Units with a ranged and melee attack

[Ra's Head]

Has anyone played around with a unit that has both a ranged attack and a melee (offensive attack)? I was thinking about having a unit that could attack normally with a high combat value but potentially expose itself to harm, or attack with a weaker ranged attack. I think such a unit might be interesting as it has no current analogue.

My first attempt was to make a unit with a ranged combat value but not give it the "defense" only promotion. However, when I try to attack in melee, it seems to just automatically use its ranged attack. I don't select bombard, but my unit takes no damage. I was wondering if anyone else had this idea or knows how this might actually work.

This kind of setup could be an alternative to gunpowder units that could now either stand and fire or charge into the enemy.

 

[Spatzimaus]

Yes, it's been done. I've got several units in my mods that do this. You're right that all you need to do is remove the ONLY_DEFENSIVE promotion and the unit will be capable of both.

The only real issue is in the UI. If you right-click to attack, then the unit will use a ranged attack if it has one. But if you manually click "attack" from the bar on the left side of the screen, it'll default to the melee attack. So it's a bit of a headache, but not too bad.

As for the AI, it's hard to tell; from what I've seen, the AI will prefer to use the ranged attack even if it has a melee attack as well, but that might just be because it enters a hex 2 or 3 hexes away from the target and decides to attack from there, instead of closing to where it could use a melee attack.

 

[Ra's Head]

I see! Thank you very much!