How good are your city walls?

[Grumbold]

Well here is what it says in "The List"

quote: 2. 3 levels of city walls: a. Barricades, available right off the bat. Costs 40 shields, doubles defense, doesn’t protect population. b. City walls, cost 80 shields, exactly like the current city walls. c. Fortifications, cost 120 shields, available with Labor Union or something. Doubles defense against conventional and Howitzer attacks, provides +50% defense against air attacks. Protects population.

Here is my alternative:
Small City Walls (masonry): Provides Infantry with +50% defence, protects cities of size <=6 against population loss. 40 shields. 2+ Garrison units required.

Large City Walls (masonry): Provides Infantry with +50% defence, protects cities <=12 against population loss. 80 shields. 3+ Garrison units required.

Small City Fortifications (gunpowder): Provides Infantry and Artillery with +50% defence, protects cities of size <=8 against population loss. 100 shields. 2+ Garrison units required.

Large City Fortifications (gunpowder): Provides Infantry and Artillery with +50% defence, protects cities <=16 against population loss. 200 shields. 3+ Garrison units required.

Keep (concrete): Provides 1 Infantry unit only with +100% defence, does not protect population. Not cumulative with city wall but applies when only 1 defending unit remains. Last unit of pop cannot be lost unless the keep falls. 100 shields.

Castle (engineering): Provides 1 infantry unit only with +200% defence, does not protect population. Not cumulative with city wall but applies when only 1 defending unit remains. Last unit of pop cannot be lost unless the keep falls. 200 shields.

How it works (assuming combat stacks in Civ3) Large city walls apply if defender has enough garrison. Once down to 2 units, the defender retreats to the inner walls (if any) and loses a pop point if population >6. Small city walls applies until one defender destroyed, then the last unit may use a fort/castle to further protect itself, but the city must at this point lose a pop point unless is size 1 (not cumulative).

With the advent of the Rifleman and Artillery, cities automatically provide defending infantry and artillery with +50% defensive bonus but all city walls and castles become ineffective against attackers with these troops. They can be sold for a 1-off production boost (stone used for building construction) or retained for a small fixed trade income (tourism).

Too complicated? or just complicated enough?
[This message has been edited by Grumbold (edited December 20, 2000).]
[This message has been edited by Grumbold (edited December 20, 2000).]

[Yog-Sothoth]

I don't know about you others, but to complicated for me
Just haveing a couple of different walls like the ones described in the list is good enough for me.

Also in modern times there are limited use for city walls. There should instead be several "replacements":
-A bonus for infantry defending against armor inside the city.
- You should be able to entrench (is that the right word?) units around your city.
- Build bunkers and fixed guns.

[Yog-Sothoth]

Maybee i should not have used the word modern, I was thinking of the period from lets say 1850 till today. In the ww1 and ww2 there were widespread use of trenches and bunkers.

I agree that with the introduction of missiles they become less usefull, but not obsolete. Not every civ will have a bunch of missiles to trow around.

I think trenches and bunkers can replacement both city walls and forts, and be built like an tile improvement.

[Diablo, Bro. of Mephisto]

I have to agree with Yog-Sothoth on this one. except in modern times there would be the SAM sites to pretect from missiles and air attacks. naturally, of course not against nukes, I dont even think there should be a SDI defense, way too unrealistic.

On the thing with the SDI defense, there should not be one, and if there are going to be, then the missile would still detonate in the air, before it landed, still causing massive damage, and the defense should only have a 50% chance of thwarting the attack.

[Grumbold]

I can't think of a single modern city which has any defensive emplacements. Long distance missiles have made such things pretty pointless. Bunkers around your city can be accomplished by fortifying units on an ajacent tile with the fort improvement.

[Grumbold]

I have always disliked the concept of total invulnerabiluty to nukes, too. Of course, we shouldn't be using nukes much, should we?

If the SDI resulted in a 50/50 chance of halting the missile and got more effective with further tech advances I would be happier. The defender also needs to be able to launch an immediate retaliatory strike. In the pollution thread we discussed the pointlessness of nuking enemy cities anyway - there should be nothing left worth occupying.