So vieux will there be specific commands such as charges, taking cover in a forest, etc. besides the targeting priorities currently mentioned? will there be a long, med., and melee phase like in endless space. (i really doubt it but would like clarification)

I don't think. The units may do things you described, but not on your behalf (unless devs adds more orders/stances but I wouldn't bet on it).

Charge is already coded as a special trait (you get +X% per hex you get through before getting to contact) and the forest should give a bonus in defence (but I'm not sure th eAI already uses it to its advantage. The game is still in pre-alpha )

I know it's late in the game, but a GDD on the Battle system would be helpful, if only to clearly understand what the design goals are so we can provide feedback on the system based on what it is supposed to be, rather than comparing to other systems...

How about orders such as volley fire before an offensive charge? It would be interesting for ranged units to lose usefulness after the two armies collide.

Adventurer_Blitz wrote:
How about orders such as volley fire before an offensive charge? It would be interesting for ranged units to lose usefulness after the two armies collide.

This is really interesting, it would do a great deal to mitigate the general OP-ness of ranged units in 4X games. This is one of the best suggestions I've heard.

Adventurer_Blitz wrote:
How about orders such as volley fire before an offensive charge? It would be interesting for ranged units to lose usefulness after the two armies collide.

They already lose their usefullness as their attack is divided by two when in close contact (or it should be)

And they already fire at incoming "charges".

What you described is already there in a mechanic-way, it's just you have few control over what happens, and in fact... it's fun to play (and I repeat... I'm a wargamer, so before trying it I thought I would hate such battle system)

But with the Early Alpha, the combat system is just barebones.



About a combat GDD : devs have changed several times of combat system (we weren't even able to play with them, as they were in very early production), so a GDD could become obsolete. They already put a lot of engineering hours into it and they are starting to like what they have. But they know they have still a long way to do. So making a GDD now would be wasting hours of work.

More than a full-blown GDD, a statement on what some of the design goals would be helpful. I think a lot of players are going to come to the table with different expectations on the tactical battles. Stuff like "should be playable in 3 minutes or less" and "Combat AI makes decisions of when/if special abilities are triggered" would be useful.



So far, I like what I see though. There's a lot of (currently opaque) things happening under the covers. For example, PANCZASU mentioned that units are more effective if they don't move before they attack.

VieuxChat wrote:
It's not at all RTS O_o It's turn based but you have no control apart the initial deployment and the initial orders. You can give new orders two times in battle, every three round.

After watching a longer battle I can clearly see what you are talking about now oh well I guess it wasn't anything like what I thought.