Destroying nukes

[krw72588]

If you nuke an enemy city will it destroy enemy nukes in that city?

[nihilistic]

No.

[Knightblade pDM]

Only way to destroy nukes is to capture/raze city

[Anti-EUA]

Right, but isn't that wrong? If it destroys lots of improvements, kills half of citizens, kills lots of units, why would a NUKE survive?

[scotland_no1]

yeah it is wrong...its kinda weird aswell...wouldnt it cause two nuclear explosions if there was 1 nuke in the city..three explosions if two nukes in the city and so on.

[handyandy]

it's becouse nukes "live" in a protected silo which is desighd to with stand a nukula blast.

[krw72588]

It would be very cheap if nukes could destroy nukes. Early warning systems would detect the incoming nukes and the enemy would fire theirs off.

[Blunt_Axe]

Originally posted by scotland_no1
yeah it is wrong...its kinda weird aswell...wouldnt it cause two nuclear explosions if there was 1 nuke in the city..three explosions if two nukes in the city and so on.

The nuke in the city would need to be detonated to create the blast etc. I think if you did blow up a nuke with another nuke it would create extra radiation like a dirty bomb but not nearly as much as if it was detonated. Like handyandy said the ICBM's would live in a silo and that explains why you can't move an ICBM from the city you build in. I guess with the tactical nukes being mobile they would probably still store them somewhere where they would be safe from a nuclear attack. After all they are designed to be a counter-measure from a nuclear attack.

Off topic a bit here - It would be cool if there was a silo shown in the city display screen for your ICBM's.

[elmerfudd0370]

on the question of the nukes. how do you get the nukes. all i have come up with so far is a cruise missile. and also how do you get the panzers. the best i have in the game i am playing is radar infantry and its no match for the the zulus and the romans.

[MadScot]

Originally posted by elmerfudd0370
on the question of the nukes. how do you get the nukes. all i have come up with so far is a cruise missile. and also how do you get the panzers. the best i have in the game i am playing is radar infantry and its no match for the the zulus and the romans.

To build any nuke some civ in the world must have built the Manhattan Project Great Wonder. (NB it doesnt have to be you). That "unlocks the nuclear Pandora's Box for everyone).

For you to build nukes you need the required technology and strategic resources.

Tactical Nuke (range of 8): Space Flight plus access to Aluminium and Uranium
ICBM (infinite range): Satellites, plus Aluminium and Uranium

I'm not sure what you mean by Radar Infantry, as the basic game has no such thing. If you mean Mech Infantry, then chances are you only just entered the Modern Age and dont have Space Flight researched yet.
If you mean Radar Artillery then I'm confused, because that's only available with Robotics, which is one of the last techs - I don't think I've ever used Radar Artillery, ever.

You only get Panzers if you play the Germans (they are a German Unique Unit). Other civs get Tanks (which are still pretty dandy) and Modern Armor (sic), which is even dandier.

[RX2000]

Originally posted by Anti-EUA
Right, but isn't that wrong? If it destroys lots of improvements, kills half of citizens, kills lots of units, why would a NUKE survive?

Its not wrong. In rl, ICBMs are housed in special silos that go very deep underground, and have huge blast doors on them. They can just about withstand a direct nuclear hit.

Anyways, it wouldnt be very good for gameplay reasons if you could take out the enemies nukes with your nukes. Since Civ3 is a turn based game, whoever launches first could always win easily...... Not very fun, especially in multiplayer.

[Doshin]

If you could move ICBM's it could lead to large exploits too. You could build them in your capital, transfer them to far-flung cities, disband them and then get a courthouse police station and factory up and running in a few turns. It would sure beat staying on wealth

[Tarkeel]

wouldnt it cause two nuclear explosions if there was 1 nuke in the city..three explosions if two nukes in the city and so on.

No. A nuke detonated at ground level isn't very effective, most of the initial energy is absorbed by the terrain/buildings arround it. For better efficiency they are detonated at a certain height, where the ball of energy will cover as large are as possible, while still retaining enough energy to destroy buildings etc.

[The Last Conformist]

It's a bow to turnbasedness. In reality those nukes in the target city would be fired as soon as incoming ICBMs are detected.

[xxaaaxx]

Originally posted by RX2000
Its not wrong. In rl, ICBMs are housed in special silos that go very deep underground, and have huge blast doors on them. They can just about withstand a direct nuclear hit.

It still seems silly. In the game, nukes aren't represented as being housed in silos, but rather as 'units', hovering over the city like a cruise missile would. If the game treats them as units, then they should be subject to destruction by nuke, just like any other unit.

Off topic a bit:
If nukes in silos can survive nuke attack in rl, then why the hell was half the US and Soviet nuclear arsenal aimed at the other's nuke silos?

[stevenx]

hmmm... how they know silo whether can survive nuclear attack, since never tried before... n hopefully wouldn't...

missile need to be armed first before it can denotate... so when a icbm is destroyed, there wouldn't be any nuclear explosion... radioactive material would probably be limited, since no fission or fusion occured during the destruction...

[MadScot]

I think they probably did try various nuclear blast hardening techniques during the various atmospheric tests in the 50s and 60s; that's where most of the data on nuclear weapons effectiveness comes from, and it's an obvious thing to test.

[RX2000]

They have tried it before. There's huge areas out in Nevada and New Mexico that are still radioactive and have bombed out buildings and things like that from all the testing back in the 50s and 60s.

[rflagg]

Originally posted by xxaaaxx


It still seems silly. In the game, nukes aren't represented as being housed in silos, but rather as 'units', hovering over the city like a cruise missile would. If the game treats them as units, then they should be subject to destruction by nuke, just like any other unit.

Off topic a bit:
If nukes in silos can survive nuke attack in rl, then why the hell was half the US and Soviet nuclear arsenal aimed at the other's nuke silos?

For the first paragraph - it's a simple gameplay issue. Since the game is hardcoded as turn based (regardless as being sold as having 'turnless' play), you (or even worse, the AI) would always have the opportunity for a 'winnable' nuclear war, ie no chance for a retaliation, which is what kept the world at peace during the cold war. The only way to truly fix this, without major changes to the code would be to force the nuke unit to take 2 turns, and anyone who is far enough in their tech studies would be alerted before the nukes were to hit, and who they were coming from, allowing for a counter strike.

As far as the real life nuclear setup, neither the US nor the Soviet Union had the technological capability to directly pinpoint where their nukes would hit (until the cold war was closing to an end) - once the US actually found a way to successfully focus a first strike option, supposedly being able to directly hit the silos and hopefully disable them (not destroy them as you'd think, just cause an emp and ground destruction enough to take out necessary computers), they then learned of the effects of nuclear winter, and realized they would f--k the world over regardless of who was able to succeed with a first strike. Later, it was found by those who worked close with the ICBM's in Russia that their ability to 'directly hit' even a city was way off, and they'd be lucky to hit Canada if firing for New York City.

In game, it's basically keeping it as historical as possible without making it unfair for any side - hence the reason of a usual world war III when nukes are fired by anyone upon others. In a "perfect" version of Civ, you would build the silo with the ICBM housed in it, and be able to place it anywhere in your terrority (once there, it stays there) - it would be unable to be captured by the enemy unless they capture the city it is linked to, and if the city it was linked to was hit by a nuke, then you would be required to perhaps rebuild the systems to fire the nuke, or have the option of launching prior to the nuclear strike by the enemy, etc.

Now, if you want to claim that the air units in the game are grossly inaccurate, I'll gladly join you in that argument...

-rflagg.

[Don Uittone]

A noob question but what the hell:

When you build that small wonder what comes with Integrated Defence (can't remember the name right now) it protects 75% of ICBM attacks.But will it protect from tactical nukes? In Civilopedia it says nothing about protecting from normal nukes.It would'nt make sense if it wouldn't.