11-12-1999 20:54									#1
	Watch Tower tile improvements: who uses radar? Support Apolyton, buy Civilization 2

Does anybody actually use radar?

I don't. And I got tired of having to build 3 or 4 lawyers and march them around my civ everyturn searching for vile interlopers. Very time consuming.

Now I realize I could just build lawyers (and spies or diplomats, depending on the stage of the game) and fortify them, but that seems silly.

So I modified the installations:

Was: "Radar Station"
Now: "AI Scanner"
Vision: 10
Radar: 25 (why not?)
Cost: 1200
Avail: AI Surveillance
Sees: Subversives, Trade Units, Normals (0,3,4)

Was: "Listening Post"
Now: "Watch Tower"
Vision: 5
Radar: none
Cost: 800
Avail: Optics
Sees: Subversives, Normals (0,4) (like diplomat)

Advantages: long-range vision comes earlier. Don't need to station diplomats in all corners of empire. But, the ability to see slvers and abolitionists and clerics does not come so soon that the AI cannot use them effectively. Mostly, it's just a convenience.

Wheathin

	13-12-1999 13:50									#2
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The first time I built a radar, I couldn't even figure out what it did. I finally saw that it revealed ships around it, but to this day I am not sure if it works properly for land units, and I sure don't know if it reveals special units.

Giving watchtowers the ability to see stealth and/or terror units would effectively eliminate the usefulness of those units against civs that made good use of towers.
And as far as I know, the AI doesn't know how to build watchtowers, so this new ability would solely benefit the human. (Actually, the only installation that the AI *does* seem to know about is air bases, which they put in stupid places, anyhow.)

Btw, Wheathin, I wasn't annoyed or anything that you brought this up in the Med mod thread, but I do think that it's best for users if we restrict that thread to questions and comments about things already in the mod.

	13-12-1999 19:07									#3
	Support Apolyton

Wes,

I had noticed the AI doesn't use the listening posts in the game much. But then, since it generally lacks any strategic ability, I guess extending its vision range would be of limited utility. If the Awesome AIPs improves the AI's ability to plan lang-range attacks, maybe it should also have it build more vision installations?

As to obsoleting terror and stealth units, note that my Scanner only sees subversives and trade units. I had thought of the same problem, but solved it two ways:

1. The Scanner is available well after the development of the units it can see. Scanner comes with AI Surv, while it sees Lawyers (Democ), Corp Branches (Corp), and Televangelists (Mass Media). Thus, there is a wide window for use of those units. And, of course, by that point the computer shouldn't be using clerics, slavers, or abolitionists anyways.

2: Scanner can't see the most insidious units: terror and stealth. You will still have to build spies/cyber ninjas to look out for the nasties (vision class 5) and stealth planes/stealth subs to spot other stealthy units (classes 6 and 2).

3. The same argument currently applies worse to submarines - as soon as you can build them, you can also build the sonar buoy (cheap!!) to see them.

My aim here was to make it easier for the human player and the AI.
AI: if the AI would ever build the damn things, it wouldn't be so easy for humans to endlessly franchise a whole empire without worries about getting caught.

Human: usually, I'll get franchised or sued once. Then I build 3 or 4 lawyers, and spend the next 10 turns patrolling my roads and coasts; and maybe build a few more to station in my largest cities. But after 10 turns of walking these guys back and forth over and over again, it gets annoying. So i stop - and a few turns later I get hit again. Not because the AI is crafty, but only because I don't want to triple the length of my turns.
Same for diplomats in the mid-game.

But, while I have enjoyed it, the AI seems to be indifferent.

Question: even if the AI could plan, would the watch towers help it?

Wheathin

Only mildly related minor question: how do you capture another player's tile improvement? The AI keeps swiping my watch towers!

	14-12-1999 05:53									#4
	Full PM-box? Change here!

I haven't come across any code for telling the AI how to use any of the installations, so I don't know how to help it in using them.

I have also been a little confused as to how control of the watchtowers works. Sometimes, if you take control of a city with a tower within its radius, you get control of the tower. Sometimes, though, it seems that you don't.

Writing this has made me remember games where the AI *did* use towers, so I was wrong about that in the previous post. I still don't know what to do about *how* the AI uses them, though.

	14-12-1999 18:15									#5
	Remove this text

Wes, were those towers perhaps in the radius of another AI city as well as the one you captured?

	15-12-1999 03:17									#6
	Avatar Enlargement: We've got the solution

Hi All,

You can "capture" an enemy public work only if it is within a city radius that you control. First you move a unit onto that public work, then you wait till the next turn and place a worker on it. This works with farms, mines, and even nets. If you don't want the AI to capture it back, you will need to keep the unit fortified or in the case of boats, sentried, on that location. Presumably, you could "capture" a listening post or whatever in a similar manner. In the case of a listening post, all it may take is fortifying a unit that belongs to you on top of it. I have never had occation to try that, so I don't know. Seems that the AI has done this to me once a long time ago, but I may be wrong there.

Regards,
Timothy Pintello

	15-12-1999 08:59									#7
	Full PM-box? Change here!

Paul, I can't remember. Sorry.

	15-12-1999 10:22									#8
	Support Apolyton, buy Alpha Centauri

I have used radar, but mostly out of curiosity. Similarly with CD's satellite. I really like the idea of a mod which incorporates the changes you discuss in one of Nordicus' ubiquitous threads. All of our present technology is at least mostly derived from that of previous times. Besides, the more to choose from, the happier most of us are, I think.

I'd really like to use your mod should you ever make it. One addition, though:

Balloon -- a precursor to actual powered flight, it's not really a medieval technology, but I think quite suitable to be added to the mod, as it is a Renaissance unit. Limited sight capabilities (range of 3, maybe?), and no defensive abilities whatsoever. Still...it'd look cool!

Keep us posted!