Why are ICBMs so expensive.

[solar]

Why are the ICBMs so expensive in Civ3. During the Cold War both the US and USSR had thousands of ICBMs. Building that many ICBMs is almost impossible in Civ3. The ICBMs in Civ3 cannot represent a group of ICBMs like a tank represents a group of tanks because if an ICBM was ever used against a city only one would need to be fired. I know that this would make the game unbalanced, but they are unbalanced in real life. If the US and USSR had gone to war they would have destroyed themselves, but this does not happen in Civ3. There is never a positon where two civs can destroy themselves in a war.

[Iron Chancellor]

ICBMs are expensive. The USSR fell because they spent most of their money on arms and nukes to keep even with the USA, in addition to blowing it on a giant sponge like SDI. The USA won the cold war because a powerful free market economy can support a larger military and a few wasteful projects.

Real life ICBMs are expensive, the danger is of small suitcase bombs made of ICBM materials purchased dirt cheap from corrupt officials

[Mr. Schwang]

In case you don't know Solar how much ICBM's cost in real life, they're ALOT.

And if you don't like the cost of them, it is very easy to change that in the editor.

[asleepathewheel]

Re: Why are ICBMs so expensive.

Originally posted by solar
. There is never a positon where two civs can destroy themselves in a war.

Sure, you can't have a nuke war that would destroy everything, as the cities would eventually be reduced to size one, need trooops to occupy.

That said, I have had nuclear exchanges which have been quite devastating (at least for the other side , I wait until I have SDI, then attack, reducing the counter strike quite nicely.)

While you can't eradicate cities, you can reduce them to rubble, as they destroy both improvements and population. Andperhaps more importantly, you can destroy the trade of the civ. Nuke every luxury, every resource, every airport/harbor. Will bring a civ to its knees quickly. Not destroying a civ, exactly, but quite punishing.

[Being rambling/] As an aside, I kinda wish that if you went through one of these wars, and have access to resources and trade routes cut off, you would lose technologies (going through a dark age ala warday, alas babylon, the postman etc) or that the cities cut off (or distant) from the capital would revolt and perhaps secede. [End rambling/]

Also, a nuke attack will destroy all of the units in the city (eventually) but they leave the resident nukes intact, thus allowing a return exchange and the abiltiy to harm the other. Granted, the system could be a lot cooler, a MAD system or whatever, but this does ok.

I wish there was a way to transport the ICBMs in civ3. Is there? am I insane? I'm hoping they will allow us to use the airbases in PTW as silos.

I've been toying with the idea of modding the nukes in my game. Since there is only one type of ICBM, i am pondering adding additional nukes to 2-3 later techs, each dropping the cost of the unit. This is to reflect the newer, sexier missles we have in RL, since we can't change the effect, we can make them cheaper thus allowing more to be built.

[asleepathewheel]

Re: Re: Why are ICBMs so expensive.

Originally posted by asleepathewheel
While you can't eradicate cities, you can reduce them to rubble, as they destroy both improvements and population. Andperhaps more importantly, you can destroy the trade of the civ. Nuke every luxury, every resource, every airport/harbor. Will bring a civ to its knees quickly. Not destroying a civ, exactly, but quite punishing.

My apologies, that was probably an overstatement, destroying the buildings and population would be more damaging than just the trade of a civ. But it is fun to go after the luxuries and trade routes as punishment.


I should add that the green house effect is painful as well.
In my current game, 25 squares were effected in one turn!

[Jaguar]

Re: Why are ICBMs so expensive.

Originally posted by solar
Why are the ICBMs so expensive in Civ3. During the Cold War both the US and USSR had thousands of ICBMS

No, they had thousands of warheads, not thousands of ICBMs.

[Blue Moose]

Originally posted by Iron Chancellor
ICBMs are expensive. The USSR fell because they spent most of their money on arms and nukes to keep even with the USA, in addition to blowing it on a giant sponge like SDI. The USA won the cold war because a powerful free market economy can support a larger military and a few wasteful projects.

Real life ICBMs are expensive, the danger is of small suitcase bombs made of ICBM materials purchased dirt cheap from corrupt officials

I think a bigger reason why Russia fell is because it was basically a third world country trying to keep up with a first world one. The government didn't help, but the fact is that they didn't have a good infrastructure either (because they spent money on weapons as opposed to other things).

[Panag]

hi ,

its a realistic goal , .....

if you have a good city , that can make 70 shields a turn , its no problem to make them , .....

in real live it used to take about 18-24 months to make one , ....and costs a large amount of money , ....

have a nice day

[Gen. Maximus]

Yeah, i got cities that have access have 100 sheilds a turn before, I blast off ICBMs just for the fun of it to punish and contaminate my rivals cities

[solar]

No, they had thousands of warheads, not thousands of ICBMs.

Sorry, I guess I misunderstood the amounts. Never mind this thread.

[Patriqvium]

Re: Why are ICBMs so expensive.

Originally posted by solar
There is never a positon where two civs can destroy themselves in a war.

Which is one of the reasons I liked Alpha Centauri; turning a whole continent into Swiss cheese with 'them Planet Busters gave you that nice omnipotent feeling.

[Gen. Maximus]

yeah, right! We sink entire continents underwater with those but it wouldn't be realistic on Civ3!

[Iron Chancellor]

Originally posted by Blue Moose


I think a bigger reason why Russia fell is because it was basically a third world country trying to keep up with a first world one. The government didn't help, but the fact is that they didn't have a good infrastructure either (because they spent money on weapons as opposed to other things).

That's exactly what I said. All there money was spent on the arms race and financing international communism, so they had no cash left over for infrastructure, investment, etc. A country like Russia only has so much wealth that can be taken before it collapses

[Carver]

Re: Re: Why are ICBMs so expensive.

Originally posted by asleepathewheel

I wish there was a way to transport the ICBMs in civ3. Is there? am I insane? I'm hoping they will allow us to use the airbases in PTW as silos.

A few weeks ago someone posted a way to make ICBMs mobile and even load them onto subs - thus giving the full SLBM effect of subs that can nuke any city on Earth. But I don't remember how .

[WarpStorm]

It's easy, just remove the immobile flag and add the tactical missile flag.