Keep infinite railroad movement?

[Guardian]

Only if you choose to look at it that way, I say.

I prefer to think of the rail network as a key strategic asset and expanding it into new areas as a key strategic objective.

[Xorbon]

My favourite idea is to have a cost for railroad usage. This could work by costing 1 gold to move a unit 'X' tiles (where 'X' increases with technology) by rail. Movement by rail would still be unlimited (unless you run out of money). I would also allow the first 10 or so gold used for rail transport to be 'free' so that minor redeployments wouldn't cost anything. Also, moving workers (and certain other units) could cost nothing.

[alva]

Again, that would only increase the level of MM seeing as you would start checking which unit is nearest to the desired destination.

[Xorbon]

Originally posted by alva
Again, that would only increase the level of MM seeing as you would start checking which unit is nearest to the desired destination.

Maybe. But I don't think micro-management would be too bad if the cost was 1 gold per 10 or 12 tiles. That would make fairly large concentric 'circles' where the movement costs would be the same within each circle. On the other hand, if the cost was 1 gold per 3 or 4 tiles then, yes, you would have to spend time checking different units.

[Shogun Gunner]

I voted for no free movement -- each tile should cost something to traverse. Nothing is free.

I also voted for some utilization limit. I recognize this may be difficult to implement in a manner which would not negatively affect gameplay, but it would make things more realistic. Imagine your decision point when facing a threat on a front. What's the condition of the railroad? the capacity? Has the enemy bombed this rail link? Have paratroopers blocked the rail? Which units do I move first?

Many more variants available with this feature. I hope some form of it makes it in.

[GePap]

Railroads should be super-roads, giving a unit the ability to move a certainy a number of times, with the limit based on world size a turn on the system, regardless of the movement of the unit (cause movement is based on the locomotives). you shoud also be unable to build railroads outside of someones territory (yours or that of someone with a RR) in order to stop RR blitz.

[lajzar]

Under my rail roads model, rails become city improvements instead of tile improvements. Actuial connections are assumed to exist between any pair of cities that has a road or better contact. Any unit that starts its turn in a city with a "rail depot" city improvement can pay a small fee to use the rail, and go to any other city that is connected (by road/highway) and has a rail depot.

[Xorbon]

Originally posted by GePap
you shoud also be unable to build railroads outside of someones territory (yours or that of someone with a RR) in order to stop RR blitz.

The problem with that is it would be very difficult to connect the cities of a fragmented/divided empire. An example is newly captured territory where the cultural borders haven't had a chance to fill-in yet.

[Straybow]

Trying to model "realism" into the RR system makes it suck. Managing a RR is an incredibly complex and tedious task and should be left to a RR managing game.

In Civ3 the inability to use RR in opponents' territories is also bogus. The only time this happens is when the opponent uses a scorched-earth defense, and the effect should be modeled as auto-pillage of tiles when a defending unit retreats or is destroyed (as hypothetical surviving subunits retreat).

A well-designed supply (not unit support) model would enable limitations on rail usage outside home territories automatically.

[Addled Platypus]

why not pay for maintenance, we do for a lot of other items in civ3

more use = more maintenance ?

If you want no one to use your rail road, maybe a que to select a different gauge? (maybe 5 to choose from).
Wouldn't that be a suprise !

[Old n Slow]

Two thoughts for more equality:

1) After the road measure of spaces, the unit in quetions would be unable to execute its activity -- combat, engineering function, etc. So unlimited movement still exists, but does come with a sacrifice. Thus by accepting the strategic gain, one pay a tactical cost.

2) Allow aircraft to "use" the rails -- again with a tactical cost as noted above.

[joncnunn]

In addition, remove production bonsuses associated with Rails so there is no incentive to liter the empire with rails.

[Elok]

Maintenance costs sounds like a good idea, but then there's the question of who pays for maintenance-whoever has the nearest city, or what? I voted for it anyway, though I suppose use costs might be a bit more realistic. But use costs would do nothing to stop that godawful sprawl.

I'm inclined to support lazjar's idea, except possibly for the usage fee bit. Railroads as a forerunner of airports makes sense, and a "limit on use" would be easy to implement in that case, by giving each city a railroad use limit per turn. But that might cause a hassle trying to remember which city has used its RR already on a given turn, so perhaps a money-for use model would be in order, though the transport fee might be scaled somewhat to the value of the unit. The only thing it doesn't simulate is the risk of interception, and that can be compensated for by the same means as aerial intercepts in Civ2. Getting flight and radio could allow true "airlifts," which would be somewhat less expensive due to the flexibility of air travel as well as avoiding interception by non-AA units. If you want to be able to get off at a point other than a city, build a fortress/base there, or whatever. I don't know if there were similar things in Civ3, since I gave up trying to play it pretty early. Yawn.

Ideally, I think Civ's limitations should be based to some degree on the limitations of the real world. We do sort of cover everything with railroads IRL, don't we?

[The Templar]

Keep RR movement infinite, and instead fix naval movement. I recommend something like what was done with the air units in civ 3 - operations all take place on the same turn within a specified range.

Actually, why not do this with land units as well and just allow rails and roads to increase the operational range of land unit. Yeah! That's the ticket.

[Elok]

Uh, because land units don't move at the speed of sound, and are bound by the limitations of terrain. Or were you joking? I, for one, don't want musketeers hovering around the map in a state of quantum uncertainty or whatever. That only makes sense for air units.