I have some doubt about the role the weather can have in a one-year-per-turn scale. I don't love too much random events that I can't properly counter (i.e. vulcanic eruptions or earthquakes).

As for combat, it depends on whether or not Firaxis intends to use a tactical battle map ala Heroes of Might and Magic type thing. It would be easier to include then. But even w/o it I had mentioned in the past using RCE's- Random Combat Events- to alter battles that appeared predestined at start. Like Random Events, but they are checked for each and every time a battle occurs. Most will have no effect. A good percentage will shift the combat % in the favor of one side or the other, based on several variables, including terrain, weather, presence of a general unit, etc. In very rare cases one side will be caught completely off guard, giving the other side a huge bonus. The game will give the player a little window of information explaining what happened after committing to combat: i.e. "Early morning fog allows you to close with the enemy, catching them off-guard- +10% attack." Or something like that.

quote: Originally posted by Theben on 08-03-2000 07:41 PM Weather for agriculture can be considered to have evened out over time. Except in cases where great distress/benefit has struck an area, in which case the effect should only be for 1-2 turns at most.

Really? Heard of the Sahara desert? Its about twice its ancient size due to bad Roman and Egyptian farming practices. Same goes for Palestine.

quote: Originally posted by Alexander's Horse on 08-03-2000 08:43 PM Really? Heard of the Sahara desert? Its about twice its ancient size due to bad Roman and Egyptian farming practices. Same goes for Palestine.

Why yes, I have. And I also know that the Sahara's problems are mostly due to a 1/2 degree shift in the axis of the earth, which caused it to lose a good deal of it's arable land (and the main reason for the fall of the Kush empire; helped the Egyptians). What, you think the Europeans used better farming methods initially? They just had more rainfall.

As for strategist, well, he must be a wanker with a name like that

quote: Originally posted by Shadowstrike on 08-04-2000 08:47 AM Something that really bugged me from SMAC was that you could build a city as high as ground would go. I mean, erecting a city on the top of Mt. Everest would take superhuman feats! They should put an elevation cap on cities unitl you acquired the relevent technology.

So true, so true, building cities on mountains should be banned.

SMAC Climatic condition model is interesting, but should be made less crude on CIV III.
The main change is from main human terraforming (raise/lower land) that doesn't happen easily on history.

Realistic weather change effect should come from extended city growing, large grid of roads, industrialization/pollution, long wars (lot of animals has been killed during wars, farms pillaged, forests burnt, etc.).

About building cities on mountain, we have some real cities quite high on Peru and Tibet. I suppose main limits on city building there are scarce food production on high mountains and difficult/expensive transport. If they are well modelled I see no need to put a game ban.

- they must be related to game developement (as pollution link to massive production) or really random on terrain (as earthquakes), not an AI cheat to hit the human player when he/she's unstoppable

- they must have some way to be counterracted by player actions (if I want to avoid pollution problems I can develop "green" production investing in development, if I want to avoid some silly economic crash but haven't any tool to manage/avoid it I'm in hostage of programmers routines: not very funny not challenging for me)

easy: no random trouble
medium: some random trouble
hard: plenty of random trouble

If I can't cope with the difficulties, better I chose to be humbly and play easy.

Random events are certainly needed, like in first civ. They shouldn't be totally random, though. In civ1 volcano eruption could suddenly happen in every city which was adjacent to mountain square and hadn't temple improvement, killing 1 person. And everyone should remember those numerous times when discovery of gunpowder made all the barracs obsolete and next turn the pirates attacked mercilessly to one city, pillaging it.

Ancient:
1. Noah's flood. Destroys the most 'wicked' (largest) cities, a global event.
2."Fire from Heaven", an asteroid strike

Middle/Industrial:
1. Krakatoa eruption (largest Volcano eruption in modern times)
2. Tunguska incident. asteroid that blows up over empire, destroys city improvments.

Modern:
1.Global warming, ala SMAC
2.Scorched Earth: Solar activity expands deserts.

The thing about weather is it is a short term phenomenon. With drought as a possible exception, no weather pattern lasts for more than a few months. Civ turns are long, the shortest duration is 1 year. So that's why you don't see weather being too important in the game.

quote: Originally posted by Urban Ranger on 08-11-2000 12:58 AM Too lazy to read through the whole thread The thing about weather is it is a short term phenomenon.

That is wrong. Have you heard of El Nino? Our weather patterns here run on 7 or eight year cycle.

As Follows:

1.) Siberian Winter- The squares begin to change into polar squares and cooler and sparser vegetation squares (Chance of happening depends on type of world selected- Jungle, Water, age, erosion, etc)

2.) Global Warming- Discussed Earlier

3.) Ice Caps Melt- Water Rises and sinks some cities (Smaller ones, the larger ones would build dykes etc.)

4.) El Nino- Weather Patterns Altered (Not much/ chance of lots of alteration is based on pollution)