Developer Diary | Combat

[ifischer13]

Late answer, but could you once again explain the order of a battle?

From what I understand it goes:
- support units targeting line units (or if there are none - targeting at random)
- line units fighting line units (or if there are none - targeting at random)
- mobile units targeting units with the lowest HP.

Did I get it right?

Close.

1. Support goes first, they pick targets at random.
2. Line goes next, they attack enemy Line if any are present (targeting them randomly). If there are no enemy Line, they target full-random.
3. Mobile goes last, they also obey the Line rule and attack any enemy Line present first BUT they attack the lowest HP Line (they do not target at random). If there are no enemy Line, they target lowest HP of whatever remains.

Worth mentioning, if a Unit breaks (Organization <= 0) they can still be hit by Support and can be targeted if there are not other valid targets, but Line and Mobile move on to non-broken targets. The intent there is that, if Mobile breaks a Line (if a charge of knights or tanks makes infantry consider the better part of valor), they have a chance to get into the back ranks (Supports) where they can do some real damage.

 

[ifischer13]

That sounds like a good approach to combat. I am certainly in favor of reducing the number of units roaming on the map, so grouping them into armies sounds like a smart solution to me.

My only question would be if there will be some kind of army limit per empire or something along these lines. Otherwise we will end up with a cluttered map, only that it will be cluttered with armies instead of individual units.

An Army limit isn't in place now, but we're still looking at how things play out with different strategies in the later stages. Ideally, upkeep costs should provide balance against having a zillionty Armies.

 

[ifischer13]

Some interesting ideas there

Hopefully you get it right with the implicit balancing issues of "Support fires first" - you admitted the main problem with this already and I'm curious on how you prevent such a scenario.

The Night Elves in the WC3 board game, for example, are OP beyond reason because of the same mechanic as their main units are archers where everybody else has melee.

There are some balance elements intended to keep this (and other strats) from being The One True Strategy. Mechanically, you also have damage distribution / overkill in the first round from all-Support groups. In a matchup where three Supports all target the same enemy and kill it, you might come away happy. In a matchup where they damage different targets, you might be sad on the second turn of the battle.

 

[ifischer13]

Taking a more high-level approach seems like a good choice if you can have the player focus on other aspects of the game as well. One departure from other similar games seems to be that there is essentially no "bombarding" of enemies across multiple tiles, assuming things like artillery and aircraft are just Support Units.

In that case I am curious to see how aircraft will actually be shown in combat. Having planes hover in the air behind the army or parked on the field would probably look... odd?

I am actually very glad for the intention to limit the number of armies on the field!

Things were getting long so I didn't want to get into air or sea -- we might have a followup on combat to cover those.

Air Units fly in and drop bombs and such -- they don't line up and fight with the stuff on the ground.

 

[ifischer13]

Will the units that broke receive an extra damage from Support units?

Also how are the situation above possible? Something like second army attacking the same enemy army that was broken or are there some other mechanics/situations at play that makes it possible for Support units to attack broken units?

And yes, please do have a Dev Diary on air and navy combat!

Supports don't do any bonus damage to broken Units because they are broken, but their baseline bonuses still apply. Supports (generally) have an Attack bonus against Line, so any broken Line would see that applied if hit.

(Units that are broken in a battle are also broken for the duration of the turn. If they are alone or within an Army of entirely broken Units and attacked a second time, they are wiped out. If there are non-broken Units in the army, additional battle happens as normal but the broken units start the battle in their broken state.)

How is this situation possible?

"Worth mentioning, if a Unit breaks (Organization <= 0) they can still be hit by Support and can be targeted if there are not other valid targets, but Line and Mobile move on to non-broken targets. The intent there is that, if Mobile breaks a Line (if a charge of knights or tanks makes infantry consider the better part of valor), they have a chance to get into the back ranks (Supports) where they can do some real damage."

Say you have an Archer and Spear fighting a Crossbow and two Chariots.
Archer and Crossbow take turns, pick random enemies.
Spear goes, no enemy Line to fight, picks Crossbow or one of the Chariots.
Chariots go, there is enemy Line, they both target the Spear -- say that causes the Spear to break.
In the second round of combat, the Archer and Crossbow go again, again pick random targets (the Crossbow could target the broken enemy Spear).
The one Line in the fight is broken, so there is no Line attack after the Supports.
The Chariots go. They ignore the Spear that they charged and broke last round, now go after the enemy Archer.
(If the first Chariot attack breaks the enemy Archer, the second Chariot would consider both broken enemy Units valid targets.)

 

[ifischer13]

It is a long running problem with 4X games, I remenber plenty of discussions on the matter on civ fanatics. Have soft limits in regard to pop be consider? So going over a X limit , determined by tech and societal factors, units become expensier/ healing become slower.

Related to the above, another issue in 4x games is the binary nature of combat deaths, as cost is only lost when a unit is defeated yet a 1% unit only nees to get back to full strength from healing. Will healing cost something so that injured units are also something that need to be planned for?

Time is a "resource" too. 1% Units take longer to heal and you're paying full upkeep for them while they rest. The other options for getting them back in a fight, like Reinforcements, have Warfare Domain costs.

So, there are some knobs there already. Still, you're right that it is a common issue, and I would not be shocked at all to see it appear in Millennia. We have a lot of ways we can address it when we see the specific way it is causing problems.

 

[ifischer13]

Considering they also deal increased Organization damage, did you consider having them target the enemy unit with the lowest Organization, instead of the lowest HP? That would put the focus of cavalry charges more on routing the enemy than destroying them, which seems thematic. Did that combination turn out to be too strong?

These are often the same -- the Organization (which we will probably soon change to "Morale", BTW) damage is derived from Health damage. Organization fully recovers at the start of a new turn too, so a lot of battles are against Armies where all Units are at 100% Organization. Targeting lowest Health is intended to be a nod toward the ability of Mobiles to flank or otherwise exploit enemy weaknesses.

 

[ifischer13]

Are you able to clarify if this means Air units are an entirely distinct thing from the support/line/mobile triangle?

Yes, that is the case.