Implementing a Supply Convoy type of unit

[Predator145]

We have many great truck graphics but little options to mod them into gameplay. Civ6 has the "Supply Convoy" unit that gives extra movement, helps the unit heal inside enemy territory and speeds up healing rate to the units it's attached to. What does all that in civ3? Armies. But since we already have armies, where to fit such units?

I suggest having barracks allowing armies to be trained and using C3X to have the Mil Acad. be the required building in the city to train armies. Supply convoys are army ability and AI strat units that have 1 transport capacity, give no HP bonuses and shouldn't be able to pillage (the AI always pillages with armies even on neutral terrain that it needs, and army pillaging is very overpowered in human hands anyway). Have them cost like 100 shields or so. They still give +1movement and +25% atk and def value.

I think the only problem left is that somehow army ability units in game will mess with the unit's color. How to fix that?

 

[robotlincoln]

Loading into a small army will prevent unit upgrades, right?

 

[Predator145]

Loading into a small army will prevent unit upgrades, right?

Yes. There is no way to unload the unit if the transport unit has the army ability.

 

[Civinator]

Yes. There is no way to unload the unit if the transport unit has the army ability.

There is a way to unload the units in an army: Upgrading of the army. If remembering well, this is unfortunately only possible in a city that contains a building that allows to build armies without using a leader (in standard Civ 3 the Military Academy) and without C3X that city also needs barracks.

 

[tjs282]

Yes. There is no way to unload the unit if the transport unit has the army ability.

AFAIK, it's not the Army-strat or -flag that prevents units from being unloaded from the Firaxis Army-unit, it's because that unit doesn't actually have the "Unload" ability -- which is necessary in order to allow Armies to be transported in ships.

Giving a land-transport unit the "Unload" ability does allow its "passenger" units to be swapped out (and upgraded) at will -- but at the cost of preventing that transport-unit from ever being shipped overseas (though I think it could still be made Airlift-able).

The EFZI mod by @Vuldacon makes heavy use of land-transports (cars and trucks) to move the slow foot- and chemical-weapon units quickly around Paradise Island. However, as EFZI also demonstrates, the historical problem with land-transports in unpatched C3C has always been that the AI didn't know to use them, making them essentially a human-exclusive tactic -- but I don't know if that's now changed with Flintlock's patch.

The questions that would likely need to be answered (if the "All about Armies" thread somewhere in C&C doesn't already answer them?) are (1) Is it possible to give a unit the "Army" AI-strat without flagging it as an Army-unit? (2) Which of those two checks force an Army to be buildable/upgradeable only in the MilAcademy town? (I suspect it's the flag rather than the strat, but it would be good to have confirmation).

 

[Predator145]

We could have the same supply convoy truck unit upgrade into a newer era truck. This would kick the units loaded out. Then the AI can upgrade them as well. Since it only takes a barracks to upgrade armies in these type of mods (for real armies, use C3X to limit them to the Mil Acad).

I haven't tested but if the AI has a unit flagged as "Army" AI Strat it would want to load an offense AI strat unit into it. So if that unit doesn't have the Army ability but transport capacity I guess the AI would load it but then never disembark. Instead it would use the Army Strat land transport unit to attack. So even if this works, the AI wouldn't be able to use land transport properly.