Abstract military tactics
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Commander Bello
Say No 2 Net Validations
rhialto said:
Exactly!
Therefore, tactics would modify your stats by just 10%. And even this only in case you have the "stone" against the "scissors".
In other words, this would cause a different result (different in relation to unmodified stats) only every xth battle.
I haven't done the maths yet but the effect would become significant only after quite a number of battles.
It is not meant to thwart the units' stats, it is meant just to add a small portion of spice to the game. "Why the <insert appropriate expression> have I lost THIS battle? - Does he really have square units? Should I wait with my attack on town xyz, until my reinforcements have arrived?"
You're missing my point. A normal civ battle involves one decision process, and the the factors involved are clear to see and the player can make an informed decision with that information.
The tactics model presented here is a game of pure luck. There is no way a player can make an informed decision on which is better. So what if you can change every 50 turns? The AIs can do that too, which makes changing based on previous results meaningless.
To refer back to an old analogy which works very well here. Suppose I toss a coin 99 times, and every time it lands heads. What are the odds it will land heads next time I toss that coin? It's 50:50.
The point is, in a game of pure luck, you can't make predictions of this kind. Just limiting the frequency of when you can change doesn't make it any more a game of skill.
The tactics model presented here is a game of pure luck. There is no way a player can make an informed decision on which is better. So what if you can change every 50 turns? The AIs can do that too, which makes changing based on previous results meaningless.
To refer back to an old analogy which works very well here. Suppose I toss a coin 99 times, and every time it lands heads. What are the odds it will land heads next time I toss that coin? It's 50:50.
The point is, in a game of pure luck, you can't make predictions of this kind. Just limiting the frequency of when you can change doesn't make it any more a game of skill.
North King
blech
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No. If you're going to add tactics, then they should be real things, not just rock paper scissors. Rock Paper scissors is boring.
The only tactics you need is to make outflanking a unit on the map and encircling count, and have archers be good against slow units, pikes good against horse. horse good against everything but pikes. Etc.
The only tactics you need is to make outflanking a unit on the map and encircling count, and have archers be good against slow units, pikes good against horse. horse good against everything but pikes. Etc.
Commander Bello
Say No 2 Net Validations
rhialto said:
Although I agree that the AI might change it tactics as well - and, as I already explained, it is a declared goal of my suggestion to enable it to do so - there are two factors which just don't make it pure luck.
1) The modifiers are small enough not to abrogate the "normal" unit stats.
2) The AI shall change it's settings only after having analyzed a significant number of individual battles.
Chances are rather low that it would do it in the same moment as you do. But it would make you look very critically at the outcome of your battles. It would make you more cautious and - this is my hope but it of course would have to be proven by the game - it would change the current mode "collect your troops and smash the enemy" a little bit more interesting.
As you have two choices - to change or to go for mastership - it even adds a small amount of strategic decision to the game.
Well, I guess we have exchanged our arguments. I don't have a problem in recognizing that you don't like this idea. I still like it, as I haven't read a "killer" argument against it, yet.
After all, it is just a proposal. But please, don't blame Sid if he's going for it....
Commander Bello said:
If it is small enough not to make a difference, it shouldn't be in the game anyway. A decision which has no meaningful effect is a waste of time.
That's the key word - chances. It's all a game of chance, not skill. If I wanted to play games of chance, I'd head off down to my local pachinko parlour.
Commander Bello
Say No 2 Net Validations
rhialto said:
Ok, now I really have to answer one last time:
I never said it would make no difference. It would not abrogate the stats, though. After enough battles, there indeed would be a difference. Why should it be in the game, otherwise?
And the keyword is not chances, the keyword is skills. When you are good enough to determine which tactics one uses, it will benefit you. If on the other hand, you don't pay attention to the game, you will just loose. Well, at least some battles you could have had won otherwise.
But this is, what seperates the supreme commander from the private.
dh_epic
Cold War Veteran
Rhialto, I think you underestimate the amount that Rock Paper Scissors can change the complexion of the game. It's psychological, and psychology is not random. Just playing a Rock Paper Scissors game, you can quickly get the sense if a player favors one strategy over another (if you're perceptive). And you can use this to your advantage. For example, predicting that the enemy will probably switch strategies means that you might surprise him and keep the SAME strategy.
Beyond this, it's not just a shell game. If you combine this with intelligence/spies, something really magical happens for the game. Does the enemy know what strategy you're coming at him with? Is he prepared? If you know, does he know that you know?
This is much less a game of chance than Egyptian Warrior fighting Greek Warrior.
Beyond this, it's not just a shell game. If you combine this with intelligence/spies, something really magical happens for the game. Does the enemy know what strategy you're coming at him with? Is he prepared? If you know, does he know that you know?
This is much less a game of chance than Egyptian Warrior fighting Greek Warrior.
sir_schwick
Archbishop of Towels
Also it adds a flavor to the game in the form of discovery. If it is your first military contacts, or even first contacts in a while, what tactics come out are interesting. Your generals would even after a few turns say, "We have analyzed their blah blah school of strategy and determined it is slightly/moderately/significantly at a(n) advantage/disadvantage to our blah balh school of strategy."
I've played rock paper scissors, and not just as a kid. Here in Japan it's kind of mandatory in schools (they all it janken, and it forms a fundamental part of a surprisingly large number of classroom activities). There's even a national championship, if you can believe it. And yes, there are strategies and psychology to be used. But those strategies and psychology plans only work in the context of a human opponent whom you are facing. These jankensha become effectively novices when given a computer version of the same game.
Note the key point: Experts in this exact kind of shell have no better chance than novices when playing against a machine. This is because humans tend to fall into predictable patterns and have observable body language, while machines are truly random and can't be observed in act of deciding.
Ok, let's see if we are on the same page here.
The basic mechanism is rock-paper-scissors (or circle square triangle if you like). For interface puposes these might be named after famous generals or something. If you win this game, you get a small (10%) bonus on your combat stat.
You can only change your choice every 50 or so turns. The same goes for the AI. I imagine the exact period would need to be randomised each time to stop everyone changing at the exact same turn.
Can you see the AI's choice? If so, after your first battle, gaining the advantage is trivial after your first fight. If not, gaining the advantage requires a player to analyse a long list of battles to fight a statistical pattern. Which strikes me as being worse than workers for MM. And what's to say the AI couldn't analyse that same list and change his decision based on the exact same information. Absent the psychology aspect (see first paragraph), you're back to shell game.
You can discover the enemy choice as part of a spy action. So far, this is the one item that is NOT shell game.
It seems to me that the above can be boiled down to:
- No shell game
- "discover military plans" spy action gives a 10% attack bonus for a set number of turns, or until they do a counterspy action.
Note the key point: Experts in this exact kind of shell have no better chance than novices when playing against a machine. This is because humans tend to fall into predictable patterns and have observable body language, while machines are truly random and can't be observed in act of deciding.
Ok, let's see if we are on the same page here.
The basic mechanism is rock-paper-scissors (or circle square triangle if you like). For interface puposes these might be named after famous generals or something. If you win this game, you get a small (10%) bonus on your combat stat.
You can only change your choice every 50 or so turns. The same goes for the AI. I imagine the exact period would need to be randomised each time to stop everyone changing at the exact same turn.
Can you see the AI's choice? If so, after your first battle, gaining the advantage is trivial after your first fight. If not, gaining the advantage requires a player to analyse a long list of battles to fight a statistical pattern. Which strikes me as being worse than workers for MM. And what's to say the AI couldn't analyse that same list and change his decision based on the exact same information. Absent the psychology aspect (see first paragraph), you're back to shell game.
You can discover the enemy choice as part of a spy action. So far, this is the one item that is NOT shell game.
It seems to me that the above can be boiled down to:
- No shell game
- "discover military plans" spy action gives a 10% attack bonus for a set number of turns, or until they do a counterspy action.
dh_epic
Cold War Veteran
Rhialto. If we ignore multiplayer, you're right. Since the AI is completely random, there's no psychological impact. So it all comes back to who has the better intelligence network, or who uses it.
But that's not a knock against asymmetrical combat. That's a knock against paper rock scissors played every 50 turns, against the AI. (And there's still the value of playing with intelligence.)
What if you produced units with strategies -- that is, you selected their training before they hit the field, as opposed to changing it while they're in the field? Circle swordman, square swordman, and triangle swordman. (Or berzerker swordman, stealth swordman, strict swordman -- whatever meaningful labels you want to give them.) Then your troops don't have one monolithic strategy.
Yes, if a civ is an AI, or simply leave it to your governor, you'll randomly produce units of each strategy. But there's still an important step of how you use them. A stack of circle-swordsmen here, a stack of square-swordsmen there. Suddenly troop arrangement takes on a higher dimension. And intelligence isn't something that gives you a 50 turn advantage, but gives you the opportunity to do something about it -- if you think that what you know of a few units is helpful.
It's easy to be negative. But the reality is you can have three different kinds of warrior fighting each other, with psychology (or plain old statistics) and intelligence as factors. Or you can have the REAL shell game -- two equally matched warriors going toe to toe, with the result settled by a roll of dice.
Or some other alternative... ?
But that's not a knock against asymmetrical combat. That's a knock against paper rock scissors played every 50 turns, against the AI. (And there's still the value of playing with intelligence.)
What if you produced units with strategies -- that is, you selected their training before they hit the field, as opposed to changing it while they're in the field? Circle swordman, square swordman, and triangle swordman. (Or berzerker swordman, stealth swordman, strict swordman -- whatever meaningful labels you want to give them.) Then your troops don't have one monolithic strategy.
Yes, if a civ is an AI, or simply leave it to your governor, you'll randomly produce units of each strategy. But there's still an important step of how you use them. A stack of circle-swordsmen here, a stack of square-swordsmen there. Suddenly troop arrangement takes on a higher dimension. And intelligence isn't something that gives you a 50 turn advantage, but gives you the opportunity to do something about it -- if you think that what you know of a few units is helpful.
It's easy to be negative. But the reality is you can have three different kinds of warrior fighting each other, with psychology (or plain old statistics) and intelligence as factors. Or you can have the REAL shell game -- two equally matched warriors going toe to toe, with the result settled by a roll of dice.
Or some other alternative... ?
I think this might have been raised in other areas, but I would like to see 'tactics' as a more abstract concept of your military stance. This stance can be changed, like govt, with the change coming at a cost. Each 'stance' would have advantages and disadvantages
So, for eg.
In ancient times, you can choose 'barbaric' stance or 'defensive' stance. Barbaric means units don't decrease unhapiness as effectively (maybe 50%, so you need two units for one unhappy face), but barbaric units all gain +10% attack.
'defensive' on the other hand get a +5% defence bonus, but units experience takes one additional battle.
After you invent a tech, maybe militarism or somesuch (in ancient age), you get a new stance to play with, called 'disciplined'. This would be like the Roman legions, so troops gain +5% attack and defence and no penalty
As the ages progress and with new tactics, you get more choices. Each age should have three choices, two basic which are diametrically opposed, and one choice later in the period and for an extra tech (ie has a cost), which would give a nicer bonus.
This way, each civ has to make a choice about what it wants to do with its military and make forced choices. This isn't little stuff at the individual battle level, but almost at the level of military governance.
Some ideas for middle ages:
Professional: units cost more gold to maintain, but get +10% bonus att and def
Peasant Armies: units cost less to build (-10%), but war weariness is quicker
Bonus tactic: *Religious: units get 1 experience level greater than they should when built, and +5% attack
some ideas for industrial:
Standardised armies: units uniforms etc are identical (after mil tradition perhaps), confers +5% att and def bonus as well as -10% building cost
Mercenary forces: cost in gold is greater, but war weariness is much less
Bonus *: Meritocracy: leadership in army is based on skill not noble birth, giving armies +10% att and def advantage
ideas for Modern
High Alert: armies on constant readiness for war, cost in gold higher but movement is +1 and +10% att and def
Peacekeepers: war weariness is much reduced, plus troops act as mil police x2 (one unit makes two unhappy happy, or one in democracy), assimilation of conquered cities is faster
*bonus: military/industrial complex; units cost 25% cheaper and gain +1 movement as well as +5% att and def bonus
So, for eg.
In ancient times, you can choose 'barbaric' stance or 'defensive' stance. Barbaric means units don't decrease unhapiness as effectively (maybe 50%, so you need two units for one unhappy face), but barbaric units all gain +10% attack.
'defensive' on the other hand get a +5% defence bonus, but units experience takes one additional battle.
After you invent a tech, maybe militarism or somesuch (in ancient age), you get a new stance to play with, called 'disciplined'. This would be like the Roman legions, so troops gain +5% attack and defence and no penalty
As the ages progress and with new tactics, you get more choices. Each age should have three choices, two basic which are diametrically opposed, and one choice later in the period and for an extra tech (ie has a cost), which would give a nicer bonus.
This way, each civ has to make a choice about what it wants to do with its military and make forced choices. This isn't little stuff at the individual battle level, but almost at the level of military governance.
Some ideas for middle ages:
Professional: units cost more gold to maintain, but get +10% bonus att and def
Peasant Armies: units cost less to build (-10%), but war weariness is quicker
Bonus tactic: *Religious: units get 1 experience level greater than they should when built, and +5% attack
some ideas for industrial:
Standardised armies: units uniforms etc are identical (after mil tradition perhaps), confers +5% att and def bonus as well as -10% building cost
Mercenary forces: cost in gold is greater, but war weariness is much less
Bonus *: Meritocracy: leadership in army is based on skill not noble birth, giving armies +10% att and def advantage
ideas for Modern
High Alert: armies on constant readiness for war, cost in gold higher but movement is +1 and +10% att and def
Peacekeepers: war weariness is much reduced, plus troops act as mil police x2 (one unit makes two unhappy happy, or one in democracy), assimilation of conquered cities is faster
*bonus: military/industrial complex; units cost 25% cheaper and gain +1 movement as well as +5% att and def bonus
dh_epic
Cold War Veteran
Differing bonuses is a-okay by me. You're probably right that it's better than Paper Rock Scissors, too.
Commander Bello
Say No 2 Net Validations
Please let me add some comments.
I took the concept of paper-scissors-stone (square-triangle-circle or "Patton's Push-Rommel's Revenge-Alexander's Approach", whatever you like most), since it is the most easy and understandeable concept and the first one which holds all three: a draw, a benefit and a malus.
I think, Rhialto got me wrong when he states that he either would have to change "every 50 turns" or just "could change only every 50 turns".
The 50 turns just were an example of mine.
In principle, you could change every turn, but it would not benefit you, as I refined the model with a certain delay for your troops to adopt the new tactics (let's say 2 or 3 turns).
Those different tactics should add a little modification and therefore spice to the game without making it pure luck. I did some (very raw) maths and it seems to be a difference of ~ 8%, but this would have to be confirmed.
I calculated with A=4, D=4, T=0.1, H = 5
A = attack, D = defense, T = terrain, H = hitpoints
8% seems to be a value which you may identify after a while, but which doesn't spoil the "normal" combat results. Even more, it will be a negative effect only for 1/3 of your contacts. For 1/3 of your contacts, you will gain a benefit, for the last 1/3 it will be a draw, so there nothing changes.
In total this means:
For a single battle, there will be no significant change. But, for a greater number of battles, you may identify a certain pattern. In that case, you may decide to either switch your tactices or you rely on the soon to be reached mastership, which will cover your slightly worse chances.
With very little effort, the AI can do as well.
Of course this means that they can become masters as well. Under the assumption that they have the "better" tactics in relation to yours, you still suffer those 8% malus.
It could happen, though, that they are confronted with others as well, and have go give up that tactics for the sake of other battles to be fought.
Well, I guess, I have explained it over and over again.
In combination with espionage and maybe a modifier for the switching time (Sun Tzu or other improvements) I see more options for the player come up. But this is something, everybody may decide for himself.
I took the concept of paper-scissors-stone (square-triangle-circle or "Patton's Push-Rommel's Revenge-Alexander's Approach", whatever you like most), since it is the most easy and understandeable concept and the first one which holds all three: a draw, a benefit and a malus.
I think, Rhialto got me wrong when he states that he either would have to change "every 50 turns" or just "could change only every 50 turns".
The 50 turns just were an example of mine.
In principle, you could change every turn, but it would not benefit you, as I refined the model with a certain delay for your troops to adopt the new tactics (let's say 2 or 3 turns).
Those different tactics should add a little modification and therefore spice to the game without making it pure luck. I did some (very raw) maths and it seems to be a difference of ~ 8%, but this would have to be confirmed.
I calculated with A=4, D=4, T=0.1, H = 5
A = attack, D = defense, T = terrain, H = hitpoints
8% seems to be a value which you may identify after a while, but which doesn't spoil the "normal" combat results. Even more, it will be a negative effect only for 1/3 of your contacts. For 1/3 of your contacts, you will gain a benefit, for the last 1/3 it will be a draw, so there nothing changes.
In total this means:
For a single battle, there will be no significant change. But, for a greater number of battles, you may identify a certain pattern. In that case, you may decide to either switch your tactices or you rely on the soon to be reached mastership, which will cover your slightly worse chances.
With very little effort, the AI can do as well.
Of course this means that they can become masters as well. Under the assumption that they have the "better" tactics in relation to yours, you still suffer those 8% malus.
It could happen, though, that they are confronted with others as well, and have go give up that tactics for the sake of other battles to be fought.
Well, I guess, I have explained it over and over again.
In combination with espionage and maybe a modifier for the switching time (Sun Tzu or other improvements) I see more options for the player come up. But this is something, everybody may decide for himself.
Commander Bello
Say No 2 Net Validations
Albow's additions seem to be good ones, although I feel the need for more explanation about how the AI should handle this concept.
Commander Bello
Say No 2 Net Validations
As far as I understand it, there is a difference between governments and Albow's suggestions:
In case of governmental advances, the AI has to make a go-no go decision which mainly seems to be founded on the gold effect of that governmental system.
In case of Albow's suggestions, it has to weigh two different options which are even for most human players not very easy to distinguish and which seem to be hard to quantify.
Once again, nice concepts don't add very much to the game, if the engine would not be able to deal with them properly.
In case of governmental advances, the AI has to make a go-no go decision which mainly seems to be founded on the gold effect of that governmental system.
In case of Albow's suggestions, it has to weigh two different options which are even for most human players not very easy to distinguish and which seem to be hard to quantify.
Once again, nice concepts don't add very much to the game, if the engine would not be able to deal with them properly.
sir_schwick
Archbishop of Towels
I like Albow's ideas for the beginning of a 'strategy school' idea. Basically over time you would invest in different schools of strategy for your various troop types. This means that cavalry forces may use a different school than infantry.
1) The schools need to have the same ambiguous names as under Bello's systems.
2) They also need to be randomized to which does which for each player. You would still know, but the Alexander's School of this game may be different from last.
1) The schools need to have the same ambiguous names as under Bello's systems.
2) They also need to be randomized to which does which for each player. You would still know, but the Alexander's School of this game may be different from last.
@Commander Bello
I think if these stances were implemented from the start, it would be quite easy to write an AI that can understand it, assuming the desire to write a decent AI exists in the first place. But at this stage in the game development, I think we both know in our hearts we are discussing what should be in civ5.
I think if these stances were implemented from the start, it would be quite easy to write an AI that can understand it, assuming the desire to write a decent AI exists in the first place. But at this stage in the game development, I think we both know in our hearts we are discussing what should be in civ5.
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