[Freeciv-Dev] Re: Civ II player puzzled by ICS strategy (long)

[K@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx]

Mike wrote:



> The biggest problem I had with no free city center, at least the way I 
> implemented it, is that you can't free your first worker off the city 
> center.  This has a couple of serious consequences.  1) The way Freeciv 
> works now, you can free your single worker off the tile it is working on if 
> the city is in revolt and still not starve because of the free city center.  
> If you can't free the worker, there will be no easy way to get out of 
> revolt, and I think this is too big a difference.  2) On the other hand, it 
> is difficult to implement it so that you _can_ free your only worker in a 
> size 1 city without the free city center.  Furthermore, even if you could, 
> the city will simply starve if you do lift the worker from the tile.  Again, 
> this strays too far from the original behavior, IMHO.  To me, it just 
> doesn't feel right.

I don't understand what you are talking about. A size 1 city is not
in revolt unless you do some military actions (in that case you can simply
home the unit in another city or disband it to avoid unhappiness or
simply wait for the end of the military action).


> But of course, I have other reasons as well. Most importantly, I think the 
> "deity level" patch brings more to the game than simply preventing ICS.  I 
> still believe there has to be a way to limit expansion and that's the most 
> natural and elegant way of doing it.  I understand it will not be utilized 
> in the default rulesets, but all I want is a viable alternative, not a 
> revolution.  So it is all right as long as I can get it into CVS so that I 
> can run my own custom rulesets.

I agree that your deity level patch is an interesting alternative.
Whether one likes to limit overall expansion is, of course, a matter
of taste. Personally, this is exactly what I dislike.
I find it rather strange and unnatural that you effectively need to 
restrict your empire to some number of cities, that you even need to 
destroy your opponents cities instead of conquering them to avoid
passing that number. It also means that you need to spent a lot of your 
time in mid-game on disbanding cities and happiness issues. This time
I would prefer to think about diplomatic and military strategies.

Deity also prevents you from building an empire which I feel is 
the underlying idea of the game and which I would  define by 
controlling a larger area with a large number of rather 
big cities (what I dislike at the present model is that the best
and only way (until steam engine) is to build as many tiny cities
as possible, what is so nice about "no central worker" is that it
does not matter whether one has two small or one big city of twice
the size).



> You will also havve to consider the effect on cities of sizes other than 1.  
> In general, these changes make the distribution of food resources less 
> uniform.  For example, you can end up with huge food surpluses in areas of 
> grasslands, and not nearly enough around hills and mountains.  IMHO, this 
> upsets the balance of food distribution a little too much.  And I prefer not 
> to change it if it is at all possible.

This is a matter of taste, too. Presently, production rules the game
(number of whales/forests/buffalo to maximize production at size 2 
to build a settler), with the changes food and trade (roads on grassland) 
will be more important. On gen2 the distribution of both grassland and 
whales is rather fair, but on gen1 you will need to settle in a fertile 
area [you need to settle at the whale coasts and close to
forests (to switch at size 2) now]. Where to settle will be a more important
decision since one also needs to care on what to do with the
3rd and 4th worker etc.. But the unimportantness of this decision is what
people in this list just complained about.




> More tweaks are certainly possible, but the mere fact that it requires such 
> consideration should raise a red flag.  All things being equal, the simpler 
> solution is usually the better solution.

I think removing the free city center is a simple, plain solution
which naturally results in larger cities and a greater choice
of strategies (you have a more balanced choice between building a new city
or an improvent allowing the old city to continue to grow, e.g.). 
As long as the free city center remains, ICS is still in the game 
(namely exponential growth by building new size one cities) but only 
punished at some point (e.g. by minimum city distance
or by happiness with the deity patch). Freeciv is both a
strategy game and a simulation of the raise and fall of empires.
For the the latter aspect, I think the current growth model
is very unnatural and an option for an alternative is desirable.


K


P.S.: For the deity level to be playable, I think one needs
the concept of vassal states that depend on a more powerful nation
and transfer some part of their trade points to that powerful nation 
unless they revolt at some point.