Unit support

[Henrik]

That is an exelent idea!
That is the best way if implementing this I have seen untill now!
The amount of gold should be customizable by a scenario esinger though.
This will make for a much more realistic millitary system of civ, when a unit "revolts" it should automatically pillage all improvements in the surounding squares(being forced to loot and plunder the land).
[This message has been edited by Henrik (edited February 21, 2001).]

[Lord Spam]

I agree with the poster (Gary) who gave the example of military dependant primarily on city-states versus the nation until later on in history. Nation-wide support could very well be an advance, or a nation-wide improvement once you've discovered 'constitutional monarchy' or 'democracy'.

Completely abandoning the Civ approach to military support will represent a major gameplay shift. I mean, changing the rules will affect:

1) Individual city design (manufacturing/trade center, food, etc.) Some cities were shield producers because they could make units quickly and support them well: Athens was for culture, Sparta was for war.

2) Fighting wars over large areas: supporting and building units in cities you've taken from the enemy far from your empire would be easier. Since there would be no penalty from pumping out units from you're newly conquered city under nation-wide unit support, wouldn't this change warfare in Civ altogether, and would the result be better?

3) Larger empires would be easier to maintain earlier in the game, which isn't what people wanted, I thought.

Now I thought that it was silly when you're supposedly in the modern age and still had to fight wars like you're nation was just city states. So I agree that nation-wide unit support should be an upgrade or tech. This tech would be one of the key technologies to get, like gunpowder, invention or industrialization, so an empire with nation-wide unit support would be better prepared for war than one still stuck in ancient ways.
[This message has been edited by Lord Spam (edited February 21, 2001).]

[Cyclotron]

Or, support could depend on governments... A Monarchy would have individual cities support units with shields, but a Democracy would pay lots of Gold, and a Communist government would pay with shields on a nation-wide basis.

The way I see it, this is good because it improves both the Government system and the support system.

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"Any shred of compassion left in me was snuffed out forever when they cast me into the flames..."
- Marsil, called the Pretender

[GaryGuanine]

cyclotron,

I like the idea of support changing as a function of government, maybe also/or as a function of time. I would just reverse your two suggestions: Monarchy pays gold, and democracy/republic pays city support. This is just because democracy/republics predominantly are decentralized forms of government throughout most of history.

Gary

[Biddles]

Unit support needs to include gold somewhere in the process. korn469's idea sounds pretty good. The reason why units should have gold support is so that a cold war situation can be simulated (well we'd be a step closer). The cold war ended up being who had the cash to build the bigger gun. That's why the soviet union lost out. That's why we need gold in there somewhere. Maybe take it a step further and include gold in the production costs as well......

[Henrik]

Upkeep and disbanding costs gold and so does upgrading (it should be possible whitout leos, but cost money) if you can't support a unit then it will revolt and destroy improvements.
That way the cold war can be simulated (as well as most historical conflicts)
[This message has been edited by Henrik (edited February 22, 2001).]

[Cyclotron]

Okay, Gov't support revised:

Despotism: Units supported nationally with both shields AND gold. Autocratic Governments like these were more centralized around a single ruler, hence the national cost. The shields are for maintainance, and the money is to pay the troops do they simply won't leave your oppresive regime. On the other hand, maybe gold should be not much, and the troops stay in line simply out of fear of your great person...

Monarchy: Units supported by city with gold. The Feudalistic system of the time put more authority and responsibility on feudal lords, or vassals. Typically, military during this time were hired mercenaries (i.e. knights, samurai) who provided their own supplies but needed monetary compensation.

Republic: Units supported by city with shields. Republics stress the autonomy of the city-state. Military service is usually required in event of a war, so although monetary compensation is not needed soldiers still must be supported with food and supplies from the government.

Communism: Units supported nationally with shields. Communist governments are strongly centralized, and military service is often compulsory so only weapons and supplies are needed.

Fundamentalism: Units supported nationally with a minimum of shields. Fundamentalist governments revolve around a central church or authority, hence the nationalization. The zealots that compose their armies, however, fight for your countries' sake and need no direct monetary compensation and little government support.

Democracy: Units supported nationally with gold AND shields. Funny how this is like despotism, huh? A democracy like the US and most modern European nations has a centralized military, which it needs both to pay and to support with supplies. Given the freedom in a democracy, many will not part with it readily to fight with little compensation.

Other goverments (CTP comes to mind, theocracy, fascism, and other "future" governments) can fit this model too.

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"Any shred of compassion left in me was snuffed out forever when they cast me into the flames..."
- Marsil, called the Pretender

[joseph1944]

This is for everyone who has asked how are units payed for in CTP 2. I had a problem with receiving the message "to many units" early in Nov. 2000 and posted a question on the forum and was answer by someone from Activision. The answer is PRODUCTION. Activision did not say how many production points per units. Also I found out the type of Gov. has a small part in the numbers of units. I was receiving the message "to many units" under Dem. I switch to Corp. Rep. and the message stopped (same number of units).

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[Henrik]

cyclotron7 has a good idea there, but disband should cost too, and more than the support is costing.
And I still like the idea of units revolting destroying improvemnts if they don't get payed, that is a lot more realistic than it sounds, not for a democracy maybe but for a monarchy. Armies during the 17th century was often forced to live on looting since they hardly ever got payed, this is why if a nation had and army they wanted to have it in someone else's territory, or disband it, they couldn't disband it so they had to move it into someone elses territory declaring war.
This system made it more costly whit peace (if you had an army) than to be at war (atleast in a short sighted analasys).
THis is why wars lasted so long (the thirty years war is a very good example.).

[Straybow]

Mercenaries had to be paid cash, whereas national units were often paid in scrip. Abandoning mercs in the field made it difficult to find mercs later when needed, so "disbanding" mercs usually meant transporting them back home. Disbanding a national unit meant transporting them back home. The cost and inconvenience of shipping men around was a major factor in the "leave them in the field" attitude. Gold is the only way to represent this.

[Henrik]

Well, usually disbanded regiments wherent transported anywhere (not as regiments or units annyway) but the money cost was colosal anyway, since you have to give the soldiers all their pay when disbanding their regiments (I am talking about the situation in the 17th century here, it might have changed later on), during campains lots of money went into maintaning or supporting the regiments and units, but not all of them got payed, this was basicaly ok since the soldiers plundered the country for money and food (which is why no nation would have an army in thier own territory, that would ruin thier infrastructure and agriculture), but when a regimnent was disbanded every single soldier had to get payed for his services, this made disbanding armies a huge finacial undertaking, this is also why in most peace treatys of the time you will see an an amount of money to be payed be the "losing" nation to the "winning" nation, these sums where called satisfaction (a word whit many meanings it would seem ).
I think that disbanding a unit should cost twice as much as supporting it (in gold that is).

[Straybow]

Even in the nineteenth century the same problem persisted. In the American Civil War the Northern states were burdened with trying to move prisoners of war both ways. They refused to pay for transportation of their own men whose conscription had expired while prisoners in the South, etc. Quite a mess.

[Biddles]

Cyclotron has a great idea. Changing the support type with the government type allows a more realistic support structure.

1. However, cyclotron's actual factors need to be adjusted or playtested. For example, a communist government would have a production bonus. Then your having them support nationally from production. IMHO you wouldn't even notice support costs under a commmunist government if that were to be the case. IRL though (I'm not one of those advocating total realism however -> The communists really did notice support costs because they were such a huge part of the budget. I'm not saying that the way cyclotron has it isn't fine, but they would definetly need to be playtested to make sure that one or the other wasn't far too powerful.

2. How would SE affect this. If SE is included, would just the government choices have support modifiers or would the economic ones have them as well. Only having them for government choices would be the simpler way to go, but would sacrifice realsim. For example, you wouldn't have the communism choice (since communism would be gov: Oligarchy, econ: socialist) but an oligarchy support situation probably wouldn't be the same as communism. (Sorry I haven't explained that well, I can't seem to find the words I need.) However if you had factors for both gov and econ then you probably could model the communism support by using the correct modifiers for each of gov: oligarchy and econ: socialist. However doing that you would have to be careful that that wouldn't change the outcome for gov: democracy econ: socialist (welfare state?). Either way it will be a minefield for SE.

[This message has been edited by Biddles (edited February 24, 2001).]

[down th' pub]

How about we make the support indicator sensitive; if neme=Henrik support=gold, if not support=production.

Or if US: support(Gold)=twice(everyone else put together)

How about a tech which changes it from a feudal system (local) to Democratic (National)

Sorry if I said anyting reasonable...

[Sabre2th]

I haven't been online much lately, but there were some good ideas in here. I hope Firaxis has been keeping up with the message board.

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"We don't know a millionth of one percent about anything."
-Thomas A. Edison