Cavalry Moves Faster Than Tanks?

[David Murray]

Re: cruise missiles

Why can't cruise missiles and nuclear weapons move over water?

I've noticed that you can move nukes and cruise missiles one square per turn over land for as long as you want. Therefore, why can't you do the same over water?

Furthermore...maybe it's just me not having played enough yet, but...helicopters...seem to be pretty useless at transporting troops, what use are they when they have only a small range from their base of operations? If you want to transport troops into enemy territory far away, you just can't, unless you have a city near the enemy to rebase to.

What I'm saying is, helicopters should have a movement value per turn, instead of having a very limited number of squares that they can move during an air mission.

Or am I just missing something? Your help and comments on these matters will be most appreciated.

[Dev]

Originally posted by Akka le Vil


Well, the problem is that the empire has not to be 5 tiles deep. You just have to prepare a BUNCH of tanks, and then take on city after another and then use the new-conquered terrain to bring new tanks (using the railroad that was in the city area and that are now usuable).
If you have enough tanks, you can wipe out a whole continent in one or two turns.
A tank should be faster than cavalry, but have accidented terrain costing more to get through (3 or 4 mov point for forest, impossibility to go to mountain without roads if it's not the case, etc...).

You just have to prepare a bunch of 3 movers and you can basicly do the same thing, prepare 500 workers and you can rail an entire continent from end to end in about one turn. 6 moves will help but compared to 3 it's not that much of a difference.

This problem is really due to the flawed hand to mouth approach Firaxes opted for when they should have made a proper upkeep phase instead, IMHO.

/dev

[Mawrin]

Considering the turn time is in years the whole question of which moves faster in real life is pretty much irrelevant.

When two units fight in Civ 3 I wouldn't view it as a single pitched battle but rather as the summation of a series of conflicts over that square of territory. Unfortunately I can't think of a reasonable way of explaining why it would take a bunch of tanks (or cavalry or anything else for that matter) years to move along a road between two cities within my own borders...

[sophist]

Originally posted by David Murray
Re: cruise missiles

Why can't cruise missiles and nuclear weapons move over water?

I believe you could look at the cruise missile and nuclear weapon units as being like those big trucks the Air Force has to carry them around. So they can move all over land, but their bombardment range is only a few squares (for cruise missiles). Or something like that. Gameplay balancing. Also a way to justify having subs (which the AIs can see from the other side of the world).

[Nemesis of the North]

Well, actually, the infantry IS faster than the warrior. Take a small look at the year counter, and it moves quite a bit slower in the ages when you have infantry than when you have warriors.

The question is where all those still-existing warriors get their modern trucks from, though.

Nem

[David Murray]

Originally posted by sophist


I believe you could look at the cruise missile and nuclear weapon units as being like those big trucks the Air Force has to carry them around. So they can move all over land, but their bombardment range is only a few squares (for cruise missiles). Or something like that. Gameplay balancing. Also a way to justify having subs (which the AIs can see from the other side of the world).

That's a good point.

What about the issue of helicopters though. You could argue that they require regular fuelling, thus they cannot travel great distances at once. But then again, I could rebase my helicopter from a city on one end of my empire to one of my output cities on the other end of the earth in one turn. Surely it would have just been better to have given helicopters a per-turn movement and combat value instead of having to give them silly "missions".

Or...am I missing something.

[Herder]

The whole *point* of helicopters is being able to operate outside of normal airbases.

Forcing them to operate from cities and hamstringing them to a short range is ridiculous. Sorry, its true. Whats the frigging point.

[JayKay]

Originally posted by sophist


Also a way to justify having subs (which the AIs can see from the other side of the world).

I must disagree with you since in a game of mine where i was the Persians, i had a Submarine stopped in open ocean and when i declared war to the Aztechs they moved a lot of Destroyers nearby, passing exactly side by side with the sub and they didn't attack it! As a matter of fact they only attacked it when i, in the next couple of turns, attacked one of their Destroyers making them aware of the sub! It was quite cool to watch about 5 Destroyers pass by the sub without notice it! This was in Regent difficulty level!
_________________________________________________



Portugal
Nation of: Magellan's (from Magellan's Expedition);
Vasco da Gama (Discoverer of the Maritime path to India);
and Pedro Álvares Cabral (Discoverer of Brazil in 1500)

[David Murray]

Originally posted by Herder
The whole *point* of helicopters is being able to operate outside of normal airbases.

Forcing them to operate from cities and hamstringing them to a short range is ridiculous. Sorry, its true. Whats the frigging point.

Herder--

That's what I'm trying to get at.

Or were you just putting the point more succinctly for me?

[Dev]

Apart from being offensively madly overpowered chopers worked great in SMAC.

They didn't have to return to their base but if they didn't they'd take a bit of damage each turn.

/dev

[Auren]

Originally posted by morb


you show me a horse that can run at 70km/h for 12 hours straight without collapsing....

I show it as soon as you show me modern armor that can go 70 km/h for 12 hours straight without running out of gas.

[black98z]

Originally posted by Auren


I show it as soon as you show me modern armor that can go 70 km/h for 12 hours straight without running out of gas.

Yea, what do they get? 3kpg? Anyways, you also got to remember that equipment like that needs alot of maintenance.

[morb]

Originally posted by black98z
Yea, what do they get? 3kpg? Anyways, you also got to remember that equipment like that needs alot of maintenance.

actually more like 3 gallons per km. but they carry thousands of pounds of fuel. a horse will run out of breath long before a tank will run out of fuel if both run at maximum speed.

[Raleigh]

My fellow forum contributors:

Thank you ever so much. Of all the posts I placed here I least expected good replies to this one and thought for sure it would be flamed or ignored. So far we **** in at over 40 replies I think! Thank you all for contributing.

Thanks most especially to Xane for his excellent excellent research!

[Venger]

Originally posted by xane


Bradley M2/M3 Infantry Fighting Vehicle - 66 km/h source
Horse - 70 km/h source

There ya go

I'm pretty sure that speed is governed. And anything that is governed...

Venger