Logistics and attrition warfare

[Thorfinn the Shallow Minded]

Also, perhaps soldiers could 'forage' for food by hunting, farming, or collecting berries.

[majapahit]

Beside the fact that in my opinion this will make balancing quite hard, I don't really get the point. The distances displayed on one map and the armies itself aren't that huge I think. Of course logistics is necessary in reality, but how will you implement that an invading force can use the resources of a conquered city e.g.? If I remember Clausewitz correctly, which of course was way later, every greater invasion force had to use the resources of the so far conquered country and I honestly don't believe Xerxes did supply his troops only from persia. So I think if Logistics is added and troops will loose health outside the own territory, the effect should be much smaller, if not zero, if buildings/troops of the enemy get destroyed, as the troops would be able to use their food etc.

In my opinion, resources such as farmland etc should accessible to all factions. So player A can 'steal' resources in player B's city if not guarded.

[wrod]

I think instead of the troops losing health or stamina it should be that their defenses drop since they don't know the area and that they move slower too.

Also, perhaps soldiers could 'forage' for food by hunting, farming, or collecting berries.

Also, perhaps soldiers could 'forage' for food by hunting, farming, or collecting berries.

i think u can already do that Edited June 9, 2012 by wrod

[Sighvatr]

It would make the game unfair and less enjoyable to play if one faction is affected by disease on a map and not other factions. So in order to cheat the system of disease to play fair, you can draw all the different ground textures in the game, place down every species of animal and tree.

[majapahit]

It would make the game unfair and less enjoyable to play if one faction is affected by disease on a map and not other factions. So in order to cheat the system of disease to play fair, you can draw all the different ground textures in the game, place down every species of animal and tree.

That's why there should be an option to enable or vote disasters and map based attrition.

Its nice for people who like to play in random maps.

[The Crooked Philosopher]

I suggest that 0 AD should have deployable base where logistic convoy could drop supply, providing supply for the soldiers, becoming defensive structure when under attack, able to heal soldier when wounded soldier came nearby and most of all deployable and it would be more logical to have such deployable base when player waging war on hostile land.

Edited June 15, 2012 by The Crooked Philosopher

[wrod]

Maybe it would just be better that if they r in a foreign area they move slower have less health and cause less damage

[majapahit]

I suggest that 0 AD should have deployable base where logistic convoy could drop supply, providing supply for the soldiers, becoming defensive structure when under attack, able to heal soldier when wounded soldier came nearby and most of all deployable and it would be more logical to have such deployable base when player waging war on hostile land.

I don't think the map is big enough for making such logistic effort.

[Thorfinn the Shallow Minded]

That depends entirely on the map size. By the way, what I meant by foraging for food would be a kind of foraging that would restore stamina and not yield food for your civilization.

[The Crooked Philosopher]

Good idea, why don't you include pillage as an option for survival? since there's no war without raiding and looting.

[majapahit]

That depends entirely on the map size. By the way, what I meant by foraging for food would be a kind of foraging that would restore stamina and not yield food for your civilization.

So its "consume" food for stamina? That's sounds interesting. Reminds me to arcade adventure games but I guess its also nice for strategy games.

[savva]

I like this idea so much! It would enable guerilla warfare, making the game more strategicaly advanced. I think that supply routes should be implemented, Units would load withfood and water at the depots. Maybee roman camp should also recieve and distribute supplies or maybe it should be self sustained and produce them itself? But army should also be able to self sustain itself by huntning, eating berries and raiding enemy houses and food depots, making the enemy destroy his buildings. Dont think all soldiers shoud be able to farm.

Ranged units may also have limited supplies of arrows/spears, slingers should not require ammo, as stones are widespread,thus making them more independant of supplies. Ammo shoud be given

Edited July 6, 2012 by savva

[majapahit]

Just tried the atlas and indeed it can support la-arge maps, so logistic route is realistic

Edited July 10, 2012 by majapahit

[Alpha of the Eagles]

I would totally love being able to raid the other players supply depot (like a hostile market trade, with high risk of loss) just to make them protect it better. But making advanced rules for where which faction should do combat would be simply game breaking to the general public. Making eastern troops loose less stamina than others in desert enviroments is a good idea in my mind, but the moment you start removing health for no appareant reason, people will be frustrated. We should have more subtle differences in performances with regards to enviroment to influence the player, not force him/her.

[spedgenius]

I thought I would pop in and add my two cents. I really like the Idea of attrition and logistics.

Here is how I see this working: When a unit is outside the sphere of influence for given amount of time his stamina as well as attack points will steadily decrease. Some civs could have an advantage as they were better at living off the land and foraging. Eventually without some sort of replenishment the unit will become inefectual. (A malnurished soldier would have a hard time with descision making, aiming and weilding a heavy sword/spear/shield) To combat this there could be a unit that has its own area of influence that replenishes the unit while within its perimeter, Perhaps a food cart or an encampment. I like the Idea of a cart that unpacks into a camp. The replenishing would cost a certain amount of food. Restocking of the camp could be done virtually or for a bit more logistical complexity would have to be restocked manually, perhaps a trade cart could pull double duty during war time? If this were the case then soldiers could also restock by foraging and stealing from plundered crops using the camp as a dropsite.

This would allow for quick raids with no loss of stamina or attack, but be true to the reality that long protracted engagements are costly for the those left back home. I also agree that health should not be affected as the logistics could be sidestepped by bringing along some healers to go around and bring everyone back to health.

Edited July 22, 2012 by spedgenius

[Sighvatr]

Holy crap. I don't want to spend the extra time to click on my units to 'forage' or bring a food cart to battle. I just want to invade and be done with the match. There is only so much realism you can put into a strategy game similar to Age of Empires. Maybe if this game was a first person viewed, persistant world game, I would agree with you guys; but your suggesting to add in a lot of unexplained complexity to players whom will download this game, and wonder why their troops aren't doing so great. This just increases the amount of time it takes to kill off somebody, and that is already difficult.

[spedgenius]

it could also be a setting that could e toggled on/off, thhis would allow the player to chose from levels of complexity. I usually found AOE to be boring after about 10 games and had to put it down for a while> this would allow me to remain interested as I progresse in skill. also, some of us like long games tht last for days

[Mythos_Ruler]

Holy crap. I don't want to spend the extra time to click on my units to 'forage' or bring a food cart to battle. I just want to invade and be done with the match. There is only so much realism you can put into a strategy game similar to Age of Empires. Maybe if this game was a first person viewed, persistant world game, I would agree with you guys; but your suggesting to add in a lot of unexplained complexity to players whom will download this game, and wonder why their troops aren't doing so great. This just increases the amount of time it takes to kill off somebody, and that is already difficult.

I agree here. If there was some kind of simplified attrition/logistics model, then it could work. But anything more than the most simplistic model would add all kinds of additional management that takes away from combat and economics.

[AuroN2]

nah, leave the logistics and all that jaz to hegemony, why have part of a logistics sytem when you can have a whole one.

just sayin.

[Patricius]

A attrition in the range of enemy buildings unless a player has a logistics cart, might work.

[NoMolester]

This is my opinion:

I dont like that attrition reduces your units HP, thats unrealistic and doesn't fit the game.

I propose this:

When you are in your territory: your stamina will increase, your units will be at 100% strength

When you are in no mans land: your stamina will not increase, your units will have 100% strength, siege units fire speed -25%

When you are in enemy territory: Your stamina will decay, your units will have reduced fight speed (less attacks per second) and reduced speed (less distance per second), siege units fire speed -50%.

To avoid this use charts, they will have a range and nullify the attrition penalty.

Not dinimishing the HP but the fighting efficiency.

[Pedro Falcão]

i like this idea to some extent, but the proposal of the attrition damage is to discourage too early attacks to protect your villagers. If not for this, what else will block the enemy from camping on your resource sites just outside the reach of your civic centre. Okay, he can lose those soldiers, but while you were fighting them, his villagers were gathering at full speed and you got a serious resource disadvantage here, what means you'll have to take defensive because you can't afford sending troops far away before your enemy does the same.

[NoMolester]

I see, you can add defense penalty too.

Speed, attack speed and defense penalty (they recieve more damage making them easy to kill).

[alpha123]

Holy crap. I don't want to spend the extra time to click on my units to 'forage' or bring a food cart to battle. I just want to invade and be done with the match. There is only so much realism you can put into a strategy game similar to Age of Empires. Maybe if this game was a first person viewed, persistant world game, I would agree with you guys; but your suggesting to add in a lot of unexplained complexity to players whom will download this game, and wonder why their troops aren't doing so great. This just increases the amount of time it takes to kill off somebody, and that is already difficult.

+1

My thoughts exactly.

[Charles Martel]

I think logistics would be very important, but at the same time I think it doesn't need to be at the tactical level. My idea is that you have each population drain 0.1 food per second from the global pool. It shouldn't be too hard to calculate food cost-the AI already calculates population, and you just need to drain food based on population. The other thing is that ammo should be important. Perhaps slingers, whenever they fire, would take 0.1 stone from the global supply, archers 0.1 wood, javelineers maybe 0.2 wood, and catapults and bolt shooters taking 1 stone and 1 wood respectively. It would add a cost to ranged units, so that you have a balanced army, but at the same time it means ranged troops are still capable. To manage supplies would just involve checking materials.