What do you think Combat and Combat movement will be like on the Hex grid?

[PieceOfMind]

Ahriman, let me quote myself:

Modifiers like class bonuses, defense bonuses, situational bonuses like melee/ranged etc. are very likely to make a return IMO.

class specific bonuses are less likely than others to make it in because ...

I'm not suggesting class bonuses are likely to disappear, just that there are bonuses that are even more likely to be in, like bonuses that depend on formation/position and bonuses that depend on terrain.

I just have a confusing way of stating things, I think.

Why do I think class bonuses are less likely than those others? Civrev, plus the reasons I gave already. In civrev there were no class-specific bonuses, but there were other types of modifiers that were (usually) apparent from the interface alone.

 

[Ahriman]

like bonuses that depend on formation/position and bonuses that depend on terrain.

I would be relatively surprised to see bonuses that depend on formation.
They could be confusing to figure out.

[Exception; they've said there will be bonuses for flanking; I'm guessing this will be like the Backstab ability in Battle for Wesnoth, where you get a strength bonus if you also have a unit on the opposite hex of the enemy is occupying.]

But you can have implicit bonuses for formation without needing to make them explicit, because formations protect units from being surrounded and focus-fired, and so make it more difficult to get complete unit kills. So you're more able to preserve units and retreat them without having them die.

And you can have implicit bonuses for positioning from a class-based bonus system; I do better if I position my cavalry where your spearmen can't attack them, I do better if I can block your cavalry from reaching my archers, etc.

I think its more likely that we'll see these kind of implicit tactical incentives rather tha

Relative likelihood of different features being In or not is impossible to analyze though.

On terrain; I'm sure we'll get high-ground bonuses for some missile units, and probably some terrain specific promotions (like forester, etc.) but I would be surprised to see core combat bonuses for very many units that only affected particular types of terrain.
The one thing that could be interesting to see is to have mobile units like cavalry and armor do better on open terrain than forests/hills/swamps. In Civ4 this is modeled only on the defense (no defensive bonus).

I never played CivRev though, so I'm unfamiliar with that system, but from what I understand it was deliberately simplistic, and probably won't prove much of a model for combat mechanics.

 

[PieceOfMind]

Well given we've been told that archers won't do very well up close and personal, I think it's not much of a stretch to say there will be some modifiers based on position or formation. I think they've already said that having more attackers around a city gives a bonus too, haven't they? Maybe formation is not quite the right word I'm looking for. But positioning of units I'm nearly 100% sure will play at least a minimal part.

 

[Alki]

If we can flank then that also means units must have 'a facing'. Getting round the side or from the rear will be as important in Civ 5 as it is in real warfare.

 

[PieceOfMind]

Personally, I doubt there will be facings. That alone will be a major change from previous games. Also, they probably would have mentioned it by now or it at least would have been obvious to people who've seen early videos of the game. Remember this is a heavily abstracted game where turns take years and battles are fought over thousands of kilometres. Unit facings (beyond just the appearance) is an extra layer of complication I don't think the designers will have wanted. Besides, I don't think it was in panzer general was it?

 

[Ahriman]

Well given we've been told that archers won't do very well up close and personal, I think it's not much of a stretch to say there will be some modifiers based on position or formation.

I think its a bit of a stretch. It seems far more likely to me that archers don't do well up close and personal because they have a lower combat strength value.

I think they've already said that having more attackers around a city gives a bonus too,

I don't remember seeing this. Which isn't the same as saying they didn't say it.

If we can flank then that also means units must have 'a facing'

No, flanking need not require Facing. A flanking bonus can simply require you to have two units on opposite hexes around the unit.
So the semi exploit strategy would be to have a cavalry unit that runs down behind the enemy line in a single turn, giving every one of the units in my line a flanking bonus against the enemy they're attacking.

Personally, I doubt there will be facings.

Agreed, though just because its complex and unnecessary, not because it will be a major change. There are lots of major changes to the combat engine.

 

[PieceOfMind]

Agreed, though just because its complex and unnecessary, not because it will be a major change. There are lots of major changes to the combat engine.

That's kinda my point. They already have made many major changes. Yet another major change that makes the military game even more complicated tactically is not likely to be well received by fans of previous games. The 1UPT is already a pretty major gamble by the sounds of it.

I'm a little surprised actually that most of what they've talked about has been related to the military part of the game, when they have acknowledged that a lot of the feeedback they have received is about the culture-side of the game. I'm expecting to see big changes there and we'll probably hear more about it in the next info released.

 

[Ahriman]

Hopefully. My *guess* from the UI screenshot with what appeared to be a Culture counter is that we might be moving to culture as an empire-wide variable rather than a city-based variable.

Given that the main effect of culture is expanding borders, making culture empire wide seems the easiest way to make culture production of core (as opposed to border) cities actually matter.

 

[Alki]

I don't see how you can flank someone or tell who is at the side if you don't know which direction your troops are pointing their guns? Obviously the ability to form up in 'squares' is the counter to being flanked.

Anyway it's not an exploit to get your infantry to engage from the front and have your cavalry engage from the flanks. We've been doing that in warfare since we could domesticate horses.

 

[Ahriman]

I don't see how you can flank someone or tell who is at the side if you don't know which direction your troops are pointing their guns?

Because if I have a unit in front of you and a unit behind you, it doesn't matter which way you're facing, you must be exposing a side or rear to me.

Facing would just be a really annoying MM hassle; it would nearly double the MM of unit movement.

Anyway it's not an exploit to get your infantry to engage from the front and have your cavalry engage from the flanks.

But its potentially very gamey to get the flanking bonus for the infantry attacking from the front when you have a cavalry unit behind never that actually engages, and its a bit gamey if a single cavalry unit can allow 3-4 infantry units all to gain the flanking bonus in a single turn, as the cavalry unit rides down the back of the enemy line.

 

[Alki]

And to dodge that gamey bit give the unit a facing. One unit will attack from the front then the next from the side or rear unless the unit can use the square maneuver*. Or to simplfy perhaps the first unit to engage is considered the front and the second unit to engage is the flanker.

*If that is even possible in Civ 5.

Also we don't know if a cavarly unit can actually engage more than once per turn. They certainly can't normally in IV BTS.

 

[Ahriman]

And to dodge that gamey bit give the unit a facing

Not worth the huge MM hassle of specifying unit facing every turn.
I would massively prefer no flanking at all to having to a system that involved unit facing.

Also we don't know if a cavarly unit can actually engage more than once per turn

I think you're missing the point; the cavalry doesn't *have* to engage any of the units to grant the flanking bonus. It just has to occupy the tile behind the enemy unit at the time when you attack it.

In the simplest way to introduce flanking is for a unit A belong to player X attacking a unit B belonging to player Y to gain a bonus if there is a unit C belonging to player X in the hex that is on the hex that is directly opposite of the hex unit A is in.

ie three hexes in a row: A - B - C

This way, a cavalry unit in a turn-based system can walk down the back of an enemy line, providing a combat bonus
I move cavalry behind first enemy unit, then attack it with infantry in my line.
Then I move cavalry behind second enemy unit, and attack it with infantry in my line.
Then I move cavalry behind third enemy unit, and attack it with infantry in my line.

Without ever having to actually engage anything with the cavalry unit.

But this is all speculation since we don't know how flanking will work.

 

[Dunkah]

Combat imho is still going to be abstract enough that a unit could/should gain flanking on another unit it is engaging to it's front. Just like Cav against war machines in CivIV.
But it would be cool to have bonuses based on positioning (without facings). Seems doable.

 

[Ahriman]

If you gain a flanking bonus every time you attack a unit from the front... then its not really a bonus, its just part of the base combat strength.

In order for a bonus to be meaningful, it has to be conditional.

 

[EditorRex]

Three observations:

-- On the combat scenario outlined about where the units start out (Archers and Spearmen)

A A A A A
S S S S S S
S S S S S S
A A A A A

I would suggest a serious flaw in assuming this is the opening position and where combat begins.
If I have archer units, I don't want my enemies' melee units (or ranged units) to be full strength when they close. I should be able to begin picking them off before we get to these position. I can forsee several strategies to handle this. A) The row of archers in FRONT of the defenders to snipe an approaching enemy force. B) Archers angled on the wings the harass an enemy as it approaches the main melee defenders, then retreat to the position seen above at the last second, but with the result of an already injured opponent. If the enemy tries to focus on a wing, it risks being flanked by the melee troops and picked off by the opposite wing of archers. This formation will be even more significant if later units, eg. Longbowman, have the expected greater range.

-- On the Swap maneuver, I have played some Strategy games where the defender has bonuses for digging in at a position over time. This helps to somewhat offset the temptation to over-swap.

-- Multi units on a hex is probably a lost cause, but I just want to throw this out as an idea. I remember playing a hex-came that was a U.S. Civil War theme, sorry I can't remember which one, but it was from the 90s, in which multiple units were allowed but had absolutely no advantages and major disadvantages. Only one unit would be allowed to defend. Only that unit would risk death, but it was possible the other unit would take damage and could rout, become uncontrollable for a few turns. Also, there was a defensive penalty for having anything more than one infantry or cavalry unit and one artillery unit on a hex. The logic was that such formations made unit manuever difficult and generated greater confusion on the battlefield, so that orders weren't followed. This idea of allowing stacking but making it a liability would be interesting.

 

[qwerty25]

-- On the Swap maneuver, I have played some Strategy games where the defender has bonuses for digging in at a position over time. This helps to somewhat offset the temptation to over-swap.

That would be Civ 4, where for every turn you fortify you get a 5% defense increase for a maximum of 25%.

-- Multi units on a hex is probably a lost cause, but I just want to throw this out as an idea. I remember playing a hex-came that was a U.S. Civil War theme, sorry I can't remember which one, but it was from the 90s, in which multiple units were allowed but had absolutely no advantages and major disadvantages. Only one unit would be allowed to defend. Only that unit would risk death, but it was possible the other unit would take damage and could rout, become uncontrollable for a few turns. Also, there was a defensive penalty for having anything more than one infantry or cavalry unit and one artillery unit on a hex. The logic was that such formations made unit manuever difficult and generated greater confusion on the battlefield, so that orders weren't followed. This idea of allowing stacking but making it a liability would be interesting.

If I remember correctly Civ 1 and 2 allowed you to stack units. The downside was only one defender was allowed and if he died then all of the units on the same tile died.



One thing that will be important in Civ 5 will be how many tiles you can fit your units on against your enemy. Example: (O stands for empty grass tile)

O-O-O-O-O
-O-O-O-O-
O-O-O-O-O
-O-O-O-O-

If you occupy your spear men like this:

O-O-O-O-O
-S-S-S-S-
S-S-S-S-S
-O-O-O-O-

You would have an advantage over the enemy because they will have less chances to attack.


Don't forget about terrain, if there are forest (assuming they give better defense) you would have to choose between placing your units on the forest for better defense or on the grass but with more chances to attack.
(F is Forest)

O- O - O - O -O
- F - F - F -F - <-Place spear men here for better defense
O- O - O - O -O <-Place spear men here for better offense
- O- O - O - O -
^^^^^^^^^
^^^^^^^^^
----Enemy-----

 

[migkillertwo]

I for one love the new hex-grid style. It makes unit placement much more important than in previous versions of Civ.

 

[Aeon221]

Because if I have a unit in front of you and a unit behind you, it doesn't matter which way you're facing, you must be exposing a side or rear to me.

Facing would just be a really annoying MM hassle; it would nearly double the MM of unit movement.


But its potentially very gamey to get the flanking bonus for the infantry attacking from the front when you have a cavalry unit behind never that actually engages, and its a bit gamey if a single cavalry unit can allow 3-4 infantry units all to gain the flanking bonus in a single turn, as the cavalry unit rides down the back of the enemy line.

The extremely obvious and widely used solution to this exploit is to require a minimum of two attacks to gain the flanking bonus. So, in your example, the cavalry would have to attack the defender for the infantry attack to receive a flanking bonus. Thinking back to Panzer General (the original, I never played the sequels), I'm fairly certain this was how it was handled there.

It's unlikely that your horse dude would be able to do that four times in a single turn.

The other common requirement of flanking systems is that the two units in question be on opposite sides of the enemy, preventing goofy 'two dudes in the front, one flanks' situations.


Trip has been on this forum longer than me, and you can be damn sure he has a good understanding of how hexes and games like Panzer General work. I'm not worried about an obvious blooper like screwing up flanking.

Worst case scenario, it's not in -- not really a big deal, it doesn't make much sense on this time scale anyway. Best case, it's in and well designed.

edit: Also, lol at the people assuming that you'll be able to make a defense in depth like that. If you line up all your dudes four deep, I come around with my tanks/horseman/whatever and gangbang your archers from behind, then slow-kill your spears with my kiting archers. You aren't fighting in a closet, the landscape is big! You can't just pile all your dudes into a small space, stagger them, and hope for the best! That's stack thinking!

Spread. Out.

 

[Ahriman]

The extremely obvious and widely used solution to this exploit is to require a minimum of two attacks to gain the flanking bonus.

So only the second unit gets the bonus? That seems feasible, but not ideal, because it leaves invisible variables hanging through the turn.

You should at any point in time be able to see the entire state of the game from a fixed snapshot. If I save a game in the middle of a turn and then load it a week later, I should know everything that is going on.

I can't think of an obvious simple way to represent in-game "unit X has been attacked already from direction A this turn", and thus clearly indicate that a second attack will get the bonus.

Maybe this could be done with some temporary arrows on the map or something though.

Worst case scenario, it's not in

Honestly, this is my preference, I don't see any need for it.

Spread. Out.

I severely doubt that this is likely to be the best strategy.

The kind of combat systems where it takes several attacks to kill a unit, but healing is free, massively encourage concentration of power and focus fire to get complete unit kills.

If you spread out too far, then the enemy's concentrated power can come and eat you up piecemeal with minimal losses.

And if you spread out even just a little, then you lose the ability of a tight formation to screen units and to protect them from being attacked by more than 2 enemies at once.

 

[Dunkah]

Also, lol at the people assuming that you'll be able to make a defense in depth like that. If you line up all your dudes four deep, I come around with my tanks/horseman/whatever and gangbang your archers from behind, then slow-kill your spears with my kiting archers. You aren't fighting in a closet, the landscape is big! You can't just pile all your dudes into a small space, stagger them, and hope for the best! That's stack thinking!

Spread. Out.

I for one am assuming that this type of combat encourages line defense... because anytime you can get two or more attackers on a defender you will have an advantage. If enemy has 3 units all spread out and I can get my three units on one of his I am going to kill him. Then the next one then the next... perhaps once artillery pops up we may need to spread out but... until then I am assuming lines and wedges.