black_imperator
Deity
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(On the ai, i've started to merge parts of MNAI, though not the naval part yet, but i'll get there )
Final Fixes Reborn
- Thread starter Ronkhar
- Start date
PPQ_Purple
Purple Cube (retired)
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I'd still prefer all ships to have a strait upgrade path instead of terminating roughly. Like, imagine if the swordsman didn't upgrade and you had to build new champions. You'd just hold out for champions.
Speaking of gunpowder and boats. Given how most boats come in before gunpowder I'd say that we might want to consider refluffing those ships to use magic attacks instead. The historical shift from galleys with boarders and archers to ships with cannon might instead be one from ships with archers to ships with mages on board throwing fireballs and lightning at one another only to eventually end up using cannon in the very late game because it's cheaper than training a mage. I've been doing a lot of civ specific boat art lately. And I could definitively have a go at designing units that fit this role visually. And I feel this is a fluff angle that might be very interesting to expand upon.
Like, basically imagine if your mid game combat ship was the arcane barge. And than your late game combat ship was the frigate.
Thanks for the productive dialogue. I'm going to add some clarity around the role of ships and balance, and make a wider pitch for renewing the naval system along these lines. Any issues around the timing of tech requirements, or game mechanics can be solved by tweaks. What I have is the benefit of actual historical development as reflected in mods like Realism Invictus, and it can translate to a fantasy world whether the combat mechanics are mundane or arcane dependent.
The purpose in this is to enhance naval combat which is stale, and make ships more relevant in both the early-mid and late games, so that the AI and players will perceive the need to use them. Adding one or two techs to development extends their effective life and a good game often reaches its climax after the tech tree is exhausted anyway. Increasing the rewards or opportunities on the sea goes in hand with that. For illustration the Lanun and an unspecified aquatic culture get an early jump on limited oceanic expansion with weak ships. That advantage extends to some fast ocean units but not necessarily the larger warships in the mid and late game where any one of several civs can compete for dominance on the sea.
@PPQ_Purple: There isn't any ship in my proposal that does not have an upgrade path to the final stage, the only issue is allowing more parallel upgrade paths earlier which a few have commented on. Consider that in the present AoE shell most development lines are broken:
- the galleon is stand alone, no precedent or upgrade
- the weak cavalier and privateer have no upgrade path.
- the carrack has no precedent, nor does the man of war or QOTL
- those ships that have an upgrade all converge to frigate, which is a missed opportunity for some imaginative rethinking that adds depth and flavour.
So naval combat may be limited, but I've been in games where my targets and opportunities were far along the coast or on islands, and AIs were capable of using naval dominance to make amphibious attacks. Adding a few additional classes makes the game feel more intuitively correct, plus I think its just plain cool.
@azatote: Where there is currently a resource dependency like iron or gunpowder in the original game, I am reluctant to dispense with it entirely because the original reasoning may still stand and there's no reason to change it. For instance galleons need something more than just optics which comes rather early. Sometimes ships only need the technology like iron working or blasting powder, other times the actual developed resource - which I think jives with what PPQ_Purple is suggesting is the difference between early development and widespread adoption or innovation. Having said that; reintroducing sailing and related materials as a mid game requirement may be too restrictive, but the purpose as you can guess is to space development out so that these classes don't become so quickly obsolescent. So more work on that.
I just want to take this opportunity to illustrate a few more attributes of these ships that may need tweaks but will hopefully affirm their place. In most cases I start with the existing stats and enhanced one useful attribute at the expense of another to further define their role.
Galley - goes up slightly in cost but can hold 3 units, making them more useful in early game.
Trireme - they lose their base cargo ability but gain 1 movement, so they can actually get somewhere or keep up with galleys. They are also tougher in battle. (Triremes were known to average almost 10 knots in a day on calm seas) They can use the free options to gain 1 cargo, or rely on galleys.
Trader - becomes an early coastal unit that doesn't require currency, allowing earlier trade missions.
Merchantman - later ocean trading vessels need not be slower than a galleon. It becomes a little more expensive than the existing trade ship.
Note: I had an idea about making neither of the trading ships sacrificial. If the purpose is more trading missions we could allow them 2, or permit them to explore rival territory without open borders. Even if only 4 of each can be built in total that allows 8 or more trade missions.
Galleon - base unit loses 1 movement but gains one cargo, enhancing their specialty. Galleons weren't that fast.
Queen of the Line - increased cargo capacity over galleon with no sacrifice in speed. Slightly more expensive than original.
Caravel - early ocean exploration. Instead of 35% attack withdrawal give it a defense withdrawal to increase survivability vs stygian guard, privateer and the like.
Carrack - more or less identical to original. Not fast but should be able to stand up to most sea monsters and provide early fire and siege support.
Galleass - coast control vessel, where most battles will be fought in their era. Like the trireme they have head on attack with the ram plus early ranged weapons in the bow or stern. With 1 first strike and the coastal defense bonus, or collateral damage on attack (Greek Fire or the like) they can negate a carrack, which at most can neutralize that advantage by initiating ranged combat first, at the expense of an actual attack. Consider what a few galleasses might do to unsuspecting carracks.
Privateer - gains one base strength at the expense of cargo, or adapt it with the free upgrades. I agree we need a different requirement than the civic mercantilism or slavery, but you get the idea; we need more than just optics I think.
Commerce Raider - a specialized frigate with hidden nationality. Upgrade of a privateer for that role in the age of fighting sail when they become pretty useless.
Sloop - inexpensive sea patrol vessel, with an advantage over all hidden nationality ships. They can also be employed as automated to intercept barbarian ships and protect improvements, saving your attention on higher value ships for bigger operations.
Frigate - no change, still the fastest of the late game warships.
Man of War - I increase movement at the expense of 1 strength in base model. As in QOTL; late fleets should be able to move at 4 in their optimal configurations. Reach allows more naval interaction and opportunities even the AI can take advantage of.
Arcane Barge - maybe increase base strength by 1, and reduce speed to match other late ships. They don't need to be the fastest when they should be traveling in a group with other powerful ships.
So thats what I'm proposing in a nutshell. The final tweaks and inclusion are entirely up to the game designers and developers of course. Over the next month or so I am offering to further develop these and the UUs with descriptions and suggestions, even pictures, if there is a genuine interest.
The purpose in this is to enhance naval combat which is stale, and make ships more relevant in both the early-mid and late games, so that the AI and players will perceive the need to use them. Adding one or two techs to development extends their effective life and a good game often reaches its climax after the tech tree is exhausted anyway. Increasing the rewards or opportunities on the sea goes in hand with that. For illustration the Lanun and an unspecified aquatic culture get an early jump on limited oceanic expansion with weak ships. That advantage extends to some fast ocean units but not necessarily the larger warships in the mid and late game where any one of several civs can compete for dominance on the sea.
@PPQ_Purple: There isn't any ship in my proposal that does not have an upgrade path to the final stage, the only issue is allowing more parallel upgrade paths earlier which a few have commented on. Consider that in the present AoE shell most development lines are broken:
- the galleon is stand alone, no precedent or upgrade
- the weak cavalier and privateer have no upgrade path.
- the carrack has no precedent, nor does the man of war or QOTL
- those ships that have an upgrade all converge to frigate, which is a missed opportunity for some imaginative rethinking that adds depth and flavour.
So naval combat may be limited, but I've been in games where my targets and opportunities were far along the coast or on islands, and AIs were capable of using naval dominance to make amphibious attacks. Adding a few additional classes makes the game feel more intuitively correct, plus I think its just plain cool.
@azatote: Where there is currently a resource dependency like iron or gunpowder in the original game, I am reluctant to dispense with it entirely because the original reasoning may still stand and there's no reason to change it. For instance galleons need something more than just optics which comes rather early. Sometimes ships only need the technology like iron working or blasting powder, other times the actual developed resource - which I think jives with what PPQ_Purple is suggesting is the difference between early development and widespread adoption or innovation. Having said that; reintroducing sailing and related materials as a mid game requirement may be too restrictive, but the purpose as you can guess is to space development out so that these classes don't become so quickly obsolescent. So more work on that.
I just want to take this opportunity to illustrate a few more attributes of these ships that may need tweaks but will hopefully affirm their place. In most cases I start with the existing stats and enhanced one useful attribute at the expense of another to further define their role.
Galley - goes up slightly in cost but can hold 3 units, making them more useful in early game.
Trireme - they lose their base cargo ability but gain 1 movement, so they can actually get somewhere or keep up with galleys. They are also tougher in battle. (Triremes were known to average almost 10 knots in a day on calm seas) They can use the free options to gain 1 cargo, or rely on galleys.
Trader - becomes an early coastal unit that doesn't require currency, allowing earlier trade missions.
Merchantman - later ocean trading vessels need not be slower than a galleon. It becomes a little more expensive than the existing trade ship.
Note: I had an idea about making neither of the trading ships sacrificial. If the purpose is more trading missions we could allow them 2, or permit them to explore rival territory without open borders. Even if only 4 of each can be built in total that allows 8 or more trade missions.
Galleon - base unit loses 1 movement but gains one cargo, enhancing their specialty. Galleons weren't that fast.
Queen of the Line - increased cargo capacity over galleon with no sacrifice in speed. Slightly more expensive than original.
Caravel - early ocean exploration. Instead of 35% attack withdrawal give it a defense withdrawal to increase survivability vs stygian guard, privateer and the like.
Carrack - more or less identical to original. Not fast but should be able to stand up to most sea monsters and provide early fire and siege support.
Galleass - coast control vessel, where most battles will be fought in their era. Like the trireme they have head on attack with the ram plus early ranged weapons in the bow or stern. With 1 first strike and the coastal defense bonus, or collateral damage on attack (Greek Fire or the like) they can negate a carrack, which at most can neutralize that advantage by initiating ranged combat first, at the expense of an actual attack. Consider what a few galleasses might do to unsuspecting carracks.
Privateer - gains one base strength at the expense of cargo, or adapt it with the free upgrades. I agree we need a different requirement than the civic mercantilism or slavery, but you get the idea; we need more than just optics I think.
Commerce Raider - a specialized frigate with hidden nationality. Upgrade of a privateer for that role in the age of fighting sail when they become pretty useless.
Sloop - inexpensive sea patrol vessel, with an advantage over all hidden nationality ships. They can also be employed as automated to intercept barbarian ships and protect improvements, saving your attention on higher value ships for bigger operations.
Frigate - no change, still the fastest of the late game warships.
Man of War - I increase movement at the expense of 1 strength in base model. As in QOTL; late fleets should be able to move at 4 in their optimal configurations. Reach allows more naval interaction and opportunities even the AI can take advantage of.
Arcane Barge - maybe increase base strength by 1, and reduce speed to match other late ships. They don't need to be the fastest when they should be traveling in a group with other powerful ships.
So thats what I'm proposing in a nutshell. The final tweaks and inclusion are entirely up to the game designers and developers of course. Over the next month or so I am offering to further develop these and the UUs with descriptions and suggestions, even pictures, if there is a genuine interest.
MechanosGuy
Chieftain
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- Jul 17, 2018
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Hi everyone, i just signed up on this forum for thanking the devs of this amazing mod... Now while i'm here i have to ask a question: the Techpriest UU of mechanos are a replacement for both disciple and magic line that mechanos cannot build right?
PPQ_Purple
Purple Cube (retired)
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Personally I have no issues with iron being a requirement for better ships as it is a good mid game benchmark.
As for the rest here are my thoughts.
Galleys can already get pretty decent as transports though. You have a set of promotions that give you +1 cargo that you can take right off the bat. And you also have the free crew promotions. So they end up being +4 relatively quickly. I am not sure making that a +5 would be an improvement balance vise. But I am not sure it would not either.
So I just want to bring this danger up for discussion.
This makes sense.
The whole idea of trade ships strikes me as a really cheap way to stamp out infinite gold. Making them suicide units at the very least makes it an investment comparable to building wealth in your cities. Without that I feel they would be very much OP.
No particular issue with this.
I don't really see why the QOTL would be more expensive than it is. I don't really see what an increased price contributes other than making them even less attractive to build than they already are. At what point is it better to just build more galleons?
Here is a suggestion. The caravel is the recon ship. So why not simply give it the same bonuses scouts and explorers get vs wildlife? That would make them no better at fighting other ships than they are now but would much enhance their role as scouts by allowing them to navigate dangerous seas.
One note about the carrack as it is now. I don't ever use it. Literally newer. There is simply not a single reason to build them when they come so close in the timeline to Frigates which are better in every way. So these might require reimagining.
So basically it would be a superior combat unit to the carrack but lacking the ability to travel on the ocean?
That might work, but it will make them a very niche unit that's mostly useless unless you are fighting on a map with a lot of coastal action but extremely useful if you are. So you might just want to consider maximizing their optimization for that role by doing things like for example giving them bonuses vs privateers or something to let them be useful further down into the game.
Honestly I think that the way you are going the trio of Carrack, Galleas and Privateer should come at the same tech level. One is your defensive and bombardment ship, your archer if you will. The other is your attack ship. And the last is your raider. So I say bring them all on at the same time and make for some rock-paper-scissors action.
Have you considered simply letting privateers upgrade to frigates and giving frigates a spell that lets them assume and reject hidden nationality at will? FFH does that with the Lanun hero unit. And it would be a good way of keeping privateering alive later into the game without having to saddle it with another specialized ship class that's only going to be a frigate equivalent anyway.
Honestly I feel this role is too niche and better filled by the galleas. Because I don't really see a way that you can make it work without it displacing on of the other naval units in their roles. Especially so since ships in general are a somewhat rare but large investment so you want to keep the number of types and their role limited to avoid any one falling by the wayside. And strengthening the galeass would give it more use and make it more competitive.
Ideally I feel the manowar should be your battleship whose job is primarily to be big, scary and imposing so as to force your opponent into a see battle on your terms. So its roles should be stuff like escorting QOTL invasion fleets and other stuff your enemy has to attack. So it should have to keep up with those, but not necessarily chase down frigates.
Honestly I would do something completely different with the arcane barge. I would make it into a mage on the seas. As in low combat stats, speed that's good enough to keep up with frigates and a proper repertoire of learnable spells to make it act as a proper fleet support unit. So not just the generic ones it has now but stuff like summoning sea
Also I would give privateers the ability to snipe so as to make them assassins of the seas in the late game.
Also, I would consider refluffing some of the gunpowder weapons on early-mid game ships into magic ones by virtue of me making ships with magic spell effects instead of the cannon fire.
Yes.
MechanosGuy
Chieftain
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Thanks PPQ_Purple.
If i have a suggestion to make there is a particular place to post it or this thread will be fine?
If i have a suggestion to make there is a particular place to post it or this thread will be fine?
black_imperator
Deity
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- Dec 4, 2005
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This thread is good, but you can also join the discord server for the mod : https://discord.gg/H3uqZN8
MechanosGuy
Chieftain
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Thanks Black_Imperator
PPQ_Purple
Purple Cube (retired)
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Honestly I don't understand why you'd want to take stuff to an external discussion method when we have this forum.
@PPQ_Purple Thanks the point form breakdown works pretty well. To some points I have a ready answer or angle to consider but they are brief and to the point.
yes iron and gunpowder are strategic resources for their era that are fairly plentiful, and land units have similar dependencies. Should there be also something for sailing? cotton, silk, flax, wool, hemp, razorweed ? I suggest it only as a requirement to go with optics in the mid tier ocean types; or we add sailing as a mid game tech.
That is true though that one promotion may be all they get other than the free crew choices. It would be nice to have that capacity without compromising speed or protection. It justifies raising the cost by 15 to equal trireme, provisioning a larger party. Though that is also a risk, it enables doing something early when opportunities are limited. So I don't think it's too unreasonable to balance, if this is the max. Some of the UUs will have lower capacity but wider range. So we can work with it, it may encourage earlier naval expeditions by our AI rivals.
I see your point to keep them simple, though they are not all that cheap. I have a concern about allied cities becoming factories churning out traders when you need open borders. So set em adrift exploring rival territory till a monster, barbarian or privateer wipes them out. They'll soon disappear, and you gain something useful, and in a pinch they make a small transport. With two classes of trader there's plenty of gold to be had. And you can always just kill them whenever you want...but I suppose the AI can't
I should have clarified: I made it only 25 more expensive because I raised the speed to 4, same as the proposed galleon, without any compromise. But if you still think they are a poor investment, I had initially put the base cargo at 7 too, and with their greater protection and equal speed that is a far more capable ship than the galleon and you don't need as many. So I echo your sentiment about proportional cost/benefit ratios.
In fact I had already identified some UUs as starting with the animal/beast promotion, but it can be earned easily by the others. The defensive withdrawal is a more versatile survival mechanism closer to the original, and it can't be earned. I just don't see caravels functioning well as attackers in general.
But you may forget, frigates are a longer wait now with dependence on mixed sail and shipyards in my system. That is the mechanism that enables mid tier units to flourish, frigates simply come TOO early to have any fun with the existing mid tier ships. And the carrack is not a dead end, if it upgrades to man of war. The most appropriate path in my opinion.
But the galleass is a strong enough ship to be useful in its era and that's all that matters right? Giving a coastal ship a bonus against ocean going privateers isn't that useful, and thats the role for the sloop with a bit of range.
They do indeed come at similar timelines, but the caravel is currently the third in that tech range. The galleass is definitely on a different tech dependency, and I would say siege workshop like carrack or something akin to alchemy.
That is indeed what I initially thought of, and it may make the hidden nationality more convincing. I'm in general agreement but the advantages inherent in a commerce raider should come at a certain price, and there were relevant comments about making them just slightly less powerful than a frigate in raw strength, perhaps retaining a 20% withdrawal.
The galleass is slow and obsolete though by this point. As per my note above, the sloop is an end state with ocean reach, a lot easier to patrol an area - and I don't see a galleass intercepting an upgraded commerce raider. The sloop is a reasonable upgrade path for a modest caravel that isn't likely to gain huge experience. The intended result, is to justify the few additional classes I have suggested. I want to enrich the naval game if it can work well and makes sense.
They are quite powerful and imposing as it is, but they don't have to be slower than fully laden transports. Giving the big ships a uniform speed of 4 doesn't make them frigate chasers, and all ships can access the free crew promotions. I would just like 4 as the base speed for the late ships, as it comes with improved sail and hull design
This and many of your other ideas are interesting - can they be variations on the basic theme as UUs for some of the navies. I've just begun to anticipate some of the cool possibilities and with you and @azatote we can really flesh this out.
I also thought of that - it is cool. I was going to suggest marksman for the Svartalfvar equivalent.
Again lots of room for customizing - there is actually no gunpowder dependency in the mid tier though it is implied.
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black_imperator
Deity
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It's different, more reactive, which can be useful for certain discussions ^^
I noted : " late fleets should be able to move at 4 in their optimal configurations."
--> I disagree.
end-game melee units move by 6 or 9 !!! (1 + mobility +haste) * engineered roads.
ships/fleet should at least move by 6-7 to be worth it.... (save transports/merchants, which should be slower 4mvt.... and thus may limit the actual speed of the fleet).
other comments will come later
--> I disagree.
end-game melee units move by 6 or 9 !!! (1 + mobility +haste) * engineered roads.
ships/fleet should at least move by 6-7 to be worth it.... (save transports/merchants, which should be slower 4mvt.... and thus may limit the actual speed of the fleet).
other comments will come later
PPQ_Purple
Purple Cube (retired)
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From my perspective it's just another mouth to feed, so to say. As in just another think I'd have to register for and keep track off and I just can't be bothered.
Honestly I think you should keep iron simply because of its place in the tech tree. Hell, maybe even ditch iron but keep iron working as a requirement. Bottom line is that the goal is to push these things back down two tech lines rather than tying them only to one thus making them harder to rush and give early ships more time to shine.
My primary concern is the fact that if you let people pack entire armies onto ships and sail around the coast it might make invading the AI too easy.
I mean, you are basically bypassing his armies as well as all the natural dangers like barbarians that exist on land. And whilst you can sort of do that now a 4-5 slot galley could easily cut the number of ships required to do that to 2/3.
It's all basically to do with balancing them so that they retain their historical level of usefulness on maps with a lot of shallow seas but not so much that they become an OP breakthrough unit on maps like Erebus continents.
I was under the impression that traders were supposed to be ships that have the same ability as the great merchant. As in to start a trade route AKA produce gold from thin air in a foreign city. And I just feel being able to construct these on demand at any scale would be OP unless you made them so expensive that they would be useless.
Again, imagine your average Erebus Continents map with two cities right next to each other. One is your own, the other a friendly empire. Trade mission money stamping ahoy.
25 points is not as huge as I thought you meant. Like, I thought you wanted to add 50% to the cost or something. Either way though I feel the QOTL vs Galleon combo is something that's going to have to be play tested and tweaked as it goes.
True. But it also makes it very painful and annoying to kill. If you've ever hunted the pegasus you'll know what I am talking about. And I'd rather not make the caravel into something that's actually useful as a combat ship either in attack or defense.
Which is why I am excitedly suggesting ideas for the mid tier, as you might have noticed.
Honestly I think it should go into the frigate or manowar instead of just the manowar. Simply because if you don't do that there will be a lot of dead end carracks floating about when frigates hit the stage and a long period where the player who built a carrack fleet will be stuck with them whilst his enemies are producing superior frigates.
Well basically the way I'd do it is make a rock papers scissors game out of it.
Privateer travels the oceans and raids. So they are your cavalry.
Galeass is stuck at the coast and defends. So they are your archers.
Carrack travel the oceans and fight so they are your swordsmen.
So:
Galeass beats everything it can catch.
Privateer beats galeass (by running away to sea).
Carrack beats privateer (because it can catch it at sea).
Carrack can't really do the same because if your warship runs away instead of fighting it has lost. So advantage defense.
And your mid game ship combat begins revolving around raiding with hidden privateers, escorting invasion fleets using carracks and intercepting the same with privateers and having home waters dominated by galeasses which sadly comes at the cost of building lots of them as opposed to other more versatile ships.
Basically I see them as being your archer, swordsman, horseman and explorer of the naval world. The roles they have is more or less analogous to these units. And so I think it would be good to have their placement along the tech tree follow the same analogy.
That is to say, they need or should not have the exact same tech requirement. But their tech requirements should be such that if you are going for one or the other it takes your roughly the same effort to get there. Just like you can rush longbows or champions or horse archers in roughly the same time.
That way each player picks a path and ends up with their chosen ship class in service in roughly the same time. The caravel is of course an exception to that as is the land explorer.
That could easily be rolled into a specific hidden nationality promotion. Call it "letter of marque" and give it say: -20% vs frigate/manowar, +20% withdrawal, hidden nationality.
My main concern is that you want to have a cheep and yet capable patrol ship. And I don't like cheep and cheerful as a game design choice because it outclasses other stuff by definition.
Also, I don't like the idea of crossing lines and having a scout ship upgrade into a combat ship. If you want to have a late game coastal defense ship I'd rather have it be an upgrade to the galleass into some sort of monitor.
I was actually mostly agreeing with you there in terms of general idea. Frigate = cavalry, manowar = elite heavy infantry.
As far as speed goes I am on the fense. But I think I agree with dropping the base speed of galleons to 4 as long as it is the base speed and than having the manowar match that whilst the QOTL and frigate outpace it.
No need to make them UUs. You just need a 3 step program:
1. Unique model (courtesy of my self) with effects tied to the free mana the civ gets.
2. Remake the AB so that it can learn spells like an adept.
3. Design a bunch of unique ship only spells for it to cover the few spheres that don't make sense.
That way you could have all sorts of interesting combination like an AB with life turning your transport fleet into hospital ships that heal their occupants or an AB with fire being your heavy bombardment ship, an AB with wind busting the speed of your fleet or an AB with creation repairing it. All sorts of fun stuff.
As for UU's I want it on record that I generally dislike having UU's for the sake of UUs. UUs should only exist if there is a very specific piece of lore in regards to that civilization that needs a special unit to tell it. And everything else should be represented by a visual change and the use of existing game mechanics (like just allowing the ship to learn spells).
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I think that your ideas are good, but they are "bloqued" on the non-fantasy "real" tech tree.
I think one could organise the same roles in different ways
- transport / sea attack / trade / exploration / sea domination / raiding in other ways ; possibly integrating firemages, water mages, windmages;
my understanding of the upgrade path (& roles) (built upon reading yours and PPQ_purple discussion) adn trying to find a middle ground:
. ................./--> Arcane Barge --> Arcane Sloop
Trireme-----/---->Galleass--------> Man-O-War
................. \ ................ ...\
. ................ \--->Carrack---\--------> Frigate
. .................................. ..\
. ................/--->Caravel --\->Privateer
. ............../ ............... \--> Arcane sloop (see above)
galley ----/----> Galleon ----->QoL
..............\
tradeship-\-> merchantman
results+roles:
ideas for new promotions / other mechanics:
+ Lanun champion gives automatically a +1str to ship it has boarded (if possible?)
+ lanun get explorer unit (ranger UU?) that can board a caravel (I don't really know how : sea Vanilla civ mechanics)
+ Amphiby promotion: allows to attack ships even on sea ; +capture ship (? so that the last "amphiby" unit is not stranded at sea )
+ captured ship get "wrecked" promotion : (works like a poisoned promotion, with the following values : -1mvt, -1cargo, -1str, slowed reparation)
+ attack ships : frigate / privateers / Carrack / trireme, get chance to capture ship : respectively 50%, 30%, 20%
+ trade ships (and transport ?) always get captured ?
trade ships might be ok with the GM mechanics : gold on reaching city...
trade ship will be better with new mechanics : you need to get to trade-target city and back home, and can be interrupted by barb/ennemies/privateers
I think one could organise the same roles in different ways
- transport / sea attack / trade / exploration / sea domination / raiding in other ways ; possibly integrating firemages, water mages, windmages;
my understanding of the upgrade path (& roles) (built upon reading yours and PPQ_purple discussion) adn trying to find a middle ground:
. ................./--> Arcane Barge --> Arcane Sloop
Trireme-----/---->Galleass--------> Man-O-War
................. \ ................ ...\
. ................ \--->Carrack---\--------> Frigate
. .................................. ..\
. ................/--->Caravel --\->Privateer
. ............../ ............... \--> Arcane sloop (see above)
galley ----/----> Galleon ----->QoL
..............\
tradeship-\-> merchantman
results+roles:
Spoiler :
Spoiler :
+ Lanun champion gives automatically a +1str to ship it has boarded (if possible?)
+ lanun get explorer unit (ranger UU?) that can board a caravel (I don't really know how : sea Vanilla civ mechanics)
+ Amphiby promotion: allows to attack ships even on sea ; +capture ship (? so that the last "amphiby" unit is not stranded at sea )
+ captured ship get "wrecked" promotion : (works like a poisoned promotion, with the following values : -1mvt, -1cargo, -1str, slowed reparation)
+ attack ships : frigate / privateers / Carrack / trireme, get chance to capture ship : respectively 50%, 30%, 20%
+ trade ships (and transport ?) always get captured ?
trade ships might be ok with the GM mechanics : gold on reaching city...
trade ship will be better with new mechanics : you need to get to trade-target city and back home, and can be interrupted by barb/ennemies/privateers
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Nor'easter
Deity
- Joined
- Feb 25, 2007
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If it helps, a few of us brainstormed about naval units some years ago: https://forums.civfanatics.com/threads/navy-brainstorming-thread.352685/
Not trying to toot my own horn here, just thought people might find the discussion interesting. Tholal hadn't created his More Naval AI Mod yet, if that matters.
Not trying to toot my own horn here, just thought people might find the discussion interesting. Tholal hadn't created his More Naval AI Mod yet, if that matters.
PPQ_Purple
Purple Cube (retired)
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- Oct 11, 2008
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- 5,764
@Calavente I notice you want to speed ships up overall. Honestly I am not sure why. As far as I am concerned the current speed of ships is quite acceptable. Indeed, if ships were any faster than raiding in coastal areas would just be unsustainable as you could use a small number of ships to cover a very large area of coast. I mean, can you just imagine what a ship with speed in the 6-9 range would do for coastal defense?
Now, I would be up for a speed bust in ocean tiles if you feel sea journeys between continents are too long. Because they are. Like, getting galleons to someplace half way across the world map is a chore these days. But not at the expense of coastal combat.
I would like to hear your reasoning on the subject detailed.
As for the rest:
Now, I would be up for a speed bust in ocean tiles if you feel sea journeys between continents are too long. Because they are. Like, getting galleons to someplace half way across the world map is a chore these days. But not at the expense of coastal combat.
I would like to hear your reasoning on the subject detailed.
As for the rest:
- I don't really like the idea of having the caravel upgrade to any sort of combat ship. Especially not the privateer which I feel should be a mid game ship that comes before or at the same time as the caravel.
- I feel that the privateer should come earlier than that and be weaker. It should ideally be part of the same ship tier as the galleas and carrack.
- I like the idea of a tier 3 arcane ship that the caravel upgrades to. A mage ship of sorts to complement the adept ship.
- On that note we might want to consider a third tier magic ship that would be limited to a few civs like the Amurites who use magic a lot. Possibly as a manowar UU.
- I would prefer to have the arcane ships get no spells by default and learn magic like mages do. That way each civ would essentially get a UU arcane barge whose abilities would depend on what mana they have.
That I feel would be much more fun for very little effort than having a generic arcane ship for everyone.
- Having the galeass upgrade to the manowar makes sense from a role standpoint but only as long as we ensure that the unupgraded unit does not go hard obsolete at any point. So far your proposed design would ensure that. But it is something to note.
- I am not sure blitz on a ship would be a good idea. The only time it would really come into play is when it's bombarding the coast and well... blitz + more than 4 moves + ranged attack + a unit you can't kill unless you have a specific counter is just a bad idea.
@PPQ_Purple
I think you are right on most points
coast vs ocean... my point is mainly for oceans... but I think you are right on the movement part.. it should be reduced... but slow ships are an issue late game. (what about a promotion that gives double movement in ocean ?)
1. no worry then, it was for parallel with scout : scout (explorer) can go further explorer (ranger...etc) or assassin...
2. agreed with earlier privateer... (what about a coastal-only privateer?)
3. thanks
4. good idea too... ManoWar UU is a good spot for that.. but the "arcane sloop" (or whatever its name) would also be a tier IV unit.
5. agreed. (thats why I proposed not only the spells (to learn) but also the "promotions", where you can only buy 1 (or 2?)... (specialise your boat)
6. I wanted the galeass to upgrade to manowar AND to frigate... what do you think ?
7. I think you are right. (but I like the idea of the ship having a free broadside.. and then attacking.. The idea was showing that oars give a greater "instant" mobility (opposite to the ocean crossing & real speed capability of Carrack).... and thus the unit may engage multiple ennemy ships. so instead, maybe 2 FS + 25% withdrawal ?)
I think you are right on most points
coast vs ocean... my point is mainly for oceans... but I think you are right on the movement part.. it should be reduced... but slow ships are an issue late game. (what about a promotion that gives double movement in ocean ?)
1. no worry then, it was for parallel with scout : scout (explorer) can go further explorer (ranger...etc) or assassin...
2. agreed with earlier privateer... (what about a coastal-only privateer?)
3. thanks
4. good idea too... ManoWar UU is a good spot for that.. but the "arcane sloop" (or whatever its name) would also be a tier IV unit.
5. agreed. (thats why I proposed not only the spells (to learn) but also the "promotions", where you can only buy 1 (or 2?)... (specialise your boat)
6. I wanted the galeass to upgrade to manowar AND to frigate... what do you think ?
7. I think you are right. (but I like the idea of the ship having a free broadside.. and then attacking.. The idea was showing that oars give a greater "instant" mobility (opposite to the ocean crossing & real speed capability of Carrack).... and thus the unit may engage multiple ennemy ships. so instead, maybe 2 FS + 25% withdrawal ?)
PPQ_Purple
Purple Cube (retired)
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Don't ships in vanilla civ already have a different movement rate in ocean tiles vs coast tiles? I am pretty sure they do, that's why I suggested it. And even if not, it should be easy enough to change the terrain difficulty of ocean tiles to less than that of coasts just like grasslands are less than hills.@PPQ_Purple
I think you are right on most points
coast vs ocean... my point is mainly for oceans... but I think you are right on the movement part.. it should be reduced... but slow ships are an issue late game. (what about a promotion that gives double movement in ocean ?)
I actually think it's better they don't. In my view the privateer should be a ship that's weaker than all the mainstay combat ships but has the advantage of being able to escape to the open ocean so that you have to get a carrack or frigate to chase it down. Thus making it a foil to the all galleas fleet.
This will obviously require play testing as it might be too annoying. But the general idea is:
Galleass beats carrack
carrack beats privateer
privateer beats galleas (indirectly by running away thus forcing you to also build carracks)
A combination unit perhaps? We already have some UUs in the game that combine two roles.
I misunderstood it than. I thought those would be its only spells. Those proposals might need tweaking (I can't be bothered to do balancing math right now) but I like the idea as long as it's on the side of actual spell learning.
Depends 100% on if the galleas is useful for fighting frigates or not stat vise. If it's powerful enough that it can beat a frigate, even if it can't catch it than upgrading to a frigate is pointless. If not it's necessary.
Honestly I feel just having it have more base strength than anything else (which it does) fulfills that role. Plus, it's unlikely to be outnumbered when it's the one standing close to your coast and entire navy whilst the enemy has to trudge across the ocean as you build ships. But I would not be opposed to having things like first strikes or withdrawal (not both, would be op) on it for free. At this point it's really something we'd have to try and playtest.
This being said, I would actually love to see blitz available to all ships as a promotion down the line. But only down the line. Getting the uberbombardment ship I described should be a definite option. Just not strait out the shipyard.
I want to bring it back there too, in revised form. we're in the midst of some interesting and open ended discussion,
I think our guideline should be to build into the current game without disrupting it too much. Its easy to lose all reference points that maintain inherent checks and balances. That becomes a far more challenging and labour intensive pursuit. Assuming there is any kind of consensus.
@Calavente Something else about movement; although infantry may move 6+ on roads in their own territory, they lose that ability in enemy territory. and still have to negotiate terrain. And travel on oceans is very weather dependent terrain. I think you've already noted that; turning speeds up one notch makes a significant difference to any unit...and we have a 'haste' spell on the seas; fair winds.
I would keep galleys and triremes at their original strength. No need to make them weaker than common sea monsters when they all we got and we want AIs to use them
You have some interesting ideas for promotions and class enhancements. I have a few comments;
Privateers having marksman sounds cool - but sailing in and taking out transports with impunity can be devastating. Its not just one unit like an assassin targets; its a ship load of specialized troops. I suppose it could be a later promotion; then we will have to make their contemporaries; carracks and galleasses, guard ships too, burning more promotions. I dunno...fleets range from ~6+ ships in early game to ~16+ later on, they are expensive and will never be as plentiful or varied as land units.
I agree traders are coastal - only need boat building and trade, merchantmen are ocean but need currency and optics.
I think you came up with the most elegant solution to cities becoming preoccupied with building traders - the ship has to return to a home port to complete the mission. Only makes sense and it at least regulates the process a bit. I still like the explore rival territory option to disposing of it but that is just a personal choice
Alright if there are no objections: trireme can become galleas or carrack, galleys become caravels or galleons, and we can have galleas or carrack become frigate or man of war. Then lets make privateers a new unit class. We don't have to have one size fits all as we go from 2 to 6 ship classes. I like the idea of specialized roles that develop with eras.
I think some arcane UU variations on traditional ships is fine, but it doesn't work in reverse. For that and other reasons lets keep the main arcane line separate and not mix them in development with more traditional ships. Mature melee, arcane and recon units rarely blend together either. It seems the talk is towards a mid tier 'adept ship followed by a 'mage' ship (max 4).
It is an interesting proposal to make mana dependent variations of the arcane ship, if they are UUs or have variable promotions with the same basic capabilities. I am leery of adding too much complexity and whether a struggling power cant possibly match them with limited mana. The way it is now everyone has access to the same build.
Captured ships with a "wrecked" promotion is a good idea. I'm not into giving Lanun boarding parties any greater capabilities - they will have a few interesting ships to pick from as it is, and an earlier start on the ocean. Their near monopoly on boarding tactics could be neutralized by ship defenders - but if ships have a base chance at capturing prizes it can get out of hand. Few land units like Druids can capture others but its feasible only with a series of promotions at the expense of other choices. Sometimes cool ideas can change dynamics and gameplay so drastically it requires an overhaul.
Well only by sacrificing everything else- the advantage is more like 3/4. But where the galley is an actual transport, the trireme has lost one cargo space in base config, (which is only fair). And it will probably be more plentiful. So I may have actually reduced amphibious capability.
Yeah I don't consider this remotely adding to gameplay or realism if it becomes a race to build traders so you can exchange money back and forth, when you'd rather be doing more interesting things. I want a mechanism to regulate it - and I think Calavente has one. Using your privateers to intercept them is another - then soon your ally's frigates or sloops will hunt them down. It could get expensive.
Yeah and the Elk or Stag too. For caravels sailing alone a 35% defensive withdrawal chance is only a 1/3 chance at survival. Not bad odds for an unlucky encounter with a privateer or serpent, when a 25% beast bonus won't help you with either. Or leave them as is the 'cavalry' of the seas, which I think you agree they are not ideal as. Whichever, they should be able to upgrade to a specialized combat role like all recon units.
ok done
Of course the carrack can't easily catch a privateer but it does other things. In practice I see mixed battles with carracks providing fire support as galleasses battle it out, then providing siege support and defense for colonization fleets. Privateers would probably play a secondary role - In the epic battles that count.
As it is there isn't really a solution on the ocean mid game to hunt the privateer, (except more privateers - which I sort of think belongs with certain civics). Is this where the 'adept' ship comes in? But the ersatz sloop is available sooner than frigates and it could save some micromanagement.
I suppose that works as well - I guess it won't need a bonus vs transports at 11.
A sloop is 50% more expensive than a caravel and is proportionately halfway between a caravel and frigate. But it does not outclass everything - a carrack or galleas can hold their own against it, a privateer won't and a raider will have trouble. It still comes later and is only the first hint of the powerful ships that will own the seas. The recon role remains useful for anti-piracy. As for the galleas it already has two identified upgrade paths - it is a front line warship.
I've raised the QOTL one notch to 4 and its a bigger transport. I once had it at 5 but prefer to maintain some consistency in tweaks. Frigates can choose when to fight or flee, bigger ships may have to stick together.
I don't want to get carried away either - some of them are just recognizable subtypes that seem to fit, others are civ inspired. But what would you say to one naval UU per civ minimum, with about a third of the civs getting 2, fewer at 3, and only the most select at 4-5?
It's actually a pretty powerful weapon if you can bombard then attack enemy ships in the same turn, and should come only at a high level, as it does for cavalry. Many times I've had to choose between the two.
As I have also said. A carrack can at least face it down if not catch it. And to the original point about the commerce raider being a bit weaker.
it is, its a mid tier ship - a well promoted one may be able to put up a fight if you're falling behind tech or money wise.
yup
I guess to sum up the characteristic of what I'd like to see in this mod is a unique final upgrade state for every unique class before it, but there can be more than one upgrade path. just not every possible upgrade path
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