Mechanics to reduce stack sizes

Combat Wombat

Combat Wombat

Warlord
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Oct 26, 2009
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I think we an all agree at some point stacks get to large. What I would like to see are mechanics that keep stack sizes in check instead of a stupid arbitrary limit.

Supply lines: Based on tech, distance to cities, roads/railroads each tile has a supply level it can maintain and after going beyond that units start taking damage every turn.

Movement logistics: The more units you have in a tile the greater chance for a traffic jam or other such random event to occur trapping some or all units in that tile for a turn or more.

Disease mechanics: Especially pre-modern the more units you have piled into a tile the greater chance there should be a disease outbreak

Natural disaster mechanics: Don't want to put all your eggs in one basket because a tornado may roll through and wipe out all your troops. I see adding greater frequency and variety to already existing natural disasters and letting them affect more than just tile improvements and city buildings
 
I agree that some mechanic to encourage smaller stacks might be nice. Perhaps allowing collateral damage to affect more units: at the moment, I understand that a unit which causes collateral damage can inflict that damage on only a limited number of units. If these limits were high, it'd be more disadvantageous to stack your entire army in one square. Though perhaps this would make it hard to defend...

Alternatively, much better stack management (interface) would be useful, and not require AI changes. Persistent grouping, for a start. I would be happy with this, because I don't mind huge stacks, but I do hate how tedious the stupid CivIV interface for dealing with them is.
 
You're basically proposing Realism Invictus mechanics.
I'm not sure it's worth the effort or the risk of causing new bugs at this stage of development. But I've considered it in the past and not discarded the idea completely
 
I will have to install it and play around with their mechanics. I think it's worth it if only as a game option toggle.
 
Just my opinion, but I kind of like the giant stack sizes. Nothing gets my heart pumping more than hearing those war drums and then seeing the Stack of Doom show up at my doorstep. Giant stacks are one of the reasons I stick with Civ 4 vs. Civ 5.
 
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well i havnt seen any problems with the stacks that can be made, plus its so much nicer to move 1 huge stack over to the fronts lines or to your next target spiecally if its going to take 10+turns to get there compaired to many single unites

i have also yet to see a stack of 50+ in my games other than what i have created, which in the one game that got me to love this mod, i was fighting a losing battle even tho i had over whelming numbers and Superior troops i had to pull my troops back and rethink my strategy, because i my stack of doom was getting killed by the enemies surrounding me

with the surround and destroy perks many times iv seen 3 stacks of ten easy take out a stack of 50
 
alstone said:
well i havnt seen any problems with the stacks that can be made, plus its so much nicer to move 1 huge stack over to the fronts lines or to your next target spiecally if its going to take 10+turns to get there compaired to many single unites

i have also yet to see a stack of 50+ in my games other than what i have created, which in the one game that got me to love this mod, i was fighting a losing battle even tho i had over whelming numbers and Superior troops i had to pull my troops back and rethink my strategy, because i my stack of doom was getting killed by the enemies surrounding me

with the surround and destroy perks many times iv seen 3 stacks of ten easy take out a stack of 50
Click to expand...

Does the "surround and destroy" feature works ok?I knew there're problems for the AI in the past so it's only suitable for multiplayer games.
 
45°38'N-13°47'E;14115672 said:
You're basically proposing Realism Invictus mechanics.
I'm not sure it's worth the effort or the risk of causing new bugs at this stage of development. But I've considered it in the past and not discarded the idea completely
Click to expand...

I liked the way they handled it, but I'm still not convinced their AI knows how to use it. It's implemented nicely - or at least, not horribly - but I swear I still see the AI try and superstack whenever possible, and every other stack will have slews of negative debuffs on them because of the sizes.


After AND's "Big Final Release", that might be the time to finally look at options like this, but not right now when we're tidying up for that last stretch towards a complete mod. Then perhaps, either as an option or a module, it may be worth looking into.

I like the idea, but now's not the time yeah.
 
In Civ III, artillery and other bombardment units would help keep stack sizes down. In Civ IV, you lose your unit every time you bombard another stack.

I know we have the bombardment action mod thingy, I can't remember what is called, but maybe it might help if you use that.
 
zeroRPGmaker said:
In Civ III, artillery and other bombardment units would help keep stack sizes down. In Civ IV, you lose your unit every time you bombard another stack.

I know we have the bombardment action mod thingy, I can't remember what is called, but maybe it might help if you use that.
Click to expand...

The AI uses that mechanic fairly poorly though. They'll stand there using ranged bombard to very little effect and almost never actually attack with the siege unit itself.

You don't lose your unit every time you attack another stack though, but it does often have fairly low odds of survival - especially if the enemy has units that counter siege in the stack. Large stacks are easier to handle - or at the very least they're less painful to fight against - when you're in the Modern since then you have air bombers to help out with softening up large stacks.
 
The AI uses that mechanic fairly poorly though. They'll stand there using ranged bombard to very little effect and almost never actually attack with the siege unit itself.
Click to expand...

That might be a solution. I don't like offer solutions when I am not involved in the development of the mod, but is it possible to get the AI to use that mechanic? I dunno :dunno:

By the way, what is the name of the mod that is included? Dales Combat War?
 
Well, I had a really hard time (when I had some) to improve the AI movement and use of bombardment. The problem of Civ IV code is that many functions that handle AI decisions can be found at very different location and the whole lacks of comments. If you add the many mods that were merged during the development, it can be really hard to improve. It should be possible, but it needs a lot of coding time (trial and error).
 
Combat Wombat said:
I think we an all agree at some point stacks get to large. What I would like to see are mechanics that keep stack sizes in check instead of a stupid arbitrary limit.
Click to expand...
What are the arguments against a limit ?
A clever AI would be smarter that's right, but a limit is easier and more effective. With the masses of units that the AI produces, it does not matter for me whether a stack with 200 or 4 stacks with 50 units are in front of my door. It is a pure mass battle, the value of a unit as well as the promotions and general units losing value. I don't like that.
Furthermore with the "unit limit per stack" there is problem that the AI doesn't know where to go with the whole units. A limit of the total number of units can be reached via "smart AI" or simply a "national unit limit".

What do you think of a troop limit which is linked to the population quantity ?
For example a civ has a single town with a population of 6, and empowered the nation to build only 6 military units (or 12, or depending on the military branch ... it would be a later question). If the nation has reached the limit then he can not build any further units. An exception is the convocation/levy of soldiers as an addition to preserve reserves for emergencies.
 
A bigger stack should does suffer more collateral damage, maybe letting it increase in damage of 10% per 10 enemies, so 100 stack would recieve double collateral damage. For another thing 1 medic healing a stack of 200 troops is also odd... He must be a miracle working healing troops by a high five as he passes them by.

Unsure if linking to the population might be good, the effect would be a smaller aggresive nation is always doomed against a larger passive one, cause they can bulk up in no time. If check history early Prussia was one of those nations with a relative large army and low populace/territory, similar to many german princedoms.
 
The larger stacks suffer more collateral damage, I would also find fair. Even more people are stuck on a spot, the easier it is to hit something or more :lol: .

Nyayr said:
Unsure if linking to the population might be good, the effect would be a smaller aggresive nation is always doomed against a larger passive one, cause they can bulk up in no time.
Click to expand...
But a large nation is usually better placed on military grounds, as it has more money. Therefore, even without a troop limit, small nations have a problem against large neighbors.
Furthermore, large nations need more military, since they usually have to defend more (towns, border region,...).

Nyayr said:
If check history early Prussia was one of those nations with a relative large army and low populace/territory, similar to many german princedoms.
Click to expand...
Yeah that's right. Hmm ... perhaps it could be linked to the policies. Some state forms contains a multiplier to the maximum troop limit. Pacifism, on the other hand, reduces the limit.
 
To be perfectly honest what I'd love to see is a port of the HOTK hero mechanic (only tied to great commanders) combined with a unit per tile limit.

Basically what I mean is have a limit of say 6 units per tile. That's my preferred stack size. But than port over the HOTK general/army mechanic and let those bypass that limit. So if a player (or AI) wants to go above the unit limit they need to expend a great commander to found an "army". That way you can have reasonably large stacks (say 20-30 units) but only a very limited amount of them.

This would make the whole thing far more strategic overall without limiting the AI too much.
 
PPQ_Purple said:
... you can have reasonably large stacks (say 20-30 units)...
Click to expand...
Hehe, how cute, 20 or 30 units is a relatively large stack. :)
I've abandoned a game because my stack of 500 became too tedious to use in offence since Stack Attack doesn't work in AND. I was up against similarly-sized AI stacks. When you see 300+ grenadiers along with 200+ canons marching towards you, yikes, that's terrifying.
 
aggri1 said:
Hehe, how cute, 20 or 30 units is a relatively large stack. :)
I've abandoned a game because my stack of 500 became too tedious to use in offence since Stack Attack doesn't work in AND. I was up against similarly-sized AI stacks. When you see 300+ grenadiers along with 200+ canons marching towards you, yikes, that's terrifying.
Click to expand...
I explicitly said reasonably large stacks. The word reasonable was chosen for a reason. And that reason has to do with its meaning.

In particular, the purpose of it being there is to qualify the example number I gave by a descriptive adjective that would inform the reader that said number is not a fixed value I would implement but rather an example and that ultimately the value chosen should be such that it is reasonable in the context of playability. This is as opposed to the default current behavior of actually having 500 units in your entire army, let alone a single stack which is in fact not reasonable.
 
Last edited:
:) No worries, PPQPurple.
However, if stack attack worked then I would consider 500+ units in a stack to be perfectly reasonable.
 
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