[Freeciv-Dev] Re: (PR#3594) Data: viking.ruleset

["Christian Knoke" <chrisk@xxxxxxxxx>]

<URL: http://bugs.freeciv.org/Ticket/Display.html?id=3594 >

On Tue, Aug 16, 2005 at 12:16:44AM -0700, Per I. Mathisen wrote:
> On Mon, 15 Aug 2005, Jason Short wrote:
> > Per may feel differently, but as far as I'm concerned if we have any
> > reasonable SVG flag the ruleset can be added.
> 
> I do not object to a split into a viking and Norwegian ruleset. I want a
> unique new flag, however.

I agree here.

> My objection to new nations is general - we have problems with existing
> nations that are just made worse by adding new ones, and no efforts are
> made to solve the existing problems.
> 
> The existing problems?
> 1) There are too many nations, and finding the one you want takes too
> long. This is partly a GUI issue, partly a human indecision issue.

Besides of the possibility of improving the GUI, I see no real problem here.

> 2) There are too many similar flags, and seeing two players apart can be a
> real challenge sometimes.

True; what we can do is, put flags that are hard to distinct, into small
groups, and let players choose only one nation of that group per game.

> Nations in Freeciv are just pure fluff, linguistic candy. They are easy to
> add, but (especially when considering the amount of code and data that has
> eventually gone into them) add very little to the game. Playing the game
> as the vikings is just the same as playing the game as the elves.

I disagree. Freeciv has ever lacked some eye candy. The choice of many
nations is a nice feature. And I like seeing some poor nation rulesets now
improved.

In times were the number of nations was limited, there often were requests
for adding this and that or just more nation(s).

> When will it be enough? There are literally thousands of nations on this
> planet, each with their own cities/settlements, leaders and symbols.

Again I see no problem here. It's not too often now, that somebody comes
along and asks. And the usual answer is, do it yourself, and when it has
sufficient quality, we add it.

> A nation member may be just as likely to pick the Mordors as his nation as
> his own nation, not just because the Mordor nation is cool, but it is
> difficult to find or even know that his or her nation exists in the
> humongous list of nations that we have.

The way is to improve the gui a bit. Also, we can add some server options,
that restrict the nations to some groups like medieval, or american.

> I am afraid that we are adding nations more out of a sense of completeness
> and wouldn't-that-be-neat than an eye for making the general gameplay
> experience a better one for everyone.

I see no 'sense of completeness' here. We have covered the biggest nations,
with I think a quite good quality. There is no pressure to add new ones.

>   - Per

Christian

-- 
Christian Knoke            * * *            http://cknoke.de
* * * * * * * * *  Ceterum censeo Microsoft esse dividendum.