it isn't a game-play element though. For it to be game-play there would have to be a decision, a cost-benefit. There isn't with water. You lay pipes for everyone because it costs essentially nothing, and buildings will abandon without it.
Water/Sewage Network - Time to drop a feature
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it isn't a game-play element though. For it to be game-play there would have to be a decision, a cost-benefit. There isn't with water. You lay pipes for everyone because it costs essentially nothing, and buildings will abandon without it.
Honestly, I'd say just leave it there. It can't be using that many system resources, and it would take some development effort to get rid of it, which I would rather see spent actually improving the game. Not removing some feature I spend 1% of my time playing the game thinking about. Seriously after you get a nice chunk of money, drag out a huge grid of water across your hole map and forget about it.
yes, I realize that could be an argument for improvement, I'm not against that. The OP here is that it should be dropped, which imo is nothing short of foolish. Waste of time to fix nothing.
The suggestions for adding buildings and costs to allow the system to actually mean something does interest me. To add to this I thought that perhaps piping/electricity should be connected to an zone before it can even support housing/commercial etc. I find myself allowing buildings to go up in my zones in order for a viable connection to be made. What do people think of that idea?
Biggles
Biggles
Power lines and water pipes are an important part of the game when your starting out and money can be tight. Later on they are just a pain. I think pipes and electricity running under all the roads should be an acheivement gain when say the city hits something like 10,000 people, and it be a togglable option that increases the cost of roads laid with it (purchase and maintenance).
That way the early game challange stays, if people want to lay their own pipes and power they can, but for those that just see it as a useless pain get a good way out too.
That way the early game challange stays, if people want to lay their own pipes and power they can, but for those that just see it as a useless pain get a good way out too.
I think as a city planning style game you need some sort of water/electricity management, however it just needs expanding upon as the game develops in order to actually mean something apart from clicking the tab to make sure it works every time you plant a few new zones down.
Adding to this discussion, the main "problem" with the way CS deals with water/sewage systems is that, as many of you already said, they don't have an impact on gameplay.
Right now you either supply water/sewage to RCI buildings and they develop normally or you don't supply it and they "get out of town".
In SC4 there was actually a gameplay reason to lay pipes. they would allow RCI buildings to grow beyond the lowest density and wealth levels. You could still build a city without water if you wanted to have a low density and low wealth urban feeling.
In some of the cities I currently have in my SC4 regions I'm actually building water pipes only in small specific areas of the city to keep the water consumption just below the capacity of the water tower since I'm trying to build cities following some principles of "organic growth". All this adds a level of "role-playing" to the game.
A similar approach could be possible for CS in which RCI buildings without water would not grow beyond level 1, as someone already suggested.
However, the best approach to the water system ever made in any SimCity game is, in my opinion, the way SC 2000 deals with it.
Brief explanation of the system:
- RCI buildings have small pipes under them and you have to connect "main" pipes to those small pipes to supply water/sewage to the buildings;
- RCI buildings without water don't grow beyond the lowest density level;
- Seasons and weather affects the consumption/production of water;
- Water towers don't pump water, they store excess water to be used in case there's a situation that causes the water consumption being higher than the what production rate (like a drought or the arrival of summer).
The fact that the player also needs to account for the storage capacity and the effects related to the "weather and seasons" presents the players with an more interesting set of mechanics for the water system.
This also makes it so that the amounts of water being produced and consumed are dynamic, which gives the player a reason to periodically check the status of the system and account for weather effects like:
- drought - decreases the production rate of water pumping/desalanization facilities;
- forest fires - sudden increase in water consumption level;
- floods - increases the production rate of water pumping/desalanization facilities and increases risk of suffering a flood disaster;
- etc.
This elements help to create a system where the player has to keep checking how things are going and has to periodically modify the system to meet the demands of a growing city while trying to account for possible emergency events and keeping the budget under control.
If they dropped this fundamental feature it would just make the game that much easier. They need to flesh it out because it's meaningless, not drop it because of it.
A quick and dirty improvement would be to incorporate water pressure, that needs sub-pumps in-land to get water to where it needs to be beyond a certain distance. Right now mitigating dirty water is easy, keep the pumps up stream, but needing sub-pumps inland adds more complexity to keeping your water clean.
A quick and dirty improvement would be to incorporate water pressure, that needs sub-pumps in-land to get water to where it needs to be beyond a certain distance. Right now mitigating dirty water is easy, keep the pumps up stream, but needing sub-pumps inland adds more complexity to keeping your water clean.
Water and sewageshould bank on 4 variables:
Pressure
Distance
Height
Scarcity
With a game difficulty modifier readily available for modding.
The major pipes which must be layed out manually should be only necessary for major connections, and to pump large amounts of water over long distances.
streets (but not highways) would have an implicit capilary system to distribute water to buildings.
Water towers and larger reservoirs (the letter does not yet exist in-game) should have a buffer to gradually release into the pipe system, and either pull or push water into the system depending on pressure.
Water pumps would have a 'push' pressure to put water into the system.
Buildings would have a 'pull' pressure to take water out of the system. This pressure would oscillate depending on the number of people inside the building.
Buildings should have a water buffer too. If water pressure on street falls too much, they start to complain. If the buffer depletes, they complain RED and may go abandoned.
Like traffic, roads would have a pressure map. If pressure falls too low buildings complain. Player would have to find ways to put more pressure into the system.
Height affects pressure negatively (or positively depending on water source location) as well.
On the default casual game difficulty it shouldn't be too hard, but players should be able to adjust paremeters to set the intended difficulty via modding.
Pressure
Distance
Height
Scarcity
With a game difficulty modifier readily available for modding.
The major pipes which must be layed out manually should be only necessary for major connections, and to pump large amounts of water over long distances.
streets (but not highways) would have an implicit capilary system to distribute water to buildings.
Water towers and larger reservoirs (the letter does not yet exist in-game) should have a buffer to gradually release into the pipe system, and either pull or push water into the system depending on pressure.
Water pumps would have a 'push' pressure to put water into the system.
Buildings would have a 'pull' pressure to take water out of the system. This pressure would oscillate depending on the number of people inside the building.
Buildings should have a water buffer too. If water pressure on street falls too much, they start to complain. If the buffer depletes, they complain RED and may go abandoned.
Like traffic, roads would have a pressure map. If pressure falls too low buildings complain. Player would have to find ways to put more pressure into the system.
Height affects pressure negatively (or positively depending on water source location) as well.
On the default casual game difficulty it shouldn't be too hard, but players should be able to adjust paremeters to set the intended difficulty via modding.
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I like placing pipes and power lines. But I would be interested in seeing more water treatment options, such as an incinerator for human waste, or various filters for the treatment plant that will filter out industrial or agricultural waste. If you don't, then you'll start spreading toxic waste into the water system. (Different colours for that type of waste water? - like neon green or red).
There are also other treatment buildings I would like to see, like huge storage tanks or pools of waste water, but I think they can be easily built by modders, if not already done.
As for pipes, maybe different sizes for different demands. If you don't provide enough water, then the residents will complain. Main pipes to deliver water to different sectors of your city, and smaller pipes for the neighbourhoods.
There are also other treatment buildings I would like to see, like huge storage tanks or pools of waste water, but I think they can be easily built by modders, if not already done.
As for pipes, maybe different sizes for different demands. If you don't provide enough water, then the residents will complain. Main pipes to deliver water to different sectors of your city, and smaller pipes for the neighbourhoods.
simcity did better in this area. I just wish we could build buildings BEFORE roads.
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I agree with this completely. I think part of the reason the water pipe laying seems pointless and boring is because it has no object money. Like if they were either much more expensive, or ( a better solution) money wasn't so extremely easy to get, then it would be a bit more of a challenge.
As a whole though, I must agree with OP and most other people who posted, that they seem quite pointless right now with the current game mechanics and money.
I think the pipes are in the game because it is a way of balancing out the games financial systems, especially early on. Imagine if you had no cost from laying pipes around, your runaway surplus budgets would happen much sooner, making the game even less challenging earlier than it is at this point.
Well if water pipes could break like IRL, then you'd have to think about how to place them, right?
Personally, I think the suggestions pointing to making the system more dynamic would be cool. Making them more accessible, or punishing in efficiency like in traffic situations, and so forth would be much more interesting. I agree with people who believe that the features shouldn't be dropped, as well. Not only is building this kind of infrastructure part of real world management (and I'd find it really lacking if they took it out), keeping it in allows them to implement some of the suggestions here or general improvements they come up with in the future in either DLC or patches.
This, and other issues, would become far more interesting with some sort of maintenance modifier or requirement. Something that required access to pipes to check on them. Similar with roads and so forth. City upkeep is limited to citizen services and not to infrastructure updates. It would put a lot more stress on the player and add a lot more realism and complexity to the game to make them balance the upkeep of a town road, and also encourage people to be even smarter with their city designs.
This, and other issues, would become far more interesting with some sort of maintenance modifier or requirement. Something that required access to pipes to check on them. Similar with roads and so forth. City upkeep is limited to citizen services and not to infrastructure updates. It would put a lot more stress on the player and add a lot more realism and complexity to the game to make them balance the upkeep of a town road, and also encourage people to be even smarter with their city designs.
Yes. Especially the railroad terminals.
Edit: Back on topic. I think the pipes and power lines should stay. Future mods or patches that allow disasters such as pipes breaking (earthquakes) and power lines coming down during a storm would justify this.
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+1 Yes to a water pressure mod that requires you to build water towers from loss of water pressure as you travel further from the pumps.
Water Towers are pretty pointless in game with its current build. I really wish that instead of pipping they just had it on the roads.
Where I live we have dozens of water main breaks every year. I wonder what it would look like if bad maintenance caused a water main to break in the game and water to shoot out of the ground like a geyser until your city works employees can patch it up. And in the mean time, water would not be available in that area until the break is fixed.
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