Hitpoints/Firepower?

[BeBMan]

Sorry if this has been discussed before, but all units we have seen so far in the "civ of the week" editions had only values for attack, defense and move. Is the HP/FP system gone?

[Tventano]

I really hope so. It is just one level extra of needless complexity. This HP/FP system can easily be simulated by higher Attack/Defense ratings.

Probably the number of hitpoints varies with the time period and the veteranness (veteran +1, elite +2) of the unit.

Because of this added complexity CivII was much more a wargame than CivI. I am happy they are getting closer to the original idea.

[BeBMan]

Personally I like the FP/HP system, but mainly for scenario design reasons - it gives you more flexibility here.

[Admiral]

In one of the Ask the civ team'sit was mentioned that armis pooled their hit points. So at least hit points are in.

[Roman]

I also like the FP/HP system and we know at least hit points have been kept in civ 3.

[barefootbadass]

Having HP/FP to ramp up in modern times can help prevent the phalanx-beats-armor phenomenon. You need to have at least one of the two or you will have ancient units beating modern machines of war on occasion.

[Nemo]

I have seen no mention of FP, but they did say that in order to prevent phalax-tank issues, they have devised a 'class' system of some sort. Since the FP was originally designed to prevent the phalax-tank issues, I suppose that FP is out.

[hetairoi22]

I have read somewhere that the strength of ZOC depends on FP. F.x. it is harder to go past a tankt than to go past a Phalanx. I don't remember where I read it, though.

[Provost Harrison]

I think it would be a shame if HP/FP are gone. I would have hoped that the concept would have been improved upon, but kept nonetheless. I do not want to see a return to the civ1 combat system, which was too basic with it's 'phalanx beats battleship' incidents...

[barefootbadass]

Just because civ2 had fire power and phalanx vs tank was a problem sometimes doesn't mean it wasn't making the phalanx win less often. The reason it happened was because you could pile up too many defensive modifiers on the phalanx. If there hadn't been a differential FP/HP system in civ 2 this phenomenon would have happened a lot more often. I don't think there should be a class system such that unit A could never defeat unit B, but there should be a probability like system such that an ancient unit beating a modern one would be something like winning the lottery, i.e., the modern unit malfunctions or something. Btw, I'm pretty sure I never saw a phalanx beat a tank, except for when the tank started out in the red and the phalanx was green, and then it would be quite possible to see something malfunction.

[Ralf]

Originally posted by Tventano
I really hope so. It is just one level extra of needless complexity. This HP/FP system can easily be simulated by higher Attack/Defense ratings.

But they have not made the attack/defence points any higher. Instead they have down-tuned them. Those 1-1-2 standard chariots for example, really seems quite worthless - heck they even need the horse-resource to be built at all. One can always tweak the Rules.txt files of course, and I guess the downtuned attack-values makes conquering cities without forged armies much harder. We dont know anything about the ADM-data for modern units yet, I admit.

Because of this added complexity CivII was much more a wargame than CivI. I am happy they are getting closer to the original idea.

Health bar (or damage-bar) for units may increase after each victory in combat. If a unit has won several battles, there is a small chance that unit could become a Great Leader. This ensures that HP and hopefully also FP (or some classification-system) is included and that indevidual combat-units will not fight in the same simple way that they did in Civ-1. Still, why not add HP and class-system also in the "civ of the week" at http://www.civ3.com/ ?

[BeBMan]

Originally posted by Ralf
Still, why not add HP and class-system also in the "civ of the week"?

Yes, I also would like to see this. However, perhaps they are still finetunig this system, this may be a reason for "hiding" it.

[Cyclotron]

Keep Hit Points and Firepower!

I must point out that in my opinion, it was the lack of hp and fp in CTP that destroyed the game and ruined its combat system. C'mon, guys! You can almost always determine who is going to win any battle with just attack and defense. Add up the terrain bonuses, the fortification bonuses, the veteran bonuses, compare the two numbers and you might as well just throw in the towel already if your number is lower. That's the way without hp/fp.

With these values, however, we can put more strategy and suspense/excitement into Civ3. A unit with a low attack but a high firepower doesn't hit an enemy very often, but when it does, it hits hard. Think bombers, early submarines, V-2 rockets, etc. Likewise, a unit could have a high attack but little firepower, thus delivering a lot of blows to the oppponent but each doing very little damage. Perhaps a lot of ranged units fit this description?

The same goes for defense and hit points. A tank has good armor (defense) but if a shell or bomb pierces it's armor shell, many vital systems and crewmen could be destroyed, thus taking out the tank.

Why settle for anything less? I am interested in what exactly Firaxis has in mind, and I hope that they will include hp and fp in some form, whether by unit, army, or whatever.

[SlowThinker]

The FP is useless

FP has (almost) no effect (may be substituted by an increased HP).
A 10HP/2FP unit is almost equal to a 20HP/1FP unit.
Only the effect of the fortuity is lower in the case of the 20HP/1FP unit.

[BeBMan]

I don´t believe that is true. I experimented a lot with HP/FP for my scenarios, and more FP can have an enormous effect...