Civ 7: stack/carpet of doom optional

[ShadowWarrior]

The debate over one unit per tile or multiple units per tile is unending and there is simply no resolution to this issue. Can we simply have a Civ 7 that allow players to choose one or the other?

 

[aieeegrunt]

Literally no reason why not.

Ranged units are stupidly broken either way, so it’s almost moot, and some form of stacking makes moving an army less of an agonizing exercise in frustration

 

[HorseshoeHermit]

Are you going to tell the A.I.'s how to conduct wars under two different rulesets? The game has to be built around the decision on this point, around both AI and the combat mechanics' tie-in to everything else.

If a game is 1UPT, it should have longer movements per unit and include a join feature that lets units of the same class combine their hitpoints, to address traffic jam problems. To leave the stats as they have been in the past, and being turn based, means that each individual unit is the defender of its position, right? But the division of the unit classes, by technology, makes many of them extremely unsuitable to doing that. This is fine, in a tactical game where fronts move and the defended position is more of a broad area. This is a HUGE clash, however, with the other end of the Civilization game, where these tiles that are being fought over are all, individually, quite significant; representing a complete neighbourhood, a complete resource-extraction operation, or the city center itself. The scaling problem isn't just a finicky thing of not liking wars fought over a thousand miles, it's a risk/reward clash of two dynamics that want two very different things for the game.

But, I suppose if the game is jank in one of these rulesets, that doesn't mean it can't be there. So long as it is made and properly balanced in one of them.

I prefer 10 units per tile, I'm quirky like that. Or, it is still possible if the game exits the dichotomy, and retries the unit editor, where we compose a unit with various perks from among the technologies we have researched. Mounted elements, artillery, spears, swords, bows. These things enhance an *army* and the army (with its implied local commander) figures out its combat effectiveness beneath the notice of we, the grand strategy helm. If you want to keep the tactical gameplay from the series up to this point, which you do if you're still attached to individually positioning archers, spears, tanks, and artillery, then you have to accept how tactical that makes the entire game, and accept design decisions that build on that fundamental pacing, risk/reward, and the rest, from the start.

 

[aieeegrunt]

Are you going to tell the A.I.'s how to conduct wars under two different rulesets? The game has to be built around the decision on this point, around both AI and the combat mechanics' tie-in to everything else.

If a game is 1UPT, it should have longer movements per unit and include a join feature that lets units of the same class combine their hitpoints, to address traffic jam problems. To leave the stats as they have been in the past, and being turn based, means that each individual unit is the defender of its position, right? But the division of the unit classes, by technology, makes many of them extremely unsuitable to doing that. This is fine, in a tactical game where fronts move and the defended position is more of a broad area. This is a HUGE clash, however, with the other end of the Civilization game, where these tiles that are being fought over are all, individually, quite significant; representing a complete neighbourhood, a complete resource-extraction operation, or the city center itself. The scaling problem isn't just a finicky thing of not liking wars fought over a thousand miles, it's a risk/reward clash of two dynamics that want two very different things for the game.

But, I suppose if the game is jank in one of these rulesets, that doesn't mean it can't be there. So long as it is made and properly balanced in one of them.

I prefer 10 units per tile, I'm quirky like that. Or, it is still possible if the game exits the dichotomy, and retries the unit editor, where we compose a unit with various perks from among the technologies we have researched. Mounted elements, artillery, spears, swords, bows. These things enhance an *army* and the army (with its implied local commander) figures out its combat effectiveness beneath the notice of we, the grand strategy helm. If you want to keep the tactical gameplay from the series up to this point, which you do if you're still attached to individually positioning archers, spears, tanks, and artillery, then you have to accept how tactical that makes the entire game, and accept design decisions that build on that fundamental pacing, risk/reward, and the rest, from the start.

There are mods that allow stacking for both Civ5 and Civ6, and the AI tends to do better when it can stack

 

[DeckerdJames]

To resolve the 1 UPT problem in one way is to increase the cost of traversing a hex significantly so that crossing one might cost 3 turns on grassland, 6 turns in the hills, and 9 turns on sandy desert dunes. Then you make the units last much longer but cost more too. Hopefully the result is that fewer troops are produced in the course of a game, but the units become much more well trained and have histories of their own. In later eras roads, railroad and air travel become more important because they vastly multiply how fast units can travel. Recon units could be significantly faster on land. Maybe 2x as fast as full units. Then give everything 2-5 times the line of sight that they have now. Enough that you can start reacting much sooner to an advance and it allows deeper future planning and strategy. Trees and hills would still block line of sight as it does now.