[GS] I wish Military Engineers didn’t suck...

[acluewithout]

So, I’ve been playing around with England’s Workshop of the World, and so looking at Military Engineers.

WotW is not very good, is it? The additional yields from iron and coal are negligible. The additional yields from power are pointless, because you need to build tier 3 buildings and they’re rubbish, so you don’t build them so the extra power yields are irrelevant. So, it really comes down to the Military Engineers.

But even cheaper and with more charges ... well, MEs still don’t do anything.

If their build roads ability worked like build railways (ie no charge) that would be good. But it doesn’t. And building railways is not that useful.

Building forts is rubbish because Forts are still rubbish. How do Forts not increase resource storage?

Rushing Dams is good, but I’ve usually built my Dams way before MEs come along. Rushing canals is pointless because I’m not building canals?

How do MEs not rush Sea Walls? It’s hard building them in coastal cities. If you could use MEs to rush them, then you might actually be able to build them.

MEs are very disappointing.

 

[leandrombraz]

They are a bit better than it was before but they still that weird unit that seemed like a good idea but not really.

 

[Cagarustus]

I found MEs great! I loved connecting railways between my cities. From the isolated deserts to the most bustling cities, it was actually fun building them.

 

[SxSnts9]

Remember railroads and canals increase profits for trade routes along the route. Build them smartly and your gpt will shoot up. I will agree that ME's feel like they are missing something, but railroads and canals aren't completely pointless.

 

[ShunNakamura]

Rushing sea walls would be a godsend. Though almost certainly would get used by me then. Like the OP my dams are usually up or close to it by the time I could use them and it just doesn't seem worth it. As such I maybe build one for railroading my trade paths. If roads worked like railroads I might build one earlier to lay down some paths I don't want to waste a trade route on, but as it is that would just be wasteful.

 

[iammaxhailme]

ME seem completely pointless if you aren't warmongering with the small exception of mountain tunnels.

 

[thecrazyscot]

I'm experimenting with updating roads to cost no charges but instead iron from Medieval Roads onward. It isn't a perfect fit but at least will make iron useful again. I also am going to move Forts to Military Engineering, and am thinking about letting Military Engineers rush Encampments as well. This is in addition to the fort enhancements I've already done in my Improved Forts mod, which I think I'm going to add a modifier for units stationed in a fort to protect land trade routes within 2 tiles from plundering.

 

[acluewithout]

I'm experimenting with updating roads to cost no charges but instead iron from Medieval Roads onward. It isn't a perfect fit but at least will make iron useful again. I also am going to move Forts to Military Engineering, and am thinking about letting Military Engineers rush Encampments as well. This is in addition to the fort enhancements I've already done in my Improved Forts mod, which I think I'm going to add a modifier for units stationed in a fort to protect land trade routes within 2 tiles from plundering.

That all sounds kinda interesting. Very cool. Really like the change to roads.

I feel like with all the new mechanics there must be some way to make ME’s good as well as Forts and other things. Hopefully FXS will play around with this a bit in patches.

I think Forts increasing your resource capacity - even just +2 or something - would be a good change. I also think MEs should be able to rush Industrial Zones late game and maybe some things currently built by Builders should require MEs - e.g. Offshore Oil Rigs and Windfarms.

 

[Disgustipated]

I still have yet to build a single railroad, I keep forgetting. I still have games where I don't build a single encampment. They just don't seem that important to me. Are you guys finding the railroad useful?

 

[mrjepson]

The railroads drastically reduce the movement cost of you tiles and you can build them in whatever route you want. If you follow where your traders are going there is a big increase in their gold on their trade routes. Your first two cities you connect also gets you some era score. The downside is your CO2 production from railroads seems to be quite high so if you are going to do a lot of railroads you may want to aim for sea barriers sooner than later.

 

[ggmoyang]

They are now better with railroads... but the problem is it requires too much micro.

 

[Yzman]

You need to be able to pick a route with railroads, right now it is incredibly tedious doing it one tile at a time.

 

[ShunNakamura]

I agree with Yzman. One tile at a time is part of the reason I don't bother with railroads much of the time.

 

[Disgustipated]

f you follow where your traders are going

This is a problem for me as at this stage of the game there are roads everywhere. City states and other AI's have their own roads. It's hard to know which roads my traders are using unless I actually follow them, or try to remember the route when the trade route comes up for renewal. Doesn't sound particularly fun.

 

[SammyKhalifa]

They should be able to rush sea walls and aqueducts. Free roads like others have said.

 

[Seabastian Civ]

You need to be able to pick a route with railroads, right now it is incredibly tedious doing it one tile at a time.

I like that the game makes railroads super difficult and time consuming to build. Mirrors the real history of that technology a bit.

I never knew about them increasing trade value. I'll have to play around with that and see if they don't seem like a better investment.

 

[Seabastian Civ]

Do ME's redeem themselves with the ability to build airstrips? What about missle silos? I haven't made it far into GS yet to find out.

 

[StashMcWhalen]

Lol, a fort that increases storage? While it sounds reasonable in real life, how could you justify such a huge improvement that would be for only the cost of one build charge? Just seeing where you're coming from, as you're way more experienced than me. But, isn't that a huge red flag of unbalance?

I think Forts increasing your resource capacity - even just +2 or something - would be a good change. I also think MEs should be able to rush Industrial Zones late game and maybe some things currently built by Builders should require MEs - e.g. Offshore Oil Rigs and Windfarms.

I really like the oil rig etc idea

 

[Linklite]

I find that railroads can be a great booster - if you're far enough ahead to build a bunch of MEs or buy them.

I had a continent spanning Civ in one of my games, and since I had a bunch of gold going spare so built something like 10 of them and upgraded my entire continent with railroads. It was great because my earlier iron and coal mines were actually useful, and when I was done, my units could get anywhere very quickly. Barbs attacked a city, and I had a few tanks whip across the entire continent in something like two turns. Two modifications I'd like though;

1. Have a queue function. I found it really tedious having to do assign each ME a single tile every turn. Let me queue them up a bunch of tiles, and forget about it until they're done. I don't mind the one tile per turn slowness, just let me queue.
2. I think the CO2 contribution is overkill.

 

[Lily_Lancer]

England Military engineers are great.

Remember they can chop trees. And 1/4 cost of military engineers means English can chop trees at much lower cost than any other Civ.