Moral issue on "Missle Dance"

[WhiteHojo]

I have seen lots of Posts both pro and con on the manuever know commonly as the "missle dance".

At 1st I agreed that this was a very unsporting way to to take advantage of the computer players in tact combat.

But while playin a game Last nite I had an epiphany (for me at least).

What is the difference b/t doin a missle dance early in the game (or any time for that matter) and takin advantage of range differences b/t your ships and the computer using DF weapons? IE - you have DUC that hits 5 squares away and cmptr has some wmpy cannon that only shoots 3 squares - logically you stay w/in 4 squares of the enemy (after accounting for movement on both sides)

I fail to see the difference b/t this, as I'll call it, "Max Wpn Range Dance" and the "Missle Dance"... is it just me or am I missing something.

[dmm]

There are four ways this could be inherently unfair:
1) If you come into range, fire, then go back out of range (shoot-and-scoot). The opponent should have been able to fire at you when you came into range.
2) If the computer is too stupid to know that it can simply have the ship being targeted by missiles run away while the other ships close in.
3) If the computer is too stupid to know that DUC ships shouldn't engage CSM ships without either armor or superior numbers.
4) It fails to take inertia into account. It ought to take movement points to turn and reverse course in space. (Anyone else old enough to remember the arcade game "Space Wars"? How about "Asteroids"?) SEIV combat doesn't bother with that, which makes dancing in and out possible. (On the other hand, maybe the engines use some sort of non-inertial drive, which maybe also explains how they can carry enough fuel to zoom all over star systems.)

[This message has been edited by dmm (edited 11 January 2001).]

[TimMcBride]

What the Game needs is a feature called Opportunity fire. It is cominly used in wargames and is a nice feature. Basiclly if an enemy moves into a specified range the ship will fire a weapon.

[This message has been edited by TimMcBride (edited 11 January 2001).]

[Richard]

Actually that is something that may be added later, but it isn't guaranteed.

------------------
Sarge is coming...

Richard Arnesen
Director of Covert Ops
Shrapnel Games
http://www.shrapnelgames.com

[TimMcBride]

Richard,
It would make a great addition, providing much more realism to the combat.

Regards,
Tim McBride

[General Hawkwing]

I'm not sure quite how this relates, but I've seen the AI fire missiles and move away from my ships. They will also press their longer range beam advantage if they can. I don't think they move-fire-move but like mentioned previously, an opp. fire (which Richard says could be in the works ) would negate this trick.
The biggest hurddle for the AI in combat is number of movements. I continue to encounter AI battleships, carriers and dreadnaughts with only ion engines. The AI needs to research prop. sooner and to make better use of the additional movement gained in combat.

[Nyx]

The AI will use the missile dance itself against my worlds. I find that the AI is not smart enough to take advantage of longer range when it has direct fire weapons and is attacking a planet, even when the direct fire weapon has longer range than the weapons defending the planet.

I don't have a "moral" problem with the missile dance for the simple reason that there are other and more effective ways to defeat the AI. The missile dance just happens to be one that works starting on turn 1 because we all get access to capital ship missiles at the start of every game.

------------------
Compete in the Space Empires IV World Championship at www.twingalaxies.com.

[SirDarwin]

Of course if you are attacking a player's fleet, they can use the missile dance to a lesser degree as well, if you want to destroy them you gotta move closer. Or both players can move back and forth

[Talenn]

Hehe...well, no I have no 'moral' objections to it, but is its the easiest exploit of the AI I've found to date. Getting into a 'stern chase' with a missile ship is suicide and the AI loves to do it. A human player wont and will force the missile player to chase THEM. Also, human players will spread out their forces to form a 'net' that the missile boats cant constantly evade.

The AI is also incapable of bringing out ship designs to counter the missiles. Eventually it may have ONE PD weapon here and there. A human opponent will quickly appear with a small group of escort ships that will render the missiles nearly useless.

So, IMO, its really just something I'd like to see go away. It makes the game far too easy against the AI. Its not so bad in single player games as I can always choose not to do it (although I find that silly in and of itself). In multiplayer games though, the AI is simply doomed as players are going to use WHATEVER means are necessary to grease the AI so that they are at an advantage over the other human players in the game.

I've somewhat reduced the problem in my set by:

1) removing CSM's as a starting tech and tweaking the AI research files of the races that are missile dependant to get them early in the game. Now, if you want the missiles, you have to pay for em and if you get into an early conflict, its more difficult to come up with those RPs.

2) Added in a base level 'Early PD Cannon' as a starting component available. It is basically a PD-1 but it takes up 50% more space and can ONLY target missiles.

3) Upping the radioactives cost of the lower level missiles by a reasonably high amount. This means going for a seldom used resource and maintaining a stock of it. The later missiles have no increased cost (IMO, they are simply made more efficient). This has the effect of basically nullifying the missile weapons as cheap and quick cure all. Those missile boats cost a fairly heftly amount to build and maintain and reducing that cost means a substancial commitment to the missile 'tree'. For the early game, its not always possible to continually research a 15k tech.

Thats my $.02 on it.

Talenn

[Talenn]

One final thought....

It amuses me to no end how names like 'missile dance' stick! I deemed it that in one of my Posts a few weeks ago and it seems to have become coined as the 'official' title now.

I referred to it as such as it reminded of a tactic I had seen repeatedly in Age of Empires long ago where people used Chariot Archers to hit and run the slower infantry pieces. It was referred to as 'Chariot Archer Dancing'. When I first saw some friends using the missiles in that way my first thought was of AoE, hence my post terming it the 'Missile Dance'.

And now its stuck forever it seems!

Talenn