POLL: No Unit Workshop in Civ3

[Aredhran]

While I absolutely loved the workshop in SMAC, I'm not sure it would be a good thing to have in Civ. I think we're better off without it.

Aredhran

[Biddles]

I don't think that the unit workshop added enough to the game. The only thing I ever used it for was to make water probe teams and to upgrade my units. If anyone can come up with uses for the UW I would reconsider my position but it will just be annoying unless it is actually useful.

[Trachmir]

I agree that the Unit Workshop in SMAC was flawed... the main reason was that all componets were linear, one being obviously superior to the other. Thus it was only used to upgrade to the "latest and greatest".

Despite that, I feel that CIV3 should of used the unit workshop... not as it was in SMAC, but an improved version that gives you true choices, not simply a way to upgrade. If the "componets" in SMAC actually did diffrent things, as well as give disadvantages not just clear improvements, it would of been much better.

For example, in CIV3 your ancient infantry units could of had the choice of weapons:

Mace: High CRUSHING Damage, poor armor penetration, cheap, slow "rate of fire", poor defense

Sword: Good Damage, Fair armor penetration, Expensive, moderate "rate of fire", moderate defense

Polearm: Excelent Damage, Good armor penetration, Moderate cost, very slow "rate of fire", good defense, reduces unit's movement

Compound Bow: Good PIERCING Damage, Fair armor penetration, moderate expense, Ranged Attack, Slow rate of fire

etc.

For armors:

Leathers: no speed reduction, low cost, low protection
Scale: some speed reduction, moderate cost, moderate protection
Chain: some speed reduction, High cost, low protection vs. PIERCING damage, Moderate protection vs. Crush, High protection vs. others
Plate: Major speed reduction, Very High Cost, High Protection but reduces defense! (vision is restricted)
etc.

Plus: Shields/Mounts/Barding/back-up weapons (not all archers were wimps in melee, and knights carried a lance & a sword)/Special Trainging (formations/sappers/etc.)

See, if CIV3 used a workshop similar to this, you would have real choices and then could customize troops to fit your play style/vision of your nation (plus you would get a lot more than cookie cutter)

and ofcourse tech would be restricted on certain chassis, so there wouldn't be pikes on F-15's!

But in the end, I guess we'll never know... I just hope CIV3 has enough units in it to allow for diversity... (and looking at pics for Migs and F-15's, plus 2 diffrent tanks gives me some hope on this)

[Cyclotron]

Ummm... what you just said sounds like an RPG. I'm not sure if I would EVER play a game that complicated, especially not a Civ game. The amount of time all that would take would be colossal, and hugely slow the game down.

[Adm.Naismith]

We don't need to add so many detail as Trachmir suggested in enthusiastic example

Still we should have, for every "chassis", a mix of available armour/weapon/special skill or tactic, each with strong points and weakness.

At the change of era some combo will become obsolete - e.g no chain armour available for marine -

I don't think we need ten armour each era; we should have (I don't care for proper name, I'm letting room for historic expert here):
no or light armour,
medium armour,
heavy armour

short weapon (dagger, sword)
long weapon (pike)
long range weapon (bow)

and so on.

On modern time you can have available armour changed in
flak jacket
kevlar/compound jacket

The difference with CIV II defined unit type are:
- that you can have more smooth transition, making components available step by step on the whole tech tree
- that you must balance more carefully enhancement over limits (e.g. heavy armour will better protect but slow your troop, too), while in CIV II (and in SMAC II, building cost apart) the last discovered is probably the best of all existing units.
If you look carefully at SMAC manual you can see Firaxis tried to add different effects to every armour/weapon (some are effective against some kind of weapons only), but they discarded the whole thing during beta test (too complex? too buggy? only heaven knows).

Unit workshop should be replaced by "Formation (stack) order" as someone suggested, but I'm not sure to like taking care of that tactical detail before every battle: I mean, is more like football (soccer) tactics, you must change them according to enemy you are facing.

Well, I suppose this let us with the only hope Firaxis will give us enough different Units effective in the same time period, i.e. not only one defense and one attacker unit good for every age.

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Admiral Naismith AKA mcostant

[Grumbold]

I like the idea of formations but really most troops only have one sensible formation. If we have no unit workshop it is really up to Firaxis to produce units that have different effects rather than just being better all round. Light infantry skirmishers for scouting and rough terrain. Heavy infantry and cavalry for open terrain. Phalanx slow but superior against cavalry etc. Armies are made up of different units of specialists for a reason.

[Zeevico]

I envision combat with a few simple formations. ie:
Ancient combat with cavalry (something should be in between knights and horsmen), archers and phalanx on each side, both equal. these three units would use formations with each other and rely on the others support o defeat the enemy. here's a typical battle:
you army marches up to the battlefield, with the phalanx defending the archers and the cavalry ready to charge. The enemy seems to have taken an all offensive approach, with its swordsmen breaking from phalanx and going offensive. The battle begins!
Your cavalry charges as does the enemies, with the swordsmen lagging behind. Your archers take advantage and pound the swordsmen. Swordsmen take 50% damage. Enemy cavalry takes 5% damage. Friendly cavalry takes 10% damage (friendly fire). the swordsmen retreat, panicking and deserting the enemy (there is a 10% chance this happens if enemy is heavily damaged in one hit). Your cavalry is fighting a gradually losing battle and is being pushed back. your phalanx takes position for any attack. your archers are near useless, and any attack against the enemy may hurt you more than them. You decide to attack anyway. Luck is with you, and you only take 5% ff (friendly fire) while you damage the enemy by 20%. However, enemy cavalry had seriously degrade your cavalry before that.
Round summary:
Your cavalry take 30% damage, is now on 60%
Their cavalry takes 30% (equalised by the archer attack) and is now on 65%. You decide to fire with our archers again and are heavily succesful! the enemy cavalry takes 50% damage and is retreating at full pace, as is the enemy archers. your swordsmen begin to attack the damaged enemy cavalry while your cavalry destroys the enemy archers.
Battle summary. Your archers: 100% Your swordsmen: 95% Your cavalry: 45%
Their archers 5% (retreated succesfully). All other units destroyed. Any good?

[joseph1944]

With a unit workshop maybe we could have done the same thing that the USA has done over the years. Take the M-4 Sherman Tank. It came out with a 75mm gun, was later given a 76mm and then even later given a 90mm gun. Also the chassie was used for lot of other vehicles. The same with M-46 which became the M-47 (new turret), the M-48 which became the M-60 and eventually the M-60A3 with the 105mm gun, which btw the U.S. Marines slaughtered the Iraqs Republican Guard T-72 and T-80s at the Kuwaitie airport in the gulf war. And now the M-1A1 with a 120mm gun. We did not loose a single one to action in the gulf war. Some say the best tank in the world.
when someone walks into a store and puts his/her money down on the counter and buys the game, goes home and wants to build a M-1 chassis with a bowman standing in it, who should care, it is their game and they're not harming anyone else.


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[Biddles]

But is the unit workshop going to add to the game? That is the $64m question. People who don't want to use the workshop are going to demand that firaxis include prefab units, firaxis will comply, and we will all end up playing with the prefab units (except for our diplomats that have iron armour and the special ability of non-lethal methods) because we will realise that although the broadsword and the steel plate are te best offensive and defensive weapons to date, it isn't worth the cost of putting them into one unit (SMAC behemoths, good, but you pay through the nose for something that isn't really that neccesary).

[Urban Ranger]

Part of my reply posted on another thread.

quote: Originally posted by Urban Ranger on 02-05-2001 12:07 PM One of the best features of SMAC is the unit workshop. It allows you to build customised units to tackle a situation. I don't see why that would cause such a problem in Civ 3. For example, maybe I want to build some defensive units with pikes and heavy armor at the expense of their speed. Why can't I? Right now in Civ 2 an English Phalanx unit is exactly the same as a Chinese one. Why is that the case? That's more unrealistic than having each civ design their own units according to their situations. For example, Okay, we have a bunch of iron mines around here, but we don't have many horses. Why don't we make armor for the horses so they get protection? It just makes sense.

[Urban Ranger]

Part of my message on yet another thread.

quote: Originally posted by Urban Ranger on 01-15-2001 11:46 PM I think the unit workshop in SMAC has almost the perfect combination. What I think would be the best is for a unit to have, on top of the basic "frame" type: one armor slot, one movement slot, two weapons slot, two special slot, and a doctine slot. For example: Ancient Skimisher Basic Frame - infantry Movement - foot Weapon 1 - short sword (bronze) Weapon 2 - short bow Armor - leather Special 1 - wilderness survival Special 2 - none Doctrine - skimisher Modern Special Force Unit Basic Frame - infantry Movement - foot Weapon 1 - light arms Weapon 2 - espionage kit Armor - bulletproof vest Special 1 - wilderness survival Special 2 - combat insertion/extraction Doctrine - special forces

[Cyclotron]

Okay, that may be interesting (ooh! My marines have wilderness survival training!) but what use is it? How will all this junk and doctrine and stuff affect the game at all? This sounds like an RPG, not Civ! If it has no use, there is no reason to tack additional meaningless details onto CivIII.

Face it guys: Firaxis made the decision (right decision, IMO) to go against unit workshps, and that's it. Live with it.

[Roman]

quote: Originally posted by cyclotron7 on 02-12-2001 03:44 PM Face it guys: Firaxis made the decision (right decision, IMO) to go against unit workshps, and that's it. Live with it.

Indeeeeeeed!!!!! But you should still let people voice their opinions about this. That's what these forums are for.

[Cyclotron]

By all means, do. Who am I to stand in the way of free speech?

[Roman]

Actually I agree with you, so I will leave that to "the others".

PS.
If they check out the response from Firaxis (Dan Magaha) on the thread dealing with flexible units, they might sto complaining too.