Basically, it's that there should be a means to carry troops (infantry only) by an APC-type unit.

The APC would have higher hitpoints/movement points, and you can load people with the "sentry" command like you load people onto sea transports. The slight disadvantage to this would be that any unit carried by the APC (even over railroad) would not be able to move/attack the turn they are dropped off.

The same idea can also apply to air tranports, of which there will be two types: helicopter and cargo plane (eg Hercules). The helicopter transport can travel infinitely until its hitpoints run out as per usual, and the plane is ranged.

Stuff, about your menu movement idea, what do you think of a pop-up menu that appear near units when you release the drag&drop go to cursor?
I mean, moving a unit in SMAC I simply drag it (the pathfinder line in fact) to the target point. When I release the cursor it should simply appear a submenu with detailed movement order like:

. convoy
. move
. attack
. charge

Every choice has pro&cons about movement and fight penalties, at the acceptable cost of an added mouse click.

In a convoy you move quickly but cannot counterattack. If you are a unit defined by workshop with the special attribute of "mechanized" you have better defense (otherwise a "convoy movement" will be considered by truck). You are more exposed to "ambush", too (attack from enemy units you can't see because hidden by terrain or out-of-sight when you order to move).

In a charge you have better attack, but you'll be more vulnerable next turn (just an example).

for special troops (when applicable) we can have more menu voices as

. paratroop (no more need to chose paratroop, then click where to jump)

It's a bit on a tactical side, but its simply enough IMHO, and it reflect quite well modern concept of integrated army.
A better "Stacked units" should fill others part of battle model (as the mix of tanks, artillery and mech.infantry).

Why an APC is inappropriate for other units.
Marines and Alpine Troops are specialists, who don't need them.

The Rifleman unit represents an older type of infantry, the kind that was lightly armed and moved by train (1865-1943) and so an APC would be inappropriate for them.

What you could do is give the existing Mech inf a 'mount/dismount' command which would alter its att/def and movement abilities.

Adding a mount/dismount command would be good for many units, ie artillery and rifleman turns into trains, ect.

This could be achieved by the unit workshop,
or incase we don't have any, by a special unit.

The thing is, in civ2, you always had to drive tanks or any other units to the front line them selves. Usually that's not correct. the tanks are brought in by rail / ship / planes or big trucks.

We need to have these trucks. A truck should have a def. value which is lesser than the tank value, because it's just a truck, and the tank is not in operative conditions.

You would spend one movement point getting on the truck, and one movement point getting off. That, and the fact that the truck would have a medium def. value would keep you from driving the truck straight to the front in one turn. But it would sure make the use of artillery or slow but hard infantry more efficient.

The thing is, in my attacks I need infantry to hold and fortify positions because most good attack units have many move points and high att. value but a low def. value. But i don't use infantry bevcause it would take ages with a movment rate of 1. If i could bring them quickly to ares where I have no time to build permanent transportation solutions like railroad, I would use them and I would be more succsessfull.

We have to understand the difference between this convoy truck and APC. APC's are not always very fast. Their objective is usually to provide higher def. value so the troopers won't be hurt on the way to their target.
That is what is represented by the Mech Inf. unit we have.

The truck however will never be found in battle fronts. It used for back up. I'm sure all of you are familiar with the situations when your first attack force is already weak and half dead, and most of it is used to fortify (unsucsessfully) the areas we have just conquered. And then you have to spend 20 turns just to bring your newer attack force to the battle. That never happens in real life. Because then, the force we are attacking would counter attack us. So we would constantly fight over the same 4 cities. We should have fast moving convoy trucks that will bring fresh troops to the backside of the battle front.

We should also have trucks for all terrain. They would be big and heavy, and will have a small quantity of movement points, but they would be able to move over all terrain. This can be implement already in civ2 by having a unit with 2 movement points, and it would treat all squares as road. And it could carry three units of any kind.

So i'm suggestig two units:

Convoy Truck
=============
attack: 0
defence: 2 to 3
movement: 8 to 10
hit points: 2.5 (x10)
firepower: 1
carry: 5 to 8

All Terrain Truck
=================
attack: 0
defence: 2 to 3
movement: 4-6 on all terrain (or 2 + treat all squares like road)
hit points: 4 (x10) (It's heavier and suited for all conditions)
firepower: 1
carry: 3 to 5

quote: Originally posted by Sirotnikov on 08-02-2000 09:47 AM I think that what we want is really a convoy truck. Something like the transport ship only on land.

I think that there is far too much units in civ2 as it is. I propose we simplify as much as possible. Moving around a bunch of units can be entertaining in early game but ones you have built more than 40 cities it's a pain in the ass keeping track of all units and what you where supposed to do with them.
- First of all, I propose units defend multiple squares.
- Have transporting units as an command option and not as an enterily different unit
- Trade routes as routes and not camels
- ferry routes at sea