The Case for Nukes

[Enigma]

Korn I also frequently end up with cities producing 100 shields per turn when my economy is mobilized, and that adds up to only 3 tanks for an ICBM... I think anyone would like to add in an ICMB for the cost of 3 tanks into the mix.

I agree with your statement that an optimal strategy probably doesn't involve nukes... my point was that maybe 30% of the time a nuke would be useful.

You drastically underestimate the costs of taking out an enemy civ in the late game. 1000 minerals! My offensive force cost 3600 for air units, 2000 for subs and battleships, 2000 for sea based transports, and 4000 or more for ground units... not to mention the reinforcements I dropped in. That adds up to 1200 minerals total... so I *could* have built 20 ICBMs... this is on a *standard* map. It was overkill to a certain extent, but my economy was mobilized and I was behind in the space race because all 3 of the other civs had allied against me.

The other civs wouldn't trade me for nuke technology, but I would have liked to have had an ICBM or two, 10% isn't a significant percentage of this cost.

The damage a nuke does to infrastructure isn't terribly significant, but if you need to take a city of strategic value it allows you to sacrifice long term goals. 6 bombers really isn't that significant, 5 modern armor is good but not fantastic.

I don't factor in the manhatten project because I would rather let another civ build it... it is rather worthless to have nukes 3 or 4 turns ahead of other people, if that.

Also human players are very different than AIs, I would *LOVE* to have a nuke in a human vs human conflict, I actually consider them much more useful in that context. Say both of you are in the space race, he is slightly behind and launches a massive invasion. You have been focusing on naval defense overall but neglecting your ground defense because you think no one will be able to punch through your fleet.

Well rather than trying to fight your fleet he simply ignored it- made sacrificial destroyers, you simply do not have enough battleships to destroy everything he has. But you do manage to force him to focus his forces in one square.

Nukes can be effective as a deterrant for getting your enemy to stop concentrating his forces- this could be extremely important on large maps, where you might have a lot of units on one square. Rather than having to worry about a massive attack coming from one direction (which could be nuked) you have to worry about much more spread out attacks. Nukes do very little to cities, but 50% of a stack of 50 units is very significant.

I think we will see a tendancy for large stacks like that a lot in PvP conflicts, I saw that AI frequently drop 15+ units at me, but they didn't go on the offensive a whole lot against me. Nukes seem actually QUITE cost effective in naval combat- no player would want to spread his naval units over more than a 8x8 box, you can attack a significant chunk of this box at once with a tactical nuke. A single battleship costs 200! If you manage to take out two battleships that is a good return on your investment, if you are so lucky as to destroy a transport full of modern armor that is 1300 minerals... more than quadruple the cost of your tactical nuke, and more than double the cost of an ICBM.

Nukes are the only thing preventing players from making "stacks of doom"... there is no other attack that damages a percent of a stack... Also nukes are perfect for neutralizing armies.
To summarize-

Nukes aren't that expensive
They are best used against units, especially stacks, especially player vs player combat.
In naval combat or in taking out armies (1 army with 4 modern armors is 880 mins) nukes are cost effective, otherwise they are mainly a deterrant.

Nukes are totally useless in Civ3 if you use them in their real life use of destroying infrastructure and population, but if you use them to focus on naval fleets and unit stacks they have the *potential* to be great.

[korn469]

Enigma

good responce

i'm in class right now so i can't be as long winded as i like to be but a few replies

You drastically underestimate the costs of taking out an enemy civ in the late game. 1000 minerals!

this is based on my experiance...so far i haven't encountered any problems using more than 4-6 modern armor backed up by 4-5 bombers (880-1220 shields) and a few mech infantry for garrisons when necessary (my standard operating proceedure is to burn enemy cities down)

i normally play on tiny and small maps because the game slows down on my computer on larger maps with more civs

however i have only made it to the modern era three times...in my other games i have crushed the AI early in the game got them down to one city and then won through the space ship

Rather than having to worry about a massive attack coming from one direction (which could be nuked) you have to worry about much more spread out attacks. Nukes do very little to cities, but 50% of a stack of 50 units is very significant.

i agree with that point, but it seems that attacking in smaller waves is more effective anyway, unfortunantly the AI still seems quite clueless on the tactical level and the attack, make the computer sue for peace then attack again works too good for me, the AI could possibly need to be less forgiving

using tactical nukes against a naval transport task force seems like the best use of nukes, especially if it sinks a transport loaded with juicy units, however against smaller waves of units approaching from a few directions over land makes nukes less useful, especially when you take into account the possibility of nukes causing neutral civs declare war on you

single battleship costs 200! If you manage to take out two battleships that is a good return on your investment

but on average there would need to be four battle ships in the blast radius to achieve this

unfortunantly in two different games i've played one of the best anti-battleship unit has been the ironclad
it almost seems that the odds from those games would be a 1:1 lose ratio when the ironclad attacks...i might have just been unlucky

also i think that all of the air power in civ3 is on the weak side, and that bombard units are less than effective...especially radar artillary, why does it only have a move of 1?

swordmen, horsemen, cavalry, tanks, and modern armor have made up the backbone of my army...i find swordmen to be highly effective until the later middle ages |immortals are good right up to musketmen, but by then the game is already over on a tiny or small map |

[jgflg]

Korn469 wrote:

"jgflg

if what you said is true then you built 10-15 ICBMs

that is more than double the cost of the space ship...so why didn't you just build the space ship and win the game?"

The number probably ended up being more around 20-25 when it was all said and done. 10-15 on the Egyptians and then another 5-10 on the Zulus once I eliminated the Egyptians.

Good question about the space race. The most enjoyable way for me to win is through the destruction of other civs. I don't really see the space race as all that exciting. I never really even considered building the ship. Just my play style. Call me sadistic or what have you, but there is something extremely satisfying about watching the ICBM explode over a city (in the game).

The reason that this strategy worked so well in that game for me was that I went straight for modern armor while everyone else focused on the other tech paths in the modern age. So I had already accumulated a huge modern tank army and reduced my pollution ahead of my nuclear proliferation. Once the nukes were built and used, I already had the quick moving army in place to follow it up with a rapid sweep. Building the nukes was actually quite easy with the productive capacity available from my cities. I had about eight or nine cities turning out nukes and it was taking about 10-12 turns per nuke, so I was able to build them quite quickly. With the French Commercial bonus I had also accumulated a huge amount of money so rush buying things was very easy.

[Pyrodrew]

Originally posted by jgflg
Korn469, "if what you said is true then you built 10-15 ICBMs?"

The number probably ended up being more around 20-25 when it was all said and done.

What did that do to the planet? Were the environmental effects that minor? I would think after that the world would be just small desert islands.

[Wrong_shui]

I changed the cost in the editor to 10 shields, built about 25 ICBMs and nuked most of germanys citys.

Didnt make much of a difference, they still had a horde of knights, if i bothered to wait and see if that pollution bothered them Global warming would have happend and buggerd us all anyway.

So yeah i think they're useless.

[Grumbold]

To my mind the question is one of scale. The 'nuke' pieces seems to be costed as if it represents a cluster of weapons yet have the impact of only one. In the same way some players believe that ships should be sinkable by bombardment because they visualise the piece as representing only a single ship, not a taskforce. That nukes deal out standard and not special pollution is an additional flaw. The construction cost, explosive effects and lasting pollution effects are not in step with each other. Probably the simplest short term answer is to adjust the cost of the nukes so that each nation can build up a significantly larger arsenal even if the diplomatic effects of using large numbers would be catastrophic.

[cassembler]

Why I think the late/ modern era feels rushed

It's all about company policies...
Think about it, the dudes in the suits at Infrogrames could care less about completely checking out a released product- they might play it for 30 turns or so and say, "Looks fine to me... Good job Firaxis!"

Of course, Firaxis knows this, and Infrogrames is the hand that feeds them, so why would they NOT spend a great deal of time making sure the first impressions of the game are favorable?

As far as nukes go, I completely agree that they are not balanced correctly... I tend to play until I ether know I'm gonna win or lose, then I start fresh... Early game is much more enjoyable than Civ2. If only the whole game was that way...

[Ancientfool]

nuke shmook.

When id finished contruction of a handful of quantum planetbusters in SMAC I felt like a god whether I used them or not. Veeeeeery high fun factor.

They need to graft a new AI onto SMAC, some pretty graphics and abandon this civIII nonsense.

[Your.Master]

Originally posted by Wrong_shui
If america nuked afghanistan, ppl would ***** and moan but who would have the balls to do anything?.

If America nuked Afghanistan, Bin Laden would be right.

[Jokka das Trevas]

Technical detail here:

Fusion, neutron and hydrogen bombs are pretty much the same. No comparatives here, they REALLY are the same one

[Zanzin]

Originally posted by Ancientfool

They need to graft a new AI onto SMAC, some pretty graphics and abandon this civIII nonsense.

Or maybe jut fix the nukes in Civ3?

[korn469]

yea since they don't have real M.A.D. i would be happy if they increased the chance that the AI will declare war on a player using nukes, and that they increase the destructive power of nukes to 75% with the ability to kill really small cities (size 3 and under)

also i wished they would change the manhatten project to a small wonder

(then change its stats to the following -2 culture, creates 1 unhappy person in every city)

then hopefully in the expansion pack they will add in true M.A.D.

[Yoleus]

Uhm, now I really do not know.
I thoght nukes were too weak (nuke salade thread), but now I temporary suspend my jugdement on actual implementation.
Does somebody care to quantify the Global Warmig effect? Is it the same, better or worse than in Civ2? Any idea on the average effect of nukes on a stack of units? Do nukes affect only the units in ONE (the city's) tile or do they damage a wider area?
What I know for sure is:

MAD please!

[jgflg]

"Does somebody care to quantify the Global Warmig effect? Is it the same, better or worse than in Civ2? Any idea on the average effect of nukes on a stack of units? Do nukes affect only the units in ONE (the city's) tile or do they damage a wider area?
What I know for sure is:

MAD please!"

The global warming effect was pretty bad at first, but you gain so many workers from razing cities that you take over that there are plenty of resources to clean up the pollution.

The nukes affect the city tile plus a one tile radius around the city, so you can really hammer a large amount of units if you know what cities to hit. Using espionage to locate military units is key. I found the 50/50 odds of a unit surviving worked out about right in the game.

[Jason]

Tac can work as it does in the game now. ICBM should be devastating like it was in Civ2, and an option to build a costly hydrogen bomb that wipes out everything within 2 squares of a city.

Actually, ICBMs and tactical nukes are hydrogen bombs pretty much by definition, because of the small size requirements. H bombs are easily minaturized.

However, wiping out a city and the surrounding area isn't practical for one bomb; it could be done with a series of bombs on one town, if you really disliked that town I guess.

Increasing the megatonnage of a weapon beyond 5 megatons is only going to make a bigger light-show, there's diminishing returns at work. The Russians made some silly-arsed 60 megaton job, but just as a stunt.

Incidentally, a nuclear strike on a city, depending on how it's layed out, is only supposed to kill what, 1/3rd to 2/3rds of the population? To my mind the current system is more realistic than what you're proposing. When you bomb a city twice, it's not going to lose the same amount of people. Perhaps if you slavered 5 or 6 mirv nukes on one city it could be made uninhabitable, but when you think about it, a pop 1 city with a few dozen years worth of fallout around it is moderately realistic.

It isn't SMAC, we can't use fictional black hole nukes. I don't see that losing 30 pop or so to a nuke barrage in a turn is such an minor thing. You can say that the AI should have built tanks and radar artillery instead, but frankly, I have an army too. Nuking cities doesn't require winning battles first. I don't have much use for em, but the computer having them makes me a little cautious.