Fire power is not what we need, we need modern units to have more hit points

[WhiteElephants]

Goldstien -- I'm not going to reply to your petty insults in an attempt to keep this arguement clean. I would appreciate it if you could do like wise.

I'm sorry, White Elephant, but this argument doesn't even qualify as specious. So, because the graphics of Civ1/2/3 aren't cutting edge, we're to believe that they don't represent what they appear to - or what they are named?

They units are a function of the mechanics of the game. They are an abstraction of reality and bent to fit the rules of the game in order to make it challenging, balanced, and fun. The tank unit is no more a tank than the Bank in your capital city is a bank. The capital city is no more a capital city as much as it is a representation of a rule that allows you to lower corruption in the surrounding area. It is a rule you choose to obey or modify in the editor. The choice is yours.

Tanks and pikemen, however, are very real. Those of us with the ability for critical thinking expect something which looks like a tank and is called a tank to naturally smash something which looks like a pikeman and is called a pikeman.

A critical analysis of the combat mechanics would prove otherwise.

However, a cretin would have us believe that those things that look like tanks and pikemen really AREN'T tanks and pikemen, but whatever suits them in the present. Naturally as their old lies come full circle and catch up with them, the pikemen and tanks will come to be something totally different.

They are no more and no less than the values you, in the editor, or Firaxis choose them to be. What they look like is merely a graphical place holder for the assigned values. The circle ends there, no lies, no catching up, nothing more, and nothing less.

[zapperio]

Originally posted by E. Goldstein
Just tell me why it is logical that ancient units can put up a semi-credible defenses against modern ones.

mmm... because it makes the *game* more fun? Isn't that the point? Soren thinks so. So do the rest of the romantics.

If I want to play a military simulation I play 'Steel Panthers' and 'A Bridge too Far'. For a great empire building game you couldn't choose better then Civ3.

On the other hand, if anyone here could show me how they would change the current combat system and still retain the necessary balance that supports the resource system I'm all for it. So far I've seen a lot of recommendation on how to make the combat result more 'realistic' but no-one has shown how the changes will make the gameplay more fun. Do that and I, and a lot of other people, I suspect, will be convinced as to why it is necessary. And no, realism != fun.

Zap

[n.c.]

Nothing is more fun than reading other people say what you are thinking/have posted. This was especially true wrt woody! thanks guys. I'll try to specifically agree later.

Originally posted by WhiteElephants
I'm not going to reply to your petty insults in an attempt to keep this arguement clean.

So his describing your argument specious is a petty insult? How would you describe calling someone thick-skulled?

[GePap]

NOT THE SAME!

WhiteElephants:
We can't just set aside bonuses, morale and so forth. They were as much a part of the equation as those two all important numbers of attack and defense. Your example was shard rover v silksteel. OK. Shard has an attack of 14, silksteel defense of 4. With modifiers in cities it was 5. No one has yet complained in any forum about their tanks loosing to musketmen yet the probabilites (16 vs 6 or 8 if in a town) are very similar, so why do we not complain that our tanks loosing to musketmen even though historically this should not happen either? because at a certain time we decide that certain units can be credible defender vs us in game terms. So the musketman has half the defense of a tank, 1/4 the power of the attack, but this still makes them far more powerful than spearmen and we will be careful towards them. Also, musketmen take resources to build which means we can try to counter them also- we can't vs those miserable spearmen.

I also ask anyone to tell us how, combined arms, masterful strategy, nuclear weapons, whatever, if they had been in the same position as those poor A.I. civs in N. Machiavelli's gamee, they would have been able to defeat his attack. Also, to N Machiavelli. You could always just zip and post your saved game (if it exist) and then doubters could experience the experiment for themselves and witness the power. Also, they could, theoretically, recive different results (i doubt this) and then be able to make better counter-arguments. Otherwise the FP/HP debate might be coming to a close!

[n.c.]

Originally posted by zapperio
So far I've seen a lot of recommendation on how to make the combat result more 'realistic' but no-one has shown how the changes will make the gameplay more fun.

Of course, for many of us realism = fun (thus our desire to "rewrite history"). As for an answer on my recommended changes see SMAC (including the workshop), which could have easily been done in Civ III.

Not only would you have liked it, but as noted by WE there would have been very few complaints from our side.

[zapperio]

I'd like to quote vulcanohead from another thread as he says a lot of things I thing relate to this more eloquently than I could

"I was quite sceptical of the anti-civ3 combat system crowd at first, but some more game time and Venger's summary in this thread have convinced me there is a real issue with the Civ3 combat.

The problem is quite simply the side-effect of undersampling a statistical system. Toss a coin three times and your odds of getting 3 heads or tails in a row is 25%. Toss that coin 30 times and the chance they are all heads or all tails is bugger all.

Undersampling is the major reason we see some 'outliers' (caravel impressively taking out ironclad, for example) rather more often than the ADM values would suggest. Venger has quite elegantly put his finger on this, and it was a job well done. However, there remains several issues about the integration of this combat system with the rest of the game that we need to think about before being sure that changing this system is the best thing to do.

Unfortunately, many people in our community have a rather blinkered viewpoint: either the game is perfect and any criticism is defined as 'whining' (a curious term used mostly by people who haven't played all that much or who are unable to see that God did not design this game, people did, and therefore EVERYTHING AND ANYTHING is fair game for modification and improvement), or realists such as Venger who quite justifiably wish to see real-world type common sense reactions and effects within the game.

The problem with the realist point of view is that Civ 3 is absolutely not an attempt to reproduce reality. It says it is, the marketing blurb makes a big deal about it, but there are far too many abstractions to really claim that this is a model of the world and its peoples. What we actually have is a more complex version of Risk.

My personal viewpoint is that, for now, I do not want to change the combat system. I like the fact that sometimes wacky things happen. I like not wiping the floor with everyone with one tank. I think there is a good balance in the game, not realistic, not accurate, but fun.

In time however, particularly if MP happens (which of course is dependent on Firaxis resolving the much greater problem of slow game turns...), I can see that being a technological superstate that is destroyed by 500 Impis could be annoying, to say the least. Perhaps the combat system could be altered for an all human game, but against the AI it's fine as it is, for me, and for now.

V"


Zap

[zapperio]

Originally posted by n.c.
As for an answer on my recommended changes see SMAC (including the workshop), which could have easily been done in Civ III.

Scuse my lazyness, but I must have missed it when it was posted. Where is it at exactly?

Zap

[n.c.]

Originally posted by zapperio
I must have missed it when it was posted. Where is it at exactly?

(really hoping this was not sarcastic) Well, in that very post, after being asked! Seriously, I have made many comments in this vein over the last few weeks. In fact, I have been told to shut up several times.

I loved your post at 17:55, especially the following:

Unfortunately, many people in our community have a rather blinkered viewpoint: either the game is perfect and any criticism is defined as 'whining' (a curious term used mostly by people who haven't played all that much or who are unable to see that God did not design this game, people did, and therefore EVERYTHING AND ANYTHING is fair game for modification and improvement), or realists such as Venger who quite justifiably wish to see real-world type common sense reactions and effects within the game.

[WhiteElephants]

Troll on brother n.c.! Troll on!

No one has yet complained in any forum about their tanks loosing to musketmen yet the probabilites (16 vs 6 or 8 if in a town) are very similar, so why do we not complain that our tanks loosing to musketmen even though historically this should not happen either? because at a certain time we decide that certain units can be credible defender vs us in game terms.

Wait, wait, wait! Now you're telling me that musketmen defending against tanks are OK? Come on, I could go on and on and on about how this would never happen in "real life" as I've heard others say time and time again, yet you realist guys are going to let that one slide? Man oh, man! Burn the heritic at the stake!

Cross your fingers and hold your breath ladies and gentlemen we may very well have a convert on our hands!

Look, if you're willing to accept that musketmen can hold off a tank column that next extra step isn't too far is it? Why not view the whole game in "game terms"? Why stop with just this example?

[GePap]

Convert? Never!

Convert? NEVER !
Lets return to those wonderfull numbers those that like the combat system are so attached to. In a large city a musketman has a dfense of 8, if behind a river, of 10. Those are the game rules. Well, my tank has an attack of 16. So we have a situation of 16 vs 10. That's not stellar for the tanks. Spearmen would be 6 at most, ever. 16 vs 6 is much better. But the point is this. Let say i set up the same situation twice. Regular tank vs. Regular musketman. Regular tank vs. regular spearman, with defender in a city 12 behind a river. Could I, with anything even approchiang certainty, tell you how these battles will turn out? Can I even make an educated guess? No! As is, the spearmen may win just as well as the musketman. Hell, the musketman may do no damage to my tank while the spearmen might leave unscathed. That is unacceptable.
There are other reasons, of course, to accept the musketman. A player must invest time and effort to reach gunpowder and have saltpeter, besides the fact that they had to advance a whole age further. So, a lot more went into being able to get that musketman (for me or A.I.) than getting spearment (for some, its immidiate) and there should be some sort of reward for all that time and effort besides a unit that while theoretically twice as good, is empirically not. It comes down the the question- whats the point of advancing at all if all i need to win are masses of weak, obselete units? Why ever try peacefull expansion, cultural improvement, all those other wonderfull victory options I was given, if i must spend all my time and effort creating and managing ungodly amounts of units because I simply can't trust a strategic (i have resources, they don't) or technical edge?

[Elrad]

Originally posted by WhiteElephants


I was under the impression that most of the dissatisfaction revolved around the concept that such and such ancient unit defeated my such and such modern unit, which is claimed to be realistically impossible. The counter claim to that is that such and such unit couldn't co-exist in a realistic setting and that said unit is really a weak modern version of such and such, but still looks like said ancient unit.

This is a point I made a good while ago in a similar thread (Not sure if I was the first, but its a good way to think of it none the less)

Its a hitting 2 birds with one stone, you satisfy both the realmist variable without disturbing gameplay. People are complaining that archers beating tanks is unrealisic...isn't it unrealistic for a modern power who DOES have tanks for example to still have those ancient units around? As far as graphical changes to support this "explanation" for how ancient units in modern times are moderatly armed...it wouln't be much of a change at all.

Ancient units and Mideival units are fine the way they are....I mean after the dark ages there realy wasnt that much of a leap in weapons technology was there? In the industrial age just stick a tiny musket to replace the Axe, sword, or bow. In the modern age, stick a tiny rifle or ak47 on them, maybe even a dot to represent somekind of grenade (to explain how they can kill tanks). I refuse to believe that a civilization that has nuclear missiles will still have several legions armed with just swords, cmon...even civilians in the modern age are better armed.

On another note, I don't believe the prospect of ancient units beating modern ones is even all that serious. Have you ever tried to face modern units with ancient ones? I think we just have a tendancy to remember things that seem unlikely. Everyone remembers when their tank lost to two archers, but do they remember when their 5 tanks too out 5 cities armed to the teeth with 10 units each? Granted if your thinking about the realistic outcomes when these units from diffirent ages clash, that it would seem unrealistic. But so is the fact that those units are still around in the first place.

One thing I would like to see however is a reduction that chance plays a part in combat. The problem is that combat consists of very few rolls, a 3 health units vs a 3 health unit has a high degree of variance beacause there is only a max of 5 rounds calculated between them...and the battle in each round is so luck driven.

Multiply health by say 5 (so you get 10,15,20,25) and you will see units react how they are supposed to, superior units only loosing in very very rare cases, or when they are very weak. (A band of modern rifleman long exausted after many consecutive battles with no time to sleep or eat...dying of wounds or disiese wouldn't do too well againsed some civilians with sticks now would they?)

Well anyway, thats my 2 cents about it. My other question would be what are you guys doing playing tanks vs archers anyway? Try Diety on a large map (without taking advantage of the AI's lack of diplomatic talent) and you will see the tables turned, and in my expirience atleast my Archers, Musketmen, and even infantry loose to those enemy tanks every time.

-Elrad

[zapperio]

Originally posted by n.c.
(really hoping this was not sarcastic) Well, in that very post, after being asked! Seriously, I have made many comments in this vein over the last few weeks. In fact, I have been told to shut up several times.

No really, nc, I wasn't being sarcastic. You pointed me towards an answer, you thought would satisfy my request, in another post. And I honestly ask, where is the thread so I may read it? 'SMAC (including the workshop)' doesn't ring any bells but then, I don't spend that much time away from Civ3 and I must have missed it.


ps the quote you liked was from vulcanohead

Zap

[WhiteElephants]

Originally posted by Elrad
One thing I would like to see however is a reduction that chance plays a part in combat. The problem is that combat consists of very few rolls, a 3 health units vs a 3 health unit has a high degree of variance beacause there is only a max of 5 rounds calculated between them...and the battle in each round is so luck driven.

Multiply health by say 5 (so you get 10,15,20,25) and you will see units react how they are supposed to, superior units only loosing in very very rare cases, or when they are very weak. (A band of modern rifleman long exausted after many consecutive battles with no time to sleep or eat...dying of wounds or disiese wouldn't do too well againsed some civilians with sticks now would they?)

No, no, no! Your whole post made far too much sense and for that you're a cretin and thick skulled!

I'd even be willing to bend a little and see what happens if units were given more hit points. I was thinking ten each and have morale be a modifier for the attack rating as it was done in SMAC.

[WhiteElephants]

Re: Convert? Never!

Originally posted by GePap
Convert? NEVER !

After your musketman vs. tank statement I don't think a realist is going to touch you with a ten foot pole. No, no, no! I think you've definetley lost standing in your party, pal. You're a stranger in a strange land now -- no man's land -- neither here nor there -- the balck limbo void between the realists and the romantics. It sounds like a cold and lonely place my friend. I wish you well.

[n.c.]

Originally posted by WhiteElephants
Troll on brother n.c.! Troll on!

I'll be around if you want to try a real answer.

BTW, the reason I commented on the thick skull thing initially is that you seemed above it. The subsequent "can't we play nice" request was just too ironic.

Elrad- That discussion has taken place on a couple of threads. I think the real flaw is allowing units to exist 200+ years after becomig obsolete.

zap- The best example I can recall was a "SMAC is better" thread. Otherwise that sort of comment is here and there.

I really am baffled why they changed such an obviously successful design. Of course combat is just the most glaring example of Civ III ignoring a SMAC improvement.