Gallic Swordsman: Is it overpriced?

[Artifex]

Is the gallic swordsman overpriced? Or is the cost about right?

Basically it cost 20 more shields for an extra movement point.

What do you think? Does it need to be modified? Will a cost reduction to 40 points make it too overpowered?

[Dinner]

The short anwser is yes. It ruins an other wise excellent UU; they should lower the price by about ten shields in order to make it more competetive with the other new UUs.

[Artifex]

I was considering making a mod and decreasing it's cost by 10 shields. I just didn't want to unbalance the game too much, so I refrained. I'm not too great at numbers crunching.

[WarpStorm]

I have tried it at 40 shields and that seems about right to me. I know that it used to be that price and the guys at Firaxis purposefully raised its price because they thought it was too cheap.

[player1]

No, the cost is OK.

[Artifex]

Maybe I should make a poll. Seems alot of peeps think it is overpriced.

[WarpStorm]

At 30 it would be way underpriced. At 50 I think it is a little overpriced.

Lets look at the price of some of the units in the same rough class:

Swordsman 3/2/1 30 iron
Legionary 3/3/1 30 iron
Immortal 4/2/1 30 iron
M. Warrior 3/1/2 30 horse
Med. Inf. 4/2/1 40 iron
Gallic S 3/2/2 50 iron
Keshik 4/2/2 60 horse
Conquis. 3/2/2* 70 horse
Knight 4/3/2 70 iron+horse
Rider 4/3/3 70 iron+horse

Looking at this table I think some of the original UUs were too cheap.

[Artifex]

Looking at your chart your assumption is correct. Take the chinese rider for example. If we used the same rules for the rider it would cost 90 shields instead of 70. Basically the chinese rider gets it's extra movement point for free, while the gallic swordsman is charged 20 sheilds for it's extra point.

That doens't seem fair does it? Or am I missing something here? Explain thier logic in doing that?

[monkspider]

I thought 30 was fine, 50 is preposterous!
Compare this to the 30 shield Immortal? The cost is nearly twice as much, is the G. Swordsman twice as useful? Firaxis does silly things sometimes.

[Artifex]

Look at the Chinese. Their UU is way powerful as I described in the above thread. They get thier movement point for free, then they have the strongest civ trait (industrius) followed by the strong militaristic trait.

Compare them to the Celts. The Celts have the militaristic trait as well..and a decent trait in religious, although I think industrius is more powerful than religious.

So China wins on traits, then they win on the UU they get an extra movement point for free? So this is balance? It would seem they would have the Celt UU get the price break..not the other way around.

Also add to that the fact that 20 sheilds early in the game is alot of shields for that time period, factor in inflation and it's easily comparable to 30-40 shields on the middle ages once you have your cities grown and infrastructure built up. So really the chinese rider would cost 100-110 shields if applying the logic that firaxis applies to the Celts. Instead you get the devastating Rider for a meager 70 shields.

I am just trying to figure out firaxis logic on this. If it is all about play balance, sometimes it just doesn't make much sense to me.

Player1 explain to me why this makes sense? Since you say 50 shields is good for the gallic swordsman.

[WarpStorm]

In general, the original UUs from Civ3 were a bargain compared to the PTW ones. If you assume that UUs get some sort of price break for their value as a unit (it sure seems that the original Civ3 ones did), then most of the PTW units are more expensive for their value.

I'd rather have an 5 Immortals or 5 Mounted Warriors (or 2 Riders) than 3 Gallic Swordmen for the same number of shields.

Well, like Firaxis told me last time I complained about something that can be easily changed in the editor, "Warp, that's why we put an editor in there".

[Major Guz]

If you compare the UU from normal Civ3, it seems that all get an extra attribute boosted compared to their "regular" counterparts (Greek hoplite = 1-3-1, Zulu Impi =1-2-2 and spearman from which these units stem = 1-2-1; French musketeer = 3-4-1 instead of 2-4-1 for musketman).

Having said this the cost for the Cartaginan Numidian Mercenary which is 2 -3 -1 (2 attributed boosted instead of 1), has a 10 shield increase in cost and seems logical [1 boost for free, the second at an increase].

What about the impi (which also has 2 movement) it should cost 40 instead of 20 shields? (Off course, I compare a defensive with an offensive unit which cannot honourably be compared so this comparison is slightly off).

I can live with the 40 shields (for the Gallic Swordsman that is, I mean retreat is a sweet thing and counts much more heavy at an offensive unit), but from the "one boost for free" point of view the Gallic Swordsmen should cost 30 (but I agree that that is ridiculously cheap) so I would vote for 40 shields.

Just my 2 (euro)cents

Guz

[The Mad Monk]

Compared with other units, and given its UU status, 40 is probably about right, maybe a little on the high side.

[player1]

Originally posted by monkspider
I thought 30 was fine, 50 is preposterous!
Compare this to the 30 shield Immortal? The cost is nearly twice as much, is the G. Swordsman twice as useful? Firaxis does silly things sometimes.

Yes it's twice as useful.

While Immortal is in fact "expendable" (useful only agaianst enemies which have no Horses), Galic Swordsmen is not.

He has enough good attack (attack of 4 is really not too much needed in anicent age), good mobility and vey much needed denfese of 2 (too defend againt Horses).

And to that, good traits of Celts, and plus that it's UU, so it won't be so tough to pay 50 shileld while you'll in GA.

Synergy of bonuses is what makes him most powerful.

.

P.S.
Of course there is another one reson.

Firaxis probably though that maybe it should not be good to make Horsemen useless after you get Galic S. And if GS was 40shileds, producting 30shields Horsmen would surely be waste of time.

This way, with 50 shields, making some 30shields Horsemen could be smart, at least to use against units with defense of 1 and GS against tougher targets.

P.P.S.
Now is this unit fine as it is?
Yes, I plyed games with it and had no real problems.

With 40 cost?
I assume it won't be too much dominating, but you'll never again bother with Horses.

[CerberusIV]

I reduced the price to 40 shields in my mod. 50 shields is too much when all the other ancient era units are 30 at most. That is still more than the cost of a horseman so horses are worthwhile for scouting and pillaging.

I also edited the Celts to start with the wheel instead of warrior code. Partly historic as the celts, in Britain at least, were famed for chariot warfare, and partly to make it worth going for horses.

I eventually changed the costs of many units, especially the industrial and modern ones because I wasn't happy with the progression of costs or the cost compared to the shield production of a civ after industrialisation.