Unit Stacking

[Olaf_The_Great]

I think all this will do is limit early medieval unit spam and increase the effectiveness of army style units. Sure it will change the game a bit, but now forts will actually be useful.

 

[Thyrwyn]

ASL stacked. If you never played it, why would even try to suggest I was wrong on that point? Anyway, machine gun units, infantry squads, squad leader units (as hinted by the name of the game), and even vehicles could stack on a hex, representing 40m diameters, iirc. You couldn't stack more than X vehicles on a hex, and there were restrictions based on terrain type or buildings.

I played ASL. I also played SL. And, as you point out SL and ASL both had stacking limits (effectively 3 'combat' counters per hex). Which is still vastly different than the unlimited stacking you seem to be arguing for - so exactly what is your point in bringing up ASL?

 

[Ahriman]

The trend is for simplified UI elements based on cross-platform development supported by MS, in the form of XNA, DirectX, and GfWL logo progams requirements. My statements aren't based on dick-stroking. They're based on what you see in game development today.

There is no evidence that Civ5 is going to be aimed as a console game. You are just inventing this completely.

Didn't you see the Civ 5 video interview where one of the Firaxis folks doing the interview described what they learned from UI design based on their experience with developing for the console (revolutions)?

They learned something about simple UI from a simple game. So what? Simple UI is good. Doesn't mean simple game mechanics.

So while they haven't yet announced a console port, what do you think the odds are that there will be one

Low but non-zero.

Getting your panties in a bunch because someone else doesn't like seeing current game design - in particular, UI elements - being restricted based on out-dated console hardware and software limitations is no excuse for your ignorance.

How is a streamlined UI being "restricted"??

You couldn't stack more than X vehicles on a hex, and there were restrictions based on terrain type or buildings

So wait, your example is one that has stacking limits? Hmmm....

But ASL was offered as "proof" since I think it was you crying for "proof" of a game that is arguably one of the most complex, detailed, rich - whatever adjective you want - tactical level strategy game created

You can't offer "proof" without explaining how the system worked. Explain how it addresses the design problems of stacks.

I don't automatically assume 1 unit/hex is going to magically make the game more "tactical" - whatever that means.

It could hardly be *less* tactical than Civ4.

More tactical means; more relevant decisions and tradeoffs. It means; more decisions to make in how you use your units.

You complain about the Civ4 stacking system without addressing any of its weaknesses. Guess what; thats the system we've got now. So don't complain about a change without proposing somethnig better.

P.S. I can't think of a table-top wargame or strat game that didn't have some form of unit stacking within a single hex (or more rarely, square)

Chess?

 

[Aesir Rising]

You're trying too hard to avoid the simple admission that 1 unit per hex doesn't inherently impart any kind of tactical nirvana. You're on your own. Please bookmark the topic so it can revisited after the game launches.

 

[Sonereal]

Chess?

Again with the unit stacking complaints? It isn't like one or fifty modders aren't going to increase the limit or, like AND, allow the player to set the limit, within a month or two of release.

Can we go over why they're changing the system again?

In the current system, the player simply builds giant SoD (or several) and rampages across to the nearest city. In theory, siege weapons should've kept players from using SoDs but the problem is that players simply added cavalry and siege weapons to their own stacks which lead to a situation where the player with the higher technological advantage or more units had the advantage. Problems?

1. Terrain bonuses became sorta pointless after a while and so did corresponding promotions.

2. Every battle, more or less, became a recreation of the Battle of Stalingrad because the AI would eventually hole up in the cities.

3. After a while, there's no reason to pillage. It's quicker to just charge the closest city with your large stack than actually pillage unless you pillaged with an entire stack (or else an enemy SoD would pick off your lone cav pillagers).


Now, I wasn't all aboard for the 1UPT thing until I played a mod which allowed me to set it to 1UPT and I can't say I disliked it too bad (except the mod lacks unit swapping so I simply set it to 2UPT).

Now, playing 2UPT or 3UPT on larger maps (since again, units still are built in droves in CivIV), I noticed several things.

1. The battles are forced into the countryside.

2. There's a lot more pillaging and so, you have forces on your borders.

3. No more 1-turn Sealion-esque landings. In the mod, you still build transports but units can stack in the transports but once you arrive to the "beaches", it could take several turns for the player to get a large force to bear (or one turn if they spread their forces out and the terrain allows for it).

4. I'm actually using promos other than Medic, Combat, and City Raider. Especially Woodsman and Guerrilla.

5. Wars last longer than 10 turns and can be more destructive.

 

[Sonereal]

You're trying too hard to avoid the simple admission that 1 unit per hex doesn't inherently impart any kind of tactical nirvana. You're on your own. Please bookmark the topic so it can revisited after the game launches.

It's more tactical than sending giant stacks of death to a city and having battles that would make Stalingrad wince every city-battle during the Classical Age.

 

[Aesir Rising]

It's more tactical than sending giant stacks of death to a city and having battles that would make Stalingrad wince every city-battle during the Classical Age.

I see "giant stack of death" tossed around 2 or 3 times as some colorfully-loaded emotion-charged phrase in order to somehow lend some weight to the argument. It will be replaced by "giant wave of death" one day this year - a phrase more suitable for your clever Stalingrad reference. Remember: Giant Wave of Doom. You read it here first.

Let's promise to do this: When the game releases and you get a clue about how one unit/hex tactics are actually implemented, let's discuss whether anything tactically fun or interesting or enjoyable couldn't have also been implemented within the framework of a stacking ruleset. You know where I stand - they're not doing anything with 1 unit/hex that couldn't also be implemented just fine with stacks. There has to be some other reason they're doing 1 unit/hex now. The obvious answer to my mind was simplification with respect to the UI and user input controls - in light of an eventual console port. Another prediction I'll make without hesitation.

 

[pi-r8]

apparently a lot of people never actually learned how to fight wars in Civ 4, which is why they complain about how "all you do in Civ 4 is put as many units as possible in one stack and march it forward".

 

[Aussie_Lurker]

Aesir, the only one guilty of evasion is *YOU*! More than once you've been asked to provide examples of how unit stacking enhances the tactical element of the game, but your response has been to simply repeat your unfounded assertions & heap scorn on your detractors. Meanwhile, your detractors have been kind enough to provide numerous examples of how unit stacking dilutes the various, existing tactical elements of the game, & how 1upt can prevent this dilution from occurring. My advice to you then, sir, is to PUT UP OR SHUT UP! No, 1upt is not-in & of itself-a guarantee of more tactical game-play, but it can certainly enhance any tactical elements that already exist.
As to your assertion that its simply preparing the game for consoles-well my experience is that moving units as a single stack is far, far simpler than moving units individually. So, if anything, a retention of stacked units would be more indicative to me of a preparation to shift the game to consoles. As before, unless you can *prove* how individual unit movement (or even grouped movement of individual units) is *less* complicated than moving a single large stack of units, then your claim simply has no basis in FACT!

Aussie.

 

[Chalks]

1upt inherently increases the number of tactical decisions because the positioning of every unit affects the choice of positioning for every other unit.

Even moving a weak unit around a battlefield needs to be carefully considered since an incorrect placement could block a vital high power unit from being effective.

This is far more tactical than "throw stack A at stack B until one of them is gone".

 

[Thyrwyn]

apparently a lot of people never actually learned how to fight wars in Civ 4, which is why they complain about how "all you do in Civ 4 is put as many units as possible in one stack and march it forward".

Enlighten us.

 

[AlpsStranger]

You're trying too hard to avoid the simple admission that 1 unit per hex doesn't inherently impart any kind of tactical nirvana. You're on your own. Please bookmark the topic so it can revisited after the game launches.

I never said it *inherently* did squat. I did say that it was better than infinite stacking. If they somehow mess up the implementation in Civ 5 this fact will not change. I will *never* change my opinion that 1upT is better than infinite stacking because most random systems you could pull out of your posterior are better than infinite stacking. Civ 5 may or may not make good on the potential for 1upT.

Go ahead and bookmark it. Even if Civ 5 is the worst piece of crap to ever come down the pipe I'll still want a non-SoD system in Civ 6. SoD is awful and it needs replaced. I'm glad they're trying something else in Civ 5.

 

[Ahriman]

You're trying too hard to avoid the simple admission that 1 unit per hex doesn't inherently impart any kind of tactical nirvana.

I (and others) are providing numerous examples of how a 1upt system *potentially* offers more in the way of meaningful decisionmaking than a stack system *as implemented in Civ3/4*.

You're sticking your fingers in your ears and saying "no it won't, no it won't".

If you think you can add more meaningful decision-making to an infinite-stack system, great, please describe an example of how you'd do that. Put up or shut up, mate.

You're on your own.

I'm on *my* own? Are you reading the same thread as me?

 

[CyberChrist]

There seems to be some flawed arguments in this thread speaking in favor of the 1upt system, which may or may not be due to people mistakenly bundling all the good new ideas in ciV inseparably together with the 1upt system.

1upt does NOT inherently offer more tactical options than a stackable units systems, as all that rule does is FORCE the players to deploy their units over several tiles(where it is optional in a stacked system) - and this alone is actually taking away a tactical option (huddling your troops in a single fortified position).

It is ONLY the fact that they have also included true tactical advantages to having your units spread out (Flanking bonuses etc.) that gives the 1upt system an edge in comparison. However there is no reason such advantages to spreading out your units couldn't be implemented in a stacked system - or that the AI couldn't be taught the benefits of deploying it's units (and how to best deploy it's units) to take advantage of such benefits.

That a stacked system offers no tactical options is also flawed. Apart from the before mentioned bonuses that has been added to support units in adjecant tiles then stacked units potentially have exactly the same(more actually) tactical abilities/options available to them as units in 1upt system does.

A common argument against the stacked system is the fact that it is supposedly harder to kill a stack, but in reality how is the automatic ability for the strongest defender in a stack to step forward to defend against the next attack(in the stacked system) any less tactical from the way the damaged unit in a 1upt system can retreat and allow a fresh unit to take it's place? And anyway, that is what collateral damage is for (even though that could also do with far better implementation than in cIV).


Of course the big problem with the stacked system - as it has been used so far - is the fact that they can contain almost unlimited number of units, allowing for the justifiably hated SOD.

IMO then the better solution to this would have been to keep the stacking system and instead add incitements to spread out your units (in the form of true Flanking bonuses etc.), adding a primitive support system (ie. based on: food req pr unit, food available on tile, available tech and unblocked routes = support cost) and making the AI aware of the situational pros and cons of either stacking or spreading out it's units.


To sum up my view on this matter then 1upt was just as bad a choice as leaving in the existing SOD-producing stacked system unchanged would have been - a truely innovative solution somewhere in between would have been preferrable.


Finally then, of course, I don't expect to see this kind of system ever in ciV (not even with a mod), but then this thread IS about sharing our views on the 1upt system - and I'd also like to consider it food for thought for cVI.

 

[Ahriman]

1upt does NOT inherently offer more tactical options than a stackable units systems, as all that rule does is FORCE the players to deploy their units over several tiles(where it is optional in a stacked system)

Not true. In a 1upt system, I can use my attacking unit to target an enemy that is weak against it. You can't do this with stacks, because with stacks the best defender always defense. So there is little scope for using specialized units to attack.

In a 1upt system, I have to worry about over-extending my unit and making it vulnerable to counterattack. I don't have to do this much in a stack system, because I can just cover it with defending units.

Its bizarre to say that "anything you can do using 1upt you can do with stacks, because moving onto separate tiles is always an option", because all the incentives are to stack, and because your opponent is going to be using a stack.
I don't have the option to attack your spearmen with my axemen, because your spearmen are stacked with other units.

I don't have to worry about terrain in a stack system, because I can just move my entire stack into a position where the terrain is in my favor (eg I can keep my entire army in hills and forests, or I can move across a river into a single tile with my entire army rather than that river becoming a real defensive line).

Narrow paths that are only a few tiles wide have no real impact in a stack system, because I can just move my entire army along on a single tile. But they can have a huge impact in a 1upt system; you can potentially hold off or delay a much larger force for quite some time if they don't have the space to properly attack you.

Forts are relatively useless in a stack system, because I can just move my entire army around them and ignore them. Whereas with 1upt its much more difficult for me to do this.

Forcing you to deploy your army over multiple tiles *does* inherently change the situation.

1upt does a lot more than just add flanking, and many of these things are change that are instrinically difficult to do in a system that allows stacking.

but in reality how is the automatic ability for the strongest defender in a stack to step forward to defend against the next attack(in the stacked system) any less tactical from the way the damaged unit in a 1upt system can retreat and allow a fresh unit to take it's place?

Because if I have unit that ends its turn and gets damaged, with stacks I can easily bring up another unit to sit on top of it. But with 1upt I can't. If I use the last movement point of a unit to attack, I can't then withdraw it in the same turn; I must leave it vulnerable during your turn.

Oh, and at Sonereal:

It isn't like one or fifty modders aren't going to increase the limit or, like AND, allow the player to set the limit, within a month or two of release.

Hacking the game to allow multilpe units to be on the same tile isn't going to restore Civ4. The whole game is going to be designed around 1upt. This includes the combat mechanics (eg: combat doesn't always involve a unit dying), the AI combat behavior, the unit stats and abilities, and unit costs/resource system/maintenance costs.
You would have to rewrite *all* these things to get back to a system of stacks.

A mod that allows the human player to change the number of units on the tile is not sufficient.

Its like; if you took Civ4 and made a hack mod that made it impossible for a unit to enter a tile that had another friendly unit, the game would be a mess, and warfare wouldn't work well at all.
The AI wouldn't understand it, the pathfinding would get confused, etc.

 

[mjs0]

Stepping back slightly and considering the wider effects of infinite-UPT vs. limited-UPT vs. 1-UPT the following occured to me...

As a programmer (with some background in Expert Systems, DSS and early AI attempts) I can kind of get my arms around programming the AI to understand and be good with either 1UPT or unlimited UPT. Trying to get the AI to play well when it has to balance units between stacks of finite size and then use (and counter) those stacks of arbitrary size effectively is not only a significantly harder problem to solve it is also going to take one heck of a lot more processing time.

This may have nothing to do with the decision but it would have had affected the AI so maybe that knowledge was factored into the decision.

Personally I would rather play against a good tactical AI with 1UPT than a poorer/slower tactical AI with some arbitrary limited-UPT.

 

[Aesir Rising]

Aesir, the only one guilty of evasion is *YOU*! More than once you've been asked to provide examples of how unit stacking enhances the tactical element of the game,

One example I provided (Advanced Squad Leader) somehow got rejected because it uses stacking rules. I couldn't wrap my head around that response at all. It was even worse than the first response to my ASL example (which tried to imply ASL didn't have stacking rules at all). I can name other good games with deeper tactical gameplay than anything the Civ series had.... having a decent collection of old AH boxset games, like Kingmaker, Squad Leader (pre-cursor to ASL), some FASA box games. But I'm reasonably certain they'd be rejected for other similarly spurious reasons.

On a related note, I only just noticed how Thrywyn in post 162 started talking about infinite or unlimited stacks. Something I never proposed or espoused, but he attributes that to me. None of the games I've played in the past had unlimited stack rules, so we should try really hard to drop that straw man, folks. None of the games I've played has unlimited or infinite stacks. Even if there was no hard limit, there was some form of soft limit (like unit upkeep costs increasing geometrically as you increase the number of units in a tile).


So to be clear, and keep folks from making brand new up, I don't want unlimited or infinite stacking. And nothing about 1 unit/hex is going to automatically provide any tactical depth of gameplay or fun that couldn't otherwise be provided with unit stacking. Not even the big draw that I see a couple of you mention (horizontal wave of doom unit placement vs vertical stack of doom unit placement). There is no game design theory or rule that says stacking rules are limited to the Civ IV implementation. Nothing that says the strongest defender defends the stack. Nothing that says there cannot be some adjencency or positioning bonus based upon the composition of the stack. Several games in my collection, boxed and PC, serve as examples that the Civ IV implementation isn't the only possible stack ruleset definition. But that's too complicated a concept for several of you. And in the end mjs0 raises a good point: I suppose it would be easier to develop a 1unit/hex ruleset. And easier is better, right?

As to your assertion that its simply preparing the game for consoles-well my experience is that moving units as a single stack is far, far simpler than moving units individually. So, if anything, a retention of stacked units would be more indicative to me of a preparation to shift the game to consoles.

Unit movement from one hex to the next is just one consideration, and you've not bothered to dig deeper at all. I have. So, let's consider that 1unit/hex automatically reduces the number of input bindings by 3 as compared to Civ IV. The developer gets to drop alt+/+shift+/ctrl+select unit selection management functions as they're not needed - you only have one unit in the stack now. You also get to drop group and group-disband functions (don't know the keys for that from Civ IV. It was button that appeared when you had multiple grouped units selected within the same tile). Both implementations (stacked, 1unit/hex) can still retain group assignment and selection keys (typically shift+# to set the group, and # to select it). I'm pretty sure that what this means is a dev can drop the need for 5 key/button bindings. Which is gold when you're targeting a UI design for a controller that has a lot fewer buttons than a standard 101/104-key keyboard. But hey, you only mentioned movement. Not sure what you proved with that though.

 

[Ahriman]

I think the order of difficulty of programming an AI that can optimize reasonably well probably goes:

Easiest: infinite upt < 1upt < small but finite upt :Hardest

Infinite means that, like Civ4, you just program it to make a big stack, charge at the nearest city, bombard defenses down, then use collateral damage and then attack with units in decreasing order of survival chance.

1upt is hard; you have to look forward to worry about what counterattack you're exposing your unit to.

Say 3 units per tile is even harder again, because you have to also look at the opportunity costs; if I move a 3rd unit onto this tile, I am blocking myself from moving another unit there.

 

[CyberChrist]

Not true. In a 1upt system, I can use my attacking unit to target an enemy that is weak against it. You can't do this with stacks, because with stacks the best defender always defense. So there is little scope for using specialized units to attack.
...
I don't have the option to attack your spearmen with my axemen, because your spearmen are stacked with other units.
...
Because if I have unit that ends its turn and gets damaged, with stacks I can easily bring up another unit to sit on top of it. But with 1upt I can't. If I use the last movement point of a unit to attack, I can't then withdraw it in the same turn; I must leave it vulnerable during your turn.

That is only really a matter of introducing options - to a stacked system - for units to specialize in being able to target specific units/unittypes (like it is possible with ie. Flanking Strikes in BTS and/or the Marksman promotion from the FfH2 mod).

In a 1upt system, I have to worry about over-extending my unit and making it vulnerable to counterattack. I don't have to do this much in a stack system, because I can just cover it with defending units.

In a stacked system you still have to worry about being hit by collateral damage - afaik there is no such aspect in a 1upt system. Of course with incentives to spread out your units in stacked system your worry from the 1upt system would be present in a stacked system as well.

Its bizarre to say that "anything you can do using 1upt you can do with stacks, because moving onto separate tiles is always an option", because all the incentives are to stack, and because your opponent is going to be using a stack.

That is what my suggestion about adding incentives to spread out units in a stacked system was about. With proper bonuses to having your units spread out and the AI code in place to handle this then any player sticking with the SOD approach would (apart from facing staggering support costs) stand to take far heavier losses facing a player(even of the AI variety) taking advantage of the spread-out bonuses.

I don't have to worry about terrain in a stack system, because I can just move my entire stack into a position where the terrain is in my favor (eg I can keep my entire army in hills and forests, or I can move across a river into a single tile with my entire army rather than that river becoming a real defensive line).

Narrow paths that are only a few tiles wide have no real impact in a stack system, because I can just move my entire army along on a single tile. But they can have a huge impact in a 1upt system; you can potentially hold off or delay a much larger force for quite some time if they don't have the space to properly attack you.

Forts are relatively useless in a stack system, because I can just move my entire army around them and ignore them. Whereas with 1upt its much more difficult for me to do this.

Once again you are referring to stacked systems as they have been - not as they should be. In my suggested support system using stack of anything but the most moddest of sizes would not only be mindstaggerling expensive to support, but you would also risk hunger, fuel- or ammunition shortages in such stacks which would diminish the strength of the units present.

Forcing you to deploy your army over multiple tiles *does* inherently change the situation.

The situation is forcibly changed, yes, but that in itself just doesn't increase the amount of tactical options. It actually reduces the amount of tactical options available.

1upt does a lot more than just add flanking, and many of these things are change that are instrinically difficult to do in a system that allows stacking.

I wasn't expecting Flanking to be the only bonus (it is just the only bonus I am aware of at this point), but perhaps you'd care to elaborate on why you think that such bonuses would be more difficult to make work in a system allowing stacked units?


I stand by my opinion that it would have been far better to add incentive in the form of combat and economic benefits from NOT making use of stacks that even remotely resembles the size of SODs - rather than completely obliterating the possibility of stacks altogether (and the tactics that are only available with the ability to stack).

 

[Schuesseled]

You're trying too hard to avoid the simple admission that 1 unit per hex doesn't inherently impart any kind of tactical nirvana. You're on your own. Please bookmark the topic so it can revisited after the game launches.

Oh are you on the development team?

No?

Oh, then you must have a friend on there no?

No.... Well then I guess your physic to know that the guys making CIV 5 have just dropped a 1upt rule into the game without changing how the game works in any way at all.