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MrBaggins
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Whilst the basis for upkeep in CtP2 is pretty flexible, there are still a couple of areas where it seems to be lacking.
The first is in upkeep costs for Tile Improvements. There are none. A massive rail network only needs the initial production from PW. It costs nothing to maintain.
It would be nice if there were options to have upkeep costs (food, production or income) for TI's. This would allow for costs not only in the absence of (for instance Mines meaning there is less growth, because its not a farm instead,) but actually less growth because of a food upkeep.
The CtP2 system, with its empire level production and upkeep is ideal for this.
The second thought I had was about Unit upkeep, and the associated GDP. In CTP2 if you have 25% of your upkeep going to military upkeep, its a slight drag on your production, but nothing significant. You produce 25% slower. Since warmongering usually gains production, its usually moot anyway.
In the real world, a 25% military GDP is significant... or massive even. Thats the kind of military GDP which tore the USSR apart (around 120-170 billion roubles or about 13-19%)
There is a definite disparity, here. You can't solve it by just increasing production costs. The societial effects of high military GDP's go beyond that.
A solution, I thought, would be to have comparitive food and income upkeep costs for units... 50%, say, of the production cost. Thus a nation spending 100 production on units would also have 50 less food and gold.
Having both growth and science penalties, as well as production, might serve to both more accurately describe military expenditure, and be a game balance also.
Last edited by MrBaggins on 28-12-2003 at 21:31
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child of Thor
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Yes it seems like a nice idea to me, we could also add a population limit as well(i covered it briefly in another thread). I'm not sure exactly how many people a unit is meant to represent, but i always seem to think of it as being a thousand(well not for special units), so a twelve stack would be 12,000 individuals.
Anyway the point is that how big your army can be does depend on the amount of 'spare' people you can draw upon. So if we also added a population factor to the mix, we might be half way to stopping a warmonger strategy being the default way to play CTP2(it should still be possible, but the player would have to plan and configure his empire for that footing, as it is a very expensive undertaking).
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MrBaggins
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Having a food upkeep for units will simulate and abstract a wide range of effects, from the initial drafting, to reinforcements and general food rations. Its a simplistic yet effective solution, in my view.
For a "cruise missile" or something similar, you might wish to avoid a food upkeep, but include a much higher income upkeep, in addition to the production cost, to simulate the high currency cost of these units.
This reasonably simple change should improve the "guns or butter" choice in the game.
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Maquiladora
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Why would it improve the 'guns or butter' choice in the game? It seems to me it will encourage even more the "overall" strategy.
Building units is necessary for any empire, whether your a 'butter' or 'guns' player. That needs to be treated closer to the problem, like increasing attacking units support 4 times as much as defensive ones (using Loc's combat idea), or really crippling civs happiness or crime for units outside their borders, not great ideas but just to illustrate.
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MrBaggins
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You're right... every empire needs to develop at least some defensive units... which should be cheaper, as has been said.
It doesn't change the basic premise though... if we implement food upkeep for units (primarily offensive ones) then that will make them more of a critical cost.
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child of Thor
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Shouldn't the "overall" strategy by the default one? To encourage the player to play as broad a strategy as possible?
Then you would have the "Guns" strategy for those that wanted to craft a warmonger civ, with its costs and penalties to ensure it was risky venture(which it should be? or not?).
And the "Butter" strategy where the player sacrifices military might for the happiness and science of its people(this strategy really relies on a good diplomacy model to make it a really viable option).
IMHO at the momment it feels like we are locked into playing as a warmonger - even when we wish to be a builder. So I agree with Mr Baggins overall ideas to bring our attention to these issues.
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MrBaggins
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True, coT... you don't mind me calling you coT, do you? 
A point I'd make is that there aren't "Guns", "Overall" and "Butter" switches in the game. You develop in certain ways and that "costs" you.
Certain things cost too little, or not at all. The "Guns or Butter" statement was meant to imply not that I see only the "Butter" strategy... just that there should be some kind of cost that needs to be dealt with to signficantly build armies.
I did read your post towards the end of the DESIGN: End Game thread.. although I wasn't thinking of that thread when I was composing this. I was thinking about rise and fall of empires, then I got to thinking about the USSR economic collapse, then I checked some figures, and noticed the military GDP which in large part caused the collapse, then put 2 and 2 together. Ironically, the relatively simple implementation I've put forth should do what you've suggested, if in an abstract (but obvious) way.
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MrBaggins
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As I've mentioned the cost of production isn't significant.
All changing the shield upkeep will do is alter the number of units built (just deflate the overall number if the shield value is increased,) and maybe alter the general build speeds in the game. That might affect PW a bit.. but thats pretty much all.
If, as I'm suggesting, we (optionally) include food, then growth can be effected (which also abstracts manpower, rations and reinforcements,) and currency costs for high tech units, with income upkeep. These growth and science effects would be less about deflation/and inflation and more about reduced pop size and research, both significant issues a warmonger will need to consider.
This makes building a large offensive army a choice with a downside, rather than a choice with a marginal/no downside.
Of course, you can benefit from having the army... it allows you to invade and conquer...
Its not removing the option at all... merely increasing the options and strategies that can be meaningfully used by a player.
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Maquiladora
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Its still making the "overall" strategy even more important, which i thought we wanted to avoid...
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MrBaggins
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Not really...
There are more components to the game than just this in isolation...
It discourages the "bigger is always better" argument, at least for offensive armies, by creating a meaningful downside.
Thus... you might chose to go expansionist builder, and concentrate on defense instead of the default strategy of warmonger at the moment.
You DO agree that warmonger is the best strategy at the moment, and the others are basically inferior, don't you?
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Maquiladora
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quote:
The single player game is where we need to concentrate most as in MP its easy for the player to pick a style of play, and the whole game outlook is very different anyway.
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Single player can learn alot from Multiplayer games though IMO, because you cant predict your opponents strategy for definate, if i start on a map next to a diplomatic AI, i know what to do. Beating SP is about knowing the limitations of the AI, exploiting it in every way and building your whole strategy around those limitations, MP (it seems to me) is about being ready for anything, all of the time.
It should be an aim to make SP as random as MP but making the human vary his strategy too at any time. You can start with things like changing AI personalities in the middle of a game (i think this was mentioned before somewhere) anyway im off topic.
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child of Thor
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Maq i forgot to add that its also the type of game most people are going to play(single player that is).
And yes MP is best - the only real way to play these kind of games, but still i feel MP could benefit from a much tighter logisitcal cost for armies as we've been discussing here.
Overcomplication is one thing but trying to get the player to play with a real strategy other than 'more is best' should be a good thing to try to look at. Wes did some good threads on this stuff ages ago i think.....
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Maquiladora
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Hey im not saying make MP the first concern (as much as id want it to be) theres too many people here not interested in MP for that.
quote:
Overcomplication is one thing but trying to get the player to play with a real strategy other than 'more is best' should be a good thing to try to look at.
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I agree, but im not convinced adding more complicated unit support is the best way.
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Maquiladora
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quote:
Whilst you might claim that a player just build more to support the additional upkeep... another player could grow and use those resources WITHOUT the upkeep penalty.
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This already happens, so for this to work there would need to be big advantages for the defender, which is what was suggested already.
quote:
So... you build up then go warmonger. It's *still* warmonger.
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Well this is in MP because its the only way to be sure, a failed long range invasion can mean the end of your civ sometimes, because of the build up time for units it *has* to work.
In SP i have built and defended all game and have the biggest empire by Republic, because my cities arent overlapping like the AI's. Would i rather have AI's slightly bigger overlapping (but less in number) cities or my own perfectly spaced but smaller (but greater in number) cities? Well the game i played last night with 2 humans and 5 AI's i didnt attack the AI until Fascism and only then because i ran out of good land.
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MrBaggins
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quote:
Originally posted by Maquiladora
I agree, but im not convinced adding more complicated unit support is the best way. |
You say complicated unit support... but I really don't see that.
CTP2 has a decent interface for showing unit stats now. Adding an additional couple of columns isn't a big deal.
The player can very simply see what his army "costs"... the calculations are all taken care of, for him.
It seems to me that adding an additional food and income upkeep when there are already several cost factors for these, isn't a great hardship or any micromanagement at all. There is no way to add meaningful choices to the game without adding components.
It seems to me, in fact, that it would be a small leap of intuition to a CTP2 player, who already understands that there are food, shields and income, that there could be food, shield and income unit upkeep, rather than just shield upkeep.
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MrBaggins
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quote:
Originally posted by Maquiladora
This already happens, so for this to work there would need to be big advantages for the defender, which is what was suggested already.
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I disagree that the shield penalty is significant in game terms. All it does is set the ratio of army units to production points, (which is the same for everyone,) and slow production by a small fraction.
If growth and science were included in the upkeep, then the cost would be meaningful, since a player with a large army grows and gains techs slower.
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MrBaggins
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Maq: Have you ever not gone for conquest victory in MP?
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Maquiladora
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No, i prefer upto the modern age because i dont want to sit watching Fusion Tanks move 8 squares a turn all over the map to Gaia Controller.
quote:
I disagree that the shield penalty is significant in game terms. All it does is set the ratio of army units to production points, (which is the same for everyone,) and slow production by a small fraction.
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This is a balancing issue, not something wrong with prod support only.
quote:
If growth and science were included in the upkeep, then the cost would be meaningful, since a player with a large army grows and gains techs slower.
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It would mean being a bigger empire is even more important, even by a fraction, if a large empire build units to attack a medium empire, the medium empire can totally max its production and perhaps withhold in the current Production only support system, but it has no chance under the food/prod/gold system.
This is only about combat it seems to me, and the gold/food/prod. support would widen the gap further between medium and large empires even.
edit:
quote:
* MrBaggins Does a little post count status dance, noticing "King" for the first time.
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Congrats, 4 years, not bad 
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MrBaggins
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quote:
Originally posted by Maquiladora
This is a balancing issue, not something wrong with prod support only.
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Balancing would merely make defense easier... by increasing the ratio of defensive troops to offensive troops.
There is an merely an obstacle, not a deterrant to offensive war.
A growth or science penalty of an offensive build up would provide an actual, tangible disincentive to offensive war, and thus an actual, tangible incentive for peaceful development (or more correctly non-offense,) if peaceful development can lead somewhere... I.E. alternate victory conditions.
quote:
It would mean being a bigger empire is even more important, even by a fraction, if a large empire build units to attack a medium empire, the medium empire can totally max its production and perhaps withhold in the current Production only support system, but it has no chance under the food/prod/gold system.
This is only about combat it seems to me, and the gold/food/prod. support would widen the gap further between medium and large empires even.
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The larger the army the greater the growth penalty and science penalty.
If you, as you've assumed, consider that the larger empire will build more offensive units, and you seem to do, since you've considered that they'd be attacking the medium empire... then they'd be faced with a much larger growth and science penalty than the medium empire.
The penalty should be roughly proportionate to the empire size, but will be a larger actual number, thus the growth/science gap narrows, not widens.
Also, the medium empire wouldn't suffer any significant growth or science penalty for its defensive troops, and thus would be at a defensive advantage...
quote:
Congrats, 4 years, not bad |
Yep.. done with almost zero spamming 
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Maquiladora
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Ill admit i like the current upkeep system because its simple and it abstracts things for me, like less PW/city builds = less farms/mines/ports... granaries/academies/mills.... in a way i like alot, and doesnt draw me away from other areas of the game for too long.
The new idea is more realistic, but i dont know at what cost to ease of play. Id rather see the current system balanced perfectly before we dig a new hole.
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28-12-2003 21:23
I have tried many different strategies and ive stuck with one finally, not because it suits me specifically but because ive learnt by getting beat a thousand times in MP.
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