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I was noticing in my latest game how little visibility and intelligence play a role in Civ3 combat, which got me thinking about why that is and what could be changed for Civ4.
Visibility:
With the current ratio of visibility/movement rate, even a 1 move warrior can move to the edge of its visibility in one turn. Which is to say that if an enemy is 1 tile beyond your visibility, after 1 move, suddenly you're right next to him, and on the next turn he can attack. This serves to make tactical decisions somewhat arbitrary in the ancient age.
I propose that the minimum visibility for any unit should be 2 tiles instead of 1 on the plains, grassland, tundra, marsh, etc.
Forrests, jungles should provide less visibility. A unit in a forrest tile bordering grasslands should be able to see its full visibility distance across the grasslands, but a unit on grasslands should only be able to see a unit in forrests if they are 1 tile away.
Intelligence As it stands now, in C3C, intelligence and visibility are essentially the same. As soon as you can see an enemy stack, you can right click on it and tell the exact strenght of the opposing force.
I would like to see varied levels of intelligence. At its lowest level, a stack at the edge of your vision appears as a single unit of any random unit in the stack. Essentially all you know is that some of the enemy is there.
A second level of intelligence is when you are right next to the stack. Then you get a rough break down of the units and total power. Maybe a right click brings up the Military advisor who says something like, "Our best intelligence indicates they have 15 units, including catapults, swordsmen and spearmen."
IF you have a "Scout" type unit, it gets that second level of intelligence even at the limit of its vision. If the scout moves next to the enemy stack, it gets the type of intelligence we have now, where a right click tells you exactly how many units and what kind are in the stack.
Visibility:
With the current ratio of visibility/movement rate, even a 1 move warrior can move to the edge of its visibility in one turn. Which is to say that if an enemy is 1 tile beyond your visibility, after 1 move, suddenly you're right next to him, and on the next turn he can attack. This serves to make tactical decisions somewhat arbitrary in the ancient age.
I propose that the minimum visibility for any unit should be 2 tiles instead of 1 on the plains, grassland, tundra, marsh, etc.
Forrests, jungles should provide less visibility. A unit in a forrest tile bordering grasslands should be able to see its full visibility distance across the grasslands, but a unit on grasslands should only be able to see a unit in forrests if they are 1 tile away.
Intelligence As it stands now, in C3C, intelligence and visibility are essentially the same. As soon as you can see an enemy stack, you can right click on it and tell the exact strenght of the opposing force.
I would like to see varied levels of intelligence. At its lowest level, a stack at the edge of your vision appears as a single unit of any random unit in the stack. Essentially all you know is that some of the enemy is there.
A second level of intelligence is when you are right next to the stack. Then you get a rough break down of the units and total power. Maybe a right click brings up the Military advisor who says something like, "Our best intelligence indicates they have 15 units, including catapults, swordsmen and spearmen."
IF you have a "Scout" type unit, it gets that second level of intelligence even at the limit of its vision. If the scout moves next to the enemy stack, it gets the type of intelligence we have now, where a right click tells you exactly how many units and what kind are in the stack.
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