Goodmorning all,

Been giving some thought ot unit experiance, have an imcompleat idea i wanted to share.

In 4X games, often experiance and levels = more hitpoints,  or +1 to hit,/ defend, whatever. . .

Which is well and great, but i think it somewhat misses what learning about real battle is about.

Many of our units are going to have special ablilities, Shield wall, pike wall, co-ordinated actions over a full unit, activating a special weapon or tool... whatever.   And it stikes me that there is a huge differnce between being able to form ranks and build a shield wall, on a training ground,  and being  able to do the same thing on muddy ground with enemies runing at you at trying to kill you, or half way up a mountain side where the guy beside you isn't flat and level with you.


So i'm thinking that most or many ablities should be limited in some way by terrain, or battle duration, or whatever.  For example,  your archer's may be trained in 'double shot'   or your shield bearers in 'form Shield Wall',  But a level one unit will only be able to use double shot thier first round of battle, becuase it's fumbly,  and perhaps use it again if they haven't fired a shot in over 45 seconds.  Your level 1 shield bearers can only form a wall if over 80% of them are still alive, there are no opponents within 2 squares, and the terrain is flat.  As a unit level's up they learn to respond faster, be able to use ablilties in terain they couldn't before, or addapt to more difficult demands.  So  a level 7 achery unit trained with the same double shot  could use the ability almost every shot, or every second shot, and a level 3 shield bearer deployment could form ranks  with as low as 70% survival, and 1 space, perhaps also on hilly terrain.  a level 7 shield bearer deployment could use the ability mid combat, with 50% survival and even whilst fighting in mountain scape...

This would be in addition to slight bonuses to hit or evade, or whatever.  Some abilities would be from level 1 always the same, others might depend only on level [personal first aid kit, a level 1 unit could understandably fumble whilst trying to patch themselves of a friend due to the noise and confusion of battle, where a level 7 unit is so use to battle they can pull things out of the pack behind thier back whilst still fighting and wrap a wound with one hand and pulling stichest with thier teath... or whatever.]), other abilities would be fine, unless in the wrong terrain, and less restrictions as you level up.

The idea being that battle fields are truly chaotic and things you are trained to do on a training yard don't nessisarily work when you're in the field. Only with the detachment from and acclimitazation to war can one begin to apply that training fully when you really need it.

 Anyway that was the thought

 some help flushing it out would be nice,

 Many thanks Robbie