Wishlist of fixes to internal mechanics
- Thread starter Michael Gladius
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Not really. It's more that the critics have put the term into a little box, and will tolerate nothing outside of it. They're dogmatically devoted to a one-dimensional worldview, and use flowery terms to disguise their lack of imagination.
Kinda like how the military reformers of the 1980s claimed they were "just trying to stand up to the bureaucracy and put people first" yet their ideas consisted of using 1942 solutions to modern problems. Instead of throwing men and money at the problem, they were dogmatically determined to throw men with obsolete ideas and equipment at the problem.
1) No, that's like saying that changing from a 4-seat car to a 12-seat van is the same as making the highway wider.
2) In NSB, commanders and academies can have "preferred tactics," and the AI will choose its tactics based on the math. Designing divisions that can use this math to their advantage is quite viable, and can be done by anyone capable of multiplying or dividing by 2, 3, 4, or 5.
The AI is programmed to use cost-effective options, and is less idiotic than you think.
Dismounted infantry spam is cheaper, faster to train, and has fewer penalties in harsh terrain than motorized. In a head-on fight, dismounted infantry have no unique disadvantages versus motorized, and the speed bonus of the latter only comes into play in a multi-province maneuver. So clogging the front line with more bodies than the motorized can overcome before it runs out of ORG is a workable strategy, and doesn't drain the economy as much.
I am all in favor of making the AI smarter with mobile formations than it currently is; however, so long as dismounted infantry possess the aforementioned advantages, the AI will choose the less-expensive, fully viable spam option.
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I'm arguing in favor of making division width elastic, rather than a solid brick.
Your math is also wrong- if encirclement reduces the template width and adds the +50% terrain width, then you can fit in 4 divisions, not 3 (135 terrain width, 120 division width). Your effective fighting width would thus become 180, not 135. Which would make encirclement battles more crushing/decisive.
On the other extreme, fewer templates getting into a battle would be beneficial in low-supply situations.
People aren't understanding your words
Definition is about getting people to understand
If X doesn't equal Y, then saying X equals Y is wrong
Saying your definition is correct when it does not fit the parameters of definition is wrong
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1) Both are the same as saying "more people are moving down the highway". It doesn't matter how they get there, just that the effect is filled
2) Fair...but not fair enough. Tactics even with prefered tactics and other bonuses are still unreliable
The AI is programmed with specific templates. If you look in the code, there are lists of "prioritize XP to try to make this"
It doesn't look at unit stats, and the only time it actually adjusts for what's going on in the world is adding Anti-tank or Anti-air
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You could also make the tactic just add +100% width and get the same thing, 180 EFW. Your suggestion doesn't do anything we couldn't do in a much simpler way, using things we already have and should be familiar with.
On what basis, and for what purpose?
Combat width of templates or of battles doesn't have a realistic basis to begin with. The devs are on record saying they made it up for balance. It's completely arbitrary and I've had a hell of a time trying to find a cohesive piece of logic to try to see what sort of reality it is trying to represent, and have come up with nothing. If you or anyone else think you found something, I'd like to know. Since combat width isn't based in reality, you can't use reality to try and argue for it.
What is the purpose of more or less injecting RNG into the width system? Most often, people are trying to make more widths of templates and therefore total template designs viable, supposedly increasing variety. That viability/variety can be used to encourage the use of historical things but as evidenced from every other change they've made to increase variety, it often ends up doing little more than shuffling the meta around a little bit. If the goal actually is to make historical templates viable/competitive/the meta, then all you really have to do is thoroughly research what a historical template would actually look like in game terms, and then tune the balance towards promoting those sorts of templates. You don't need to make up new mechanics to try to make off-widths more viable, we can work with what we have.
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Yet my definition can be cited in the dictionary, while the other is one-dimensional dogma that I'm supposed to accept on pure faith. Claiming I'm saying "X equals Y when X doesn't equal Y" is just making things up as you go.
1) It would be... if that was your train of thought. You are arguing the equivalent of "making the highway wider is unnecessary bloat and complexity while making the cars bigger is 'simplification.'" It's a weak argument, and betrays a kind of one-dimensional thinking.
2) Sounds like a great opportunity for a fix, eh?
If so, then why does it constantly produce 18+ infantry battalion templates that can steamroll the Maginot Line? If it was pre-programmed to make realistic templates, then why do they keep packing in more dismounted infantry battalions until it's a 28,000-man wave of bodies that can accomplish just about everything?
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You could, but then you'd run into the issue of being completely unable to use one divisional template in more than one terrain type. One would have to create a special template for every different terrain type (no differently from now), and any division unlucky enough to end up in the wrong terrain would have a ton of penalties; on top of this, the AI/battleplanner isn't smart enough to align divisions to their optimal terrain. You thus remain stuck with a one-dimensional gameplay style, but with a multiplier to make it bigger without making it any more flexible.
The point is, you need more than one variable to build interesting combos. One variable alone doesn't cut it. Besides the dynamic simplicity of combos, this is also more true to the period: combined-arms was what won WWII, not sheer quantity grinding away at each other until everyone lost 40% of their population.
Realism, and more dynamic gameplay. Dual-purpose tools and toggle features are conducive to combos, rather than a one-dimensional grind.
Just because combat width was developed for balance doesn't mean that's all it ever should be. Treating it like that is incredibly narrow and dogmatic, and refuses to see what could be.
Yes, the goal is to make historical accuracy mechanically advantageous. The present mechanics (and most of the "bloat" arguments) favor weird templates that can accomplish things that they never could IRL- it's like having a Napoleonic wars game in which musket infantry have the abilities of jet packs, AK-47s, and body armor. The same people who will complain about meme-worthy NF trees will defend equally (or more) implausible outcomes in combat because it's "simple and easy." The lack of combo-based gameplay is what makes the game a CPU-consuming grind post-1942.
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1) No, it can't
2) You're missing the point. When you say something that everyone else interprets a specific way, and that isn't the way you want it interpreted...then you shouldn't say it like that if you want people to understand you
The train of thought is "It's already in the game". There is no need for any change because what you want to happen already happens. Tactics already allow more troops to join the battle at various points
It's not programmed to make realistic templates
It's programmed to create specific templates that the Devs decided would mesh best with the battle planner, the specific nation's capabilities, and a few other programming quirks
I've actually played with these files (trying to make a nation use a unique division type is murder), and know what they entail
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I feel like we've departed inane and are drifting towards asinine. I suppose I'll ignore the hyperbole of being 'completely unable' to use templates of whatever size in more than a single type of terrain, but I do have to ask what you think would enable the inclusion of a new mechanic that does literally the same thing as the old mechanic, to magically have a different effect. It is patently, demonstrably, objectively, verifiably, doing the same thing. How could we possibly be getting a different result? Isn't that what Vaas would have us believe the definition of insanity is? Doing the same thing and expecting a different result?
You can't argue for realism from an unrealistic position. Combat width is unrealistic, so it can't be used to argue for realism.
Yes, there are some ways you can manipulate the combat width mechanics, or wrenches you could throw into it to mix things up and have some interesting results. You've proposed absolutely none of those sorts of changes, and so we're still dealing with the same pool of problems related to combat width. It doesn't matter what it could be, you aren't suggesting it be anything other than what it is.
Lets try to take this from the top and go through it step by step. I've basically been laser focused on suggestion 2.6 from your list, so lets do our best to keep our discussion focused on that point, and wander off into as few tangents as possible.
2.6 basically just wants tactics and/or terrain to modify width in some way. Terrain already does that, tactics already do that. Pack it up, we're done here. Currently in the game, a combat can have different widths based on the terrain it is being fought in, and the tactics that are being used by either side.
Going into the linked thread is where we start to see mention of having tactics or terrain scale the sizes of the divisions up or down. Which is a moot distinction to make because as I and others have been letting you know, it is functionally identical.
Perhaps you'd like them to use the mechanic in more nuanced ways to have more of an impact on gameplay, but that isn't what you're saying. Perhaps you'd like them to add some sort of new functionality to the mechanics to let them do something they can't do at this moment, but that isn't what you're saying.
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One country being able to do a thing, even when it is based on history (germany's vast amounts of captured stuff - e.g. the Czech panzers), isn't really ideal to change how game mechanics work, now is it ?
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is that actually how France used their tanks though ? As opposed to assigning entire battalions of a notional "tank division" separately ?
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Not their medium and light tanks, no. But their heavy tanks were found in both armored divisions and as independent battalions in an infantry corps. Since the game does not abstract for corps (jumping straight from division to army), armored support companies are a proportionate abstraction at the division level.
I should also note that this isn't just limited to the French in 1940- the Germans did the same thing in 1945 due to fuel shortages (the Italians tended to do this with light tanks, and this is already abstracted by the tank recon companies).
1) From the American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition:
- To correct or set right; adjust.
- To restore to proper condition or working order; repair.
- To make ready for a specific purpose, as by altering or combining elements; prepare.
Your move.
2) Funny how it's always the same group of people who say it, yet the ones who actually read the posts in the "Suggestions" forum don't whine about it making the game "too bloated/complex."
Except it's one-dimensional, whereas my ideas are aimed at making it multi-dimensional.
Imagine, for instance, a fight game where the player could only punch with one hand, and when he suggests letting characters punch with the other hand to create new combos, the critics say "it's too complicated for players, and we already have it in the game." Doubling up on one-dimensional gameplay is not the same as making it two-dimensional.
And in a history game, that is immersion-shattering. Affecting the outcome by shifting priorities is not comparable to changing history by breaking the laws of physics. Historical divisions had real strengths and limitations based on how they were organized, and making the failed designs more powerful than the ones that actually worked is a bad idea. Commentators complain about weird tank designs being OP, yet somehow division designs are sacrosanct?
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The word Funner doesn't appear in the dictionary. Nor does Ain't (at least not the last time I checked)
Yet people know exactly what they mean
It doesn't matter what is written down by academics. If you aren't being understood by the vast majority of your audience, then it's you who are using the wrong words
Every extra bit of code makes the game run slower. And given the only argument against AI division spam is performance...those two goals don't mesh. It's extra work on the programmers and extra work on the computer for no descernable benefit
Perhaps if the AI was competent. If it could manage it's troops well. If it knew what it was doing. Then maybe I might agree
But the AI can barely handle what it already has. And what it already has has been tailored to it's capabilities. Change that, and you get an AI that provides no challenge whatsoever
If you want an opponent with historical divisions, go multiplayer. But unless someone codes a better combat AI, you can't have what you state you want
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Not entirely sure if it's even a good idea to comment here since this thread has already turned into an increasingly uncivil argument and might get locked if it continues, but I may as well throw my two cents in. I'm not going to address most of what this thread has turned into because it's been argued ad nauseam by different people, but I will comment on a couple of things.
Going to respond to both of these at once since they're repeated claims that are quite honestly beyond hyperbolic. If you think you can assault the (defended)Maginot line with "peasant militias" with SMGs and pure infantry templates without using tanks, CAS, siege artillery, or strategic bombing to do the fort damage for you, then I have a bridge to sell you. Battleplan level 10 forts in mountains across rivers with infantry and see what happens. The forts get repaired faster than they get damaged and your divisions get shredded. In fact, in previous versions of the game they patched the AI to stop attacking the Maginot line because it would relentlessly attack there until it had no more men or equipment left.
If I could wager a guess, I'd say that many people who are generally satisfied with the game probably don't frequent the suggestions forum - they don't feel the need to suggest changes. Likewise, people who are not satisfied with the game would naturally go to the place designed for suggesting changes to it.
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Asinine, you say? I take it you don't like being called one-dimensional and dogmatic. Yet that is exactly what you are proposing, even if you don't quite recognize it.
You are incorrect when you say the two accomplish the same thing, and that I am insane for doing the same thing and expecting different results. You are looking at this from a "how can we cram more quantity into a battle," which is inherently one-dimensional (and makes gameplay boringly predictable). My actual suggestion is to do two different things and expect different results. Specifically, to make division templates less rigid and to make tactics more or less effective in different terrains (before you say this is dodging the question, read the original post again).
Simply put, a division relates to terrain based on common denominators. If the width is a common denominator to the terrain, then it fits like a glove. If it doesn't divide into a whole number (no fractions/decimals), then there are penalties. Multiplying the terrain width does not change this fact; the division is still at an advantage/disadvantage based on whether it is a common denominator or not. A 15-width division will do well in a 90-width terrain, no matter how many multipliers you put on the terrain. A 20-width division will not, and it is this type of division that I am trying to make more viable in 90-width terrain (to continue with the example you proposed).
So, for instance, a tactic making the 90-width terrain 50% wider does not make the 20-width division more viable. Whereas if the tactics made the division 25% narrower while the terrain became 50% wider, now you have an effective combat width of 15 and terrain width of 135 (allowing 9 divisions to fit like a glove). But this would make the 20-width division easier to counter, as using this same tactic over and over would be easier for the AI to pick a tactic that would counter them. So instead of merely cramming in more bodies, tactics and heir counters become more important.
Also, in my original post, I suggested making tactics' effectiveness vary by terrain. So this would also mean that encirclement increasing width by 50% would not be for every terrain; for plains/desert it might be 100% while in marshland it's only 10%. So don't overlook the flat-rate changes I actually proposed.
Yet why couldn't it be? Why should either of us remain stuck in the "that's what it is now, and it can never change, be overhauled, or re-purposed because reasons!" mentality. Combat width is quite capable of being made realistic, so why not do so?
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There is a big difference between adding new words and shrinking existing ones. One enhances understanding, the other is arbitrary and isn't beneficial to anybody.
Hence why I proposed this as a way to fix the internal mechanics- fixing internal mechanics make the game smoother and requires fewer multipliers on top to compensate.
AI division spam is a performance-based argument. So why would smoothing out the mechanics and correcting design flaws that enable division spam to overload bad mechanics make the game "more complex/worse"? I'm going to the root of the problem, which is bad mechanics that enable these downstream problems. Oversimplification treats the symptoms, not the disease.
The AI's bad decisions are based on the mechanics, and the statistical math. Dumbing down gameplay to the AI's level of intelligence is not the fix.
The correct solution is to fix the mechanics that allows the AI to make bad decisions and human players can cheese. Once that is accomplished, the AI will make different decisions, and improving it will become easier. But trying to code an AI to make decisions that are mathematically nonsensical is futile.
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Whenever I play as the French, the Germans send bloated infantry divisions with no tanks and they sweep over the Maginot Line if it is defended by historical-template infantry divisions. I don't have the DLC for siege guns enabled, so they are not a factor.
I would counter-argue that the ones who frequent the suggestions forum are the ones who have a lot of imagination and love the game enough to say "this mechanic is good, but here's a way to upgrade it" and the like. All I've heard here is complaining about how everything's too bloated/overly complex, and the only solutions offered are oversimplification. Whereas in the suggestions forum, those who disagree tend to put forth good alternatives or bring up points I hadn't considered before.
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