 |
|
Harlikwin
|
|
Ok. This is to be the "chat room" for the military dicussion.
|
|
| |
|
|
|
Harlikwin
|
|
Ok kewl, Here is my agenda of stuff to discuss...
Range effects modeling in the combat resolution model. (Other than what I have posted already (Cuz I really don't like it))
Supplies and forage
Local recruiting of levies from enemy territory (Kinda ties into supply)
|
|
| |
|
|
|
Mark_Everson
|
 |
Canton, MI
Jan 1970
time: 00:13
|
|
M1
Warning... I am using my dictation software to produce these posts. This can result in really weird typo is. If I say something you don't understand trying substituting a "sounds like" phrase for the thing that looks really bizarre, and sometimes you can figure out the meaning.
There are several big issues that I would like to address. I'm sure you all have your own lists... As I said before mine are more the things leading to combat in a specific square, and related to it, rather than the actual combat that happens in the single square. However, I think getting basic agreement on these things leading to combat is Essential. I think the actual combat/battle model can be polished in a lot of ways after these decisions are laid down. Before we've reached complete agreement on them, I think it's possible to end up with a combat system that makes a lot of sense in the single square, but doesn't connect well to the rest of the game.
The basic areas I think are important are:
1. Establishing a link between movement outside of battle and any battles that may be happening.
2. The basic way units are built, maintain, and supplied (not a lot of detail, just a general outlines)
1a. Strategic movement rates... the player should have the choice of moving their units at a variety of rates. The maximum rate will be set by things like unit composition, road and bridges infrastructure, prepositions supplies, etc. However, ratcheting down from the maximum possible movement rate there should be a variety of choices (we have talked about this before) from forced march (maximum) down too cautious advance. Whether a unit can be surprised, or put in a disadvantage in a coming battle should be affected by these movement choices. We also need to figure out the connection between the movement rate on the main map, and Harli's scouting phase. If we end up using phases (ticks) the distance traveled per tick will depend on the basic movement speeds selected.
1b. Connection between outside units and battles. Basically what I'm talking about here is the logical extension of the simple support mechanism in demo 4. For one thing, a real modern battle will sometimes take place in an area significantly larger than a single square. We need to have rules for how a TF can join a contest in a single square. For instance in a large fluid engagement like the battle of Kursk... overtime during the engagements (during a single turn IMO) units should be able to enter the contest in adjacent squares. For instance, I can see nothing so irritating to the the player as having a large task force that annihilated the enemy in its square (say, during the scouting phase) being unable to Ever make it to help in the closely-fought battle sequence immediately adjacent until a whole other turned goes by. Such a series of battles, according to Harli is model could go for many battles, clearly plenty of time for some armor that is only 50 miles away to enter the fight at some point later than the initial part of the first engagement.
1c. Another thing we need to nail down is whether task force movement is simply square-by-square, or more continuous. A continuous movement system, or you keep track of Where the unit is within each square is clearly more complicated, but has some advantages. The main advantage is that you can capture a different movement rates much better. For instance in civ, you can only have strategic movement differences that are very large in terms of movement rates, because you're either move a whole square or you don't. So we need to discuss whether we want to use continuous or by-square movement (before battle)
2. We've already discussed building units, and supplied somewhat. I don't think the issues here are as big as in the movement regime. It seems we're agreed that building units requires real amounts of population, and combining them with weapons, training, and possibly doctrine. In terms of maintenance and supply, I think Harli's simplified system presented before should be given a shot. At some point we will have the merchant coding functional, and see how difficult it would be to do Real supply. But that may be too computationally expensive. There will also be a variety of mobilization levels I think, and we can work out the details on exactly what these are. There has already been some mention of this in the economics model in the miscellaneous section. But I'm sure we can work up something better and a few quick ideas that are there.
Okay, I just read the things you want to discuss, and am waiting for your initial positions.
|
|
| |
|
|
|
Harlikwin
|
|
Ok, For my benefit I NEED to know how big one square is. I do agree on your points in terms of movment in terms of getting there effects how a battle is fought. Howver I want to clarfy a few things
No force could get aniahliated during the Scout phase, technicaly all battles would go up to the the assulat phase, or if a withdrawl is ordered to the witdrawl phase or if that fails to the pursuit phase.
Also I really don't buy the idea of armies abmusing each other. On a smaller scale it happens but not a big army level. The scout phase reflects the commander trying to pin down exactly where the enemy is so that they can deply their forces in the best manner to deal with the enemy (the manouver phase)
I'm not sure how to handle Kursk style engagments other than to say that they should just be fough as individual battles if they are in seperate squares... Perhaps we could use something like in EIA where there is a possiblity based on the commander of reinfrcing an adjecent battle or something...
as for the continous moment idea it is cool, and so far I have assumed square by square movment. It would force me to reevalute the comat model in terms of it but I don't think that it would be a huge proble. Maily I would have to design a pre-battle section
-Harli
|
|
| |
|
|
|
Harlikwin
|
|
Issues to address
Resolve range issue
Problem: don't want the range thing to turn into a tactical combat system.
Solutions:
1. Roll it into one thing
Use tactics, mobility rating and ranged firepower rating rolled into one to determine casualties, also use commitment/aggressiveness level
Range effects,
Depends on several factors, local tactics used and terrain mainly
Local tactics
Defend (dig in/hold position and shoot as much as possible)
Assault (Charge the enemy and close to hand to hand range)
Maneuver (Try to maintain fixed distance from enemy while firing)
So if you are defending infantry versus an assaulting cavalry charge you get X number of shots
If you are a Mongol horse archer attacking Knights, you would use your advantage of mobility to use indirect fire on them, and get X shots before you withdraw
These things are modified by terrain.
Also mobility is also affected by terrain
Casualties per element per phase should be on the order of ~10% max for the 1st 2 phases in modern times.
It should be noted that almost all heavy casualties and destruction of armies historically occurs in what I term the pursuit phase, i.e. the phase where the enemy's morale is broken and they are retreating. If the battle goes to this phase (rather than the withdrawal phase) then heavy casualties should be expected. The main difference in modern times is that usually the battle will proceed to the withdrawal phase and thus avoid heavy casualties
This system should be able to model things such as: The steppe horse archers, which no one really found a counter to, only other horse archers. The advent of the long range rifle in the civil war that put the rifle as the premier defensive weapon. The reverse of this in the first world in terms of artillery (note: using bombardment at the end of the scout and maneuver phases reflects this IMO, just as long as you have enough arty to do it)
Ex: In the civil war, primitive entrenchment's put the defensive infantry in a position of primacy on the battlefield. This effect would be exacerbated stuff like bolt action rifles.
2. Use my pre proposed system of movement and fire along the 1D range band with multiple resolutions.
Problems: This seems awfully tactical to me, and in those terms really unrealistic since it is 1D…
Supply
We need to also model foraging as a function of civs? Or during different time periods or as af unction of tech. (well certainly as a function of tech)
Also I want to take a look at recruiting local troops to fight for an army that is far from home, Historically this happened during roman times (2nd Punic war; Hannibal recruited Italians in Italy to fight for him against Rome.), and medieval times.
Harli
|
|
| |
|
|
|
Harlikwin
|
|
RE: M2
Um as to the time scale thing, It has been dicussed but I'm not sure what the actual concensus was. From what I heard it all sounded reasonable... I was knd of partial to dividing each yearinto 12 months and letting the computer resolve that kind of stuff but the other things I heard were pretty good. Actually in terms of that, 12 months would be fine for modern wars, but I think that a 6 month turn would be fine for ancient and something like 4 3 month turns would be ok for say napoleonic... Again this would all be handeled by the computer so that the player wouldn't really be involved.
-Harli
|
|
| |
|
|
|
Mark_Everson
|
|
Canton, MI
Jan 1970
time: 00:13
|
|
M3
Army's Ambushing...
it's not exactly army's ambushing each other, but obtaining relative advantage leading into the scouting phase. If an Army screams in at maximum rate not knowing much about the terrain it is going to be at a severe disadvantage to someone who has had a chance to already scout the ground etc.. But anyway, I don't think this is a critical thing for us to worry about right at the moment.
Kursk...
I think armies can have fairly straightforward pre-programmed orders like: first priority is achieve objective of taking x square. If that succeeds, support friendly troops as much as possible... this sounds kind of like the system you are citing which I'm not familiar with.
Continuous movement...
I think it has a lot of potential advantages, but also some disadvantages in terms of complexity. After you thought about it a bit, let me know which way you think we should go on it.
Range effects for combat within a square...
your model number one looks better to me to at the moment. I think it is Quite sufficiently complex. If we can get the interaction of terrain, mobility, and range more or less correct, we will already be going Way beyond what is available in the genre. Also I think a system that doesn't produce huge surprises (which range proposal 2 might do depending on troop placement) will be a big advantage for the AI.
Supply...
yes I think we definitely need to model foraging, especially in earlier time periods. Probably there will just be a movement penalty associated with it. Recruiting local troops is good, but I think that's almost more diplomacy than military. I think we should clearly have the possibility of that.
|
|
| |
|
|
|
Harlikwin
|
|
yeah korn just hop on in...
|
|
| |
|
|
|
Mark_Everson
|
|
Canton, MI
Jan 1970
time: 00:13
|
|
M3:
On timescales...
I am going to be one of the guys doing the AI. Your and Krenske's alternative of having the computer run things for 12 military mini-turns during a year is simply not going to work IMO. Even a brilliant computer AI will not be able to do what the player would want to do it each juncture, it's just impossible. Way too much can happen in the year. The player can't even give orders that far enough ahead because so much can happen in the year. General orders based on the success of an initial operational level flight, can easily be invalidated if the fight turns out to be a disaster, or a great success. To model where the AI handles it would trundle along with the same old orders for a whole year before the player got a chance to respond. IMO, in order to get this one real world detail right, you'll end up with endless player frustration. I think we just have to sacrifice reality when reality conflict with fun.
So, could we let the players actually run all the turns that you envision?
I think your proposal for how long the military turns might be it is reasonable, but if you just add up the number of turns that would require, it is Enormous.
Ancient (six months turns) if we do about 6000 years over ancient history, that's 12,000 turns
Napoleonic (4 turns per year) over a 100 year period That's 400 more turns
modern (12 turns per year) over 100 year period That's 1200 more turns.
All of civ is only 400 or 500 turns!
IMO you need to accept the fact that military actions are Not going to take the right amount of time. It's an abstraction that makes the whole idea of a civ-type game work.
Now what you say is Very doable four scenarios. In that case we could easily have seasonal or monthly turns without any problem, and the player could direct each monthly turn if necessary.
|
|
| |
|
|
|
Harlikwin
|
|
Re M4
Well, my main concern is to capture the feel of these conflicts. In ancient times you cmpaigns that lasted 20 years or more. In modern times campaigns can take under a year (i.e. desert storm... 100 hrs) The other thing that I would like modeled somehow would be seasonal effects and so forth.
Ok, from the Ai point of view I see the bigger problem. So what are the alternatives? The sliding scale as we discussed or what. The seasonal effects can be handled abstractly I know that... The rapidity of modern conflict though seems a bit harder to do...
-Harli
|
|
| |
|
|
|
Mark_Everson
|
|
Canton, MI
Jan 1970
time: 00:13
|
|
M 4:
hello korn469, glad you could make it!
Harli:
leftover movement...
I think the big point to get right is that if all the timescales were right, a unit that should be able to make it to a confrontation in real life, should be able to make it in the game. So units that are close enough to make it by the end of the first battle should be able to join at the end (provided they have orders to support etc.) Task Forces that could not reach the first battle in time, but probably would make it in time for a second battle if one is going to occur, should show up for that battle. This will not only make the battles more realistic, but will make the description of the results much better IMO.
I do think you need to put an arbitrary limitation on how many battles actually happened in a turn though. I think for each age we just need to pick the amount of Real military time that happens in a game turn. If we follow that regimen, then everything else will turn out right. It's just that the military time will never match the calendar time.
Or hears an alternate radical idea... just never say what the real-time is! I'm not sure if this would be good or bad, but would get us around the problem of campaigns that should take a few months taking a few years instead.
The discussion on mercenaries hasn't gotten very far. Just that they will be more expensive in general than regular troops. Some cultures will probably specialize in hiring out mercenaries.
I hear you on the continuous move model. There is one hybrid between continuous movement and per-square movement that I sought out also. I will run it by you just in case to see what you think. The idea would be that movement is per square, and you're always assumed to be at the center of the square. However, if a TF selects a go to destination, as long as that destination isn't changed additional incremental progress toward it would be kept track of even if it didn't amount to a whole square. So suppose my movement rate is 1.5 squares per turn the first turn I would move one square toward my goal. The second turn, if the goal hasn't changed, I would move to squares toward my goal because I would be using the "saved up .5 from the last time. What to think?
|
|
| |
|
|
|
Harlikwin
|
|
Korn: Pertty much all battles take 1 tic. The way I see it in terms of scale is that time for 1 tic iss far graer than 1 day. 1 Day is the longest 1 battle is gonna run... that is why I propose more than 1 battle in hex per tic...
-Harli
|
|
| |
|
|
|
Harlikwin
|
|
Ok, The way I read you guys on the whole turn/tic thing is this...
One "military turn" is divied into X tics. Each unit can move fight etc.
My point. SCALE
This military turn is going to be at leas something like 1 year, probably longer, therefore each tic represents at least a few months of time. Therefore, I do not see any battle regardless of anything else commitment etc. NOTHING (battlewise anyway) taking more than one tic. In fact in the space of one tic you could easily have several battles in the same square, due to the scale of battles being pretty short affairs. In the civil war forces manouvered for weeks or months, before something like a 1 or two day battle.
Correct me if I'm wrong on the tic thing, I'm not sure I still get it.
-Harli
|
|
| |
|
|
|
Mark_Everson
|
|
Canton, MI
Jan 1970
time: 00:13
|
|
Harli:
I think the scales need to be different between economic and military actions. If you can just focus on the military, and take a turn to equal one month approximately, and a tick to equal three days approximately. If you stick to this scale for everything military, all the game effects should come out in a roughly sensible way. The only disconnect is between the economic timescale and the military timescale, which I am only just have to fudge. By fudge I mean picks something that results in decent game play.
This requires different timescales for military and economic turns. But so long as all the military stuff works to the same timescale, everything will, out approximately correct. By approximately correct, I mean the same civs will win the same wars they will lead if we fought out the whole game on a realistic timescale. It's just that military things will happen significantly more slowly than they otherwise would. But as we agreed above (I thought), we can just not say what exactly a turn is, and leave it at that.
If you stick to your idea that one tick equals a month, then we will have the ridiculous result that reserves 60 miles away can never help friendly forces as they go through battle after battle after battle! For the system to work, there Has to be one disconnect. I think the place to disconnect with reality is to keep the military timescale of everything the same, and just have it not match correctly the economic and diplomatic timescale.
It might also be useful for you to read over the following posts in which I discussed my take on this issue. M2 near the bottom; M3, virtually the entire thing; M 4 Middle two paragraphs.
Korn469: those sound basically Ok with me. On 4 I think if a battle in square A is over by tick 2 (FE) those TFs should be able to attempt to support adjacent square B later (say getting there by tick 6)even though they were technically in an action this turn.
All:
I am taking the liberty of locking this thread, so that people won't post in it thinking that it is the ongoing military model thread. If anyone objects, I will happily unlock it...
Any further posts that are on the topics herein should be put in the current military discussion thread.
[This message has been edited by Mark_Everson (edited January 18, 2000).]
|
|
| |
|
| |
All times are GMT. The time now is 05:13.
Apolyton Time is 00:13. |
top of page
|
|
|
Forum Rules:
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts
|
HTML code is ON
vB code is ON
Smilies are ON
[IMG] code is ON
|
|
|
|
|
|
16-01-2000 20:37
) So thats no biggie...
|