The Civ V wish-list!!!

[Scilly_guy]

Exactly that is my point about opinions, perhaps perspective is a better word.

 

[RedRalph]

I think in the later stages of the game you should have ordinances, like in sim city. Certain ones for certain civics, like under free market you should be able to decide if you want to put t tax on imported resources, which would give you money form them, but decrease the amount of happiness they cause, or under Emancipation you should be able to decided to limit immigration form certain countries, lowering the amount of their culture that gets through but stopping any potential population increases which may result. I'd love to hear people's ideas for any others

 

[KrikkitTwo]

One thing I would definitely like under Civ V is drastically simplified unit management, Currently the longest games are those that go domination/conquest because of all the unit movement.

I would do this a few ways

Have unit actions be similar to air unit intercepts

An air unit intercept is a unit action that takes place automatically, limited by a certain range, once you have given the unit that goal for the turn.

Units should have that "area effect" where they engage everything within their range.

They should also have a limited range that they can reach away from a city.

In an 4000 BC Earth map, Rome should NOT be able to contact China, there should be a maximum range on how far scouts could go (you should send them on a "scout mission" and after a few turns they should reappear in your capital with a map, and maybe a hut goody... or not, they got eaten)

Of course in 1950 AD Rome should be able to Conquer all the way to China in maybe 5 turns.




There would have to be a much stronger role for culture. (Cities should revolt even if they have been conquered)

Essentially if you have a bigger army than your opponent, they should NOT have time to build a army to slow you down. (you should be able to take them in two or three turns).. what they have to do is revolt back later (if you over run them)... the only reason you have to slow down is to leave behind the massive numbers of troops to actually hold the territory.

 

[rysmiel]

One thing I would definitely like under Civ V is drastically simplified unit management, Currently the longest games are those that go domination/conquest because of all the unit movement.

Have unit actions be similar to air unit intercepts

An air unit intercept is a unit action that takes place automatically, limited by a certain range, once you have given the unit that goal for the turn.

If this happens, I would like it to be optional, because personally, long games are by far the most satisfying, and I very much want the option of air units that behave as actual units too, like they did in Civ 1 and 2.

In an 4000 BC Earth map, Rome should NOT be able to contact China, there should be a maximum range on how far scouts could go (you should send them on a "scout mission" and after a few turns they should reappear in your capital with a map, and maybe a hut goody... or not, they got eaten)

That would be extremely frustrating; exploring the map early on is really one of the most fun bits of the game as I see it. Yet another place where "realism" weakens gameplay and so I vote against.

 

[ottabear]

I don't know how many of these may already have come up, but here goes:
The first group might be called "Unlike real war"
Bombardment #1 - capable sea units can't bombard enemy units or improvements in cosastal squares, unlike real ships.
Bombardment #2 - for some reason bombardment becomes less effective as the game progresses (or the opponent weakens - I can't tell which). Destroyers start out with a 15% bombardment effect, but it gradually drops to 12% and so on, reducing in the late game or with the opponent nearly wiped out to only 3%.
Airlifts - although in real life a unit can arrive at the airport from out of town and fly immediately, in Civ 4 the unit must already have been located in the airport city at the start of the current turn.
Gunships #1 - a hopeless useless unit in my experience. It can't rebase to another city like the other air units, and can't transport special forces like real helicopters do.
Gunships #2 - it refuses to fly over an water squares, even a 1-square lake, although it has plenty of movement points to reach land on the other side. It flies around the bottom of bays, and won't cross narrow straits. This is effectively a land unit, and should be dropped entirely if it isn't made more realistic.
Marines - after researching Robotics, which allows mechanized infantry, you can no longer choose to produce marines, even though they remain a superior "attack from the ship" unit. Whatever you have on hand at Robotics is all you'll ever have for the rest of the game. And there are other units that continue to be valuable in certain circumstances that are obsoleted by tech developments, such as when getting some older unit faster is more important that getting the latest (and most costly) unit.
Spies - I had to learn by bitter experience that while spies can be stacked like other military units they cannot benefit by it. The actions are still performed one spy at a time, and any given action can only be tried once per turn, no matter how many spies you have available. Spy teams should be able to perform more successfully than individual spies.
The other group might be called game play issues:
Grid - there should be a setting to have the grid turned on by default, if that's the way you like it.
Starvation #1 - sometimes you have so severe an unhappiness problem that you need to reduce city size by forced starvation. You can set the food production way down to get rid of several people fairly quickly, but every turn the city automatically overrides your setting and you have to reset it.
Starvation #2 - in the same vein why not allow some sort of forced immigration or goon squad killings, perhaps requiring something like the facism civic to enable this option.
Specialists - the introduction in Civ 4 of new specialist types was very good, but why did we have to give up the old Entertainer specialist, and maybe even the Tax Collector one, when you need extra ways to reduce unhappiness or increase commerce. For that matter, how about a Doctor specialist to improve health in the city?
City Growth - what rules govern expansion of competing cities at a border? I've had cases where my city is twice the population of the opponent city but still he expands and takes over my squares.
Game speed - I have 1 GB of RAM, but the game still gets noticably slower and slower as time goes on. Is there anything I can opt not to load, Python for example? I have no problem editing configuration files.
Those are my gripes/suggestions for now. Hope I didn't embarass myself with anything too stupid or newbie! Look forward to any responses, especiallyfrom Firaxis.

 

[Scilly_guy]

I don't know how many of these may already have come up, but here goes:
The first group might be called "Unlike real war"
Bombardment #1 - capable sea units can't bombard enemy units or improvements in cosastal squares, unlike real ships.

This I agree with, your ships should be able to bombard improvements and units like in Civ3, and they should be able to bombard other ships from adjacent tiles, although this could be seen as simply attacking.

Bombardment #2 - for some reason bombardment becomes less effective as the game progresses (or the opponent weakens - I can't tell which). Destroyers start out with a 15% bombardment effect, but it gradually drops to 12% and so on, reducing in the late game or with the opponent nearly wiped out to only 3%.

I am not sure if you mean in a particular barrage that the first time you bombard a city it does more damage, think of this because there is a bigger target, when there is less damage to be done, it is because the target is smaller and so each bombard will be less affective.

Airlifts - although in real life a unit can arrive at the airport from out of town and fly immediately, in Civ 4 the unit must already have been located in the airport city at the start of the current turn.
Gunships #1 - a hopeless useless unit in my experience. It can't rebase to another city like the other air units, and can't transport special forces like real helicopters do.
Gunships #2 - it refuses to fly over an water squares, even a 1-square lake, although it has plenty of movement points to reach land on the other side. It flies around the bottom of bays, and won't cross narrow straits. This is effectively a land unit, and should be dropped entirely if it isn't made more realistic.

It doesn't really bother me that rebasing take up an entire turn, in reality it is does take a while to rebase stuff and its not that big a deal. Gunships are a bit pants really, I agree, I hadn't noticed that they can't cross water, but I agree, they should be able to cross smaller 1,2 maybe even 3 tiles.

Grid - there should be a setting to have the grid turned on by default, if that's the way you like it.

Doesn't turning the grid on in the settings stay for future games?

Starvation #1 - sometimes you have so severe an unhappiness problem that you need to reduce city size by forced starvation. You can set the food production way down to get rid of several people fairly quickly, but every turn the city automatically overrides your setting and you have to reset it.
Starvation #2 - in the same vein why not allow some sort of forced immigration or goon squad killings, perhaps requiring something like the facism civic to enable this option.
Specialists - the introduction in Civ 4 of new specialist types was very good, but why did we have to give up the old Entertainer specialist, and maybe even the Tax Collector one, when you need extra ways to reduce unhappiness or increase commerce. For that matter, how about a Doctor specialist to improve health in the city?

I agree more types of specialist would be good. As for reducing food production and changing population assignments, there is a button that stop the city automatically choosing its assignments. In warlords or BtS I think it must be switched when you change an assignment yourself because I never touched it.

City Growth - what rules govern expansion of competing cities at a border? I've had cases where my city is twice the population of the opponent city but still he expands and takes over my squares.

CULTURE!!! Hover over any tile and you can see what % it is yours. When cities become less than 50% yours they want to join whoever there is most of, and if they are unhappy they will start rebelling.

Game speed - I have 1 GB of RAM, but the game still gets noticably slower and slower as time goes on. Is there anything I can opt not to load, Python for example? I have no problem editing configuration files.
Those are my gripes/suggestions for now. Hope I didn't embarass myself with anything too stupid or newbie! Look forward to any responses, especiallyfrom Firaxis.

I have 2GB and it still slows to a crawl, especially when I buy someones map off them or discover satellites. I have not looked at the code but I can tell that the reason it slows is the AIs having their turns, all that is going to improve that is a faster processor and better programming. Not that I doubt the Firaxis AI programmer(s). I sincerely doubt that you will hear anything from the Firaxis team, although this site is suggested by the official site, no one I know of has declared themselves as representing them.

If this happens, I would like it to be optional, because personally, long games are by far the most satisfying, and I very much want the option of air units that behave as actual units too, like they did in Civ 1 and 2.



That would be extremely frustrating; exploring the map early on is really one of the most fun bits of the game as I see it. Yet another place where "realism" weakens gameplay and so I vote against.

Indeed, exploration is one of the most fun bits, I have thought of other ways to do it, and I understand that it doesn't make sense giving orders to scouts and the like whilst they are off on their journeys, but it is a game, and this works and is fun so keep it. Perhaps add some sort of penalty for distance, increased maintenace, or alternatively keep it as it is. Rysmiel I agree with you, (lets not get confused again hey)

 

[ottabear]

Quote:
Originally Posted by ottabear
Bombardment #2 - for some reason bombardment becomes less effective as the game progresses (or the opponent weakens - I can't tell which). Destroyers start out with a 15% bombardment effect, but it gradually drops to 12% and so on, reducing in the late game or with the opponent nearly wiped out to only 3%.
Reply by Scilly Guy

I am not sure if you mean in a particular barrage that the first time you bombard a city it does more damage, think of this because there is a bigger target, when there is less damage to be done, it is because the target is smaller and so each bombard will be less affective.

Maybe I wasn't clear enough. As far as I recall the value of repeated bombardments of the same city doesn't change as a seige wears on. What does change over a large number of turns is the value of ALL bombardments. 15% per bombardment in the "early" game (after you get destroyers) reducing to 3% per bombardment eventually for every city you bombard, even if it's the first time for that city.

Quote:
Originally Posted by ottabear
Grid - there should be a setting to have the grid turned on by default, if that's the way you like it.
Reply by Scilly Guy

Doesn't turning the grid on in the settings stay for future games?

No, it doesn't. You can't establish it as the default setting for all games, and it won't even carry over in saved games - when you load the saved game you have to again set the grid on

Quote:
Originally Posted by ottabear
Starvation #1 - sometimes you have so severe an unhappiness problem that you need to reduce city size by forced starvation. You can set the food production way down to get rid of several people fairly quickly, but every turn the city automatically overrides your setting and you have to reset it.
Starvation #2 - in the same vein why not allow some sort of forced immigration or goon squad killings, perhaps requiring something like the facism civic to enable this option.
Specialists - the introduction in Civ 4 of new specialist types was very good, but why did we have to give up the old Entertainer specialist, and maybe even the Tax Collector one, when you need extra ways to reduce unhappiness or increase commerce. For that matter, how about a Doctor specialist to improve health in the city?
Reply by Scilly Guy

I agree more types of specialist would be good. As for reducing food production and changing population assignments, there is a button that stop the city automatically choosing its assignments. In warlords or BtS I think it must be switched when you change an assignment yourself because I never touched it.

I didn't notice a button to stop the city managing citizen assignments, and I'll look. If you're referring to the Avoid Growth button, it doesn't work reliably - I have to check back on cities with frozen growth every few turns to make sure they haven't automatically started growing again.

Quote:
Originally Posted by ottabear
City Growth - what rules govern expansion of competing cities at a border? I've had cases where my city is twice the population of the opponent city but still he expands and takes over my squares.
Reply by Scilly Guy
CULTURE!!! Hover over any tile and you can see what % it is yours. When cities become less than 50% yours they want to join whoever there is most of, and if they are unhappy they will start rebelling.

Didn't know that - thanks. I'll check it out.

Quote:
Originally Posted by ottabear
Game speed - I have 1 GB of RAM, but the game still gets noticably slower and slower as time goes on. Is there anything I can opt not to load, Python for example? I have no problem editing configuration files.
Those are my gripes/suggestions for now. Hope I didn't embarass myself with anything too stupid or newbie! Look forward to any responses, especiallyfrom Firaxis.
Reply by Scilly Guy
I have 2GB and it still slows to a crawl, especially when I buy someones map off them or discover satellites. I have not looked at the code but I can tell that the reason it slows is the AIs having their turns, all that is going to improve that is a faster processor and better programming. Not that I doubt the Firaxis AI programmer(s). I sincerely doubt that you will hear anything from the Firaxis team, although this site is suggested by the official site, no one I know of has declared themselves as representing them.

Perhaps you're right about the AIs, though I regularly have the problem in games with only one human player and only two AIs. It looks to me more like inefficient algorithms for saving the state of a game, which naturally gets more complicated as the game progresses - perhaps they're trying to save everything each time, rather that just saving what's changed since the last save.

 

[Balderstrom]

Taking of a Capital - the Palace should be converted into a Forbidden Palace.
The CIV should be demoralized, +2 Unhappiness in all cities for 10/20 turns.

Open Borders by default. Which was mentioned in another thread.

When you enter a CIV's land that IS Closed Border's it doesn't cause War. It causes diplomatic penalties: "You entered my Land without permission"
-1 : 10 Turns, Domestic Units *Scouts, Missionaries, GP, etc.
-2 : 20 Turns, Combat Units

IF You enter a CIV's land without permission WITH a Combat Unit AND don't declare war you cannot attack that CIV, Unless
That CIV attacks your units, (you can defend/attack anything that attacks you. (This doesn't automatically cause War either).
Attacking your unit reduces the diplomatic penalty by 1.
A Civ should be less inclined to capture workers.

A Unit that has been "vectored" to attack you, will show a Red Circle. You can then try and bribe the CIV to not attack you, offer to leave, etc.

2 Levels of Closed Borders:
1) Closed to Combat Units, Penalties as Above.
2) Closed to ALL, Penalties as Above.


Not sure if this thread or another, someone mentioned border disputes, and putting down Flags to "claim" a plot of land.
This would allow a CIV to 'work' a plot that is outside their borders.
The other CIV can send a worker over to RE-claim the plot, -1 Relations.
Claiming a plot should take 2-3 Turns. It doesn't change Culture Ownership.

If the plot is outside the CIVs borders, a Worker/Gatherer must work the tile to get the resources - which can be delivered to a cities.
Worker/Gather explained here

You can click on a plot that has been claimed from you, and donate it to the CIV for +Relations.
You can kill the Gatherer working the plot, -1 or -2 Relations.

These penalties, cumulatively, may cause the CIV to go to war with you.
I'm actually not sure how it is now, but there shouldn't be a -Relations "declared war"
if the CIV declares against you. You've already acumulated a few pts of Relations.

When you suck up to a CIV that either you declared war against, or visa versa
it should expediate the lessening of negative hostile activity related penalties.

 

[Sonereal]

I just have ideas I haven't seen yet.

One iron deposit shouldn't be able to supply a huge army

Let's use iron as an example:

Say that you found an iron deposit, automatically, it should be producing 10 iron per turn. Then you get a mine, it produces maybe 15 a turn now, and you connect the mine with a city, 25 iron a turn.

And units would cost a certain amount of a resource, like a swordsman would cost maybe 1 or two iron to produce.

Diplomacy would be better too. As instead of having to give away an entire oil deposit to your enemy in exchange for something else, you could give them like 4 out of the 10 barrels you're producing.

This would be a cool feature for all resources.

Also

Resources that can be sold on a market

If the above suggestion was used, and that a Civ was producing say, 50 barrels of oil or something, than it some of it could be sold for a price.

Ok, I set it up for 5 out of my 50 barrels of oil to be sold, and it's on market. Than there's a price on it, depending on how quickly it sells and how much in stock there is. So, if there's a surplus of oil, than prices will be low. However, if there's little oil left, than it could become very expensive.

You can't set the price though, the supply/demand does.

Another idea

Units require certain resources under certain conditions

Airplanes, ships, and other things of the sort would require oil. So, that maybe a single ship might suck up 3 barrels a turn, while a tank and plane just 1 or two. Soldiers would need food. Copper and iron would be used up in battle, so they would need more weapons. So, just because your one iron deposit is producing 30 iron a turn, you can't be building a huge army of swordsmen without their weapons breaking down, if the weapons break down, then they receive defensive and offensive penalties.

Last idea =P

OPEC, the UN, and more!
I love the UN and Apolistic Palace in this game. Not many other games I've played added something that.

But say that there's a shortage on food resources, there could be a UN Resoulution to either ration remaining food (hinders birth rate) or help the "starving" which would be any Civilization lacking food and having a starving population.
The Apolistic Palace could work the same way, but a huge twist. There would be the same resoulution, but let's say that the nation they they "want" to "help" isn't their religion, then they can set up an offer for that nation. You can either starve and fend for yourself, OR, change your state religion and be saved.
Finally, there would be "OPEC" like organizations. A nation with 3-10 deposits of any resources can build a wonder, like a Organization for Wheat Growing Nations, or Organization of Iron Mining Nations. Together, they can set their prices on their export of that resources (to within of 50 gold of the "real" price)

These organizations work like the UN with the resoulution on what to set the prices. So imagine that, a group with a monopoly on copper sets the prices 50 gold higher than the supply/demand prices and they could kill the market. On the other hand, they could set it 5 under for a while too relieve stress on civilizations.

That idea right there could very well change the way the game is played. Imagine five nations out of 20 who control a lot of iron, and they set their price incredibly high. The UN could demand a reduction of prices or risk conquences, from embargo to actual military action.

Also, think about what would happen if Civ A gave Civ C enough uranium to build a nuke, Civ B would be mad. The UN would try to ban such trade.



Of course, a person can add more stuff to my list once you throw trade embargos and spies into the mix, but I don't have time to delve into that. Plus, I don't know what to do with luxurious resources. They should be expensive though.

Two more things theat were too small for section, I wish there was a "forever" game. There would be no winning conditions, just losing, and that's if you're eliminated. You could still build the spaceship and conquer everyone. There could be an option where the game would throw in a civilization into the game every 100-500 turns. Or just add Revoulution to the game, but a little more tamed.

Technology could determine how much iron, food, etc you get from a deposit. So could civics.

I love Civ 4, and Civ 5 has no where to go but up I assume. Can't really take away but add. More units, religions, resources, etc.

 

[Scilly_guy]

Sonereal, you say you only have ideas you have NOT seen? Did you not look, all of these have been suggested, and I quite agree, these are probably some of my favourite features.

I am not sure how well quantifiable resources would work but there is no harm in trying right? It would be nice if there was a market for good so you could see what a particular resource is worth. I find I can usually sell any resource for all of a civs spare gold per turn. With quantifiable resources there would be the possibility to sell a bulk load of a resource for a technology or lump sum of gold or some other one off, or to sell an amount per turn for another resource or gold per turn, or I suppose it would even be possible to sell research (for a particular tech) by the beaker.

Somewhere I had suggested expanding the Unions feature. My concept was to have wonders that found different types of Unions (Religious, Alliance, Trade, Resource, Research) the founder could decide on some rules for the Union and a name.
Leadership:
Single leader
Everyone Equal
The richest/largest/powerful/etc 2/3/4/etc
Elected council of 2/3/4/etc
Who can run for leader:
No one
Everyone Equal
The richest/largest/powerful/etc 2/3/4/etc
Voting on resolutions:
No one (if its suggested it is carried out)
Everyone Equal
The richest/largest(area)/largest(population)/powerful/etc 2/3/4/etc
Elected council of 2/3/4/etc
Votes weighted:
Every Civ Equal
Population
Religious Population
Area
Power
Council carries more weight
Council gets power of VETO
Who can join:
Invite
Request
Religion
Resource
Is there a fee or condition:
Lump sum of resource/gold/technology
Ongoing fee of resource/gold/research
Particular civic(s)

The different types of union affect what resolutions are available.
General:
Invite someone to join
Accept someone who has requested to join
Kick someone out
Change fees
Change structure (ie leadership style)
etc
Religious Union:
Adopt Religious Civic
Open Borders
Stop war against X
Declare war against X
Stop trade with X
etc
Alliance Union:
Adopt Government Civic
Open Borders
Stop war against X
Declare war against X
Stop trade with X
etc
Trade Union:
Adopt Economic Civic
Open Borders
Stop Trade with X
Only Trade with union members
Give gold to X from union wallet
Give gold to X from members wallets
etc
Resource Union:
Minimum price for selling
Maximum price for selling
Don't sell to X
Don't buy from X
etc
Research Union:
What the Union should Research next
Don't sell any tech to X
Don't sell particular tech to X
Give all techs to members
etc

Wonders to found Unions:
Apolistic Palace - Religious
NATO - Alliance
CERN - Research
OPEC - Resource
World Trace Centre - Trade

Special Wonder - United Nations - Super Union (all resolutions available) predefined as a
Council run Union where every member is equal, council is elected.

Great People can also found unions but this costs a larger sum of gold.

 

[Scilly_guy]

I wish there was a "forever" game. There would be no winning conditions, just losing, and that's if you're eliminated. You could still build the spaceship and conquer everyone.

Do you mean that building the spaceship and defeating everyone would not result in victory? Because I fail to see how the prospect of never winning a game of civ would be enjoyable. Don't get me wrong, there are certain times in some games when I don't want victory conditions, sim city for instance, the sims (not that I ever played it much), everything else seems to have some sort of victory condition. Certainly with Warlords and BTS you can have a custom game with your choice of victory conditions, I don't know if you can turn them all off.

There could be an option where the game would throw in a civilization into the game every 100-500 turns. Or just add Revoulution to the game, but a little more tamed.

New Civs rising from the ashes of failed ones could work and would be interesting.

Technology could determine how much iron, food, etc you get from a deposit. So could civics.

...Yes......

I love Civ 4, and Civ 5 has no where to go but up I assume. Can't really take away but add. More units, religions, resources, etc.

If you love it that much then surely it has no where to go except down. More units would not be an improvement for me, nor religions but I would be les bothered by more of them. More resources is fine by me, I just don't know what; Tea, Coffee, Tobacco, Precious Metal (Titanium, Platinum (gold and silver enough), Lapis(already in as gem stones?), coral, silk, wood, rare wood (mahogany (obsolete under environmentalism)), slate, clay, different types of stone and special buildings require a type of stone that isn't local (similar to marble)?

I would quite happily enjoy a bigger tech tree and not be required to research every technology.

 

[rysmiel]

Do you mean that building the spaceship and defeating everyone would not result in victory? Because I fail to see how the prospect of never winning a game of civ would be enjoyable. Don't get me wrong, there are certain times in some games when I don't want victory conditions, sim city for instance, the sims (not that I ever played it much), everything else seems to have some sort of victory condition.

But that sort of thing's not really a game at all. At best it's a toy that you poke. I don't myself find any attraction in that at all, and I do not see how there could be any appeal to a game that went on indefinitely, though one where you could enable multiple victory conditions and have a score judged by achieving all of them without the first one ending the game might be fun. I have had Civ 3 games where it's been pretty close whether I'd win by culture or conquest first (I never play domination) and being able to finish the game out to both conditions would be cool in that context.

More units would not be an improvement for me, nor religions but I would be les bothered by more of them.

I've said "lots more units" before, haven't I ? I am not sure whether more religions would make a difference to how I play; maybe if you like games with 32 civs on ultrahuge maps, but that's not my thing.

More resources is fine by me, I just don't know what; Tea, Coffee, Tobacco, Precious Metal (Titanium, Platinum (gold and silver enough), Lapis(already in as gem stones?), coral, silk, wood, rare wood (mahogany (obsolete under environmentalism)), slate, clay, different types of stone and special buildings require a type of stone that isn't local (similar to marble)?

Well, one way of simulating being able to get more out of resources over time is having, for example "Iron 1" replaced by "Iron 2" on exactly the same sites when you get, say, Gunpowder, to represent being able to mine Iron more efficiently, and having the resources look the same but give you more extra production when you work them. It's not my favourite mechanic for simulating that but it's a relatively simple thing to implement

I would quite happily enjoy a bigger tech tree and not be required to research every technology.

Heh. I want a much bigger tech tree that requires at least 85% of the technologies for a spaceship win. No Civ game yet, except possibly the Rise and Rule mod for Civ 3 and some of the other really large ones, has had enough technologies.

 

[Balderstrom]

I wonder if the Tech tree really needs to be expanded - as opposed to refining it even more - removing things from it that can be considered physical things. By doing so a new avenue could be created - one where once you have a given tech or a group of tech's you can develop new things to build. So 2 tiers of research, one for the global Technologies that define what you can study furthermore to build.
(Not at my home machine atm)
But for example if getting the tech that enables "Railroads" - made it so you could try and learn how to build Trains - with a little RANDOM thrown into the mix, the Train your civ develops might have differing stats/bonuses/penalties to the Trains that the other Civ in that game might build. And knowing more advanced tech's before you try and build trains - instead of trying as soon as it was possible ... would be more likely to create a better Train.

Along that idea, could be Jewelry Making, for example - which might add to the Commerce your CIV creates with access to at least Gems, a greater bonus with access to Silver & Gems, or Silver, Gems & Gold.

I can certainly see where people are coming from - wanting more Tech's... but I believe another significant group of people might prefer less. By having the multiple tiers of Research - you could even turn the 2nd tier off for quicker games.

 

[Scilly_guy]

Rysmiel is this a reply to me or to Sonereal? We seem to agree on most things but your posts often seem to come across that they disagree with me. We both agree that no victory condition would be a bad idea and I know exactly what you mean by describing those games as toys. BTW the fun is in building something that works and you can be proud with, its a creativity thing rather than a competitive thing.

Having multiple victory conditions would be nice, like having to control 50% of the globe AND launch the Spaceship.

 

[Sonereal]

Scilly guy, I look at the ones suggested, but I admit I may have missed something. lol

I didn't mean it like "forever", but where all winning conditions besides Time and Conquest have to be met before the game's declared over. Like what you said, why can't I launch the Spaceship and have the diplomatic victory? I'm on the fence on whether or not each victory has a certain score or whoever has the most. Because it would be easy to win Domination and Diplomatic.

lol Scilly Guy, I really didn't see the other stuff. I think I looked at the list and thought my ideas weren't suggested. Even though I like your idea a lot. For the Union idea, shouldn't the rules be able to change in a vote after the leader of the group isn't leader anymore?

For the Research Union, I don't really like the idea about it being able to decide who not to trade tech with. If anything, shouldn't the other Unions have the choice of who gets which tech? The UN should have the power of limiting the number of nukes a nation can have instead of banning them outright. Throw in other weapons such as radiological, chemical, and bioweapons into the mix and things would get even more interesting.

For techs, I more or less agree with Balderstorm. Being able to specialize in certain techs would be even more interesting. Like a nation that specializes in railroads and artilery could get railguns (not the space kind, the train kind)

That way, I don't feel pressured in having to have to research everything. Would researching a global tech and specializing in a tech count as two different research paths though?

 

[rysmiel]

But for example if getting the tech that enables "Railroads" - made it so you could try and learn how to build Trains - with a little RANDOM thrown into the mix, the Train your civ develops might have differing stats/bonuses/penalties to the Trains that the other Civ in that game might build. And knowing more advanced tech's before you try and build trains - instead of trying as soon as it was possible ... would be more likely to create a better Train.

I'm not quite sure I'm following your mechanic here, but any random aspect to research at all really should be optional; so much strategy in any version of Civ depends on picking your research path for your sesired short and medium-term goals. I'm aware there are people who like the option of blind research, and I'd be happy to see that as an option, but not as a default.

I can certainly see where people are coming from - wanting more Tech's... but I believe another significant group of people might prefer less. By having the multiple tiers of Research - you could even turn the 2nd tier off for quicker games.

It comes back, again, to how quick you want your games to be; and I come back, again, to thinking that for people who want quick games, there will be Civ Revolution, and that I want games that stay playable and interesting and challenging for hundreds of hours of playing time on any individual game.

 

[rysmiel]

For techs, I more or less agree with Balderstorm. Being able to specialize in certain techs would be even more interesting. Like a nation that specializes in railroads and artilery could get railguns (not the space kind, the train kind)

That way, I don't feel pressured in having to have to research everything. Would researching a global tech and specializing in a tech count as two different research paths though?

I'm not proposing that everyone should have to research every tech in general. Just that whatever the tech-related victory is - which at the moment is the spaceship - it should need you to get the vast majority of techs to achieve it.

Specialised paths work for me to a certain extent. It should definitely be possible, within any given tech tree, to focus more on military developments, or cultural, or ones that increase your research capacity, and so on; but if there are no restrictions at all on that, such that a civilisation which barely has libraries and phalanxes can have thrown enough research in one very specific direction to be building battleships, I do not think that would actually work well.

 

[Sonereal]

There would be restrictions of course, a civ with know idea of arillery wouldn't be able to think of a battleship of course.

For Spaceship, a Civ should have not all, but a lot of the tree like you said. But it also depends are how much they look into certain areas. Like mathmatics and rockerty (sp?). A civ with basic understandings of both wouldn't be able to build a spaceship that can travel to another galaxy.
Same with satelites I suppose, a basic understanding of satelites and lasers shouldn't equal an SDI system.

 

[ExplodingFist]

Full non restricted 3D-engine w ability to freely chose camera angle and zoom level, varying detail levels of units, cities etc based on zoom, "living" units with more fine grained unit-pieces that adapt their individual movement to the tile/environment (# unit-pieces vary by zoom). Keep it simple enough though so modding this is not too hard.

Improve importance of naval units, perhaps the ability to raid/escort naval trade/communication routes/vessels. Perhaps in combination with open sea resources (that can be claimed and occupied/improved/taken by civs).

Explore+map out underwater sea maps as a requirement/investment needed to explore the sea more efficent/safely. Tradeable.

Trading rocks, expanded trading - could be more integrated with diplomacy factors and geography/military control. For instance, a non hostile trading route between trading civs is a requirement/must be established, or military escort would have to be used. Ability to raid trade routes over neutral tiles while staying somewhat anonymous, etc. Diplomatic hits if a raid is discovered (-2 "You raided our trade routes").

Improve range in the value/ability to get foreign civ information, including map info. Maybe ability to send holy man/cultural emissary/diplomat/scientist/general to friendly civilization's court, to unlock non spy based options like information gathering or other goodies - and to allow more secrecy if civ won't comply to that. Maybe more types of spy missions of more varying risk/reward, i.e. map enemy territory (example of very well kept secrets in early history). New eras might also unlock more options to gain foreign civ information.

Make the Explorer useful, or nuke it.

Make building space equipment more dynamic and useful (= possible to build satellites or other space related vehicles that are not the game winning space ship).

Ability to build more non military units, that have some other value and will need to be protected = balance between expanding/investing-escorting and/or conservative-defending/aggression.

The ability to research or aquire military doctrine, as an addition to just military units. Each civ always has three active doctrines: land, air and sea doctrine. Could present some interesting diversity in strategy and game balance (unit1+tactic3 vs unit3+tactic4). A doctrine when applied by a civ would be in use by all military units (by relevant type) that the civ has. Switching doctrine would require retraining, time, etc. Some doctrines could be required to mix certain units in the same army, battle group, etc. Some doctrines could be required to even build some units (guerilla, samurai, legionary, blitz bomber, terrorist, etc), and maybe require certain government or religious civ status (kamikaze, fanatics, knight, gladiator).

A (one time) opportunity to use a Great Person to accomplish a unique great work (non wonder) giving special bonuses not available through any building. Could be triggered based on era/civ/leader maybe combined with some event or similar, maybe not fully deterministic so it does not affect strategy too much, more like a fun calibrated bonus.

Rare non city cultural/religious sites, that give some sort of bonus esp in the later game (use/protect/destroy/etc). Might have to be "discovered" or built (by semi-accident).

The ability to designate map area as not possible to settle, but possible to make limited use of without interfering with other civs. Like colony type strategies w. specialized purpose or improvements like research stations. Could be by area or terrain type like Antarktis, the north pole, the open ocean or space. Since nobody "owns it" several civs can invest and gain the benefits, or destroy eachother's investments...

Ability to improve city water tiles in some way, maybe by using some non military unit combined with a required naval city building (and escorting naval units).

 

[rysmiel]

Full non restricted 3D-engine w ability to freely chose camera angle and zoom level, varying detail levels of units, cities etc based on zoom, "living" units with more fine grained unit-pieces that adapt their individual movement to the tile/environment (# unit-pieces vary by zoom). Keep it simple enough though so modding this is not too hard.

That really is an awful lot of effort, and effort on this is effort not spent on gameplay. I don't want 3D or anything like; it can look like Civ 1 if the gampelay is good enough.

Improve importance of naval units, perhaps the ability to raid/escort naval trade/communication routes/vessels. Perhaps in combination with open sea resources (that can be claimed and occupied/improved/taken by civs).

Naval units should be able to attack coastal ground units, and advanced naval units should be able to bombard terrain improvements on land [ all naval units should be able to pillage sea tiles. The weakening of naval units' abilities since Civ 2 is one of the things I like least about the game as is.

Explore+map out underwater sea maps as a requirement/investment needed to explore the sea more efficent/safely. Tradeable.

Interesting. How are you envisioning this working ?

For instance, a non hostile trading route between trading civs is a requirement/must be established, or military escort would have to be used. Ability to raid trade routes over neutral tiles while staying somewhat anonymous, etc. Diplomatic hits if a raid is discovered (-2 "You raided our trade routes").

All good ideas, if you are going to have trade routes rather than trade units in the first place; I still favour the latter, but ideally I'd like to see a workable combination.

Improve range in the value/ability to get foreign civ information, including map info. Maybe ability to send holy man/cultural emissary/diplomat/scientist/general to friendly civilization's court, to unlock non spy based options like information gathering or other goodies - and to allow more secrecy if civ won't comply to that. Maybe more types of spy missions of more varying risk/reward, i.e. map enemy territory (example of very well kept secrets in early history). New eras might also unlock more options to gain foreign civ information.

All sounds excellent to me.

Make building space equipment more dynamic and useful (= possible to build satellites or other space related vehicles that are not the game winning space ship).

Ability to build more non military units, that have some other value and will need to be protected = balance between expanding/investing-escorting and/or conservative-defending/aggression.

I strongly agree with both of these.

The ability to research or aquire military doctrine, as an addition to just military units. Each civ always has three active doctrines: land, air and sea doctrine. Could present some interesting diversity in strategy and game balance (unit1+tactic3 vs unit3+tactic4). A doctrine when applied by a civ would be in use by all military units (by relevant type) that the civ has. Switching doctrine would require retraining, time, etc. Some doctrines could be required to mix certain units in the same army, battle group, etc. Some doctrines could be required to even build some units (guerilla, samurai, legionary, blitz bomber, terrorist, etc), and maybe require certain government or religious civ status (kamikaze, fanatics, knight, gladiator).

This, however, seems an unhelpful level of complexity. I vote against.

A (one time) opportunity to use a Great Person to accomplish a unique great work (non wonder) giving special bonuses not available through any building. Could be triggered based on era/civ/leader maybe combined with some event or similar, maybe not fully deterministic so it does not affect strategy too much, more like a fun calibrated bonus.

If it doesn't affect stratgey too much and you can't aim for it, what's the point ?

The ability to designate map area as not possible to settle, but possible to make limited use of without interfering with other civs. Like colony type strategies w. specialized purpose or improvements like research stations. Could be by area or terrain type like Antarktis, the north pole, the open ocean or space. Since nobody "owns it" several civs can invest and gain the benefits, or destroy eachother's investments...

I don't like this, any more than I like any of the other ideas that move land use away from cities and culture.

Ability to improve city water tiles in some way, maybe by using some non military unit combined with a required naval city building (and escorting naval units).

A proper naval worker unit, as opposed to silly one-use work boats, would be a very helpful addition.