pikemen flag

[rmontaruli]

In the UNITS section of file RULES.TXT there are the units, cost, attack, defense, and some flags.
One of those flags is 000010000000000 = x2 on defense versus horse (pikemen).

My question is: what are horses?

Wait! Not a silly question.
I mean: there is no "horse flag" for units.
Does the program consider horses the mounted units from slot 16 to slot 22?
Is Chariot a horse?
Is Elephant a horse?
Is Armor a horse?

I'm thinking of a scenario, where a civ uses those "horse units" and another civ uses other units with the pikemen flag set.

 

[Boco]

IIRC,

movement = 2
hp = 1
fp doesn't matter (see combat thread on Poly)
land unit

 

[Prometeus]

Originally posted by rmontaruli

Is Chariot a horse?
Is Elephant a horse?
Is Armor a horse?

Yes
Yes
No

Technically are considered horse mounted units all of movement 2 units without alpine flag on . Armor has more then 2 movement points, so it's not a horse units.

I tried to create a scen with "mounted units" civ and a all pikemen civ - the beta of my Gok Blue scen. It'as a bit unbalanced. You'll need to mix them a little, believe me.

 

[Case]

*tries to think of some kind of smart way to impliment this in a WW2 scenario*

 

[rmontaruli]

Thanks for the answers.

So, any unit with
mov=2,
hp=1,
flag_alpine off,
land unit,
is a "horse" and when attacks an unit with pikemen flag on the attacked unit doubles its def points.

Well, interesting. I will develop something...

Thanks again. See U.

 

[techumseh]

Originally posted by Case
*tries to think of some kind of smart way to impliment this in a WW2 scenario*

It's pretty limited, but several variations have been tried. If you make all your armour w. a move of 2, then the flag can be used for AT weapons. But that's very limiting for armour. Or if you make all your infantry move 2, then the flag can be used to represent MGs and other defensive AP weapons.

 

[Case]

Yeah, but the HP=1 requirement sort of rules that out

Hmm, In my upcoming scenario Paratroopers only have one hitpoint. Perhaps I could give them 2 movement points and give armoured units the flag to stop them being attacked by Paras.

 

[Boco]

The kicker is the 1hp requirement. Like Tec says, it's pretty stringent -- tanks are usually >2hp in most scenarios.

You could make everyone faster, so that the infantry has 2mp. Tanks, MG units, fortress units, city garrison units, or something similar could then be pikemen.

Or...if you're using a disease unit, perhaps it could have the requisite 'cavalry' stats. Then disease-resistant units could be pikers. Still it's hard to restrict the range of a land disease unit.

Oh yeah, the bonus is actually x1.5, not x2.

 

[Case]

I do have infantry moving at 2 spaces/turn, but I certainly don't want them to have 1 HP Likewise, I'm reluctant to give paras the ability to move quickly as they generally didn't have much transport...

 

[Boco]

but I certainly don't want them to have 1 HP

It's funny, I've tried half a dozen ways to include pikers and piker-bait (shishkabob?) in a scenario, and it always comes down to "I don't want to make that a 1hp unit". 1hp'ers are already handicapped against most units (in a WWII scen, I've seen mainly >2hp). Making someone a pikeman against such a weak unit adds insult to injury.

Btw, I grumbled about the weakness of the 1hp Stuart in Battle for Australia. But then, it was a recon tank.

Still, if you want to show a development in a new unit that makes several older types of units quickly obsolete, raising the hp works well. Sometimes it catches a careless human off guard. Kull demonstrates it well in "Age of Empires" (i.e. it suckered me).

 

[kobayashi]

I use 1 HP for most units in all my scenarios. What's wrong with adjusting the attack/defense and firepower stats. Usually the 2 or more HPs are reserved for fortification units and maybe battleships.

Ultimately HP is a measure of how much damage a unit can sustain and still keep fighting. In the case of a ship, it can take torpedo hits or have turrets out of action and still remain in action. A tank on the other hand is either out of commission or fully functional, it can't be partially damaged.

Besides having different HP for different units confuses the hell out of players. You don't think they will have a calculator handy to multiply out the effective combat strength of each unit do you?Just double the attack and defense factors to approximate 2 HPs and so on.

 

[Morten Blaabjerg]

Originally posted by kobayashi
Besides having different HP for different units confuses the hell out of players. You don't think they will have a calculator handy to multiply out the effective combat strength of each unit do you?Just double the attack and defense factors to approximate 2 HPs and so on.

Hmm... It depends, I'd say. If terrain plays a key role in the warfare of a scenario (like in medieval warfare), it makes a lot of sense to play with the HP's to reflect changes in strength, rather than adjusting the ATT/DEF too violently. This way weaker units will still stand solid on good terrains, even if attacked by stronger ones. Still not finished considering how precisely to balance it out.... Another way to think of HP's is rounds of fire... i.e. used for units that can be used continually in a combat (which actually somewhat matches your concept well). I do agree its something to play very carefully with, to retain the dramatic as well as the realistic effect of units with different strengths/weaknesses.

BTW, I've never heard about the 1hp requirement for horse units before... is that a confirmed fact? -I always believed it was just the 2move ability that made something a 'horse' unit. -never noticed the pikeman ability didn't work with 2move units with more hp's. Maybe because I didn't pay attention, or perhaps its a divergence between different versions of civ2? -I'm definitely gonna look into it the next time I work on my medieval project -if its true, its a bit of a letdown... but I'll get around it eventually... I usually do...

 

[Boco]

MB, I found the 1hp requirement on Poly Great Library Combat Thread. To be honest, I've never tested it myself, but Marquis de Sodaq has run a tight ship (i.e. accurate) over there. Has to, because Slowthinker keeps him on his toes.

I'm pretty sure someone on that thread disproved a previously publicized requirement for 1fp. Is that true Sodak?

Kobe, I was cryptic. Much of the time, it helps to have most units share the same hp/fp. Makes it easier for the human to judge the odds of success without a calculator. But when you want to show the decisive effect of a revolutionary weapons system, increasing the hp can be very effective. It also has the additional characteristic that you mention - many players will overlook it until they lose a battle. Depending on the context, that kind of surprise can be useful.

You caught my predjudice against 1hp units. I believe that the range of combat results is wider with 1hp v. 1hp battles compared with 2hp v. 2hp ones. The gap widens as fp increases. Rookie that I am, I like to have the combat a tad more predictable as I design and test.

 

[Case]

Like Boco, I don't much like 1 HP units. Including them means that luck plays too big a factor in scenarios, and that erks me. (ie, will my siege battery crush the peasant village, or will it be really unlucky and lose the first round of combat, and theyby be destroyed by a far inferior unit).