The Cold War 1947 - 1991

[JPetroski]

Maybe a fair solution to western naval dominance is to allow the Pro-East / Soviets to be able to reinforce any city - not just coastal ones. This would mean that coastal cities would be difficult for you to hold (which, honestly, I think they should be) but you'd be much more dangerous on the interior. Europe could still counter you but the Pro-West/Americans couldn't as easily.

 

[JPetroski]

Also I'm not opposed to making rocket research I tradeable given it doesn't actually allow for any nukes/etc.

 

[JPetroski]

Just as one last thought - while it would be a bit of work for me, I think it might be necessary... The gun truck/RPG/infantry model works OK for the beginning of the game but let's face it, it doesn't work so well in the mid to late game. Maybe later in the game (driven by technology) some tanks and artillery make sense. I don't think an air force really makes sense until a city is founded, however. Some mechanism is probably needed to keep the core gameplay mechanism of this scenario relevant throughout.

 

[JPetroski]

And... Because I need four posts in a row. I just thought of a way better idea than my going through thousands of lines of code and adding in stuff. I'd propose a pretty simple solution to all of this that I think will give you a good option @Prof. Garfield without needing to completely change things like letting you reinforce anything and everything but also make you quite dangerous where you should be (the boonies).

Instead of changing the game completely let's just do this (assuming @techumseh and @civ2units agree).

If a Pro-Eastern unit activates on jungle, mountain, hill, or swamp terrain (the boonies), they get an attack bonus. I was thinking something in the order of +5. This would hopefully make it more likely that a concerted Pro-Eastern revolution would be able to take cities but wouldn't completely change everyone's strategy partway through our game. It would make places where the Pro-Eastern guerrillas should be problematic (like jungles of Southeast Asia, South & Central America, and parts of Africa) much more difficult for the west to hold, but at the same time, of course, since there is no defense bonus, if the Western Powers really were having none of it they'd have a chance too.

Personally, I think this is a simple, quick and accurate solution that should alleviate your frustration @Prof. Garfield while also hopefully not starting WW3 in the next 4 turns!

What are everyone's thoughts? I agree with @Prof. Garfield that this is a little unfair as naval power is quite strong and currently the game revolves entirely around the coastline.

 

[techumseh]

Well, there are a couple of factors that lead to that. One is the super importance of International Ports, the other is the over-rated power of naval bombardment. Of these, the most important is the power of naval bombardment. One simple way to reduce its impact is to reduce the number of attacks that capital ships are allowed to make from 2 to 1. Let's start there. Another way might be allowing the construction of coastal batteries sooner.

As for the power of insurrections, your idea might fit the bill. Another idea is to add more RPGs into the mix, and give them the 'ignore city walls' flag.

 

[JPetroski]

I do think something needs to be done about insurrections as they're the core, fundamental "hook" of this scenario. The solution I have above only helps the attacker but not the defender (including the tribe that just attacked). It's "clean" and doesn't involve me going through literally every, single country that I defined in the rebellion mechanism and adding more code to each.

Garfield's right - if he can't reasonably expect to take any land then why not simply invade Europe as early as possible? I'd like to avoid this being another scenario about WW3 and make it a scenario about the conflicts across the globe.

I do like the idea of keeping the international port mechanism because I think it makes things interesting, but you know, if he had an option of, say, investing 6,000 in the interior with the reasonable expectation that they could capture interior cities, and then continue investing in more rebels to swarm towards the coast, I think that would be much more fair, balanced, and interesting than the current mechanism of everything being blunted immediately.

It's one thing if I can bring forces to bear on an area and decide to contest it and he doesn't make progress because of this. It's quite another if he simply cannot make progress because the units afforded to him are not powerful enough to capture any cities.

Maybe a compromise would to be to only give the attack bonus in jungles and not hills, mountains, and marshes. This would make:

-Southeast Asia
-The Congo
-Central America
-Columbia

The hot areas that would be more susceptible to guerilla attack. Frankly, these were the areas that saw such contention so it's not like it is inaccurate.

 

[techumseh]

Another area where I wonder about the realism is the ability to capture a port, then purchase large numbers of unit directly there. This may be beyond what you want to do in the middle of a game, but perhaps delivery of military purchases should be limited to home countries, or at start cities.

 

[JPetroski]

But what is a pro-Eastern or pro-Western home country? To me the international port is akin to the critical sector/city/area. I don't think it's unrealistic that the government in control of a country can buy shipments. It is a bit unrealistic that they could just show up past a blockade, but sometimes gameplay decisions need to trump realism decisions. At the very least they're strategic and interesting targets.

 

[JPetroski]

Another idea is to add more RPGs into the mix,

This is something that could be fixed with one number. We can change any of the below to anything we think makes sense:

specialNumbers.smallRevoltInfantry = 3
specialNumbers.mediumRevoltInfantry = 5
specialNumbers.largeRevoltInfantry = 5
specialNumbers.smallRevoltGunTruck = 0
specialNumbers.mediumRevoltGunTruck= 1
specialNumbers.largeRevoltGunTruck = 2
specialNumbers.smallRevoltRPG = 0
specialNumbers.mediumRevoltRPG= 0
specialNumbers.largeRevoltRPG = 1

 

[civ2units]

I made the same experiences like @Prof.Garfield. The insurrection possibilities in foreign countries are very nice and I really like this part of the game but holding these cities for the Non Aligned Movement are very difficult too. I saw it in my Somalia adventure. I think I will be able to incite succesful revolutions later in game, when I'm able to build a more stronger navy for securing the coastal cities. And if I can build better units. At least I hope so.

So, if the others agree, I would like to ask you to apply your suggestions for the Non Aligned too.

 

[civ2units]

Sorry for all these grammatical mistakes I'm writing in my posts. After posting I always see a lot of spelling mistakes. In my last post I wrote suggested instead of suggestions. I've corrected it.

 

[techumseh]

Interesting. I would definitely bump up the RPGs. How do you feel about giving them the ignore city walls flag? Tackling cities seems to be a weak point for the revolts. Also, can you double or triple up on the revolts in the same turn?

 

[JPetroski]

I'm not opposed to giving them the ignore city walls flag. You can have as many revolts as you have cash for. I'm uncertain that the city walls will help them defend against the better tanks.

 

[techumseh]

I think we still need to address the issue of shore bombardments. The ability of a bombarding fleet to clear a city of the equivalent of an entire corps of ground troops just doesn't seem realistic to me.

 

[JPetroski]

For all China's posturing, their beaches are theirs because the United States Navy says they're theirs

2 attacks per turn is plenty limiting already. Each BB is destroyed by about 2 cruise missiles, which multiple late war units can fire.

 

[JPetroski]

So what should be done then?

Certainly, if rocketry I is required for SCUDs to fire (I'm not at my pc and can't check), then it should be giftable.

I'm not opposed to increasing the number of RPG given by the rebellions. Perhaps

Small = 1
Medium = 2
Large = 3

Would work better? This would work for everyone, of course, but the Soviets would still have the cheapest rebellions.

I'm not opposed to a jungle attack bonus if necessary though I wonder if the above would work as is?

The battleships, in my mind, aren't an issue that needs correction

-They're among the most expensive units in a scenario that forbids incremental rush building.
-They take 6-7 turns for the best cities to build.
-They can only attack twice per turn and usually sustain damage doing so.
-They can only attack coastal targets.
-They can be destroyed by cheaper tactical bombers, missiles, or strat bombers (which have impunity unless a carrier has LAUNCHED aircraft nearby).
-In all my own playtests, and this very scenario (around Vietnam) they must withdraw after a few attacks, or be destroyed.

If you let someone build an area up with them, yeah, they're a handful, but they're on the wrong side of attrition if they're the main target.

 

[techumseh]

That's the same RPG numbers that I was thinking.

I've never had a problem with attacks on battleships, as I always give them air cover. Perhaps this will sort itself out when Prof. Garfield perfects the air-to-air system. How is that coming btw. P.G.?

 

[Prof. Garfield]

I've never had a problem with attacks on battleships, as I always give them air cover. Perhaps this will sort itself out when Prof. Garfield perfects the air-to-air system. How is that coming btw. P.G.?

It's done, and I think everything else I wanted to add in the update is done, in my 'testing' version of Cold War. I've just been a bit busy for the past few days, and wanted to wait until I was sure I had enough time in a single day to move the changes into my 'playing' folder, so that I wouldn't have to disrupt the flow of the game, and could announce ahead of time. Since the game is on hold, I'll probably get the pending changes out within a couple days, so we can focus on the balance changes.

There's been a lot of stuff proposed and I'll go through point by point eventually. For now, I'll say that even if we accept that it is realistic that a battleship can obliterate anything on the 'coast', the nature of the map is that an awful lot counts as the coast. If Google Maps is to be believed, the nearest point of Pyongyang to the coast is still 30 KM inland, for example. The aircraft which are supposed to present a danger to the battleship are essentially parked on a runway on the coast, and even if they are not attacked by the battleship itself, another ship can make the attack after the high value defenders are eliminated.

 

[JPetroski]

There's limitations in Civ2. Korea is going to be quite difficult for you to hold. Southeast Asia, with a few interior bases, is a different story. While you do get event help there, you also have a much better strategic position.

I'm not against the idea of letting the Soviets reinforce the interior without the need for a port but think maybe they ought to have to at least research the cargo plane tech first, or have some sort of other detriment so it's "better" to have the port.

Could a non coastal city be limited in how many units it could buy? Maybe they only get 2 or 3. I'm open to ideas to keep it fun and viable for all.

 

[techumseh]

Not limitations of Civ2 as much as the limitations of the design, which combines two important factors: great emphasis on International Ports and overwhelming shore bombardments for those who have large navies. It's the combination of these two factors that is the destabilizing influence.