I'm honestly surprised this discussion is centering on Haciendas (kind of random but unobjectionable) and Conquistadors (useful if awkward) when the Inquisitor part of their UA is still such a hot mess stapled onto their other two functional UAs. I think the civ would honestly feel more coherent if it was thrown out and the tile yields were slightly buffed in "compensation" maybe.
Spain
- Thread starter void_genesis
- Start date
What is such a "hot mess" about it?
pineappledan
Deity
I maintain that the "issues" w.r.t. promotion path are speculation only. The mobility and defensive strengths of a scout line unit, paired with adequate CS and starting promotions, would be more than serviceable. Even if it were the case the unit is a bit lacking as a pure military unit, the change to explorer would amp up the scouting/settling component of the unit anyways, so a slight downgrade to its overall combat performance would not be uncalled for.
Your input is always appreciated. I agree that the conquistador is "fine", but not "great"
The awkwardness and disfunction of that part of the UA comes down to the inquisitor unit itself, and not merely the idea of giving a free one. The game has moved away from needing to have them stationed in cities because they don't reduce passive pressure like they were supposed to, and they don't block active spread like they once did. The mod has generally made them much less effective and much more punishing to use, and overall much less necessary. Ideally we would make inquisitors better, and that would make that part of Spain's kit better by association.
That's my opinion on that, anyways. At least making them maintenance free will stop them from being situationally a burden to keep around. It speaks volumes about the state of inquisitors that people are complaining about even paying maintenance on them when they get a free one. That's how useless/undesirable they are perceived to be.
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I think the ideas about the conquistador are problems looking for problems.
The only time I ever use Inquisitors is when I have the Inquisition enhancer, but I find when I do have it they're quite good and have a good distinct feeling. Why not just clone the baby and have Spain get Inquisition as a bonus belief when they found (instead of the current benefit)? Can the bonus belief code from Byz support only giving a specific bonus belief?
What about:
Conquistador (Lancer replacement)
Unlocks at Astronomy
30 CS
+25% CS when on a landmass your capital's not on, coded like Denmark's UA (direct CS modification) if possible (basically Lancer strength when abroad)
Brute Force
Embarkation with Defense
No Penalty Attacking Cities (33)
Sentry (instead of Extra Sight (2) so it stays on upgrade)
Can found abroad
Numbers can be adjusted. Its only advantage carrying forward is +1 sight, but I'm not sure what else we can add to it without it being too good.
Conquistador (Lancer replacement)
Unlocks at Astronomy
30 CS
+25% CS when on a landmass your capital's not on, coded like Denmark's UA (direct CS modification) if possible (basically Lancer strength when abroad)
Brute Force
Embarkation with Defense
No Penalty Attacking Cities (33)
Sentry (instead of Extra Sight (2) so it stays on upgrade)
Can found abroad
Numbers can be adjusted. Its only advantage carrying forward is +1 sight, but I'm not sure what else we can add to it without it being too good.
Gizmoman
Warlord
- Joined
- Feb 16, 2020
- Messages
- 154
That sounds like possibly the worst unique unit in the entire game.
Like imagine you'd get that lancer from a city-state, anywhere from when you unlock Astronomy to when you unlock combined arms.
They're still better lancers when abroad. Can't be worse than getting Naga-Mallas or Naresuan's Elephants (both have no promotions carrying forward) after the upgrade is unlocked.
Gizmoman
Warlord
- Joined
- Feb 16, 2020
- Messages
- 154
Naga malla got one free rank of accuracy, and Naresuan got extra great generals, both which carries on. Not to mention that both those units are actually better than the unit they replaces, unlike this lancer, that's 7 CS weaker(and that's without promotions, with promotions it's even worse)
bahamut19
Chieftain
- Joined
- Jun 15, 2020
- Messages
- 95
I agree with Gazebo... The conquistador as it is does not need changed to another unit or anything. It serves its purpose well given the unique thing it does, which is an explorer and settling unit with average combat ability. Not every UU need to be used for domination victories directly. That's kinda boring if all units did the same thing but in slightly different ways.
Those are only from pdan's tweaks.
Paramecium
Prince
- Joined
- Jul 14, 2016
- Messages
- 346
In my opinion I think it is a good idea to move the Conquistador as an UU into to the Renaissance Era.
The solution as unique Lancer sounds good, coming earlier. But I wouldnt pack it necessarily on Astronomie, maybe putting it on Gunpowder with ocean travelling ability and the city founding, maybe adjusting the CS and giving a special /extra promotion to pass it on might do the trick.
But if you are really concerned about the city founding ability and that it might come to late at Astronomy/Gun Powder, what about making the Conquistador an unique Tercio coming at Compass?
It would have the same abilities to cross oceans as the Caravels and Explorers. It would keep the city founding and would have a real time advantage to come to new lands before anyone else (except Polynesia) and would give Spain an military advantage because its Tercio comes earlier.
Maybe we have to adjust the CS and add a promotion to pass on, maybe give it an extra movement which is lost on upgrade (or just straight mobility promotion?).
The point is, sure, the Conquistador had the domesticated animal advantage above the indigene population, but most of them were adventurers, second sons, and horse were still expansive and difficult to transport that far away. It was the mix of horses, tactics, better weapons and using politics which enabled the far inferior troops regarding manpower to win against the bigger armies like from the Aztecs or Incas.
Sure, we would have another unique Tercio, but we have more unique knights. If we even consider the 4UC, the field is more spread and it would have its place (I dont consider custom civs to matter in balancing questions for VP).
The solution as unique Lancer sounds good, coming earlier. But I wouldnt pack it necessarily on Astronomie, maybe putting it on Gunpowder with ocean travelling ability and the city founding, maybe adjusting the CS and giving a special /extra promotion to pass it on might do the trick.
But if you are really concerned about the city founding ability and that it might come to late at Astronomy/Gun Powder, what about making the Conquistador an unique Tercio coming at Compass?
It would have the same abilities to cross oceans as the Caravels and Explorers. It would keep the city founding and would have a real time advantage to come to new lands before anyone else (except Polynesia) and would give Spain an military advantage because its Tercio comes earlier.
Maybe we have to adjust the CS and add a promotion to pass on, maybe give it an extra movement which is lost on upgrade (or just straight mobility promotion?).
The point is, sure, the Conquistador had the domesticated animal advantage above the indigene population, but most of them were adventurers, second sons, and horse were still expansive and difficult to transport that far away. It was the mix of horses, tactics, better weapons and using politics which enabled the far inferior troops regarding manpower to win against the bigger armies like from the Aztecs or Incas.
Sure, we would have another unique Tercio, but we have more unique knights. If we even consider the 4UC, the field is more spread and it would have its place (I dont consider custom civs to matter in balancing questions for VP).
pineappledan
Deity
tangential, but why would 4UC matter if custom civs dont? I would assume that, as far as 4/5 of players are concerned, neither matters. If I am wrong, and custom civs do matter, then I would like to personally apologize for having added a jillion unique swordsmen.
I must say I’m a bit perplexed that the people resisting changing conquistador away from a knight, and specifically citing too many unique tercios as a reason not to give Germany a tercio, are the same people. Either overstocking 1 unit class with too many uniques is a problem or it isn’t.
re: my own opinion, moving the conquistador to another unit class might make moving the Songhai Mandekalu back to knight, where it was originally, a bit more palatable. It’s a pretty big balance issue as a horseman. The conquistador is already the weakest unique horseman, so making it a stronger explorer, and further emphasizing the settling and scouting parts of its unique abilities even more, doesn’t seem at odds with an expansionist Spanish playstyle. I think it overall puts the mix of UUs in a better place, and plays more to the conquistador’s existing strengths.
Paramecium
Prince
- Joined
- Jul 14, 2016
- Messages
- 346
For me it is quite simple, I still enjoy very much every time I meet a civ and its Leader and the Vanilla Civs have them all, most custom civs lack just that and it is enough for me to break the immersion.
On the other side, quite a lot of people seem to play nowadays the 4UC modmod.
But I didnt mean to add the Conquistador as a Tercio UU because of 4UC, where there are fewer unique tercios.
Straight up just from a VP vanilla viewpoint, there are currently 3 UU Tercios and 3 UU Knights (the Conquistador included). So it would pack again a melee foot soldier class with UU, which is imo the biggest contra point
Two pairs of shoes, apples and peaches. We are speaking about the Conquistador and where it might end up, but its time frame is definitely between medieval age and Renaissance.
German could have all kind of UU if you want to get rid of the Panzer. So it is understandable, if there is opposition to add another unique Tercio if there is no real need for it.
I can just join the group who is against an unique explorer and its because Spain is more of a (religion) warmonger, making their UU an scout line unit just kills that.
But to connect both sides it is the reason why I suggested to make the Conquistador an explorer-tercio coming earlier.
Regardless the possible change of the Conquistador, I just want to add, that he is already one of the most amazing units you can have, if you have the fresh lands to settle coming to Astronomy.
The point is, if you take Zealotry as an enhancer, you can faith buy an insanely fast pioneer and settle good city before the others even began to build their pioneers ...
At least I had my fun with it one time, buying four fresh ones in one turn and settling a whole new bigger island with good cities in a blink of an eye ...
pineappledan
Deity
Well I'm kind of on the Jaeger/Commando train on that other discussion now anyways.
At this point I guess I will concede that much of the community just isn't going to come around on that "hybrid" idea, so I will stop pushing.
I suppose no combination of stats and promotions geared towards combat would ever convince some people that a unique explorer could also be a combat unit. It was the intent with my proposal to make Spain feel like it was gaining a better settling advantage while losing nothing w.r.t. military. The Polynesian Koa from 4UC is a similar concept.
At this point I guess I will concede that much of the community just isn't going to come around on that "hybrid" idea, so I will stop pushing.
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Hinin
Agnostophile
I just don't agree with that idea : if we give enough base CS and good promotions, which is very easy to do, then the Conquistador can be both a very good Explorer (with better power so it can defend itself) and a good combat unit (we talked about a variety of possible combat buffs for that). I personnally think that, in exchange of a higher cost for the unit (200, so the same cost as a Knight, but without the Strategic Resource cost), it makes the whole unit a lot more "clean" in term of design. Plus, once it has gained a few levels (invested for example in the Survivalism tree), its combat promotions could really become powerful tools that allows it to be a true threat :
- It would have around 23 base CS, and would gain defense from terrain (so in defense often better than the Knight).
- It would immediatly have access to the faraway lands that the current Conquistador has to wait 3 more techs to reach.
- With a siege-oriented promotion (like City Assault) and Survivalism promotions, it can be a powerful tank that regenerates itself and can bust open secondary cities with enough of them, or even participate in large siege with support.
- You wouldn't be limited by the number of Horses you have to build them (so even more spammable with Zealotry)
N.B. : Plus, if you fear that the A.I. doesn't know how to use the unit correctly, nothing forbids us from making the unit behave like a normal combat unit (it's just a small modification).
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Rekk
Deity
- Joined
- Dec 9, 2017
- Messages
- 2,608
You could give the Explorer conquistador 25-30 CS, so that with some promotion support, it's a straight upgrade over Knight and able to fight Tercios, but still worse than a commando. It could come with a healthy city attack bonus to make up for the lack of drill, along with +X% attack to lead into commando and also balance with Survivalism.
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The trick as I noted above, is the Survivalism promotions provide a very strong defensive bonus, so any unit that has too high a base CS becomes an unmovable rock, which is both unbalancing but also a weird flavor for the civ.
That caps the base CS at 24, this gives you roughly equivalent defensive bonuses to the cataphract....which right now is setup as an extremely defensive UU for the time. The cataphract is still better against ranged units, the conquistador more generally defensive, and the conq would be later....so I think you have enough design space there to work with.
So now you have a CS 24 unit at compass, which you can decide what to do from there. I think a city attack bonus is fine if you want to maintain that flavor, but it would probably need to be +75% or so. The +100% bonus that siege might be too strong with a 48 attack....although this is coming later than your normal medieval warfare which might balance it back out....that part would at least be worth testing as that way you don't need another new promotion. We have talked vs wounded penalties, brute force, overrun....all are reasonable ideas. You could even go with a lower CS but give it like Drill I, II, and III....that covers some core combat proficiencies but weakens the impact of survivalism....and gives you the option of going City Assault for the unit if you want to... aka more options for specialization.
So yes I think you could do the job with the explorer. The key question that others are asking, which is a very reasonable question....is that a true "improvement" over what we have now? You give Spain faster settling but a later combat spike, is that "better" than what they have now?
pineappledan
Deity
heh.
