Malfador, Bring back retreat option from SEIII

geoschmo · #1 February 17th, 2002, 05:03 AM

I too was not a huge fan of the retreat in SEIII, and am happy it's not in SEIV. Consider the following. An attack ship attacks a colony ship. The attack ship has the speed advantage but because the combat starts with the ships on opponsite sides of the screen, the clony ship can retreat before the attacker can catch him. So the attaacker is forced to either allow him to escape, or spend another strategic movement point chasing him into the next sector. BUT, that combat starts with the ships on opposite sides of the combat screen again. Rinse and repeat, until the attacker gives up or the one of the ships runs out of strategic movement points. This has the effect of greatly increasing the speed of the colony ship in relative to the attacker.

Why should a ship be allowed to retreat from battle, and the pursuer is not allowed to follow? The battle should continue until the combat round ends. Now I could be convinced that the comabt screen should be expanded, although I am not sure how much that would add to the turn processing time. This would allow faster ships to evade until the combat ended without getting caught in the corner.

One of the problems with implementing a retreat option with the current simultaneous movement system is the way movement is calculated. Eacn turn is divided into days (30 I think), and then if a ship has 6 movement points, they get to move every five days. If a ship attackes another ship on a "day" when they have strategic movement, the other ship may not have strategic movement availableon that "day" even if they have some left for the "month" (turn).

Geoschmo

Dravis · #2 February 19th, 2002, 01:52 AM

Another option could be a wrap around map. That wouldn't be very realistic, but it might work. One more option could be that it takes more than 1 movement point to retreat (sorry if somebody thought of that before).

Either way I miss the ability to retreat...

Instar · #3 February 19th, 2002, 02:47 AM

"But more important it was a possibility to cheat and see what was the exact strength of the enemy in a sector."
Well, you could consider when that happens as them to be scout units, but it is kind of unfair for the defenders, as they get no chance to get at the ship.

PvK · #4 February 19th, 2002, 05:04 AM

quote:
Originally posted by geoschmo:
I too was not a huge fan of the retreat in SEIII, and am happy it's not in SEIV. Consider the following. An attack ship attacks a colony ship. The attack ship has the speed advantage but because the combat starts with the ships on opponsite sides of the screen, the clony ship can retreat before the attacker can catch him. So the attaacker is forced to either allow him to escape, or spend another strategic movement point chasing him into the next sector. BUT, that combat starts with the ships on opposite sides of the combat screen again. Rinse and repeat, until the attacker gives up or the one of the ships runs out of strategic movement points. This has the effect of greatly increasing the speed of the colony ship in relative to the attacker. ...

That's not how the SE III system works. Ships can only retreat if they have unspent movement points from their previous turn. The enemy colony ship can only run if it didn't use all it's movement Last turn. The enemy ship can never move farther than its speed on the strategic map, and only ships that don't use all of their movement have any chance to retreat. If a scout of the same speed moves into your sector and retreats, it will have used two movement points, so you will be able to chase it down unless it has a speed advantage of at least two greater than yours. Also, with the SE III ability to specify a change in strategy based on enemy strength, if you have a battlefleet that you don't want scouted by trivial enemy ships, you can place a screen of light ships in between that fleet and the enemy, with orders to chase up to a strength ratio, or retreat if a real threat appears.

PvK

CW · #5 February 19th, 2002, 06:23 AM

IMHO, something serious is lacking if ships can't retreat from combat (as of present). The current "space is nothing but a little square" setup means that even if I've a dedicated fast scout it won't be able to make use of its speed advantage to survive. Do you really think ships will get trapped in a corner in combat in real life 300 years from now?!?!

No offense intended to anybody but the argument on whether a retreat order should be implemented as some of you suggested is quite pointless - it SHOULD. The real question is HOW you are going to do it.

geoschmo · #6 February 19th, 2002, 04:33 PM

CW, The argument that retreat should not be allowed is only pointless if you disagree with it.

I for one think it has a valid point. Many games do not allow units to leave the combat phase before it is over. And, as much as I hate to use the "R" word, this has some realism to it. In real life war if one side retreats, the other side doesn't always stop shooting at them. They will often persue and attempt to destroy them. Now, if the retreating unit can disengage without being destroyed, and has sufficent speed to withdraw without being run down, yes eventually they should be able to get away. That is why I would agree with modifying the combat screen to allow more room for movement. But that's different than allowing one side to completely disengage from combat unilaterally.

Pvk, I believe nothing I said about the SEIII system is incorrect. Please explain.

I was using the example of an attacking ship trying to run down a slower, retreating ship to point out an obvious flaw in the SEIII retreat system, that is the fact that by retreating a slower ship can in effect increase his speed in relation to the persuer. As I stated eventually he would run out of strategic movement and be caught, if the attacker felt it was worthwhile to persue. But that could draw the attacker out of position as others have pointed out.

Your example was different, one of unit attacking and withdrawing, more of a skirmishing type action. Something that could be done with a larger combat screen as well. The "scouting" unit could attack, and then evade for the duration of the combat phase. Then with their strategic movement withdraw afterwards.

Geoschmo

PvK · #7 February 20th, 2002, 02:32 AM

Ok, let me quote a smaller part. Regarding your colony ship example:

quote:
Originally posted by geoschmo:
... This has the effect of greatly increasing the speed of the colony ship in relative to the attacker.

I don't think it increases the speed of the colony ship in any way. Say it is speed 5 and the warship is speed 6 (the typical ion engine example). In the first place, if the colony ship used its strategic movement on its turn (the usual situation), then it can't retreat and gets stomped immediately. However, if the colony ship didn't move at all on its turn, then it will be able to retreat five times. If the warship starts adjacent to the colony ship, it will be able to try to engage it six times, and on the sixth time, it will catch and stomp the colony ship. This actually coincides quite accurately with what would be expected for a speed 6 ship to catch a speed 5 ship that is one sector away and wants to flee - in a precise simultaneous movement system, this is exactly what would happen.

PvK