A new mod enters the ring - Introducing "Close to Home"

[Charriu]

Oh I'm not denying that PRO is weaker (economcially) then ORG and I would change something with it. I just wanted to state that it isn't as weak as PB59 makes it.

[civac2]

Forts (bunkers) working for enemy and paratroopers (drop pod units) attacking after air drop are both a bit of a problem in Smac. I'm not sure implementing those in Civ4 is a good idea. With the latter you could nuke cities and then collect them with paratroopers. Is that the intentional use case? Seems very (too?) powerful.

[Tarkeel]

Back in PB58, Corellia was slotted for building nukes, pulling in about 300 hpt.

[DaveV]

2. I agree that nukes felt a little bit too powerful in PB59. If you make nukes 1 tile only, it could be worth reverting their cost. A big part of their strength in PB59 seemed to me to be area control, which is hugely nerfed by that change. I don't hate the idea, though.  Another option could be adding more drawback to their use, but I'm not sure how civ could represent that. 

How about a big unhappy hit (+2 per city per use? +5?). Mouseover would say "No Nukes!" or something similar.

[Charriu]

2. I agree that nukes felt a little bit too powerful in PB59. If you make nukes 1 tile only, it could be worth reverting their cost. A big part of their strength in PB59 seemed to me to be area control, which is hugely nerfed by that change. I don't hate the idea, though.  Another option could be adding more drawback to their use, but I'm not sure how civ could represent that. 

How about a big unhappy hit (+2 per city per use? +5?). Mouseover would say "No Nukes!" or something similar.

That is a possibility, but keep in mind that nuclear strikes already increase war weariness by a good amount and cause unhappiness via that. Then again a lot of people here hate WW and don't want to play with it.

[Miguelito]

I've got a few takeaways from PB59 that I wanted to put up for discussion. These mostly refer to modern warfare issues that maybe had not ever come up. Admittedly they may not ever again.

1. ...
   
2. I fear nukes are still overpowered....
   
3. Nukes off boats are sillily overpowered. A nav 2 submarine with tactical nukes has an effective range of 13 to obliterate stacks of arbitrary sizes - that is more than any other unit in the game, however promoted. And the only remotely viable way to even spot it beforehand in advance are freaking stealth destroyers (unless your opponent has their own), because you can't see it from the air and you would need to maintain a destroyer/sub screen more than 1 turn of movement in front of your actual fleet/army/city, ready to be picked up every turn. Missile cruisers have even more range, but they can be seen and they are on a tech that serious people would never research anyways. Proposed solutions (pick any amount): Make nukes (not guided missile) range 1 when firing off a boat (need range 2 if you maintain the blast radius to avoid nuking yourself); increase movement cost for ships by 100%-200% when loaded with nukes (so moving a tile would cost 2-3 movement points); brute force: Have submarines start with maybe 3 movement points and nav1+2. But I'd rather not nerf subs because they are already useless for anything but as a missile launch pad (that's maybe a different issue that the mod should adress)
   
4. ...
   

1. ....
   
2. ...
   
3. I think PB59 exacerbated this a lot. So much sea, and so little land that was safe from it. I'm not convinced a change here is necessary, especially if nukes are changed as above. 
   
4. ...
   

Actually this would be the one that I am adamant about. All you need for this to come into full effect is a shared sea that is >10 or so tiles wide. Off the top of my head, PB 52, 53, 54, 55, 56, 57, 58, 60 and 63 would all have been effected by this significantly if the games had reached that era. Some less than 59, some even more I would argue (60...). A range of 5 tiles into inland is a lot on nearly any map (6 if you capture a port)! And with seas sufficiently wide, the strike comes from out of sight and if accompanied by a reasonable fleet it can't even be spotted ahead feasibly.

And yes, disabling WW breaks so many things.

On forts: they don't work in enemy territory, because otherwise that defender could be screwed by the fort they built, having to work against its defense bonus when invading troops occupy it.  This problem dates back to SMAC, where nobody built forts (bunkers) on defense since they became a liability for an attacker to occupy.

If you want to get use of a fort in enemy territory, conquer the city whose culture holds that square, so it isn't in enemy territory any more.

So for once, nobody in our games builds forts for defense either. We use them as canals, and maybe later on as airfields? Apart from their very limited usefulness for defense they are also very costly to build in terms of worker turns. Charriu, up for a general fort rework ?
But I don't quite get the problem either. If an attacker takes my stuff they should get an advantage from it, so I'll have to think well where I want a fort and where rather not.

And usually I do not only have to conquer the next city but often also 2 more around it, then wait until they get out of revolt and possibly pop borders. And if one of the covering cities happens to be on an unreachable island... I disgress

But admittedly I had not thought of this:

Forts (bunkers) working for enemy and paratroopers (drop pod units) attacking after air drop are both a bit of a problem in Smac. I'm not sure implementing those in Civ4 is a good idea. With the latter you could nuke cities and then collect them with paratroopers. Is that the intentional use case? Seems very (too?) powerful.

Maybe rebasing air units and missiles to the fort would be too powerful. Although I would not be too worried about nukes: they would be visible and could be defended against or avoided by evacuation. If possible you would still want to fire off a boat. This btw is another reason why nukes are so powerful off boats, you don't see them when loaded.

[Mjmd]

So for once, nobody in our games builds forts for defense either.

FYI Ramk used them to excellent effect defensively vs both GKC and myself. VS GKC basically he had unlimited defensive positions to use his collateral / stacks against GKCs more advanced armies. VS me he was annoying putting 1 crossbow with hill defense in forts along key parts of my path to slow down my advance and bleed troops.

[Ginger()]

The problem with forts in my mind was always how ridiculously long they took. 10 worker turns is a bit much.

[Tarkeel]

The other problem with forts is of course that they deny any other improvement on the tile. This is especially troublesome for a serfdom economy, in which grass-hills are some of the best tiles.

One option (I don't know if this is possible to do): A fort can be used as a canal by either the tile owner or tile controller. Ie, you'd need to take control of the tile with ground troops to get the canal effect.

[Miguelito]

One option (I don't know if this is possible to do): A fort can be used as a canal by either the tile owner or tile controller. Ie, you'd need to take control of the tile with ground troops to get the canal effect.

Oh yes that's what I meant to propose. Along with also granting the defense bonus to the occupying player,  but that's an afterthought really. 
 
I would also like for Open Borders to enable to use a friendly player's canal (in that case without granting a defense bonus)