Vokarya's Workshop: Units

Noyyau said:

It would make the unit window much clearer.

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I agree with you very much. I'm not sure if cavalry also needs the various terrain attack bonuses/penalties. I'm doing some analysis on the Megapack right now and that's the one thing that keeps coming up is that all the cavalry UU's need standardizing on the current unit template.

As I said in the renaming thread, I want to rename the Nuclear Submarine as the Missile Submarine. I also want to rework the submarines a bit so that the basic Submarine upgrades to either the Attack Submarine or the Missile Submarine and have the two coexist until the end of the Modern Era when they both upgrade to the Stealth Submarine.

I think this will set things up properly to make this work.

• Change Attack Submarine to require Advanced Rocketry AND Nuclear Power, and drop the Oil Products option (so you have to have Uranium)
• Give the Attack Submarine the 80 strength of the current Nuclear Submarine and the attack bonuses of the Nuclear Sub. This means that there is a HUGE jump between the Submarine and the Attack Submarine, but I think that's appropriate given what nuclear power meant to submarines.
• Reduce the Missile Submarine's strength to 70. It still has a very high withdraw chance, so it'll be hard to kill unless you attack it in waves.

Is there anything else you think I should adjust?

Since you're looking for more things to change when it comes to units...

I mentioned this before but didn't get much input on it - Scouts in their current form are almost not worth building. They get eaten alive (literally ) by the numerous 3 and 4 animal units almost as soon as you can build them, reducing the advantage of playing a civ that starts with Hunting. Yeah you can hit some tribal villages if you get lucky but you almost have to spam them non-stop if you want to explore any significant amount of territory.

Sugggestion: Scout 1 -> 2, normal bonus vs animals kept or possibly reduced to as much as 75% or even 50% if needed for balance reasons. Allow them to win the battles vs 1 and 2 animals handily unless badly wounded or surrounded, but they can still lose vs the 3 and 4 animals if you're unlucky or careless with your explorations/healing.

A few other random thoughts on units:

urtho said:

Since you're looking for more things to change when it comes to units...

I mentioned this before but didn't get much input on it - Scouts in their current form are almost not worth building. They get eaten alive (literally ) by the numerous 3 and 4 animal units almost as soon as you can build them, reducing the advantage of playing a civ that starts with Hunting. Yeah you can hit some tribal villages if you get lucky but you almost have to spam them non-stop if you want to explore any significant amount of territory.

Sugggestion: Scout 1 -> 2, normal bonus vs animals kept or possibly reduced to as much as 75% or even 50% if needed for balance reasons. Allow them to win the battles vs 1 and 2 animals handily unless badly wounded or surrounded, but they can still lose vs the 3 and 4 animals if you're unlucky or careless with your explorations/healing.

A few other random thoughts on units:

- I think there needs to be some type of mid-to-late game recon unit. The line ends with Adventurers, there should be at least one and possibly 2 more later recon unit types, something to do with helicopters in the modern era perhaps.​

- A later/late game more advanced colonist would be nice as well if possible, found cities with a size of 5 - 7 with all the usual early priority buildings of late modern era and up cities.​

- Workers being upgradable to Clones or more logically Androids might be nice. In games I've managed to reach the Transhuman era I always have tons of leftover normal workers still hanging around when I can build Clones and Androids, being able to "retrofit" them into the advanced versions would be nice. Should cost a great deal of course, but money is almost never a problem if you make it that far in the game.​

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I don't mind Scouts being weak; I think if they are too strong, they reveal too much of the map too quickly and that discovery should take some time.

I do want to introduce at least 2-3 new Recon units; I'd like to have the Ranger fill in between the Explorer and the Adventurer, with the Adventurer upgrading to the Motorcycle at Automobile and then possibly a Jeep or Hovercraft. I do not want to go down the helicopter path with recon units.

If I could find the right artwork, I would like to see a Transhuman Settler. I am actually leaning towards placing it at Organic Cities but I think that might be too late. I also agree on the Worker upgrades but I would like a late-Renaissance or Industrial-Era worker so that it isn't so long an upgrade path.

Vokarya said:

I don't mind Scouts being weak; I think if they are too strong, they reveal too much of the map too quickly and that discovery should take some time.

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I always thought of the military units representing a somewhat bigger squad, while the scouts only a smaller. So I don't think they should be stronger, but maybe could recieve some withdraw chance.

I do want to introduce at least 2-3 new Recon units; I'd like to have the Ranger fill in between the Explorer and the Adventurer, with the Adventurer upgrading to the Motorcycle at Automobile and then possibly a Jeep or Hovercraft. I do not want to go down the helicopter path with recon units.

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Can't wait to see it

If I could find the right artwork, I would like to see a Transhuman Settler.

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How about MCV from C&C ?

Vokarya said:

I don't mind Scouts being weak; I think if they are too strong, they reveal too much of the map too quickly and that discovery should take some time.

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Well you have to remember that AND has other features that can kill off scouts more easily - namely lots more 3 and up animals, lesser defensive bonuses from forest/jungle tiles, and terrain damage as an optional further source of damage. And revealing the map earlier than civs that don't start with Hunting and early scouts is part of the advantage of playing one of those civs vs ones that don't start with it. Ah well, no one else agrees I guess so I'll either just live with it or keep modding the xml to taste I suppose.

Good to hear you are looking at options regarding the other points I brought up, hopefully you can find some solutions to the issues at some point.

A couple things I noticed when I did a spreadsheet of all the UU's and UB's for core AND and the Megapack that I'm going to adjust in the next build:

Keshik: Does not have the Immune to First Strikes ability turned on. Most Mounted units do. Mounted Infantry does not, but it's a mobile defense unit, not a charger; Cataphract does not have this ability, but it's been that way since BTS (a tradeoff for its higher Strength); Heavy Cavalry should get this ability, and I'm not sure which way to go on the main Cavalry.

Musketeer and Janissary: The default Musketman builds 15% faster with Lead. These units build 20% faster. I'm going to drop them back to 15%. Also, Musketeer is too cheap at 140. I want to bring it back up to 180. Speed is a really good promotion, as it stays with the unit throughout the rest of its life as it upgrades.

If anyone has any problems with this, please let me know.

And a couple more minor tweaks to regular units:

Heavy Cavalry: Turn on Immune to First Strikes. This brings it in line with the rest of the Mounted units.

Grenadier: Increase cost to 200. Right now, they are both cheaper and stronger than Musketmen, which isn't good.

I will be attentive to these changes in your next revision. I will update the MegaCivPak with this changes.

Vokarya said:

As I said in the renaming thread, I want to rename the Nuclear Submarine as the Missile Submarine. I also want to rework the submarines a bit so that the basic Submarine upgrades to either the Attack Submarine or the Missile Submarine and have the two coexist until the end of the Modern Era when they both upgrade to the Stealth Submarine.

I think this will set things up properly to make this work.

• Change Attack Submarine to require Advanced Rocketry AND Nuclear Power, and drop the Oil Products option (so you have to have Uranium)
• Give the Attack Submarine the 80 strength of the current Nuclear Submarine and the attack bonuses of the Nuclear Sub. This means that there is a HUGE jump between the Submarine and the Attack Submarine, but I think that's appropriate given what nuclear power meant to submarines.
• Reduce the Missile Submarine's strength to 70. It still has a very high withdraw chance, so it'll be hard to kill unless you attack it in waves.

Is there anything else you think I should adjust?

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The unit Submarine refers to the WWII submarine that was diesel-electric of course.INMO there is a gap between this unit and the nuclear powered submarine because modern navies use nowadays non-nuclear submarines that are more powerful and capable than the WWII subs but less capable than nuclear subs.
So it could be a good idea to import the diesel-electric sub with a strength of 60 approx. (requiring oil products and coexisting with nuclear subs until the end of Modern Era).It would be useful for civs that don't have uranium.

nionios said:

The unit Submarine refers to the WWII submarine that was diesel-electric of course.INMO there is a gap between this unit and the nuclear powered submarine because modern navies use nowadays non-nuclear submarines that are more powerful and capable than the WWII subs but less capable than nuclear subs.
So it could be a good idea to import the diesel-electric sub with a strength of 60 approx. (requiring oil products and coexisting with nuclear subs until the end of Modern Era).It would be useful for civs that don't have uranium.

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I think I agree, it shouldn't be necessary to have uranium to build a sub.

45°38'N-13°47'E;13082194 said:

I think I agree, it shouldn't be necessary to have uranium to build a sub.

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If you don't have Uranium, you would fall back to the basic Submarine. I don't want to introduce another submarine unit - that would give us four in the Modern Era. Would it be enough to give the Submarine a strength bonus somewhere in the Modern Era?

Vokarya said:

If you don't have Uranium, you would fall back to the basic Submarine. I don't want to introduce another submarine unit - that would give us four in the Modern Era. Would it be enough to give the Submarine a strength bonus somewhere in the Modern Era?

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You're right.It's better to give a strength bonus to the Submarine.
What about the cargo of Missile Submarine and Attack submarine?Nukes and cruise missiles for the former, spy and cruise missiles for the later using Advanced Cargo Mod?

nionios said:

You're right.It's better to give a strength bonus to the Submarine.
What about the cargo of Missile Submarine and Attack submarine?Nukes and cruise missiles for the former, spy and cruise missiles for the later using Advanced Cargo Mod?

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Yes, maybe that's the best way. As for missile cargo, I fear at the moment there's no way to distinguish between nuclear and conventional missiles.

45°38'N-13°47'E;13083101 said:

Yes, maybe that's the best way. As for missile cargo, I fear at the moment there's no way to distinguish between nuclear and conventional missiles.

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If we keep the "SPECIALUNIT_MISSILE" for conventional and add "SPECIALUNIT_NUKE" for nuclear missiles so it will be "<SpecialCargo>SPECIALUNIT_MISSILE,SPECIALUNIT_NUKE</SpecialCargo>" and tweak respectively the "Civ4SpecialUnitInfos"?
Isn't it so simple?

nionios said:

If we keep the "SPECIALUNIT_MISSILE" for conventional and add "SPECIALUNIT_NUKE" for nuclear missiles so it will be "<SpecialCargo>SPECIALUNIT_MISSILE,SPECIALUNIT_NUKE</SpecialCargo>" and tweak respectively the "Civ4SpecialUnitInfos"?
Isn't it so simple?

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I fear not. I can try but remember that every xml entry has to be added to the schema file too, not to mention checking the core dll code for other implications.

I have always wanted to do some reorganization of the cavalry units and their upgrade paths. Before the Modern Era, I want to have four groups of mounted units:

• Mobile Defense units with speed 2 and NOT having Doesn't Receive Defensive Bonuses.
• Light Mounted units that are cheaper and lower-Strength than Heavy Mounted units.
• Heavy Mounted units that are move 2 and relatively high attack strength.
• Elephant units with speed 1 and high Strength.

Elephant and Heavy Mounted units merge together into Tanks. Mobile Defense units are not part of the main mounted tree; they are part of the main foot troops line. So I came up with a "ladder" for the horse and tank units, arranging them by era (or portions of eras).

This is how I want the ladder to look.
BLUE units don't yet exist, but I will make them.
PURPLE units exist but will be renamed.

The idea is this: Light Mounted units upgrade to the next Light Mounted unit (so Chariot upgrades to Horse Archer). Heavy Mounted units upgrade to either the next Light Mounted or the next Heavy Mounted (Horseman upgrades to either Horse Archer or Light Cavalry). I'm not completely sure if Light Mounted units should ever be able to upgrade to a Heavy Mounted, especially with Auto-Upgrade turned on. This is the biggest question that I have about this. But in general, this is the plan I want to pursue.

The one unit that I don't know what to do with is the T-95. I don't even know what this is supposed to be. There are a couple of different Wikipedia articles on various tanks named the T-95, but I don't know which one is the one in-game. It definitely needs a rename to make clear what it is.

I'm not sure whether Helicopters should be a part of this. I definitely want to develop Recon units into a more extensive separate line as well.

Sensible and great work as always, Vokarya!

Should Heavy Mounted even be able to upgrade into Light Mounted?
I think they could be kept separate in upgrades as well.

Helicopters I think should be their own thing, and they (as they do now iirc) merge with Marines and Paratroopers into the Dropship (parachutable, highly mobile, bonus vs tanks).

Mid and Late Modern Light could be APCs and then IFVs (think the US M113 for the APC and Soviet BMP for the IFV). Maybe have them carry infantry? Can the AI be taught what to do with that?

Noyyau said:

Sensible and great work as always, Vokarya!

Should Heavy Mounted even be able to upgrade into Light Mounted?
I think they could be kept separate in upgrades as well.

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The reason why I was going to allow it in the first place is that the Heavy Mounted of one era is weaker than the Light Mounted of the next era. For example, Horseman (Ancient Era, Heavy Mounted) is 5 strength, Horse Archer (Classical Era, Light Mounted) is 8. Light Cavalry (Classical Era, Heavy Mounted) is 8, while Heavy Cavalry is strength 10. So it is an upgrade to allow the Heavy Mounted to become Light Mounted, but I don't think I want to allow going back.

Noyyau said:

Mid and Late Modern Light could be APCs and then IFVs (think the US M113 for the APC and Soviet BMP for the IFV). Maybe have them carry infantry? Can the AI be taught what to do with that?

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I see APC's as either Mechanized Infantry or an upgrade of them. I don't think the AI understands land-unit carrying very well, and that's another route that I don't want to go down. I'd much rather keep troops and vehicles as one unit.

Yeah, really great and very well thought changes Vokarya. Once more you're showing your talent. :thumbup:

As for land units carrying other land units I've been down that road some time ago for another project I had but it didn't work and in the end wasn't worth the effort.