Naokaukodem
Millenary King
- Joined
- Aug 8, 2003
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WHAT?
Who hates Civ3's combat system?
- Thread starter Sark6354201
- Start date
WHAT?
Too far. Notice that the nature of the civ series has been highly simplistic up to now. Additionally note that combat playes a purely tactical role, not a strategic one (i.e. its about statistics, not logistics --who has more of what and where it is deployed, not necessarily how it is used and the limitations on that use.
TW is way too complicated a system for Civ3. Can't even picture something like that in Civ4, but you never know.
The only thing I can picture is some sort of really simple range limitiation like a gradual loss of health if a unit moves beyond friendly borders. I had something pretty simple in mind and I talked about it in another thread.
Hi all, I've said this before but it was a long time ago. I haven't played medieval war (or something like that) but I don't think that civ4 will have any sort of scaled down combat (like having armies have left, center right flanks), that's way too much micro-management (even for me!).
I think there are two major problems with the combat in civ3:
1- Almost all fights are "to the death". This is by far the most annoying and unrealistic part of the combat engine. I mean if an army is suffering too many casualties, they will retreat! In civ3, only fast units can do that (and they are indeed very powerful). The improvement I see is that a unit attacks another one, they start losing hit points (relative to their attack-defense values) and then, after while, it stops (or it can lead to the destruction of one unit if for example, one unit started with 5 HP and the other only had 2). Basically like panzer general. On the next turn, the defender can try to kill off the attacker (with the same unit if it's still alive or another one). This system is a lot more realistic and doesn't require any more micro-management.
2- Repairs and healing is free!! I mean this is so wrong and it's the root of so much frustration I think. I mean for example, let's say a (veteran) knight costs 70 shields (I believe). It attacks a veteran spearman, kills it and has 2 HP remaining. It should costs money to repear the knight! This doesn't require more micro-management either but it would make war more costly. Also, it would be less frustrating because if you lose a unit, then the computer will have to pay to repear its own unit so there's a slight downside even to winning. This would also be a lot more realistic because if you have 1000 men and win a battle and lose 500 men, the game right now says: just wait in your territory and pouf, they'll resurrect after a while!
I have other ideas but these are the two I think would improve the game in every way. My other big gripe is with the lack of difference between modern and ancient units. Not so much their ADM values but their construction costs (knight 70 and modern armor 120 ?!, come on!) and their upkeep (a warrior costs 1 gold per turn, the same as an aircraft carrier with 5000 men onboard ?!). Argh. I voted yes.
I think there are two major problems with the combat in civ3:
1- Almost all fights are "to the death". This is by far the most annoying and unrealistic part of the combat engine. I mean if an army is suffering too many casualties, they will retreat! In civ3, only fast units can do that (and they are indeed very powerful). The improvement I see is that a unit attacks another one, they start losing hit points (relative to their attack-defense values) and then, after while, it stops (or it can lead to the destruction of one unit if for example, one unit started with 5 HP and the other only had 2). Basically like panzer general. On the next turn, the defender can try to kill off the attacker (with the same unit if it's still alive or another one). This system is a lot more realistic and doesn't require any more micro-management.
2- Repairs and healing is free!! I mean this is so wrong and it's the root of so much frustration I think. I mean for example, let's say a (veteran) knight costs 70 shields (I believe). It attacks a veteran spearman, kills it and has 2 HP remaining. It should costs money to repear the knight! This doesn't require more micro-management either but it would make war more costly. Also, it would be less frustrating because if you lose a unit, then the computer will have to pay to repear its own unit so there's a slight downside even to winning. This would also be a lot more realistic because if you have 1000 men and win a battle and lose 500 men, the game right now says: just wait in your territory and pouf, they'll resurrect after a while!
I have other ideas but these are the two I think would improve the game in every way. My other big gripe is with the lack of difference between modern and ancient units. Not so much their ADM values but their construction costs (knight 70 and modern armor 120 ?!, come on!) and their upkeep (a warrior costs 1 gold per turn, the same as an aircraft carrier with 5000 men onboard ?!). Argh. I voted yes.
Some good points Plume.
For the first point, I think it would suffice to just add an 'Always Retreat' flag. This would be given to Armies and certain other special 1 MP units.
The main arguement for not doing so is to maintain gameplay at a certain speed and keep with the original concept's simplicity.
For the second point, adding a 'Repair Unit' option just like the 'Upgrade' option would do the trick, I think. A general 'Automate Repair' option would reduce micromamagment. As you said, you then lose gold proportional to the amount of damage done (just like upgrade cost is proportional to the difference in unit cost --I think).
Another thing that I would personally add is a default minimum recovery time (set in 'General' section of the Editor) proportional to the unit cost --units heal WAY too fast as it is.
The unit upkeep question is something that I have been ranting on and on and on about for quite a while now --I even opened a thread of this in the C3C Requests forum.
[Get this: one of the reasons I actually bought Civ3 in the first place was because I assumed it would have different upkeep costs for each unit , unlike Civ2 (only in gold rather than shields) just like every other strategy game. Needless to say, I was bitterly dissapointed when I found out they used the same stupid system..well at least units cost gold and not shields (at this rate we'll have individual unit upkeep by maybe...CivIV
).]
The two problems with introducing this into Civ3 are a) governments are already set up to change the standard upkeep, b) AI doesn't limit production accoding to what it can afford (i.e. will keep buiklding until unit start to disband).
Sound kind of like lame excuses for not adding a 'feature' that every other game has just because of minor government mechanics and a ******** AI but that's how it is.
The only solution I can see for this is to add an 'Upkeep Multiplier' field in the 'Units' section of the Editor (e.g. if you type in '3' as the value, the units 1 gold upkeep will be multiplied by 3 thus the unit actually costs 3 gold). This would not interfere with the government upkeep feature already in place. As for the AI, considering it doesn't take upkeep into account anyway, adding upkeep for certain units (like Carriers) would just cause the AI's treasury to run out a little faster than normal.
Aside: It just seems to me that whenever you tie in economics with the military aspect of the game, people dislike it. CIV is meant to be generic, hence its simplicity, but something like this would not take away from that simplicity in any significant way and would really give the game alittle more flavor IMO.
Something that would MAJORLY change combat is Combat Modifiers (i.e. unit have different combat stats verses different units). This would give TOW Infantry a real advantage s. tanks, or Pikemen vs. cavalry or anything you bloody hell want.
I came up with a system that would give absolute flexibility with little more trouble than adding a "x2 verses..." unit flag. See it here.
For the first point, I think it would suffice to just add an 'Always Retreat' flag. This would be given to Armies and certain other special 1 MP units.
The main arguement for not doing so is to maintain gameplay at a certain speed and keep with the original concept's simplicity.
For the second point, adding a 'Repair Unit' option just like the 'Upgrade' option would do the trick, I think. A general 'Automate Repair' option would reduce micromamagment. As you said, you then lose gold proportional to the amount of damage done (just like upgrade cost is proportional to the difference in unit cost --I think).
Another thing that I would personally add is a default minimum recovery time (set in 'General' section of the Editor) proportional to the unit cost --units heal WAY too fast as it is.
The unit upkeep question is something that I have been ranting on and on and on about for quite a while now --I even opened a thread of this in the C3C Requests forum.
[Get this: one of the reasons I actually bought Civ3 in the first place was because I assumed it would have different upkeep costs for each unit , unlike Civ2 (only in gold rather than shields) just like every other strategy game. Needless to say, I was bitterly dissapointed when I found out they used the same stupid system..well at least units cost gold and not shields (at this rate we'll have individual unit upkeep by maybe...CivIV
).]The two problems with introducing this into Civ3 are a) governments are already set up to change the standard upkeep, b) AI doesn't limit production accoding to what it can afford (i.e. will keep buiklding until unit start to disband).
Sound kind of like lame excuses for not adding a 'feature' that every other game has just because of minor government mechanics and a ******** AI but that's how it is.
The only solution I can see for this is to add an 'Upkeep Multiplier' field in the 'Units' section of the Editor (e.g. if you type in '3' as the value, the units 1 gold upkeep will be multiplied by 3 thus the unit actually costs 3 gold). This would not interfere with the government upkeep feature already in place. As for the AI, considering it doesn't take upkeep into account anyway, adding upkeep for certain units (like Carriers) would just cause the AI's treasury to run out a little faster than normal.
Aside: It just seems to me that whenever you tie in economics with the military aspect of the game, people dislike it. CIV is meant to be generic, hence its simplicity, but something like this would not take away from that simplicity in any significant way and would really give the game alittle more flavor IMO.
Something that would MAJORLY change combat is Combat Modifiers (i.e. unit have different combat stats verses different units). This would give TOW Infantry a real advantage s. tanks, or Pikemen vs. cavalry or anything you bloody hell want.
I came up with a system that would give absolute flexibility with little more trouble than adding a "x2 verses..." unit flag. See it here.
Commander Bello
Say No 2 Net Validations
I agree to certain points of you, Plume and yoshi.
But, you don't cover the whole problem. Nor will I, but allow me to add some comments.
a) Lethal combat:
Obiviously, this is a remnant from the original board game (as much, much more features are, as well - I will cover some of them later).
This is easy to implement and seems to be logical for a board game, where you don't have the time to record each and everything. This is, what Yoshi called simplicity.
But, since now the game is managed by a computer, there is the chance to hold track on many variables.
So, a solution could be to make each fight between two units last of 10 internal micro-turns. This would allow for an increase of hitpoints as well, btw. This increase obviously was thought of, since there is the hitpoint bonus feature in the editor (and for some units in the epic game as well).
It would require some changes to the way how hit point subtraction is calculated, though. AFAIK, at the moment there is no draw. At each micro-turn, one of the two units will loose a hitpoint, since only the attacker does a roll. To put it simple, the calculation is A/(A+D). So any random number from 0 to A is a win for the attacker, while everything from (A+1) to (A+D) means a loss.
As already said, this would require a change. Two rolls are necessary: one for the attacker, one for the defender. If A > D, the attacker wins. If D > A , the defender wins. If D = A, it's a draw.
Obviously, this would mean a higher probability of draws for low value units. So, for units with higher combat stats, there could be an additional modifier like (put very simplistic) win = (A-x) > D, loss = (A-x) < (D-y) with x and y subtractions from the combat stats to enhance the probability of a draw.
Again, this is a very simplistic model and might need some more elaboration, meaning more sophisticated algorithms. But that is, what computers are for, aren't they?
b) Retreat
The problem of the retreat is, that combat is based on movement points. So, no 1 mp unit ever has the chance to retreat from a combat. As you already stated, this is very unrealistic and doesn't reflect "real life behaviour" in any way.
With the combat systems as described above, the retreat option would become obsolete.
But, if you really want to have this option then it could be implemented rather easily, I guess.
It would be fair, to limit that ability for 1 mp units to the retreat in the very turn. This could be done by setting a flag "retreated" which would be erased in the second turn after. So, a slow unit having retreated (either as attacker or defender) would not be able to retreat again, if counter attacked at the next turn. A fast moving unit could, though.
Of course, the chances for retreat would be based on the percentages as stated in the editor for the different experience levels (draft, regular, veteran, elite).
[This brings up the fact that one experience level is missing: "green or novice". Regular units should be built in a city with barracks, but veteran and elite status should be given by combat experience only]
c) Healing
The basic weakness of the whole concept is that combat units do not consume population. A very productive city may produce units each turn and will not loose any citizen. This is absolutely unrealistic and seems to be another remnant from the board game times.
So, my first idea would be to make all units consume population. This has pros in every aspect, since it limits the ability for wars even for bigger civilisations.
But there is the next problem, caused by the adoption of board game principles to a computer game:
All figures are just much too low!
If a unit consumes 1 pop, you don't have the chance to have fractions of that pop (which would reflect the hitpoints).
So, if 1 citizens as of now would be reflected by 10 pop units in the future, a given unit would subtract those 10 pop units from a city (which, in turn, would have 100 pop units instead of 10 citizens, of course).
Under the assumption that the hitpoints of units would be increased to a maximum of 10 (for elite units), this would mean that a unit loosing 1 hitpoint would loose 1 pop unit.
It could recover in a city or in a fortress (under the assumption that fortresses might hold pop units as well - may be transported over there by workers or a special "refreshment" unit).
That way, you would have to bring your injured units back to your territory (or you could build "field hospitals" in enemy territory. Again, they would have to be provided with pop units by either workers, settlers or "refreshment" units).
These pop units would even allow for some units to consume more of them without killing off the "producing" town. A land unit could cost a little bit more pop units than a naval unit, etc.
All of this would require some changes to the game engine, but wouldn't require too much micro-management, as far as I see it.
So, the player could still play with some additional features, while the computer would have to do what it was made for: computing of the results.
But, you don't cover the whole problem. Nor will I, but allow me to add some comments.
a) Lethal combat:
Obiviously, this is a remnant from the original board game (as much, much more features are, as well - I will cover some of them later).
This is easy to implement and seems to be logical for a board game, where you don't have the time to record each and everything. This is, what Yoshi called simplicity.
But, since now the game is managed by a computer, there is the chance to hold track on many variables.
So, a solution could be to make each fight between two units last of 10 internal micro-turns. This would allow for an increase of hitpoints as well, btw. This increase obviously was thought of, since there is the hitpoint bonus feature in the editor (and for some units in the epic game as well).
It would require some changes to the way how hit point subtraction is calculated, though. AFAIK, at the moment there is no draw. At each micro-turn, one of the two units will loose a hitpoint, since only the attacker does a roll. To put it simple, the calculation is A/(A+D). So any random number from 0 to A is a win for the attacker, while everything from (A+1) to (A+D) means a loss.
As already said, this would require a change. Two rolls are necessary: one for the attacker, one for the defender. If A > D, the attacker wins. If D > A , the defender wins. If D = A, it's a draw.
Obviously, this would mean a higher probability of draws for low value units. So, for units with higher combat stats, there could be an additional modifier like (put very simplistic) win = (A-x) > D, loss = (A-x) < (D-y) with x and y subtractions from the combat stats to enhance the probability of a draw.
Again, this is a very simplistic model and might need some more elaboration, meaning more sophisticated algorithms. But that is, what computers are for, aren't they?
b) Retreat
The problem of the retreat is, that combat is based on movement points. So, no 1 mp unit ever has the chance to retreat from a combat. As you already stated, this is very unrealistic and doesn't reflect "real life behaviour" in any way.
With the combat systems as described above, the retreat option would become obsolete.
But, if you really want to have this option then it could be implemented rather easily, I guess.
It would be fair, to limit that ability for 1 mp units to the retreat in the very turn. This could be done by setting a flag "retreated" which would be erased in the second turn after. So, a slow unit having retreated (either as attacker or defender) would not be able to retreat again, if counter attacked at the next turn. A fast moving unit could, though.
Of course, the chances for retreat would be based on the percentages as stated in the editor for the different experience levels (draft, regular, veteran, elite).
[This brings up the fact that one experience level is missing: "green or novice". Regular units should be built in a city with barracks, but veteran and elite status should be given by combat experience only]
c) Healing
The basic weakness of the whole concept is that combat units do not consume population. A very productive city may produce units each turn and will not loose any citizen. This is absolutely unrealistic and seems to be another remnant from the board game times.
So, my first idea would be to make all units consume population. This has pros in every aspect, since it limits the ability for wars even for bigger civilisations.
But there is the next problem, caused by the adoption of board game principles to a computer game:
All figures are just much too low!
If a unit consumes 1 pop, you don't have the chance to have fractions of that pop (which would reflect the hitpoints).
So, if 1 citizens as of now would be reflected by 10 pop units in the future, a given unit would subtract those 10 pop units from a city (which, in turn, would have 100 pop units instead of 10 citizens, of course).
Under the assumption that the hitpoints of units would be increased to a maximum of 10 (for elite units), this would mean that a unit loosing 1 hitpoint would loose 1 pop unit.
It could recover in a city or in a fortress (under the assumption that fortresses might hold pop units as well - may be transported over there by workers or a special "refreshment" unit).
That way, you would have to bring your injured units back to your territory (or you could build "field hospitals" in enemy territory. Again, they would have to be provided with pop units by either workers, settlers or "refreshment" units).
These pop units would even allow for some units to consume more of them without killing off the "producing" town. A land unit could cost a little bit more pop units than a naval unit, etc.
All of this would require some changes to the game engine, but wouldn't require too much micro-management, as far as I see it.
So, the player could still play with some additional features, while the computer would have to do what it was made for: computing of the results.
Hey just re-read my above post and didnt want to sound rude, sorry.
All I wanted to say is that I find the military model to be secondary to the main action: understand the geopolitical aspect, so I dont see myself giving even more attention to the combat.
You guys forget that there are great wargames out there, and there is no reason to turn this fine civ simulation in another Korsun Pocket or Rising Sun, thx.
All I wanted to say is that I find the military model to be secondary to the main action: understand the geopolitical aspect, so I dont see myself giving even more attention to the combat.
You guys forget that there are great wargames out there, and there is no reason to turn this fine civ simulation in another Korsun Pocket or Rising Sun, thx.
Naokaukodem
Millenary King
- Joined
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- Messages
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HiroHito nobody said you anything, or have been erased maybe??
Anyway i feel that Plume's ideas just put back the system in more complexity, but averagely the same result. If units can heal freely, no need to retreat: for one unit killed, another killer unit will be able to "heal".
The problem in Civ3 according to me is that AIs are too much agressive and in the same time diplomacy possibilities are thin. Indeed the system of aweaken a civ little by little by winning epic/historical/strategic battles might be unperfect while treating of many civs. If only Ai civs would be aware of good objectives to follow and go with us without asking for a change, or only when we are the big who asks to the small. Big AI civs could ask us something also, without reward us of the only attention that they dain to pay to our ****ty being. I mean, ask for a MPP with your neighbour Big Babylon would cost to you all your economy during all the time of the MPP, i think it is just ridiculous. In the other hand, they had not any reason to do this, so we can see it as a favor to have a chance to balance things...? Anyway like that, any civ have honest objectives to follow and work for, and AI is not like "what do you think, we are not here to let you win and will not do it" but is just fair and smart.
Anyway i feel that Plume's ideas just put back the system in more complexity, but averagely the same result. If units can heal freely, no need to retreat: for one unit killed, another killer unit will be able to "heal".
The problem in Civ3 according to me is that AIs are too much agressive and in the same time diplomacy possibilities are thin. Indeed the system of aweaken a civ little by little by winning epic/historical/strategic battles might be unperfect while treating of many civs. If only Ai civs would be aware of good objectives to follow and go with us without asking for a change, or only when we are the big who asks to the small. Big AI civs could ask us something also, without reward us of the only attention that they dain to pay to our ****ty being. I mean, ask for a MPP with your neighbour Big Babylon would cost to you all your economy during all the time of the MPP, i think it is just ridiculous. In the other hand, they had not any reason to do this, so we can see it as a favor to have a chance to balance things...? Anyway like that, any civ have honest objectives to follow and work for, and AI is not like "what do you think, we are not here to let you win and will not do it" but is just fair and smart.
Naokaukodem
Millenary King
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- Messages
- 4,298
It must be Commander Bello if you want my advice, he is... weird. 
Aussie_Lurker
Deity
The way I worked around the flaws in the combat system was to both increase the number of hp at each XP level, and to double the attack/defense values of units each time you enter a new age. This has the effect of stretching out the attack/defense values a bit more than is currently the case!
Maybe try that out!
Yours,
The_Aussie_Lurker.
Maybe try that out!
Yours,
The_Aussie_Lurker.
Aussie_Lurker
Deity
Oh and, as it happens, I feel that the greatest flaw with the Civ3 Combat system is that they removed FIREPOWER 
!! This was the best aspect of the civ2 combat system and, like everyone says, 'if it ain't broke, don't fix it!' Hope they bring it back, either in an XP or in Civ4!
Yours,
The_Aussie_Lurker.
!! This was the best aspect of the civ2 combat system and, like everyone says, 'if it ain't broke, don't fix it!' Hope they bring it back, either in an XP or in Civ4!Yours,
The_Aussie_Lurker.
What makes firepower so essential?
If you really must have a lower population loss, better to simplify it by just losing one citizen on the tenth unit built or something.
Players see the loss of population when building Workers or Settler as a necessary evil but I think anything more would be would be pusing it.
As for the healing part, paying gold simulates the hiring of new military personelle while keeping with CIV's simplicity. Your solution, though clever, is definitely too complex for a game of this simple nature.
Adding a price to units could simulate the hiring of people at the outset (i.e. cost in gold every time a unit is built) and still keep with the game's simple format. (But considering how flustered people get over the thought of the slightest bit of micormanagement associated with combat, I doubt any of this will ever see light.)
Algorithms, so many algorithms!
Having slow units retreat only once is a pretty good solution. What about having them retreat ONLY when they are attacking --as opposed to fast units that can retreat when attacking AND defending.
Too complicated Bello. Personally I find that with a little rebalancing of unit stats, just having units cost citizens like you can do now works well enough. Problem is the AI doesn''t know who to use this --among many other things.
If you really must have a lower population loss, better to simplify it by just losing one citizen on the tenth unit built or something.
Players see the loss of population when building Workers or Settler as a necessary evil but I think anything more would be would be pusing it.
As for the healing part, paying gold simulates the hiring of new military personelle while keeping with CIV's simplicity. Your solution, though clever, is definitely too complex for a game of this simple nature.
Adding a price to units could simulate the hiring of people at the outset (i.e. cost in gold every time a unit is built) and still keep with the game's simple format. (But considering how flustered people get over the thought of the slightest bit of micormanagement associated with combat, I doubt any of this will ever see light.)
Commander Bello
Say No 2 Net Validations
Originally posted by Naokaukodem
It must be Commander Bello if you want my advice, he is... weird.
Sorry?
Commander Bello
Say No 2 Net Validations
Personally, I think this is the big mistake which has been made by the developers as well.
At first glance, bigger figures seem to make for more complexity, less intelligibility and more problems on the side of the human player. I have to admit this.
But - it is only at first glance!
If you would replace the current look of the city screen - where you see 10 heads now - with a line: 100 citizens, this would make no difference. Nobody would get confused by this.
Then, as soon as a unit is built, the line would read: 90 citizens. No confusion, either, since you know that units cost population.
Now, you bring back an injured unit to your city. At the next turn, a popup will appear: "Lord, healing our units will cost x population of y population present. Agree? Y / N"
This would require no micro-management at all, but add some strategic decisions to the game. It wouldn't be confusing, either.
The advantage I see in the pop consuming of units would be, that we wouldn't need that ridiculous concept of overwhelming corruption to "balance" the *BIG* civs, but that they would be balanced automatically. Any empire which is going to war in a constant manner, would be automatically limited since it looses (cost of opportunity) shields, money and population constantly as well.
Back to the top:
The current use of very small numbers is easy at first glance. But, if you have a closer look to those figures, you see balancing problems each and everywhere. How many people are stating that unit x is so overwhelming powerful in comparison against unit y?
And why is this? Because unit x with A=6 is triple of strength than unit y with D=2. But, what would be if unit x would have A=55 and unit y would have D= 25? You would have reduced the ratio from triple to almost double, without making y too much powerful, or weakening unit x too much...
Bottom line: small numbers are easy to handle - if they are not put in calculations and / or if there is no reason to have fractions.
Bigger numbers allow for more balancing, on the other hand.
Since all the computing is done by the machine, there is almost no reason to stay with small integers.
/* weird mode off */
Naokaukodem
Millenary King
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Nah, nothing. j/k. (wrong place i guess, btw i think that all people are weird :roll: )
(wrong place i guess, btw i think that all people are weird :roll: )You're probably right about that --although some players can be really...uh...slow...sometimes
.Actually, the idea's not bad. How players recieve it really depends on how you display it I guess.
The reason why I offered the cost in gold as an alternative is only because I have an idea how developers think and they generally tend to stick with the tried and true; notice that Civ3 is actually VERY similar to Civ2 in terms of the general game mechanics --bombardment, air missions, espionage screen and some other minor changes aside. I just think that the building a unit triggering a loss of gold is more probable (mainly because it requires virtually no change in the original concept's mechanics) than a change to the population mechanism --not to mention other issues that arise from such a change. Another reason is that people are used to this concept (gold cost) as it is used in virtually every other strategy game involving units that I know of.
I think it was while ago that I mentioned the possibility of limiting the number of unit that can be built based on the number of citizens. Combine that with a cost of gold and you have a pretty simple system for limiting unit production. Add to that variable unit maintenance and you complete the package: it is not enough for a civ to be large but it must also be rich in order to build the unit and stay rich in order to maintain the unit. Hence you tie the military to demographics and economics, which IMO is what a good strategy game of CIV's nature should be all about.
But would it really make that big a difference to the combat system? Clearly this is an idea for Civ4. I prefer to be optimistic that there will be another Civ3 XP that will sufficiently address that issue (one of the things I suggested for C3C was a 'Combat Seed' field in the 'General' section of the Editor --so you could set the odds to your preference, which is more realistic IMO...where Civ3 is concerned).
gen.dragolen
Chieftain
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- Jul 16, 2002
- Messages
- 93
Yoshi,
I've tested my own mods where I gave units a pop cost too, and the AI managed just fine.
Actually the higher difficulty level the better the AI did. At chieftan, they did have a bad habit of building hordes of warriors that ******** their growth, but for the most part, it did keep them from making the Doomsday stacks of 30+ ancient age units and then rolling over your lowly spearmen by weight of numbers.
However, it did make for one problem: what do you do when it's time to disband the units ? I made it so that they didn't produce shields, just population. This caused more turns lost to rioting than I had ever seen. This lead me to look at how effective the improvements were at increasing happiness, and found that I had to make temples and markets more effective to compensate.
This game design balancing act is a nuisance, with many playable nodes where the elements are balanced. Just a matter of picking a better one than the one Firaxis chose.
D.
I've tested my own mods where I gave units a pop cost too, and the AI managed just fine.
Actually the higher difficulty level the better the AI did. At chieftan, they did have a bad habit of building hordes of warriors that ******** their growth, but for the most part, it did keep them from making the Doomsday stacks of 30+ ancient age units and then rolling over your lowly spearmen by weight of numbers.
However, it did make for one problem: what do you do when it's time to disband the units ? I made it so that they didn't produce shields, just population. This caused more turns lost to rioting than I had ever seen. This lead me to look at how effective the improvements were at increasing happiness, and found that I had to make temples and markets more effective to compensate.
This game design balancing act is a nuisance, with many playable nodes where the elements are balanced. Just a matter of picking a better one than the one Firaxis chose.
D.
I think Sark really hit the nail on the head here. Civ 3 seems lacking as a wargame in large part because its more of a wargame than its predeccessors, but the basic concept doens't support the required depth of tactics. I'm in favor of shifting the balance back towards building, not trying to make war more complicated. Sure, its frustrating to have the current limitations in the combat system, but most people's suggestions to fix the combat system would make war decisions take up a lot more of the play time, and if I wanted that, I'd be playing one of those other games like Total War.
I actually like some of the innovations in Civ 3 relative to 1 and 2, like artillery and armies and such. And I don't mind the way combat is in the early ages (although I wish it wasn't SO necessary for victory). My real beef is the huge number of units that are running around by the late game. Allowing greater strategic use of those units (with left flanks and retreats, and cooperation between a dozen different units, and whatnot) would make manipulating all those units a little less tedious, but it wouldn't fix the problem that late in the game you spend all your time moving units around and not much time focusing on building you empire. I don't want to attack a city defended by 10 infantry using a giant stack of tanks and artillery and having to click to attack with every single one. I want to attack with a couple tanks and an artillery piece or two, and have a chance of taking a city that's defended by two or three infantry. Much like early in the game, when cities have a couple spearmen defenders and a handful of good offensive units is enough to give you a chance of victory. If they have to drastically increase the cost and power of late-game units in order to keep the numbers down, so be it. I want to focus on my empire's strategy, not the tactics of my individual military units.
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