Unit Workshop

[mark1985]

I think Civilization IV should have a unit workshop where you can design your own units. You could design your own tanks using different chassis types and armour plus pick the types of weapons you want on.

 

[sir_schwick]

You are new here so I forgive will this dead horse being resurrected. This issue has been hashed in about as many forms as one could hash such an issue. If you want to, plenty of posters will come forward with reasons why a UW would not fit with the atmosphere, AI, or gameplay flow of civ. It was an interesting idea for SMAC, but ultimately does not enhance the overall Civ experience.

 

[elementgoo]

Yea, i didnt really enjoy it that much in SMAC

 

[sir_schwick]

I liked it, but the AI could never use it effectively. Also, you ended up using the same two or three design philosophies with occasional variations. The only part of the UW that could or should be carried over is some interesting unit variants.

 

[Maniac]

You are new here so I forgive will this dead horse being resurrected.

While I personally like the Unit Workshop, I'd agree there's like zero chance this could get in Civ4. It doesn't fit with their "Simplify, Simplify, Simplify" mantra. However you act like it's forbidden to discuss it simply because you say so.

Also, you ended up using the same two or three design philosophies with occasional variations.

Then you're not fully using the possibilities of the unit workshop. Besides, aren't those 'occasional variations' - all the different special abilities - you can design yourself exactly what makes the unit workshop fun?

Eg in Civ you usually have a single infantry unit at a time.
In SMAC you can build lots and lots of units each with a different function.

A simple 1-1-1 unit, as cheap as possible, to garrison bases for police duty.
A 1-best-1 unit for pure defense.
A best-1-1 unit for offense.
A few best-best-1 über-units.

That's already four design philosophies for the infantry unit only. However the best part still has to come: special abilities.

Should I give my base garrison the "non-lethal methods" ability to double police effect, the "hypnotic trance" ability to have +50% defence against psi attack, the ECM ability to have +50% defence against rovers, the AAA ability to have +100% defence against air attacks, or something entirely else instead??

And for my offensive infantries, should I just churn out simple units with no abilities, to keep the cost as low as possible. Or perhaps I'd like amphibious pods to sneak-attack from the sea? Drop pods to surprise them out of the air? Empath song to attack psi units better? SAM ability to attack aircraft? Make them long range artillery?

The list goes on... The same counts for rovers, combat ships, transports, aircraft...

I liked it, but the AI could never use it effectively.

How so? I'd say they use it pretty well. Of course they could never exploit it as fully as a human (but that counts for everything), but they're certainly doing more than two or three design philosophies with the occasional variations.

 

[sir_schwick]

While I personally like the Unit Workshop, I'd agree there's like zero chance this could get in Civ4. It doesn't fit with their "Simplify, Simplify, Simplify" mantra. However you act like it's forbidden to discuss it simply because you say so.

I'm saying discussing it is a fruitless endeavor for most of the veterans. You can discuss if you want, but do not expect any enthusiasm. Sometimes my cynicism and time on the forums show.

How so? I'd say they use it pretty well. Of course they could never exploit it as fully as a human (but that counts for everything), but they're certainly doing more than two or three design philosophies with the occasional variations.

You must be playing a different SMAC than I did.

Then you're not fully using the possibilities of the unit workshop. Besides, aren't those 'occasional variations' - all the different special abilities - you can design yourself exactly what makes the unit workshop fun?

Eg in Civ you usually have a single infantry unit at a time.
In SMAC you can build lots and lots of units each with a different function.

A simple 1-1-1 unit, as cheap as possible, to garrison bases for police duty.
A 1-best-1 unit for pure defense.
A best-1-1 unit for offense.
A few best-best-1 über-units.

That's already four design philosophies for the infantry unit only. However the best part still has to come: special abilities.

Should I give my base garrison the "non-lethal methods" ability to double police effect, the "hypnotic trance" ability to have +50% defence against psi attack, the ECM ability to have +50% defence against rovers, the AAA ability to have +100% defence against air attacks, or something entirely else instead??

And for my offensive infantries, should I just churn out simple units with no abilities, to keep the cost as low as possible. Or perhaps I'd like amphibious pods to sneak-attack from the sea? Drop pods to surprise them out of the air? Empath song to attack psi units better? SAM ability to attack aircraft? Make them long range artillery?

The list goes on... The same counts for rovers, combat ships, transports, aircraft...

I would not mind a SMAC UW discussion, since the SMAC Forum is dead.

Cost analysis shows you can usually build 2 offensive and 1 defensive unit for the same cost as a single super-unit.
I also never put more than one special on a unit except for very specific roles.

I never built slow defenders, except for the very early game, and those were usually disbanded later. My fast defenders always travelled in these groups:

1 Trance Rover
1 AAA Rover
1 ECM Rover
1 Algorithmic(?) Rover(for protecting against probe teams)

I almost never built Rover artillery b/c Needlejets were around the corner and my industry usually couldn't support that many. Some interesting uses for Hovertank Artillery, mainly b/c droppod arty seems expensive.

___________________________________________________________________

Now that I think about it, SMAC armies felt more like real armies because you had tactical differentiation. If they had used 'group' vs. 'group' combat, I bet it would have been really cool.

However a new model of figuring out how militaries should be designed and new units researched would be needed. The UW itself works well for a more engineering oriented atmosphere(sci-fi or modern era), but before then defence industries were just not that large. So this is why the UW will never make it, but something of its kind should.

Yes, I know I just switched positions.

 

[Komoda]

In response to the original statement about a unit workshop, its sounds a lot like Steve Jackson's Car Wars or GURPs Autoduelling.
Certainly all of us, that have kept up with civ and all its releases, have all wanted to make are own units. But, some of us have the time and some of us do not. I am not about to quit my job and dedicate my time to learning how to design my own units, because it does not pay the bills.

It is a good idea, but perhaps an even better idea is to have an open-ended tech tree that would allow for the development of tech based modules for the player to add to their units.

Mind you another point, with everyone all wanting a conflict based game, so as to wage war on other civs, the game has all the echoes of almost being like Earth 2150 as well as other games of a similar bent.

Less template based game and more creation based. The whole part of winning a war is coming up with weapon that your opponent has not thought up yet, and the player keeping the tech secret. An avenue of war that has not yet been accessed by the programmers at Firaxis.

 

[CurtSibling]

The new 'adoptive unit tactics' feature may add some varied options to units.

 

[Eran of Arcadia]

Or maybe there could be an 'out-of-game' UW for modding - like you can only build amphibious units with a certain SW or something like that.

 

[Graadiapolistan]

I don't think unit workshop will enhance gameplay, It would most likely take up memory and hinder gameplay.