ThisNameIsTooLo
Emotion Lord
- Joined
- Sep 14, 2012
- Messages
- 213
In the old days, the Stack of Doom was freely employed by humans and AI alike, much to the chagrin of players desiring more tactical combat. It was the logical extreme of having no restrictions on the amount of units per tile, and while the logistics of military supply could restrict the size of these SoDs to some degree, it still severely reduced the viable strategies for city siege.
The devs of Civ V wanted to get rid of this ridiculously cheesy system of war-making, and so introduced the 1 unit-per-turn rule. Unfortunately, this only ended up taking things to the opposite extreme; now instead of a big ol' frick-off stack, we had frontlines which spanned the entirety of the countryside. On top of that, it also created issues with managing military and civilian units within one's empire.
Modders of Civ V took to fixing this mechanic. The mods that didn't just revert it to the old way of doing things, raised the UPT limit to two, three, or four. And while this was a fair compromise, ultimately it only treated the symptoms and not the root cause. The golden mean, alas, just had a few problems of one system and a few problems of the other.
What's my big fat solution then? It's a little thing I call the "Rook-Bishop-Pawn Stacking System" (it's a working title).
In this system, there are three major classes of units. As a handy mnemonic, I name these classes in chess terms:
Tile Sharing: Up to four units can share a tile, but not just any combination of units. Each tile can hold only one Rook at a time, and up to three Bishops / Pawns at a time.
Movement: If a Rook is moved, any accompanying units will move along with it by default. If a Bishop or Pawn is moved, accompanying units do not follow by default.
Combat:
Rooks, when not accompanied by any other units, fight in the same way that they do in all previous games.
When Rooks have Bishops and Pawns in their contingent, Rooks will use up all its own Action Points and the Action Points of all accompanying units for an enhanced attack. As an example, a Swordsman unit with Archers in tow will get a number of pre-emptive strikes before the enemy can start attacking (similar to how Archery units attacked in Civ IV).
Only bishops with full Action Points will contribute to an enhanced attack.
Bishops can still fight on their own. They're even weaker on defense, though, and often go down in one hit unless defense bonuses are really on their side.
Bishops can also act individually as part of a contingent, though doing so exempts them from being part of an enhanced attack for that turn.
Pawns can also be part of a Rook's contingent in battle, and usually provide passive buffs. Builders, for instance, will add stackable fortification bonuses for each turn that the contingent does not move. Medics will automatically restore some HP to all units in the contingent upon ending the turn.
This is just a first draft for the idea, of course, so I'd like to hear how you'd refine it.
The devs of Civ V wanted to get rid of this ridiculously cheesy system of war-making, and so introduced the 1 unit-per-turn rule. Unfortunately, this only ended up taking things to the opposite extreme; now instead of a big ol' frick-off stack, we had frontlines which spanned the entirety of the countryside. On top of that, it also created issues with managing military and civilian units within one's empire.
Modders of Civ V took to fixing this mechanic. The mods that didn't just revert it to the old way of doing things, raised the UPT limit to two, three, or four. And while this was a fair compromise, ultimately it only treated the symptoms and not the root cause. The golden mean, alas, just had a few problems of one system and a few problems of the other.
What's my big fat solution then? It's a little thing I call the "Rook-Bishop-Pawn Stacking System" (it's a working title).
In this system, there are three major classes of units. As a handy mnemonic, I name these classes in chess terms:
- Rooks, which are the high attack / high defense melee units that make up the backbone of one's army. Warriors, Pikemen, Caravels, Musketmen, and Carriers are examples of land and sea Rooks throughout the ages.
- Bishops, which are the much more vulnerable (and usually ranged) units that, without them, you'd be stuck on the defense. Archers, Chariot Archers, Trebuchets, Frigates, and Artillery are all examples of Bishops.
- Pawns, or "civilian units", which lack any combat ability, but serve other important functions. Workers/Builders, Missionaries, and Archaeologists are examples of Pawns.
Tile Sharing: Up to four units can share a tile, but not just any combination of units. Each tile can hold only one Rook at a time, and up to three Bishops / Pawns at a time.
Movement: If a Rook is moved, any accompanying units will move along with it by default. If a Bishop or Pawn is moved, accompanying units do not follow by default.
Combat:
Rooks, when not accompanied by any other units, fight in the same way that they do in all previous games.
When Rooks have Bishops and Pawns in their contingent, Rooks will use up all its own Action Points and the Action Points of all accompanying units for an enhanced attack. As an example, a Swordsman unit with Archers in tow will get a number of pre-emptive strikes before the enemy can start attacking (similar to how Archery units attacked in Civ IV).
Only bishops with full Action Points will contribute to an enhanced attack.
Bishops can still fight on their own. They're even weaker on defense, though, and often go down in one hit unless defense bonuses are really on their side.
Bishops can also act individually as part of a contingent, though doing so exempts them from being part of an enhanced attack for that turn.
Pawns can also be part of a Rook's contingent in battle, and usually provide passive buffs. Builders, for instance, will add stackable fortification bonuses for each turn that the contingent does not move. Medics will automatically restore some HP to all units in the contingent upon ending the turn.
This is just a first draft for the idea, of course, so I'd like to hear how you'd refine it.
