Nice one Joeld! I have been tripsing through other posts and i'm happy to report that there are a significant number (didn't count how many) of people who want it. The problem is that we lack cohesion ( and time - living sure gets in the way of playing ) But i get the feeling that we are still the minority among the vocal adherents of the galciv community. We also happen to be the most bloodthirsty:- business is war / diplomacy is a facet of war etc. I gues that the others must be simcity fans or something where the most horrible sight is having to fight a fire or somesuch . Just kidding guys, really!!

The truth is probably more complex and relates to how the gaming industry is doing as a whole. Strategy games are losing their percentage and it is being taken by 'things' like the sims or random violence/carjacking games such as GTA et al. Maybe developers of strategy games are changing their values to try and get back some of this percentage. which is why civ 4 is so watered down / simplified, )and probably why the inclusion of tactical combat wasn't essential to be included in the final product) but you lose your core gamers' respect by doing things like that.

the thing is, the games industry is still growing at a decent rate, so that percentage loss isn't necessarily lost revenue, so don't worry too much about simplifying your game. if its good we'll buy it and word of mouth will do the rest. (although it does not quite compare to EAs marketing machine)

And here is another truth - If tactical combat was in the game to begin with, not one of you nay sayers would have batted an eyelid and still played the game and most probably enjoyed it.

Whew... rant over, but i'm not sorry!

and tactical combat would push that balance towards the micro-management nightmare

How on earth is tactiacal combat related to micro management?? the two are completely separate issues.

combat mission you say? well i suppose it might be worth a look at the very least. As for space empires 4 its getting released here in the uk soon, so i'm gonna be getting it.

later peeps.

I see myself as a member of the quiet minority.
I’m just a bit more vocal then most

I do like the game as it is, that’s why I don’t want tactical combat, particularly considering the man-hours better spent on other bling-bling.
Good point, though.


Rygel XVI - Dominar to over 600 billion (more or less) loyal subjects.

Alienrider: You may be right. The majority of Galciv2 players may like the game as is and they don't post on the forums because they're just too busy playing the game. But... maybe some of them are a little bit intimidated by the whole posting/forum concept; I know I used to be. Perhaps others feel that their one voice won't make a difference; a version of voter apathy. For years I've lurked on various forums, reading what others had to say but not taking the time or effort to post myself. I'll probably continue doing this.

This game, though, is one that's easy to love. It has many, many things going for it. Because of this, a lot of the players want to see it grow and evolve. Some want multi-player; others want more modding; still others want something else. Some of these ideas I support and would use; others would make no impact on my chosen gaming experience. Obviously, by the content of my posts, having the option of tactical combat is something that I would like to see. Many others have posted similiar wishes. Are we a small minority or a large majority? I don't know. How could anyone know? The fact remains that many of us would like tactical combat and would use this option if it were offered in the game.

...and tactical combat would push that balance towards the micro-management nightmare... ... How on earth is tactiacal combat related to micro management?? the two are completely separate issues. ...

My exact quote states it would push it towards not make it a micro-management nightmare and that could disrupt the balance of a game that is already awesome as it is IMHO.

However let me explain, your proposal introduces, the optional, the tactical management of fleet battles during combat. In a hypothetical situation the Drengin launch a surprise attack on me (they were on the other side of the galaxy and I played with Blind Exploration and had no idea of the size of their empire due to not getting around to exploring it). I am woefully under-prepared and should pay the consequences for not knowing all my enemies strengths and weaknesses.

Human desire says that whenever possible I want to win the game, so though its an option. I know, what I'll do, seeing that the Tactical Combat AI has been said to be typically weak I'll manage the battle individually, so I change into my admiral hat from my running the empire hat and start managing the tactical aspect of every single one of those battles with the Drengin. That is micro-managing those battles because one I am primarily an emperor and this is an empire management/strategy game and two all things being equal I want to win and the game has given me a valid method to massively turn that in my favour despite the fact that I had made a serious strategic error in allowing the Drengin to start a war the when I was unprepared for it. For further food for thought Chess is a deep strategical game where you position your pieces and strike and counter strike against the opponents strategy and pieces. However when I do my pawn takes pawn I don't want to 'tactically' manage that exchange of pieces, it changes the nature of chess. Chess is designed that way. GC2 has been designed in its own way.

GC2 doesn't seem as if it was designed with Tactical Combat in it, maybe as others have intimated that is because Stardock had felt that creating a decent AI was too difficult or out of scope. So while you feel the strong desire to express your opinion, and I welcome intelligent debate on the subject, I feel a desire to express mine.

And here is another truth - If tactical combat was in the game to begin with, not one of you nay sayers would have batted an eyelid and still played the game and most probably enjoyed it.

I suspect some might have enjoyed it, I probably wouldn't have, but then we come back to the silent majority I can't speak for them but I take solace in this simple fact if Tactical Combat is such a important part of these games why one has it still sold so well despite this 'huge omission' and two why aren't the forums flooded with huge numbers of different people asking why it isn't there, in the hundreds, nay I say again thousands ?

Thank you for listening.

Have a good day.

AR

@ joeld1212

I understand your postion and I respect your opinion. Please as I said in my post above I welcome intelligent debate on this subject and I think you understand I hold no malice towards the Tac Combat please group, I simply want to present my point of view for consumption by all who are prepared to hear it. Some changes are inevitable and should be made to keep the experience fresh. While we have civil reasoned debate on this subject it can only help clarify understansing on this subject.

Have a good day joeld1212

AR

Alienrider describes rather well how a typical game would look like should tactical combat be implemented. Personally I would probably take it one step further and rely heavily on the computers weaknesses rather then my strengths.


Rygel XVI - Dominar to over 600 billion (more or less) loyal subjects.

How a tactical combat sim would affect our overall strategy and a glimpse of how some of us might actually like it...now:

Techs needed / appropriate / wanted.

Death ray type weapons
Space marine pods (we could adapt the present system for this though)
Carriers and fighter bays.
Weapons to be classified as long/short/medium -excluding the mass drivers, they have potentially unlimited range

this would add diversity to the deep yet linear tech tr...it doesn't actuallly resemble a tree does it? lets call it a list, a tech list! All the above should be similar to what we have already ie the more you research along said branch the smaller better etc.Hey we might actually get a bona fide tree afterwards

The Battleground

I would love a 3d fight area, but we don't have those hand waving implements that they had in Minority Report (or a 60 inch screen either) so its back to good old 2d. the sizo of the area should be around twice the longest range, so apart from the mass weopons it doesn't really matter now who fires first. But speed will not lose its usefulness as will be shown. The width of the area should be determined by the higher logistics value between opponents

The attacks themselves should be line of sight only (in Moo2 you could shoot who you wanted and this lead to positioning the ships being almost irrelevant) only the ship in front gets hit. I know space is 3d, this is a sim. (who's thinking high armour ships with mass drivers up front)

My fleet strategy

Big, armored, mass chucking battlewagons up front. - FRONT LINE
Your latest and greatest ships
and then your has beens
followed by carriers
followed by troopships - yup, its the tail end.

The straight forward strategy would be to get in close using the defensive screen then HAVE IT!

But you could split forces and try flanking the enemy if they wanna huddle.

Send the fighters out at the last minute to take out incoming missiles

the troopships sent out out once in range to board enemy ships. When boarding there should be a choice as to what they want to accomplish. be it damage weapons / defences / engines or to take over the ship,( this should be made extremely difficult as it was too easy to do in MOO2). one action per troopship.

And not forgetting the best ships, lets see how they do against the enemy, eh.

Planetary attacks:

Ground batteries and the like are a great idea - not mass drivers

the present fleeet coordinating thing should have tech which allows for upgrading - for planetary defence sats

the minefield idea cannot be ignored

this puts the onus on the attacker to come into range and get slapped

Thats the kind of tactical combat i want .... need

And this is the reason why:

when i typically go planet hunting my fleet consists of my best ships another fleet of very fast transports and more than a few fast constructors

I kill the defenders

mini soldier the planet cos i hate losing tiles.

build up my new front line with my construtors - repeat as desired.

It works really really well, but its too easy, too unsophisticated.... Dull

I want more.

Thanks for listening and being patient


AlienRider - I still stand by my earlier statement(the two issues...issue), but less invective would have been more appropriate

I like the chess and pawns idea except the pieces all have a one shot kills ability and for most of the game that aint gonna happen which changes everything considerably.

Later ... init

Tactical combat would be too resource-intensive for even an expansion for GC2, in my opinion. It would take rebalancing all the weaponry (tactical combat without weapon ranges wouldn't be worth playing), creating a tactical AI, and updating the ship design AI to deal with the rebalanced weapons, the research portion of the AI to reprioritise the ship techs, etc.

As for the majority wanting it, I can't authoritatively speak for the majority, but neither can anyone else in this thread. There was a thread created a while back on how many people wanted tactical combat in GC2, and "No" won by a large margin. Even that can't speak to the majority of GC2 players, only the majority of people that were active in these forums at that time.

I'd have no qualms with tactical combat in GC2 on the following conditions:

1) It isn't cheesable. MoO1 and MoO2 combat definitely was, the respective AIs just weren't up to tactical combat against player designed ships. I didn't maintain interest in MoO3 long enough to find out how cheesable its tactical combat was, but even there, I did much better if I commanded my ships rather than using quick combat. And I wasn't particulary good at MoO3.

2) It doesn't take away development resources from things that I care more about. My guess is the AI issues mentioned above are the biggest obstacles to this one.

3) it's optional. Now, you might ask why I care about both if it's cheesable and that it's optional. It's because I don't want to feel compelled to micromanage combat to play my best. In MoO2, I never used quick combat, even though I didn't like tactical combat most of the time (first combat with a new ship design or a new weapon being one of the few exceptions), precicely because I'd do much better if I did control it.

Oops, forgot to mention, I don't have anything against the pro-tactical combat element either, for that matter. I do understand why some people want it, I just don't think that it's as appropriate to GC2 as it would be to other games. GC2 isn't a wargame, it's a game of conquest, and spending the time to manage combat every time it occured would focus the game more on the combat than managing an empire.

One other point: when I'm at war, there's more battles in GC2 than there is in MoO2 or MoO3. When I'm on the offensive in MoO2 or MoO3, I might see two or three battles in a turn, and only once have I seen as many as 5. In GC2, when I'm on the offensive I'll have 10-20 battles a turn. This would cause the game to drag out even more.

Tribes all the way!

Hell even Tribes 2 was a cool game.

While I would enjoy tactical combat done right, I think it would take an enormous amount of effort to do it right by the time you factor in a competent AI and all the other factors that some other posters have already posted. I guess the effort would be equivalent to writing an entirely new game, minus the graphics engine. That is effort that can better be spent on improving and expanding on what GalCiv2 already does best.

It's my belief that the majority of folks against adding it are thinking along the same lines. We are not against it in principal, but can't see how it can be done well with the available resources and not hurt further development of the overall game.
Tony

Alienrider and Rygel XVI: It's a pleasure to debate people who present their opinions as well as the two of you do. You both have argued your point effectively and I would guess that if there are any fence riders viewing this thread that you may have won some of them over.

I would like to think that Frookie and I have also won over a few. As most everyone who posts on these forums [or any forums for that matter] wants something enhanced, changed, clarified or added I will continue to push for the inclusion of tactical combat in a future expansion. I feel that this would be like "getting your cake and eating it too", in other words a real treat!

...It's a pleasure to debate people who present their opinions as well as the two of you do. You both have argued your point effectively...

Thank you for this, you have also presented interesting food for thought.

As most everyone who posts on these forums [or any forums for that matter] wants something enhanced, changed, clarified or added

Agreed. I believe we all want what is best for the game, having reasonable discussion about it makes it easier for Stardock to get a feel of what is wanted and potential thoughts (from a vocal minority ) on how to implement these suggestions.

For the record I have no problem with 'Tactical Combat' being implemented as long as it one doesn't allow me to overturn a sure defeat due to a less then Intelligent AI and two that having the AI auto resolve my battles for me doesn't make me feel like I had given away a victory that all things being equal should have been mine (these two points I see as subtly inter-linked).

Have a good day.

AR

I guess I finally have to chime in on this topic (just having seen it). Please excuse my ramble. I play both tactical and strategy type games and have for a number of years, and I enjoy both. They are different, and I have yet to see any game that has done both of them well. As far as GalCiv2, I picked this up off the shelf at a game store, and I put it back down after looking it over. It 'looked and sounded' great, but I've been burned too many times by games not living up to their hype. About a week and a half later, I saw a review of the game over on civfanatics, along with the fact they had a demo. Cool, let's check it out. I was hooked, and bought it as soon as I could tear myself away from my computer. I love the game, and all of the options, but Tactical Options could easily be added, IN THE SAME MANNER AS THOSE FOR A PLANETARY INVASION. This game reminds me of a combination of two old board games that I used to play, called 'Federation and Empire' and 'Starfire'. Starfire was almost too detailed, you built your ships from the ground up, just like GalCiv2, and controlled everything from production down to and including tactical combat. Federation and Empire was more of a grand strategy game, tactical combat was even more simplified than GC2, but you had a couple of options that made it more interesting. While I want Tactical Combat Options, in most cases, I don't want to control every ship. Just give me the option of what to shoot at first. I may not be the actual admiral commanding that fleet, but I can darn well tell him that I want him to kill all transports that he sees before targeting anything else. I want to have the option to retreat after each round, unless my race is fanatical, they would perform a 'retrograde action' to preserve the fleet for a later date when I might be able to have a better advantage. Even if a true Tactical Combat option was added later, it could be limited to only one battle per turn, you can't be everywhere at once. In any case, I still love the game and will play it with or without the tactical options, but the 'Galactic Bumper-cars' TM *IS* the biggest turn-off in the game

For the record I have no problem with 'Tactical Combat' being implemented as long as it one doesn't allow me to overturn a sure defeat due to a less then Intelligent AI and two that having the AI auto resolve my battles for me doesn't make me feel like I had given away a victory that all things being equal should have been mine (these two points I see as subtly inter-linked).

So how about AI vs AI tactical combat only? You can probably fast-forward it without kaboom gfx oomph rather damn quickly with exactly same tact AI that would be used with pretty explosions. But it'll make combat make more "sense" and more interesting.

Plus, since both sides are using same AI ..

(Off Topic, those of you who like naval combat, (or are true grognards) the Harpoon games provide a good Operational Level Simulation that is pretty close to tactitcal combat in a Strategic sim. Link )

I forgot about Harpoon. Many balls-to-four shifts spent in the Combat Electronics office playing on one computer with a Senior Chief across the room doing the same. The man never forgave me for destroying both subs in one of the first sub-hunt scenarios in less than 15 minutes on my first attempt at the scenario. Come to think about it, that was one of the last times I got to play the game.

Space mines, orbital bombardment, tactical combat, heroes, special agents, asteroid fields, special powers for races, and dozens I won't mention right now. It's not that these aren't good ideas -- they are. I want many of those features too (except orbital bombardment ). For me, PC strategy games revolve around having good opponents.

This is part of the journal "Features versus AI" April 20 from Draginol aka Frogboy - "All Hail the chief!" its worth reading and most of you probably already have.

Its enough for me. Its a consideration for the expansion if they can do it in the time/resource/quality/budget soup that will define what will go into the expansion.

Like Joeld, who's been my wingman ever since this post started, I'd like to thank Rygel and AlienRider for the excellent debate, but also everyone who has contributed. Nice one guys!

I would also add that I would now (because of all you argumentative bods out there ) that I would sacrifice my need for Tactical Combat if there are improvements in the strategic gameplay side -Diplomacy, trade, espionage,AI, AI ship design etc and would not want a dilution of resources, by this I mean I'd rather have a few excellent improvements than loads of weak / unbalanced ones.

Would anyone mind if it comes in the expansion after that?