Combat idea: Blocking and evasion

[Sore Loser]

This is an idea I tinkered with a long time ago, I think it might be useful for Civ IV.

The basic premise is that each unit has four values:

Offence = damage per attack
Defence = hit points
Blocking = ability to draw enemy fire, screening fragile units
Evasion = ability to evade enemy blockades, letting you attack fragile units
Initiative = determines when the unit gets to fire; obviously, units that die before their initiative is up never get to fire

The main problem with this is that a target selection routine is needed. It can be set by the player prior to a combat, but I'd prefer it if player input wasn't necessary.

As an example, let’s say the values are set at these figures (name, off, def, block, evade, initiative)

Infantry 3/ 10/ 2/ 4 /1
Tanks 10/ 15/ 4/ 6 /2
Artillery 12/ 10/ x/ 12 /3

You have an army of 100 infantry and 50 tanks. Your enemy has an army of 200 infantry and 20 tanks.

Step 1: Artillery are not present, so the tanks first first. Your tanks have a total of 300 evasion points, and the enemy infantry has a total of 400 blocking points. So you don’t get to attack the enemy tanks yet. Your tanks deliver a total of 500 offence points to the enemy infantry, resulting in a loss of 50 infantry. The enemy infantry has 100 blocking points to block your infantry. The enemy tanks attack at the same time, using up 120 of your infantry’s 200 blocking points. They kill 20 infantry units, leaving 80.

Step 2: Infantry. The enemy infantry is capable of blocking 50 of your infantry, letting 30 of yours through to the tanks. Your infantry blocks 40 of the enemy infantry, letting 110 through to attack your tanks. The enemy infantry manages to destroy 22 of your tanks and 12 of your infantry. Your infantry manages to destroy 6 tanks and 15 infantry.

I would like to fit morale in there somehow. One idea is that each attack may cause either casualties or a morale loss. Broken soldiers do not participate in combat and may be captured.

[Shogun Gunner]

Okay....

Well, it seems that you are getting to the details of how combat is resolved.

If you are introducing a concept like "blocking" I assume you mean "covering fire" which would be units protecting the flanks of an attacking unit. That implies small unit tactics. I guess I'm stuggling with the scale of your idea. Usually it's a few units attacking, currently one at a time.

But since we are suggesting ideas for Civ4, perhaps there are some other concepts that would be required to provide support to your idea - such as a tactical minigame.

[Sore Loser]

This doesn't really need a tactical mini-game, if you're thinking of something that is based on position in any way. The advantage of this idea is that it is no more complicated for large stacks.

Let me give you another example:

NAME; OFF; DEF; BLOCK; EVADE; INI
Legion; 6; 8; 2; 5; 2
Archer; 6; 3; 2; 2; 4
Cavalry; 8; 6; 4; 5; 3
Phalanx; 4; 8; 4; 2; 1

Army 1 has 50 cavalry and 100 phalanx
Army 2 has 100 legion and 100 archers

First, the archers attack because of their superior initiative. They have a total evasion score of 200, and the phalanx have a blocking score of 400, so all the arrows fly towards the phalanx and the phalanx have 200 blocking points left. The archers do 600 points of damage and each phalanx unit can absorb 8 points, meaning that 75 phalanx units perish. This reduces their blocking score to 100, as only 25 remain standing.

Next, the unharmed cavalry attacks. They have 400 evasion points total, and the legions have a total of 500 blocking points, meaning that the legions manage to block all the cavalry and have 100 blocking points left. The legions were selected because they’re the least juicy target. The cavalry does 400 points of damage, killing 50 of the legions. The legions still have 100 blocking points left.

Now the legions are up. They have 250 evasion points, and the phalanx had 100 blocking points left, meaning that 40% (20) of the legions attack the phalanx, and the remaining 60% (30) attack the cavalry. The cavalry suffers 20 casualties and the phalanx suffer 23 (30*6/8) casualties.

The phalanx attack last. There are only 7 left, with an evasion score of 14. The legions had 100 blocking points left, so they have to attack the legions, doing 28 points of damage. Each legion can withstand 8 points, so another 4 (rounded up) die.

The result of the combat is that army 1 loses 93 phalanx and 20 cavalry, army 2 loses 54 legions. Morale could be factored in somewhere. For example, each unit type could have Mortality and Lethality ratings, indicating how fragile the unit is when receiving damage and how dangerous the unit is when inflicting it.

I don't have any good offers on how to determine the winner of a combat or how retreat is handled.

[Sore Loser]

Expanding on the above, here are some more musings:

All movement is simultaneous, and divided into two phases: Combat and Movement. During the movement phase only, units may be moved. During the combat phase only, combat may be initiated. Combat may be initiated at a distance of more than 1 if you have units with a greater range. Long-range artillery may conduct bombardment across more than one tile, and fast-moving units may also initiate combat across several tiles.

Detection is done in several steps. If an enemy army with two moves is in the vicinity of one of your armies during both of those moves, then you get two chances of detecting them, each at 50% of the base chance. You get one chance per unit in the stack, meaning that large stacks are much easier to detect. Chance of detection depends on the distance to the unit, the spotting unit’s recon value and the enemy unit’s camouflage value. Units that have already been detected are much easier to spot in subsequent turns. Units that use only part or nothing of their movement allowance have their recon and camouflage values increased.

[Sore Loser]

Combat could be resolved as in Fantasy General, with combat ending as soon as all attacking units have concluded their attack. This means that infantry don't get to counter-attack against an all-archers army, for example, unless they also chose to initiate combat. If both armies chose to initiate combat then combat ends once all units have concluded their attack. Units can be brought into combat as active or passive. If they're passive they don't attack, which is useful if you need some cannon fodder but don't want to allow the enemy full retaliation.

[DarkCloud]

Combat could be resolved as in Fantasy General, with combat ending as soon as all attacking units have concluded their attack. This means that infantry don't get to counter-attack against an all-archers army, for example, unless they also chose to initiate combat

Why don't we just abstract the whole thing and auto-resolve it as you select "x number from stack a attacks enemy stack b"? That way it maintains the civ-spirit and allows stacked combat...

The way that seems to be suggested in this thread seems to be making civ more of a hybrid between "Civ CTP and Shogun:Total War" ...

and I just don't think that'll work- because it will require a more 'minimialized' game with more war-micromanagement than civilization and city macromanagement/micromanagement

[Sore Loser]

So you want stacked combat to be nothing more than allowing attacks with more than one unit at a time and essentially keeping the traditional Civ system? How exactly would that work? Are targets chosen at random?

[DarkCloud]

Well, I would basically suggest that all the unit's attacks, defenses and movements are added together and then the attack is carried out as each side's totals attack the other side's totals... (at least when the battle takes place outside a fortress or city where the attack would still be one on one)

then as for damages and destructions- I would suggest that the sides' units take damages based upon a random-number generator that will destroy a certain amount of hitpoints on the winners side while completely annihilating the loser's troops...

Unless of course retreating would be allowed in Civ IV... that would complicate matters.