(I added Spoiler tags but I cant get them to collapse so you can click though them..if anyone knows how Ill update the post.. atm its hard to read :/)
In the last Crusade stream Brad asked us to make a thread with our opinions and ideas about invasions. Since I couldn't find one anywhere i thought I would start one here and start a discussion. I hope people join in.
Of course we dont have a hold of the beta of crusade to be able to test how balanced it is, but going by what we could see and how Brad described invasions this is my take on the direction invasions could go and some of my ideas for balance. This is a long post so I have split each answer into separate spoiler tags to make it easier to navigate.
Also alot of the suggestions are intertwined so similar suggestions are interspersed between. Its also 2am here on a sunday and I may have spent way to much time writing this up.. so expect typos or other oversights.. Worth keeping in mind when reading.
Brads issues
-It was difficult to build many legions meaning many planets were not defended or under defended.
-With the limit of Generals being the only unit that can invade a planet (defend a planet), this could be an issue.
-Its difficult to build a military improvement on every planet just to defend it.
-He wanted to know our thoughts on the idea that when you win an invasion you get to keep the intact invasion ship.
-How many legions should be on a invasion ship.
-Should research time on the first tier weapons techs be lower?
My initial observation on invasions
-Besides generals only military improvements could build legions on planets, this has issues with smaller planets or planets focused on other things being undefended or under defended. (im not sure if you can move them around)
-Legions being able to destroy tile improvements has no penalty or defense (besides the limited legions)
-Legions are difficult to produce meaning many planets are left undefended allowing you to a steam-roll takeover of planets.
-There is no way to see the path the legion will take towards the capital when you place them. Nor does it tell you on what 'turn' the legion will arrive at the capital.
-Capital placement has become more crucial, yet our inability of control of the placement of them is still unchanged.
-Resistance seems to server no purpose any more.
-Once you take a planet you dont need to do anything in order to keep the planet in check, they just give in.
Here are my solutions to Brads questions, balance or ideas to do with invasions in general. As I said at the start until we get our hands on it its mostly guessing what would be a good solution. So these might be better served to only be implemented in part or it may give you an idea of the concerns or directions invasions could take. Likewise its possible im misunderstanding some of the mechanics so with that in mind some ideas might need to be tweaked.
Invasions and taking out tile improvements:
Thoughts on how it is now-
I like the idea of when you invade it takes out the tiles your legions move over, it makes the consequences of the placement more dire for the person being invaded, but also allows you to invade even if you wont win in order to do some damage.
The concern I have with this method is the when you get the planet you most likely have decimated the tile improvements on the planet. This will be even worse once you factor in adding more legions per ship (which I will go into details later why I agree it should be more). There is also the problem where it seems as if your basically salting the earth as you proceed over the planet, which for a benevolent player seems way to counter alignment. Not to mention you could cripple a player by doing a sneaky, almost cheezy invasion of a planet with no real downside to yourself. When not being sneaky and wanting to take the planet for use of your own, once you win you either have to make sure you didnt destroy many tiles you want to keep, making the mechanic a hindrance, or you get your self a crippled planet almost negating the benefit of taking the planet in the first place.
Idea/Solution-
Every 4 improvements the legions go though to get to the capital you lose one legion that "holds" its position on the map. Basically .25 a legion per tile stays behind to defend the tile. This will balance all aspects of invasion meaning if your wanting to go in for maximum damage you have to have enough legions in order to get to the target. If you win the planet you get the legions back. If you lose, as with now, you lose all your legions.
Instead of destroying tiles outright. Each tile that is moved over reduces the improvement by 1 tier. Then the .25 of the legion is left on the tile to defend it and hold the line as described above. An example would be a Xeno Factory would turn back into a Basic Factory. You could do this without the above legion suggestion but I thought it was an interesting idea. This prevents players from decimating a planet if they lose but still does "damage" to the planet. Likewise this means that when you win the planet you are not starting with an empty planet and just need to 'repair' or upgrade the tiles which were assaulted during the invasion. This also doesnt change the strategic ability to do focused attacks on a planet. Like Brad did in the stream when wanting to take out the Research Core. Any unique or "wonder' improvements its removed as it only has 1 tier of upgrade.
--
It is difficult to build many legions meaning many planets were not defended or under defended./Resistance seems to server no purpose any more./when you win an invasion you get to keep the intact invasion ship./How many legions should be on a invasion ship?
Thoughts on how it is now-
In order to invade a planet you need a General. You then need to convert him to an invasion ship in order to invade. This is the only way to begin an invasion on a planet. Likewise your always going to have more planets then civilians available meaning its near impossible to defend your planets if you have no ships near by to stop the fleet. Likewise if you dont have anyone available to defend it can take many turns and you could lose many planets before you can even react.
Now Military Academy allow you to slowly build legions. As far as I know they are only allowed to help you defend the planet you cant turn them into invasion ships. This has issues with smaller planets or planets focused on other things being undefended or under defended. Im not sure if you can move them around but even if you can the time it takes to build a single legion is massive. The time it would take to not only build one but to build enough per planet to defend them seems impossibly impractical.
In my opinion this is a severe limitation in the invasion mechanic. Not only does this mean that you can easily defend against invasions by focusing your best fleet on the invasion fleet. But if your the one invading and you lose it, you have no way to progress your invasions. Likewise if your fleet loses when trying to destroy the invading fleet, you have no recourse and no ability to defend your planets as you need a general to do so.
General Stats for anyone wondering:
Idle: +3% Global resistance
If on planet: 5 legions to a planet it is defending, or
If on ship: Can be converted into an invasion transport holding the general and his 5 legions.
Idea/Solution-
Dealing with General invasion limitations.
I think a general invasion ship should allow you to have upto 5 legions as it is now. But I think you should also be able to build lesser single invasion ships which give you 1 legion per ship. This allows commanders to be the preferred unit in invasions as it gives you more legions per fleet logistic points. Yet not make it completely gated in your ability to invade if your putting your civilians in other fields. Likewise the invasion general should give a bonus to soldering of all legions in the fleet giving them even more of an preferred ability in this roll. Since you will be limited by logistics, a non general fleet might only get a flat 4-5 legions in a full fleet. But with a General you could pretty much double that number to 10, plus with the solider bonus you get a significant advantage. Taking into consideration of the suggested mechanics in the above post this would make it the preferred way to win a planet but not the only way.
EG:
One legion on a planet turns into one Transport (1 legion)
As now, Build Transport Command ship, (1 general) to give you a 5 legion invasion ship.
Dealing with Generals defending planets.
As mentioned above with the limitation on available generals its impossible to defend a planet. Likewise besides generals only military improvements could build legions on planets, this has issues with smaller planets or planets focused on other things being undefended or under defended. My solution to this, which I have also read in other posts is being able to use your pop on the planet to defend you. For the purpose of talking about this Ill call them Militia. They act like a legion but with some limitations.
A Militia is created at the start of an invasion. You are able to pick how many you want to create at the start of the invasion. Each Militia takes a base of 4 pop to 1 Militia. Your resistance is the percentage discount of population needed to form 1 Militia. Eg: If you have 50% Resistance you could get a single Militia for 2 pop instead of 4. The idea behind it is that resistance is the ability of your population who know how to fight if the time comes. As well as there comparative power vs a legion. So basically 4 civ pop is equal to 1 Legion in power by default but that can be improved. At the end of the invasion no matter who wins all remaining Militia are turned back into pop. Im not sure if there should be a cap to the number of Militia you can make. Perhaps its like 3 Militia cap plus 1 Militia per legion you have on the planet or max 50% of your population minimum of 1. This is to prevent a planets population being cleared out as well as not making it to powerful. Whats the need for legions then? Well unlike pop the Legions dont require food (I believe), they increase your overall defense on a planet, they can be turned into invasion ships. And I think they should also give bonus soldering to any Militia they are next to or with on the map.
Also, keeping this all in mind, a general on your planet increase both resistance and soldering therefore this give them a distinct and potent purpose. They also, as now, give 5 legions to the planet they are on.
--
Additional Idea/Brainstorm.
Ideology and invasions-
Invasions seem to ignore Ideology choices. Besides some invasion techs later that might help you I find that unabated slaughtering and destruction of improvements on the planet dosnt fit this game mechanic. Therefore if the above change is made this could also be implemented. You get one of the following depending on which Ideology you are most invested in. OR even better, which would give a well needed boost to the Ideology point system. At the start of an invasion you pick one of the following options and you get +10 Ideology to the one chosen.
Benevolent - High chance that the tile isnt destroyed. (in instruct your legions to avoid collateral damage)
Pragmatic - Removed 1 tier of improvement per tile.
Malevolent - Removes 2 tiers of improvement per tile. Being slavers the 10 turn wait that requires 1 legion to stay behind is removed. (see 'Once you Win a planet, what now?' post)
Tile insensitive During invasions-
Taking into considering what each tile represents in game, as well as thinking of a creative ways to give more meaning and strategy placement to invasions. One Idea I had was that each tile you move across gives you either a bonus or hindrance. Some of these have ramifications for a few turns after making gameplay more interesting as well as giving even better insensitive for attacking a planet without winning.
Eg: Population Improvements: Heal the legion by 0.15 per tier of improvement destroyed (upto max 1)
Economic Improvements: Give them 50-100 credits per tier of improvement per tile they go though. Or credits equally to 1
turn of economic production on the planet. (what ever is higher)
Military Improvements: As with now, damage the units that move over it.
City Improvements: Forces more legions to stay behind on the tile (.5 instead of .25)
Approval Improvements: Reduce the soldering of 'Militia Units' (see 'Dealing with Generals defending planets')
Influence Improvements: Increases your soldering damage against 'Militia Units'.(see 'Dealing with Generals defending planets')
Manufacturing Improvements: Reduces current production on any current improvement or adjoined shipyards current progress.
EG: A ship with 125/200 production complete might lose 20% making it 100/200. Increasing turns to build. Same with planet building in the queue
Research Improvements: Gives you 25-50 research points per tier destroyed. Or research points equally to 1 turn of research on the planet. (what ever is higher)
Special: Nothing, but the improvement is destroyed. Which that in itself is good.
Tourism: Prevents any Tourism income/credits from the planet for 2 turn per tier destroyed.
If the units need to go though a water tile they should take eg: .25 damage per tile of water/ocean. This is also important for "island capitals" which sometimes happens during colonization. Instead of having a defenseless capital with no tiles in between the ocean around it is more of a strategic placement
Capital Placement-
Speaking of placements in the above. Since the location of the capital is critical to invasions. I think the time has come to allow the player to pick the capital placement during colonization. There is just so many factors riding on its placement and with the addition of interactive invasions its even more important that players have this control.
Legion pathing
There is no way to see the path the legion will take towards the capital when you place them. Nor does it tell you on what 'turn' the legion will arrive at the capital. I think a visible line should be shown as you place them so you can tell how many tiles and which ones they will go though. Likewise a "turns to capital" should be visible per legion so you can coordinate all legions arrive on the same turn if you want to for a more effect assault.
Once you Win a planet, what now?
One of the major issues I can see with how the current invasion system works is the stream rolling of planets once you get an invasion ship. You can witness this in the stream and even Brad mentions it needs to be looked into.
For this reason I suggest that once you win a planet, I suggest 1 legion minimum needs to stay behind on the planet in order to prevent a rebellion of the planet. They need to stay there for X turns (maybe like 10 turns, perhaps depending on game speed) otherwise like a planet in culture influence they can rebel and take back the planet. Perhaps also within this 10 turns you are unable to build any new improvements unless you buy them. All you can just use planet projects during this time. There would need to be a planet project which is always equal to this wait time otherwise you wont be notified when the rebellion is over. Current minimum planet project one I see is 25 turns which is way to long. The reason for this as i said is that it prevents you from steam rolling though all the planets as you will slowly lose steam as you progress. It isnt a complete setback tho as you are able to within a few turns as the rebellion ends, regroup and continue on.
Likewise If you take back a planet you once owned, this wait time is lower or even zero allowing you to instantly move your full set of legions elsewhere. As mentioned in the above post on 'Ideology and invasions.' the Malevolent pick removes this limitation. But seeing as you also lose alot more improvements it balances out the speed of war vs keeping a planet intact.
-
Should research time on the first tier weapons techs be lower?
Most in chat said no, or even asked to make it higher. While I like tech I have to agree. How it is now there is NO reason to build lower tier ships as the upgrade system is so economically and productively a waste to build them when you can get better ships so soon. meaning you wont even bother with the lower tech. IMO by making it longer to get to it allows a stronger incentive for tiny ships with first tier weapons as you know they will be around for at least some time before u get new tech.
The only other way to make this not an issue is to finally put into the game the upgrade machine from GalCiv2 where you can spend credits per turn instead of a flat amount which is unrealistic. Saying all this.. until we get our hands on the game its hard to tell if this is a good turn time for techs.