Paratroopers

[ejdacanay]

What happened to them? I know they where in Test Of Time (dont know bout civ 3), but what happened to em?

 

[nattivillin]

i dont think they exist anymore. i am at future tech and i cant build them.

 

[Dida]

there is no paratrooper and no cruise missle.
paratroopers have been useless in the past, so I can understand their exclusion, but cruise missle was fun to have.

 

[Panzer Ace]

Yeah I wise they would have kept the cruise missles, always caused havoc with 'em.

 

[Dida]

at least, we should be able to upgrade ships to have cruise missles, increasing their bombardment range up to 3 tiles.

 

[ejdacanay]

naw paratroopers where awesome, they should make a plane then u load it up with troops (paratroopers get bonus, just like marines on AA)

 

[franlato]

I think you can take gunship and parachute infantry units with them. As i'm all for cruise misile in ships, it would be awsome

 

[Dearmad]

there is no paratrooper and no cruise missle.
paratroopers have been useless in the past, so I can understand their exclusion, but cruise missle was fun to have.

Other way around.

 

[oldStatesman]

Paratroopers rocked in C3C if you were creative with using them.

I loved dropping them in a pattern in depth behind enemy lines...preferably in choke points and on mountains and hills...they would really slow down the aI SOD's rushing to reinforce the MBL. I'd suicide at least 6 to 10 of them every turn in this fashion...a few would always survive at least one turn, and their ZOC also would damage those enemy units who threaded their way around them without attacking. On mountains, one PT could sometimes take out/damage two or three Mech infantry or MA, and always occupy at least one unit. They could significantly reduce the aI response.

 

[Dida]

Oh, I usually just run over the AI army with tons of bombers, artilleries and tanks. Usually, by the time my tanks gets to the enemy city, it is empty or weakly defended.

 

[SuperBeaverInc.]

Paratroopers were worthless in Civ III for me. I only built them once, to see what they were like, then never built them again.

 

[Zakar]

Nooooo! Paratroopers were among my favourite units. I hope they bring them in the expansion

 

[Soryn Arkayn]

I'd like to see Paratroopers added to Civ4, but I think they should be changed so they can attack the same turn as they're deployed. It doesn't make sense to me to have a unit you can drop behind enemy lines, but not attack with until the next turn -- IMO it negates the PT's inherent purpose of launching a surprise attack.

If I recall correctly Civ3's Paratrooper unit was better on defence than offense; I suspect this is because they'd be dropped behind enemy lines without any support, so they'd need a good defence to survive. But this is contrary to how paratroops are used IRL. Also, since there are no attack or defence values in Civ4, this could be done away with anyway. Instead they might get certain bonuses -- preferably offensive, not defensive.

Or here's an idea, why not permit most units to be para-dropped? Like make a special tech for Paratrooping, then have a National Wonder called "Airborne School" that enables virtually any unit to be upgraded to a "Paratroop" so that it can be air-dropped onto the battlefield. The upgrade would cost gold and take one turn to complete (just like an upgrade), but after it's air-dropped it would have to be upgraded again -- for game balance. I'd like to say that the "Air-Drop" feature should be unique to infantry units, but IRL virtually any vehicle, including tanks and artillery, can be air-dropped. To air-drop units, a city would need an Airport, but unlike traditional airlifting units that's limited to one unit per turn, you'd be able to air-drop any "Airborne" trained units -- the cost of the upgrade would represent the transport plane used to air-drop the unit. If this type of "Paratroop" feature were used than the "Airborne" trained units wouldn't have any special bonuses, other than being allowed to air-drop and attack the same turn. Once they're dropped, they're identical to traditional units again.

 

[zeeter]

I never was a big fan of troopers. They were nice in Civ2, because you could nuke-drop, then sue a democracy for peace. They had to accept. In civ three I never found a use for them. Too fragile to stand up against tanks. Unable to attack MI unless you beat the city/unit to death with bombers first. Just no fun. Usually it was faster to just load a bunch of tanks on a ship and move that in instead of paradropping.

If they are going to implement them, they should be a late promotion to an infantry unit. That way it's gone through several promotions already, ensuring that it's got probably two stars and another promotion. Secondly, it kind of forces the player into wars in order to get promotions.

 

[Soryn Arkayn]

I never was a big fan of troopers. They were nice in Civ2, because you could nuke-drop, then sue a democracy for peace. They had to accept. In civ three I never found a use for them. Too fragile to stand up against tanks. Unable to attack MI unless you beat the city/unit to death with bombers first. Just no fun. Usually it was faster to just load a bunch of tanks on a ship and move that in instead of paradropping.

If they are going to implement them, they should be a late promotion to an infantry unit. That way it's gone through several promotions already, ensuring that it's got probably two stars and another promotion. Secondly, it kind of forces the player into wars in order to get promotions.

I like the idea of Paratroopers becoming available through Promotions -- it'll be better for game balance than simply spending money on the upgrade as I suggested.

But I disagree that Paratroops aren't of much use. An ideal use in Civ4 would be to para-drop units all around a city to surround it and cut off its food, hammers, and gold from its radius. I'm not sure if the city would lose it's connection to resources like Aluminum or Oil too -- but if it did it would also mean that the city couldn't produce units like Tanks or Fighters (although they could still produce SAM or Mech Infantry, which don't require any resources). Regardless, surrounding an enemy city would weaken it by attrition and make it easier to capture, and Paratroops would be ideal for this since they can be dropped relatively deep into the enemy's territory, whereas it would take several turns for even mechanized units to surround a city.

Also, if Paratroops were altered for Civ4 so they could attack the same turn that they were dropped, they could pillage a Civ's terrain improvements and prevent all of their cities from producing certain resource-dependant units (like I mentioned above) -- at the very start of the war, which could cripple the defender.


I admit though, I say Paratroops can be used for such tactics, but I'd probably never use these tricks myself, especially pillaging resources. I rarely engage in an attritional war, where sabotaging the enemy's infrastructure would be most effective. Instead, I favour a Blitzkrieg-style war, where I launch quick, decisive attacks intended to crush the defender and capture their cities. So I try to capture the enemy's infrastructure intact, so I don't have to use my own Workers to rebuild them.

Regardless, I'd still like to have Paratroops in the game -- it'd just make things more interesting.

 

[tomcat885]

Paratroopers were pretty cool in Civ 3. I would capture an enemy city with my main force, then quickly drop in heaps of paras to reinforce and defend the city while the attacking force would move on.

 

[dpaajones]

I loved using paratroopers in CivII ToT - the pressing of 'p' on the keyboard and then getting that para icon... ah yes, the good old days!!

 

[zeeter]

I admit though, I say Paratroops can be used for such tactics, but I'd probably never use these tricks myself, especially pillaging resources. I rarely engage in an attritional war, where sabotaging the enemy's infrastructure would be most effective. Instead, I favour a Blitzkrieg-style war, where I launch quick, decisive attacks intended to crush the defender and capture their cities. So I try to capture the enemy's infrastructure intact, so I don't have to use my own Workers to rebuild them.

Regardless, I'd still like to have Paratroops in the game -- it'd just make things more interesting.

I completely agree. I never pillage the enemy unless I'm desperate or bored. If I'm attacking someone, then I'm pretty sure I have the advantage. That whole Sun Tsu win the war before you start it kind of thing. I'm not going to attack his resources when I can just attack his cities. Plus, whatever he's got building is still going to be built, so it only affects his next build queue. By the time that queue is built I hope to have won the war, or at least have captured his resource without pillaging it.

As to your other point, I'm starting to wonder if their exclusion may have been for play balancing. Already I notice that gunships target resources. Imagine if you could drop a strong paratrooper on them. Gunships are at 20, as are Infantry. Mech infantry is at 32. So paratroopers would likely fall somewhere in between. Probably at 24, like Marines. Plus they get to use the terrain bonuses for defense where gunships do not.

Imagine if you could drop just two paratroopers onto a civ's only iron mine. There's 48 points +25% defense. Gunships are more of a nuisance. Paratroopers would be downright dangerous. Looking at it this way, I'm really leaning towards the playbalance idea for their exclusion.

 

[MrCynical]

Paratroopers don't appear in Civ 4, and after Civ 3 I can understand why. I hardly ever built them, and never found a use for them. Their advantage was to be able to get suddenly deep inside enemy territory, which in the modern age was suicidal. The fact they couldn't move after paradropping meant they would always be destroyed before they could do anything. Also they could only paradrop from a city with an airport, which seemed rather strange when stealth bombers could launch from anywhere. Last but not least their stats were too low to consistently beat any unit of the late industrial or modern age.

That said, I'm not sure that removing them completely was necessary. Just giving them a second move after paradropping would have made them some use.

 

[abbamouse]

Paratroopers and Cruise Missiles weren't very useful in Civ III but they both played a huge role in Civ II, often in tandem: Cruise Missiles took out the toughest defenders, Bombers finished up the rest, and then Paras moved in and took the city on the same turn. They were overpowered, but Civ III fixed that (indeed, I thought the Civ III cruise missiles were underpowered). They should have atl least allowed some form of airborne assault in Civ IV.