What is War

[civilizationfanatic2000]

What is a War?

'It is against the enemy.' yes, but who is the enemy?

'It is against one champion, pitted against another.' says a tribesman.

'It is between two royal families.' says the feudal lord.

'It is between two Folk- men, women, and children.' says the fascist.

'It is between corporations.' says the cyborg hooked up to a supercomputer.

---

You don't get to decide off the bat what your civilization thinks a war is. You need to nudge them into a certain form of war. Levels of war affect what you can acceptably target- this applies to your enemy, as long as they agree. Breaking this results in morale penalties for your faction and morale bonuses for their faction.

The highest level of war is the most destructive. The lowest level of war is the least destructive. Choose what works for you at the time. In a world with nuclear arms, you may be inclined to try out champion warfare, but if you face your Enemy, the Anathema To All That Is Good, then nothing short of their complete destruction will satiate your people.

 

[Caesar of Bread]

War! What is it good for? Absolutely nothing!

 

[vorlon_mi]

War! What is it good for? Absolutely nothing!

Say it again! War! <uhhh, Good God y'all>

 

[civilizationfanatic2000]

I like the jokes but can we be serious?

 

[Boris Gudenuf]

War: an act of Politics by other means - Clausewitz

A method of untying with the teeth a political knot that would not yield to the Tongue - Ambrose Bierce

(War) is a creative Act, the province of confusion - German Truppenfuhrung manual, 1933

There has ever been a good war, or a bad peace - T. Sherman

War in every instance comes down to a Political situation that someone wants to change dramatically, and decides (rightly or wrongly) that Force is the easiest way to affect that change.
Almost inevitably, Force turns out to be an answer with a whole bunch of unanticipated questions attached. Solving one political problem with Force almost always leads to Another problem, for which Force may or may not be an easy answer.

Fundamentally, War changes both the victor and the defeated. And victory in one war has never been any guarantee of victory in the next one - quite the opposite: Germany 'won' the Franco-Prussian, Danish and Austrian ("Six Weeks'") wars in 1862 - 1871, then 43 - 74 years later lost two wars, her monarchy and her entire political structure - twice. Russia lost world war one, 'won' world war two, but that 'victory' cost so much that the Russian population still hasn't recovered 79 years later. In fact, the number of Russians on the planet has gone steadily downwards throughout that time and shows no signs of recovering to positive numbers. What Price Glory?

 

[Caesar of Bread]

I like the jokes but can we be serious?

It’s true. War is hell, it only ruins most if not all people involved. Killing young people for a lost cause you force the population to ardently follow, risking their lives for a twisted ideology.

 

[BuchiTaton]

What is a War?

'It is against the enemy.' yes, but who is the enemy?

'It is against one champion, pitted against another.' says a tribesman.

'It is between two royal families.' says the feudal lord.

'It is between two Folk- men, women, and children.' says the fascist.

'It is between corporations.' says the cyborg hooked up to a supercomputer.

---

You don't get to decide off the bat what your civilization thinks a war is. You need to nudge them into a certain form of war. Levels of war affect what you can acceptably target- this applies to your enemy, as long as they agree. Breaking this results in morale penalties for your faction and morale bonuses for their faction.

The highest level of war is the most destructive. The lowest level of war is the least destructive. Choose what works for you at the time. In a world with nuclear arms, you may be inclined to try out champion warfare, but if you face your Enemy, the Anathema To All That Is Good, then nothing short of their complete destruction will satiate your people.

I guess you are talking about an extended system of casus belli, war score, peace talks, war awareness and grievance.

Now you say that...

You don't get to decide off the bat what your civilization thinks a war is. You need to nudge them into a certain form of war. Levels of war affect what you can acceptably target- this applies to your enemy, as long as they agree. Breaking this results in morale penalties for your faction and morale bonuses for their faction.

Link the kind of war you can wage to your ideologies/policies/values is logical, as it is that these also affect the reactions to those war development and outcome.
Still player always should have some level of clarity of how to lead you civ to the game style you want. So explain an example of how player would "nudge them into certain form of war" beyond the current mechanics to select your kind of society.

 

[civilizationfanatic2000]

I guess you are talking about an extended system of casus belli, war score, peace talks, war awareness and grievance.

Now you say that...

Link the kind of war you can wage to your ideologies/policies/values is logical, as it is that these also affect the reactions to those war development and outcome.
Still player always should have some level of clarity of how to lead you civ to the game style you want. So explain an example of how player would "nudge them into certain form of war" beyond the current mechanics to select your kind of society.

Let there be a Volksgeist- a summary of everything your people believes. In a suitable gamist fashion, there should be a sliding spectrum on every position the civilization holds- from -10 to 10. You should be able to draw the slider to one side or another- but only gradually.

You also know more than your people. You can stage accidents, fake history, and do other things to fool your people into hating your enemy more and more.

 

[Boris Gudenuf]

Let there be a Volksgeist- a summary of everything your people believes. In a suitable gamist fashion, there should be a sliding spectrum on every position the civilization holds- from -10 to 10. You should be able to draw the slider to one side or another- but only gradually.

You also know more than your people. You can stage accidents, fake history, and do other things to fool your people into hating your enemy more and more.

BUT you never have complete control.

Even in the Totalitarian states of the mid-twentieth century, when complete control of information was possible in Nazi Germany and Stalinist Russia, both states still had pervasive evidence of non-conformity: religious icons in a large number of rural homes in Russia, anti-Nazi groups committing espionage and assassination attempts against Hitler in Germany - including people who should have been heavily vested in the State like Generals and diplomats. Ironically, the Abwehr, the German military's anti-spy/counterintelligence department, was headed for part of the war by an Anti-Nazi!

To mis-quote:

"You can fool some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time,
- And that better be enough, because it's the best you can do anytime."

 

[vorlon_mi]

What is a War?

'It is against the enemy.' yes, but who is the enemy?

'It is against one champion, pitted against another.' says a tribesman.

'It is between two royal families.' says the feudal lord.

'It is between two Folk- men, women, and children.' says the fascist.

'It is between corporations.' says the cyborg hooked up to a supercomputer.

---

You don't get to decide off the bat what your civilization thinks a war is. You need to nudge them into a certain form of war. Levels of war affect what you can acceptably target- this applies to your enemy, as long as they agree. Breaking this results in morale penalties for your faction and morale bonuses for their faction.

The highest level of war is the most destructive. The lowest level of war is the least destructive. Choose what works for you at the time. In a world with nuclear arms, you may be inclined to try out champion warfare, but if you face your Enemy, the Anathema To All That Is Good, then nothing short of their complete destruction will satiate your people.

On the one hand, I can see the possible game implications of settling disputes in the early game with champions pitted against one another. Having different flavors of armed conflict, with different levels of risk. We see these different flavors even in this century, with armed militias or paramilitaries attacking their targets, without necessarily involving nation-states.

On the other hand, I have to agree with Boris about the understanding of war between empires / civs being a large-scale campaign of violence. When civ A declares war on civ B, none of civ B's units or cities are safe. Units may be captured or killed, improvements destroyed, cities captured. I don't think that many or most conflicts rise to the level of "nothing short of their complete destruction" animus.

 

[BuchiTaton]

Let there be a Volksgeist- a summary of everything your people believes. In a suitable gamist fashion, there should be a sliding spectrum on every position the civilization holds- from -10 to 10. You should be able to draw the slider to one side or another- but only gradually.

You also know more than your people. You can stage accidents, fake history, and do other things to fool your people into hating your enemy more and more.

A more CIV like system is to let players to unlock and select different ideologies/policies/values for your civ and have some of these providing bonus and malus that would fit the theme of such selection. Things like:
* Propagandism,

-30% war weariness for your general population.​

+10% manpower recovery.​

-25% global morale reduction from defeats.​

+50% morale loss from defeat for the particular defeated armies.​

* Supremacism,

-20% war weariness for your main heritage population.​

+5 combat strenght for militar units.​

-10% militar unit production cost.​

+100% grievance.​

* Fundamentalism,

-20% war weariness for your main belief population.​

+50% morale of armies, garrisons and fleets.​

-90% spread of non official beliefs.​

+50% expensive research progress.​

*Interventionism,

-10% war weariness for your general population.​

+30% spies effectiveness.​

+3 envoys.​

+50% happiness/loyalty penalty from war defeat.​

So players dont need to micro a lot of small specific actions to gain support for each war, just global bonuses that would be usefull for certain objetives.

 

[The_goggles_do_nothing]

I don't have much to add other then this video, which a interesting commentary on war in the modern age:

How on Earth Did Winston Churchill Lose the Election Directly Following Germany's Defeat

 

[Boris Gudenuf]

I don't have much to add other then this video, which a interesting commentary on war in the modern age:

How on Earth Did Winston Churchill Lose the Election Directly Following Germany's Defeat

Whenever the Victory doesn't seem to have been worth the cost, the result can be as bad as a Defeat for the 'victorious' population. in 'total' war ala 20th century world wars, the extreme exertions demanded by the government make the price obvious, but that kind of disconnect between victory and demands isn't really new.

France won the War of the Spanish Succession (1702 - 1714) , in that the succession in Spain went to a Frenchman. But the 'victory' virtually bankrupted France, and the French government never got a handle on its finances for the rest of the century (taking part in big expensive wars like the 7 Year's War and the coalition war with Britain of which the American War of Independence was part didn't help: each war put the French royal government further In The Hole). The last straw was when the king called the Parliament of Paris into session to come up with new taxes to cover the ballooning deficits, and the parliament demanded reform of the entire tax system instead. King tried to send them home, they refused to go, cue the Revolution . . .

 

[Patine]

Whenever the Victory doesn't seem to have been worth the cost, the result can be as bad as a Defeat for the 'victorious' population. in 'total' war ala 20th century world wars, the extreme exertions demanded by the government make the price obvious, but that kind of disconnect between victory and demands isn't really new.

France won the War of the Spanish Succession (1702 - 1714) , in that the succession in Spain went to a Frenchman. But the 'victory' virtually bankrupted France, and the French government never got a handle on its finances for the rest of the century (taking part in big expensive wars like the 7 Year's War and the coalition war with Britain of which the American War of Independence was part didn't help: each war put the French royal government further In The Hole). The last straw was when the king called the Parliament of Paris into session to come up with new taxes to cover the ballooning deficits, and the parliament demanded reform of the entire tax system instead. King tried to send them home, they refused to go, cue the Revolution . . .

It's amazing how both the American and French Revolutions were orginally entirely over taxes, before any high-minded, enlightened ideals and government reform ever came into it.

 

[TyrannusRex]

War! What is it good for? Absolutely nothing!

For some reason, my mind went to "baby, don't hurt me" XD

 

[Patine]

For some reason, my mind went to "baby, don't hurt me" XD

That was the song I ALMOST typed in, right after.

 

[civilizationfanatic2000]

I can see some interesting strategies with this (if you add more in depth religions)

Let's say your religion is a warrior religion. You do not idolize the merciful, the weak, the poor. You idolize the vengeful, the mighty, the rich, ones with power. Your gods demand sacrifice- of animals or humans. The highest honor is to die in battle so that your soldiers may attain eternal glory in the afterlife.

Let's say you also have nukes. And your enemy also has nukes. And has the same religion.

You know where this is going. You don't want to go there. So, you can try to make a movement that views modern warfare as dishonorable, and champion warfare as the way to go. This movement might spread to your enemy and affect them too, meaning when (not if, when) you two go to war- it will only take away two men, not possibly millions of people.

But you can fail. You can fail hard and get your people to follow an even more extreme sect of the religion. You can instead keep going...and hope that whatever war happens doesn't wipe out the human race .

 

[Naokaukodem]

Whenever the Victory doesn't seem to have been worth the cost, the result can be as bad as a Defeat for the 'victorious' population. in 'total' war ala 20th century world wars, the extreme exertions demanded by the government make the price obvious, but that kind of disconnect between victory and demands isn't really new.

France won the War of the Spanish Succession (1702 - 1714) , in that the succession in Spain went to a Frenchman. But the 'victory' virtually bankrupted France, and the French government never got a handle on its finances for the rest of the century (taking part in big expensive wars like the 7 Year's War and the coalition war with Britain of which the American War of Independence was part didn't help: each war put the French royal government further In The Hole). The last straw was when the king called the Parliament of Paris into session to come up with new taxes to cover the ballooning deficits, and the parliament demanded reform of the entire tax system instead. King tried to send them home, they refused to go, cue the Revolution . . .

How to reflect that in a game like Civilization ?

I guess it's already kind of happening in multiplayer, when someone takes a warmonger civ and conquers its neighbours early : not only there's a fair risk of going bankrupt if you constantly build units, but if you lose too many your amenity will suffer too, and you are probably, if not surely, fall back in science. That's a risk momentum objectively, not considering subjective risks like going to war for too long (and then you basically lose) or like said earlier build too many units because "war war war" ! I know this well, loved to take Scythia and conquer, but had a tendency to overbuild horsemen when 5 (=10) are indeed enough. You may also want to build a couple commercial hubs right after your horsemen and maybe a couple campuses.

But in single player ? You can abuse the AI and can virtually stop any war that causes too many casualties to wait for the WW to vanish. Meanwhile you won't go into any war preferably. You have control on what you do to the AI and on your own people. There's no such thing as "might" that pushed monarchs of France to do so many wars. And it's probably not only because of "might", but more down-to-earth politics, if I can say. (politics can indeed seem everything except "down-to-earth")

What France expected to such wars ? Showing their importance ? I know it's still a concern nowaday, eventhough a little childish in my opinion. But it's the same as suggesting leaders for their mighty accomplishments we see a lot in those forums. So I better not underestimate mightness. Myself younger I admired Napoleon at school. Mightness can be inspiring, eventhough I don't think 99.99% of the people are trying to be mighty. (they are not fools) Did kings really tried to achieve something mighty ? Like being cited in books ? (I guess you can be mighty or you cannot, therefore kings are well placed for it. I have to admit that I wasn't king, but that I dreamed of might. That made my life and spirit, soul a MESS. I'm understanding this right now, however I have been fooled by sneaky, coward forces that I hope I will have my revenge on, and a bloody one - at the measure of the hurt)

To sum up : how to represent might in Civ, or if any, political reasons that force a nation to declare so many costly wars at the expanse of the economy ? (except from pure loss of control of the player on what he is doing, learning to play the game - what I can reasonably say I'm still doing)

 

[Bonyduck Campersang]

For some reason, my mind went to "baby, don't hurt me" XD

You and me both. Every time I see a notification for this thread and read the title, that tune starts playing in my head

 

[BuchiTaton]

I can see some interesting strategies with this (if you add more in depth religions)

There are a lot of areas were CIV already represent part of this like Beliefs/Pantheon/Tenets like also did Policies. I am more for a system were Ideologies cover different areas of your society like government, economy and of course religion. There is also the option to add a more open system of "Values" related to culture.

Let's say your religion is a warrior religion. You do not idolize the merciful, the weak, the poor. You idolize the vengeful, the mighty, the rich, ones with power. Your gods demand sacrifice- of animals or humans. The highest honor is to die in battle so that your soldiers may attain eternal glory in the afterlife.

I get the general concept, but to be honest the idea of "idolize" either the vengeful or the weak is not realy the best way to present it. Piety or Retribution do not ideolize negative aspect, they justify their way as the right doing for a greatest good. Authority to protect your people, Profits to provide abundance to everyone, and Sacrifice to sustain the cosmos. To get this right we must first understand that nobody built a society to be "villains".

Let's say you also have nukes. And your enemy also has nukes. And has the same religion.

For an Era with nukes and knowing what they can do this is beyond religion,

You know where this is going. You don't want to go there. So, you can try to make a movement that views modern warfare as dishonorable, and champion warfare as the way to go. This movement might spread to your enemy and affect them too, meaning when (not if, when) you two go to war- it will only take away two men, not possibly millions of people.

But you can fail. You can fail hard and get your people to follow an even more extreme sect of the religion. You can instead keep going...and hope that whatever war happens doesn't wipe out the human race .

This is something I find interesting, pretty much what Millennia is going to be about. Alternate World Eras like this one.
For example I had already pointed about a "What if.." scenario were instead of use industrial revolution for a mechanized total war of effectiveness and mobilization of whole nations economy and manpower, we get a different world were the idea of honor and champions turned into the use of duels between "hero mecha pilots", or at least more ritualized battles were armies of mechas combat without the dishonorable massacres of our world.
Sadly this is unlikely for both real world and CIV.