space combat and normal combat

[DeathByTheSword]

well it looks to me like we are going to have spaceships and spacecombat....if i look at other strategy game that have spacecombat in it i always am amazed by the lack of tactics need in the actual fight....it is the one with the biggest guns, the best shields and foremost with the most ships....i find that boring....i am was thinking about this and also about how to change it then i came up with the game ground control...i dunno if someone played it ever but it is one of my favorite games....it is a realtime game but the way that fighter fight with each other i always like they are not simple going head to head with each other but are making a real dogfight of it.....maybe we can hace a realtime battle resolution in the game with very active ships and units...you give general orders before the battle begins and then lets it go its seperate way....maybe after a time you can give new general orders and ofcourse you can always say retreat something....but you wouldnt have direct control in battle in real life generals also dont have direct control over there units and have to give there orders before hand....some during....but most before the battle...just a tought.....so:
:realtime battle
:no direct control
:dogfightlike space combat


that are my ideas

[Jeremy Buloch]

I like them DBTS!
I dont like the Hit points and stuff like that. Cause sometimes the lower obsolete vessel might win. In real life that is. So therefore we should do this thing that DBTS is proposing. I dont have any marks to make about the Idea cause it is a real nice thing to have, I think.
-J.B.-

[Michiel]

I agree, but.. Isn't that exactly what Civ has? You choose to attack a unit, and the fight starts untill one wins. You don't have direct control over the battle.

And if we're not going to use hitpoints, then what? It's gotta have a name. Hitpoints, Ship-containment, Hull-integraty, Shield-status, whatever.. If we're not going to use something like this, then how does the game decide which ship wins?

I've got another fun idea to add. You can give the ship you want to send into battle an attack-pattern. There'll be attack-pattern Alpha, Beta, Ceta and Delta (or whatever, this just sounds cool ). The defending ship chooses a defense/evasion-pattern.

Attack-pattern = AP
Defense-pattern = DP

AT-A has an advantage over DP-B (AD = 2)
AT-A has a disadvantage over DP-D (AD = 0.5)
AT-A has an equal chance against DP-C (AD = 1)
AT-B has an advantage over DP-C (AD = 2)
etc.

It's like a rock-paper-scisors game, but we could make it more complicated than that (custom patterns for example). You must guess what pattern the enemy is going to use. Of course, a stronger ship still has an advantage over weaker ships. There will have to be some sort of equation for the damage.

Damage = AD*(Rest of equation)

'Rest of equation' will contain variables like defending ship's shield-strength, attacking ship's weapon status, etc.

Tell me what you think of my idea.

[DeathByTheSword]

yes that is what civ is about but in StP there are going to be armies not single units (i think to applies also too spaceships) but if we would make it Real Time we can use tactics instead of simple click on a unit to fires....but i like the idea of attack patterns that is what i ment with general orders

[Kuciwalker]

First, let's assume that there are five space weapon types: Projectile, Fragment, Laser, Plasma, and High-Energy Explosive.

Projectile - weapons that shoot projectiles that either explode on contact with an object or just don't explode at all. Railguns would fall under this catagory.

Fragment - weapons that either fire projectiles that explode when withing a certain proximity of an object, releasing shards and such, or weapons that just fire shards of stuff out of them. A shotgun and a flak shell would both fall under this catagory.

Laser - anything that fires a laser at a target. Duh.

Plasma - anything that fires some sort of object that damages an object on contact through heat. A plasma gun would fall under this category. Duh

High-Energy Explosive - Fission, Fusion, and Antimmater explosives. Also any other weapon we make up that causes damage in roughly the same manner as these do. A Yamato Cannon would NOT fall under this category - it would be either Laser or Plasma.

Each weapon would have charactaristics such a speed, acceleration (if missile), explosive radius, explosive energy, mass, heat (plasma), energy (laser), rate of turn (if missile), etc.

We would have different levels and different types of armor. Armor would have certain defense values against certian weapon types.

[Blake]

Firstly, spaceships will be grouped into fleets, and will fight under the rules of bastardized newtonian physics ()

skywalker, dollars to dimes your a Starcraft player, altough I deny ever playing starcraft I recognise the weapon/armour interactions (but only 3 weapon types in starcraft, IIRC), and the yamato cannon reference....

Altough it is a fairly good system in any case, used by virtually every RTS game in some shape or form, so it cant be too bad . I also quite like your weapon classifications, altough not sure if plasma is realistic, and beam would be a required weapon type (ie ion cannon)


I think one important aspect of space combat should be ship orientation and profile, if you dont get what I mean check the attached image.

Anyway, the smaller the profile a ship presents to the enemy, the less damage it takes, through a combination of extra armouring and a higher chance to miss, and in the case of fragment weapons, being hit by less of the fragments.

This would be especially important for capital ships, the wedge would probably be some sort of battleship, equiped with many weapons and prehaps fighter bays. It obviously prefers to present the leading edge, because that is the smallest profile, it can be shaped to deflect hits, and armoured to reduce damage.

The cigar would generally house a single very large weapon that uses electromagnets to accelerate stuff, ion cannons and rail guns come to mind. For several reasons the cigar wants to point at the enemy, it's harder to hit that way, and it also needs to point in the general direction of the enemy in order to smoke them.
Technical note: Electromagnetics can be used to "aim" the beam or projectiles, using technology very simialler to that in your television. So the cigar doesn't have to point exactly at it's target.

The sphere deserves special mention, because there is no better shape when being attacked from all sides.

So anyway, against wedge and particullary cigar shaped capital ships flanking would be an effective tatic.

However do remember, that realistically, in space 2 things will be very important in deciding the battle
Outrange (a cumulation of projectile speed, beam coherence, accuracy, and detection range)
Outnumber

Also of importance will be countermeasures, like if the enemy is using a lot of missiles it'd pay to have anti-missile systems installed, if they have shown a love of fragmentation weapons, then thicker armour or deflection fields would help....

[Gateway103]

Hey Blake, do you know how MOO3 handle space combat? From the report of MOO3 beta-testers, the combat system is adequate enough to involve actual tactics and strategy. Maybe worth a look.

There are too many threads on this topic in the Infograme forums (as well as other sources), but perhaps one quick stop to the Beta Tester Impression thread may help a bit, here is the link,

http://www.ina-community.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=239742

Please post any questions here, and I'll get back to you when I can

-Gateway103

[DeathByTheSword]

btw shogun: Total war is also a good example of real time fight in a turnbase game i am not suggesting such a system but still may take a look

[Kuciwalker]

I hate Starcraft.

[targon]

I have another one wierd idea: integrated space and ground combat system, so fleets on orbit may target and shoot up surface critters (missing infantry by 50m of course ). Ground troops also may blast these ugly shades just below the stars and why squad of high-tech tanks is unable to fry destroyer? Of course, some surface troops are simply too unprecise to track even low orbit, but why restrict energy based weaponry to planetary targets only?

And one more: urban combat. In traditional Civs city is single sector despite its pop and is't especialy fortified. But modern warfare denotes urban combat as themost difficult one, so we may add special rules for storming "uplifted" areas or even treat them as some structure with its own map etc...

[Kuciwalker]

Only big, powerful weapons should be able to hit spaceships from the ground. However, spaceships SHOULD be able to bombard planets from space.

[DeathByTheSword]

the HARP cannon was made in the `90 and it was able to shoot things in to orbit....that was more then 10 years ago and it wasnt that big....so i think that planetary defenses are a real possiblity

[Kuciwalker]

Yes, but I don't think that normal armies should get them. I think they should be reserved to buildings.

Also, you should be able to sort of control any battle at which your flagship (and by extension, you) is present.

[Jeremy Buloch]

Yes Planetary Defense is possible. The U.S. Government is working on a system to do that. I think. I might be wrong but anyways its still theoretical. So its very possible indeed.
-J.B.-

[targon]

Skywalker, both US and Russian armies (at least!) have things called "anti-sattelite missiles", mounted on interceptors. This stuff kills sattelites at low-to-medium orbits. Of course, AFAIK it's very simple kinetic weapon based on "dust cloud" idea (no need for precise targeting) so it's really humble against even light armor, but it's just beginning, is't it? Modern aircrafts seems to steadly dissolve atmosphere-orbit "border" and thus must obtain some spaceborn weapons somehow. Surface based troops will need something to keep this guys at bay, like modern SAMs do. It's just an evolution.
If we'll let orbital weapons for buildings only, any invading force will be in unrealistic disadvantage if any defender ships are still at orbit.