HP are in, as they should be, but FP?
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cyclotron7
I must point out that in my opinion, it was the lack of hp and fp in CTP that destroyed the game and ruined its combat system. C'mon, guys! You can almost always determine who is going to win any battle with just attack and defense. Add up the terrain bonuses, the fortification bonuses, the veteran bonuses, compare the two numbers and you might as well just throw in the towel already if your number is lower. That's the way without hp/fp.
With these values, however, we can put more strategy and suspense/excitement into Civ3. A unit with a low attack but a high firepower doesn't hit an enemy very often, but when it does, it hits hard. Think bombers, early submarines, V-2 rockets, etc.
A tank has good armor (defense) but if a shell or bomb pierces it's armor shell, many vital systems and crewmen could be destroyed, thus taking out the tank.
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Are you saying that firepower (FP) is good because it makes the combat system mysterious and arbitrarily difficult to understand or that it's good because it makes the combat system full of crazy flukes?
I'm with Tventano in that FP adds unneeded complexity. Complexity is only good if it adds to gameplay. Yes, FP does affect combat and does so in a different way than increased attack values but does this distinction add to gameplay?
A modern unit having dramatically higher attack and defense combined with hitpoints should eliminate the phalanx beats tank issue. (And, as barefootbadass alludes to, if a smoking 1-hitpoint tank coasts into a mass of pikemen, maybe they can pry that sucker open.) Crazy high-HP low-attack units are better represented outside the standard combat system (spy sabotage, naval/artillery bombardment, ...). The only thing you lose in removing FP is the choice between (A) a unit that kills a phalanx one in four times and (B) a second unit that rarely beats a phalanx, but always gets rid of a quarter of its hitpoints. I guess you'd want unit A if it's acting alone and unit B if you want a dependable big force.
However, despite the fact that Civ2 had FP, I NEVER made a decision between two units of this sort. Can anyone here think of two such units and an actual situation where they made a strategic choice between them? Can anyone think of a real situation where they said "Hey, screw attack value. This calls for a high FP unit."? Does FP add anything to the strategy or fun of the game?
I personally think that FP was a kludge that could have been avoided with exponentially increasing attack/defense factors combined with hitpoints. Maybe you could add a "modern unit vs. ancient unit" bonus (like the Civ2 pikemen vs. mounted bonus). FP's removal would result in an easier to understand game and would eliminate over half of the long threads regarding how Civ combat works.
