Suggestion for making whales useful

[jerVL/kg]

Whales are so annoying. They're not harvestable until Optics, become obsolete very quickly (Combustion) and appear only in fringe, ice-bound areas where you'd never think of placing a city otherwise. And what do you get out of them? Happiness. For a short while.

At least with Elephants, you get the Happy bonus right away (w/ Hunting), plus a very cool unit (War Elephant) with Construction, and they don't obsolete until Industrialism. Furs also last a long time (until Plastics) although you don't get a unit out of them.

Naturally, we need a way to make whales more attractive -- in other words, make them unlock a special unit. So, I propose:

The WHALE ARCHER!



Naval Unit
Requires: Optics, Archery, Whale
Strength: 3
Movement: 4
Hammer Cost: 70
Abilities: +50% vs. Caravel, Galleon (think Moby Dick here)
Promotions: Combat, Medic, Flanking, Navigation, Sentry
Upgrades to: Battleship

Whaddaya guys think? Something for the first Warlords patch?

 

[Mutineer]

Whales are usefull.
Useally when you have optics you got Markets and whales give you +2 happy stright away.

The only problem with them is that they are not attractive resource themself.

 

[Meatbuster]

How about researching Optics earlier? Compass and Optics are good techs to trade anyhow on higher difficulties.

 

[ironic_lettuce]

Upgrades to: Battleship

LMFAO

 

[Vynd]

On a more serious note, I think that Whales should be accessible with Sailing or Compass. It's more accurate, since people have been whaling pretty much ever since they figured out how to make boats. And it would make them more worthwhile, whereas now they're barely worth bothering with. Mutineer has a good point though that another way to make Whales more attractive would be to make the output of an improved Whale tile significantly higher.

 

[svv]

I remember in Civ2 whales were about the best you could get - except maybe that mined and railroaded vineyards hill.

 

[shivute]

I remember in Civ2 whales were about the best you could get - except maybe that mined and railroaded vineyards hill.

I remember whales being a very desirable tile as well. Now in Civ 4 they aren't worth the bother. The tile should be better eg +2 food extra +2 hammer extra.
I like all resources to be worth going to war for and unfortunately the whale is not a resource I would go to war for.

 

[Crighton]

I agree with making the whaling option come earlier, with compass perhaps

 

[drkodos]

I like all resources to be worth going to war for and unfortunately the whale is not a resource I would go to war for.

Maybe the introduction of a new "Greenpeace" unit could help ignite some Whale Wars.

 

[ownedbyakorat]

Maybe the introduction of a new "Greenpeace" unit could help ignite some Whale Wars.

Dunno about you all, but I played Colonization back in the day. There was a unit that appeared to opponents to be without nationality - the privateer. You could attack ships and steal their cargo without going to war with the other country. They would 'suspect', of course, and occasionally demand you withdraw your privateers, but you could deny it and carry on without consequence. The caravel would be a perfect unit to have this property.

 

[drkodos]

Dunno about you all, but I played Colonization back in the day. There was a unit that appeared to opponents to be without nationality - the privateer. You could attack ships and steal their cargo without going to war with the other country. They would 'suspect', of course, and occasionally demand you withdraw your privateers, but you could deny it and carry on without consequence. The caravel would be a perfect unit to have this property.

For sure. The Privateer is a time-honored unit of the real world that is sorely missed in this incarnation of Civ.

 

[blitzkrieg1980]

^^^Yeah, didn't they have the privateer in CivIII, or was it CivI? It was great, you could mess up enemy ships and not have to declare war! I loved it!

 

[zyphyr]

^^^Yeah, didn't they have the privateer in CivIII, or was it CivI?

Twas 3 that had privateers. One of the few things I really miss in C4.

 

[Quagga]

I love the Whale Archer. Though being such a stickler for realism, I have to come down against it. Sorry.

However, how about whales that are trained to clear mines? What? No mines?

 

[blitzkrieg1980]

You should be able to train whales with Animal Husbandry. You can train them to destroy older naval units like Galley and Trireme Moby Dick style.

-call me Ishmael...

 

[drkodos]

You should be able to train whales with Animal Husbandry. You can train them to destroy older naval units like Galley and Trireme Moby Dick style.

-call me Ishmael...

There are modern applications, as well. To wit:

US Naval Marine Mammal Program

 

[sydhe]

I think if you have both uranium and crabs you should be able to build giant radioactive crab monsters to ravage your opponents' beaches.

 

[drkodos]

I think if you have both uranium and crabs you should be able to build giant radioactive crab monsters to ravage your opponents' beaches.

The Zoidberg. UU for Atlantis.

 

[CivDude86]

Comes with bad medic (-10% healing) promo free.

 

[TheDS]

I could never make Privateers (in Civ3) be useful at all, so I pretty much never built them... until I made diesel subs have no nationality, and had Privateers upgrade to them. Seemed pretty cool, but the AI never seemed to build them either. (And oh yes, diesel subs still upgraded to nuclear subs, which were NOT unnational.)