MOD: Snipers

[Aranor]

This mod contains the sniper unit Worked on by myself with assistance from the comunity at large here at CFC. In particular shqype thanks man you rock

anywas here are the basic specs:
Recon Unit
Strength: 25
Movement: 1
Cost: 300

Requires: Assembly line Rifleing

National Unit 3 allowed
Invisible to most Units
Can see snipers
cannot capture cities
can explore rival territory
1 first strike
+50% against gunpowder units
View attachment snp3.bmp
View attachment Sniper.zip
as usual unpack the zip file to your mods folder in your civ4 directory. This will add the sniper unit to your arsenal of weapons
Any critisims or comments will be muchly apreciated, this is my first published mod so please be gentle

 

[GIR]

in my opinion the problem is that snipers cant kill whole armies. maybe the attack should work like a airstrike or a siege attack with 95% withdrawal chance or something like that (dont kill the enemy).

 

[Aranor]

in my opinion the problem is that snipers cant kill whole armies. maybe the attack should work like a airstrike or a siege attack with 95% withdrawal chance or something like that (dont kill the enemy).

firstly, they cant kill entire armies. A single unit per turn is not what id call an army. That said currently there is work underway to try to give the sniper a ranger attack like the artillery in civ3, but we are unsure if this will work, and if it does how well it will work.

 

[wlievens]

A single unit IS an army...

 

[Aranor]

still in respect to the game a sniper can kill off a single "army" if you want to call it that, and still not have a great effect on the war at large, unless placed well in advance. Also, if one would care to read the specs for the unit it must work in tandem to take a city as it can take a city itself. Still I understand the point you are all trying to make. And as I stated in my previous post, we are working on a civ3 style artillery ranged attack for the unit, I hope that it does work as it will add an interesting twist to the game.

 

[Yestin]

I like the thought of the "Sniper" as more of a catch-all unit for Special Forces in general. That would represent the variety of SF units in real military use, and since the 'sniper' would never be the lone unit in an army due to the fact that it can't take cities, it wouldn't be too much of a stretch. This is like Marines, we don't have entire regiments of Marines making up our army, they act as support troops for certain operations.

 

[Aranor]

I like the thought of the "Sniper" as more of a catch-all unit for Special Forces in general. That would represent the variety of SF units in real military use, and since the 'sniper' would never be the lone unit in an army due to the fact that it can't take cities, it wouldn't be too much of a stretch. This is like Marines, we don't have entire regiments of Marines making up our army, they act as support troops for certain operations.

Thanks Yestin, this is generally what I was trying to achieve. The sniper is designed to be an infantry hunter. while it can dispose of armor it is weaker against it. Im considering giving it a weakness against armor in future versions

 

[Lightzy]

I hope that with the SDK you could add much more interesting variables/triggers/flags/thingies to units, so that, for example, if the sniper is attacked twice in the same turn, it dies automatically (pinned down and destroyed in close range), and all kinds of stuff.

btw this unit is grossly overpowered.

 

[Aranor]

I hope that with the SDK you could add much more interesting variables/triggers/flags/thingies to units, so that, for example, if the sniper is attacked twice in the same turn, it dies automatically (pinned down and destroyed in close range), and all kinds of stuff.

btw this unit is grossly overpowered.

how do you figure?????

 

[AKtionFich]

i like the idea of limited specialforces like the spy

but i guess lighttzy is right in seeing this unit overpowered.

Maybe 20 basepoint combined with a bonus against gunpowder unit would fix that. to make the unit more attractive there could be added addional abilities like sentry,maybe commando etc.

I also liked the idea that it could only damage units not destroy it, like the airforce only could,
that would give u a big siege advantage befor u have flight

 

[Aranor]

i like the idea of limited specialforces like the spy

but i guess lighttzy is right in seeing this unit overpowered.

Maybe 20 basepoint combined with a bonus against gunpowder unit would fix that. to make the unit more attractive there could be added addional abilities like sentry,maybe commando etc.

I also liked the idea that it could only damage units not destroy it, like the airforce only could,
that would give u a big siege advantage befor u have flight

thanks for the comments. Ill work on the strength of the unit for my next update. As for extra abilities I fell giving it too much extra would again overpower the unit. But the suggestion of giving it sentry to start with was an idea I had toyed with originally so maybe Ill give it a shot and see how it works.

As I have said in previous posts, I also want to give the sniper a ranged attack ability much like the artillery in civ3. So it would not be able to kill the "army" it facing but do some serious damage. But unfortunately python modding is far beyond my abilities at this point and I unfortunatly cannot do this. However all hope is not lost as Shqype has kindly offered to assist me in this, it could just take alittle time as he is verry busy at the moment. So any other comments on how the sniper can be improved without the artillery style attack would be much apreciated

 

[Lightzy]

I figure its overpowered because its an invisible unit that can kill tanks. uhm.


I think it'd be more interesting to use this unit, and the unit itself would be more balance if you either make it so it can only attack but dies automatically on defense, or make it so that its invisibility is removed after it attacks and until the players next turn.

Oh, and make it so that snipers/spies/great people can see it and remove its invisibility

 

[Aranor]

i can see what you mean now Lightzy. i have been testing to make the sniper weak against armor, to no avail From what I can gather it is protected by its invisiblity. Im not keen to remove it but i will keep trying to fix this problem!!
thanks for brining it to my attention

 

[Aranor]

Looks like its gonna be a python job Unfortunately I cant fix this without removing the invisibility trait. Dont wanna do that if I can help it. Aside from changing the armor units to see snipers there is no other way im afraid. So if anyone outhere knows how to knock up a simple python code to allow snipers to be seen after combat, till the payers next turn. Or if it can be done with xml, pls tell me when to look coz i have no idea , I would much apreciate the help

 

[BigFuzzy]

How about making it so that you can only have 1-3 of these units at any one time? I would lean towards only allowing 1 per civ. That would help making it balanced as they can only be in so many places at once...

 

[Aranor]

Its a national unit, 3 are only allowed at one time

 

[FatalhitX]

yeah, i need some help. i can load the mod, but when i go into the game, i ont see a sniper anywhere.

 

[HourlyDaily]

This is a good idea and I'm glad to see it worked on.
In the civ 3 days, I modded snipers to be invisible, low powered artillery, no collateral damage, unable to attack air and sea units.

It was useful in Capture the Princess/King unit games.

I think it would be useful for assasinating Great People/Spies at this stage.

I like your ideas at this stage, doing serious damage to an army without killing it could be reflected by killing its general/captain. Keep it up anyway.

 

[GIR]

maybe you find some help in this thread:
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=151941

 

[Nedkjemp]

I like the thought of the "Sniper" as more of a catch-all unit for Special Forces in general. That would represent the variety of SF units in real military use, and since the 'sniper' would never be the lone unit in an army due to the fact that it can't take cities, it wouldn't be too much of a stretch. This is like Marines, we don't have entire regiments of Marines making up our army, they act as support troops for certain operations.

Well, in that regard an army will never be made up of just one type of unit - but actually, regiments can be. However, regiments seldom appear in modern military organizations. On another note, you will see divisions, which are larger than regiments, made up entirely of a certain type of unit, e.g. marines. But there are different sorts of marines - some are infantry units, some do logistics, while other specialize in reconaissance. I think one should see the units in the game as divisions, as it is likely that they have some organic capabilities in terms of logistics and communications. For those unit with the City Raider ability one can probably make arguments saying that they also have an organic artillery capability.