MOVEMENT, SUPPLY, ETC. (ver 2.0) hosted by don Don

This is a continuation of discussion from <A HREF="http://apolyton.net/forums/Forum28/HTML/000022.html">MOVEMENT, SUPPLY, ETC. (ver 1.0)</A>. Earlier discussion can be found at CIV3 - Master List - MOVEMENT (1.0) and at Movement Rules.
Go to the <font size=3> Current Summary </font> and return to this thread to post ideas.

In a game where turns are a minimum of 1 year and typically 10+ years long how do we rationalize such pathetically low movement rates? Caravans typically traveled the 3000+ miles from Damascus through the Hindu Kush to Xian in 8-11 months, including weather delays in the mountains. Travel on the Mongol post road from Sarai to Korakoram (c. 3000 mi, flat terrain) took less than 4 months, and message relays took less than half that.

The best means is to expand the types of strategic movement generalization. There are already several strategic generalizations in Civ2 movement rules. Free railroad movement is a strategic generalization. When an opponent expels a diplomat or insists that military unit(s) be removed from their territory, these units instantly return to your capital/nearest city. If you donate a military unit to an ally it moves instantly to the ally's city. Airlifting and Paradrop features are perhaps the best examples.

How to increase movement, remain playable, and not dilute the value of RR, Airlift, etc.? This composite of my original suggestions, modified for various constructive criticisms (thanks, everybody especially Theben) may prove useful. Further comments and suggestions by many participants are included. There are some who strenuously object to any change in movement rates. They're probably the ones who don't like the "double movement" option in MGE. For their sake perhaps new movement rules should be an option. On the other hand, if most of the strategic movement generalizations here are implemented, their apprehensions may be eased by the great flexibility of movement options. Most of these suggestion are far more than just changing the movement rates in the rules.txt file. Some (especially the old die-hard paper map/cardboard unit wargamers) would love a game with a purely strategic feel to it.

This was originally presented as a more-or-less coherent proposal (and was e-mailed to BR as such long ago), however the inclusion of many (possibly conflicting) ideas from independent sources makes this more of a grab-bag.

CONTENTS

1) Land Unit Movement
2) Naval Unit Movement
3) Air Unit Movement
4) Supply
5) Trade
6) Zones of Control
7) Exploration
8) Air Superiority
9) Air Support
10) Strategic Air Attack
11) Miscellaneous Suggestions
<font size=1 face=Arial color=444444>[This message has been edited by don Don (edited January 05, 2000).]</font>

Basic movement

1) LAND UNIT MOVEMENT

GENERAL COMMENTS: Fix the Civilpedia so it really works with modified rules.txt files! As is, anything but minor changes make the help and Civilpedia functions so inaccurate as to be useless. :^) Some have suggested multiple road types evolving throughout the game. At least one player has suggested that RR travel should only be allowed between cities (no hopping on or off outside the city).

1a) First, increase unmounted movement rates to 3 and mounted unit rates to 5 (chariot & elephant 4). Motor movement rates to 6 (freight, armor, modern infantry) and 8 (adv armor, mech inf). From extensive play testing, this can make defense difficult but no further imbalance against the AI is created.

1b) As an adjunct to this, some form of form of staged movement, simultaneous execution of movement orders, or both may be necessary for smooth gameplay. Suggestions ran up to one stage per movement point, but four stages ought to be sufficient. If some form of mobilization is implemented, then the hassle of staged movement could be bypassed for civs not currently engaged in large-scale warfare, and perhaps some expense saved.

1c) Make road building and RR building independent tasks. (In crossing the American West and the Russian East, RR came long before roads.) Movement on roads would no longer cost 1/3 mp per tile, rather terrain/3 mp per tile.

1d) Make military units capable of road building (but not RR) and construction of fortresses at ½ the rate of Settler units.

1e) After a civ builds one Superhighway city improvement, that civ may improve roads to Highways, reducing cost to ¼ point in all terrains or perhaps terrain/6 per tile. Upgrading takes a Settler [1 + terrain movement cost] turns and costs 1 money unit. Highways increase trade by one above road (and above Superhighway improvement) trade benefits, even for tiles that would not get road trade benefit.

1f) Movement on railroads would cost terrain/12 per tile. Unlike roads, railroads would be constructed one link at a time, from one tile to another rather than connecting to any and all surrounding tiles at once. Construction of a railroad link takes [½ turn x terrain movement cost] by Settler and costs 1 money unit. In tiles without roads, one or more rail link(s) confers the 1 unit trade benefit if applicable for roads.

1g) Additional suggestions to make roadbuilding somewhat closer to historical progression: paved roads such as the Persian Royal Road didn't come until 5th century BC, and quality of roads varies too much to be represented by a single tile improvement type.
<ul>[*]An initial primitive trail (does not reduce movement cost or create trade) necessary to extend city radius from 1 square to the standard 2 squares, and necessary for mounted units to cross mountains.</li>[*]Basic Roads (terrain/2 movement cost, plus standard trade bonus) available as a civilization advance (preq Masonry) necessary for wheeled units to cross mountains.</li>[*]Paved Roads (altered from the existing road improvement as suggested in §1c above) as an advance available after Basic Roads and Construction.</li>[/list]Initial trailblazing, or upgrading from one road type to the next, would require only ½ as long as currently implemented.

2) NAVAL UNIT MOVEMENT

GENERAL COMMENTS: Some means of river navigation for some naval units would be welcome. Many people have made suggestions for canal-building. River engineering would make short stretches of river navigable so that inland cities can become ports. Building a canal across an ithsmus to connect two bodies of water should be difficult and expensive; nearly impossible for hills and prohibited for mountains and glaciers.

2a) For naval units doubling movement works well, but I recommend cutting unit holds and costs. More than tripling movement for powered naval units doesn't mess things up too much, but I cut unit holds to a minimum (Frigate 0; Trireme, Caravel, Galleon 1; Transport 2) and reduce costs more (Tri 10; Car, Gal 20; Frig, Trans 30).

2b) A more sophisticated approach is to implement a global sea multiplier like the road multiplier for ground units. Multiplier would be cut in half for coastal travel due to tides, currents, rocks/sandbars etc, except in friendly city radius where local pilots can guide friendly ships. The multiplier could change with improved technology.

2c) An alternate suggestion is for naval units to have a range limitation, in turns, unique for each vessel type, or to have naval units slowly accumulate damage (similar to helicopter units in Civ2). Repair should be impossible in the open seas, and for modern (steel-hulled) ships impossible except in port.

2d) Travel by sea should be dangerous: any naval unit ending its turn at sea should have some probability of sinking. Alternately, travel through each tile could incur some probability of suffering damage from storms or coastal dangers. Probability of sinking/taking damage would diminish as sea travel advances are discovered and for each more advanced ship type.

2e) A Lighthouse city improvement would diminish movement penalty or chances of suffering damage or loss in coastal squares in that city's radius (note that the city proper would need not to be located on the coast). Radio would further diminish probability of damage or loss by Lighthouse improvement.

2f) There ought to be a Naval Base tile improvement, requiring 2 turns for construction (by Settler). After Steam Engine each Naval Base would require 1 money unit support cost per turn, and new base construction would also incur a cost of 1 money unit.

3) AIR UNIT MOVEMENT

GENERAL COMMENTS: The extreme mobility of air units requires radically different movement rules from land or sea units. Many people do not like the tactical-style fighter and hanging-in-mid-air bomber implementation. Many people have called for air transport units similar to ships.

3a) Air units are stationed at airbases, cities, or carriers. Air units can move tile-by-tile from one station to another using a global air multiplier similar to (but much larger than) the road multiplier for ground units (perhaps 8-12, may increase over time). Moving air units pass over ground/sea units, cities, and bases w/o attacking or landing. To make an air unit "land" on (move its station to) a carrier, city or airbase under it the player "A"ctivates the unit and a pop-up lets player choose to land or to continue moving the unit.

3b) Aircraft have an attack range and would spend just one mp to attack any valid target in range without moving through intervening tiles. For an air unit the default action is attack, but "A"ctivating the unit raises a pop-up with options to move or attack. The mouse cursor changes (similar to the paradrop cursor) to allow target selection for the active unit, but attacking unit icon remains where stationed. Range is initially short (1-2 tiles), increasing over time. Paradrop range should be the same as bomber range.

3c) Movement of air units between cities or airfields can be conducted by air transfer (similar to airlifting of ground units) at a cost of one movement point. Transfers are limited to N/turn in and N/turn out where N=size/4 for unimproved cities, N=size for cities w/airports. N=2 minimum for cities and airbases; round fractions up.

3d) Ground unit airlift to and from any city or airbase after the first Airport improvement is built (for that civ); limited to one unit in and out per turn. Airport allows size/4 units in and size/4 units out per turn; round fractions up.

3e) If an air unit runs out of movement points it is "stranded" and takes damage equal to 50% of remaining hits. If stranded on a road, RR, or fortress within a friendly city radius no further damage is taken; otherwise the unit suffers damage equal to 50% of remaining hits on the next turn. The stranded unit must move to the nearest friendly base or city on that player's next turn at the cost of 1 mp per tile. The player may construct a road, railroad, fortress, airbase or city on the tile before the end of the subsequent turn to avoid additional damage (the latter two also avoid cost of movement points).

3f) Airbases should take a Settler 2 turns to build and cost 1 money unit to build and 1 money unit/turn to maintain. Rules might allow for "superbases" by building an airbase in a tile already containing an airbase. Superbases would allow N=4 air transfers under rule 3c, and require double the maintenance cost.

Movement conditions and modifications

4) SUPPLY

GENERAL COMMENTS: Supply has no effect on unit support costs, only on effectiveness of that support reaching the unit. Supply is a generalization of whether that unit has instantaneous access to supplies (the resources modeled as well as unmodeled) and communications, and whether the unit has freedom to move unhindered. Supply rules are a nod of recognition that the supply line of a fighting unit is far more vulnerable than the unit itself. Some people want supply to modeled by supply units on land and sea, which would obviously require greater micro-management. There are also cries for pooling of unit support requirements among cities linked by roads, for support requirements to include food (for large groups of units), and for modern armies to require oil. But that is not really a movement and supply matter.

4a) Supply would extend some limited distance from the nearest friendly city not in rebellion. Supply radius would start at 1; increasing 1 with wheel or horse and again with auto. Supply cannot be traced through unfriendly units' Zone of Control (including Fighters). Any unit in supply moving to a tile in supply gets movement costs cut in half. Any unit not touching a tile in supply takes damage each turn depending on distance from nearest tile in supply. Display grid could be toggled to show supply status instead of city radii.

4b) A diplomatic option would allow units far from home to query another civ to sell supply access to the unit. Again supply has no effect on support cost but would eliminate losses. Supply access cost would be graduated: free for allies, 1 money unit for friendly civs, 2 for neutral, 3 for icy, etc. If no trade routes exist between the two civs cost would go up.

4c) Supply line extension eliminates out-of-supply losses but does not confer movement benefits. An occupied fortress or airbase tile connected by road or RR to an adjacent in-supply tile extends the supply line such that friendly units adjacent to it do not suffer out-of-supply damage. An occupied fortress or airbase connected by road or RR to an adjacent occupied fortress or airbase that extends supply line as above also extends the supply line as above.

4d) Any unit crossing geological obstacles (mountains, deserts, glaciers, and jungles), or remaining in a tile of this type without moving, move and take damage as an out of supply unit. If a fortress or airbase is built in a tile of this type, and it meets the requirements for supply line extension in §4c above, units in the fortress/airbase will not take damage as out of supply, but do not extend supply to units in adjacent tiles.

4e) "Alpine" units would be redefined to allow such units to operate in mountains, deserts, glaciers, and jungles without suffering supply penalties described in §4d.

4f) Units in the ZOC of a hostile unit may not repair unless in a fortress (or airbase, for air units). Modern vehicular units should be more sensitive to supply restrictions than infantry or other non-vehicular units. Units out of supply would incur defense penalties and either severe attack penalties or would be prohibited from attacking.

5) TRADE

GENERAL COMMENTS: Large scale sea commerce will involve ships constructed and manned by the private sector, but usable in time of war for shipping of supplies and personnel. Two main ideas have been brought up to model sea commerce.

5a) A trade line can be traced through friendly transports stationed on the high seas. Each pair must be spaced no farther apart than the lower movement allowance of that pair. Units can travel over trade routes. Traverse may begin in any friendly city or ship in range; no movement points are expended to enter the trade line. Traverse may end at a friendly city or a ship with an unoccupied hold (the unit may disembark unless it boarded a ship prior to entering trade line).

5b) If §2b is implemented, trade lines could be established that increase the sea movement multiplier. This would represent the higher level of civilian trade traffic, making movement of supplies easier. They could be "built" in a manner similar to roadbuilding, or implemented between cities with a monetary cost for set-up and maintenance.

5c) Trade routes would then exist on trade lines and through areas in supply. Attacking, piracy, and defense is then carried out on the high seas wherever ships are stationed, at ports via blockade, and on land via supply. Eliminating a sea link in a trade line or blockading origin/destination port(s) would each diminish trade route bonus and net a small amount of money (most of the merchants simply stop traveling once piracy becomes a problem). A city cannot selectively cut trade lines to only one city or civ, but a civ can cut off ALL external/sea trade routes.

5d) Capacity of trade lines for unit transport: Sum of [holds times movement allowance each ship], plus [size/4 +1 each for harbor, port, shipyard, etc] of origin/destination cities, divided by distance (1 Diplomat/Spy free). Other civs may also use your trade lines with trade routes to carry 1 Diplomat/Spy per turn to your city. The Dip/Spy can enter the trade line at the destination city from the Enter Enemy City menu. The Dip/Spy can then Enter the origin city of the trade line.

5e) Alternately, land units would move on trade lines similar to RR movement. Movement rates would depend on sea travel technology. Land units moving on water would not be able to attack, and defense would be highly limited. In pre-gunpowder era soldiers can repel boarders and defend themselves; otherwise defense depends strictly on transport vessel technology. Note that players could still embark on transport ships and move in a convoy with combat ships if greater protection is desired.

5f) Once a trade route exists on a trade line trade units can reach the destination city simply by entering the origin city of the trade line. If the destination city belongs to another civ, that civ may petition to use your trade line to establish a new trade route to your origin city directly from the destination city.

6) ZONES OF CONTROL

GENERAL COMMENTS: Given that tiles are on the order of 100 miles across, the ability of a military unit to respond to opposing units moving through adjacent tiles should be limited. Some way of taking the mobility of units into consideration would also be welcome. A foot unit should be less effective at exerting ZOC than a mounted unit, which should be less effective than a motorized unit. A unit moving on a railroad should be very easy to attack, while a unit moving across open ground or in an area with a well-developed road network should be harder to attack.

6a) Zones of Control do not entirely prevent movement. When a unit first attempts to move controlling units are revealed (the same as Civ2 ZOC), then a "continue or cancel" pop-up appears. Moving from a tile in an opponent's Zone of Control into another tile in any opponent's ZOC costs 1 extra movement point (or fractional road movement point, applied for road or railroad travel) and makes the moving unit "vulnerable." Units that "ignore" ZOC may opt to pay the extra movement cost to avoid being vulnerable, or may pay normal movement cost and risk opposition.

6b) A unit exerting ZOC may either "strike" or launch a "flank attack" against a vulnerable unit moving to or from a tile in its ZOC. A ZOC strike does fp damage (or expels diplomat) without retaliation or altering fortified status of striking unit. The unit exerting ZOC may launch a flank attack (a ZOC strike followed by normal combat), but loses fortified status. A neutral or peaceful unit exerting ZOC may insist that the vulnerable unit be withdrawn through diplomatic action.

6c) To implement this, a new unit status toggle is created, "watch/guard/repel." Units are assumed to be in watch mode unless toggled otherwise. A unit toggled to guard will strike or initiate diplomatic action, depending on relation to the intruding civ. A unit toggled to repel will allow the controlling player/AI to launch a flank attack against intruders from hostile civs via a pop-up menu, and otherwise act as a unit in guard mode.

7) EXPLORATION

GENERAL COMMENTS: More exploration units wanted. Inexpensive ships with no transport capacity and little or no combat ability, modern noncombat unit to replace obsolete Explorer, etc.

7a) To represent the cautious nature of exploration, moving onto a tile such that any unrevealed tile(s) will be revealed costs 1 extra movement point (or fractional point as applicable).

7b) Exploration beyond a certain range should be automated. The player would issue a general order to explore and report back. When (if) the unit returns to a friendly city radius then it reports back to the player.

<font size=1 color=444444>[This message has been edited by don Don (edited June 17, 1999).]</font>

Air combat (movement related issues)

8) AIR SUPERIORITY

GENERAL COMMENTS: Air units following the specialized movement rules proposed should also have attack and defense rules reflecting the extreme mobility of air power. It may be worth the effort to separate air attack/defense characteristics from surface characteristics, but this topic is primarily concerned with the movement/mobility issues.

8a) Fighters and bombers have a "range" unrelated to movement points. Air units expend one movement point to attack a valid target in range. Fighter attacks target any air, ground, or sea units. Bombers and Cruise Missile barrages can target only cities, ships, airbases, and bridges. Anti-aircraft units (x2 vs air), SAM batteries, and fighters are termed "defenders;" all other valid naval/air units, cities, or terrain improvements are just targets.

8b) Fighters exert an Air Superiority Zone of Control (ASZOC) over all tiles in range. ASZOC interdicts supply as in 4a, but does not interfere with movement of ground units as in 6a. For each tile the Air Superiority Index (ASI) is the sum of all friendly fighter units exerting ASZOC on that tile plus friendly AA units in that tile. The net ASI for a tile is that civ's ASI plus allied civ ASIs minus all non-allied civ ASIs (not less than zero).

8c) Fighter units with at least 1 mp unspent may be toggled to guard. Fighters set to guard exert ZOC in adjacent land tiles like a ground unit in guard mode, and exert ASZOC with a range of 1. Fighter units can be ordered to guard in a tile more than one tile distant, designating one land tile in range except cities. The fighter then exerts ground ZOC and ASZOC only in the designated tile (and the tile the fighter unit is stationed in) except that it cannot initiate diplomatic action. Fighters conduct ZOC strikes as described for ground units in 6b.

8d) Fighter units with at least 1 mp unspent can be ordered to repel, designating one adjacent land tile except cities. The fighter exerts ASZOC with a range of 1, and exerts ground ZOC in the designated tile. Fighters conduct ZOC flank attacks as Air Superiority attacks (see 9a below) regardless of net ASI in the designated tile.

9) AIR SUPPORT

GENERAL COMMENTS: Close air support is a critical function lacking in most strategic games. It is difficult to destroy a division-scale ground unit with air attacks, but the effects of close air support shouldn't be neglected. A means of integrating air support with the proposed movement rules is necessary.

9a) The net ASI is the maximum number of Air Superiority attacks friendly Fighters can conduct in that tile. Air Superiority attack does fp damage to the unit of attacker's choice in target stack in the first round. Attack rounds then continue against the targeted unit until the targeted unit wins a round (reflecting successful evasion of the attacking craft). "Defender" units automatically damage the attacker at this point; other targets have a 50% chance of inflicting one point of damage.

9b) Regular fighter attacks target a stack rather than one unit, and "defender" units can interfere with the attack. Use the defense factor of the strongest "defender" unit in the stack or defending fighter within range. Damage dealt by attacker is distributed point by point between the defender unit and a randomly selected unit in the target stack. If defender is destroyed, and no other defender is present in the target stack, attacker may expend 1 additional mp to perform air superiority attack on a valid target in target stack.

9c) Surface units in a tile with net ASI > 0 attacking a tile with net ASI > 0 attacks with close air support. Some attack bonus should be applied.

10) STRATEGIC AIR ATTACK

GENERAL COMMENTS: Again, this is included for completeness to show a means of integrating strategic attack with the proposed movement rules.

10a) Strategic bombardment targets a city within range, expend 1 mp. Damage to city would diminish shields of production for that turn; collateral damage to civilians, military units, and/or city improvements (especially SAM) likely. Can attack naval units at half strength under attack rules for fighters; target bridges/airbases with some chance of successful "pillaging;" defense as above.

10b) Cruise Missile barrage is an expendable strategic bomber. Follows bomber rules except only defenders in target stack may defend, and attacks full strength and firepower vs naval unit. Nuclear Missile is the same as a Cruise Missile, plus may attack ground units at half-strength; SDI only defense (treat as SAM).

This is just a start, more work necessary on particulars of air combat and defense vs strategic bombers. SAM improvement would have to be changed to fit in this system.

<font size=1 color=444444>[This message has been edited by don Don (edited June 17, 1999).]</font>

11) MISCELLANEOUS SUGGESTIONS

One that doesn't easily fit into any of these catagories is a broad generalized movement model: deployment. Units should be able to deploy directly to nearby cities, fortresses, airbases, carriers, etc. without the player having to move them by hand (or rely on buggy "go to" functions). Obviously there must be a difference between strategic deployment and the airlift function, for example. A deployed unit takes more than one turn to reach its destination and would have no defense strength on the turn it arrives. The origin and destination would have to be connected by road or rail, or perhaps by trade lines.

Coastal tiles would be one of three types: Beach, normal, and cliff.
<ul>[*]Beach - units can unload and load from/to transports and units with multiple movement points can move again or attack.</li>[*]Normal - units can unload and load from/to transports but multiple movement points units cannot move again or attack until the next turn.</li>[*]Cliff - units CANNOT unload or load from/to transports from this square.</li>[/list]
Port cities and Naval Bases assigned to a specific side/face of tile/hex. A city stradling an ithsmus could build a harbor or port facility on each side, but ships could not cross unless a (very expensive) canal is built.

Hexes/staggered tile rows. Some love the idea, a few hate the idea (fearing crippled keypad movement, for example).

Ocean currents: act like "one way" roads.

PARTICIPANTS AND THEIR INPUT

All the comments and suggestions mentioned here also appear above, however it may interest you to see where soem of the ideas came from (credit where due). Many people made comments or suggestions already brought up by someone else (perhaps in a different thread). Special thanx to Theben for his attention and suggestions to my first efforts months before Firaxis/MicroProse made any commitment to start work on Civ III.

<font face="Courier New,Courier">Itokugawa........(thankx also for participation before Firaxis
................. and MicroProse made a commitment)
CyberShy.........(moving in stages)
Trachmyr.........(prepare for combat taking %age of movement allowance;
................. map hexes)
Brother Greg.....("realism" too complex & interferes with gameplay)
mrtemba..........(ocean currents, atmospheric jet streams, act
................. like one way roads)
Asmodeous........(1 year turn length throughout game, or
................. initially 5 years max)
Shining1.........(not hexes)
Lancer...........(simultaneous movement)
mindlace.........(comments on various suggestions)
EnochF...........(comments on various suggestions)
croxis...........(comments on various suggestions)
Ecce Homo........(yes to increased mp & looser ZOC; units attack only once;
................. sealifts like airlifts)
willko...........(hexes wouldn't work well with keypad movement)
Ian Wu...........(resources iron, coal, petroleum, etc; support costs)
Jeje2............(seconded Ian Wu)
Druid2...........(movement/supply too complex; unit supply rules cripple AI)
Vadertwo.........(even more road types; RR only between cities;
................. beach/normal/cliff coastal tiles)
Bubba............(all units take some damage when not in city,
................. fortress, or base)
Hannes...........(but damage could be repaired when not in enemy
................. ZOC by not moving)
CAB..............(special supply units, especially for sea;
................. pooling of support costs)
darkgrendel......("ranges" for all units, reset when passing through
................. city/base; low movement rates; more exploration units;
................. navigable rivers)
Kropotkin........(support costs pooled by connected cities;
................. supply routes/convoy units between unconnected cities)
Eggman...........(only some rivers navigable, only some ship capable;
................. no logistics, too complicated)
Harel............(even higher movement rates, larger maps;
................. use borders instead of separate supply rules;
................. suffer combat penalties instead of damage outside borders)
russelw..........(agree on min logistics, supply unit;
................. oil consumption/reserves separate?)
CormacMacArt.....(tie distance allowed from friendly territory to
................. corruption for govt type)
ember............(deployment as a generalized movement model,
................. airlift a special case thereof)
MBD..............(communication effects: exploring unit automated,
................. must return & report)
ml_4da3..........(Engineer makes river navigable)
Flavor Dave......(wants movement rules to de-emphasize military
................. aspects of game; more logistics; trading posts)
wheathin.........(alternate sealanes implementation [CTP-like?] )
Diodorus Sicilus (damage in hostile terrains, heavy in some cases;
................. roads an advance, paved separate adv;
................. rivers more effective than roads; canals, too;
................. RR more effective still; range in turns for ships)
Theben...........(comments that Alpine units would suffer no penalty
................. or damage but not move as road)<font>

<font size=1 color=444444>[This message has been edited by don Don (edited June 17, 1999).]</font>

[Theben]

Gee, I feel so darn special...

One, congrats on this summary. It seems to be one of the best I've seen.

Two, I've got a couple more for ya.

Railroads(and anything better): While civs may use enemy roads, they cannot use enemy rr's. Non-combat units may use peaceful rr's; all may use allied. May capture rr's. Last combat unit to move thru owns, if at war. Perhaps color-code rr's to civs for easy identification?

If using a SMAC-style workshop, have the 'brigade' special option (I'm also assuming there will be no limit on the # of specials a unit may be equipped with, and that units are considered to be division sized). The 'brigade' unit would have some kind of heavy reduction to overall cost. It would also have it's total hit points reduced by 2/3rds (so a 2hp unit has 20 'hits', the brigade unit would have 7). Any special abilities it had (cargo capacity) would also be reduced by 2/3rds. It's ATT/DEF rating would stay the same. Voila, instant explorers for all chassis types!

RR's would be pretty easy to capture, in most cases, and if the owner civ doesn't block his rail network at chokepoints he gets what's coming to him… literally! (Toot, toot!)

I wouldn't mind having "small" unit subtypes. I think they'd have some minor attack/defense penalty. But I'd want a more generalized support model with fractional support requirements. So each unit would require ½ shield & ¼ food, with the total then taken from the supporting city and rounded as appropriate. Modern units could require maybe ¾ shield for infantry and 1¼ shield for vehicles, plus the food.

This side topic of support keeps coming up… I don't want to encourage it. I've got enough work as it is!

------------------
*a friendly note from your favorite heretic

[Theben]

I forgot to include support costs. Thanks for bringing it up.
On the idea of reductions (however small) to ATT/DEF, I disagree, mainly because I have visions of wooden-hulled 'divisions' of ships sinking iron-hulled 'brigades' of destroyers. The severe reduction in hits, IMHO, should be sufficient.

[Theben]

Someone brought up the idea of only being able to enter rails from cities. What about including rail stations (as TI) as additional jump on/off points? Would cost movement= last type of TI on (none, road) to entrain/detrain. Also, has anyone mentioned that the movement rate of the unit on the train should be determined by the tech level of your trains, not the unit itself?

[Ecce Homo]

A development of my Sealift idea:

Let's have two city improvements, the Dock and the Runway. You can build many of them in the same city, and they all cost gold AND resources to maintain.

Each Dock/Runway maintains one ship/aeroplane, which normally appears on the map as an automated caravan-type unit, controlled like in CtP. They move back and forth, making a trade route.

If you wish to Sea-transport/Airlift a ground unit, you move it into a city and give the order. The trade route is interrupted for the moment, and a plane/ship goes away with the ground unit. The ship can unload it on any shore, but the plane must land in a friendly city/airbase.

[Flavor Dave]

"Movement on roads would no longer cost 1/3 mp per tile, rather terrain/3 mp per tile."

This is a good idea if Firaxis uses the higher MPs suggested. Otherwise, there is no advantage to building roads in mountains, except for mounted units. This, IMO, would swing the balance toward attack.

Also, this should be done ONLY if roads get built at the same speed on every type of terrain. Otherwise, the bad luck of being surrounded by mountains will be too much.

[Knight_Errant]

So many topic fields, it is difficult to find the proper category.

Here is my suggestion:

Here is my suggestion for handling military units in the possible Civ 3.
As things are now, you can make a strike force or clean up force and move them about the planet at will. You can park them on the other side of the world and forget about them. They are invincible barring attack by superior forces. Their supplies reach them seemingly by magic. This is not realistic and changing it can make a better game.

I propose a change in the supply system. Implementing it will require some form of a border system. Not necessarily a hard and fast patrolled border, but an sphere of influence border. This border surrounds the players cities, like the borders in SMAC.

While units are within this border, they are supplied by the normal (magical) way. It would even be nice if early age units were supported by their 'home' city and modern and later units were supplied on a national scale like CTP.

It is when these units leave the border area that the change comes into play. Units outside supply range will need to return to that range within a certain amount of time - much like aircraft must refuel. These units may capture a city which would then resupply them as the city would now have a sphere of influence about it.

Units that run out of supply need not die off immediately, they can loose hp like choppers do in Civ2.

Units may also be supplied by friendly (allied) civilizations that are ammeniable to having troops stationed on their soil. This could perhaps be a global thing for alliances or could be a seperate agreement made during diplomacy.

There might even be the possibility to create a supply unit that can convoy supplies to units in the field.

Using this supply method will allow tactics such as cutting off supply lines, building war roads and railroads to neigboring enemies, and keeping troops from parking forever in the middle of nowhere.

[Flavor Dave]

I would like to clarify--I think the movement rules should de-emphasize the *army*, specifically, and raise the importance of the navy and air force. As the game is now, I think there is a good balance between the Military and city management and civ development.

But, once you've got railroads, and the AI has cruise missiles, you've only got one military path--build howies, and crush. I'd like to see ships more valuable (faster), and bombers too.

One suggestion from long ago, and maybe another forum, was to eliminate the "one dies, all die" rule for the sea. If I have a stack of vessels crossing the ocean, I don't want 3 cruise missiles to knock out several hundred shields of work.

Of course, that isn't a movement suggestion. Sorry.

[Knight_Errant]

Ships should work in the supply scheme I mentioned. Especially if there are underwater cities. Perhaps though, some ships would have a special supply ruling or a larger supply allowance to reflect things like Columbus' crossing of the ocean.

First, a word of profound apology to Ecce Homo. I was sure I had included a paragraph on Sealift in Naval Movement… or was it Trade? Maybe I "cut" it from one to "paste" to the other and got lost in the process. Well, it was about 3:00 am when I finished & sent it off to Yin. Had I noticed I would've at least added a paragraph in the Miscellaneous section to differentiate it from ember's generalized deployment idea.

I do like the idea of sealift taking trade resources—you are either moving consumer goods or military personnel and materiel with your ships. But not to exclusion; perhaps one free sealift for every N trade routes. Also sealift should be available for armor but not airlift. (Yes, the C5 can carry an M1, maybe even two, but that is cost prohibitive.) Tying trade to city improvements might be problematic. How does a land-locked city trade overseas? The port city used should collect a little bit from each route going through it. That's how New York got to be what it is today.

We run into the turn length problem whenever these ideas come up. Once powered ships become the norm deploying/sealifting units almost anywhere should take no more than 1 turn (a whole year or even longer). If a turn is a year, why would an airlifted unit have no movement left over after arriving at the destination? It gets sticky trying to coordinate the many levels of technology.

Theben (and Vadertwo): The problem I have with RR only going between cities is… they don't. Steam powered trains stopped every 40-100 miles just to fill water tanks. Whatever the engine type you can stop trains anywhere, with or without a station. Sure, loading armor units might be difficult without facilities and special flatbed cars. But then again, the turns are long and moving armor efficiently is a high priority for invaders and defenders… you almost always have engineers/bridging units with them and a makeshift loading dock should be no prob.

Let's ship a few hundred tanks plus supply & support units across a continent by rail. How far is it? How many trains travel the route? How fast? What does it take to extend supply of fuel to the destination? Too many variables. Give rail travel a very low movement cost & vehicular units high movement allowance and it works out.

Flavor Dave: If movement through mountains is difficult those attacking you are at the same disadvantage. Think of how hard it would be to build a road across the Alps in Roman times. Think of how slow it would be drawing supply carts through passes with or without Roman roads. Regardless, in the winter those passes would be, er, impassable. Thirty to fifty years ago, before the interstate highway system, roads over mountains were steep, winding torture tests of endurance. Only by shelling out the big bucks for grading earthwork & multilane roadways do you get anything near terrain-independent movement costs.

Supply rules should de-emphasize the army to some degree. Personally, I favor eliminating arty in general from strategic simulation: catapults, cannon, etc. only support ground units esp. infantry. Obsolesence of walls and fortifications can be handled without separate arty units.

Knight_Errant: The devil is in the details…

[Flavor Dave]

"Flavor Dave: If movement through mountains is difficult those attacking you are at the same disadvantage."

Re-read my post, that wasn't what I was saying.

Also, why should the army be de-emphasized? Please explain.

[Knight_Errant]

>Knight_Errant: The devil is in the details…

I'm not entirely sure what you mean by this. I thought the idea was simple enough.

[Mikel]

About units being in supply.
There is some discussion on the UNITS forum about Command and Control. I suggested the following :
Well I noticed a while back that people where discussing the idea of units needing supply line. Someone
even suggested that they may need multiple types of supplies. Personally I feel that is getting a bit
complicated but three types of supply types may be workable, rations, fuel, and information.

Does this conflict witha ny of the ideas that have already been discussed and would it be workable?

PS TheBen , I was in the middle of posting the reply on both threads but thanks for the advice.

Flavor Dave: You seemed concerned about giving too much advantage to mounted units, and the "bad luck" of being surrounded by mountains. I just wanted to point out that it wouldn't be all "bad luck," movement rules work both ways. You said "I think the movement rules should de-emphasize the *army*, specifically, and raise the importance of the navy and air force." I meant to say that "Supply rules should be sufficient to de-emphasize the army to some degree." I will add that higher mp for ships and the proposed air movement/attack changes would make air power much more significant. Why do you mean by "movement rules should de-emphasize the *army*…" hmmm?

K_E: I've been trying to get contributers to get to the details. How would you implement a special supply rule for exploration? It may look simple…

Mikel: I think everybody can see how to separate fuel from everything else (in the modern era), but what would you do to separate "info" from everything else?

[Flavor Dave]

"Movement on roads would no longer cost 1/3 mp per tile, rather terrain/3 mp per tile."

This is a good idea if Firaxis uses the higher MPs suggested. Otherwise, there is no advantage to building roads in mountains, except for mounted units. This, IMO, would swing the balance toward attack.

------

Think of the practice. Slow units will move one tile through the mountains whether or not there are roads. The only enhanced movement will be for mounted units.

The biggest problem will be that if you see the enemy coming over the horizon, with your infantry only moving one tile per turn, there is not way you can defend your outpost/border city. It will be taken before the infantry can get there. That's what I'm getting at, that under your suggestion, civs lose the ability of buildng roads to improve defense. Anything that hurts defense helps offense.

[Knight_Errant]

It is getting close to suggestion compilation time and I find that some people seem to misunderstand me when I talk about the supply rule. I want to post this supply idea in a simpler form. I think this is simple and doesn't require any extra manipulation by the player.

This supply rule is an an extension of the border system. Units within a countries border would be supplied in the way they are supplied now. No change.

Units that are outside the border lose points like a Civ 2 chopper.

Units within an allied border are supplied as if they were within their own border.

Using this system, no one has to be standing near a beach. No one has to move around any special supply units and so forth.

[ember]

I think this will make invasion prohibitive. (you have only 2-3 turns that you can siege before you lose your units as effective fighters). I like making it so that you cannot repair units in enemy teritory better.

------------------
"Any technology, sufficiently advanced,
is indistinguishable from magic"
-Arthur C. Clark

[Flavor Dave]

Two points. First, any idea along these lines that doesn't allow some kind of provision for repairing troops in enemy territory is bad b/c it radically upsets the play balance between perfectionism and militarism. 2nd, you'd just get around this by sending a settler along. He'd found a spite city, to make sure your invasion force is within your borders.

2 suggestions, not necessarily mutually exclusive. First, instead of regular barracks, you could include superbarracks as a city improvement. Superbarracks would cost more, but would have the added ability of allowing units built there to be repaired outside your borders (more properly, in somebody else's borders. Being in transit should have no effect.)

2nd, allow the building of a military base of some sort, in enemy territory. You can refine this idea many ways, but essentially, within (5?) tiles, units are repaired as if not in enemy territory. Probably needs to be a special unit available with the tech engineering.

[Eggman]

That supply system might work (with some tweaks), but you have to give the attacker more leeway. Perhaps give the units a range outside of their own borders where they don't take damage. Or a certain number of turns before the damage begins.

The key to the supply concept is that armies cannot live forever in enemy territory without being supplied. If you can cut off that supply or if the enemy is overextended, the army starts to fall apart unless supplies can be acquired elsewhere. But armies outside their territory don't just start falling apart when they leave their borders. If the US invaded Canada tomorrow, they could hang out in the middle of Alberta forever, assuming the Canadians (or the winter) didn't effectively cut the supply lines. The system you suggest doesn't allow for this.

The ideal system would use pathing to figure out if (1) the units can make a path to a friendly city (either by land or sea) and (2) if the distance is feasible for supply considering the technology available. Thus, supply lines can be cut by moving in units to block or extend the path or blockading with naval units. However, this system would probably be complex and time consuming, so it probably be impractical. But you can dream...

[Ecce Homo]

There could be a Wonder that gives supply to all units on the continent.

[Knight_Errant]

Yes, I'm for that. My suggestion was meant to be "on the surface".

[Dr Strangelove]

Consider this: It took Alexander 5 years to get to India. It took Octavius Caesar 3 years to get to Egypt. It took the Huns 2 or 3 generations to reach Europe. On a large map, assuming that the world represented is about the same size as ours, a single tile should represent a square about 150 to 200 miles/side. It would appear that early in the game movement rates of 1 to 3 tiles/year is not that different from historical movement rates.
By the Renaissance era movement rates increase. It took Marco Polo only 3 years to reach China. It took Genehiz Khan only 3 years to reach Poland. Magellan circumnavigated the globe in 2 years. Napoleon made it to Moscow in less than 1 year. Renaissance and Age of Reason units need to have their movement rates increased. Foot and horse units should move at least 5 or more tiles/year. Ship units could move up to 50 tiles/year. In modern times any unit should be able to span the globe in less than a year. At least ships should have a range of 100 or more movement points and land units oh, say 20 or 30. Transport (air or sea) could be used to extend their ranges for movement between friendly ports or bases.
In order to balance game play in the later stages of the game, say from the Age of Reason on, military units should have a radius of supply to limit how far they can go in a turn. Captured cities would be converted into supply bases after an expenditure of movement points. Combat would also consume movement points as would enemy zones of control. Amphibious landings onto nonfriendly territory should also be limited by range, though landings on neutral territory might be less restricted. Nonmilitary units should be less restricted by supply range. Perhaps engineer units could act as a mobile supply source.

Dr. S: I can't find the last time I said something like this and this is a good opportunity to bring it up again.

There is a difference between moving, advancing, and migrating. Octavius advanced around the eastern edge of the Mediterranean, stopping off to secure the loyalty of the local governors along the way. That is normal Civ movement. The Huns migrated from the Don river to Pannonia in "2 or 3 generations," taking their families with them. Civ doesn't handle that kind of thing too well. Movement by sea aroung the cape of Africa to points east took only a few months, but the Portuguese spent years exploring the coast incrementally before they could securely travel the route.

Most of what we're discussing here is plain movement, which can be very rapid indeed. What various Apolytoners (including me) have proposed is for movement that doesn't involve exploring new territory or advancing into unfriendly territory to be handled by strategic generalization: rail movement, trade lines, sea lanes, airlifting, some of the supply rules, my air movement proposals, ember's deployment idea, etc.

Movement rates would be set based on advancing through minimal opposition. Supply and ZOC rules are intended to cover the specifics of advancing against the more active foe, until units engage in combat. Are there strategic generalizations or supply/ZOC rules that you don't like, or would propose differently?

Flavor D: With terrain/3 road movement a unit with movement of 2 (civ2 mounted units, or "fast" infantry) still can't cross mountains and attack at full strength unless the target is immediately adjacent to the mountains. It isn't as bad as you make it seem.

If you build a road over nearby mountains and don't station a defender on it… that's a risk you have chosen. The Romans had difficulty reacting to invaders crossing the Alps. They allowed their military to weaken and didn't man the passes; mountains are no substitute for a strong army.

Yes, with supply rules we need a way to extend supply other than founding a string of cities. I favor a fortress/base rather than adding a non-combat unit. Perhaps stationing fortified units should also be sufficient to extend supply lines for long distance attacks. Any ideas on how to do this efefctively?

Knight_E: I think people understand what you're saying but don't understand why you think it would be better. Simpler isn't always better; if it interferes with making warfare playable it won't survive the cut at Firaxis. Don't get me wrong, we're putting as much into the Firaxis suggestion box as possible.

My thoughts on supply rules in general: as long as the program is automatically doing whatever calcs are required there isn't any management overhead for the players. Making them "simpler" isn't any particular advantage. For example, can a defender in his own territory be cut off from supply? In real life, yes; using a simple border supply rule, no.

You hinted that you had a new idea for how to make exploration more interesting…

Eggman & ember: On the other hand, losing points "like a chopper" doesn't mean "at the same (steep) rate that choppers in civ2 suffer." We do want specific suggestions on how to make supply rules work in a civ2/civ3 system. My suggestion in §4a is to have "Any unit not touching a tile in supply takes damage each turn depending on distance from nearest tile in supply."

I would also point out Diodorus Silicus' idea of units taking damage when in adverse terrain. Mountains, deserts, swamps & jungles all tend to wear down the effectiveness of fighting units that attempt to cross them. Napoleon took heavy losses just because of water-born parasites in the St. Petersburg area (and was himself afflicted with diarrhea for the rest of his life).

[Flavor Dave]

Movement vs. exploration--perhaps we could have trails and roads. Whenever your explorer or horseman or whatever goes over a square, he leaves a trail, a light gray line like a road. Movement rates are halved, but there's no trade bonus. Settlers still build roads, but they would cut movement points by 1/4, not 1/3. Explorers and alpines should get the 1/2 bonus when on roads or trails; otherwise, they lose one of their key advantages.

OK, to summarize--explorers on roads or trails move 6, on open ground, they move 3 (altho 8 and 4 might be easier to program; caravans on roads move 4, on trails they move 2; horsemen, etc move 2 on open ground, 4 on trails, 8 on roads.

I like this idea b/c it is one way to deal with what we all see as a realism problem--units are too slow in the middle period. Also, it makes caravaning to AI civs easier, once you've established that first trade route. Also, I have a fondness for the explorer unit; these will become valuable, as they can scout ahead of caravans (or your army, for that matter) and speed their movement.

"Flavor D: With terrain/3 road movement a unit with movement of 2 (civ2 mounted units, or "fast" infantry) still can't cross mountains and attack at full strength unless
the target is immediately adjacent to the mountains. It isn't as bad as you make it seem."

Right now I don't remember the exact discussion. My problem is that infantry in mountains will move one square, whether there are roads or not (3/3=1). This leaves you in the weird position of roads having no effect on movement. That doesn't make sense. Further, only horse units will benefit at ALL from roads. That doesn't make sense, and seems to unbalance the game slightly.

Altho I admit that in almost any territory, the effect will be minimal. Only in large mountain ranges will it matter.