double post

I disagree. You're effectively blocking off the dragon from attacking for a moment. Of course, if you are only draining his AP with peasants then they won't be able to stop him for long since the peasants would be killed in the counterattacks.

As far as constantly draining a dragon's AP with newly summoned creatures that's a balance issue rather than an issue with the system itself.

This is a very poor analogy for the situation. There's a big difference between focus firing a unit and killing it, and tying it up with high defense units so it can't move/attack. Units die, but having one that you can't control for consecutive turns because it's getting its AP depleted is not fun.

But this isn't true, you said so yourself:

I mean, you oversimplified it, but isn't the point of tactical combat to actually be tactical, and not "everyone does everything"? You'd have your heavily armored units mainly trying to protect your ranged damage dealers - they'd spend all their AP attacking while the their protectors would counter-attack.

You also talk as if attacking and counter-attacking is a 1:1 relationship, but this isn't true either. Under the current proposal we're all running off of, counter-attacking takes half as much AP as attacking. So, you would absolutely have a choice between attacking or defending and the benefits of each will be highly situational.

Let's play with a few numbers:

Say you have a unit with 3 AP and 1 combat speed against units with 1 AP and 1 combat speed, for simplicity. That's 3 attacks, or 6 counter-attacks. If the unit is engaging 2 of the other units, you have a choice between: 1) attack 3 times. 2) attack 2 times, have enough AP for 2 counter-attacks, 4) attack once, save 4 counter-attacks, 5) save all AP for counter-attacks. The obvious choice is 2). You get 4 hits in, and since the opponent can only attack once you also counter each of their attacks. Everything else results in a lower total damage output from you.

Now say you have the same unit and against the same 1/1 units, but now there are 6 of them. You have the same choices, but now the obvious best choice is 5), you save all AP so you counter-attack 6 times and maximize your damage that way.

This is far, far, far superior to any "ha-ha, I can lock down your unit and there's nothing you can do about it" mechanic.

Counter attacks are going into the 3C build.  Units are now refunded their action points every time initiative switches (defender to attacker, attacker to defender), rather than after each round.  Units use these action points to counter attack. 1 AP per counter attack. When you're out of AP, you're done counter attacking.  Please note that this doesn't affect what you can actually do during the unit's turn. They'll have all their AP points back when their turn starts.

We're also separating the movement and attacking phases of each unit's turn.  Once a unit attacks, they can no longer move that turn. They are still free to switch targets within range and cast spells however.

How is it beside the point? If I send one unit off alone and an entire ARMY comes after it, didn't I get what I deserved? It sounds to me like I just got outplayed. What is the counter to a super unit supposed to be aside from another super unit, if you can't swarm it down with an army?

It's not going to be a very fun game if you see a dragon and go "oh well I don't have one and nothing else can possibly fight it, I'll go surrender now."

(If people are really worried about it, you could have the dragon ignore attacks that do zero damage, which means it'd never counterattack a peasant because peasants aren't capable of harming something with defense that high. Then to lock it down you have to use significantly more expensive units, and if you're able to do that and I can't field anything to support the dragon, at some point you probably should win anyway.)

I'm open to other ideas on counterattacks, but not this "oh just don't use your moves, then they can counterattack!" stuff. That's silly and a downright bad decision in most cases because taking out a unit first denies the opponent the ability to use it and the damage it could deal. That's a much better idea then standing still and hoping he attacks your immobile unit instead of going after the one that can't counterattack due to having actually done something.

Well, that's an interesting choice. It does avoid the obvious problems of having too many free counterattacks, or locking down units by forcing counterattacks that are too costly. Of course the counterattacks are still 'free,' just limited in number, there's no tradeoff between attacking or counterattacking. Still a good way to do counterattacks, it avoids any serious pitfalls.

Yeah it's a moot point now, but I enjoy good discussion

My point wasn't that you would send your dragon in alone to get ambushed by a perfectly crafted group of spellcaster+50 peasants designed to exploit lockdown; my point is that because such a situation could occur, you'd have to take steps to avoid it, it alters game balance even if it never happens. A dragon really should be able to kill a single high damage but vulnerable unit and his harmless friends; you really shouldn't have to escort your dragon everywhere he goes just to ward off the scary peasants. Obviously the dragon probably will have a larger army with him, and so will his enemy, but this basic flaw in the system doesn't go away just because a larger battle is going on around the dragon - as long as I have some expendable peasants, I can lock your dragon down as long as I have peasants to spare while my other units and your other units fight. This costs me a bunch of peasants, yes, but it denies you use of your dragon, a rarer/more valuable/much, much more dangerous unit. Again I'm not saying that this 'lockdown' can't be countered, just saying that it shouldn't be there at all, and shouldn't need to be countered. But yeah, it's a moot point, Stardock found a good moderate solution that should cover it.

Well hey, that was an easy solution. Good job!

Did the combat speed/movement stuff get changed based on this discussion as well? I know Brad was specifically interested in some of the suggestions.

The dragon probably should be acting first. He should be faster than peasants, no? So if some kind of initiative was in play that dictated turn order (not just I go first with all my guys then you go with all your guys) that would probably eliminate the possibility.

Otherwise, I don't know if it's an exploit. If you send one unit in by itself you're ASKING to get gang tackled. The best choice to make is to not send the dragon in by itself against a stack of 51 units...You might call it having to "counter an exploit", I call it sound tactics. I mean, is it really going out of your way to not fight when you're outnumbered 50 to 1?

But as far as counter attacks, why not derive them from another stat AND do away with the taking from next turn or whatever. Since DEX is supposed to relate to defense, make number of counterattacks be derived off DEX. Use a chart, formula, whatever, modify it by items, buffs, debuffs - and go to town. Or use combat speed - you got Combat Speed number of counter attacks per defensive turn. That way you can gang tackle but the target won't lose any turns.

The biggest issue I have with Tactical Combat is, I don't know how many attack or moves each character has.

I like the idea of action points

Action Points - used to move, attack or save some for a counter attack.

Example: 5 AC

AC costs

2 AC to Attack (Weapon, Spell, or Ranged Weapon) (maybe each weapon or spell could have it's own AC rating)

2 AC to counter Attack

1 AC to move one hex (maybe different creatures have a different movement AC rating)

So with 5 AC you could do one of the following:

-Move 1 hex and attack twice (1+4).

-Move 3 hexes and attack once(3+2).

 Attack once, move 1 hex, and prepare for counter Strike (2+1+2).

Nice, nice. Not-so-secretly happy that you guys didn't go with a "lockdown" idea.

it didnt work

it WAS in other games

there are 123424124 flaws in civ4 even if it was one of the best games ever

Not that it really matters now... but Civ 4 doesn't have tactical combat at all. So what does it have to do with this?

We've increased the cost of moving to 2AP per tile (attacking and casting still costs 1). All units now start with (combat speed + 1) action points. Minimum AP is thus 1.  Fractions of an AP will still allow you to act. Best way to explain this is by example.

EXAMPLE:

Say I am a sovereign with 1.2 combat speed. I go into a tactical battle. I get 2.2 AP to spend per turn.  The following actions are available to me:

- I can move twice (the first move costing the full 2 AP because I can afford it, and then the second move taking the remaining 0.2 AP).

-I can move once and attack once (the attacking taking my remaining 0.2 AP).

-I can move once and then cast a spell (the spell cast taking my remaining 0.2 AP).

-I can attack three times (the third attack taking my remaining 0.2 AP).

-I can attack once, cast a spell, and then attack again (and the other variations of this combo).

This should solve the cases where units can't move or attack due to low combat speed, either from slowing spells/abilities or from naturally low stats.  This should also help balance mounted units a little more. Their naturally high combat speed made them murder machines in 3B.

Well that is certainly good news.

Are we still having monolithic Combat speed? Or are we going to split it between Tactical Speed and Attack Speed (as discussed)?

..

If not, then does this mean that Cavalry's main advantage will be Overland movement? And I suppose Sauron will be running faster than the Cavalry during a battle

Yet wouldn't they still be murder machines unless we separate attackspeed/movespeed in some way?

Is it still going to be easy to get high combat speed (via level up or equipment)? If a sovereign has 15 mana he can cast 7 damage spells at 2 mana per spell before anything happens, provided he has the action points. Seems a bit excessive.

To bad we were not able to assign classes to are guys like archer, warrior, etc, or make templates that assigned certain skills to them automatically, like make an Archer template, and they get "Aimed shot Arm" disarms enemy for a turn, "Aimed shot legs" stops them from moving a turn, or whatever, to assign to anyone you create as archer, you know kinda like a RPG game,

Well, that sounds better. It still seems like mounted units will get an attacks (and thus effective damage) boost if they don't move though. I know we're sucking up your time here, but can you explain why NullAshton's idea was rejected?

Aye ... I would like to know why NullAshton's idea was rejected.

I DO like the fact that any point value left allows for movement though.

... I am guessing that Cavalry will only cost 1 AP per tile then? To allow them with a relatively low combat speed yet still able to move those distances ...

In that case at least a combat speed of 5 for Cavalry. (which is still a LOT of attacks)

I think Brad responded to it pretty well. The connection between movement speed on the main map and movement speed in tactical battles implied by action points = moves overpowers the stat we think. You'd be able to move huge distances on the main map and huge distance in tactical battles too. I think it worked in Age of Wonders partially because they had a lot of "movement sinks" on the main map with it being a hex grid, and having 3 levels.

If I'm misunderstanding what NullAshton was suggesting, feel free to correct me, I read his post really fast.

just explaining that many games had a feature that nearly worked even if there were many flaws

this sounds bad to me

imo should allow MAX the next unit not just 2

ie

0.2 i can do an action requiring 1 max

1.2 i can do an action requiring 2 max

the bestest would probably be not use fractions at all

sounds bad if a cavalry with 4 ap can do the same than a footman with 2.0000001 ap

Well, the modified Ideas led by Several Posters ... decided to leave Overland movement outside of battles, and to instead have a completely new stat called Tactical Speed (or Action Points)

If, however, Combat Speed is still going to equal Action Points (merging Tactical Speed and Attack Speed) ... then I would suggest that moving 1 tile costs 3 Action Points, and have Mounted units move at 1 tile costing 0.25 Action Points.

That way a Mounted Unit can have 2 combat speed and move 8 tiles (in a Tactical Battle).

And it also allows a Sauron to have 9 combat speed and only be able to move 3 tiles.

Of course ... if you give Sauron a Horse then you can easily see that such a proposed system (by me) is broken.

Now, under the current rules moving a tile costs 2 action points. Lets assume that Riding a horse reduces that cost to 1 action point.

How fast do you want your Horse to move? Well, conservatively assuming most infantry have a combat speed of 1-2, and 1 tile movement is normal for infantry ... (well, that tells me that Battle maps will be very, VERY small) ... then I guess you could get away with having a Horse give +2 combat speed for a total average movement of 3 or 4 tiles.

Of course ... this has the strange affect of letting the Soldier's skills (at attacking) affect how fast the Horse runs.

i dont really like the idea of units attacking 9 times tbh

sounds bad to me

apart from sauron having multiple attack  on noob units doesnt sound right

Lol ... you do know that Combat Speed max is 10 right?

Anyways, having high attack speed is okay ... as long as having a lot of HP is an alternative. (especially high HP monsters).

The problem I have is connecting Attack Speed with Tactical Movement speed.

I agree that Overland movement should have nothing to do with Battles, but I think Attack Speed and Battle Speed should be separate.