Öjevind Lång said:
No troops ever passed across the Alps or the Himalayas. They went through mountain *passes*, which exist in Civ IV. I like it that way. Also, I don't think the game needs a lot of new units. Though perhaps it could include dragoons (as in Civ II) to fill out the space between Knights and Cavalry. It's a bit weird to have an army made up of macemen, musketmen, trebuchets and rifle-toting 19th type cavalry.
It's not because you personally don't like the idea of crossing mountains that it is necessarily a bad one. I could respond to your "dislike" by stating my "likes", in which case no one gets anywhere. This forum is there to post ideas either way, remember?
For your information, Nepalese people live in the Himalayas. There are plenty of villages in the Alps. Of course no one lives in glaciers, but there are valleys and mountain villages where people live nonetheless. And believe me, these places are nothing like *hills*. I lived for 20 years in France's Maritime Alps and spent quite a bit of time up in the mountains -- there ARE lots of people there. There are villages perched way high on terrain I wouldn't call merely a *hill*, but a bonafide "mountain". So the idea of mountain CIV's isn't as far-fetched as you may think, especially as a separate mod.
Furthermore, it is guaranteed in real life that for each defense there should come a way to get around it. The old shield vs sword thing. Hey, ever heard of "Chasseurs Alpins", "Gebirg Jager", "Alpini", "Gurkas", etc. These are all specialized mountain troops. Impassable mountains? In general yes, but not as a systematic guarantee! If you have a LARGE range of mountains, the game will not allow you to get through since there will be no passes. Doesn't happen in regular play as far as I know, but in a mod, there's much you can do, especially if it focuses on "montagnards" vs. lowlanders.
In the ancient times there were no good passes to get through the Alps from Gaul to northern Rome. Hannibal managed to get through with a lot of difficulty (and losses of men, horses, and elephants). Napoleon did the same in the 19th Century, with comparable result (minus elephants of course!). In the process, Napoleon actually built a road which still exists today. It is called, quite naturally, "La Route Napoleon". The definition of where a hill ceases to be a hill and becomes a mountain doesn't seem very clear in the minds of a lot of people who haven't lived in mountain areas. Just a thought.