New Preview up @ Apolyton

[Leuf]

But that's realistic. If you are a peaceful nation, your troops will not have the experience of the troops of a warmongering nation.

What does the fact that the US was in previous wars have anything to do with the 18-25 year olds comprising most of the current forces? Sure there are officers with experience, but that has more to do with command and control which is solely the player's responsibility in civ. There's no substitute for actual combat experience, but unless the next war starts really soon after the last one it doesn't carry over.

You can have a well trained army that hasn't fought yet, and it seems like this system doesn't allow for that. I don't wish for a super complicated realistic model, and I while I'm not crazy about the upgrades I can live with it so long as it doesn't force me to fight early wars to keep from getting killed later.

 

[apatheist]

I've suggested this before... You should be able to dedicate a city's production to building up a unit's experience level (if the city has a barracks). Maybe 10 hammers convert to a single experience point, and a unit gets promotions at 4, 6, 9, 15, 23 etc. XP. You could build up a super charged unit eventually if you felt like dedicating a city's production for so long to that task. And, like other kinds of production, you can rush this buy paying money.

Perhaps more experienced units should cost more to support, to balance this out and shake things up a bit also.

I wonder if this might provide an opening for the reintroduction of the military Great Leader.

 

[Leuf]

I was just looking to see if those that had played it already found they could be peaceful without getting their butts kicked rather than try to say the combat system is broken without even having played it yet and start suggesting ways to fix it like we always do.. but hey, you twisted my arm What else are we going to do for the next 10 days... When the game comes out I'll try to put aside all my wants and preconceived notions and just play the game. By the time the SDK comes out I should have a pretty good idea what works for me and what doesn't. In the meantime...

Perhaps more experienced units should cost more to support, to balance this out and shake things up a bit also.

This is sort of what I was thinking, but in civ3 terms if a regular unit costs 1 GPT upkeep, and a veteren costs 2 GPT, it would cost 100% more for a 33% better unit. You'd be better off having two regulars. In civ4 units are less disposable so maybe it would be worth it. I suppose you could have a fractional upkeep and just round after you add them all though.

I was thinking more like there should be a military upkeep slider. Training isn't something you can just buy once, it's something that has to be done continuously. When you raise the slider it should take X turns to come into effect. When lowered it would probably have to drop immediately to prevent people from lowering the slider until the turn before the drop and then raising it again for 1 turn and then drop again.

I also think whatever benefit training gives should be separate from the combat experience. This way you can have untrained but experienced units, trained but unexperienced units, and trained and experienced units. I think this would be too complicated with the current upgrades though.

 

[Cyberstar]

I'm glad for all the new changes; making for an almost new game. Dare I say that Civ3 was getting a bit old and boring. Forgive my blasphemy.

 

[Tommy1234567890]

that preview was the best!!!!!!!!!!!!