What is wrong with the Naval Game?

DeckerdJames

Warlord
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Nov 1, 2019
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One thing that can be improved is the move speed of embarked land units. There should always be an advantage to movement for embarked units. It is what makes the water valuable. On the water, they can move 24 hours a day and 7 days a week. The rate of movement should be something like 5 points. In a global domination, the water around landmasses would become more valuable. A larger movement rate will make the embark and disembark cost to movement and time feel more impactful. This is only a personal opinion. I hope the tone of the message can be taken a suggestion and I am not asserting that the movement rate is tied to realism of any sort, if it were to be 5 points.
 
I think the problem if you were to implement a system like that, you would need to make the oceans much more massive than they are in-game. Like, IRL, the Pacific Ocean spans literally half the globe. An "ocean" in Civ is like 10 tiles wide at most. You would need all those oceans to be like 5X as big as they are now if you gave units an "appropriate" movement rate.

Not saying they shouldn't do that. I wouldn't mind if oceans were vast stretches that you really had to really patrol lest a ship sneak its way past your sentries. But it would need a large change to map generation to have that big of a stretch of water.
 
One thing that can be improved is the move speed of embarked land units. There should always be an advantage to movement for embarked units.
There's already a huge advantage as all water tiles are effectively flat.
 
It is somewhat annoying how slow embarked movement is, and it does make seas and oceans less valuable than they would be with faster movement. However, it would be really immersion-breaking if embarked movement were very fast. Humans were generally not able to move huge amounts of people across the sea over long distances until the last few hundred years of our history. Sure, there was relatively long distance sea trade in the Bronze Age, and ancient Romans sailed to India, and even further, but those were just trading ships, not whole expeditions.
 
Try playing as Indonesia, build some unique Jong units and bring your embarked units along in formation with the Jongs at full speed. This makes Indonesia a blast to play on (say) an Archipelago map.

"Jong: Indonesian unique Medieval era naval unit that replaces the Frigate. Formation units all inherit escort's Movement speed and +5 Combat Strength when in a formation."
 
There are key technologies that upgrade the navigation:
  1. Sailing allows Builders to embark (ancient era)
  2. Celestial Navigation allows Traders to embark (classical era)
    • Great Lighthouse gives +1 Movement to all naval units, including embarked units (classical era)
  3. Shipbuilding allows all land units to embark (classical era).
  4. Mathematics give +1 Movement for all naval units, excluding embarked units (classical era)
  5. Cartography allows Ocean movement (renaissance era)
  6. Square Rigging give +1 Movement for embarked units (renaissance era)
  7. Steam Power give +2 Movement for embarked units (industrial era)
  8. Combustion give +1 Movement for embarked units (modern era).
By the modern era, land units should have 6 Movement, 7 with the Great Lighthouse, but you are stuck at 2 Movement half of the game until Square Rigging.

Maybe something should be done to make some units better at navigation. I have two ideas. The first one is using the Escort Mobility promotion: Formation units all inherit escort's Movement spreed. The Melee Naval unit tree could inherit this ability, ending with 3 clear naval units:
  • Melee Naval: Faster but doesn't have Ranged Attack. Made for Exploration or Escort.
  • Ranged Naval: Powerful but slower. Made for Destroying Cities or Units.
  • Raider Naval: Invisible but frail. Made for Destroying Naval units or Raiding.
The second idea is to make some unit more suitable to cross ocean: Cavalry are less praticable to move around since it is easier to shove human than horse on a raft. For example, when the melee units have their Commando ability have +1 Movement, it kind of made Amphibious mediocre in comparison. Amphibious could inherit like +1 or +2 Movement when embarked. It would make a clear distinction between Cavalry fast at home continent but slow to use abroad, and the opposite for Melee.

Ocean itself should something else than being a giant blue plain of peaceful emptiness. It is just boring: there is no risk/reward from trying to cross it early since you are prevented to cross an arbitrary ocean tiles until Cartography. I like the "Lost at Sea" mechanic from humankind that allows you 1 turn being in the Ocean before being deleted, or naval units to loose HP per turn instead. That "Lost at Sea" mechanic would suit better for Civilization.
Maybe the Ocean should be more dynamic with a current system that could increase or decrease the Movement cost, or a wind system that could make navigation with Square Rigging faster if the wind align where we want to go (becoming obsolete with Steam Power). Maybe Ocean should be more strategic with Fog to hide yourself but reduce your vision (impossible to predict the current / wind), some weather event or something else.

In short:
  • New ideas should be explored:
  • Allows Naval Melee to escort land units fast if in formation.
    • Maybe that will make the 3 naval units type more distinct.
  • Create a difference between Cavalry and non-Cavalry units, so the former can cross faster.
    • Maybe update the Amphibious promotion from Melee units to grant +1 or +2 Movement when embarked.
  • Make Ocean more interesting:
    • Allowing the ability to cross early the Ocean tiles at a risk, like the Lost at Sea mechanic from Humankind.
    • Add a Current system, that would increase or decrease the Movement cost of a tile.
    • Add a Wind system, that could decrease the Movement cost of a tile if the Wind is favorable.
    • Make Ocean more interesting with some features, weather or events.
 
I had the idea of making the water tiles larger. But I don't know how that would work against other hex tiles. I'd have to draw it out.
My first thought would be to just make all water tiles (above a certain size of body of water) squares.
 
I think the problem if you were to implement a system like that, you would need to make the oceans much more massive than they are in-game. Like, IRL, the Pacific Ocean spans literally half the globe. An "ocean" in Civ is like 10 tiles wide at most.

You must play with really dinky maps, because I routinely have oceans that are 40, 50, or more tiles wide on continents maps with 10 or 12 civs.
 
I had the idea of making the water tiles larger. But I don't know how that would work against other hex tiles. I'd have to draw it out.
I feel like making seven deep sea tiles into a single tile, one in the center and then all connecting tiles, might work.
 
One thing that can be improved is the move speed of embarked land units. There should always be an advantage to movement for embarked units. It is what makes the water valuable. On the water, they can move 24 hours a day and 7 days a week. The rate of movement should be something like 5 points. In a global domination, the water around landmasses would become more valuable. A larger movement rate will make the embark and disembark cost to movement and time feel more impactful. This is only a personal opinion. I hope the tone of the message can be taken a suggestion and I am not asserting that the movement rate is tied to realism of any sort, if it were to be 5 points.

As was pointed out in an academic treatise higher up, embarked units do move with increasing speed over water as one progresses through the tech tree. However, I would tend to agree that they should move maybe one tile farther on water than on land right at the get-go. To offset this, maybe just grant +1 movement to embarked units when steam power is developed, instead of the current +2.
 
There are key technologies that upgrade the navigation:
  1. Sailing allows Builders to embark (ancient era)
  2. Celestial Navigation allows Traders to embark (classical era)
    • Great Lighthouse gives +1 Movement to all naval units, including embarked units (classical era)
  3. Shipbuilding allows all land units to embark (classical era).
  4. Mathematics give +1 Movement for all naval units, excluding embarked units (classical era)
  5. Cartography allows Ocean movement (renaissance era)
  6. Square Rigging give +1 Movement for embarked units (renaissance era)
  7. Steam Power give +2 Movement for embarked units (industrial era)
  8. Combustion give +1 Movement for embarked units (modern era).
By the modern era, land units should have 6 Movement, 7 with the Great Lighthouse, but you are stuck at 2 Movement half of the game until Square Rigging.

I have a general sense that ocean movement comes just a little too late in the game for the average civ. I acquire it, and not too long after, really, I'm upgrading to battleships.
 
There are key technologies that upgrade the navigation:
  1. Sailing allows Builders to embark (ancient era)
  2. Celestial Navigation allows Traders to embark (classical era)
    • Great Lighthouse gives +1 Movement to all naval units, including embarked units (classical era)
  3. Shipbuilding allows all land units to embark (classical era).
  4. Mathematics give +1 Movement for all naval units, excluding embarked units (classical era)
  5. Cartography allows Ocean movement (renaissance era)
  6. Square Rigging give +1 Movement for embarked units (renaissance era)
  7. Steam Power give +2 Movement for embarked units (industrial era)
  8. Combustion give +1 Movement for embarked units (modern era).
As an amusing side note, in Civ2, Nuclear Power also gives a +2 move bonus to all naval units (nuclear powered vessels). However, with the wonky and lurching tech paths that are possible that ignore what SHOULD be needed tech, intuitively and historically, and how tech trading works in that iteration, you can end up with nuclear powered wooden ships. :p
 
As an amusing side note, in Civ2, Nuclear Power also gives a +2 move bonus to all naval units (nuclear powered vessels). However, with the wonky and lurching tech paths that are possible that ignore what SHOULD be needed tech, intuitively and historically, and how tech trading works in that iteration, you can end up with nuclear powered wooden ships. :p
At long last we learn the true secret to Columbus's success: nuclear powered carracks. :mischief:
 
In Civ3, a version of the "lost at sea" mechanic was enforced. If you directed a Galley (Classical-ish) or Curragh (Ancient) to go from point A to point B, the game would always select a safe route using coast / shallow water tiles. If you directed one of this ships manually, you were free to enter deeper water, either Sea or Ocean. You had a percentage chance of being lost at sea. Skilled players would often send such ships on one-way exploration missions, trying to find the other continent or island. Risk/reward tradeoff.

BTW, the Curraghs had 2 movement, the Galleys 3 moves, and Caravels 4. Building the Great Lighthouse gave all units +1; having the Seafaring trait also gave +1. No units embarked! All land units had to be loaded onto a ship to be moved, which could be done as soon as Galleys were available.
 
In Civ3, a version of the "lost at sea" mechanic was enforced. If you directed a Galley (Classical-ish) or Curragh (Ancient) to go from point A to point B, the game would always select a safe route using coast / shallow water tiles. If you directed one of this ships manually, you were free to enter deeper water, either Sea or Ocean. You had a percentage chance of being lost at sea. Skilled players would often send such ships on one-way exploration missions, trying to find the other continent or island. Risk/reward tradeoff.

BTW, the Curraghs had 2 movement, the Galleys 3 moves, and Caravels 4. Building the Great Lighthouse gave all units +1; having the Seafaring trait also gave +1. No units embarked! All land units had to be loaded onto a ship to be moved, which could be done as soon as Galleys were available.
This also existed in Civ2, for the Trireme (the only pre-Caravel ship in the game - though there was a custom flag to give it to any naval unit in the custom scenario editor) that the Lighthouse Wonder also effectively made moot, and I think the Lighthouse, too, gave a small move bonus to all naval units until it's expiration tech was discovered.
 
I have a general sense that ocean movement comes just a little too late in the game for the average civ. I acquire it, and not too long after, really, I'm upgrading to battleships.

They could do the following:
  1. Mathematics could apply to embarked units. We would have 3 movement at sea back in classical era.
  2. Steam Power is decreased to +1 Movement, to compensate.
As an amusing side note, in Civ2, Nuclear Power also gives a +2 move bonus to all naval units (nuclear powered vessels). However, with the wonky and lurching tech paths that are possible that ignore what SHOULD be needed tech, intuitively and historically, and how tech trading works in that iteration, you can end up with nuclear powered wooden ships. :p
We know they can make units and civics can be made obsolete. I don't think it would be impossible to do something like giving +4 Movement at Combustion and make obsolete all previous tech. If you didn't researched the previous tech yet, you would still have the best version.
But admit it... wouldn't it amazing to see our fellow soldiers trying to cross the ocean on a raft with some Square Rigs, a steam-powered paddle wheel, and some screw propellers? Triple the speeeeeed!
 

What is wrong with the Naval Game?​


Take a look at my thread which has a lot of thoughts thrown around on making the naval game better and more relevant:

On embarked units, I think that it's crazy most of them are moving further in the late game than the naval units. That doesn't help make the naval units matter if so many land units can slip through their grasp!
 
Go back to loading units on ships I says. I kid. I doubt too many people miss that mechanic. Funny thing is as complex as that mechanic seems for the AI, the AI was better at launching attacks across oceans better in Civ4 than in Civ5 and Civ6.

I figured this thread would be about the AI not building naval units. Funny thing is I have seen them build them on the Europe map (or maybe it was the Mediterranean map), but hardly any on generated continents and islands maps (my preferred map type).
 
Go back to loading units on ships I says. I kid. I doubt too many people miss that mechanic. Funny thing is as complex as that mechanic seems for the AI, the AI was better at launching attacks across oceans better in Civ4 than in Civ5 and Civ6.

I figured this thread would be about the AI not building naval units. Funny thing is I have seen them build them on the Europe map (or maybe it was the Mediterranean map), but hardly any on generated continents and islands maps (my preferred map type).
That old mechanic is what we did in Civ2, as well.
 
Go back to loading units on ships I says. I kid. I doubt too many people miss that mechanic. Funny thing is as complex as that mechanic seems for the AI, the AI was better at launching attacks across oceans better in Civ4 than in Civ5 and Civ6.
I have mixed feelings about loading units on ships, but I think it's weird that Civ V did away with it, in pursuance of the one-unit-per-tile rule, only to allow for aircraft to stack and be placed on aircraft carriers. That said, I'm rather partial to Old World's Diplomacy-esque solution to 1UPT naval transport: Units can move from one landmass to another, provided that a ship, or chain of ships, is anchored between them.
 
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