The Official Civ4 Ideas Thread

[Khan Quest]

I’d like to see naval units have greater range. Perhaps with flight, airdropped supplies would give all ships one more point of range. Another point could come with a tech discovery leading to refueling at sea (UNREP or underway replenishment as its called in the Navy). And a third movement point with the discovery of computers, which would lead to improved propulsion systems, etc.

Allow diesel subs to be upgraded to nuclear subs.

How about a modern naval warship? One with stealth. It couldn’t be detected until right next to another unit or one tile from the shoreline. This could be negated with the satellite tech. These warships could also be allowed two attacks.

If a toroidal or spherical map is considered, then perhaps a small Polar Expedition wonder would allow aircraft to travel over and submarines to travel under the polar caps.

Add an escort button. With a unit selected, click the escort button then on a second unit. If the two (or more) units have different movement range, the faster will keep pace with the slower and fortify at the end of the turn. The escorted unit should appear first in the stack.

--

Don’t add a dark ages – we already have one when we change governments. We don’t need depression, that’s generally covered with unhappy citizens.

Make Ironworks easier to get by placing the coal closer to the iron.

--

Finally, those who contribute ideas, or least those whose ideas are implemented ought to receive beta versions of CIV IV ;-).

 

[Xether]

What might be a good idea is to have a few futuristic units,improvements and techs just like in Civ2 extended version. It can be a clickable choice so if you dont like it you can choose to only get up to the present day techs.

This is because the game orginally ends in the year 2050.

 

[Ukraineboy]

Ok.. this is the most annoying thing.. of ALL time in Civ3... Spearman beating Tanks!!!!! or Riflemen beating an Army of Infantry! or Musketmen beating Infantry... it is STUPID, I don't CARE if they have defensive points etc... Infantry would ALWAYS beat old riflemen with crappy rifles... honestly, Infantry have helmets, they have bolt action rifles, and they are trained! Riflemen, are freaking guys with crappy gun, the old Civil War guns... no matter how many times in real life INFANTRY WOULD BEAT GODDAMN RIFLEMEN! now.. to fix this I propose this:

A Minus Percentage depending on Technology...

If you have a Riflemen, and he is fighting another Riflemen, sure it could beat him cause its high damage.. or if a Riflemen is beating Cavalry... but when a Riflemen is fighting Infantry, the Riflemen should get a -%50 defense/attack effectivity, because Riflemen are consider "obsolete", so they should get a deduction in effectivity... I am tired and tired of seeing Infantry beating by Spearman.. YES, SPEARMAN.... THEY DONT EVEN HAVE GUNS FOR CHRIST SAKE!

FIX IT PLEASE! maybe even in the next patch

 

[Ozymandius]

What you say is mostly true but think of Afghanistan & Iraq where people with rudimentary weapons & bombs are killing elite infantry etc . S**t happens.

During WW2 and later molotov cocktails were often quite successful against armor.

Vietnam war: superior firepower did not win the (non)-war.

A spear or a club can still kill.

 

[Ukraineboy]

Ok.. maybe if it was Infantry versus Tanks.. or Guerilla versus Infantry....

but Musketmen, and Spearmen?

And don't tell me one conscript (yes CONSCRIPT!) can kill an entire Infantry Army.

Also, those Afghanistan people, had Guns for one thing, and they hid and attacked... this was a straight on attack. and Vietnamese were fanatical and didn't care if they died.. Riflemen I don't think are fanatical..

 

[Ukraineboy]

Idea: Militia

If you have some land, or a colony you want to hold, just in case, but you dont want to use one of your precious infantry or guerillas or tanks... then, you can take a Worker who isnt working, and Draft him into a Militia.

Militia won't do too much damage, but they have a fast movement, and when in Mountains, Jungles and Forests, there defence is very high. When they attack they don't head on attack, they do a type of "Bombard" in which, they attack, hurt as much as possible, and then run off. When Militia are in a Mountain, Jungle or Forest, they can only be seen sometimes. there is a percentage that they are seen, and a percetage that they are invisible.. so its random. Also, When an enemy captures your town, you can call up normal civilians from it (with the Espionage tool ofcourse) and turn them into Militia. So, if you notice a town that is ill-defended which was taken from you, you can do some espionage and all the citizens there good rize up. So, if its a big town, you could have around 3 Militia Armies! ofcourse, they aren't that good against like 3 infantry or an infantry army, but if there is only one Infantry guarding the town, you can try and summon them up to take it away.

Also, as probably stated before in this thead... I want the ability to have UN sactions, i.e. we could vote to ban atomic warheads, and also you can send PeaceKeepers (Although.. anyone have an idea how the PeaceKeepers would keep the peace?) and try and negotiate cease fires.

Also... I would like to have some "Barbarian" civs... basically, these guys cant really do much technology study, but they would own land as if there own, and when they go to war together, then thats when you can negotiate peace.

Also... I think that you should be able to declare Neutrality, if there is a war going on, and you don't want to get swept in, you can declare Neutrality, and they CANNOT declare war on you. While Neutral.. you can give them maybe rights of passage.

Another thing is Expeditionary Forces. When one of your Allies is at war, or if your Neutral but your doing a kind of "lend-lease" program, you can select the tanks or airplanes to go there and be under there control.

 

[immortals84]

instead of just regular and advanced barbarions we could have

Modern Barbarians such as guerillas, and fanatics.

I remember playing civ2 for the playstation alot. Whenever you took a city in modern times, the game said "desperate partisians take to the hills". That was cool.

I haven't read all of the replies so dont get mad at me if a simular post has already addressed.

 

[Ukraineboy]

Actually, post above you just said that, my post.

 

[immortals84]

no but have massive barbarian uprisings of guerillas as they do with the advanced barbarians. So instead of a civil disorder, you have a situation like Vietnam or Somalia. Are those spelled right?

 

[CMcQueeny]

First, I think that Civ4 should have a more robust system of imperialism. You should be able to establish colonies that act as individual states (Either autonomous or directly controlled.) and have their own capitals. Also, you should be able to adopt an economic theory, i.e., mercantilism, socialism, etc. These would give you extra abilities and flaws. (e.g., for mecantilism, you gain a commerce bonus for exporting more than you import, but a penalty otherwise.) In addition, when you convert to a non-autocratic government, you should only be able to encourage the construction of certain items, with leaders in each city deciding whether or not to support you actions.

 

[Ukraineboy]

omg! you read my mind! exactly.... I would love to make colonies. Also, Puppet States... like.. if you conquered cities, you can select which cities you want to be yours, then which cities should be puppet states. (Let's say you conquer a country with lots of resources, but your too busy to do all that crap, you can setup a puppet regime) Also, with a puppet state, you wouldnt be looked on as a tyrant or emperor, they would see that you were "liberating" them, thus proving to them it was a reasonable war.

 

[Vietcong]

all unist need to retreat!! faster one with a faster atack, more then one unit shold atack at the same time!! if ur surounded, defens shold be halved, and atake weekend by 75%

 

[Yeti]

I would like to see differences in the ocean to land interface.

Instead of ALWAYS being level, I would like to see places where cliffs or glaciers go right up to the ocean, resulting in places where you can't land a ship and bring units ashore.

 

[Mercade]

Messages that appear on-screen during MP consist of two types:
1) Game messages.
2) Text typed between players.

These messages will be displayed for a certain duration, and then they automatically disappear. However, for text typed between players, I very frequently miss messages because I am in the city screen or something like that. Therefore I have a request for an option (either as preference, or through the INI file) to do one or more of the following things:

1) Have an option to always display the queue of messages, i.e. disable the time out.
2) Have an option to set the time out value (in millisecond) in the INI file.
3) Have the option to set the size of the on-screen message queue in number of lines above and beyond the current 8 (?) lines.

 

[Ukraineboy]

Could we have an actual FORUM for Civ4 discussion? because this isnt a discussion thread.. its mroe of a post your idea over and over.. I'd like a forum category where we discuss eachothers ideas.

 

[Mercade]

Originally posted by Ukraineboy
Could we have an actual FORUM for Civ4 discussion? because this isnt a discussion thread.. its mroe of a post your idea over and over.. I'd like a forum category where we discuss eachothers ideas.

I second that.

 

[bluebox]

maybe it's a big unsorted idea basket. i think this thread is aimed at firaxis to give them input from the player community. as long a 'we' don't know anything about how civ4 will be, discussing single ideas extensively could be a waste of time if firaxis doesn't make use of it.

however: anybody there who would sort ideas in this thread into categories, wonders, techs, interface etc.? i haven't read through all of the posts. it's too lenghty ...

now to my 'idea', already posted or not:

i would like to see different layers of the map because the map gets crowded especially in the end game.

implementation: some hotkeys to switch cities, improvements, and units on and off separately.

thank you for reading

 

[mintyfreshdeath]

OK... I posted this idea in another, similar thread so I don't really know if it's er... proper ettiquette to go repeating it... but this seems to be the more appropriate thread in which to expound my ideas.
Firstly, I'd really like Civ4 to be a DIFFERENT GAME. Did any of you read that properly? A different game. Sure, alot of the basic aspects should remain the same without a doubt. But alot of the ideas in this thread are worthy of an expansion pack, not a sequel. Age of Mythology special powers? Read any history books? Maybe we could have a Romanian civ with a Dracula unit... sorry, I'll get on with it.
My idea is to have the ability to not just found new cities, but new nations.. new civs. Let me put it into context by giving you a real life example: The European powers decimated the native tribes of the Americas and Canada, the USA, Mexico et al were founded. Any Canucks here will have no doubt noticed that their capitol is NOT London. Great Britain is responsible for what we now all recognize as the nations of Australia and New Zealand. Neither of them have London as the capitol because they are countries, nay, CIVILIZATIONS in their own right. Their origins are British however....

I propose the idea of having the ability to annex offshore colonies in order to create seperate and new civilizations. Perhaps you have 5 new cities on a distant continent. Say, for instance, after you have founded your 6th city you will be given the option of ceding control to these new colonial cities thus creating a new nation. The amount of cities would be dependent on the map and land mass sizes.
This new nation would have a direct link with you.. your civ is something of a Motherland I suppose. This civ is obligated to aid you in whatever military action you need it to without you having to reciprocate should it be in need... kind of like a one-way MPP. It would have it's own specific traits and units or whatever they decide to include in Civ4. It could be controlled by the AI or by your good self... you'd be effectively managing two seperate civs... or more :/
Each civ could have a specific offshoot civilization... Britain could give life to Australia... or vice versa... Australia founding Britain is a pretty damned cool idea if you ask me. What about Canada founding the United States? Awesome You could have it which ever way you pleased.

PS All of this is partly in response to the idea I've seen in regards to "Lesser Civs". Truly that is a disgusting idea... sorry, but it is. Where do you come from? A "Lesser Civilization"?

 

[Salte]

When u get to the industrial and moder era this game gets too easy (if you are an experienced player anyway). Off course on lower levels its easy right from the start, but even at diety you know that if u survive until replacable parts (with a empire of moderate size, and without being at war with everyone) then u're gonna win. I'm still not quite sure why, but here are a couple of theorys:

The AI is too easy to bribe/manipulate.
- All u need to get the other civs to fight amongst each other is a few hundred gold pieces, and this is not hard to come by at this stage. Once this is accomplished its a piece of cake to catch up in territory and techs. On several occasions have I led a backwards and small civ, but still been able to turn the entire world into war. It is also agonisingly easy to get AI to brake alliances and recently signed peace-treaties. Even weak civs who already are in war with a number of enemies will gladly sign an alliance agains the worlds leading civ if u send a few hundred gold their way. Followed by their total destruction off course.

The AI has no idea about warfare.
- This is a known subject, i know, but i cant restrain myself from bringing up a couple of points. On my most recent game i had by far the weakes military, but with the help of 20 artillary and 10-15 infantry (in addittion to one defending each city), i easily captured one city after another from much more powerful civs. (I didnt get oil until far out in the game, but still managed very well with infantry and marines)

I like to play on emperor level, because here i can still use a variety of strategies from the off and still do well. So i hope some modifications and improvements on the AI can be worked out to make emperor challenging throughout the game, not just until industrial era.

 

[timberwolf4545]

I don't think the idea of naking features is silly at all. Named features can serve as destination points and can show up like cities when you when you use the go to feature. You could name sometime like "northern frontier hill" and be able to easly send units there.