posted May 29, 1999 12:17            

If you have an idea that is combat related, but dependant on another thread subject, post a condensed version of the idea in the other thread and point them here for the full details.

When posting, keep your ideas seperated. Post different ideas in different posts so it is easier to read.

Combat will be focused on these subjects:

Combat look and feel, the interface - if any
Combat factors and modifiers
Combat resoulution
Combat effects on units after resoultion
Any others that I didnt think of.

If it happens in the "CTP Battle Screen" equivelant, or happens when two units fight, the post belongs here.

Some ideas may more closely fit under units, supply and movement, or AI. Some ideas fit here AND there. You make the call.

------------------
Redleg

Small minds talk about people, Average minds talk about events, Great minds talk about ideas.

posted June 03, 1999 10:35            

I'd like to vouch for the current (Civ2+SMAC) combat system, it works fine. The earlier addition of firepower and hitpoints was a real good improvement.

Modifiers?
Maybe it would help if I posted the SMAC terrain modifiers from the manual Appendix 2 - Tables
Terrain affects on combat-
Artillery - + 25% attack bonus per level of altitude
Mobile units in level terrain - +%50
Rocky Terrain - +50%
(Xenofungus modifiers wouldnt apply on earth)

Plus the others I can remember
Infantry gain + 25% bonus to attacking a city. This may be a bit unrealistic . . but infantry need clear bonuses - cheap defense is one. How about they have easier times policing. Only infantry can police? I guess the main bonus to infantry in the real world are their inexpensiveness, ability to hold objectives, they are more fluid and flexible . . . anyone think of anything?

I liked the special abilities in SMAC, and think these could be transferred to Civ3 well, AAA tracking and even Chemical (instead of "Nerve") gas pods, Air Superiority are viable modern day special abilities. What about rennaisance, miedeval or ancient units? Could their be special abilities for these units? The ancient ships could be given "cartographer" as a special ability, decrease the chance of a trireme being sunk at sea.

If we are to maintain customizable units here is what I suggest.
1 Chassis are obesleted by others-
Like I said above a trireme's could have a "cartographer" special ability. On more modern ships, this is sort of a duh - ships won't get lost at sea. Later on a certain advance could obsolete the trireme chassis and one to obsolete that one. Instead of just a trireme having the chance of getting lost at sea, grant it to all ships, Trireme = 50% chance of sinking off shore, Sail boat = 10%, Modern Cruiser = 0.01%.

To sum up, here is a chart of naval Chassis, and some suggestions for naval special abilitys-

Trireme- "Breakdown" = 50% base move-2 hp1 fp1
Caravel- "Breakdown" = 10% " " " "-4 hp2 fp2
Cruiser- "Breakdown" = 1% " " " " "-6 hp3 fp3

Cartographer = halves breakdown odds
Double Hull = + 50% defense, carrys twice as many if transport
Double Size = *2 hitpoints, -1 movement
Ironsides = +100% defense to non Cruisers
Flight Deck = Carrier capability
Submersive = Submarine
Nuclear Reactor - (No Support?)
(help me out, I'm not a naval guy!)

Land units-
Chassis
Infantry (never obsoleted)base move-1 hp(variable) fp(variable)
Horses/Cavalry move-2 hp2fp1
Armor(obsoletes cavarly) move-3 hp3fp2

Infantry only
Gurreala movement thingy - each square a road when moving
Pikes - + 50% defense versus horses
Others -
Artillery - Bombardements as in SMAC
AAA defense - + 100% vs Air
SAM's - Attack Air
DeepRadar - see 2 spacees
Paraatroopers (Inf only?)- air drops 8 movements away from city w/Airport or Airbase
Gas Pods = double attack, atrocity
High morale - trained, veterans
grr . . I dont have more time I'm gonna think about this and get back!

posted June 03, 1999 14:35            

I propose that they adopt this notion, but only in what would be called "major combat." There would have to be a variety of units present, and a minimum number. And it shouldn't apply to taking cities; that's basic siege warfare. But it might be smart and fun to allow a few short battles.

posted June 03, 1999 21:21            

I think sieging should be an option for your military. Basically, you "surround" a city (cut them off from their friends through ZOC or road connection, put X number of units in their radius, fortified units in a fortress in the area, having more units outside the city than defenders inside, whatever, etc.) and cut them off. They immediately lose 50% of all production, food, etc. As people starve to death, the city starts taking massive happiness penalties and if it gets too bad, surrenders without a shot. Perhaps even units can be damaged/disbanded as the supplies run short. This has the positive benefit of forcing the defenders to have something resembling an offensive military to break sieges. Also increases the value of granaries. And this reflects a major military strategy that was the alternative to bloody frontal attacks on city walls.

Bombardment units should be able to cause damage/destroy buildings inside the city. Especially bombers and howitzers. This is historically reasonable. Even today if you go solely after military targets, you will miss sometimes (see Kosovo). Back in WWII, carpet and fire bombing were clearly the most effective way to bomb, leading to massive destruction. And artillery, even today, are not surgical weapons on the battlefield.

posted June 05, 1999 10:02            

I mean units with a defense strength of 12 and suchlike.

posted June 05, 1999 22:51            

What I propose is to come up with a set of rules where sieging can become a real option to a direct attack. Make it so that five units in a strategic position can effective cut a city off and put it a crisis without a direct assault. Make it so that cities will give up without having to be forcibly occupied. And make it possible for the sieged to break the siege. And make it a real risk that the city might surrender much more quickly than expected or hold out much longer than it should.

posted June 06, 1999 09:26            

I would like to reiterate a fix for a combat model flaw.
In the combat model as is units fight to the death way to often.
To fix this my idea is to make most combat end after a certain number of rounds.

For ground combat nmber of rounds be proportional to the HP of the attacker. Each round three things can happen, attacker can hit, defender can hit, or neither hit. Have 50% chance no hit scored, and the remaining 50% would be divided in the usual way.

For bombards (artillary and combat betwwen domains, and all air combat).
Have number of rounds proportional to the HP of the attacker.
For every round roll for the attacker, attack strength is proportinal to the % chance of the attacker doing damage.
If the defender is capable of hitting back (phalanx cannot hit back at a bombard) the defender rolls with the defese strength indicating the % chance of the attacker being hit. Both can happen in the same round)

Under the normal repair system there would be an imbalance towards the defenders, but i propose to make all repairs cost gold proportional to the shields worth of damage repaired. Lots of damaging but not destroying attacks would quickly drain the defenders treasury, then damage would no longer be repaired.

The targeting ability of bombard units would depend on tech level. Low tech units would just generally bombard a city, damaging units, structures and pop indiscriminatly. High tech could pick a specific target.
Whenever a unit attacks a city there would be collateral damage. Each point the defender takes a point could be randomly assigned to something else in the city, representing colateral damage.
This would emphasise defending outside your cities, because they are velnerable to expensive to repair damage. A good fortress system would be very helpfull.

posted June 06, 1999 11:49            

Well, I don't care about "true" history. I care about making the GAME better. One thing about the game that I don't like is that in the middle period of the game, it is too hard to take cities. Civ falls into a pattern of expand, perfect, assault, waaaay too easily. Perhaps enhancing siege tactics could make crusader-pikeman era offensive warfare more of a viable option. That's what we should be thinking about, not making this game like reality.

If you want to make this game more realistic, you'd play 2 turns and die of old age.

I suggest one redface for every neighboring, occupied square to a city. That way, if you occupy enough spaces, the city is sure to go into revolt, and a diplomat will easily be able to buy it.

posted June 06, 1999 13:10            

Personally, I think Civ should do away with buying out cities. You should be able to incite revolts with spies. Then you have three possibilities:
1) The revolts are put down. Perhaps the city gets a happiness penalty for several turns or something.
2) The city declares its independence (ala CTP).
3) The city joins another civ (not necessarily yours). Ethnicity could play a big deal here.

My reasoning is that one of my most successful Civ2 combat strategies was to sack and destroy the enemy capital (may take several tries) and then buyout the rest of their cities cheap. To me, that strategy shouldn't work. To defeat an enemy I should have to conquer him or cause unpredictable political instability, not just throw money around and buy everyone like the "Million Dollar Man" Ted DiBiase.

posted June 08, 1999 10:37            

I like the idea that an enemy unit in the city radius causes unhappiness to the city. This could produce similar effects to those that I was describing since unhappy citizens will require entertainers that were formerly working the land or doing other valuable labor. The loss of production, food and whatnot becomes obvious.

Furthermore, I think that if you put 3 units in one square, it should cause 3 unhappiness. (or something similar). Grouping your units together should provide a better defense (assuming they get rid of the silly kill one unit and the 25 unit stack dies with it thing), makes sieging easier and is fairly historically accurate (the army camps in one place and patrols the surrounding area to keep people out/in). Plus, if you have real gall, build a fort on that square and make the enemy's life real miserable.

Of course, I am open to any set of "siege" rules as long as it makes it a viable combat option. There are a lot of ways that it can be handled. For example, instead of causing unhappiness, the unit blocks the use of all the squares in its ZOC. One well placed unit can render 6 squares useless. If those are used squares, it could be devastating. Of course, if those square are worthless swamp, the city would be generally unaffected.

There could also be a minimum number of units that would be needed for a siege. It could be a fixed (3 units min) or relative (at least half the number of defenders) amount. If you have 1 "siege" unit and the enemy has 5 defenders, a siege shouldn't work. Sure, I can disrupt that one square, but the most damage I could pull off is a disruption of trade and production, not a full-blown crisis. Most likely, my "siege" unit would be playing hide and seek (like a guerrilla or a pirate), attacking targets of opportunity while evading patrols sent to hunt me down. To truly siege a city, it needs to be cut off, which requires a force of some significant size that requires a direct confrontation to get rid of it.

Perhaps sieges could require at least one "siege" weapon. Like a catapult, or a cannon or artillery. Or perhaps siege weapons could reduce the number of units needed to pull off a siege.

You can have a specific number of requirements that need to be met for the siege to start. If you meet requirements A, B and C, the city takes a 50% penalty in everything.

BTW, ships should be allowed to help "siege." They would "blockade" water squares.

However, the important key element is that the city must be forced to eventually surrender if the siege is not lifted. Otherwise, sieging is just organized vandalism, which while hurting the enemy, is not much of an ego boost. Having a city go into riots and grovel at your feet for mercy is a lot more fun than just making their life miserable.

If ethnicity is implemented (WHICH IT SHOULD!), sieges should be considered an event that hurts the relationship between two ethnic groups. Starving people out does not make friends.

posted June 10, 1999 10:41            

Also, the number of units in a city should affect the price. Now, it's to easy to "allow" the AI to take a small city, move in half its army, and buy it. At the same time, bribing units should be alot easier.

"Furthermore, I think that if you put 3 units in one square, it should cause 3 unhappiness."

Disagree. This would make siege too powerful. Think about it--you build a fortress on a hill two squares away, and continue feeding units in. What if you have 10 units in one fortress? Should that really make 10 redfaces?

Also, overlapping squares shouldn't count for this. A unit in my city radius and an AIs shouldn't cause unhappiness in either.

posted June 10, 1999 10:58         

Suggestion for a concept to reduce the micromanagement:

The ability to group units into larger entities and formation editor to place the subunits of an army in desired positions:

Example:

code:

---

xxx = Militia, XXX = Legionnares, ooo = Light archers, !!! = Light Cavalry
                                                                     Front
                                                                      Rear
Marching                               Formation #1
                                  Default                               Attack
    !!!
    !!!                                                       !!!           XXX           !!!  
    !!!                                                           !!! XXX   XXX !!!
   xxx             !!!   !!!  XXX  !!!   !!!          xxx                       xxx
   xxx            xxx XXX xxx XXX xxx                      xxx
  XXX                 ooo ooo ooo                    ooo ooo ooo
  XXX
  XXX                                                                Defence
  ooo                                                                      xxx
  ooo                                                !!! !!! XXX XXX XXX !!! !!!
  ooo                                                      xxx  ooo ooo ooo  xxx
   xxx
    !!!

---

Thus, you could combine frex. four units into one army, combine that army with two others and include some more light units as screening forces and so on.

Combine this with some buttons to highlight obsolete units or other useful stuff. Reducing micxromanagement (in moving many units at the same time) as well giving more options to customise your armies.

[This message has been edited by Ove (edited June 10, 1999).]

[This message has been edited by Ove (edited June 10, 1999).]

posted June 10, 1999 11:14         

Marching formation: Basically just a line of troops with a userdefined order of the component units. Designed for maximum speed (every unit gets to walk along a road for instance, instead of just traveling parallell to it). Being ambushed in this formation is not good.

Default position: Starting position on a battlefield.

Attack position: Describes the desired position of the units in an advance forward.

Defence position: Ditto for the defending position.

If the battle is played out in a combat window, each unit starts in its designated position and then moves into its attack or defence position depending on what strategic role the whole grouping plays.

In ancient times (slow messengers), the player shouldn't be able to influence the formation once a battle has begun, unless the king is present in the army.

posted June 10, 1999 11:28         

code:

---

Never mind                                                
                   I
                     found
                           it !  

---

posted June 10, 1999 12:35            

The overlapping city radius wouldn't be a problem as a siege is an act of war so a civ can't siege without being at war anyway. With borders, the whole issue becomes moot.

As for spies, I still think that buying revolts is too easy (and unrealistic) even with higher prices. The revolt should not be a sure thing (the revolt may work, it may be crushed). Even if the revolt works, there should be no guarantee that you get to annex the city if the inhabitants don't particularly like you and thus declare independence. And some cities just shouldn't revolt. If the citizens are all happy, why would they revolt? Only cities that have some level of unhappiness or have an ethnic background similar or friendly to your own should be willing to revolt at all. If Communism really worked, there would be little unrest...

posted June 10, 1999 13:24            

Some of my most fun games are when I try to win with only X cities. The best I've done so far is 5. But if two spies had a good chance of taking out 20% of my empire...that would be rough. This rule balances fundy-expansionism and demo-perfectionism.

posted June 11, 1999 11:00            

1. Game balance. All you'd have to do when fighting a democracy is put 5 units into a fortress, and the city goes into revolt, or has to take so many squares out of production that the city will very soon starve.

posted June 12, 1999 12:28            

Use some combat modifiers, such as morale and giving special abilities to certin units (giving a besieged city the pleauge by launching dead beasts into the city walls). -Pythagoras / NotLikeTea

Use an optional battle plan phase where you choose formations and order of battle, then watch the fight. - Flavor Dave / Ove

Give the ability to destroy buildings and infrastructre to the land and air forces, rather than only being able to destroy units.

Automate the siege process. Perhaps cause unhappiness in the victim city per unit involved in the siege. (controversy on the unhappiness factor)

Give the ability to destroy a city completely, rather than captureing it. This would cause refugees and/or slaves.

Automate the manouvere of military forces though "stacks" (CTPesqe) or armies (collections of units, like a stack, but representing a hard number of men and equipment rather than abstract "units") - Eggman

Use more levels of difference between units. Such as 1st Generation Armor, 2nd Generation Armor, etc... - Chowlett

Do not have units absolutely fight to the death, but rather give the attacker a chance to withdraw by moving combat in stages or phases or turns.

Increase the probability of "bombardment" attacks hitting thier intended target (a unit, building, or infrasructure) as the technology increases. - Ember

Spies are too powerfull, tone them down. - Eggman (others)

This is only a summary and very distilled collection of your ideas. If I left out an important part of an idea, or have misinterperted your idea - let me know. I will be on military training for 2 weeks and hope to see the great ideas still rolling when I get back!

------------------
Redleg

posted June 13, 1999 18:39            

I for once would like to see morale done differently. Human beings are usually interested in staying alive not dieing in armed conflicts. Perhaps this morale system should be looked at...

Morale should govern when a unit "breaks" in combat. The game cheaks morale when a unit is at a certain percentage of damage. If the unit doesn't break then when the unit takes more damage the unit makes additional morale cheaks unit either the unit is healed above it's "damage limit" or it breaks. A broken unit either retreats or surrenders if there is no neighbooring squares that it can flee into. Broken units stay broken until they at maxiumn health.

posted June 14, 1999 10:29            

Also, (I think I also said this under units thread) cities should be more expensive, but units cheaper.

Last, I'd like to see the overall happiness of a city affect the price. From what I've read of MP, bribing is too powerful. But what if you could put luxury at 10%, and get a light blueface and no reds, making the city more expensive.

posted June 14, 1999 17:30            

For each city there is a certain cumulative combat rating required to siege it depending on size and defenders. Less than that can be used, it is a blockade.

If the exact siege amount is used to food accumulates, and no units may be deployed / produced to the city. Repairs still can be conducted. If less is used it reduces the food accumulation and production proportianal to the fraction used. If more than this amount is used, there is a net food loss, depending on how much more than the required number (no food at all is 2 - 3 times the minimum siege combat rating)

Certain units, like catapults, artillery, etc count as double the combat rating.

Units with bombard can still bombard the city, but bambard units in the city can hit back. Either side can disside to launch a direct offensive. Small blockades will only be effective agains a city with no offensive units inside.

When all stored food runs out, population loss occurs. There is also a % chance per turn that a besieged city surreders.

Bombards on a city do collateral hits to other units / structures / population than the target.

posted June 15, 1999 12:39         

When a city is surrounded (via zones of control) it should not be able to draw sustenance from the surrounding countryside. In other words, all it should have is what is in the food box. Once that's gone the city should surrender. Historically, I can't think of any examples of cities actually completely starving to death whilst besieged. No food, no water usually means no more fighting or th defenders having to try and fight to break the siege.

If implemented I see three effects:

. A more dynamic game

. Emphasis on fighting in the countryside rather than around cities because once a city is besieged it will usually be all over red rover (though there will still be time for sieges whilst the food box drains down).
. Forces you or your opponents to fight to save cities rather than sitting passively behind city walls.

posted June 15, 1999 07:15         

How about having military sub-phases in each turn. Variable number depending on how long a main turn is and maybe on the command structure and technological capabilities of each civilization.

That way we can have sieges and great wars in less span than (for instance) 20 years.

I do not mean that the military phases will be active all the time (although there will probably be a war going on somewhere in the world).
OK, let me flesh this out with an example:
(current turn advancement is 5 years)
MAIN PHASE: Diplomacy, production, research
optional military phase 1: Calls up 5 armies from reserve status, deploys them in strategic mode (unable to use this phase).
omp 2: Sends 8 armies over the border to attack a neighbouring country, 3 of these armies besiege 3 cities and the other 5 screens those from attack. Combat resolution.
omp 3: Enemy reacts, you both move armies and fight.
omp 4: (wishing to save money/manpower/resources) you order victorious besieging armies to fortify in the cities, and the other armies to stay in place. However the enemy continues to attack you.

New turn:
MAIN PHASE: diplomacy/production/research
omp 1: redeployment of 2 armies to reinforce the combat front. Enemy attacking.
omp 2: No combat or deployment from any side.
military phase ends.

New turn:
MAIN PHASE: diplomacy/production/research, peaceagreement
omp 1: withdrawal and demobilising of 4 armies. no further military activity.

Next turn:
MAIN PHASE: ...
no military activity

Next next turn: ...
and so on.

[This message has been edited by Ove (edited June 15, 1999).]

posted June 15, 1999 07:23            

If the timescale changes, war becomes a sub game. Since time is slower, building is less important, research is less important, growth is less important...

I'd rather have too long wars than being dropped into another detached game for war. Realistic? No.. but more enjoyable, more epic in nature, and in the end, more exciting.

posted June 15, 1999 09:20            

first i think the present civ2/SMAC combat system needs to be changed my ideas are along the lines of other posters in this thread

1. combat is divided into rounds

2. some sort of stack/multiple units in combat at once

3. all units have these factors

attack: the amount of damage your unit does when a hit is landed

defense: the amount of damage cancled out when a hit is landed (could only lower damage to one point)

hit points: the amount of damage a unit can withstand before it dies

rate of fire: the number of attacks a unit can make in a round of combat

range: each unit has a range number...if there is a difference in range the unit with greater range gets to have as many unopposed rounds of combat as the difference in range...unless it is ambushed

accuracy: the chance an attack will actually land

evade: the chance a defender has of evading an attack, also the chance that a unit will succsessfully retreat

disipline: the chance of a unit to surrender or to keep on fighting...additional purpose of disipline could be for the possibilty of your units turning into renegade, and bandits, has anyone seen fortunes of war?

3. giving units rate of fire could make some older weapons be able to have certain advantages over newer ones and it could make certain weapons better for killing certain units.

two examples of this are

native americans warriors of the great plains had an advantage in using bows when faced against spanish and early american settlers and soldiers who used non repeating rifles and muskets, not because arrows did more damage but because they could fire arrows at a much high rate...not until repeating rifles arrive did the native americans really start losing ground

and as for a unit better at killing one thing than another imagine a machine gunner unit and an anti-tank unit...the machine gunner would have a high rate of fire and do less damage than the anti-tank unit becuase infantry units should have less armor and hit points yet there should be larger numbers of them

here's an example of combat a machine gunner unit built with technology of the late 20th centurty comes into battle against three legions built with technology from the time of ceasar their stats are

machine gunner:
attack: 5
defense: 3
hit points: 15
rate of fire: 6
range: 5
accuracy: 75%
evade: 25%
disipline: good

legionsx3
attack: 3
defense: 2
hit points: 20
rate of fire: 1
range: 1
accuracy: 95%
evade: 10%
disipline: excellent

ok lets say the machine gunner wasn't ambushed so it gets four free rounds of combat before the the legions get into attack range and at 6 attacks per round that is 24 free attacks before the legions can attack

out of those "free" 24 attacks the machine gunners will hit with 18 attacks (number of attacks times machine gunner's accuracy) and the legions will evade two attacks (number of attacks times legions evade) leaving 16 attacks that hit the legions

the legions armor will cancle out 2 of the five damage points of each one of the attacks (machine gunners attack minus the legions defense) so that means the three legions will take 48 damage during those first four rounds so two of the legions will be dead and starting the round and the last one will be at 12 hit points even if the legion does hit it wont be enough to kill the machine gunner this round (1 attack at 3 attack damage) and the machine gunner will have enough to kill the legion

of course their should be modifiers according to terrain and moral level and maybe when a unit gets to a certain level of damage (depending upon its disipline level) it might either retreat or surrender

Seige Warfare

my thoughts on seige warfare is this...if the seige force has an unbroken zone of control that completely surrounds a city then that city is considered "under seige" it recieves no trade, and your civilization only recieves half of the income from that city it normally would

a city cannon work sqaues beyond the zone of control circle that the seige forces have around the city. all squares that contain enemy units cannot be worked and if a square is in an enemy zone of control it doesn't produce anything with the exception being if a friendly unit is in that square the tile is still productive and if a both a friendly and an enemy zoc are in a square that square produces half of it's normal value. also once a city under seige runs out of food it will have an ever increasing chance of surrendering to the enemy

korn469

posted June 15, 1999 13:04            

2. I would like for siege warfare to be SLIGHTLY more effective, since conquest in the mid game is too difficult. But if you make it aLOT more effective, then you hurt game balance--offensive warfare becomes too powerful. I don't care about realism--if you want realism, you play two turns and die of old age.

3. Maybe I'm wrong, but Korn469's idea of stacked combat would make the game waaay too easy. What is the AI's biggest weakness in war? Its inability to think on a large scale. If you have stacked combat, I'll just form a superhorde of like 20 units, and go into the enemy's territory and lay waste to it. Once I've destroyed every single mine, road, irrigated tile, killed every stray unit, and taken every small city, I'll just move on, leaving behind a hopelessly wrecked empire. The AI can't do that to me, b/c Civ is too complicated. Then a few turns later, I'll use dips to buy everything, since the cities will be cheap. See, without roads, the AI civ won't have the arrows/income to support its city improvements. They'll have deficit spending. (Or perhaps, a tax rate of 20% science and 80% tax. In that case, I come back 50 turns later with my cavalry/alpines against their phalanxes and archers.)

posted June 15, 1999 14:43         

- Air units (icons) are only allowed to exist in base squares (specifically built airbases or cities). They create an "effect zone" (EZ) around them, which includes all squares within the unit's operational radius. Player can move air units from base to base by selecting the unit, clicking on the new base and watching a nice little animation of planes taking off, flying and landing.

- Automatic Recon Flights: If an enemy land/sea unit is inside friendly EZ, there is a chance per turn that it will be spotted. This chance increases the closer the enemy unit is to the base square. The spotting would be re-evaluated every turn.

- Bombing Runs: Player selects a bomber air unit, clicks on the target enemy unit (can also be air unit) and again watches a neat animation of bombers doing an attack run and returning to base. If the bombers fly through an enemy fighter EZ, there is a check whether they are spotted by the enemy. If spotted, enemy fighter interception is very likely. There can be multiple interceptions if flying through multiple/overlapping enemy EZs. If the bombers take too much damage, the mission is aborted and they (try to) return to base.

- Automatic Fighter Escort: If a moving/attacking bomber unit is within friendly fighter EZ, it has fighter escort. Possible enemy interception then first engages the fighters, and if sufficient strength remains then the bombers.

- Automatic Air Superiority: If friendly and enemy fighter EZs overlap, there is a chance of air superiority combat between the fighter units (much like artillery duel in SMAC). The chance increases the more EZs overlap. Enemy bombers entering friendly fighter EZ are intercepted, if spotted.

This sacrifices some player control, BUT reduces combat micromanagement with air units. IMO, it's also more realistic as all air combat is concluded within game turn.

Yeah it's maybe not perfect but what is... all ideas need refining...

posted June 15, 1999 14:44            

have you ever played Space Empires 3? something like that system

and what i was talking about when i said range is that the units wouldn't attack six squares out they would still attack as they usually do but units with higher range would get free attacks rounds under my combat suggestion, but there could still be artillary units that shot more than one square

posted June 15, 1999 17:23            

I believe there is also a plus in stacking for the AI. There are less "units" to move around as they are combined into stacks (basically out of necessity - combined arms are generally more powerful than homogeneous stacks or *gasp* the lone unit). Less decisions makes for a smarter computer player. Or at least I can hope.

However, I think they should consider giving a bonus of some sort to the stack with the numbers advantage. Mass attacks with mediocre units can be very successful, though generally costly.

FinnishGuy - I REALLY, REALLY LIKE THAT IDEA! It keeps the ego boosting value of sending your planes to go kick the crap out of someone while simplifying the work greatly. Plus, we get rid of the phenomenon of bombers taking two turns to make a complete bombing run and hanging out blocking all ground traffic for no good reason whatsoever.

A couple of comments though:
1) You have to assign which fighters are escorts and which ones are patrol. No fair having the same fighters escort the bombers and then intercepting incoming bombers or dogfighting on patrol the same turn.
2) There are some issues to consider with aircraft carriers (would you please teach the AI to use them this time?) Maybe carriers should have 1 or 2 "free" interceptors built into the unit to make it stronger.
3) How do we handle helicopters and missiles? I think choppers would be considered ground units (which they basically are) and missiles are a special case but nonetheless.

posted June 15, 1999 18:42            

AIR COMBAT
due to the extreeme speed, yet huge dependance of air craft on fixed bases, they cannot be acuratly represented under the current model

All aircraft bombard. Air craft do not tend to get into one unit shall die situations as easily as ground or naval forces, there is a strong chance of both sides being damaged to some degree, but still efective as a unit.

air craft can only be moved by deployment (see my economics thread post) they can be deployed to owned and allied cities, air-bases and carriers. In the case of nuclear weapons and cruise missiles, to subs and cruisers instead of carriers.

Air units have four options for each turn; to attack, to go into active defend mode (sentry), go inactive (fortify) and to redeploy.

Redeploy is done by sending them back to the deploy list to be re-deployed the next turn.

ATTACK
The movment of the air unit gives its attack range. When it attacks it bombards the target.
figters and bombers can just choose to bomb units or structures. one of these is then picked at random. Stealth fighters/ bombers can choose induvidual targets. The unit with the best agains air defense rating always defends

Modifiers to air attacks
city walls / fortress: no effect on air combat
SAM: +100% defense
Airport / airbase: +50% defense for defending aircraft
hills, forest, river...: -25% attack
mountains: -50% attack
ships in port: +50% attack
normal moral modifiers apply
For air combat, a unit in the forest does not have an easier time hitting the planes, but the planes have a harder time hitting them.
Ancient units: -100% defense.
renaissance units, helicopters: -50% defense
modern units, bombers: normal
SAM, AGIES, (stealth) fighter: +100% defense

Ranges
figter: 6
stealth fighter: 8
helicopter: 6
bomber: 12
stealth bomber: 16
cruise missile unit: 8
nuclear weapon: 16

Assumes ~100-200 km per square

Recon plane: range 32, when used does not attack, and rarely draws active defense, acts as a vision range of 6 at that point unitl the beggining of your next turn.

airplanes have a vision and active defense range of 0.5x their attack range

ACTIVE DEFENSE only can be used if the plane did not deploy or move in the preceeding turn
for fighters: When an enemy plane targets somthing of yours or an allies in the defense range, they get a pre-emtive air attack on the attacker. It functions as if the active defender had initiated the bombard. If the attacker survives, it bombards the target normally. a unit can only active defend once per turn, and only one unit can defend agains each attacker. Stealth bombers have a 50% chance of the active defense failing to notice them. Figters on carriers active defend agains naval units as well as air units.
For bombers: Enemy naval and ground units are targeted, when they enter range. can be set to only target certain unit types if available, like carriers and transports or settlers.
helicopters: are the only air unit that can attack submarines, target like bombers, but target subs preferentailly. They have a % chance of detecting submarines in vision range.

FORTIFIED air units only defend if they are in the tager square. A carrier attacked by a sub will automatically scarmble helicopters to pre-emptivly strike (% chance before, % chance simultaneously in this case). They do not have to have movment left to defend agains a direct attack, only a distant one.

A good staratagy for bombing is to send in adavanced fighters (target terrain improvments even) to use up the defenders counter attacks, and damage them, then to bring in the bombers. This simulates escorting the bombers with long range fighters.

SAM units activly defend in a 1 square radius. AGIES cruisers have a range of 2 or 3

When air units attack terrain improvments they have a % chance of hitting based on the type of air craft (50% fighters, 90% stealth bombers...)

Helicpters can be used to attack with a marine unit. The helicpter bombards, then the marine attacks in the target square unit it clears all the defenders or dies trying - like an amphibous attack.

posted June 17, 1999 04:35         

OK. I'm a latecomer in this discussion, I just found this board.

Good points there, especially that air units do not die so easily although they can take
heavy damage. Hmmm, perhaps healing should then actually consume production (replacement aircraft being produced). One more good point is that helicopters can attack with a marine unit.

I don't think that we need a separate recon air unit. Recon flights can be abstracted with other air units.

Eggman:

About your comments:

1) Yes I thought about this too. But, there is a danger that air combat will become a clickfest if player needs to constantly change fighter assignments by hand. Some kind of an automatic assignment scheme is almost a must to maintain ease of use. The simplest solution would be to just allow the fighters do double or triple duty (i.e., no assignments). Because air superiority and interception doesn't occur automatically every time (the proposed opportunity checks), some fighters would only fly one mission per turn while others might then do triple duty. Anyway, if assignments are implemented, here's what I thought:

- Fighter units could have four modes of operation: Air Superiority, Interception, Escort and Rest.

- Fighters in Air Superiority mode can attack ONE randomly selected enemy fighter
unit (of any mode). This selection can be made by putting all candidates (those that have overlapping EZ ("effect zone")) in random order and then making engagement checks one by one until the check is succesful or no more candidates remain. The engagement check is based on how much EZs overlap. The more they overlap, the greater chance. The chance maxes out when the enemy BASE square is within EZ. If the candidate enemy is also in Air Superiority mode, the chance is increased (both trying to find enemy fighters). If the candidate is Resting, the chance is decreased (Resting unit is trying to avoid combat). Air Superiority combat should be resolved in the beginning of turn before any other air combat. If the fighter unit doesn't find a target (all candidate checks fail or no overlapping enemy EZs), it assumes Interception mode for that turn.

- Fighter unit in Interception mode can intercept ONE spotted enemy bomber (or escorts first) entering its' EZ.

- Fighter unit in Escort mode can escort ONE bomber unit per turn. It can respond to several enemy interception attempts on the same bomber. If it takes too much damage, another (healthier) Escort fighter can take its' place, provided EZ restrictions apply.

- Fighter unit in Rest mode doesn't participate in combat (unless forced by enemy Air Superiority fighters) and heals more quickly.

- Any fighter unit in Interception or Escort modes can also be used like bombers. If they are used in fighter-bomber role however, they can't do double duty as fighters that turn (or vice versa). Fighter-bombers do not use fighter escorts.

2) Basically, carriers would be handled like ground airbases with the exception that they can move. If a carrier is sunk, all air units it was accommodating have a chance (maybe depending on experience) of evacuating to any friendly carrier (provided there's room), airbase or city within operational radius. I don't think there's any need for "indigenous" fighter units. If a carrier can take 8 air units, there will be enough room for interceptor fighters and still have 2-3 bombers with escorts. Also, on occasion you might want to risk an "all-or-nothing" style air assault, sending all air units to bombing mission.

3) Both could be special cases of bomber units. A (cruise) missile is just a "bomber" that has a very low chance of being intercepted, doesn't use fighter escort and is itself destroyed while attacking. Helicopters could be modelled by bomber units with short operational radius. Chopper units (icons) could also be allowed to exist outside city or airbase squares. They could establish temporary "airbases" for themselves WITHIN their movement radius from a city or normal airbase square. To repair damage, chopper units must return to normal airbase or city (but they suffer damage only from combat, not automatically at end of turn like now in CIV II). Choppers act like bombers, but don't use fighter escort. Because choppers naturally try to avoid combat against fixed-wing aircraft, enemy fighters would have strongly reduced chances to intercept them. Also, they would have a chance to escape enemy fixed-wing bomber attacks (survive with no or minimal damage). The best weapon against choppers would be another chopper or land/sea units with strong anti-air capabilities.

Some more points on air combat:

- If radar technology has been developed, chances to spot enemy units (especially bombers) inside friendly EZ are increased substantially.

- If an airbase is under direct enemy bomber attack, there could be a chance (based on experience) that all fighters in that base can do double duty as interceptors.

- Perhaps there could be a target selection possibility for Air Superiority fighters also. Player can select an enemy base and then the fighter will only engage enemy

fighters originating from this base. This would allow concentration of forces in air superiority missions.

- Conventional cruise missiles should be "anti-structure" weapons to be used against city installations (like demonstrated by real world Tomahawks). Inflicted damage to land and air units should be minimal. Perhaps air units could be more vulnerable. Land or air units can't be destroyed by cruise missile attack. Sea units on the other hand could be destroyed.

- About marines with helicopters proposed by ember: Any marine unit in an airbase can participate in one helicopter attack originating from the same airbase. First, the chopper provides support fire in the target square (like artillery attack in SMAC, damages only) and then the marine unit makes a normal land attack. If the marine unit is victorious and no more enemy units remain, the marines occupy the target square. Marine units can also move WITHIN helicopter EZ from any square to any unoccupied or friendly occupied square (helicopter transport). Perhaps some damage is suffered if moving to enemy ZOC. Attacking marines must start in airbase square because of combat preparations.