Shouldn't Tank, Battleships and Artillery have a attack range of 2?

I forget which version of the game it was but at one time at least Arty had a range of 2 tiles and not 1. Shouldn't it be that why again? Things like Artillery will not be on the front line and therefore should be able to be held back a tile and fire for effect at 2 tiles out. To make it fair reduce their effectiveness at the max range as opposed to being in the tile next to the target.
I'd like to see modern tanks and Destroyers/Battleships have the same that range? So that they could hit targets that are 1 tile inland. After all real Battleships have a range of over 16 miles with conventional shells?
Just a thought, if I knew how to mod I'd change it.

i completly agree with the artillery i con't see them getting destroyed except for being attacked, the battleships are iffish for me because a 16 miles long shot is not accurate. a tank no they have to get relatively close up and personal usually around 1000 meters.

s.c.dude said:

16 miles long shot is not accurate. a tank no they have to get relatively close up and personal usually around 1000 meters

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Well no, Battleships are very accurate at 16 miles for a flying voltswagon ... trust me I've been a FO (Forward Observer) with the Marines calling for effect from the New Jersey you have to adjust fire very little, a couple of 100 meters tops. And modern Tanks (M1A1) have a range of over 8000 meters which is about 4.69 miles. However this is the published range the actual is a bit further but classified by the DOD as to the true range. Which I don't know but would guess at closer to 10K. But thanks for you support on the idea.

sorry about that when i did the 1000 meters i was doing t-72's against abrams the engagement was in a book. but what if the tanks were in a forest maybe only works on plains and deserts and grass.

Leatherneck said:

Well no, Battleships are very accurate at 16 miles for a flying voltswagon ... trust me I've been a FO (Forward Observer) with the Marines calling for effect from the New Jersey you have to adjust fire very little, a couple of 100 meters tops. And modern Tanks (M1A1) have a range of over 8000 meters which is about 4.69 miles. However this is the published range the actual is a bit further but classified by the DOD as to the true range. Which I don't know but would guess at closer to 10K. But thanks for you support on the idea.

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I go along with you on the accuracy of battleship gunfire at long range, as I have see impact patterns from the New Jersey in 1991 that put 36 rounds into the area the size of a football field. However, tank gun ranges are very heavily dependent on the terrain. Yes, in the open desert, they may have a potential of 5,000 to 10,000 meters, although pinpoint hits with anything but a sabot round at those ranges are pretty much not feasible. Sabot rounds are great against armor, but useless against the grunts. As for tanks in hills and mountains, depends on how rough the terrain is and which way they are shooting; down hill, up hill, along the ridge line, and the steepness of the slope. As for forest and jungle, tanks might have a range of 100 yards, and have major problems training their guns because of trees in the way. Grunts love to catch tanks in the trees. And city fighting is the tanker's worst nightmare. So, give a range of 2 to naval gunfire and artillery, but be real careful about boosting tank gun range. I have to see the .xml files to see if you can base range on terrain or not.

Good Shooting.

timerover51 said:

I go along with you on the accuracy of battleship gunfire at long range, as I have see impact patterns from the New Jersey in 1991 that put 36 rounds into the area the size of a football field. However, tank gun ranges are very heavily dependent on the terrain. Yes, in the open desert, they may have a potential of 5,000 to 10,000 meters, although pinpoint hits with anything but a sabot round at those ranges are pretty much not feasible. Sabot rounds are great against armor, but useless against the grunts. As for tanks in hills and mountains, depends on how rough the terrain is and which way they are shooting; down hill, up hill, along the ridge line, and the steepness of the slope. As for forest and jungle, tanks might have a range of 100 yards, and have major problems training their guns because of trees in the way. Grunts love to catch tanks in the trees. And city fighting is the tanker's worst nightmare. So, give a range of 2 to naval gunfire and artillery, but be real careful about boosting tank gun range. I have to see the .xml files to see if you can base range on terrain or not.

Good Shooting.

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As well I agree with you on the tank info as to what, when, where and why etc they can hit IRL, and if the code allows I think then yes that would be a neat feature albeit maybe a but to much to say ...
well if I tank is on a hill shooting into a valley then it's 2 or if it's in the valley shooting up a hill then it's one. So the easiest thing to do might be not to worry about the tanks and stick with Arty and Battleships

On another note the first time I called for effect fot the USS NJ was in Lebanon in 1982 and it is very unnerving to hear those rounds coming in your general direction, but after you learn the accuracy you don't sweat it. Just the sound alone is about enough to decide a fight as a 1900lbs VW lands in your area.

if its accuracy your concerned about i wouldnt worry, we are talking about large areas, these grid squares, im pretty sure any artillery unit can lay down enough fire to carpet the area in a turns length while being "realistic"

evirus said:

if its accuracy your concerned about i wouldnt worry, we are talking about large areas, these grid squares, im pretty sure any artillery unit can lay down enough fire to carpet the area in a turns length while being "realistic"

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True and that was my first thought if a Tank, Battleship or Arty lobs a round into a urban area 2 tiles away; accuracy doesn't play much of a roll it's going to hit something and it's going to do damage.
You park a battleship say 14 miles off the coast of NYC, LA or DC and start pulling the tigger in the general direction, odds are pretty good you'll hit something that will derupt life and cause chaos. My point is these weapons mainly arty and Battleships are not front line troops, that ground units are going to run out and attack right away. Thats what air support and other arty, Tanks and Battleships are for. That is the realism I'm talking about. If ground units are trying to take out arty then thay are going to have to move beyond the "frontline" (i.e. 1st tile) to do that. If the city doesn't have air support to protect them from these units, well things don't look good.
I also believe these rear (Bats, Arty and Tanks) units can cause damage to more then the city and the enemy units should as well at times suffer damage. I find it annoying you can a blast a city to 0% defences and you can keep blasting away all you want and never do any further damage.

Interesting discussion. I agree w/ the 2 tile range idea for advanced arty/ naval units. I also appreciate and am thankful (far beyond the realm of a Civ discussion board) the operational experience you guys can draw on.

If it was possible to program a 2 tile range, I think a % decrease in effectiveness would be ok for "early advanced" arty/naval units. This would be almost completely mitigated by the Aegis / advanced radar type arty units. A defensive penalty for artillery against ariel bombardment would be a good balancer as well. I think too much of an offensive advantage would go to a wall of tough ground, units next to a city, backed-up by a a stack of artillery units, one two tile from the city, firing support over the ground units.

If air superiority in the surrounding region hasn't been established by the offense, then the defending city should receive an ariel bombardment bonus vs. the arts units.

Egypt used this idea brilliantly during the build-up and war w/ Israel in 72/73. They pushed their advanced Soviet SAM batteries close to the Suez to cover their infantry and artillery attacks against the IDF.

Thank you for your thanks, I find the moment rather upsetting as I spent 4 years in Lebanon in the early 80's I now look at the news. Those problem in that part of the world will never be solved.

Anyway less I degress...

It's possible as it was in one of the earlier versions I think it was Civ 3 but It might have been Civ 2 I don;t remembre that happens when you get old. I'd think old arty units like Cats and Cannon would still have an range of 1 tile. 2 tile would not go into effect until you get to the modern age and modern weapons.

Anywho ... something I'd like to see in a MOD guess I need to learn xml and python ... I've looked code doesn't seem to scary no worse than reading my own writing.

Leatherneck, if you want to do .xml modding, the best program I have found is Adobe GoLive. I have been doing modding using it for Rise of Nations, and have never had any problems. I do not know enough about python, but figure I might be learning it eventually. Right now, I do not have a Mac that runs Civ4, and when I play Civ4 on my son's laptop, I do not enjoy it near as much as Civ3Complete. Big headache there is no editor for the Macs for Civ3Complete, so I have to use my son's computer. However, the files do transfer with no problems from the Windows box to the Mac. I have been working on modding the unit combat values in Civ3Complete, and also thinking about doing a Guadalcanal campaign scenario, after having been in the Solomon in 2002, and having landed on both Henderson Field and Munda Airstrip, both of which are simply hard packed coral.

Thanks I looked at the code in Marcomedias Dreamweaver and I've read that WinMerge is a good program too to edit xml. The later being best for Merging mods, since I haven't done it I can only go on what I read.
My laptop will not run Civ 4 without a video upgrade as it's only running 32 meg. Trys to open but the program crashes on the final load. Run great on the Desktop.
I'll be looking at the code as I get time and see what I can come up with.

Leatherneck, you might want to check and see how Dreamweaver handles the xml files. I have that as well, and had problems with Rise of Nations, which uses xml files as well crashing when I edited with Dreamweaver. You might want to make sure that you back up your files thoroughly before editing them. I know that on the Rise of Nations website that guys have had pretty good success using Winmerge for xml editing. My son's laptop runs Civ4 with a 64 meg video card, but it is slow. It runs faster when he sets the game to single figures, as that cuts down on the video card load. Where are you at in Kentucky by the way? I am north of Chicago.

timerover51 said:

Leatherneck, you might want to check and see how Dreamweaver handles the xml files. I have that as well, and had problems with Rise of Nations, which uses xml files as well crashing when I edited with Dreamweaver. You might want to make sure that you back up your files thoroughly before editing them. I know that on the Rise of Nations website that guys have had pretty good success using Winmerge for xml editing. My son's laptop runs Civ4 with a 64 meg video card, but it is slow. It runs faster when he sets the game to single figures, as that cuts down on the video card load. Where are you at in Kentucky by the way? I am north of Chicago.

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Last question first, I'm south of Paducah about as far west as you can get before you run out of state. I use to work in Chi-town out in Itasca .
Oh playing on the Laptop is not required, just would be nice. I play on my desktop which has more than the required stuff. So I've got use to the wide open, full graphics, huge maps, full audio/video and would not be happy with less you get spoiled on those setting.
I'm not sure I'll have time to fool with the xml stuff or not. I stay pretty busy and I rarely have much time to play better yet got tweaking code. But if I do it will be this winter when my work slow down some. Thanks for the info, might have saved me some headaches if I do.