How about when you "fling" a unit "out of control of" the capital, you can give it some generic orders like:
- explore and return in X turns
- explore and sentry in X turns
- attack all enemies and return in X turns...
- attack the city of X
- goto and defend X location (prompts for a selected square)
Perhaps when you give orders, you can select an area or a square for unit guidance.
This way, while you can give it some idea of what to do, but you can't magically send instant orders to units 10,000 miles away, limiting rapid expansion, but *giving expantionist civs something to live for*.
The AI code would take over for the unit (a generic goto) and do it's best to follow orders, making decissions as it goes along (which would be fair- not perfect I'm sure- but decent thinking).
We can assume that most ancient units, such as the warrior, can hunt and otherwise live off of the land, and other units such as musketeers, need a "supply chain" of some sort. Editable maintenance costs per unit, baby!
I think the "zone of unit control" could best be expanded in descreet, gradual changes, such as at the start of each age for example. Once radio comes into play, it's eliminated.
Of course, another way to do it would be to have it start at like 5 squares from your cultural borders, and gain one extra square for each tech, or have a tech effect that adds X squares to you "zone of unit control."
- explore and return in X turns
- explore and sentry in X turns
- attack all enemies and return in X turns...
- attack the city of X
- goto and defend X location (prompts for a selected square)
Perhaps when you give orders, you can select an area or a square for unit guidance.
This way, while you can give it some idea of what to do, but you can't magically send instant orders to units 10,000 miles away, limiting rapid expansion, but *giving expantionist civs something to live for*.
The AI code would take over for the unit (a generic goto) and do it's best to follow orders, making decissions as it goes along (which would be fair- not perfect I'm sure- but decent thinking).
We can assume that most ancient units, such as the warrior, can hunt and otherwise live off of the land, and other units such as musketeers, need a "supply chain" of some sort. Editable maintenance costs per unit, baby!
I think the "zone of unit control" could best be expanded in descreet, gradual changes, such as at the start of each age for example. Once radio comes into play, it's eliminated.
Of course, another way to do it would be to have it start at like 5 squares from your cultural borders, and gain one extra square for each tech, or have a tech effect that adds X squares to you "zone of unit control."
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