[Freeciv-Dev] Re: Artillery and sea units (PR#1476)

["Ross W. Wetmore" <rwetmore@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

At 12:26 AM 02/05/22 -0400, Daniel L Speyer wrote:
>On Tue, 21 May 2002, Thanasis Kinias wrote:
[...]
>Hmm, I never like starting from scratch if I can help it.  Here's the list
>of changes I've been thinking of making:
>
>Rename Leadership, Conscription, and Tactics
>  historical accuracy, basic descriptiveness
>
>Swap Writing and Alphabet
>  historical accuracy and basic logic.  What's the point of an alphabet
>  without writing?

I think of writing as in recording or disseminating epic poetry or Plato's
works. It also requires ink/paper or something other than stone blocks as
a reasonable recording medium to reach necessary efficiencies.

There was no real proliferation of writing and written records until
*after* there were standardized alphabets. Pictographs just don't make
a really accurate way to record the spoken word and turn it into the
written word.

>Swap Map Making and Seafaring
>  logic: seafaring should get you boats, map making should help you make
>  maps

I typically move explorers to map-making and like to see them appear 
earlier in the game.

But there is an issue with moving triremes to Seafaring (not bad in
itself) in that the progression of boat improvements comes pretty
rapidly. Also, you need techs that teach triremes how to float along
the subsequent tree.

>Make Feudalism require Monarchy and Iron Working
>  gameplay: make ancient units (esp chariots and legions) useful.
>  also logic/history: you realy want to try a stone pike?

Pikes were largely made of wood - weilding an 18 ft iron bar is a 
trifle demanding. Bronze was the mainstay after stone for quiet a 
long time as the material for the weapon tips/heads.

I like to see Feudalism a little earlier in the tech tree and
Iron Working tends to be a bit far on, maybe Bronze Working?

The real irritant though is that pikemen were typically the defence
against heavy cavalry, and knights appear *after* this. The Greek
phalanx after which pikemen were modelled was pretty good against
Persian light cavalry or chariots.

Maybe Feudalism could also boost Horsemen into something more useful
as in 2a1d1h -> 3a2d1h - Roman heavy cavalry, Arthurian knights or
Chinese armoured horse. But it would need Horseback Riding or at 
least the Wheel in its back-tree. The alternative is to have some 
tech in parallel that upgrades horsemen rather than one big jump to 
knights.

>Swap Musketeers and Canon
>  gameplay: musketeers are too powerful
>  history: canons came first
>  (note: this makes ironclads even more powerful, maybe we should raise
>         their cost to balance it out?)

No, make Legions a little more powerful. They should be 3a/2d/2h
where the hit points gives them a little more staying power that
boosts both attack and defense modes. They are then mini-musketeers.

>Rename Engineering
>  usability: it doesn't get you engineers
>
>Rename howitzers
>  history: we had howitzers in WWI -- we sure didn't have robots
>
>That's not that long a list.  A lot of it is just fixing
>naming.  Admittedly, I haven't tackled the late navy, which has both
>historical and gameplay problems.  What do other people think?
>
>--Daniel Speyer
>If you *don't* consider sharing information to be morally equivalent to 
>kidnapping and murder on the high seas, you probably shouldn't use the
>phrase "software piracy."