terrain and combat

[Olive]

I've difficulties to "feel" the penalties of climate when I'm playing ( encumberance means few for me, I know Units are faster tired, but I don't easily quantify how much it will affect a battle). Same for economics, I know wrong climate can affect It, but it doesn't seems as important to me as turmoil or death. I just wanted more meaningful effects to me.

But maybe it's because I'm a weak player.

[BigJMoney]

Yeah, I always thought climate had only a very modest effect on the game. I don't really know what to say to that. I might suggest that the effects of climate be exponential, rather than additive. Where X = the climate penalties; level 1 heat or cold scale = X, level 2 = 2X and level 3 = 4X. All this really changes is level 3, but maybe that makes the most sense.

And I see your point. When one looks at history and reads stories like the German advance into Russia being halted mainly because of the weather, it causes one to realize the effect extreme weather can have on war.

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[BigJMoney]

I was thinking today that maybe Mountain Survival troops should be able to cross unpassable heavy brown borders. I think that would be pretty strategic. Worth resurecting this thread for.

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[Wick]

Or flying troops go over them, Agarthic troops use the mysterious tunnels under them, and Siddhas just ignore them. These all have the same problem -- there are no borders in the game, mountainous or otherwise. The provinces are connected point to point. Adding a "hexside terrain" value to those connections is a Dom4 wish. It might be worth starting a Dominions 4 Wishlist thread for, because it is a good wish.

[AAshbery76]

I really would like to see this aspect greatly expanded,and the A.I programmed to understand it of course.

[Fate]

There could be different kind of terrain "connections", for example a mountain trail that only flying/tunneling/mountain survival units could cross. Maybe something for Dom4?

[Taqwus]

You could see an impact on starting distance or initiative -- ex. an army with more units with forest survival being able to get initiative even on the attack when ambushing enemies in a forest.

Survival skills and terrain might also affect stealth/patrol efficiency and ease of moving supplies from a nearby fortress.

On a more universal level, you would expect a forest to hamper ranged attacks (lots of cover, difficulty spotting) so a precision penalty would make sense, and possibly attack penalty. It being a forest might also force a shorter initial distance between the armies.

In mountains, one realistic but potentially complicated and dangerous factor would be making it difficult to coordinate multi-province attacks. Mountain passes might also have closer initial deployment; and one might want to see encumberance penalties.

Swamps are going to be brutal on ground-pounders; heavy encumberance, probably lower att and def as well. Patrols should have a harder time finding sneakers that have swamp survival.