ICP & Bonus Squares

[Geronimo]

Originally posted by vmxa1
Geronimo I think Dom meant human players would hold back those two move settlers, not the AI.

With respect to my question about the AI 'holding back' their settlers I wasn't referring at all to the kind of 'holding back' that DOm was referring to. That was just unfortunate similarity in wording. What I was refering to was the fact that the AI never lets it's settlers move anywhere that I have seen without making sure that a defensive unit will be stacked with it at the end of each move. I was wondering if the AI would only move it's two move expansionist settlers only 1 tile each turn so as to ensure that the defensive unit could keep up. That's what I meant when I asked if the AI would "hold back" it's two move settlers. I guess Dom might know from observing expansionist AI civs in his mod of the game.

Originally posted by vmxa1
The settler blitz is basically where you bring some settlers with you to an invasion or attack. You raze cities and drop your own town with a settler and now have access to all tiles in its borders and can blitz to the next city.

This is a killer when you break through the defended towns and find the core nearly empty of defenders. It is more useful against humans who will leave empty interior cities.

The ai is exposed as bit as well as it will have only 2 units in most cases, but at the highest levels the better cities will have more than two. So those nice rails are now offering free move to within striking range. The ai will not often cut the roads/rails to its towns, only yours.

sounds like smart strategy so I don't see where the problem arises. Historically the most enduring conquests all involved large migrations of settlers alongside the conquering armies. The expansion of the US at the expense of the native americans certainly followed this model as did the expansion of Russia and almost any other conquering nation that established a long term hold over their conquered territories.

If anything this 'problem' suggests that 2 move settlers should eventually be available to all of the civs rather than just the expansionist civs.

Capturing railroads was also very important and as far as I can tell this is the only way in the current game system to allow this to occur.

I wonder if most of the objection to use of settlers in this way stems from the perception of most player of conquest as being a strictly military affair and that civilian participation is somehow 'unrealistic', historical precedent notwithstanding.

[Dominae]

Originally posted by Geronimo
I hadn't considered any sort of blitzing exploit. could you elaborate a little on how that works and the problems it causes?

More or less what vmxa1 said. The only thing completely stopping you from conquering an enemy civ in 1 turn once you have Railroads and Cavalry is that sometimes 3 moves is not enough to reach some cities due to large cultural radii. A Settler with 2 moves virtually eliminates this problem, ensuring that you can reach any AI city from any other AI city (it places its cities a maximum of 6 tiles apart). In fact, with 2-move Settlers you could conquer some empires in 1 turn even prior to Railroads.

Do you find that the expansionist AI civs hold back their 2 move settlers to one move per turn so they can keep them stacked with a military unit such a spearman or do they let the settlers move at their full 2 moves per turn without waiting up for the defensive unit?

No, the Settlers are never held back by the slowness of their would-be escorts. In fact, some cities newly-founded cities are sometimes left undefended for a handful of turns. On Monarch difficulty and above, where the AI gets free units, this does not seem to be a problem because the AI knows to divert some of its exploring/wandering units to defend an empty city. On Regent and below I can imagine this being more of an issue; I play Demigod/Deity, so I find it very hard to test anything at the lower difficulties. From a few debug games I've played with the mod, I can say that it's not as big a deal as it might seem.

[Dominae]

Originally posted by Geronimo
I wonder if most of the objection to use of settlers in this way stems from the perception of most player of conquest as being a strictly military affair and that civilian participation is somehow 'unrealistic', historical precedent notwithstanding.

No, it's more the fact that once you know how to pull this off, you can take out AI civs in the blink of an eye, before it has any chance to react (you declare war, they do not get a next turn). The fact that the AI is not programmed to defend against this strategy makes it easy to beat, and the game less interesting. Faster combat Settlers would only amplify the problem.

[Geronimo]

Originally posted by Dominae


No, it's more the fact that once you know how to pull this off, you can take out AI civs in the blink of an eye, before it has any chance to react (you declare war, they do not get a next turn). The fact that the AI is not programmed to defend against this strategy makes it easy to beat, and the game less interesting. Faster combat Settlers would only amplify the problem.

If the player has enough raw destructive power to eliminate every last unit the AI has in their empire through conventional means in a single turn what difference really is few extra turns for the AI going to make? It seems that taking away access to the railroads won't make it any less lopsided, just more prolonged.

A game turn is supposed to be at least a year long.

[Modo44]

Originally posted by Geronimo
If the player has enough raw destructive power to eliminate every last unit the AI has in their empire through conventional means in a single turn what difference really is few extra turns for the AI going to make? It seems that taking away access to the railroads won't make it any less lopsided, just more prolonged.

A game turn is supposed to be at least a year long.

You get their cities earlier, you get out of War Weariness earlier. MUCH earlier, I should say, especially on big maps. Lots of things can happen while you do a 20-turn conquest. Things that won't hurt a 1-turn conquest at all. If the price are a few Settlers, it's too cheap a price. Hence, it's an exploit, at least agains the AI. PBEMs usually allow it.

[Geronimo]

Originally posted by Modo44

You get their cities earlier, you get out of War Weariness earlier. MUCH earlier, I should say, especially on big maps. Lots of things can happen while you do a 20-turn conquest. Things that won't hurt a 1-turn conquest at all. If the price are a few Settlers, it's too cheap a price. Hence, it's an exploit, at least agains the AI. PBEMs usually allow it.

20 turns vs one turn? please. If the player spread his forces out amongst fully loaded transports He could still take every last coastal city in one turn and after that it's certainly not going to take 20 turns to reach the rest. Someone with enough firepower to clear every last city in one turn is going to be able to plow pretty damn far on that second turn.

[Modo44]

Originally posted by Geronimo
20 turns vs one turn? please. If the player spread his forces out amongst fully loaded transports He could still take every last coastal city in one turn and after that it's certainly not going to take 20 turns to reach the rest. Someone with enough firepower to clear every last city in one turn is going to be able to plow pretty damn far on that second turn.

Still, you get there earlier. Even 5 turns of offensive war can find a Democracy in serious doo doo. Plus, a 1-turn conquest allows for no counter-attacks, which do some damage on higher difficulty levels. And, if you haven't noticed, no Alliances/Embargos will get signed against you.

[aksully]

Dom and any others that mod...can you set up a mod of two players where both are human with no AI? If so how? I tried this yesterday to test some combat and movement trials and the game starts to load and then it quits altogther? When I made the scenario I created it with 2 Civs and clicked Human player for both. Can this be done...having just two humans so I can run some different tests? Thanks!
Sully

Oh and Theseus..thanks for the tip on modifying your leaderhead! I never knew you could do it and I'm one of those that DO read manuals!

[aksully]

Originally posted by Dominae


No, it's more the fact that once you know how to pull this off, you can take out AI civs in the blink of an eye, before it has any chance to react (you declare war, they do not get a next turn). The fact that the AI is not programmed to defend against this strategy makes it easy to beat, and the game less interesting. Faster combat Settlers would only amplify the problem.

This is the first I've read about this "Combat Settler Scenario" other than I think it was the "Virtue of Being Industrious" by Bamspeedy I think. That focus was on what would have likely called, Combat/Offensive Workers. Where you have a stack of workers building roads right behind your stacks/Armies. Then your Settlers can follow and build where needed. I might be wrong on the above reference but you get the point.

Is this Settler gambit written somewhere? I've utilized this strategy from time to time. Nice to know it has its merits. I've been hesitant to use it fairly regularly due to the possibility of a rapid culture flip of my new city deep in the heart of a culture-strong civ. Feel free to comment!
Sully

[aksully]

The Virtues of Being Industrious was penned by Velociryx...apologies to him.

Sully

[aksully]

It was by the way, ver informative.

[Theseus]

Hmmm... I cannot recall anyone writing up an extensive strategy article on 'Settler Blitzing', but rather have seen it discussed mostly in AU games, some special games put on by Aeson and others, and a few other places .

[vmxa1]

Hum, I seem to recall one game where we used it T, rather recently.

Anyway landing in numerous locations an attacking is not so easy to do. It is much easier to land a large force in one place and fan out using settlers. The wiping occurs, because many cities are not defended or very lightly. If you are going to take 4 or more turns to get to all those cities, then drafting will allow extra defenders and make some of those larger cities very hard to take.

You can end up not being able to even take them. This is because a metro that is empty is a snap, if it has drafted a few MI's, that lone tank is not going to get the job done.

If this is an invasion, you have limited forces that can start to be chipped away at and hard to reenforce. I think Hot Enamel has a nice post about such an event.

[Theseus]

Originally posted by vmxa1
Hum, I seem to recall one game where we used it T, rather recently.

Thus my use of the 'wink' smiley.

[Dominae]

Originally posted by Geronimo
If the player has enough raw destructive power to eliminate every last unit the AI has in their empire through conventional means in a single turn what difference really is few extra turns for the AI going to make? It seems that taking away access to the railroads won't make it any less lopsided, just more prolonged.

The AI does not keep all its units in its cities; at any time more than half its unit are out in the open, waiting to do something (probably to mitigate the effect of cultural flips, or nukes). Thus the cost of blitzing is far less than taking out every unit in the AI empire.

Furthermore, Longbowmen and Cavalry, which the AI absolutely adore, are a joke on the defensive. When you declare war and win in one turn you do not need to worry about a counter-attack, so you are effectively replacing 30+ Infantry (or other defenders) with 5-6 Settlers - no a bad ideal no matter how you look at it.

If you want to look at the realism aspect, consider how unrealistic turn-based games really are: during the entire year that you are running over another country, that country is utterly paralyzed, unable to react in any way to your offensive. Civ3 is a strategy game, not a historical simulation.

[Geronimo]

Originally posted by Dominae


The AI does not keep all its units in its cities; at any time more than half its unit are out in the open, waiting to do something (probably to mitigate the effect of cultural flips, or nukes). Thus the cost of blitzing is far less than taking out every unit in the AI empire.

Furthermore, Longbowmen and Cavalry, which the AI absolutely adore, are a joke on the defensive. When you declare war and win in one turn you do not need to worry about a counter-attack, so you are effectively replacing 30+ Infantry (or other defenders) with 5-6 Settlers - no a bad ideal no matter how you look at it.

If you want to look at the realism aspect, consider how unrealistic turn-based games really are: during the entire year that you are running over another country, that country is utterly paralyzed, unable to react in any way to your offensive. Civ3 is a strategy game, not a historical simulation.

If i dislike lack of realism how is dwelling on other unrealistic aspects of the game going to make me feel better about about a particular unrealistic aspect of the game?

Anyway, chess is a strategy game. Civ3 is more than a strategy game and that should be obvious with the most casual glance. The old "this unrealistic flaw in game is above critism because this game is a total abstraction having no relation to reality whatsoever" argument doesn't really make sense for civ games any more than it would for any other non abstract game, be they shooters, RTSs or giant robot sims.

[Dominae]

The problem with the realism argument is that the more game designers inject realism into their games, the more realism the "historical accuracy" players want, and the less fun the games are strategically. Do you really want Civ3 turns to represent weeks, in order to more realistically simulate major battles? Do you really want to control every single unit in an army? Do you really want to have to build multiple Libraries, Cathedrals or Factories per city? Do you really think that the tech research model in Civ3 even closely resembles historical technological progress in the real world?

The reason I point out unrealistic aspects of Civ3 is to demonstrate is that there's no end to the list of "unrealisms". So I see no point in pointing out every flaw, because there are (and will be, in future incarnations of Civ) always more flaws to ruin your day. I prefer, therefore, to view the real-world aspects of Civ as a pleasing backdrop to what is essentially a strategy game, just like the types of pieces in Chess (King, Knight, Rook) are pleasing abstractions/representations of the real world that are related in only a very indirect way to the actual purpose of the game. I've never heard a Chess Grandmaster complain that it was unrealistic that his towers (Rooks) can move around.

[vmxa1]

Realism is not the thing, it is immersion that matters. Being lost in the planning of the moves and what is going to be happen in a few turns.

Wanting to see that tech be researched and so on that is important. That some things are depicted in a some what realistic way is just a bonus. That many things are not, is just a restriction. Often as Dom said to make the game play work with out killing the fun.

Pointing out these flaws is useless at this point, nothing is to be done about it for any number of reason. Everyone already has a working knowledge of the real world, we all live in.

[Geronimo]

Originally posted by vmxa1
Realism is not the thing, it is immersion that matters. Being lost in the planning of the moves and what is going to be happen in a few turns.

Wanting to see that tech be researched and so on that is important. That some things are depicted in a some what realistic way is just a bonus. That many things are not, is just a restriction. Often as Dom said to make the game play work with out killing the fun.

Pointing out these flaws is useless at this point, nothing is to be done about it for any number of reason. Everyone already has a working knowledge of the real world, we all live in.

nonsense. there's plenty that could be done with other similer games in the future and in some cases even things that can be done using the civ editor in this game. 2 move settlers is an example of the latter, although I think we will both agree that since the change is only appropriate for single player games it's probably silly for me debate it's merits to the extant I have in this thread.

I think in entertainment everything about a product equates to being simply another 'bonus'. After all the end result is simply to entertain. So if realism is a 'bonus' it's a good idea to look for as many ways to introduce it alongside other bonuses with as little conflict as possible. It's frustrating when people conclude that it's just a superfluous quality that should be the first thing thrown out when the first game mechanic to be considered didn't easily work with it.

There is no intrinsic reason that a challenging civ type game has to include things like surreal models of 'corruption'. It's not hard to come of with plenty of alternate methods of achieving the same end without something that introduces an effects with no parrallel in the real world. It certainly damages my immersion that I need to have a grasp of a formula so complicated it generates huge threads just to begin to explain it so that I can deal intelligently with major strategic element of the game that has no intuitive realworld counterpart. It ruins something called 'suspension of disbelief' moreso than even less realistic elements like turn based combat simply because there is no good reason it has to be there.

[vmxa1]

I really do not agree with anything you said. I have no need to understand the formulas for corruption. I only need to figure how to get the most out of it. The tools to do that are quite simple.

Like I said I am not concern with how they choose to implement functions, only how to deal with them. There is not a TBS game in the world that is realistic. That is for siimulators.

The fact that they have sold millions of units and are on the fourth version, says they have a good idea of how to implement games.

I find it tiresome to hear about realism frankly. I watch movies and play games for entertainment. I walk out my front door for realism.

[Geronimo]

Originally posted by vmxa1
I really do not agree with anything you said. I have no need to understand the formulas for corruption. I only need to figure how to get the most out of it. The tools to do that are quite simple.

Like I said I am not concern with how they choose to implement functions, only how to deal with them. There is not a TBS game in the world that is realistic. That is for siimulators.

The fact that they have sold millions of units and are on the fourth version, says they have a good idea of how to implement games.

I find it tiresome to hear about realism frankly. I watch movies and play games for entertainment. I walk out my front door for realism.

ahh now we are discussing matters of taste which doesn't make for much of a debate.

I suppose that's the bottom line. When someone complains that something reduces realism in the game they are not, on the basis of an argument that realism is an irrelevant quality, somehow objectively wrong . They are only 'wrong' because you and many likeminded players couldn't care less about that quality.

Anyway I agree the developers do a much better job than most game designers and lucky for us both they say they value both realism and gameplay so there's no reason to expect that they will have to throw out either.

[aksully]

Personally I like the game as it exists..flaws and all! And the developers did a good job providing an editor to let one "balence the play" if you don't like the game as it shipped. Now I think they could've done a better job on explaining the use of the editor. But once you figure it out, it works well.

And I've been reading alot about corruption and like most I hate to see those wasted shields! But rather than change it with the editor, I try to learn to live with it or beat it.

Don't like it fine; build a more efficient layout for your Civ, build a FP, build courthouses, change governments, add policemen, etc. The developers gave us plenty of ways to limit corruption. So that's just one example.

I'm looking forward to the release of Civ 4 and will get it as soon as I can. After all, anything that keeps me from "Walking out the door and facing reality"...works for me.

Sully

[vmxa1]

Excellent response Geronimo and I bow out of that topic at this point.

[aksully]

Peace in our time! Anyhow....you can't have peace without a strong Army! Here's a writeup from Civfanatics I found as I was looking for how to employ my Armies better. Some nice tidbits.

Basics of Armies (C3C)

Author: Theoden; Date Added: 9/28/04

Since I have seen no strategy articles covering armies yet, I've decided to come up with one, hopefully solving some of the misunderstandings about armies. This guide is for Conquests only, so many of these things don't count for vanilla/PTW.

What I am going through are the properties of armies and a few known bugs. Much of these info were gathered from different threads so thanks to those people.
This is mainly a newbie guide so some of it might seem familiar to alot of people. This article doesn’t cover how to use the armies effectively -- only the basic properties and the bugs about them.

What are armies?
Armies are created by great leaders to create the army in any friendly city. They can also be created in a city containing the Military Academy (a small wonder). Once the army is created, other units can be loaded into the army. All the units in the army move around on the map as one unit together. The units then share hitpoints as if they were one unit.

The properties of armies:
• The attack and defense of the army is a tricky part. The formula for this is:
Attack = A+(TA/N)
where
A is the attack of the unit currently doing the fighting.

TA is the attacks of all the units added together.

N is 4 if you own the military academy, else just 6.

This formula is rounding fractions down. To find the defense just use this and replace attack with defense (pretty obvious). Note that when right clicking an army it doesn’t show it’s attack and defense as it really is, only the unmodified attack and defense.
• Armies have a capacity of 3 units although the Pentagon increases this to four.
• The armies movement is equal to the movement of the army’s slowest unit +1. So an army consisting of three knights would have 3 movement points.
• Only combat units (those with an attack and defense) can be loaded into an army.
• When defending, an army gains defensive terrain bonuses as a percentage of the improved defend value, not the value showing when right clicking it.
• When no units have yet loaded into the army, the army will only have a movement of one. Furthermore the army’s movement along roads is reduced by 1. So following a normal road an army will only have two moves, on a RoR road (which gives a 4x road multiplier) the movement for an army would be 3.
• You must have at least four cities for every army you create. If you lose cities so there is no longer at least four per army you won't lose any armies, you just won't be able to create any more before enough cities are built/captured.
• Armies have the blitz ability which allows them to attack multiple times in a turn.
• They have the radar ability which allows them to see two squares regardless of terrain.
• Armies can pillage without using movement points.
• Armies heal at the rate of one HP per unit in the army. This can also be done in enemy territory even before battlefield medicine. Furthermore armies are also able to heal in one turn in a city containing barracks.
• When transporting armies in ships each unit in the army plus the army unit itself requires one free space (so a normal 3 unit army requires a transport with capacity 4).
• The army unit itself as well as units in the army requires support every turn.
• Units in armies can receive promotions just as normal units. The downside is that only one of the units in an army can get experience (I'm not completely sure here). Also armies cannot get automatic blitz promotion . It has to be gained through many combats (unless you are lucky, off course). Also the army unit itself cannot get promotions only units in the army.
• Units in armies cannot be upgraded.
• An army only gains a special ability if all of the units in the army have that ability (e.g. an army of 2 marines and one rifle cannot make amphibious attacks).
• An army can never gain a worker function even if all of the units in it have that worker function (So a crusader army cannot build fortresses).
• Armies cannot make any MGL's, not even if the army unit itself is elite status (not possible in the game but I tested it through the editor).
Known bugs about armies:
• The AI will almost never use their leaders to create armies (in fact I’ve never seen or heard of an AI creating an army in the Conquests expansion).
• When they have an army (like in RoR) they will usually put a stupid combination of units in it (e.g. i once saw Carthaginians make an army of two elephants and one swordsman in RoR).
• AI’s are very hesitant to attack your armies. Since the AI calculates everything on a unit-to-unit basis it will have a very low chance of winning with just one unit, and since the AI doesn’t know combined arms strategy they will almost never attack your armies. The few cases where some will probably see an AI attacking an army is when the AI has an army of it’s own, if you got a very weak army, or if the army defends a town that the AI absolutely must have.
That was all their was about the basic properties. Hope this helped solving some of the misunderstanding there has been about armies.

Sully

[Theseus]

To clarify the point about unit promotions: Each unit in an Army fights serially, from strongest to weakest, dividing the available hps amongst them. As each unit fights, if it wins, it has a chance of promotion like any other unit. Also, as far as I know, the units ARE subject to blitz promotion.

[vmxa1]

"• The AI will almost never use their leaders to create armies (in fact I’ve never seen or heard of an AI creating an army in the Conquests expansion).
• When they have an army (like in RoR) they will usually put a stupid combination of units in it (e.g. i once saw Carthaginians make an army of two elephants and one swordsman in RoR).
• AI’s are very hesitant to attack your armies. Since the AI calculates everything on a unit-to-unit basis it will have a very low chance of winning with just one unit, and since the AI doesn’t know combined arms strategy they will almost never attack your armies. The few cases where some will probably see an AI attacking an army is when the AI has an army of it’s own, if you got a very weak army, or if the army defends a town that the AI absolutely must have. "

AI will make an army, but it is not common at all. I have only run into may three all total.

It is like using bombardment on attack, they do it, but not often.

As near as I can tell, the AI will never attack an army in the open if it is at full health, regardless of the units involved. If the armies is in yellow status, it does at times and it will if the army is in red status.

It will attack cities with armies, regardless of its units and the armies composition and status. Once it targets a city, it becomes and imperative. This is how you exploit the AI at high levels.

You use armies to safely land your stack. You found or capture a city and with stand the counter attack. Move the stack on tothe next target safely with armies as escorts. Pillage or not is dependant on your plans.

I do not have a shot of an army, but here is a rare one of the AI sending bombardments on the attack.

[Dis]

Originally posted by Theseus
To clarify the point about unit promotions: Each unit in an Army fights serially, from strongest to weakest, dividing the available hps amongst them. As each unit fights, if it wins, it has a chance of promotion like any other unit. Also, as far as I know, the units ARE subject to blitz promotion.

what's blitz promotion?

[Modo44]

Originally posted by Dissident
what's blitz promotion?

2 battles won in a row promote the unit automatically. Blitz units can attack many times a turn. This allows them to be promoted instantly, if only they manage to win two attacks on the same turn. That's why Tanks/Panzers/Modern Armor are such powerful toys. Armies can provide this ability much sooner.

[Xorbon]

One thing noticed missing from aksully's last post:
Paratrooper armies don't get airdrop. (I mentioned this on another thread as well.)

[Theseus]

BTW, we finally figured out why there were no AI Armies in stock C3C, and have fixed it in the AU Mod with single-unit Armies. We see them all the time now.