On-Topic Off-Topic Forum Thread: Rate'em! Civ's I-V

[Krill]

If units could move a ****load of tiles in a single turn to raze any city, then you have to guard every city with an SoD. But if you have 20 units in 5 cities for a total of 100 units, then it's reasonable to expect your opponent, who also has a similar number of units, to move his units to wipe out a single one of your cities.

The crux of the issue is that a defender needs to have time to react to any attack, otherwise sneak attacks out of the fog break the economic model, so units need to have limited movement. Even doubling the unit movement speed from 1MP to 2MP doesn't do anything; that is exactly the same as playing on epic speed as opposed to quick speed, considering unit build times.

[Krill]

(I freely admit that I'm not the best player, but I don't see how any amount of skill could get siege weapons through three tiles at the border in less than three turns)

Fast mover stacks. Attacking prior to 60% culture in cities affecting borders. Spies revolting cultural defence. Settling minimum distance to your opponents cities and focus on building culture. Artist bombs. Paratroopers. Naval assaults. To name but a few that are used effectively in MP, so an AI should have no chance.

[Elok]

Fast mover stacks.

Do you mean cavalry? I use those just plenty. Doesn't much matter when the terrain is hills or forests, and they're not the best for attacking cities. Still wonderful for raiding though.

Attacking prior to 60% culture in cities affecting borders.

? Sorry, you lost me there. I know about cultural defense, of course, but I thought of that as distinct from borders except in that they both come from the ol' purple music notes.

Spies revolting cultural defence.

True. I rarely use spies since so much of what they do seems useless, even when they do it to me. Again, it seemed so much more fun in 2 when you didn't have to stockpile espionage points and could just buy the city.

Settling minimum distance to your opponents cities and focus on building culture.

Good when it works out, tho' sometimes it just gives the AI more time to build up so you break even overall. But yes, that is an option at the border.

Artist bombs.

A guilty pleasure of mine--when I get stuck with artists instead of the prophets/engineers/merchants I was gunning for.

Paratroopers.

Very late-game.

Naval assaults. To name but a few that are used effectively in MP, so an AI should have no chance.

Believe me, I go D-day when it's an option. I think that's partly why my wife goes Dutch on Archipelago so much--quick, brutal war.

[Tupac Shakur]

The reason I used to have you on ignore is coming back to me: you're obtuse.

QFT. To be fair, though, it's not really his fault. He has a developmental disorder.

[Krill]

Fast movers means more than just cavalry. You can attack in the early game with HA and mid game with knights. Cultural defences are lower then and it is possible to produce an army that will have odds on attack without catapults.

Basically, if you aren't using slavery you aren't playing the game out efficiently, which is probably why you haven't been able to use those tactics effectively.

Again, it seemed so much more fun in 2 when you didn't have to stockpile espionage points and could just buy the city.

Wait, this was actually part of the game? And you think that is good design? WTF that's retarded.

[Krill]

QFT. To be fair, though, it's not really his fault. He has a developmental disorder.

Says the person with a conduct disorder.

[Tupac Shakur]

Blow me.

[MRT144]

Commando? FFS, that requires four combat promotions, isn't available to anything but spies until the game's half-over, and is never available to siege weapons of any sort. If I want to have any specialized abilities (medic, city raider, barrage, shock/cover/pinch, march, amphibious, flanking, whatever) when I finally get there, I basically have to be Boudica running Vassalage and Theocracy with West Point and the Pentagon. Plus maybe a couple of settled GGs...that's not what I'd call a solid option for a full invasion force. Great for cavalry doing chevauchees, doesn't do much for the "damn this invasion takes forever" issue.

The inability to steamroll is not CIV's biggest problem.

[regexcellent]

No. That wouldn't address the issue at all.

Yes it would. When you defeat the enemy, instead of killing his units, you take whatever fortified position he's in and force him down to the next one, until you've kicked him back to a city and manage to take that city over.

So, for instance, suppose you have a road across your empire with forts evenly spaced, say, one every 5 tiles. Every time you defeat the enemy in your invasion he gets kicked back to the next fort because it's the next good defensive position where he can try to halt your advance. That keeps the game from being, in one turn, ride railroad from border into enemy city -> game over.

Another thing that could be done is to have units suffer attrition when they are out of supply from a city you control. Supply would be calculated like a trade route. It can run along rivers, roads, and railroads. It can run between harbors in cities. It can run by air between cities and from cities to forts. Land units dicking around will stop supply along roads, railroads, and rivers. Ships running blockades will stop sea supply. Fighters on interception will stop aerial supply. Conquer an enemy city and you can supply your units from there.

Because it would put such a ridiculous damper on early warfare, make it so that only units beyond a certain tech level have this requirement. So for instance warriors don't need to be supplied.

That mechanic will prevent people from just running stacks of death because you actually have to build some kind of cohesive line to keep your units from withering away.

[Hauldren Collider]

Blow me.

I didn't realize you were having that much trouble picking up dudes in your old age.

[Hauldren Collider]

That's cos your bad.

I admit I'm not a great player, but the AI really unit spams it seems. I get a kill rate of about 2:1 so it works out. The AI is not very smart.

[Hauldren Collider]

The inability to steamroll is not CIV's biggest problem.

When wars take over 100 turns, it's not "inability to steamroll". It's ****ing boring. You've gone through four centuries of game-time by the time you can finally wipe out your enemy.

[self biased]

When wars take over 100 turns, it's not "inability to steamroll". It's ****ing boring. You've gone through four centuries of game-time by the time you can finally wipe out your enemy.

then you're by all accounts doing it wrong. i'm not a good player but i don't waste that much time being needlessly stubborn.

[Joseph]

I like them all. I have every vision of Civ.

[Aeson]

Yes it would. When you defeat the enemy, instead of killing his units, you take whatever fortified position he's in and force him down to the next one, until you've kicked him back to a city and manage to take that city over.

It looks like your initial statement got defeated and you've now moved back to the next defensible position?

Because that's not what you said. You said it would have been a chance to kill on the first attack, and a much better chance to kill on each successive attack, and only knock them back 1 tile. (This would of course just result in free XP for chosen units and easier kills if the AI tried to take advantage of this manner of "defense".)

The initial "problem" was that invasions were too slow and so enemy roads should be usable by invaders. This would cause a lot of problems of it's own as I noted. Now you're trying to fix those problems by essentially revoking the ability to use enemy roads for non-blitz units (in cases where it actually would apply). In at least some cases your suggestion would slow down invasions more than they already are, negating the entire point of allowing enemy roads to be used in the first place.

It would seem a much better solution would be to continue to disallow enemy controlled roads to be used. No need to fix the fix to get us back to ~ that point.

Another thing that could be done is to have units suffer attrition when they are out of supply from a city you control. Supply would be calculated like a trade route. It can run along rivers, roads, and railroads. It can run between harbors in cities. It can run by air between cities and from cities to forts. Land units dicking around will stop supply along roads, railroads, and rivers. Ships running blockades will stop sea supply. Fighters on interception will stop aerial supply. Conquer an enemy city and you can supply your units from there.

Because it would put such a ridiculous damper on early warfare, make it so that only units beyond a certain tech level have this requirement. So for instance warriors don't need to be supplied.

That mechanic will prevent people from just running stacks of death because you actually have to build some kind of cohesive line to keep your units from withering away.

Separate issue. Could be interesting if done right, but more likely would turn into a whack-a-mole or non-issue depending on how powerful it was tuned to be, and if the AI was designed to take advantage of it or not. (Similar suggestions came up a few times in Civ IV development.)

In context of this discussion ... I think it's safe to say that just about anyone who thought invasions in Civ IV were too slow already would likely hate having to deal with less abstract supply issues than are already present.