------------------------------------------------------ Firaxis respond letter:

I didn't say anything about city-area.

Anyway, that feels like a very non-fluid and counter-intuitive set of rules. I think we have a better set of solutions. Want to know what they are?

(chuckle)

Chris Pine

------------------------------------------------------ My e-mail to Firaxis:

Hi there (Ralf, Sweden)

The MAIN idea of below suggestion is to give the Civ-3 game an added anti-ICS dogleash.

And thats perhaps necessary: im not shure that city-area related anti-ICS prevention is going to be enough. Check out this thread over at the CTP-2 section:
../../Forum35/HTML/000313.html?45

The idea - city-improvement related max number-of-cities limit:

- To expand beyond 10 cities; you must build marketplaces in at least 5 of them.
- To expand beyond 20 cities; you must build marketplaces in at least 10 of them, and courthouses in at least 5 of them.
- To expand beyond 30 cities; you must build marketplaces in at least 15 of them, and courthouses in at least 10 of them.

In dont know if the ratios are perfect, but at least consider the overall idea. It can also be .txt-file tweakable.

------------------------------------------------------ A few summarising words:

Now, that guy nows how to reveal information without actually reveal any information

Anyway, note the ICS-related key-sentence here:

"I didn't say anything about city-area".

It seems to me that you are ignorant about the fact that Chris Pine is the LEAD PROGRAMMER of the Firaxis team, and that you dont have a foggiest clue what ICS stands for.
ICS means Infinite City Sprawl (or Infinite City Sleaze). Use the thread-search function to find threads about this problem.

Tical_2000 and Thunderfall:

Read the post carefully, dont just skim through it, BEFORE you post replies.

- FIRST, my introduction
- SECOND, Chris Pine´s respond letter
- THIRD, my e-mail to chris Pine
- FOURTH, my summarizing words

1. You said in your letter "I'm not shure that city-area related anti-ICS prevention is going to be enough".
What city-area related prevention?

Well, my idea was if the player had these non-negotiable improvement-related expanding-rules, he would tend to adjust automatically in advance, in much the same way that he prevents city-unhappiness before it actually happens, by precociously building happiness-improvements. Also; the whole idea could be tweaked (or bypassed) in the .txt tweak-files.

Anyway, i feel confident that Firaxis really HAVE found "a better set of solutions", so i definitely dont mourn the fact the above idea was rejected. Hence: "that feels like a very non-fluid and counter-intuitive set of rules".

Your quote: "you should be able to build 100 cities even if you have zero # of marketplace or courthouse".

I really *dont* agree! Historic quote:
"You can conquer an empire from a horseback, but cannot RULE an empire from a horseback".

I think this have been said about the Hunns, but im not sure. Anyway, in order to keep and maintain a huge empire you MUST have an civil infrastructure. Why should it be different in Civ-3?

CHRISTANTINE THE GREAT:

Now, thats an imaginative idea! Well, who knows...

TIBERIUS:

1/ I was merely refering to the Activision CTP-2 solution of the problem. They have implemented expanding city-areas and more anti-ICS preventions, mostly related to the city-areas. Read about it in above shortcut.

2/ He have only answered me two times. The first response was to my ideas about workarounds for a better and stronger Civ-AI. Click below:
../../Forum6/HTML/001752.html

The second response i have reproduces in this thread. I guess he was just leading me away from the wrong track. I took for granted that the Firaxis-team perhaps adopted a similar solution to the ICS-problem as the Activision-team did, you see.
If you read about how Activision dealt with the ICS-problem, you see that they have choosen a rather "technical" city-area percentage-calculating squares type of solution.