Nuking your enemy!

[private-ryan]

I unleashed a nuclear torrent on my computer opponents, raining nukes down on their cities large and small.

I was very disappointed to see that my didnt destory any of their units fortified in the cities or reduce the population by any significant amount.

So what is the point of using this "super-weapon?"


PS. I dont think the computer civ had built bomb-shelters.

[Proteus_MST]

According to the manual every unit within the target tile (and the tiles directly adjacent) has a certain chance to get destroyed (i.e. there is an initial RNG-Roll for each unit if it survives or gets destroyed).
If it survives it can be damaged (probably an attack is made with the strength of the ICBM against the strength of the unit) or even survive unharmed.

So IMHO the big question is, how high the probability is that a unit is destryoed by an ICBM (maybe even every unit/-type has a different probability to get destroyed by the attack).
But one thing is for sure, it probably doesn´t work anymore to nuke the enemy and then use a few single tanks to conquer all enemy cities

[Blake]

Use pairs of nukes, this seems to be pratically guaranteed to obliterate all units in the city.

[lawofqr]

Originally posted by Blake
Use pairs of nukes, this seems to be pratically guaranteed to obliterate all units in the city.

Kind of like the nukes in Starcraft, where two simultaneous nukes can destroy any building.

[James M]

Yeah, use 2-3 nukes on the same turn and you should clear the way pretty effectively. Kinda wasteful mind you...

[BaneBlade81]

First post, so "HI" to you!
I was heavily dissapointed at Nukes when i first used them, but i realised that came from SDI/shelters. Next MP game i did i planned/executed a Nukerush that won me the game(was 3800 to 3100 back if i recall right, enemy on other continent with big lead in spacerace). Got Communism, built Kremlin(-50% hurry production cost), Scotland and 4 spies, inserted them. Built Manhattanproject, in the 13 turns i had to build them dropped science to 10%, Manhattan finished and in the same turn i bought 6 ICBMs, and i think an average of 2-3 per turn for the next 20 turns or so. One nuke against a city/stack without shelters is mostly enough, wipe the rest with Armor/Mech. I indeed conquered all of his cities with 4 MechInfantry!
Edit: I play Universalsuffrage in the endgame, sure u noticed the need for that. Other thing i forgot to say, this is surely a high-risk-strategy, him getting SDI(far to strong gamewise imho and truly far fromreality) would have wasted the whole effort. If he expects it he could possibly simply buyrush shelters in one turn, but for that he must have observed ur techpath closely, got universalsuffrage and a big bankaccount.

[Datajack Franit]

psst! instead of bombing a city 3 times in a row, combine a group of 3 ICBMs and send them as a group- the explosion, as long as the effect, is combined

[Mujadaddy]

Originally posted by Datajack Franit
psst! instead of bombing a city 3 times in a row, combine a group of 3 ICBMs and send them as a group- the explosion, as long as the effect, is combined

I did this, but by the time I'd built 3 nukes in the first place, the AI had rushed SDI