Unrealistic Combat: What side are you on?

[Zinegata]

Originally posted by kimmygibler
What I meant was if you can't stand tanks losing to longbowmen, the picture is important to you. The odds are the odds. You can see them before you attack. It's not as if the odds are stacked in favour of the longbowman. But some people look at the picture and see a tank and say that could never lose to that single man with a bow and arrow.

Well, my arguments is that the odds should also make sense based on the picture =).

Think of it this way. If a knight attacks an archer in an open field the knight should have a higher odds of winning. This fits the public image of knights running down troops in the open field.

Take the same knight and make him attack an archer in a city, and the odds go dramatically down for the knight. This again fits the public image of horsemen having a much more difficult time fighting in cramped spaces like cities.

This is the ideal. The odds reflect the public's expectation, based on what they see on screen.

Now, take a tank and fight a spearman. Sure, the tank has an advantage, especially in the open, but in the cramped environs of a city the odds are significantly lower. In fact, it's to the point that it seems to happen more than just rarely.

Now, think about it. Sure, the tank will have a hard time in the cramped environs of a city, but the tank is fighting spearmen. Guys with spears! Ask a guy on the street what he thinks of that matchup, and he'll probably say the tanks will win and anyone who says otherwise is either crazy or watching too many movies.

Sure, you can bombard them to reduce the city defenses, but again... these are tanks. Shouldn't you at least have guns of some sort to win against them?

The best route, I believe, is thus to make the odds reflect what is "common" public perception. No, the tank isn't invincible and if it keeps trying to attack spearmen in the city it should eventually be destroyed. However, it had better go through a LOT of spearmen before it dies, and it definitely shouldn't lose at full strength to a spearman!

On the other hand, some people clearly see a 6 and a 20 (or whatever the numbers are) rather than a tank and longbowman. If you look at it this way, you are not going to be arguing "no way a 6 could ever beat a 20 in real life. It just can't happen, it's impossible." That's why I think if the picture was changed, nobody would have any problems.

Changing the picture can work, but it's not the best solution. See previous posts for the reasoning =)

[Zinegata]

Originally posted by Kc7mxo


While I do slightly care that the varety of units in civ4 is abysmal, what I think, anyway, is that the combat system is intentionally designed to slow down warfare and give builder civs more options.

Which is why primitive units are still resonably viable against more modern forces. Judging from some of civ4's values, Great Brittain and the rest of europe would never have been able to conquer vast swathes of the world the way they did. They would have been overwhelmed by the hordes of unupgraded AI units.

I don't agree or paticuarly enjoy this aspect of civ4 and I consider civ2's combat system largely superior. A combination of the old system and this new one would provide a system far superior to both, in my opinion.

Just to be fair however, I think slowing down warfare by improving city defenses is good game design in the case of Civ IV. Briefly, here is the chain of reasoning:

1) Previous Civ games tend to become micromanagement nightmares, especially thanks to the use of the ICS approach.

2) To reduce micromanagement, the best way to do this is not to automate the micromanagement (MOO3 did that and see where it ended up), but rather to reduce the number of playing pieces on the board.

3) To reduce the number of playing pieces on the board, maintenance costs were introduced. As a result, the number of cities and units built by a player is now greatly reduced.

4) However, as a result of the lowering of the number of cities, each city has now become more valuable. Losing a city in a 20-city empire will only cost you 5% of your empire's power. Losing a city in a 8 city empire will cost you a much higher 12.5%

5) As losing even a single city is now a big deal, the odds of taking one should be lessened, hence the introduction of high city defense bonuses.

Note though, that I do also disagree in point 5 in the case that extremely modern units fight ancient units. If they're near parity in terms of technology, it's fine to give the defender the upperhand. Giving spearmen a chance against tanks however? That's rewarding poor technological advancement or lax updating of units.

BTW, are ancient units still common in in A.I. armies at Prince of higher difficulty levels? I hope not because if so it might look like the high defense bonuses are actually just anoher way to artificially make A.I. competetive -_-;;;

[Kc7mxo]

3) To reduce the number of playing pieces on the board, maintenance costs were introduced. As a result, the number of cities and units built by a player is now greatly reduced.

If anything I use far far MORE units (other than engineers) than I EVER did in civ 2 in both civ3 and civ4.

In the last game I got curious, and my neighbor, who only had three cities in the industrial era had more than thirty combat units, plus 12 ships that i could see.

At least for me, this has left me only able to either win extremly SLOW wars where I inch across the landscape blowing away cities with navl bombardment or artillery, or I just pound my across his empire taking horrendous casualties, which naturally requires massive numbers of soldiers.

So, for me at least, I micromanage a great deal more in civ4 than I ever did in civ2. Used to be six cavalry was an army. Six cavalry now dont even seem to get me past the front gate.

I kinda think they should bring back unit support and home cities, at least that was an impact you could feel.

[Holistic Cookie]

Originally posted by Zinegata


Well, my arguments is that the odds should also make sense based on the picture =).

Think of it this way. If a knight attacks an archer in an open field the knight should have a higher odds of winning. This fits the public image of knights running down troops in the open field.

Take the same knight and make him attack an archer in a city, and the odds go dramatically down for the knight. This again fits the public image of horsemen having a much more difficult time fighting in cramped spaces like cities.

This is the ideal. The odds reflect the public's expectation, based on what they see on screen.

Now, take a tank and fight a spearman. Sure, the tank has an advantage, especially in the open, but in the cramped environs of a city the odds are significantly lower. In fact, it's to the point that it seems to happen more than just rarely.

Now, think about it. Sure, the tank will have a hard time in the cramped environs of a city, but the tank is fighting spearmen. Guys with spears! Ask a guy on the street what he thinks of that matchup, and he'll probably say the tanks will win and anyone who says otherwise is either crazy or watching too many movies.

Sure, you can bombard them to reduce the city defenses, but again... these are tanks. Shouldn't you at least have guns of some sort to win against them?

The best route, I believe, is thus to make the odds reflect what is "common" public perception. No, the tank isn't invincible and if it keeps trying to attack spearmen in the city it should eventually be destroyed. However, it had better go through a LOT of spearmen before it dies, and it definitely shouldn't lose at full strength to a spearman!




Changing the picture can work, but it's not the best solution. See previous posts for the reasoning =)

1. hmm Look no further then Agincourt, where numerically superior knights lost to archers.

2. Modern weapons and technology does not necessarily mean an ensure victory. Vietnam is a very good example of a gunpowder nation beating, not one, but two modern nations. (France and the Yankees for those who don't know)

I do however agree that combat is a little strange, back in civ 3, my tanks would get owned by the occasional chariot...but it usually occurs infrequently. I've only played a few games of civ4 atm, and i must say the combat is fine so far. I did lose a major battle recently with riflemen against Spearchucking, armorwearing tin cans. but man..did i kill alot of 'em.... lol (5 Riflemen fortified in a city killed a mass wave of spearmen, warriors, chariots, catapults, knights, swordsmen, archers, etc) but hey...a modern day platoon of troopers with ray guns is gonna lose to a horde of screaming barbarians if they outnumber you 10,000 to 1.

Anyways, What i really think thats needed is not an increase in the basic percentages of the unit, but some form of bonus to combat for being a whole Age higher then your opponent.

[Egbert]

I would not like it if I "just knew" I was going to win. I much prefer that the spearman can sometimes defeat a tank but this should be rare. I like a little uncertainty in the wars. (IRL Inferior forces have defeated superior forces).

OTH If the spearman wins too often players will get very frustrated, particularly new players who play their first game and see their armour destroyed by spearmen. They might uninstall the game. I still remember a Civ1 game in which this happened to me. A large force of tanks destroyed by spearmen and my navy of battleships destroyed by sail. Big disaster. Oh, and a Russian trireme sank my aircraft carrier in the middle of an ocean in that game. (Despite that it turned out to be an interesting game, the germans attacked, with tanks etc, when the French spearmen had destroyed my invasion force). If that had been my first game I might have uninstalled after the French spearman disaster.

[Skanky Burns]

Risk is part and parcel of good game design. I would not like it if an attack was guaranteed to win - very high odds yes but not a sure thing. As such I am forced to vote for 'B'.

That being said, I wouldn't mind a greater disparity between gunpowder excluding musketeers and non-gunpowder units.

[Holistic Cookie]

The end of Melee weapons in warfare really ended in the first world war with the introduction of the watercooled machine gun, rendering Napoleonic infantry formations Cavalry charges obsolete. So really up till the early 1900s, we were still poking each other with pointy stuff.

That said, A good balance is what we have going here, whilst i still think that a sail boat sinking a Carrier would be neigh impossible, one has to think back to the USS Cole....

Anyways, this is a game and not a hardcore simulation. More like Discovery channel lite.

On that point...where's my friggin' Great Wall? What happened to the Great Wall of China? Its visible from Space for pete's sake...It's an ancient wonder afterall. Gimme my great wall anytime..keep your Hagia whatever you call it. I smell whiff of discrimination here. or one big gigantic oversight.

[Zinegata]

Originally posted by Holistic Cookie
1. hmm Look no further then Agincourt, where numerically superior knights lost to archers.

Actually, the field of Agincourt was muddy, granting the archers a defense bonus almost as good as if they had been fighting in a city =).

Crecy's another possible example, but again the rain and mud helped bail out the English =).

And yes, I know my Hundred Years War history =).

2. Modern weapons and technology does not necessarily mean an ensure victory. Vietnam is a very good example of a gunpowder nation beating, not one, but two modern nations. (France and the Yankees for those who don't know)

Which is why I said it's okay if a gunpowder unit can beat a modern unit like a tank. The tech disparity is not that bad.

Spearmen against tanks however? Too much of a stretch...

Also...

I do however agree that combat is a little strange, back in civ 3, my tanks would get owned by the occasional chariot...but it usually occurs infrequently. I've only played a few games of civ4 atm, and i must say the combat is fine so far. I did lose a major battle recently with riflemen against Spearchucking, armorwearing tin cans. but man..did i kill alot of 'em.... lol (5 Riflemen fortified in a city killed a mass wave of spearmen, warriors, chariots, catapults, knights, swordsmen, archers, etc) but hey...a modern day platoon of troopers with ray guns is gonna lose to a horde of screaming barbarians if they outnumber you 10,000 to 1.

Anyways, What i really think thats needed is not an increase in the basic percentages of the unit, but some form of bonus to combat for being a whole Age higher then your opponent.

I'm glad you agree with me in principle! =)

And from the look of things, more and more posters are seeing the point of at least making the game "make sense" so players aren't frustrated =)

[Frank Johnson]

One simple "check box at start up" option that could be used is something similar to what I've seen done on certain board games like Axis and Allies.

A&A involves alot of dice rolling, just like civ. Some of the gamers felt cheated when they approached a battle with what seemed like overwhelming odds, but took serious losses instead.

What they came up with is a system that took the numbers then saw what the "average" dice rolls should be.

IE, if we took the mathmatically perfect results of 1000000000 dice rolls between the spearman and the tank, and simply automaticly used the average result of that battle, it would be like what they had done.

So if a full hit tank and a full hit spear man, well fortified and all fight each other, then the spearman would always die and the tank would always take the speficied ammount of damage for fighting a spearman in XYZ fortified position.

Only, when someone is stupid enough to ignore the fact that the tank is too damaged to win would the tank ever lose.

I would find this boring however, since you can see all the units in a stacked army hiding in a city, so you could wheel up, do math, then turn around, which would be lame,......

Also because of the way civ handles units and damage, we're talking about an unfair situation. Healing a tank takes time, but ultimately its FREE in comparison to its production cost. The well entrenched spearmen, you seem to agree, should inflict some level of attrition on the enemy, lest they keep fighting with 1 tank into eternity which we accept is impossible, at some point the tank needs to fuel and gets jumped, runs out of ammo, breaks down in the mud, loses a tread, or something. Most people don't seem to get annoyed if a tank is damaged by a spearman.

But....

As far as the math is concerned, 5 tanks at 80% health and 4 tanks at 100% and one dead one could be the results of the same rolls. However you're much more likely to be "annoyed" by the 1 lost tank unit, even though the numbers came out exactly the same way in the long term average.

But with the way civ handles repairs. Unless the spearman "gets" a whole tank every once in awhile you havent lost a thing. No attrition. So, its needed for a tank to occasionally die, or you need to have a hammer cost for unit repairs so that it actually costs something to repair a tank when it is damaged.

[icecone]

I just want to point out that a tank beats a spearman exactly 99.99999998507587% of the time if the spearman has no bonuses. Even when the spearman is jacked up with bonuses the tank is still vastly superior.

Edit: the tank "only" wins 99.99999989636317% of the time.

[Harovan]

I would like to see a savegame of a full health tank losing to a spearman.

Until I do, I consider discussions like this baseless drivel.

And a huge waste of time. I wasted enough on this already.

[Zinegata]

Originally posted by Sir Ralph
I would like to see a savegame of a full health tank losing to a spearman.

Until I do, I consider discussions like this baseless drivel.

And a huge waste of time. I wasted enough on this already.

Well don't look at me, I'm still eagerly awaiting my copy of the game =).

I think there was a guy three threads ago who reported this however, and that one incident started this whole series of arguments...

Of course, you need to qualify if that's a spearmen with no bonuses, or a spearmen with a lot of bonuses, because you did mention previously that the biggest reason this happens is that the tank is either not full strength or the player blundered.

(And Zinegata, being bored while not having his copy yet, participated a lot in the said arguments. ^_^)

[RGBVideo]

The griping on this subject will never end....

Has it even started?

What kind of idiot wants absolute realism in a non-simulation computer game anyway?

I don't want realism. I want a combat model which makes offensive war a sane option within the game. I could mod it myself if I could find a way to allow bombard other units without having any damage created to the bombarding unit itself.

[Dead Sage]

While I am new to this forum, I have played all the Civ games with great enthusiasm and satisfaction. Civ IV is no different. I, however, find myself unable to come down either wholly in the A or B camps.
The problem, to me at least, is one of abstraction. One side abstracts numbers for “units,” while the other abstracts graphical representations for balanced game units. The sides are both right and both wrong.
On some level, Civ is about building a civilization and ever player hopes to build one as great as any in history. That requires that the game track, at least in a minimal fashion, the real world. As such, “units” become available at appropriate times, with strengths appropriate to their supposed attributes. This is where I believe Civ IV has failed. It has failed to numerically quantify the attributes of the different units.
Gunships fly, while spearman march on the ground. The primary weapon of the spearman is a spear, which he uses to, essentially, impale his opponent. How does a spear impale a chopper? Granted, if the chopper gets too low, they may get a shot, or the pilot could error and strike a tree while maneuvering…but such occurrences would be extremely rare. Likewise, in the now infamous Tank v. Spearman case, similar issues apply. I have never seen, heard or read of anything that would lead me to believe that a bronze spear is capable of penetrating more than an inch of steel. Bullets won’t even do that. The only way that it would be possible for a spearman to “destroy” a tank would be to actually destroy the men or equipment inside. To do that, they would essentially have to mob it and attack through the hatch. While difficult, it is certainly possible; especially on certain types of terrain.
This is where, I believe that the term “unit” comes in handy. A unit, in the military sense, refers not to lone tank and lone spearman facing off, but rather to formations of these weapons systems engaging in combat. Considering the scale of Civ IV, I can only postulate that a ground “unit” would be approximately equivalent to a battalion. Thus, when you speak of a tank being defeated by a spearman, you are actually referring to a battalion of tanks being out classed by a battalion of spearmen. In this context, the idea of the spearmen’s victory seems even more improbable. It would entail not just three spearmen charging up a tank, but hundreds of spearmen charging up more than a hundred tanks and managing to take them all out at the same time without being massacred. This belies the realities of combat maneuvering and modern mobile warfare...a tank could outrun a spearman, or even run him over. Thus, the likelihood of a unit of spearmen taking out one of tanks is so remote as to be a near-statistical impossibility. As a unit of tanks became more damages (lost tanks, in other words) it would become increasing vulnerable to the mob attack.
As a result, I believe that in fairness to common sense, as well as the complexities of the real world, a spearman should be unable to defeat a full power tank, or even a 2/3 strength tank. Damage it, yes, but not destroy it. Reality would provide a unit of tanks with the ability attack at range and severely limit the ability of spearmen to attack and then withdraw if they began to be overwhelmed by spear-toting kettles. I believe it to be a balancing compromise to prevent the destruction of a tank by a pre-gunpowder ground unit when its strength is at more than 2/3. Below that, they are fair game.
I believe that it would make more sense to employ quantification system based upon the numbers and strengths of weapons systems within a unit. This would then necessitate the balancing of weapons system count within different kinds of unit, but I believe it would be a net gain for the next Civ installment. Moreover, it would help mitigate streaky number generation during combat. Finally, I believe it would make the combat simpler for the casual player to understand: four tanks attacking 653 spearmen is not a good idea no matter how good the tankers are. This would provide a smaller unit of balance to combat in the game, allowing for smarter, more effective control of units without eliminating the role of chance.

--D.S.

[Kiltdown]

History is full of military results that should not have happened. Sometimes it's due to brilliant tactics, a failure of morale, a missed resupply, or simply bad weather. But a markedly inferior force ends up victorious.

In entertainment fiction, written or image, the most compelling and memorable battles are not the ones where the outcome follows the predicatble result. We are almost trained to expect an unusual result, or at least its possibility. The uncertainty creates suspense; and suspense is entertaining.

It's the unusual that grabs our attention and our imagination; it is the unusual that is memorable.

The same is true in CIV IV battles. While we might not always like the unusual outcome when it goes against us, we certainly remember it. Those who are inclined to imagination, and/or have a historical perspective, will see the spearman defeat the tank and then envision a small force of hoplites holding a mountain pass against hordes of persians, or perhaps ewoks crushing walkers with swinging logs, or a terrible storm that washed out the roads leaving the tanks mired and helpless. These players will mentally tip their hats to their imaginary opponent and then crush them with the next tank (though they very well may sswear first). They will look beyond the battle graphics. Other players will bemoan their loss and respond with a mixture of frustration and fury; perhaps crying "foul!"

The mathematical fact is this: if there is a small but finite possibility of victory, there is a virtual certainty that such victories will happen occasionally. And, as other posters have mentioned the poignancy of such memories gives them a weight beyond their number.

Take away that small degree of unpredicatability and the game is lessened and *less* real, IMO.