The Brazilian Slaughter
Arcane
We have been talking a lot lately here in the Codex about how the Civilization series has stagnated, and we have been lacking a Civlike that could compete with Firaxis and innovate the Civlike 4X genre.
Maybe we could think together and have some innovative ideas.
Lemme start:
Diplomacy: I feel a lot can be taken from Paradox games here. Things like Vassals, Royal Marriages between Royal Houses and Personnal Unions, Claims, Spheres of Influence, Subsidies, Marshes, etc.
Micro: How about turning parts of your empire into Provinces and handling them to AI governors? Another part that takes from Pdox games. You could micromanage if you want, but its ok if you just leave the AI to it, with some instructions. An interesting part is that said provinces could turn into break-away civilizations, or rebel. Civ IV had colonies. This would work a lot better if we had bigger maps and more players. Talking about that...
Maps: Oh yeah, bigger maps and more players. I think the max the classic Civilization games had like thirty nations at once in III and IV? Bigger maps are totally necessary too. Engine optimization is the name of the game here.
Tile Limits/Doomstacking: How about a cap on units per square/Hex? I'm thinking your cap would have a formula like Technology + Terrain. So you can put a large army in some nice grassland, but a mountain can only have a few units per turn through it. Maybe model a primitive logistics chain where the game calculates proximity to nearby city and terrain near the unit/stack in the square/hex.
Demographics: Why strategy games seem to reluctant to use such concept? 4X should totally feature demographics as a thing. Another interesting factor are foreign demographics, who should present their own challenge with advantages and disadvantages - like being able to recruit cultural units from other countries.
Social Engineering: Taken from SMAC, we really need this, and good. Would love to see more, and even more exotic choices. Rather than the small table from SMAC and IV, maybe we should get instead a far larger Social Engineering table of choices - running the gammut from Tribal Rule from Modern Democracy, or from Barter economies to Planned economics. One gets the idea.
War: One thing that always bothered me in most Civlikes is how time and war make no sense. Every turn is too many years until near the "Modern Day". Most units take forever to move, and the average war takes forever, too. I was thinking faster wars through faster units than in a normal civilization game. Could also lead to the concept of thing like temporary armies - think feudal levies, or conscripts. Essentially, you can't just "build up" a huge army and keep it growing, until you have the tech and/or size to do it.
Cities, Nomads and Feuds: The whole "Cities as the Center" was not the deal for a good part of history. In the Steppes, the nomads moved constantly and cities were pretty much places were those wandering nomads got together and traded. In Western Europe, power was concentrated in the castles and agricultural lands. Groups like teh Mongols or Arabs should be represented as they should be.
This could also allow "Pre-Civilization" warfare - imagine tribes of unsettled nomads fighting it out for land, or even pre-civilization cavemen doing their thing before founding civilization.
Maybe we could think together and have some innovative ideas.
Lemme start:
Diplomacy: I feel a lot can be taken from Paradox games here. Things like Vassals, Royal Marriages between Royal Houses and Personnal Unions, Claims, Spheres of Influence, Subsidies, Marshes, etc.
Micro: How about turning parts of your empire into Provinces and handling them to AI governors? Another part that takes from Pdox games. You could micromanage if you want, but its ok if you just leave the AI to it, with some instructions. An interesting part is that said provinces could turn into break-away civilizations, or rebel. Civ IV had colonies. This would work a lot better if we had bigger maps and more players. Talking about that...
Maps: Oh yeah, bigger maps and more players. I think the max the classic Civilization games had like thirty nations at once in III and IV? Bigger maps are totally necessary too. Engine optimization is the name of the game here.
Tile Limits/Doomstacking: How about a cap on units per square/Hex? I'm thinking your cap would have a formula like Technology + Terrain. So you can put a large army in some nice grassland, but a mountain can only have a few units per turn through it. Maybe model a primitive logistics chain where the game calculates proximity to nearby city and terrain near the unit/stack in the square/hex.
Demographics: Why strategy games seem to reluctant to use such concept? 4X should totally feature demographics as a thing. Another interesting factor are foreign demographics, who should present their own challenge with advantages and disadvantages - like being able to recruit cultural units from other countries.
Social Engineering: Taken from SMAC, we really need this, and good. Would love to see more, and even more exotic choices. Rather than the small table from SMAC and IV, maybe we should get instead a far larger Social Engineering table of choices - running the gammut from Tribal Rule from Modern Democracy, or from Barter economies to Planned economics. One gets the idea.
War: One thing that always bothered me in most Civlikes is how time and war make no sense. Every turn is too many years until near the "Modern Day". Most units take forever to move, and the average war takes forever, too. I was thinking faster wars through faster units than in a normal civilization game. Could also lead to the concept of thing like temporary armies - think feudal levies, or conscripts. Essentially, you can't just "build up" a huge army and keep it growing, until you have the tech and/or size to do it.
Cities, Nomads and Feuds: The whole "Cities as the Center" was not the deal for a good part of history. In the Steppes, the nomads moved constantly and cities were pretty much places were those wandering nomads got together and traded. In Western Europe, power was concentrated in the castles and agricultural lands. Groups like teh Mongols or Arabs should be represented as they should be.
This could also allow "Pre-Civilization" warfare - imagine tribes of unsettled nomads fighting it out for land, or even pre-civilization cavemen doing their thing before founding civilization.