Balance: Frigates

one range is just fine. Age of Sail warships had rather short range, even for their time. It was absolutely impossible to inflict damage on another warship without exposing yourself to their guns as well, especially in formation combat. So Frigates pewpewing each other away with 2 range and massive stacking is absolutely eye-rolling and the reason I don't play on continents anymore. On land you can't have 10 archers kill 5 archers without taking any damage, but somehow on the sea that's possible
 
one range is just fine. Age of Sail warships had rather short range, even for their time. It was absolutely impossible to inflict damage on another warship without exposing yourself to their guns as well, especially in formation combat. So Frigates pewpewing each other away with 2 range and massive stacking is absolutely eye-rolling and the reason I don't play on continents anymore. On land you can't have 10 archers kill 5 archers without taking any damage, but somehow on the sea that's possible

If you nerf the range of frigates, then you have to nerf the range of the galleass, all archers, and the cannon (based on your argument).
 
Lowered range on frigates would be a great change. This would mean most cities could only be accessed by 2 frigates, and a power 30-40 city with crossbow support might be able to hold this off. Also, this would allow gatling guns to be useful vs frigates.
 
Lowered range on frigates would be a great change.

This is a bit drastic for my taste. A 2 tiles access would be almost impossible to use without being trolled down by 3-4 Xbows surrounding the landing point. Maybe giving a slight city% attack bonus to compensate. You still need to kill units around ;)
 
This is a bit drastic for my taste. A 2 tiles access would be almost impossible to use without being trolled down by 3-4 Xbows surrounding the landing point. Maybe giving a slight city% attack bonus to compensate. You still need to kill units around ;)

I was seriously thinking about Frigates and balance and then this post made me painfully realize how poorly thought out the ranged combat in this game is to begin with. Crossbowmen shooting miles upon miles into the open seas and sinking ships. Keshiks shooting miles upon miles on the land and annihilating Riflemen. Longbowmen with the range of artillery. :sad:

When I think about it I have never read any "x is OP" type of threads about non-ranged units.
 
I think they are fine. Civs that choose to invest strategic resources into sea units should have a unit that can control a coast line. Why shouldn't navy focused civs get a unit with some punch?
 
By the time you get frigates, Iron isn't really a strategic resource anymore, if it ever was one due to the terrible tech path for Longswordsmen and the excellent tech path for Pikemen. It's basically +1 hammer on a tile.
 
By the time you get frigates, Iron isn't really a strategic resource anymore, if it ever was one due to the terrible tech path for Longswordsmen and the excellent tech path for Pikemen. It's basically +1 hammer on a tile.

What does this mean? That no one in a position to build Frigates is limited by their iron capacity?
 
No you don't. Except for the Galleass.

I was seriously thinking about Frigates and balance and then this post made me painfully realize how poorly thought out the ranged combat in this game is to begin with. Crossbowmen shooting miles upon miles into the open seas and sinking ships. Keshiks shooting miles upon miles on the land and annihilating Riflemen. Longbowmen with the range of artillery. :sad:

When I think about it I have never read any "x is OP" type of threads about non-ranged units.

Your argument was that the range of actual frigates was very limited, and so we should reduce the range to 1 tile (like late-game archery units), but their weapon was the cannon. Individual cannons on frigates were inaccurate, but their range was much greater than an archer. If you nerfed frigate range based on "realistic range", you'd have the problem of archery units still with "unrealistic range", and you'd also have precedent to limit the range of cannons.

The whole point of having a 2 tile range is so that a ranged unit can support a melee unit, especially during a siege. Nerfing frigate range will make it impossible to capture a well-defended city from the sea until battleships.
 
Without wishing to offend anyone, I find all the threads on 'this or that unit is OP' a bit odd. It's a strategic game; these are the pieces and these are the rules on what they can and can't do. I personally consider threads on imbalances within/between civs to be a valid premise, but single units? As well argue that some chess units are OP or not true-to-life.
 
a good strategic games needs good balance ,,,

rules need to be thought well to have a fun game

Totally agree with you, just don't see that the answer lies in nerfing some units. If it was the case that only the AI or the player had access to a particular unit type then it would be an imbalance, but it isn't - anyone can build frigates.
 
If it was the case that only the AI or the player had access to a particular unit type then it would be an imbalance, but it isn't - anyone can build frigates.

U dont get it ..

Thats like it d be OK if every1 could build giant death robots from turn 0 on.
A unit which kills everything in its way - just because ai CAN build it aswell thats doesnt mean its ok.

And actually Frigates ARE like giant death robots. At least on a water map.

If there is something clearly better as other stuff its a no brainer to build this thing - but diversity and close to equal choises make a game interesting.
 
I can't remember ever having fleet of AI frigates +melee ship come and blitz any of my cities all by themselves. I've seen them do it very occasionally with the support of (or more likely in support of) assaulting ground units, but never all by themselves. If I have any amount of crossbows and/or cannons on hand in and around the coastal city, I've always managed to destroy any such frigate attacks fairly easily, usually mostly wiping them out. The only scenario where massed frigates have made me pull my hair out, is the English men of war- when I take an English city on the coast, they always seem to have 30 bazillion of those boats (and caravels/privateers for melee attack) right offshore to quickly retake their city over and over again, until I can finally manage to eliminate enough of them to hang onto the city. Now that's a pain in my backside, grrr! Always end up finally capturing said english coastal cities with a population of only 1-2 citizens left in them due to all the yo-yo action.
 
then it would be an imbalance, but it isn't - anyone can build frigates.

but that is the rub. anyone can't. try playing a water map with your opponent having 2x iron (i'm talking Multiplayer). Well, it will soon be 'GG'. That to me is what makes Frigates so OP, say compared to xbow. it is very luck of the draw. similar to uranium and nukes. rich get richer, poor get killed.

Frigates are probably the #1 reason 95% of MP games are Pangea.
 
Your argument was that the range of actual frigates was very limited, and so we should reduce the range to 1 tile (like late-game archery units), but their weapon was the cannon. Individual cannons on frigates were inaccurate, but their range was much greater than an archer. If you nerfed frigate range based on "realistic range", you'd have the problem of archery units still with "unrealistic range", and you'd also have precedent to limit the range of cannons.

The whole point of having a 2 tile range is so that a ranged unit can support a melee unit, especially during a siege. Nerfing frigate range will make it impossible to capture a well-defended city from the sea until battleships.
first of all, range is not the same thing as actually being able to damage something. Yes, a cannonball was shot for half a mile, easily. BUT at that range, it didn't actually deal any damage anymore. Actual combat range for those cannons was much, much shorter. Arrows that fall down on a formation are a serious threat, even at max range.

as for the gameplay issues
Also, a well defended city should be hard to take! A city that only has 1-2 land tiles next to it is almost impossible to take by land, I agree with that. But that city would still be easily taken by 1 range frigates because of the sheer number you can get in range.

However, a city with only 1 coast tile can be bombarded by up to TWELVES frigates per turn, and even if it's a straight coast line up to SIX frigates can bombard it. That is enough to gun down a city

Your whole argument stands on the premise that a frigate fleet should be able to capture a city with only 1 adjacent coast tile by itself. A premise I doubt many players would agree with. You even contradict it yourself with that statement

"The whole point of having a 2 tile range is so that a ranged unit can support a melee unit, especially during a siege"

What is it now? Should Frigates support a land assault on cities with 1 coast tile, or should Frigates be able to carry out the entire assault by themselves?

What does this mean? That no one in a position to build Frigates is limited by their iron capacity?
This means, by the time Frigates come out, you should be sitting on so much iron it won't be the limiting factor anymore.

Without wishing to offend anyone, I find all the threads on 'this or that unit is OP' a bit odd. It's a strategic game; these are the pieces and these are the rules on what they can and can't do. I personally consider threads on imbalances within/between civs to be a valid premise, but single units? As well argue that some chess units are OP or not true-to-life.
If catapults could shoot 4 tiles with indirect fire and deal the damage cannons deal now, would they be balanced just because everyone can build them? If one unit dominates all other units to the point of the only way to counter a bunch of said unit is also bunching the same unit, there's clearly something wrong.

And just because the AI is too stupid to properly abuse this strategy doesn't make it any less silly. There's people who play multiplayer, and all forms of island multiplayer greatly suffer because the renaissance just becomes frigate spam.
 
Until the city power reaches around 50 (60?) there is no land-based solution to an attack force of 8 frigates and a privateer. This seems silly.

The land based option, is where you build your cities, and the defense of those cities.

Build your city where it can only be attacked from one or 2 ocean tiles...

You build a city at the end of a peninsula, where it can be surrounded by 8 frigates, you deserve to loose it. Just as a city in the middle of flat land is hard to defend from 8 CB's.

Any unit that requires a strategic resources deserve to be powerful, and difficult to counter.

The other land based option to frigates, take away the other civ's iron.

Just because a unit is difficult to counter, and takes some thought to counter, does NOT make that unit overpowered.
 
U dont get it ..

Thats like it d be OK if every1 could build giant death robots from turn 0 on.
A unit which kills everything in its way - just because ai CAN build it aswell thats doesnt mean its ok.

And actually Frigates ARE like giant death robots. At least on a water map.

If there is something clearly better as other stuff its a no brainer to build this thing - but diversity and close to equal choises make a game interesting.

Well T, like I said I wasn't trying to offend anyone. I agree that Frigates ARE powerful units but I honestly don't see they are OP. But there you go, that's just my opinion.
 
You counter frigates with frigates, bombers with fighters, nukes with nukes. These units are powerful for a reason.

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