tourism, the environment and happiness....

[naf4ever]

I havent seen too much posted on this lately, but currently in Civ 3 there is seems to be no tough choices to be made at all regarding what to do with forest and jungle squares,,, clear them, duh. I like it when theres tough choices to be made, it means there is more strategy involved. Heres what could be done:

After the discovery of Automobile squares in the cities radius should produce happiness to reflect the fact that a lot of people who own cars now seek thier recreation outside of the immediet city and increased trade to represent tourism. Forest squares, jungles (think rainforests), rivers, water squares and perhaps even swamps (think Everglades) could all produce happiness and/or trade after automobile is researched. Basically there should be a point and reason to simply not convert everything to flatlands. I mean really i would think a city surrounded by nothing but grasslands with mines on them would be a very depressed and sad place to live in. In addition the same could be done for hills and mountains, symbolic of outdoors activities and skiing, but on a national level. Say you have a city like Aspen, surrounded by nothing but mountains and hills. Perhaps there could be a small wonder you could build there that makes the city give happy faces nationwide based on the number of non-plain/grassland/floodplain tile that it contains. Which means the same concept could be applied to some city that is surrounded by nothing but ocean,, like a beach getaway.

Also right now theres no point to not build a factory in almost every city that has moderate production. Perhaps they could alter pollution to lower the happiness level of forests and rivers provide.... Also in regards to the environment. I'd love to see a feature where forest or jungle squares that are original (meaning you havent cut them down and replanted other trees over them) eventually turn into "old growth forests" or tropical rainforests (for the jungles), maybe after a few thousand years of game time. These squares could generate even more happiness and trade from tourism and perhaps even help out with science, like herbs and pharmaceuticals from rainforests.

Lastly the above concepts will only be useful if there is more of an incentive for players to make thier people happy. Currently there is no point right now besides your score to really make people happy. Usually if i have a city of 18, 6 are happy, 6 are content and 6 are unhappy. there is no point for me to build other improvements to make them all happy unless im simply trying to win via the score. Maybe they could make it so happy people are little more productive, or generate more culture, or in a democracy the more people that are happy and approve of you the easier it is to do things like go to war..

Any other ideas on these...

 

[t3h_m013]

we love the king day? only erally useful in curupt cities though...
I very much like this idea and kinda hinted at it in a reply to some other thread... but you have it worked out in much more depth

 

[Aussie_Lurker]

I'm not sure EXACTLY how it should work but, after a certain time, particular terrain types should grant you bonuses if they are in a 'pristine state' (i.e. no terrain improvements or urban sprawl). Some ideas might be that you can make them 'Landmark terrains' (like the Great Barrier reef for instance), they should allow you to build 'improvements' like a 'National Park' and/or they should increase happiness, wealth and culture of a nation that has them (the more the better). This might help put a brake on the rampant jungle/marsh clearance which currently plagues the game, as these terrains would have great intrinsic value in the later game-especially if they have bonus resources! Also, pollution impacting on these terrain types should also lower their cultural/tourism value, thus placing a greater imperitive on having a clean environment. Imagine, for instance, if the pollution in that nearby American city caused those beautiful marsh terrains to slowly turn into grasslands or plains! It would lose any LM status it had, and its cultural/monetary value would decline too (and you would probably lose any bonus/luxury/strategic resources located on it too!)
Oh and, as you can probably guess from my example LM terrain, I think that a coral reef should act as an offshore/coastal 'bonus resource' or as a terrain type!

Yours,
Aussie_Lurker.

 

[Chauliodus]

The only use I have for forests atm is deep in modern games where nuclear wars have sent the pollution counter through the roof. Global warming seems to first targets forests and jungle before attacking other tiles. So what I do is make some of my workers fill the territory outside my cities with forests and replant them as gloabl warming eats them up.

 

[roidesfoux]

One of the reasons poeple give for not cutting down the rainforests is that with all of the species of plants and animals in there, there could be something with a cure for cancer, and we could make it extinct through deforestation. What can be done to simulate this is placing certain special resources in jungles and forests. These resources are invisible until towards the end of the game, and if you cut down the forest/jungle that contains them (whether or not you know they're there), the resources are lost.

-RdF

 

[Aussie_Lurker]

IMHO, The entire pollution system needs to be revamped, as I have said in other posts.
The way I feel it should work is as follows:

1) Every tile has a 'Base Pollution Number', from -3 (for forests, jungles and reefs), to 1 or 2 (for volcanoes).

2) Every resource has a ' Base Pollution Number' if its being exploited, more if its being overexploited.

3) Tile Improvements have a 'Base Pollution Number' if they are being exploited, more if they are overexploited.

4) Every time a city's population passes a certain 'threshold', its 'Pollution Number increases by 1. For instance, a city of less than 10,000 might be 0, a city of around 100,000 might be a 1, and a city of 1,000,000 might be a 2 or even a 3.

5) City improvements have a 'base pollution number' of around 0-5.

6) If a city's additive 'pollution number' goes above a threshold (set in the editor), then your city's 'Pollution Bar' increases by the excess. For instance, if your city is 6 points over the threshold, then your pollution bar increases by 6 that turn.

7a) As your pollution bar rises, your city's culture, wealth and happiness decline. If it gets VERY bad, then your population will decline as well.

7b) Worse still, as pollution increases, neighbouring tiles begin to degrade-losing first their food, then their shield producing potential. The worse your pollution gets, the worse the degredation gets AND the more tiles which get effected. At very high levels, terrain tiles can completely change and terrain improvements can be lost!

8) A certain % (say 10%) of your city's total 'pollution number' contributes to the national pool as well. If this passes the national threshold (same as the city threshold) then your national 'Pollution Bar' increases, with similar effects to 7a and 7b-except on a national scale.

9) A % of your National 'pollution number' contributes to the Global Pool. If THIS goes above the threshold, then you get the global pollution bar increasing-with global environmental effects!!!!

As an example, lets say you have a city of 1,000,000 people. It's additive pollution number (from terrain, improvements and population) is 58-which is 8 above the threshold. This means that, each turn, the cities pollution bar rises by 8 points! Up to 20 points is negligable (no effect). Above 20, though, your people become increasingly unhappy, then your wealth declines and, after that, the city's culture. If it gets sufficiently high enough, your city's population will also begin to decline-as people die from poor water, bad air and toxic food. Eventually, the city might start to rebel against you as people begin to get increasingly angry at their mistreatment!! At the same time, this city is contributing 6 points (10% of 58) to the national 'Pollution Number'. If that number rises above 50, then the 'National Pollution bar' will also begin to rise, causing environmental damage on a national scale.

Its not all bad, though, as upgrading your terrain and city improvements can help reduce their pollution numbers, as can underexploiting tiles. Spending more money on the environment and changing the landscape can also reduce pollution numbers. If you get, and keep, your pollution number below the threshold, then your pollution bar will likewise come down (though not on a 1 for 1 basis!) Also, some improvements and wonders can reduce the pollution numbers of cities and improvements. As for repairing environmental damage, well it will mostly repair of its own accord-slowly. This can be sped up by investing Public Works budget into environmental repair! There would be an upward limit, though, on how quickly your clean-ups can be done.
Anyway, like to know what people think!

Yours,
Aussie_Lurker.