Civ4 Units

[Jon Miller]

I also suggest some sort of stacking penalties

like have 2-5 units in a square be the normal stacked square

show the icons for these units in the square in miniature

if there are more than 5 units in hte square, just show an army encampment

these units cannot attack as one or defend as one (if there are units that can do this, they should be built special as armies, and be limited as I have discussed earlier)

their defense is penalized as so

if artillery misses one unit, it attacks the next unit (until it has attacked all units and missed, or hit one unit)

if a unit gets destroyed, there is these chances out of 10

10% - death of anoher unit (due to moral failure/route)
20% - injury of another unit (similiar causes)
70% - unit is fine

for every unit

so if there are 5 units in a square, and one gtes destroyed, this percentage is rolled for every one

army encampments have the additional disadvantage of only allowing 5 units to leave that square per turn

there would be none of these stacking negatives in cities or fortresses

JOn Miller

[Kuciwalker]

I LIKE the randomness (though I do think the MA should not require a victorious army). It adds uncertainty to warfare. What I like about armies is (especially with the C3C army bonus) how you have a much, much stronger "single unit" that really changes the face of the battlefield. I don't like it because it is "stacked" combat, per se.

[Fosse]

Originally posted by Jon Miller
the attacker actually is what gets support, you could probably give the defender support as well, but it wouldn't be as fun

I don't see how having armies adds anytihng, peopel will spend there production to build a single huge stack like in civ and that will be that

Jon Miller

And then they will lose to somebody who actually spent the time to craft a balanced and intelligently designed fighting force, featuring combined arms and support units that work in a synergistic way with each other. That is the fundamental thing that army-style combat allows over unit vs. unit - even a u v. u that allows us to move units in stacks.

[Jon Miller]

Fosse

I consider Civ3's armies more limited than CTPs

I would prefer something more limited at Civ3's levels

(I would also like it, if in, dependent on tech. in reality organization is tech just as much as the printing press is)

Jon Miller

[Fosse]

Originally posted by skywalker
I LIKE the randomness (though I do think the MA should not require a victorious army). It adds uncertainty to warfare. What I like about armies is (especially with the C3C army bonus) how you have a much, much stronger "single unit" that really changes the face of the battlefield. I don't like it because it is "stacked" combat, per se.

Okay... So I was wrong about the common ground. But thanks for the quick response to the specific question!

Well... regarding randomness changing the face of things... okay, I can see that appeal. What kind of similar things could a combat system that is primarily army vs. army offer? Using Civ 3 military leaders, a great leader from a victorious battle could take command of the army that spawned him, granting that army untold combat advantages. In game terms, he was always the army's commander, but he proved himself so well in battle that he now whips the troops into a frenzy in every battle. No?

Such a unit could certainly change the face of a battlefield.

[Jon Miller]

Originally posted by Fosse


And then they will lose to somebody who actually spent the time to craft a balanced and intelligently designed fighting force, featuring combined arms and support units that work in a synergistic way with each other. That is the fundamental thing that army-style combat allows over unit vs. unit - even a u v. u that allows us to move units in stacks.

no

battles are fought on, and have been fought on fronts

it is not a single battle of all my manpower versus all your man power as seen in Civ3 (and it is similiar in CTP)

also, you will spend time crafting a battle force once, maybe twice

from than on you will know what is the best way to do it and will do it that way every time (TEDIUM)

in Real life units work with eachother on a front

also, you don't think that Civs tanks are just takns do you? I am sure that like the USs tank divisions that they are combined arms (the US has both mechanized and armor divisions, the armor divisions are not all armor, and the mechanized divions also have armor, everything is mixed up, at the Unit level, I would prefer not to have to do that)

if you can't tell, I personally want to get rid of stacks in favor of broader base combat

Jon Miller

[Jon Miller]

I will tell you why I don't like stacked combat

it gets rid of any reason to have squares or tiles

because most of them are meaningless

all combat turns into is takinga bunch of troops in one province, and throwing them against another province

sort of like in EU

there is none of the moving troops arround to try and get an advantage

none of the punch and counterpunch as both sides try to lure the other in to traps, or to find an area of advantage

instead all htere is, is ammasing troops in your province a little faster than you enemy (Fast enough that by the time your troops get ro his province, you still have more troops than him)

that is boring, and devising the content of armies is ok, but you can do that in nonstacked combat also

Jon Miller

[Fosse]

Originally posted by Jon Miller
Fosse

I consider Civ3's armies more limited than CTPs

I would prefer something more limited at Civ3's levels

(I would also like it, if in, dependent on tech. in reality organization is tech just as much as the printing press is)

Jon Miller

I'm still not clear in what way you consider Civ3's armies to be more limited than CtP's. Because they are random? Because you can only put three or four units in? Because they don't really attack all at once?

I would be all for technology impacting the possiblities and effectivness of armies. Instead of just providing more types units to be fodder, various military applications could provide all sorts of neat little bonuses.

That's a good idea. Now, how would you apply it to Unit vs. Unit?

[Jon Miller]

because they don't attack all at once

because you can only put in 3 or 4 untis

I wouldn't apply it in unit versus unit

I am just saying that if armies are in, this would be the best way to have them

as well as, if armies are limited enough, they will still be fun

Jon Miller

[Fosse]

Originally posted by Jon Miller
I will tell you why I don't like stacked combat

it gets rid of any reason to have squares or tiles

Well, I don't agree. But even so, I would personally see the elimination of tiles as a positive. But that's for another thread.

all combat turns into is takinga bunch of troops in one province, and throwing them against another province

sort of like in EU

Sort of like Civ 3. Take your fifty MA - throw in twenty artillery - and march to their city.

there is none of the moving troops arround to try and get an advantage

Why not?
If I bother to put my units into advantageous positions then I will defeat the player who doesn't do so because they are organized into armies.

none of the punch and counterpunch as both sides try to lure the other in to traps, or to find an area of advantage

Again... why not?

instead all htere is, is ammasing troops in your province a little faster than you enemy (Fast enough that by the time your troops get ro his province, you still have more troops than him)

This is no different than the current Civ 3 system, though.

devising the content of armies is ok, but you can do that in nonstacked combat also

True, but in unit vs. unit it will eventually all come down to moving your units one at a time into the other guy's, one at a time. Even if you do try to organize 'armies' of different units and unit types, if the combat engine doesn't support them working as a cohesive unit, then they won't.

And regarding the Fronts issue.

Yeah, battles are fought on fronts... but you wouldn't simply put all of your units into one unit and try to find out where the other guy put all of his units. You would design more than one army, and send them all to the front. Then, let the maneuvering begin.



And I know that "a tank" doesn't mean One Tank All By Itself. It still wouldn't in what I'm proposing. Think of the units as representing Divisions. Several divisions make up an army. Perhaps 10-20 divisions would be it for one full sized army. Then you could have a few dozen mobile army units out there on your front, each one designed by you to be the most effective they can be on that particlar front, against the kinds of armies your enemy is sending you.

[Jon Miller]

did you miss the part where I said I didn't like the Civ3 system?

and that I am descrobing the civ3 system's problems (And through it the probelms as a whole?)

civ3 had stacks, and stacked combat

while I like its stacked combat better than CTPs, it is still truoblesome

stacks are troublesome

BTW, have you played these games recently?

there is little need for maneuvering, all it is is trying to get your stack to your opponents cities while only taking on smaller stacks of your opponents

there is no finess, no choices, nothing of interest going on at all

all there is is building more units than your opponent, and building the right variety of unts

both things that my view has, but my view has so much more

my view has grand strategy, some tactics and some local strategy

and is a much more interesting game

yours is EU

which is terrible as a war game (EU is worse than Civ3 or CTP as far as waging war is concerned)

JKon Miller

[Jon Miller]

you missed my point of that within a week, most players who have brains will have the perfect army setups and that choice will no longer exist

it will only be optimization (doing the same thing over and over again)

this is not fun for me, it is only fun for spreadsheet managers

Jon Miller

[Jon Miller]

did you read my idea?

my idea most assuredly does have units working togther

Jon Miller

[Fosse]

Originally posted by Jon Miller
did you miss the part where I said I didn't like the Civ3 system?

No, but I confess that nearly everything you say you want for a combat sytem sounds lot like the civ3 system to me.

there is little need for maneuvering, all it is is trying to get your stack to your opponents cities while only taking on smaller stacks of your opponents

there is no finess, no choices, nothing of interest going on at all

all there is is building more units than your opponent, and building the right variety of unts

This is what I think will be solved by armies. Why won't this be solved by armies, in your opinion? For future reference: If I am asking you a question you feel you have already answered it is not because I didn't read your previous posts, but because I honestly have great trouble working through all the statements of what you don't want in order to discover what you do. Until the post I am responding to I thought you were arguing that Unit vs. Unit did provide a need for more than just amassing troops and moving them towards cities.

both things that my view has, but my view has so much more

my view has grand strategy, some tactics and some local strategy

and is a much more interesting game

Again... I have no idea what your view is. Each time you post it makes my notion of what you want even cloudier.

yours is EU

which is terrible as a war game (EU is worse than Civ3 or CTP as far as waging war is concerned)

Never played EU.

Civ isn't really supossed to be a wargame, so if I make a "terrible" war game, that's okay with me. What I want is a good grand strategy game. Incidentally, I don't think that the combat system I want - and have explained - would be a terrible one.

[Jon Miller]

I want a grand strategy game

that is why I am against tactical minigames

but I am for a fun representatino of combat

and while I have survived Civ3's one

I do not find it that fun

in fact, combat is the worse part of the game for me

and civ3 deffinitely does not have ideas of flanking and stacking limts as can be seen in the first post of this page and the last post of the last page

they are both good size posts if you missed them

Jon Miller