posted July 23, 1999 07:39            

The bonuses won't be too big or too small. I will give an example:
a 1 city civ, with all the require upgrades, wealth SE, all trade she can have, and the suggested upgrade.
10 city civ, no trade, no buildings, no nothing.

The bigger civ would still produce more cash, but just a little more. The smaller civ could rival the bigger civ by just one topic. Her armies would suck, her technology would suck, but she would have enough money to go on.
And since she has all that money on one city, that city could bloom.
Ofcourse, the bigger civ would still be mighter and could just take over the smaller one. But her trade would have sufficent appeal to let her stay alive.

A military small civ would posses units ( if she choose the upgrade "power" SE ) this get +3 or +4 to morale. Now, this isn't enough to fight an army ten times your size, but it would balance things more in the favor of the smaller civ.

The size of the bonus is around +100% to the Value SE from SMAC. If power gave you +2 morale, +2 support -2 eco, the upgraded one would give you +4morale, +4 support, -0 eco ( the negative would also be elminated ).
This size of bonus is only to one or two cities. Bigger small civ would get a much smaller bonus. This isn't enouhg to totaly offset the game, but it would balance things more.

About the "Wonder race". A bigger, human controlled civ would just buy off the wonder first. We aren't just playing VS AI. The point is, to build a strong city you need an economical backbone which is from other cities.

posted July 23, 1999 15:35            

I'm sorry, but you're just wrong here. It is a very effective strategy to build a 8-10 city perfectionist civ. And even a guy like me can make this work at 5 cities. I've done it many times. It's a fun, fast game.

That's the problem I have with your whole premise. When playing a small perfectionist strategy, you DON'T NEED THE HELP!! Really, trust me, Harel, you don't. If you did have to be the biggest and baddest to have a chance to win, then you'd have a point. But you don't. You've again stated that you're just trying to give small civs a chance, but the small civs do just fine without your help.

What you are suggesting will just make the following strategy funnel mandatory for excellence:

1. Build science city.
2. Build the Oracle.
3. Stop at ~8 cities.
4. Build lots of settlers to perfect your terrain.
5. Give your cities all the key improvements.
6. Go republic once you have some trade routes and marketplaces.
7. We love to size 8.

The game at this point is over. You haven't even gotten to monotheism, but your science rate and tax revenue and production are already so awesome that you can get every key wonder you want.

posted July 23, 1999 17:32            

Harel, instead of saying 1 city 50% bonus and 5 cities only 25% bonus, wouldn't it be better to make a City State SE choice. +20% Food production, +20% Industry, +20% Trade, but -4 Efficiency. Very bad for civs with even only 8 cities. That would also solve the problem of 'how many cities should a small civs be allowed to have on a huge map?' because on a huge map a city on 30 squares of the capital has much less corruption as the same city on a tiny map. In SMAC anyway.

posted July 23, 1999 17:40            

There are other ways to save small civs from the expansionist's axe:

posted July 23, 1999 20:47            

Why? If you don't like to win by world conquest, then don't do it. Essentially, you're saying that since YOU like going to AC, since YOU don't like world conquest, you want to change the game so everyone else has to play your way. Do I have that about right?

posted July 24, 1999 14:44            

too easy : solution : better AI

too safe : The problem is conquest has no bad side effects. So everyone conquers and conquers (me too) as if it's the most normal thing in the world.
At the end of the game you control most of the world. Very unrealistic. I want to fix that.

1)In SMAC after 50 years your people become as happy as the ones of the cities you founded. You should have problems with 'nationalists' throughout the rest of the game. +you should have revolutions in the conquered cities. That would eliminate my tactic of leaving the middle of the empire almost undefended, because you should always have an army nearby to suppress the revolutionists. If you have to keep troops in your own territory, you could spend less time else. This is more realistic.

2) I have witnessed several times that AI Civs switch from war to alliances in a few turns. Bad.

3) Having a city is better than not having a city.
That was always true in CivX. In reality it isn't. People work harder for their own or for their country. It's better to take as much advantage as possible of a country and let it alone the rest of the time, as USA does with Israel, than to actually need to control it.
Economic alliances and trade should be upgraded so trading with a country is more beneficial than to conquer it and loose the trade.

posted July 24, 1999 16:03            

First of all you should know that I want to multiply everything in Civ3 by ten to allow more precision.
If you do that you can allow technologies(eg Crop Rotation, Horse Plowing(before the Renaissance oxes were used to plow)) to increase food production in a terrain by 10%(grasslands produce 22 instead of 20 food). That similates the continual search for better food production.

In SMAC Industry made things cheaper or more expensive to build. I would let it increase or decrease the Labor(see Economy thread for more info about Labor).

I think you should be able to research technologies simultaneous. One of each category à la explore, discover, build, conquer. There should also be a window where you can edit how much of your research points you put in every category.

"That increases the time between discoveries." you say. No, because I find the tech tree should be enlarged to 300 techs and therefore the price for each tech reduced so research speed is the same.

How can you find 300 techs?
Take a look at all the historical Civ2 scenarios on the web and you've got them.

Why 300 techs?
More realism and precism.

I know all the above shouldn't be on the SE thread, but it's necessary to know because I based my model on it.

posted July 24, 1999 16:28            

First this : There are 5 types of citizens.
Aristocracy/Elite : other name for happy citizens, produce 50% more food,labor and trade than normal.
Plebs/Workers : other name for content citizens
Proletariat/Drones : other name for unhappy citizens, produce 50% less
Revolutionaries : other name for very unhappy citizens, produce nothing
Specialists : Entertainers, Taxmen,...

Cities riot when there are more proletarians than aristocratians. Revolutionaries can cause revolting and creating another (minor?) civ.

Declaring martial law means all people become workers for ten turns, similar to nerve staple.

In all Civ versions I wundered why airplanes caused unhappiness. The reason a manual gave me was that it was because the pilots had to do practice flights. That caused unhappiness. Is that a reason??????
I think airplanes cause less unhappiness.
As long as a democracy(Western countries) is bombarding another nation(Serbia, Iraq)no problem. It's only when they want to send ground troops, there comes trouble. That's why I think Air units should cause less unhappiness.

With allies I mean simple allies
With pact nations I mean civs that are in your multistate-coallition(eg NATO, probably possible in Civ3). There should be at least 4 civs in a coallition.

There should be a council proposal à la SMAC possible to or not to allow nuke use.

Police rate can effect population happiness.

posted July 24, 1999 17:03            

I have a confession to make. I AM a perfectionist. I am the one who picks the psilon at moo, the guys who build the super-armies at SC ( but get swamped by rushes ), the one who likes to mend it cities in civ.
So, I KNOW but you mean about winning with 8 good cities.
This method would be very hard however, against human players. But, that's not what I mean.

You need to understand, flavor dave that I am not talking about a civ for 5-8 cities. NOT AT ALL. That civ is maybe not big, but neither is it small.
Nay, when I say "little" civ I mean a civ of one or two cities ( maybe three is VERY big maps ). Thats it. And you have to admit, that winning with one city against HUMAN players ( and AI, if they were good ) is very hard.

About the player who won with one city at 1821 AD. I can tell you one thing: he played at easy level. How do I know? Beacause I did, several times, a similar thing at moo. I became to good at that game ( always won even with 8 players, impossible ) so I did the following thing: set the game to easy level and begun playing the entire game without leaving my home solar system. I won, btw.

BUT, there are some problems with that:
A. You need to be a very good player, and not everyone are that good.
B. We both know you can't really win at a hard level.
C. That method would NEVER, EVER work against human players, mainly when you start to build the space ship.

But lats leave that behind. We talks about realism and playability.
Well.
Small civ, we all agree, are better orginised. You can effect and shape your populas easily, and you can direct your economy into much narrower regions more effiecently.
Big nations can't offord to specilize in one thing like smaller nations can. Nor, even if they try, can they do that with the same success.
This is true in real life. Adding this to the game would make it too realistic.
Even if the bonus would be very small ( usless, as you say ) we added another side of realism into the game. So, add a simbolic bonus to minor civ. Doesn't have to be very big: a +50% to the value bonus and no SE minus from the value ( the other still give a minus ) to a one or two cities civ ( no more! ).
Hardly big, and it will:

A. Encourge trade and diplomacy.
B. Increase game ballance.
C. Allow perefectionist players to play easier.
D. All more realism.

To Maniac:

posted July 24, 1999 17:27            

It has been segested, recently, that instead of you choosing to change governments, if you would, instead, have to go through and amke changes to prepare for the government switch.

For instance, to go from a Monarchy to a Democracy, one would need to make social and economic changes before being able to change the government. I found this to be a good idea, but would also like to add a few ideas to the fray.

For instance, what is society demanded changes? Let us say that I am a Monarchy, who is a medium sized power. My people are growing un happy, and I don't have the resources to make entertainers, without killing off my people. I go to the Social advisor who tells me that they are demanding more say in government. In responce to this, i call a parliment into existence. Being just created, and having been a token gesture, I would set the Parliment's influence to Little or none.

Over time this might happen over and over again with people demanding more and more controll in the government and, more or less, forcing you to grant it to thme, until the Parliment would be a major factor in the game. It could stop you from doing certian things and take over certian functions of government.

You may not like this, wantign dirrect control over every aspect of the game, or you may allow it, wanting them to be able to pick up certian functions, and allowing you to turn your attention towards other things.v If you do NOt like it, you could attempt to limit the power of the PArliment, but you might suffer some large scale un happiness.

there would, of course, be other options, perhaopse cahnging to a Fachist government or something else, or changing into a Democracy *shrugs* I don't have ALL of the details worked out.

posted July 24, 1999 17:42            

I said the Minoan civ lasted from 3000 to 1500 BC, so I think there's plenty of time for trade.
You're right. I don't think the Minoans conquered Athens.
About that army, I'm not sure, but they were a sea people with a fleet!
Because they didn't build city walls, does that mean they didn't have an army.
Why don't we invite Diodorus Siculus?
Or do you get your information about Crete from him?

posted July 24, 1999 18:47            

First I want to say that decide a normal level of support is difficult. That's why I didn't determine one. Perhaps after playtesting... BTW Firaxis has to do something!

Secondly I think every unit should have a different support. With the everythingx10 system this easy to do. For example a transport or an explorer unit should have a smaller transport than a battleship or a knight.

Thirth I think support should be a matter of regions, just as food distribution and resources(but not labor and trade)

What is support? : every unit needs a certain amount of food and resources(see Economy thread for the difference between labor and support)
+10 Support : a city/region can support every unit free up to city/region size.
+9 : Support decreased with 90%
...
+1 : -10%
0 : normal support level
-1 : +10%
...