Apolyton Civ4 PREVIEW (By Solver) - Part 1 online

[The_Aussie_Lurker]

For me, the balancing effect would be that when it came to actual 'toe to toe' fighting, most siege units would get cut to pieces fairly quickly-so you wouldn't want to overstack with artillery. Also, there would be nothing to stop your siege weapons from suffering the same collateral damage effects from enemy siege weapons. It is basically another element of combined arms-having siege weapons is pointless if you don't have other units to press home the attack/defense!

Yours,
Aussie_Lurker.

[snoopy369]

Hmm. One possibility I think of, would be to decrease Arty movement to nearly 0. Can you make it 1/3 perhaps? Then allow them to do similar damage to Civ3 scale, but with more spread out damage (say, 20% base chance of hitting each unit, for the entire stack).

That gives them the appropriate degree of power ... but means that if you use them and don't have enough to defend them, you won't win (and you have to move very slowly when you do have them)...

[Dominae]

Originally posted by The_Aussie_Lurker
For me, the balancing effect would be that when it came to actual 'toe to toe' fighting, most siege units would get cut to pieces fairly quickly-so you wouldn't want to overstack with artillery. Also, there would be nothing to stop your siege weapons from suffering the same collateral damage effects from enemy siege weapons. It is basically another element of combined arms-having siege weapons is pointless if you don't have other units to press home the attack/defense!

Then either you're misinformed as to how it works in CIV, or I'm not understanding you right.

I thought the mechanic you have issues with is how the Catapult or whatever must attack to do collateral damage. My reply was that without the risk of losing the unit, collateral damage suddenly becomes very powerful and a nightmare to balance. What you do not want is stacks just "collateral damaging" each other until one side runs out of hit points.

Sure, they could have implemented it another way. Which is why I'm challenging you to mod it that way!

[snoopy369]

Originally posted by Dominae


Then either you're misinformed as to how it works in CIV, or I'm not understanding you right.

I thought the mechanic you have issues with is how the Catapult or whatever must attack to do collateral damage. My reply was that without the risk of losing the unit, collateral damage suddenly becomes very powerful and a nightmare to balance. What you do not want is stacks just "collateral damaging" each other until one side runs out of hit points.

Sure, they could have implemented it another way. Which is why I'm challenging you to mod it that way!

Stacks collaterally damaging each other is not entirely unreasonable, actually. Certainly ... (erp) Realistic (erp) ... It's a sort of "trench warfare", and I wouldn't object to a particular era of civ4 being allowed into that (I value a variety of combat styles being utilizable). Artillery battles would only occur if both sides were artillery heavy, and thought themselves evenly matched with the other - they'd shoot at each other until one side clearly was winning the arty battle, or one side decides that the other WILL win the arty battle and thus rushes in with the non-arty compliments ...

[FrostyBoy]

Artillery Wars

[Dale]

Originally posted by hexagonian
I believe that CTP will be officially 'retired' from my hard drive...or at least I will not be arguing its superiority over the civ series anymore

Now that's a big call from one so pro-CTP2.

It'd be good to work on a big mod again with ya mate. Let's revolutionise Civ4 like we did CTP2.

Dale

[The_Aussie_Lurker]

You see, I don't feel that what I have put forward is unbalanced in the least. Consider it like this:

2 stacks-Stack A contains 2 Knights, 2 Pikemen and 2 catapults. Stack B contains 3 knights, 3 macemen and 2 catapults.

Round 1: Stack A attacks Stack B. First off, each sides catapults release their respective 'first strike' volleys. IF they hit, then they do one lot of collateral damage. Then, after this 'free shot', normal combat resumes between the strongest attacker of stack A and the strongest defender of stack B. We do not hear from any of the catapults again UNLESS one sides catapults happen to be the 'strongest defender' or the 'strongest attacker'. If this is the case though, then it is almost certainly curtains for that side-as all their non-siege units are almost certainly dead or retreated.

So, the amount of damage that the siege weapons can do is limited to their first round of use and, should they ever come into play in the battle again, they will almost certainly get massacred. This is a great disincentive for using a 'siege-heavy' stack-that and the fact that it is vulnerable to any siege weapons on the other side.

Yours,
Aussie_Lurker.

[ajbera]

You could also make artillery particularly vulnerable to air and heli attacks, for later ages.

[Mudhut]

It's 5pm now (Australian time) on the 17th and still no sign of Solver Part 2 Preview....

I can't leave work until he posts it (no internet at home) - maybe this is some conspiracy between Solver and my boss to make me do more work

Please Solver, post it soon and release me from this slavery!

[spa]

I don't know if it's a conspiracy persay, just the universe trying to equal out all the loss productivity that's coming next week!

[The_Aussie_Lurker]

Next Week. Ha, I WISH!!! Unlike you Americans/Canadians, we Australians won't be getting the game until the 3rd of November ! Thats a whole17 days away!!!

Yours,
Aussie_Lurker.

[Harovan]

Originally posted by Solver
The AI does NOT cheat. Seriously. On higher difficulties, it gets some bonuses like cheaper research, production, etc., but it has no rule cheats. It doesn't know where resources are in advance, etc.

This is the single best information ever heard about Civ4.

Originally posted by hexagonian
I believe that CTP will be officially 'retired' from my hard drive...or at least I will not be arguing its superiority over the civ series anymore

It does remain to be seen how it compares to CTP/AOM in challenging gameplay, but I do see this...

There is a great amount of potential in civ4, and in the capabilities of the vast modding community to really come up with some innovative mods.

Looking forward to seeing them (and I'm definitely open to being a part of the process, probably not as a lead, but in a support role)

Originally posted by Dale
Now that's a big call from one so pro-CTP2.

It'd be good to work on a big mod again with ya mate. Let's revolutionise Civ4 like we did CTP2.

Dale

And that the second best!

[Freddz]

Yes, and hopefully it means that trading maps to the A.I. actually means a liability for real as it now can plan the war better?

Does it become a liability, Solver?

[Ennet]

Originally posted by sophist


This is such a simple thing that I highly doubt that you (or I or Solver or Sid) could make better decisions than the algorithm they use. It's mathematically provable which combination of attacks would lead to the highest chance of victory with the largest number of surviving attackers. Micromanaging would just yield the same result or reduce your chance of success or leave you with fewer units after your victory.

Attacking with your elite units first will have the highest odds in your favour from the start, but it's still most probable that you lose your level 3 elite.
If you attack with a weaker unit it will for sure die, but will give your elite unit higher odds of surriving.

[Dale]

Sir Ralph:

Thanks. I'm just drooling with all this talk of mod-potential.

Dale