Civilization: Alternate Way To Use Military
An interesting idea was forwarded to me while I was thinking about Civ variants, soon after my article "Beyond the Eleventh Card" was published in the General. I forget who it was from, but I like it better than my original proposal and also better than the current rule. It is this (in modified form): The Military card does not alter the movement order. Instead, a player who has the Military card can create professional armies. At the end of the population expansion phase as many tokens as desired can be converted to armies by flipping them over on the board. In conflicts an army token causes another side without army tokens to remove tokens first (though this advantage is cancelled if the side without Military has Metalworking and the side with Military doesn't). In addition, the side without army tokens removes two tokens each time a removal is required. In conflict an army token must be removed before a normal token. If both sides or neither side have armies, normal conflict applies, but the above advantages may accrue to one player in the middle of the conflict if the other runs out of army tokens first. One or more army tokens attacking a city of a player without Military reduces by one the number of tokens required to attack and the number of tokens the city is replaced with. This is cumulative with the effects of Engineering held by the attacker and/or the defender. If the city of a player who holds Military is attacked by a player without armies, the city must be attacked by one more token, and the city is replaced by one more token (again cumulative with Engineering), but the city is replaced with only normal tokens.
Armies do count for population limits, but do not count for city support and cannot be used for population expansion. They can be flipped back to their normal side, but only at the end of the next population expansion phase. The Military card per se does not aggravate calamities. Instead, each army token on the board during the calamity phase causes one extra loss due to the appropriate calamity.
I never liked the published effects of Military. It confers no advantage whatever on a small civilization that will move last anyway. Small cultures are more likely to be attacked by bellicose neighbors bent on plunder and they are the ones who need help the most. This rule gives a much more useful role in battle and can be used by small cultures as well. The catch is that you have to have the economy to support a large investment in soldiers. Small elite raiding forces should be cost effective, but large wars of conquest will still be difficult (except perhaps in the Imperial variant).
I haven't play tested this idea, but it ought to be fun.