Gap between Cavalry and tanks

[Mîtiu Ioan]

Please don't kill me for being so insistent ... but I really like this game and want it to be a state-of-art ( even I'm not financially motivated ... ).

1. Make possibility of a "artilery duel". Randomly - if both attacker and defender hve artilery or cannon in a stack let's them have a directly fight !! For catapult ... hmmm ... I don't know what to say ...

2. Instead of making a infantery of movement of 2 - create some logistical units - which will may be added only to a army to improve the sense of having armies and :
- heal units in 1 turn;
- allow a increased movement rate ( e.g. - 2 even if there are infantery inside );
- offered a air defense support ( when air units available ).

This is exactely like in real life - any divisons ( and even regiments ) have its own STRELA-carrying company, medical units, chemical protection platoons and so on.

And this will increase the effectiveness of armies in modern wars - exactely like in reality !!

Regards,

 

[Justus II]

Quote from Selous

what is it with the assumption in real life that infantry is a poor attacking unit? ... infantry is used in EVERY attack ever made, still used and will continue to be used forever more, yet in civ3 the only unit u ever need is tanks or modern tanks, yet in civ3 the only places u need infantry are in mountainous areas without any roads .... civ3 seems to think that roads make it all great for tanks and it makes the use of infantry obsolete .... where as in the real world the infantry make up the major force in EVERY army today .... in combat there is only 1 unit ever used to attack and that is the infantry ... EVERY other unit in the army is there to support the infantry ... the infantry is the only unit in the army that doesnt have the word support in their role ... in the real world there are 4 combat units ... armour, artillary, engineers and the infantry .... EVERY one of those units exept the infantry are supporting units, yet in civ3 tanks are the premier assulting unit when in real life highly trained proffessional soldiers of various infantry corps are the main assult force supported by armour, artillary, air support and engeneering corps ... yet civ3 and some people here only regard the infanrty as defending units to be kept behind the lines and brought up to hold an enemy city from counter attack

Again, I dont' think anyone is disputing the fact that infantry makes attacks, only that infantry will not win an attack one on one, therefore the defense must be higher than the offense. However, multiple infantry's are still able to defeat a single infantry unit. 3-1 odds should be required in an attack. Tanks can defeat infantry at lower odds, because one battalion of tanks has more firepower than an infantry battalion. The unrealistic thing is the cost. M1A2 Abrams cost over $2 million each, a full battalion of 60 is therefore over $120 million to equip, whereas an infantry battalion would be in the low single digit millions. But in Civ3, it is only a slight differential, so why not build tons of tanks. If they cost 10 times as much as infantry, you would see more infantry attacks, but how much fun would it be?

Mech infantry, by the way, is pretty accurate IMHO. Modern mech infantry use M2 Bradleys/Marders/BMPs etc. as both transportation and firepower support. These IFV (Infantry Fighting Vehicles) have a smaller cannon than a tank, but still effective, and guided anti-tank missiles. They would have difficulty assaulting a dug-in armor unit, but on the defense can destroy tanks from a distance. They can also dismount to take advantage of the terrain (Mountain/City). The majority of U.S. Infantry units in the modern day are mech infantry. The "missing" unit, if there is one, is a more modern version of Light Infantry, the airborne and ranger troops being used in afganistan. They certainly have more firepower than WWI infantry, and do include some more internal support weapons (Mortars, Anti-tank), but still would not be as mobile or as powerful as mech infantry. They would be able to paradrop, or use helicopters. Personally, I would prefer bringing marines and paratroopers up in power to represent these modern troops, or allow a new unit "Ranger" that would have those attributes.

 

[Cavalry]

Originally posted by JoseM
mech infantry are good in offensive against anything but the mech infantry and the modern tank. [/B]

Mech infantry can attack.... somewhat, however I have seen Cavalry easily trounce these things, yes. 12 attack isn't sufficent to win hardly ever against 20+defense infantry or 40+Mech infantry, all those defense bonuses add up. Plus no blitz, and they often loss to tanks(most mechs are conscripts). You can somewhat attack with them however don't expect too much. They are about evenly match against a raw infantry just standing on a grassland/plains.

 

[royfurr]

Originally posted by Justus II
[...
Mech infantry, by the way, is pretty accurate IMHO. Modern mech infantry use M2 Bradleys/Marders/BMPs etc. as both transportation and firepower support. These IFV (Infantry Fighting Vehicles) have a smaller cannon than a tank, but still effective, and guided anti-tank missiles. They would have difficulty assaulting a dug-in armor unit, but on the defense can destroy tanks from a distance. They can also dismount to take advantage of the terrain (Mountain/City). The majority of U.S. Infantry units in the modern day are mech infantry. The "missing" unit, if there is one, is a more modern version of Light Infantry, the airborne and ranger troops being used in afganistan. They certainly have more firepower than WWI infantry, and do include some more internal support weapons (Mortars, Anti-tank), but still would not be as mobile or as powerful as mech infantry. They would be able to paradrop, or use helicopters. Personally, I would prefer bringing marines and paratroopers up in power to represent these modern troops, or allow a new unit "Ranger" that would have those attributes. [/B]

I have a lot of agreement with the points made by Justus II. However, one other point can be made by looking at the historical evidence from WW2. It may surprise a lot of people that the "masters of Blitzkreig", the Germans, had an army which was mostly still based on horse-power- and moved at the same pace as the armies of the 19th century. VERY few German unts were "mechanized", ie armour units or (the VERY FEW) "armoured infantry" ("panzergrenadier"). The vast bulk of the Wehrmacht was plain old infantry. Of course they had a big problem with the infantry keeping up with the mechanized spearheads. One solution was the development, which the Russians copied in a BIG way, of "motorized infantry". These were simply truck borne infantry, who of course dismounted for battle and fought strictly as leg infantry. But the motorized transport provided them with a great strategic mobility, compared to leg infantry, and greatly improved the mobility of the accompaning artillery. The US went for this wholesale, and almost of US Army infantry divisions would have been called "motorized infantry" by the Germans- about the only truly leg inf. fielded by the US was the Marines and the Paratroop divisions. Only the richer other nations like Great Britian or Canada had totally motorized/mechanized armies like the US did. Russia of course had a large % motorized, thanks to Allied help, but still fielded large numbers of straight leg infantry ("Rifle Divisons").

How does this fit into this threads discussion? First, a new unit, motorized infantry. It would be a more modern firepower infantry, so boost the A/D strength. Perhaps a 9 attack and a 12 defense. A debate could be: movement 2, but, 2 regular, or 2 with all terrain as roads? I kinda lean to the later, but of course trucks ARE pretty much restricted compared to tracked vehicles. OTOH, tracked vehicles are far more moblile in most terrain then a 2 or 3 movement factor counts for. So, perhaps this: make Panzer, Modern Armour and Mech. Inf. speed 2 BUT all terrain as road. (MAYBE Modern Armour and Mech Inf. a 3). Let our motorized Inf., and Tanks, be a 3 MP, but NOT all trerrain as roads. THis way Panzer/MA/MI are 50% faster then Tank/Mot. Inf, but Tank/Mot. Inf. definitely have an advantage over pure leg inf. with a 1 MP. True, this makes the motorized troops are faster then our armour are, over a road net, but by this time our troops are mostly moving over RR and overland, rather then by roads.

Then, upgrade marines and paratrooppers- a little. Keep their special attack abilities, and MP of 1, but raise A/D. However, they are still a little weaker then "regular" (motorized) infantry, as Paratroopers do not have quite the abiltiy to haul heavy arty. with them and to a lesser extent, same for the marines. Maybe lessen this effect a little as we are thinking of having segragrated out the arty to seperate bombardment units anyway. So perhaps something like this: Paratrooper- 8/10/1 and Marines 9/11/1. They are thus a litte weaker then the new mot. inf., maybe a little better then the traditional inf. and of course still have their special attack modes.

Then if you want to go all out, a second new unit, Ranger or Special Forces or Assualt Infantry or Strosstruppen, whatever title fits your fancy. They would have BOTH naval assualt AND paratrooper attack abiities. Give them a 10/10/1 rating, BUT very significantly boost the cost, so we don't simly replace Para and Marines with them. Speaking of costs, lets say:
Current Infantry = 90 (unchanged)
New:
Motorized Inf. = 110
Marines = 110
Paratroopers = 110
Rangers = 120
and boost:
Mech. Inf. = 120
Modern Arm. = 130
Tanks = 110
Panzer = 110

I'd give these preequesites for building: for Mot. Inf. to be Rubber, and tech Motorized transport (of course!). For Rangers, Rubber and Oil like paras, and Advanced flight tech wise.

Note that I boosted Modern Armour a bit- they really do cost a LOT more then infantry in any form, and probably the price here is still to low. It's definitely too low in the game as supplied, IMHO.

I gotta agree with I think it was Zachriel, if you listen to some people, you'd think that all one needs is tanks. The Germans found out for sure at Kursk that this was Not So. Raising the cost of armour relative to inf. will help address that. Possibly the costs difference should be even larger then I suggest above.

Youall and especially you mod makers, let me know what you think!

 

[Reichsmarshal]

Hmm a 12 attack unit attacks a city with a mech infantry defending. Let's see... there is the 100% city defense bonus from being size 12 + (which they almost always are), a 25% for fortifing, a terrain defense bonus from the panel, 4% for each citizen and for each improvment (check the editor if for some reason someone doubts this). Easily 35+ defense.

Now even when they attack modern armor they have little hope. Tanks use high explosive anti tank rounds
Having modern armor and mechs is somewhat redundant.

Of course, this would no doubt upset our blitzing and razing brothers who continue to assert that armor alone is capable of conquering the entire globe, and that if only Hitler had turned left at Stalingrad instead of right, the fascists would have won the war.

Yes. What is with the almost exclusively tank offense and combat? Why is a tank exempt from the defense problem? Ever heard of infantry that use bazookas? What about Panzerfaust?

It is delusional to deny that infantry can sometimes when against tanks with such weaopns.

Tanks, air units, artillery, and other stuff are all support. The infantry is the true main fighting force.

Considerably over 60% of most armies are infantry.

Bazookas, Stinger Missle Launchers, AA guns, anti ship weapons. It isn't like they only fight other infantry.

When fighting on grasslands, plains, and floodplains, they don't have time or advanced warning to build fortifications, thus the attacker should have the advantage. Cutting supply lines helps.

There are 3 constants of warfare:

1. Infantry have always been used and always will be. Their role can't be filled by some vechicle.

2. Artillery style units have and always will be used. From Catapults to Crusader Howitzers they are still used. Siege equipment is still important today

3. Ships will always remain useful, for obvious reasons.

That is consistent with history. Cavalry and chariots have gone obselote. So will many of these ww2 weapons.

It is impossible to claim Civ 3 is historically accurate. When a spearman wins against a tank that is fantasy. The game is a game not a book on how to use tanks.

More unrealistic things:

Mech infantry attack Cavarly: Cavalry trounces mech infantry.
Legionaire severly damages tank.
Cavarly attack as well as Infantry
Knights are almost as good against tanks when on the offense as Infantry and paratroopers. That is clearly rediculous!

Therefore there is nothing wrong with having a 12 attack infantry attack a 20+ defense infantry in a city.

The game represents the defensive bonuses:

City bonus
Land/Tile bonus
River Bonus
Population Bonus
Improvement Bonus (which does exist)
Fortification bonus

Now say that it is realistic that the mech "infantry' can have so much better stats than moder armor when defending and still be drafted!

Mabey if you could draft offensive units that would be good.

How are tanks immune to entrenched infantry with weapons that severly damage tanks?!?

The game is already unrealistic. An infantry unit that can attack would actually make it more realistic.

Weapons that marines use in realife: M4 assault rifle/carbine, M SAW machine guns, M16 A2s, Automatic Grenade Launchers, Hk submachine guns, and other type of assault rifles and machine guns.

Now if the infantry is supposedly from the "era of defense" why does he not use a machine Gun? This is alledgedly a ww 1 infantry.

Reasons for an offensive infantry explained.

 

[Zachriel]

Machine guns in open fields. That would be Verdun.

 

[simwiz2]

"Modern Armour and Mech. Inf. speed 2 BUT all terrain as road"

So basically 6 moves for modern armor? Sounds like a recipie for the ultimate 1-turn MA blitz. I think its enough of a problem with 3 move, why make the blitzing even worse?

"When fighting on grasslands, plains, and floodplains, they don't have time or advanced warning to build fortifications, thus the attacker should have the advantage. Cutting supply lines helps."

I think that would be unbalanced gameplaywise, if the attacker wants to take ground he should have to pay for it. Even unfortified, infantry could find rocks, bushes, small holes to hide in. Perhaps they could have time to dig a few small holes themselves. So they would have a small advantage. You have mentioned the attacker having the advantage because of preempetive strike or surprise or something. The infantry will have sentries, they will be alerted and open fire on the attackers while they are still charging across the field.

Just because a unit is unforitifed does not mean they are going to be caught unready to fight. It just means they havent dug elaborate trenches, barriers, etc. Unfortified units could find cover even on grassland. Grassland is not like someones lawn, perfect 2-inch grass with no obstructions. The grass alone could be high enough for the defenders to lie in, ambush the attackers, etc. And rocks, and bushes. And of course grassland doesnt mean that there are NO trees on it. There would likely be scattered trees to hide behind. And remember that the attacker is the one who has to take the ground, therefore he would most likely be the one out in the open while the defenders are in cover.

 

[napoleon526]

Originally posted by royfurr


I have a lot of agreement with the points made by Justus II. However, one other point can be made by looking at the historical evidence from WW2. It may surprise a lot of people that the "masters of Blitzkreig", the Germans, had an army which was mostly still based on horse-power- and moved at the same pace as the armies of the 19th century. VERY few German unts were "mechanized", ie armour units or (the VERY FEW) "armoured infantry" ("panzergrenadier"). The vast bulk of the Wehrmacht was plain old infantry...

YES. Most people don't realize that the wehrmacht was not fully mechanized until the Battle of the Bulge, by which time it was to late to save the reich.

 

[Zouave]

Originally posted by etj4Eagle
The real problem here is not the AD values of infantry but the entire combat model. Since attacking is the best attacker verse the best defender, there is no use for infantry in an attack (other than to protect your tanks against a countre attack).

To really see the value of infantry in attack, you a group attack model. While Axis and Allies has a fairly simplistic combat model as well, it does do this better. Both sides will have massive amounts of infantry, representing the lines, and then armor and planes to provide the offensive punch.

With the current system for combat, I don't see how you can really improve the use of infantry in attacks with out creating a single "super" unit or making an irrelevent unit.

All of which proves yet again that Sid (or Soren or whomever) and Firaxis continue to fail totally to understand warfare and battles.

I have been saying for years going back to Civ I that battles must reflect COMBINED ARMS: a force of foot soldiers, bombardment, cavalry/tank, and later air all combined together is far better as a whole than the sum of the parts.

For example. In reality and history musketmen and pikemen were meant to fight together, not separately. Pikemen became obsolete when the bayonet was invented 300 years ago.

Furthermore, take knights. I long ago edited their defense factor down to '2' (if Cavalry have a '3' with rifles knights must be lower).
By being a 5.2.2 knight, we force the attacker to bring up pikemen and/or musketmen with the knights to defend against counterattacks from enemy knights. But with the original stupid Civ III mod that had knights at 4.3.2 we'd witness huge stacks of knights (or Mounted Warriors) invading only by themselves.

In history, only on the rarest occasions could a successful offensive force be of one arm - the Mongols, for instance, and they are not in the game, and even they had various types of light and heavy mounted units with different functions.

SOLUTION: the 'army' unit in the game stinks. It should be abandoned in favor of Military Leaders with a combat bonus AND a stack should attack as a group, and the defender also fight as a group, not as individuals. Depending on the experience level of his forces, and the presence of a leader, the attacker (and defender) should be able to make some adjustments during battles, such as "all out assault", or "reconnaisance in force", etc.
The defender could issues orders to adjust the degree and type of defense.

An 'Army' unit could add to the strength and flexibility of a stack. But we all know the Civ III "army" is not very desirable.

This all could result in battles that are inconclusive - or total victories or defeats with the enemy shattered. Such is history and reality.

It would make the presence of MILITARY leaders very important, and make combat more interesting and less tedious. It would also lessen the occurence of invading armies of one type of unit.

Yes, some types of units would require less "support" from others, the legionary for one, but even they had auxilliaries - light troops and cavalry.

So. Firaxis gave us a very disappointing and rudimentary land combat system that desperately needs improvement. BTW, naval combat and warfare is even worse.

 

[JoseM]

reichmarshall r u the same from FF or phora.com?

 

[Reichsmarshal]

Originally posted by JoseM
reichmarshall r u the same from FF or phora.com?

No. I have never went on any of those web sites. It is defintley a coincedence if there is someone else using this name on another site. This is the only time I ever used this name.

 

[Selous]

after reading all the post ... i have come to the conclusion that civ3 entire battle system sux (duh ) ... but while i dont think a good solution would be to make infantry units cheep (as then there would just be thousands of units and war would be so much more tedius) i think an excellent solution would be to make tanks and modern tanks prohibitivly expencive and that would have the effect of turning them into the support units that they are .... i beleive the effect on the game would be that u would attack with infantry/artillery to soften up defences(unfortunatualy they would die a lot rather than pull back) and u would use your few armour units to make a break through
also paras need to be pumped up to a VERY large degree .... they ARE better in real life than normal infantry units (they are made up of the elete infantry soldiers) and also artillary support in real life is para jumped into battle with them

in short civ3 modern battle sux ... and as Zouave pointed out the nature and the need of modern warfare is flexability and combined arms, the extent of civ3 combined arms is modern tanks and mech infantry with some bombers or stealth bobmers.... and even asthetically it looks crap ... all the units look so damn similar

 

[etj4Eagle]

Yeah, the problem with combat in the civ games is that it too easily results in the player producing just one combat unit, in this case tanks for attack. As it stands infantry are properly balanced for attacking other infantry. Standard military doctrine says 3-1 odds for attacking opponents in plain fields, which is what you need with their A/D values. Of course the defense values for metropolitises before you kill all the civilians may be a bit high.

The problem is that there is no reason for a player to produce a bunch of infantry for attack. Tanks are much better, and there is no cost advantage to using infantry instead. (and their extra movement points as well). Pumping up the cost of tanks to a fair bit above 3x infantry should help deal with this problem. And would also remove the problem of artillerly not staying up with your attack force, as that force would now consist primarily of units moving at its speed.

Another change might be to also knock down the defense of tanks a fair bit, to make it suicidal to send them out without infantry escorts.

I was just thinking of a war game for comparison, Axis and Allies and realize that that game also has a problem of the attacker over relying on armor. As an attacker you are best off mass producing tanks and no infantry. They cost only 2/3 more, hit on a die roll of 3 or less instead of 1, and also can move two territories instead of one. Even if you expect to be counter attacked, in most cases it is still better to buy mostly armor (and some bombers for heavy hitting), since with the stronger attacks you are likely to take less casualties. You hit three times more often for less than double the cost.

So I guess it is hard to fault civ3 too much for failing to represent modern warefare too well, if even dedicated war games have similar faults.

 

[LaRo]

Originally posted by etj4Eagle
I was just thinking of a war game for comparison, Axis and Allies and realize that that game also has a problem of the attacker over relying on armor. As an attacker you are best off mass producing tanks and no infantry. They cost only 2/3 more, hit on a die roll of 3 or less instead of 1, and also can move two territories instead of one. Even if you expect to be counter attacked, in most cases it is still better to buy mostly armor (and some bombers for heavy hitting), since with the stronger attacks you are likely to take less casualties. You hit three times more often for less than double the cost.

So I guess it is hard to fault civ3 too much for failing to represent modern warefare too well, if even dedicated war games have similar faults.

When playing A&A, I always protect my tanks with infrantry because tanks are more expensive and my enemy would destroy my stack of tanks if I did'nt. It should be the same in civ3

So, the solution should be to rise the cost of tanks or reduce the cost of infantry.

But in this case, B2 should cost a lot more than classic bomber. Only some wealthy civs should built stealth bomber. Do you agree?

I hate when all civs have stealth bomber and bypass my fighters and my defense lines.

 

[Mîtiu Ioan]

Originally posted by etj4Eagle
Another change might be to also knock down the defense of tanks a fair bit, to make it suicidal to send them out without infantry escorts.

Or - better - make a Anti-tank gun which need to be destroyed via a artilery duel or infantery assault.

U.S.S.R. main tactics in WWII was to "hammer down" with a strong artilery barrage ennemy lines and after this send large number of Tanks and desant infantery in the hole - very effective - remeber terrible wepon - Katyusha!

Russians had something like 80-90 guns on km on break-line at Moscow ( 1941 ) and almost quadruple on battle for Berlin ( 1945 ). As artilery preparation the soviet artilery fired 1 million and half obuses over Berlin !!

Regards

 

[napoleon526]

Artillery was responsible for about 65% of all ground casualties during the war.

 

[etj4Eagle]

Originally posted by LaRo


When playing A&A, I always protect my tanks with infrantry because tanks are more expensive and my enemy would destroy my stack of tanks if I did'nt. It should be the same in civ3

So, the solution should be to rise the cost of tanks or reduce the cost of infantry.

But in this case, B2 should cost a lot more than classic bomber. Only some wealthy civs should built stealth bomber. Do you agree?

I hate when all civs have stealth bomber and bypass my fighters and my defense lines.

I do throw some infantry in, but nowhere near as much as I really should to be realistically accurate. And it is even worse with Japan, since with the new factories on the main land I can only produce 3 units a turn.

But I do agree, that the relative cost of tanks to infantry needs to be raised. With tanks only costing 1/9 more and modern armor 1/3 more (1/11 to mech infantry), the cost definetly needs to be adjusted. And yes I agree that the stealth bomber should be more expensive too, heck the B-52 is still the backbone of our long range bomber fleet.