1.30A.044 | Civ Capital "hot potato" effect is not good

I noticed a change recently where if you capture the capital colony of an AI civ, the Civilization Capital improvement becomes an Initial Colony improvement after you make the capture. Another colony of that AI (it seems almost random) then becomes their new capital. If you are on a rampage to capture every last planet, the LAST colony you capture remains a Civilization Capital after you take it (and remove that AI race from the game).

I don't really like this new logic. I DO like the fact that you don't see captured Civ Capital improvement all over the place, as that became rediculous if you captured the AI's planet in the right order (always capturing the new capital next).

I'm proposing a couple changes:
- If you capture an AI capital, the planet will have a Former Alien Capital improvement on it, which has bonuses that are somewhere between Initial Colony and Civilization Capital.
- If a race (yours included) loses their capital, they have actually build a new one! No more getting a free capital as a reward for not properly defending the old one. Make it expensive too. Perhaps around the same production cost as an Industrial Sector.
- If a race (yours included) is currently without a capital, there should be some negative modifiers until they rebuild it.
- Even if you capture the last planet of an AI civilization you don't get to keep their Civilization Capital. It becomes a Former Alien Capital also.

Just imagine if Washington D.C. was destroyed somehow. You would lose your seat of government (the important symbolism and the physical buildings), as well as all the high level bureaucratic offices and infrastructure. There would be no choice but to build all that ASAP, and it wouldn't be cheap! If you wait, the rest of the nation would be without proper leadership. I'd like to see something similar modeled in the game.
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Reply #1 Top
On a related note, I've always found it funny that the AI always seems to pick any crappy little planet as their next capital. You'd think the class-19 economic paradise would be a better choice than a barren class-6, but evidently not in the AI's eyes.
Reply #2 Top
On a related note, I've always found it funny that the AI always seems to pick any crappy little planet as their next capital. You'd think the class-19 economic paradise would be a better choice than a barren class-6, but evidently not in the AI's eyes.


I have always seen the same thing. That's why I guessed that it was random.
Reply #3 Top
Ah. Now thats how i got that class 3 planet with 12b pop. Uterly unhappy all the time
Reply #4 Top
The first jump is to a crap planet in the same system. I found this when trying to beat down the Drath and the Iconians one game. The jump after their system was to a decent world nearby, but they'll always try to stay in their home system if there's a world available.

I managed to bypass this in my current war with the Drengin, and took Kona before Drengi. They did the jump to a class 15 planet still controlled by the Drengin pretty close by, BUT in my region of influence.

Fun and hijinks ensued.
Reply #5 Top
===On a related note, I've always found it funny that the AI always seems to pick any crappy little planet as their next capital. You'd think the class-19 economic paradise would be a better choice than a barren class-6, but evidently not in the AI's eyes.===




+1
Reply #6 Top
Just imagine if Washington D.C. was destroyed somehow. You would lose your seat of government (the important symbolism and the physical buildings), as well as all the high level bureaucratic offices and infrastructure. There would be no choice but to build all that ASAP, and it wouldn't be cheap! If you wait, the rest of the nation would be without proper leadership. I'd like to see something similar modeled in the game.


I think the Bush Administration has proven that we'd be better off without a central government. States rights and decentralization, brother. Strong central governments breed tyranny.

I don't want to see the homeworld aspect made into something that matters. Let the homeworld jump to wherever it needs to go.