Allow bombardment to remove outposts

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Dilvish
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Re: Allow bombardment to remove outposts

#16 Post by Dilvish »

Oberlus wrote:Yes. I envision you would need at least two turns to wipe out a system: one to get all pops to 0 and revert them to outposts, one to bombard(remove) the outposts.
One thing to consider is that bombing an outpost to un-owned status is not something that absolutely needs to be a deterministic one-turn operation. Like the fading of Concentration Camp Remnants, it could be a stochastic operation, with some chance of success each turn. Or it could apply a special, which accretes capacity each turn that the planet is not supply-connected to any other planets owned by the same empire (disappearing if it is) and once that capacity reaches a certain point (3,4, whatever) then the outpost becomes an unowned planet. There is a wide variety of ways to make it take more than one turn (which is something that seems desirable to me for such a significant operation).
The equivalent scorched land strategy with no outpost-removing bombard capabilities would require the same ships (doom stack with bombers and one solar), go as twice as fast but not removing outposts.
Even that does not really sound to me like a desirable tactic to support being accomplished at such a rapid rate. It would be good to hear from the multiplayer people about how much, if at all, that gets used currently, but whether it is used much currently or not we could still move to restrict it if the multiplayer folks thought a restriction would be better (or such restrictions could be subject to a GameRule). I would tend to think that the stacking abilities of bombardment units should probably be restricted a bit-- either don't let them combine linearly, or give some chance for groups of bombadiers to take self-induced attrition, or whatever.
but I have the impression that bombardment weapons are seldom if ever used (and this means that scorched-land strategy is also seldom used), because conquering populated colonies is always better to achieve dominance than wiping them out (you not only reduce enemy's power but also increase yours)
Scorched earth policies do tend to make bitter enemies. In a long term multiplayer group like we currently have, such dynamics could create pressures against certain tactics, which might not apply in a more open ended system like if o0leg's multiplayer server took off. I think we should still be careful about providing support for such tactics.
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Oberlus
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Re: Allow bombardment to remove outposts

#17 Post by Oberlus »

I agree with Dilvish.
Re-reading my own post I think I made it a bit ambiguous. Just wanted to note that the scorched-land strategy without removing outposts is already possible/supported by current mechanics: bombarding planets you reduce their population, and if it gets to 0 it becomes an outpost (still owned by the same empire), and current mechanics makes each bombard part to add to the number of pop. killed per turn, which means that enough bombard parts in a single fleet ensure total obliteration of a system in a single turn, which seems overpowered as noted by Dilvish.

And yes, it would certainly be great to hear from multiplayers whether scorched land is ever used and if not, why.

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Re: Allow bombardment to remove outposts

#18 Post by Jaumito »

Oberlus wrote:And yes, it would certainly be great to hear from multiplayers whether scorched land is ever used and if not, why.
(From my limited experience from hotseat multiplayer with a couple friends:)

It's sometimes used, but then it's done by the weaker empire who tries to cripple a superior foe's production with bombing raids on undefended planets. I've never seen it used for conquest.

Also, one of my pals is fond of building BH collapsers on systems he think he might lose. Just pause production one turn short of completion, and resume when you're about to lose the system. It's expensive but quite effective in neutering an invasion, since it destroys starlanes to the system. If that's not scorched earth, I don't know what is.

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Re: Allow bombardment to remove outposts

#19 Post by Oberlus »

Jaumito, that BH collapser strategy is TEH scorched land strategy, indeed.

Regarding the other, just to be sure: scorched land using bombers to revert colonies to outposts or troopers to conquer them?

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Re: Allow bombardment to remove outposts

#20 Post by Jaumito »

Oberlus wrote:Regarding the other, just to be sure: scorched land using bombers to revert colonies to outposts or troopers to conquer them?
The former, when this strat is used by the weaker empire (which, in my experience, is "always".) Because if you can bomb a world producing 300 PP/turn clean, it'll take 100 turns to get that world back online since PP output can at best increase by 3/turn with the current game mechanics. Which means that world will effectively remain a "dead" world for a while (which is the whole point.) Which also means it isn't worth conquering if you can't invest resources to defend it for that long - or for at least the time it takes to build a colony+transformer here, which will probably take more than 8 turns since you'll likely be out of supply.

On the other hand, the stronger empire can just invade, rinse & repeat.

It makes bombing raids by the weaker power a viable stategy when applicable, depending on map settings - obviously more bottlenecks (low starlanes, cluster shape) makes it harder to use.

Gault.Drakkor
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Re: Allow bombardment to remove outposts

#21 Post by Gault.Drakkor »

Dilvish wrote:
Oberlus wrote:Yes. I envision you would need at least two turns to wipe out a system: one to get all pops to 0 and revert them to outposts, one to bombard(remove) the outposts.
One thing to consider is that bombing an outpost to un-owned status is not something that absolutely needs to be a deterministic one-turn operation. Like the fading of Concentration Camp Remnants, it could be a stochastic operation, with some chance of success each turn. Or it could apply a special, which accretes capacity each turn that the planet is not supply-connected to any other planets owned by the same empire (disappearing if it is) and once that capacity reaches a certain point (3,4, whatever) then the outpost becomes an unowned planet. There is a wide variety of ways to make it take more than one turn (which is something that seems desirable to me for such a significant operation).

I would tend to think that the stacking abilities of bombardment units should probably be restricted a bit-- either don't let them combine linearly, or give some chance for groups of bombadiers to take self-induced attrition, or whatever.
I am fine with bombard removing an outpost in one turn. I do believe that bombardment should not be able to take out a populated world in one turn. Unless you truly have enough to glass plain it.
Something like:

Code: Select all

 def bombard_kill_count(pop, bombard_parts, exponent=0.02, slope=0.2):
  """
  @param pop: current pop of target
  @param bombard_parts: number of bombard parts that nominally kill 1 pop.
  @param exponent: non-linear diminishing return value. 
  @param slope: linear limit, should be less then the implied nominal kill 1 pop per part
  @return: number of population points are killed
  """
   return min(pop, max(pop - pop * (1 - exponent)**bombard_parts, max(1, bombard_parts * slope)))
So this allows for diminishing returns on bombard_parts, until the linear portion kicks in. The linear portion allows for determination of # of parts to one shot bombard_parts = pop / slope.
E.g. planet with 70 pop, if bombarded with 100 bombard parts, would last 2 turns.
planet with 70 pop, if bombarded with 20 bombard parts, would last 8 turns.

Code: Select all

pop=70; arr = []
while pop >0:
    pop -= bombard_kill_count(pop, 100,0.02,.2)
    arr.append(int(pop))
print arr
[9, 0]
pop=70; arr = []
while pop >0:
    pop -= bombard_kill_count(pop, 20,0.02,.2)
    arr.append(int(pop))
print arr
[46, 31, 20, 13, 9, 5, 1, 0]
Of course numbers can and should be adjusted.

I kinda like your accreting special idea, I believe one that applies for each bombard_parts used would be interesting.
If it exceeds certain amount(s) it applies special(s) that could:
  • prevent re-colonization,
  • have influence/ diplomatic cost,
  • require a clean-up cost( minus one pop for each count of the special, can be cleaned up by ...).
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Oberlus
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Re: Allow bombardment to remove outposts

#22 Post by Oberlus »

@Gault.Drakkor, worth a PR, IMO (after some devs discussion, I guess).

o01eg
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Re: Allow bombardment to remove outposts

#23 Post by o01eg »

I want it to be implemented and available for monsters for Tower-Defense mode.
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Geoff the Medio
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Re: Allow bombardment to remove outposts

#24 Post by Geoff the Medio »

The SetOwner effect can/should already be usable to remove ownership of outpost planets...

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