There have been many discussions on expanding nuclear capable units. Lets see if we can get a comprehensive list of sensible units to make the strategy of nuclear deterents and M.A.D. somewhat more engrossing than just, "Look, up in the sky! Is it a bird? Is it a plane? No, it's an ICBM!" If we have bombshelters, we might as well have:

Crucially needed:
Nuke carrying Sub
tactical nuke for sub and airstrips (btw, ARE there airstrips in the game?)
singel square nuke bomber plane (for before rocketry)
Chemical weapons (mustardgas artillery for early on, nervegas for later)

Might be fun:
Different classes of nuke bombers
Multi warhead nukes.
H-bombs, A-bombs, newtron bombs, etc.
Biological weapons.

I totally agreed with the direction in that thread, and hope you get the ball rolling on the creation of some needed units to fill the gaps in the later eras unit list.

Just some ideas that come to mind to help tighten your search:
A Nuclear Submarine that is a launch platform for ballistic missiles. A good template for this would be an American Ohio-class SSBN or a Russian Typhoon-class SSBN or Delta III-class SSBN.
A graphic for a simple gravity bomb to represent the early nukes. Just a big, fat, unguided warhead.
Chemical and bio weapons are tricky. How would you depict them being dispersed? By plane? By artillery? By specialized infantry wearing those cool-looking moon suits?
And then you have multiple nuclear-capable strategic bombers you can choose from: The B-29 Superfortress, B-36 Peacemaker, B-52 Stratofortress, Avro Vulcan, Tu-95 Bear, Tu-22M Backfire, and Tu-160 Blackjack are some of the most well known.

Is there a place for cruise missiles or short-range attack missiles?

I'm thinking "chemical" weapons. A bit like an ICBm but affect infantry and population only...and a new promotion too "NBC warfare" allowing units greater chance at surving a chem/bio or nuke attack.

There were artillery cannons that could fire tactical nukes. It could be limited to rail and look like a train car with a huge turret sticking out with an attached ammo car.

I'd like to see ICBM's have a good chance of being destroyed from other nukes so that the other options become needed as a deterrent.

I'd like to see nukes cause massive unhappiness if kept in a city, so that civs will be forced to keep them at airbases or in silos. (which could be an immobile land unit or tile improvement)

Would it be possible to have nukes of varying power? Specifically to encompass the following:

You split the atom an get everything figured out, allowing you to build Fat Man and Little Boy sized nuclear devices. These are of course gravity bombs. You could build a specialized bomber to deploy them, it could carry one at a time. Due to the inexperience of those making the bombs, this would only affect one tile in-game.

Then you develop better nukes, and better rocket technology. The V-2 equivalent, for instance, or a little better than that. So now you have tactical nukes (In the Civ III style) which you can deploy directly from cities or from submarines. These would detonate and destroy the standard 9 tile area of the world.

Having developed expert rocket and nuclear technology the next level of nuclear bombs can be constructed - ICBMs. Delpoyable to anywhere on the planet, these massively destructive weapons destroy two tiles in every direction. So if you shave the corners off, you'd hit a total of 21 tiles with it. This shows the huge advancements made, where the case was once that a single city would be heavily damaged, to today where an entire region could be destroyed with a single bomb.

And maybe you could stick the other sizes of nuclear warhead onto the ICBMs, for tactical purposes. Maybe there's a specific stack of units or encroaching army you want to take out.

And of course, everyone wants a doomsday weapon which will destroy everything within fifteen tiles :D

Of course this would probably need a new technology or two as well.

SCUD's anyone

There have been many discussions on expanding nuclear capable units. Lets see if we can get a comprehensive list of sensible units to make the strategy of nuclear deterents and M.A.D. somewhat more engrossing than just, "Look, up in the sky! Is it a bird? Is it a plane? No, it's an ICBM!" If we have bombshelters, we might as well have:

Crucially needed:
Nuke carrying Sub
tactical nuke for sub and airstrips (btw, ARE there airstrips in the game?)
singel square nuke bomber plane (for before rocketry)
Chemical weapons (mustardgas artillery for early on, nervegas for later)

Might be fun:
Different classes of nuke bombers
Multi warhead nukes.
H-bombs, A-bombs, newtron bombs, etc.
Biological weapons.

Biological weapons is a great idea. I believe all of these need to be implemented. Anyone planning on tacking this?

Maybe the trick is to have cruise missiles, ICBMs, bombers, etc. being sort of hollow vessels.... then you construct the warheads separately.... and you can have different kinds of warheads: dirty bombs, hydrogen bombs, regular ol' atomic bombs, chemical... biological... maybe incendiary bombs for those who like to incinerate life on a smaller scale? The warheads themselves can't attack, and the missiles and bombers themselves are useless without a warhead. Or, at least, bombers and missiles ought to have a default convential weapons payload which can be switched to something more holocaust-ish.

A biological weapon could have continued effects after being used by spreading to surrounding areas.. and could have the potential to backfire on the user as well as being shunned by the international community.

A biological, neutron and chemical bomb would kill the inhabitants and defenders but leave the buildings and improvements intact.

Maybe the trick is to have cruise missiles, ICBMs, bombers, etc. being sort of hollow vessels.... then you construct the warheads separately.... and you can have different kinds of warheads: dirty bombs, hydrogen bombs, regular ol' atomic bombs, chemical... biological... maybe incendiary bombs for those who like to incinerate life on a smaller scale? The warheads themselves can't attack, and the missiles and bombers themselves are useless without a warhead. Or, at least, bombers and missiles ought to have a default convential weapons payload which can be switched to something more holocaust-ish.

A biological weapon could have continued effects after being used by spreading to surrounding areas.. and could have the potential to backfire on the user as well as being shunned by the international community.

A biological, neutron and chemical bomb would kill the inhabitants and defenders but leave the buildings and improvements intact.

I like this idea... the warheads would have a range of zero.

On a slightly differing topic:
I'm also wondering if the Nukes shouldn't do extra damage to any/all electric producing power plants?

Or, you could have a "spy" type unit with a briefcase bomb. Invisible unit that can bombard as a nuclear weapon. Gotta have a special unit to be able to see him or shomething.

IRC Sulla said there are no airbases.

There were artillery cannons that could fire tactical nukes. It could be limited to rail and look like a train car with a huge turret sticking out with an attached ammo car.


My Field Artillary unit is composed of weapons much like CivIII's Radar Artillary. We are also capable of launching nukes from our MRLS rockets.




___________________________________________
PV2 Collison

If there are no airbases, it begs the question: can we MAKE airbases?

B-52 or B-29 that int destrioed on use!!!!

I don't think the bomber should be destroyed in the process of dropping a nuke. Like I said, bombers should be empty vessels that are then loaded by different payloads. When it drops a nuke, it's payload is expended. It then returns to the home base just like any other bomber, and can then be reloaded with either A) another WMD or B) convention weapon payload. Conventional weapons payload would be infinite. You don't have to build a conventional bomb unit to be loaded into a bomber, but you would have to build a WMD warhead before it could be loaded. Conventional bombs would be the default. So you could have B-52s and B-29s that would drop conventional bombs as well as WMDs.

That's my two cents anyway...

If there are no airbases, it begs the question: can we MAKE airbases?

With the SDK, certainly. If not until then, we can do it the same way we did in vanilla Civ3 I- immobile defenseless land units that transport air units only.

I don't think the bomber should be destroyed in the process of dropping a nuke. Like I said, bombers should be empty vessels that are then loaded by different payloads. When it drops a nuke, it's payload is expended.


I agree completly..
a friend of mine had a university course 'strategic studies II: the atomic age' all about warfare when nukes are involved... it was very cool. One simulation they ran 'South America: 2050' they divided the class into groups of 5 assigned them countries, gave them resources and a week to plan and talk between groups, then they started with 2 minute turns seeing the evoloution of conflicts there... they simulated very few different things as far as military units go: conventional warfare (which could develope into spastic nuclear war, chance per turn based on the intensity of the conflict. this I guess would include all the short range surface to surface missiles/ rockets/ neutron bombs/ briefcase bombs/nuclear landmines...), short range balistic missiles (which you could only hit your neighbours with), ICBM's (unlimited range), bombers (reuseable 50% losses per use), nuclear subs (can't be targeted), and SDI shield units (could stop one bomb each regardless of source, higher price than any bomb)

Any time you nuke someone you decide if it's counter force or counter value (hit the units or population/infrastructure). If you do enough counter value damage to a country it colapses.

you could wirte 'doomsday device' programs, to automatically launch nukes under certian conditions, and submit them before hand.

the results of the simulation: my friend's alarm clock battery died, he had submitted his aliance's doomsday device program to the teacher but hadn't distributed the copies to the rival countries, which was what he planned to do just as class was starting... by the time he got to class a nuclear war had started and set off the doomsday device, over 100 million dead, the only nations uncollapsed at the end were the three in his alliance.. all because od a dead battery, and if you read up on the cold war similar things have almost happened in the real world...

I agree completly..
a friend of mine had a university course 'strategic studies II: the atomic age' all about warfare when nukes are involved... it was very cool. One simulation they ran 'South America: 2050' they divided the class into groups of 5 assigned them countries, gave them resources and a week to plan and talk between groups, then they started with 2 minute turns seeing the evoloution of conflicts there... they simulated very few different things as far as military units go: conventional warfare (which could develope into spastic nuclear war, chance per turn based on the intensity of the conflict. this I guess would include all the short range surface to surface missiles/ rockets/ neutron bombs/ briefcase bombs/nuclear landmines...), short range balistic missiles (which you could only hit your neighbours with), ICBM's (unlimited range), bombers (reuseable 50% losses per use), nuclear subs (can't be targeted), and SDI shield units (could stop one bomb each regardless of source, higher price than any bomb)

Any time you nuke someone you decide if it's counter force or counter value (hit the units or population/infrastructure). If you do enough counter value damage to a country it colapses.

you could wirte 'doomsday device' programs, to automatically launch nukes under certian conditions, and submit them before hand.

the results of the simulation: my friend's alarm clock battery died, he had submitted his aliance's doomsday device program to the teacher but hadn't distributed the copies to the rival countries, which was what he planned to do just as class was starting... by the time he got to class a nuclear war had started and set off the doomsday device, over 100 million dead, the only nations uncollapsed at the end were the three in his alliance.. all because od a dead battery, and if you read up on the cold war similar things have almost happened in the real world...

Tuition well-spent to breed another Hitler... :p