Thoughts for Naval Combat in 3.4

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Chieftain
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Aug 5, 2012
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A Nerf of melee naval & embarked units:

I recently played a game as the Zulus during which in two turns I lost a size 12 city (defended but no fortification buildings) to three Korean frigates. Each one had the Raider 1 promotion but nothing else, and hit my city for ~180 HP each time. Is that not overpowered? It takes several turns of pounding via siege engines (as it should) to take a large inland city. Coastal cities are currently sitting ducks, so to speak, regardless of fortifications.

Regarding embarked units, I've found them actually LESS vulnerable on water than on land. It shouldn't be so. I agree that embarked units shouldn't be defenseless as they were in the vanilla game, but a same-era melee naval unit shouldn't be hard-pressed to win an engagement against an embarked unit, either.

Finally, undefended carriers should be weaker. They have a higher overall strength than Battleships and this makes no sense. A carrier without (or even with) aircraft and accompanying support ships should be a vulnerable target, as in the real world. I couldn't figure out why I saw so many AI carriers without aircraft until I finally realized it was using them solo for that high melee value.
 
1) The AI currently gets a huge anti-city bonus (100%). It sounds like this will be reduced to 50% in 3.4 (it should probably go down further to 25%). This should cut back on the enormous damage from AI units on cities. I don't think the problem is caused by naval power per se, but is that the high bonus gets amplified because of naval unit speeds that are harder to counter with a navy blocking.

2) The embarked units strength is mostly because the AI rarely defends its units well or embarks illogically in general and its units would be too easy to kill off otherwise. I think it's set at 66% of era land unit strength, so a melee naval unit should still have an advantage per era. Only an amphibious promotion unit should be a challenge to kill on its own. Melee naval units should also have a bonus when attacking units (naval or embarked).

3) We could probably tone down carriers as a unit value or via unit priorities. I think part of that comparison is simply that battleships are weaker than before as well.
 
Please see the following for more discussion:

City Damage - http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=505836
Naval Units - http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=501133


Finally, undefended carriers should be weaker. They have a higher overall strength than Battleships and this makes no sense. A carrier without (or even with) aircraft and accompanying support ships should be a vulnerable target, as in the real world. I couldn't figure out why I saw so many AI carriers without aircraft until I finally realized it was using them solo for that high melee value.

I've actually seen this behavior in vanilla BNW where the AI builds a bunch of (empty) carriers. The AI seems to rebase it's aircraft at a whim.
 
Agree with Mystikx in general.

But the carrier is a hard thing to design in general. It can't attack, the AI doesn't use it very well (though it is much better in BNW than it was in G&K), it's easy for it to be totally ineffective.

I really can't help but wonder if we should give it a significant overhaul by hardcoding in some abilities. It could automatically have a large sight range, an interception chance, or even a weak long range attack (representing a built-in CAG).

An even more radical change would be to drop housing aircraft on it entirely, and just make it a combat unit. It's not really all that important to be able to transport air units beyond what they can rebase from. That's probably not so fun though.
 
I hadn't noticed that carriers couldn't melee attack... I guess I just jumped to that conclusion since I saw it pre-BNW.

Thanks for the replies & pointing me to the appropriate threads :) As much as I enjoy the new expansion, playing without the CEP feels... watered down, I guess. Can't wait for it's release.
 
Intercept can have its own range. I'd be fine with an AA range of 2-3 on carriers for that and a large (+2?) sight bonus, or possibly a built in bonus against aircraft as well.

I don't think a ranged attack is necessary but a weak one might be okay.
 
1) The AI currently gets a huge anti-city bonus (100%). It sounds like this will be reduced to 50% in 3.4 (it should probably go down further to 25%). This should cut back on the enormous damage from AI units on cities. I don't think the problem is caused by naval power per se, but is that the high bonus gets amplified because of naval unit speeds that are harder to counter with a navy blocking.

2) The embarked units strength is mostly because the AI rarely defends its units well or embarks illogically in general and its units would be too easy to kill off otherwise. I think it's set at 66% of era land unit strength, so a melee naval unit should still have an advantage per era. Only an amphibious promotion unit should be a challenge to kill on its own. Melee naval units should also have a bonus when attacking units (naval or embarked).

3) We could probably tone down carriers as a unit value or via unit priorities. I think part of that comparison is simply that battleships are weaker than before as well.

Where are you getting the 100% figure from? According to the civpedia, the ai handicap bonus against cities is +50%, with I am assuming the +50% city attack for the unit itself (50+50=100)? Also, in the actual xml files the handicap promotion reading +2 sight (correct) but only +25% against cities, and -25% experience??? Am I looking at the wrong files here-promotions-'CEA_other'
 
The promo xml file from the last download still says 100% versus cities (same file you're looking at, you might have a different version from 3.34 August 5 or have modified it. Mine's modded to 25).

The civilopedia text for it is probably at least a year out of date if it says 50. It's been 25 or 100 for a while. Probably nobody looked at that because CivUp had a setup that automatically read off promotion tooltips and hasn't been updated for BNW.

Spoiler :
<Row>
<Type>PROMOTION_HANDICAP</Type>
<Description>TXT_KEY_PROMOTION_HANDICAP</Description>
<Help>TXT_KEY_PROMOTION_HANDICAP_HELP</Help>
<PediaEntry>TXT_KEY_PROMOTION_HANDICAP</PediaEntry>
<Sound>AS2D_IF_LEVELUP</Sound>
<VisibilityChange>2</VisibilityChange>
<CityAttack>100</CityAttack>
<CityDefense>50</CityDefense>
<ExperiencePercent>-25</ExperiencePercent>
<FreePillageMoves>true</FreePillageMoves>
<PortraitIndex>58</PortraitIndex>
<IconAtlas>ABILITY_ATLAS</IconAtlas>
<PediaType>PEDIA_ATTRIBUTES</PediaType>
</Row>
 
Ok, so I am looking at the right file, and have not modded it myself, but August fifth, yeah I probably download just before that. Thanks. Also, is there a change log on version 3.4 vs the earlier version I seem to have?, and where might I find it.

Edit: found it. Because I am in the middle of a game, will finish first. Can I ask about the non buildable ship of the line, as, I am playing as England and would like to fix it myself.
 
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