My Elite tanks defeated by a veteran pikeman

[Grav]

To paraphrase;
You dislike the combat system,
therefore it is poop.
Others like it,
therefore they are self-deluding lying poop eaters.

Based on the popularity of Civ, I would rather say that we ARE being given brownies, and you're a paranoid contrarian who tries to convince the rest of us that the brownies are inherently bad and should be replaced with what I will term "oatmeal porridge". Bland, flavorless, and predictable.

*me whacks a 10-kilo stone axe into a tank, wonders how many warriors make up 1 unit, and decides that a warrior can justifiedly do damage to a tank*

@Longasc: Like I posted above, the chance of a 0,64% event NOT happening is the minute 0,16% among 1000 Civ players. Expect the unexpected.

So because its popular, it means the fact that they took out feature was a *good thing*? You know, "Enter The Matrix" was a top seller, I guess that game much have ROCKED!

Then you talk about warriors and tanks... you don't have any clue how many 'warriors' are represented, or how many 'tanks' are either for that matter, yet you made a conclusion based off the assumption that you knew. Let me tell you what, I'll get in a tank, and you run at me with a stone axe, we'll see how far you get in the real world.

I still can't believe people defend the fact that the fact a huge feature (firepower) is not even here, as a good thing.

Hey, at this rate, I could make a best seller by coding an atari game and then covering up my laziness and saying "ITS SUPPOSED TO BE THAT WAY." Fight the evil red dot with the blue circle! Fun for everyone! I swear I made the game like this on purpose and not due to being lazy! Sure, I COULD have implemented features of which have been the standard for the past 10 years, but market research shows that people suddenly don't care! Yay for me and my crappy game!

Then of course, I'd have hordes of moronic minions all out defending my game because they'll believe almost anything they're told. The intelligent will see it for what it is (crap), however they're not heard above the cataphony of former civ 3 diluded "brownie " eaters.

 

[tR1cKy]

Longasc, do you think that my workarounds are a topic of interest in Civ4 suggestions forum? Should i start a new thread in Civ4 suggestions and post my arguments there?

 

[ynone]

Here is my thoughs. The reason so many people are upset here is that the AI has advantages you don't (all agree). When you attack an AI city, it takes 3 to 4 times (or more) units to capture the city. However, you can have the same city with the same fortifications and number of defenders and the AI will walk all over you with a couple of units.

I attacked a city recently. It had 3 Mech Inf in it. Bombarded with BattleShips and Destroyers (about 10 units, and mostly failed). Attacked with Bombers and F-15s, again mostly failed. Brought in a stack of Modern Armor (veteran and elite). Attacked and lost 4 or 5 tanks while they only lost a hit point of two. Kept attacking, using Army of Modern Armor and Mech Inf. The Mech Inf was down to 1 hp left and then it got promoted. I lost 2 Armies. Attacked again and the Mech Inf won again. It's now back to 3 hp. It's like the Mech Inf, even in it's weakened condition still has the strength of a fully functional Mech Inf. There should be no way that once it's weakened to 1 hp, that it can still take out 5, 6, 8, 10 more Modern Armor and Mech Inf attacks. But it does. Finally used all my units. Next turn attacked again. All units are back to full strength, and I'm starting from stratch again. I stopped counting the number of units I lose. I just keep the stacks going.

The same appears to also happen for Spearman.

I don't believe this is necessarily the intended action.

 

[ZiP!]

3) Let E, P(E) and T as above. Let S be a work variable which initially has a value of 1 (100%). This variable will be used to store probability of past events (or sequences of them). This is a little complex trick, but easily understandable with an example.
Let's take T=0.01, or 1%, as above.

a) my first legionary lose to a spearman. Chances are 18.6%. S takes the value:
S*0.186=1*0.186=0.186.
Now S>T. The event is allowed to occur and my legionary is killed.

b) my second legionary lose again. Chances are again 18.6%. S now is:
0.186*0.186=0.035.
Once again, S>T and my second legionary follows the first in heaven

c) my third legionary lose. Chances are the same. S now is:
0.035*0.186=0.0064.
Now S<T. Event is forbidden, the legionary wins despite the roll and S is reset to its initial value of 1.

That's all.

My 0.02€


tR1cKy... i find ur idea quiet good and innovative... u defnitly got a good point there
though i don't know if this could actually get implemented without causing 'exploits' : the problem with it is that, after u get unlucky 1 or 2 times in a row, u'r sure the 3rd time u won't.
The problem is that, in some cases, you are SURE you will win a certain battle, if u wait for a couple defeats beforehand... wait for S to lower enough, then attack with your strong unit so that T is quiet high so that T>S for sure. If only one battle with a particular unit is really important for you, then u would attack with other units in the same turn, and when u get an unlucky streak, immediatly play the important battle 'coz ur quiet sure u'll win
i hope u got my point

anyway, i think you are totally right about anything : 1 strong unit loosing to a very weak one is maybe not so probable, but could and SHOULD happen (so that the game is not linear...) and i personally think it is quiet realistic... i mean look at it this way : a tank attacks a weak warior in the woods... the warrior only got a stone axe... then the tank falls short on fuel, or whatever... the warior manages to get beside it without beeing detected, and then on top of it... he opens the hatch...
OK, this is quiet (a lot) unprobable, but i think u got my point...
but the good point about ur theory is that it prevents the bad luck from occuring many times in a row, THAT beeing what breaks the fun

a little suggestion (i'm not at all a mathematician or a programmer though) : instead of comparing T to S in that way, and preventing radically the legionary to loose the third time, maybe u could get like a bonus% on the attack rate if u just lost, that % beeing higher if the last defeat wasn't much probable...


Explanation (here comes the tricky part ) :

Let A be the effective attack rate taken into consideration : it could be
A = T*(1+S) ; and S = (0.5 - Z) with Z beeing the probabitlity of the last battle to be lost for that player.
If last battle had a 50/50 chance to be won, then S = 0.5-0.5 and A=T, probability not changed.
If the last battle had 75% chance of beeing won but was still lost, then Z=25%
S = 0.5 - 0.25 = 25, A = T(1+S) = 1.25*T and u have more chance of winning

For that to be a "history" of a couple last battles, u could make S = oldS+(0.5-Z) that way u take all last battles in consideration

to continue with the same exemple : let's say the second battle was still lost and A compared to the defense shows that the attacker had a 80% probability to win. OldS was 25%, ans Z is now (100-80)=20% ; that makes S = oldS+(0.5-Z) = 0.25+(0.3)=55%, the attacker gets a 55% bonus this time instead of 25%. It becomes even less probable that he looses again...
You could also let S go negative, so that u have quiet a bad luck after a couple very lucky strikes (i mean if you just defeated 10 tanks with a single spearman, even though you wouldn't complain about it, it would be bad also )

To continue with the same logic... u could make this work also for the defensive value. that way the combat system would somehow compare the differential luck of the antagonists (and then the effective defense would be D = basedefense*(1+S)...)

You could also reset S once in a while (like at the begining of the player turn) although i personally wouldn't like it

and finally, one last thing... you could make each player have a different S towards each enemy on the battlefield (to reduce exploits) : if you have been unlucky latly against germany, you will get a battle bonus only against them but not also against the egyptians who u have never warred with...

And for the "Role Playing" part of this : the next time the tank is likely to encounter a warior, they would have learnt to always keep their fuel tank full, and so they are less likely to loose again


Anywayz, i hope this helps...
sorry for my bad english (i'm from France ) i just hope it didn't make things even more uncomprehensible, and PLEASE forgive me for my grammar errors

ZiP!

PS : i think that one can say that, for a first post, it's quiet a long one

 

[Erik Mesoy]

Then you talk about warriors and tanks... you don't have any clue how many 'warriors' are represented, or how many 'tanks' are either for that matter, yet you made a conclusion based off the assumption that you knew. Let me tell you what, I'll get in a tank, and you run at me with a stone axe, we'll see how far you get in the real world.

I don't know, since no numbers are provided. But given the cost ratio of warrior/settler/tank, the 1gp upkeep for them all, and the population of a size 1 city (what a settler makes) I can come up with an estimate. Lots more warriors than tanks.

You know, "Enter The Matrix" was a top seller, I guess that game much have ROCKED!

Stupid spinoffs of very popular films are in a different category. There is no Civ3 The Movie to create a fanbase for Civ. Apples and oranges.

I still can't believe people defend the fact that the fact a huge feature (firepower) is not even here, as a good thing.
<snip>
Then of course, I'd have hordes of moronic minions all out defending my game because they'll believe almost anything they're told. The intelligent will see it for what it is (crap), however they're not heard above the cataphony of former civ 3 diluded "brownie" eaters.

Will you please stop it. The position of "everyone who disagrees with me is a self-deluding liar that enjoys eating fecal matter" is so immature that I can hardly stand it. If you continue with it, I will sig you. I've already shown a different flaw in Civ3, proving that I am not a "mindless fanboy". Come up with a better argument than mudslinging, will you?


@tr1cky: OK... sounds interesting to simply forbid events under a certain probability margin. Still, if it's cumulative, it could get annoying/exploitable/useless.
Oddity: Say an event has a 50% chance of happening. What does S do then? Halve for each time, until it sinks below 0,01 no matter what side wins?
Exploitable: Nag at diplomacy. Force random numbers to appears where you want them.
And... how about the "legionary wins" case? If that happens often enough, is S still sinking? Will S be kept as one variable for each side? Wouldn't this possibly force a spearman to win at some point (see Oddity, above) after the tanks have won a lot?

The idea definitely has some merit, but it needs hammering out.
Hammer: Rules lawyers.
Anvil: Min/maxers.
Nice work, though!

 

[Grav]

I don't know, since no numbers are provided. But given the cost ratio of warrior/settler/tank, the 1gp upkeep for them all, and the population of a size 1 city (what a settler makes) I can come up with an estimate. Lots more warriors than tanks.
Stupid spinoffs of very popular films are in a different category. There is no Civ3 The Movie to create a fanbase for Civ. Apples and oranges.

Will you please stop it. The position of "everyone who disagrees with me is a self-deluding liar that enjoys eating fecal matter" is so immature that I can hardly stand it. If you continue with it, I will sig you. I've already shown a different flaw in Civ3, proving that I am not a "mindless fanboy". Come up with a better argument than mudslinging, will you?

You bring up the point about unit 'upkeep being the same, so there must be more warriors'. However there is no such thing as variable unkeep costs... at all, so 10 tanks will cost the same as 10 warriors as 10 nukes as 10 longbowmen, so i don't see your point. Another feature that should have been in the game but wasn't. So your argument is dependent on the fact that another part of the game is flawed.

I don't think people who disagree with me eat fecal matter, but I do believe that people who wont even awknowledge that very simple fact that having less features is a bad thing... do in fact in fecal matter. So go ahead and "sig" me, AKA, The Nerd Attack! I'm sure it will bruise my ego significantly.