05-10-2004 22:46									#181
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quote: Originally posted by Trifna 1- About tanks and such units, I would not see them as going as well in a dense forest as in a plain. In Civ though, a forest tile is not by default a dense forest. I never read about how it is to drive a tank though.

Tank warfare would be more difficult in a forest to be sure but not impossible as in a jungle. Most forests have natural lanes large enough to be able to drive a tank through and with the German Heavy tanks of WWII you could actually remove most of the trees in your path.

quote: 2- I do not expect CiV to have modifiers for every single terrain and every single unit since Civ always have been a pretty general game. I would rather expect a few general modifiers.

Not for every unit but the units can be grouped together into 4-5 groups and terrain could have modifiers for those groups. For example the types of units could be:

Offensive foot units
Defensive foot units
Horse units
Armored units
Bombardment units

Not really much of a change as CIV 3 has most of these distinctions already in place. Unit abilities could also be added to fine tune the combat system (pikes +10% def against horses, Aegis and Mobile SAM systems +50% defense against missle attacks)

	22-10-2004 03:50									#182
	Battles: the effect of tech Browse Apolyton AD-FREE

This is not really complete, but here's what is done until now. It is simply a little list of battles that were fought between opponents having very different levels of technology. It permits to see the effect, and to which extent it changed something. Of course, it also shows in which situations weaker tech units won and at which cost. It is coming from http://apolyton.net/forums/showthre...30&pagenumber=6 Here is what was done until then:





Upgrade of what I found in Britannica encyclopedia. What is not in what I said but would have been interesting simply are things I didn't found in Britannica (such as weapons used). Infos that have an asterisk (*) next to it are from people on the forum.


-Glorious victories through Superior Technology, Training, Organization, or Industrial Base

Thermopylae
August, 480 BC
Greek (300 Spartans, their helots and 1100 Beotians) vs Persians
Greek lost: all
Persians: considerable losses

Notice: Persians won but it was a good resistance for the Greeks. The troops I named here (Greeks) are what was used to let all the others escape.


Salamis
480 BC
Persians (800 galleys) vs Greeks (370 triremes)
Persians lost: 300 galleys
Greek lost: 40 triremes

Notice: Greek lured Persians in the narrow waters of the strait of Salamis where the massed Persians ships had difficulty maneuvering.


Operation Desert Storm (Iraq)*
1990-1991
USA (1848 tanks + air power) vs Iraq (4230 tanks)
USA troops: Abrams M1, M1A1 and M1A1(HA)
Iraq troops: 50 T-72, 1600 T-62, 700 T-54 (Soviet tanks)
USA lost: 9 permanent lost, 9 had to be repaired, no casualty within crewmen
Iraqi lost: 4000 tanks

Notice: USA losts are mostly due to mines. On average, an Abram outranged an Iraqi tank by about 1000 meters.
My comment: Informations are not complete. Anti-air, others? What's about air power?
Sources:
http://www.fas.org/man/dod-101/sys/land/m1.htm
http://www.desert-storm.com/War/



-Ruinous defeats in spite of Superior Technology, Training, Organization, or Industrial Base

Isandhdlwana
January 22nd-23rd, 1879
Zulu (20 000 men) vs British (1700 men)
Zulu lost: 3000 to 4000
British lost: 1580

Notice: Zulu advanced unnoticed. A part of them that was willing to die for the others was on a drug making them feel invincible.
My comment: This is partly because they attacked all at the same time (stack unit someone? )


Battle of Adwa
March 1st, 1896
Italy (14 500 men) vs Ethiopia (100 000 men)
Italian lost (killed, wounded or captured): 70%
Ethiopian lost: not said

Notice: Italian columns were disorganized and Italians lack adequates maps of the area. Part of the Italian losts are due to a retreat in difficult terrain, harrassed by hostile population.
My comment: Seems partly due to terrain and number of men all there at same time (almost 1:7 ratio)


Dien Bein Phu
November 20th* to May 7th, 1954
France (15 709 men*) vs VietMinh (socialists Viets) (40 000 men)
France troops*: tanks, artillery and air support
VietMinh troops*: guns (light to heavy), anti-air, mortars
France lost*: 1800 killed, 5000 wounded
VietMinh*: 8 000 to 12 000 killed, 15 000 to 30 000 wounded


Notice: French (fortified) taken by surprise. Roads were cut so troops and supplies could only come by air. VietMinh were popularly supported (dunno if it changes anything). Heavy artillery broke French lines.
My comment: I guess 40 000 men is alot, espescially if they had the jungle advantage where French and American were seriously not trained to.


Little Bighorn
June 25th, 1876
USA vs Amerindians (cleary overwhelming Americans)
American troops: cavalry
American lost: more than 200 (they only talk of Custer's 7th cavalry who was completely vanquished)

Notice: Part of the cavalry was surprised to see some encampment where they weren't thought to be and it caused some problems to the tactic. Unaware about it, the other part of cavalry arrived alone with the group they were supposed to attack. Lost of strtegic edge that they thought they would have (river). Amerindians were alerted of Custer's attack because of other attacks they already had (Custer is the one that was surprised to see some troops where he didn't thaught). Other than Custer's 7th cavalry, the other retreated (they had attacked before him).
My comment: Here again we see a common factor: more troops at the same place. Also terrain advantage/disadvantage that got a place.


Spartacus
71 BC
Rome (8 legions=54 000 men*) vs Spartacus (ultimately, Spartacus had at least 90 000 men)
Spartacus lost: erm... alot including the 6000 crucified

Notice: They lost this battle (and died), but they also beated 2 consuls in 72 BC it is said. But I'd say they were the ones with more troops, and not the romans. 90 000... Not every consul has 50 000 men, no? Notice that not all slaves are combatants.*


Agincourt
October 25th, 1415
French (20 000 to 30 000 men) vs English (5900 men)
French troops: many of the troops were mounted knights in heavy armor
English troops: 900 men-at-arms and 5000 archers
French lost: 1500 knights and 4500 men-at-arms
English lost: less than 450 men

Notice: French unwisely chose a battlefield with a a narrow frontage of only about 1000 yards of open ground between the two woods, making large maneuvers almost impossible.



Similarity: more troops on the winner's side at the same battle at the same time. (stack unit someone? )
Not surprising, since one strategy is trying to catch the opponent's troops by little parts.

That's what I found. You guys should all look at getting this encyclopedia. Encarta is peanut compared to it. It's marvelous


About Napoleon in Russia, I read about this war and I know that troops were frozen (winter). Many died because they hadn't enough supplies or from frost. All this not helping morale to make things worst. I guess going from France to Russia in winter is a great change of temperature...

	24-10-2004 23:01									#183
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like CTP2>>if we have 10 units in one fortress it'stupid they defend from a opposant'unit one by one ...

the visibility, situation (camouflage or unit in moutain by example) should be ameliorate

	15-12-2004 01:46									#184
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any thought of adjusting city population when garrisons are in the city, or huge military units are drawn from the locals?

	17-12-2004 19:31									#185
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quote: Originally posted by bayraven any thought of adjusting city population when garrisons are in the city, or huge military units are drawn from the locals?

quote:

	17-12-2004 19:45									#186
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quote: Originally posted by bayraven any thought of adjusting city population when garrisons are in the city, or huge military units are drawn from the locals?

Yes, I'd like to see a system like that. I would suggest making advanced units (swordsmen, cavalry etc.) cost 1 pop to build. Primitive units (warrior, spearmen) would cost no pop. This would mean that small cities could still have some defense, but larger cities could afford the better units. A city could regain a population point when you disband the unit.

	18-12-2004 09:12									#187
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I have always felt that the demographic effects of war should be better simulated in some fashion, but to do what you are suggesting I feel would require a wholesale change to how a city's population is determined-either what each pop point represents OR perhaps by implementing an X.ab system for population measurement and, thus, having units cost not WHOLE pop points (the X), but incremements of pop points (the .ab)

Yours,
Aussie_Lurker.

	19-12-2004 07:20									#188
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Would it cause other gaming problems to ditch the standard 'city digit' representation of population, and go with actual population stats per turn? Say the city had a population of 35,000 and you wanted to raise an infantry unit of 1000 men. When you have purchased or fabricated infantry weapons and armor for the 1000 recruits, they would train for an amount of time (boot camp). The city pop drops to 34,000 (plus whatever population growth the city would experience per turn) once the unit is deployed.
If it were to be a settler unit from a city of 200, the population would drop by whatever size settler contingent you send out. The new city would begin with the number of people in the settler party, less attrition from the journey.
This approach would also allow you to allocate people to the different factories or farms in governments below republic / democracy.

	19-12-2004 07:33									#189
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Problem with simply taking population directly out as soldiers is that if you are going to go into that much detail, you'd also need to account for the fact that most armies (especially modern ones) have a huge amount of personnel tied up in support structure. Today, or each soldier in the field, 3 people are employed by the military in purely support roles.

Also, this model takes no account of the fact that armies traditionally employ only males as soldiers.

Anything that goes into breaking down population into numbers will either have some glaring anomalies like teh two I highlighted, or else be too complicated to be fun.

	19-12-2004 07:56									#190
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You wouldn't need to go into too much detail-after all, it IS just a game-however, you could have a population model that does reflect the cost of war on the population! Thats all I am asking for!

Yours,
Aussie_Lurker.

	19-12-2004 11:15									#191
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this might be to much, but WTH....

placing units in reserve??

	19-12-2004 16:28									#192
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I don't think that having 1000 generic people move to an army is too bad... It's less abstract than "pop point" and not so focused as to be a headache.

I don't really understand why making an idea less abstract automatically forces making it extremely detailed and elaboratly modeled. Settlers can cost 10,000 "people," workers 5000, and ancient military units 1000. By the end of the game military units can cost as much as or more than workers or settlers.

	19-12-2004 19:04									#193
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As the ages progress the 1000 war fighters WOULD require a total allocation of 3000 people to account for support personnel. When that unit suffers loss, the attack / defense value would drop proportional to the number of fighting men left alive. Decimated units could be amalgamated to form new units. That would address the problem of nearly destroyed units ‘healing’ themselves back to full strength.

Wouldn’t it make sense to have whatever level of industry you’ve acquired at the time produce the weaponry you take into the field? Your build queue wouldn’t reflect every factory you would need, but you could focus on some major areas; furniture, jewelry, munitions, wine, automobiles. This could provide your actual luxury and trade goods (vis-à-vis Colonization). During war time your auto plant could be co-opted to build tanks, and (this is my original point) sending 1000 (3000) boys to war reduces the number of hands you have for the factory and the farms. I would enjoy this level of micromanagement, but it could be toggled off to AI Advisors should the Player not want to make those decisions

	20-12-2004 06:29									#194
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quote: Originally posted by Fosse I don't think that having 1000 generic people move to an army is too bad... It's less abstract than "pop point" and not so focused as to be a headache. I don't really understand why making an idea less abstract automatically forces making it extremely detailed and elaboratly modeled. Settlers can cost 10,000 "people," workers 5000, and ancient military units 1000. By the end of the game military units can cost as much as or more than workers or settlers.

I like this approach in general. The problem seems to me to be that if you get specific real values for population in the military then other game assumptions and models might break down. FE the players start to ask "Why doesn't my million-population modern city produce 1000x more than an ancient-era 10k person city. (1000x comes from 100x for population and at least 10x for efficiency)

Like I said, I'm for such an approach, but it has to be melded with the existing system carefully lest something be broken. And you're right, a "slippery slope" argument can always be uses spuriously to reject change.

	20-12-2004 10:20									#195
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Thats easy, Mark. As your population increases, the amount of food and shields needed to sustain them at basic happiness ALSO increases-largely in proportion to population growth. This means that, whilst your mega-city might be producing hundreds of shields/food every turn, a large percentage of these are required to represent the buying and selling of neccessary consumer goods. You could siphon much of this into your military and industrial capacity-of course-but only at the cost of your city's happiness.

Hope that makes sense !

Yours,
Aussie_Lurker.

	20-12-2004 22:43									#196
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Well rationalized TAL, but not completely convincing.

FE those excess goods can be tapped during serious wartime (as opposed to those wartimes when tax cuts are absolutely required ).

Cya,

Mark

	20-12-2004 23:01									#197
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Mark,
the excess goods tapped by the vast Military Industrial Complex are still siphoned and not shown as (exponential type) city surplus.
As TAL says, that leads to discontent.
But i've noticed tax cuts make for Happiness.

	19-01-2005 16:14									#198
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Here's what I got in my movement thread:

1- From Hexagonian, see here for the image he attached to illustrate his point.

quote: See the attached image to get a general feel of my ideas for civ4 combat. The numbers and the layout are not particularly important - as they are in a rough form - but are there to give you a visual example. First off, I see the need to increase the range of attack/defend combat numbers - possibly from 1-50 or 1-100. Unit selection will allow you to pick multiple units at one time and indicate that you want to send them into combat. The colors are to designate the type of unit (red - flank, blue - range, green - melee) - and units are broken up in the pulldown menu by category - all melees are in one group, and so on. When you select the units and send them into combat, you will get additional bonuses (possibly (+1) per unit) based on the number of units you bring into battle. If you only bring in one unit, no bonus. Bring in 6, and you may generate a (+1) attack for two units - bring in 12 and you may get a (+1) for four units. Same with the defender - a fully defended city may generate (+1) bonuses for a lot of units. The bonus will increase based on the unit type too. A tank may get (+3) instead of (+1) because it is a more advanced unit and its attack/defend number is higher. The goal here is to provide the means to manage your forces and eliminate the need to send units into battle one at a time. There is nothing more tedious than having a stack of 80+ units - select stack, search for unit in pulldown menu, send unit, repeat... It rewards a player that chooses multiple units for attack with a potential bonus for some of those units. In a nutshell, combat can either be resolved as in civ3 (unit vs unit) or it can be broadened to a combined arms format. (This is up to the designers to determine). In a combined arms setup, when you select the units and send them into combat, they will show up on the the box on the left of the pulldown menu. You have a number of slots that you can fill - 2 flanks, 6 melees and 4 ranged, plus an additional 12 reinforcements. (this setup can vary, based on what the designers want, but I'm using a total of 24 units as an example) When combat starts you have the following melee vs melee with range firing on melee with flanker attacking end melee When melee units are destroyed, then the ranged units come up on the front line - after that, the reinforcements come in play, taking the place of those defeated units. (or ranged units do not come up on the front lines until all reinforcements are destroyed - this is up to the designer) Range units - both attacker and defenders - inflict damage on frontline melee units without taking hits themselves until they end up on the frontline - but they have very weak attack/defend, so they will get crushed by a conventional melee unit. Flankers only get their bonus if they are not faced with an opposing flanker. They hit the end melee unit in the row. Flankers also have weak attack/defend numbers, but they generally are not as weak as the ranged attack/defend numbers. This system - whatever version (civ3 or combined arms) is streamlined, and does not require a unit stack cap. The beauty of this system is that you can select and send up to 24 units into combat at one time, and it allows your forces to stay in a fluid stack. Taken a step further, you can preset units to stay locked via the checkbox on the left on the pulldown menu. Select multiple units in the right checkbox, select the far left checkbox of one of the units, and it will designate that stack as a sub-army. Select that army via the right checkbox and you will get a pulldown menu that will tell you what is in that sub-army. This also will allow a player to handle movement in a streamlined manner, and it can be broadened to include the means to effectively group your worker force. It probably needs finetuning, but this is the gist of it.

2- Opposite point of view here from wrylachlan

quote: Most of what I was talking about was in response to people calling for tactical bonuses in a mini-map. To summarize: Instead of having tiles cost a certain number of movement points, it should be transitions between tiles. i.e. Plains to Mountains costs X points, Mountains to Mountains costs Y points, etc. This allows things like plateaus, cliffs, impassable mountains, etc. As for the tactical bonuses, I think that flanking bonuses should be implemented on the main map scale. Simply put a defender can only defend in the direction he was first attacked from or adjacent directions. For example: With 3 Spearmen and a Catapult in a certain tile being attacked by 5 Warriors and 1 Ancient Cav. The first three warriors attack the spearmen, establishing the direction of their front line. If the remaining 2 warriors attack from the same direction, the spearmen defend. If, however, the Ancient Cav uses 1 movement point to get into a flanking tile and then attack, the Catapult defends, and gets killed. This makes the terrain, play an important role in tactical combat.

	19-01-2005 17:24									#199
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The sub-army concept is a leap forward for utilizing units in combat and movement
I've also thought there should be a flanking advantage, however structured.
How does combined arms (game play) differ from Civ3 ?


Is it possible to have 'simultaneous movement' of forces as in Gettysburg, or does that eat up to much memory from a program perspective? There could be one phase of game play to do city maintenance and direct the extended movement of units, and the second phase everything moves at once. Perhaps you can redirect any units already in motion that have multiple movements (along roads, for example) but with a movement cost penalty.

Is it feasible to have a sub-map for combat that would take, for example, the one block movement progress of a spearman , and when 'magnified' give you three smaller movements that would constitute the one movement seen on the main map. If not to cumbersome, this would increase battlefield detail. Or the player could choose to stay in the big map as Civ is now, if they don't want to micro manage battle.

Last edited by bayraven on 19-01-2005 at 17:41