this combat system has to **GO**

[Zachriel]

Originally posted by aneeshm
The chances of a conscript tank attacking an Elite fortified Spearman on a hill across a river in a metropolis and winning is ONLY 48.o91 % . Sad , isn't it ? Applying the same to modern Armour Vs Elite Musketman , it is 35.117% , while the same Modern armor Vs Elite Rifleman is a disgusting 19% .

What you're saying is that well-trained, committed troops trump technology. . . . That is exactly right.

Untrained, undisciplined troops will break and run. They don't know how to use their weapons, they have little knowledge of tactics, they are susceptible to deceit, and most of all, they have no loyalty to their comrades-in-arms.

[asleepathewheel]

Originally posted by aneeshm
The chances of a conscript tank attacking an Elite fortified Spearman on a hill across a river in a metropolis and winning is ONLY 48.o91 % . Sad , isn't it ? Applying the same to modern Armour Vs Elite Musketman , it is 35.117% , while the same Modern armor Vs Elite Rifleman is a disgusting 19% .

Its more disgusting to me that you would try to take a city defended by a dead horse with only one conscript tank. You're just asking for trouble.

I liked Zachriel's description. I would hope that human ingenuity and tactical skills represented by the elite unit could at least sometimes defeat a rookie tanker with barely enough skill to fire at a target. Not all the time, but sometimes.

[Nubclear]

Just a small question....

Do the different units represent different times eg does the spearmen represent ancient times while a cossack represents latemiddle/earlyindustrial times?

[asleepathewheel]

Originally posted by Tassadar5000
Just a small question....

Do the different units represent different times eg does the spearmen represent ancient times while a cossack represents latemiddle/earlyindustrial times?

small question?

Its really whatever you want it to be

Personally I feel that there is a difference between a spearman in 2000 bc and 2000 ad, they are just the weakest defenders possible, that the tech gap is just more extreme in modern times. The modern spearman is a local militia or something with very small arms. I wish that they could represent this like they do for the workers, but my imagination is sufficient. I like it that way more, as its a bit silly to have guys with swords taking on tanks.

But, its whatever you want it to be.

[faded glory]

"So you were wrong. Perhaps you should just admit it."

Actually. Judging by the popularity of these forums. I would say I was right.

"You often ARE a troll. Your reference to sucking the big could be the reason for the other remarks."

My opinion. Im not a Troll, but some people here are just hardcore fanboys IMO


"My fighters DO shoot down bombers. Never lost a tank to an Impi. Lost ONE to a speaman since the game came out."

See and pre patch the bombers were invulnerable. And as for a handful of men armed with clubs fighting off my tank divisions. It happens to me ALOT.


"Might be. I would not be at all surprised if you complain that Human Zulu's are killing your tanks."

No cause the human will actually be worth playing. And wont be a retarded, random set of actions.

[Cyclotron]

Originally posted by aneeshm
The chances of a conscript tank attacking an Elite fortified Spearman on a hill across a river in a metropolis and winning is ONLY 48.o91 % . Sad , isn't it ? Applying the same to modern Armour Vs Elite Musketman , it is 35.117% , while the same Modern armor Vs Elite Rifleman is a disgusting 19% .

Ok, some tips: Conscript tanks? Only if you mod or get a really unlikely barbarian camp in the industrial era... and I don't think even those put out tanks. Try again.
With a regular tank, that gives the spearman about a 30% chance of winning.

And no, it's not sad.

Moving right along...

Actually. Judging by the popularity of these forums. I would say I was right.

1) When was the latest "faded glory popularity poll"? I'm sorry, I missed that one.
2) Who told you that just because you are popular you are right?

My opinion. Im not a Troll, but some people here are just hardcore fanboys IMO

And "fanboys" have to do with you being a troll... how?

[faded glory]

"1) When was the latest "faded glory popularity poll"? I'm sorry, I missed that one.
2) Who told you that just because you are popular you are right"

What the hell are you talking about? I was talking about how popular the forums are. The CTP section is faster and has more browsers than this place.

I am popular? thats news to me. (wtf that has to do with anything?)


"And "fanboys" have to do with you being a troll... how?"

Incase you dont know
Fanboys ala - Opposite of the Troll. You'll take it up the ass for firaxis and jump on the forum gernades.

[asleepathewheel]

Originally posted by faded glory
What the hell are you talking about? I was talking about how popular the forums are. The CTP section is faster and has more browsers than this place.

@FG

the CTP forum is faster? to load or what? Even if this were true (which I doubt, wouldn't the whole site be slowed due to the number of viewers, not the individual fora?) but wouldn't this be the inverse of what you say? The Ctp is faster because there are fewer people viewing it. Duh!

As for more browsers, prove it. Which Ctp forum do you mean? Are you including Ctp2 fora? Are you including the other Civ3 fora? What is your measuring stick, everything I look at points to this civ3 forum (excluding the strat, ptw, civs, etc) as being more popular, please explain to me your reasoning.

[faded glory]

Faster as in I see more people post there than here. My god. You thought I was talking about load times?




Im sorry. I see maybe 100 posts per day in all the civ3 forums (thats a rougly an esitimate). CTP gets as much and is two years older. If the game was sooooo great then lots of people would be here posting wouldnt they?

[Blue Moose]

I did read it. I ignored it because it was incongruous with your previous statement of "automatic win" for units 2 eras better or more.

Though congruous with the overall paragraph.

But the combat system in Civ3 can't handle giving hoplites/phalanxes more attack points to account for their attack uses in primitives times, because of how the combat system works, surely you realize that. Otherwise you'd make bowmen worthless or some other unit worthless....the system is simply too primitive to allow a more realistic portrayal of units and combinations of units.

I think you are confused between the combat system itself and the way firaxis has decided to use it. When your base unit is 1/1, it is true that there is very little variation possible. But if a warrior was 5/5, you could have a whole range of units, using many more possible combinations of ADM numbers. The fact that Firaxis didn't do this doesn't invalidate the system.

You are the one confused, I think. The current system is limited. The historic value and purpose of units is partially lost. Hoplite battles in history, for instance, were largely affairs of equals, a hoplite attacking another hopelite would be (and should be) and even fight. Off the top of my head I cannot think of one unit in Civ3 that shouldn't have an equal fight on its hands if it attacks a like unit (assuming flat terrain and no forts or fortifications). Of course units can't all have equal values for attack and defense, and unequal ones don't make sense really, so this is a large problem with the basic concept.

The problem with this is that there is a difference in who attacks apart from simply where the attack takes place. Defending means holding a position, often from a fortress, something cavalry are ill equipped to deal with. Cavalry won't do as well in a great stone fortress as they will when facing the enemy in a field, and when they are fighting in a field they are fighting by charging... which is an attack. They aren't holding ground or even advancing/retreating slowly. A strategic defense is different from a tactical defense. Besides, making the attack and defense values the same would make combat extremely one-sided because all units would be either better than or worse than one another as far as combat stats are concerned.

And if you recall my original post, I said that there should be modifiers for wether or not a unit is fortified or in a fortress, but otherwise things are even. In retrospect I suppose a modifier for having high ground should be there as well. I also said that they should only be granted such bonuses if appropriate for the unit, so Cav couldn't gain much if any benefit from a fortress as you say. Something that isn't in the Civ3 system. And I prefer a totally new system as opposed to the ADM, for the more I think about it, the more silly it seems. Units should do better against some units than others, units that have a long ranged attack should be able to deal damage and possibly kill units before melee units can deal damage to them. This is simply impossible under the current system, and is indirectly responsible for its faults (as well as the upgrade system and partially the technology system). You get odd combat results because things aren't handled reasonably well, and hence to make 'sense' of it, you are forced to come up with often ridiculous 'theories' (though some theories aren't so bad) as to what is going on. Horse are bad against pikes, but swordsmen can do a better job against them (compared to horses), and two pikemen would be pretty evenly matched (and archers would do very, very well), and pikes with archers would slaughter them. This is simply not modelled in any way whatsoever with the current system, nor could it be. With a ADM system, you can't duplicate a Rock, Paper, Scissors system.

And it is only functionally the same as HP if HP are different for various units, but they aren't, they are the same for every unit (varying only by combat experience).

and attack indicating ability to deal damage

And that is the same as attack/defense rating.

Unless you are defending, then defense is ability to deal damage.

Why is that? How is every last tank destroyed? Is that very realistic?

Artillery can easily demolish tanks, they are big targets, and one hit will most often incapicitate a tank. Against infantry however, artillery is better for just keeping them from doing anything (they'll take cover and hide, won't be able to do anything, but probably won't suffer the damage a tank unit would). In a modern army, a few tanks aren't going to make a big difference (surely in a civ-style game), so artillery killing the vast majority of tanks is enough for the tanks to be dead).


Anyhow, to add my two cents on the issue of out of tech units...one way to handle this would be to have a greater proliferation of technology. It should be basically impossible to be two ages behind another player, and hard to be one full age behind. Realistically, a nation can't keep that much technology secret. If you have computers, it is going to be almost impossible to keep electronics out of the common knowledge, and hence it would be easy for a foreign nation to get that knowledge. This would fix most of the arguements about fighting out of date units.

[asleepathewheel]

Originally posted by faded glory
Im sorry. I see maybe 100 posts per day in all the civ3 forums (thats a rougly an esitimate). CTP gets as much and is two years older. If the game was sooooo great then lots of people would be here posting wouldnt they?

Check your math pal

I'm sorry that I've wasted this much time with a troll, but here is what I have found.

Number of posts to Ctp mp forum on 7/10/02 as of this post: 47

Number of posts to Civ3 main forum on 7/10/02 as of this post: 132

Since you have a problem with numbers, that's slightly less than 3 times the amount of posts, in ONE forum, not the all of the Civ3 forums as you suggested. Is there any need to look at the others?

And I should add, most of the posts on ctp are the same 4 or 5 people playing pbem games. I would hardly call THAT active.

[Theseus]

1) The Civ3 combat system is the Civ3 combat system. Eihter deal, or play something else.

2) For any who complain of unusual results, well, first there's Zachriel's comment, which I think quite elegant:

"What you're saying is that well-trained, committed troops trump technology. . . . That is exactly right.

Untrained, undisciplined troops will break and run. They don't know how to use their weapons, they have little knowledge of tactics, they are susceptible to deceit, and most of all, they have no loyalty to their comrades-in-arms."

Adding to that, and stressing the value of training, comradery, esprit-de-corps, etc., I would point to the many instances of heroic perfromance, starting with Thermopylae and continuing through many unbelievable feats in the 20th century.

Hell, I'm a Marine... give me a spear, and show me a tank.

Enough of this already.

[Cyclotron]

Originally posted by Blue Moose
Though congruous with the overall paragraph.

Well, I don't knwo about that, but it seemed incongruous to me so I didn't comment. Fair enough.

You are the one confused, I think. The current system is limited. The historic value and purpose of units is partially lost. Hoplite battles in history, for instance, were largely affairs of equals, a hoplite attacking another hopelite would be (and should be) and even fight. Off the top of my head I cannot think of one unit in Civ3 that shouldn't have an equal fight on its hands if it attacks a like unit (assuming flat terrain and no forts or fortifications). Of course units can't all have equal values for attack and defense, and unequal ones don't make sense really, so this is a large problem with the basic concept.

Well, taking into account my belief that there is a difference between an attack and a defense (and thus different values for each), the AD system seems perfectly appropriate to me. Having each unit attack and defend the same would make for a very boring combat system... and I'd take an unpredictable system over a boring one.

I also said that they should only be granted such bonuses if appropriate for the unit, so Cav couldn't gain much if any benefit from a fortress as you say. Something that isn't in the Civ3 system.

Actually it is. The cav's defense is less, so thus it gets less defence value from the fortress than, say, a rifleman. I fail to see the gameplay difference.

And I prefer a totally new system as opposed to the ADM, for the more I think about it, the more silly it seems. Units should do better against some units than others,

Units with high attack do well against units with low defense

units that have a long ranged attack should be able to deal damage and possibly kill units before melee units can deal damage to them.

Fair enough, give them bombard ability

You get odd combat results because things aren't handled reasonably well, and hence to make 'sense' of it, you are forced to come up with often ridiculous 'theories' (though some theories aren't so bad) as to what is going on.

Actually, odd combat results have nothing to do with the combat system itself... they are two different things. It has been shown by mods that so-called "ridiculous combat results" can be all but banished by simply adding additional hit points, or changing the ADM values. The odd results in no way justify a new system.

Horse are bad against pikes, but swordsmen can do a better job against them (compared to horses), and two pikemen would be pretty evenly matched (and archers would do very, very well), and pikes with archers would slaughter them. This is simply not modelled in any way whatsoever with the current system, nor could it be. With a ADM system, you can't duplicate a Rock, Paper, Scissors system.

Well, it seems to me that Civ2 had an ADM system, and gave pikemen bonuses against horses. Pikemen defending archers can do quite well against swordsmen, as the pikes defend the archers as they move into position to hit the swordsmen. If you add bombard to the archers, it becomes even better, as you can whittle down the swordsmen so they can't penatrate your pikeman line. All those things seem quite well modeled.

And it is only functionally the same as HP if HP are different for various units, but they aren't, they are the same for every unit (varying only by combat experience).

There used to be arguments over dropping firepower from Civ2... people wondered if it was necessary. It turns out, combats that deal high damage some of the time were pretty equal to combats that dealt low damage very often. In other words, it was shown that functionally all the results achieved with firepower could also be achieved with sinply a higher attack rating. Why does there need to be a guage for many things when one serves equally well?

Unless you are defending, then defense is ability to deal damage.

That's what I meant.

Artillery can easily demolish tanks, they are big targets, and one hit will most often incapicitate a tank.

No, artillery can easily demolish a tank. I'm talking divisions here. An entire division, every last tank, destroyed by artillery alone seems highly unlikely.

In a modern army, a few tanks aren't going to make a big difference (surely in a civ-style game), so artillery killing the vast majority of tanks is enough for the tanks to be dead).

That's what the health bar is for. A tank with one hp left from bombarding won't make a difference, so artillery killing the vast amount of tanks makes the unit essentially invalid until is repairs/is reformed.

Incase you dont know
Fanboys ala - Opposite of the Troll. You'll take it up the ass for firaxis and jump on the forum gernades.

Fanboys != opposite of troll

Clearly you need a better definition of a troll... seeing as there are trolls who, as you would put it, are "fanboys." A troll can have any opinion.

[Tiberius]

Originally posted by aneeshm
The chances of a conscript tank attacking an Elite fortified Spearman on a hill across a river in a metropolis and winning is ONLY 48.o91 % . Sad , isn't it ? Applying the same to modern Armour Vs Elite Musketman , it is 35.117% , while the same Modern armor Vs Elite Rifleman is a disgusting 19% .

War is not mathematics. Armies with higher probabilities to win do not always win.
Odd results happen in real life, too.

In 1552 the ottomans were at the peak of their power and under the rule of Suleyman the Magnificent they've conquered almost the entire Eastern Europe. In the autumn of the same year, an army of 70.000 - 80.000 ottomans gathered in front of a small hungarian town, the fortress of Eger, defended by 2.000 hungarians (~1000 trained soldiers plus ~1000 armed peasants and women).

Let's put this in civ3 terms:
The attackers: 60 or 70 veteran Jannisaries and Sipahis plus, let's say, 10 cannons.
The defenders: one veteran plus one conscipt musketman, maybe 2 cannons, fortified in a small town (size: 2 or 3) on a hill, protected by walls.

What probabilities would you give for the turks to win, aneeshm?

The ottomans attacked with all they've got, and they weren't able to defeat that lousy veteran and conscript musketman. After a month of futile siege they've got so damaged and demoralized, that they gave up and left.

Sheer numbers and probabilities are not the only things that count in a battle. Commitment (especially commitment!!), morale, discipline, training, leadership, loyalty, knowledge of tactics, these all do count. Is this so difficult to understand and accept?

Hell, I'm a Marine... give me a spear, and show me a tank.

Well said

[Tiberius]

Originally posted by faded glory
Im sorry. I see maybe 100 posts per day in all the civ3 forums (thats a rougly an esitimate). CTP gets as much and is two years older. If the game was sooooo great then lots of people would be here posting wouldnt they?

I'm sorry, exactly how many copies of CTP2 did Activision sell ?