{The List-} Movement, supply, etc.

[hexagonian]

wrylachen,

Actually, as it stands in CTP, your proposal would work very well in in a stacked combat setup. The supply unit would sit on the back line and would not be hit until everything else is destroyed. (Range units fire on frontliners - not on enemy ranged units) And in the current CTP battle screen, there is a third line of units in the very rear of the battle where the unconventionals sit (settlers, spies, slavers, etc). They do not move up until everything in front is destroyed. So a suppply unit could also sit on that line.

My guess is that in that setup, a special unit could also be created via coding that acts as a type of flanker with the ability to target a specific line of units.

So it could be pulled off for civ4.

[wrylachlan]

Originally posted by hexagonian
wrylachen,

Actually, as it stands in CTP, your proposal would work very well in in a stacked combat setup. The supply unit would sit on the back line and would not be hit until everything else is destroyed. (Range units fire on frontliners - not on enemy ranged units) And in the current CTP battle screen, there is a third line of units in the very rear of the battle where the unconventionals sit (settlers, spies, slavers, etc). They do not move up until everything in front is destroyed. So a suppply unit could also sit on that line.

My guess is that in that setup, a special unit could also be created via coding that acts as a type of flanker with the ability to target a specific line of units.

So it could be pulled off for civ4.

The reason I don't like the mini game CTP setup, whether it is player controlled or not, is that it de-emphasizes terrain. If the "sneaking around the main force" is performed on the mini-map, terrain doesn't factor as much. If it is done on the main map, terrain becomes important (if your Logistics unit is on a mountain on the plains, it doesn't have to worry as much because it can see any enemy approach - if you know the enemy has nothing but wheeled units, your Logistics unit knows it won't get attacked from the mountains - etc. etc.). Ditto for flanking. Ditto for bombardment across a river.

For me, tactics means putting the right force in the right place at the right time. Therefore anything that de-emphasizes the importance of place is less tactical.

[Bleyn]

All of this talk of flanking and HQs and logistics etc. puts me more in the mind of games like TalonSoft's Battleground series than of Civ.

One of the biggest problems I have with it in Civ is scale. In the epic game, the scales that are being dealt with are such that I just don't think these things make much sense. And honestly, I don't know how much fun they would be either.

Don't get me wrong. In the proper medium, I love this sort of thing. I have several of TalonSoft's Battleground series games, and Sid's Gettysburg/Antietam games. But those are games that are at a much finer scale. And they are all about the art of manuver.

I'm just not sure how much of this sort of thing would really work in Civ.

[polypheus]

Attrition

One of the things I dislike about Civ is the fact that by 1AD, the entire continent is totally mapped out, known, and nearly every tile is claimed. This is simply unrealistic and takes away from gameplay. I would prefer it be like it was historically where even the mightiest empires (Rome or China) knew only so much of the world and there was still vast stretches of virgin land available up to early modern times.

One way to prevent this is to implement attrition of units in hostile terrain. Thus every turn there is a, say, 50% chance of losing 1HP when a unit is so many tiles away from friendly territory. Then units could only move so far in the ancient era. This prevents the expand until every square is claimed by 1AD phenomenon and leaves much virgin land for grabbing later . Also it totally killls the race by human and AIs to pump out and expand and build as many cities as possible.

This should also be implemented for naval units too to prevent, say, the equivalent of Roman Empire from being able to sail to Japan in ancient era.

[Kuciwalker]

It's easy to do that even in C3 by delaying map and communication trading (and slowing research).

[polypheus]

Originally posted by skywalker
It's easy to do that even in C3 by delaying map and communication trading (and slowing research).

But how does this solve the problem of nearly every tile of land being claimed (or about to be claimed w/temple, etc) by some nation by 1AD?

[ThePlagueRat]

Originally posted by Bleyn
Don't get me wrong. In the proper medium, I love this sort of thing. I have several of TalonSoft's Battleground series games, and Sid's Gettysburg/Antietam games. But those are games that are at a much finer scale. And they are all about the art of manuver.

I'm just not sure how much of this sort of thing would really work in Civ.

You are probably right. Civ-warfare is all about numbers, and having the right techs. But IMHO there should be a bit more to it in the next generation. Perhaps not as much as my first suggestion.

That means for more transparent rules, like modifiers and such... Supply modifier, leader modifier, and addon modifier (as I was mentioning in the Unique Unit thread) All transparent. The code would be complex, but not neccesarily the gameplay.

The supply level could also be determined by the defense budget , as it is in EU2. - Pretty cool feature: if you use all income for the navy and the research, and nothing for the army, they would be more ineffective when fighting.

[polypheus]

Not sure this is the right List, but in conjunction with the idea to have hostile terrain as well as terrain far from your own or friendly territory take away HPs is that the map generator would need to be improved.

Thus we would need huge expanses of tundra, jungle, desert, mountains, etc that act just like oceans, at least until modern times, to prevent overexansion and overexploration. If the map were large enough then no ancient units penetrate into hostile terrain or even non-hostile terrain that was far from your nearest port or city.

This would be a natural way to basically have the game operate on "mini-maps". Then when the right technological advance comes, you could send explorers or other units to explore these virgin lands late in the game rather than have the entire world be claimed and occupied by 1 AD.

This is one aspect that really would improve gameplay tremendously and give that historic feel of exploring and settling the interior of Africa or sending ships to China or the New World, etc.

[ThePlagueRat]

Nice... similar to EU. In that game you would probably lose a unit before they could reach unexplored land. Then you sometimes got an explorer leader who made these losses minimal.

Civ4 explorers:
In Civ4 they could use leader traits this way, by adding an explorer to a unit. (e.g. in a Unit Workshop) and make them capable of traversing mountains, jungles, deserts, and stuff without huge losses.

For instance, one HP per round should be the default for a desert so that fast units could cross a smaller desert without losses. A leader who is an explorer could eliminate this loss, making them able to stay in the desert until a fort is built. A fort should also eliminate these losses.

[hexagonian]

Originally posted by wrylachlan
The reason I don't like the mini game CTP setup, whether it is player controlled or not, is that it de-emphasizes terrain. If the "sneaking around the main force" is performed on the mini-map, terrain doesn't factor as much. If it is done on the main map, terrain becomes important (if your Logistics unit is on a mountain on the plains, it doesn't have to worry as much because it can see any enemy approach - if you know the enemy has nothing but wheeled units, your Logistics unit knows it won't get attacked from the mountains - etc. etc.). Ditto for flanking. Ditto for bombardment across a river.

My last post was addressing the way combat would be resolved in a CTP format, if supply units were part of the stack, and it was a straight-up battle.

The basic premise of the CTP mini-game is exactly the same as combat resolution in civ3. The CTP minigame is only a visual representation of (up to) 12 single-unit combat resolutions executed at one time instead of sending units into a battle one at a time. The tactical decisions (flanking, range) are made when you compose your army rather than when you commit to battle. Terrain is just as important in the CTP setup. So your proposal would work the same way in either setup.

The solution for a stacked CTP setup in the way you envision is very simple...

If you want to set up a situation to 'sneak around' and disrupt supply lines by taking out supply units in an adjacent tile, you can do that in a stacked combat model on the mainmap in the same way that unconventional units currently operate in CTP. In fact, you could give certain units the ability to target and destroy supply units in a stack and thus use up their combat ability for a turn.

And to take it further, the success rate can be based on the ability of the disrupting unit (set up a basic percentage chance - say 50%) with a possible small defensive modifier for the supply unit if part of a stack. Elements such as terrain/rivers can add to this modifier too.

As you pointed out, the important thing is to make it hard to defend these units, because if they sit in a stack and gain a defensive bonus, then that is where they will be. You can also take away any defensive benefit from sitting on a stack, but logically those supply units should gain something for sticking with an army. From a gameplay standpoint, you make have to make them gain no benefit from sitting in a stack, but that is an issue that is common to both a stacked and non-stacked format.

With either a hard or soft cap on tile occupation, and with attacking units that can hit supply units even within a stack, you gain very little benefit with keeping them up front, so most likely, they will sit as far back as possible behind your front lines, which is what you want anyhow. In fact, a hard or soft cap will make the decision even easier to keep them far back because your main stack on the front line will not want to use valuable unit slots for non-combat units that add nothing to your attack or defense strength.

And if they sit back behind your lines, then the attacker uses his movement units to sweep in and attack conventionally (which would be a slaughter if the unit was undefended) - again, this is what you envision.

[wrylachlan]

Originally posted by hexagonian
The basic premise of the CTP mini-game is exactly the same as combat resolution in civ3. The CTP minigame is only a visual representation of (up to) 12 single-unit combat resolutions executed at one time instead of sending units into a battle one at a time. The tactical decisions (flanking, range) are made when you compose your army rather than when you commit to battle. Terrain is just as important in the CTP setup. So your proposal would work the same way in either setup.

Maybe I'm way off base, but I really don't think that terrain is as important in CTP unless I'm misunderstanding how it works (haven't played it). IF you implement flanking on the mini-map, then your ability to flank is determined only by the tile the battle takes place in. If you implement flanking on the main map, then a tile that is in a "valley" between two mountain ranges is relatively safer from flanking attacks. This makes strategic decisions on where to engage much more dependant on the terrain.

This also forces you to think ahead about battles, not just in terms of force distribution, but in the logistics of getting the right unit to the right place at the right time. If a defending army is sitting in the valley, assuming that I'll try for the one on one fight, but I instead send a unit the hard way over the mountains for a surprise attack...

I'm hard pressed to think of a terrain dynamic that isn't better modelled on the main map level than on the mini-map level.

[hexagonian]

Originally posted by wrylachlan
Maybe I'm way off base, but I really don't think that terrain is as important in CTP unless I'm misunderstanding how it works (haven't played it). IF you implement flanking on the mini-map, then your ability to flank is determined only by the tile the battle takes place in. If you implement flanking on the main map, then a tile that is in a "valley" between two mountain ranges is relatively safer from flanking attacks. This makes strategic decisions on where to engage much more dependant on the terrain.

Go back to what I said about the CTP mini screen - it is merely a pictoral representation of (up to) 12 of your units simultaneously fighting a single pitched battle, instead of a single units fighting one at a time. This is the only difference in the basic combat resolution between CTP and civ - combat is resolved for multiple units as opposed to single units.

The bonuses are slightly different, in that CTP has a few more added to the mix. These bonuses are automatically implimented, so a player is not actually doing anything out of the ordinary, nor is he doing anything extra on the mini screen.

Here are the bonuses

1. There are conventional terrain/tile improvement/city building bonuses that are added to your units (+50% Hills, Forests - 100% Mountains, Forts, City Walls, etc.) - BTW, these are the same types of bonuses as in civ3 (...although in CTP there is no 'Across River' bonus in CTP, but that is a minor point not really relevant to the discussion).

2. In CTP, there is also flanking/range bonuses that are automatically implimented on the tile where the battle occurs and only when you initiate combat.

In the same way, CTP has limitations on unit movement based on terrain. For instance, certain units cannot cross unroadded mountains, so in your situation above, you face the same issue in both games.

If you are looking for some type of modifier bonus/penalty for taking a 'strategic flanking approach' to a battle (i.e., a flanking maneuver via mainmap movement), I don't see why this could not be implimented in a stacked-CTP format. The principle would still be the same.

[polypheus]

I know its been said before but to repeat, I'd wish that Civ4 would elimininate the Road and RR sprawl. The only reason for this sprawl is due to bonuses. If roads/railroads had, say, upkeep, and/or bonuses were curtailed, then we wouldn't see this ugly sprawl.

It's just tedious to build and ugly to have roads and RRs everywhere. It'd be nicer to have mostly point-to-point roads and railroads.

And of course as has been said many times, RR infinite movement needs to finally go so that it is balanced with air movement and naval movement.

[wrylachlan]

In a real battle, the differences in terrain across the battlefield effect the tactics. If you're in between two mountains, flanking becomes impossible. If the left side of the line borders a river, flanking on that side becomes impossible. As a defender you can exploit this to your advantage. If you know the enemy is approaching with knights, get into that valley and stack your archers behind a line of pikemen.

By implementing the flanking bonus at the mini-map level, those terrain differences are nullified because the army attacking in the valley is equally effective at flanking as the army attacking on the plains. As it is, the tactical and the strategic levels are essentially conflated in Civ, which I think is a simple and easy game dynamic to understand. As such, it should be accepted that tactics happen in the same map space as strategic decisions.

The alternative is to make the mini-game more robust in terms of differences in terrain across the front. But then you get into a situation where, in order to make the decision of "Where to engage", you have to zoom into the tactical level of each tile, which would quickly become unwieldy.

[hexagonian]

Originally posted by wrylachlan
In a real battle, the differences in terrain across the battlefield effect the tactics. If you're in between two mountains, flanking becomes impossible. If the left side of the line borders a river, flanking on that side becomes impossible. As a defender you can exploit this to your advantage. If you know the enemy is approaching with knights, get into that valley and stack your archers behind a line of pikemen.

Then all you need to do is impliment a penalty that would nullify your flanking bonus based on the terrain type (...and even possibly including the surrounding terrain and the terrain that you attacked from as part of the equation) Again, this does not hinder using your premise in a CTP stacked format. You would see the dilemma about terrain on the mainmap level and realize that your flanking ability on the local level is lost.