4. Units

Units

Units both offer mobility to your civilization and supply the violence with which it will survive and expand. The available units may be classified as military units, whose talents are those of defense and aggression (warriors, phalanx, archers and horsemen), and a few noncombatants which support expansion (explorers and settlers), diplomacy (the diplomat and spy), and trade (caravans and freight). The support of your units will be one of your major expenses because of each unit requires gold.

Under representative governments, aggressive units standing outside your visibility radius of your cities each cause one worker to become unhappy. This makes war quite expensive under representative government, since gold are required to support each unit and luxury points must be produced to mollify the citizenry.

Movement

Units begin with movement time, depending upon their step time and time accumulation — shown for each unit in the catalog below. The accumulation reduced, for damaged land and sea units, in proportion to the extent of their damage.

Movement time of the unit

Every action undertaken by a unit consumes movement time. The most basic action is movement. Units can move into any of the eight surrounding squares under fairly obvious constraints: land units are confined to land and transport vessels; ships are confined to ocean squares and port cities (which are thus the only cities that can build them); and aircraft ignore terrain, though they must often end their turn where they can refuel — see the description of each unit for specific restrictions. Moving one square usually consumes one unit of movement time. Rough terrain, however, can be more costly for land units as detailed in the terrain catalog.

Enemy units impose zones of control, such that military units, settlers, workers, and engineers cannot move between squares adjacent to enemy units without retreating into unthreatened territory first, unless the square they enter already holds a friendly city or unit, or the unit is one that ignores zones of control. Note also that land units can embark and disembark from transports whenever the transport is adjacent to land or another transport — this does not require ports or other facilities. Land units can move instantly between airports in friendly cities with the airlift action. An airport can participate in only one airlift per turn.

Catalog

Several schemes are possible for organizing the variety of units available in Golden Age of Civilizations. This table arranges them chronologically: each of the eras in the following table groups units which require similar numbers of advances before they can be built.

The production cost, the purchase cost and the support cost specifies the economy of the unit, how many production points or gold a city must invest to build, purchase and support one unit. The fog radius (Fr) specifies how many squares see the unit. Next comes (Mt) the movement time and the (St) step accumulation of the unit. The combat statistics (As) attack strength, (Ds) defense strength are all explained in the section describing combat.

• Fr: Fog radius
• Mt: Movement time
• St: Step accumulation
• As: Attack strength
• Ds: Defense strength
• Ca: Capacity
• Pr: Production cost
• Pu: Purchase cost
• Su: Support cost

Era	Name	Fr	Mt	St	As	Ds	Ca	Pr	Pu	Su
Bronze	Settlers	2	120	4	5	50	0	100	1,000	10
Bronze	Warriors	2	30	4	10	5	0	10	100	1
Bronze	Workers	2	30	4	1	10	0	20	200	2
Bronze	Horsemen	4	15	8	20	5	0	40	400	4
Bronze	Archers	3	30	4	10	10	0	20	200	2
Bronze	Phalanx	2	60	2	5	10	0	10	100	1
Iron	Trireme	2	30	4	20	10	2	40	400	4
Iron	Chariot	4	15	8	20	10	0	40	400	4
Iron	Catapult	2	120	1	100	10	0	100	1,000	10
Iron	Legion	2	30	4	40	20	0	80	800	8
Iron	Diplomat	4	15	8	1	1	0	40	400	4
Exploration	Explorer	4	15	16	5	5	0	40	400	4
Exploration	Caravan	3	60	4	5	20	0	100	1,000	10
Exploration	Pikemen	2	30	8	10	100	0	100	1,000	10
Exploration	Knights	4	15	16	100	50	0	200	2,000	20
Exploration	Caravel	2	30	8	50	25	5	200	2,000	20
Gunpowder	Galleon	2	30	8	10	100	5	1,000	10,000	100
Gunpowder	Frigate	3	30	8	200	100	2	1,000	10,000	100
Gunpowder	Ironclad	3	30	8	100	100	0	500	5,000	50
Gunpowder	Musketeers	3	30	8	200	200	0	500	5,000	50
Gunpowder	Dragoons	4	15	16	200	50	0	500	5,000	50
Gunpowder	Cannon	3	120	2	500	50	0	2,000	20,000	200
Gunpowder	Engineers	3	30	8	10	100	0	2,500	25,000	250
Industrial	Transport	4	30	8	20	200	10	5,000	50,000	500
Industrial	Destroyer	4	30	8	500	100	0	5,000	50,000	500
Industrial	Riflemen	3	30	8	500	250	0	2,500	25,000	250
Industrial	Cavalry	4	15	16	1,000	500	0	10,000	100,000	1,000
Industrial	Alpine troops	3	30	8	500	500	0	5,000	50,000	500
Industrial	Freight	3	15	16	25	250	0	5,000	50,000	500
Modern	Spy	5	30	12	10	10	0	5,000	50,000	500
Modern	Cruiser	5	30	12	1,000	1,000	0	50,000	500,000	5,000
Modern	Battleship	5	30	12	500	500	0	25,000	250,000	2,500
Modern	Submarine	5	30	12	2,000	200	0	50,000	500,000	5,000
Modern	Marines	3	30	12	1,000	500	0	25,000	250,000	2,500
Modern	Partisan	3	30	12	500	500	0	10,000	100,000	1,000
Modern	Artillery	3	60	6	5,000	250	0	100,000	1,000,000	10,000
Modern	Fighter	5	15	24	2,000	1,000	0	50,000	500,000	5,000
High-tech	AEGIS cruiser	5	30	12	5,000	5,000	0	250,000	2,500,000	25,000
High-tech	Carrier	5	30	12	500	5,000	10	250,000	2,500,000	25,000
High-tech	Armor	4	30	12	2,000	1,000	0	50,000	500,000	5,000
High-tech	Mech. inf.	4	15	24	1,000	1,000	0	25,000	250,000	2,500
High-tech	Howitzer	4	60	6	10,000	1,000	0	250,000	2,500,000	25,000
High-tech	Paratroopers	4	30	12	1,000	500	0	10,000	100,000	1,000
High-tech	Helicopter	5	15	24	2,000	500	0	100,000	1,000,000	10,000
High-tech	Bomber	5	15	24	5,000	500	0	250,000	2,500,000	25,000
High-tech	AWACS	8	15	24	50	1,000	0	500,000	5,000,000	50,000
High-tech	Nuclear	4	15	24	25,000	50	0	1,000,000	10,000,000	100,000
High-tech	Cruise missile	4	15	24	10,000	50	0	500,000	5,000,000	50,000
Space	Stealth bomber	8	15	24	5,000	1,000	0	1,000,000	10,000,000	100,000
Space	Stealth fighter	8	15	24	5,000	1,0000	0	2,000,000	20,000,000	200,000

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