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[Mephansteras]

Ok, figured I'd start a thread specifically for formations and how they should work.

I think formations should be generic, with some way to give civ entities access to them on a leader level. That way you can have better generals knowing more formations then leaders with less experience. That'll give individual leaders more importance to civs, as well as provide an automatic scaling of combat difficulty as you deal with better and better enemy generals.

Part of this would be some way to track which formations work well against which other formations. That's a lot of what formations are for in actual warfare. Even basic stuff like pike hedges vs cavalry and shield walls vs archers would be important. As leaders get more experience they learn more formations for their troops and learn more counters to formations used by other armies. Even if, say, elves don't use shield walls they'll still need to know how to defeat one.

I'll ponder this and try to come up with some good code-friendly way to handle these issues. I've thought about it a bit in the past, and I think I've got some decent ideas floating around in the back of my head.

Thoughts from other people?

[Footkerchief]

Toady just made a giant ass post in the List thread which included this on formations.  Don't know if you'd seen it already or not, but it's probably good context for this thread in any case.

This is the idea for the improved sieges section, to have this stuff around for use.  I think it might be a waste to do it this time around, with the changes there slated to happen "soon" for sieges, and I think it might be good to have a release of dwarf mode formations to iron them out before getting down to the AI.  But yeah, definitely.  Formations or lack thereof are one of the main things that will give opposing forces character, as with their mount choices and so on.

Formations are all planned to be saved at the entity level, so the specific choices can be variable -- whether or not there'll be a specific raw format for them is up in the air.  I certainly don't have any objections to bringing it down to that detail level (rather than just using a few tags to guide a generator) if people want to take it there.  It shouldn't even be that time consuming, since you just need to parse them and then they are ready to go -- though they might need AI hints or some very tragic things could happen.

If formations turn out to be useful/fun enough, there might also be some tool requests I suppose.  If you can export formations and then load them in in subsequent games, it would probably save people time, much like the embark load-out exporter.

As for what formations will be possible -- we've talked about it a little bit so far, but that's an ongoing discussion, and one you are welcome to participate in.  A general idea would be to lay out the weapon type (or broader, melee, ranged, whatever) positions by number, with a few types for extending to larger groups (form a line this way etc.) and instructions for what to do when the formation is obstructed (obstructed melee to the front, etc.).  Formations could be used to flank and surrounding people (at first if you are doing the controlling yourself, AI is harder) -- by transitioning between two formations or turning off adherence to a formation you might achieve 2 or 3 to one or back attacks on enemies, and things like facing already matter in the game.  This should give a tactical benefit.

Later on, when you can do things like charge and set polearms against a charge or possibly attack more than one square with a polearm, they will matter much more.  I really don't know much about formations, historically.  The more that comes up the more they will be useful.  The AI can be taught things (at least to some extent) as we discover what works best in play.

[bjlong]

There should be a point where formations fail--when dwarves run because Urist McChampion just got slaughtered, for example. Or when they give chase to fleeing enemies.

I'd like both the generator and raws available on this point--I'd want to define certain formations, but I'd want the generator to come up with some formations, too. This is one of the few places where I think it's warranted, too. There will always be someone trying to come up with something new, even if it's not as good as some of the other formations.

Let's note that this should be both a discussion about formations in gameplay, and an exchange of resources of historical formations. There will be some overlap with tactics, but remember that this is about formations.

[Mephansteras]

Thanks, Foot, that was in fact what prompted this thread. So it's good to have it in here.

And I agree with bjlong about what this thread should be about.

Hmm...there should be formations specifically designed to fight monsters instead of enemy soldiers. Like, what's the best way to take out a GCS? Or a Dragon?

Knowing what you're fighting, as well as what formations they use, should be an important piece of information.

[father_alexander]

Thanks, Foot, that was in fact what prompted this thread. So it's good to have it in here.

And I agree with bjlong about what this thread should be about.

Hmm...there should be formations specifically designed to fight monsters instead of enemy soldiers. Like, what's the best way to take out a GCS? Or a Dragon?

Knowing what you're fighting, as well as what formations they use, should be an important piece of information.

What i care the most at the moment is not exactly the objective but rather the method, i think the biggest question here is HOW we are going to make them (if we have the chance to make them ourselves)

[bjlong]

One method for the raws would be to have a system where you have two variables per space, to designate equipment and dwarf placement. Not sure how to go about rotating the formation, but here's a quick sample:

Code: [Select]

nn,nn,nn,nn,nn,nn,nn
aa,nn,nn,nn,nn,nn,aa
nn,hi,hi,hi,hi,hi,nn
nn,nn,xx,xx,xx,nn,nn
be,nn,be,nn,be,nn,be
Where a is axe, h is hammer, i is shield, x is no specific designation, b is crossbow, e is buckler, and nn means no dwarf.

The only problem is that you'd have to have a specific loadout. Perhaps the dwarves would just say that this is the preferred loadout, and if they don't fit it exactly, they'd just fit people to the formation as they could.

[Silverionmox]

We could define them very strictly and place the soldiers on a grid where we want them; in combat situations, they try to approach that position if possible.

Alternatively, we can define roles or places for specific dwarves (eg. protect the other squad members, fire, charge into melee, place yourself between the archers and the enemy, etc.). More flexible, but more hardcoded behaviour (which has to happen for the ai anyway).

We'll also need general commands for the squad (stay close together, fan out, stand ground, form a line (nice for archers), crawl, hide, snipe from cover, waiting in ambush for spot x, fight to the last man, orderly retreat, etc...)

[Mephansteras]

Good ideas, silver, although I think the tactical rules are separate from the Formations themselves. After all, you may want to set up a formation and either charge or hold your ground based on what the enemy is doing. That's very common for shield wall configurations, for example. Same formation, different tactical behaviors.

[Footkerchief]

e: disregard, not well thought out

[Silverionmox]

Good ideas, silver, although I think the tactical rules are separate from the Formations themselves. After all, you may want to set up a formation and either charge or hold your ground based on what the enemy is doing. That's very common for shield wall configurations, for example. Same formation, different tactical behaviors.

Yes, they were intended as a separate variable, that can be changed quickly in combat. Formations are normally for the whole duration of the battle. Formations and tactics should be exercised first before they can be used, with the exception of simple melee for warriors, fire at will for ranged troops, and trample for cavalry. It would be up to the player to decide which moves are trained first, depending on the squad (a scout squad would rather train eg. stealth and mobility, while heavy infantry will train eg. discipline and shield use).

Footkerchief: include cavalry to be complete. Dwarves won't use it much, but other races will.

[Narmio]

There's one really important part of the actual *impact* of using formations that I'm not sure if the combat system respects.

Is it harder to shoot at a target that is behind several other targets?  That could be one of the most important tactical uses of formations.  A bunch of heavily armoured, shield-skilled dwarves forming a solid steel wall behind which you can put your skilled-in-formation-fighting marksdwarves.

If creatures between you and your target impose accuracy penalties (or even, eventually, a chance to shoot the wrong target!), and there's some way to drill in formation to lessen the effect of your own squad-members on those penalties...  That would be pretty epic.  And very dwarfy.

Two lines of warriors, the first with hammers and shields, the second with crossbows.  The first line overlaps their shields and puts their heads down.  A rattle of impotent goblin arrows bounce off the magnificent wall of steel...  A sergeant barks a gutteral command and, like a great clockwork war machine, the marksdwarves level their bows, the hammerdwarves kneel, catgut bowstrings twang and a hail of steel perforates the charging goblin ranks.

Can anyone else think of other awesome tactics that could be built out of a formations system?  Let's come up with some cool stuff we'd like to be able to do, then think about how it might work.

[Footkerchief]

^^^ In adventure mode, projectiles can definitely hit enemies that they weren't aimed at, especially enemies in the line-of-sight between you and your target.  So yeah, meatshields work.

[Craftling]

Chuck in a spear wall and im happy.

[Mel_Vixen]

Well for formations working best the projectile paths of bolts and arrows would have to change from a straight line to a curve over z levels. This way you can station them behind your pikeneers.

secondly a "formation" could be composed out of several squads f.e. 1 Squad archers, one with shields one with pikes and helbards.

Pikeneers in 2 or even 3 raws as well as shieldwalls with helping pikeneers would be good also which again would require a rewrite of the polearms distance.

Maybe but only maybe giving the organisation of a formation to the captain of the sqad would be possible.

[Joakim]

Thinks IŽd like to do:

Thermopylae-style defenses of corridors. Three elite dorfs should be able to hold a three tiles wide corridor without much help. Add a few more to replace eventual wounds or to cut down wrestlers that attempt to overwhelm the front line.

Using a wedge of charging hammerdwarves (screw cavalry...) that and splits the goblin line in two.

Wounded dwarves should fall back if necessary, depending on, courage, captain's orders, martial trance, etc..

In a line formation the flanks should be protected by the best troops. The phalanxes had the right flank as the most important I believe, since the rightmost man had no shield on his right side to protect him. It'd be cool if the dwarves could recognize this or similar things:
"He was dishonored by being placed in the rear lately."

Flanking, flanking, flanking. Stuff like tying up enemy troops in a prolonged fight so that my auxiliary troops (fortress guard?) have enough time to flank them. To prevent this, the enemy would need to deploy reserves. Now weŽre getting real tactics!


Last stand style squares/circles, optionally hollow ones where marksdwarves, trade-liasons or merchants can be placed.

Fighting back-to-back! This is something more well-drilled dwarves would do if their formation broke, more than a formation in it's own right.

Swarming, especially against single opponents such as champions and mega-beasts. Surround the enemy and attack from all sides at the same time. If the opponent moves, the circle follows (while shrinking) to keep him in the middle. Think of the early fighting scene in "the Last Samurai" before Nathan in captured.

Regarding orderly retreat I'd like to see more well-trained dwarves being more synhronised. A less trained line might get jagged while moving. If this happens during a fallback, soldiers would be at a higher risk of being surrounded and killed by the presumably superior enemy (otherwise, why fall back?) Elite troops would move as one.