supply tweak

[chef pablo]

This is a mod request,ok, there has been alot of discusion about this,ive said more than my share and peolple have gotten their feathers ruffled over this.So ive not really had any desire to ask about a mod ,till now.This is one of those 12 year old boy's ideas,well duh just let the air out of the tires.Any way its this simple ,A unit for each age should have fixed culture attached to it,this should be some type of groand unit,warrior,swordsman,maceman,musketman,etc.The big issue is getting the AI to reconize this.
If you think about it, this should resolve alot of the supply issues,and allow some of the tactics.If your pushing units to your border attempting to push the border back and the AI (this is probally going to be the big hurdle, to get the AI to understand the concept)is doing this as well,then you should end up with the nifty line of units on both sides of the border.With units requireing maintanence and needing units to push the border back there wont be the stacks of doom in the cities.furthermore if war is declared figuring out where the weak point in the chain is, will be imparative .flanking ,pinching all these tactics will come into play.I know this dosnt resolve the oil issue for mech units but it does resolve the issue of supplieing ground troops.
any modders out there want to tackle this?or are there any sugestions

 

[Starship]

I've always felt that a unit, other than recon units, shouldn't be able to leave your borders without a supply unit near. A unit that gets out of say a 2 tile range from the supply unit would be frozen. Without supply the unit would eventually be sent back to your cultural borders, if not destroyed, and only with 1 health. The supply unit could change in each era accordingly. You could even have air drop supplies later on.

There is a lot of friction over this type of mechanic. It seems many believe this would be difficult to implement w/ the AI, and also that it wouldn't be that fun (ie monotonous) That's not what I think, but it's the response to things like this that I've seen elsewhere.

 

[chef pablo]

yeah ,ive seen the same, main reason ive not wanted to ask for a mod for a long time.I think that however that this is a pretty good compromize between the people who say that being in the enemys border and having those penalties applied is enough and the people who are gun ho about supply.The question is does the AI plant units in the cities because its defending improvements or because of the culture. I suspect its culture because it really stacks the border cities,so if thats the case it might be a little easier to tweak the AI for this purpouse.

 

[The Dopelganger]

But you've got a major problem. You would have to place a single unit on each square of road all the way back to your border. My advice would not to give each unit a set amount of culture to override your enemies, but a set diameter of squares that imediatly overrides your oppenents culture. This way, it's much like occupying enemy territory in a seige. Also what you would need to do is have an attrition effect on the units defending the city if all trade routs have been cut off, increasing the effectivness of the seige.

- In the winds of change, even the most
trivial of things can turn into deadly projectiles. -

 

[chef pablo]

culture = terratory,place a couple of these culture units outside of an enemy city and your going to starve that city.basic premise for a seige.As far as running a line of culture units up one of my roads,go ahead im going to flank your units pinch them off so they cant pull back and wipe them out.meanwhile my troops will be gaining expierience cause i can pull the injured back to heal and youll have to replace with fresh troops.
Thats why i said the natural course for this is going to be a front.

 

[chef pablo]

I just realized this cuold be done with the navy as well.pick one unit to represent a blocade unit have it have culture,move it into your enemys port city or cities and the culture from the blockade should cover your enemys access to the sea .As you advance through the ages more advanced ships would have a higher culture rating.culture rating would represent operational range.In modern times the blockade ship would be the submarine, having 5 or 6 in an ocean would effectivly give you controle of shipping in that ocean.
The same could be done with bombers giving a one time culture rating in an area that you decide land or sea provided it servives any fighters on patrole

 

[The Great Apple]

Hmmm - seems to me if you want to have something like this all units should have the ability to control whatever square they are on.

 

[chef pablo]

ahh a programer,atcually im really thinking that it should be a unit spacific traite and that the culture rating should be realativly high giving you controle of at least one tile out from the tile that the unit is on.
with naval it should be a little bigger,and air blockade should be one tile.
A note on the naval and air blockade concept,i dont remember if production is interupted if a city is seperated from the trade network in vanilla but it should be with this set up.

 

[chef pablo]

does any body know why the AI stacks its units in its cities?

 

[The Great Apple]

It stacks defensive units in cities because it thinks it needs them. I have no idea about offensive units.

 

[chef pablo]

can the AI be tweeked so it it has 3 classes of units ,offensive,deffensive and cultural,the latter being dirrected to move to the borders?

 

[The Dopelganger]

Okay so You got me earlier about that one, I just didn't completley undrestand what you were saying! But now that I do understand, I say this could be a bit of gold. Think about it for a second, there's no longer that single movement of troops from wherever, it's an actual strategized advance. So no more of my oponents sending a wandering archer that randomly razes my improvements. I mean, gawd, the AI fights just like the barbarians!!! I'd like it if they actualy did something smart for once. I can conquer many a nation with just mass forces alone, no need to build a strategized army. That's also why I like your post about unit costomization, though I agree with some that it would result in a lot of micromanaging, but some of us like that. I do also relize this all sounds a lot like micromanaging, but this is because IT IS micromanaging. Building a proper army requires a lot of this, as does building up your cities with all the improvements to produce the refined resources you were talking about. BUT I LOVE IT!!! KEEP THE GREAT STUFF COMING!!

 

[chef pablo]

I really want to avoid to much micro if possible,but i do want some of the stratagy that i really feel the game is missing.the unit customizing idea is still in evolution give it some time,I rally want some input to come with a good solution. dont jump on the band wagon yet .
BTW you live here in tulsa? or are you in one of the berbs?