Built in combat calculator and other features

[Teabeard]

I like to use the combat calculator and civ assist because it makes figuring things out so much easier. So I would like it if Civ IV had such features built in. The game could give you more alerts via popups to tell you if beakers will overrun or a city is about to riot or a deal is about to expire and so forth.

 

[Jon Shafer]

Cities won't riot in CIV like in the past so you don't have to worry about that.

An auto-combat calculator would be nice though. I remember Panzer General had this feature, giving you projected casualty figures for each battle so you knew exactly how many of your poor tanks were going to get chewed up if they tried to assault that city with entrenched engineers.

 

[Dida]

I like this idea

 

[Aussie_Lurker]

I liked the combat calculator in 'Peoples General' (a FANTASTIC addition to the '.....General' series, BTW !) I especially liked it, though, 'cause it wasn't always 100% reliable ! It gave me a rough idea of what casualties to expect but, every so often, I went in expecting sure victory only to get my but soundly kicked for one reason or another (actually, warlords had a similar type of thing-I always loved the 'This will be like slaughtering sleeping cattle my lord', right before I went on to loose 50% of my forces to the enemy !) Anyway, thats what I would want from any kind of combat calculator in cIV, the element of chance that can NEVER be accounted for. Otherwise, the game becomes too simple (like trade in civ3-man I HATE knowing what they will and wont except!)

Yours,
Aussie_Lurker.

 

[searcheagle]

A tool like this would help both beginners and experts better plan their attacks. They would better understand the risks that they were taking by attacking. Players wouldnt have to memorize all the multipliers (terrain, veteran status, etc), they could just see a reasonable predicted ending.

 

[socralynnek]

Maybe they could at least give an interface where a tool could get the infos. For example, you make two clicks (attacker, defender) and the tool get the relevant information (terrain etc.)

 

[sir_schwick]

To make the tool require even less clicks you could have it partially integrated into the map. Suppose your Cavalry was sitting on a mountain. All enemy units it could attack would have some numbers on top of them. The numbers would be these %Victory/Lost HP/Chance Retreat. All of these would of course be calculated approximations rather than actual results. If there were multiple directions to attack from it would have the numbers nearer the side you could attack from. This way you could see which way to approach. Also, if you were risking getting fired on by arty or ZOC troops, the numbers would be different colors.

The only real problem with this system is computing cycles that woudl be required.