One of the big problems with 'organic' roads is it really only works over really short distances - you can't make a massive kingdom-spanning 'highway' style road.. not all cities are going to be right next to each other, i'd think.

Magic.

Seriously, a spell or spell-like ability that is researched like any spell, but would cost gold instead of mana or whatever to cast. Make it generate a few miles of road per turn(perhaps modified by how much gold you spend on it). Maybe a few types of roads, for instance: paved highways and underground low-ways.

But then I have to spend all game micro'ng my units to run back and forth to ensure my roads grow where I want them too.

The extremes are either you make roads independant of the players control (ie they grow organically between cities to represent trade) and thus as a gameplay mechanic roads become an abstract experience, or you make roads totally under the players control. If roads have a big effect on gameplay then the player will want total control (to be able to maximise their potential through the players control), if roads don't have much effect the organic is better (as there is no user input to make the game look nice with pretty roads criss-crossing the map).

As roads will have gameplay effect then the player will want control, because when the player doesn't have control but wants it they will feel the game is silly (ie why can't my thousands of troops build a road?). I think click and drag is easiest but how to confer the cost? Something must expend energy (either a unit spending time to build, a cities production spent building or gold deducted) or the player will just throw up roads willy-nilly.

A units time, magicians magic points, civilizations money or cities production. Where will the cost come from? I say let me choose, give me options.

I have not read all above, so maybe this was already mentioned.

For me there are mainly two types of roads:

- standard roads

- military infrastructure

For the standard roads I would like the concept that your caravans create those roads...

So first the move through complete wilderness (with according risks), after some movements back and forth a dirt track starts to appear. Depending on the amount of trafic the road of the quality increases slowly.

Beside this there needs to be a way to establish Highways for fast military movement.

For those I would say that we could have some military builder unit, which can build such roads between cities, build bridges, built fortresses, remove forrest,

so which can do all the non magical terrain changes.

Another +1 for organic roads

But... I think you still need the ability to build roads as well. It may be you'll want a decent road infrastructure between your military centres that wouldn't necessarily appear with an organic system. Really you want the organic system to take care of the dull micromanagement road building but also have a mechanism on top of that for a fully player controlled road build.

Basically this.

But I don't believe the manual road building should be limited to military use. You may want to force a particular trade road or some such to be higher quality than would occur naturally, but it has to come at a high cost.

So far the organic roads are indeed nice. I do not like the idea of having carts create roads by itself though. I would at least like the option of creating roads and putting an effort into it. Roads auto-upgrading seems a bit stupid to me, it should require a concious effort and an investement rather then it just magically appearing.

Getting options for better roads by technology, by magical spells and build by soldiers - after getting the right technology maybe - all sounds good to me.

They should upgrade automatically to a point, and after that it would require some kind of intervention/payment from the player. (ha-micropayments for roads! but I digress) Its perfectly reasonable to assume a single dirt track would improve do a decent compacted dirt wagonway by use alone, but anything further, such as drainage or a hard wearing surface needs to be actually planned and built.

My view is that this should be mixed. Historically road building was a mixture of state action (for example, the Roman Empire built roads like no tomorrow) a very small amount of private action and the organic development of 'tracks' between trade settlements.

So my view is that an empire should allocate some money to 'public works' and then use that to build stuff outside cities. Not just roads, but other stuff like wells, bridges, aquaducts, viaducts etc.

There seems to have lots of roads ideas,

My suggestion as road as trade relationship.

I like the idea of organic road, and further link that to cities relatioship

If City A trade with City B, a road will be create upon the open trade route.

After X years, of trading, the road become bigger and can be upgraded with tech / magic

If City A cancel the trade with city B after it is been captured by a hostice faction,

the road slowly downgrade back to a simple one.

Sounds good to me..

See this thread: https://forums.elementalgame.com/370742

In the game 'Merchant Prince' you could build roads just by clicking a road tool on a square. It just required funding, which you could get from being appointed to the 'road builder' position in the government, or you could use your own funds. It was very simple and gave the player complete control over the exact route.

  I think we need to have multiple options for road building.  If this game is gonna be replayable: add infintum, then we should have a checkbox or multi choice at start of a game.  It should help modders as well. 

a)  Organic roads-roads built by units that don't need to be controlled.  they have trading caravan's, guards, inns along way, meet fellow travels or pilgrims on road, occassional bandits, borderland keep, towers

  Roads that require players to manage their own road building(I think this is important to keep in for those who go for complete control of how and where roads are built as well as when)  I like the suggestion of an engineer unit being used for this purpose.  Engineering units should be able to build roads, buildings, fenced off areas for farming or defense, bridges, mines, castles, etc. 

c)  Build roads by waypoints as suggested above by mrakomo.

d)  Roads are "pre-existing" and not part of map control by players.  Each map generates a different road network upon start.  Have a history or lore attached.

e)  Roads that are not meant for humans.  "Dwarves, dark elves, goblins " might have tunnel networks.  Intelligent spider civilization might have cobwebbed "tunnels roads" in trees or rocks.  Leprauchans using the "Rainbow road".  etc.

  I like the suggestions that roads have multiple tiers or levels of building with attendant bonuses.  Game trail, dirt trail, compacted dirt gravel early road, cobblestone road, flagstone road, bricked and mortared road.  These all get you "there" faster than NO road.  It would also be nice to enchant or cast spells onto our roads like MoM's Enchant Road spell or cast a protection spell so that golems appear to dispatch bandits or other invaders into my realm.  Generally, just want to have options on casting spells on road systems.

  One last thing about roads.  They are used for transport and trade.  Rivers are also.  I would like to see barges, rafts, docks, etc along "some" river routes.  Rivers should be large commerce hubs or at least have a presence in some territories and/or geographic features.