Strategic Resources for SEV?

[raynor]

I will admit that I haven't played a lot of Civ III because the AI is pretty tough. But one of the additions to the game that caught my attention was strategic resources. In Civ 3, you must have a source of a strategic resource in order to build certain types of units. For example, horses are a strategic resource for mounted units. Iron ore is necessary for building units with swords. This seems like a pretty cool idea. As I said, I haven't played enough Civ III to see how it works out. But I wonder if it might be an interesting addition to a predominantly human game of SEV. (Of course, the AI simulation in SEIV could now handle something so complex as a strategic resource.)

There might exist certain types of components including weapons that required the strategic resource. They might feature additional movement points, enhanced range, etc. They might even add features to existing weapons instead of allowing you to build completely unique weapons.

Has anyone played enough Civ III to tell whether or not strategic resources add much to the game play?

[Atrocities]

I think we brought this up before. Its a good idea, but it would, IIRC, cause a lot of micro management concerns. I think it was brought up in one of the "Next Patch - or - SEIV Expansion" threads.

[Noble713]

Originally posted by raynor:
Has anyone played enough Civ III to tell whether or not strategic resources add much to the game play?

I'd say yes. In the early stages of the game, the Swordsman is probably the best offensive unit, but you need Iron to build it. What direction you expand in and who you attack can largely be determined by where the iron is.

In my current game I am on different continent than the Chinese, who completely control their continent as well. I didn't think I could make a serious invasion attempt, so I tried to slow their military progress by taking all of their cities that had access to rubber (no rubber, no infantry, and their riflemen would be easy prey for my Panzers). Two hundred years, four invasions, and a hundred+ dead units later (Chinese casualties well over 200), I was forced to drop 9 ICBMs on their largest cities, followed up by the remains of my Panzers and Mech. Infantry, in order to gut their empire. Of course, they sank my entire transport fleet when they overran the port city they were in, so it's going to be about a decade before I can follow up on my nuclear attacks with a final invasion.

Back to your original point though, strategic, and even luxury, resources DO have a serious effect on the game. If you snatch up your opponents resource supply it can cripple them for decades, especially if the other players have embargoes on them so they have no one to buy resources from.