I was watching the movie "Zulu" yesterday and starting thinking when I saw an earlier scene with a group of Zulu warriors picking up british rifles off of dead soldiers after a battle.

It reminded me of in Colnization when the 'indian tribes' could steal horses and guns from your settlements and arm thier units with them. Do you think it would be feasible at all to include something like this in civ 4/5? Say, for example, a horseman unit routs a musketeer unit, perhaps if conditions are just right (RNG?), you could re-arm that horseman unit with guns, in essence giving them a type of time-limited promotion (until they run out of gunpowder/bullets?). Any thoughts?

I like it - and with the new promotions system, i see no reason why this isn't a feasible idea. Sounds good to me!

Very clever. But then I guess the same theory could apply to techs (eg capture a city with a university have 1/3 chance of gaining an enemy tech etc.)

"Zulu" was a great movie....

I like this idea, but the only drawback is that would the horseman (as in your example) know how to use a rifle?

"Zulu" was a great movie....

I like this idea, but the only drawback is that would the horseman (as in your example) know how to use a rifle?

Store the guns & ammo in an inventory-system until the knowledge is learned - whether it be via manual research or as perhaps an option when conquering an enemy city perhaps. If you think about it, the people of the nation with guns should know how to basically use them, so it only seems logical that if you occupied that territory and wanted the tech, you could select it from a list of possible techs (that are relevent to city level perhaps) that the conquered city's nation have discovered.

In WW1, at least, I know the Allied air army discovered lots of things from the Fokkers.

In WW1, at least, I know the Allied air army discovered lots of things from the Fokkers.

I would perfer a system where when an inferior unit defeats a superior unit, the civ earns some tech towards the tech required to build the superior unit. I would consider that like reverse engineering.

Just imagine what would happen when a Spearnman defeated a Tank :ack:

lol how true.. and that could be the problem i dont know if they fixed it in civ4
i.e. i have once played on game on deity (and i lost pretty bad) and a spear was defending key city can came in with 3 tanks and it killed two before taking even 1 damage :sad: would the spearman hope into a tank and know what to do? lol i dont think so but good idea :p

Well getting techs by taking cities slants the game too heavily toward military. But, the ability to make advanced units on a limited basis when you are in contact with a more advanced power (allow the Indians to 'Buy' a limited number of say conscript level Cavalry units if they are in contact with someone at or above military tradition.) Indicating the black market/stolen guns...a captured gunpowder unit might just promote the unit that did the capturing... or allow one more in the 'buy box')

I don't like the idea. unbalances the game. What would the horseman upgrade to?

I was thinking a horseman would get a temporary promotion, allowing him to act as say, a conscript cavalry for the next 2 battles. And it wouldn't happen every time you defeat a superior unit, maybe just once in awhile, like civIII leaders.

Actually, I think that that would balance out the game a little bit. Think of the times that a far advanced civ has invaded the home of one lagging behind on an island. Even with a handful of knights it's not hard to swallow and entire civ in no time. This way, the inferior civ might get a chance to stave off an attack, regroup, and survive.

Well getting techs by taking cities slants the game too heavily toward military. But, the ability to make advanced units on a limited basis when you are in contact with a more advanced power (allow the Indians to 'Buy' a limited number of say conscript level Cavalry units if they are in contact with someone at or above military tradition.) Indicating the black market/stolen guns...a captured gunpowder unit might just promote the unit that did the capturing... or allow one more in the 'buy box')

First off Krikkitone, I don't know if your comment was in response to my idea.

Second, I agree with you. To have a city capture (aka Civ 1 and 2?) does create an advantage for the warlord.

Third, I am 100% for the idea of unit trading, unit loaning, which this idea largely falls under.

Taking advantage of the possible misunderstanding of my idea, I will further expand on it. I think that when an inferior unit defeats a more advanced unit, it should have the chance to gain tech points as a result of that.

What does this do?
1. Adds realism due to the reality of reverse engineering
2. takes power away from the military powerhouses that have the advantage to large numbers of advanced military. By giving the advantage to the less powerful, it puts them back in the game.
3. It gives only the benefit only to limited range of tech. If a spearman (of the Bablyonians) defeats a tank (of the French), as that cliche goes, and the Babylonians has not researched automobiles or any preceding trait, the Babylonians could recieve a few beakers towards researching that.
4. Restores balance to the game. Civ is a game of balance on many differnent levels, such as : Military, science, Population
5. Limited Scope: This scope is limited ONLY to military techs and only to the military units that have attacked the inferior civ.

If a civ has a signifant advantage, in 2 of theses areas, they can run away with game. This attempts to change that.

I really like that idea. Not unbalancing at all.

Remember that each turn is a year or more, and that each unit (which looks like one person) in fact represents thousands of people. A few captured weapons mean nothing on this scale unless you can learn how to make them as well as how to use them.

If you capture technology that's way ahead of you, probably you'll be able to do nothing with it at all. Spearman captures tank? Useless great lump of metal.

On the other hand, musketeer captures rifle? Might be able to learn something from it.

In principle, capturing slightly more advanced weapons should give a bit of a boost to your own research. But only a bit. If you're on muskets and you capture a rifle, after a good deal of work you might be able to produce a better musket or a crude rifle. But you wouldn't be able to produce a perfect copy of the captured weapons, because you wouldn't have the tools to make them, even if you understood the design perfectly.

Capturing an enemy city with its factories ought to be more help -- though, again, only if the technology is not too far advanced.

But in no case do you get an instant fast-forward to your enemy's higher technology.

Remember that all the steps in technology in the game are BIG steps, most of which took real civilizations centuries to achieve.

In SSS, I have also plan to include another feature: the "experience is knowledge" system.

If with your spearman you are fight cavalry, then you get some points in the tech giving cavalry, and if you fight long enough you can actually discover the tech without researching it.

In principle, capturing slightly more advanced weapons should give a bit of a boost to your own research. But only a bit. If you're on muskets and you capture a rifle, after a good deal of work you might be able to produce a better musket or a crude rifle. But you wouldn't be able to produce a perfect copy of the captured weapons, because you wouldn't have the tools to make them, even if you understood the design perfectly.

Rome made hundreds of copies of one shipwrecked Carthaginian ship. I think you can make copies. :p

Personally I think just contact/trade with a civ that is more advanced than you should be sufficient to speed up your research. Watching cars roll by your neighbours' lot while you're still riding horses might give you ideas, eh?

As for what I originally suggested, I didn't even think of getting any kind of tech bonus, I just thought of it as a battle-field event. Good idea, though...

EDIT: @Jonathan Yeah, I don't think speaman would be picking up tanks, but that's just common sense ;) . As for unit size, if you kill 1 000 rifleman with 1 000 horsemen, you're likely to have about 1000 rifles left in the field, no?

Rome made hundreds of copies of one shipwrecked Carthaginian ship. I think you can make copies. :p

You can make copies easily of slightly superior technology if you already have suitable tools and if the new principles involved are easy to understand. With the kind of technology jumps seen in Civ, I don't think this is generally true.

In fact, the technology trading that already happens in Civ is unrealistically fast in its effects -- except perhaps in modern times, with modern communications.

Personally I think just contact/trade with a civ that is more advanced than you should be sufficient to speed up your research.

Yes, agreed, to some extent.

Watching cars roll by your neighbours' lot while you're still riding horses might give you ideas, eh?

Yes, though it wouldn't necessarily tell you anything about how to make those magic machines.

As for what I originally suggested, I didn't even think of getting any kind of tech bonus, I just thought of it as a battle-field event.

More of a campaign than a battle, given that each exchange of fire takes a year or more.

As for unit size, if you kill 1 000 rifleman with 1 000 horsemen, you're likely to have about 1000 rifles left in the field, no?

Yes, trampled into the mud by all those horses! :) When you've finished cleaning them up, to use them for even one turn you need enough ammo to last the length of that turn -- which is a year or more in Civ.