"Si vis pacem, para bellum" scenario under construction

[Gagliaudo]

@Kashanka: IIRC, Vawrnos, Leonidas, the same Fairline (and me ) could help in units/cities greek names.

@Boco: this proselytizing isn't correct
but... nice links

[Heresson]

ToT is available in Poland, there's a Polish language version. I've bought it twice, after all...

[KASHANKA]

It is? Where can I get it?
I buy most of the games from the local Empic store.
(I live in Warsaw)

[Boco]

Originally posted by Gagliaudo
@Boco: this proselytizing isn't correct
but... nice links

eretico!
but thanks

Seriously, this is a great subject for any version.

[KASHANKA]

My light infantry idea:

I've been thinking, how many players actually use light infantry in situations other than "I need a unit imideatly, but I don't have cash for the Heavy Phalanx so this Peltast will have to do for now"?

When I play scenarios like "Imperium Romanum" as for example Macedon, I buy Phalanx to defend and Hypaspistes or Heitaroi to defend. I almost never buy Peltasts, archers or any skrimishers. The game engine just doesn't make light infantry that usefull to have around.

Historically light infantry and skrimishers played a very important role in ancient warfare. They were used in the initial phase of every battle to find weak spots in ennemy lines or to cover the wings of heavy infantry. When the army was on the move the light infantrymen were ofthen sent on patrols, used to secure the camp area and supplying the army with fresh water. They also played a key role in sieges.
Overall light infantry was an integral part of any ancient army.

Therefore to make Light infantry a unit worth buying in Civ2 I have decided to give all such units (as well as archers, slinger and other skrimishers) several special abilities:
- 2 space visibility (patroling was one of their main tasks)
- Alpine movement
- Ignore city walls (This is the most controversial, but I think fair ability. Sieges are very different to open field battles. In sieges even Heavy infantry lost many of its best assets, not to mention the Phalanx or cavalry. In comparison Light infantry or archers with lighter equipement and projectile weapons proved much more effective)

I'll hvae to do some tests to check how this works ingame, but I hope to make light infantry a much more respected unit.

[Exile]

Not a bad idea at all. I like the ignore-city-walls but think you'll find that the alpine movement is unecessary. A movement factor of more than 1 seems advisable instead.

[Gagliaudo]

[errorlease delete this post]

[Gagliaudo]

Originally posted by Boco
eretico!
but thanks
Seriously, this is a great subject for any version.

Indeed... maybe you'll be able to think about the Tot version (btw I have it,but never played - I've neither time to play MGE... )

@Kashanka: totally agree, I always dislike when units seem unuseful, cause I think the creator made a selection, and it would be nice use the largest variety of them...
The difficult is to set their values. Keep on!

[Boco]

Kashanka those are excellent ideas, but I'll play devil's advocate against 'ignores city walls'. Here's the model:

• Give the Howitzer flag only to siege artillery and perhaps leaders.
• Give light troops high mobility and recce value as you indicated. These are already great benefits
• Make the Macedonian elite costly and geographically restrict the cities from which they can be obtained (either explicitly or economically).
• There should be a strong need for light troops and medium infantry (peltasts and their successors) to provide troops of last resort. Kinda like needing units, but lacking prestige in PacGen.
• Light troops in good terrain should have a fighting chance defending against the phalanx. This would reflect the difficulty in maintaining a phalanx in order. It'd also allow the player to deploy them aggressively in broken terrain at choke points and in enemy city radii.

If during testing, you find it viable to field heavy infantry only, then tweak the scen to punish the fielding of small armies

• Increase the need for having many units to enforce martial law,
• Create barbs in/near any empty city,
• Give a specific 'Rebel' unit the para flag, so that the AI will attack a weakly guarded city.
• Use more terrain that highlights the advantages of mobile light infantry,
• Make phalanxes and the like even more expensive,
• Ignore all this and design the scen that way you think will work best.

From one of the Ueda links I gave earlier:

Because the Macedonians were the most proficient part of each Successor's army army, and also the hardest to replace, the Diadochoi had an incentive to use them sparingly....They had to harbour their Macedonians for use in the pitched battles that ultimately decided all their fates.

This argument focuses mostly on Macedonian heavy infantry used by your Hellenistic civs. The Roman Legion is another matter.

Here's the $64k question: should phalanxes be primarily offensive or defensive units? I'd lean toward offensive. Otherwise players will just use them as garrisons, not the units to decide field battles. Pike flag would be useful here, if light troops and/or cavalry fit the 2mf/1hp rule.

[Boco]

Some gaming links with a little info:

http://rtw.heavengames.com/rtw/info/units/

http://slitherine.co.uk/spartan/SpartanIndex.htm

Has anyone played these?

[beingofone]

I played the demo of Rome total war. I found the AI way to easy to obliterate. The game engine is really cool though.

I own Legion Gold and Chariots of War both by Slitherine. Great games especially Chariots. A little dated but hey, we still play Civ2 lol.

[fairline]

Got them both, and they are both excellent. Spartan has a poor combat sim but is a great turn-based civ-like stategy game. Rome Total War is unrivalled both as a civ-like stratagy sim and as an RTS in terms of it's combat portion.

If you are looking to buy one, get RTW. If you have plenty of cash, get both. Highly recommended

[Broken_Erika]

all i have is civ2 (obviously, or i would't be here ), empire earth, age of empires 1 and 2 with their expansion packs and rise of nations, they can give some rather good direction for scenario making, mabe.....huh?

[KASHANKA]

It would be really cool to make the Phalanx fight worse in difficult terrain, but I don't think that the engine will allow this for only the Phalanx and not for legions at the same time.

As with geographical restriction of the Hellenistic infantry - this would be highly unhistoricall!
In 217 during the battle of Raphia Ptholemy used 20 000 Sarissophoroi, all of them were trained Egyptians.
The Seleucid phalangistes were recruited from the military colonists who were spread throughout the empire. One of the Phlanax units which fought to the last man in the battle of Magnesia was made of warriors from Mesopotamia (through they were probably ethnical Greeks from the military colonies).

Therefore I don't see the need of geographical restriction of heavy Hellenistic units. On the other hand, I belive that geographical restriction of light horse archers would be much more reasonable.

The Heavy Infantry will of course be rather expensive...

As for the cost, this is one thing I find hard to simulate:
Hellenistic soldiers were mostly expensive, profesional warriors which had to be paied large sums of money to maintain. Hellenistic wars were ofther waged to the first battle. The winner was able to maintain his army from the plunder, while the looser went bankrupt and didn't have a way to pay his units.
Roman legionaires were mostly recruited peasants and were paid rather lousy sums of money, plus they were recruited easily every year due to the roman law.
I can't seem to find a way to simulate this, except changing the price of the units (high for Hellenistic, low for Romans) and giving Rome the "Crusade" wonder.

[fairline]

Just a thought, but you could make phalangites cost food as well as production points to maintain with the settler flag.

I completely agree with your thoughts about light infantry BTW