1 unit shouldn't dominate a time period

[baseballfan45]

i dont like the fact that 1 unit dominates a time period, it seems like in medieval times all anyone builds is knights, civ4 should have more units, not alot, but a few more. certain units should counter others so no 1 unit is dominant.

ex-machinegunnner counters infantry
-tanks/artillery counter machinegun

just some ideas

 

[Dida]

yes very good idea. Like the paper, sissors and stone concept in Age of Kings. Pikeman has attack bonus vs. mounted united, mounted units has attack bonus over foot soldier, and foot soldier has attack bonus against settlements and fortress and so on.
Some unit should have more unique ability, self healing, airdrop and attack in same turn, can build road, and so on, so we don't build units just because it has high defense or attack value, but also because of its special ability.

 

[warpstorm]

Except that Soren has said that he hates rock, scissors, paper...

 

[judgement]

Originally posted by warpstorm
Except that Soren has said that he hates rock, scissors, paper...

Honestly, I'm not that big a fan of it, either. Things don't necessarily work that way in real life. Even the example Dida gives isn't realy rock-paper-scissors: if pikemen beat mounted units and mounted units beat infantry, then infantry would have to beat pikemen to complete the circle. Or beat something else that beats pikemen, if you want a circle of more than 3. But the point is the same: things don't always go in circles.

Pikemen having an advantage against mounted units? Thats fine. It was even in Civ 2. But I don't see the need to have an entire combat strategy based on picking the right unit to attack with based on what the enemy unit is. Some units do specialize, yes, but other units are good at lots of things, and shouldn't necessarily have to watch out for some particular unit that is their "nemesis."

 

[rcoutme]

What needs to happen is a more "historical" approach. When did knights dominate and why did they go the way of the dodo? Answer: Knights dominated when weaponry could be turned away (armor). They ceased to dominate due to the invention of firearms. The first firearms prompted thicker and better armor (dents in breastplates are the proof that the armor would take on the early pistols and arquebus's of the time).

Eventually the black powder and firearm designs became too much for any armorsmith and armor was limited to Spanish conquistadors (who were fighting stone-age tech people).

The musketman and the dragoon (i.e. cavalry without rifles) should dominate the late MA while the knight and med. infantry should dominate (not just have pretty good #'s) the early MA.

 

[baseballfan45]

i am not saying it should be like rock paper scissor, just that some units

should have advanages/bonuses against other units, not that 1 unit should

completely dominate another.

 

[Evie]

And yet again we have the ludicrous Hollywood-inspired idea that armored knights dominated the middle ages surfacing...

 

[Ballazic]

I think the solution should be that the really good units would be more exspensive. But i agree.

 

[joebasstard]

I agree that it shouldn't always be one kind of unit dominating the 'scene'. However, in Europe and Asia minor the Roman Legion did basically dominate for a long time because it was a better overall fighting unit than anything out there. Mostly better organization and discipline.

 

[joebasstard]

I would like the concept of different cultures having different units EVEN in the same 'class' of unit. Teutonic Knight is different from Norman Knight is different from English Knight and so on.

 

[joebasstard]

This would also work very well with ships from all time periods. Instead of having to make a gigantic mod to reflect unit diversification, at least some higher degree of it should exist in the basic game. Civ III with culture-specific units was a good first stab at it, and the interest that generated makes it OBVIOUS that this should be taken much further.

 

[joebasstard]

Also this might provide employment for some of the very talented unit creators in the civ forums.

 

[homeyg]

Except that Soren has said that he hates rock, scissors, paper...

I'm glad he doesn't like rock, paper, scissors because I don't like this idea at all. Rise of Nations uses the "rock, paper, scissors" concept and it is way too confusing and unrealistic. I just don't like the concept. Maybe if you just threw in a few different defensive units it would all balance out...

 

[baseballfan45]

i think this would round out the gameplay more, so that if you build all of one "best" unit you wont nessesarily win the war. it doesnt work that way in real life either, its not like in the middle ages all there was were knights. also i find my self just building tanks, when really infantry are by far the majority on the battle field.

 

[t3h_m013]

yes i didn't play age of kings much but i lvoed having spearmen against cavalry, cavalry against artilary etc. Also the down side of it in age of kings was that it was real time so organising all that was too tricky. but in civ, being turnbased it would be brilliant

 

[Dell19]

@joebasstard - It is possible to edit a previous post where you want to make an addition rather than making 4 posts.

I actually quite like the combat situation in civ, perhaps cavalry are too powerful though...

 

[rcoutme]

I would like the concept of different cultures having different units EVEN in the same 'class' of unit. Teutonic Knight is different from Norman Knight is different from English Knight and so on.

I would like to see Civ4 have a random generator (+/- 20%) for every unit for every nation. This would allow that some civilizations produced better units of given types than other nations. As I mentioned in another thread, Japan and Italy had terrible tanks. Germany started with weak tanks and eventually made the best tanks. Russia also had really good tanks. Taking and Italian tank up against a T-34 was suicide!

Civ4 needs to allow a variable to units (one time set) that gives a +/- of 20%. Then if a player did not like his random draw (for instance -20%), he could re-research the tech to get those units to be better (or maybe allow the maximum--I'm not sure which, it would need to be playtested).

Thus, if France gets sucky tanks, they could choose to re-research armored combat (or whatever the tech was that gave those tanks). The advisor would say something like, "Sire, we already know that technology. Are you sure you want us to continue?" The options would be A: Oh, well then, nevermind. B: Tell those idiots that they can do better than that!

One of the caveats of doing this is that all combat values would need to be multiplied by 10 (assuming that you could also get +/- 10%) since the units would need to display the correct values. I, for one, would have no problem with warriors having a 10 attack and modern armor having 240. I can easily discern the ratios.

 

[Evie]

I *really* like your idea rcoutme - a random variable which causes certain civilizations to produce better variant of the same unit while others produce worse ones would be indeed very good.

Perhaps if you obtained the tech through trade rather than researching it on your own, you could automatically get the low-grade units?

 

[Stonegate]

i dont like the fact that 1 unit dominates a time period, it seems like in medieval times all anyone builds is knights, civ4 should have more units, not alot, but a few more. certain units should counter others so no 1 unit is dominant.

ex-machinegunnner counters infantry
-tanks/artillery counter machinegun

just some ideas

I couldn't agree more. Nothing more boring than building the same thing over and over again.

 

[The Last Conformist]

Is there really anyone using only Knights in the early middle ages? I usually find myself using a mixture of Knights, Pikes, Medievals and Trebuchets. The only period in the game in which I only build one type of military unit is the super-early part, in which Warriors is the only available option.