Question about movement costs

[MacCoise]

So as an Eternity player I was thinking about how some aspects of the game don't really scale at all.

So in Eternity, Snail, or the quickest speed it still takes a Warrior four turns lets say to move from one city to the next.

If you think about this it means regardless of game speed a unit goes the same distance in the same number of turns even though in my game 4 turns is supposed to be say 100 yaers while in another game it is 10 years or whatever.

In fact by Civ logic unit movement should be slower in faster paced games....

So my question is: would increasing the terrain movement costs in the XML files allow for a scaling of movement? Is there a minimum one tile per turn a unit can do? Would the approach of altering the movement costs of terrain cause a lot of other issues?

 

[Dancing Hoskuld]

would increasing the terrain movement costs in the XML files allow for a scaling of movement?

It would mostly have no effect. No matter how many movement points a plot has it only takes a minimum of 1 movement point for the unit to move into it. It can then move out the next turn.

The effect of movement points on plots only have any meaningful effect on units that can move very far in a turn. Those that can move only one plot will not see any change

Is there a minimum one tile per turn a unit can do?

Yes

Would the approach of altering the movement costs of terrain cause a lot of other issues?

I can't think of any.

And that is three questions not one

 

[MacCoise]

Thanks, that's what I thought!

Pity really, the limits of map sizes really diminish the tactical elements of quicker units but I guess it's not a military sim!

 

[Thunderbrd]

To add a little to what DH explained,

1) I've considered a function for units to take more than one round to move a tile but I don't feel it would be good for Earth maps. It was potentially for Solar or Galactic maps really. Why not Earth Maps? It seems to me that there could be extended complications from inabilities to represent withdrawal effectively, inabilities to launch an attack without having to wait some rounds for it to carry out and by the time it does there could be a whole different arrangement on the attacked plot, complications from just moving and by the time you get there you could be attacking and not have an opportunity to abort the move... numerous reasons really. And I've only CONSIDERED it for space maps but the same problems really do exist there as well... BUT we might be able to work out a tactical map scenario for space maps since those could be a lot more generic than they really should be on an Earth map. Still... it's on very shaky ground as to whether to do it at all and if I did it would purely be due to the tile minimum making representing these vast distances otherwise impossible.

2) Strategic combat in CivIV and movement rules have and always will be a bit of a 'representation' of military activity during an age. Obviously when a one space move takes 50 years or more in some ages, most of the individuals in the unit would've been retired or dead by the time they get to the next tile. It strikes me as pretty much impossible to get a much better model in that regard. You make a good point about the tile limit on the maps as well and how it would take thousands of tiles wide and high (and much wider city radii) for a map to well represent the historic world model we strive to do the best we can to replicate. But while I do all I can to improve this model as much as possible here, the limits will always make the game a little more poetic than prose in some areas.

 

[stoferb]

About movement points I noticed a very strange thing in my previous game. Boat's that say they have only 1 movement can cover two tiles, and so does boats that say they can move two tiles. The only difference is whenever it's across seagrass or reefs, where appearantly the one-movement boats goes two tiles while two-movement boats only go one tile. I taught that was very strange and confusing. I have the latest patch, but not the SVN, so you probably fixed it long time ago...

 

[Dancing Hoskuld]

It should have been fixed in v36 so you should have the correct movements.

Reefs and sea grass should slow movement so that units with less that 3 movement will only be able to move into the plot and not out again. Having a lighthouse on the reef should speed the boat up again. Boats should never get better movement than stated. At least until we workout currents and weather

 

[Thunderbrd]

About movement points I noticed a very strange thing in my previous game. Boat's that say they have only 1 movement can cover two tiles, and so does boats that say they can move two tiles. The only difference is whenever it's across seagrass or reefs, where appearantly the one-movement boats goes two tiles while two-movement boats only go one tile. I taught that was very strange and confusing. I have the latest patch, but not the SVN, so you probably fixed it long time ago...

I think it's improved now as DH stated but further refinements to naval movement are planned still. Probably to be implemented during the v38-v39 cycle.