The only really usefull naval unit is the transport, I build 20 transports or so and about 5 battleships to protect them. I send them out in one massive invasion fleet. With 20 full transports of modern armor you really dont need any other unit types.
Naval warfare
- Thread starter Sparhawk
- Start date
. . . battleship only escorts will work against the AI, but come MP you'll get your head handed to you. Human players will be able to coordinate bombers/cruise missiles/naval forces. With MP, combined naval forces - battleships, carriers w/ both bombers and fighters, and subs/destroyers - will become very important.
Portuguese
Vassalising Spain
I don't agree of the importance you give to that...
-In Civ2, once you break the blockade, cities will trade for the rest of the game.
-In Civ3, you may close the trade routes by blocking all the connections (i.e., all the harbours until there is airports), and you can negotiate a trade embargo during negotiations with foreign powers.
I prefer CIV3 approach.
Portuguese
Vassalising Spain
Unfortunatelly you're right...
CIV3 lost naval units
.But some nuclear subs and a little more battleships don't harm anyone... 
bobgote
Trousers
OK Zouave, this is one of the few areas i agree with you on. They need to show sea trade somehow, and improve the hell outta naval warfare. In world history, naval dominance and trade have been paramount, and unfortunately this isn't reflected in the game.
Sparhawk
Chieftain
I wonder if i should edit some of the naval units, ie allow it to kill under naval units or even land units by bombardment. It is quite strange that a battleship cannot sink a caravel by bombardment. But then, I don't really want to mess around with the rules.
Zouave
Crusader
- Joined
- Dec 21, 2001
- Messages
- 1,603
Indeed. Subs and privateers were never intended to attack warships in most cases. They attacked TRADE. Civ 3 has it all pitifully abstracted.
At least in Civ 2 we had transports moving freight by ocean. It could be dramatic and fun.
As for Sparhawk above, the game's values are a joke. Mod. Edit. Change them. Take you pick of the mods on the other forum.
Black Waltz
Prince
- Joined
- Jan 29, 2002
- Messages
- 569
Shut up Zouve. Do you have nothing positive to say about the game? *sighs*
And in my eyes Navel Dominance is VERY important. In my first few games I was going alright and I managed to get a huge world war going with Germany one my side, and I saw them ferrying 20+ Frigates over to the enemy and proceeded to bomb the crap out of them. Now I would have hated to be on the recieving side of that.
And in my eyes Navel Dominance is VERY important. In my first few games I was going alright and I managed to get a huge world war going with Germany one my side, and I saw them ferrying 20+ Frigates over to the enemy and proceeded to bomb the crap out of them. Now I would have hated to be on the recieving side of that.
bobgote
Trousers
You should use this as your sig, Zouave, then you wouldn't need to keep saying it.
Black Waltz, take it easy, Zouave isn't just bagging it, he's offering suggestions for improvement too. He's making some valid points. The privateer in the game has no use whatsoever. Many wars involved the severing of trade to disadvantage the enemy. Subs would lie in the trade lanes and sink merchant ships. This cannot be done in civ3. It's a big problem and should be fixed. It is theoretically possible before navigation/magnetism, but is virtually impossible afterwards.
The Last Conformist
Irresistibly Attractive
Speaking of humans being able to coordinate ships, bombers and cruise missiles, has anybody seen the AI use a cruise missile in Civ3? In Civ2 it pretty much only fired them at battleships (and perhaps Carriers - rarely built those), and in Civ3 it doesn't seem to use them at all.
Portuguese
Vassalising Spain
Cruise Missiles are pretty useless, I think.
Bombard in naval warfareis good, but I miss that battleships that defended my cities from its harbors...
Bombard in naval warfareis good, but I miss that battleships that defended my cities from its harbors...
bobgote
Trousers
I don't use cruise missiles, so i don't think the AI should either.
Portuguese
Vassalising Spain
So, they are useless. Who would use a weapon like that?!?
Navies are useless in Civ3, I don't care if the AI lands an invasion force, as long as I have 1) Railroads and 2) Artillery (20+), I have been able to eliminate any invasion force the AI has thrown at me at any level (including 20+ unit landings, which I have found are very rare). As for transports, they are good to start an invasion, but after I get a beachhead, I just rush an airport and that's the end of using transports!
Naval dominance is not important, imo. ships cost lots and you can waste a whole enemy fleet with lots of artillary and railroads. imo, railroads are very overpowered. A ship that gets in artillery range will be reduced to a sliver or red and my trusty fleet of iron clads will make a bee line to him.
About all you really need is a single fleet with good units and escort the land units to their island.
now on cruise missles. I have seen the germans use cruise missles often but I dont think they are effective.
About all you really need is a single fleet with good units and escort the land units to their island.
now on cruise missles. I have seen the germans use cruise missles often but I dont think they are effective.
navies will be *very* important in MP. first, where geography makes it possible, a human player will use carriers with bombers to cut off RR access - not necessarily to a particular city, but perhaps to some remote hill/mountain where the player can land his forces. also bombers will be used to cut off oil/aluminum/rubber/coal/etc. so that you will be drafting several units down on the tech chain and unable to replace offensive units. with sufficient fighter cover on the carriers, the beachhead will be secure from your bombers. suppose i land 2 transports of MI, particularly a couple of MI armies? land a transport of workers to build fortress, and all i have to do is survive two turns, then another transport with more defesnive, with artillery, tanks, etc. if i can sufficiently attack the RR network, you won't be able to get your artillery close w/i the first turn. now when you try to advance your artillery, you will need sufficient defense to keep them from being vulnerable to my tanks. as your troops advance, i concentrate my bombers on them. (btw, in a rare moment of agreement with Zouave, i think the carrier capacity should be around 6-7 aircraft).
in a one-on-one war, the person being invaded still has a huge advantage in marshalling resources. but if you've coincided your invasion with a military alliance with another, particularly a human player, and suddenly you can't throw your whole strength into destroying the beach head. with the upcoming MP, the workers can even build an airstrip to bring in more aircraft.
on another note, the attacking enemy shipping does need to be modelled, but i don't know off-hand how it could be done w/o introducing logistical units - i'm doing enough clicking and moving the way it is. my suggestion would be to make blockading much easier. having to cut-off every sea square to blockade a single city is ridiculous. if you have a single ship with an attack value (i.e. not jsut a transport) w/i a certain range of a harbor (say 4 tiles), then that port should be effectively blockaded. thus it would not require an unobtainable # of ships to blockade an entire island/civ. since you could blockade outside the 2-tile line of sight of a coastal city, this would force a civ to have a navy to patrol it's coastline to prevent blockading. what will quickly develop is that someone who wants to blockade will stick one or two ships outside each port and then have one or two flotillas hanging back to defend the blockaders. any civ that wants to avoid being blockaded will not be able to do it with one or two ships per port - they will be overhwhelmed. to avoid blockading, you will have to have several flotillas of your own.
submarines should have a slightly longer radius to blockade - say 5-6 tiles. suddenly you now need combined ship fleets to track down subs and be prepared for the wolfpacks or the defending navies nearby.
my suggestion has the very considerable advantage of not adding new units that then have to be tediously moved about. instead it forces strategic depth on the units taht are already there.
I agree with most of your comments. I particularly agree that when the AI in Civ3 is replaced with real "I", then the game completely changes, including which units are most "useful".
That said, I am not sure the strategy you suggest would necessarily be effective. While certainly a nuisance, I may have enough workers to repair any RR damage you do before you are able to attack from your landing area. Reducing 16 or even 23 MI to one hit point each is not really a problem as long as artillery can get close (see my first point), and a 1 hit-point MI can be taken out regularly with just a cav unit, let alone tanks.
If you don't buy that, try this (I do this all the time). The next time you mount an attack on an AI civ follow this pattern:
1) move artillery to any city which is within the 2 tile radius of your borders
2) bombard all defenders to 1 hit-point
3) raze the city
4) use workers to build RRs straight to a point within 2 tiles of the next city
5) rinse and repeat
With enough artillery and workers, you can take an entire continent in one turn with minimal offensive units, actually just cavalry is good enough, infantry is great for this!
All that said, a nuisance is a nuisance and I would probably want to nuke your fleet in any case just to make you stop.
Perhaps an even more effective strategy would be to use your bombers to reduce my size 13+ coastal city defenders to 1 hit-point each, then attack the city directly with marines. Once you take the city land your 16 to 24 MI units and now you're in a 12+ size city which at least gives you maximum defendability...
That said, I am not sure the strategy you suggest would necessarily be effective. While certainly a nuisance, I may have enough workers to repair any RR damage you do before you are able to attack from your landing area. Reducing 16 or even 23 MI to one hit point each is not really a problem as long as artillery can get close (see my first point), and a 1 hit-point MI can be taken out regularly with just a cav unit, let alone tanks.
If you don't buy that, try this (I do this all the time). The next time you mount an attack on an AI civ follow this pattern:
1) move artillery to any city which is within the 2 tile radius of your borders
2) bombard all defenders to 1 hit-point
3) raze the city
4) use workers to build RRs straight to a point within 2 tiles of the next city
5) rinse and repeat
With enough artillery and workers, you can take an entire continent in one turn with minimal offensive units, actually just cavalry is good enough, infantry is great for this!
All that said, a nuisance is a nuisance and I would probably want to nuke your fleet in any case just to make you stop.
Perhaps an even more effective strategy would be to use your bombers to reduce my size 13+ coastal city defenders to 1 hit-point each, then attack the city directly with marines. Once you take the city land your 16 to 24 MI units and now you're in a 12+ size city which at least gives you maximum defendability...
Crow T Robot
Minister of Hedonism
- Joined
- Jul 17, 2002
- Messages
- 171
My basic battle group is a Battleship and a Destroyer. If the geography and my location means I will have to fight overseas a lot, I will add a Carrier (3 B, 1 F) to SOME of them - the others remain fast-attack groups. You can always combine a fast group with a carrier group when needed.
If subs are a problem later, I will add an Aegis to the Carrier groups. I use a Destroyer instead of another Battelship because a) they are cheaper to build and allow you to establish control of the seas early on, they still can take out a frigate, caravel or galley easily and b)remain useful to bombard a sea unit to weaken it before a Battleship attacks, lessening the chance of a galley sinking it.
Destroyers can be very effective on their own. The greeks owned a medium island and were at war with me because I kicked their colony off of an area I was colonizing. I didnt feel like invading their island, but using 5 Destroyers managed to bombard them into suing for peace by taking out their incense and irrigation all along their coastline.
Subs are excellant recon units. Slink along the coast and check out where they are weak before you send in the marines.
That said, the default naval unit rules are SERIOUSLY WHACKED. Destroyers are faster than Battleships, Battleships carried cruise missiles and are DEADLY to sea and to coastal land and close to invulnerable, subs carry cruise missiles etc.
99% or more of all cruise missiles have been fired from modern warships or from planes, not from land.
Similar threads
- Locked
