[Freeciv-Dev] Re: Patch: bye bye free city center

["Mike Jing" <miky40@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

On Wed, 13 Dec 2000,  Johannes wrote:
> Even though this might be a good idea, I see this potensial problem. If I 
> remember correctly, even if the first worker is unhappy when you found a 
> new city (which happens often in civ2 on deity level with a large 
> civilization), you can always remove the first worker (but keeping the 
> central square, of course) and this will solve the unhappiness problem. If 
> there is no 'free square', how do you intend to solve this kind of 
> unhappiness? You can't starve a city that you just built!
That's a very good question.  Fortunately, it's not really a problem, as 
long as you don't actually starve that new city, but simply render it 
useless until the unhappiness is taken care of -- either through martial 
law, raising luxury rate or other means.  I have to check the code to see 
what actually would happen in such a situation, but it's not hard to simply 
keep the city from growing and being productive instead of starving it to 
death.  And as you can see, this has exactly the intended effect of limiting 
infinite expansion.
> That said, I think we (can I use 'we' in my second freeciv note?) >need to 
> solve the smallpox syndrome. It just feels a little stupid to
> develop a complex game aspect (citydevelopment, buildings) if the
> 'best' strategy is to ignore it! Actually, a good strategy game should not 
> prefer any one strategy. There should be at least a good handful of 
> different strategies (and different not just on the detail
> level) that are approx. equally good, so that a player can choose one
> that fits his/her personality. This would also help to keep up the
> interest in playing the game, perfecting ones playing skills and
> trying to 'prove' that your strategy is 'the best'. Also, the 'best'
> strategy should depend on a number of factors, like if the world is
> mostly land or sea, the average terrain, unhappiness, the density of
> resources, riversquares, mountains etc. This way one would would not
> be able to choose a 'best' strategy at the beginning, but would have
> to reevaluate as the game proceeded.
I couldn't agree more.  This is precisely the reason behind this effort to 
fix the "smallpox" problem because it has become way too dominating and 
rendered several major parts of the game completely irrelevant.  The exact 
same problem exists in the original Civ2.  The whole problem becomes clear 
if you check out DaveV's ICS Strategy Guide in Apolyton's Civ2-Strategy 
Forum.
> Of course, this might be how you already play, it's just that for me
> hearing so much about this smallpox strategy, it feels like it's all
> lined up: just let those settlers come, no need to stop thinking
> about placement and development of cities! (Sorry about the sarcasm.)
Unfortunately, that's pretty much what Freeciv plays like now, at least in a 
multiplayer game.  It only takes one ICS'er to destroy all your carefully 
developed cities simply because he will reach steam engine way before anyone 
else, and those ironclads are more than deadly in a gen2 game, which is how 
most of the multiplayer games are played.  This patch is only the first step 
towards a more balanced game.  And I still believe more unhappiness is 
needed on top of it.
Not surprisingly, quite many people are opposed to this.  During one recent 
game, the great Assmund offered this objection to my effort to slow down the 
expansion:" You know, historically, expansion is extremely important."  Ah 
sure, but it also makes an extremely boring game -- Freeciv is now simply 
Free-expand and nothing more.  So that's entirely beside the point.  Others 
argue that slowing down the game would simply make the game last too long.  
This is indeed a valid concern, but I believe a long and interesting game is 
much better than a short and boring one.  I would rather sit through an 
8-hour game where there is at least a possibilty that my space ship would 
reach Alpha Centauri, rather a 2-hour game where the result is apparent as 
soon as the first ironclad appears.  But again, that might just be me.
Mike

_____________________________________________________________________________________
Get more from the Web.  FREE MSN Explorer download : http://explorer.msn.com