Are Siege weapons properly balanced?

[Louis XXIV]

I think that's quite a good idea. It would even leave them vulnerable to ranged units in the city but protects them from the city.

 

[PibbZ]

We really need the Mobile Artillery / Howitzer back in the game to fill the gap between Atomic Era artillery and modern era artillery. Maybe 50?

In my opinion, it could just as well be 60, same as the Rocket Artillery, but give the Rocket Artillery a base range of 4 (or 3+Range Promotion for balance purposes).

After all, the biggest advantage with IRL Rocket Artillery over conventional artillery is the range.

 

[kaspergm]

In my opinion, it could just as well be 60, same as the Rocket Artillery, but give the Rocket Artillery a base range of 4 (or 3+Range Promotion for balance purposes).

After all, the biggest advantage with IRL Rocket Artillery over conventional artillery is the range.

Eh - no, Rocket Artillery is already pretty crazy as it is (they'll do 100+ damage against more or less any city that is not fully fortified), I agree that we need something to fill the gap, but it most certainly should not be as powerful as Rocket Artillery.

 

[Luckystrike77]

Nah, citadels are the new offensive weapon now. Everything else is obsolete.....

 

[PibbZ]

Eh - no, Rocket Artillery is already pretty crazy as it is (they'll do 100+ damage against more or less any city that is not fully fortified).

I certainly agree that they are powerful, but my point was that a regular 155mm howitzer ain't necessarily any weaker in terms of damage output, in the real world anyway.

I'm perfectly happy with a weaker Mobile Artillery unit in the game though, if it makes the game more balanced

 

[tommynt]

the only reason siege weapons arent balanced good is that (whatever)bow(whatever) is op - compared to melees they are balanced perfect

 

[extract]

Liked your idea. Wrote out a quick 5 min mod for it.

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=103038054

Go nuts

 

[kaspergm]

Liked your idea. Wrote out a quick 5 min mod for it.

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=103038054

Go nuts

Awesome thanx! One question: Will they lose this promotion upon upgrading into Canon?

There wouldn't happen to be some sort of UU siege weapon graphics lying around from one of the scenarios or something which one could use as a base to add a Mortar to the game as a new unit?

 

[apocalypse105]

Liked your idea. Wrote out a quick 5 min mod for it.

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=103038054

Go nuts

Maybe its a good idea to have someone make a mod and updates it constantly that makes all the good idea of the community true.

A mod from and for the community..

 

[extract]

Awesome thanx! One question: Will they lose this promotion upon upgrading into Canon?

There wouldn't happen to be some sort of UU siege weapon graphics lying around from one of the scenarios or something which one could use as a base to add a Mortar to the game as a new unit?

I don't think they lose the upgrade. All other units don't lose their upgrades so it should keep it.

New cannons you produce won't have it though, hmm, should they? Because cannons are also range 2. I don't know much about the scenarios, but if the art exists it should be pretty easy.

I realized I forgot the Roman and Korean UU so just added those; I'm kind a noob modder, but xml stuff is really simple to change.

Maybe its a good idea to have someone make a mod and updates it constantly that makes all the good idea of the community true.

A mod from and for the community..

Steam has collections, so someone could make a big collection of the popular mods in the community as long as they don't conflict; most of the time they shouldn't if they're small changes.

 

[apocalypse105]

I don't think they lose the upgrade. All other units don't lose their upgrades so it should keep it.

New cannons you produce won't have it though, hmm, should they? Because cannons are also range 2. I don't know much about the scenarios, but if the art exists it should be pretty easy.



Steam has collections, so someone could make a big collection of the popular mods in the community as long as they don't conflict; most of the time they shouldn't if they're small changes.

Yes they should I have seen cannons get 1 shot by medieval era cities

 

[extract]

Yes they should I have seen cannons get 1 shot by medieval era cities

Updated in.

 

[Drawmeus]

Maybe its a good idea to have someone make a mod and updates it constantly that makes all the good idea of the community true.

A mod from and for the community..

Check out the work Thalassicus has done... but we'll never have universal agreement on what 'should' be part of 'the community mod', so it's better to keep things separate and modular.

 

[apocalypse105]

Check out the work Thalassicus has done... but we'll never have universal agreement on what 'should' be part of 'the community mod', so it's better to keep things separate and modular.

Yes I know his work I like it.

Maybe the best way to solve it if firaxis takes a closer looks to the mods that are made and put in the real game

 

[kaspergm]

Check out the work Thalassicus has done... but we'll never have universal agreement on what 'should' be part of 'the community mod', so it's better to keep things separate and modular.

Thalassicus has done some great stuf, particularly many of the interface mods of whoward are fantastic, but there are also a lot of stuff planned for the communitas expansion pack that I don't agree with, so I think it's not always as easy as just looking to the modding communities to see what people do.

 

[Dtekkar]

I think a range 3 city upgrade would make a great national wonder, or on a very cheap defensive building that does only that, with a restriction like recycling center allowing only 3 per empire.

From a gameplay perspective the point of siege gaining range when the cities don't at dynamite is to start to bring the game to an end. The weaker cities are relative to armies, the more unstable the borders get, cities change hands, and a winner is found. For that reason, I don't like an automatic upgrade to all cities upon dynamite. I think that would just favor a science-prioritization strategy even further..

Having the upgrade on Military Base might be interesting since the defensive structures aren't that great, especially the later ones. This would then take the large/core/select rushbuy cities off the table for some late-game wars somewhat, and newer outposts and the rest would still be up for grabs. This would lengthen games:/. It would still be good flavor for the "playing around" kinda games, the games where there is that keystone tactical city where a military base purchase wins you the round, and decent for self defense in small empire victory types. But the deity AI with their infinite production would have range 3 upgrades for everything, which would be rather annoying.

I don't have time to write anything well thought out about the covered siege idea atm, but I rather like it, especially for catapults early game.

Great thread, good thought food, wanted to show support by weighing in.

 

[Minor Annoyance]

Just let the Siege unit "+200% vs Cities" apply to its too.

I thought about that but I was thinking about melee units and their siege promotion. I rarely take it because I'm usually using ranged units to weaken a city and just using a melee for the last attack so I'd use cover to protected them from the ranged attacks and I wouldn't need siege for a solely offensive bonus.

 

[Matthew.]

I think the default is fine as is. What one has to realize is you are not supposed to be able to take strong cities right away (strong = capital and first couple of expansions). The game is designed to span thousands of years; how fun would it be to finish by 2000BC by simply rushing the map with a couple of catapults?

The purpose of early game siege is to take out those late city placements near your border, in which case they do work very well. It is difficult to take capitals before cannons, but as said above, it is more or less designed this way.

Also, get in the habit of sending in a decoy unit or two upon set-up. The AI seems to put priority on damaged units, and sending in a couple of damaged knights will work wonders in keeping the AI off your siege.

 

[Matthew.]

Also, for late-game siege I don't have much of an opinion as my late-game experience is fairly low. Either my games end before I get access to all the cool toys, or other nations are so far behind that I don't get an accurate picture of balance.

But...

after all, one must assume that the ranged attack of cities is supposed to represent contemporary military equipment stationed in the city, so it doesn't make sense for cities to keep having shorter range than the units.

I'd argue that cities are supposed to become significantly weaker at that point in the game. The advantage is always in the hands of the attacker with modern technology. The US has been trying to come up with ways to protect airspace since the cold war, and still hasn't reached much success--hence MAD doctrine. If you really want to bomb the out of another city with modern technology, there isn't much the defender can do to stop the attack.

I get your point of equal level technology having the same range, but that is what your combat units are for.

 

[Jelster]

That is why I will still have Artillery placed with Dynamites - i.e. predating Tanks - I will just take the Indirect Fire ability away from them. And then I want to add another unit two steps later at Balistics - call it Mortar, for the sake of discussion - which has the Indirect Fire ability.

And placing it with Balistics will not ruin the upgrade path. Notice that after the fall patch, Railroad will be a necessary prerequisite to research Balistics. Therefore, we will have the upgrade path secured: Dynamite (Artillery) > Railroad > Balistics (Mortar) > Radar > Rocketry (Rocket Artillery).

Your "Mortar" unit needs to have similar dynamics to infantry, as that's how they are generally provisioned. Canons & artillery are/were pulled by horse or vehicle.