Army budget

[morss_4]

This is a bit like changing civics in Civ IV between Monotheism at peace and Theology at war. It made sense it terms of the economics, but was it fun? I didn't think so. And apparenly Firaxis didn't think so either, because it has been removed from the game.

If you are always in reserve mode in peace and active mode in war, then (to use Blizzard terminology) there is no "interesting choice" there... just a button that you have to push when you declare war. There's nothing fun or interesting about it.

On the one hand, you don't want a game that plays itself, but you do want the actions that the player takes to be meaningful and interesting, and not something that could just be automated.

I would have to disagree with this. First of all switching civics wasn't fun largely because of the associated anarchy.

Off the top of my head I can think of a couple "interesting choices" the system would present:

1. Barbarians might cause you to consider placing your units on full maintenance in the early game even at peace.

2. Assuming it takes time for your units to get up to full power after being put on war level, then you have the issue of what happens in the event of a surprise attack. A civilization with a powerful and aggressive neighbor may have to weigh keeping his units ready for war vs the economic benefits of going to a peace setting. This is even more relevant now that you can't simply hide behind city walls. Being placed in this situation may even force you into a preemptive strike to avoid long term money troubles.

3. If other nations get a notification every time you go to war spending, then they can view it as an act of aggression, and may go to war spending themselves. This could have diplomatic penalties and would provide advance warning of potential attacks.

4. When facing weak opponents you may consider fighting the war on peace footing, to save money.

I won't miss the feature terribly if it's not included (and I assume it's not) but I think you're selling it a little short. Other games have the feature, and when I play those games it's not always a mindless decision as you describe.

 

[staterman]

Agree with morss_4 that the 'no fun' aspect of switching techs was the anarchy.

I suppose the system I'm imagining adds details and extra considerations (unit upkeep, science and production) to having your nation's status being 'at war' or not rather removing choice.

In addition to the national 'at war or not' status, you could save money on unit upkeep by:
1. Keeping units in clumps (less supply routes);
2. Keeping units close to your cultural borders (less logistical problems to supply)
3. Lowering their war readiness (perhaps 3 levels possible - primed for action, standby and deterrent/keeping the peace)

point 3 could perhaps be only determined by a 'front' basis determined either by proximity to a rival civ's borders (so you can be ready for war with one civ while not with another) or to an area that you 'paint' on the strategic view or something.
If someone declares on you a military advisor might prompt you ready the troops such that you can set the entire war machine in process or decide on a front basis or defer the decision for the end of the turn.

There would then be some defensive penalty or other handicap for under-prepared forces.
But the trade off will have been lower upkeep.

Another thought I had was the to do with the possibility of going into war debt.... whether another friendly civ or city state could back you up financially and commit to underwriting your war debt up to an agreed sum....
If your economy goes to ruin during the war civil unrest could happen... your friend civ/city state backers could pressure you to quit fightin'... I'm thinking of the Suez Crisis where the US told Britain and France to stop and Britain was too financially screwed at that time to not pay attention. There's an interesting article somewhere on the BBC (can't find it just now) commenting on how this formed the basis for Britain and France's relations with the US - Britain realised it couldn't do much without US support, while France sulked and distanced itself from the US.
Don't know if this last thought could really be implemented in a 'fun' way though... hmmm

 

[AriochIV]

Anarchy was the cost for switching civics -- the only thing that made it a decision rather than just automatic.

Unless there is some cost to switching between readiness levels -- heat-up times or something like that -- then there's no point in having it. But given the time scale of the game, having to wait a year or years for your armies to get to combat status doesn't make a lot of sense. I don't see this adding anything but unnecessary complexity to a game like Civilization. If I have units on the border, I want to be able to smack my enemy in the face on a moment's notice.

 

[morss_4]

Anarchy was the cost for switching civics -- the only thing that made it a decision rather than just automatic.

Yes, but anarchy was fundamentally "unfun" as a concept (at least in my opinion).

Europa Universalis III has an army maintenance feature. There are costs and benefits for moving the slider back and forth. None of them are headache inducing like anarchy is though (not that EUIII doesn't have it's own headache inducing features).

Unless there is some cost to switching between readiness levels -- heat-up times or something like that -- then there's no point in having it. But given the time scale of the game, having to wait a year or years for your armies to get to combat status doesn't make a lot of sense.

If you want to go down that road there are a lot of things that don't make any sense. Why does it take 1000 years to walk from China to India? How can archers "shoot across the English Channel" to borrow a silly complaint often made about range combat? Why do wars in the ancient era often run 500+ years?

Time and length scales in Civ are heavily abstracted. Frankly this objection holds no weight for me.

I don't see this adding anything but unnecessary complexity to a game like Civilization. If I have units on the border, I want to be able to smack my enemy in the face on a moment's notice.

Liking the feature or not liking the feature is one thing, but it clearly does add something if implemented properly. Again, EUIII has this feature, and it does add something to that game.

 

[staterman]

Another way to look at the idea (partly based on morss_04's interesting point about being ready for barbarians) would be to say the default position for your military upkeep is full maintenance and complete war readiness.
This would make sense from the early game as at that time everything is a threat.
Later on, possibly activated by a tech, you could chose to support a military front at a lower state of readiness, saving you money.
The option would perhaps not be particularly necessary for the easier difficulty setting as your economy could be easily healthy enough, but at the higher levels economical balance could be more essential.
And if you wanted to "be able to smack [your] enemy in the face on a moment's notice", then you just wouldn't lower you state of readiness at all.

I think you would have to be able to always go to war in any given turn, there would just be penalties for jumping in from not being ready.

If you declare on someone then probably a one-off financial cost, and possibly an additional movement (or even all movement) point cost. (cost of not preparing for the war by either being ready or forcing unprepared forces into action)
If someone declares on you then your defensive strength is not full until a turn later, but there's no one-off financial cost. (a short term defensive vulnerability is the cost of trying to save money which you can chose to do or not)

 

[staterman]

Expanding on the thought of automatic benefits, when 'at war', to productivity of military science, production & units and defecits to non-military science, production & units:

This aspect could incentivise going to war at certain parts of the game either to advance your own military situation faster or to damage an opponents non-military situation by drawing them into war.

It could also incentivise diplomatic solutions to stay out of war if you are following a non-militaristic path (for that period at least)

 

[Earthling]

I agree that the feature is realistic, but...

Does it really add anything to gameplay value?

Actually, it would add tremendously to gameplay value, especially as this is one of the things looking to be the most sorely lacking from civ5. While previous games had very clear methods of focusing on all-out military capacity or not (mobilization in civ3, and civics in civ4) there has been no suggestion of anything close to equivalent in civ5. The problem is, the economic aspect of a war needs to be as important if not more important than anything to do with micromanaging units. If units can be maintained and produced with hardly a misstep in other areas, spam becomes inevitable and the player gets a huge advantage using his units to tactical advantages over AIs.

Of course, to understand this you really have to understand a couple of other things first, so to back up:

-The human player should always have a massive advantage on actually moving units around, battling and so on, and this is amplified by 1upt and all the other designs implied in the civ5 combat engine (ranged attacks here too)
-If constant warfare/no significant costs to warfare is easy, then the human is encouraged to always be at war because due to tactical advantages it is the best way to make significant gains and progress in the game against one's opponent.

So to sum up - a mobilization factor of some sort, which the OP proposes, not perfectly fleshed out of course but it could be done in many different ways, would add greatly to the game. It would offer a measure of defense against trivial warfare and require true commitment on the part of both parties involved to all-out or total war. Causus belli and other diplomatic things are already not likely to be in civ5 at all, which I'm sure many of you know are in other strategy games, so without any diplomatic or tactical limitations on the player the economic aspect of warfare really could do with being included.

This is a bit like changing civics in Civ IV between Monotheism at peace and Theology at war. It made sense it terms of the economics, but was it fun? I didn't think so. And apparenly Firaxis didn't think so either, because it has been removed from the game.

If you are always in reserve mode in peace and active mode in war, then (to use Blizzard terminology) there is no "interesting choice" there... just a button that you have to push when you declare war. There's nothing fun or interesting about it.

Ah, I see part of the problem here, your statement clarifies what you are thinking. You are right in the sense that the player should not feel they have the most choice about the matter when they are at war. If you are at war, and especially if losing/doing poorly, you should feel the pressure to adopt whatever extreme measures you can to save yourself.

The most important part of the system, is to encourage players NOT to go to war willy-nilly in the first place. If civ A wants to engage civ B in a serious war, and it involves both civilizations falling behind in economic matters and everything else, that should be a very strategic decision to be made. Other civs not at war make gains for choosing to stay at peace and not being involved. Again, this has been mostly lacking from previous games but at least was somewhat possible to understand in civ4 - you could switch civics before a war even, just to prepare for battle, even if it brought short term costs. But fundamentally the underlying system didn't have enough of an effect - in civ4, there was virtually no difference between being at peace and being at war with a distant enemy for diplomatic purposes, or almost being at war in general, if you wanted to keep peaceful civics. Unit maintenance was far too low, war weariness implemented poorly (only in enemy territory so you could slaughter AI stacks on a border) and there wasn't always a necessity to switch to war mode.

For the record, if I were to make changes in civ4 I actually wouldn't mess with civics or a new mobilization system too much, as imo the better fix would be to drastically alter how standing armies would work. I would make militia/city defense units, from archers on up, cheaper to maintain/build, and make offensive units have large increases in upkeep, to force a clear choice and investment when going to war.

 

[bjbrains]

Actually, it would add tremendously to gameplay value, especially as this is one of the things looking to be the most sorely lacking from civ5. While previous games had very clear methods of focusing on all-out military capacity or not (mobilization in civ3, and civics in civ4) there has been no suggestion of anything close to equivalent in civ5. The problem is, the economic aspect of a war needs to be as important if not more important than anything to do with micromanaging units. If units can be maintained and produced with hardly a misstep in other areas, spam becomes inevitable and the player gets a huge advantage using his units to tactical advantages over AIs.

Of course, to understand this you really have to understand a couple of other things first, so to back up:

-The human player should always have a massive advantage on actually moving units around, battling and so on, and this is amplified by 1upt and all the other designs implied in the civ5 combat engine (ranged attacks here too)
-If constant warfare/no significant costs to warfare is easy, then the human is encouraged to always be at war because due to tactical advantages it is the best way to make significant gains and progress in the game against one's opponent.

So to sum up - a mobilization factor of some sort, which the OP proposes, not perfectly fleshed out of course but it could be done in many different ways, would add greatly to the game. It would offer a measure of defense against trivial warfare and require true commitment on the part of both parties involved to all-out or total war. Causus belli and other diplomatic things are already not likely to be in civ5 at all, which I'm sure many of you know are in other strategy games, so without any diplomatic or tactical limitations on the player the economic aspect of warfare really could do with being included.

Social policies provide what you're looking for, since you'll be making choices that affect your military buildup/effectiveness at the cost of other powerful bonuses. Also, making assumptions that the AI will suck at combat is premature, as we haven't seen it in action.

 

[Earthling]

Social policies provide what you're looking for, since you'll be making choices that affect your military buildup/effectiveness at the cost of other powerful bonuses. Also, making assumptions that the AI will suck at combat is premature, as we haven't seen it in action.

From what we've seen about the social policy system, it will do no such thing. It's implied social policies may be chosen or invested in from very early on, and that changes cannot be made to a different tree rapidly. At the least they will not be as flexible as civics in civ4 were (and again, I stressed that civics alone don't really represent enough of the impact of war.) There's no way the social policy system will cause massive changes even greater than civics did in civ4.

As for the AI, it's not, because AI don't have human level intelligence. The default assumption is that the AI will suck, until there is strong evidence otherwise. Civilizaiton, as a turn-based strategy game, has no elements of reaction time or precision or anything that the AI should be presumed to excell at (eg, in a shooter game, an AI very well could have automatically absurd accuracy). It could be given significant bonuses on various levels/situations, but that is not the same.