Drones in BNW?

I don't know if this has been discussed, but instead of sci-fi crossmarketing ideas (xcom squad), I'd rather BNW included more innovations in modern warfare. Drones are here, for good, so why not include them as one of the last units available in the game?

Ideas:

- unlimited range,
- only modern jets in intercept mode could harm them,
- you don't pump out units, you construct an expensive project, which gives you an ability to attack once per turn,
- and also eliminates fog of war permanently.

Thoughts?

Guerrilla, U2 Spy Plane and Predator Drones could be really cool additions to the unit roaster in modern to information eras.

Unlimited range is really good idea for drones IMO, thats enough to make em in game

Unlimited Range might be a bit much. After all, XCOM Squad is only getting 40. Plus, the US has drone bases, so they don't actually have unlimited range. That being said, however they choose to implement them, I would like to see them in the game.

My suggestion had been a "sneak and peak" ability. Essentially, the ability to recon an area, have it reveal the surrounding tiles, and then shoot something that appears within five or six tiles of the spot revealed. That way they can operate well outside of your LoS and destroy armies that didn't even see you coming. I would suggest a range of 40 for consistency's sake.

What you are describing (unlimited range, big project that allow one shot per turn) sounds more like an orbital weapon, LOIC style. I would love it too, very interesting gameplaywise IMO.

No unlimited range. Actually regular drones have very restricted range. However I always felt like lack of survivallance warfare in late game. Such as AWACS airplanes, or Early-Awarning Radio Survivallance Stations (as an improvement) (like Daryal for example:

)

Or there can be also drones, that execute only reconnaissance functions. However they can attack once per turn but can be successful only against Infantry or Armored Infantry.

There are also ships equipped with AEGIS system that are almost small floating Darial's or such types of stations but with less range (though Missle Cruiser in current game nothing else than that):


Also, I agree to Avatan

Avatan said:

What you are describing (unlimited range, big project that allow one shot per turn) sounds more like an orbital weapon, LOIC style. I would love it too, very interesting gameplaywise IMO.

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Once, thinking of improving space race (science victory) and space capabilities in general (particularly, building satellite groups that are intended to improve outcome of your empires certain features) I thought that it would be fine to have a survivallance satelite network that not completely remove fog of war but can watch for pointed ares of earth.

I say no, mainly because their functions can be handled by other in-game units, and unlimited range/no FoW is too powerful (and unrealistic), imo.

I could see an AWACS type unit eliminating FoW in a fairly large radius, but not a drone.

I think the primary reason to use drones in game would be that they should be easy to mass produce and have no resource associated with them. I also don't think they should be able to do any damage. They should only be able to reveal shaded terrain. At the most, they should put the -10% combat strength modifier on ground targets to represent the effectiveness of realtime combat intelligence.

Ok, so I obiously don't know much about drones What I thought was:

- drones rely on satellite imagery (do they?)
- they require a sophisticated navigation technology and infrastructure
- the drone itself is just a small part (a peripheral if you will) of a big IT project.

If you take that into account, the whole 'project' would give you all these perks I mentioned (one hit per turn, no fog of war - maybe just in a chosen region).

Perhaps it should be more gradual, with the first step called 'Satellite', as in building and launching one (world map gets revealed). After that you'd get new possibilities upon researching the right techs. Drones being one of them, but also some kind of a surveillance system? Other fun stuff?

At the most, they should put the -10% combat strength modifier on ground targets to represent the effectiveness of realtime combat intelligence.

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That's a really good idea. But I'm against limiting them to surveillance only. These babies can shoot.

The reason I'm against having them do damage is that I endorse having them not use resources. They are cheap relative to manned aircraft. Since you can stack infinite air units in a city, you could have an infinite air force of drones and it wouldn't matter how weak their damage is, you could kill your enemies with a thousand airborne papercuts. So no damage.

The way drones work, at least as far as I know, is that they navigate by GPS and are guided by a satellite uplink. They are superior to spy satellites because satellites fly over every few hours and provide static images. Drones provide realtime streaming footage like a security camera in the sky. A controller can watch what a target is doing and where it is going and transmit that data to local ground or air units for intercept. You can't do that with satellites.

igelkott said:

- drones rely on satellite imagery (do they?)

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No, they don't. They depend on satellite network by the means of communication. They can only function effectively if there is a reliable constant satellite communication network. I underline -- communication network, not survival, or reconnaissance. They themselves serve for making imaging of certain area but they need a satellite (or to be precise, a group of satellites) to be able to transmit video flow back to the control center, and what's more important -- to receive commands to process. To be short -- they are generally planes, controlled remotely. Nothing less, nothing more.

igelkott said:

- they require a sophisticated navigation technology and infrastructure

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Yes they do. The technology that is required is "Robotics" or better "Programming" in terms of Civ technologies.

igelkott said:

- the drone itself is just a small part (a peripheral if you will) of a big IT project.

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Well, yes and no. They were not created as a part of big project initially. It just appeared that satellite network was able to handle the drone data flows, however when people has realized the potential of Unmanned Aircraft Vehicles I bet they started to build up a next generation military satellites with that particular purpose in mind.

I still stick to thought that they should be relatively cheap units that can reveal fog of war in several (no more than two) tiles from them. And they maybe can attack a target optionally. However, they should not be able to perform strike and reconnaissance tasks simultaniously. A player have to choose this, or that. Only this seems to me quiet fair.

igelkott said:

I don't know if this has been discussed, but instead of sci-fi crossmarketing ideas (xcom squad), I'd rather BNW included more innovations in modern warfare. Drones are here, for good, so why not include them as one of the last units available in the game?

Ideas:

- unlimited range,
- only modern jets in intercept mode could harm them,
- you don't pump out units, you construct an expensive project, which gives you an ability to attack once per turn,
- and also eliminates fog of war permanently.

Thoughts?

Click to expand...

Regarding the last point, doesn't the Satellites technology already do this?

Much better idea than an xcom unit.

Are you sure this is a good idea?

Akinaba said:

No unlimited range. Actually regular drones have very restricted range.

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True. One of the great benefits of UAVs ("drones" is a horribly misleading and ignorant-sounding term) is their long loiter time....but they don't do inter-continental.

jjkrause84 said:

....but they don't do inter-continental.

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What is intercontinental is a sattelite.

When I thought of reconnaissance satellite network in my time, I have thought that that would be cool to build up your reconnaissance group step-by step by actually launching satellites one by another.

In this case the effect of "removing" fog of war can be not that simple and even interesting: there could be "sinusiodal" or wave-like trace on earth that depicts the orbit of your particular satellite and this trace moves on certain tiles each turn. The more satellites you launch -- the more of the map you reveal. For those who do not familiar with how satellite orbits looks when they are projected on earth map it's quiet complex to imagine, but actually there is nothing complex at all, just take a look :



Here we have 6 trajectories of the same satellite but in different periods of time. So I thought it would be cool for example, if one satellite reveals a line of 3 tiles beneath itself. You have a sinusoidal 3 tiles trace on world map that reveals what's under the fog of war. When you press the Next Turn button this trajectory jumps 6 tiles to a certain direction so you have new window to look at. Isn't it cool?

However I know it's too complex and blah blah, but God, how I love it !

Wow, you've certainly taken this thread to a whole new level Thanks for claryfing how drone relate to satellites.

From what I understand drones indeed require satellites. So my proposal still stands:

1. launch satellite (reveal world map - not fog of war, mind you)
2. after that, you could build drones, which can maybe hover over one chosen region. Maybe to make them less powerful you could give them only one mission, choosing from:
- providing realtime surveillance
- can fire a missile once in X turns (not to often)
- increase the rate in which spies gather intelligence
- increase land units' effectiveness
3. can build an advanced or even futuristic (but realistic) surveillance program, like the one discribed above

BTW, 'drones' may sound ignorant to someone knowledgable, but they do exist in the imagination of most people as 'drones', not UAVs. And what they 'do' is 'rain hell from the skies'

And Civ, being a computer game, can sometimes make concessions in the 'realistic' department to let us play with that semifictional imagery. And I'd rather have drones that are a tad overpowered, than an x-com squad (although I enjoyed that game a lot).

I've been itching to have Drones, both armed an unarmed. But no Unlimited Range, maybe just a little bit more or equal to jets. But seeing as they would consume less fuel, their clearing the FoG would last like 2 Turns... The first turn being the initial sweep, the second being the one that follows. Further their attacks should be reduced in damage so someone cant just use one to clear the field... [On a side note possibly allow cruise missiles to be added to the Drone, like two that way its only one unit an can be used for surveillance or attack. Just a thought]

Perhaps have it so a player cannot tell the allegiance of units he spots with the drone. Let the drone do damage to these units, which can lead to diplomatic incidents since the player doesn't know the allegiance of the targets.

I don't see the point of drones in the game. They sure have a point in real life: you can recon/attack somebody without jeopardizing one of your people's lives. But this is a game--no one's dying anyway. So from a game POV, it's no different from a stealth jet, or it's already part of the espionage system. So what if a jet is manned or not--it's a game. Firaxis went through great pains to keep painful micro out of espionage (and everything else) prior to BNW, and it's the reason I like Civ V over IV.