Just hope my scouts don't find you in the middle of this or it could end badly for both sides
Military exercises become possible in a FFA multiplayer game?
- Thread starter Ikariam
- Start date
Just hope my scouts don't find you in the middle of this or it could end badly for both sides
CossackProblem
Warlord
- Joined
- Jul 25, 2007
- Messages
- 131
Dunno. It's still FFA meaning I can be doing "military exercises" in your capital.
Healing could have a cost, yeah. Be it production, food or gold being channelled from a nearby city. Or from pillage.
But as long as that cost is bearable in normal situations, it might still be worth it to pay it to gain xp. Or the cost could be quite high, making wars and attrition cost more interesting with it.
Sure, there's a risk, but as long as you know your 'ally', and you're near enough that both your units can be near where you'll usually have them, that risk is quite low.
But as long as that cost is bearable in normal situations, it might still be worth it to pay it to gain xp. Or the cost could be quite high, making wars and attrition cost more interesting with it.
Sure, there's a risk, but as long as you know your 'ally', and you're near enough that both your units can be near where you'll usually have them, that risk is quite low.
Random (as in the sense of going to a lobby and starting a game with whomever) Multiplayer I have little to no expectations for being very good anyway. Just going to be lots of early wars/rushes and team games set up for such, and of course flooded with newbie players which is all right but not very exciting.
This sort of thing is handled among friends/house-rules/RPing and more long term multiplayer games which is where it's at anyway.
This sort of thing is handled among friends/house-rules/RPing and more long term multiplayer games which is where it's at anyway.
Teamers are better by far, but noob farming is also fun sometimes
I think he's more referencing how much people collude in FFAs. You either have to be good enough to beat everyone in the game even if they gang up on you or you have to keep your score low enough that no one thinks you're the biggest threat. Of course, right now in civ 4 only noobs play FFAs so it's pretty easy to kill 4 or 5 of them by yourself. Civ 5 will doubtless start out much more competitive than that and then move more towards what Civ 4 was like as the game gets older.
That and it'd be pretty easy for someone to just swoop in with a unit or 2 and kill your units while they're "training." Given how hard it is to have a massive army this technique would leave your respective nations in considerable danger.
Arguing that one of the players might backstab the other is kind of missing the point. In MP it's not too hard for two people who know each other to play the game. If military training exercises is something that is mutually beneficial, and if those two players are likely to play more games together in future, you'll find lots and lots of people who'd be honest to their friends and this problem still exists.
If third party players who swoop in and wipe them out is a problem, yes you might have a point there. However given how strong cities are at defending, and that for units to be training in this way doesn't require the whole army on the one front, I think it would be easy enough to minimise the risk of being sneak attacked.
If third party players who swoop in and wipe them out is a problem, yes you might have a point there. However given how strong cities are at defending, and that for units to be training in this way doesn't require the whole army on the one front, I think it would be easy enough to minimise the risk of being sneak attacked.
Let's say for the sake of the argument that the two players do know each other and do collude. In that instance, it's a problem to other players regardless of what technique is available and is inherent in the FFA game type. However, as soon as other players realize what's going on typically everyone gangs up on the "cheaters." (Generally in FFAs collusion is considered cheating, at least in Civ 4).
And I still think it's a risky tactic. Given the importance of movement in this game if your units aren't in the right place at the right time you could get effed in the A. It seems to me that it's unlikely for both players to do this with their units in an ideal location for both parties. Likely, at least 1 should be very exposed if not completely exposed to attack.
That's a better point. I suppose this strategy will be tested reasonably quickly after release so we'll see soon enough. I'm reasonably optimistic it won't be a problem, but it does still concern me we haven't heard much about multiplayer.
Well, multiplayer is problematic for the same reason it's fun: people. The people that play the game make for challenging and dynamic opponents, but they can also use their ingenuity to find new exploits, abuses, and methods of griefing.
I'm sure there are a plethora of methods to grief in Civ 5's multiplayer that haven't been discovered for the simple reason that most beta testers aren't looking to cause as much misery as possible to their opponents. There are many such things in Civ 4's multiplayer to this day even after all the patches.
I'm sure there are a plethora of methods to grief in Civ 5's multiplayer that haven't been discovered for the simple reason that most beta testers aren't looking to cause as much misery as possible to their opponents. There are many such things in Civ 4's multiplayer to this day even after all the patches.
i agree
there is no point in trying to boost your troops with a friend when you can actually play lamer tactics
thats why ffa doesnt make sense, there is no meaning in the word "FFA"
in the scenario of this "tactic" lets assume both players ARENT friend
lets assume there is a situation where player A attack ranged player B who has a strong unit in defense fortified that CANT be killed
then both player get a benefit and free xp from the attack and they have no interest in preventing these attacks to happen
if they attack each other every turn witht producing damage (assuming that is possible) they are breaking the policy of FFA even though they arent friends
MasterDinadan
Warlord
- Joined
- Mar 2, 2008
- Messages
- 235
The same thing was possible in Revolutions, since it was possible to retreat from battle (and give the attacker a free promotion). I never saw it abused, but I barely played multiplayer.
It's still a design flaw, even if people don't rely on it frequently. It basically means that wars can be mutually beneficial to two players in a FFA game. It seems to me that they should be zero-sum or even negative sum.
One could devise an XP system that doesn't have this flaw. For instance, have units gain 1 XP per damage they deal, but healing costs XP. Two units beating on each other will just use up all the XP they earn healing themselves and not really get anywhere. The only way to profit from an encounter is to deal more damage than you take, so it would be impossible for two players to just trade hits. Extra XP would be earned for killing an enemy, but again you can only earn XP by taking something of value away from a player instead of dealing damage that ultimately doesn't matter.
The cost of promotions would probably have to be rebalanced since there would be less XP going around, but I think a system like that would work alright.
It's still a design flaw, even if people don't rely on it frequently. It basically means that wars can be mutually beneficial to two players in a FFA game. It seems to me that they should be zero-sum or even negative sum.
One could devise an XP system that doesn't have this flaw. For instance, have units gain 1 XP per damage they deal, but healing costs XP. Two units beating on each other will just use up all the XP they earn healing themselves and not really get anywhere. The only way to profit from an encounter is to deal more damage than you take, so it would be impossible for two players to just trade hits. Extra XP would be earned for killing an enemy, but again you can only earn XP by taking something of value away from a player instead of dealing damage that ultimately doesn't matter.
The cost of promotions would probably have to be rebalanced since there would be less XP going around, but I think a system like that would work alright.
How about this: a unit only realizes his xp (both from giving and taking hits) if the enemy unit is killed. It's a potential xp, but if the enemy unit never dies (and it has to be within X turns) the xp is never actually awarded.
Moreso, if the enemy heals the damage you've given (first in, first out) you lose that potential xp. Or maybe simply the killing having to be within X turns would avoid infinitely cumulatively exploits. Probably gaining xp for taking hits should be abolished, however, it would still be exploitable, and makes no sense: you're losing your experienced men, recruting new (healing) costs nothing but time (up until here it's ok with me), and to top it off they get even more experienced somehow, even if they didn't deliver a single point of damage?
Moreso, if the enemy heals the damage you've given (first in, first out) you lose that potential xp. Or maybe simply the killing having to be within X turns would avoid infinitely cumulatively exploits. Probably gaining xp for taking hits should be abolished, however, it would still be exploitable, and makes no sense: you're losing your experienced men, recruting new (healing) costs nothing but time (up until here it's ok with me), and to top it off they get even more experienced somehow, even if they didn't deliver a single point of damage?
The_Reckoning
Prince
All that needs to be done is research pacts are worth more than some unit xp. So by being at war with someone you could trust you'd actually be losing more than you're gaining.
MasterDinadan
Warlord
- Joined
- Mar 2, 2008
- Messages
- 235
I considered that as well but I started thinking of situations such as...
I flank the enemy's unit and then beat the crap out of it. It barely survives but it manages to escape. My units would earn no XP for this because it got away, and the hurt unit heals up with no consequences? Doesn't seem fair to me. I'd much rather see the attacker gain some XP for pulling off a good move like that, and the defending unit lose some XP to heal back up.
If you think about it, losing some XP for healing does make sense. Thematically, their archer unit is a whole group of archers. When you deal damage to them, you are basically killing off some of their archers. When they retreat back to their borders and "heal up" they are just replacing what they've lost. But since the units that are joining their forces are not experienced, the XP of the force as a whole goes down.
I don't think it's so bad. If a unit manages to escape, good for him! It's not that easy to pull off (might happen once in a while within a bigger battle, enough as to not be a bother since you'd still be getting other kills).
Plus it might add an interesting mechanic that is historically accurate: chasing off troops who route. Anyone who's played Total War know how major that is within a battle and cavalry are there exactly for that (beyond charging to break formations).
Though your model is indeed a good idea and makes a lot of sense, I can also find some problems with it:
- It would benefit much superior tech from 'farming' obsolete units (two players could arrange that), since you award xp per damage. However this can fixed with adding a multiplier based on the ratio of strength between the two units involved.
- If a unit is badly damaged but doesn't have spare XP, what does it do? 'Lose' a promotion? Are promotions lost automatically to heal when spare xp is not enough? That would be a headache--it makes a lot of sense on theory but would just piss off players to have to give up promotions. So the unit has no choice, it would have to do damage to heal but how can it do so when it's already almost dying?
MasterDinadan
Warlord
- Joined
- Mar 2, 2008
- Messages
- 235
There's a few ways to deal with that. You can either prevent the unit from healing altogether until it's acquired some XP (essentially, damage dealt to a unit with no XP is a bit more "permanent") or you could allow the XP to go negative (the unit doesn't lose any promotions, but still has to make up the "deficit" before he earns his next).
As for the farming, I'm not sure it's a big issue, as the farmee still has to spend resources to build the low tech units, and what is he getting out of this? The problem with the current system is that two players can mutually benefit from clobbering each other for a little while. If a new system requires one player to invest signficant resources to help another, then the system is working, as a decent player will never agree to such a deal.
As for which way works better, I suppose it depends on how easy it will be to kill units. If it only takes a few decent attacks to finish them off, then your way is probably better. If it will tend to take several turns to do it (a war of attrition) then denying XP because the unit escapes may be too harsh.
Perhaps a mix of the two would work best. I think they are both solid ideas!
I really don't think it's a major issue. As it's been pointed out, the merits of resource trading and research deals are probably good enough to warrant not going to war for pointless reasons, but I am still uncomfortable with the fact that agreeing to beat each other up is actually an alternative to other kinds of mutual agreements. It shouldn't be something that can even be considered advantageous.
"Lemme kill some of your boys and I'll let you kill some of mine, we'll all come stronger out of this! Except for their mothers."
Have they ever heard of simulation?
Completely agree with your post, and indeed I think the models may be interesting to develop upon and implement in a mod.
And what if both players have a unit that has 0xp? How would they heal? Or if they can heal, couldn't the two players just keep beating up on those 0xp units that don't need the xp?
Similar threads
