Embarkment messes this game up

[Kyroshill]

Precisely wrong!
Given how many hexes it takes to go around the earth and the size of the earth, a hex is very approximately 200 miles across.
The D-day invasion, the largest amphibious assault in history, easily fits within one sea hex.

Try again... there is NO scale in civ.... the land area numbers, just like the troop levels, and population are basically imaginary numbers.... they're meaningless except for comparison to other players...

If scale existed then ranged bombardment couldn't.... at least not until dynamite at least.... since when has an archer in Amsterdam been able to fire upon a knight in Paris?

 

[builer680]

It boils down to how much "realism" you're willing to sacrifice for "gameplay." The more I think about it, the more I agree with what some others have already said. You simply can't "realistically" simulate tactics on the scale of units and battlefields on a map that is strategic in scale. Basically, you either take it on faith and play anyway, or you don't.

For what it's worth, games like Total War have the "strategic map," and another much finer and smaller scale battlefield "tactical map" that loads upon any battles. I find those to be much better, but not really in the scope of something Civ would want to try to emulate. Civ has always been an empire builder first (until this version arguably), and a combat sim second. 1upt has its "fun" parts, but in the end it just won't "feel" right if you try to make logical sense of tiles that are this large relative to the rest of the map, yet too small to sustain more than one military unit. As I said, you just gotta kind of take it on faith... or not

 

[Deep_Blue]

What if Embarked units are given some strength so they can take 2 or 3 hits before the are sunk?

 

[Howard Mahler]

You point out that ranged combat as implemented in Civilization V is absurd given the scale. You then also point out that the square miles for land area given in demographics may also be nonsense.

Neither of these shows there is no scale.
The scale is set by the number of hexes the game uses to represent the circumference of the globe.

Yes Civilization V then has a number of features that are inconsistent with that scale.

The original statement to which I replied stated that the scale proved that a certain feature of the game was realistic. Yet it totally got the scale wrong. Implicit in the original statement was the existence of some scale.

You should have directed your reply to the original statement and said (that since you believe) there is no scale, therefore this game feature can not be more realistic.

Not related to civilization, but some other game.
Let us start with the absurd statement: Since dogs are taller than giraffes, this shows that a certain feature of the game is realistic.

I point out that in fact giraffes are taller than dogs.

Then someone else chimes in that there is no scale in the game.

Someone else chimes in that in any case the game also assumes that archers can fire over mountain ranges.

Then someone else starts an argument about whether we should be measuring in feet or meters.

What about baby giraffes?

What about dead giraffes?

Aren't some breeds of dogs much bigger than others?

Try again... there is NO scale in civ.... the land area numbers, just like the troop levels, and population are basically imaginary numbers.... they're meaningless except for comparison to other players...

If scale existed then ranged bombardment couldn't.... at least not until dynamite at least.... since when has an archer in Amsterdam been able to fire upon a knight in Paris?

 

[Kyroshill]

You point out that ranged combat as implemented in Civilization V is absurd given the scale. You then also point out that the square miles for land area given in demographics may also be nonsense.

Neither of these shows there is no scale.
The scale is set by the number of hexes the game uses to represent the circumference of the globe.

Yes Civilization V then has a number of features that are inconsistent with that scale.

The original statement to which I replied stated that the scale proved that a certain feature of the game was realistic. Yet it totally got the scale wrong. Implicit in the original statement was the existence of some scale.

You should have directed your reply to the original statement and said (that since you believe) there is no scale, therefore this game feature can not be more realistic.

Not related to civilization, but some other game.
Let us start with the absurd statement: Since dogs are taller than giraffes, this shows that a certain feature of the game is realistic.

I point out that in fact giraffes are taller than dogs.

Then someone else chimes in that there is no scale in the game.

Someone else chimes in that in any case the game also assumes that archers can fire over mountain ranges.

Then someone else starts an argument about whether we should be measuring in feet or meters.

What about baby giraffes?

What about dead giraffes?

Aren't some breeds of dogs much bigger than others?

I don't know why you're killing giraffes.... but scale is still all in the eye of the beholder when it comes to civ games.... besides any "circumference" would only even attempt to come into play if you are playing an Earth map and want more realism... on any other map the planet can be any size your little heart desires

 

[Howard Mahler]

Thank you for making my point for me.

The original statement to which I referred did not refer to a specific map (although a reasonable person would have assumed the default Earth map.)
You should have replied to the original statement pointing out that he needed to specify the map to which he was referring.

In any case, you are wrong again.

There is a scale which varies by the size of map (number of hexes) and the area depicted on the map.
In the case of an Earth map or a depiction of any real world portion of the earth, the scale can be determined using simple arithmetic.
In the case of a map set in a fictional place, unless the designer gives additional details, there is no way to decide exactly what the scale is.

So to be fair, you are correct in the case of some maps depicting fictional places.
In those limited cases "scale is in the eye of the beholder."

I don't know why you're killing giraffes.... but scale is still all in the eye of the beholder when it comes to civ games.... besides any "circumference" would only even attempt to come into play if you are playing an Earth map and want more realism... on any other map the planet can be any size your little heart desires

 

[zonk]

At least with embarkation, the AI tries....

It's not like the AI did any better with transports.... it took them until the modern day to actually construct a force for naval invasion.... then they would dump all their siege units first... after you'd mop them up... then they would use amphibious attacks suiciding their entire force against the city's walls....

In ciV I've seen some pretty formidable AI navies.... and they happily embark their units anytime.... now the challenge is to get them to send them to enemy territory....

Of course... leading an effective naval assault and landing on fortified beaches requires a high level of thought processes that are never going to be in a $50 video game

This is completely false - by the final BTS patch, the AI was quite adept at properly stacking a proper invasion force AND properly escorting it. It included proper mixes of units and also learned to properly land the invasion force in proper terrain.

In fact, it added an entirely enjoyable dimension -- on more than one occasion, I had patrolling ships who would discover an enormous AI fleet headed towards me, scramble every available ship to intercept -- then be very happy to see it reverse course and attack a different civ instead.

 

[nokmirt]

Precisely wrong!
Given how many hexes it takes to go around the earth and the size of the earth, a hex is very approximately 200 miles across.
The D-day invasion, the largest amphibious assault in history, easily fits within one sea hex.

Yes I see your point. But still hexes means tactical, one unit in a hex.

 

[seasnake]

It's a tough balancing game.

I've seen some stupid AI embarkations. Like, playing a OCC with a one tile pass at one side, the AI there declares war on me. What does he do? Sends one infantry to get picked off by my artillery. Continues sending one unit at a time. He gets tired of that. What does he do? Starts sending embarked units, one at a time, to try to go around me. Well, geez, sounds great, except my destroyer there is pretty good at picking off unaccompanied units. And if not, my city and artillery from the land are pretty good at bombarding. It's true, he did get a couple through, but when you're talking a 2HP unit, my infantry back are pretty good at picking them off.

They try to use it too much. And I still think it would have been better in the game had embarked units been like civilian ones, so you can stack destroyers on top of them to escort them. But overall, I do in some sense like the idea. In theory, it will be easier for the AI, since they don't have to worry about getting the exact mix of boats correct. It will take some work and some refining - honestly, I don't expect much from this iteration, not because of the issues that everyone thinks, but just because it will take time to figure out the algorithms. But in the long run, it will make sense for the series.

I think this is a reasonable solution. In addition, make all of your citizen units and embarked units exempt from the 1UPT. You'll still have plenty of incentive to build more than one accompanying ship, because you wouldn't want to protect 20 vulnerable embarked units with only one destroyer. But you could have a fleet of destroyers proceed with 1UPT and then follow with a stack of embarked units following, ready to unload along the shore.