OC3: Combat Ideas

[amjayee]

I agree about what you said. But about the unit equipment, perhaps they could be built for one "man"? Legion equipment for one soldier, one tank (requires several men to operate), one aircraft etc. Each one of these sets would be used for one "hitpoint" the unit has. This may sound strange, but if we make it that way, we don't need to have all 100 tanks before we can form a tank battalion; instead, if we have 34 tanks available, we could form a tank battalion with 34% of hitpoints left, which is better than no tanks at all. Later when we get more tanks we could reinforce the unit. I don't think this would make anything more complex; you would just be allowed to build "incomplete" units. The unit sizes would of course be fixed.

So, for example you want to build a legion. Legion has a fixed size of 1000 men; so, you need 1000 men and 1000 legion equipment, and perhaps some extra stuff to form a legion. If you have only 750 men, or only 750 equipment, in an emergency you could form a legion, that starts with 75% of hitpoints left. Later, after a battle, where 120 men die, and 50 equipment are lost, you could reinforce the unit to full power with 370 men and 300 equipment. But I assure this wouldn't require any micromanagement.

[Victor Galis]

"What about space? We will be adding some kinds of space units, like orbital weapons, perhaps even larger battle stations and ships. Perhaps we should add also space-space, space-air and space-ground; it is different to shoot relatively slowly-moving ground units than fast fighterplanes."

-I'm open to suggestions I think we could worry about that least, since I don't see any use in space weapons in the Civ timeframe; however, I can see their use in scenarios, so... I'll think. I have a little time. I've got a week 'till my next program is due

"About sieges and combat in general; I think that when units attack another units, they will first move to the same tile, then fight, and the winner will remain in the tile fought of. The loser either retreats or is destroyed. This is much like in earlier games."

-Sounds right. Though, you would have the option of doing an artillery attack, in which you don't go into the tile. early units can't do this, but more modern ones (howitzers) can.

" Land units couldn't assault sea units, since they can't enter ocean tiles."

-I would say they can fight artillery battles, or over coastal cities (since ships can sail into those). Maybe even on large rivers you could get a ship entering a land square (maybe limit this to the small ships for rivers, and larger ships could enter specially built (read: expensive) canals).

"Units with artillery capability could shoot from the adjacent tile, and if defender doesn't have artillery, he can defend only by trying to assault, or by retreating; the player should have option to decide how the units react when under artillery bombardment."

-Or he could sit it out. Artillery is not effective enough to kill off large armies, especially if those armies have bunkers. (i.e. a howitzer shooting at infantry in the next tile, might be able to hope for 25% casualties if the enemy was out in the open and it wasn't a large enemy unit... several batteries would be devastating though )

"I think that when civs are not at war, several units should be able to be on the same tile without any problems. Only if one unit attacks another should there be one."

-That would be like SMAC, except you wouldn't need to be allied I think though, that violating someone's territory (with a military unit) could lead to war immediately. A caravan would ignore anything that wasn't firing at it, as far as moving around.

"I also agree that a unit should be of a certain size. For me as an economy model developer it is much easier to operate with standard units of unit equipment than to have loads of different sizes."

-Right, if you need a bigger unit, make two and combine. It takes care of some micromanagement at the production level

/* New stuff */
I think we should have a unit workshop. You could select in there what type of armor, ranged weapon, and melee weapon a type of unit would have. Thus you could make archers, that would not be totally defenseless in melee(for the extra cost of a melee weapon and training).
Maybe for other units like tanks, ships, and aircraft you could chose options that would modify the stats, like rangefinders, or a command center (to make a ship a flagship).

Chassises would be like in SMAC, but different (infantry, chariot, tank, mounted soldier, etc.)

Maybe this might not work, but I'm curious as to what people think.

[The Joker]

Amjayee:

quote: But about the unit equipment, perhaps they could be built for one "man"? Legion equipment for one soldier, one tank (requires several men to operate), one aircraft etc. Each one of these sets would be used for one "hitpoint" the unit has.

That may seem like a good idea, and for combat purposes it is. But from an economic viewpoint it will be really annoying. Equipment will need a market price, need some labour and raw materials and such. But when equipment items are this little, these amounts will simply be too small to work with. Equipment for one legion guy could need 0,02 labour, 0,007 iron and have a market price of 0,06 credits. These amounts are impossible to work with. In stead it will be much better to have a legion unit with a few thousand men in it, and where the legion equipment will cost 120 labour, need 42 iron and have a market price of 360 credits.


Victor:

quote: -That would be like SMAC, except you wouldn't need to be allied I think though, that violating someone's territory (with a military unit) could lead to war immediately. A caravan would ignore anything that wasn't firing at it, as far as moving around.

Yes. I agree with the violation of territory thing, but I think you should have the option to let another civ move it's units around near your cities without you HAVING to go to war with him. When an enemy unit enters your territory you should have the option to go to war with him (in which case he would be the one starting the war) or not.

BUT: NO CARAVANS!!! Never.

quote: I think we should have a unit workshop. You could select in there what type of armor, ranged weapon, and melee weapon a type of unit would have. Thus you could make archers, that would not be totally defenseless in melee(for the extra cost of a melee weapon and training).

I am gonna have to say no on this one. I think that the unit workshop will usually end up with being tedious micromanagement. In stead I would like to have small units (quickly built) that could be combined into armies that you would be able to give the abilities you want, by adding units to it.

[amjayee]

About unit workshop: I agree with Joker about that it would result in too much micromanagement, with too little profit. The same result could be got by having a larger amount of unit types (like several kinds of archers) and then having an _army_ workshop, where you could customize your armies, like adding scout capabilities, better comm systems, etc. To allow some customization to units, we could for example have some special unit equipment; night vision systems, gps systems, etc., that you could give to individual units.

Also notice that our units will be 1000-10000 men, depending on era, and armies have usually had 30000-150000 men. So, there will be quite many units in each army, so that allows you to customize the army somewhat, by carefully choosing what kinds of units you have in them.

About unit equipment: For infantry units, that is like you said. Ok, perhaps infantry equipment could be built for the whole unit, but war machines like tanks and fighters individually. They are after all quite expensive.

I agree that you could allow others to pass through your territory. Also, if an enemy unit during peace-time tries to move to the same tile guarded by your units, and your units notice it, you can choose to attack it, send an ultimatum to stay away from your units, or let it pass. And caravans are not needed.

I agree about artillery; it is used mainly to suppress the enemy, but it also kills some soldiers, depending on their situation.

I agree land units with ranged attack could try to assault ships in those situations.

About space weapons, we need to add them, as well as space units; for a long time they would of course be simple exploring ships, probes and satellites. But space weapons _will_ be available in near future; even today it could be possible to build space stations with small nukes in them. And well before we can travel to Alpha Centauri, we will have some kinds of orbital attack stations, perhaps even some crude energy weapons, when fusion is invented. Large battle ships might be a bit off, but like you said, in scenarios they could be used.

About space battle, how about this; let's add space-space and space-atmosphere. When attacking atmospheric units, you simply get a penalty depending on the evasion of the unit, or something.

[ElmoTheElk]

quote: Originally posted by Victor Galis on 07-21-2000 02:28 PM "Would I be right in saying that the amount of Hit Points they have represents the amount of units you have stacked together. What I mean is, if 10 units made up 1250 Hit Points, then would 20 make 2500?" -Right.

Don't you think 2 units are stronger together that 2x1 unit?

[amjayee]

Hitpoints don't mean the strength, but the amount of men. If two units are combined in an army, they get extra bonuses for cooperation, depending on the skills of the commanders you have. But two independent units are not any stronger than one combined unit - at least not in our game, and I think that's the case in reality too, to some extent.

[ElmoTheElk]

Sorry, you're right.

[Victor Galis]

"About space weapons, we need to add them, as well as space units; for a long time they would of course be simple exploring ships, probes and satellites. But space weapons _will_ be available in near future; even today it could be possible to build space stations with small nukes in them. And well before we can travel to Alpha Centauri, we will have some kinds of orbital attack stations, perhaps even some crude energy weapons, when fusion is invented. Large battle ships might be a bit off, but like you said, in scenarios they could be used."

-Well, I say our game should end 2050-2100... the normal game, and thus space weapons would be really unimportant (mayeb have one or two at the very end to test them, so that we know how to implement them in future scenarios).

"About space battle, how about this; let's add space-space and space-atmosphere. When attacking atmospheric units, you simply get a penalty depending on the evasion of the unit, or something."

-Sounds good. Maybe drag forces on space craft would severely hurt them (some would have artillery-like weapons) that would not require them to dip into the athmosphere. Otherwise you could have craft that maneuver through the athmosphere like a "combination of a TIE fighter and a big rock," but of course be more resistant than athmospheric fighters.

"Hitpoints don't mean the strength, but the amount of men. If two units are combined in an army, they get extra bonuses for cooperation, depending on the skills of the commanders you have. But two independent units are not any stronger than one combined unit - at least not in our game, and I think that's the case in reality too, to some extent."

-Actually they get penalties, but a 2000 unit (fighting at -25% because of bad leadership) is still a 1500 unit, and can crush both 1000 man units if it engages them separately. If those combined, luck, terrain, and the leaders would make the big difference. Also cool to watch would be archers and pikemen/swordsmen combined. The enemy is slowly killed off by archers while your other troops keep the enemy away from your archers (It would not be so cool if your troops routed leaving the archers exposed...)

[amjayee]

About units retreating and stuff, this is an important thing. I know something about history of warfare, and mainly hand-to-hand combat didn't cause losses very quickly; it is hard to kill a man with armor and shield with a sword, when he at the same time is trying to kill you. The army, whose lines were first to fall apart, was the loser; the men started to die more quickly, when two enemies could attack one man, etc., and that army usually retreated. Then, the most losses were gained during the retreating phase, when enemy's cavalry units could chase them and kill them one by one.

So, discipline and leadership should be important factors determining the battle results, when both armies have similar armament. Also preparedness should be modeled somehow. Also we should think, how the different kinds of units are best made work like the real-world counterparts. Archers, cavalry and infantrymen should all have very different kinds of effects. We don't need to be afraid of adding many properties for units; combat resolving will be simple number-crunching.

Perhaps we should first have a limited set of unit types, like swordmen, horsemen, archers, pikemen; then there would be a larger amount of variations from these, that you could build in different situations. For each type there could be some special rules about how they cause damage and how they defend, what are their special abilities etc.

[The Joker]

I guess it could be possible to create one tank or one airplane. But to keep it simple and easy to use I still vote for the traditional way, where a tank unit might be 10 or 20 tanks or so. But if the rest of you feels another way I wouldn't have anything against using the system where it is possible to create one tank.

[phunny pharmer]

Wouldn't there have to be a minimum army size? Just for programming purposes, wouldn't it be easier to restrict an army to no less then a certain amount of tanks/infantry/etc? Of course, it would be suicide to have ten infantry running around! However, lone tank units should not be created: how many countries place orders for only one tank?

However, I see a major problem with the small unit/large army plan. If a base is being attacked, the defender can rush small infantry units, and thus create a certain amount of defense. This would slow attacks down. I'm not sure if this is intended, but it will certainly arise in multiplayer.

Also, a question: will armies be able to spread out over several squares, or will they stay as one collective group? Thus, can armies explore multiple squares, with the cavalry wandering farther off and the infantry in a certain square?

[Victor Galis]

I say, you could build a smaller unit, but not move it unless it was a smaller size. Thus you order a 1000 man set of pikemen. In a turn you get, say, 100 of them. They are under construction, and so can't move, but they can defend the base while the rest of the unit is produced. I think this works best.

Armies will be one square alone (you'll have to make and move a separate vanguard if you want more LOS); however I was toying with a scouts unit, which would have a LOS of 2, as opposed to the normal one, and no fighting ability (it would represent men scattered over 9 squares, and would be really useful when bundled with an army).

[The Joker]

Victor and Phunny:

I agree that a unit should have a certain size, and not just be 1 tank.

Victor's scout unit is a great idea. We should have such special units, also including a supply unit, that would be required for an army to let it recieve supplies.

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"It is only when we have lost everything
that we are free to do anything."
- Fight Club

[Victor Galis]

"Victor's scout unit is a great idea. We should have such special units, also including a supply unit, that would be required for an army to let it recieve supplies."

-I think not required, but rather would make supply better. Just the same way an army can see without scouts, but now it can see better.

Requiring these units would increase micromanagement, but if they only make an army better, it's good.

So far: Scouts, command units, and supply units would be in this category.

You can have an army without a command unit, but it's effectiveness is reduced. Adding extra men always helps, but after a point each additional man fights with less power (because of poor coordination.)

[amjayee]

Of course units should be fixed size, that's what we have been agreeing on. When I wanted the player to be able to build one tank or plane at time, that was because they are expensive; you wouldn't need to wait until all twenty tanks have been built, before you can use your unit. I don't know what would be so difficult in this - building equipment and forming a unit are separate things. You form a unit by taking x men, and y equipment for them from your stores. You could just build "incomplete" units.

Remember also, that you can be sometimes short of men; wouldn't it be stupid when in the early game you have 100000 people, are losing in a war, and have only 990 men available for enlisting in your army? You need 1000 men to create a unit. If you could get one more unit, the coming battle would be easier for you. Wouldn't it be better to have now one unit with 99% of their hitpoints, than wait one turn (after which your people can already be extinct) to get just ten more men?

Allowing the unit only to defend a city while incomplete is not a good solution. What would you say if you play a game, where a group of men can't move just because they are waiting for more men, or more equipment? The units will get incomplete during the game anyway. Let's just allow the player to form incomplete units. But you do have a point when you are worried of units of 10 men wandering around. Perhaps we should place some kind of limit to the unit size, as phunny pharmer suggested? For example, you could not create units with less than 10% of their hitpoints left. If unit is damaged in combat below that level, you would have two options: you can reinforce the unit, or merge it with the nearest possible unit of same type. I believe that doesn't cause any problems, or much-feared micromanagement if it is done properly.

Phunny pharmer introduced a possible problem in the planned combat system, that we must take care of: we must avoid tactics exploiting the weaknesses in game rules. You shouldn't be able to harass large armies with single units. So, we must a) make armies considerably stronger than the same amount of same kinds of units all alone and b) make it so, that the movement of armies won't slow down, when their way is blocked with small infantry units; since the units will have much longer movement range than earlier, perhaps we should consider a rule, where the size of battle decides, how many mp's the battle consumes. So, if a large army with 100000 men confronts a 500-men unit, they would literally walk over them with some 0.1 mp loss, while when they confront another army of equal size, the battle would consume several mp's. Also the difficultiness of the battle needs to be taken into consideration; if the defender is entrenched, the battle will take longer etc.

About dividing an army to several tiles, that is not possible. Instead, you could always split your army into two smaller armies, if you need to, but usually those two armies' combined battle strength might be smaller than the original army's, and of course they would now fight as two individual "units".

About scout, supply and command units, sounds good. We might make the visibility range of the scouts a little larger (remember the map scale is smaller) and the range should perhaps be dependent on the terrain; in forest the scouts could not move as far as on plains. Also on coast, they could not move into ocean tile, so they could see only 1 tile away. On the move, the scouts' visibility range would be made smaller, and they could not see very far ahead, but of course farther than ordinary units. So, my idea is, that the scout units need to actually "move" to scout the area; that is done automatic, according to some simple rules. In difficult terrain, they could not move as far as in easy terrain, and would not "see" as far. Also scouts would get a little penalty for noticing stealthy units in the tiles they are scouting - they move quickly in small parties in a large area, so a possibility to notice a guerrilla party is smaller.

Also it might be possible to make it so, that you could transform an ordinary unit into scout unit. They would lose their fighting ability, but get the scout advantages. Infantry unit would become a "explorer" kind of unit - walking men - and horsemen would become horse scouts. "Explorer" units would be better in really difficult terrain, like mountains and thick forest, horse units would have a longer range. We could use the unit's training property to make the difference between "real" scouts and scouts created from other units. When you build scouts, they will usually get some special training, which will rise their "training" property (if you can afford training), but transformed scouts would start with a lower training level.