My goal wasn't really to start a discussion about historical army equipment and fighting style, and more about whether other people also think that the skirmisher unit is a bit overpowered within the game mechanics, especially early on when it first appears. If that's my exclusive opinion then that's fine with me too, it won't ruin this great mod for me
For whatever my input is worth, I kind of agree with you for the most part and think that a nerf wouldn't be a bad idea, but they're still not exactly a trump card: their vulnerability to archers is significant and since their terrain-contingent bonuses are exclusively
offensive and since their effectiveness in attacking cities is generally underwhelming or not worth the risk if the unit in question is sufficiently promoted, having just one archer in a stack (or in a city, which you would likely be using as a garrison anyway) is a pretty solid safeguard IMO.
To Pecheneg's point, though, maybe it is more or less deliberate that the skirmisher is a desirable, high-utility unit? If the elite cavalry and heavy infantry are supposed to constitute the specialized core of a preindustrial army, then it makes historical sense to me that irregulars and "skirmishers" (adept hunters and the like albeit armed with simpler missile weapons) would form the bulk of most of its headcount, besides. In pure gameplay terms though, since their only definite counter already has a dominant niche as a city defender, it means that they become rather expensive to build for armies in the field. That makes for some interesting choices, because then you have to choose which cities to properly defend and which to leave more or less vulnerable (especially under the Slavery and Serfdom, one of which you are likely to be running for most of the midgame).
I think your ideas are good though: a nerf to 3
would put them more or less on par toe-to-toe on flat terrain with contemporary classical heavy infantry, like the swordsman. Their movement and terrain bonuses would still leave them with hefty advantages of mobility and a mitigated defensive bonus for units hiding in the woods or in hills. Personally, I think their stack aid contribution is the best thing about them, and I rarely attack with them directly for that reason. With the full Recon Aid III bonus, even dirt-cheap irregulars walk out of the gate with 2-3 first strikes (in addition to probably a promotion or two from barracks/aggressive leader, etc.). Making that even more pronounced seems too unbalanced with respect to what the unit is modeling in real terms, and would eliminate something that makes pretty good sense in that regard, like their bonus against melee.
As it is though, they kind of have an awkward utility arc: they arrive as early as the
ancient era in the third tier of techs and are uber-powerful when they appear; then they slowly depreciate gently, remaining good throughout the classical era and even decent a good ways into the medieval era just in terms of raw strength against melee, notwithstanding terrain bonuses or mobility. Then, in the late medieval, they become weak against pretty much everything in direct combat while still remaining highly useful as stack auxiliaries because of their Recon Aid. That leaves a pretty big gap in time between when they become virtually obsolete as direct attackers and their category replacement of Explorers appear; so, while their actual battlefield usefulness seems properly modeled by their eventual worthlessness in direct combat, that is not at all reflected in their ability to provide magic first strikes to every other unit indefinitely.
The only other unit in the game that has a similarly long shelf-life that I can think of is the Horse Archer, but unlike the Skirmisher, it doesn't follow an inverted S-Curve of usefulness where its usability in battle eventually expires completely, because it upgrades linearly at each point that it would otherwise become obsolete. Longbows would annihilate the regular Horse Archer but its upgrade appears at the same time as Longbows, for instance. Then you get Pistoleers earlier than Line Infantry, keeping the cavalry competitive against other unit categories. So, the Skirmisher does seem a bit overpowered to me, but it's still got a couple of definite weaknesses, including the death of ability to conquer cities at a phase in the game when warfare generally favors the offensive otherwise.
Also, I don't agree with you about Spearmen being a particularly decisive counter to charge mounted. I would more put it in terms of they can usually hold their own against heavy cavalry, which is otherwise completely dominant against foot units in the open field. If you pair the Cataphract and Spearmen (peers of the same era) for instance, the former still has a mild advantage on flat ground (10.5
vs. 8
), notwithstanding flank attacks and collateral damage. It makes sense to me that spearmen are supposed to be good, solid all-purpose infantry in RI since they're only slightly weak against their categorical counter and slightly buffed against the most likely city defenders, not specialized cavalry-killers. When you consider that other infantry is particularly vulnerable to heavy cavalry (especially Axemen against Chariots), that jack-of-all-trades nature seems to show up more apparently, to my mind at least.
Regarding the multiplayer, I am actually not a fan of Discord specifically and other "hub" platforms seem somewhat unnecessary and likely to be problematic if we have a lot of people playing simultaneously. Some kind of real-time chat seems good enough for me, especially since the game is turn-based.
this could be nice additional option:
effectiveness of raw materials depends on population
Civ4 Reimagined Introduction: Civ4 Reimagined is an extensive overhaul for Civilization IV: Beyond the Sword. Despite touching almost every aspect of the game, Civ4 Reimagined strives to feel like an as-it-should-be version of Civilization IV, not a kitchen sink mod. As such, don't expect tons...
forums.civfanatics.com
finally, building a city to stock a fourteenth source of fish would make sense
also these all "recycle centers" , gas and nuclear plants would apply (I feel that the level of health in the modern era is overstated, in modern era i never have problem with unhealthy, i even dont need build these modern plants to reduce
)
That would be great if that could be implemented in RI! One of the only disappointments I have about the direction the mod took the vanilla game (and that's one relatively small thing against many enormous improvements IMO) was the removal of corporations, which
did incentivize the acquisition of several resources and made multiple instances of the same thing important, without reworking it into something else or replacing it with something that also did this. I know that's kind of a stab at the multi-tier industrial buildings which the mod did add, but since one instance of a resource has infinite domestic utility, and you're either not going to want to or be able to trade numerous other resources to the AI, there's basically no point in trying to get more than one or two of each resource, while the corporations mechanic in the vanilla game did approximately model the greedy drive to get more and more of the same raw materials as witnessed with real world industrial nations.
I see that the vanilla corporations were kind of gimmicky (although I thought they were fun and not immersion-breaking), but scrapping the whole thing without replacing it with some other "more resources = more benefit" corollary mechanic sacrificed a bit of the late-game fun IMO. Too bad it likely won't ever be worked in, but something like that seems like it would perfectly fill the gap.
But I'm correct in assuming you mean some form of simultaneous online play vs PBEM, right? Because I agree that actually chatting while gaming makes for much more fun diplomacy.
.
because of high population, two pigs will give you the full +1.0
. Then the game designers came – and hell followed them. In general, it is possible to make a realistic mod and it will even be in demand by five or six people. But the rest will demand conditional "swordsmen".
