[Planning thread for a new Succession Game] Metropolis, or City by Committee

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Myquandro

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Mar 31, 2015
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You call twice as big 'a little bigger'? Did you lie about being Dutch and are actually from Texas? :p Remove the harbor area (beyond the mountains, to the East) from your area and it starts to look ok-ish in with regards to its size (as compared with the other districts). I didn't notice that the area is identical in both shots; it only appears smaller in the second shot because the main area is a lot bigger there.

That district doesn't have any access to the sea. You might get confused by the red lines from your map that I used, but that red line has to be neglected. If you still think it's too big I will take a look at the map myself in-game and redraw the districts.

As for voter collusion, we will simply have to actually *trust* people not to do it (a scary concept, I know). That is, if it is to be disallowed. I'm for allowing it actually, as it adds spice to the game. You will simply make fraud a part of your campaign in this case, neatly simulating real world politics. :) It's ok with me if we want to ban this avenue of influence, though; the main thing should remain the building of the city, and this kind of intrigue might spark too much conflict down the line, when the city is big and the mayor has a lot of sway over the direction of development.

I do like to keep things like these easy. Don't manage it too much and if we find out it doesn't work we can change it later on (or in a next SG). You can either try to manage everything, work out every possibility and fix every problem in advance or accept that you can't work out everything (at least not in an acceptable amount of time) and let some thing run its own course.

Think about it this way: what harm is there in having term limits? None whatsoever, unless you can somehow count on being mayor for three or more times in a row. Imo, the situation where the term limit is actually needed is unlikely to occur: most people will be curious to see how someone else will do as the MM, and will not vote for the same person even two, let alone three times in a row. But it doesn't hurt to have it, so, why not have it in place in case such a freak scenario *does* occur? Remember that it takes weeks or even a month to get through a single election cycle (albeit we have had some bad luck in our current SG, or perhaps the game has run its course and people are simply losing interest). Imo two terms as a mayor in a row should be enough for anyone. If not, well, frankly such usurpers should be unwelcome in our game. Have a nice day, Citizen. :)

I would like to put this in place with a limit of two terms. As said before, we can't oversee all possibilities and that leaves us with the conclusion that we might get a situation that is unwanted but not against the rules. To prevent some of these things from happening a term limit is a good system.
 
Apr 23, 2015
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That district doesn't have any access to the sea. You might get confused by the red lines from your map that I used, but that red line has to be neglected. If you still think it's too big I will take a look at the map myself in-game and redraw the districts.
Oh... Damn, now it all makes sense! I apologize for accusing you of hogging too much territory. :oops: Without the 'extra' area, your territory is indeed equal in size to the others. Still though, it remains the prime spot on the map, and should imo be the common area. --Maybe we'll wait until we have more players and then decide who gets what area? If enough people think that it's not crucial to have a central common territory, I'm willing to compromise on this issue.

On that note, so far we seem to be the only three people talking in this thread; maybe I should send a few messages on Reddit and try to recruit some more people? I spotted another thread today where the op seems to have quite good city-building skills, and might be a good fit for this kind of game. But anyway we're not in a hurry, as I'll be able to start this game in the beginning of August at the earliest.

I do like to keep things like these easy. Don't manage it too much and if we find out it doesn't work we can change it later on (or in a next SG). You can either try to manage everything, work out every possibility and fix every problem in advance or accept that you can't work out everything (at least not in an acceptable amount of time) and let some thing run its own course.
I agree in principle; we should have a definite agreement though as to whether collusion is to be allowed or not. Otherwise it might lead to some disputes down the line, if it becomes apparent that it has been engaged in and the rules are not clear from the beginning.

I would like to put this in place with a limit of two terms. As said before, we can't oversee all possibilities and that leaves us with the conclusion that we might get a situation that is unwanted but not against the rules. To prevent some of these things from happening a term limit is a good system.
So we have two votes for, one against having a term limit. I guess we'll wait for everyone to give their opinion here as well; in the final end it's not the end of the world if there are to be no limits, due to the reasons I stated above.


Btw, I've added a river and removed two mountain ranges from the map (from around the central valley); I've also planted some trees, but I'll have to put some more before I'll be satisfied with the terrain. I'll try not to put in too many trees though, to keep the elevations clearly visible (in its original state, imo, this map had too many trees in some spots, making it very hard to see the shape of the terrain that you're building onto). I will post the modified map in this thread once I'm satisfied with it (it will take a few days though, as I'll have to do some work and finish my turn report).
 

ItalianGuy

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Oh come on! The solution for voting is so simple: we use spoiler tags! That way who didn't vote yet, doesn't see the other votes. No problems, but secrecy is cancelled. If you don't mind that...

Term limits: let's decide together wit the other three players.

*prepares bribes*
Of course I'm joking.
Or am I?
 

Myquandro

Major
Mar 31, 2015
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Oh come on! The solution for voting is so simple: we use spoiler tags! That way who didn't vote yet, doesn't see the other votes. No problems, but secrecy is cancelled. If you don't mind that...

Term limits: let's decide together wit the other three players.

*prepares bribes*
Of course I'm joking.
Or am I?
Of course we have to wait with some decisions until at least most of the players are participating in the conversation. Those things are (though not limit to) District choice, Term limits, Turn time (months or years) and Playing order (which player plays when).

Also something to consider is the amount of money someone may spend on his personal district. As all money earned in the city is flowing into the same treasury, money made by the group could be spend by someone just for its personal district. Maybe we should prevent players for doing that and keep a part as savings for the main district. I would propose that each group of turns the MM sets a limited amount of money that can be spend each turn on personal districts. Exception for this can be made if it benefits the city as a whole (for example improving the highway or building a harbor). This amount can increase over time as the city becomes wealthier and the main district might get filled completely and it gets difficult to invest money there.
 
Apr 23, 2015
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Oh come on! The solution for voting is so simple: we use spoiler tags! That way who didn't vote yet, doesn't see the other votes. No problems, but secrecy is cancelled. If you don't mind that...
I'm not sure if you've thought this through. Unless I'm missing something, this solution has one benefit (ease of counting the votes), with the significant downside of lost voting secrecy, meaning that collusion is now even easier (i.e. since you can see who of your 'favorites' has many votes, you can then choose to target your 'deals' at them ('I'll vote for you and you alone if you'll let me build a metro tunnel underneath your district', etc). I don't really mind this though, since I don't mind it if collusion occurs. Judging by your spoiler, you might be shifting your view on this as well. :)

FWIW, even with the secret check words it is possible to collude; you would simply make your deals and post your pm- influenced, 'corrupt' votes along with the secret word that you got from the mayor. It's a case of 'who watches the watchmen?' here (as irl...). So since intrigue can happen no matter what, then it makes sense to allow it, imo.

Myquandro said:
Also something to consider is the amount of money someone may spend on his personal district. As all money earned in the city is flowing into the same treasury, money made by the group could be spend by someone just for its personal district. Maybe we should prevent players for doing that and keep a part as savings for the main district. I would propose that each group of turns the MM sets a limited amount of money that can be spend each turn on personal districts. Exception for this can be made if it benefits the city as a whole (for example improving the highway or building a harbor). This amount can increase over time as the city becomes wealthier and the main district might get filled completely and it gets difficult to invest money there.
While this is an excellent suggestion, imo, we must be careful, as the powers of the mayor are growing each time we come up with a new task for him to do. If the position becomes too dominating, the game might become more about fighting for the position of mayor than about the building of the city... Of course the idea is that a bad / domineering mayor will not get elected again -- and in any case even as mayor you may *not* opt to e.g. bulldoze the whole common area -- but it's good to be careful here, imo.

On this note, I was thinking whether the mayor should have 'veto' power over the negotitated plans; e.g. all other players have drafted a brilliant (according to them) traffic plan for the upcoming turn-set; however, the mayor totally disagrees and chooses to implement his own plan instead, using most of the city's budget on it on his own turn (so as to make it difficult for others to undo his plans). Imo this could maybe be allowed; the reasoning is twofold: 1) it's unlikely enough to happen, as we'll have mostly like-minded, 'gentlemanly' players; and 2) such behavior would likely spell the end of that player's mayoral terms for the remainder of the game, serving as an adequate deterrent. YMMV on whether you want to take this chance though, so we should all discuss this.

On that note, when I will have the time I will send some pms on Reddit, and try to get some more players talking in this thread. No ETA on this though (busy busy, yada yada).
 
Apr 23, 2015
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I may have found an even better map than Tarawe. It has a more realistic terrain (since it is copied from the real world), and has a very good-looking harbor area (imo).
What do you think, people?

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=436955692
(Durban)

Also, this island map seems intriguing, but imo it has too little buildable land. Islands are also natural district boundaries, meaning that there's little conflict over areas.

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=421010916
(Vossekop Archipelago)

Here are some screenshots and an initial district template for the Durban map (for 6 players):

http://imgur.com/a/pIOou

On this map the common area can have both a central(ish) location and good harbor sites, so that's one problem solved right there.
I think I still prefer Tarawe, but not by much; it's maybe 60-40 in it's favor in my mind right now, and I could easily be swayed
by good arguments, or by players preferring the Durban map.
 

Myquandro

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A map that I've found that could be great (if not perfect) for an SG is Cantil Valley: http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=445636101

This map has a great looking environment and a good amount of build able area. It also has several "platforms" that could be used as personal districts while the fertile riverbanks can be used for the main city.

Overviews
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Scenery
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Myquandro

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Mar 31, 2015
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I've been building my own city there and I've managed (easily) to fit 60k citizens in just the top half of the fertile area. If it would all be filled (of course a mix of all zones) I would definitely fit well over 100k citizens in there. That's more then we've reached now in our current SG with it's personal districts together. I don't think that the shared area is too small, but if we decide that it's not enough we can easily expand the area.

And what kind of problems are you referring to?
 
Apr 23, 2015
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Imo, the mountains on this map are a tad excessive. It is a European map though, and I like the general look of it. With a little editing to flatten a few spots, I could very well play on this map. :)

I was thinking that for the common area, the mountain range directly to the right of the river should face the flattening first and foremost; with this change I see no possible issues with our core area. However, the mountains all around this central valley turn and twist at awkward angles for major city-building, and don't seem to follow any obvious logic. I only glanced at the map before I had to leave though, and I'm now on my bad computer. I'm sure that with editing the map can be made playable; I'm just not sure how much work it would require.

FWIW, the editing of Tarawe is almost complete, but I cba to continue it on this computer, so it will have to wait quite a bit into the future for me to finish it (mostly some trees are still missing).
 

Myquandro

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I've made a possible lay-out for different districts. This also makes it clear to see what parts are (perfectly) flat, which is all the districts I've painted. I know this map has a lot of mountains and that has been the reason for me to wait with mentioning this map, but as I'm playing on the map building a city of my own I now know that this map has more then enough buildable area.

ztYMsJj.jpg


I will take some pictures of my own city at a later moment to give you a better idea how a city would fit in this map. Of course if your opinion is then still that the map isn't good enough for an SG we can still go with Tarawe.
 

ItalianGuy

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I've been building my own city there and I've managed (easily) to fit 60k citizens in just the top half of the fertile area. If it would all be filled (of course a mix of all zones) I would definitely fit well over 100k citizens in there. That's more then we've reached now in our current SG with it's personal districts together. I don't think that the shared area is too small, but if we decide that it's not enough we can easily expand the area.

And what kind of problems are you referring to?
I was referring to traffic problems when building together, mainly because of the river that splits the area in two narrow stripes. Anyway, I didn't use it.
I still prefer Tarawe, mainly because I studied and tweaked the connections and they seem complete.
 
Apr 23, 2015
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I've made a possible lay-out for different districts. This also makes it clear to see what parts are (perfectly) flat, which is all the districts I've painted. I know this map has a lot of mountains and that has been the reason for me to wait with mentioning this map, but as I'm playing on the map building a city of my own I now know that this map has more then enough buildable area.

ztYMsJj.jpg


I will take some pictures of my own city at a later moment to give you a better idea how a city would fit in this map. Of course if your opinion is then still that the map isn't good enough for an SG we can still go with Tarawe.
Unfortunately, that picture confirms my fears: the mountains have a choke-hold on the surrounding districts, even if the central valley is fine (with a little tweaking at least). I would like to play on European map though (I know there's a mod for it, but it seems a bit daft to use a 'mod slot' for such a trivial purpose, when this can be dealt with by the map choice itself). If I was on my good computer, I'd try to edit this map, to try and see how easy it is (it's easy to flatten territory, but hard to do it so that it seems plausible and aesthetic). @ItalianGuy, you up for this maybe? ;)

EDIT: As another solution, we could keep the mountains (or most of them) and agree to use the Ingame Terrain Editor mod; it's expensive enough to use that we couldn't alter the terrain *too* drastically, especially if we will limit the amount of cash that one can spend on their own district. Yet at the same time major changes could be made in the spots that are crucial for traffic; if you've ever been to Switzerland, you'll know what oodles of cold, hard cash can do to a mountain environment! --Provided that it works, I'd actually prefer this solution, as it'd add one more crucial decision, both collectively and individually (where and how to excavate the major mountain highway passages, and how to connect your own district to them in the best way possible?).
EDIT2: You might think we won't have the cash for this, given the extreme cost with the mod's default settings; but keeping in mind the lessons that we've learned of city-building in our current game, and the flatter, more central territory to build upon, I think we could easily double our current income in this new SG, given the same population.
 
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Myquandro

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Mar 31, 2015
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I agree with this partially as I don't think this map would be more difficult then when we had a main island with several surrounding that for personal district. The difference is just that with islands you build bridges and with mountains you build tunnels.

I will post my city here later this week probably which can give an as good as possible look at the potential problems of the city (keeping in mind that I have my own style in building cities).
 
Apr 23, 2015
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All those European buildings sure look nice. :) You've convinced me; I will vote for this map! --Some minor touches could be effected in the steepest areas, while keeping the mountainous character of the map intact; I will see what can be done once I return from my trip. Or someone else can pick it up, and/or check the connections while they're at it (I'm looking at you @ItalianGuy -- unless of course you hate this map and refuse to have anything to do with it :p).
 

Myquandro

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Mar 31, 2015
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I can do a few things. First of all I can move the map a bit north to get a bigger shoreline. I can also look if I can do something about a few mountains to get a bit more area, but that's difficult without changing the look and feel of the map too much.
 
Apr 23, 2015
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I can do a few things. First of all I can move the map a bit north to get a bigger shoreline. I can also look if I can do something about a few mountains to get a bit more area, but that's difficult without changing the look and feel of the map too much.
...Wait -- you can do this?! o_O *How*?! I've totally missed this option in the map editor! Not that I'd have needed it often, but when I did, the need was rather dire. -.-