Morale Concept

[general_kill]

After playing the Rome: Total War demo in all the difficulties, i think morale can be easily adapted to civ 4. Morale can affect both the military and citizens.

Basically for military, your units should get morale drops which causes penalties. for example, if your units stay in enemy land for too long, they will experience morale drops that can be reflected in attack and/or defense penalty.

Morale can also increase which can mean a bonus to attack and/or defense. Maybe even give the blitz ability to fast moving units that doesnt have them.

your actions can also influence the morales of your enemy. For example, if you have a significantly higher kill than death ratio, your enemy can be demoralized.

In addition, citizens should experience morale drops and ups too. They can get demoralized if they are in a representative form of government and are the aggressor in a war which can be penalized by less productivity. they can be demoralized by more advanced neighbor civilizations which can be penalized by producing less science beakers. Of course morale boosts can come from wiping out a civilization or being extremely wealthy and advanced.

Anyways there are alot of ways to add to this idea and feel free to do so. sorry for the sloppy structure of the passage above, I am just so tired that i can barely keep my eyes open (literally).

 

[Haradrim]

Demoralizing enemy troops might further destabilize a war between a highly advanced civ fighting a backward civ. With every turn morale would drop significantly, so all other units would be far easier to destroy. Back at home, the citizens would drop in morale and the economy would suffer, so new units would not be out on the field as often.

Morale should be something to add, but it should be thought out in a way that does not horribly destabilize the game. For example, penalties should not be very harsh, so a losing army does not experience exponentially increasing deaths, but bonuses should be great. Citizen morale should be far more important than troop morale. High citizen morale would cause cities to put out more commerce, and workers to work faster.

 

[dh_epic]

I think morale is a huge part of strategy. War doesn't happen in a vacuum. Society sees war and is affected, and the soldiers see or recall society and are affected.

Even Alexander the Great couldn't make it to China. But boy did he have morale on his side for a while.

 

[Brohz]

I dont like continent-big empires of a civ that got too powerful. I think it is unrealistic and unfair, but with a morale sistem in the game this could be corrected: Imagine a the smaller civs fighting back in conquered territory in a guerrilla wars. They could manage to kill enough invading forces to make the more powerful civ to pull them back. The conquered people would be highly motivated to fight back the invaders, and the invading civilization's cityzens would question the front line loses (war weariness)and would slow down the troop building and making their ruler to spend his resourses in pro-war propaganda instead of investing them in the war effort. This way a civ that gets too powerful would start to have internal problems and trouble from the occupied countries.

 

[Aussie_Lurker]

Hmmm, citizen morale could also be a factor in deciding if a city gives in to an enemy which is either approaching or which has laid seige to it!
Your city would have a starting morale based on your population, current happiness, wealth and food stores. This would then be modified by your current government type, how your people view the besiegers, the # of troops defending your city, the tactics of the enemy in the seige and so on!
Each turn, you have a chance of losing morale and, also each turn, your morale is checked to see if the city gives itself up!
Anyway, just a thought!

Yours,
Aussie_Lurker.

 

[citizen001]

Imagine smaller scale battles where a change in events could trigger morale changes just like in Dynasty Warriors 4. For example enemy troops advancing could trigger a troop charging movie where the morale of the attacking team is lifted. Also, armies could have individual morale where they are affected by health and the number of troops they have slaughtered.

 

[skylined]

After playing the Rome: Total War demo in all the difficulties, i think morale can be easily adapted to civ 4. Morale can affect both the military and citizens.

Perfect Idea!