DESIGN: Armor and HP's

[MrBaggins]

Ok... I worked out how to do a fairer test...

I removed the Tanks ranged ability, so it wouldn't prefer being in the back, along with its flanking category and isflanking.

I did the tests by creating new batches of units in the cheat editor in the same game, rather than reloading.

I noticed that the attacked always seemed to have the advantage. I wanted to see if archers ranged ability would be enough to overcome a defensive advantage so I set up an intially unbalanced test... repeated 20 times.

5 attacking tanks vs. 6 defending tanks. Equal terrain.

Attacker wins 2. (both times 1 tank remaining)
Defender wins 18. (1 tank remaining 16 times. 2 tanks remaining 2 twice)

Then...

5 attacking tanks & 7 archers vs. 6 defending tanks. Equal terrain.

(Attacker has 1 more front line attacker than intended, but its the weakest frontline offensive unit possible)

Attacker wins 15.
-1 time 1 tank remaining & 1 archer remaining
-9 times 1 tank remaining & 3 archers remaining
-1 time 2 tanks remaining & 3 archers remaining
-4 times 3 tanks remaining & 5 archers remaining
-1 time 4 tanks remaining & 5 archers remaining

Defender wins 5
-4 times 1 tank remaining
-1 time 2 tanks remaining


It seems that large numbers of obsolete troops can, in large enough quantities, unbalance a situation, even in a situation, where they should have no significant effect on the outcome.

Of course, you could increase the attack and defense ratings of subsequently advanced units, by a multiple, making the difference larger... but I think there should be the option to have an defensive threshold, to demonstrate very large differences in attack and defensive capability... aka arrows vs. tank.

[Kuciwalker]

Perhaps obsolete units, if not upgraded after a certain time, could be automatically transformed into a more generic "militia" (not like in WesW's) appropriate to the tech level.

[Gilgamensch]

I voted option 1:

Reason: When a technical advanced CIV comes in touch (conqueres) a weaker one, the weaker one has a hard time defending:

1.) America South/Middle/North
2.) Australia
continue if you want.

What skywalker mentioned is not (I think) what most people here had in mind, differences because of ages.

A nowadays militia might be able to destroy a tank (like Russia-Afganistan/USA-IRAQ/......) but that would be a different unit, what we have not been talking about.

But the way how I was thinking about: It doesn't make any sense having an outdated unit destroying a modern one (at least two ages difference). It might be able to damage it, but it shall not be able to destroy. (I was only thinking of a indian (Jungle) with a pipe(?) blowing a arrow with poison onto the driver of a jeep, would still work, but you wouldn't be able to destroy the jeep or the complete platoon). So I would rather prefer a mixture:

Damage Yes, but not able to kill/destroy a modern unit (again two ages difference).

Reason for 2 ages:

An Archer can still kill a musketeer, but he will already have a hard time injuring an infrantry unit (bodyarmor and further range of weapons).

just my 2 cents for the moment.

[tyrantpimp]

this is getting complicated

[Atahualpa]

I think armor should absorb damage.

If you have 10 armor and you get damaged by 12 then you only lose 2 hitpoints.

[MrBaggins]

Very interesting, but theres a problem with the system...

Units do a number of very small damages, as per firepower... so 1,2 or 3 damage, per hit for example.

Ablative damage each turn would be very interesting, though...

So, each turn, each unit started with a fresh value of X Armor (based on the value in units.txt,) and when it takes damage, damage which would ordinarily be caused to it, is first removed from the armor, before removing hitpoints.

I.E.

On this turn, Tank has, say, 30 HP's and 6 Armor.

Its bombarded, for 1 damage. It now has 5 armor, but still has 30HP's.

It attacks another unit. The other unit manages to score 4 attacks, each doing 2 damage (2 firepower) on our Tank, prior to it being destroyed.

This would remove all of the 5 remaining armor, and 3HP, leaving the tank with 27HP's.

The next turn (its next owner player's turn, not every turn) it would start with 27HP's and 6 Armor.
===
There are a couple of ways that you could slightly extend the system... by only having armor protect against attacks where the current armor was 2x or more than the firepower of the attack...

I.E.

A Rifleman (Firepower of 2) hits a Tank with Armor 5. 2 damage is done to the armor... none to the HP's.

Another Tank (Firepower of 3) hits a Tank with Armor 5. No damage is done to the armor (armor wasn't 2x or more than the firepower,) and 3 damage done to the Tank's HP's.

===
There's no micromanagement... nothing to "do" per se. It just abstracts some additional level of resilience for certain units.

[tyrantpimp]

simple yet elegant

[The Big Mc]

I like the idea of armour allowing you to ignore attack lower then this. It makes sense that a canon “could” kill a tank . However even if you had a hundred arches you could not kill a tank

[Maquiladora]

A hundred men (forget that they have bows) could disable a Tank surely?

I just hope that adding new levels to combat adds to the fun and doesnt add unnecessary complexity (for human and/or AI), because its work for nothing otherwise. Im perfectly happy with HP's only, ive never craved more complexity to that side of combat, just better balancing.

[MrBaggins]

A hundred men with bows AT RANGE?

What are they going to do? Wish it damaged?

Even if they engaged in "combat", a Tank could engage, and keep moving in a manner that it would be invulnerable to them... Tank shoots, they die. They shoot, ~tink~ (sound of arrow hitting tank).

The only way guys armed with bows would be able to do anything vs. a Tank, would be if they were Rambo, and had explosive tipped arrows. or maybe sticky bombs ala Saving Private Ryan?

Then they wouldn't be Archer units, however... they'd be... something else.

[tyrantpimp]

Well one hundred men with bows dont stand much of a chance once they are in range of the tanks machine gunner.

[Maquiladora]

So at range they all spread out, the Tank wont be able to get them all, they rush the Tank and climb up on it, what hes gonna do, drive all day with them sat on top hoping theyll die of hunger?

[MrBaggins]

A Tank can maneuver quicker than a human can deal with. A 30mph Tank is awfully difficult to "jump on to". The Tank can position itself whereever it wants and shoot the archer guys... pick them off, even if they are spread out.

Al Quaeda tried rushing tanks with guys with machine guns (in buses.) Those tactics made no impression.

RPG's are a bit different, but as has been mentioned, they wouldn't be archers any more.

[The Big Mc]

Originally posted by Maquiladora
So at range they all spread out, the Tank wont be able to get them all, they rush the Tank and climb up on it, what hes gonna do, drive all day with them sat on top hoping theyll die of hunger?

Thirst

rule of 3s

3 minuets without air

3 days without water

3 weeks without food

[tyrantpimp]

Well the machine gun isnt fixed first of all so that will deal with a good number of archers. Secondly the machine gun range is alot further than the archers. Third theres also the turret which will make big boom noises and blow up any cover they may have taken. And to be realistic that in itself is demoralizing so the archers would not be as effective anyway. Fourth the tank itself can roll over and crush people as they approach.

So suicide archers or not their chance of success is really nil. Unless its an ambush type of situation in which case thats a whole other story.


Hehehe i said suicide archers