Better Military Mechanics

[civilizationfanatic2000]

Military in Civ VI is too static. It never changes! It's too uniform, too.

Let's change this.

Manpower-

Manpower is given through an abstract number- it directly signifies how many units you can raise. If you run out of manpower, you cannot make more troops nor can you reinforce existing ones. You run out of manpower by losing units or reinforcing existing ones.

You gain manpower by- Centralizing your empire, increasing its population, making the culture more militaristic, and so on.

How do you raise troops now-

Click Raise Troops button, select how many troops you would like to raise, and boom they get built instantly

Differing Types of Military-

There will be five types of military units. Levied, Professional, Conscripted, Mercenary, and Fanatic.

Levied would consist of units such as Levy Footmen, Yeomen, etc. They do not get raised at the behest of the player, but instead the player has to click a 'Levy Troops button' through which all of their Vassals (consisting of cities, villages, or towns ruled by dukes, counts, lords, etc) have to go through a loyalty check. The player can see how many units the Vassals can raise and try to increase that number. This only applies in decentralized systems ala Medieval France

If a vassal fails the loyalty check, then it doesn't raise the units, if the loyalty lowers during a campaign then the vassal will declare war on the player.

Levied troops have no upkeep but you automatically disband them after every war (think: EU4 style war screens). They have low morale and lower quality.

Professional troops like Roman Legions or Prussian armies take more money to get started, much more effort by the player to try to get them started (centralize your empire a lot), but are much easier to raise. Click 'Raise Troops' button that's it.

They are very high quality, don't get disbanded after every war, but are expensive to maintain. Better for rich empires.

Conscripted troops are a mix of Professional and Levied troops, you can click Raise Troops, they get disbanded, and their quality is medium. Think most Chinese armies.

Mercenary troops, like medieval Italian mercenaries, are expensive to train and maintain, but are high quality and don't take away from your manpower. They attack you when you run out of money.

Fanatic troops are low quality, but they don't take away from your manpower and decrease unrest. Knight Templars, that sort of stuff. They don't get disbanded ever. If you betray their ideals they attack you.

Armies and Battles-

You automatically can form units into Armies at the beginning of the game. Battles are resolved like EU4, with each battle being between armies divided into phases. A melee phase, a arrow barrage phase, a charge phase, etc.

 

[Zaarin]

Interesting ideas. Reminds me a bit of both Paradox and the Endless games. It might be a little more complicated than what I'd like to see in a 4X game, but by the same token I do like the possibility of having units quickly available if the AI declares war on me.

Fanatic troops are low quality, but they don't take away from your manpower and decrease unrest. Knight Templars, that sort of stuff. They don't get disbanded ever.

Not sure I agree with this. As the saying goes, there's nothing more dangerous than an army with an idea.

 

[civilizationfanatic2000]

Not sure I agree with this. As the saying goes, there's nothing more dangerous than an army with an idea.

they might have high morale, but the majority of fanatic units would be essentially extremists clad in armor with a spear/rags with a rifle
specialized fanatic units like the Knights Templar would be really good, however

 

[Boris Gudenuf]

There will be five types of military units. Levied, Professional, Conscripted, Mercenary, and Fanatic.

You are mixing different things and different sets of characteristics here,

Levied and Conscript, along with Drafted, are all the same thing: men (rarely women) called up to fight by various organizations or individuals with varying degrees of reluctance and skill. Who specifically calls them up is a political question and doesn't affect how good, bad, or indifferent the actual troops are: they are all Amateurs who do not expect to fight for a living and do expect to go back home to the civilian economy - and the sooner the better.

Professional and Mercenary are both troops who fight for a living, it's just that Professional Troops are usually paid by their own government/political elements while mercenaries are paid by Someone Else other than their 'home' polity. More importantly, Mercenaries are generally from Somewhere Else and so have no effect on your own population - if they all get killed off, you don't lose a single Farmer or Worker supporting your cities.

Fanatic is a measure of Morale - how much troops want to fight. Morale is part of the Unholy Quartet of military effectiveness:
1. Weapons and Equipment. What do they have to fight with, spears or atomic bombs? Do they move on foot or in helicopters?
2. Doctrine. How they expect to use all that weaponry and equipment. Before the early modern era, this was not usually 'formal' or even written down, but it is basic to how any military force will act, affecting both their actions and their preferred weapons: a force whose doctrine/military tradition is a screaming charge straight at the enemy as soon as they spot him will not excel at defending and will not adopt the bow as their primary weapon.
2. Training. How well do they understand that Doctrine and how well can they use all that weaponry and equipment? Some weapons require constant training and practice to use with any efficiency at all, while others are much better suited to part-time Amateurs. An Amateur Spearman can still be pretty good with his (simple) weapon. An Amateur Helicopter Pilot is a crash-landing waiting to happen.
4. Morale. How much to the troops want to use that Doctrine, weaponry and equipment? How much do they want to fight, or even be standing in the ranks, at all? Amateurs generally have lower Morale than Professionals because they have a vested interest in Not Fighting and going home to do something useful.

In game terms, Morale is ephemeral: it can change in minutes, and High Morale on one day can become Desertion a week later because all the food supplies disappeared. All a game on Civ scale of time can do is present a generalized Average of Morale in any given turn and model the factors that Affect Morale, like being out of supply, being outnumbered, not trusting your own government, having been beaten repeatedly by the enemy, being led by a charismatic and competent General or King, etc.

At the other extreme, Doctrine can take generations to change, and all too often is a real limiting factor on the effectiveness of new weapons. Worst Case Example would be the new smokeless powder rifles and machineguns of the 1890s, which 25 years later no one in Europe had figured out how to use and neutralize to make a successful infantry attack. The result: a million German, French and British casualties in 1914 trying to use new weapons with outdated Doctrine, and a subsequent 4 year 'learning curve' before new Doctrine was found and adopted which, more or less, worked with the new weapons.

Training and Morale are the most linked of all the factors. In general, well-trained troops also have at least good Morale - they have a degree of confidence in themselves, their weapons and their organization from the training, and that acts in a large way to counteract Negative Influences, like sudden mass casualties.

Which brings up an interesting point about Fanatics and Amateurs. The absolutely worst combination in battle is untrained Amateurs with extremely High Morale, because they will stand fast or throw themselves at the enemy, getting themselves slaughtered in ghastly numbers while doing very little damage to their foes. The most significant characteristic of well-trained troops is that they keep themselves alive, and while alive hurt the enemy because they know how to do both things and the untrained are still learning how while getting themselves killed.

So in defining Troop Types, the game can break down all Units by:

Weapons - the way Civ and almost every other game in existence has always done. There is a difference between Horse Archers and Machine Gunners and gamers expect that to be shown in the game.
Training - is the Unit full of Amateurs or Professionals.
And Mercenaries can be considered Professionals, and all Professionals, because they spend all their time practicing or making War, require constant Upkeep or Maintenance - they are Expensive to keep around, unless your society (Civics/Social Policies) provides them with 'built-in' support - like fiefdoms for Knights.

The game should also make a distinction between Amateurs who are really well-trained with their weapons - usually the result of Social/Civic factors. For instance, the Greek Hoplite was an Amateur, except in Sparta. They were Upper Middle Class Farmers who provided their own weapons and armor and only joined up when a war started, and went home as soon as the fighting stopped. But it was a social requirement that you kept yourself well-trained and practiced with spear and shield in the gymnasion, so the Hoplite was a very proficient Warrior with his weapons, but a Hoplite Army had virtually no ability to maneuver as a group, and little if any command and control - the Strategos fought in the front ranks as a Hoplite! Likewise, a pastoral culture can field a huge force of extremely proficient Horse Archers, because most adults spend their lives on horseback, defending their herds against 2 and 4-legged predators with a bow and/or spear.
Morale can be largely assumed in the Civ time scale. Professionals have generally higher Morale than Amateurs, unless they are defending against invasion, and especially against invasion by Somebody Different: the Greeks didn't like other Greeks invading their polis very much, but they really hated the Persian invaders, and that was reflected in the results of the battles: where in a normal Greek Hoplite battle losers threw away the heavy shields and ran for home, against real Foreigners they fought to the death as Inspired Amateurs.
Religion, Culture, Desperation ("Defending the Homeland") and effective Propaganda that emphasizes any or all of these can all affect Morale, and in general will affect Amateur Morale more than Professionals, who already start at a somewhat higher level of both ability and willingness to Fight.

Fanatic is Extreme Morale, usually a result of Extreme Factors: religion, culture, desperation as mentioned above. But Note: 'Fanatic' does not mean Well Trained, Good Doctrine, or Effective Unit. Peter the Hermit's Crusade may have had a high percentage of (religious) Fanatics, but they were wretchedly ineffective as a military force for lack of training, competent combat leadership, or decent weapons.

 

[civilizationfanatic2000]

very good points from Boris as always!

Which brings up an interesting point about Fanatics and Amateurs. The absolutely worst combination in battle is untrained Amateurs with extremely High Morale, because they will stand fast or throw themselves at the enemy, getting themselves slaughtered in ghastly numbers while doing very little damage to their foes. The most significant characteristic of well-trained troops is that they keep themselves alive, and while alive hurt the enemy because they know how to do both things and the untrained are still learning how while getting themselves killed.

Unless, of course, you want them killed- because they're radicals who will destabilize your country if you don't promise them a state of their own if they help you win in a war with the enemy. That could add another layer of depth to the game's diplomacy- figuring out which pops cause you issues and how to fix those issues.

 

[Boris Gudenuf]

very good points from Boris as always!

Unless, of course, you want them killed- because they're radicals who will destabilize your country if you don't promise them a state of their own if they help you win in a war with the enemy. That could add another layer of depth to the game's diplomacy- figuring out which pops cause you issues and how to fix those issues.

Several people on these Forums have posted some very good ideas about inherent Culture or differentiation of Population Points within your Civ. From a military standpoint, that should definitely include what I call the 'military Sub-Cultures' - Warrior Aristocracies like those of Mycenean Greece, Feudal Knights, Prussian Junkers, etc. that will warp your military in ways both good and bad and affect the rest of your Civics and Social Policy choices.
In addition, the use of Propaganda of various kinds to convince people that they should submerge their political demands in favor of Defending The Homeland against an invader dates back to at least the Classical Era, so
not nly can sub-groups manipulate your military affairs, but military affars can be used to manipulate the sub-groups!