This week's debate : Defensive versus Offensive

[unmerged(4007)]

Maur13,

But EU has never been about perfect game balance. If it were, then having nations of differing sizes and conditions would be self-defeating. The DP slider is there for us to adjust the history of the nation we play. Fine. But that doesn't justify throwing out the historical validity of those choices.

I'd say lessen the penalty for going defensive on the slider to morale, and allow for fortresses to increase or decrease in cost at a percentage equal to whatever morale would slide at. That would provide the best "balance' between historical concern and game balance, IMHO.

 

[unmerged(2833)]

Well, yes, EU isn't about game balance in general, but DP sliders are much more. Though instead of removing morale penalty, i would go for not having shock value penalty for high defensive.

 

[TheDarkside]

I never understood why being defensive means you need higher siege ratings... do enemies invade with fortresses? And same with morale... would you think troops have higher morale defending their homeland or invading some country they might never have been in and might not even know why they are fighting them in the first place?

 

[unmerged(4007)]

The Darkside,

Actually the seige rating thing makes sense historically. A defensive commander is likely to think cautiously (like say Gen McClellan in the Civil War). He may be very competent, he may even win a lot of field battles once he engages (like McClellan did, in fact when he actually engaged), but he is always reluctant to engage in pitched battles, and will always look for an alternative.

That alternative is seige warfare almost invariably. which means a really defensive oriented nation that doesn't want to risk its men ought to be really good at seige warfare, because battles of posts don't cost troops due to slaughter as pitched battles will.

An offensive commander will despise a seige, because it takes too long and he is too impatient often to do it right. (Think of Grant, he did succeed in seiging Vicksburg, but he wanted to do anything BUT lay seige to it in fact.) So he thinks "assault." As such he never really refines the art of seige warfare to the place the defensive commander will.

 

[TheDarkside]

Originally posted by shawng1
The Darkside,

Actually the seige rating thing makes sense historically. A defensive commander is likely to think cautiously (like say Gen McClellan in the Civil War). He may be very competent, he may even win a lot of field battles once he engages (like McClellan did, in fact when he actually engaged), but he is always reluctant to engage in pitched battles, and will always look for an alternative.

That alternative is seige warfare almost invariably. which means a really defensive oriented nation that doesn't want to risk its men ought to be really good at seige warfare, because battles of posts don't cost troops due to slaughter as pitched battles will.

An offensive commander will despise a seige, because it takes too long and he is too impatient often to do it right. (Think of Grant, he did succeed in seiging Vicksburg, but he wanted to do anything BUT lay seige to it in fact.) So he thinks "assault." As such he never really refines the art of seige warfare to the place the defensive commander will.

Ok you convinced me I haven't thought about it in that perspective, but it makes perfect sense.

 

[Janster]

hmmm

I am not so sure I would quote Patton really, he was not THAT good a general, and ok, he was the commander, but sadly his choices of strategies were sometimes a bit..lacking.

on to fortresses..
One can bypass fortresses, ignore them etc, unless you build the equivalent of the maginot line, but even that was bypassed, but then again, good cover is always sought after, having a good defensive fotress is always nice.

Now there are a HUGE diffrence between fortresses and who builds em, some countries just were far superior, take the ventians for example,. who refined the tactics of fortresses. Unless someone studied their buildings they could not hope to replicate those.
Usually fortresses also overlooked strategic positions, and were not designed to defeat anything, but to protract sieges and make it possible to raise and army and defeat the intruders.
So basically you can build any size fortress, but if you build an effective fortress..thats a whole diffrent ballgame.

btw..having an increased tech, doesnt mean you neccesarily make all the others obsolete, a longbow can still have use even today, but a gun is far easier to learn using, which is why they became some popular really. If the gun was not that easy, the bow would have easily outmatched it far out into the 1700 century..maybe even longer. Same goes for the sub, good equipment is only good in the right hands..
Otherwise its just rubbish.

 

[unmerged(6448)]

Re: hmmm

Originally posted by Janster
So basically you can build any size fortress, but if you build an effective fortress..thats a whole diffrent ballgame.

That is really my point. In the game fortress size and effectiveness are really the same. What I have been arguing (probably obscured by analogies and dragging them too far) is that a country's superiority could be modeled by not allowing some country's to build fortresses of the highest level available. For example, my offensive country in reality may build fortresses as big as anyone but in reality they would not be as good. In the game there is no way to model this inferiority. Just not allowing me to build the highest fort tech would accomplish this.

 

[Raen]

I'm a bit surprised no one has mentioned this:

You actually DO take negative hits to siege at high Offense, contrary to what that chart says. It's -2 at 10 and -1 at 9, can't see the others at the moment.

The question is, does this have any real effect in the game, since anything lower than 1 siege doesn't display. Anyone know for sure?

 

[unmerged(6448)]

There was a thread a while back by LordBarkingDog I think that showed negative siege has no effect. -1 or -2 is the same as zero.

 

[Idiotboy]

Originally posted by Dorsey4Heisman
There was a thread a while back by LordBarkingDog I think that showed negative siege has no effect. -1 or -2 is the same as zero.

Correct. This could be rectified however with giving the defencive slider no penalties as well. I think 2-2-2-2 would be a much better incentive for choosing defensive.