glassware there are far better options for weapons, like Bronze. But if you introduce glassware (possibly) at the beginning of the tech tree, these items would immediately be the best weapons your civ could have - kind of like the opposite of apocalypse weapons, where your resources are suddenly far behind the possibilities of the tech tree.

That might be an interesting idea to keep a civ that is extremely behind in the tech tree alive for a while, like a glassclub warrior with comparable stats to a Stone Maceman (upgrading to Obsidian Maceman or O. Swordsman) but without any tech prerequisite.

Sorry for going off topic, but it would seem strange to me that a "primitive" civ that gets glassware uses it to store milk, but doesn't realize that it outperforms their weapons by a lot.

They can only get the stuff they trade for, but then obsidian is glass anyway.

Bamboo Worm Gatherer needed Bamboo in vicinity as if it was natural resource.
Changed requirement to Bamboo Grove building - it needs Bamboo feature in vicinity.

It is a natural resource just not one that appears on the map. This is true of a lot of resources. Perhaps the manufactured resources should be split to reflect this.

Radio factory was moved to Radio from Electronics tech and recosted.
Now it requires Glass AND Copper Wires or Transistors or Semiconductors.
Radio resource reveal/enable tech was moved to Radio tech.

Should be Copper Wires AND ( Glass or Transistors or Semiconductors)

 

[raxo2222]

It is a natural resource just not one that appears on the map. This is true of a lot of resources. Perhaps the manufactured resources should be split to reflect this.

Ah so any resource that comes from plant, like grass, straw, bamboo, reeds, berries, fruits, vegetables, nuts and so on?

Should be Copper Wires AND ( Glass or Transistors or Semiconductors)

Done.

 

[Harrier]

Milk for trade, butter and hence ghee oil have bigger problems when you want to make them or trade them. The phrase "Cleanliness is next to Godliness" comes from butter production; you need a high level of cleanliness to make the stuff, barrels and pottery just don't make the grade. It needs to be glass or stainless steel.

Just to be awkward.

I can remember as a kid, after WW2 - going to the local store and butter (which was rationed) was stored in barrels. They would scoop it out and use spatullas to pat it into the block shape seen today.

 

[Noriad2]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milk

"based on the analysis of lipid residue in prehistoric pottery, that shows that dairying was practiced in the early phases of agriculture in Southwest Asia, by at least the seventh millennium BC."

So milk products could be used with pottery, not just glass.

 

[raxo2222]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Textile

"The discovery of dyed flax fibres in a cave in the Republic of Georgia dated to 34,000 BCE suggests textile-like materials were made even in prehistoric times."

Technically you don't need agriculture to make plant fibers.
That is plant fibers and their producers could be unlocked much earlier.

Weaving is needed for Shelter Building tech.
This tech is in third column, it reveals cotton and silk.

 

[KaTiON_PT]

About the milk thing, maybe make it give a single unhealthiness point to simulate the lower shelf life? It can later be corrected by having access to proper glass containers.

 

[raxo2222]

Bamboo fibers can be used as material for cloth.

That is Weaver's Hut could have lowered yield until wool and various plant fibers are accessible.
It would have normal yield with Animal Husbandry, when you can make wool.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bamboo_textile
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fiber - Other possible fibers for weaving.

 

[Noriad2]

Raw milk is notorious for causing diseases. Only with Pasteurization and/or refrigeration did it become safe. Before that, actual milk wasn't used much unless it was directly from the cow. Milk products like cheese and yoghurt are much older consumables than actual milk.

 

[raxo2222]

Raw milk is notorious for causing diseases. Only with Pasteurization and/or refrigeration did it become safe. Before that, actual milk wasn't used much unless it was directly from the cow. Milk products like cheese and yoghurt are much older consumables than actual milk.

+1 Unhealthiness +some Disease from Dairy Barn until Refrigeration or Modern Sanitation.
Also it can use pottery as alternative to glass.
Pottery is 4 columns from Animal Husbandry (Not counting Tengriism and Sedentary Lifestyle)

Or Milk itself could give +1 health on those industrial era techs.
That would be realistic change I guess.

Both Weaver's Hut and Dairy Barn must wait for majority of era before they can be built.
I don't think, that there are other buildings, that must wait for almost whole era until their prereqs can be fulfilled.

Now it is so easy to see what is buildable and what is not with Toffer's pedia.

I permanently enabled displaying unbuildable buildings and units options in BUG.
Items, that can be built are separated from ones that can't be built.

Here is what it looks in example game (It was from AI autorun save).

Spoiler :