Overpowered catapult?

[Breunor]

Mounted units should get a new promotion:

Flanking III
50% chance to attack Siege units first.

Ohh, I like this! Is it too strong though?

Breunor

 

[Breunor]

I allways wondered why seige units (from a gameplay perspective rather than a realistic perspective - the seige units being the anti stack unit) don't have increased collateral damage for bigger stacks. So, if the enemy stack is 5 units, then the cat (and other seige) do normal collateral damage. But if the enemy stack is bigger, then the collateral damage that is inflicted is increased more so that the more units in the other stack, the more collateral damage each seige unit does. Currently there is no way of stopping a huuuuggggeeee stack except with another huuuuuggggeeee stack which kinda screws up this rock-paper-scissors system imo. The bigger the opposing stack, the more lethal your seige units become. Sounds cool to me and would solve this problem.

I see what you are getting at, but doesn't it make already overpowered artillery even more overpowered?

Best wishes,

Bruenor

 

[Blaarg]

Ohh, I like this! Is it too strong though?

Breunor

The % chance could be balanced.

 

[azzaman333]

Actually, I think that all Seige units (other than the machine gun) should only be able to defend against other seige units. All foot units would capture them, all mounted/armoured would destroy them instantly.

 

[Blaarg]

That doesn't really change much...their actual strength isn't very high, if your stack is down to the siege units you're probably going to lose the siege units regardless.

 

[notagoodname]

We multiplayer players know all about this problem.
Stacks tend to consist of at least 50% catapults. There is nothing that can stop such a stack.

What's particularly interesting is that Firaxis were made aware of the problem of catapults being too strong ages ago. You know what they did?
They stopped catapults from taking collateral damage. Thus making the already overpowered catapults even better.

Then before 2.08 came out they were again informed by the multiplayer community that catapults were waaay too useful. Guess what they did this time?
They made catapults defend when they were the strongest possible defender in the stack. So they now stop spearmen in the latest patch.

Yes, that's right they made the already overpowered catapults even more useful again!

 

[Mercenary82]

I think cats are just fine, they need to be powerful to counter the riddicoulsly high defence bonuses of archers and longbows.

 

[Stylesrj]

Seriously, if you had a field gun, you should be able ot defend against a tank. You set the field guns up in defensive positions (remember, each turn is a set period of years, so the defenders have time) and when the tank army moves in, the artillery fires and destroys a few waves. Have then in rows and you'd stop a tank rush.

Why should Mounted Units destroy siege weapons? (except Machine guns) They're perfectly capable of getting off thier mounts and taking over the thing (remember, the Cavalry must have some kind of supply wagon following them!)

Artillery weapons (Cannons to Artillery) are perfectly capable of defending themselves. The support troops would also fight back (the guys pushing the cannon might have swords or pistols) (The guys pushing the artillery probably have a gun or grenades).

Catapulta and Trebutchets are another story, they should be able to defend, but poorly, but none of this capturing crap please (unless they're heavily dsmaged to start with) Catapults also probably have a supply wagon with them, and cooks and a few support troops. Can't they pull out swords or spears and at least TRY to defend itself?

 

[azzaman333]

Seriously, if you had a field gun, you should be able ot defend against a tank. You set the field guns up in defensive positions (remember, each turn is a set period of years, so the defenders have time) and when the tank army moves in, the artillery fires and destroys a few waves. Have then in rows and you'd stop a tank rush.

And they attack for years and years. A group of catapults can't realistically defend against a trained group of axemen, or swordsmen, or spearmen. Possibly Archers would have trouble in a fight with Catapults, but if the archers are trained half-decently they will take out the men operating the catapults before the catapults can hit enough of the archers to 'win'.

Why should Mounted Units destroy siege weapons? (except Machine guns) They're perfectly capable of getting off thier mounts and taking over the thing (remember, the Cavalry must have some kind of supply wagon following them!)

Mounted unit kills men operating catapult, and move on. otherwise there is not point to them having 2 moves.

Artillery weapons (Cannons to Artillery) are perfectly capable of defending themselves. The support troops would also fight back (the guys pushing the cannon might have swords or pistols) (The guys pushing the artillery probably have a gun or grenades).

The ability of a cannon or artillery to defend against charging troops is much, much smaller than their ability to besiege a city. The accuracy of such weapons is too low in comparison to any other available troops. The operators will be shot down very quickly UNLESS defended by other troops.

Catapulta and Trebutchets are another story, they should be able to defend, but poorly, but none of this capturing crap please (unless they're heavily dsmaged to start with) Catapults also probably have a supply wagon with them, and cooks and a few support troops. Can't they pull out swords or spears and at least TRY to defend itself?

They are trained to operate catapults, not to fight hand to hand combat. They might kill 5% of the attackers if they get very lucky, but they will be basically unarmed, unarmoured, and have next to no training in such combat.

 

[notagoodname]

I think cats are just fine, they need to be powerful to counter the riddicoulsly high defence bonuses of archers and longbows.

Catapults actually make defense even easier, not harder.

When 2 armies are fighting the army that hits with catapults first wins. Only the defender can use roads so invariably the defender is always the one who hits with catapults first. Once the defender has hit the attacking stack with catapults the attacking stack will be greatly weakened and vulnerable to the non-catapult units.

In multiplayer this problem has become so huge that victory conditions are often set to 1 city elimination as taking a city is such a rare event.

 

[Breunor]

Needing time to prepare or not could be thought of as the difference between whether you are the attacker or the defender.

Historically, though, the game is 'backwards'. That is, artillery in the ancient world was usually used by 'defenders' since they had the time and the place established. (Moreso in the Medieval period.)

Of course, real life warfare is complex. At Alesia, Caesar besieged the Gauls, but they were attacked in their seige lines form the outside.

The game may be more reaslistic if you have one or two catapults on defense, and when the attacker moves into your territory, you get to use them first, so you are the tactical attacker.


Nonetheless, my main point is that in ancient warfare, artillery was important in seige warfare from the third century BC on, but its use in battle was occasional at most. The two civ's that used them a lot were the Romans and the Byzantines, because they had a lot of engineering knowledge in warfare and even more important, great logistical systems for deploying them.

The ability to use as many catapults as we do as gamers, and do the kind of damage they can do, is way out of proportion to any sense of history. But at this point its probably necessary for game reasons.


Best wishes,

Breunor

 

[Fuzzz]

Dunno if it's been said before, but how bout weakening the catapults abilities by reducing their bombarding power when attacking cities.
Now when they attack cities, they bombard 15% away of your cities defenses.
Thus in theory, you would need 7 (15*7= 110) catapults to bring the defenses down to 0 (there are exceptions: the last 5% or so are bombarded in 1 turn and a catapult with "accuracy" has -25%/turn). In other words, it doesn't really matter if you have walls or not: it will take 1 turn for 7 catapults to bombard a city to 0% defense whether it had 50% defense or 500% defense.
So why not give catapults eg. "-10% bombard" (or stn like that). This would mean that a city with 50% would have to be bombarded 5* by a catapult to get the defenses to 0%.

 

[Stylesrj]

Ok, yes some artillery units are vulnerable on the field. What about in cities? If they're the only defenders left and are hiding behind walls, should those brave siege units be captured, or get some awesome attack from behind the walls.

Remind of SMAC where if you attack an artillery with an artillery, you'd get into a regular combat.... ahh those days.

Anyway, cannons should be able to defend against Cavalry (unless the graphic is changed to a Bombard and not a Field Gun, because Field Guns are used in the field and therefore are used against armies). Same with the Artillery. That's the kind of Artillery they used during WWI to attack trenches and soldiers. I know the graphics only represent what the unit is and could have more, but sometimes the graphic could be a bit misleading. That cannon looks like it's meant for field combat, not city sieging.

 

[GenocideAlive]

I'm having a lot of difficulty not laughing at some of these responses. What in god's name does ancient application of catapults have to do with game balance? Nothing. Civ IV - Warlords isn't a simulation, so if you want to spend hours bickering over stupid nuances like that go find a different game. The fact of the matter is that they're too strong--annoyingly so. In multiplayer, it's being abused.

If I were the Civ coders I would simply make it so that catapults were limited to 2 per stack. Not only that, I would probably stick some penalties in there for armies with 5+, 10+, and 15+ units in a stack, since armies that large would have a lot of trouble communicating and coordinating. Not to mention that the whole "stacks" concept makes the game semi-obnoxious.

 

[LucyDuke]

Not to mention that the whole "stacks" concept makes the game semi-obnoxious.

What on earth do you mean by that?

 

[Quagga]

If I were the Civ coders I would simply make it so that catapults were limited to 2 per stack. Not only that, I would probably stick some penalties in there for armies with 5+, 10+, and 15+ units in a stack, since armies that large would have a lot of trouble communicating and coordinating. Not to mention that the whole "stacks" concept makes the game semi-obnoxious.

Since you don't want any references to history, I won't bother trying to inform you of historical "stacks."

Curing your MP problem is as simple as agreeing to play with no more than two siege units per stack and no more than, say, 10 units per stack. Problem solved. No game rework necessary. Go in peace.

 

[TheLastOne36]

Also artillary can defend itself pretty well. Just look at the charge of the light brigade. Cavalry vs cannon. The game is pretty fine as it is, weakening arty would make it pointless.

Yah but that whole battle was a mistake, there was a miscommunication and the light calvery went down the hill full of artillery to attack the infantry on the other end. And the only person that new about the mistake and could've told everyone to retreat, died on one of the first shell's that was fired.

So not the best of examples but i agree some artillery could defend themselves, but not really good.

 

[GenocideAlive]

My references to stacks being obnoxious lay in that it encourages players to mass ridiculous numbers of units on squares, so that the first person to attack is pretty much guaranteed ridiculous losses. Mobility is highly undervalued and relatively useless until the modern age. It's supposed to be a strategy game, so let's have some strategy. What's with this boring assed camping BS.

Since you don't want any references to history, I won't bother trying to inform you of historical "stacks."

Thanks. If you could keep your references to history to yourself, that'd be great. Because I'm sure if you and a handful of others had your way, Civ IV would be one big history book. Wonders would be long, boring lectures on the relative factual accuracy of pop culture references. Upgrades would probably be little history "factoids" that could double as sleep aids. You'd take out the instruction booklet and just leave a voucher for a ****** college known history book.

Curing your MP problem is as simple as agreeing to play with no more than two siege units per stack and no more than, say, 10 units per stack. Problem solved. No game rework necessary. Go in peace.

What's hilarious is that you refer to it as my "MP problem", when I never once stated that I play multiplayer. This "MP problem" that you are referencing belongs to others, not me. So if you could redirect your smartassed snide comments towards them, that would be dandy. As for my suggested change, your comments are worthless, so I won't bother to reply.

 

[LucyDuke]

Civ IV - Warlords isn't a simulation, so if you want to spend hours bickering over stupid nuances like that go find a different game. The fact of the matter is that they're too strong--annoyingly so. In multiplayer, it's being abused.

It certainly is your problem with multiplayer. No one else was complaining. Perhaps that's what Quagga was referring to?

With all the great things you have to say about Civ, maybe you'd do better to find a different game.

You should try being less prickly. Life will be easier. I know, my comments are worthless, so it's okay, you don't need to bother to reply.

 

[Mercenary82]

It may be unbalanced in multiplayer, but its just fine in single player. I don't think cats should be nerfed just cause its unbalanced in MP.