What is going on with the Dromon

[Estebanium]

While I played YnAEMP with Greece, I became more and more uncomfortable with the Dromon. If you are confronted with a few of them, there seems to be nothing that you can do against them. Playing as Greece you can build the Dromon and the Trireme. First ship seems to be a bad option, because it is the same type, but building the Trireme is just like building a ship that will sink in the next round. The combination of a huge attack range and a very good attack damage makes this boat some kind of OP. What do you think?

 

[Elhoim]

Off-Topic: Are you using a terrain texture mod? Also, is the thing on the bottom left a fort with custom graphics?

 

[Enginseer]

Off-Topic: Are you using a terrain texture mod? Also, is the thing on the bottom left a fort with custom graphics?

Pretty sure that's one of the Rise to Power's tribes.

 

[Estebanium]

The Fort is a part of the mod "Exploration Expanded Continued". It simply enhances the exploration part of the game and goes hand in hand with CPP.

Yes I use a terrain texture mod. I always have been using a terrain mod, or better the combination of those two avaliable here. After I recently bought a new monitor with a higher contrast and sharpness, with a 4k instead of a 2k resolution, I realized that the terrain textures look really crappy. So I began to create my own textures with a doubled resolution, instead of 1024x1024 I use textures with a resolution of 2048x2048, resulting in a much more sharper terrain. I try to keep the look of the original textures, but they are completly new.

@btt: What do you guys think of lowering the attack range to +1? I read a lot of those ships and it seems like their range was pretty low. Comparing this weapon with a bow and arrow, you never were able to attack an archer that were able to attack a dromon. So it would be more correct to change the range attack unit to a close combat unit instead.

 

[Der_Zorn_gottes]

I would rather adjust the power than the range.
Messing with range would lead to inconsistencies in the ranged ship tree. I don't like inconsistencies.

 

[Moi Magnus]

While I played YnAEMP with Greece, I became more and more uncomfortable with the Dromon. If you are confronted with a few of them, there seems to be nothing that you can do against them. Playing as Greece you can build the Dromon and the Trireme. First ship seems to be a bad option, because it is the same type, but building the Trireme is just like building a ship that will sink in the next round. The combination of a huge attack range and a very good attack damage makes this boat some kind of OP. What do you think?

View attachment 407909

You are in a situation where you cannot win the naval war : it is too late.
Naval units are very easy to kill, so having the initiative is the most important thing.
The only way of killing this naval fleet would be to have a fleet of 1-2 melee ship and 2-3 range ship, attacking from outside the mediteranean sea, but any ship that come from Athen would be a waste of money and time.

Unless you have suffisantly naval cities, and gold, to buy an entire fleet in one or two turn, you really need to have a defensive fleet, because if you don't and a powerfull enemy attack, the war is already lost.

 

[Strigvir]

Why are you building archers instead of trebuchets?

 

[wobuffet]

Messing with range would lead to inconsistencies in the ranged ship tree. I don't like inconsistencies.

What do you mean by inconsistencies?

 

[Der_Zorn_gottes]

Hm. While writing my answer I realized that Battleships have range 3. So range two is not common to all of them.

 

[Funak]

Hm. While writing my answer I realized that Battleships have range 3. So range two is not common to all of them.

Battleships hitting 3 range is the same transition as artillery hitting 3 range, nothing really strange about that, it's just how warfare evolves in the lategame.

 

[Gazebo]

The absence of your navy is the problem, not the dromon. Navies are not to be ignored, especially now that the AI has a better idea of what to do with them. The Trireme crushes dromons.

G

 

[Gothic_Empire]

While I played YnAEMP with Greece, I became more and more uncomfortable with the Dromon. If you are confronted with a few of them, there seems to be nothing that you can do against them. Playing as Greece you can build the Dromon and the Trireme. First ship seems to be a bad option, because it is the same type, but building the Trireme is just like building a ship that will sink in the next round. The combination of a huge attack range and a very good attack damage makes this boat some kind of OP. What do you think?

View attachment 407909

I hate to go off-topic, but are those gorgeous tile textures downloadable somewhere?

 

[Estebanium]

The absence of your navy is the problem, not the dromon. Navies are not to be ignored, especially now that the AI has a better idea of what to do with them. The Trireme crushes dromons.

G

Yes they do after I build one. I have a problem with the ability of the dromon that it can attack land units. I can understand that the majority wants to keep the consistency and so to keep the ranged attack, but we are speaking of a ship that was not able to cross huge distances with the Greek Fire so seeing this unit to vaporize land units and naval units is a bit.. WTH.

 

[Strigvir]

Yes they do after I build one. I have a problem with the ability of the dromon that it can attack land units. I can understand that the majority wants to keep the consistency and so to keep the ranged attack, but we are speaking of a ship that was not able to cross huge distances with the Greek Fire so seeing this unit to vaporize land units and naval units is a bit.. WTH.

Ranged naval units vaporizing land units is a vanilla mechanics, probably the best change from civ4 combat. You just didn't see it there due to AI being incapable of naval warfare.

 

[jma22tb]

Yeah with Carthage nearby all the gold they can stack up is more pressure to build defenses.

 

[Gazebo]

Yes they do after I build one. I have a problem with the ability of the dromon that it can attack land units. I can understand that the majority wants to keep the consistency and so to keep the ranged attack, but we are speaking of a ship that was not able to cross huge distances with the Greek Fire so seeing this unit to vaporize land units and naval units is a bit.. WTH.

I'm not going to get into a debate on that. Slippery slope towards the 'why can archers fire across the English Channel' trope that's been with Civ 5 since the beginning.

Navies are superior to everything until the airplane. Navies can only really be countered by navies. But navies cannot project their power beyond the coastline.

G

 

[Enginseer]

Navies are superior to everything until the airplane. Navies can only really be countered by navies. But navies cannot project their power beyond the coastline.

Also known as Ship of the Line spam pre-Vox Populi.

 

[Atlas627]

Sadly, I have not found that Triremes counter Dromons. I find that Dromons counter Dromons even better. Triremes seem to be better at killing cities than Dromons

 

[Xony]

Maybe adding a unitline or just promotion "Coastal Artillery" could provide an alternative counter at the cost of dedicating resources only for coastal defense. Dunno if this will work for Dromons though since Coastal Artillery seems to appear later historically.

Off-Topic: I'm also interested in the terrain texture mod.

 

[Estebanium]

Sadly, I have not found that Triremes counter Dromons. I find that Dromons counter Dromons even better. Triremes seem to be better at killing cities than Dromons

I can understand the advantage of Dromons against other ship units, because this unique weapon was a very powerful weapon against other ships. So I can understand why I need two or three attacks against a Dromon with a Triremes, but I don't see how a Triremes should be good against a Dromone.

Maybe adding a unitline or just promotion "Coastal Artillery" could provide an alternative counter at the cost of dedicating resources only for coastal defense. Dunno if this will work for Dromons though since Coastal Artillery seems to appear later historically.
Off-Topic: I'm also interested in the terrain texture mod.

I am totally fine if we say that a Dromone is a powerful ship that rules the seas. From a historical standpoint I can understand that this ship was a very good unit against other ships, or possibly cities, but this should be enough to make this ship valuable. By also giving this unit the ability to burn the whole coastline plus the hinterland (lol nice to see something German ^^) seems a bit too much.
Off-Topic: I am thinking of releasing the terrain pack if I am fine with the result