Alternate commando effect

The commando promotion doesn't seem that useful. It comes so far into the promotion tree that you'll likely never have a newly built unit able to take it right away. That means you'll need an experienced unit to have it, and because of what the promotion does, that would mean you'd be leaving that unit alone in enemy territory and you're sure to lose that high experience unit. I was atching TV and saw something about paratroopers securing roads in Germany in WWII and that got me thinking about having a promotion that lets your other units use the road it's standing on? There's still the problem of requiring several of them to be effective, but it wouldn't require all your units to have it.

If you have BtS then spies who start out with commando really benefit them because they otherwise have only 1 move.

In Civ:Revolutions, I believe you can stack up to 4 units into an army, and they share promotions. Now I dunno about that mechanic for all promotions.
But it seems like certain ones could function like Abilities/Spells did in Warlords III.
So promotions like, Leadership/Morale/Tactics (GG Promotions) could be applied to up to 4 (maybe 8) other units in the GG stack.

I'm not sure I agree with Commando being included amongst possible shared promotion effects. Even its name implies a sole unit going commando ;-)
It's use, primarily I believe, is for scouting purposes. So you send your attack in the right direction. With its high requisites, I could see it also giving +1 Visibility Range - like Sentry does.

Balderstrom said:

In Civ:Revolutions, I believe you can stack up to 4 units into an army, and they share promotions. Now I dunno about that mechanic for all promotions.
But it seems like certain ones could function like Abilities/Spells did in Warlords III.
So promotions like, Leadership/Morale/Tactics (GG Promotions) could be applied to up to 4 (maybe 8) other units in the GG stack.

I'm not sure I agree with Commando being included amongst possible shared promotion effects. Even its name implies a sole unit going commando ;-)
It's use, primarily I believe, is for scouting purposes. So you send your attack in the right direction. With its high requisites, I could see it also giving +1 Visibility Range - like Sentry does.

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All of my axes will have 4 hitpoints. They'll also have medals.

You'll think you have me countered with you pretty stack o medieval stuff, but I'll just laugh and flatten you killing units 8 to 1. Don't forget that this stack gets double movement points.

Or maybe I'll just walk from one city to another and backstab you with 1-3 "mercenary" knights (civ 4 don't have grif funs) in 3000 BC that I get as a reward for that "quest". Good times.

Warlords III was...extra balanced . Damn it was fun though.

I don't understand why your troops can't just use Enemy roads from a realistic point of view. Are they made differently? Comon! Now gameplay it's easy to see why. I do agree though that it needs a buff but giving your full stack the promo is a little extreme. Maybe just make it so the unit also gets a +20% Withdraw and an additional vis might help. It should be available from Combat/Drill 3

I moved it to only require Combat 1 (Agg civs with a barracks in the city can have it upon unit creation.) and made it so that it unlocks at compass. Works rather well IMO as it makes the bottom line in the tech tree around that time hold its own nice little advantage.

Interesting, I've been working on some mechanics that increase unit-movement, instead of the current idealogy of increasing number of turns and time-to-research. The only snag I've run into is it really will require a change to how roads work. When I get some free time this summer - I hope to figure out DLL compiling so I can balance-test it all.

Combat-I seems a little lowball for commando though, I could possibly see Combat II, or even if there was a way to say a promotion was available to any unit of X-experience(level). So any level 3/4 unit.

I wanted to enable enemy road usage by default, until/unless an enemy could see you. Thus making a pseudo-ZOC. I haven't quite nailed down that code yet. Commando would negate this pseudo-ZOC. It might be too much effort to enable that functionality though.

Well, one thing I am noticing about commando in my system is that it seems an 'expensive' ability as a promotion. Which is why I put it at combat 1 instead of 2. (I will admit I also considered 2 at first.) What I mean is it doesn't actually make your units stronger, just faster (and only sort of in that regard) So when you spend a promotion on a unit, you actually sort of sacrifice the level for this ability. Meaning the promotion would cost 5 xp (or 10 depending on how you look at it - adding up all promotions) to have it be at combat 2. Then you are left with a combat 2, commando with no specialization. I personally prefer combat 1 because the advantage Aggressive holds over the others isn't too monumental in this regard. (Agg civs would only need a unit with 5 xp to get commando and others would require double that - requiring combat 1, the difference is only 3 xp.)

or even if there was a way to say a promotion was available to any unit of X-experience(level). So any level 3/4 unit.

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That would be really cool.

Perhaps making a promotion that 'grows' with experience? Not sure how that would work though. WOuld be interesting to hear what you are doing with roads though too. I don't know commando is a promotion that is nice to have, but can easily get too expensive IMO. As it's a promotion you need to give every unit in the invading stack or else it can easily become worthless.

Its a useless promotion because only spies who start with it will ever have it. MAYBE if you're imperialistic and settled all your GG in one city that has WP in it while running vassalage and theocracy. Maybe you could have commando by the time modern armors roll around. But I'd rather have 10 cities making units with 2 promos than one city making units with 5.

I played as the Agg/Charismatic Celtic chick and after some serious early and mid game warring amassed enough GG to pump out Commando Rifles. They laid waste to the rest of my opponents. The extra speed is incredibly devastating as it lets you quickly move from the front lines to the next level of cities.

ICNP said:

I don't understand why your troops can't just use Enemy roads from a realistic point of view. Are they made differently? Comon!

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I think the point is more that an invading enemy was more likely to avoid using the enemy roads.

ICNP said:

I don't understand why your troops can't just use Enemy roads from a realistic point of view. Are they made differently? Comon!

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From a realistic perspective, when traveling in friendly territory, units know the roads and know the terrain, and can maximize speed accordingly. When traveling in unknown enemy territory, those same units have to take security precautions (a man with a rifle could be behind every tree), and are less familiar with the roads and lay of the land. Progress is therefore slower.

@ jkp1187: I can agree with that for the most part.
What I can't bring myself to agree with at all, is that you have to pay 2MP for moving onto/thru a roaded hill/forest.

ICNP said:

I don't understand why your troops can't just use Enemy roads from a realistic point of view. Are they made differently? Comon! Now gameplay it's easy to see why. I do agree though that it needs a buff but giving your full stack the promo is a little extreme. Maybe just make it so the unit also gets a +20% Withdraw and an additional vis might help. It should be available from Combat/Drill 3

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They need to be given up to date roadmaps and a phrase book to help them ask for directions. Hence why only commandos can use enemy roads.

So commando's aren't Rambo, they're a linguistic Gandhi.

The commando promotion should definitely be modded to allow more then "can use enemy rodes". Commandos are generally thought of as leaders or the people you call when you need to do some heavy demolition (if you have BtS think 'Dreadnoughts'). In addition the other units in a stack should be able to move with the commando unit (if one guy leads the way the rest should be able to follow) of course the guy who said there could be riflemen hiding behind trees had a point but still, there should be some realistic way to overcome those issues. Finally: I think that perhaps some late game (or even early game) units could have the commando promotion to start with (such as Navy Seals and paratroopers) because in real life the unit would probably not be hindered by some infantry guarding the roads (think snipers to take our those pesky infantry). Plus after you discover satellites the whole (don't know the territory thing) isn't that big of an issue.

(vanilla)
I have been encountering opportunities to take the commando promotion in my latest 'Prince' difficulty game.

Seems as though i have no reason to choose it at all, the OP is spot on, it is completely useless. Why on earth would i want to run a valuable unit off on its own to get killed the next turn?? Units have to stay together for safety.

If ever i was able to get a large enough strike force of commando units together, then it might be appealing but there are too many far more important promotions in line before that option can ever be viable.

I noticed the OP mention parratroopers. I remember the parratrooper units of civilisation call to power 2, they were heaps fun to use. However i think such units will kinda circumvent the territorial movement limitations which although unrealistic, make good strategic fun in civ4.

The OP is absolutely right about commando currently being useless.

I would make it so, that it enables you to pick an opponent himself when attacking enemy's stack. After all, that is what commandos are supposed to be doing - pick a target and eliminate it. Send in your guys to take out that annoying Anti-Tank or SAM...

Would be pretty powerful tho - maybe move it up to require Combat V?

Yeekim said:

The OP is absolutely right about commando currently being useless.

I would make it so, that it enables you to pick an opponent himself when attacking enemy's stack. After all, that is what commandos are supposed to be doing - pick a target and eliminate it. Send in your guys to take out that annoying Anti-Tank or SAM...

Would be pretty powerful tho - maybe move it up to require Combat V?

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Ah a selective targeting promotion! that is an interesting idea.... although it would be very annoying if the AI can use that promotion and attack your heavily promoted unit before it has a chance to heal!!!