Queuing unit actions

[blciv4]

I'm curious about action queuing. I seem to recall being able to queue up units(workers specifically) to do my bidding for several turns in advance in previous civ games. My questions are;
Was I simply unaware of this ability in civ v?
Will it be included in civ vi?
Also, I'd love to be able to have units placed on alert AND move along a predetermined path of my choosing using a similar concept. A patrol path if you will. While I grasp the concept of choosing a strategic position and fortifying until an enemy unit approaches, I find that fantastically boring. What say you?

 

[stealth_nsk]

Civ6 has completely different worker system, queuing them will not work well.
And with 1UPT everything becomes even worse. I don't think there's any sane implementation of such feature possible in Civ6.

 

[King Jason]

Civ6 has completely different worker system, queuing them will not work well.

... Why? "go here and build this" x 3 isn't hard at all. Even builders being automated could work if the priorities were weighted correctly.

That said They've already said that from a design perspective, they don't like the idea of automation. Some things have the option to be automated (exploring, others have been removed (worker/builder automation).

I doubt action ques are in.

 

[SupremacyKing2]

That said They've already said that from a design perspective, they don't like the idea of automation. Some things have the option to be automated (exploring, others have been removed (worker/builder automation).

When a builder only has 3 charges and can built tile improvements instantaneously, I don't think you really need automation anymore. And as you pointed out, the whole design philosophy is to make it so that the game does not need automation on the principle that it is more fun for the player when they are able to do things themselves.

 

[AriochIV]

The ability to queue worker commands would have been useful in Civ V, but it seems superfluous with the limited-charge Builder system.

 

[Felis Renidens]

But if units and queues are already mentioned, I'd like a "follow" order that will allow me to move units together (the follower will move after the unit it follows in the same direction if possible).

Queuing actions can be nice but isn't something I usually do. I don't think limited builds will make it less useful though. Actually, I'll now create a builder to build specific things, so I might just give all the orders when the builder is created. With a worker there is less reason to prioritize - most of the time I just try to keep it busy so there is no reason to think of a queue.

 

[4N4C0ND4]

Because I do like the military aspect of Civ, and do like the tactical aspect of 1UPT, I rather hope that we can have some kind of group commands: just draw a square, units are selected and somehow (hardest part, I'm aware of) manage to get to a destination.

Moving more than 15 units is the fun killer for me

 

[bookman_]

Because I do like the military aspect of Civ, and do like the tactical aspect of 1UPT, I rather hope that we can have some kind of group commands: just draw a square, units are selected and somehow (hardest part, I'm aware of) manage to get to a destination.

Moving more than 15 units is the fun killer for me

They said that giving group orders to on army will be possible, and just that is enough for me to buy the game.

 

[stealth_nsk]

They said that giving group orders to on army will be possible, and just that is enough for me to buy the game.

I believe they meant corps/armies plus support unit, plus civilian unit - everything staying on 1 tile. Not units on several tiles as this would totally conflict with different movement costs, roads etc.

 

[Felis Renidens]

That's why I offered a "follow" command. I think it's a better way to move units in formation when you have 1UPT. You tell every unit who to follow once, and then move the leader and if implemented correctly everybody follows.

 

[stealth_nsk]

That's why I offered a "follow" command. I think it's a better way to move units in formation when you have 1UPT. You tell every unit who to follow once, and then move the leader and if implemented correctly everybody follows.

I imagine a lot of mess... different speed, different movement cost. They'll quickly get scattered.

 

[Felis Renidens]

I imagine a lot of mess... different speed, different movement cost. They'll quickly get scattered.

Not if they know to use wait\do nothing\fortify. There is no need to scatter. If you can't move try to move the blocking unit. If blocking unit is out of moves\ does not have sufficient moves - wait for next turn.

Also, if you set it out correctly they'll all get in line. C follows B, B follows A. You move A then B moves then C moves.

Knowing when to break formation will be trickier but not a problem for human players, and for the AI players it will still be an improvement.

 

[stealth_nsk]

Not if they know to use wait\do nothing\fortify. There is no need to scatter. If you can't move try to move the blocking unit. If blocking unit is out of moves\ does not have sufficient moves - wait for next turn.

Also, if you set it out correctly they'll all get in line. C follows B, B follows A. You move A then B moves then C moves.

Knowing when to break formation will be trickier but not a problem for human players, and for the AI players it will still be an improvement.

It will work in 2 cases:

1. Moving 1 tile at a turn if no obstacles met.

2. Moving by road in a line (one after one) with the speed od the slowest unit.

In all other cases the amount of work will be compared to decent tactical AI (the type of problem is generally the same).

 

[Felis Renidens]

Why one tile? you move A two hexes. B moves two hexes, C moves two hexes.
obstacles may cause some gaps to form but it's still an improvement
faster units in front will open a gap, fast unit after a slow one will be slowed - but it's still an improvement. You can also make the AI not to let units with different speed follow each other.
And it's part of making the tactical AI more decent so it's not a job wasted it's a move in that direction. It won't make the AI great, but at least will stop some kinds of stupidity and can be combined with other simple tactics.

 

[stealth_nsk]

Why one tile? you move A two hexes. B moves two hexes, C moves two hexes.

Only on absolute flat land or with full road coverage, which is too few cases to rely on.

obstacles may cause some gaps to form but it's still an improvement

Ok, let's say we implement this as moving straight lines. In this case terrain could cause gaps, but it's not a big problem. Units will continue crawling through hills even if there's a road nearby, but this could be acceptable by some players, ok. But what if one of the units meet mountain? It should move left or right, taking place of another unit, or in worse case it could make wrong turn and become completely separated from the rest of the pack.

Another situation - a group meets unit standing on a way of some of its units. Should we consider it a temporary obstacle and wait or a permanent one like mountain? If we guess wrong, the results could be nasty.

That's the case where it's better not to have feature at all, than have it implemented badly. Players will rely on it only to see their army scattered after several moves.

To avoid this, the game needs some real group pathfinding, which is a hell of the task. Starcraft 2 has something like this, but they've spent really huge amount of work on it, probably more than $1M.

And it's part of making the tactical AI more decent so it's not a job wasted it's a move in that direction. It won't make the AI great, but at least will stop some kinds of stupidity and can be combined with other simple tactics.

This feature is calculating path for multiple turns, while AI needs to deal with 1 turn, but with heavy land/opponent analysis.

 

[stiiknafuulia]

@op: Registered in 2009 and this is your only post... Must be a really important issue for you since it's your only post in 7 years!

As for the topic, I have no opinion since I never used the queuing option in Civ IV when it was available (or was it available in V as well?). Priorities change so often in the early game that I'd rather not use it then... And I guess I simply liked clicking on my workers often, since it gave me a feeling of personally developing the virgin lands. Could also be that I forgot about its existence half the time, absent-minded creature that I am. This said, I wouldn't mind the option being available in Civ VI for those who want it. More options is almost always better.

 

[stiiknafuulia]

I believe they meant corps/armies plus support unit, plus civilian unit - everything staying on 1 tile. Not units on several tiles as this would totally conflict with different movement costs, roads etc.

Iirc, they have stated that the units will move in 'formation'. Whatever that means is anyone's guess... But I tend to agree that it would lead to a huge mess if it were to mean a whole 'carpet' of units moving at once. Fwiw, it could just be a bad translation from a foreign-language article and they could've simply meant grouping units together on a single tile.

 

[4N4C0ND4]

That's why I offered a "follow" command. I think it's a better way to move units in formation when you have 1UPT. You tell every unit who to follow once, and then move the leader and if implemented correctly everybody follows.

But it's not exactly the same;

Let's take an example: I want to move my 10 unit army from A to B.
With my "method", I would only have to click once to select the group, twice to order to go to B.

With your "method", you would have to assign one by one each unit to follow a "captain".

In the end, the result might be the same but you multiply the number of clicks by the number of units

 

[stealth_nsk]

Iirc, they have stated that the units will move in 'formation'. Whatever that means is anyone's guess... But I tend to agree that it would lead to a huge mess if it were to mean a whole 'carpet' of units moving at once. Fwiw, it could just be a bad translation from a foreign-language article and they could've simply meant grouping units together on a single tile.

Could you find the exact quote? It's really interesting.

Forgot about one possibility. Maybe they were speaking about moving units for 1 turn only if no obstacles or movement cost prevent units to end up turn in formation.

 

[Felis Renidens]

Only on absolute flat land or with full road coverage, which is too few cases to rely on.

- With obstacles most units will move 1 tile per turn anyway.

Ok, let's say we implement this as moving straight lines. In this case terrain could cause gaps, but it's not a big problem. Units will continue crawling through hills even if there's a road nearby, but this could be acceptable by some players, ok. But what if one of the units meet mountain? It should move left or right, taking place of another unit, or in worse case it could make wrong turn and become completely separated from the rest of the pack.

If the leader avoids the road the followers avoid the road. If A moves onto a road, B will move onto the road after him when he can, then C will do the same thing. Why should they crawl through hills if the leader uses a road?

Another situation - a group meets unit standing on a way of some of its units. Should we consider it a temporary obstacle and wait or a permanent one like mountain? If we guess wrong, the results could be nasty.

That's the case where it's better not to have feature at all, than have it implemented badly. Players will rely on it only to see their army scattered after several moves.

To avoid this, the game needs some real group pathfinding, which is a hell of the task. Starcraft 2 has something like this, but they've spent really huge amount of work on it, probably more than $1M.

- If it's a unit you control that has moves - move it first, out of moves or not yours (and not an enemy, in case of an enemy move all units to manual anyway) - wait a turn, At worst case the formation is broken and unit returns to manual control. AI and players might have to be able to decide whether to move units out of the way or break formations, AI won't do it perfectly but I have no high expectations from AI.

I don't see why better not to have that feature even if all it does is saves you some time navigating a bottleneck If the only thing it does is to make units of the same speed move one behind the other pretty well and have other formations terribly - it still saves tedious micromanagement in some of the worst cases.

This feature is calculating path for multiple turns, while AI needs to deal with 1 turn, but with heavy land/opponent analysis.

- it's not calculating more than one turn. It shouldn't. You tell unit B to follow unit A but still calculate the moves for unit A normally (you might give A an order to go to a distant location, but that's true even without the feature. all it does is that you don't have to give B the same order only for it to take a different route). And even if it doesn't help in battle you (and the AI) need to get your units into battle, that's when I think the feature will help.