Bombardment Targets Units in Cities First?

[ChrisiusMaximus]

On the point of attacking cities with huge stacks of Arty, if it is working more effectively for the human player then you wont need so many units as before.

Player1 I like your suggestion, but the real crux is does the AI know how to offensively use its Artillery ? If it does then it sunds like a great tweek, but if not then yes its too powerful for the human.

[WarpStorm]

Well, let me know the first time you see the AI use a big stack of Arty.

[Xorbon]

I don't know if I like how the new bombardment rules sound. I didn't like how I needed huge stacks of arty to be effective (before Conquests), but this seems like an 'over-fix'. Maybe they should come up with a compromise between the pre- and post-Conquests rules in one of their patches.

I always thought a player using surface (i.e. not air) bombardment should get a choice of whether to target units or improvements. This would increase your odds of hitting the desired target, but you would still have a chance of hitting an undesired target. Once all possible targets of a certain type were eliminated (i.e. all units destroyed or reduced to 1 hp; or all improvements destroyed; or city down to size 1) then that target-type couldn't be targetted in that city.

[Jaybe]

According to the C3C Editor, bombardment units with Collateral Damage enabled does the trick:

With a successful bombardment on a unit (unit takes damage) in a city, there is another throw to see if damage is taken by improvements or citizens.

The problem seems to be that for some reason, Collateral Damage was not enabled for anyone (that I could find).

[The Kaiser]

I agree mostly with what player1 says. When an army approachs an enemy city they would target the areas where troops are. This is where the first calculation must be. Destruction of buildings must be a secondary consideration.

If they have line of sight, Artillery is more accurate than WW2 era bombing so that adjustment sounds correct.

Maybe if the AI can't be taught to use Artillery the only option is to perhaps make it more expensive or lower the attack rating a little.

[WarpStorm]

Originally posted by Jaybe
According to the C3C Editor, bombardment units with Collateral Damage enabled does the trick:

With a successful bombardment on a unit (unit takes damage) in a city, there is another throw to see if damage is taken by improvements or citizens.

The problem seems to be that for some reason, Collateral Damage was not enabled for anyone (that I could find).

And if you do enable it, it doesn't work on bombardments. Counterintuitively, it only works when units do a regular attack and not bombardments. It is used for barbarians in the Fall of Rome conquest.

I've thoroughly tried this already.

[Jaybe]

Now THAT's some yucky documentation! Unfortunately, probably easier to change the docs than the game.

[Tiberius]

Originally posted by player1

Old system was too random.

Basicly thing to be bombed was choosen before calculating hitting chance.

Totaly illogcial. It should be other was around.
Not to say that it added extra 50% miss chance.

For example let's assume that main purpose of using artillery is to breach enemy defenses (units).

So Atrillery tries to hit unit.
But it misses.

Now since shell needs to be somewere then add chance to hit building or population.

Sounds much more resonable.

I didn't say the old system was good. But turning 180 degrees and simply reversing things isn't good either.

What you are suggesting sounds good: target units, and on miss add chance to hit population or buildings. However, from what I am hearing, this is not the case.

Hitting exclusively units until there isn't anything left to hit and targeting population and buildings only after that is untrealistic and unbalancing.

Wrong solution

[player1]

Originally posted by Tiberius
Hitting exclusively units until there isn't anything left to hit and targeting population and buildings only after that is untrealistic and unbalancing.

Wrong solution

Still, I think it's lesser evil then the old way.

[Tiberius]

Still, I think it's lesser evil then the old way.

It may be, but why can't they do it right? Why do they choose always extreme solutions?

[player1]

Maybe it's limit in the engine (I hope not), who knows?

[alexman]

I have no problem with how they changed bombardment, because it's consistent with how bombardment of tile improvements has always worked: units first, tile improvements only after all units are at 1HP.

More effective bombard units means more military options, which is fun. I do agree that the AI is at a disadvantage with this change, but the AI is terrible in all military tactics, so what's new?

[dexters]

A question.

How in particular is the AI more disadvantaged now than it was previously? The old method always allowed for rather frequent hits on structures. Knocking out marketplaces, libraries and barracks.

If the enemy has a stack of 8 units in the city, you need at least twice as many artys just to get all eight units down to manageable HP, and because city pop are rarely (never?) reduced before hp goes to 1, a size 12 city is going to be an even tougher nut to crack.

I think we need to move away from the "we can wheel in 60 artys" talk, because quite frankly, if you have 30, 40, 50, or 60 artys lying around, you've already won.

There will be games, where it will be a tough go. Maybe no iron. Or a poor start. And I say this having felt that resource allocaiton appear to have been tweaked in C3C to make getting domestic sources of key resources harder, at least on pangea.

I am currently finishing up a hopeless island start. No iron. No coal. I decided to send a bunch of troops over the Greeks. 3 cities, and they have iron and coal. Easy pickings for my cavalries? Well, for one, I didn't know a 3 city civ could afford to garrison so many riflemen units in their cities. This was in Monarch only too. And that's another aspect of the game that's also been improved. AI money management.

In anycase, it was tough going. I moved in artys to speed up the process. I had 3 artys and 3 frigates bombing away for turns on ony city, hoping for a lucky barracks hit and then I'll just whittle down their forces and move in. After about five turns. I kinda figured out it was only hitting troops and after each turn, they healed. Even with a good 15 cavalry force, it wasn't enough to take down their size 8 city on a hill.

My point really though is, if you have a lot of artys, no amount of tweaking is going to matter. I feel having the bombard hit troops first actually gives AI advantages since cities won't go into disorder by losing a marketplace and if they have barracks and a stack of tough defenders, you WILL NEED, that big stack of artys to make a dent. That's a luxury not all of can afford in all games.

[SirOsis]

I've witnessed destruction of walls using trebuchets in the middle ages tutorial. There is some chance to destroy walls at least. Generally I hit units but once the walls fell I moved in.

[dexters]

That's nice. I rarely build walls, neither thus the AI in the standard games.

[Catt]

First off, as I said in the poll thread related to this issue, I don't think it's a really big issue. In SP, we as humans can limit our own use of offensive artillery if we're disturbed by the change; I'll let someone else comment on MP since I don't play it.

Originally posted by alexman
More effective bombard units means more military options, which is fun. I do agree that the AI is at a disadvantage with this change, but the AI is terrible in all military tactics, so what's new?

I do agree it provides more options, but if the option being added further extends an already-present human advantage, doesn't that weaken the overall game experience (if use is not voluntarily limited)?

Originally posted by dexters
How in particular is the AI more disadvantaged now than it was previously? The old method always allowed for rather frequent hits on structures. Knocking out marketplaces, libraries and barracks.

If the enemy has a stack of 8 units in the city, you need at least twice as many artys just to get all eight units down to manageable HP, and because city pop are rarely (never?) reduced before hp goes to 1, a size 12 city is going to be an even tougher nut to crack.

The AI is more disadvantaged now because it still doesn't use artillery offensively (other than a few artys being brought into the field of battle to lob shots at units). On the other hand, the human player can choose to use offensive arty in two ways now, versus one way in prior versions. The common prior use of arty, and an option still available to the player, is to reduce a city to rubble -- 1 pop point, no improvements, and red-lined defenders, before taking it and either razing or holding with no need for resistence / culture flip suppressors. The new option available to the player is to take large cities with numerous expensive improvements intact. With a strong culture, or a relatively fast-moving series of arty stacks (age of railroads) a human player can take large production centers and either conclude the war quickly by wiping out the civ in question or taking what is wanted and risking flips depending on the odds. The interplay of (1) need for much smaller arty stacks to redline all defenders; (2) value of city improvements if flipping concern can be addressed (through elimination or otherwise); (3) the change to MGLs (no GW rushing, so no need to hold an MGL for ToE or Hoover if the attack is an Industrial Age assault); and (4) and the benefit of palace moving in the industrial age when an old core is fully-developed -- something humans will do but AIs will not, and somehting powerful that MGLs can still do -- the change to city bombardment significantly strenghthens the human hand against the AI in SP games if the human chooses to take advantage of the unit and gameplay properties.

If the goal is efficiency and the game lasts to Replaceable Parts, multiple arty stacks under infantry protectors, with some cav attackers for the redlined defenders, would seem to make the early Industrial Age a prime warmonger phase. Heck, even the late Industrial Age without tanks would be an invitation to conquest.

I think we need to move away from the "we can wheel in 60 artys" talk, because quite frankly, if you have 30, 40, 50, or 60 artys lying around, you've already won.

I don't think that's the case. Sure, in some instances, the game is won. But in many others an offensive arty stack is a method to take down a much more powerful and advanced civ. A smallish, even backward, civ that can devote 10 - 15 turns of production from the core to produce artillery units, can build a crushing offensive force against the AI, even if outpowered and out-teched. With the change in C3C, the power is enhanced -- again because the player can still take the same actions as he/she could in PTW, but also because new options are opened that strengthen the player's hand.

Catt

[dexters]

Catt, good points. I didn't really consider the effect of capturing cities with several existing major improvements.

I was thinking more along the lines that if bombard can't hit barracks and rarely (never?) hit pop points, even redlined defenders in a size 12 city can still put up enough of a fight to either exhaust the attacking stack's offensive units whereupon in the next turn, the defenders are again fully healed. It's certainly quite common to have a 1 hp infantry take out a fully healed tank when you consider all the various defensive bonuses.

There are certainly exceptions and it depends on the mix of defenders they have vs. the mix of attacking units you have. Rifles vs. Cavalry? Infantry vs. Cavalry? Infantry vs. Tanks? Rifles vs. Tanks? But then again, there's always been these windows before and this hasn't changed.

You make a good point about keeping city improvements intact, and how this may benefit human players, but I think this can be fixed by just making cities lose more improvements. Maybe it's just me but it seems like the thrust of the change was to make the old exploit of bombing cities to the ground and attacking at size 1 into a strategy that isn't viable anymore. The new strategy requires the human players to both have enough units to redline defending units and enough units to take out every defender in the city to capture it that same turn.

The attrition game can still be played. Naturally, if you can take out 1 or 2 units each turn, the hope is that those defenders aren't replaced while you replace your lost offensive units. But it's no longer viable to send a stack of artys to a hill, bomb the h out of a city for several turns, blowing up barracks and marketplaces, and then move in with a relatively small force to finish the job.

[player1]

By the way, any time city is conquered, some buildings do get destroyed (maybe even 50%).

[dexters]

quesiton Catt has raised is whether enough buildings are getting destroyed if they don't get destroyed from bombardment and how human players get these fully developed cities from this current system.

[Jaybe]

... it seems like the thrust of the change was to make the old exploit of bombing cities to the ground and attacking at size 1 into a strategy that isn't viable anymore.

A most welcome change, especially since I had gotten into the rut of frequently doing it that way (I prefer not to raze).

[WarpStorm]

Originally posted by Catt
A smallish, even backward, civ that can devote 10 - 15 turns of production from the core to produce artillery units, can build a crushing offensive force against the AI, even if outpowered and out-teched.

Very good example, Catt. Pulling a win out of what rightly should be a losing postion.

[dexters]

Originally posted by Jaybe

Quote:

... it seems like the thrust of the change was to make the old exploit of bombing cities to the ground and attacking at size 1 into a strategy that isn't viable anymore.

A most welcome change, especially since I had gotten into the rut of frequently doing it that way (I prefer not to raze).

Yes. Although the starve a city to death exploit is still there. '

[RobC]

Originally posted by dexters


Yes. Although the starve a city to death exploit is still there. '

How is that an exploit? Putting an enemy city under seige is a time-tested strategy (just wait a few months, and then use your catapults to lob some bread over the walls to bribe them into surrendering...)

[Jaybe]

Originally posted by RobC
How is that an exploit? Putting an enemy city under seige is a time-tested strategy (just wait a few months, and then use your catapults to lob some bread over the walls to bribe them into surrendering...)

That's the way it should be. But it takes "years" in Civ, with only 1-population reduction each turn (once the food banks run dry).

[Panag]

Originally posted by Jaybe
According to the C3C Editor, bombardment units with Collateral Damage enabled does the trick:

With a successful bombardment on a unit (unit takes damage) in a city, there is another throw to see if damage is taken by improvements or citizens.

The problem seems to be that for some reason, Collateral Damage was not enabled for anyone (that I could find).

hi ,

maybe they have left this open for each player to choose from , .........

have a nice day

[WarpStorm]

Panag, not only is it not enabled, it (intentionally) only works on successful regular attacks i.e. not during bombards.

[Panag]

Originally posted by WarpStorm
Panag, not only is it not enabled, it (intentionally) only works on successful regular attacks i.e. not during bombards.

hi ,

someone from Firaxis is going to have to explain this to us ( maybe again ) , .....

well we shall get used to it ( player ) , eventually , ....

or maybe we get to see a patch inwhere it changes , .....

have a nice day

[WarpStorm]

I've asked for it to apply to bombards also for quite a while.

[Jaybe]

Originally posted by WarpStorm
And if you do enable [collateral damage], it doesn't work on bombardments. Counterintuitively, it only works when units do a regular attack and not bombardments. It is used for barbarians in the Fall of Rome conquest.

I've thoroughly tried this already.

I was SO hoping that was from Beta experience!
I tested it with Debug, and the Collateral Damage option in the editor seems to be Totally Broken. You can only apply it to bombardment units, to which it has totally no effect.

I Demand a PATCH!!
(BTW, I NEVER said that with vanilla or PTW)

[WarpStorm]

No, the CD flag is working perfectly as it was designed to. It was designed to work only for zero range bombard units. It is used quite well in the Fall of ROme scenario.

I would love to see it extended to all attack forms.