Patch suggestion MOD (PtW version)

Patch suggestion MOD - PtW version 1.24 readme (based on 1.27f PtW patch)

Author: player1

Why "patch suggestion"? Simple. These are the changes that if added to original Civ3 rules (based on v1.27f PtW patch) would improve game balance and fun. I tried using the conservative concept of not changing the rules too much, if not necessary, in order to keep original Civ3 flavor. I hope that players of this MOD will find game more fun and interesting.

INSTALL INSTRUCTIONS:
Just put BIX file in scenario folder.
Load from game menu.


Here is the link link to no-PtW version.

Extended version with improved civilopedia and tech screen can be found here.


Comments to changes in v1.24

MOD has been made compatible with v1.27f PtW patch.


MOD CHANGES

Upgrade paths:

Longbowmen and Med. Infantry upgrade to Riflemen. This way, AI won't have huge army of sword & bow units in early industrial era. And in reality, rifles did made sword & bow obsolete.

For similar reasons, to prevent having ability to build these units in modern age, Frigate, Man-O-War, Privateer and Ironclad upgrade to Destroyer. True, it does look odd to upgrade sailing ship to Destroyer, but look at the costs. To upgrade Frigate you need 120gp per unit.

Submarines get upgraded to Nuc. Submarines. Considering that Nuc. Submarines are better in every way, there are obvious reasons for new upgrade chain.


Unit flags:

All artillery units, Scout, Explorer and Leader get Airlift flag. I don't know why they are skipped in normal rules, since you can airlift tank. On the other hand Presidents (and other Leaders) do fly by the plane too.

Foot Unit flag added to Scout, Explorer and Leader units, in order to make them transferable by helicopters. Since these units already got Airlift ability, there is no good reason to prevent their transport by helicopters.

All artillery units, Tanks, Panzer Tanks, Modern Armor and Mech. Infantry gain Wheeled ability. This prevents moving them on Jungle and Mountain tiles if there is no road.
Note: You can move those units on enemy roads, you just don't get road movement bonus.

Normally, Cruise Missiles can be loaded into transports directly, but not from city since they have no active "load flag". I fixed that bug and added load flag when needed.

Mech. Inf. has no more offense AI flag selected (has only defense AI flag now).
Since AI used too much Mech. Inf. instead of Tanks when planning attacks (and built Tanks rarely). This should fix that AI behavior.

All King units get Airlift and Foot Unit flags. Considering that all King units have Load ability (which makes them transportable by ships), I think that having them with these abilities should be allowed too (it even makes some interesting strategies for MP).


Rate of fire:

Fighters and Jet Fighters get ROF of 2. I always wondered why Catapults have better bombard values then Jet Fighters. This will make those units not great bombers, but still useful since they also now have lethal bombardment ability.

Cannon and Hwacha get ROF of 2, but their price increases to 60 shields. This is done because normally, Cannon firepower is on average weaker then firepower of two catapults. This should make these units much more worthy and will reduce some micromanagement.

Cruise Missiles get ROF of 4 to make them more devastating, and cost-effective (since they get destroyed after attack). Also, if they are lucky, they can kill 3hp (or even 4hp) Battleship.


Air unit tweaks:

Fighters, Jet Fighters, F-15 and Stealth Fighters get lethal sea and land bombard (they can kill units with bombards). All these units get Air bombard AI flag added.

Why?

These units are tactical bombers. They do their job from close distance. That way they can take out 1hp units. This won't be unbalanced since these units are much worse bombers then standard Bomber unit, and land units have huge defensive bonuses.

Jet Fighters get bombard strength of 4, to make them more distinctive from Fighters. They do have rockets anyway. Since it would lead to less powerful F-15 & Stealth Fighter, these units get increased bombard strength of 6.

In order to balance out increased Stl. Fighters bombard efficiency (compared to Stl. Bombers), Stl. Fighters gets new price of 160 shields. Costly, but anything less would make use of Stl. Bomber meaningless since Stl. Fighter has lethal bombard abilities.

Bombers get their range increased to 8. Large bombers usually have extra fuel tanks, which give them higher operational range. Also it should make modern ships an easier target (it would be a little more difficult to get out of their operational range in one turn). Should be not too much unbalancing since bombers have no lethal bombard turned on. Also lowers the need of relocating Bombers every time you conquer enemy border city.

Since Bombers now have operational range of 8, it would seam strange to leave Tactical Nukes with shorter range of 6. That's why I now increased bombard range of Tactical Nukes to 8 tiles.

Civilopedia says that Cruise Missiles can fly for thousand miles, so let it be reflected in the rules. They get bombard range of 4.

Helicopters can now transport 2 foot units. This makes Helicopter a more useful transport unit.


Ship tweaks:

Frigate gets attack AND bombard rating of 3, while Man-O-War gets attack AND bombard rating of 4. My reasoning was, that historicly, main difference between Ironclads and sailing ships was in ARMOR, and NOT in weapons. These changes reflect that. Ironclad has not much better offense, but has pretty good defense. With new stats Man-O-War becomes pretty interesting vessel. Has attack power of Ironclad (cannon heavy ship), while on the other hand is pretty vulnerable against Ironclads (and even Frigates).

Privateers get defense of 2, increased movement of 4 and lower cost of 50 shields. This will make them more useful to players. On the other hand it's not overpowering considering that Frigate has now both higher attack rating and very useful bombard ability.

Prerequisite tech for Ironclad unit is now Industrialization (instead of Steam Power). Also, Ironclads get cost of 90. This is done in order to prolong use of Frigates as "queen of seas". In original rules, Frigates were quickly made obsolete by Ironclads.

Late game naval units have increased movement by 1. This is done in order to make greater difference between speed of modern naval vessels and sailing ships. It should not be unbalancing since change is for just one movement point.

So Destroyers, Battleships, AEGIS Cruisers, Transports and Carriers get movement of 6. Subs get movement of 4, while Nuclear Subs get movement of 5. Note that now, since Carriers and Battleships are same-class ships, they get same movement rate of 6.

Submarines (nuclear version also) get attack of 10, to make them dangerous enough and force players to make their own submarines to detect enemy ones.

Also, Nuc. Submarines get reduced cost of 120 shields (was 140). Nuc. Submarines are better in every way, but not that much better to keep old price of 140 shields.

Battleship bombard capabilities are barely better compared to Destroyer (8 vs 6). So in order to fix that, Battleship gets bombard strength of 12. AEGIS Cruiser also gets higher bombard strength of 8.

Battleship gets higher cost of 220 shields. This is mostly done in order to make Destroyers more useful.

In order to make AEGIS Cruiser better at defense against bombers (that's the point of AEGIS), I increased their defense rating to 12. It's same defense as of Battleship, but since they are cheaper they become best in escort missions. Makes them more them more useful then simple submarine detectors. Destroyers still stay as main grunt force (cheap).


Basic unit stats:

Longbowmen gets reduced cost of 30 to make them more attractive compared to Knights. 40 cost was too much anyway (Immortals cost 30 and have attack of 4).

Gunpowder infantry units look too much weak on attack and too expensive for defense compared to cavalry or pre-gunpowder units.

Musketmen get 2/4/1 stats, cost 50 (lower cost)
Musketeer gets 4/4/1 stats, cost 50 (useful, finally)
Riflemen get 5/6/1 stats, cost 70 (higher attack and lower cost)
Guerilla gets 7/6/1 stats, cost 80 (higher attack and lower cost)
Infantry gets 8/10/1 stats, cost 90 (higher attack)

Reduced cost and higher attack makes these units more valuable.

Knight to Cavalry upgrade looks pretty cheap considering it's benefits (+50% to offense and movement for just 10-20gp). And its devastating if done early in rennaissance age. To make this a little bit more balanced I increased cost of Cavalry to 90 shields. Despite higher cost of Cavalry, Cossaks will keep their cost of 80 shields, since their higher defense is not much impressive on its own. Siphai will keep their cost of 100 shields too, since their cost is already high enough considering their benefits.

Marines and Paratroopers get some changes too:
Marines get 10/8/1 stats.
Paratroopers get 8/10/1 stats.

This makes these units more valuable and gives every of them special tactic. Paratrooper will invade and hold position, while Marines will assault. These units can be especially good in Jungles and Mountains, which wheeled units can't pass. And since in modern times Infantry gets obsolete these unit take role of jungle & mountain warriors. Someone could argue that Attack of 10 makes Marines capable of killing Tanks, but since smart players will stack tanks with Infantry support, that should not be problem.

Paratroopers also get operational range of 8. Real problem with these units was that it was difficult to land your units behind enemy lines, since they need to start from your cities. Hopefully this change will make them more strategicly useful.

Modern Armor gets defense of 14 to make Mech. Inf. more important.

Radar Artillery is mobile unit, so it gets movement of 2. Since Radar Artillery has movement of 2, it now needs Oil and Rubber (plus Aluminium).


Unique units changes:

When comparing Keshik and Ansar Warrior, Keshik's benefits looks much weaker. To fix that I added blitz ability to Keshik (can attack multiple times in single turn). It goes well with flavor of "mounted archers" (attack, withdraw, attack). Also, Keshik is probably a unit that benefits the least from blitz (it's difficult to blitz Pikemen and due to low Keshik defense they are easy to be counterattacked). I added to them the ability to ignore movement penalties on Hills too, because it looks more realistic (how could they travel fast on Mountains if they can't on Hills).

Also, Elephants gain ability to ignore movement penalties in Jungles. It's mostly done to make them better unique unit (since usually you have strategic resources in abundance), and to reflect their endurance and familiarity with climate in these regions.

Bezerk gets attack lowered to 5, but decreased cost of 50 shields. Why? Since I just can't comprehend axe-wielding unit with same offensive power as gun-armed Cavalry. Still, even with these changes they will be a very competitive unique unit.

Conquistadors get reduced cost of 50 shields. Although they need to be balanced to Knights (having them with attack of 4 would probably make Knights obsolete), they are still unique unit, which needs Navigation as prerequisite, so they need to be a little bit more powerful.

...

Description of changes continues at next post due to post size limitations.


Version 1.01 was downloaded 18 times.
Version 1.11 was downloaded 26 times.
Version 1.12 was downloaded 20 times.
Version 1.13 was downloaded 70 times.
Version 1.14 was downloaded 9 times.
Version 1.2 was downloaded 52 times.
Version 1.22 was downloaded 69 times.
Version 1.23 was downloaded 108 times.

Hmm...

More downloads then at Poly, but no comments.

Version 1.1 is OUT!

Comments to changes in v1.1

MOD has been made compatible with new v1.14f PtW patch. This includes several fixes, like removing Frigate from England build list (was a bug), changing Spanish AI Wealth preference from build never to build often strategy, and adding load flags to all king units. Some things I already did in this MOD were also fixed in new patch (Bezerk and Hwacha upgrade paths and AI Explore flag for Keshik and Conquistador).

Cossaks get defense AI flag added. Cossaks had this flag in original Civ3, but it was removed in PtW. Still, since in this MOD Cossaks got defense rating increased to 5, I added that flag back too.

All king units get Airlift ability. Considering that now all king units have Load ability (which makes them transportable by ships), I think that having them Airlift ability should be allowed too. Leaders to fly by planes anyway.

Version 1.11 is OUT!

Comments to changes in v1.11

Cossaks get AI defense flag removed, since I've seen Russians using Cossaks instead Infantry to defend cities. And that's not good.

Frigate gets attack of 3, while Man-O-War gets attack of 4, but with original defense of 2. My reasoning was, that historicly, main difference between Ironclads and sailing ships was in ARMOR, and NOT in weapons. These changes reflect that. Ironclad has not much better offense, but has pretty good defense. With new stats Man-O-War becomes pretty interesting vessel. Has attack power of Ironclad (cannon heavy ship), while on the other hand is pretty vulnerable against Ironclads (and even Frigates).

These changes made Ironclad not so much powerful as before so price is reduced to 90 (but not back to original 80, since that would ALWAYS make them better choice then Frigate).

Caravels get back defense of 2 (to be protected from Galleys). Plus, since Privateer is based on smaller ships like Caravel, I've added defense of 2 to Privateers (they should not be more vulnerable then Caravel), but gave them original cost of 60 shields.

NOTE: All changes done in v1.11 are also done in non-PtW version of this MOD.

Player1 fanatic Good work on the documentation!! Unfortunately for most (including me ) documentation is not fun and the most neglected. It also has the unfortunate trait of being very important too. So I commend you.

I'm trying your mod now, I'll let you know how it goes.

VERSION 1.12 is OUT!

Comments to changes in v1.12

Spy experience was changed to Veteran for all non-communist governments and to Elite for Communist government. That way, I've increased success chances for spying missions, which are by default low. Note that Diplomat experience is still Regular, so you'll have good reason to use Spy instead of Diplomat for Steal Tech mission.

Also Steal World Map mission is added to Diplomats. World Map is most useful in ancient era anyway.

ROF for Battleship and AEGIS Cruiser is changed back to 2. With ROF of 3, they were really powerful, especially Battleship, which could be as good as bomber, and also an assault ship. Still in order to make Battleship more then "slightly better then Destroyer", it gets bombard strength of 10. AEGIS Cruiser also gets higher bombard strength of 6 too. Since Battleship is not good as before it gets price reduced to 220 (still more then original price of 200 shields).

Some planes get a little bit higher bombard rating. Jet Fighters get bombard rating of 4 (was 3), and F-15 and Stl. Fighter get bombard rating of 6 (was 4). This is mostly done to make these units more balanced compared to other naval and air units.

Stl. Bomber cost changed back to 240, since it IS worth that much. But, in order to make it balanced with Stl. Fighter, Stl. Fighter gets new price of 160 shields. Costly, but anything cheaper would make use of Stl. Bomber meaningless since Stl. Fighter has lethal bombard abilities.

NOTE: All changes done in v1.12 are also done in non-PtW version of this MOD.

Version 1.13 is OUT!

Comments to changes in v1.13

Musketmen attack lowered to original value of 2 (but they still keep price of 50). With attack of 3, human player had big advantage against AI since he could nicely use Musketmen for attacks on open ground, while AI couldn't since Musketmen had no offense AI flag. On the other hand, giving Musketmen offense AI flag would not work well too, since in that case AI would also use them for suicidal attacks on cities (while there are many better and cheaper units for that, like Longbowmen).

But, even in that case, French Musketeer will keep its attack of 4, since with lower attack, it would just not be good offense unit.

Cossaks get their defense lowered back to 4. Testing showed that defense of 5 makes them too much powerful, since it makes them almost as good in defense as in attack.

Frigates get increased bombard strength to 3, while Man-O-War gets bombard strength of 4. This is all done in order to complement their increased attack ratings in last version. This should prove not unbalancing since these units still have poor defense. Since that change made Frigates even more better then Privateers, Privateers get their cost lowered to 50 shields.

In last version I've gone too far with limiting bombard strength of Battleship and AEGIS Cruiser. For that reason, they get slightly higher bombard ratings. Bombard rating of 12 for Battleship and 8 for AEGIS Cruiser.

Fighters get lethal land bombard added. Fighters were used for tactical bombing mission after all, and since they have pretty low bombard rating, this change will not be unbalanced.

Major changes for Longevity Wonder. Since it just doesn't give proper benefits in modern age, I made it available with Sanitation (industrial age) and removed all happiness bonuses. Now it could give some good benefits, especially after Hospitals are built.

NOTE: All changes done in v1.13 are also done in non-PtW version of this MOD.

Just wanted to thank you for this mod. It's very well done and high quality. I appreciate all the details in the readme files and that the civpedia pages seem to all match (i don't know if that happens automagically or if it's something you have to do).

I've been playing a civ3 game so far on a medium map with 10 civs and everything's worked great (out to year 1770). Just got ptw, so i'll try the ptw version next.

Thanks!!!
dsr

Actualy only unit info maches with civilopedia.
(units stats and needed resources)

And tech chnages.

But there is always readme file.

That's the part I noticed updated in the civpedia --> the stats. That's the most important part!

Hey, I've been playing my game now to year 1900. I started in an absolutely horrible starting location, and fell majorly behind other civs in the beginning. I spend most of the middle ages catching up to the other civs. It's been an enjoyable game despite (because of?) the extra hardships. Overall, I've enjoyed the mod much more than the out-of-the-box game and have not seen any crashes or problems.

Anyway, here's more details on my take on the changes:

Unit changes, upgrade paths, etc: excellent!

Spy experience change: Does spy experience change (Veteran/Elite) change the cost of missions, or just success rate?

Barbarian changes: good!

Cost of Propaganda spying missions is HALVED: Propaganda now seems too cheap, which makes Democracy more powerful as a way to stop it. Perhaps 75% would be a good cost. In fact, perhaps all of the espionage missions could benefit from a 10-25% off bluelight special. (Though my opinion on this might change if the spy experience change effects cost of missions).

Number of optimal cities: I prefer the original numbers. I know Civ3's corruption is a widely argued topic, but I like the limitations to help out with the ole' Infinite City Sprawl.

Communism Worker Bonus: Not sure. Is Communism underpowered enough(compared to Democracy) to warrant this?


Thanks again!
dsr

Originally posted by dsr
Spy experience change: Does spy experience change (Veteran/Elite) change the cost of missions, or just success rate?

Click to expand...

Just success rate.

Originally posted by dsr
Cost of Propaganda spying missions is HALVED: Propaganda now seems too cheap, which makes Democracy more powerful as a way to stop it. Perhaps 75% would be a good cost.

Click to expand...

Does it?
From my experience while cost look lower, chances for successfull propaganda are still low enough.

What was your sucess with propaganda?
(I peronaly didn't tested this mission too often, but till now I have't seen any complains)

By the way, I normaly see Deomcracy as a little bit underpowered, since you gain "a little" lower corruption and worker bonus, but suffer terrible unhappniess in war.

Originally posted by dsr
In fact, perhaps all of the espionage missions could benefit from a 10-25% off bluelight special. (Though my opinion on this might change if the spy experience change effects cost of missions).

Click to expand...

Actually original costs are fine for most missions.
While lower cost of steal tech would benefit for ancient and medivial ear when tech steal is very expensive, it would make in modern age that mission way to much abusive.

Even with original cost you could "safely" steal tech for 2500gp for which you would normally need about 12,000gp

Originally posted by dsr
Number of optimal cities: I prefer the original numbers. I know Civ3's corruption is a widely argued topic, but I like the limitations to help out with the ole' Infinite City Sprawl.

Click to expand...

Actually it's not much different form original.
Just a littl bit higher at lower levels (to help novice players).

Originally posted by dsr
Communism Worker Bonus: Not sure. Is Communism underpowered enough(compared to Democracy) to warrant this?

Click to expand...

Actualy it indeed a little bit underpowered.

But woker change on itself does not make it anymore powerful.
It's there for flavor.
Communism did promated public works.

Originally posted by dsr
Thanks again!
dsr

Click to expand...

You are welcome.

I haven´t tried your mod yet, but I think your changes to the berserk will be an improvement. However, have you thought of changing the enabling technology? The Viking expansion began circa 800AD, and had peaked before circa 1100AD, so the choice by Firaxis of invention (which is associated with Leonardo da Vinci, who lived in the 15th/16th centuries, and the longbow, which came to prominence in the 14th century) as the enabling technology is puzzling. This placement in an incorrect era may explain why the attack value was made unreasonably high.

Although the rise of the Vikings actually predates feudalism (and was in part responsible for its development), it´s close enough that I think feudalism would be a reasonable enabling technology. The berserk could then replace the medieval infantry unit for the Vikings.

Originally posted by player1 fanatic

From my experience while cost look lower, chances for successfull propaganda are still low enough.

What was your sucess with propaganda?
(I peronaly didn't tested this mission too often, but till now I have't seen any complains)

Click to expand...

There was only one county, the Romans, in the later game that wasn't a democracy. The cost for propoganda was in the hundreds, which didn't seem like much. Of course, I don't know what my success rate was. Guess it could have cost a bit more if I had to try several times before succeeding. I'd go back and check a save game, but they're gone already. Doh!

Originally posted by player1 fanatic

Actually original costs are fine for most missions.
While lower cost of steal tech would benefit for ancient and medivial ear when tech steal is very expensive, it would make in modern age that mission way to much abusive.

Even with original cost you could "safely" steal tech for 2500gp for which you would normally need about 12,000gp

Click to expand...

I agree with that. Didn't realize the differences between ancient and modern for those costs.

dsr

Originally posted by Caligula
I haven´t tried your mod yet, but I think your changes to the berserk will be an improvement. However, have you thought of changing the enabling technology? The Viking expansion began circa 800AD, and had peaked before circa 1100AD, so the choice by Firaxis of invention (which is associated with Leonardo da Vinci, who lived in the 15th/16th centuries, and the longbow, which came to prominence in the 14th century) as the enabling technology is puzzling. This placement in an incorrect era may explain why the attack value was made unreasonably high.

Although the rise of the Vikings actually predates feudalism (and was in part responsible for its development), it´s close enough that I think feudalism would be a reasonable enabling technology. The berserk could then replace the medieval infantry unit for the Vikings.

Click to expand...

I thought about changing tech to Feudalism instead of Invention, but then I realized that it would change this MOD too much from core Civ3.

And I try to be conservative with this MOD.

P.S.
Lower attack rate for better price was enough anyway.

Version 1.14 is OUT!

Comments to changes in v1.14

Explore command removed from Tactical Nukes, since it doesn't make sense.

Observation showed that AI, despite having airlift flag, was unable to airlift Cruise Missiles. So to fix this imbalance I removed airlift flag from Cruise Missiles.

I reduced price of Galic Swordsmen to 40, since original price of 50 was too expensive for a unique unit (Mounted Warrior has just one defense point less and costs 30 shields).

When comparing Keshik and Ansar Warrior, Keshik's benefits looks much weaker. To fix that I decreased cost of Keshik to 50 shields.

In light of recent changes to some unique units, I concluded that price reduction to 60 shields is not enough to make Conquistadors worthy. That's why I now reduced their cost to 50 shields.

Knight to Cavalry upgrade looks pretty cheap considering it's benefits (+50% to offense and movement for just 10-20gp). And its devastating if done early in rennaissance age. To make this a little bit more balanced I increased cost of Cavalry to 90 shields.

Despite higher cost of Cavalry, Cossaks will keep their cost of 80 shields, since their higher defense is not much impressive on its own. Siphai would keep price of 100 shields too, since their cost is already high enough considering their benefits.

Also, after some consideration, I think that Great Wall does not need to give free walls anymore (it already gives defense bonus to walled cities). So I removed that ability.

Click to expand...

Also, extended version with improved civilopedia and tech screen can be found here.

Version 1.2 is OUT!

Comments to changes in v1.2

MOD has been made compatible with v1.21f PtW patch. This mostly includes some minor tweaks, like removing Asturias from Spanish city list or fixing explore flag for Tactical Nukes.
I also updated this readme file to include all needed data, so you don't need to refer to non-ptw readme anymore.

Note: Since BIX format is same for both 1.14f and 1.21f PtW patch, you could use this MOD with 1.14f patch too.

In almost all cases I found myself nodding in agreement with each of your Mods - with the exception of increasing the helicopters number of transports.

In case you didn't know - the most valuable attribute of a helicopter IMHO is its ability to transport units between airports without using any of the units movement cost. Instead just the helicopter's movement is used. To see this just load units into the helicopter, and than relocated the helicopter to another airbase, than unload the unit from the helicopter and presto... (Maybe this is not widely known? I know I found this out myself…)

Increasing the capacity of the helicopters makes them to powerful in this respect in my opinion. Especially in PTW where your workers can build airports very quickly...

Of course they can only do this (I haven't played in a few months so I hope this is right) for units that are flagged foot... but it is still very powerful. (I forget if I made sure that all units that are logically "foot" units where properly flagged or not...)

As additional comments - since you seem to appreciate them My favorite mod is the lower cost of the longbow men. I hardly ever used them in CIVIII as it was… and in PTW with Medieval infantry… when you get them AFTER you can build Medieval infantry? Preposterous!!

On second thought - it’s flagging everything that’s wheeled as wheeled… makes combat a little more interesting.

Least needed mod - upgrade path of sailing ships and Ironclads. I wouldn't like it at all if the sailing ships upgraded to Ironclads (would be too powerful), but as it is… if it helps the AI to not use those ships than all the better. I guess I am slightly concerned that the AI may waste money upgrading those ships though. IMHO it isn't worth it - the money in the industrial ages is MUCH better spent building factories to build the ships if it comes to that… and I'm concerned that the AI will not do so?

OK - continuing on this topic of things that are not "conservative" enough for me… - I think that with your other changes to frigates and man-o-war that the Iron-clad doesn't need to be moved. The increased attacking ability of the frigate while not increasing its cost means that the frigate will not be regulated to the junk pile as soon as a iron-clad enters the scene!! Running some numbers - with both units at full HP and veterans, the frigate will win 25% of the time, on average the Iron clad will lose 2 HP… and this takes into account the Ironclad defensive bombard… Veteran 4HP frigate attacking a 3HP Ironclad will win about 40% of the time (before it was 10% and 21% respectively). To put it differently, if two frigates attack an ironclad the same turn they will win 66% of the time, on average having one frigate left with 2 HP (previously it was 41% ) And that bombard increase is very nice for coastal bombardment, making it in an economical sense just as good as the Ironclads - and also helps out a small amount defensively (reduces Ironclad win from 84% to 80)

Well - I wrote a lot more than I meant to… Anyway except for these 2 or 3 things I did find myself nodding at each of the modes. Good work.

Originally posted by Meisier
In almost all cases I found myself nodding in agreement with each of your Mods - with the exception of increasing the helicopters number of transports.

In case you didn't know - the most valuable attribute of a helicopter IMHO is its ability to transport units between airports without using any of the units movement cost. Instead just the helicopter's movement is used. To see this just load units into the helicopter, and than relocated the helicopter to another airbase, than unload the unit from the helicopter and presto... (Maybe this is not widely known? I know I found this out myself…)

Increasing the capacity of the helicopters makes them to powerful in this respect in my opinion. Especially in PTW where your workers can build airports very quickly...

Of course they can only do this (I haven't played in a few months so I hope this is right) for units that are flagged foot... but it is still very powerful. (I forget if I made sure that all units that are logically "foot" units where properly flagged or not...)

Click to expand...

Now don't forget that you need to discover optional tech to gain helicopters.
Also, units such as Mech. Inf. are not foot units.
So at modern age only Marines and Paratroopers would be transportable (and Infantry in Industrial age).

Obviously, ability is most powerful before Computers.
But I don't think that it's overpowering since it's still just 2 foot units.

And don't forget how railroad works.

Originally posted by Meisier
Least needed mod - upgrade path of sailing ships and Ironclads. I wouldn't like it at all if the sailing ships upgraded to Ironclads (would be too powerful), but as it is… if it helps the AI to not use those ships than all the better. I guess I am slightly concerned that the AI may waste money upgrading those ships though. IMHO it isn't worth it - the money in the industrial ages is MUCH better spent building factories to build the ships if it comes to that… and I'm concerned that the AI will not do so?

Click to expand...

And I wanted to give Man-O-War chance.
If they would upgarde to Ironclads Englad would have no time to play with this unit.

Originally posted by Meisier
OK - continuing on this topic of things that are not "conservative" enough for me… - I think that with your other changes to frigates and man-o-war that the Iron-clad doesn't need to be moved. The increased attacking ability of the frigate while not increasing its cost means that the frigate will not be regulated to the junk pile as soon as a iron-clad enters the scene!! Running some numbers - with both units at full HP and veterans, the frigate will win 25% of the time, on average the Iron clad will lose 2 HP… and this takes into account the Ironclad defensive bombard… Veteran 4HP frigate attacking a 3HP Ironclad will win about 40% of the time (before it was 10% and 21% respectively). To put it differently, if two frigates attack an ironclad the same turn they will win 66% of the time, on average having one frigate left with 2 HP (previously it was 41% ) And that bombard increase is very nice for coastal bombardment, making it in an economical sense just as good as the Ironclads - and also helps out a small amount defensively (reduces Ironclad win from 84% to 80)

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Although as you say these two units are more balnced in cost efficiency sense, I just thought that it would also be nice to have sailing age a little bit longer. It can help Privateer to fill their role for longer period.

Originally posted by player1 fanatic

Although as you say these two units are more balnced in cost efficiency sense, I just thought that it would also be nice to have sailing age a little bit longer. It can help Privateer to fill their role for longer period.

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I agree somewhat in that sailing time should be a little longer. Or rather, that the sailing ships should be viable longer. I don't think that privateers are very useful because you still get a reputation hit if you use them... but anyway... that's just me.

Have you ever seen what the AI will do if you lower the movement of the Iron clad from 4 to 3? It has always kinda irked me that the Ironclad is just as fast as a sailing vessel... they where not... and the lower movement would help make sailing vessels a little bit more viable once Ironclads come along...