Tactic Upgradees

[Hannibal3]

Ok, I gotta say that I'm really not following this. Are you guys talkin about upgrading units like to a new type of unit? Based on how much experience they have? Is this the Pokemon effect?

Or are you talking about increasing their strength being increased from experience? Or is it something different entirely?

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"...The highest realization of warfare is to attack the enemy's plans; next is to attack their alliances; next to attack their army; and the lowest is to attack their fortified cities." - Sun Tzu

[Dr Strangelove]

It sounds to me like what is being proposed is that specific tactical techniques would be acquired like civilization advances, then transferred to units in the form of increased defensive and/or offensive factor strengths. In a way that is already incorporated into the game. Take phalanx vs legion for instance; they're primarily different tactical organizations. Likewise goes for dragoons and cavalry, riflemen and marines, knights and crusaders, etc. If you're serious about this, consider how many tactical techniques have evolved in all the historical ages from 3000BC until now. In order to incorporate the significant ones you'd have to greatly expand the list of civilization advances, perhaps to the point of detracting from less militaristic aspects of the game. You'd forever be forced to decide whether to devote your research to military research or other types of research. One way around that would be to have a seperate military research tree.

I'd like to speculate that what you're really looking for is a way to make conflict resolution more a matter of skill, and to exert more control too. Personally, I think the best way to do that would be to develop tactical screens (ala CTP and Imperialism) that would allow the player(s) to actually direct their battles. The last time I proposed this the majority gave this idea the thumbs down, saying that it would make the game too militaristic. If that's true, why bother with such half measures as command ratings, experience ratings and tactical advances?

[Ralf]

Are we talking about suggestions to a 3-7 human player strategy game with 3-7 computers linked up with each other? If thats the case, most of above suggestions are intriguing, altrough somewhat complicated.

If we on the other end, are talking about a human vs AI game, you should bear in mind that most of above suggestions can be utilized *much* more effective by the human player, and by the upcomming Civ3 AI.

I dont know if all of my own suggestions were that good. They were scribbled down hastily. Perhaps some of them have flaws.
[This message has been edited by Ralf (edited October 11, 2000).]

[emren]

To the confused:

What I originally suggested (about civs having Command Ratings) was meant as a way of creating armies in civ3. Armies is what civs use to fight it out - NOT individual units. The point of creating armies is this: Combat becomes simpler AND more realistic, at least it can be made to be so. This is because a large number of units fight a large number of units INSTANTANEOUSLY. You're also likely to have far LESS armies than a regular civ game would have units. Combat results don't necessarily end in one army dying, it could also result in a retreat. This might even be dependent on what orders YOU give it.

The composition of an army, i.e. the number and TYPE of units in it, reflects YOUR civs ability to command military forces. It is simple: Say your civs Command Rating is 3 (rather low - I'd guess the maximum would be 9-12). Say a simple infantry unit requires 1 CR, and an artillery piece also requires 1 CR. Thus, your civ has the ability to combine 2 inf and one arty into an army. The point is, that the ARMY gets better stats (bonuses) than the individual units summed up. If you decide to create such an army, you just need your cities to start cranking out units to 'fill the ranks'.

Bonuses should only go up to a certain extent - having more than, say, 3 inf per army wouldn't give you any extra bonuses compared to having just 3. Instead, you'd just make more armies.

The whole point of the exercise is to allow for SIMILAR military technologies (units) being HANDLED differently by different civs, without introducing silly concepts like leaders. Think of any conflict in history. To armies squaring it off would have, roughly speaking, the same technology level. But maybe one civ knows better how to command and organize troops, and that's what decides the outcome.

I have no experience whatsoever in programming - so I haven't the slightest idea if an AI could handle this. Somebody tell me....
[This message has been edited by emren (edited October 12, 2000).]

[Vrank Prins]

quote: Originally posted by Marcel I on 09-28-2000 03:26 AM .... the best option would be, as discussed earlier in another thread, to separate men and weapons. You could upgrade the weapons of your unit as you discover new technology and their experience level or tactical grading when you discover new tactics .... .... Firaxis should make it possible for you to recognize in a glance the kind of unit your dealing with. So there should be some kind of standard icons like the knights or cavalry in Civ 2 symbolizing the kind of weapons they wear ....

What about this one.
1) In COLONIZATION (somehow I get the idea that this Sid-M.game is not very welknown to CIVvers) free citizen units could be given all kinds of occupation, f.i. miner, tobaccoplanter etc. and !! the equivalant of dragoon, artillery and musketeer. If a f.c.unit was destined as such, horses, guns and cannons had to be available in a city.
2) These requirements had to be produced and stored in a city-arsenal and -stable.
3) If troops had routed and had had the change to escape from being taken captive, you could send them to a nearby friendly city where they were armed again in one turn.

Introduction of these COLO-elements without any adjustements into CIV3 would mean to much micro-management. I suppose FIR. should reduce these principles to:
1) production of weapons (and that would include horses to) in resp. "arsenal" (new to introduce city-improvement), mill (see the thread "top 10 of new tech > Ribannah", factory and mfg-plant;
2) arming of troops becomes possible after production of weaponry;
3) training of troops becomes possible after building barracks;
4) upgrading of troops, meaning the renewal of their arms, would mean that a) these new arms will have to be produced first and then b) the troops have to be interned for say two or three turns in the barracks to get training. In this way they will learn the TACTICS which come with the introduction of the new weaponry. This makes the building and renewal !! (that's a thing that should stay in the game) of barracks even more important.
- The production of the arms is the thing that will cost shields/money. The time this takes depends on whether you have a mill/factory etc.
- It should also be possible to arm troops just like that, but the consequence of that will be that they will have little hitpoints.
- The arming of the first primitive units like militia and horsemen don't need the production of arms.
- Campaigning troops should need to be supplied in the field (allthough the way of doing this has been discussed in other threads I think it needs more thinking)

PS. BTW what is the meaning of "IMHO"
[This message has been edited by Vrank Prins (edited October 12, 2000).]

[emren]

On tactics:

Tactics is generally defined as being in the middle of military hierarchy. Strategy is on top, Tactics in the middle and Operations in the bottom. To better understand this, think of it like this: "Strategy: What war do I want to wage?", "Tactics: What battle(s) do I want to undertake to win the war?", "Operations: How can my units win this battle?".

I think the concept of tactics in civ should translate more into kind of a "what-can-my-armed-forces-do" mindset rather than "what-can-my-units-do" mindset. Even though individual units differed in tactics historically, they did not differ due to advances in technology - rather, they differed due to differences in organization and leadership.

As I've said before, I think leaders are inappropriate in a game at civs scale. Therefore, I'd like to simulate tactics differences in terms of organization. Specific, historic tactics don't make much sense anyway, since succes due to tactics are/were usually very short-lived advantages anyway. I mean, if blitz-krieg was a succes due to tactics, this advantage disappeared in 2 turns of civ-time. There's hardly any reason to program such concepts into the game for 2 turns worth of difference.

Organization reflects your civs ability to wage war. You might have many armies of small organization for defence. Or you might concentrate your units into larger organizations (armies) for offence. This type of thinking can span military history in its entirety, rather than focus on single, specific tactic abilities.

So how you organize, deploy and use your units - THAT's what civ tactics should be in my book.

[Dom Pedro II]

I think emren is right. Civilization is not a tactical game. The units represent changes in tactics, and there was already talk about tactical changes. These changes should be incorporated and some units should have such tactical abilities, but otherwise I think we're getting way to detailed. I don't see it working very well.

I agree with the overall civilization tactical concept. I think that there should also be an increased benefit for those civilization's with a historical tendency to be militaristic. Those that have a military culture should get certain bonuses, and those known to be unaggressive should get certain disadvantages.

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"...The highest realization of warfare is to attack the enemy's plans; next is to attack their alliances; next to attack their army; and the lowest is to attack their fortified cities." - Sun Tzu

Dom Pedro II.... aka Hannibal3

[Dr Strangelove]

Emren, you have the concepts of tactics and operations backwards. Strategy refers to the largest scale of planning, i.e., where I will send my armies. Operations is an intermediate level of planning, i.e., where I will place my corps, divisions, and regiments. Tactics is the lowest level of planning, i.e., how I will use my battalions, companies, platoons and squads.

Someday I would like to see someone attempt to design a bi-level version of a Civilization game. Before you say it can't be done consider this: there is a new type of CD under development that will use an ultraviolet laser, allowing a CD disk to hold up to 70 GB of data. The game "Braveheart" utilized a zoomable map of the entire island of Britain rendered down to a level of 50 meters. A 70 GB disc should be able to hold a map more than 100 times larger. If you accept less resolution, say down to 100 meters, then you could cover over 400 times the area.

Oh well, I've had this arguement before. I'm sure that this game will eventually be done because it will be possible to do it. "War: The Operational Art of Civilization." I'll buy it then even if you don't.

[emren]

Dr. Strangelove:

You're right, of course.

Mental note:
***Remember never to post b4 checking out the facts***

But I stand by the rest...

[Dom Pedro II]

Dr. Strangelove,

That stuff about the CD being able to hold 70 GB is interesting. I think it would be fun to have a map that could zoom down even to 500 meters. I would love to control every part of a war. I'd probably get a headache trying to play it though.

But although I disagreed with most of what was said, I think that a tactical screen where you can organize your stacked units is good because a general fights differently depending on what they are attacking or what they are being attacked by.

[Shogun Gunner]

Dr. Strangelove, that is a great idea to have a strategic/tactical view of combat. It seems a very basic attempt, in the area of city management, has been made allowing cities to "auto produce." The same could be done with combat for those who don't want to direct individual regiments or whatever. This allows your choice. I never set "auto" I might as well let seven AI's play each other.

I'm all for this, but we are talking about a very serious programming effort. The Universal Military Simulator was one such attempt many years ago. Possible, but possibly very expensive.

[Dr Strangelove]

I've had this idea about a Civ-like game where the computer designs a battleground for each battle. The basic features of the battleground would be determined by the general features of the main map,i.e.,terrain, flora, rivers, cities. Adjacent tiles of the main map would also influence the design of the battlemap, such as determining the terrain of the edges and the general slope. Units on the main map would be assumed to be strategic sized units such as corps and armies, and on the battlemap would be broken down to operational sized units such as brigades, regiments, legions. The battle would then be conducted just like a traditional turn based wargame.

It would be the wargame to end all wargames, the everlasting gob stopper of all wargames. You'd never need another. Divorce lawyers would florish.

Alas, I haven't been able to interest anyone in producing such a game. Maybe I should do it myself. Oh wait, when I last went to school people fed programs to computers via little beige manila punch cards. Hmmmm, maybe I'm just going to have to wait.

I remember "UMS". It was "UMS II" that was supposed to be a zoomable stratgic & tactical game, but it was never finished. They actually boxed the thing and sold it unfinished. Buyers were supposed to receive updates via mail, but none were ever sent. Man, was I bummed.

[DarkCloud]

Bump.