Alex's Uniques v0.00001

Updates


b2 version

• Added American cowboy, minutemen, and m1a2

b1 version

• reworked roman units
• added english and japanese units
• new file at bottom of post
• Simply unzip this to your Mods folder in the civ directory and it should be loadable from the Mods screen.

Description

Being somewhat dissatisfied with the selection of unique units in civ games I felt like expanding on them and hopefully rebalancing some that may need it (ie praetorians). Ideally I would like the uniques not to be vastly more powerful but to provide some interesting choices.

My initial idea was to have 4 uniques per civilization. 2 sets of 2 in different eras. This gives a bit of a chance for a few comebacks for civs that have been losing. It might be difficult to find those units in 2 eras so I would want to either balance it to 1 very strong unit in each of 2 eras or 3 normalish units in 1 era. Does that make any sense to you?

What I want from you is ideas about ~ historically accurate units and any thoughts you have on balance.

Here's what I've thought out so far for UUs (constantly being updated)

New Units

Rome - done

Legion (reqs bronzeworking)
4 pow
+100% vs barbarians; Builds roads

Praetorian Guard (+25% cost, replaces axeman) reqs copper or iron
6 pow
+25% city def; +25% vs mounted; +50% vs melee

Marian Legion (+25% cost, replaces swordsman) reqs iron
6 pow
+25% city attack; +50% vs archers


England - done

Welsh Longbow (replaces longbow, -10% cost)
6 pow
+25% city def; +25% hill def; +25% forest def

Maybe a knight replacement as well?

Man O War (replaces frigate)
10 pow
+10% Bombard

Japan - done

Ninja (available with currency)
6 pow
invisible; cannot pillage; -50% city attack; no def bonuses

High Samurai (replaces knight)
10 pow
+2 first strikes; Immune to first strikes;

USA - done

Cowboy (with nationalism)
12 pow
same stats as knight + builds ranch (+1food,+1coin on cow/horse from pasture)

Minuteman (replaces grenadier)
same as grenadier except :
+25% vs grenadier
builds road, cottage, farm @ 50% worker speed.

M1A2 (replaces modern tank)
40 pow
+1 sight radius

Greece

Peltast (reqs bronzeworking), replaces axeman
5 pow
+2 first strike; +50% vs melee

Ballista (reqs archery and bronzeworking)
same as catapult, but with 3 pow and 30 cost

Evzonos
same as rifleman but starts with march

Spain

Conquistador (replaces musketman)
9 pow
Spreads state religion when conquering a city

Mounted Conquistador (replaces knight)
10 pow 2 mov
Immune to First Strikes; +50% vs melee
Spreads state religion when conquering a city

Russia

Red Army Conscript (reqs communism, 75% less than cost of infantry)
10 pow
0 movement

Katyusha (replaces artillery)
Same pow as arty
+100% vs armour

Germany

Berserker (replaces axeman, -25% cost)
5 pow
+50% vs melee

Teutonic Knight (replaces Knight)
same as knight but spreads religion on conquest

Stuka (in addition to fighter)
15 pow
+100% vs armour; -25% vs air; -25% vs city

China

Soldier-Farmer(replaces warrior, reqs farming)
3 pow
Builds farms

India

Ghurka (replaces maceman)
Same as maceman
spreads religion on conquest

Ghurka Rifles (Replaces rifleman)
Same as rifleman
Starts with guerrilla upgrade

Anyways any and all thoughts and comments are welcome!

I don't think it makes sense that the Praetorian guard are weaker than the Legionnares since the Praetorian guard were drawn from the most elite troops of the Roman army. Also if it replaces the spearman why only give it +25% vs mounted instead of 100%?

It seems like the Welsh longbowman should replace the longbowman not the archer but aside from that it has 250% of the archers normal attack! That is way too high compared to for example the conquistador who only gets an 11% boost.

Also it seems there is a real tendency to only give Germany modern unique units because people get stuck on WWI and WWII when in fact they have always had some fierce warriors. A few examples: some sort of barbarian berserkerish unit, Prussian Rifleman, Teutonic Knight, etc.

Small mistake there, the + to mounted bonus for praetorian is supposed to be 50%, it's that way in the file I posted. That way they are only slightly better than the spearman for the mounted units while being better in other ways.
I wanted the welsh longbow to come before the regular longbow since they were the first to use them. Regular archers are 3 power so 5 power is only 66% more, which is fairly okay for a defensive unit I think (there is another UU like that I think).


The 2nd german era would probably be something along the lines of those knights, I'll do some research and maybe add them in appropriately. This is sort of why I want 2 eras for each civ.

I think its cool. How do you mod 4 unique units into the game? I like the idea for the english. A modern example for a few civs could be f-16 fighter, for the Americans could be mountainman (a souped up explorer with automatic hills and woodsman promotions). For the French, Knights Templar, for the English, maybe a souped up medieval siege unit (or any other european civ for that matter) for the spanish, long range caravels (not that they were longer range, but they did sail to the new world).

Lastly, some of the world war II mods are already in the Desert War mod, including the Stuka, and a heavy tank. Just FYI.

Hmmm.. I've been thinking. What about an improved ironclad for either the british or the americans, since the current one is rather useless (has anyone ever built one?) Or a harrier jet, or a really nice sub for the germans (sorry, WWII i know). Maybe the germans get a saxon warrior. Or we can take sterotypes from real world and put them in the game. The greeks can get a great transport.

For England:

Welsh Longbow is a good replacement for the longbowman

Hmmm - for the others I'd go for Man o' War (like Civ 3), and either a knight replacement, or the Spitfire (fighter replacement).

For other civs - you can always use Civ 3 UU's that changed for Civ 4, as alot of them were quite good.

This has great potential. There's nothing worse than every civ using the same units. I hope you keep plugging away at it so we can test it out to see how all of the variables work out.

And I agree with Dr. Bloom that Germany tends to get treated as a modern civ way too much. I'm sure some sort of warrior, cavalry, beserker type unit would be historically correct.

A cowboy unit for the Americans would just be awesome. They could replace the cavalry.

Germany has not existing all that long as a unified country though has it? Before that it was mostly Prussia and a few other seperate countries?

I have no idea tbh, my German history is non existant.

Thanks for the feedback everyone - as you can see I'm updating the list with some of your ideas. I suppose I agree with you on the longbow thing, also since archers come so early it's probably best anyways that it comes a bit later. I wonder if it's possible to make a unit that replaces longbow come a tech before longbow. I will try that tonight..

I will also take a look at the desert war units - at least maybe I could poach some graphics there

Tonight I will also add in a bunch to the mod file so you can try some of them out.

I like your ideas a lot - one comment though. The skuka would be a good thing to add for the German, except that it shouldn't work as a fighter. Use it like a lighter bomber with high attack value against units (particularly armor) but low against cities. That way it can be used like they were supposed to, to support the ground. Basically, let the Germans keep their fighter (if you want to add a fighter for them, make it the BF109 or FW190).

-Snafusmith

can you explain exactly how you changed the xml to add or change unique units ?

I'm going to write up a quick tutorial sometime soon, probably on sunday if no one else has done it by then. Maybe I'll even write a little java prog to make it easy.

but to get started, look in XML/units/Civ4UnitInfos.xml for adding a unit

and then the definitions for UUs are in XML/civs/ I think. You can add in multiple uniques for a civ no problem.

Sorry I can't be more specific I don't remember everything since I'm at work atm and don't have civ4 here

As for Rome:

Triarii for Spearman, since the Triarii where spearman. The Preatorian should be the strongest since they where romes finest troops. (mind you, the preatorian guard is older then the legionaire and where later reformed in yet an even greater unit)

But i find the preatorian to weak to resemble a real life preatorian, so i'd boat him out and replace the swordsman with the Legionaire, who where also superior units and have the Triarii for the Spearman.

so like this

Rome:

Legionaire (replace swordsman)
8str +25% vs archer or start with Cover (to resemble the Legionaires Testudo formation, wich was unique to them)

Triarii (replace spearman)
4str and starts with Combat1 (Triarii where the most veteran troops in the early roman armies)

redid the romans yet again

I think it should be good now, the praetorians are the best - and it takes out those unroman axemen.

I feel that 8 pow is just too much for something you get with ironworking, they can't be beaten by anything and it's so unbalancing.

bump for update

Nice work Alex. Any idea how easy it is to add what other people have done in regards to research and game speed to your Mod?

woodelf said:

Nice work Alex. Any idea how easy it is to add what other people have done in regards to research and game speed to your Mod?

Click to expand...

Copy their mod files into my directory, if you don't have to overwrite anything it will most likely work. If the only file you have to overwrite is the traits file then it will also probably work.

In short if they don't touch the civilization definitions (where I define UUs) or unit names, or the unit definition files, then it should be fine.

Cool, I'll give that a try later on. If that doesn't work I might have to roll up my sleeves and get my hands dirty doing some cut/paste work.