why does the new rare resource icon looks like ice cubes

The way things are going, water will soon be a rare material lol
But I don't think thats what you meant hehe

That rare material still looks strange and now it's bigger than the rest. Good job

perhaps you should make the rare resources more dark so it makes it look “rare”

LOL they keep making it look like some kind of gem, like it's a fantasy game with magic crystals.

It is not an ice cube. It was changed because alot of players complained about the gem-like appearance of the previous rare materials icon. We also asked a bunch of veteran players that agreed that the new icon is better, so we changed it to that one.
It will be sized down a bit in a future update.
It was exactly the reason why we changed the previous icon to the one we released now, because the previous one looked like from a fantasy game. At least that's what a lot of players were saying, so we listened and changed it :).


But I feel like this is a neverending circle. If we changed it again now, we would have the exact same discussion next time, with players getting confused why the icon changed. So I think we will just keep the new one now.

The reference for the new icon is Uraninite btw, which develops cubic crystals in various color variations (example picture attached).
We just simplified it a bit and made it a bit brighter and went with a blue-ish variation to make it distinguishable from other icons, with good visibility in the interface and on the map.


(picture from Wikipedia)

Agreed. The underlying problem is that "rares" don't make sense in the game.

They used to make sense because they were used to for two essential things:
1. Research.
2. Building industrial centers.

Both of those uses went away, but we're still stuck with this resource.

Research now uses regular resources (oil, metal, goods, food) and industrial centers can be built anywhere much more cheaply. Building up a city from rubble back to an industrial base used to be terribly expensive, and something RARELY worth doing. Now you can rebuild Stalingrad in a day.

So the only way to solve the problem is to get rid of the "rare" resource which is no longer special or rare. The game would be better off with 4 resources, and we'll never have to argue about "gems" or "ice cubes" again.

I don't see a problem tbh. I think most players are satisfied with the current balancing in CoW. Doing what you suggested would be a major balancing overhaul again. That is too much to discuss in a news thread, but feel free to open a new thread in the Suggestions forum.

That's one way to look at it.

Another way is that the overhaul was incomplete. The behavior of industry and research changed dramatically, but the "rare materials" remained as a vestigial reminder of the old industry and research. There was no reason to leave it in the game, or re-balance the game to include "rare materials". Why not finish the job?

My understanding was that "rare materials" was just to encompass all the stuff outside of food, oil, goods, and steel. Rubber and nuclear material and whatnot. It also helps balance things (like 5 cities per country and 5 different resource types), and I think the current balance works well.

I got used to the old new icon but I think this one is probably better and I'm sure we'll all get used to it. My only feedback is to shrink it a bit (which you said is already planned). You may have to increase the contrast a bit if it's smaller but I'm sure it will be fine.

What are Goods except a grab bag of Stuff that is not metal, oil, or food?

But yeah, I get your point about 5 starting cities. I guess they could have made very imbalanced economies with 2 of 5 cities making the same resource... or there could be 4 starting cities.

I would vote for 4 cities. There's also no need for the Special science tree. There could be 4 science trees, each using mostly 1 type of resource, coming from 1 of 4 starting cities.

Is your problem with it only in name, that's it's called "rare" when it's not? or you just hate it in its entirety?

I hate the fact that it's a leftover from the old 1.0 resource system in which rares had a specific role.
There were units in the tech tree that used rares, specifically things like commandos and nuclear missiles and subs.
At the same time, all research required rares, as did the building of industrial centers.
That created an interesting question for your strategy:
- Should I research better tanks?
- Or should I build a commando for a surprise stealth invasion?
- Or should I just build an additional industrial center, so I can later build mechanized units faster?
This was a really cool strategic element that made every game feel more different, and it's now gone.
And it was built around a resource that had a RARE and SPECIAL impact on your game strategy.

Now fast forward to 2.0
We still have the Rare resource.
We still have a Special research tree.
But it all feels clunky and unnecessary, because the specialness is gone... what's left is a mess.
Why does a Rocket Artillery live in a separate tree from (cannon) Artillery?
Why does one use food+rares, and one use goods+food+metal?
So rockets are special..... ok, so what about the Railroad gun, that's just a (bigass) cannon.
It's a mess, I hate it.
And I really, really hate that it reminds me of a better strategy game that was CoW 1.0

New rare materials icon is a certified Breaking Bad moment

Yea I feel that the secret tree is unnecessary too, only nukes should be in there. Rocket fighters and nuke bombers should just be put under the air tree and rartys and rrgs in ordnance.

I think the problem with rares is that they're really only used in planes and that's it. Compared to other resources, they're very one dimensional. Balancing them to be required in the production of other units apart from planes could solve the problem. Ships for example should require rares not food.

You see? This is what I'm saying? It's an incomplete change. It's left a hole in the game.

Certainly, it is also a reasonable idea that make icons from various uranium ores.
But I think it might be inwelcom to distinguish "uranium before processing" between other minerals like rare metals.
How about your to use the semi-fnished production, yellow cake as a model?
Sulfide and Silicate minerals also are often yellow, but I think them to be preferable than to select blue or black.

Not only in planes, also in secret units. Rocket Artillery, Rockets, Nukes etc all need mainly rare materials.