Brandobaris
Chieftain
- Joined
- Nov 20, 2018
- Messages
- 3
Hi everyone,
It's my first post here, so I apologies if something like this was suggested before.
Background & Rationale
Now, I've been playing this game since CIV II, and unlike some, I think CIV VI has brought some amazing depth to the game, especially with the 1UPT rule. It makes combat realistic and forces you really think your strategy through.
But for the same reason, combat can be frustrating, and seems like many people wants the stacks to come back, and I agree.
For me, CIV is about strategy. You are the ruler; you decide what needs to be done and you carry it out by giving orders: build a campus here, train more soldiers, build a mine, etc.
Those are all high-level decisions, because most actions are generally high-cost & high-impact, and you are executing a strategy with each one.
However, combat in CIV VI is different, because it forces to micro-manage every action.
When I'm at war, I no longer "feel" like I'm a ruler but more like a commander. My other "duties" suffer when I have to move 10 units one by one and position them. Or worse, late in game when you are in enemy territory with 15 tanks and not one enemy unit in sight, I have to spend an awful lot of time moving them around and attack cities for a battle I've already won.
Stacks were convenient in that sense and realistic too from a different angle; you build your army first and send it out to battle. Now, 1UPT means I don't have an army but bunch of disconnected units. Even with Corps I don't feel like I have an army.
What I want, is to build armies, and give them commands. I want one army to attack a city and the other to occupy another city. I want to sit back and watch them do it while I focus on other things and intervene only if necessary.
So, to have the depth of 1UPT and the convenience of stacks and add bit more realism to war, I think we can have a Commander unit.
Mechanics
Early on in the game (after you complete Military Tradition) you unlock Commanders.
This can be a new unit type you train, or, even better, something that allows you to promote any combat unit to a Commander rank, say, after level 2. The latter would make you care for your good soldiers more.
The main idea behind commander units is that you can put a group of combat units under its control without breaking the 1UPT rule. For example, you gather all units around a commander, select the commander and all units within say 1-tile radius becomes an army (a promotion could extend that to more tiles).
Like Great Generals (GG), commander units could provide certain bonuses to nearby units. It could have a static bonus (less than a GG probably), or as the commander unit gains more experience, it can select new abilities from a different Promotion Tree (control more units, give more bonuses, etc..)
Once the commander is in charge of some units, you can give him orders and all units under its control move with him. It could be in formation, but when necessary break formation to adapt but they would move as one unit (the slowest unit).
In addition to moving as one, you should be able to give a him some orders for most common actions in battle. Same examples that comes to mind are:
Players can at any point, of course, cancel the order and take control, issue new orders, send new commanders to the field, split the army, move them around as necessary.
At a technical level, this is nothing more than grouping a bunch of combat units and automating their actions. The AI does this already, and you may argue that it doesn't always do a good job but at the very least, it'll save you the hassle to move all units one by one.
Commander Types
To add some variety, different commander units can have different bonuses. For example, if a scout is promoted to a commander rank, it could provide bonus movement, and a warrior could provide extra attack bonus, etc, but I think even a single promotion tree would be good enough.
I think the building blocks for this type of mechanic is already there. It'll take some AI scripting, some clever UI tricks and a new promotion tree to add more depth and realism to war and bring back the convenience of stacks and combine it with the depth of 1UPT.
Let me know what you guys think.
It's my first post here, so I apologies if something like this was suggested before.
Background & Rationale
Now, I've been playing this game since CIV II, and unlike some, I think CIV VI has brought some amazing depth to the game, especially with the 1UPT rule. It makes combat realistic and forces you really think your strategy through.
But for the same reason, combat can be frustrating, and seems like many people wants the stacks to come back, and I agree.
For me, CIV is about strategy. You are the ruler; you decide what needs to be done and you carry it out by giving orders: build a campus here, train more soldiers, build a mine, etc.
Those are all high-level decisions, because most actions are generally high-cost & high-impact, and you are executing a strategy with each one.
However, combat in CIV VI is different, because it forces to micro-manage every action.
When I'm at war, I no longer "feel" like I'm a ruler but more like a commander. My other "duties" suffer when I have to move 10 units one by one and position them. Or worse, late in game when you are in enemy territory with 15 tanks and not one enemy unit in sight, I have to spend an awful lot of time moving them around and attack cities for a battle I've already won.
Stacks were convenient in that sense and realistic too from a different angle; you build your army first and send it out to battle. Now, 1UPT means I don't have an army but bunch of disconnected units. Even with Corps I don't feel like I have an army.
What I want, is to build armies, and give them commands. I want one army to attack a city and the other to occupy another city. I want to sit back and watch them do it while I focus on other things and intervene only if necessary.
So, to have the depth of 1UPT and the convenience of stacks and add bit more realism to war, I think we can have a Commander unit.
Mechanics
Early on in the game (after you complete Military Tradition) you unlock Commanders.
This can be a new unit type you train, or, even better, something that allows you to promote any combat unit to a Commander rank, say, after level 2. The latter would make you care for your good soldiers more.
The main idea behind commander units is that you can put a group of combat units under its control without breaking the 1UPT rule. For example, you gather all units around a commander, select the commander and all units within say 1-tile radius becomes an army (a promotion could extend that to more tiles).
Like Great Generals (GG), commander units could provide certain bonuses to nearby units. It could have a static bonus (less than a GG probably), or as the commander unit gains more experience, it can select new abilities from a different Promotion Tree (control more units, give more bonuses, etc..)
Once the commander is in charge of some units, you can give him orders and all units under its control move with him. It could be in formation, but when necessary break formation to adapt but they would move as one unit (the slowest unit).
In addition to moving as one, you should be able to give a him some orders for most common actions in battle. Same examples that comes to mind are:
- Intimidate Enemy: Automatically move to a city you choose and fortify units alongside the city’s border.
- Occupy city: Automatically moves and positions all units around a city you choose; they fortify and wait but don’t attack.
- Capture/Raze city: All units move and attack the city until it is captured.
- Capture Tile/District: All units attack an enemy district or tile.
- Damage City: Attack improvements and tiles surrounding the city.
- Seek & Destroy: Search for enemy units and attack them on sight.
- Defend Territory: Defend a tile or territory against upcoming attacks or attack any enemy unit that comes close.
- Defend City: Defend a city against enemy attacks.
- Capture Civilians: Attack civilian units and capture them, etc.
Players can at any point, of course, cancel the order and take control, issue new orders, send new commanders to the field, split the army, move them around as necessary.
At a technical level, this is nothing more than grouping a bunch of combat units and automating their actions. The AI does this already, and you may argue that it doesn't always do a good job but at the very least, it'll save you the hassle to move all units one by one.
Commander Types
To add some variety, different commander units can have different bonuses. For example, if a scout is promoted to a commander rank, it could provide bonus movement, and a warrior could provide extra attack bonus, etc, but I think even a single promotion tree would be good enough.
I think the building blocks for this type of mechanic is already there. It'll take some AI scripting, some clever UI tricks and a new promotion tree to add more depth and realism to war and bring back the convenience of stacks and combine it with the depth of 1UPT.
Let me know what you guys think.
