Capture catapults and cannons?

[Alfonsus72]

As far as I know, in civ3 the human player has some chance to capture AI workers.
As workers could have a defense value of 0 (umm.. still not sure about that), will other units with a defensive value of 0, as catapults could have, be capturable?. Has anybody heard something about it?.
Guess we will have to wait and see... but that would be a nice new feature.

[TechWins]

I highly doubt it.

[Gramphos]

I hope so, as catapults alone shall be able to do noting (without infantry to control them). They are support units, and if such units are left behind, what stops another unit from taking them. I guess that they shouldn't be able to disband themselves either.

[dearmad]

I think its silly they have to be "manned" the building of a unit should also represent the crew of the unit too- are we going to need to "man" battleships and the other naval units? How about missiles? Those need to be controlled by people too- tanks??

It's stupid that way. However I DO like the fact that they don't kill other units, just wound them and structures. That makes more sense.

[dainbramaged13]

Originally posted by TechWins
I highly doubt it.

me too
it would be cool bnut i bet you its not in

[tuckson]

Hmmm, a catapult killing no units? Makes no sense to me either. Of course for a catapult, the change to hit a man alone is minimal, but throw the stones on an attacking army (irl a mass invasion) still makes victims.

But it should make sense if a catapult causes more damage to structures then to units.

[Inverse Icarus]

cataoults are not traditionally used to fire at a group of chariots, iirc

they are used for barraging a fortress / castle / city and pummeling it until infantry / calvary can move in.

civ3 should represent this.

is it the same thing as the SMAC barrage (artillery) ?

[Gramphos]

UberKruX is right. Catapults are not used to shot stones on armies. And if it were it would be very ineffective if the armies not were extremely big. One person can avoid a shot from a catapult as a stone takes some time to fall. It is also hard to aim with it.

[Trifna]

Well I guess that throwing a big rock to some infantry is useless, but throwing all a bunch of little rocks, couldn't it be useful in some way? I personnally don't know, but I know it was used as such in Ages of Empires.

[Immortal Wombat]

Originally posted by Alfonsus72
As far as I know, in civ3 the human player has some chance to capture AI workers.
As workers could have a defense value of 0 (umm.. still not sure about that), will other units with a defensive value of 0, as catapults could have, be capturable?. Has anybody heard something about it?.
Guess we will have to wait and see... but that would be a nice new feature.

ala Cossacks, where it works very well, provided the player has the option of disbanding the cannon/catapult befor eit is captured, to prevent it being captured.

[Harlan]

If Catapults are taken as symbolic for the whole range of ancient wooden range (non-archery) weapons, then they could be used in non-seige battles. Don't you guys recall the opening battle of the movie Gladiator? The Romans were throwing all kinds of things at the barbarian army. The Romans had a lot of range weapons for that very purpose, since so many of their armies weren't based in fortified cities. Various mini-catapults about as tall as a person, some looking like large crossbows. Even if you don't hit people all the time, its a great fear weapon.

Anyways, if there's a chance to capture workers, then its probably a feature that can be turned on or off for each unit. So you could make your own mod that allows the capture of certain units, if the game doesn't come that way.

[korn469]

posted by dearmad
I think its silly they have to be "manned" the building of a unit should also represent the crew of the unit too- are we going to need to "man" battleships and the other naval units? How about missiles? Those need to be controlled by people too- tanks?

my thoughts exactly dearmad! manning a catapult adds nothing to gameplay, it adds little to strategy...the only thing it adds to is MICROMANAGEMENT! in civ you are the spirit of the civilization, not a company commander, or platoon leader

however i think (hope?) that manning units is a rumor, from the screen shots i've seen that a catapults stats are 0(4).0.1 so this means that it has no attack or defense values but instead has a bombard value like what was found in SMAC, so this means that a catapult can't actually kill any units (except for other bombard units), so in oder to make the best use of a bombard unit you'd need to operate it in coordination with normal units...using the catapult to soften up hardend targets like greek hoplites in a city and then once you weaken them you attack with legions to actually kill them...this is what i hope it means

if not, and if you actually have to continously have to stack other units with bombard units this will just be a major annoyance...if this idea gets in and M.A.D. doesn't then we know firaxis let one slip away!

[isaac brock]

I'm willing to bet cold hard cash that there will not be manning of catapults. Each unit you build is supposed to be built manned. Catapults will NOT be manned.

What i like is that you can use the catapults to destroy city walls. I never found artillery in SMAC to be anything more than a nuisance. Also, I have trouble with city walls in Civ sometimes. Some of the guys in there just wont die, and you have to have too big of an attack force for it to be worth my while. so i pump out diplomats for sabotage, but you don't know whether he'll get the city walls, and then you lose the fugging diplomat after each attempt. Thats why i like spies better, they wont die automatically. Which brings me to another threads topic, how will espionage be handled?

So many questions, I'm dizzy. Or maybe I'm just having a stroke.

[Bleyn]

On the subject of having to use another unit to man a catapult or cannon, I'm indifferent at this point. I'd rather wait and see what actually happens, and get better details.

On capturing, I'm all for it. Especially if a catapult or cannon unit is caught on its own. Yes they would have the crews serving the weapons, but with 17th-19th century cannon at least, they did not have enough, if any, organic infantry to really defend themselves. The best the artillery crews could often do on their own was spike the cannon to make them useless to enemy until a master gunsmith could repair it. And I would bet catapults had similar defensive issues.

I'd also like to see city walls do a disappearance, like the barracks do, when cannon appear. The straight up and down fortifications that were adequate for defense against a catapult were useless against all but the earliest cannon. The Alamo is a perfect example of this. It was a frontier garrison fortification that was perfectly adequate for defense against Native Americans and bandits with only small arms, but perfectly useless against the artillary of a real 19th century army. Those guys were just plain doomed and stupid to hole up in there like they did. They would have done much better to emulate the guerilla warfare tactics of the Revolutionary war.

And if there must be a post cannon city walls, limit it to only towns under a certain size. The fortifications required to protect a town against a siege with cannon just weren't feasible for the big cities.

[tuckson]

Hmmm,

I think a catapult WILL be useful against infantry, grouped in certain formations, like the famous roman Phalanx. In civ 2 phalanx is a Unit, but i.r.l. it was a formation of roman soldiers.
Those formations usually march straight ahead, unless the casualties become to big. So a catapult could at least break those formations, which otherwise would have been way to strong for the enemy.

A catapult to be used mainly as a bomarding unit of course makes sense, but then it must be possible to:
a: attack from a long range and
b: to defend it with other units.

And a long rang means out of reach of "normal units". And units like horse or something also should be considered as "normal units", so a striking distance of 2 makes no sense. At least make it 3 so a horse also needs 2 turns to reach a catapult.
In this case however, the catapult should hardly be able to kill the horse, though giving it some damage could be a possibility.

Grtx

[tuckson]

Hmmm,

I think a catapult WILL be useful against infantry, grouped in certain formations, like the famous roman Phalanx. In civ 2 phalanx is a Unit, but i.r.l. it was a formation of roman soldiers.
Those formations usually march straight ahead, unless the casualties become to big. So a catapult could at least break those formations, which otherwise would have been way to strong for the enemy.

A catapult to be used mainly as a bomarding unit of course makes sense, but then it must be possible to:
a: attack from a long range and
b: to defend it with other units.

And a long rang means out of reach of "normal units". And units like horse or something also should be considered as "normal units", so a striking distance of 2 makes no sense. At least make it 3 so a horse also needs 2 turns to reach a catapult.
In this case however, the catapult should hardly be able to kill the horse, though giving it some damage could be a possibility.

Grtx

[dainbramaged13]

Originally posted by UberKruX
cataoults are not traditionally used to fire at a group of chariots, iirc

they are used for barraging a fortress / castle / city and pummeling it until infantry / calvary can move in.

civ3 should represent this.

is it the same thing as the SMAC barrage (artillery) ?

you guys are too into the realism facotr.

the catapult is a gameplay issue, there for an early high-offense unit that can defeat high-def. units. maybe they could have named it better, but thats not my porblem

[Alfonsus72]

Well, I guess almost everybody here agree that captured catapults and cannons would be a nice feature. But, as many people here, I also HIGHLY DOUBT that could be in. We only have 2 argument to hope so:

- For 1st in the civilization saga (except colonization), at least an unit (the worker) will be capturable.

-Catapults, as worker, will have a defense value of 0, so they are defenseless, or, in firaxis terms, "have to be manned". So if your soldiers find a defenseless war machine alone, why do they have to destroy it instead of capture and use it?.

So, do you think this is enough?. Has somebody read something about the matter?

[Fiil]

Originally posted by Bleyn
The best the artillery crews could often do on their own was spike the cannon to make them useless to enemy until a master gunsmith could repair it. And I would bet catapults had similar defensive issues.

They did! Some catapults I saw was held together only by a single rope. The crew could if they wanted surrender or flee the battlefield distroy the catapult by cutting the rope. The entire potential force of the catapult would wrip it apart!!
This made capturing these catapults difficult!

[Urban Ranger]

I don't think you can compare worker units with catapult units and the like.

The value of a worker unit is in the men, while the value of a catapult unit is in the seige weapons. Men are unlikely to kill themselves to avoid capture, but they are very likely to destroy weapons and equipment.

[Gramphos]

Originally posted by Urban Ranger
I don't think you can compare worker units with catapult units and the like.

The value of a worker unit is in the men, while the value of a catapult unit is in the seige weapons. Men are unlikely to kill themselves to avoid capture, but they are very likely to destroy weapons and equipment.

You are probably right, but there should be real troops (with men) on the same square as the catapult to be able to disband it as I doubt they will have a self destruction mechanism .

[The Mad Viking]

Tuckson:
This is NOT a military simulation. Each tile represents about 200 miles. It is a STRATEGIC game. The game turn is a year. If you have a catapult against a cavalry battle, in the course of a year, the catapult will lose. It will not damage the horses some 600 miles away.

Cats, and their successors, cannon, were of mostly psychological value in battle. They disrupt and demoralize the defenders, and improve the morale of the attacking infantry.

(That is in addition to their primary role as an anti-structure weapon.)

It sounds to me that Civ3 is on the right track. As I suggested before, bombardment should have the opportunity to damage units similar to a spy's sabotage function.

And to the newbie struggling with city walls-
as you have found, you need an overwhelming superiority in attacking units to win through city walls. Veteran catapults will go about even against fortified pre-gunpowder infantry. Vet cannons will kick ass againt the same units. For musketeers, you will struggle even with vet cannons. Vet artillery will kick muskets, and will do ok against riflemen, about even with alps. Of course if you get a vet defender and the town is in a river square, yikes!
For these reasons, most prefer to wait for spies and sabotage the walls, or incite a revolt (best bet). You need an army of dips. Or wait until you have bombers / howizters which ignore city walls. Try taking out the capital city militarily, then incite a revolt inexpensively in the remaining cities. (if they're a rich civ, the capital will move, at a cost of 1500gold. )

[Steve Clark]

Originally posted by korn469
my thoughts exactly dearmad! manning a catapult adds nothing to gameplay, it adds little to strategy...the only thing it adds to is MICROMANAGEMENT! in civ you are the spirit of the civilization, not a company commander, or platoon leader

Well said, korn. I recall the debates we had early last year on those who wanted to turn Civ3 into SidQuartermaster. As others have mentioned, it is important to understand the scale of Civ games. You have to keep everything at the approriate level of play, else you will frustrate the gamer. Abstract units representing large armies are the appropriate level for a global strategy game. They do cost resources to build and maintain, but only at the large armies level. Any interactions below that abstract level would be so out of place in Civ that it would be more frustrating (and work) than enjoyable to play. That, imo, was the fatal flaw of EU, but I digress.

[lockstep]

Originally posted by The Mad Viking
Of course if you get a vet defender and the town is in a river square, yikes!

This shouldn´t happen anymore because, judging from the screenshots I´ve seen so far, rivers are flowing between tiles in Civ3.

[Fiil]

Originally posted by lockstep
This shouldn´t happen anymore because, judging from the screenshots I´ve seen so far, rivers are flowing between tiles in Civ3.

Wow nicely spotted lockstep , I'm not completely sure, but you could be right!! This would mean that unit movement and tile resources weren't affected anymore or a least affected in some other way than previously!!

[Grim Legacy]

Originally posted by Steve Clark


Well said, korn. I recall the debates we had early last year on those who wanted to turn Civ3 into SidQuartermaster. As others have mentioned, it is important to understand the scale of Civ games. You have to keep everything at the approriate level of play, else you will frustrate the gamer. Abstract units representing large armies are the appropriate level for a global strategy game. They do cost resources to build and maintain, but only at the large armies level. Any interactions below that abstract level would be so out of place in Civ that it would be more frustrating (and work) than enjoyable to play. That, imo, was the fatal flaw of EU, but I digress.

I agree with this as well.

However, the 'ranged barrage' type of warfare that similar units in SMAC had was pretty much completely useless and uninterestingly weak. I would have rather seen these catapults/cannons to be the real siege weapons.
Strong walled cities/fortresses were impregnable for most of history, without siege weapons of great power (which there really weren't too many before the advent of the 'super cannon', fist used by Mehmed II to ravage Constantinopel's famed city walls.

[Lemmy]

Originally posted by lockstep


This shouldn´t happen anymore because, judging from the screenshots I´ve seen so far, rivers are flowing between tiles in Civ3.

hadn't noticed it before, but you're right, here are some screenshots with rivers on them.
http://www.civ3.com/gallery.cfm

[Gramphos]

We may capture them

Originally posted by Dan Magaha FIRAXIS
Any unit with a defensive rating of zero is captured automatically when an enemy unit moves onto their square (unless there is another unit with a nonzero defensive value also on that square for defense)


Dan

[Stuie]

Originally posted by Gramphos
We may capture them

Outstanding!! I was hoping this was the case. This game is looking better and better all the time!

[Immortal Wombat]

Originally posted by Gramphos
We may capture them

Chinky