Units in an epic mod

[Steph]

I need to decide what I will do for my epic mod about the units, and I'd like to know via a poll what you'd like.

First, I aim at having almost only flavour units for every civ. I have several lines, basically
- Swordsman : better attack, less HP
- Spearman : main army, defense a little better than attack, more HP.
- Archer : bombard attack, but weak
- Horseman: faster, good attack, weak defense
- Horse archer : faster, bombard attack
- Heavy cavalry : less HP, but great attack and good defense.

I have different possible models for my unit lines.

Model 1 : Standard unit model
Here, all the units are built normally. The difference between unit is not too big to remain balanced. The AI will not use all the units available, but the player can.

Model 2 : Population unit model
Same as above, but every unit requires population. It limits development of cities if you want a strong army. The AI can sometimes not cope very well with it and end with very small cities.

Model 3 : Auto produced units, in every cities, balanced units
The units are produced via auto production, from an improvement, and so virtually in every city. This could lead to large armies, but the AI will have a mix of every units, especially if the building time is adjusted. The units are still balanced as in Model 1, it's the way they are produced which change.

Model 4 : Auto produced elite units
Here, only the "elite units" are produced via building : swordsmen, cavalry, archer... Main unit (spearman) are produced normally. The unit producing building are either small wonder, or requiring a good in the city radius (horse for cavalry). This limits their number, and so only a few elite unit will be produced. However, they will a lot more stronger than the basic spearman.

Model 5 : Everything autoproduced, with elite
Spearmen are autoproduced by improvment, in any city.
Elite units are produced via small wonder / natural resources in city radius, so in smaller number, and are stronger.

Model 6 : Everything autoproduced + normal base unit
The spearmen can be produced normally AND via autro production. Elite units via auto production, but with improvment (not small wonder). However, they will be produced slower, so their will be less elite units.

Model 7 : Everything autoproduced + normal base unit, limited elite
Same as above, but the elite units are produced via small wonder, in smaller quantity.

What model do you like best? Could you propose another?

Also, what are your view on:
1) Should base unit (spearman) be built normally, by improvment, by both?
2) Should cavalry be built by improvment in any city, by improvment requiring horse in city radious, by a small wonder?
3) Should swordsmen by built in any city (but with slower rate), in city with iron in city radious, by a small wonder?
4) What about archer?
5) Should the swordmen, horsemen, knights, etc. be relatively balanced (a little stronger than spearmen but not too much), or should be really stronger (but limited in number)?
6) What is the ideal time to auto-produce units?
7) Since autoproduction is done with a shared "recruit" which upgrade to your proper national unit, every civ should have similar unit lines, and built in the same time. Do you think extra units should be removed to simplify the lines? Or bonus unit producing building added to some civ for more variety?

 

[AnthonyBoscia]

Steph, from what I've seen of your game so far, I think Option 4 would be a good way to go. You could have two or three base units using offense and defense flags (such as archer, spearman, and horseman), and then have the rest be auto-produced. I wouldn't have the base unit be auto-produced as well.

For the auto-producing, I think a combination of small wonders and improvements requiring a resource would be cool. For example, perhaps the civ can build a normal horseman (with offense flag) normally, then auto-produce mounted archers from an improvement requiring horses in the radius (regions where nomadic peoples are fighting for your ruler), and then a small wonder that makes the elite cavalry. I wouldn't worry about making every civ having the same requirements, either. Since your building list changes every era, you could make building chains. For instance, if you have a Hellenic civ, you could make an 'Athens' specific wonder and then a 'Sparta' wonder. Then have several buildings which require these wonders to make. Each of these buildings can auto-produce a specific Athenian- or Spartan-style unit.

I don't know how much variety among civs you would prefer in your game. In mine I wanted a lot, but that's a personal preference. If you do have different options for the civs, I'd have not only different auto-producing units, but different base units as well. Eg. if in a High Medieval Era the Mongols could build powerful horse archers normally while every one else in that era can only get them by auto-production.

As far as an ideal time for production, it's hard to say without seeing your tech tree.

 

[Steph]

Thanks for the answer.

I think I'll have the main infantry (spearman) via normal production. For the cavalry/ swordsman, I'll probably produce it also normally only if it has relatively the same strength as the spearmen. Since I'm considering buffing the heavy cavalry (knights) a lot, and make it really stronger than infantry, then auto production is probably better.

Even if I can change things with each era, since I have 25 civ planned and up to 10 different types of units, if I don't use shared buildings I would need 250 of them!

So I have to make some common. But I could keep a few slots for extra small wonders to produce a few additional flavour units such as Spartan elite.

I like your idea about making horse archer "normal" for the mongols. Perhaps just unchecking the "king" flag for a few selected units could do the trick.

This way, the mongols could get horse archers from the auto production as all the other civs, but would be the only one who could also build it normally. This would definitly make mongols an horse archer civ!

 

[Steph]

I'm thinking about something.

Sometimes, I may have some missing units in a chain

For instance, I could have heavy cavalry for England in era 2 and 4, but not era 3.
While I have light cavalry for era 2, 3 and 4.
And for France, I have heavy cavalry for era 2, 3 and 4.

This could create some trouble with the upgrade path.

If I auto produce a "heavy cavalry recruit" from a small wonder, and make it uprade as
"England heavy cav 2 " -> "England heavy cav 4" -> "France heavy cav 2", "France heavy cav 3" -> "France heavy cav 4"

In era 3, the wonder would produce an heavy cav that the British won't be able to use.

So... What if I make copy of the English light cavalry for era 3?
One with
- Light cav recruit -> England light cav 2 -> England light cav 3 (copy 1) -> England light cav 4
- heavy cav recruit -> England heavy cav 2 -> England light cav 3 (copy 2) -> England heavy cav 4

This way, while some civ will built heavy cavalry, England will just built a few more light cavalry, but it won't break the chain. And even if some untis would be stronger, in terms of number it will be more balanced.

This could solve a lot of issues when a few units are missing in the upgrade link, and would avoid adding a lot of techs / building to cover the specific cases.

For instance, I could have have two or 3 range unit barracks small wonder. One for javeliner, one for archer, one for crossbow. Except some civ would generate 3 javeliner, others 3 archers, others 3 crossbow, some 1 javeliner and 2 archers, etc. depending on the era. All in all, a civ would get 3 range unit producing units, but the type will vary for each civ.

I could make 4 heavy infantry small wonders (swordsman without armor, swordsman with armor, axemen, haldberdier), just making duplicates when needed (and splitting the Spartan and Athenean between them).

Trying to summarize it, these are the building producing improvment I could add

- Main infantry line (improvment) :
-- Line 1 : for spearman without armor
-- Line 2 : requires iron in the city radius : for spearmen with armor. If not available gives extra spearmen

- Heavy infantry line (small wonder)
-- Heavy 1 : for swordsman without armor
-- Heavy 2 : for swordsman with armor
-- Heavy 3 : for foot knight
-- Heavy 4 : for halberdier

- Range infantry line (small wonder)
-- Range 1 : Javelineer
-- Range 2 : Archer
-- Range 3 : Crossbowman
-- Range 4 : Catapult

- Cavalry line
-- Line cavalry (improvment, requires horse in city radius) : horseman
-- heavy cavalry (small wonder, requires horse and iron, but not it city radius) : chariot, knights
-- range cavalry (small, requires horse in city radius) : horse archer
-- Elephant (small wonder, requires elephant in city radius) = Elephant
-- Camel (small wonder, requires camel in city radius) = camel
-- Camel archer (small wonder, requires camel in city radius) = camel

So that's a total of 16 buildings dedicated to unit production.

This method would give things more balanced since every civ would roughly have the same number of units available, even if for some they are duplicates and not real extra unit. But perhaps even there I could change things a little. For instance, if I have only javelineer, I could make a coopy with artillery flag, another with offense and the last with defense, just to force the AI to use them a little differently.

 

[W.i.n.t.e.r]

mhh... I'd also opt for version 4. Normal unit production with a few elite units getting auto-produced (I.e. Normal Unit = Bismarck Class Battleship; Elite Unit = The actual "Bismarck" itself), as long as Elite units are produced via small wonder / natural resources in city radius, so in smaller number (or as individual units), and are stronger.

Only issue I see in an epic mod is that if one does this resource oriented, it may be limited by the strategic resource bug. Otherwise most stabile use of normal and auto production.

 

[MeteorPunch]

My advice is to try to imagine how you want the game to be played, which method fulfills your vision, and go with that.

Typically I use auto-production to control the number of very good or reward/wonder units that exist. From what I can tell you are mainly concerned with creating variety - because you are adding so many unit types to the game, you want to make sure they are used, right? So, you should consider doing the opposite of what I normally do and what people are suggesting (auto-producing elites), and instead auto-produce weak units to fill in the ranks as good and elite unites will be built naturally. Allow all units to be produced normally as well.

3 Auto-production buildings (upgrades to one of these types, whatever is available)
Footman - Warrior/Swordsman
Ranged - Javelin/Archer/Crossbow
Horseman - maybe include Mounted Bowman/Crossbow, but not Heavy Horseman

Spearmen/Defenders will be built naturally.

You could also still have buildings for "elites," as well.

Again though, I'd say to go with how you envision the game playing - no one else can answer that for you.

 

[Steph]

Auto production for weak units would not work.

I want the elite units to be in small number, and I want to avoid the AI from building only these stronger units.

Hence the need to produce the elite via small wonders.

 

[Blue Monkey]

Voted for option 6. There should be a 3 tiered system, imho. Normal / Improvement / Small Wonder units. Like infantry / rangers /special forces in modern armies.

 

[tom2050]

Model 4, but I would say for some of the small wonders that require resource within radius, instead make these improvements that require resource within radius. This makes it so these resources will be much more 'inviting' to take, or go to war over.

If they are small wonders, then once you have one of those resources (camel, eg), there is no need to try to get another.

You can control the number of these resources available on the map, so it's fairly easy to limit the auto-production that can come from them.

 

[Steph]

Good advice for some unit like the camel, for the Elephant since they may be really strong, I think using a small wonder may be better to limit the number even more.

 

[T-mun]

Model 4, with a bit of 6 and 7

 

[Deth McBones]

I voted for Option 4. As for the archers question, I usually make my archers the light infantry, with a faster speed, zone of control, defensive bombard, usually no resource requirement, and sometimes bonuses for terrain movement. They are also less capable in direct attacks than the main infantry, but as cheap or cheaper. Some combination of that might help define their role in your scheme, and also stop just spearmen from being produced for a small, weak civ.

 

[Elephantium]

If you want to limit the numbers of "elite" units, you'll need to make it so the AI can't build them at all -- autoproduction only. I've been playing a WW2 mod, and Britain had over 20 Vanguard-class battleships running around

 

[Goldflash]

Restricting players on what they can or can't build isn't fun, Steph. Option one, all the way across. I want to choose the makeup of my army. If I want to spend my resources building twenty Vanguard battleships, then by God and Country I'll have twenty Vanguard battleships. And no, the AI won't build every unit, but why do we need 20 different fighter planes, or 14 Shako Wearing Musketmen? One or two cosmetic choices if fine, but it slows things down to have too many.

Well whatever. Just my opinion, and my Mod will reflect that.

 

[Elephantium]

Restricting players on what they can or can't build isn't fun, Steph. Option one, all the way across. I want to choose the makeup of my army. If I want to spend my resources building twenty Vanguard battleships, then by God and Country I'll have twenty Vanguard battleships. And no, the AI won't build every unit, but why do we need 20 different fighter planes, or 14 Shako Wearing Musketmen? One or two cosmetic choices if fine, but it slows things down to have too many.

Well whatever. Just my opinion, and my Mod will reflect that.

I disagree. I really like the autoproducing mechanic -- it's like getting a bunch of nifty extras for your army. In CCM, where Settlers and Workers are autoproduced only, the game takes on an entirely new character -- you have to change your strategies to manage the AI.

As for 20 different fighter planes, you're exaggerating ... too much. No one suggested that. While you have a point that too many unit types will slow things down, it's still nice to have some variety. I'd really like it if I could enforce "only naval bombers on carriers" in Civ 3 and have separate land and naval bomber units. I'd also like it if the game could model historical naval balance better -- where you really do have a mix of DDs, CAs, and only a few BBs instead of "20 BBs and nothing else."

 

[cemo1956]

I would say option 4 with some changes.
Making the auto unit to be such units that is most unlikely the AI will produce. Perhaps AT units, tank destroyers and several other complementing units.
Fighter aircraft indeed need to be among these. If you try to explore the ever taunting naval avaition problem the AI need to be force to autoproduce naval aircrafts. Perhaps in certain SW with naval installations needed.
The building of an entiry carrier force is something the AI need to be force to do, if the AI is by the sea so to say. Make these aircrafts a little weaker than normal landbased aircrafts, that will be built by AI to handle normal aircraft situations.
Same thing perhaps with either strategic bomber force (with charm perhaps) in contrast to fighter/dive bombers. One of these elements needs to be autoproduced.
Your idea with Guards units in 18 and 19th century time period should be great as autoproduced from the capitol city only.
Perhaps Marine units in modern time from a Naval Barrack close to the sea.

Then making all these King units is perhaps not a good idea, but using instead RFRE stuff to make them very high on population cost if the AI or human tries to build them.

McBones ideas on Archer is just superb. A truly support unit IMHO

If the auto units should be the weaker or stronger type is something you can alter I think. Sometimes it´s clearly best to make the stronger (Guards) as auto, but the supporting units are basically weaker than main offensive and defensive units. The works in making the best available unit for only offense or defense, then of course you got those pesky flags that triggers the AI to build.

 

[Steph]

What is RFRE?

 

[Diviner]

Rise and Fall of Roman Empire, I presume.

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=111682&highlight=rise+fall+roman+empire

 

[cemo1956]

Rise and Fall of Roman Empire, I presume.

http://forums.civfanatics.com/showthread.php?t=111682&highlight=rise+fall+roman+empire

Correct !!