Feedback Requested: War and War Resolution

[passeris]

I plain don't like ideas that generally "force them to split their military", be it for defender side, or for attacker side

The issue, is micromanage is just a giant pain, not to mention that Big Brain Battles (that people fantasize they'll engage in) isn't actually the preferred way to fight. Winning generals don't go into battle with an evenly matched opponent hoping for an honorable battle where the best win: they only engage in combat if they think they're sure going to win. Only when they have no other option (because no plan ever survives contact with the enemy) do they start doing all those "Big Brain Maneuvers" people always dream about, and those usually require quick thinking on the ground that is done precisely because the commander doesn't do that

Personally, forcing people to "split their doomstack" is not the way to go. It's only natural to want a surefire win. An honorable battle where both sides are equally matched is only "fun" when you know nothing bad will happen even if you lose

But you are fantasising solely about being the aggressor. In Stellaris, wars are declared unilaterally, so you may someday find yourself in an engagement you have not chosen. Wouldn't it be disappointing to have to say "My opponent did nothing but produce alloys, therefore I shall lose"?

You would want some hope of resisting through skill and defensive posturing with your smaller fleet and starbases. You'd be happy to micromanage if victory depended on it. You'd be happy to commit fleets to an uncertain outcome if it were the only chance of survival.

If doomstacking is nerfed, it just means the attacker has to put in the same effort. A thinking attacker ought to beat a thinking defender (it's good game design), but the playerbase in general finds it tiresome that an unthinking attacker who maximises alloys and fleet power always beats their defender no matter what -- because combat width is essentially unlimited, so battles are just a comparison of cumulative historical alloy production.

If you want to overwhelm through long-term outproduction and attrition, that can still be a legitimate strategy, but it takes more investment. The game should always transfer some risk to the attacker, even if it's just losing a fraction of ships each battle (which a doomstack doesn't). You might find that once doomstacking is no longer the easy option, more diverse and varied strategies ('Big Brain Battles', cloaking, jump drives) start to look worthwhile.

 

[3ishop]

But you are fantasising solely about being the aggressor. In Stellaris, wars are declared unilaterally, so you may someday find yourself in an engagement you have not chosen. Wouldn't it be disappointing to have to say "My opponent did nothing but produce alloys, therefore I shall lose"?

Odds are it will still go that way. If they can out produce you, they can have a larger fleet in the first place and replace losses quicker than you. Means even if you do manage to win one fight they have reserves you didn't confront and can start to replace those you did quicker.

You would want some hope of resisting through skill and defensive posturing with your smaller fleet and starbases. You'd be happy to micromanage if victory depended on it. You'd be happy to commit fleets to an uncertain outcome if it were the only chance of survival.

We already have that, it would be you needing to doomstack on a starbase to win. Not really much to micromanage if fighting a more powerful enemy and only reason to commit to an uncertain outcome would be because it's going to be game over if you don't so you don't risk anything.

If doomstacking is nerfed, it just means the attacker has to put in the same effort. A thinking attacker ought to beat a thinking defender (it's good game design), but the playerbase in general finds it tiresome that an unthinking attacker who maximises alloys and fleet power always beats their defender no matter what -- because combat width is essentially unlimited, so battles are just a comparison of cumulative historical alloy production.

Most aren't going to be "thinking" though, it will be the AI. It has a huge advantage when it comes to micromanaging lots of fleets over a human. This also doesn't change the core value of alloys and large fleets being the core value to winning wars.

 

[President Park Lee Ng]

But you are fantasising solely about being the aggressor. In Stellaris, wars are declared unilaterally, so you may someday find yourself in an engagement you have not chosen. Wouldn't it be disappointing to have to say "My opponent did nothing but produce alloys, therefore I shall lose"?

I don't see how this has ever been an issue? That's how it always has been. If your enemy has more ships than you, no matter what kind of defenses you have you'll crumble out of simple attrition

You would want some hope of resisting through skill and defensive posturing with your smaller fleet and starbases. You'd be happy to micromanage if victory depended on it. You'd be happy to commit fleets to an uncertain outcome if it were the only chance of survival.

And now you're fantasizing that you can pull off magnificent tactics where enemy superiority is defeated by Big Brain Maneuvers

That is not possible in Stellaris, or CK2. HOI4 has this but that's due to the fact that game is entirely about warfare.

You may say "well then change it!" but like, what's the point? There are other things to do in Stellaris: you need to deal with your empire for example, there's politics and such to consider. Focusing inordinate amount of focus on the fighting doesn't seem like a good idea

If doomstacking is nerfed, it just means the attacker has to put in the same effort. A thinking attacker ought to beat a thinking defender (it's good game design), but the playerbase in general finds it tiresome that an unthinking attacker who maximises alloys and fleet power always beats their defender no matter what -- because combat width is essentially unlimited, so battles are just a comparison of cumulative historical alloy production.

The attacker did put in some effort, they just did it long before they decided to attack you: they built up their economy

A quote that summarizes that is "amateurs talk about tactics, professionals talk about logistics"

If you want to overwhelm through long-term outproduction and attrition, that can still be a legitimate strategy, but it takes more investment. The game should always transfer some risk to the attacker, even if it's just losing a fraction of ships each battle (which a doomstack doesn't). You might find that once doomstacking is no longer the easy option, more diverse and varied strategies ('Big Brain Battles', cloaking, jump drives) start to look worthwhile.

Again, this is focusing inordinate amount of focus on the battle, completely ignoring why you're even in the disadvantageous position in the first place.

 

[President Park Lee Ng]

To summarize my thoughts:

People always fantasize to have that grand battle where with Big Brain Maneuvers they pull off something like Thermopylae or maybe Dunkirk where smaller, HONORABLE force can defeat much bigger, COWARDLY, DISHONORABLE enemies.

I understand that. The satisfaction of winning against all odds is the whole point of like thousands upon thousands of movies and TV. But this is one of those things where it'd be fun it you do it, and not if it was done to you

When people get soundly defeated, "Well played good chap, mayhaps there be nuggets of lesson for this ol' noggin, verily the best had won" is like never the first thing in their mind. What DOES appear is "This is outrageous, it's unfair! How can I dedicate myself to battle, and not win the war?"

When I watch play videos at veteran level, the amount of metagaming that I see is insurmountable. There never was an honorable "my best against your best". No, what happens is "your best against my counter, based upon innumerable meta research I have done against the AI" (of course, I'm talking about single player here)

I really don't think "splitting up forces" is something people actually want, it's something they fantasize, but will never, ever, actually do unless they're forced to do so. The evidence being they can already do that: they can just NOT focus the entirety of their military to steamroll the enemy, they can just NOT use meta designs to counter enemy ships, but they never do that: instead, they'll take the path of least resistance, they'll do whatever is necessary to get their objective, and squeeze out every last exploit possible to get the upper hand

I personally think, even when implemented, it will not matter much at the end of the day

There are many, many reasons IRL troops are not doomstacked, all of which are annoying and boring, not something you want to have for entertainment

 

[passeris]

I don't see how this has ever been an issue? That's how it always has been. If your enemy has more ships than you, no matter what kind of defenses you have you'll crumble out of simple attrition

The attacker did put in some effort, they just did it long before they decided to attack you: they built up their economy

A quote that summarizes that is "amateurs talk about tactics, professionals talk about logistics"

Again, this is focusing inordinate amount of focus on the battle, completely ignoring why you're even in the disadvantageous position in the first place.

You know, I don't disagree. I'm not even against the idea that the person with the biggest fleet should dominate. In the sea of space, planets are just islands after all. But I want to take the focus away from alloy production and 'honor', because that's not really what this is about.

Here is the actual problem I want to address: combat width is unlimited, so by having the bigger fleet you lose fewer ships and take less damage in engagements.

This creates a snowballing effect that gives the bigger fleet a disproportionate advantage, being essentially immune to attrition. Having a larger fleet makes you untouchable, so having the largest stack becomes imperative. Doom stacking is the only way to survive, because ten 100K Bastion starbases will not stop an invading 500K stack.

This power-amplifying snowball effect is what people want to remove from doomstacking. I've suggested a hyperlane width, others suggest a limit on the number of fleets in a system or able to engage in combat. Non-linear scaling of fleet power in battles is the issue that leads to doomstacks. By limiting the size of engagements, we remove the snowballing effect.

The outcome is that the player with more fleet power still wins, but doesn't steamroll the player with less. There is a cost to the victor; they suffer proportionate losses.

It's my hope that this would make diverse tactics more rewarding by reducing losses for the aggressor, and make life less frustrating for the defender who currently can't touch the attacker's larger stack. But that's not my aim; my aim is to mitigate the disproportionate advantage that larger fleets have, because that's the root of this problem.

 

[President Park Lee Ng]

I do not believe that it's the actual problem. It looks like a symptom, not a problem

The root of the problem, as you say, is actually defender's frustration. This frustration needed outlet, and one of the targets happen to be doomstack

Here's why I don't believe doomstack is an issue:

1. If you're fighting against the AI, they die to counters of much lower firepower anyway
2. If you're fighting in MP, the presence of other players should already serve as deterrent against knowingly sending your entire fighting force to the other side of the galaxy.
3. Such a mechanic will, for the majority of the time, become an annoyance to single players (who'd of course be winning against AI) rather than an advantage they can use. Artificially extending war that should've ended
4. In SP, it doesn't really matter how much of a fight you put up, once you've been annexed the game is over. If you're subjugated instead, that's an opportunity to fiddle around with subsidy instead

Based on how it's described, this "anti-doomstack" is less "how can I put up a valiant fight in the face of inevitable defeat?" and more "how can I take a bit of revenge after I have been destroyed?", and a uniquely MP "problem"

If I remember correctly, they tried to deter doomstacks by hard capping naval cap. That was wildly unpopular so they reverted it back to soft cap

Warfare while a highlight of Stellaris (because space fiction is always about firing mah lazors), is also a pain. There's no end to complaining about warfare being a slog: finding the enemy fleets, bombarding their planets taking forever, accepting win only to find out that one system was not fully occupied so now what should've been destroyed annoys you again for the next 10 years. It's gotten to the point people value Colossi not because of its firepower, but because it grants access to casus belli that quite literally takes the hassle out of war, war becomes What You See Is What You Get, and the ultra defended planet just gets cracked coz it's not worth it

I sincerely don't think adding more annoyances in an attempt to mitigate doomstack is a good idea. People don't like annoyances. Give them a benefit for not committing their entire fighting force instead

IDK how it can should be done, just putting it out there

 

[00no4]

Something that has always been mindbogoling to me is you have the EU war system right there, like obviously they are different games but even if you took they EU system unchanged and imported it into stellaris it would do a better job of representing she shifting alliances on an intergalactic front then the current all or nothing system?


At a minimum we should be able to, Change a war goal mid war in response to changes, Be able to peace out factions separately if I have conquered the entirety of a civilisation and its physically impossible for their ally to reach me why the hell am I still locked in this war?

Declare war, and make treaties with people who are at war why the hell do i have to wait patiently for a war with another faction that I don't even know exists to end? I should be able to join in on an existing war!

 

[ParciwalGaming]

Add a way to negotiate join another empires war against someone after they started. And Count the willingness to surrender from both sides. I have had multiple instances where I got stuck in a war because another Empire was fighting at the same time and we split the enemy in two (especially bad if one controls the system while the other holds the planet). Maybe treat these situations as one war or make a conference at the end, kind of like hoi4, where, the more you did, the more you get.

 

[hongsan1233]

Change the justification of the war to "pre-war mobilization" and directly link it to war-weariness. Otherwise, you remind me of China 3,000 years ago. At that time, China was not an empire, and the vassal states would attack each other for "disrespecting Zhou rituals". At that time, there was a country called Chu, which attacked other countries without any reason. At that time, other countries asked Chu. "Why did you start a war?" Chu responded, "I am a barbarian!"
You see, this is ridiculous. A FTL civilization acts like China did 3,000 years ago. So the real war is that if you lag behind, you will be beaten. If you don't get beaten, it's because I don't want to beat you today. The post-war disposal method can be simply made with laws and policies, and made into a series of events.
Mechanism:
1. The stationing of troops consumes resources, just like the EU. The productivity of a planet may not be able to support an army, so the army with poor discipline will suffer "non-combat casualties".At this time, should the army still "not harm anyone"? Limited "military requisition". Or should it adopt the "Three Alls Policy" (rob All, burn All, kill all)? The choice is given to the player.
2. Highlight the consequences of war: War will lead to long-term hatred and distrust, and when the player occupies a country with different national thoughts and different physiological forms (such as humanoids and reptiles living together), they must pay the price of public security. Then hatred and distrust will further increase public security, but this is not purely negative, but will provide gains when players impose certain bills, and can increase stability by creating "us" and "them". Historical hatred can also accelerate the speed of the next pre-war mobilization."
3. Proxy wars and deviations from war goals: Mechanisms should be added to require that in a war, both sides must fight closely around their own war goals, otherwise it will accelerate the rise of war weariness. Proxy wars will allow third parties to intervene in the war, and through protracted confrontation, the other side's war goals will lack phased results, thereby increasing war weariness. This is "one and prosperous, two and declining, and three and exhausted." In the battle to defend the homeland, the invader can also force the enemy to surrender through this "attacking the heart first."
4. Escalation of war: During the war, in order to avoid deviations from the war goals and lead to war weariness. The national will will escalate or de-escalate the war to adapt to the situation. If the war is de-escalated, it will take the initiative to raise war weariness in order to seek a "decent ceasefire" between the two sides. If the war escalates, it is necessary to increase the intensity and goals of the war. This will lead to "non-combat casualties "Events" and "historical legacy issues" in the future. Obviously, for some extreme militarism and extreme xenophobia, "non-combat casualties" and "targeted cleanup" will happen. I mean that people in human history have done such things, and the post-war treatment of such wars will last for more than one generation. Unless they show enough "apology".
5. Post-war garrisons and regulations: When one civilization breaks the military backbone of another civilization, they can become "allies" and "federations", and the suzerain country should have the right to garrison to "protect" the defeated country. At the same time, powerful countries can also require the defeated country to sign various unequal treaties, even if they violate their mainstream thoughts. For example, requiring xenophobic civilizations to open their doors and accept free trade. Or requiring militaristic civilizations to disarm, etc. At this time, using the suzerain estate to transform the defeated country's society can ensure that the next integration can be smooth.
6. Gestalt civilization is war-weary: Gestalt's war-weariness can be referred to the pain feedback of biological limbs. When Gestalt "feels pain", he will shrink back. Usually, Gestalt's ability to continue fighting is very strong, but once it is afraid, because it only has one main thought, the fear left may last longer.

 

[klopkr]

It didn't even occur to me that ground warfare was part of what's being asked for feedback here. I only hope it'll be easier to manage your ground troops. I want them to let me merge them with my naval fleets and let them return to my naval fleet after conquests so I can stop micromanaging them so much.

I also want to see much much larger frontlines. Fighting int he late game against super defensible planets the main issue is that no matter how much you out number them only a handful of troops are fighting at once. I kind of wish the frontlines were more dynamic. Where are all these reserves hiding on the planet anyways? It might be nice to be able to select how big a frontline you want as an empire law, with the smallest one taking precedence. Some empires might want to do giant line formation battles, others more insurgency actions.

Took me a second to realize they weren't also just asking about war resolutions. The single most odious part of stellaris.

War resolutions NEED to allow you to take uncontrolled systems. The AI is too gameable as it is. I've won enitre campaigns as a weakling under dog by just leaving a small ally between me and an enemy then claiming all their systems and only declaring claim wars so they literally can't take anything when they win. Most of these wars involved nearly my entire empire occupied and me taking 10 systems to their 1 or 0. If the AI is winning they should win the peace too.

I really think we need a Europea Universalis system. AI's peacing out before 100% warscore or exhaustion. The ability to demand things you didn't occupy for a higher price, plenty of additional peace options so not every war is an annihilation war, asking to break alliances, resources, support on galactic resolutions, to fight a crisis, to decloak for a while, to let you pass through, to give you a scientific research or some ships, to change a law or embrace a faction, to let me put my royal family on their throne. There are so many possibilities and so much more roleplay to be had! As for total wars, just take a page from Imperator Rome. They implemented them and they worked fine. Just keep a peacedeal at the end to exchange for more stuff and maybe to cut down on bordergore destroy the space stations of inaccessible solar systems.

And for the love of stellaris please add back shared system control. The game can handle it! Just give every planet a simple outpost and let any empire control it. That'll fix so many issues with pre-ftls too and prevent so much border gore and cheesing the AI by leaving them only disconnected planetary systems.

 

[n0cturn4l]

This creates a snowballing effect that gives the bigger fleet a disproportionate advantage, being essentially immune to attrition. Having a larger fleet makes you untouchable, so having the largest stack becomes imperative. Doom stacking is the only way to survive, because ten 100K Bastion starbases will not stop an invading 500K stack.

The main reason for battles IS snowballing, what do you mean?
If you are the weaker side, you have to rely on hit and run tactics, baits, cutting reinforcements off etc.

Nerfing doomstacks by restricting the hyperlane/battle width basically rewards weak empires for no reason.

 

[passeris]

The main reason for battles IS snowballing, what do you mean?
If you are the weaker side, you have to rely on hit and run tactics, baits, cutting reinforcements off etc.

Nerfing doomstacks by restricting the hyperlane/battle width basically rewards weak empires for no reason.

You have two ships. Your opponent has three ships. The ships go into battle. Because of the way fleet combat works in Stellaris (unlimited combat width), you lose both your ships, while your opponent retains two.

You both continue producing ships of equal quality, and at the same rate. By the time you have produced two ships, your opponent has four. At the end of the next battle, your opponent still has his four ships, while you have zero. And following the battle after that, your opponent has six ships, and you have zero.

You could wait until you have more ships, but there are two problems with this:

1. Your opponent has declared war, so you do not get to choose the terms of engagement.
2. This will eventually reproduce the same growth pattern, but on a different scale. There is no way out of this cycle.

In an alternative universe where [combat width = 1], your first battle ends with you losing both your ships. But your opponent also loses two ships. So next time, when you enter battle, you have two ships and your opponent again has three. Your opponent still wins every battle, but he isn't further rewarded for having the bigger fleet. There is no feedback loop amplifying his advantage over you.

Which of these systems is more fair? Which is more desirable? Does it change when you imagine yourself as the defender rather than the attacker? These are open questions. There seems to be a diversity of opinion. Finally, now that you know fleet combat works this way, how are you going to play? What becomes the highest priority?

 

[3ishop]

Which of these systems is more fair? Which is more desirable? Does it change when you imagine yourself as the defender rather than the attacker? These are open questions. There seems to be a diversity of opinion. Finally, now that you know fleet combat works this way, how are you going to play? What becomes the highest priority?

Neither. I'd still much prefer the current one which then gives me a fighting chance against superior enemies. Good luck fighting someone who has more advanced tech who doesn't lose ships at the same rate as you. Your system still leads to them getting more and more numbers. At least the current system you can try and fight them with numerical superiority if not tech superiority.

 

[Psicke]

Have a choice to create more storytelling within our empire characters, let us train our favorite scientist to launch some nuclear bombing plan (chain of events to help our forces, etc) MORE STORYTELLING and MORE planning using our style of civilization and shape it in each war, example, lead psionic and zombis in each war with cool storytelling that gives bonuses and stories with choices

 

[Thundrcrash]

With the merging of Admirals and Generals into Commanders it only makes sense to make it so that Commanders can have transport ships attached to their fleet.

 

[Cybersbe]

I’ve come up with an idea for adding a visual component to ground combat.

I imagine that it could be VERY difficult to make new animations for all the species portraits, so I’ve come with a relative “one size fits all” approach.

My idea is making soldiers that are fully armored/encased in some way, allowing players to use their imaginations to what’s underneath. For species that are humanoid/bidepal, we can fairly standard looking soldiers, with Slender, Normal, and Massive sizes to reflect the sizes they can have. I also think there could perhaps be different helmet styles (i.e. there could be beaked helmets for avians).

For non-humanoids, it might be trickier. But I think some “monstrous” and/or “hovercraft” styles could be possible.

 

[Grenartia]

I’ve come up with an idea for adding a visual component to ground combat.

I imagine that it could be VERY difficult to make new animations for all the species portraits, so I’ve come with a relative “one size fits all” approach.

My idea is making soldiers that are fully armored/encased in some way, allowing players to use their imaginations to what’s underneath. For species that are humanoid/bidepal, we can fairly standard looking soldiers, with Slender, Normal, and Massive sizes to reflect the sizes they can have. I also think there could perhaps be different helmet styles (i.e. there could be beaked helmets for avians).

For non-humanoids, it might be trickier. But I think some “monstrous” and/or “hovercraft” styles could be possible.

But other than adding to the CPU burden (and the player's attention burden when they may have fleets engaged elsewhere that they need to focus on), what's the point? Does it add anything informational and critical that the current ground combat visual component doesn't? For all the complaining about the current ground combat visuals, you can't deny that its as informative as it needs to be: you know exactly which units are fighting, which are taking damage, and how many in total on both sides.

Your proposal sounds like it not only doesn't improve on the information supply, but even subtracts from it.

 

[Cybersbe]

But other than adding to the CPU burden (and the player's attention burden when they may have fleets engaged elsewhere that they need to focus on), what's the point? Does it add anything informational and critical that the current ground combat visual component doesn't? For all the complaining about the current ground combat visuals, you can't deny that its as informative as it needs to be: you know exactly which units are fighting, which are taking damage, and how many in total on both sides.

Your proposal sounds like it not only doesn't improve on the information supply, but even subtracts from it.

Eh, some people would just like to be able to actually see their soldiers fighting, like they already can with fleets, and I was just spitballing an idea on how to make it possible. There could probably be an option to turn the visuals off for people concerned about PC strain. (Heck, I imagine that visuals will already be disabled when invading primitive species, since they obviously wouldn't have the high-tech equipment necessary for my "one size fits all" approach.)

 

[rolfey1328]

The strategic realities of fortress worlds, chokepoint, crossroads and major industrial/trade/logistical hubs would be great. Gaining intel over another empire would feel more tactile, if in gaining it, I see those hubs and trade routes, and plan my campaigns accordingly.

Building on this, capturing these built-up planets/highly upgraded starbases should impact the war exhaustion score more than in other planets/starbases

 

[Demonthese]

A bit late to the party but if the other factions allies don't have a valid path to the warzone they shouldn't count for fleet strength comparison in determining whether or not they will surrender. Very annoying to sit around for years and years with nothing happening because the AI is unable to get access to the warzone from the other side of the galaxy. Or maybe apply a reduction proportional to the capital's distance from the war target's capital.