Unorthodox Units

[valmont]

Is there any way I can make a ground unit that can "run out of fuel" the way an airplane does? (is destroyed if not in city/airbase at end of x turns).

Failing that, can I make a ground unit that loses hit points every turn it stays outside a city like a helicopter?

Failing that, is there any way I can make a helicopter crash when it runs out of hit points?

[techumseh]

No, no, and no. Sorry. There's a tip on Scenario League site about mixing unit abilities. It'll tell you pretty much what is and isn't possible.

[Harry Tuttle]

Tech's right on all accounts. What kind of unit are you trying to make. I'm sure something can be worked out. Remember, there is a "can attack air" option for civ2 units.

[valmont]

Heh, well I figured that if it were possible then I'd have seen it in someone's scenario by now, but one can always hope....

To learn the basics of scenario design, I'm making a very small, simple, silly mini-scenario. It's called "Happy Hour". There is no research, diplomacy or trade. The player's Civ only has one movable unit, a car. The only goal is to get the car from one corner of the map (your place of employment) to the other (your favorite micro-brewery) in 60 turns.

The road winds a bit, but following it is faster than heading straight for the goal since you get the movement multiplier, and the rest of the terrain is slow-moving, jungles and swamps. Plus you want to avoid the rampaging zombies and dinosaurs.

To make things a bit more interesting I thought it would be fun if the car had to stop for fuel periodically, and the fueling stations would be placed so you have to go a little bit out of your way.

So I have to decide whether to keep the car a ground unit that gets the road movement bonus but doesn't need to stop for fuel, or to make it an air unit that doesn't get the road multiplier (in fact, isn't obliged to follow the road at all), but does have to worry about refueling. A problem with air units is not being able to capture cities, and capturing the city ("entering the brewery") would be the event that wins the scenario.

If an air unit can be made to carry a ground unit, then when you get to the bar you could wake up your "office drone" unit and take the city that way.

A helicopter has the ability to capture a city, but like a ground unit doesn't need to re-fuel, and unlike a ground unit doesn't benefit from roads. The appeal of helicopter is the loss of hit points, and maybe if there are enough rampaging zombies and dinosaurs it would be worth stopping at an airbase everty few turns.

So that's my dilemma. I doubt I'll encounter many problems like this in the Medici scenario, but I'm sure to in the one I want to do after that.

[Broken_Erika]

You mean like tanks running out of gas?

[Boco]

Here's an impractical idea, but maybe it'll trigger a better one from someone else. Home the car to a city that'll be eliminated in x turns. To survive, the car must rehome before then. Use cities as "Gas Stations" (oops! Petrol stations? Filling stations? Paycheck-sucking stations?). Place them a little off the optimum route so there's some tension in the decision about when and where to stop for gas (i.e. rehome).

The road winds a bit, but following it is faster than heading straight for the goal since you get the movement multiplier, and the rest of the terrain is slow-moving, jungles and swamps. Plus you want to avoid the rampaging zombies and dinosaurs.

That's a helluva commute. Must be good beer.

[Mercator]

How about having all sorts of "obstacles" on the road between those gas stations (well, you already said you did, with those zombies and dinosaurs). Or maybe you can even add "potholes" or game crossing the road, invisible units with a tiny attack.

Give the car plenty of defense strength and hit points to comfortably survive each attack, but little enough so that it will have problems getting all the way alive.

Then make those "gas stations" allied cities. That way your car can gain hit points again by "stopping by".

It's like what FavouredFlight did in his Fellowship of the Ring scenario with the Athelas.

Edit: oh, and another thing that might be used... When a unit captures an enemy city, he'll gain back his full strength. You could use that idea for some extra beneficial gas stations (say, a truck stop with a motel and repair shop ).

Those enemy gas stations would have to be of a civ unable to build any units and allied to all the other "nature" civs to make sure they will remain empty.

Naturally, those should probably be way off the main road, so the player has the dilemma of going for full recovery with a detour, or a more dangerous trip without the detour.

[Harry Tuttle]

I would just make the car unit a ground unit and provide enough zombies and dinosaurs to make it worthwhile to stop for a "tuneup" or some "bodywork" on the way. The running out of gas idea is great, but I can only see this working if you made the "car" was an air unit or a helicopter unit or a trireme sea unit. Problem is that then terrain becomes moot.

[Broken_Erika]

unless you make the car an trieme unit and the water as pavement,

[Mercator]

Apart from the zombies and dinosaurs... I've thought about the obstacles I mentioned in my last post a bit more.

You could have things like road blocks, potholes and construction works or something. They'd all simply be weak enemy units that block the road.

The player can drive around them, but that will require going off-road a bit and that's especially costly if those obstacles have a ZOC.

The alternative is to "crash" through them (i.e. kill them and continue on the road). That will also slow you down, but not as much. It costs you some hit points though, so that will require you to stop at gas stations to replenish the HP.

The trick then is to make sure that there are so many obstacles that the player can't reach the end in time if he drives around all the obstacles.

[Harry Tuttle]

Originally posted by Broken_Erika
unless you make the car an trieme unit and the water as pavement,

Well yeah, like I said, but still you can only deal with the ocean terrain.

[Broken_Erika]

true, but it might keep the player from cutting across the map
but it would be difficult to design the ocean terrain layout

[techumseh]

Just use impassible terrain. Oh, wait....

[valmont]

Thanks for the ideas, everyone! This stuff is gold. You guys rock!

That's a helluva commute. Must be good beer.

Heh, did I mention there is a semi-autobiographical basis for the scenario? There's a minute suburb of Kansas City named Parkville. Someone built a micro-brewery there, in the building that once housed the electric works, and called it The Power Plant. It's always packed between 5 and 7.

Mercator, love the contstruction site and repair shop ideas, will definitely use!

For the morbidly curious, I've attached the map along with the terrain files and unit file. The new terrain include asphalt, concrete, dirt, and cornfields, and river has been replaced with a 2-lane highway.

[valmont]

Would this work?

To give the player an added incentive to visit those out-of-the-way auto shops:

Suppose I put Leo's Workshop in the player's city. Then sometimes when the car captures an auto shop, an event goes off granting a tech that will "upgrade" the car to something with more movement, higher defense, etc.

The player would then see a text message with something like "The mechanic installed new spark plugs!"

I can't think of any reason this wouldn't work, but in my own games I rarely build Leo's so I may be overlooking something about the way it upgrades.