New War Options...how much will they help?

[TechWins]

There are new war options such as a farther range for aritllery, cannons, and I believe archers. This should provide a little bit more strategy to attacking and defending in the country area. Bombarments might help out the in city war strategy. Stacking armies could give some great battles. How much do you really think that these new options will help out the stragey of war?

[Provost Harrison]

It will be nice to see a lot more depth in the combat system of Civ3. In previous Civ games this has been very simplistic (not necessarily a bad thing though). As long as it doesn't detract from the game, I don't mind. I think in terms of combat, a lot can be learned from the Panzer General series, a combat-orientated TBS...at least just for ideas and suggestions anyway...

[Dr Strangelove]

Giving these units range doesn't make any sense because the distance represented by width of the squares should be at least 200 miles. That's one heck of an arm you got there William Tell! If they want to simulate the effect of ranged weapons they should add a "ranged weapons effect" phase to the calculation of the combat results.

[Inverse Icarus]

artillery i can understand. but archers?

i highly doubt that.

it will add a lot more strategy.

do we know what battleships will do? bombard or attack normally? is bombarding ala SMAC?

[Grumbold]

If archers get it then all guns will have to also. Sounds dubious to me. Stacks won't need to fight hand to hand they'll just kill cities or opposing units from the adjacent tile. Whoever attacks wins. Yeucch.

I'm all for going in the opposite direction and making bombardment a factor in a land attack rather than a separate action. No bombardment was worth much unless it was immediately followed by an assault.

[Provost Harrison]

Yeah, I think that Dr Strangelove has the best idea on this one. Of course an archer cannot fire an arrow 200 miles or so. Perhaps his range should give him an advantage in causing so much damage before they engage in combat. The longer the range, the more damage can be inflicted before the two units meet. This would allow the solution of the legion fighting with the rifleman, where in terms of hand-to-hand they would probably be evenly matched. But the simple fact is, the rifleman would prevent that from happening and just pick him off from a distance...

[MORON]

More strategy, more stacks and more combat

Nice idea Strangelove. Anyway I think muti-tile bombardment as stupid anyway. Maybe add suppression fire effect in stack combat and forget bombardment alltogether.

[Dr Strangelove]

I think we should limit the ability of naval vessels to attack land targets. They might be used to damage fortifications, and might add a fraction of their attack strength to a battle involving land units, but they should never have the capability to destroy land units on their own. I don't think this happened in real life.

[Urban Ranger]

A square is big but a unit can be anywhere within that square

So in fact your archers could be just a couple hundred yards away from the enemy in the next square

I think units with ranged fire capabilities should be able to use "ranged attacks" against adjacent units, given that:

• The attack strength cannot be greater than 50% of it's attack factor, preferably lower, with the exception of modern artillery units (including battleships and missile cruisers).


• These attacks are nullified by city walls and fortresses and ineffectual against fortified units. Again artillery units are better at this.


• It takes up resources to represent large number of ammo expended in these attacks.


• Only one attack per unit is allowed per turn.

Provost,

Yeah, PG has a lot of good ideas for combat.

[Lung]

Well, i'm not sure exactly how the stacks will work, but the bombard ability certainly added another dimension to war strategy in CTP, which i only play by e-mail. Firstly, it makes seiges more than just "sit'n'wait", as is the case in Civ2.

Naval warfare also changed drastically, with going on the attack being a much riskier proposition. This is because the player who can bombard first has a huge advantage, as they can bombard and inflict major damage without suffering damage themselves before the units can retaliate. This would add a great deal more weight to building the Magellan wonder, as that movement advantage would allow you to sit outside your opponent's range before coming in to bombard. Otherwise, you risk being bombarded first if you make the first move.

If there is going to be ranged combat in stacks, then war strategy becomes greater still, as you would need the right mix of units to maximise the strength of the stack. Having a hard-on for one type of unit would most likely result in you being less effective than what you otherwise could be.

All in all, i think that the strategy will be deeper, and that anyone using the tried-and-true methods that worked in Civ2 will find out the hard way that it doesn't work like it used to

[TechWins]

artillery i can understand. but archers?

Ok, so maybe not archers. I really do think that with these new options you might be able to have some classic battels if you use the right strategies appropriately.