The UU-A-Day Countdown

[Volar]

This wasn't an attack or criticism, Viatrix. It's a common misconception based on the outcome. I'm just kind of a history buff, and stating the facts as I know them.

Now, late war. Panther and Tiger. Well, the Panther was a superior medium tank, but it barely fit into that category. There was never an answer for that. Soviets cancelled their advanced medium prototypes in favor of simply upgunning the T-34. The USSR was crudely efficient like that. They reused and stretched the T-34 chassis it's not even funny.

Now, the Tiger. Both sides answered that eventually, and the advanced prototypes for Germany never came to fruition. The USSR built the IS2 which was a match with a 122mm main gun. Also the IS3 showed up right near the end which outclassed it, and served for years after the war in a lot of warsaw pact countries. The US answered late in the war with the M26 Pershing and Super Pershing. Super Pershing fought briefly in Europe. There was only one that made it before the war ended. Believed to have destroyed a Tiger. The M26 also seemed to have been a match or more for the Tigers and Panthers. But all these designs were significantly late.

 

[Schuesseled]

I don't think greg had much time to develop his culture, or had much spare gold to buy tiles, seeing as how napoleon wouldn't leave him be, so its understandable that his empire's borders were stifled.

 

[Zhahz]

Seeing at the example of Greg's livecast how patchy borders are by the time Gunpowder comes into play, I really doubt America's Minutemen would be that much useful for anything except strictly city defence.

True, their UA would mean cheaper border expansion, but from the looks of it (and the fact that money are constantly better used elsewhere) even America would still be far from maxing up their "fat crosses" to make their UU useful throughout the land.

I'm not sure you can really judge based on one gameplay example with some extreme circumstances (playing on immortal when he normally wouldn't, world map with africa having a lot of rough terrain (desert/jungle) and spread out cities (the culture/AI expansion won't pick those tiles for a long time) - a lot of his cities had elongated borders due to rough vs decent terrain, long and early war greatly affecting everything (he most likely focused on building units, economy to support units, and such rather than culture - he was way behind the immortal AIs in just about every category including culture, etc).

In a lot of other videos and screenshost empires seem to be less "patchy" except where really bad terrain exists (mountains and such totally in between cities).

Even so, it wouldn't be that terrible if some UUs were defensive oriented. It's not like every UU needs to give an offensive boost.

 

[Schuesseled]

yep yep

 

[12agnar0k]

That civilizations will be placed on the map according to the climate they belong to. Like Aztecs near jungle, Arabs near desert and so on.

Bit late to answer this but, well not climate as such, but Aztec will start near forests, England near ocean, and everyone else spawns near something that favours their particular strategy. I.e India could favour more fertile grounds with food resources too, this way they can grow to the sizes their UA allows. If you don't like this sort of favouritism and want everyone having an equal roll to start at location X, then you can turn off start bias.
Although even if it is on, there is still some dice roll.

The starting bias has been confirmed, but its not just about climate if climate is taken into consideration at all. But really locations good for the Civs unique flavour.

 

[Schuesseled]

As you say I don't think its 100% guaranteed, you could still start right in the middle of a desert if you were playing as Engalnd, but its less likely.

Which is a nice touch. I don't want to pick england, thinking oh yes i would like to play a naval strategy, and then get held back because of where i start is random.

 

[iop]

I don't think greg had much time to develop his culture, or had much spare gold to buy tiles, seeing as how napoleon wouldn't leave him be, so its understandable that his empire's borders were stifled.

I think I recall seeing 'Monument' as build option. So yes, he probably didn't favor culture as much as he could have.

 

[ShaqFu]

I had an awesome discussion set up for today's UU, but I accidentally closed the window. I'll still post, but I was really happy with how that one shaped up.

Anyway, with only a week left to go (time to start counting hours!), we'll look at an underdiscussed unit: the Roman Ballista. Essentially a gigantic crossbow, its Civ5 representative reflects its devastating capabilities: +4 ranged combat strength (18) over generic Catapults.

I've been unfair to siege thus far in the thread, as they didn't strike me as particularly useful in maneuver-heavy Civ5 combat. Why bother setting up to fire, when battles move so quickly? I realized, however, that siege is more useful than it first appears in field combat due to its devastating strength. The Ballista, with its 18 ranged strength, is as powerful as a Knight at range - when applied in the Iron Age, when most units have ~10 strength, it can seriously weaken an enemy's troops. So long as you can draw them into firing range (via crafty maneuvering of other units), the Roman player can dominate a battlefield with his siege engines. To say nothing of where the Ballista truly shines, city conquest: point these at a city, let fire, and your Legion/Horsemen's jobs just became easy. With 18 strength, it's unlikely any city will stand for very long against your assault.

Just be wary of the fact that they still have the Catapult's base strength of 4, making them on par with Archers in melee. If Horsemen get back to your Ballista, things will go poorly for Rome; given that the lowly Scout has 4 strength, you should keep careful guard of your siege engines.

 

[TM Moot]

Two questions regarding the Ballista (and siege generally i guess).

Can they move AND fire in the same turn?
Can they kill units outright (rather than just damage up to a certain point like in cIV)?

 

[stealth_nsk]

Two questions regarding the Ballista (and seige generally i guess).

Can they move AND fire in the same turn?
Can they kill units outright (rather than just dmaage up to a certain point like in cIV)?

1. They require setting up, so as long as they have 1 movement point, they don't.
2. Yes.

 

[Schuesseled]

Two questions regarding the Ballista (and siege generally i guess).

Can they move AND fire in the same turn?
Can they kill units outright (rather than just damage up to a certain point like in cIV)?

1) Not generally speaking, because you have to expend a movement point to set up a siege weapon. So if you move and set up, you'll have run out of movement points.

2) Yes, there is no damage cap placed on certain types of units, although you aren't guaranteed a kill with every attack, sometimes you only do enough damage to injure. (and thats true with all units)

 

[ErichRommel]

To settle the matter of panzersuperiority check this out. Its the true story of a german panzer ace with his Tiger destroying a whole armored spearhead all alone. It matters who controls technology

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Villers-Bocage

 

[dpaajones]

Do we know yet what the English Ship-of-the-Line unit will be like? I haven't seen much discussion/info about it anywhere. All I've seen is that its ranged attack strength will be very marginally higher than a normal frigate, but apart from that zilch.

 

[Feyd Rautha]

No info yet. I feel bad for ShaqFu because he's got a hard road ahead on these remaining units. I mean c'mon it's so hard to release stats before the game comes out? This has been the most secretive Civ project since the Internet really came into it's own (after Civ II).

There are still question marks on the majority of the major game concepts in all the game info sites! W-tee-H, mate?

 

[Me,myself,and,I]

The Ship of the line is considerably faster then the frigate.

 

[Ahriman]

To settle the matter of panzersuperiority check this out. Its the true story of a german panzer ace with his Tiger destroying a whole armored spearhead all alone. It matters who controls technology

Who wins battles is not the same as who wins wars.
Being the best at winning a fight isn't much good if you can't get to where the fight needs to be.

 

[Schuesseled]

The Ship of the line is considerably faster then the frigate.

That doesn't count, thats the english UA.

According to current info ship of the line has slightly higher ranged attack, but that can't be it, it would proably also have one of these:

> Bonus vs Frigates
> Lower cost than Firgates
> No resource cost.

 

[dpaajones]

That doesn't count, thats the english UA.

According to current info ship of the line has slightly higher ranged attack, but that can't be it, it would proably also have one of these:

> Bonus vs Frigates
> Lower cost than Firgates
> No resource cost.

Exactly - the increased speed is actually nothing to do with the unit: all English ships have that increased oomph! But just having a bit stronger ranged attack would be a little underwhelming for a UU. Hopefully there's another bonus or less cost as you say. The other English UU is pretty awesome though, so I'm wondering if they've balanced it out with a less amazing second UU? Hopefully not as I want to play as a naval England (how it should be!) and want to Rule The Waves.

 

[iop]

Seeing the trebuchet in Greg's game was quite impressive. Once you get the siege to the front, you can start dealing some serious damage. If you put the ballista on a hill, even if it's one tile too far away from the city, you can easily weaken or kill the defenders. It's basically like an archer with 3x the strength. With 6 iron, I'd probably build 4 legions and 2 ballistas (maybe a few spearmen) and go conquer the world.

 

[Louis XXIV]

Ballista are going to be good, but I kinda wonder if it might just be overkill for the period. Greg's Trebuchet took about three hits to kill a Rifleman. I'm thinking it might have taken two to kill a Pikeman. I'm going to assume Catapults are the same for the Ancient age (2 hits to kill). It's all but impossible that the Ballista will kill units with one hit. That would mean that, when fighting against units, the extra damage is just wasted. It would be great against cities, though.

Of course, I'm assuming a lot here. I'm assuming Greg's Trebuchet did comparable damage to other Trebuchet (which is a big assumption because it was heavily promoted). I'm assuming Catapults are similar with ancient units (another assumption). Overall, I feel I don't know enough about ranged combat to truly appreciate this unit. I know ranged units will be powerful and this one will be among the best, but that's all I know.