About Firepower

[FrantzX]

Many people are complaining about the lack of firepower. Most bring up the story of the pikeman or so kill a tank. They say that because of firepower, this rarely happened in Civ II. Checking my Civ II tech/unit/terrain poster which is still above my bed, I found out somethng very interesting. The tank has the same firepower of every ground unit in the game: 1.

Also only 13 out of 51 units in the whole game have a firepower that is NOT 1. These 13 are modern artilery, planes, and ships. Of these 13, all the firepowers EXCEPT for one is 2. The only one with 3 is the cruise missle.

It is just me, or did firepower not have that much of an effect in Civ II combat?

[Venger]

A good observation - but you also didn't note that mustketeers and other post gunpowder era units now have 2 hit points. Which acts to halve the opponents effective firepower.

HP and Firepower are two sides of the same combat effect. However, you are correct in noting that musketeers have 1 firepower. They do have two hit points however, meaning you will hardly ever see archers defeat musketeers...

Venger

[Dis]

not to be picky, ok I am picky

artillery and howitzers were the only ground units to have a fp of 2.

and amazingly they are both the best city busters. we only used tanks because they were mobile than artillery but they have 1 less fp than artillery.

edit: oh you did mention modern artillery. I missed that.

and yes hit points was a big difference in the 2 games.

[Venger]

Originally posted by Dissident
not to be picky, ok I am picky

artillery and howitzers were the only ground units to have a fp of 2.

and amazingly they are both the best city busters. we only used tanks because they were mobile than artillery but they have 1 less fp than artillery.

I hate to be picky, but they were the best city busters because they IGNORED CITY WALLS. The 2 firepower helps, but again, it's the flipside of firepower, I've seen veteran fortified mechanized infantry in a river square defeat artillery, and not all that uncommonly at that. More likely you just end up with a damaged howitzer though...

You'd love my unreleased Civ2 Can O Whoopass mod pack. Includes rocket artillery, modeled after the MLRS requiring Rocketry and Ballistic Targeting, 3 move, 14 attack, 3 FP. BAM! Now that'll bust up a city. Of course, Main Battle Tanks are around waiting to sweep up MLRS...

and yes hit points was a big difference in the 2 games.

People forget or just don't understand the HP and firepower differences between these games. In Civ2, a 1 HP unit actually had *10* hit points. Combined with firepower, this meant that units of different eras performed like you'd expect, and how they really did when facing each other... a 10 HP combat round eliminates alot of the "wierd" outcomes that a 3 or 4, even 5 hp round contest allows...

Venger

[Dis]

only howitzers ignored city walls I believe (I could be wrong- it has been a long time). but I'm pretty sure artillery doesn't ignore walls.

[Venger]

Originally posted by Dissident
only howitzers ignored city walls I believe (I could be wrong- it has been a long time). but I'm pretty sure artillery doesn't ignore walls.

You are correct - artillery's advantage is 10 attack points with 2 firepower in the age of the musketeer and rifleman. Even city walls won't keep them safe. By the time the howitzer rolls, most civs have either Alpine Troops (I renamed these to light infantry, alpine troops are a stupid name) or mech infantry, which will lay waste to artillery...

Venger