UNITS v3.0 (hosted by technophile)

[Flavor Dave]

"This should deter the computer from using nukes all the time."

Well, maybe it's different for you, b/c of how you play or something, but the AI needs no excuse to nuke me. I've come to realize that when you get to modern (artillery) times, you have to make a decision: either hunker down in how ever many cities you have, and build the spaceship, or you have to get serious about conquest. Not necessarily to the point that you win by conquest, but at least to the point where they won't be trying to build the Manhattan Project. B/c if the AI can nuke you, even in a sneak attack, it will, to prevent you from winning.

But, again, maybe there's something in my style. I almost never commit more than one atrocity, so my rep is at the top. I've just found that the AI loves nukes, even if he doesn't have a paratrooper to drop in. That's really bloody annoying; it's a pain to clean up the pollution, but it doesn't make the game challenging.

[korn469]

nukes should be powerful...i mean for the past fifty years people have worried about the world ending in a nuclear holocaust, and to me SDI is a futuristic device, nobody in the world has a working SDI system, the patriot missle was good at hitting the fuel tank of a scud missle but if they had of been carrying a nuclear warhead it wouldn't have been effective at all. it turns out that the reagan era starwars program was just a bluff intended to strain the soviet economy...there is no nation as i am writing this that could stop a nuclear tipped ICBM, the only reason the threat of nuclear holocaust doesn't seem as likely is because it seems that cooler heads, and not some techilogical miracle can stop a nuclear war, in some ways today a nuclear war is even more likely to happen because of the proliferation of nuclear weapons

the non-proliferation treaty, salt I (strategic arms limitation treaty), salt II, and start (strategic arms reduction treaty) have done infinantly more from preventing a nuclear war than has any SDI system...so think twice before including a nuclear proof system SDI system into the game, and it should cost trillions of dollars to research, develop and deploy this system

another thing is stealth bombers shouldn't have a high defence value they should have the ability to attack and the other units can't retaliate, that's how stealth works, you can't kill what you can't see

korn469

[loinburger]

RE: nukes,

This is an old debate. Side A: Make nukes extremely powerful and have diplomatic penalties be extremely harsh. This will be realistic. Side B: The AI is inherently stupid and overuse of nukes can ruin a game.

I feel that Side A has been accounted for in that there are multiple nuke sizes--tactical, strategic, and (if you really want super-nukes) planet busters. The diplomatic penalties, you will recall, go in Diplomacy, as it is assumed that nukes carry penalties with them (the magnitude is not a discussion to be held here).

Side B still has the problem of the AI being stupid. Making nukes more powerful and diplomatic penalties more severe will be useful (somewhat) for multiplayer, but the AI just doesn't care. So in this I'm siding with Flavor Dave.

SDI, as Korn has pointed out, is a futuristic development. However, it is also a necessity for the way the AI uses nukes, so I think that SDI should stay.

The only way to limit nuke useage, I think, is though diplomacy. If a large nuclear capable country was in dire enough straits that it would consider launching its nukes in one last "blaze of glory", the nation would first splinter into fifty faction nations, most of which would squander their resources fighting each other. Something akin to this has already been proposed in Diplomacy, I think. The nuclear capability of the civ would be incredibly diminished, and if anything the civ would have to use its nukes against its splinter nations.

Revolutions and splinter civs are the way to limit nuclear weapons use, not diplomatic penalties. Diplomatic penalties don't mean squat if your civ is about to be obliterated.

[korn469]

i have a few proposals

1. that each unit should have a stealth rating this could be a percentage like from 1 to 100 percent and this would determine if a unit like a stealth bomber or submarine or a guerilla could engage another unit without being detected. this would mean you see your unit engage in combat but you don't see where the attack came from and your unit can't counter attack most units would have a very low rating but some special units could have a high stealth rating, stealth units are ivisable on the map until detected and they can attack an enemy with the enemy being able to damage them

2. guerrilla units should be controled by the AI insurgents, revolutionaries, guerillas, partisans all units like this and not part of your nations armed forces should be under AI control, you should be able to give them goal but the AI would carry them out and it would have it's own agenda. the mujha-hadeen(sp?) was a guerilla backed by the US during the Soviet occupation of afganistan but i don't the US government had very much control of it's operations and so forth making guerillas AI controled with their own objectives would make civ3 more realistic and more interesting...it would give you a chance to interact with the guerilla leaders

instead of building guerilla units they could be created in four ways...if a city is conquered guerillas appear

if a city has a high level of unhappines then guerillas appear. maybe give each city a number like the eco damage number in SMAC except it represents how likely the city is going to have insurgency, this could be an insurgency number

you can fund guerillas in another civ. you pay x-amount of cash and then the insurgency number raises in of a civ's cities, and if you raise it high enough then guerillas appear

you can build units that train guerillas, you send them and they hit a city and a bumber of guerillas units from zero to three appear, these could be green berets for democracies, and viet cong recruiters for communist

3. when biological weapons are used or in ancient times when a plauge occurs it should have a chance of infecting cities close to the one that got infected unless that city was quarantined

korn469

[The diplomat]

Flavor Dave: the problem you raise about nukes is actually an AI problem not a unit problem. The AI is designed to prevent the player from winning which means that it would use nukes just to ruin your plans. What civ3 needs is an AI that acts like a leader of a civ and therefore acts in the best interests of itself. The AI should behave according to the belief that "nuclear war is bad and should be avoided".
Nukes should be powerful to the extent of reality. In civ2, nukes were severely underpowered and as a result players faced the horribly unbalanced strategy of nukes+paratroops.
Makes nukes powerful but have an AI that is deterred from using them.

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No permanent enemies, no permanent friends.

[loinburger]

The question stands regarding nukes: Why should the summary be changed?

[Theben]

Nukes aside, I do have a last UNITS idea regarding the workshop. Since it is likely that a unit workshop will be in civ3, I'd like the ability to also have something similar to civ2 (pre-generated units). I don't know if you can modify the cost of the unit equipment in SMAC (haven't looked yet), but I guarantee people will want to be able to change the costs for modpacks and scenarios regardless of the power of the unit. So this is what should be done:
[list=1][*] In an editor screen, you build the unit as normal, listing what makes it obsolete and what makes it available (or do this in the .txt files). Modified images should be available (or can modify in editor?)[*] You also input the cost of the unit; you can select any cost.[*] SMAC had 64 spaces for units in the workshop. Allow that many or more in civ3. The unit created above will be saved in a file, and will become available in the workshop list when the tech is researched (or whatever enables new units in civ3), "obsolete" when obsolete, and "retired" automatically when the last such unit is removed from play. [/list=a]

[loinburger]

Korn:

"1" has been covered in Combat. I didn't want to go too much into ideas that would alter the combat system.

"3" has been covered in Miscellaneous, I believe (haven't checked that thread for a while). Theben's created a disease model that includes diseases spreading from city to city.

I don't believe that "2" has been covered anywhere yet, so I've gone ahead and put that in.

Theben:

I've put your ideas in section 5.4: Customization. Let me know if I've done wrong in their translation to the summary.
<font size=1 face=Arial color=444444>[This message has been edited by technophile (edited September 28, 1999).]</font>

[Kropotkin]

Another point about the guerilla unit: A guerilla unit that appears without the support of a foreigen power should be funded by the city/area it comes from. That is, fund and/or resources would come from the enemy of the guerilla. Why you ask? because most guerrials has some sort of popular support and is supported by average citizens thus taking resourses from the gov't. The VC took up taxes in areas controlled by them etc.

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Kropotkin
Your personal nihilist on call
olejan98@student.umu.se

[loinburger]

bump

[Mo]

Guerilla units should also have a limited power. As in once they have acomplished they either disband or join the regular military of the nation they are supporting.
ex: If guerillas spawn because one of your cities was captured, they should fight the capturing civilization, but only within a small radius of the city and they should concentrate on liberating your city. Once the guerillas have captured the city they should most likely return the city to you and then join your military or disband.

[loinburger]

bump bump bump. NOW QUIT POSTING UNITS IDEAS IN SEPARATE TOPICS! Thank you.

[JamesJKirk]

The Communist govt type should provid free peasant armies, in very much the same way that Fundie provided fundies in Civ2. These would be nearly free, but have virtually no attack value, at least compared to modern armies, they would be basically canon fodder.
Great idea, eh?!?!

[Cosilongo]

Some thoughts around the idea of patriots/ reservists which I think is an important one. For example, most of the saxon troops at the Battle of Hastings were this kind of levy. I think large walled cities like London were never attacked in mediaeval times, because their size made them almost mpossible to overcome. They had to be forced to surrender by other means.

Maybe there could be an option to improve the quality of these troops by spending a certain amount each turn, to raise them from a pitchfork wielding peasant to something like a militia. This option would be an interesting one, because if there was unhappiness, these could rise up and attack any soldiers in the town in an attempt to
overthrow your rule and declare independence. So instead of as in Civ2 soldiers making some unhappy citizens content, these would stay unhappy, but only if the strength of the city population was more than the soldiers in the town they would rise up and attack them. So you could have the option of keeping the peasants weak, not worrying about happiness and controlling them with relatively few soldiers (a feudal approach) or training them up to provide a cheap means of defence, but
having to keep them happy.

You could use spies to smuggle arms to the populations of unhappy cities, so that they would have a bigger chance of overcoming any
soldiers stationed there.

[loinburger]

bump