Questions on Tanks

[Skywalkre]

I'll try to keep this short (I have a nasty habit of getting long winded)

1) I've come to realize through playing the game and perusing the occasional thread here that the Civilopedia is wrong on quite a few things. One point that I'm wondering about is the statement found in the description of both tanks and modern tanks. In the entries of both it states these units are capable of attacking multiple times in a turn. However, in the games I've had with tanks I have yet to see this. After my tanks have attacked and I move them to attack a second time I get the message telling me they can only attack once. So, is the Civilopedia incorrect about this ability? When the tank attacks is it really attacking other units at the same time and just not showing this? I'll admit I have yet to use modern tanks in any game so do they have this ability? [I would love to get to them in a game for once, I just don't have the patience to wait 3-4 minutes between turns]

2) I was very surprised and curious when I first saw that tanks only had a movement of 2, especially since Riders, Cavalry, and Cossacks all have a movement rate of 3! When I got the game and read about the above ability that tanks and modern tanks are supposed to have I figured this evened out. Now that this doesn't seem to be the case I'm curious if anyone has read why this decision was made? I certainly can't think of too much historical precedent to have the movement rates be as they are so I imagine it was a playability issue that governed this decision. Any thoughts or comments about this?

 

[Galen Dietenger]

Heres a few things to consider

1) Modern Tanks CAN attack x2 per round
2) Tanks cannot-they can move after a successful attack but not atk again
3) Cavalry have Greater mobility in enemy ZoC than virtually any unit-only MA can compare and I think Cav still is better.
4) since Cavalry's mobility is actually amoungst the best in the game-esp in the ciritcal enemy ZOC, It makes a lot of sense? to contunie to produce-and deploy them alongside tanks at least unit MA comes on-line.*
5) Somewhat OT-but the whole range of movement factors, A\D really needs a major reworking imo. A situation where cavalry make better spearhead attack units than tanks would aggree Id think.






*Although there is precedence for cavalry and tanks working alongside each other(Eastern Front -Cossaks WW2), and horses, it could be argued would be more mobile in certains types of terrain than vehicles would-ie mountains. The way civ3 handles tanks vs cavalry is imo, yet another instance of a flawed premise. As for cavalry being able to actually harm tanks in any realistic meaningof the word, its hard to see how this could happen as well. Rifles and other hand weapons vs massed armor and there support units, would = 95+% of certain death. (see Polish cavalry vs Panzer 1+2's 1939)

 

[Endureth]

All tanks can attack multiple times per round but not if they move. Assume you move up to a city with a single tank but do not attack.

The very next turn you will get two attacks and a chance to take out two defenders but if you die (as is usually the case when attacking a city with a sole tank anyway) you'll never see it.

I've been able to attack stacks of enemies (not in cities) multiple times without any problems.

Endureth

 

[Akka]

Any tank can attack as often as it has movement point. The thing is, when it attacks a stack of unit, the "retreat" count as a movement, hence transforming the tank in a one-attack unit, and the modern armor in a two-attacks unit. But provided there is only one unit, they can attack respectively two and three times.

 

[EvanCiv]

Originally posted by Galen Dietenger
As for cavalry being able to actually harm tanks in any realistic meaningof the word, its hard to see how this could happen as well. Rifles and other hand weapons vs massed armor and there support units, would = 95+% of certain death.

And a regular tank attacking a regular calvary on grassland has a 96.2% chance of winning.

 

[FullofHoles]

Tanks in WWI were actually pretty slow and required repairs very often. In WWI, tanks were practically incapable of crossing long stretches of land. What they would do is rail them to a place and use them in local battles and then rail them somewhere else.

Even in WWII, there were some severe problems with tank mobility. When the Germans invaded the USSR, some of the tanks that they sent could not traverse snow. In the North African campaign, tanks regularly were immobilized by mud during the rainy season. One reason that Rommel was so successful at the beginning of North Africa was because Germany had already had severe failures with tank mobility in the USSR and had learned a few things that the allies had not yet had time to fail at.

All that being said though, my first "modern" war in CivIII was a failure because I had thought that tanks could move 3. I had built over 30 tank units, but, because I was at peace, I had never moved them outside of my own rail network. My plan involved blitzing two enemy cities with tanks within the first turn of war (while simultaneously using marines to take two port cities.) My tanks were positioned three spaces away from their targets.... imagine my surprise when my glorious offensive left me with tanks sitting in grasslands just short of my objectives.

 

[Skywalkre]

Thanks to everyone for clarifying whether tanks can attack more than once. It's nice to see it's actually in the game, unfortunately I've just never been in a situation where it's been available.

My second question is still up in the air though. Why do tanks only have a movement of 2? To say that cavalry are 50% faster on a strategic scale just doesn't seem to have any historical precedent. I also don't want to think this was done on purpose so that cavalry forces are still attractive when a player has the capability of building tanks because this too has no historical basis. Could it just be that the designers didn't want tanks to be too powerful? The ability to attack twice is certainly nice but as I can attest to in the games I've played it doesn't come up that much. If tanks had a movement of 3 and modern armor a movement of 4 or so would they be too powerful? Right now I tend to think this is the reasoning, though if my games are any indication tanks aren't that powerful as it is compared to the relative defensive units of the time (and the fact these defensive units will be defending a great deal of the time from cities with large populations, and thus even better defensive bonuses).

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Originally posted by Galen Dietenger
As for cavalry being able to actually harm tanks in any realistic meaningof the word, its hard to see how this could happen as well. Rifles and other hand weapons vs massed armor and there support units, would = 95+% of certain death.
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And a regular tank attacking a regular calvary on grassland has a 96.2% chance of winning.

While I'm not as concerned with the vehicle stats (though I do think they could use some tweaking) does it seem right that a regular cavalry attacking a regular tank in grassland has a 33% chance of winning as it does now?

 

[EvanCiv]

Originally posted by Skywalkre
While I'm not as concerned with the vehicle stats (though I do think they could use some tweaking) does it seem right that a regular cavalry attacking a regular tank in grassland has a 33% chance of winning as it does now?

Well, actually, I don't have a problem with it.

People seem to have an unrealistic view of these WWI era tanks. They were notoriously unreliable and a good size percentage were always lost to accidents and breakdowns.

For some reason, people don't have a problem with say, an archer having almost 30% chance of killing calvary (reg. archer att. reg. calvary on grass = 28%) but if once a unit is using gunpowder and/or tanks, even units just one tech level below shouldn't stand much of a chance against. In my opinion, they have a vastly inflated view of the efficacy of some early modern units.

You can't look at like the units line up and someone says go and they start fighting. Surprise, weather, good luck, bad luck, accidents, human error, the fog of war, incompetent soldiering, friendly fire, catastrophic mechanical failure, cowardice, inexperienced officers ... the list goes on and on. Combat is a hazardous place no matter how much one side outclasses the other.

 

[FullofHoles]

Another interesting deficiency of pre-radio tanks was that they were very poor at coordinated action. A lot of their potential power was lost because they were unable to communicate with each other or with their friendly forces. Some of the WWI tanks communicated with FLAGS! Considering that a tank is hardly easy to see out of AND that battlefields tend to be filled with smoke, flags proved to be a pretty useless medium.

Some tank groups in WWI used PIGEONS to communicate. Some tank commanders walked in front of their tanks to direct them. If the preconceived battle plans required any changes, tanks became as dangerous as Odysseus's blinded Cyclops, strong as hell but dumb as a post.

The Soviet Union actually entered WWII without having radios inside its tanks.

 

[Akka]

Originally posted by EvanCiv


Well, actually, I don't have a problem with it.

People seem to have an unrealistic view of these WWI era tanks. They were notoriously unreliable and a good size percentage were always lost to accidents and breakdowns.

The tanks in game are not WWI tanks, they are WW2 ones (hence the special German unit "panzer").

For some reason, people don't have a problem with say, an archer having almost 30% chance of killing calvary (reg. archer att. reg. calvary on grass = 28%) but if once a unit is using gunpowder and/or tanks, even units just one tech level below shouldn't stand much of a chance against. In my opinion, they have a vastly inflated view of the efficacy of some early modern units.

And a lot of people have a vastly reduced view of the efficacity of technology in war.

You can't look at like the units line up and someone says go and they start fighting. Surprise, weather, good luck, bad luck, accidents, human error, the fog of war, incompetent soldiering, friendly fire, catastrophic mechanical failure, cowardice, inexperienced officers ... the list goes on and on. Combat is a hazardous place no matter how much one side outclasses the other.

Incompetent soldiering, cowardice, inexperienced officers are not applicable when it comes to "elite units".

 

[Dalixam]

What surprised me about tanks when I first attacked with them was the fact that a simple unit like a longbow man could take out my tanks. I was far more anvanced than the civilization I attacked, but I lost around 2 tanks to longbow men. They shoot with arrows! Where's the logic in that?

 

[EvanCiv]

Originally posted by Akka: The tanks in game are not WWI tanks, they are WW2 ones (hence the special German unit "panzer").[/B]

Germany's special unit being the exception - look at the graphic they used. Round turrets are charactistic of WWI era tanks. Only Japan used round turrets in WWII (with a couple of minor exceptions).

Originally posted by Akka: And a lot of people have a vastly reduced view of the efficacity of technology in war.

More like realistic. Look at the Gulf War. Depending on which source you want to believe, some, most, or nearly all of the US losses were due to accidents, friendly fire and/or catastrophic mechanical failure. Again, combat is a dangerous place no matter how much you outclass your opponent and losses are to be expected.

Originally posted by Akka: Incompetent soldiering, cowardice, inexperienced officers are not applicable when it comes to "elite units".

Good point - to a degree. Think of the Charge Of The Light Bridgade. By all accounts, accomplished soldiers but because of miscommunication and some bad officer decisions, they were decimated. Even elite units have to do what a dumb officer says under some circumstances.

 

[Selous]

Originally posted by EvanCiv


Good point - to a degree. Think of the Charge Of The Light Bridgade. By all accounts, accomplished soldiers but because of miscommunication and some bad officer decisions, they were decimated. Even elite units have to do what a dumb officer says under some circumstances.

wow ... im impressed!! i am assuming u are talking about the 10th light horse in gallipili WW1? .... yea very impressed! ... they were top soldiers ordered to assult the VERY heavily entrenched turks ... but the artillery timings were stuffed and the arty barrage stoped a couple of minutes before the diggers had to charge the trenches .... anyways ... the pommie officers found out about it ... but still made em charge ... and they were all slaughtered like pigs

but then when they assulted the arabs in beersheeba the 10th light horse were forced marched with lots of other mounted infantry and that and beersheeba was the only town in the area with water ... the town MUST be taken or the entire force will die of thirst .... the 10th light horse made a cavilry charge and took the city when all the infantry could not ... gota love those elite units

btw ... 10th light horse was a mounted infantry unit ... not cav ... but they were able to change tactics when needed and fool the enemy (like the cunning bastards that they are)

 

[Grashnak]

Originally posted by Selous


wow ... im impressed!! i am assuming u are talking about the 10th light horse in gallipili WW1? .... yea very impressed! ... they were top soldiers ordered to assult the VERY heavily entrenched turks ... but the artillery timings were stuffed and the arty barrage stoped a couple of minutes before the diggers had to charge the trenches .... anyways ... the pommie officers found out about it ... but still made em charge ... and they were all slaughtered like pigs

No, he's talking about the Charge of the Light Brigade. Its one of the most famous cavalry charges in history.... Crimean War.

 

[cameramano]

US special forces in afgan. are riding horses from point to point. The Cav. returns!

Perhaps an armored cav. unit with a 4 movement rating is necessary in late, late game.

 

[Selous]

Originally posted by cameramano
US special forces in afgan. are riding horses from point to point. The Cav. returns!

Perhaps an armored cav. unit with a 4 movement rating is necessary in late, late game.

well actually modern day tanks are the cav .... just upgraded .... for example the australian 10th light horse is still in existance today but they dont use horses anymore they use tanks ... and are still called 10th light horse .... for historical reasons i guess .... and im sure the yanks have "cav" units also


opps ... sorry ... got that mixed up .. sorry .. thought it was weird that a yank knew some aussi history ... even if it is integral to aussi history .... yea ... i do believe that the charge of the 10th light horse was the last succsesful cav charge in history? WW1 1916 or 17 ... something like that

 

[treadwin]

On bowmen, I read somewhere that a study during the Napoleonic wars showed that longbowmen would be more effective than the foot soldiers of the period. Better range, kill ratio, firing rate and reliability.

The proposal to raise a battalion of bowmen was rejected due more to the fact that it was considered barbaric???, but also because the training time was considerably more and the drilling would be different.

Mustketmen should be no more effective than longbowmen, but they should be cheaper.

 

[EvanCiv]

Originally posted by Grashnak No, he's talking about the Charge of the Light Brigade. Its one of the most famous cavalry charges in history.... Crimean War.

Yep.

And what happened (and this is from memory so I may have some details wrong) is that the commanders saw the Turks pulling off a foward position and trying to bring their artillery with them. They wanted the Light Brigade to stop them. They sent a message telling them to get the guns (artillery).

But by the time the order got to them, it was misinterpreted or miscommunicated to them as take a different hill where the artillery wasn't pulling out and, in fact, had the entire valley sighted.

Well, they charged the wrong hill (they couldn't see the one the commanders were actually talking about) and were torn to pieces. Immortalized in Tennyson's poem about it (source of the famous lines "Their's is not to wonder why / Their's but to do or die").

 

[Akka]

Originally posted by EvanCiv

More like realistic. Look at the Gulf War. Depending on which source you want to believe, some, most, or nearly all of the US losses were due to accidents, friendly fire and/or catastrophic mechanical failure. Again, combat is a dangerous place no matter how much you outclass your opponent and losses are to be expected.

Mmh...
Actually you're proving my own point.
The technological advantage of Allied forces in Gulf War was so overwhelming that their loses came more from friendly fire than from Iraqis. It rather prove that when you're outclassed technologically, you're no more a threat on the battlefield.
(remember : allied forces had less than 2000 dead, Iraqis had more than 100 000).

 

[Dark Sheer]

Originally posted by Akka


Mmh...
Actually you're proving my own point.
The technological advantage of Allied forces in Gulf War was so overwhelming that their loses came more from friendly fire than from Iraqis. It rather prove that when you're outclassed technologically, you're no more a threat on the battlefield.
(remember : allied forces had less than 2000 dead, Iraqis had more than 100 000).

US win the war in the Gulf alright. Its not because they have better tank or plane (So the Iraqi has T-72, but a T-72 can still kill a M1A1 from the flank And if the US missile did not take out those SAM site I believe they would have lost many many more planes.). Its because of the combined arms tactics (bomb, bomb and bomb before attack) which IS the method recommended by the game anyway

In fact, if the technology is so important, US will just need to send some of the latest hardware to the Northern Alliance and just sit back and watch Again its the bombing tactic in Afghan!! I use this tactic to the fullest in all my game and combat outcome is almost 100% certain.