Strategy Mode Combat

So, regarding my recent absence of posts, it's because i have been discussing society stage with Alaska. It was quite productive, and I will post some of the results of that soon. I have also just started school, so that slowed me down.

Here I will compile all of the significant aspects of the combat system for strategy mode. I will list the different values, their effects, and will even tie in some concepts from my socio-economic model here. I will come back and edit this OP as I think of new ideas or if you guys give new ideas, or just to revise old ones. Yellow bolded words represent important terms and will be defined at the bottom in addition to the paragraph they are in.

Morale

Morale represents the spirit and eagerness of your troops. High morale means your Units are confident and zealous, ready to charge into battle. Low morale means they are broken and afraid, ready to flee at moment's notice. Morale is an important vale for your units because it determines when your units will run away and how effective their combat is. Each unit has a Breaking Point, a value that if their morale falls under it they will automatically start to retreat. The Breaking Point of units can be increased or decreased by cultural traits, policies, training, and other such things. The base Breaking Point of a unit also depends on if they are a Soldier or an Irregular. Soldiers have a base Breaking Point of 50 while Irregulars a base of 75. Note that unit refers to any military personnel, soldier refers to specifically professional soldiers, and irregular refers specifically to non-professional personnel. More on soldiers and irregulars below.

Morale also effects the effectiveness of the unit in combat. Morale has a range of 0-100. To determine the morale bonus of a soldier on his stats you take the morale/100, and multiply that by his stat. You do this for each stat affected by morale. The list of stats will be explained below. Generals and Admirals increase the morale of nearby units.

Discipline

Discipline reflects the drill and training of your units. It also effects the likeliness of your units charging enemies without your orders. It is shown as a percentage. Again, the base discipline of soldiers differs from that of irregulars. A soldier has a base discipline of 75%, while an irregular a base of 50%. When an enemy unit comes within x range of a player unit (which is standing idle), the player unit will have a Discipline Check. This means that the computer takes the discipline of the units and rolls to see whether is attacks without orders or not. A discipline of 75% means the unit has a 75% to not attack without orders. Once this check is done for a unit, that unit becomes ineligible for any more discipline checks for the next 30 seconds. This means that for the next 30 seconds there is no chance of him attacking without orders, even if a new enemy unit enters his range. When units are grouped into squads, an average of all the discipline values of the squad's units is calculated and that becomes the new discipline value of the whole group. The squad is then treated by the computer as a unit was earlier, this time charging or not charging without orders as a group.

Discipline also affects the Breaking Point of your units. 100% Discipline reduces Breaking Point by -10 while 0% Discipline reduces by 0. This makes the equation look like:

- ( X% Discipline / 100 ) = Effect on Breaking Point

Therefore, having more disciplined troops will also make them less likely to rout.

Recruitment

Units can be recruited from the Manpower Pools of any faction, something explained in-depth here. Soldiers are the units recruited from the soldier faction, and irregulars are the units recruited from any other faction. As explained before, there are some base difference between soldiers and irregulars.

Soldiers
Discipline: 75%
Breaking Point: 50

Irregulars
Discipline: 50%
Breaking Point: 75

(The above chart is excluding any benefits they may receive to their stats, such as the discipline benefit to breaking point.)

More coming soon.

Generals & Admirals

Generals and Admirals are recruited using Leadership Points to lead your other units. They provide a boost to morale through their presence, however their deaths cause a large temporary decrease in morale. It is still undecided whether Generals & Admirals will have traits like Leaders. They do, however, have two important attributes, Leadership and Loyalty. Military Leaders with high leadership inspire higher morale in their troops, and Military Leaders with high loyalty have a lower chance of defecting to rebel/hostile nations every minute.

Squads

When units are grouped into squads, the morale values and discipline values of the individual units are compiled into an average for the entire squad.

More coming soon.

Stats & Experience

Coming soon.

----------------------------------------------------

Units: The name referring to any military personnel, soldier or irregular.
Breaking Point: The minimum morale at which a unit will still fight.
Soldier: A professional unit recruited from the soldier faction.
Irregular: A militia-style unit recruited from non-soldier factions.
Generals: Military leaders leading land armies.
Admirals: Military leaders leading naval, aerial, or spacial fleets.
Discipline Check: A check done by the computer to determine if a unit or squad charges without orders at enemies or not.
Leadership Points: Points generated through the Officer faction. Each manpower member of the officer faction provides +0.05 Leadership points per minute. 100 Leadership points are required to recruit a General or Admiral. The price can increase as a result of new techs, cultural traits, and other such things.
Leadership: Not to be mistaken with Leadership Points, Leadership is a value that represents a General/Admiral's grasp of tactics, skill of command, and motivational skills. The higher his Leadership, the higher of a moral boost he gives to nearby units.
Loyalty: The loyalty of your Generals/Admirals determines their likelihood of defecting to a rebel or hostile nation every minute. The higher the loyalty, the lower the chance per minute they will defect.
Military Leaders: A term referring to Generals and/or Admirals.

By the way you guys are allowed to post here I am just filling the OP out step by step. Please give any ideas or suggestions you may have.

An interesting factor would be unit age as well. "Younger" squads would have more morale but less discipline and livability. Veteran squads would retreat quicker because they know their limits, as well as being able to rally younger squads for some bonuses.

Another neat little thing would be that veteran squads would be willing to hold/defend an objective even if it meant the unit would die.

I've played enough games where the reason I have lost a match/battle in strategy games was because there is not a measure on how dedicated a unit is.

Dedication should be a factor. It would be kind of like discipline, but more situation. A war to overthrow a tyrant or reclaim lost territory would increase a units dedication to the cause, which would give a boost to morale and make a unit less likely to break.

PTFace wrote:

An interesting factor would be unit age as well. "Younger" squads would have more morale but less discipline and livability. Veteran squads would retreat quicker because they know their limits, as well as being able to rally younger squads for some bonuses.

I think squad age is a good idea, although it raises the issue of lifespans. If the age of individuals is averaged, then squads formed of old men and young men would result in severely increased/shortened lifespans. This wont have much of an effect in-battle, but it will be very strange when at some point in the game a group of old men and young men end up dying of old age simultaneously. Otherwise, I think this would work rather well.

PTFace wrote:

Dedication should be a factor. It would be kind of like discipline, but more situation. A war to overthrow a tyrant or reclaim lost territory would increase a units dedication to the cause, which would give a boost to morale and make a unit less likely to break.

I think this sounds like a good idea, I think it would work very well if used with the 'cultural traits' concept. The cultural traits of your empire would be able to then influence which battles your units are most dedicated to winning, as a situational discipline modifier. For example, Order/Divine right could give a dedication boost to battles against other religions, or maybe a decrease against the same religion.
Of course, if you wanted to use dedication in a different way, then this could be something else…

@PTFace: Tracking the age of individual units would be a very heavy load on the computer. There is already experience, which reflects age, and has all the same effects that you mentioned. I will have an update coming soon in which I will explain experience.

@The Uteen: Yes good point, I'm glad to see someone has been reading my cultural traits thread.

Quote :

Veteran squads would retreat quicker because they know their limits

Not necessarily. A coward creature could possible run faster when she is younger and don't has so much combat experience as a veteran, who can stand the fight better.

I wonder how creature overall character will be implemented. They should have some influence on morale and acting like retreating aswell.

As example something like: Honesty, Kindness, Laughter, Generosity and Loyalty. Donno if everyone of them can be used for this purpose.

Anyone have a link to the experience thread? I have been having trouble finding it to post the next update.

In addition to my previous question, does anyone else think that Military Leaders also have traits? They could be handled by arbitrary mechanics.

Speaking of traits, if you want to see the current list look here. I also found an awesome list of ideas we can use for traits here.

I think that Military leader traits would be a good addition to the game, it could be used so that each unit is specialized because of the particular general. This allows the player more options when engaging in military actions and can also allow them to multitask and not spend all their time on the military when the cities need their help as well. However, I don't think that there should be too much as all the traits would start to make Thrive very confusing to the player.

Military leader traits should be gained by using an experience bar, which as the leader is used in an army gives troops morale and fighting power, and generals who went to military schools and have little experience or nobles being used as generals give discipline. Traits should also be dynamic, for example a general fighting in the snow would have less attrition in arctic areas as wells as being able to camouflage his troops. These would be gained when a leader's experience bar fills up to full in a specific region. Generals who fight in battles would also be able to rally troops and each higher level of exp they have they will have a higher health pool, meaning generals are less likely to die.

I also think that in the early era of gunpowder warfare, such as the 17-1800s in our timeline, having a general die would cause morale to break and make troops go into survivability mode, where they fight for themselves, are easier to route and gain unique movement patterns such as "Shoot while running" and "tactical retreat", the first being a highly inaccurate mode of combat where troops are running away, hopefully to reinforcements. I imagine them running, stopping behind a tree and shooting before continuing to run. Troops in this mode would not be able to reload but will go into melee mode if they meet with the enemy.

Tactical retreat would be when your soldier's discipline is high, but your general is still dead. In this mode, the troops would set traps, and some would even stay back to cover the others.

Edit: Talking about the loyalty stat, I think troops would be loyal to their generals more than to the government unless the king or whatever specifically controls a unit. This would equivalent to having a personal guard of a few hundred soldiers stationed in the capital who are directly under the command of the government's leader, so if generals do rebel, there is some sort of army to combat them with.

General who revolt should also be able to form their own country if they manage to take over enough land. If a general manages to take over a industrial cities and its surrounding hamlets, it would be called <General's Name> Faction, which adds a dynamic element to the game. If their is a total militaristic revolt and your personal guard is unable to defend against it, you're country will be changed to Revolutionary <Country Name>, where due to a general leading the revolt, your nation has become a militaristic monarchy, dictatorship or democracy, which could cause zealots and ironically enough, pacifists and intellectuals, to revolt. After a given time, based on your previous country's government, the revolutionary tag would disappear and revolt risk would go down. The time for this to happens would be more or less depending on your races belief system and whether or not your government was more or less friendly than this new one, and of course, the popularity of the general who enacted the coup.

Wow, big flood of new ideas. I need to dissect this piece by piece.

PTFace wrote:

Military leader traits should be gained by using an experience bar, which as the leader is used in an army gives troops morale and fighting power, and generals who went to military schools and have little experience or nobles being used as generals give discipline. Traits should also be dynamic, for example a general fighting in the snow would have less attrition in arctic areas as wells as being able to camouflage his troops. These would be gained when a leader's experience bar fills up to full in a specific region.

Dynamic traits are too deep for generals. The most that I would push it is 3-5 arbitrarily decided traits assigned to every Military Leader upon recruitment that sticks for life.

PTFace wrote:

Generals who fight in battles would also be able to rally troops and each higher level of exp they have they will have a higher health pool, meaning generals are less likely to die.

Military leaders can't have experience, but the units you protect them with can. All military leaders will always have a passive effect of increasing the morale of nearby troops.

PTFace wrote:

I also think that in the early
era of gunpowder warfare, such as the 17-1800s in our timeline, having a
general die would cause morale to break and make troops go into
survivability mode, where they fight for themselves, are easier to route
and gain unique movement patterns such as "Shoot while running" and
"tactical retreat", the first being a highly inaccurate mode of combat
where troops are running away, hopefully to reinforcements. I imagine
them running, stopping behind a tree and shooting before continuing to
run. Troops in this mode would not be able to reload but will go into
melee mode if they meet with the enemy.

The first part of your statement about the military leaders death's effects on troops is covered. However, everything after that would be a big challenge to implement. Troops, when not routed, will always have the option to tactically retreat. There is no special button or hotkey or anything, you just order one group to retreat while the other covers them, and switch.

PTFace wrote:

Edit: Talking about the loyalty stat, I
think troops would be loyal to their generals more than to the
government unless the king or whatever specifically controls a unit.
This would equivalent to having a personal guard of a few hundred
soldiers stationed in the capital who are directly under the command of
the government's leader, so if generals do rebel, there is some sort of
army to combat them with.

Yeah, this is covered. All units assigned to the defecting military leader join him/her.

[quote="PTFace"]General who revolt should also be able
to form their own country if they manage to take over enough land. If a
general manages to take over a industrial cities and its surrounding
hamlets, it would be called

I don't know why parts of my post keep disappearing, but what I previously posted was that anything past military leaders creating their own factions is too complex for our currrent level. I would be more willing to implement that later once we have finished the strategy mode.

EDIT: Another part of my post just disappeared. I give up.

I have a few questions about combat.
First, how large of a scale will combat in thrive be? Like is there a set number of maximum units or can there be unlimited amounts?
Second, how organized will the military be and how many generals can you have at a time?

Well, the average planet surface area will be that of Brooklyn, which has a population of 2,000,000. Assuming 2/3 of the planet is water, like Earth, then that is about enough surface area to sustain 670,000 people on land. Since all land is not developed, lets just take 10% of that, which is probably the percentage of inhabited land with rural or urban development. That means 67,000 people. Divide that between 10 countries or so is about 6700 people per country. Assuming about 5% of a nation's population are active soldiers (not including militia/irregulars) that means about 335 active professional soldiers per country.

Now remember the assumptions:

Base no. - 2,000,000

-2/3 of planet covered with water
-10% of land developed
-10 countries
-5% of population are soldiers

= 335 units per country

Now let's try another case. In this scenario it is the Industrial stage, assuming the last case was an earlier stage, so there is more development, less countries, and because there is a big war taking place irregulars have also been recruited.

Base no. - 2,000,000

-2/3 of planet covered with water
-25% of land developed
-8 countries
-5% soldiers + 5% irregulars = 10% military units

= Approx. 2100 units per country

So using these examples we can get a rough estimate of the range of the size of battles through the player's species' history.

"Units" are different from 1 single soldier though, correct?

Unit just refers to a soldier or irregular. One unit means 1 unit, 10 units means 10 units, either soldiers or irregulars. 335 units means 335 soldiers/irregulars, and 2100 units means 2100 soldiers/irregulars.

Well, i think my dad could help with this, he's dr.sciene, and he especialy research military, and they combat.
he has around 7 books, at least 3 about weaponary and combat.