Boris Gudenuf
Deity
I don't foresee individually-constructed general naval transport coming back, simply because it adds a separate and unnecessary complication to crossing oceans with units. You build the unit, you have to build the transport, you have to get them together, you finally cross. At the scale of Civ, that adds potentially years or decades to the entire process.
On the other hand, the automatic Your Land Unit Has Transports With It All The Time is more than a bit simplistic. A few scouts can whittle out canoes and keep going within a week. A major army is going to require something more, and a sophisticated amphibious operation with beach-landed troops, tanks, heavy equipment and direct support vessels is an entirely different kettle of amphibious fish that is really no longer modeled in the game at all. In WWII, only the British/USA Western Allies ever landed multiple divisions with all their supporting equipment and weapons on a defended hostile shore and made the landing succeed Every Single Time from North Africa to Okinawa. Neither Germany nor Japan ever landed anything larger than a reinforced regiment, while the Soviets tried a bunch of improvised estuary crossings but never managed to put anything onto a hostile shore heavier than some light tanks, and had multiple disasters or near-disasters among the operations.
So, there needs to be 'automatic' naval transport for speed and efficiency in the game, but with some serious Caveats where extra resources were required to achieve the object.
A simple Promotion allowing amphibious attacks won't do: real amphibious warfare implies not only extra training and experience on the part of the troop unit, but also the HQ in charge of the unit and the operation and the construction of a mass of very expensive and sophisticated transport assault vessels, support vessels, and supporting techniques of all kinds, like beach obstacle clearing, estuarial/beach reconnaissance (the original SEALs), and some very specialized weapons and vehicles (river crossings were made much easier by amphibious trucks and tanks like the 2.5 ton capacity DUKW amphibious trucks, supplied to the Soviet Union in enough numbers to form over 10 battalions of them - they are conspicuous in the accounts of the late-war crossings of the Vistula, Oder, Danube and other major rivers on the way to Germany).
In the Mexican War (1840s) the US military managed a for the time major amphibious landing at Vera Cruz, landing a small army complete with all of its artillery and equipment and horses on an open beach without losing a man or horse: an amazing achievement at that or any other time in history, and achieved without any special equipment, ships, or training but with a very professional force of school-trained and experienced soldiers, sailors, and officers. This should be part of the Amphibious Equation: try it with a bunch of Amateurs, you get disaster almost every time (I've argued before: a basic consideration of all military units in the game should be whether they are Amateur or Professional, with the latter able to do things the Amateurs simply cannot do successfully, but Professionals costing Major mainenance costs to keep them in being and training constantly)
In the 20th century, sophisticated and dedicated amphibious equipment is Required to land any size force, so Production Points (at least) will be required or, IMHO, this would be the one place where separate Naval Units would be appropriate: anybody since the middle of the 20th century who wants to land anything larger than a company or battalion has to have specialized landing ships and craft ranging from assault boats to sea-going assault boat and heavy equipment carriers.
I suggest that, assuming a Civ VI like organization of the game, at the beginning of the Atomic Era Civ VII might add a new Category of naval unit: the Amphibious Landing Ship (a generic term to encompass all the LSTs, LSIs, LSSs and other alphabetic landing ships of WWII) which both enhances any infantry unit making an amphibious landing (including greatly increased factors from all the dedicated direct support weapons) and also makes it possible to land Heavy Units like Armor or Artillery. Without it (and it would be at least as expensive as any Capital Ship) you could land 'scouts' (Rangers, Commandos, Special Forces, etc) without penalty, infantry units with penalties, and no heavier units at all.
If you want to play Semper Fi, the game, you will have to invest seriously in building the Amphibious support required, which is a much better and more realistic game mechanic, while keeping the general cross-ocean movement simple for most of the game.
Note that the very rare dedicated 'amphibious' equipment, like the beach-landing ships of the Byzantines, could be UUs rather than part of any line of Naval Units prior to the 20th century.
On the other hand, the automatic Your Land Unit Has Transports With It All The Time is more than a bit simplistic. A few scouts can whittle out canoes and keep going within a week. A major army is going to require something more, and a sophisticated amphibious operation with beach-landed troops, tanks, heavy equipment and direct support vessels is an entirely different kettle of amphibious fish that is really no longer modeled in the game at all. In WWII, only the British/USA Western Allies ever landed multiple divisions with all their supporting equipment and weapons on a defended hostile shore and made the landing succeed Every Single Time from North Africa to Okinawa. Neither Germany nor Japan ever landed anything larger than a reinforced regiment, while the Soviets tried a bunch of improvised estuary crossings but never managed to put anything onto a hostile shore heavier than some light tanks, and had multiple disasters or near-disasters among the operations.
So, there needs to be 'automatic' naval transport for speed and efficiency in the game, but with some serious Caveats where extra resources were required to achieve the object.
A simple Promotion allowing amphibious attacks won't do: real amphibious warfare implies not only extra training and experience on the part of the troop unit, but also the HQ in charge of the unit and the operation and the construction of a mass of very expensive and sophisticated transport assault vessels, support vessels, and supporting techniques of all kinds, like beach obstacle clearing, estuarial/beach reconnaissance (the original SEALs), and some very specialized weapons and vehicles (river crossings were made much easier by amphibious trucks and tanks like the 2.5 ton capacity DUKW amphibious trucks, supplied to the Soviet Union in enough numbers to form over 10 battalions of them - they are conspicuous in the accounts of the late-war crossings of the Vistula, Oder, Danube and other major rivers on the way to Germany).
In the Mexican War (1840s) the US military managed a for the time major amphibious landing at Vera Cruz, landing a small army complete with all of its artillery and equipment and horses on an open beach without losing a man or horse: an amazing achievement at that or any other time in history, and achieved without any special equipment, ships, or training but with a very professional force of school-trained and experienced soldiers, sailors, and officers. This should be part of the Amphibious Equation: try it with a bunch of Amateurs, you get disaster almost every time (I've argued before: a basic consideration of all military units in the game should be whether they are Amateur or Professional, with the latter able to do things the Amateurs simply cannot do successfully, but Professionals costing Major mainenance costs to keep them in being and training constantly)
In the 20th century, sophisticated and dedicated amphibious equipment is Required to land any size force, so Production Points (at least) will be required or, IMHO, this would be the one place where separate Naval Units would be appropriate: anybody since the middle of the 20th century who wants to land anything larger than a company or battalion has to have specialized landing ships and craft ranging from assault boats to sea-going assault boat and heavy equipment carriers.
I suggest that, assuming a Civ VI like organization of the game, at the beginning of the Atomic Era Civ VII might add a new Category of naval unit: the Amphibious Landing Ship (a generic term to encompass all the LSTs, LSIs, LSSs and other alphabetic landing ships of WWII) which both enhances any infantry unit making an amphibious landing (including greatly increased factors from all the dedicated direct support weapons) and also makes it possible to land Heavy Units like Armor or Artillery. Without it (and it would be at least as expensive as any Capital Ship) you could land 'scouts' (Rangers, Commandos, Special Forces, etc) without penalty, infantry units with penalties, and no heavier units at all.
If you want to play Semper Fi, the game, you will have to invest seriously in building the Amphibious support required, which is a much better and more realistic game mechanic, while keeping the general cross-ocean movement simple for most of the game.
Note that the very rare dedicated 'amphibious' equipment, like the beach-landing ships of the Byzantines, could be UUs rather than part of any line of Naval Units prior to the 20th century.
