bring back zone of control?

[minger]

Do other peoploe want to see people bring back zone of control from civ1 (and civ2?)?

 

[Willowmound]

No! Please, no! Annoying as all Hull (not a typo).

 

[Tommy1234567890]

wat was zone of control???

 

[ainwood]

wat was zone of control???

Its where a unit in one square can prevent a unit in another square moving past it. It 'controls' movement through the squares next to them.

 

[DBear]

ZoC was annoying. You would send scout units to explore, then the enemy would camp out at a chokepoint and your units couldn't return home.

 

[general_kill]

lol sounds fun!

 

[PriestOfDiscord]

I like the idea of fortresses giving ZoC benifits, but not individual units.

 

[Phoenix_56721]

Sounds like fun to me, I remember lots of times in Civ3 when I tried to block the AI for a few turns so I could get my settler to a tile, but it was very hard to do, Zone of Control would be huge in that respect.

 

[prscormier]

Maybe you could make a fortress useful that way? A fortress could control an area around it and the only way to get past it is to kill the unit in the fortress?

 

[general_kill]

wow, a link of fortresses can act as a real wall... imagine that...

 

[Phoenix_56721]

could be fun after you have a "wall" of fortresses you could open up your boarders with the AI. Could be abused though, should cost you to build.

 

[Soryn Arkayn]

Maybe you could make a fortress useful that way? A fortress could control an area around it and the only way to get past it is to kill the unit in the fortress?

Zone of Control doesn't make sense because how can a unit in one square prevent a unit in an adjacent square from passing? The unit can only occupy its own square, not the neighboring squares.

A Fortress is intended to give a defensive bonus to the unit that occupies it, it's not intended to control the neighboring squares; that wouldn't make sense.

In Civ3 certain units could auto-bombard enemy units that passed by, but the didn't exert a ZoC that prevented them from moving -- nor should they.

Civ3 gave us the option to upgrade a Fortresses with a barricade that would prevent a rival unit from moving through that square in one turn, so that enemy units couldn't rush into your territory and launch a surprise attack. That made sense, because it only effected the square where the barricade was built. It wouldn't make sense if it effected the adjacent squares.

So if you want to blockade rival units, you'll just have to do it the hard way by creating a solid line of units.

But from what I've heard that shouldn't be as much of a problem in Civ4 since the AI will respect your nation's borders. They can't transgress into your territory -- not even their Settlers -- unless they declare war.

 

[Willowmound]

A Fortress is intended to give a defensive bonus to the unit that occupies it, it's not intended to control the neighboring squares; that wouldn't make sense.

Well, from a historic perspective, medieval castles (which is what Civ fortresses look like in the MA era) were used to control the surrounding lands. It is a typical misconception that they were primarily defensive - the opposite is actually true. As such, fortess ZoC does make sense.

Single unit ZoC, on the other hand, is neither realistic nor fun.

 

[Rexflex]

There has always been ZOC - just lately there has been single tile ZOC. That makes more sense than a 9 tile ZOC considering the map scale that is typically played on.

 

[Soryn Arkayn]

Well, from a historic perspective, medieval castles (which is what Civ fortresses look like in the MA era) were used to control the surrounding lands. It is a typical misconception that they were primarily defensive - the opposite is actually true. As such, fortess ZoC does make sense.

Single unit ZoC, on the other hand, is neither realistic nor fun.

A medieval castle didn't control its surrounding land -- it merely served as a defensive stronghold that an army could retreat inside if an enemy invaded their land. The building itself can't control the surrounding land anymore than a stone or blade of grass could. It's the garrison that physically controls the land, but only if they leave the fort. If the garrison just turtled inside the fortress an invader could roam the land freely without actually attacking the castle.

The same is true in Civ4. A Fortress on it's own can't control anything, not even the square where it's built. A unit receives a defensive bonus if it occupies the fort, but it doesn't exert any control on the adjacent squares, nor should it.

It's utterly ridiculous for a Fortress, garrisoned or not, to exert a ZoC over its 8 adjacent squares. It doesn't make any sense because the garrisoned unit would have to leave the fort in order to prevent an enemy unit from passing.

 

[Aussie_Lurker]

Actually, the English built a string of forts throughout Wales in order to exert a form of 'ZofC' over the local population. The idea was that it forced people to go to these forts/castles in order to gain permission to move around the Country-and to check in any weapons they had. So, actually, forts DO have an important Z of C function. From a gameplay perspective, giving a fort this ability would REALLY make them worth building-which they really aren't now!

Yours,
Aussie_Lurker.

 

[Bluetooth]

Sounds like fun to me, I remember lots of times in Civ3 when I tried to block the AI for a few turns so I could get my settler to a tile, but it was very hard to do, Zone of Control would be huge in that respect.

I can assure you, it wasn’t fun at all. It was really annoying and as I remember it the AI used it to block you.

 

[Willowmound]

A medieval castle didn't control its surrounding land -- it merely served as a defensive stronghold that an army could retreat inside if an enemy invaded their land. The building itself can't control the surrounding land anymore than a stone or blade of grass could. It's the garrison that physically controls the land, but only if they leave the fort. If the garrison just turtled inside the fortress an invader could roam the land freely without actually attacking the castle.

The same is true in Civ4. A Fortress on it's own can't control anything, not even the square where it's built. A unit receives a defensive bonus if it occupies the fort, but it doesn't exert any control on the adjacent squares, nor should it.

It's utterly ridiculous for a Fortress, garrisoned or not, to exert a ZoC over its 8 adjacent squares. It doesn't make any sense because the garrisoned unit would have to leave the fort in order to prevent an enemy unit from passing.

Do you presume to insinuate that I am stupid? Of course the building itself – empty – doesn’t control anything. However, castles were used primarily as an offensive tool to control the land. It was a fortified base from which to project power. The Normans, for instance, brought castle building to Britain and used it very effectively to subdue the populace. Why don’t you go read a book on the subject before you spew forth more ignorant babble?

In game terms, an occupied fortress should have ZoC.

 

[Commander Bello]

I can assure you, it wasn’t fun at all. It was really annoying and as I remember it the AI used it to block you.

Unit's ZOC wasn't fun since it was implemented improperly.

In principle, ZOC means that a unit A cannot move alongside unit B, since it would expose itself to enemy fire. Therefore, ZOC from a general point of view would make sense (the scale of tiles would be a different topic, though).

Now, this enemy fire obviously only makes sense in wartime. Therefore, the implementation as in Civ1 and Civ2, in which a different nation's unit would have always blocked your unit, was not good and therefore was dropped.

A proper implementation would be to impose ZOC after war has been declared between both nations affected.

About the ZOC of fortresses, I agree with Willowmound about that castles not only were defensive strongholds, but were meant to impose control over the surrounding area as well.

 

[IslandFox]

Forts being used for ZOC is the only way to make them a useful addition to the game. Not only would it improve gameplay, but it's been used constantly throughout history. From medieval castles, to Hitlers fortifications in France, offensive forts have swayed many battles in either direction. Leaving out this vital use of such a structure would be to miss out on the great strategies that could be put into place with them. Maybe make forts harder or more expensive to create, but I think it'd be a great way to bring back ZOC.

Maybe a mod, or an expansion pack feature.