Patch v3.13 change list

[dutchking]

Disappointments:
-Still no counter to airships until rocketry
-Global Warming is still the worst part of the game
-The useless corporations are still useless...

Others?

Has anyone else had this bug where you go into diplomacy and the entire background turns black? Kind of annoying...but then when you exit it turns back to normal?

 

[Kael]

Wow, great changes! I just have a question: Dale posted a while back a list of changes 'he submitted'. Does that mean that the mods that weren't made in-house by Firaxis are also being patched by this patch?

I believe so, I know I submitted fixes for Age of Ice for this patch as well.

 

[Gaius Octavius]

Has anyone else had this bug where you go into diplomacy and the entire background turns black? Kind of annoying...but then when you exit it turns back to normal?

No, but I've gotten one where it turns red very briefly just as you enter it.

 

[Peng Qi]

Maybe I missed it but will the the "Dead Units Coming Back to Life" graphix problem be fixed?

I think that was the first strike animation bug they listed as fixing.

 

[0R4NG3]

Good changes, just disappointed that Russia is not going to get beefed in any way, considering that it has what is probably the most useless UU and UB.

 

[Shoot the Moon]

I wouldn't call their UB useless, it is useful for space race.

 

[GenocideBringer]

Good changes, just disappointed that Russia is not going to get beefed in any way, considering that it has what is probably the most useless UU and UB.

Their UB gives two free scientists and is awesome for SRes. You can also rush it with slavery/Universal Sufferage, unlike spaceship parts.

Their UU is excellent. It's cavalry that beats the hell out of other cavalry.

-Still no counter to airships until rocketry

Who cares? They do pretty minor damage anyway. With the amount of hammers spent on airships, you can get enough military units to overwhelm him.

-Global Warming is still the worst part of the game

I'm fairly sure it's fine as long as you don't go crazy with nukes. If you still don't like it, change some .xml files.

-The useless corporations are still useless...

The corporations are exactly like they are with Solver's patch, with a slight nerf. Because I play with Solver's patch with the income reduced to four, I know that corps are EXCELLENT, but not overpowered.

 

[mice]

The corporations are exactly like they are with Solver's patch, with a slight nerf.,

GAMEPLAY
Adjusted corporation maintenance for inflation
Corporation Headquarters give 4 gold per corporation city to balance corporation immunity to inflation

If it's just like Solver's then corporations will be very strong even with just 4 gold in the founding city

 

[kettyo]

Seems a very big patch. Great !

To the naval warfare theme:
I think changing unit stats takes no time but adjusting the AI to use the units according to their new supposed roles takes a lot.
So i would also welcome a more polished naval unit structure but it'd need time to develop it.
First decide which would be a good unit structure then reprogram the AI to reflect it.
I would also be happy if the navy changes would slowly appear in the new unofficial solver patches as Blake includes more and more new AI routines related to it.

Once more thanks for this huge patch.

 

[peter450]

I'm waiting this 3.13 to buy BTS but I'm confused about ships.

It seems that Fireaxians have deeply understimated the essential role of Navy but this patch seems to have done something about it,let's see how much.

Cause I'm a bit ******** Is there any gentle guy among you who can answer these few questions ? Thanks in advance

1 ) could you please summarize a bit the big picture of the Navy with 3.13 without going into complicated mathematic rules or scissor-rock-paper examples ?

2 ) are we still in time to suggest them a further fix or are we too late ?

3 ) can the Navy fight ( 100 % of damage capability ) against planes and viceversa ?

4 ) why a WW II era submarine is still absent ?

5 ) can subs sink everything swimming or is is still present a deep understimation of Navy above all the most lethal modern submarines ?

Thanks really a lot !

Basically in answer to point one there is no paper, rock, sissors, in the late modern era naval game which kinda goes against the grain of practically all the combat units in civ, and means the combat lacks any real tactical edge.

Before BTS basic naval was battleships>destroyers>sub, with no reason to build the sub since it didnt>counter anything else as it was to weak, so naval was semi broken, BTS while being great overall, added to the late naval combat problems, (while ironically fixing the early sail era ones) by adding units that had no real roles to this already semi broken mix.

The main problem is nothing really counters anything else, so a units counter tends to be itself since the odd's of a unit beating another unit of the same type or str, that it can actually see to fight in the first place are 50/50, Units lack proper roles other than to be the only counter to themselves, An there not proper counter units in that sense either since the combat odd's are always the same on units of equal str with the same veterancy 50/50.

BTS added a lot more naval units to the game, an during the age of sailing ships these new additions have worked brilliantly (Because there's a proper counter system in place), as a result that time periods naval combat works very well, the late modern additions haven't really had much impact since there slotting into a general combat system that has no real roles for them.

Take the stealth destroyer as an example, it's combat power is identical to a destroyers so the only reason you'd get one is it's advantage that it can't be seen by any other unit except itself, so whats everyone else do? get the same unit themselves to counter another player who has one. So everyones getting the unit to basically counter itself, it's a pointless addition with it's current stats since it's only reason for being is to counter itself.

It's to late on the current patch, however this patch is to early in the games life cycle, its only been out 2 months to be the last, i expect there will be one more final patch.

Not sure what you mean, with this question, but air combat works differantly to normal combat i think it's based on the chance to intercept an then dmg is calculated, i dont think str is taken into account, as units that can intercept planes vary enomously in there base str ratings.

The first sub is the WW2 era one, although they have given it modern capabilties in terms of carrying missiles, i guess to save the hassel of adding a new unit graphic for a modern equivalent with the same stats.

Attack subs, now have str 30, so they are in effect a underwater destroyer, they counter the standard sub that no one builds, They take the role of a standard destroyer which obsoletes towards the end, and goes on to upgrade to a stealth destroyer than cant see subs, so you basically need a new unit to see the sub that no one builds, so what does this unit end up countering? itself!

 

[Ghostofkuji]

My Head Asplode!!!

 

[krasny]

unless i have missed something, espionarge will still be broken

so disapointed

 

[peter450]

Seems a very big patch. Great !

To the naval warfare theme:
I think changing unit stats takes no time but adjusting the AI to use the units according to their new supposed roles takes a lot.
So i would also welcome a more polished naval unit structure but it'd need time to develop it.
First decide which would be a good unit structure then reprogram the AI to reflect it.
I would also be happy if the navy changes would slowly appear in the new unofficial solver patches as Blake includes more and more new AI routines related to it.

Thats a good idea, an unofficial solver style patch would allow the community to play test any changes an give feedback on any issue's that arise, these could then be rectified in a final official patch

Yeah espionage could use a little fine tweakery i think the basics of a solid system are in place though, modern spy icon be nice....

 

[vilemerchant]

I'm pretty miffed that Airships have not been nerfed. Sure they only do 'minor damage', but if a MP opponent is smart enough to have 4 airships in each city along a border it makes any sort of offensive invasion almost impossible. If he could bring 20 airships (which are immune to damage) to bear on your invading stacks every turn you'd be screwed unless you had literally hundreds of units. And it comes so early in the game right when cavalry, rifles and cannons should be ruling the battlefield. Used on mass they're basically a licence to cause collateral damage without it costing you any units.

 

[azzaman333]

I'm pretty miffed that Airships have not been nerfed. Sure they only do 'minor damage', but if a MP opponent is smart enough to have 4 airships in each city along a border it makes any sort of offensive invasion almost impossible. If he could bring 20 airships (which are immune to damage) to bear on your invading stacks every turn you'd be screwed unless you had literally hundreds of units. And it comes so early in the game right when cavalry, rifles and cannons should be ruling the battlefield. Used on mass they're basically a licence to cause collateral damage without it costing you any units.

All Airships need is the ability to intercept, and they'll be balanced.

 

[Peng Qi]

All Airships need is the ability to intercept, and they'll be balanced.

Or they could add biplanes!

 

[azzaman333]

My way is easier.

 

[Venger]

Or they could add biplanes!

My Civ3 mod had bi-planes as the first air unit - they acted similar to Airships, except they could, of course, intercept each other.

The problem is that intercepting airships is possibly the most ******** Civ military concept ever. Might be worse than Spearman>Tank. Well, not quite, but close.

To fix airships, add intercept, and change them to bi-planes. Oh, and they need to move a bit down the line in the tech tree...

The key to naval combat is elegance.

Subs should do moderate damage 16, +50% on attack, have 2 first strike chances and 50% withdrawal - they should also be slower than regular ships. They should be invisible to all but destroyers/CG (guided missile cruiser). This also means subs cannot see others subs, and cannot ATTACK other subs. WW2 saw almost no sub on sub action, simply because the torpedoes were unable to maneuver and subs only able to see surfact targets.

Destroyers should be maybe 24, +50% attack (not defend) against subs. Fastest unit. Also, 30% intercept aircraft.

Battleships should be 40. 10% intercept. That's about it!

Carriers... defend only strength 24.

Guided missile cruisers - 32, 60% intercept, can see subs.

Nuclear attack submarine - 32, 2 first strikes, 50% withdrawal, move as fast as a battleship, not quite as fast as a CG/Destroyer. Can see and attack other subs.

This gives you alot to work with - subs are geared toward attack and withdrawal (duh, just like real life), destroyers as AA picket and ASW, carriers as floating air stations and power projection, battleships as juggernaughts of the seas, and CGs as AA and general force protection.

This will allow someone to create an effective naval stacks/armada, but also gives the attacker the initiative and upperhand in combat - two stacks of equal strength, the advantage, though not overwhelming, goes to the one with initiative.

A force might first attack with a couple of subs, weakening some units, come in with some aircraft, then move in with battleships/GMC - it won't be bloodless for the attacker though. This also gives the active sub hunter the advantage when poking around with destroyers around a convoy, but a destroyer minding it's own business will stand a great chance of being sunk when attacked by a sub.

A lone battleship is just like the Bismark - toast. It cant take alot of damage, but it leads with it's chin. However, give it an escort or two, and bring it in tight for hand to hand when in range.

As air power develops late in the game, battleships will become rarer, and you'll have far more SSN/CVN/CG/DDG stacks.

Some flava:

Also, one might consider enabling a single guided missile capacity for the BB and CG.

A Corvette for light scouting and ASW is a good unit, I had one in Civ3, best speed, give it decent withdrawal chances, good for a skirmishing naval unit.

Amphibious carrier - can carry two helicopter and two marine units. This is a sweet little unit to have. Chopper can be attack or ASW (if you do it)

ASW helicopter - if you create it, you can allow the LHA (Amphib carrier) and GMC to carry one. Range 8, can detect subs. Might need special attack rules, as you don't want it to get a 100% kill, but it also shouldn't be "shot down" by a sub either. Perhaps can bombard to 100%, but only X number of rounds, whatever...

Well, that was just off the cuff, but by using the Civ4 special combat gadgets, you can get really interesting interplay in naval warfare that encourages you to build combined arms fleets and take an active interest in what's over the horizon, lest it come up and knock your fleet down...

 

[0R4NG3]

Their UB gives two free scientists and is awesome for SRes. You can also rush it with slavery/Universal Sufferage, unlike spaceship parts.

Their UU is excellent. It's cavalry that beats the hell out of other cavalry.

Is an Explorer that beats the hell out of other explorers an excellent unit?

2 free scientists come way too late and do not contribute that much to space race victory, you should try it, in fact by the time I usually build the UB I already have half the spaceship, so yeah great UB...

 

[elder abuser]

Yay a patch!....but the berserker suicide monkeys didn't get added as a unit...just I'll have to keep up my hopes for next patch...