[SDK] Dale's Combat Mod!

[Kinjiru]

Thanks for the quick update Dale. I have downloaded the new dll, but won't get a chance to test it until tomorrow. I'll report back then!

Thanks again for all your hard work.

[Dale]

No problem. I'm hoping this mod turns out as awesome as we all hope. Bring some real combat to Civ4.

[Kinjiru]

Well, thank goodness for boring meetings. I was able to test a little bit this morning.

So far so good, in every case I have had all the animations showing up. The only anomoly that I may have found, and I have not been able to reproduce this in subsequent tests yet, is related to field bombardment.

I had two swordsmen, two pikemen and two catapults in a stack, on a forested tile (underlying grassland I think, mybe plains). My stack was 1 tile to the northwest of a Mongol city which was defended by 1 horseman, 1 axeman and three archers (city was also located on a hill).

Turn a:
I initiate bombardment of the city

1 mongol archer comes out to attack the stack and dies, strangely the axeman doesn't attack, maybe he was hurt and recuprerating, not sure.

Turn b:
I bombard city

Barbs move in a stack of 1 warrior and 1 archer from the east onto a tile directly to the east of my stack. Tile is a hill. Wonder who they are going to attack. Probably me, since the mongols are defended fairly well.

Turn c:
I bombard city

Barbs attack me and lose. But they damage 1 cat and take 1 sword down to 1hp

Turn d:
I do not have the bombard icon available to me now.

So, I reloaded Turn b and let things play out. Same results on turn c. And now on turn d my bombard icon is available.

Sadly, I accidently overwrote the save file with later tests so I cannot attach the original one. Unless you have also seen this happen, or someone else reports it, I wouldn't really worry about it, because as I said, I have not been able to reproduce the problem.


However, I do notice that there is no longer any population of the combat messages. (In the Turn History available by clicking the the circle icon in the upper left, and going to the COmbat Log). Is this just something we are going to have to do without? Not a big loss by any means, but I was wondering about it.

[Dale]

Well folks, stacked combat is almost complete.

Here's a series of shots from a naval battle:

Shot 1: beginning


Shot 2: air combat from scrambled carrier fighters


Shot 3: ship to ship combat progressing


Shot 4: the aftermath!



Comments welcome.

NOTE: Unfortunately the air mission animations aren't compatible with combat animations, so none show up.

Dale

[Dale]

I've combined my mod with the regiments mod off CFC. So there will be two mod options now.

Some screens:

[Addled Platypus]

standing ovation for Dale

rushing off to stacked combat !!

[Addled Platypus]

Of course I forgot the save....but here is the crash brief

4 knights, musketman, I greenadier attacking a city

classical era

other oddities

after a couple succesful 2/3 unit stack attack, the camera angle would change, I would by pass that unit , wait for the next unit to move and would change back to normal angle..I will try a screenie next time

[Jaybe]

Well, my previous (80 hour) game ended, so I took the plunge!

When I started (version 2.1) combats did not animate, just zoomed and froze until after combat. Had neglected to set Stacked Combat in Options, but even after I had done so it still froze. When I started playing again the next day, with version 2.2, all was well. Maybe it was the 2.2, maybe it was starting afresh with Stacked Combat already set.

But not quite everything was well. Twice I assaulted barb cities (not hills) of 3 archers, no promotions. I am playing at Noble, but iBarbarianBonus & iFreeWinsVsBarbs are zero (HandicapInfo.xml in CustomAssets):

First time was with 2 Pretorians (combat I) and an Ax (combat I, cover). I have had plenty of experience with this force level and considered it no problem, and with the stack grouped I checked and it looked good at over 94% for the assault, but that was the last I heard from them. I had no one else in the area to check for barb losses, but I decided I had better bring numerical superiority next time ...
This time it was a similar force with the addition of a horse archer. I took the city, but only the horse archer survived! Again, I had been assured of 94% chance of success.

Checking the combat log, it seemed that combat went round by round with each unit against an opponent. The archers each got a first strike vs. their designated opponent, then combat commenced (the combat log is now unavailable and I do not recall the subsequent details).

What are the (non-graphical) dynamics of combat in the mod? What are the mechanics of how siege & bombers work (I haven't used cat's yet)?

EDIT (Catapult experience): I see now how if you use cat's in the assault, at least when accompanied by other units, that they get a "free" round against the opponents, probably a free guaranteed hit.

[Dale]

Jaybe:

Okay, ignore the combat % for a battle. It's wrong, oh so wrong. It's still calculating the old method (of attacker versus best defender).

In this mod you will find that combat conditions favour ranged and bombarding units slightly more than melee units. This is due to the combat method.

Ranged and bombarding units get free combat rounds (not guarenteed hits, they can miss) where the unit they are targetting can not hit them back (except in the case of bombard vs bombard and ranged vs ranged). This is until that sides frontline is destroyed. After that, the ranged line becomes the frontline and melee enemys can injure them.

EDIT: Note that in some cases when it's the enemies melee combat phase, if a defending melee unit is not there then the enemies melee unit can push through to target your ranged/bombarding units behind the gap. /EDIT

Here's the full process (as of Beta 2.7 [which I'll be uploading in about 20 mins]):

- Setup attackers and defenders on 4 rows each side: melee/flanking, ranged, bombarding, air.
- defending air units combat phase: air interceptions vs enemy air, else air bombing selected targets.
- attacking air units combat phase: as above
- defending bombarding units phase: bombard vs selected targets (no right of reply from enemy units), if vs enemy bombarder then counter-battery fire ensues.
- attacking bombarding units phase: as above.
- defending ranged units phase: ranged vs selected targets (no right of reply from enemy units), if vs enemy ranged then counter-ranged fire unsues.
- attacking ranged units phase: as above.
- defending melee combat phase: melee units target selected units in their area of the combat field (IE: units in front of them). Flankers try to push through the front line then target bombarders/ranged in the rear of the enemy lines.
- attacking melee combat phase: as above.
- administration phase: kill dead units, remove units from battle who withdraw, close ranks on the field to fill gaps, move ranged / bombarding lines to frontline if frontline doesn't exist.

So ranged and bombarding units do get free combat rounds, but it's not a guarenteed hit. Misses aren't printed in the combat log, only hits. (Basically, if the combat round ends with the ranged/bombarding unit being hit, it's NULLed out). Air units do not get an automatic inteception either. In reality it's 90% chance (due to the closeness of battle) but there is a chance to not engage another air unit.

Dale

[Dale]

Beta 2.7 uploaded!

See first post for details.

Dale

[Addled Platypus]

downloaded !


hand set to screenie

[Addled Platypus]

tried out combat mods + regiments

the ragging barbs sure know how to keep you in check

unit after unit, turn after turn...had some good promotions for a while

Yes I lost them trying to keep a city from falling. Same location fell twice...gads


Everything was going good until-


No unit selected and could not end turn

I saved and will go back to see if its ok

[Dale]

Update:

The next version of the combat mod will let you build missiles. Yep, cruise missiles, tactical nukes, etc. The code is so generic that you could create any sort of missile (not tested yet, but I'm fairly certain it'll work). Spys with the missile flag could become suicide bombers. Fighters with the missile flag could become kamikazees. Create a Boeing 747 unit and give it the flag to become a terrorist bomber. The combos are endless.

Platy:

Thanks, I'll look into what caused it.

[Kinjiru]

Don't look know Dale, that's Jack Thompson coming for you!

Seriously though, I am loving your mod! Keep up the excellent work.

On another note, do you anticipate returning to the AoD mod at all?

[Dale]

Kinjiru:

Thanks. And yes, I'll be revisiting AoD once I complete this mod.

Dale

PS: I'd also like to revisit Desert War at some stage too and put some of my ideas in that didn't make the final release.