Opps- waited too long. Any hope?

[planetfall]

The issue is not speed but power in breaking down cities. Thought is if have RA I can use 6 armor and 10 RA to take 2 cities in a turn vs 10 armor and maybe artillery to take one city in a turn. Remember my army is still 2/3rd China's. The offense of armor is stronger, but that is almost balanced by city defensive and terrain bonuses. China stopped leaving troops in open terrain. They did once and I gained 17 that turn, since then they have been hiding.

- PF

[vmxa1]

I just have never seen any value in RA over arties. Both are 0.0.1. The BRF is 12.2.3 to 16.2.4 in practice it does not buy you much if anything. Don't get me wrong, I will upgrade, but not till it is with money I do not need. So how will RA help, and don't forget they both miss a great deal. I sat with 10 outside a city last night and 3 turns in a row, I only got 1 hit. Many time 5 failures in a row. I tend to abandon them once I start using MA as they miss so much and can't kept up. I use them where I can and they make decent additions to the defence.

[planetfall]

vmxa1--

Re: movement.
Local preference, move range 2 tiles. Agreed BRF difference is only to show a different graphic.

Re: effectiveness
Yes they miss a lot, I only count on 4 HP/stack. Normally I would get about 2/stack, but vary elapsed time between select target and bombard target. I don't know if it actually increased effectiveness or I only think it changes as the random number is based off time interval.

Thought here is I have 20 artillery on continent that are sitting in cites China won't attack and I really don't know if I can move them at the rate of speed of infantry. That would negate panzer speed.

BTW, what does "vmxa1" stand for. Not easy to type.

--PF

[vmxa1]

The both are 0.0.1 the 1 is for movement. The civped disagrees with the manual and say BRF is 16.2.2 so they are the same in all but bombardment.
In practice I have not really seen any difference and just upgrade for giggles.
VMXA is Virtual Machine eXtended Architecture. It is an IBM mainframe opsys.

[planetfall]

Originally posted by vmxa1
The both are 0.0.1 the 1 is for movement.

I know that is the default, but since we have an editor why not use it? I edited RA unit to give movement of 2. Kept the rest the same.

The civped disagrees with the manual and say BRF is 16.2.2 so they are the same in all but bombardment. In practice I have not really seen any difference and just upgrade for giggles.

That's why I changed movement. Boring to have 2 identical field bombardment pieces. My game experience is that RA misses more than artillery. Go figure.

VMXA is Virtual Machine eXtended Architecture. It is an IBM mainframe opsys.

All right!! Great identity then.


--PF

[Ethelred]

Originally posted by vmxa1
The both are 0.0.1 the 1 is for movement. The civped disagrees with the manual and say BRF is 16.2.2 so they are the same in all but bombardment.

Artillery 12.2.2

Radar Artillery 16.2.2

I finally found one thing RA does that is remotely usefull besides the 16 vs 12. It has Zone of Control. I have never had the tech myself. All my games have ended before I got the tech. It really should have a higher movement considering its self propelled. If I was to modify the entire Modern Era I think that is one change I would make. I see no reason to modify them otherwise since I wouldn't build them without a total overhaul of the Era.

[Catt]

Originally posted by planetfall

I know that is the default, but since we have an editor why not use it? I edited RA unit to give movement of 2. Kept the rest the same.

I played with this mod for precisely one game before moving it back to 1 move (I eventually returned to the default rules). Even with two moves I found them too slow for an advancing column of MA and so tended to use them as home continent defense, primarily against enemy naval forces that strayed too close to shore. The problem I had was that my entire continent was railroaded - so I would move them to the shoreline, fire a salvo, and then have to hit space and deal with them next turn or fortify them and remember where I left them next turn (or some turns later). This was well before 1.29f and the "Wake All" and "Fortify All" commands. Now, a movement of 4 and I would have been all over those badboys as offensive arty . . .

[planetfall]

Originally posted by Catt
Now, a movement of 4 and I would have been all over those badboys as offensive arty . . .

That would be an interesting variation to play. Only worthwhile with the new stack command, but still intriquing as a twist to add excitement to ehe modern era.

--PF

[vmxa1]

Ethelred, even the ZoC is not much value to me as they can't move enough to do any blocking. I did once get to use it in a strange game that 14 civs were at war with me and sent troops throught the same choke point every turn or so. I had stacks of RA and made life tough. Use MA to mop up.

[vmxa1]

Planetfall- Ok, I did not know it was a mod game, but I still would not spend money I need to upgrade to RA. I would do it later and piece meal.

[Theseus]

As Arrian HATES Longevity, I HATE RA.

The benefit of the upgrade from Arty is meaningless, especially with anything under move 3, and they take forever to fire. Add the lack of stack bombard, and I'd rather re-work every tile I have than screw around with RA.

[vmxa1]

I don't hate Longevity, but I do not see much value to it.

[planetfall]

1770 AD update

As in life, plans need to be changed during play.


Plans that failed
1. Thought RA had movement of 2, only had 1. Waste of upgrade. For next game changed to movement of 3 to see what play is like.
2. Idea of cutting roads to NW was a waste of time and cities were so weakly defended, easier to acquire than to delay.
3. The idea of hitting China's core production centers did not work as it took 5-7 turns to just get one center.


Summary current situation
1. China is off continent and has 2 island cities
2. Russia backed off on China and tried to settle open areas.
3. Russia building up BS and MI.
4. China war ended in 1758.
5. Will start Russia campaign within 10 turns


Last play :
1. It took until 1665, 7 turns before China and Germany military land units equalized.
2. China's net change/turn: -24 to +3
3. Germany's net change/turn: -2 to +10
4. Net gain/turn: -2 to +20.
{Don't have averages yet}

Annoying it took 28 turns to complete mission.

I did not:
1. draft citizens
2. switch former Roman cities building military generators into just building units
3. change to war mobilization

Don't know if any of those play changes would have decreased acquisition time significantly.

Question

1. Any suggestions on how to further improve play?

2. Is it normal to take about 35 turns to take over a 4# city continent empire?


-- PF

[vmxa1]

Well I ran into the issue of mods and crashes. I played one turn and then it blows to the desktop. It will take some time to bust a metro with infantry and arties as they are slow and will be ineffective. You need tanks to get it done quickly. You had (1450 sav) 7 pikes, 30 warriors? 22 spearmen?. Cities where making inf or calv that needed hospitols. I would rather get the growth going and banks, then add troops. By that time you can make tanks. You had money and could make a trade for more, so I would disband the warriors and upgrade the pikes. I would hold off on upgrades to spears until I capture Rome with Leo's then start upgrading the spears to infantry. I think I would gather 5 -7 calvs and pillage all improvements to crush the production of those cities while I massed units. This will cause the metro's to shrink some making it easier to take off and they can be replaced easy later with the 35 workers you have. Once I get tanks, then you can move out to the rest or even hold of to the next age.

[vmxa1]

Ok, I got it to play a few turns. First turn made some changes from inf to hospitols or infrastructure as you already have plenty of units. Moved forward units to make a united front on Rome and the other large city (can't see the name). Repulsed an attack. Second turn Russia offer gold for lux, rome asked for peace (no way). Attack with arties and got reminded why I build so few (boring to shoot 10-15 and hit 3 and do nearly no damage) Send a few units in to kill a few troops to soften. Third turn created a leader and captured Rome. Made an army to get epic going soon. Hospitols up, so started Battlefield. Rebuilding some roads and pressing the other city now. Got Leos so upgrade units and I scrapped the rest of the warriors and some swords/longbow to get more income. don't need all those units as finished tech and now going 4 turns for tanks. Need to look at shipping to get an invasion ready with tanks/calv/inf.