Biggest new info...2 pop points per settler, 1 per worker. The idea is to limit the ICS strategy.

Also national border size are now connected to culture rating.

This sounds really interesting and so simple too. I think it will help fight ICS. If you want to build settlers, you will have to wait longer. Just building settlers without improving your city won't make much sense strategically anymore.

Is Sid really going to be an advisor in the game, or is it an "april fools" joke?

quote: Originally posted by The diplomat on 04-06-2001 04:04 PM 1 settler = 2 pop points !! This sounds really interesting and so simple too. I think it will help fight ICS. If you want to build settlers, you will have to wait longer. Just building settlers without improving your city won't make much sense strategically anymore. Is Sid really going to be an advisor in the game, or is it an "april fools" joke?

No joke! Sid really is one of the game's advisors.

Dan
Firaxis Games, Inc.

quote: Originally posted by Dan Magaha FIRAXIS on 04-06-2001 05:09 PM No joke! Sid really is one of the game's advisors. Dan Firaxis Games, Inc.

COOL!

If so, I agree with the decision absolutely. My feeling has always been that, once a group of Settlers leaves a city, it becomes entirely independent of the city and no longer relies on the city for food or resources.

Guess why? April 6th is my birthday!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

What a present!!

Settlers - 2 Pop points
workers - 1 pop points

I understand the logic here but this is going to make the beginning
game very very slow(boring). No more running around terrorizing your
neighbor at the beginning. You just won't have the resources to build
offensive units. Lots of other strategies won't work at the beginning.
Also this will discourage new civ'ers. Young ones especially. "BORING"

I suggest a compromise. Make Settlers one pop and workers no pop
until a single city first reaches the transition size ... size 4? And
slow everything down after that with the 2+1 pop penalty on a per Nation
basis. Also it makes logical sense from the citizen stand-point. Small
established cities like to hold on to their population. This would
encourage lots of small cities at the start. The AI would also build
lots of small cities. It does this in Civ 2 depending on culture.

Another possible compromise would be to make these slow start games
occur only at the higher levels of difficulty.

At minimum it needs to be easily turned off. So it will be the first
thing I do after spending $50.

Cave til ya puke,

quote: Originally posted by SerapisIV on 04-06-2001 03:23 PM Biggest new info...2 pop points per settler, 1 per worker. The idea is to limit the ICS strategy.

Sometimes the simplest solution is the most effective one. This idea together with some additional anti-ICS relaleted tweaks should really - if not exterminate, so at least "domesticate" ICS it into a very minor issue in Civ-3.

quote: Originally posted by dennis_caver on 04-07-2001 03:28 PM I suggest a compromise. Make Settlers one pop and workers no pop until a single city first reaches the transition size ... size 4?

I think its enough that they let each civ (including the human controlled one) start out with 2-3 settlers as default, instead of only 1-2 settlers as in Civ-2/SMAC.

The boring part in Civ-2 WAS the early beginning. You only produced 2-3 scouting warrios, then settler, settlers and still settlers - and some ancient wonders thrown in between. It was the same repetitios early game procedure each and every time. Until the whole basic 15-20 city empire-layout was completed. THEN one started to cultivate each city.

I think that making the settler be 2 pop is a great thing. It is so simple but really ingenious. And, it will kill ICS which is the main thing. For me at least, ICS is the single worst thing about civ. So, I hope that it is fixed.

quote: Originally posted by Roman on 04-06-2001 05:35 PM Do new cities now start with 2 population, or still with population 1, but having a tile worker and a normal worker?

I don't understand this -- what do you mean, a "tile worker" and a "normal worker"? I thought the distinction Firaxis was making was between settlers and workers?

Any ideas on how one might be expected to compensate for this?

quote: Originally posted by Ilkuul on 04-07-2001 04:31 PM I don't understand this -- what do you mean, a "tile worker" and a "normal worker"? I thought the distinction Firaxis was making was between settlers and workers?

Oops, sorry for the confusion. I was not refering to these units at all, merely the worker's in the cities working on the land collecting resources. In Civ2, whenever you built a new city, it was size 1, but had two resource gathering workers. One was a normal worker that you could assign to a specific tile and the other was a city-tile worker, which worked on the city tile and could not be reassigned. This was the main factor enabling the dreaded ICS.

By making settlers cost 2 population points, though, the problem is eliminated, because you "trade" two workers from the original city for two workers in the new city. Of course, there are other factors contributing to ICS, like the slowing of population growth as the city gets bigger, etc. but these are basically counterbalanced by other factors, such as the resource cost of settlers and happiness limits on large numbers of cities.

quote: Originally posted by Roman on 04-07-2001 05:34 PM By making settlers cost 2 population points, though, the problem is eliminated, because you "trade" two workers from the original city for two workers in the new city.

Sorry, either I'm thick, or I've missed earlier discussion of this topic. I'm still not following you. I now get what you mean about a tile worker and a normal worker, but what has that got to do with the parent city losing 2 normal workers and the new city gaining two? You can't build settlers in a size 1 city in Civ2 anyway (without disbanding it); so how does this have any bearing on the number of workers you lose in larger cities? OK, the new 2 pop. rule will mean in Civ3 a size 2 city also can't send out settlers, so I can see how that will drastically slow expansion and inhibit ICS; but you seem to be talking about some kind of conclusive death-blow to ICS that has something to do with tile workers in a city, and that's where you've totally lost me!

quote: Originally posted by MrFun on 04-07-2001 04:34 PM Ralf - I always found the beginning fun, with exploration and the feeling of founding the early cities of a civilization.

Well, the exploration part and the actual evaluation on where to place those cities was/is of course fun - I admit that.

But thanks to fact that it was so damn effective to "semi-ICS"; quickly ramp up 15-20 totally CI-empty cities, before one actually started to build any city improvements, and also; before one started to interconnect those cities with roads - one tended to stick to that strategy again and again, even though it was pretty boring and foreseeable.

I just think its time for a change then it comes to early game strategies in Civ-3. The early hyperfast expansion of new cities should be slowed down and forced to be much more organic and evolving. The whole idea of an quickly ramped up ancient 15-20 CI-empty city-empire, covering perhaps an area the size of the ancient Roman empre, but with NO significant city-improvements and little or no roads between each city - is quite frankly totally ridicules, also from a historic point of view.

quote: Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui on 04-07-2001 06:40 PM Ilk, each new city gets a free worker in the city tile. So, when you start a new city you actually get 2 workers instead of one. So, this would prevent that from being too much of a problem.

OK, now I get it! Thanks for spelling it out, Sid!

quote: Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui on 04-07-2001 06:40 PM Ilk, each new city gets a free worker in the city tile. So, when you start a new city you actually get 2 workers instead of one. So, this would prevent that from being too much of a problem.

No, leave it as it is. By the way; what do you mean by "instead of one"?

There is no "free" workers whatsoever in Civ-3 as I have understood it. A newly founded city isnt automatically equipped with a free worker, much less 2 of them. All worker-units must be produced - and you looses 1 pop-point after that you have produced any of them - even the first one.

The same goes for settler-units, with the exception that you now looses 2 pop-points every one produced - even the first one.

---------------------------------- edited:

Oops! sorry - I now know what you mean with a "free" worker. Your thinking about that free extra tile besides the city-tile itself in any newly founded 1 pop-point city, of course.

Well, that free extra tile should be given for free, without the need of an visible tile-improving unit - just as in Civ-2. Any visible worker-unit however must be produced.

Note, most casual players don't take advantage of ICS and build up more slowly. Therefore this fits their playing style perfectly. See, they don't like being bogged down with tons of units and cities which need micromanaged. Therefore this is taking away a cheat from the more experienced players and laeving the casual players with their strategy.

quote: Originally posted by Ralf on 04-07-2001 06:45 PM Well, the exploration part and the actual evaluation on where to place those cities was/is of course fun - I admit that. But thanks to fact that it was so damn effective to "semi-ICS"; quickly ramp up 15-20 totally CI-empty cities, before one actually started to build any city improvements, and also; before one started to interconnect those cities with roads - one tended to stick to that strategy again and again, even though it was pretty boring and foreseeable. I just think its time for a change then it comes to early game strategies in Civ-3. The early hyperfast expansion of new cities should be slowed down and forced to be much more organic and evolving. The whole idea of an quickly ramped up ancient 15-20 CI-empty city-empire, covering perhaps an area the size of the ancient Roman empre, but with NO significant city-improvements and little or no roads between each city - is quite frankly totally ridicules, also from a historic point of view. Historically theres was at least two things that kept for example the Roman empire not to collapse early on, and that was good roads (= surpress rebellions) and effective government/administration.

But anything different from this is boring!

That's one of the reasons I didn't like the CTP series. It just felt... boring. It took time to build cities and then you ended up with only 8 cities. A big empire must have 20 cities not 8.

This will make the game incredibly boring. I hate it when I have only 5 units instead of 20 (CTP compared to Civ2).

And think about it this way, howmuch turns do you have in a game? How much turns do you have in BC? It would take 15 turns for a city to grow and 20 to produce settler and 7 more to found a new city. So at 100AD you'll have 1 size 8 city, 1 size 6 city, 3 size 3 cities and 2 size 1 cities !!!!

This is annoying!!!

The whole Idea is first to expand as much as you can afford (depending on terrain \ time) and later being upgrading all your cities.

There comes a time when every civ player stops building cities because they are just not worth it. Because if you build a city after 1500AD by the time you finish the game, you haven't finished upgrading the city with all the needed factories / libraries / markets to be a productive city capable of serving your productive needs!

And with this system you'll only be able to build a small number of cities, each with a very big difference in size and each 60 turns after the other ! (you need defensive units as well).

And I don't want a game like CTP where your empire is huge at 12 cities.

I once played prince (or something) and had around 112 cities! I built some, but most I conquered! And though it was tedious, I felt like a big empire as I conquered the whole world!

If I conquer the whole world and it's 45 lousy cities it suck!!!

If you want to prevent players from making empires with many cities but no buildings, simply make it inadvisable to do so, not impossible. Make it so that rebellious cities are more likely without various improvements in the existing ones. Simply saying "you aren't allowed to make as many cities as before" is rather crude.

Things might turn out ok though if the years per turn is reduced and so new cities can be brought up to speed in something less than 1000 years. Otherwise, yeah, we'll just end up with itty-bitty empires.

Imo, it represents an entire province, such as Bavaria, Alsace-Lorraine, Wessex, Iowa,... You get the point.

Someone mentioned earlier that this could make the start of the game very boring. I'd have to agree. Initial expansion is going to be tedious, and anybody who starts with two settlers instead of one is going to have a large initial advantage.

quote: Originally posted by Sirotnikov And with this system you'll only be able to build a small number of cities, each with a very big difference in size and each 60 turns after the other ! (you need defensive units as well).

The difference in indevidual size and development is a god thing. I dont favour yet another empire of 25-30 equally developed twin-New Yorks.

quote: And I don't want a game like CTP where your empire is huge at 12 cities.

Considering the whole timescale, there should be time to found at least 20-25 cities of your own - any additional cities you can conquer. Dont forget that.

Anyway, there are ways to ease off the expansion-penalty somewhat, so it dont becomes quite as steep as you suggests. First of all dont forget that the settlers represent two pop-points - this means that any founded city automatically starts out with two pop-points (it can merge, remember), instead of just one - as in Civ-2.

Also; In Civ-2 for example the settler required two foods. In civ-3 however, the settler should perhaps still require two foods, but the worker only one food. Compare below:

In Civ-2: One city-area improving settler meant two foods city-growth-penalty. Also: One city-area improving settler (-2 foods) + one city-founding settler (-2 foods) meant no less then four foods penalty.

In Civ-3 however: One city-area improving worker now perhaps only requires one food penalty (= faster city-growth). This also means that one city-area improving worker (-1 foods) + one city-founding settler (-2 foods) now only requires three foods penaltly.

Though maybe foreigh relations/espionage advisor would be better, he's already got the ability to post often without revealing information.

quote: Originally posted by SerapisIV on 04-08-2001 11:51 AM I wouldn't be so sure about the food upkeep on settlers and workers yet. There has been no mention yet of them being supported any differently from every other CivIII unit which has been changed to gold alone. Thus far the only change has been the pop loss per unit, no mention yet of upkeep.

Well, in that case we must delay any further definitive judgements about the pros & cons of the settler/worker pop-loss penalty, until we DO know. I think however we can safely asume that settlers/workers needs some form of upkeep (read below underlining).

Firaxis website quote:
"Settlers and workers are also able to merge with a city, thus increasing its population. Conversely, to produce a new settler or worker, a city gives up not only the requisite number of shields, but also population points (2 population points to create a settler, 1 to create a worker). This added requirement makes settlers and workers very precious resources that you'll want to protect."

Above underlining seems to suggest that the pop-loss penalty is added on top of something else. If this "something else" is the old food-requirment or the new gold-requirment is anybodys quess. Personally I think the food-requirment seems most logical for both settlers and workers. After all, if citizens require foods inside a city, why shoudnt they require it then they work/migrate outside the city-square as well?

On the other hand: If for example a 4-point city looses both 2 pop-points AND is required to maintain 2-foods upkeep for that settler (as long as it havent settled yet) - maybe this is the straw that brakes the camels back. To much and to little spoils everything.

I will go on record here as saying: ICS is NOT dead! The basic priciple of scattering cities everywhere will STILL apply. Of course, it will be a little slower and a little less effective than it is now...perhaps even significantly so.

Its biggest effects, of course, will be in the early game, and this is indeed very welcome in one sense. But unless other areas are made to compensate, we could also be left a VERY slow early game...which might or might not be to people's liking. One good effect of the slower start, though, is the computer might have a much better chance early on, which has a potential host of good side-effects in and of itself.

By the mid- to late-game, however, you can expect people to be 'booming' (ICS-ing) as they always have with very little changes overall. So what if my size 18 city drops to 16 so I can start a new city? There's virtually no reason NOT to do so (unless there are other factors at work here we haven't been told). This might add just a bit more strategy as the WHEN to ICS, but the necessity to ICS (at least against a human player) is still with us.