Civ 5 Movement issue idea

Ive noticed that most of the complaints about the 1upt issue is movement during peace-time, and just moving huge armies in tight spaces. I think they should add the usage of Transporting units, gained from different techs. Where you could load up like 5-8 units, horses counting as double (or even triple if for balance) because of the horse. And make leaving the transport unit count as a turn, such as un-embarking. Allowing the trasport units to stack with military, but not each other, similar to workers and military. At each age, after a certain tech, allowing the number transported and movement of that unit to increase. Also having a naval transport unit allowed to stack with navies, for better strategic placement. Sticking with the same 1upt per type (I.E. 1 Military, 1 Transport, 1 Worker/Great Person). I think this would allow alot more strategic choices, and also silence many of those against the anti-stacking contingency. Just looking for some feedback about my thought.

Exactly what would the form of these transport units take though, especially in earlier times?

It sounds a bit dubious and unnecessary to me. Instead of adding in some additional mechanism to allow extra units on a tile, you may as well just increase the number of units that can be on a tile across the game. Even if the idea of land transports made any sense (what are you loading all your Horses and men up into, especially in the early game?), it doesn't seem like it would add anything to the game apart from making it more tedious. I think I'd rather just have the ability to stack units outright if that was the case.

Like in the ancient times, as soon as you have horseback riding, and the wheel, have like horsedrawn carriages, for stacking like 3 infantry, and a few archers. And have your horsemen out in front guarding it persay. And as technology advances, they advance. Like in Age of Empires 2 (If you played it) You had siege rams which you could load a few infantry in, which allowed for protection against castles, Cities in this game. In modern times there are several methods of these, Air drop ships which can carry tanks, and infantry, Armored Transport units, and even from Civ 4 Naval transports.

But thank you for your criticism, im looking for input.

Realistically, though, armies didn't start doing that on a large scale until the 20th century. They marched by foot until then.

They may not have been used in large scales, but in certain places, and situations they were most neccesary. Similar to that in the game of civ. Would i rather march a army of 10 units through a narrow one hex space, waiting for them to funnel out, Or send one transport, and have them all then come out in a safe, scouted region with easier mobility. It would add a whole new aspect, rather then you have an invading army, id dies, 15 turns later a new = army arives. Compared to the easier ability to reinforce your army as you march. Especially a navy transport, so that you dont have 10 embarked tanks in the water, free to be killed by my weaker navy units.

Aside from realism issues, unloading the transports would still be a pain

The simpler solution is obviously still to just allow more units per tile. No need to add an unnecessary (and unrealistic) extra mechanic to the game. Much as I commend the originality, I just don't think it'd work.

Well i play a VIDEO game to enjoy it, and have many different options at my hand. Not to be Completely realistic. I deal with Realism enough as is. Perhaps unloading would be a pain, but would it be more of a pain then trying to maneuver units around each other on the battlefield? Especially with the A.I.s constant hectic movements, i find it a pain to keep the proper units in the proper places. Where as if i could load into a transport, and be able to relocate my units appropriately id enjoy it. Some would say you could just load injured units into the transport for safety, but think of it as such, they would be like embarked units, extremely weak, and easily killed. And you couldnt move the transport prior to loading, similar to embarking.

Even have units in transports, when the transport is killed, take damage, and be forced into a stack, similar to when you build a unit in a city that already has one, and you have to use a turn to unstack. Leaving you vulnerable.

Lord Parkin said:

The simpler solution is obviously still to just allow more units per tile. No need to add an unnecessary (and unrealistic) extra mechanic to the game. Much as I commend the originality, I just don't think it'd work.

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And i agree with you completely, Allow minor stacks, and mixed units. But seeing as how they obviously feel this is not an option, i feel its time to start looking into alternate solutions. Maybe not mine, but try to find something. Perhaps, allowing units to cross other units tiles, but once in that tile, they are completely useless, or something of the sort.

I'm not against naval transports. In fact, I think it would be an improvement on the current system, which is kind of weird and seems mostly in place just to buff the AI at intercontinental warfare (not that it's any good at that right now anyway). I preferred the system of having to load your units into naval transports to send them overseas, so yeah, I'm in favour of that.

I just don't think the land transport idea makes much sense.

You do know that units can move through each other if they have enough movement points to reach their destination on the other side, right? I find this makes positioning your units easy enough on open terrain. In rough terrain its harder, but I suppose that's simply the truth for maneuvring in rough terrain. In fact it's a little too easy for cavalry units to rearrange in forests, I think.

Junuxx said:

You do know that units can move through each other if they have enough movement points to reach their destination on the other side, right? I find this makes positioning your units easy enough on open terrain. In rough terrain its harder, but I suppose that's simply the truth for maneuvring in rough terrain. In fact it's a little too easy for cavalry units to rearrange in forests, I think.

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As true as this is, most maps that i play on tend to have many choke holds and such, which is nice when defending against a ******** A.I. But not so much when you build your cities around it, that would be nice to have some way of getting through easier. Sure you could build roads, but thats expensive.

"You do know that units can move through each other if they have enough movement points to reach their destination on the other side, right?"

Yes i indeed do, but many INFANTRY units dont have that luxury when theres 2 units blocking their way. And as for your comment about horses, i agree with what ive read, they are incredibly OP. Considering most armies used them as scouting, and flanking units, and now i can use them as my whole army. But i would rather not dive into that.

In my eyes, the major reason for them is this; I have a huge map a large open continent, and i would prefer the ability to make an army and travel allll the way across to the other side to hit the enemy whom is much more advanced then me, rather then try to carve a whole through each civ.

I guess im just trying to find a way to solve this 1upt issue without regressing to Stacking units, which i hated. To me fighting a stack of 50 people all on one turn was much more of a pain, then killing wave after wave. I feel that is more fun.

I think a better system would be to allow multiple units in a tile (maybe 2), but one of the units is worthless until it's on its own again. You could also add the feature (was in in Civ 3, or just Civ 2?) where if one unit is destroyed, all units in that tile are destroyed. That would make people separate units for combat, but be able to stack them a bit for easier movement.

They've decided to stick with one unit per tile, which I think has potential if they get past the repositioning issues.

Lord Parkin said:

I'm not against naval transports. In fact, I think it would be an improvement on the current system, which is kind of weird and seems mostly in place just to buff the AI at intercontinental warfare (not that it's any good at that right now anyway). I preferred the system of having to load your units into naval transports to send them overseas, so yeah, I'm in favour of that.

I just don't think the land transport idea makes much sense.

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Glad you agree with the naval part, that annoyed me more then anything. But i guess let me try to lay out whats in my head entirely.

Your transport follows a few horsemen who have scouted the area, you unload a front line of 2-3 swordsman, infantry what ever in front, then have a few ranged units, Artilery, archers what ever, in back. Now instead of trying to slowly move this army across 20 hex tiles, you did it smoothly in a transport, now my army marches the last few tiles already in formation. Now lets say, you bring another transport, with a few infantry, and a few on the field die, or are wounded, you could load them into an empty space in a transport and unload a fresh one. Some could say this is OP, but if you have archers or artillery you could simply kill the transport. Which would do damage to those inside, and probably kill a wounded unit. This seems simpler then moving all my archers, and disrupting my attack so that a wounded unit can run. Transports could also allow for a few units to sneak around the enemy army, protected by horses, or another route, to drop a flanking army. Seems like that, to me, would create a whole new feeling to the fighting in the game.

But in warfare, and in Civilization 5, maneuvering is a major factor. If you allow several units to suddenly appear on a flank, or withdraw, or whatever, it just wouldn't make sense realistically and would make the game center more around surprise attacks.

You can already move an army in formation across a few dozen hexes; it's realistic that they'd have to slow down for the slower units/the units going through the tougher terrain. The only major problem seems to be getting that army through a chokepoint; realistically, that was a problem too, so I don't see why it's so bad to have in Civ 5.

Ruanek said:

But in warfare, and in Civilization 5, maneuvering is a major factor. If you allow several units to suddenly appear on a flank, or withdraw, or whatever, it just wouldn't make sense realistically and would make the game center more around surprise attacks.

You can already move an army in formation across a few dozen hexes; it's realistic that they'd have to slow down for the slower units/the units going through the tougher terrain. The only major problem seems to be getting that army through a chokepoint; realistically, that was a problem too, so I don't see why it's so bad to have in Civ 5.

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Well, especially in earlier times in history, there were more Surprise attacks. It was a SMART strategical move. Easily punishable by if you lose your transport, before you unload, your army can easily be decimated. And again i say, i dont play a video game for it to be realistic. If you try to make a GAME more realistic your defeating the purpose of it entirely. In real life, what real chokepoint do you see that entire armies are forced down to let maybe 1/20th of their army go in a line? Never. That is, by your standards Totally Un-realistic. As i said; id prefer to have some kind of stacking, with its limits, and controls otherwise im just trying to come up with other solvings to the issue.

Oh and another thing, id rather not spend 10-15 turns moving my army, waiting for slow units. That is stupid, especially with as slow as turns load as is.

|Guillotine| said:

Well, especially in earlier times in history, there were more Surprise attacks. It was a SMART strategical move. Easily punishable by if you lose your transport, before you unload, your army can easily be decimated. And again i say, i dont play a video game for it to be realistic. If you try to make a GAME more realistic your defeating the purpose of it entirely. In real life, what real chokepoint do you see that entire armies are forced down to let maybe 1/20th of their army go in a line? Never. That is, by your standards Totally Un-realistic. As i said; id prefer to have some kind of stacking, with its limits, and controls otherwise im just trying to come up with other solvings to the issue.

Oh and another thing, id rather not spend 10-15 turns moving my army, waiting for slow units. That is stupid, especially with as slow as turns load as is.

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There were surprise attacks, yeah, but not entire armies appearing on the flank of an already-existing battle. And if the transport is behind even one unit, or near some cavalry, the enemy wouldn't be able to destroy it easily.

For real-life choke-points: I generally think of Thermopylae, where 300 Spartans (or them plus 1100 allies, depending on your source, especially if it's a movie or not) held off a Persian army of several hundred thousand (or a few million, again depending on your sources) for several days because they were in a narrow mountain pass. It's not the only example.

I agree that realism isn't necessarily important in a game, but you can't just ignore it entirely just because you want to be able to move units around easily, especially in a game that tries to be relatively historically accurate.

Ruanek said:

There were surprise attacks, yeah, but not entire armies appearing on the flank of an already-existing battle. And if the transport is behind even one unit, or near some cavalry, the enemy wouldn't be able to destroy it easily.

For real-life choke-points: I generally think of Thermopylae, where 300 Spartans (or them plus 1100 allies, depending on your source, especially if it's a movie or not) held off a Persian army of several hundred thousand (or a few million, again depending on your sources) for several days because they were in a narrow mountain pass. It's not the only example.

I agree that realism isn't necessarily important in a game, but you can't just ignore it entirely just because you want to be able to move units around easily, especially in a game that tries to be relatively historically accurate.

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If continued scouting during a battle, you would easily see the flanking attempt, and silence it swiftly. I still think Horse units are OP, so you are correct by saying it would be difficult as is. But i always have units scattered to make sure the computer, Or human in multiplayer, is not trying to flank me as is. Therefore, it would not be as easy as you say.

Yeah there were plenty of those moments, but i see them as Strategical blunders on the Aggressors, Those blinded by confidence and pride, in alot of cases.

And saying that using transports isnt realism is also ignoring facts. Because even in the Medieval Era, there were mobile ways of protecting from archers, and invading castles. Humans tend to think logically, and find ways to solve logical issues, I.E. I want to move my army faster and increase protection, i make a means to do so. Saying that is not realistic, is under-minding human intelligence.

Oh, and thank you Ruanek for your feedback, and honest opinion. Its having someone to oppose you that allows you to see from outside the box, and allow a more balanced, and intuitive end result to an idea. I say this so you dont think im just bashing your logic.

|Guillotine| said:

If continued scouting during a battle, you would easily see the flanking attempt, and silence it swiftly. I still think Horse units are OP, so you are correct by saying it would be difficult as is. But i always have units scattered to make sure the computer, Or human in multiplayer, is not trying to flank me as is. Therefore, it would not be as easy as you say.

Yeah there were plenty of those moments, but i see them as Strategical blunders on the Aggressors, Those blinded by confidence and pride, in alot of cases.

And saying that using transports isnt realism is also ignoring facts. Because even in the Medieval Era, there were mobile ways of protecting from archers, and invading castles. Humans tend to think logically, and find ways to solve logical issues, I.E. I want to move my army faster and increase protection, i make a means to do so. Saying that is not realistic, is under-minding human intelligence.

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The AI in my experience (I haven't done multiplayer) just sends masses of units. It doesn't have cavalry on the flanks to stop your attempts to flank him. It would be easy enough for humans to counter (though still annoying) but it would be easily exploitable versus the AI, and most games are versus the AI. Even assuming it is given ways to deal with it, put even one spearman and one cavalry unit next to that transport and the enemy is going to have a tough time destroying it before you deploy your instant army on their flank.

For chokepoints: you asked "In real life, what real chokepoint do you see that entire armies are forced down to let maybe 1/20th of their army go in a line?" In my example, the Persians did try to flank them with their navy, but their land army still needed to go through that pass. In mountainous areas, that's pretty common. In the fighting in northern Italy in WWII both sides tried to ambush the enemy when they were going through those narrow passes. If you need to get somewhere, and the only way is through a narrow chokepoint, trying to go through isn't necessarily a strategic blunder.

Back to transports: yes, humans do tend to find new ways to solve issues. However, they really did take thousands of years to discover a better way to move armies around. Putting people in a siege tower or battering ram may work in a siege because there it protects your troops (and you want these transports to be easily destroyable). It is completely impractical for attacking other countries as a whole.