Still no salt as a resource?

[Kamamura]

Extending the life of food and increasing the total amount of food is not the same thing. Since your empire is constantly producing food you never run out, instead you reach a point where you are consuming all you produce. Salt isn't used for all food either. Your example may make more sense if it increased the food output of certain tiles such as pig - maybe a building that increases those plots for a city.

You could also say it allows you to get food from further away since it can be preserved, allowing you to get food from tiles further away.

Please read the article I provided. Settlements OFTEN run out of food. That's why famines were common on bad harvests. Besides, you could not engage in prolonged warfare without preserved food rations. It was a resource with military importance - unlike banana or sugar. Read the text.

 

[westward]

Well, I assumed the game is targetted to relatively educated audience.

There were wars for salt. There was no war for banana, or mutton. Duh.

Wow. "People don't agree with me, therefore, they must be uneducated simpletons."

What, are you being paid off by the salt council?

A NOT FOOD makes less sense to represent a FOOD resource then a FOOD. Civilization is a history game, not a history sim.

 

[Kamamura]

Sal today has no longer the relevance it used to have. Would be kind of strange for a modern civilization to war over salt

That's why I speak about the ancient and medieval times in my original post. Of course, the rise of industrialization solved the problem.

There are many resources whose importance varied through time - spices were weighted with gold on Middle Ages markets, yet you would find it strange today, when all spices are plentiful due to advanced global transportation system.

 

[Kamamura]

Wow. "People don't agree with me, therefore, they must be uneducated simpletons."

What, are you being paid off by the salt council?

A NOT FOOD makes less sense to represent a FOOD resource then a FOOD. Civilization is a history game, not a history sim.

People are uneducated simpletons not because they disagree with me, but because they ignore known and proven facts.

 

[War_Pig]

There's a freakillion things not included in Civ. You can't have them all. If you think a feature is absolutely needed - make a mod.

That's pretty much all that needs to be said about that.

 

[volcano_head]

Salt today has no longer the relevance it used to have, it's no longer expensive or rare. Would be kind of strange for a modern civilization to war over salt

Whereas bananas/cows/sheep/rice make perfect sense to go to war over.

I agree with OP, salt is a sensibe resource to include. Without it you cannot preserve food, and therefore it is more important than the food itself.

Easy to mod though, so DIY.

 

[matt112986]

Please read the article I provided. Settlements OFTEN run out of food. That's why famines were common on bad harvests. Besides, you could not engage in prolonged warfare without preserved food rations. It was a resource with military importance - unlike banana or sugar. Read the text.

I meant it from a gameplay perspective not a realistic one. In Civ V cities can't run out of food, only consume all they are producing. The text is irrelevant.

I actually do support the addition of a salt resource as a way of showing large deposits - it should be a luxury resource with an economic benefit.

 

[westward]

People are uneducated simpletons not because they disagree with me, but because they ignore known and proven facts.

So, you think, when faced with a pile of bananas or a pile of salt, more people would point to the salt and say, "That's the food, I want to put that in my mouth"?

 

[Mustakrakish]

Salt is so important that you wouldn't really find a civilization without it.

I thought the thread would end with this post, but apparently no...

 

[War_Pig]

I thought the thread would end with this post, but apparently no...

I blame it on the simple fact that release day is tomorrow and we are all just going crazy looking for something to talk (fight for some of us i guess) about.

 

[westward]

I blame it on the simple fact that release day is tomorrow and we are all just going crazy looking for something to talk (fight for some of us i guess) about.

Some of us are builders, and some of us are warmongers.

 

[matt112986]

I blame it on the simple fact that release day is tomorrow and we are all just going crazy looking for something to talk (fight for some of us i guess) about.

We all want to change the game we haven't played yet...

 

[Lancor]

Salt was NOT accessible everywhere. On the contrary, it was relatively rare.

Okay, so I'm writing a little unfocused as I'm awake since like 30 hours, writing my damn term paper in modern history.

Lets see if I can clarify what I mean.



In Civ you build your city where you want, because it can grow (more or less successfull) almost anywhere on the map to sizes, comparable to about many thousand or even million people.

In real life and history, greater communities needed strategies to stay alive, like consuming salt for making their food stay eatable a longer time, like you mentioned. Smaller bands of people where often nomadic or lived by hunting/fishing, so they consumed their salt through their food. The invention of agriculture brought problems with it, like bad harvests and almost no salt gain through eating the fruits.

So one can say: For establishing a bigger community (like a Civ city) having specificial natural ressources (salt) is a natural prerequisite. This is one of the many (although more bigger) reasons there weren't any cities in most inland regions of the antique world. Not until trade started to flourish or coastal empires (like Rome) started to expand into these regions.


There were wars for salt, yes. And there were and are big depots of salt which got these regions very rich in the middle ages (Alps, eastern germany, southern france, etc.) - but this was through trade and it was an purely economic feature.


So to implement salt properly into the game, one had to create a new ressource type, as we don't have economic ressources in the game at the moment.
One would even have to go so far, to implement mechanics like "your civ needs 1 salt for every 15 pop"... or similar, as it was a basic ressource all the time for growth.


So my initial statement "salt was accessible everywhere" should now be more clear.

 

[VikingMaekel]

That's why I speak about the ancient and medieval times in my original post. Of course, the rise of industrialization solved the problem.

There are many resources whose importance varied through time - spices were weighted with gold on Middle Ages markets, yet you would find it strange today, when all spices are plentiful due to advanced global transportation system.

I quickly went to an online store and compare saffron to salt
Saffron costs € 76700,- / kg
Salt costs € 0,19 / kg
Sugar costs € 0,78 / kg

Spices give in Civ5 2 gold, I think that's more reasonable than making sugar or salt a resource. I do however acknowledge the historical importance of salt, but I still don't think it is needed as a resource, as much as sugar is needed as a resource ; )

 

[demidyad]

Salt today has no longer the relevance it used to have, it's no longer expensive or rare. Would be kind of strange for a modern civilization to war over salt

You could have salt become obsolete once you research refrigeration.

 

[VikingMaekel]

Whereas bananas/cows/sheep/rice make perfect sense to go to war over.

I agree with OP, salt is a sensibe resource to include. Without it you cannot preserve food, and therefore it is more important than the food itself.

Easy to mod though, so DIY.

See, I don't put my meat into brine anymore, I put it into the refrigerator.
If I don't have a cow, I can't eat meat anymore. And I do want meat

 

[VikingMaekel]

You could have salt become obsolete once you research refrigeration.

I thought to add that to my post, but honestly you then need the bonus for salt to apply to refrigeration as well, otherwise you'd lose out on researching it. I think it'd be too much hassle for too little gain.

 

[Iceciro]

Assuredly, sounds like something to mod in, but not something to concern myself over them not having in core.

 

[treadwin]

It doesn't make sense to represent something as basic as salt in the game. How are you going to represent it? If you don't find it, what is the penalty?

I don't think the fact that it is not in the game is because it isn't important, but more because it is. Having a "must have" resource in the early game would make the focus of the game; "Salt Wars" and not Civilization. Salt has to be so plentiful that it will not make an impact, or be really the focus of the game. Much better to not model it.

 

[Bad Brett]

You could have a tech called "Conservation methods" that makes the cities save some food when it grows.