Doctrines from SE4X for response to an attack

[PaskinsP]

Hey there!

I am greatly enjoying the m44 implementation and looking forward to it going live.

But I would have a suggestion I strongly see would improve the experience.

Right now, the "response to attack" interaction from the defender kills the experience tbh.

My suggestion is using a brilliant idea from the SE4X beta game.

There, during combat, players do have a significant amount of decision making to be done.

But there is a feature in place of "doctrines", where you program your priorities and preferences.
Like that, a combat resolution goes from up to 6 turn-switches... to just 1!

I propose for the "Ambush" card, a similar doctrine feature (call it "rules of engagement", or combat stance, or the like)

I think something as follows would do the trick:

> Use Ambush for my [Infantry/Tank/Artillery/Any unit]
of [Equal or less/Equal or more/Any]
health points of [1/2/3/4]
if it is being attacked by a [Infantry/Tank/Artillery/Any unit]
of [Equal or less/Equal or more/Any]
health points of [1/2/3/4]

What do you folks think?

[diamant]

What do you folks think?

In close combat, we can encounter 5 different types of situation:

a) All Ambush cards are in the discard pile. Contrary to its name, this game does not use memory. However, no player worthy of the name can forget that no Ambush card can be in either hand anymore. The battle is then immediately resolved;

b) the defender has chosen never to intervene, whether or not he has an Ambush card; in which case, the battle is immediately resolved;

c) the defender has chosen to intervene each time (except situation a), whether or not he has an Ambush card; in which case, the battle is suspended until his response;

d) the defender has chosen to intervene under certain conditions that may be programmed (except situation a), whether or not he has an Ambush card; if the conditions are met, the battle is suspended until its response;

e) the defender in possession of the Ambush card has chosen to play it automatically under certain conditions that may be programmed.

The programming concerns the d and e situations. In addition of the options you propose, it seems to me appropriate to be able to designate a hex by its coordinates: the condition is fulfilled if one of your units on this hex is attacked in close combat.

[PaskinsP]

Good points indeed.

If specific hex selection could be made part of the equation, that would make it even more detailed.

Let's see if a developer drops by and gives us some insight into what is possible to implement here.

[PaskinsP]

Just another note on this topic, being a very crucial one as I see it.

Imo, if hex designation were to be a possibility... realistically speaking, being able to select 4 hexes would be enough most of the time.

If it were only hexes... I'd say 6.

If in combination with the "doctrine" set up as specified in the first post, it could go down to 2.

But the current functioning of replying so often, is very cumbersome.

[PaskinsP]

In order to move this along, have opened a suggestion entry on the Bug forum, if you wish to vote for it to have it looked into, search under Suggestions, with the title:

#64864: "Programming the Reaction to an attack"

[PaskinsP]

I just realized that there is another option to solve this, much simpler than programming:

I stongly feel that having by default the enable/disable autopass button set to disable, would greatly improve the gameflow.
When a player draws an Ambush card, a pop-up should then ask him if they want to turn it on.
But I see no benefit as of right now to have it by default turned on, with some players not even knowing of this button.

I have posted a suggestion on this on the Suggestion page, please be welcome to upvote that, and give your insights here

[Tisaac]

I just realized that there is another option to solve this, much simpler than programming:

I stongly feel that having by default the enable/disable autopass button set to disable, would greatly improve the gameflow.
When a player draws an Ambush card, a pop-up should then ask him if they want to turn it on.
But I see no benefit as of right now to have it by default turned on, with some players not even knowing of this button.

I have posted a suggestion on this on the Suggestion page, please be welcome to upvote that, and give your insights here

Again, same answer : it's all about private information !
You would revealed that you don't have the ambush card all along if this was disabled by default. We know there is room for improvement but really believe competitive play should be the default in the meanwhile