Should civ5 have abstract combat?

[Loppan Torkel]

It's not going to happen in civ4, but I'm wondering if it's not the way to go.

At least the micromanagmentproblems would go away. The scale of wars would probably feel larger, you could have battleplans like someone suggested in an earlier thread, armies could be implemented in a better way, the AI would probably have an easier time leading it too. If they make a semirealtime version to fit multiplayergames it would probably also work better with it.
I expect most civplayers are too conservative to even consider supporting abstract combat though...


Edit: to make it more understandable - This is a couple of things what I mean a more abstract combatsystem could lead to:
Unit construction would be replaced by a longterm military funding plus a shortterm readiness level. The funding should be divided in different areas such as Navy, Airforce and Army, with different focuses (a lot of horses or defensive troops).

You would have to make up your battleplans, defencestrategies etc by drawing out the way your military should act - high priority borders next to Germany for example, or when you attack someone you could choose to attack through a weaker nation. This should be done within your turn. You should be able to put together your forces and if implemented select military leaders for them.

The military orders would be carried out in between turns, simultanesly with the other civs, which would make multiplayergames a lot faster - everyone micromanage their own civ at the same time and then see wars happening at the same time between the turns, perhaps with some small level of control - withdraw, cancel attack etc. otherwise the computer would calculate the battles, without you controlling them.

Modern eras would without a doubt benefit most from having abstract combat, but it wouldn't be impossible to implement it for the other ages either. During the Ancient times, the emphazise could lie in exploring parties and during the medieval times crusades and sieges should be possible to implement.

There's been suggested before that exploration should be made abstract too, which I think sounds great. Giving orders to seavessels to explore the continent or search for other continents for example, and only revealing the map when/if it reaches your civ again. Which would fit nicely with the rest of the combatmodel. No more single unitmovements...

 

[brinko]

maybe we will be surprised in cIV, u would think that as this game gets older and technology gets better, things would eventually become complexed and as realistic as life itself.
maybe in civ 5 or 6 it might be possible to get a list of names from all the soldiers serving in a unit, also showing how many confirmed kills and where they were born, so u know exactly who to give medals to. i know this certainly will not be in civ 4, but i know it will be in civ some day.

 

[Civrules]

This is more a question of whether we like the feature rather than a question of whether we like it to be in Civ V.
It is WAY (WAY^20) too yearly to even mention of Civ V.

We have virtually no real details of how the new battle system will be like. All we know is the very basics of what the devs are considering.

 

[thescaryworker]

I think it's about 20 turns too early to start on CV

 

[Loppan Torkel]

There's no way they're getting rid of unit-combat in civ4, so if it's going to happen it might be in the next civ.

Anyway, I was bored, and it might be interesting to see if there's any support at all for the idea.. most other ideas have already been discussed to death anyway.

 

[Arturus]

I have to say, after playing a lot of Rome: Total War when it came out, and then playing Civilization again, there is something to be said for abstract combat. I am assuming by abstract combat you mean real time fighting utilizing a combination of units against a combination of enemy units fighting in armies. I'd love to see civilization become turned based with real-time battles for single-player. For multiplayer that would be a bit more complicated, however, it has been done in at least one other game that I've researched and appears it might be being done in a second.

A quick bit of research found that an old game by Lucasarts called Star Wars Rebellion mixes a form of turn based (time moves in "days" and the length of days can be fast, medium, or slow so something like simultaneous moves) and fleet battles are done in real time. Another game being designed by Lucasarts and being released this fall is called Star Wars Empire at War (I'll have to check the name again to be sure). It appears to use some of the characteristics of the game mentionned above but allow real time fleet and real time army battles. So it certainly is possible, problem is it may be unwieldy with a lot of people playing. Star Wars Rebellion is only 2 player when played in multiplayer. Haven't seen a player limit for the new one yet, it might be too soon to find out.

 

[LLXerxes]

well, right now there isn't a Civ5. if Civ4 is a flop, there will be no civ5. so i'd wait on making this topic

 

[sir_schwick]

What does 'abstract combat' really mean? I have no idea what this would look like or feel like or anything. Someone please fill me in.

 

[Darth_Pugwash]

Uh, yeah, I don't know what you mean either.

 

[Loppan Torkel]

Sorry, it wasn't very clear, more abstract than now would also be a better description. Anyway, I guess it could be done in a number of ways but how I thought it could be done would be something like this:

Unit construction would be replaced by a longterm military funding plus a shortterm readiness level. The funding should be divided in different areas such as Navy, Airforce and Army, with different focuses (a lot of horses or defensive troops).

You would have to make up your battleplans, defencestrategies etc by drawing out the way your military should act - high priority borders next to Germany for example, or when you attack someone you could choose to attack through a weaker nation. This should be done within your turn. You should be able to put together your forces and if implemented select military leaders for them.

The military orders would be carried out in between turns, simultanesly with the other civs, which would make multiplayergames a lot faster - everyone micromanage their own civ at the same time and then see wars happening at the same time between the turns, perhaps with some small level of control - withdraw, cancel attack etc. otherwise the computer would calculate the battles, without you controlling them.

 

[warpstorm]

Okay, now that you've explained it, I kind of like it for the modern eras. I'm not sure how it would work for ancient ages, but I think that something on that line could be made to work.

 

[sir_schwick]

I personally would still prefer a WE-GO system which used units you could see. Although many times abstraction looks better, most interactions of pieces on the game board are tangible rather than abstract. Trade was kinda abstract in Civ 3, but I did not like how that abstraction felt. Against that point I am deploying the 'consistency' argument.

 

[Loppan Torkel]

Modern eras would without a doubt benefit most from having abstract combat, but it wouldn't be impossible to implement it for the other ages either. During the Ancient times, the emphazise could lie in exploring parties and during the medieval times crusades and sieges should be possible to implement.

There's been suggested before that exploration should be made abstract too, which I think sounds great. Giving orders to seavessels to explore the continent or search for other continents for example, and only revealing the map when/if it reaches your civ again.

Not sure if I understood what you meant by the 'consistency' argument, and WE-GO system - what does that mean???

 

[sir_schwick]

By consistency I mean that how we interact with the Civ universe is consistent. That means using a similair medium(tangible, tile-related pices) rather than multiple(imaginary trade networks, for example.

WE-GO is exactly how it sounds, we both go if we are playing. Of course that differs from the current IGO-UGO system. This is not real time, but rather where you plan out your moves and then they are executed simeoultaneously.

 

[dh_epic]

I'm not sure what abstract combat means precisely...

But moving to a notion of combat where you're not moving around individual units so much as defining higher level strategies and seeing what happens... that would be neat. (Kind of like picking from a list of plays in a football game, and doing modest levels of fine control when the play is executed.)

 

[Loppan Torkel]

yea, sort of like managing football, it would fit the game better than manouvering every unit like a lowly fieldmarchall, like someone said.

It would also tie to espionage a lot better where you could be able to steal battle plans or fake them, make diversions and so on.

I edited the original post to better explain what I meant by abstract combat....

 

[sir_schwick]

I like everything but making unit production abstract. Whiel I would like the ability to have citizen militias(citizens who convert to militias during combat), I do not like the idea of military being determined by a slider.

Instead of calling it abstract combat, why not call it Strategic Warfare. Essentially now you plan strategy, not tactics.

 

[Loppan Torkel]

It would probably be more than one slider... One overall military slider, divided between military research and military uphold, the research could then be divided into several different military projects - to improve the navy in some area or upgrading your fighterplanes, while the military uphold would be divided in several branches like Navy, Airforce and Army, which could let you choose what type of army you would focuse on.
If you're advanced you maybe even could have a taskforce that could be a sort of pirate unit that could to your dirtyworks. Or if you're a fundementalistic religious maniac you could fund terrorgroups that could be put in all over the world to destroy whatever upsets you. The possibilitys are endless .

It's true that it would be more strategic but the problem with calling it Strategic Warfare would be that you could make single-unit-combat strategic also. I'm not sure if it really can be labeled abstract combat. The whole concept just feels abstract when you draw out your plans and then let your army fight it out with your enemy while you watch both armies losing their troops.

 

[sir_schwick]

i'm saying I don't want that kind of abstraction in creating troops. I like the old paradigm of building units since everything that effects the game board is built.

 

[GoodGame]

j//k:

For a monster game of "CIV5--the last game you'll ever play":
(you've probably seen the telescoping, multi-genre game idea).

Regular Civ as the strategic game. Once a battle is engaged, option to resolve it in detail as a purely tactical RTS (not talking C&C/RON/AoE stuff, talking purely tactical with no puzzle-map retardation. More like Total War (actually more of a sim than a RTS) or a detailed tactical (I like WW2 Frontline Command although that is flawed).

And wait, there's more----zoom in on any RTS action to pause the RTS for a simulated second as the game telescopes to a FPS squad level game.


And we'll even throw in the Sims/RPG as your Great Leaders and Citizen Specialist can live micro-managed little lives, and go on merry and apocalyptic adventures as you vie for the extra beaker/shield/gp that they give to their city.

just joking.