Rock Paper Scissors

[Calavente]

If Pikeman became stronger,as you suggest,what would be the role of Longswordmen,Musketman and Knights?

well easy :
longswords (mounted or not) dominate early middle-age and are useful till late middle age.

knights come late middle-age and are not so good with cities (they are mounted) but crush longswords on the field

here come tercios and pikes : early renaissance (XV° - mid XVII°):
Pikes/tercio becomes obsolete by Nassau's military revolution and the heavy use of late-muskets.
before that, well they ruled.

Spoiler wikipedia :

wikipedia
More substance has the case for the “return of Heavy Infantry” as Carey has named it.[21] Pikemen, unlike other infantry, could stand in the open against heavy cavalry. While requiring drill and discipline, individual training requirements were much lower than those for archers or knights, and the switch from heavily armoured knight to footsoldier made possible the expansion in the size of armies from the late 15th century onwards as infantry could be trained more quickly and could be hired in great numbers. But that change was slow.

The full development, in the 15th century, of plate armour for both man and horse, combined with the use of the arret (lance rest) which could support a heavier lance, ensured that the heavy cavalryman remained a formidable warrior. Without cavalry, a 15th-century army was unlikely to achieve a decisive victory on the field of battle; battle might be decided by archers or pikemen, but a retreat could only be cut off effectively or followed-up by cavalry.[22] In the 16th century, a lighter, less expensive and more professional cavalry gained ground, so that the proportion of cavalry in the armies actually grew continually, so that in the last battles of the Thirty Years War cavalry actually outnumbered infantry as never before since the high feudal period.[23]

muskets... well, at first they have no real use as a melee unit, save that normally they should be way less costly than archers/longbow.

technically, early muskets were :
1) way cheaper than bowmen and especially longbows
2) less accurate than longbow
3) more powerful than longbow/X-bow
4) quicker to reload than X-bow.
5) easier to use through a firing slit than X-bow and longbow (think castle/
6) they made armor almost obsolet at close range.
7) did I mention cheaper ?

Early Muskets were not melee-like ; you had to wait until the late XVII°century muskets (lighters weapons + invention of bayonette) to obsolete the tercios and use muskets as the main effective infantry unit.

"wikipedia : 16th-century troops armed with a heavy version of the arquebus called a musket were specialists supporting the arquebusiers and pikemen formations. By the start of the 18th century, a lighter version of the musket had edged out the arquebus, and the addition of the bayonet edged out the pike, and almost all infantry became musketeers."

In fact, the main interests of early muskets were :
-skirmishing/banditing as you go put a knight down easily
-naval fights
-defensive fight : defending a house, a city
-hiding inside tercios to fight the other guys.


late muskets : they fill a 2 century-long gap between tercio and rifles :
In fact, late muskets (muskets used in the way melee is used) never encountered knights or longswords.... (at least in fight in europa ; Knights as a fighting heavy mounted unit was already obsolated by Pikes/Tercio, so it went out of use. It was replaced with a medium-weight/cheaper cavalry; think cuirassier or something.; or cavarly with light metal armor and saber and wheelgun ; and by Lancers... those were good units, light-to-medium-armor, long lance...nice stayed useful up till WWI and encountering machinguns)

England in Zululand was typically late muskets fighting hords of swordmen / longswordmen Zulu UU.

So depending on what represents muskets :
- early muskets would be :
-archery unit
-stronger ranged attack than Longbow
-smaller range
-cheaper ; way cheaper.

Late musket would be :
-melee-like unit (gunpowder unit)
-greater strength than Tercio/Pikes
-lower strength than Rifles

But all this strength-relation will heavily depend on the different times the unit appear in the tech-tree.
So..

 

[Thalassicus]

Add the promotion of gaining +25 health for every killed enemy unit to Lancers,as they were mostly used to chase wounded enemy units and buff their movement to +1 . To compensate that,nerf its strenght to be similar to Knights . And to avoid future issues,make them lost this bonus when upgraded to Anti tank unit;

I really like this idea of lancers healing after kills. I've struggled to find a way to fit in lancers to the game for over a year now. They're sort of an odd unit without a role, and a heal-after-kills bonus would help give them a more defined role.

 

[GenjiKhan]

well easy :
longswords (mounted or not) dominate early middle-age and are useful till late middle age.
[...]
But all this strength-relation will heavily depend on the different times the unit appear in the tech-tree.
So..

Nice reading . But I see at least 2 problems here:

1º) Pikeman is a unit from the beginning of Middle age and they come BEFORE Longswordsmen and Knight . Unless you want to change the tech requirements for these units,it'll become a serious balance problem to see a unit from a cheap technology beat units from more expensive technologies,without having someone to counter them . Possibly,you'd solve that by making Pikemans(from early medieval age) to upgrade to Tercios(early Renaissance) . But that will create another problem:Tercios is already in the game(as a Spain's UU);

2º) I think that Musketman in the game is meant to represent Musketman after the invention of bayonette,as gunpowder weapon before it were pretty much garbage,which was only used because of the "Novelty effect",not necessarily because it was better . Plus,it doesn't make any sense to make Musketman a ranged unit for 2 reasons:
- Gameplay reason:Back to Vanilla,we could see how problematic is to upgrade a ranged unit to a meele unit(Crossbowman => Rifleman),which was partially fixed at G&K . I don't think it's worthy to make the same mistake again;
- Historic reason: as you already mention,the range of Muskets(and similars) is too much short,which completely invalidates any attempt to make them a ranged unit .

 

[Calavente]

Nice reading . But I see at least 2 problems here:

1º) Pikeman is a unit from the beginning of Middle age and they come BEFORE Longswordsmen and Knight . Unless you want to change the tech requirements for these units,it'll become a serious balance problem to see a unit from a cheap technology beat units from more expensive technologies,without having someone to counter them . Possibly,you'd solve that by making Pikemans(from early medieval age) to upgrade to Tercios(early Renaissance) . But that will create another problem:Tercios is already in the game(as a Spain's UU);

2º) I think that Musketman in the game is meant to represent Musketman after the invention of bayonette,as gunpowder weapon before it were pretty much garbage,which was only used because of the "Novelty effect",not necessarily because it was better . Plus,it doesn't make any sense to make Musketman a ranged unit for 2 reasons:
- Gameplay reason:Back to Vanilla,we could see how problematic is to upgrade a ranged unit to a meele unit(Crossbowman => Rifleman),which was partially fixed at G&K . I don't think it's worthy to make the same mistake again;
- Historic reason: as you already mention,the range of Muskets(and similars) is too much short,which completely invalidates any attempt to make them a ranged unit .

well thats why pikes should come after longswords and after knights.
you tell me that tercio is a spain UU... well that's normal; tercios were spains pikemen.

However at that time, spain was also netherlands, belgium, germany, austria (at least).
swiss and italia had there own pike-squares that were really devious but those were mercenaries that worked for every-body.

But even in that case, it is still wrong : do you imagine playing spain and using tercios to conquer almost all europe ? and win against knights and long words? well because that was the case in RL.

That's why my opening post in this thread was :
"OMG I hate it when pike came too soon and are too weak (and are only a vs mounted speciallity unit)"

so the first thing to do is obviously make pikes appear later... (and maybe longsword earlier ?), and possibly muskets latter if that still leave them a wiggle room with rifles ?

 

[Ahriman]

The pikeman unit isn't representing renaissance pikes, it is basically representing dark age/medieval core foot soldier spear infantry. These are feudal levy peasants; barely trained, poorly equipped.

The longswords represent dismounted foot knights; they have heavy armor, military training, discipline, etc.
In gameplay terms they require a strategic resource, and so they need to be a rare/superior unit.

The military model here has basic mediocre units that don't require a strategic resource, and then

Civ games have never done a very good job of covering renaissance warfare; they tend to skip from medieval into 17th/18th century, ignoring the transition in between.
But that would require a whole new tier in the game, not just a change of pikemen.

 

[Calavente]

sadly I think you are right ....

 

[wobuffet]

I really like this idea of lancers healing after kills. I've struggled to find a way to fit in lancers to the game for over a year now. They're sort of an odd unit without a role, and a heal-after-kills bonus would help give them a more defined role.

And that role is now "Finish Him!"

 

[zarakand]

Can you get rid of the lancer in GEM even with the healing promo it's not a great unit. Or give it healing plus 100% vs siege pre artillery

 

[Tarquelne]

I've struggled to find a way to fit in lancers to the game for over a year now.

Healing after combat doesn't strike me as enough for them to fill a "role."

How about faster, more fragile, but a greater attack power compared to the contemporaneous Mounted-line unit? And maybe a greater city-attack penalty.
Basically the role would be "like Mounted, but more so." Which, IIRC, is pretty much how they were used.
They're not terribly far from that now. Maybe another point of speed, knock 2 points off strength (Still more powerful than Knights), but a small bonus vs. melee and/or siege.

Combined with heal after combat that'd give a unit very good for striking out and retreating, or for operating behind the enemy's main line and performing harassment. (If there's enough room, which there often isn't. I like 1upt, but it does shrink the world.)

 

[Ahriman]

See the discussion on lancers here:
http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=469687

 

[Tarquelne]

Personally I find the heal-after-kill mechanic better suited to a fantasy or sci-fi setting and don't particularly favor it for Lancers... ... BUT:

Here's a justification for Lancers: Compared to other units of the era they're well trained to pick up, reorganize, and keep going after each encounter. The healing isn't the dead magically raised or the wounded benefiting from a sufficiently-advanced medical technology - it's instead very high morale and cohesion. And in combat that's were you generally take the losses that really put you out of the fight - morale and cohesion.

Compared to everything else we have to rationalize in Civ5, I don't think that's bad at all.

But a better way to reflect morale and cohesion might be giving Lancers the Japanese UA and/or heal-on-move.

And I agree with this:

low cost, low maintenance cost, built-in charge promotion, high movement, bonus on attack/penalty on defense (you can use either design) is sufficient to make them interesting as a highly mobile hit-and-run.

I'd change it slightly, but as long as the movement is higher than knights/cav (both 3, yes?) and there's something that adds up to an attack-bonus/defense-penalty I think they're sufficiently different from Knights and Cavalry, and worth including in the game to fill that historical gap between the the other Mounted units. Having them off the Mounted line is still, IMO, bizarre. And an anti-mounted role only slightly less bizarre. But I think they should be in the tooling around the battlefield in some form.

A wholly separate idea: Could they be given the ability to ignore zones of control? It'd significantly increase their ability to get past the enemy's front line.

 

[Calavente]

@tarquelne
great minds think alike (see other thread).
ignore ZoC and /or blitz would render them really different from cav... and worthwhile on there own.
There weren't a lot of lancers in the secession war... however Poland had lancers until... WWI !!
(and they lost badly to machin guns...)

dragoon/cav/cossack fullfiled a really different role than cuirassier/lancer.

 

[Ahriman]

Blitz is an interesting possibility. It might be too strong, I think I'd lean towards charge instead, but it's worth considering.

Removing ZoC I don't think is either possible or desirable. Their mobility should come from a high movement rate IMO, rather than by breaking core game rules. I don't think we want it to be *too* easy to take out the enemy cannon.

 

[mystikx21]

I'd change it slightly, but as long as the movement is higher than knights/cav (both 3, yes?)

4. They changed knights in GK. I'd be fine with lancers as a 5 move. Sipahi as +1 sight and free pillaging, plus some other bonus instead of its current +1 movement. I'm not sure what to do about Hakkas yet.

 

[Ahriman]

Sipahi as +1 sight and free pillaging, plus some other bonus instead of its current +1 movement

Some kind of strength or strength when attacking might be nice. I agree they don't need to be 6 movement.

Also, should lancers upgrade to tank units, as cavalry do?
Upgrading to helicopters would make some sense, but that seems like too much of a time lag where you have near useless units around.

 

[albie_123]

I think Lancers to Tanks as well. I don't see why we can't have two units who are very similar - especially when one is rarely built - upgrading to the same unit.

 

[mystikx21]

Fine with the upgrade to tanks. The archer line and the melee line both converge on mech infantry in the late game as is.

Without the set anti-mounted role as GK has them, upgrading to ATG/helicopter doesn't make very much sense.

I'd agree with a strength or attack bonus on Sipahi too. Hakkas should probably be replaced with a UB with diplomatic advantages to work with Sweden's UA

 

[GenjiKhan]

I've been testing a mod that adds "Partial Heal after Kill" promotion and "Blitz promotion" to Lancers,along with a bonus on their movement to +5 . They are much better now with this combo and they don't feel overpowered at all with it . It's still a WIP mod,but its change are so simple that even those who have no experience at modding can do it .

 

[Stalker0]

I think the lancer is fine with even a +1 move and the offense benefit.

The key to lancers is that they are extremely powerful if used strategically. You can assasinate a unit pull back, heal up and keep going. You don't need to build a lot of them, but they can have a massive impact if used well.

 

[GenjiKhan]

@Stalker0

Well,at VEM,they give lancers an offensive bonus/defensive penalty . I just wish to see what would be the feedback of the community with those little changes I made on Lancers .