The curse of railroads

[genghis_khev]

Originally posted by Harrier


Your missing the point - if I land troops on a foreign country - I would usually have the opportunity of attacking the local forces - before re-enforcements are deployed. ( Even if that took 1 month never mid one year).
This is not the case in Civ3 with railroads (except for amphibious attacks). I land my units (they can not attack that turn) - Suprise- suprise before my next turn (when I am about to start the attack) all the AI units are attacking me (assuming we are at war).

That is what is wrong with infinite railroads.

I think this represents the "immediate communicatrions" available today. If a civ's southern border is breached troops from the north would be sent. In ancient times it would take a while for the capitol to be informed of the invasion. The ruler would then send messengers out to the principal cities where armies would be raised etc. In short a long time relative to the time taken to secure a beach-head and start attaching out. In modern day it would still take a few weeks to mobilize the majority of the army but that large number of troops would be able to stop the consolidation and "drive the enemy troops back into the sea". The moving of a large number of troops down modern motorways / rail networks would be possible, at the expense of a lot of civilian traffic. I guess it begs the question "would you stay of the road to stop a section of your county falling into enemy hands?"

In addition whenever I attack an enemy regardless of railroads I start with a "feint" attack, unless I can totally jump him / her by suprise. It makes any offensive 100% easier!

Don't get me wrong I think the infinite movement is definitely a quirk of Civ but a limited rail network would be underpowered, especially in the Modern Era.

 

[player1 fanatic]

Well, if railroads would be just 100% more quicker roads, they would definelty not be underpowered.

That's still 18tiles movment for Modern Armor.

 

[Sic_Berserker]

thinking about it twice...
I like rails, but Ive won a war in same turn I declared it (and without a RoP)
They could be somehow limited.

 

[Harrier]

Originally posted by genghis_khev


Don't get me wrong I think the infinite movement is definitely a quirk of Civ but a limited rail network would be underpowered, especially in the Modern Era.

The point is railroad movement should improve by time.
Example: Initially (Early Industrial) 15 tiles per turn, then (Late Industrial) 18 tiles per turn), etc, etc, etc. That is tiles per turn regardless of normal land movement costs.

On a train a foot soldier moves at the same speed as a turbo-charged tank!?

This of course should be an Editor option.

So most players can continue to play as it is now, if they want to.

The editor options would allow other players. i.e. Mod makers some leaway in making their mods more realistic. (For example a American Civil War Mod) In that era, train rail gauges were different. You could not move unlimitted from one end of the map to the other - even if there were railroads.

 

[genghis_khev]

I agree it should be an editor option but if you come to tak away my infinite speed trains you'd better come armed with turbo-charged tanks!! :tank:

 

[Aussie_Lurker]

OK, I have to confess that I haven't played Civ3 for quite a while (no computer !) So can someone please let me know if you get infinite RR movement from enemy rail or, if like roads, they only count in friendly territory! If the former, then this most DEFINITELY needs to be changed.
Also, they could at least make it that you can't disembark from a RR UNLESS you are in a city (or fortress, or any other relevent tile improvement) This would force players and computer to consider the placement of its RR's a little better-to make them more strategic in nature!

Yours,
The_Aussie_Lurker.

 

[Sic_Berserker]

RR are like roads. Can only be used when inside your borders, in unowned terrain, or inside a friendly civ with a RoP (Right of passage) treaty.

neither friendly without RoP nor enemy.

 

[Aussie_Lurker]

That's pretty much how I remembered it, but I couldn't be certain after sooo many months!
that still leaves the issue of unlimited movement in friendly territory. As I said before, I'm happy to retain unlimited movement, but only if you enter the RR square from either a city or a tile improvement-anywhere else and those squares should count only as improved road squares (maybe 1/5 move). If that is too hard to do within the confines of the Civ3 game, then we should have a system whereby, once travelling on a RR, you cannot leave the RR until you reach a city, fortress or other tile improvement square! Also, you should not be able to fight from a RR square-except at a large penalty to attack and defense! This would then at least force players and the AI to build their RR's in straight lines, connecting their cities directly to other cities, and to important points on the map (like a RR leading from a city to your 'string of forts', or to your colony on a vital resource-that kind of thing!) Last of all, to help to restore balance between the naval, air and ground portions of the game in the modern/industrial eras, moving through cities, from RR squares, should cost you 1 mp! This way, you could still theoretically get a unit from your home city to a city under attack-in the same turn, but only if you had a direct connection between them. In this system, intervening cities would act as 'choke points'-representing the difficulty of moving large numbers of troops, tanks etc through a city's rail hub!

Yours,
Aussie_Lurker.

Yours,
Aussie_Lurker.

 

[Mallady]

My thoughts:

1) Railroads everywhere? Ugly and unrealistic. This just shouldn't be a worker action that can be performed on every square. It should be handled much like embassies are built. Among a city's various build options should be 'Railroad', and once initiated, you'd have to designate to which city the railroad would be built. Once completed, the AI can lay down a single track between the specified cities; perhaps the track can be laid down tile by tile, much as real RR were, so you can watch the progress.

2) Unlimited Movement just isn't realistic. Should be greater movement per turn than roads, but should be limited. Another possibility is to not give railroads ANY movement bonus (they're not that much faster than highways anyway, right?). Perhaps they should serve more of a commercial role, much like the marketplace, in connecting cities and improving commerce/communication.

 

[Birdjaguar]

Interesting discussion. I've always liked the RRs as they are, but now that its up for discusssion...

If we assume that RRs represent the evolution of modern transport systems, why not have it represent both capacity and infrastructure. A capacity that can be expanded with the track system by new techs, new resources, new buildings and shields.

For example, when you first discover Steam power and find coal you have the ability to build "X" RR tiles equal to the distance from your capital to the furthest city on the continent. The tracks could be built anywhere, but the number of tiles is determined by that distance. Furthermore, the number of units you could move by RR in a turn would be equal to, say, half the number of cities you control. As your empire grows, rail capacity would grow naturally.

Cities could change the calculation of these limitiations through production. Building RR stations would add to unit/turn capacity and building tracks (in blocks of 10 or 20 square) would add to the number of RR tiles you could have workers complete. Once 20 tracks are built, workers could lay maybe 1 per turn per worker.

New techs (refining, motorized transport etc.) or resources would automatically increase capacity multipliers and reduce cost of new track production.

I would add a maintenance cost per track tile that you had the option to pay and if neglected too long, capacity would drop and track could disappear (like pollution effects).

Then as a warmonger, I could bomb individual track tiles to limit delivery destination options for the AI or I could attack train stations in cities to reduce capacity. As an empire collapses, rail capacity would drop also.

With such a scenario, I think that rail growth would be slowed and better reflect changes over time and we wouldn't have quite the unbalancing effects of unlimitied units over unlimited space. As a human player I think this would add to the game. I don't know how or if the AI could handle it.

 

[Birdjaguar]

In WWI Germany used its very efficient and well planned rail network to move troops between the East and West fronts much like we do in Civ. Troops were delivered close to front lines for rapid deloyment. This was prior to the development of the air bombarments and blitzkrieg warfare that we saw in WWII.

 

[genghis_khev]

Originally posted by Aussie_Lurker
As I said before, I'm happy to retain unlimited movement, but only if you enter the RR square from either a city or a tile improvement-anywhere else and those squares should count only as improved road squares (maybe 1/5 move).

I like this idea Aussie_Lurker and I would go so far to say that you can ONLY join at stations (built as a city or tile improvement). Dis-embarking (i.e. getting off) sould may be take all your remaining movement but movement from one rail tile to another should remain free. Ths would allow unlimited move along the network but no extra move or ATTACK once your chose to leave the network. If you chose to dis-embark not at a station your turn would end on that tile but no longer "on the network" (i.e. normal move / attack next turn).

This would allow you to redeploy forces from one end of the empire to another but would stop the immediate counter attack. It would also allow the attackers 1 turn to "fight their way of the beaches" and would leave the defender a bit stuffed if they redeployed all their forces to the western border just to find the main assault comeing over the east 1 turn later. The defence force would be forced to fight in the west or take an entire turn (not attacking) to redeploy to the east.

I will admit the need for the computer or automated workers to railroad EVERY tile is a bit unrealistic. I do not lile the idea of paying maintenance per tile though. This would get expensive, QUICKLY! May be rails should be bought (x gold for y tiles) or as Birdjaguar suggested a max. number depending on # of cities / map size / etc.

I agree infinite move on RRs realy shows up the limitations of the current naval movement values but the problem there is with the naval move values not the RRs!

As for

Originally posted by yoshi
My personal opinion is that people who think the RR system as it is is fine are lacking more than a few brain cells or just have a drone-like incapacity to say anything that questions Sid's creation in even the friendliest way...

I WORSHIP AT THE ALTER OF SID!!!!!!

ALL HAIL THE MIGHT SID!!! LEADER OF THER CIV CIVILISATION!!!