Working on a new combat mechanic

I think it's just one more stat that can add some variety to the interaction. I'm not sure the execution is ideal yet, but what I was going for is that you can possibly, by being "fast", get to attack "first", which is supposed to give you some advantage.

It does make sense that the person initiating combat would be the "attacker", so maybe the use of Attack and Defend ratings are sort of misnomers, but what I want to get at is the idea that your army can be evaluated two different ways -- by its ability to (a) inflict damage, and its ability to (b) resist the infliction of damage -- and these are not necessarily the same thing. So the idea was that you want to compare player 1's (a) with player 2's (b), and also compare player 1's (b) with player 2's (a). The "speed" gives you a logical order for doing that, or, perhaps, tells you which player will be (a) and which will be (b).

The reason it makes sense is let's say I want to initiate combat with you. I send out my elephants against your chariots. It doesn't matter that I picked the fight; your chariots are going to ride circles around my elephants, thus, they're going to attack me, and my elephants, though they precipitated the encounter, are going to have to adopt a defensive posture; how capable are they of doing that?

That's the thought process I'm working with, anyway. It may not be perfect, but the main thing I'm thinking about at this point is complexity; what's a simple way of having combat happen, yet which preserves some of the "flavor" of battle? I think the idea of a third ranking, which I chose to be "speed", doesn't add much complexity, but can add a lot of flavor, so I potentially like it. But your point is well taken. Thanks!

-Jeff

That's quite clearly the right approach because it gives both players involved a tricky choice - should the winner choose to destroy a resource because there's a scarce one there, and should the loser accept this?

Yeah...this doesn't completely work, because there is only one, or perhaps 2, resources in the game. This is something I'm working on; I'm quite adamant that there be at most 2 resources, because I think Civilization and Mare Nostrum have done the "tons of resources" thing quite adequately. And I think "having the right resources" isn't the focus of this game, nor the impetus for diplomacy and trade, so much as using your resources effectively to maximize your position. That said, if there are 2 resources, they will be used for different things; my idea is that Crops are for things like population expansion, Gold is for completing buildings. So, if the loser has to choose one or the other, it could still be a tough choice depending on his strategy...

Hmm...I like this idea quite a bit, and don't mind the extra challenge of tough decisions, but I do worry a bit about adding complexity to the rules in order to incorporate this idea. If it can be done easily, though, that might be cool. Definitely worth thinking about!

Thanks again.

Yeah, this is true; the game is fairly well fleshed-out, but I am trying, as you say, to divorce the combat mechanics from the whole game engine, yet things like "what should the outcome of battle be?" are intimately connected to the relative value in whole-game terms of the various units and commodities.

Maybe I should workshop this one. I'm rather excited about it as a solution to the "Civ lite" game. When I first heard about Mare Nostrum, knowing nothing about that game, I thought the idea of making a Civ lite would be fun, so this is my attempt, and I think it can work, but needs some streamlining to pull the various mechanics together. The combat mechanic is the one I'm addressing here, yet it's quite true that the other mechanics also come into play necessarily in assessing whether the combat mechanic "works" or not.

Yeah, that was what I was thinking; I'm afraid going to only one resource would remove some opportunity for decision making. And indeed, it would put more demands on balancing that resource for various kinds of actions, whereas if "Crops are for population, Gold is for buildings", you can choose to emphasize production of the commodity that reflects the kinds of actions you want to take. So, I think two resources are probably good, it's just balancing the costs of the different kinds of actions that is required to make it useful.

For example, one dilemma I've had in the "pay to fight" mechanic was that originally, I had "you must pay crops for each attacking troop" with the intent that you would have to balance whether you want to pay resources to fight, or not. Yet in practice, it worked out that this prevented people from fighting because no one could afford it! That's not necessarily a bad thing, because it means you have to budget if you want to be warlike. My idea for a "solution" was to go to one resource type, so that people will really have to choose, as I originally wanted them to have to choose, whether to "build" or "fight". But actually, the problem was likely related to the "population expansion" actions, which cost Crops, came earlier than the "fight" action, which also cost Crops. Switching the order of those might be all that's needed, because now there's a clearer choice -- "do I pay to fight, knowing that it will limit my ability to expand my population?"

Yes, that's true. But part of the dilemma is also defining what the rate of destruction of one ought to be; in other words, how it ought to be connected to the outcome of combat. Should it be "lose one resource/unit for each point by which my Attack exceeds your Defense"? This is really a play balance issue more than a philosophical question that can be answered here. But deciding on a simple yet also fair outcome for combat is turning out to be tricky.

Hey, I don't have to imagine too hard, that's the way it works now!

Interesting idea. This will involve some re-thinking on my part, because of the way I'm currently adding units (which you obviously can't have known). It's basically "pay one crop to add one unit to a Territory", you choose which unit, max one unit per territory. (there's another way to add units, but I'll set that aside for now). If the different units cost different commodities, that would certainly make this kind of combar resolution approach easier.

Another thing I considered was an idea where loser decides whether Resources or Units will be lost, winner decides which type is lost. So, loser says "I will lose Resources" and then winner says "Ok, you lose Crops". Or it could be flipped, so winner says "you will give me resources" and loser says "ok, here are crops". You could easily incorporate your suggestion into this, by having it be that the loser can surrender the alternative of what was requested, but at double the rate required.

The question I still need to resolve, though, is something like "If I beat you 8-5, what happens?" Should the margin of victory count for something? Or should there be a fixed outcome for winning? The former case has merit in that if you go to the expense of bringing a devastating army into a territory, you want to get some benefit for having gone to that expense. But the problem is that margins of victory could vary wildly, and coming up with a simple system for turning the margin of victory into an outcome that is fair in all cases could be more difficult; and the converse approach of designing the game so that the outcomes are always close is equally difficult!

Do you have any thoughts on whether combat should be "Speed decides which player will count their Attack rating and which will count their Defend rating, and those numbers are compared" or "Speed decides whose Attack rating will be used first ; that rating is compared to the other player's Defend rating, the player gets a benefit; then the other player compares his Attack rating to the faster player's Defend rating, and gets a benefit".

The former seems quicker to resolve, and simpler to design, the latter seems to possibly lead to something more interesting...If I'm the fast player, should I take casualties to weaken his retaliatory attack, or should I take Commodities, which is what I really want? In practice, though, it will probably be a simple math excercise where the strength of his counterstrike is determined, and in most cases, it won't really be a dilemma.

Ok, here's a way that combat could work.

1. The active player declares that combat will happen. He pays one Crops for each of his forces in the territory.

2. The active player defines a "Hit result"; if a player "hits", the result will happen to the other player. [*]

3. Both players choose between 1 and 4 Tactics cards to add to the battle (the number they're allowed to choose comes in via a separate mechanic that doesn't matter here...). Tactics cards have a rating in one or more of Speed, Attack, of Defend.

4. Players reveal their Tactics cards. The player with the higher total Speed rating is the first attacker. He adds the total "Attack" value of his cards to the Attack value of his forces: 2 per Warrior, 1 per peasant. The other player obtains his total Defend value: the total Defend value of his cards, plus one point per unit.

5. If the Attacker's total Attack rating exceeds the Defender's total Defend rating, the "hit result" is incurred by the defender. [**]

6. Now, the roles are switched; the slower player compares his Attack rating to the other player's Defend rating, and if it is higher, the other player incurs the "Hit Result".

Comments:

[*] The hit result could include:
1. The "hit" player will lose X units.
2. The "hit" player will give X resources to the "hitting" player.
3. The "hitting" player will gain control of the territory (?)[***]

In all cases, X could be set by the player, with the proviso that if the other player scores a hit, he will also incur that consequence.

I think, though, that this could be too devastating; you could go into battle with a pretty sure thing, and could set an absurd "hit result" that the other player definitely couldn't ever benefit from.

Better, I suspect to have X be a preset value that applies to all battles (such as 1 unit,2 resources, eg) or else to have players lay out cards that set out possible combat results.

So, for example, let's say before a battle, 5 "outcome" cards are randomly dealt. Perhaps they are:
1. Lose 2 Warriors
2. Lose 3 Warriors
3. Lose 1 Peasant
4. Surrender 3 Gold
5. Surrender 2 Crops

The player who initiates battle could choose one of these as a possible "hit result", then the other player selects one, and then a third is chosen randomly, or perhaps by the initiating player. Then when a player scores a "hit", he chooses one of the cards and forces the other player to perform that action.

This is probably too complex, though. Better, I think, to have step 2 be a clear-cut, definitive declaration. "If I score a hit, you will lose X Warriors" or more correctly "Anyone who suffers a "hit" will lose X Warriors" where X is a fixed game value such that any player who chooses "warriors" as the Hit Result always must choose "X" as the number that will be lost.

[**] The only problem I foresee is that if you've chosen "resources" as the "hit result" (an unfortunate term, but I'll use it for now...) then there's less incentive to play high "speed" cards, since nothing changes from one combat to the next. Maybe it would be better if the person who does not initiate combat MUST choose units as his "hit result". That way, if I'm initiating the attack, I want to strike first so that if the other player hits, he won't weaken my attack before it's had a chance to accomplish it's desired purpose, namely, getting me some resources...

So, this combat system is still pretty simple and quick, I think, but has some interesting decisions that need to be made by both sides. Here's an example:

Let's say, hypothetically, that I have 2 Warriors and a Peasant in Greece, you have 1 Warrior and 1 Peasant. I want to initiate combat. I pay 3 Crops, and declare that a player scoring a hit must "surrender 3 resources". We lay out Tactics cards. I play "Chariots: Speed 3" and "Swords: Attack 2", you play "Elephants: Speed 1" and "Armor: Defend 3". My speed exceeds yours so I attack first.

My Attack rating is 2x2 Warriors + 1x1 Peasant + 2 for swords = 7.
Your Defend rating is 1 x 2 Units + 3 for armor = 5.

I have scored a "hit", thus you give me 3 resources.

Next, we evaluate your attack. It is: 2 x 1 Warrior + 1 x 1 Peasant = 3.
My defend rating is 1 x 3 Units = 3.

You do not score a hit, and I don't need to lose resources. (and maybe if you had, I would lose them to the bank rather than to you, since I was the one who initiated combat...maybe that's the benefit). An alternative would be that if you had scored a hit, you could have chosen for yourself to make me lose units, or perhaps that's the only thing you could have chosen. Maybe, coupled with the analysis under [**], that's the way to go.

I welcome your thoughts!

-J

[***] As I mentioned in my other post, "expel from the territory" was a possible consequence if the player who owned the territory won the battle. Yet, maybe you should have to *initiate* the battle in order to set the consequence. If you do not initiate the battle, then the most you can do is take casualties. Otherwise, this leads to a complicated interaction whereby if his attack exceeds my defense he gains control of the territory but if my attack exceeds his, I can kick him out of the territory, thus you need to compare things like "whose attack exceeded the other's defense by more", and it bogs down in complexity.

So, to clarify, perhaps the best idea is the person who initiates combat can set the outcome if he wins to be one of:
1. Take X casualties.
2. Steal Y resources.
3. Gain control of territory/kick out other player.

If the other player scores a hit, he gets to take option 1 only.

Note that I haven't taken into account Scurra's suggestion of "loser can choose to take a more costly set of casualties". So maybe if the initiating player chooses 1 and hits, the loser could choose to give 2Y resources, or to vacate the territory, instead of losing casualties...but again, maybe too much complexity, though an interesting decision!

I don't think that's necessarily any simpler than what I proposed, and may remove some tactical choices. I am assuming, of course, that if you don't have any of one type you can't choose that type to be hit if you choose an alternative.
i.e. the attacker declares they are targetting crops at the start. The defender begins with both crops and gold, but by the end of the battle they have spent all their gold. They can't then say "I'll give you gold instead of crops".
And if the attacker targeted gold but the defender had none left at the end but did have crops, then they would have to surrender crops (at the double rate).
That gives both sides some decisions to make, without adding to the complexity.

One thing I should be very clear on is that there's no spending of resources within the battle itself. The Aggressor pays to initiate the combat, but that's it; after that, no more resources are spent. You just select your cards, lay them down, add up the value of your troops, and compare the numbers and assign outcomes. No resource spending.

Also, I am envisioning that the Aggressor has 3 "consequence cards" that he picks one of and lays it down, just so it's crystal clear what he is going for -- Casualties, Resources, or Territorial Control. I could add a couple of cards so that the Aggressor chooses between Peasants, Warriors, Gold, Crops, or Territorial Control. On each card, I guess, could be an alternative that could be "lost" by the non-Aggressor should he suffer a hit. For example the Warriors card could say:

If Aggressor scores a Hit, non-Aggressor loses X Warriors OR Y Peasants.

Something like that. The thing I like about this is that you, as the Aggressor, may want to target something specific. You may want to make the guy lose Warriors, to reduce his tally for the "Warriors" VP condition. Or you may want to target Gold to help yourself have enough money to build a building; or maybe you want Crops, to be able to expand your population. Having the loser be steered in the direction you want him to go could be nice for that. And the more I think about it, it isn't really an addition of complexity, as long as the choices are on the cards themselves.

Because if I, as the Aggressor, choose a card that says "Lose 2 Units", and I score a hit, you, the non-Aggressor, must choose which 2 Units you will lose. If instead I could choose a card that says "Lose 1 Warrior OR 2 Peasants", you still need to make a choice, it's just been bounded a little bit. So as long as the mechanic is "aggressor chooses a consequence up front", and this is implemented via him laying out a card with the desired consequence of success in battle, then there's actually no difference in complexity for Scurra's version than Seth's and mine, and moreover, it gives the Aggressor a little bit more control in steering the outcome, which I assume is a good thing, since he's paying resources to start the fight...(in fact, it could lead to some neat mindgames; I really want him to choose to lose 2 Warriors, so I'll lay out this "1 Peasant/2 Warriors" card, and let's see if he bites, or if he just takes the 1 Peasant...)

Thanks, Scurra, for helping me to see this more clearly. It is clearly possible to do your system just as easily as "my" original system. But which is "better"? This, I need to mull over a bit...

Now this I completely agree with. Just doesn't work at all.

Yup.

-Jeff

I know, it's a whole different situation.

I think you just say out loud- I'm on a killing spree, I'm looting Gold, I'm looting Crops, or I'm giving you the boot. I don't think we need to have cards that say that or anything.

I think that after a certain level of familiarity with the game, yes, the cards will become superfluous, but I think to facilitate learning the game, handing someone 3-5 cards before the battle and saying "lay down whichever one of these you want to be the outcome if you succeed" gives one less thing to memorize, makes it easy to remember what the outcome will be, facilitates learning the game, etc. I find that in my group, it's important to have as much in the way of player aids as you can; people (me included!) have a hard time remembering all the rules, and so until they (the rules) become internalized, it's useful to have some components that remind us of them. Plus, in a game with a lot of cards (probably 70, easily) what's 3 or 4 or 5 more?

The other thing is that if I did go to Scurra's system where each consequence is "either this OR 2 times as much of that", it might be nice to have the alternatives spelled out clearly on the cards, again, so that the player who has lost doesn't have to remember what his choices are.

I guess it's something that could go on a player aid chart or something, but hey, that just clutters up the player aid chart!

I don't know if you're thinking along the lines of selling the game, in which case of course the idea is "as few components as possible". But for me, I figure why not have a lot of components in the prototype of the game, if they make it easier to play? For example, the board in my Archaeology bidding game wasn't strictly necessary, and might not be included in a published version of the game (since it would be tougher to justify the extra expense) but I just included it to enhance the "feel" of the game, since publishing considerations don't apply yet.

But, of course, I do see the irony that I said "yes, consequence cards are bad" and then advocated using consequence cards!

-Jeff