how can we solve stuck recon?

[Siege Tower]

Would it be possible to use the same mechanic as donating units to City-States? So when you recall the unit, it disappears off the map and reappears in your capital three turns later. I believe donating units already requires them to be at full health, so that solves one abuse issue. I know paradropping requires the unit to have it full movement as well, so maybe that is another requirement that could be implemented. The one problem I can think of is that donating deletes the existing unit and creates a new unit, so it may lose XP/promotions. If that problem can be solved and the AI can be taught to use the mechanic, I believe this could be the best solution.

 

[hokath]

Trapping a scout by purchasing all the escape tiles is the biggest power play

I don't think teleporting units is on-brand.

 

[Tekamthi]

Would it be possible to use the same mechanic as donating units to City-States? So when you recall the unit, it disappears off the map and reappears in your capital three turns later. I believe donating units already requires them to be at full health, so that solves one abuse issue. I know paradropping requires the unit to have it full movement as well, so maybe that is another requirement that could be implemented. The one problem I can think of is that donating deletes the existing unit and creates a new unit, so it may lose XP/promotions. If that problem can be solved and the AI can be taught to use the mechanic, I believe this could be the best solution.

this would make for a good anti-abuse check, whether my OP suggestion for a "build" were implemented, or rival-territory-enabled recon were moved back on war declaration. In my OP suggestion, I imagined the "build" would take a few turns, and could be interrupted via enemy attack on the unit prior to its completion. My thoughts in this regard may require some heavy lifting by our devs, however, and would need some buy-in from a greater portion of the community than has responded positively here so far. I assume the AI can identify when stuck (in order to delete units), but I don't really know whats going on with them for certain.

Trapping a scout by purchasing all the escape tiles is the biggest power play

I don't think teleporting units is on-brand.

Yes, I've also managed to trap some great people -- I had a hotseat game once where my roommate and I each managed to trap each others' vassal's great generals this way. Was a very memorable civ moment, and there were many moments afterwards where we tongue-in-cheek used these as hostages (mine eventually teleported out somehow!) but it felt like a glitch, really.

re: teleporting as an unstuck mechanism, if we think of it thematically, we could say they are disbanding as a "unit", travelling individually, incognito, then reforming at the capital. I can't cite a historical example of such, but it doesn't seem that far fetched to me

 

[usadefcon1]

How about:

Recon can enter rival territory without open borders but take a -75HP hit if they end their turn there.

 

[Hinin]

How about:

Recon can enter rival territory without open borders but take a -75HP hit if they end their turn there.

The AI doesn't know how to deal with such kinds of effects. Just see how difficult it is for them to know what to do with citadels.

Plus, I do not see why recon units should be penalized for entering rival territory. They offer very limited combat potential for the supply and gold they require (supply and gold that should be more limited overall imo). As tactical agents, they focus on vision and economic and military disruption first, and so attacking enemy civil units seems normal to me.

 

[Tekamthi]

The AI doesn't know how to deal with such kinds of effects. Just see how difficult it is for them to know what to do with citadels.

Plus, I do not see why recon units should be penalized for entering rival territory. They offer very limited combat potential for the supply and gold they require (supply and gold that should be more limited overall imo). As tactical agents, they focus on vision and economic and military disruption first, and so attacking enemy civil units seems normal to me.

Agreed, attrition damage can be problematic, especially so high that it kills the unit in 2 turns. Maybe a small attrition damage, like 5hp, would be sufficient just to signal "get out asap".

That said, is this even doable? There's some kind of attrition for civilians available (presumably, judging how some units lose strength, I've never attempted anything with it), but is there an HP attrition function for combat units? I think we're pretty limited on features that apply only in rival territory, as things stand. Most location based promotion features require enemy territory, and I believe there needs to a war status for this to engage, though I could be wrong.

We could do a lua-based add/remove of promos either on per-move-basis as they enter rival (heavy cpu resource hit), or a start/end of turn basis (not so heavy). I've done this before, wouldn't take long to dig up the modmod code for it... Question is what is the right malus to apply? IIRC my past attempt I tried vision reduction but that's it. I'm wary of HP attrition, but could see it working well with some smaller debuffs like blocking healing, slower movement, etc.

 

[azum4roll]

Vision/movement reduction just gets the unit stuck easily.

 

[usadefcon1]

The AI doesn't know how to deal with such kinds of effects. Just see how difficult it is for them to know what to do with citadels.

Plus, I do not see why recon units should be penalized for entering rival territory. They offer very limited combat potential for the supply and gold they require (supply and gold that should be more limited overall imo). As tactical agents, they focus on vision and economic and military disruption first, and so attacking enemy civil units seems normal to me.

I meant only if you are not at war and don't have an open border treaty. Just as a way to get them out.

 

[Coffee Monopoly]

What is the issue exactly?
Don't send your units where there's a risk of them getting stuck, or be willing to pay the price.
I don't see why we need a magical bail-me-out button for this.

Agree that this is not something that is needed. It’s not even something I would consider good or healthy. You should be punished for careless play.

The issue is more for the AI than for humans, obviously humans should think ahead.

 

[looorg]

How about:

Recon can enter rival territory without open borders but take a -75HP hit if they end their turn there.

That might be a bit hefty. How about just having it a "missionary" promotion. Where it loses HP gradually over the turns if ends in rival lands until it either escapes and heals or dies (equivalent to getting lost and dying?)? It might be weird tho as there are other promotions that make them use tiles in enemy lands and also later you might want to upgrade and use them as paras or special forces and then you don't want some kind of attrition promotion or buff so it probably have to go away at some level of upgrade.

As far as AI is concerned they don't tend to get trapped. But if I have managed to trap their units in a land pocket of some kind by purchasing tiles they tend to sit there for a few turns and then they just disband them. That or one of us declares was on the other. The exception is probably when their scouts (of some level) get trapped out on islands due to barbarians and they just can't get away. They tend to go into the water, get hit, go to land, heal, repeat until they fail at that and just die.

 

[jwfoo555]

Is it possible to add a new action to a unit (like Fortify, Pillage etc.) except it's like a special Fortify, where after X turns (say, 8), the unit gets teleported to the closest "free" tile? Is it also possible to detect specifically when a unit is in a situation where it has been trapped by borders?