Anyone else do this mod--cheap troops who move fast?

BuckyRea

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The things that always bug me about the pace of the civ game is how slow units move. In the early game, sure, it makes sense that swords and spears can't wander far from their homelands. But by the middle ages, it seems absurd that a unit of knights, part of major medieval empire, can only travel twenty or thirty miles away over the course of a 10 year turn. Also, the bizarre length of time it takes to recruit just one more military unit takes away from the reality of the game.

So I modded the game parameters to try and breath some reality into the game & build up the military end of it. The mods I did were this:

First, I increased the distance units could travel in a turn. Mostly they were doubled, but some sea units were tripled. Knights only travel four. Horsemen 5. Cav go seven and Cossacks eight (cause, you know, they're unique units). Modern armor zoom around at cav speed too. Workers and spearmen move three. Once you get roads up and going, that really takes the tedium out of journeyman units.

Next, I dropped the price on units. It just doesn't take two generations for a town to build a battallion of defenders. Early units--swordsmen, spears, horsemen, archers, and their UU replacements only cost 10 shields. Knights, pikeys, musketmen, and wooden boats cost 20. That really churns them out and makes for a more violent game.

With lower prices, I figure the cost of maintaining them should drop, too. So republics get a few freebies per town, monarchies and commies get about double the number of free units. I think about it this way. With military units costing so much in the normal game, a unit probably represents regiment or brigade level force.

If units are cheaper to crank out, they only would represent a battallion level command. That shifts the game focus from strategy (and military happenstance about whoever happens to win a single confrontation) to battlefield tactics. Can I arm and garrison my front lines?

The cost of town improvements and the speed at which roads, mines, and irrigation are built are not reduced. I want more units in the field, but not a faster game.

I also boosted the fire power on privateers (pirates should be dangerous, dammit). To make barbarians a threat, I changed their units from warriors, horses, and galleys to swordsmen, elephants, and frigates. Now they kick ass. I also made elephants tougher, so that rampaging barbs are really dangerous and have to be whittled down over several turns.

I'm still playing the first game with this mod (and my daughter is playing a second game with it). The only hang up seems to be that single AI units prefer to do property damage rather than engage me in combat. But when the Zulus came after me thru a jungle in mass formations, I was really forced to scramble to hold my ground.

Does anyone else try this approach? I only have vanilla, so I make .bic, not .biq, files. So far I've only seen .biq maps posted in this forum (which my vanilla Civ game can't read). Is this mod worth posting?
 
BuckyRea said:
I'm still playing the first game with this mod (and my daughter is playing a second game with it). The only hang up seems to be that single AI units prefer to do property damage rather than engage me in combat. But when the Zulus came after me thru a jungle in mass formations, I was really forced to scramble to hold my ground.

Does anyone else try this approach? I only have vanilla, so I make .bic, not .biq, files. So far I've only seen .biq maps posted in this forum (which my vanilla Civ game can't read). Is this mod worth posting?

Well, considering that fast units will be used for pillaging, abnormally fast ones will do a lot of it. :D
 
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