I am all for acts of nature or later in the game human..... ie meltdown!

I hope we have it in Civ 3.

BTW, I really liked this... supernatural rule in Civ 1 that said: To eliminate the threat of an earthquake, build a... temple

I have made many posts on this, yet the enthusiasm for this has been lukewarm, at best . However, civilisation is littered with setbacks, and a game where you can grow exponentially without setbacks is a little too unreal. It was, for me, the one unreal aspect of Civ2. I say we litter the earth with corpses of the victims of natural disasters!

I care less whether it comes with snazzy graphics; only that it be included somehow. A few that come to mind are;

Earthquakes
Volcanoes
Floods
Cyclones/Hurricanes/Typhoons
Bush fires
Droughts
Avalanches
You name it! The more the merrier!!

Instead (as in Civ-1) most of these disasters should appear regurlary UNTIL approprate city-improvements has been built. Example; added health-inprovements gradually prevents reoccuring plagues. Food-related improvements (like granary) gradually prevents reoccuring famines.
Check out the Catastrophes prevented by improvements thread.

If they do put in random diasaters, I would love to see them be determined by the program a few turns prior to them happening, so a simple reset to the beginning of the turn doesn't change the event.

And even though it will be impossible to eliminate ICS, maybe problems reduced by building improvements will further discourage it. (of course people will figure out a way around them too)

In real life, most people underestimate the role of chance in their lives. (admittedly this depends on one's particular views on fatalism and supernatural guidance), but let's say that you were to flip a coin 3 times and it came up heads every time. A lot of people might take that as a signal. But the truth is that it isn't as unlikely as you might think.

Not to get too in depth but, while the probability of 3 coin flips being heads is 0.5*0.5*0.5=.125, or a one in 8 chance, a coin flip is independent of its previous flip. Thus, each coin flip's percent chance remains 0.5, no matter what happened before. Thus the chance that the 3rd coin will be heads is still 50%, not 12.5%. Still, we are humans and we look for meaning in our lives, even when it just might be random.

There should be limits on where certain natural disasters occur, and differing levels of magnitude. There was a major thread some time ago about making Civ3 'epic', which was part of my reason for proposing natural disasters. Let me put it this way - i'd rather have to overcome the forces of nature rather than a cheating AI!!! When you win a game, there should be a sense of achievement, NOT a sense of anti-climax. This is also why a history-type replay is important, and apparently it is being included, which is fantastic news! Combined with natural disasters and all of the existing good things about Civ2 and 3, this could certainly be the game of the decade!

I won't do the full list here, but i will give a couple of examples in detail;

Volcanoes
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Their magnitude could be indicated by the are of damage, for any square flooded by lava can only be dead! e.g
*minor - volcano tile destroyed by lava, reducing production/gold/food to zero (if not already) for perhaps 5 turns? Also kills any units in affected tile.
*moderate - some tiles within 1 of volcano destroyed by lava - affected for 5/10 turns, some others affected by ash or mudslides - no/half production/gold/food for perhaps 2 turns.
*major - consecutive tiles within two tiles of volcano destroyed by lava - affected by 5/10 turns. Zero prod/gold/food applies. Others within 2 affected by ash/mudslides for 2 turns.

Ramifications for cities
Lava - destroyed. Perhaps percentage or single settler/s remain
Mudslides - 1/2 pop point loss
Ash - reduced prod/food/gold 1/2 turns

Furthermore, the effects of lava should be gradual e.g 5 turn zero everything, next 5 half-normal, next 20/50/100 turns bonus food (extra-fertile soil), unless of course another eruption occurs in the mean time Volcanoes should have greater chance of recurrence (thus balancing out the food bonus), with perhaps a chance of long dormancy as well. This means that while luck is involved, there is also the element of 'reward vs risk' which is the choice of each civ. Perhaps tectonic plates could be determined at the start of each game, and become known with the discovery of a particular advance e.g Seismology? This advance could also reduce the effects of volcanoes (except lava), which would allay Ralf's concern over having the ability to influence your civ. You want to avoid volcanoes? Build somewhere else. If you are prepared to take the risk, then benefit from the food bonuses. Maybe you would even enjoy hearing the screams of melting soldiers

I would prefer that all civs would know of volcanic eruptions, at least of magnitude of major and perhaps moderate. You would hear at the start of the turn a rumble, followed by an explosion, and perhaps even a screen shake! Cooool!! You would only see it if it was within your borders, though. Perhaps in fog-of-war you would just see which volcano erupted.

Cyclones/Hurricanes/Typhoons
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Or whatever you want to call them! They should appear at the start of the turn, appearing over ocean, before moving randomly across tiles, until they pass over land, with a maximum number of tiles affected. Once they pass beyond coastal tiles, they die. If they stay on coastal tiles, a maximum of 3 tiles affected.

*minor - random building improvement destroyed in affected city. Other tiles loss of food for 1 turn, except water tiles.
*moderate - loss of pop point and random building improvement destroyed
*major - 20 percent pop point loss and 2 building improvement destroyed. Certain ancient/sail ships sunk, or at least percentage chance of sinking.

This involves mostly luck, but there are still gameplay elements involved. They should only appear in tropical/sub-tropical lattitudes. It must also be said that ones of major magnitude be more rare than minor and moderate ones. Again a certain advance could reduce the effects of these.

Floods
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They should only affect rivers, of course! They should appear at a random tile along a river and affect all downstream tiles. Perhaps dams could be built, which would stop floods from continuing downstream. Tiles downstream of dams up to 2/3 tiles could not initiate floods.

*minor - zero food/prod/gold 1 turn for all affected squares
*moderate - same as minor plus pop point loss and 1 random building improvement detroyed.
*major - same as minor plus 10/20/30 percent pop point loss and multiple b/i's destroyed. Also, adjacent swamp/grassland/plains/desert/jungle tiles to rivers also affected.

Again, major floods must be rare, but in each case, the damage is far greater than minor, more frequent natural disasters. The important thing is that, when you first hear the impending natural disaster, you don't know how bad it might be, or where it will affect! You then suffer the anxiety of not knowing, which i think adds to "the complete civilisation experience" Then you see (depending on the type of natural disaster), where is affected, followed by how much damage is unfolding before your eyes.

Also, small cities are, in the event of minor or moderate disasters, going to be more adversely affected than large cities, as only major disasters will reduce population by percentage. It's also worth noting that percentage losses need to be rounded up to pop points. This is also another way of discouraging ICS'ing, as size one cities risk total destruction, unlike larger cities. The player who has size 1 cities everywhere is likely to lose cities to natural disasters.