A Suggestion for Changing the way Units are upgraded

[WhiteElephants]

Not that this will ever be implemented in Civ3, but I was wondering why this series of games has relied on such a ridged structure of upgrading units. For instance, the leap from Cavalry to tank, or warrior to Legion, feels like too much of a "leap" in improvement.

I would suggest borrowing a system of upgrading units from RTS games like Warcraft where as you research a new "tech" upon completion every unit of a given type is given a small bonus, for example we'll say a +1 attack to warriors for discovering such and such a tech, or a +1 movement, then at some point in the tech tree it would be more advantagous for the player to build the pikemen or legion over the improved warrior (perhaps a lower cost or better stats). So rather than having hundreds of different units that need hundreds of new graphics you have the same graphic with altered stats.

What I'm getting at is a series of incremental upgrades that would set an early musketeer apart from a late modle musketeer. Perhaps the change would only be slight, but enough to suggests a small edge over the earlier modle. The unit would look the same, but it's stats could be modified in smaller increments rather than the larger jumps from say pikemen (or whatever unit come just before musketeers) to musketeers. The same would go for an early modle tank being weaker (I don't know how significantly) than a late modle tank.

I think the problems this would solve would be that there wouldn't be a tech that winds up being the end all to be all once you accquire it as a civ that isn't far behind you would still have units that are nearly comparalbe and you wouldn't have ancient units destroying modern units as the modern units would have several small, but significant advances. Nor would you have to constantly upgrade units as they would be automatically upgraded by the discovery of a new tech, the cost for the upgrade could be considered to be in the cost of researching the new tech.

I would also imagine that this would create different tech b-lines as some people might prefer an upgraded air attack over an upgraded howitzer attack, or better infantry defense for that matter.

This not need only apply to units as an imporved city walls tech, improved banking tech, better airport tech, etc., etc., would also add different b-lines and ways to play.

Or I suppose we could leave the system as it is as it seems the differences between units aren't all that much. Just a thought anyhow.

Suggestions, critiques, flames?

[GePap]

While the RTS way of upgrading is fine, it would probably be too complex for this game as it is structured. Would the upgrade techs be part of the tech tree? i.e. Spare parts leads to Infantry 1, artillery 1. Now you can research Infantry 2... and so forth? If so we would need a huge number of techs and the science system would have to be changed. It worked in RTS because you could have almost every building doing the upgrading (barracks updating X, while stable updating Y) at the same time, but everything in civ works in lines. So you may still be in ancient times by 500a.d simply because you chose to create the best spearmen possbile- but now your opponent has knights, so doh! Also, what about upgrading UU's? This would lead to unique techs too. A big question is, how much better could one get. Spearmen are 1/2/1, pikemen 1/3/1. So how much better can the best pikeman be without being better than a pikeman, and so forth since most defense values specially don't change that dramatically unitl late in the game. The most plausible way to do this would be to add more units and space them out, so lets say that gunpowder gives you musketment, but the metalurgy gives you musketeers (I don't mean the french UU, buit a better musketman since there is a huge diff between an musketman of 1500 and one of 1700, which is still not a rifleman.)

[N. Machiavelli]

It's a pretty good idea, but it will mean expanding upon the tech tree a great deal. For example, what makes that early arquebuser less advanced than the Naploeonic-era musketmen? Wheellock, matchlock, rifling, blackpowder, bullet design? Would the discovery of military tactics offer those advancements? Would Steam power?

[Skanky Burns]

I actually think thats a good idea.

[Monoriu]

I like the idea

[Hunter Hutchins]

I like it...

Really what I want is a way to upgrade units so they don't have to be loaded with resources, improvements, and in the capital...I still haven't figured out why some cities with lots of stuff can't upgrade their infantry to mech inf.

[WhiteElephants]

While the RTS way of upgrading is fine, it would probably be too complex for this game as it is structured. Would the upgrade techs be part of the tech tree?

I was envisioning the upgrades to be applied on top of the tech tree that we already have and they would come with the discovery of certain techs. Meaning you wouldn't have to discover a tech and then discover an upgrade seperately, but as you point out the differences are already quite minimal. Perhaps having larger attack/defense numbers to begin with would open some doors to small incrimental advances between the two. For instance, if a spearman was 20 defense and a pikemen was 30 you could fit a +5 defense in there and still maintain the original defense ratio of the units. By this method as you go up the tech tree in pursuit of other more advanced unit you are at the same time adding/upgrding the units you have available until you reach the point where building the new type of unit is better/cheaper/etc. I was thinking that at the point where a new unit is available (say from spearmen to pikemen) there ought to be an upgrade cost, but from the progression of early model spearmen to late model spearmen (perhaps only 1 or 2 upgrades as it's a very primitive unit) the upgrades would be automatic with the tech discovery and be free.

It's a pretty good idea, but it will mean expanding upon the tech tree a great deal. For example, what makes that early arquebuser less advanced than the Naploeonic-era musketmen? Wheellock, matchlock, rifling, blackpowder, bullet design? Would the discovery of military tactics offer those advancements? Would Steam power?

I was hoping this would work with the tech tree available only there'd be bonus included in certain advances already in the game. As for the rationale behind certain advances I do not know (I'll leave that to you realists to hash out). I was coming at this from a game play perspective and couldn't quite understand why they hadn't taken this approach before.

[GePap]

Would we be able to see the difference? You would need to have either a number next to the units that changed as they upgraded, or have a slightly different graphic for each. Would the computer be able to handle this very well either?- since the values of units, both for itself and I would be constantly changing i would think that the A.I. would have a hard time figuring this out (since what you have basically done is found a simple way to add many, many more units) and keeping up ( and still probably refusing to upgrade things)

[WhiteElephants]

Originally posted by GePap
Would we be able to see the difference? You would need to have either a number next to the units that changed as they upgraded, or have a slightly different graphic for each. Would the computer be able to handle this very well either?- since the values of units, both for itself and I would be constantly changing i would think that the A.I. would have a hard time figuring this out (since what you have basically done is found a simple way to add many, many more units) and keeping up ( and still probably refusing to upgrade things)

Sure, I was thinking that the numbers A/D/HP would change (there is a way to check this, no?), the graphics changing would be too much. I don't know whether the AI would keep up, but the upgrades would come to it as it moves up the tech tree regardless. For instance, as the AI moves up the tech tree from spearmen to pikemen there would be a "bonus upgrade" included in a tech that is somewhere inbetween the two. Whether or not it knows it has a slight advantage and uses it, I do not know, but I was under the impression that the AI is checking its attack vs. the player's defense since I had heard it was avoiding the senseless combat of ramming it's horsemen endlessly against a pikemen of the mountains scenario.

[Blaupanzer]

Originally posted by Hunter Hutchins
I still haven't figured out why some cities with lots of stuff can't upgrade their infantry to mech inf.

City needs a barracks to do an upgrade. Uses the unit's move points. So if you send a unit to a city with a barracks to be upgraded, it can't teturn to the city of origin until the next turn.