Stacking Limits

[Ahriman]

It depends on the era and "type" of archer you are talking about.

True. But ancient archers didn't (didn't have the range), nor did crossbowmen (direct fire projectiles), and then you're into gunpowder. Longbows are pretty much the exception.

This simply isn't true. The sieges get more attention but by quantity alone open battlefield has been much more prevalent. Again it depends on the era,

Over the course of human history (especially ~1000AD-1750AD), sieges are far more common. Sieges are less common ONLY since the 19th century, when powerful artillery became available that could easily reduce fortifications.
The "Age of Battle" was really the "Age of Siege and Maneuver, with very rare battles" because battles were so risky (lose your army and your country is screwed).
*Battles* get way more attention than sieges.

I recomend http://www.amazon.com/Castles-Battl...1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1267799808&sr=8-1-spell as a good accessible explanation of some of the strategic tradeoffs in medieval and renaissance warfare.

From a gameplay standpoint perhaps

Well, yeah. And the gameplay design should be there to enhance... gameplay.
More first strikes would tend to fail vs units "immune to first strikes", which in reality still should be at a relative penalty when attacking archers fortified on a hill.

I tend to wait and see before I decide.

In general, I agree.

 

[DarkTempla]

A lot of talk about 1 unit per tile - versus the Stack of Doom.

SOD has always been odd to me, and unrealistic. I have played around with stacking limits in mods, where I limit 1 unit of each class that can stack together. Also tried 4 units of each class, which starts to be both more flexible and realistic. I have used 10 units of any type also, to limit the SOD effect. Even just that is better than original imho.

I've made a naval stacking limit so that only 1 naval unit per tile is allowed, but transports and landing craft don't count toward this limit. (or invisible submarines of course). I think that feels more realistic.

Air units - 1 unit per tile per original Civ 4 code. Just seems right.

I wouldn't worry so much about 1 unit per tile - I know they will get it right.

Hi,

Not directly adding to the ongoing discussion, sorry, but could tell me how to play around with those stacking limits maybe even provide me with the mod you made you were talking about? Cuz I also would love to try this out, but I never got beyond the most basic modding-skills...

Thanks!


PS: I agree to posters comments, that it might feel more like a big battlefield (tactical vs strategic map)... But we dont know for sure yet and all have to see!

 

[livin1492]

Think about previous versions of Civ...If the scale of one tile is 100-500 miles (depending on game settings) for example, there is more than enough room for several units in a tile and the maps we have been looking at in the previous iterations of Civ make sense. There's no problem there to be fixed - SODs just represent a concentration of units in one area, which happens in any real world battle. This scale also makes most of the maps in the series reasonably accurate.

Agreed. On a World map there are several places where this would be a total travesty. Panama Region, Sinai Peninsula, Land bridges around the Sea of Marmara (Istanbul), and a couple other zones. Unless the Sinai region will be expanded from what, two, three squares, to about 20 hexagons, this is a really poor concept. One has to put it in perspective... the Iraq War, the U.S. parked just about its entire fighting force in Kuwait before invasion. By this logic, these forces would be spread out all over Saudi Arabia.

 

[Thormodr]

Debatable. It depends on the era and "type" of archer you are talking about. I know for a fact British longbowmen fired behind ranks.


This simply isn't true. The sieges get more attention but by quantity alone open battlefield has been much more prevalent. Again it depends on the era, but especially since the advent of muskets almost all battles were fought outside of cities. Just think of WWI or the US Civil War. Also you need to be careful here. Sieges on actual cities were rare and usually extremely costly. Towns and villages were at times battlefields especially in ancient history but a well built city was very hard to take and much harder than any Civ game has ever reflected.



From a gameplay standpoint perhaps, though extra first strikes would have been more "realistic" in Civ4.



Makes sense. It definitely changes the perspective you have on your warring in the game. I don't really think it's either good or bad, just different. Some people hate change some people love it. I tend to wait and see before I decide. I'm fairly trusting of Civ's designers though as they haven't failed me before. I have played every Civ game a ton. Played SMAC, and the original colonization. I remember when Civ3 came out there was a huge crowd of people up in arms about culture being added. In Civ4 it was the anti-religion crowd. In civ5 it looks like the anti-single unit and bombardment crowds. Every time these groups disappear within a month after the games release. Either they hate they game so much they stop visiting these sites or they like it so much they are too busy playing to post, I'm not sure. Point is don't get all bent out of shape over these little details we have until you either play the game or hear reviews of people who have played it.

You nailed it. This whining, ******** and complaining is nothing new. They'll shut right up once the game is released or they'll keep on playing cIV. Some people need to chill. The sky isn't falling.

 

[dezuman]

Agreed. On a World map there are several places where this would be a total travesty. Panama Region, Sinai Peninsula, Land bridges around the Sea of Marmara (Istanbul), and a couple other zones. Unless the Sinai region will be expanded from what, two, three squares, to about 20 hexagons, this is a really poor concept. One has to put it in perspective... the Iraq War, the U.S. parked just about its entire fighting force in Kuwait before invasion. By this logic, these forces would be spread out all over Saudi Arabia.

Please remember that units will cost more in CIV5, so you'll have less units than you would in CIV4.


I really look forward to CIV5, mostly cos of the one-unit-per-hex thing. Why? Cos battle has always been the most boring aspect of the game to me. Very little tactics and logistics involved.

Now, it will suddenly be beneficial to limit the size of your army in order to improve mobility; Suddenly you can no longer park your entire army on a wooden hill and be invincible; Suddenly your enemy can flank you and destroy archers/siege weapons; The list goes on and on.

The biggest flaw I see is that the AI cannot possibly handle this as intelligently as a human player, further increasing the inherit human vs AI imbalance.

I can see the many flaws of this system. Just as well as in any system. But I daresay that the CIV5 system seems more interesting

TL;DR
CIV5 combat sees funner then CIV4 combat



EDIT: Oops forgot to check last post date. Soooo embarrassing with accidental page necromancy

 

[strollen]

Please remember that units will cost more in CIV5, so you'll have less units than you would in CIV4.


I really look forward to CIV5, mostly cos of the one-unit-per-hex thing. Why? Cos battle has always been the most boring aspect of the game to me. Very little tactics and logistics involved.

Now, it will suddenly be beneficial to limit the size of your army in order to improve mobility; Suddenly you can no longer park your entire army on a wooden hill and be invincible; Suddenly your enemy can flank you and destroy archers/siege weapons; The list goes on and on.

The biggest flaw I see is that the AI cannot possibly handle this as intelligently as a human player, further increasing the inherit human vs AI imbalance.

I can see the many flaws of this system. Just as well as in any system. But I daresay that the CIV5 system seems more interesting

TL;DR
CIV5 combat sees funner then CIV4 combat

I agree I am actually looking forward to Civ 5 combat system. Some other changes road maintenance and empire wide happiness not so much.

As far as the AI goes, I disagree although in truth I really don't know. I will point out that Panzer General series had reasonably competent AI despite it being made back in 1995. It featured artillery with range and every unit had an obvious strength and weakness. Now the PG AI was significantly better on defense than offense but it was still a good fight when cranked up to the toughest level. Firaxis has a lot more resource to devote to the programming good AI than SSI (the makers of Panzer General).

Most importantly if you think of the game with the hands down best AI in the world it is chess. Chess doesn't allow stacking and there is a front line held with melee troops (i.e. pawns) supported back line troops. I am not saying that Firaxis can take chess AI and use it for Civ 5, but I do believe they maybe able to borrow some of the ideas.

I don't think it is inconceivable that in the future that Civ V tactical AI maybe better than all but the best players.

 

[unity.zero]

will there be any garrisons, hangars or ports/airports (later in game) where you can keep your units in active reserve during peace time? since there will be limit of how many units can you have on a single tile, unit production will overwhelm the tiles that one country possesses. placing produced units all over the unoccupied tiles just because there is a unit limit over the tiles would be silly and totally unrealistic.

thx...

 

[unity.zero]

so you always have to keep your units around the countryside? not being able to garrison them in peace time is so unrealistic. one's country would be turned into a parking place for military units. how weird is that... infantry and tanks belong to the barracks and garrisons in their bases, aircraft in the airfields and naval forces in their designated dock yards. you don't see tanks or infantry lying in the open just for nothing. nor naval ordinance always on the open seas. it is (again) silly and certainly, utterly unrealistic.

 

[Senethro]

so you always have to keep your units around the countryside? not being able to garrison them in peace time is so unrealistic.

Unrealistic is fast becoming my least favorite word on this forum.

 

[BammBamm]

As it relates to Civ4's Stacks-of-Doom, at least during the post-Manhattan Project/pre-SDI era, there is a sure-fire method for combatting it:

 

[leif erikson]

so you always have to keep your units around the countryside? not being able to garrison them in peace time is so unrealistic. one's country would be turned into a parking place for military units. how weird is that... infantry and tanks belong to the barracks and garrisons in their bases, aircraft in the airfields and naval forces in their designated dock yards. you don't see tanks or infantry lying in the open just for nothing. nor naval ordinance always on the open seas. it is (again) silly and certainly, utterly unrealistic.

Welcome to CFC.


Served many years in the US military and never was garrisoned in any city. Ft. Hood, Ft. Riley, Ft. Leonard Wood and many, many others are way out in the countryside. In fact, most air bases I visited, and even naval anchorages, were not in major cities.

Even overseas duty, most garrisons were outside of cities in small towns scattered throughout the countryside.

I wouldn't say unrealistic...

 

[unity.zero]

Welcome to CFC.


Served many years in the US military and never was garrisoned in any city. Ft. Hood, Ft. Riley, Ft. Leonard Wood and many, many others are way out in the countryside. In fact, most air bases I visited, and even naval anchorages, were not in major cities.

Even overseas duty, most garrisons were outside of cities in small towns scattered throughout the countryside.

I wouldn't say unrealistic...

i agree. however, there are no hundreds of small towns scattered in civ5 as there are in real world. further more, as YOU said you were (never the less) garrisoned. you were not in the open countryside. being with military experience you know that a garrison may vary in size and does NOT necessarily means that there can be only one type of unit garrisoned there. further more... how about military bases? you know that some of the largest military bases in the world host thousands of infantry, tanks and aircraft all in one place. are they not stacked? (at least at that one strategic post) how many units can there be? isn't that realistic? should it not be implemented in civ 5?

ps. you served in many bases. well here is another one for example... it is called Fort Hood, Texas - The largest US military base in the world. a host to a 35.000 troops and 30.000 civilians. it is capable of supporting armored and infantry divisions with who knows how many tanks, mobile anti-tank guns, armored half-tracks and who knows what else... i would say that they are pretty much stacked over there and that there is definitely more than one type of unit.

thx...

 

[timtofly]

While I am not a supporter of SOD's I think that finally, going 64 bit will help out in the ability to scale the size of the tile for the future. Then add three 32" screens in a row, there will be plenty of open geography without units taking up the country side.

 

[unity.zero]

don't get me wrong. i am NOT talking about SoD. i am talking about keeping units garrisoned when they are not used for other purpose (attack, defend or support should country be at war). tile limitations can still apply. this is not the same. i am merely asking whether you can organize and 'park' your troops at one strategic place during peace time so you should not keep them scattered all over the country. this is NOT 'stack of death'. they should not have to move all at once. they are just garrisoned together at one post... like normally would be anywhere in the real world.

 

[Senethro]

So you're asking about being able to make defensive stacks, but not offensive ones. I'm not sure that would make for an interesting game.

 

[unity.zero]

garrisoned units don't have to be defensive. 'parked' armored units can not fight nor infantry being held in active reserve as well as parked aircraft or anchored ships. actually that is when they are most vulnerable... and not in full battle capacity. the power of military base is not in it's actual defensiveness but in it's supporting (hosting) units combined power when properly utilized. (offensively outside the base and not within the actual base perimeter). units within the base are battle ready not battle capable. (setting aside emplaced base defences)

 

[Thyrwyn]

but since there is no penalty for "parking" your units anywhere, why bother? Also, "garrisoned" means something different in civ terms - it means "defending", not "where the unit lives". Yes, this is different than standard English, but there you have it.

 

[unity.zero]

well... there is a big difference keeping say... ten units in one tile and ten units on ten different tiles doing nothing... but whatever. we'll see it all when the game is released, with all the pros and cons. and btw, since game will be moddable i believe there will be mods that will make this game waaay better then the vanilla version. just like civ 4.

thx...

 

[tom2050]

Unrealistic is fast becoming my least favorite word on this forum.

Well, 1upt is more unrealistic than SoD's were in countless ways when it comes to Civilization. The game took a big step towards unrealism and a supposed step towards gameplay. And with the possible leap towards vast micromanagement issues you think more would be concerned about it.

The one gameplay review I've read that said it wasn't as good as some of the earlier games had me concerned.

 

[leif erikson]

<snip> how about military bases? you know that some of the largest military bases in the world host thousands of infantry, tanks and aircraft all in one place. are they not stacked? (at least at that one strategic post) how many units can there be? isn't that realistic? should it not be implemented in civ 5?

ps. you served in many bases. well here is another one for example... it is called Fort Hood, Texas - The largest US military base in the world. a host to a 35.000 troops and 30.000 civilians. it is capable of supporting armored and infantry divisions with who knows how many tanks, mobile anti-tank guns, armored half-tracks and who knows what else... i would say that they are pretty much stacked over there and that there is definitely more than one type of unit.

This gets to the heart of the matter. The question is scale. Is one tile in Civ5 equivalent to the size of Ft. Hood? And, when you look on a map, do you always see all the small towns and villages or only the larger urban areas? At 1:1,000,000 scale, you will not see anything but the major cities. At 1:50.000, you will see nearly everything.

This goes for "units" too. Ft. Hood (wiki of Ft Hood) is home to one major unit, III Corps. That unit consists of Armored and/or Infantry Divisions and their support units. An Armored Division contains all types of units as well (including Infantry, Artillery and support), in proportion. Does a "unit" in Civ represent a company of Spears (225 people), or a Division of Spears (16,000+ people)? So how would Civ5 represent III Corps?

In simulation/strategy games they have to make decisions regarding how simple or complex to make things and what scale they will use. Some of the things we think make no sense may, actually, make sense if we understand the decisions they make in their game design. Something to think about?