xUPT

[Grey Fox]

There have been a few mods similar to this one long before CiV was announced to use 1UPT. I've even made a few (unreleased) myself. One clone of Advance Wars which also uses 1UPT, and another mod which I will probably never release . Those were for Civ 4.

I even based my work on another mod so yeah it's been out there.


And I wouldn't say Magic and such from FfH2 is really balanced well. I mean even the stack busters from BtS have limitations on how many units they can damage.

 

[Venir]

And we're far from dicking around. In fact, much of the rest of the team is already working on 1.4.

Oh I know, been reading the forums a week or so. Figured I'd join the Pick On Valk With Joking Impatience Club™.

But yes the numerous features, fixes, and additions announced for 1.3, 1.4, and 1.5 look awesome.

 

[Niveras]

I did not keep up with this thread, but I thought I'd chime in. Forgive me if my points were made and argued previously.

On the surface, I'm not sure I want it. Armies aren't really armies if you can only have 1 or a couple units per tile. On the other hand, being able to limit the AI to a few units, and increasing the effectiveness of individual units (because you can't just suicide a ton of fireballs or skeletons at something to kill it), would probably do a hell of a lot to help the late game slowdowns. I think I'm against the philosophy of it (limited units per tile is an artificial limit on tactical options), but I support it for its advances in gameplay (fewer games will be abandoned due to boredom).

I'd like to see, at least, some semblance of armies remain. Is it possible that commanders would be able to increase the unit limit for the tiles they occupy? But limit the number of commanders per tile to 1, unless you can also have "subcommanders" who are attached to another commander. A chain of command: one commander commanding three commanders, who each command 3 units, for a total of 12 units in one square. But even just one commander commanding three units, a total of 4 on the square, would be fine.

Also, what would this functionality do to assassins and the guardsman promotion keeping spellcasters safe?

 

[Beardy Dan]

Problem with commanders adding to the no of units: If I have set my x to 1 adding another unit is a huge boost, if its 100 than its almost pointless.

If the mod also includes Zones of Control then then Assassins could ignore them unless they are from defenders? Possibly also have a separate promo that allows that as well with a min 2 move requirement.

 

[Zai]

Armies aren't really armies if you can only have 1 or a couple units per tile.

Each "unit" is the representation of an army, or at least decent sized military grouping of said unit type (excluding heroes). You would never for example have a single warrior able to take over an enemy city. That lone (if you have single unit graphics on) warrior you are moving around is actually hundreds of equally skilled warriors fighting as a group.

 

[Niveras]

Each "unit" is the representation of an army, or at least decent sized military grouping of said unit type (excluding heroes). You would never for example have a single warrior able to take over an enemy city. That lone (if you have single unit graphics on) warrior you are moving around is actually hundreds of equally skilled warriors fighting as a group.

Obviously, but armies still aren't just a single squad or band of identical fighting troops. They have multiple elements that move together, represented in Civ by the stacks of units. Though Civ takes this to extremes, UPT should should still allow for elements of a tactical group coordinated into a single "unit" (e.g. stack). Commanders are an excellent way to enforce that, but they'd probably need to be adjusted significantly. Reducing their spawn rates to start (though reduced units resulting in less experience gained on a civ level may do that already), but also limiting not only total units commanded but unit types commanded.

 

[Sonereal]

On the surface, I'm not sure I want it. Armies aren't really armies if you can only have 1 or a couple units per tile.

What measure is an army?

Spoiler :

A single stack, no matter how many units in it, doesn't really aspire awe until you hover the mouse over it. 100 units in a stack, impressive, but doesn't aspire awe like an army that takes several turns to land on a beach. But it also gives the defender an advantage. Look at Pusan in the screenshot. If it had been better developed, Pusan would've been a bloody battle since it would be harder to surround and so, starving the city would've been a viable option. After all, with 5UPT (the picture is misleading but my galleys, after promotions, only carry 4 units at a time), your options are limited in the case of Pusan.

For starters, I had to think about what units I was going to use. Do I use 4 Teutonic Swordsmen and ignore the defenses? Do I try to bombard the city with ships? Well, then I would have to build some ships to do the job but there's a limit on the number of ships on the tile as well and I needed triremes to escort....and so on in that case. Or do I land trebuchets on the island as well but in the process, limit the number of offensive units and make my job a little bit harder but a lot more satisfying?


And besides, playing with xUPT against other humans opens up both player's options immensely.

There's also the case of this:

Spoiler :

Long story short: Continent is divided between Siam and Germany and naturally, the border ended up being a little to the west of the small lake in the middle of the map. I wanted to invade Siam but it took several turns for me to get the force I needed through that mess. The surrounded city in the top-middle left of that picture only had enough room for 18 units (at 6UPT) and since it was coastal, it was resupplied more often than I liked.

And then there's that Pop 8 city with all the German troops starting to surround it. Slowly and surely, things became desperate for that city. It wasn't coastal so it couldn't be resupplied with troops easily and new troops were auto-kicked out. I was constantly bombarded by longbows in the city. As you can tell by the picture, the military strength (shown by how dark the tile is) of that city was larger than the tiles surrounding the city containing my troops. In short, it took 'bout 20, 25 turns to get to the point where I had both cities compared with the, oh, four or five it would've taken with 20-unit stacks.

I had 'bout 48 units on the border (maximum) and it looked vastly more impressive than simply 1 stack of 50 units.

 

[Opera]

Awesome, what mod are those screenies from?

 

[Torugu]

Pretty sure that's RoM, probably RoM: AND.

 

[Sonereal]

Awesome, what mod are those screenies from?

Pretty sure that's RoM, probably RoM: AND.

RoM: AND. If there are any more mods with xUPT, I would enjoy to play them.

As of now, my two most played mods are AND and Rise from Erebus (which I haven't played in a while since I keep thinking 1.3 is coming out soon )

 

[Opera]

Okay, thanks.

TBH, I never played AND because I find ROM istelf very daunting, very unfamiliar. But I will try it, if only for the xUPT

 

[Sonereal]

Okay, thanks.

TBH, I never played AND because I find ROM istelf very daunting, very unfamiliar. But I will try it, if only for the xUPT

I thought AND was daunting until my civilization in RiFE was destroyed by a cave bear.

 

[FrozenShadows]

Niveras: "I did not keep up with this thread, but I thought I'd chime in. Forgive me if my points were made and argued previously."


ditto on the above,

now i like this idea but i would also like it to be able to be turned on and off (i just liekz de optionz) and also i was thinking including to the 15stack limit how about have a "Army" 1 for each player/AI and the limit would be around 100 so it would really feel like the rest are just strike forces ment for doing "special jobs of unknown origins "
Gecko ^^

 

[Sonereal]

now i like this idea but i would also like it to be able to be turned on and off (i just liekz de optionz) and also i was thinking including to the 15stack limit how about have a "Army" 1 for each player/AI and the limit would be around 100 so it would really feel like the rest are just strike forces ment for doing "special jobs of unknown origins "
Gecko ^^[/QUOTE]

The problem with that is that the strike forces would be useless.

 

[FrozenShadows]

The problem with that is that the strike forces would be useless.

well think about it first, you send in your main army to there capital while use strike forces to ether distract your enemy by attacking less defended city's or by suicide bombing there army, also they could be used as mini/side battles as all of your armys collide which i think would just be fun to watch

 

[Sonereal]

well think about it first, you send in your main army to there capital while use strike forces to ether distract your enemy by attacking less defended city's or by suicide bombing there army, also they could be used as mini/side battles as all of your armys collide which i think would just be fun to watch

Meh. Having a single 100 unit army would detract the purpose of the strike forces which can still easily be taken out and a 100 unit army completly negates the point of surround and destroy, choke points, etc.

 

[Valkrionn]

Obviously, but armies still aren't just a single squad or band of identical fighting troops. They have multiple elements that move together, represented in Civ by the stacks of units. Though Civ takes this to extremes, UPT should should still allow for elements of a tactical group coordinated into a single "unit" (e.g. stack). Commanders are an excellent way to enforce that, but they'd probably need to be adjusted significantly. Reducing their spawn rates to start (though reduced units resulting in less experience gained on a civ level may do that already), but also limiting not only total units commanded but unit types commanded.

Actually, that is why I don't personally like 1UPT (though I'm hopeful for CiV, as it's designed towards it). I like the ability to have multiple types of units, with different combat roles, in a stack.

Like I said though, having to choose just some of them, rather than all of them, makes for a nice tactical element (IMO). And our unitlines will be changed significantly in 1.5.... There will be interesting choices.

 

[Valkrionn]

you have a good point on having more than 1upt, and while i was aware of the module launcher, i guess i wasn'tt aware just how much they can alter the core game. I'll give it a shot. still not 100% sold, but i'll give it a shot

I'd still like to see a game fully rebalanced around 1upt, but i suppose that will happen soon enough once ciV is out.

Modules can do quite a lot. They can even access the important python files now. Hell, we can even have modules that only load if other modules exist.

We can do any amount of balancing we feel necessary, and have it not damage the game for those who do not wish to use xUPT.

 

[Merddyn]

Whee, only glanced at the last page of this. Sooo, for 1.5 stuff...

Honestly, while people as a whole hated Civ 3, I liked it, for one major aspect. Yes, yes, shoot me, burn me at the stake, and all that, but... Armies, and how they used great generals. For those not in the know, basically, you used a Great General (first game to have Great X units, and first type of them) to create an army, which was basically a single unit comprised of 3 units (4 with a wonder). It had one health track (every unit had 2 - 5 health levels based on experience, another thing I liked (as opposed to the flat Regular/Veteran experience table of Civ 1 and 2)) that was a total of the units in it, and the army used the unit best suited for the job at hand... When attacking, it used the one with the highest attack strength, defending, defense strength, until that unit ran low on health and it switched to the next best one. You never lost a unit until the entire army died, and it wouldn't have any unit at 1 health fight until you only have 1 health per unit left.

Aaaanyway, especially if you have the limited units/tile thing in the game (especially if it's 1 or 2), can we have a modified version of this? Personally, I'm of the opinion that instead of having it be like Civ 3 has it, have it so that units can be (permanently, if it's simpler/more balanced) added to another unit, say to a limit of 4 or 5, or whatever you think is best, basically reflected as promotions. For example, if you had a swordsman, (strength 5 for bronze weapons) and attached another, give him a promotion that either gives + % strength, or even a raw number, say 2. If you attached a Longbowmen, it could be +2 first strikes, or giving it an (or increased) ranged attack value.

To reflect the casualties of the unit and the increased ability to withdraw (distract the enemy while another element of the force retreats), you could have it so that they also give a % withdraw chance, but if the unit retreats like that one of the units giving that withdrawal ability is lost... Perhaps have that tied to if the unit has the Guardman promotion, so you could say attach a Swordsman with Guardsman to a Mage, and the Mage gains either a % strength or a +2 strength, and gets a 35% chance of defensive withdrawal but loses the Swordsman in the process.

 

[Sonereal]

Honestly, while people as a whole hated Civ 3, I liked it, for one major aspect. Yes, yes, shoot me, burn me at the stake, and all that, but... Armies, and how they used great generals. For those not in the know, basically, you used a Great General (first game to have Great X units, and first type of them) to create an army, which was basically a single unit comprised of 3 units (4 with a wonder). It had one health track (every unit had 2 - 5 health levels based on experience, another thing I liked (as opposed to the flat Regular/Veteran experience table of Civ 1 and 2)) that was a total of the units in it, and the army used the unit best suited for the job at hand... When attacking, it used the one with the highest attack strength, defending, defense strength, until that unit ran low on health and it switched to the next best one. You never lost a unit until the entire army died, and it wouldn't have any unit at 1 health fight until you only have 1 health per unit left.

But that isn't an army. That's just a complicated unit.

Aaaanyway, especially if you have the limited units/tile thing in the game (especially if it's 1 or 2), can we have a modified version of this? Personally, I'm of the opinion that instead of having it be like Civ 3 has it, have it so that units can be (permanently, if it's simpler/more balanced) added to another unit, say to a limit of 4 or 5, or whatever you think is best, basically reflected as promotions. For example, if you had a swordsman, (strength 5 for bronze weapons) and attached another, give him a promotion that either gives + % strength, or even a raw number, say 2. If you attached a Longbowmen, it could be +2 first strikes, or giving it an (or increased) ranged attack value.

You can set the tile limit. In AND, it was anywhere between 1 to 100. In this mod, I think I heard 2-30 because 1 is impossible to play and anymore than....15 really, misses the point.

That would make some sense for a 1UPT scenario but no one in their right mind would use that option in this mod (not because 1UPT sucks but because its impossible to implement without changing movement for all the units in the mod to make micromanagement manageable).

Also, that is not an army. This is an army.

Spoiler :

It's simple and effective. It isn't like each stack represents an entire army (it shouldn't). If anything, all the German stacks you see on screen were treated as an army by me. Not pictured is the army I have in the south and together, they made up the Army Group I have on the continent.

Armies are lead by generals. I'm pretty sure there are Commanders in this mod (99% sure but my latest AND save has seriously detracted time from my Mechanos game) which you can attach units to so there's the General and his army right there.

In AND, a Great General can basically be converted to a Great Commander which, if units in the same stack win battles, gains experiences and earns promotions that effect surrounding troops. Again, I'm 99% sure something similar is in this mod already and it works.

Spoiler :

(And for anyone interested, that city was the hardest city I've taken in the history of me playing this game and any mods for it). It would've been only second if I had managed to take the city to the south of it.