posted June 08, 1999 09:49            

New class of Units: Biological/Chemical Weapons (I didn't find it on the list but I might've missed it)

Early biological weapons need be no more than a diseased corpse catapulted into a besieged city. This was a common ancient tactic to overcome the impenetrable City Walls problem. A diseased unit loses 1/3 or their hit points. Further attacks by early diseases have no effect on the unit, as it becomes resistant.

Later biological weapons are more devestating : 1/2 hit points lost, mobile units lose mobility for a turn, loss of veteran status due to green troops replacing sick ones, more contagious diseases affect 2 or maybe more units, highly contagious diseases affect all units in a 1 square radius.

Spies would have a chance of "planting" a disease. With Rocketry, civs could deliver biological weapons from a long distance.

Users of biological weapons should run a risk of self infection each time the weapons are meant to be used. This class of weapons would carry the same unhappiness penalty in Democracies as nukes. Likewise, the use of these weapons is generally frowned upon in the world community, but to a lesser extent for Fundamentalist civs.

posted June 09, 1999 07:33            

I don't think that they should be able to found cities, but should be able to join existing cities, and add a population point.

I also like the idea of having them accepted by allies, but not to add a population point, obviously. Once they can come back to your civ, they should.

I also don't think they should be too much of a drain on resources. Let's just say that each refugee unit (representing one population point) requires the same food as one population point in a city, and would take it from the nearest city (not crossing borders)

Of course, attacking refugees is an atrocity, in the later game, at least. And whenever it happens, legal or not, it would cause some major hard feelings.

posted June 10, 1999 18:41         

an infantry unit between legions and musketeers let's call it swordsman

a realization that a great many of history's naval battles took place between 1500 and 1850 before the development of ironclads and with more than frigates involved. So Civ III needs at least:

fire galley (soon after triremes) (2-1-2) with ability to sink if ending turn offshore

roman-type ship (3-1-2)

medieval early galleon-type ship like the Great Harry built by HenryVIII with a castle-like structure on the stern (3-2-3)

Man-Of-War (5-3-3)

An U-2 type sub (6-2-2)

Downgrade the battleship somewhat to maybe (10-10-4) and replace it with a dreadnought class ship with the battleship's old statistics

Increase the carrier defense factor by 50% against sea units to reflect its air wing

posted June 10, 1999 20:50            

Before the late 1800s, ships were the fastest means of transportation - the seas were rather connecting than separating people.

posted June 11, 1999 12:47         

Current/Gulf Stream - 1/4 movement point
Shoreline - 1 movement point
Ocean (non-current and not on shoreline) -1/2 movement point

posted June 12, 1999 12:21            

quote:

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The AI would be able to sneak into your territory easier.

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posted June 13, 1999 16:23            

1. IMHO all units should be supported from Gold on a civilization wide basis, as is done in CTP rather than through production shields on a city to city basis.

posted June 15, 1999 04:53            

the modifier would be -2 economy -2 labs

support level

three 4 units create a soldier specialist 6 units to a soldier no penalties for the first solider

two 4 units create a soldier 6 to a soldier

one 3 units create a soldier 5 to a soldier

zero 3 units create a soldier 4 units to a soldier

minus one 2 units create a soldier 3 units to a soldier

minus two 2 unit creates a soldier 2 units to a soldier

minus three 1 unit creates a soldier 2 units to a soldier

minus four 1 unit creates a soldier 2 units to a soldier each soldier specialist has a -3 labs/-3 economy modifier

for example if 2 units create a soldier and there are four units to a soldier, you build one infantry man you don't have any soldiers, on your second infantry man you get a soldier and then you get your second soldier when you have 6 infantry men

naturally when units were disbanded or killed the soldier specialist would turn back into regular workers

if you lost soldier specailist in one city and couldn't create them in another you would have to disband units

posted June 15, 1999 09:45         

Instead of building units, build the weapons and vehicles. These can be put in storage (well, riding and fighting animals are an exception) and later be combined with people (taken from the population, lessening the workforce remaining) to form a unit. The unit can then be put in training in barracks/whatever.

This would mean that unarmed militia could be quickly cobbled together (it just requires people). It also means that in order to maintain a strong industry/economy while waging war, other sources of production have to be considered (slaves/automation/equal job opportunities for both sexes/...).

posted June 15, 1999 10:10            

that suggestion sounds very similar to the style of SM's Colonization. Although I liked the game most people found the micromanagement to much.

Another (unrelated) idea. If their is a trade system similair to CTP with area specfic goods then an interesting unit would be to have a Tapper (I think this is from Imperialism), resource collector, courier de bois (for land) or fishing vessel (for sea)that could sit on a resource and send it back to a city. This would allow one to trade resources that are out of the reach of the city radius and are in places where cities are unattractive (arctic tundra) or currently unreachable (middle of ocean). These trade routes could then be pirated or the unit destroyed by a rival Civ. It would also be historically accurate in that it would model the fur trade in North America and the current fishing fleets of many nations.

posted June 15, 1999 10:57         

A unit design interface (with lots of pre-designed units combined with save and load facilities) which lets you combine, people, animals, vehicles and weapons or special equipment to form named units. Furthermore, letting you combine units (of the same or different type) into larger units (battalions -> brigades -> divisions -> Army Corps -> Armies -> Army groups).
And if combat takes place in a special window, also configuring the formations and battle plans of each grouping.

Then, instead of building all the units that you think are needed for a surprise attack on a nearby enemy, you give the order to your production minister that you want a "panzer armee"/five legions/whatever.

By dividing the different tasks (diplomacy/spying/research/trade/production/military/security/ecology/morale) among ministerial posts, you could hopefully let the computer handle the parts of the game that become tedious or uninteresting.

Of course, to avoid AI stupidity, you will have to give detailed instructions at least one time to each minister.

example:
You have given your diplomacy minister a directive to improve relations with your neighbour.
The minister informs you that your neighbours insist on a special trade relation in which they will buy weapons for food.
The ministers of trade, production and military tries to dissuade you from that course of action, because; you will lose money, your production facilities are already engaged with other orders and it is dangerous to arm your neighbour.
You instruct diplomacy and trade to make the deal anyway, but delay the weapon shipments. Production are ordered to commence the weapon production and turn them over to military who will use them to make an attack army that can crush this insolent neighbour.

[This message has been edited by Ove (edited June 15, 1999).]

posted June 15, 1999 12:37            

While others have suggested civ-wide support for military units, I'm not sure I can think how this would be done besides gold, which might be viable.

I kind of liked Korn469's idea about soldier specialists to support military, but this would have to apply only to modern units--can't be taking your one citizen off the land to support a couple of phalanx units! I'm not sure I agree about the production/science modifiers though. You do lose the use of that citizen to work the land, which is already a penalty--or for big cities, the potential happines/sci/tax benefits of another type of specialist.

Lung is absolutely right about early units supporting themselves off the land and by pillage. Early units could still be NON, I guess. Here's another idea--units should expire. There are times when phalanxes garrison my early cities until very late in the game. This is, ahem, ridiculous. At certain points--maybe major military advances, like gunpowder--you should have the option of upgrading these units for a reduced shield cost, or disbanding them. The upgrading process would automatically turn early NON units into supported units.

Ove, interesting idea on avoiding micromanagement. See my post in the Radical Ideas forum.

posted June 15, 1999 12:42            

No for 2 reasons. The less important is that it isn't realistic. The number of folks doing the actual fighting has always been a small percentage of the total population.

The other is game play. If one player runs into another player's size one city, that city would be force to activate its units. But then, when it took the "citizen" out of the fields, wouldn't the city starve?