Why the combat system should be changed

An essay

from GalCiv2 Forums
I've played many games from "tough" to suicidal in sandbox mode (not metaverse, could care less) and invariably the ai always makes the same mistakes that don't provide the challenge they were designed for. There are quite a few of these, from underestimating the military or potential military might of their opponents (which might be corrected at least partially by changing the military might calculation as per this thread Link To declaring wars that they aren't prepared to fight (the entire concept of sneak attack escapes them). Features that would incorporate ai changes that would make them effective at evaluating targets properly and gearing up for war, including creating battle fleets outside of sensor range complete with transports ready to invade all bordering worlds within 1 or 2 turns of declaring war, would be welcome additions but probably furthur off than we'd like them to be, realistically speaking.

Instead, my suggestion is a seemingly simple one and it's been said before but I'd like to elaborate on why the change would make the ai much more effective. The change I'm talking about is battle sequence...attackers shoot first, and defenders respond after taking losses, also known as first strike. In this, the current battle system, defenders really get the shaft...often taking losses to half their fleet or more before being able to respond. This by itself is not particularly bad, if there were two human players waging war this way it would be a real cat and mouse game as we each tried to get first strike on the other. The real problem is that the ai doesn't "get it". They build slow fleets, they turtle their ships on planets to defend rather than taking those ships out to engage the enemy, etc. So rather than change the ai with complex code to understand and fully take advantage of first strike...remove the game mechanic altogether and give defending ships the ability to fire before they die. It would be no more difficult than adding a flag to a defending ship that took enough damage to kill it (marked for death) it then gets to return fire along with all it's buddies before finally exploding. In short, attacking and defending fleets would effectively be firing simultaneously...sometimes resulting in complete destruction on both sides, yes, but also giving defending fleets the firepower that was robbed of them because they died without ever firing a shot.

Currently, most players seem to value speed highly...something that I also do, and probably would continue to value even after this change. I like having a mobile and flexible military that can respond effectively to threats. I also like having my newly built ships being able to reach the front lines within a few turns. Currently though, speed isn't just a benefit...it's THE deciding issue to who wins any particular engagement...Attackers win, usually overwhelmingly (especially mid-late game), all else being equal.

Though the ai could be better at building it's ships more often (said before), once designed they are actually quite effective...if only they get to fire. Most of the time, they don't. They also tend to leave their ships on their planet to defend when invaded (something human players do NOT do currently)...a competent and useful strategy in most games, just not this one. When left to defend their ships become nothing more than a minor annoyance, even if more powerful overall than the attacking fleet. Which actually leads to one other point.

Orbital fleet managers are redundant and should be removed from the game. There is no justifiable reason that ships shouldn't be able to defend in a fleet without a planet improvement. While the ai does build this somewhere around mid-late game...the planets he does not build this on aren't just easy to kill, but laughably so. The human players do NOT build this improvement currently (or I don't at least) since as stated before, they are only useful when defending and defenders get the shaft currently, so instead we pull our ships out into a fleet and attack the invaders. You could get the ai to learn to do this, or you could just change the game mechanic to reward their current behavior, I suggest the latter.

To sum up
- make ships on both sides fire simutaneously
- Allow fleets over a planet to defend using the current logistics ability by default

The end result would make the current ai behavior make much more sense, and create more challenge. Invading ai attackers wouldn't be able to be picked off with fast fleets that pack a punch but have no defenses to speak of. Taking over ai planets will be much more difficult and you might actually incur losses while doing so. All without changing a thing regarding ai behavior.

If the ai can't take advantage of the system, but the players can, then the system needs to be changed.
18,391 views 40 replies
Reply #1 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
- Allow fleets over a planet to defend using the current logistics ability by default


Agree.

Building a fleet manager is a waste of a completly good and useful tile.


- make ships on both sides fire simutaneously


IIRC Draginol spoke once about adding a initiative stat, which used on a per ship basis would solve the problem of attacking = winning and would also add something more to ship building (which can't be bad imho ).


But overall I completly agree with your analysis of the current situation.
Reply #2 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Initiative was a factor in ship design in Stars! and it could make a huge difference if you had 2 powerful ships. I think initiative was controlled by ship speed though. Dont recall so I might have to fire it up again. Been a while hehe
Galactic Civilizations IV
Reply #4 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Yep, the game's too easy on any level because of this. Doesn't matter if you're outeconomied, outresearched and outproduced, you can make it all back because you can get by with a much smaller military used smartly.

I'm dubious about an initiative system. I suspect it would go the same way...the AI not valuing initiative sufficiently. It'd also be a somewhat complicated fix.

I don't think you need a "return fire when dead" system like the one proposed. Attacker 1, Defender 1, Attacker 2, Defender 2, etc, etc would work fine I think, whilst still retaining a (non-overpowering) benefit for first strike.
Reply #6 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
The human players do NOT build this improvement currently (or I don't at least) since as stated before, they are only useful when defending and defenders get the shaft currently, so instead we pull our ships out into a fleet and attack the invaders


While I agree with most of your statements, this is completely wrong. I have specially built defenders that can survive any alpha strike, so defending them with orbital fleet manager saves me from a sneak attack by transports with ships of a higher speed than my sensor range. I've never lost a single ship with an orbital fleet manager, because I design my ships to be unkillable. I don't think speed is the be-all end-all, and have taken out opponents about 40 times my strength without difficulty.
Reply #7 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
In fact, now I think about it, this is probably the only thing stopping the AI from completely kicking my ass!
Reply #8 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Initiative has been planned for the add-on, if I recall.

I think the attacker gets too much of an advantage in both space and land battles. If you have equal opposing forces with equal firepower, the defender should win.

In space battles, it would be interesting to see what would happen if we could have the defender get the first shot, rather than the attacker.
Reply #9 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
That would remove entirely the element of tactical maneuvering though... The best tactic would be to wait for the AI to declare war, then watch as they suicide their ships into your own vessels. That's even worse than the current system.
Reply #10 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
I have specially built defenders that can survive any alpha strike, so defending them with orbital fleet manager saves me from a sneak attack by transports with ships of a higher speed than my sensor range. I've never lost a single ship with an orbital fleet manager, because I design my ships to be unkillable.


If your tech is good enough to be able to design unkillable ships, then you could just as easily build something else on the tile instead of the OFM and fill your shipyards with cheap and maintenance free junk ships to prevent lightning strikes. A single powerful fleet could then defend several planets at once much more cheaply.

I don't want to see the orbital fleet manager removed necessarily...instead I'd like it to act like that superproject which makes ALL your ships in orbit into a single fleet. It should be an immense and expensive undertaking to swoop deep into the heart of enemy territory and take over the opposition's capital planet. Achieving it with a single fleet and without loss feels a bit flat.
Reply #11 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
The original post is right in that the AI isn't playing the game as it was implemented, but as the developers expect the game to have been played.

However, it seems to me that it would be much easier to make the AI better at combat than to massively alter the combat system itself.

What you suggest would require rebalancing the entire combat system. Making the AI better at the current combat system wouldn't.

Lastly, personally I like having to use "offensive" defense. I like having to attack rather than being attacked. I like bunkering not working unless you're willing to sacrifice a tile (or 2!) for it. I think the current system is fun and interesting. The problem, as you point out, is that the AI is playing a different game. Teach the AI to play the game we have and not the game that StarDock thought they made, and everyone's happy.

There is no justifiable reason that ships shouldn't be able to defend in a fleet without a planet improvement.


I agree with OFM's being a bad (though understandable) design decision. Trading a tile for being actually able to defend is ridiculous; I'd never bother with that. OFM should be the default. It's too easy to milk experience (though far less so in 1.1 than in 1.0) from non-OFM planets than from OFM planets. Even in an offensive-based game, it should be possible to stock up a few defensive-oriented (slow-moving, lots of shields) ships on planets.
Reply #12 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
However, it seems to me that it would be much easier to make the AI better at combat than to massively alter the combat system itself.


I think it doesn't matter how hard they work on the AI, it will never be able to match the player on a ship design basis (at least without making the game ridiculously slow to run) As long as good ship design and management hands such an enormous advantage as it does currently, the AI will never pose a serious challenge without "cheating". At the moment, the advantage is so huge it doesn't pose that serious a challenge even when it is cheating! (Might just be me, but I expect to LOSE most of the time on a setting like suicidal...not lose very occasionally!)

On reflection, attacker, defender, attacker, defender may require a lot of rebalancing to ensure tiny hulls don't become too dominant. But I think they've a great deal more chance of success of changing the combat system to reduce the player advantage than they have of getting the AI up to human standards in ship design. And bottom line, it seems ridiculous that when two powerful and near identical fleets meet, the attacker should win every time with minimal losses.
Reply #13 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
As a way to make the OFMs usefull (this suggestion is going along with the suggestion that ships always defend in fleets) is make the OFM add a logistics bonous to the defending fleet (so it'll be bigger).

Some sort of init system would be nice, one way I could see to do it is have it be based on a combined sensors/speed rating, giving you a reason to research sensors(which I have yet to actually do).
Reply #14 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
I'm kinda mixed on this one. While I do think that any system created is going to have some flaw that a human player will find and exploit I don't think the current system is bad either. Lets run through a couple shall we.

Simultaneous Combat: In other words you fire, I fire, and most HPs wins. Sounds good right? Ok but what happens if I fire on the same ship twice with two of my ships? Does the defender get to return fire on that next ship thus getting multiple attacks? And what about their *turn*? That ship has already fired once. Should it get to fire again during its normal turn too? So if you say that the defending ship only gets one retaliation shot then all I need to do is make sure I can kill it within the my fleet's first volley (sound familiar?) and if not the first volley at least the next one. Thus this really solves nothing unless you give the defender multiple attacks which I would not be for.

Initiative Combat: A lot of pen & paper systems use this form to decide who gets to roll first. Fine and dandy right? Nope. Again all I need to do is make sure my ships are built with the best initiative possible and I can still wipe you out and not only that now if you attack me and I'm defending I get to fire first and wipe you out. Not to mention what happens when two fleets have the same initiative?

Current System: Ok so attacker always fires first and defender only gets to return fire if the ships survive. Given that as the human player I can build fleets that can not only withstand this first strike but destroy the attacker it should stand to reason that the AI can do the same. Right now the flaw in the AI that Brad is fully aware of is the fact that it designs ships once a year. That needs to change. Most human players from what I've read don't bother with a military until needed and then design the best possible ships. Seems to me if the AI did this it would be a lot harder to defeat.

So the only change I see needed is that the AI needs to design its ships with the following thoughts:
1) Speed good - from what I've seen v1.1 does this very well
2) Attack Power - again if given time between designs the AI starts to build some pretty good ships in terms of attack
3) Defense Power - IMO the AI does not put enough defenses on its ships. My last few games I've mopped up because the AI was building Photon Torpedoes and I was building ships with Aereon Missile defense. Guess who won. Me every time. Even when they attacked with ships doing upwards of 30 points of damage and the fleet was doing upwards of 100 points. My defense was 40. Ok so my attack was only 10 (gotta love nano rippers:) ) but even so defense is paramount in my book.

Another system is just that another system. No better or worse then what we've got. I think if Brad tweaks the ship designing like he wants it will be much better.
Reply #15 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Again all I need to do is make sure my ships are built with the best initiative possible and I can still wipe you out and not only that now if you attack me and I'm defending I get to fire first and wipe you out. Not to mention what happens when two fleets have the same initiative?


Well, it depends how they implement it (if indeed they are), but I'm assuming you'll only be able to increase initiative at the expense of offensive and defensive power. As long as they switch to individual ship firing order rather than one fleet then the other, this could work. But they'll have to do something a bit more clever than simply "highest initiative goes first" or else players will just design ships with the smallest possible initiative advantage, resulting in an even bigger advantage for the player overall (as you pointed out). Still, there are possibilities (for example, cumulatively penalize the initiative of ships each time one from their fleet fires in the round)

Will be interesting to see what they come up with.
Reply #16 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Initiative Combat: A lot of pen & paper systems use this form to decide who gets to roll first. Fine and dandy right? Nope. Again all I need to do is make sure my ships are built with the best initiative possible and I can still wipe you out and not only that now if you attack me and I'm defending I get to fire first and wipe you out. Not to mention what happens when two fleets have the same initiative?


That's not nescessarly the case. It depends on what you depend the initiative. If you design it so that you can't have a high attack rating while having a high initiative you wouldn't be able to attack first and obliterate everything. It would be more a either attack first and do some damage or shoot second and do lots of damage.

You know, sort of like why large axes always have a low initiative.

But I also have to agree to the rest of your post.

Imho a huge part of the problem is that on higher weapon tech lvls you're always able to make so much damage that you destroy your enemy with the first attack. An increase in hit points could also help a bit on this part.
Reply #17 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
There needs to be some sort of change here. Even something simple like a 50-50 chance of attacking first. It's just too easy to setup on the AI and swoop in and wipe him out in one or two turns.

Further it's way too easy to capture planets on the 1st few turns of war, while the AI struggles to even take out a minor race. Personally i'd like to see invasion tactics cost way way more, and the defender have the advantage. (Although the AI would probably never win a land battle then...)

Granted the AI has improved overall, I agree that the mechanics probably need changing here. (even if it feels like a cop-out)
Reply #18 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Imho a huge part of the problem is that on higher weapon tech lvls you're always able to make so much damage that you destroy your enemy with the first attack. An increase in hit points could also help a bit on this part.


Agree with this completely. Could be the simplest fix of all, actually.
Reply #19 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
I actually disagree with most you... most I belive that: simple = good

Lets look at it logically. Right now with the comabt system as is, the AIs already have their hands full. If you were to change any of the fundemental rules governing combat, the AI would need to be re-written to take the new rules into consideration. With more complicated rules, comes more complicated AI coding. More complex coding will enevitable lead to more bugs. In additon to more resources being used by the AI to make the need decisions. Some systems are already being severely tasked as is!

Now think, if the AI is already mismanaging fleets with these (very) simple rules, how do you expect it to realisticaly manage its fleets with even more comlex rules. What the whole "initiative/one shot before she blows" ideas are simply changing the problem, not fixing it.

Sticking with the simple = good school of thought, I feel that simply optimzing the AI (which is constantly happening anyways) to better mimmic humans in its uses of speed and surprise will deal with these problem far more quickly than overhauling the entire system.
Reply #20 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Well worded post, and interesting discussion.

I also find the existing system easy to exploit at the easy difficulty ratings that I play on now.

I would hope that at later difficulty levels that I couldnt ALWAYS get first strike with my Glass Cannon little death swarms that I love. I do PLENTY of damage with my Tiny hulled ships, and no one ever gets to retalliate. Coupled with a good sensor ranged ship, and fast engines. I tend to decimate as I am almost never get attacked first.

I agree that there should be some sort of innitiative based on speed or deffence rating, as having high deffence doesnt ever seem to a real solid solution as is Im leaning towards that.
Reply #21 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
I agrre with Teancum. I feel that the current system is fine, the AI just doesnt handle it well. I say the let the AI "evolve" through patches and such, look at the advancements made on the AI since this first shipped. It can only get better
Reply #22 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Initiative was a factor in ship design in Stars! and it could make a huge difference if you had 2 powerful ships. I think initiative was controlled by ship speed though. Dont recall so I might have to fire it up again. Been a while hehe


Actaully speed was the one factor in Stars! that didn't affect init. Hulls had a base init (bigger ships had higher), weapons had a base init (shorter range higher than long, high tech higher than low), and it was possible to put init boosting computers in your electronic slots to increase it farther.

Init doesn't have to be winner take all though, and to avoid ai abuse, shouldn't be. Make it a roll just like attack and defense. My fleet has ships with init 5, the ai with init 4, I'll win 10/20 init rolls, the AI 6, and 4 will be ties (suggest a reroll here). I'll get more first shots than the ai, but not an overwelming number. I'm not sure what the exact number would be, and don't have the energy to write a program to compute the net effect in multiship engagements (I did the 1on1 on a scrap of paper).
Reply #23 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Hmmm. It sounds logical, but there's a flaw there I think, teancum:

You're assuming two things

a) A more complicated system makes it more difficult to design an optimal AI

b) The disadvantage from sub-optimal play is equally severe under both rulesets

Assumption a) is probably fair. Assumption b) is not.

I think it's safe to assume the AI won't come close to matching humans in ship design. So the question is whether it's easier to narrow the gap by improving the AI, or changing to a different system which is more forgiving of the AIs weakness. "Different" doesn't have to mean more complicated, either. I quite like the ship design as it is and don't really want to be messing about with initiative as well, so I'd hope they can tweak something else instead, but if that's really what it takes then so be it. I'm pretty confident the devs will make the right decision.
Reply #24 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Maybe another simple change would be to increase the utilty of defense on ships. For example, what would happen if every defensive tech had its size cut in half and was also half as easy to research?

I also kind of like the idea of making it so that the fleet/ship that is the attacker does not have a 100% chance of firing the first shot. Introducing even a small chance of the defender getting the first shot makes combat less of a no-brainer.

However, these kinds of big changes take a lot of play-testing to determine the right balance...
Reply #25 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
i think defence is a little undervalued vs hitpoints. my suggestion would be that defence does not roll a dice but always defends at full value(direct)/square root(implied), whereas attack goes to (x + dice roll) to ensure basic damage and a plus to simulate successful targeting

i agree about OFM, and said as much during the beta. defending planets should be able to fleet automatically

perhaps armour should add to HP???