"One unit per one tile" strategy thoughts

[say1988]

That's why you need superior artillery. Then you also get into a question of range (i.e. can I store a unit within striking distance, but out of artillery range and can I safely counter battery fire). It really depends on mechanics.

The big difference I see is that much of the game focuses on melee, unlike Panzer General which is ranged.

I don't think it should be too hard to make the game viable, but I do worry about them piling on heaps of micro, or getting lazy and leaving big holes.

 

[nokmirt]

This idea takes me back to my early days playing Avalon Hill Games. Though not every tactical wargame requires one unit per hex. Usually there were stack rules, but perhaps some sort of extra attrition for crowding hexes. Of course, my games were based on the Napoleonic Wars, and attrition was a part of the game you always had to compute into your strategy.

If it is exactly like Panzer General, I do not think it will fit what we all are used to in civ combat. I cannot wait to find more out about the combat system.

They are headed in the right direction, you should use hexes rather than squares, but rules for combat need to change as combat technology gets more advanced. The main one would be logistics and supply, which gets more elaborate as time goes on, because armies get larger. The main thing is not to over complicated things, there are too many things to look after in a civ game. We cannot get bogged down pulling our hair out managing our military, while we are trying to take care of cities and infrastructure, as well as civics, religions, technologies, etc. One other thing I am not sure if anyone has considered. Will hexes change naval combat as well, I believe it should.

I did like how units are not just three soldiers any more, it just looks more interesting. The graphics look better, more crisp and clear, but the are not overly awe inspiring.

 

[Aquila SPQR]

Is this some sort of a joke? This is the worst thing I could ever think about Civ V. Maybe they wanted to reduce requirements by reducing number of units (while increasing graphics) but I believe it will make game much, much worse. Arrr.... I've been really very happy about this Civ V whole one day. This news killed that happiness.

 

[chongli]

So upping the movement rate on infantry units seems like it would throw things badly out of whack (back to the old civ games, where you could rush into enemy territory and capture their cities on the first turn).

You're thinking too much in terms of the old way of doing things. If you can no longer stack up units in your cities, where do you put them? You spread them out across the landscape of course. Fortified in forts in many different places, carefully planned to protect key strategic routes, chokepoints and resources.

It was incredibly silly in the old Civ games how the best strategy was to leave the landscape completely empty and stack all of your units inside the city. This silliness led to such things as the rule which expels all units from open borders upon declaration of war. How ridiculous is that? With the new system, such silly rules will no longer be necessary as the proper strategy will be to defend your entire territory, not just the cities themselves.

 

[Raider]

Stacks is like the essence of Civ. For all the talk about Panzer games, there is a reason why Civ has sold millions of copies, while Panzer hasn't. Civ system is just way better adapted for computer play. I am definitely very skeptical that this can made to work effectively and be better that the current Civ system with stacks.

 

[Raider]

You're thinking too much in terms of the old way of doing things. If you can no longer stack up units in your cities, where do you put them? You spread them out across the landscape of course. Fortified in forts in many different places, carefully planned to protect key strategic routes, chokepoints and resources.

It was incredibly silly in the old Civ games how the best strategy was to leave the landscape completely empty and stack all of your units inside the city. This silliness led to such things as the rule which expels all units from open borders upon declaration of war. How ridiculous is that? With the new system, such silly rules will no longer be necessary as the proper strategy will be to defend your entire territory, not just the cities themselves.

Best strategy is most certainly not stacking all units inside the city. Sure you can do it and then watch all your improvements across your empty countryside get destroyed rendering your cities useless starving disease pools. In Civ4 you can stack you units inside the city, but if you cannot beat the enemy in the field, you get sieged and lose and your countryside gets pillaged. Just like real life sieges. One unit per tile is most certainly not the move in the right direction.

 

[chongli]

Stacks is like the essence of Civ. For all the talk about Panzer games, there is a reason why Civ has sold millions of copies, while Panzer hasn't. Civ system is just way better adapted for computer play. I am definitely very skeptical that this can made to work effectively and be better that the current Civ system with stacks.

What a bunch of convoluted gibberish. Each sentence is derailed from the previous. The whole thing is one big non-sequitur. It's like you picked a bunch of ideas out of a hat and slapped them down to form your argument. None of them have any relevance to each other.

You've presented no evidence that stacks have anything to do with the sales of either game series. You've also shown no evidence that the sales of either game have any bearing on their quality.

 

[Sqwerlpunk]

Best strategy is most certainly not stacking all units inside the city. Sure you can do it and then watch all your improvements across your empty countryside get destroyed rendering your cities useless starving disease pools. In Civ4 you can stack you units inside the city, but if you cannot beat the enemy in the field, you get sieged and lose and your countryside gets pillaged. Just like real life sieges. One unit per tile is most certainly not the move in the right direction.

Not quite.

The "winning" strategy was to stack everything and it's mother in a city, and if the enemy attacks you, you use your Stack of Doom to destroy all his guys in the city radius, regroup them on a square the next turn, then move them solid block at his city.

Attacking an opponent from the get go? Cut out the first part, stack in a city 'till ready, move en masse at the target when ready.

Workers can easily and quickly rebuilding whatever improvements you may lose, and your city is slightly less productive while that happens. In return, you get a lolhueg bonus to your unit's defense/strength, and an easy mechanism to repair them to full health, very quickly.

 

[r_rolo1]

Not quite.

The "winning" strategy was to stack everything and it's mother in a city, and if the enemy attacks you, you use your Stack of Doom to destroy all his guys in the city radius, regroup them on a square the next turn, then move them solid block at his city.

Attacking an opponent from the get go? Cut out the first part, stack in a city 'till ready, move en masse at the target when ready.

Workers can easily and quickly rebuilding whatever improvements you may lose, and your city is slightly less productive while that happens. In return, you get a lolhueg bonus to your unit's defense/strength, and an easy mechanism to repair them to full health, very quickly.

You surely never played against a competent oponent in civ IV... holing in the cities is by far the worst defensive manouver possible in a game that has dedicated anti-city-garrison promotions, collateral damage and bombing of city defenses, making cities death holes 90% of the times ( if you don't believe see what happens to the AI, that does exactly that ). And even if you do the hole in city until enemy troops are in range and then bombs away , no one smart enough will get in range of your SoD until they have a fighting chance ... they would probably start pillaging elsewhere out of reach of your SoD if possible until they could smash you or until you got pissed enough to enter in dangerous ground for you...

 

[Ahriman]

You're thinking too much in terms of the old way of doing things. If you can no longer stack up units in your cities, where do you put them? You spread them out across the landscape of course.

So even in peacetime, the landscape is just covered in a layer of military units everywhere? Ugh. That sounds ugly looking.

Under what historic circumstances are peace-time armies spread out scattered all across the landscape? They're normally billeted in a few concentrated military bases.

 

[da_Vinci]

The "winning" strategy was to stack everything and it's mother in a city, and if the enemy attacks you, you use your Stack of Doom to destroy all his guys in the city radius, regroup them on a square the next turn, then move them solid block at his city.

I think this statement can be interpreted to mean defense by pre-emtive strike once attacker enters your lands (the only effective "defense" in Civ IV), and not a "sit and take the attack inside the city approach".

dV

 

[r_rolo1]

I think this statement can be interpreted to mean defense by pre-emtive strike once attacker enters your lands (the only effective "defense" in Civ IV), and not a "sit and take the attack inside the city approach".

dV

True, but for that it is irrelevant that the stack is inside a city or not before the attack as soon as it is safe from the enemy guns. As far as this is concerned, you can have the stack on a fort or, to be honest, on a hill or in any non-city tile and the result will be the same.

That pretty much neuters the point of the poster you are quoting

 

[Agrippa]

@ Alps,
I think he means Panzer General only had 10 cities, and with 100's of cities strategic warfare would be much more of a pain.

A map like Balkan in PG1 had roughly 70x60 tiles, 200 units and 80 cities (don't counted the last number, from the top of my head) - much like a small-to-average civ map.

What people also forget is that PG was heads-up, civ is a multi-fraction game for most of the game.
If you control 10% of 100 cities / 300 units for like 80% of the game, there is no pain at all.
When you warmonger and reach critical mass, it's over soon enough.
It was great fun, I really look forward to it.

 

[Jagatai]

Stacks is like the essence of Civ. For all the talk about Panzer games, there is a reason why Civ has sold millions of copies, while Panzer hasn't. Civ system is just way better adapted for computer play. I am definitely very skeptical that this can made to work effectively and be better that the current Civ system with stacks.

Panzer General spawned 8 sequels and is the best selling turn based WW2 strategy game of all time. That's more sequels than Civilization unless you count non-stand alone expansion packs. Generally you don't keep making sequels to a game that didn't sell well.

 

[Ahriman]

Panzer General spawned 8 sequels and is the best selling turn based WW2 strategy game of all time. That's more sequels than Civilization unless you count non-stand alone expansion packs. Generally you don't keep making sequels to a game that didn't sell well.

"Well" is a relative term, and "number of sequels" a poor metric. Try total sales figures.

PG is a specalist wargamer's game, that appeals to a relatively niche audience. Civ is one of the most popular game series of all time.

Having said that, Civ needs something new to justify a sequel, and an overhaul of the Stacks of Doom combat system. I'm just not sure if the PG model will work well here, in a much simpler environment.

 

[chongli]

Panzer General spawned 8 sequels and is the best selling turn based WW2 strategy game of all time. That's more sequels than Civilization unless you count non-stand alone expansion packs. Generally you don't keep making sequels to a game that didn't sell well.

Pointless to argue with him regarding relative sales of the games. Panzer General could've sold zero copies and had no sequels and it still wouldn't detract from the great gameplay systems it had.

 

[Disgustipated]

my only worry with this system? Clutter! I like my land to be free of clutter, and want to look at my beautiful empire.

Wonder if there will be an option to hide units so you can see the terrain underneath more clearly.

Yes I know tactical combat on a strategic game. So what? This gives us the opportunity to have our cake and eat it too. We get both tactical and strategy all in one game! I think of it like chess. If you don't like chess, then you may not like this. And like in chess units can move over each other (not pawns, but their movement is more restrictive than what we'll see in civ). So stop fussing about micromanaging moving units along a road. sheesh!

 

[Tlalynet]

You don't play chess do you?

The only chess piece that can move over other pieces is the knight, unless you count the one time king\rook switch.

 

[Disgustipated]

yes I thought about that quickly after I posted. Didn't bother to change it. Either way the point still stand. It doesn't take much skill to program "moving over" units. We aren't talking about early 80's computing here. This is the 21st century.

 

[Tlalynet]

Very true