sugg: Limiting unit production!

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nick-bang
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Re: sugg: Limiting unit production!

Post by nick-bang »

amynase wrote:
Balthagor wrote:This suggestion makes reference to limits on building units, but there is no suggestion on what the baseline is. What value does the AI look at to determine if their current count of units is less than, equal to or greater that "enough units".

In truth, unit production is already limited - by raw material resources, money and available fabrication slots. These are measurable as goods, money and a fixed count. What other stat should we look at for placing limits?
In regards to the limits my personal suggestion is as follows:

Give us the option before we start the game to decide how many total units are allowed ingame. One option should be "infinite" to have the same experience we had so far for people with really good PCs.
Other options should include something like 5000 total units ingame for people with low end PCs, 10000 for mid tier PCs, 20000 for stronger PCs and 40000 for people with really beefy machines.

[ ] No unit limit
[ ] 40000 units
[ ] 20000 units
[x] 10000 units
[ ] 5000 units

Ingame, these numbers should be divided between all independent nations according to their GDP. So if Germany has 5% of the worlds GDP and the limit is 10000, germany can build up to 500 units. The AI should use about 60% of its unit cap for land units, and 20% for naval and air units each (or all for land units if it has no access to the sea or technology for air units)
Also, each nation should be able to build a base amount of units, like 10 or 20 maybe, so small poor countries can still have an army.

To add to this, based on https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_r ... _GDP_(PPP) , in 1913,
- USA had ~19% of World GDP, or 1900 units at 10000 setting
- China, Germany, Britain and Russia each about 8%, or 800 units at 10000 setting
- India 7 % (Is a colony though so no units for them)
- France and Austria Hungary ~ 5 % or 500 units at 10000 setting
- Italy and Japan about 3 % or 300 units at 10000 setting

I think this distribution is not too bad, and roughly reflects the capacity of these countries to field armies at the time. Implementing the limit like this would be great, because it gives the player a choice if he prefers larger unit numbers or a faster game experience, and it follows pretty clear and easy to understand rules. What do you guys think?
WAIT a minute:

This is completlely OUTSIDE the realm of realities !!!!

USA had the SMALLEST army right up to 1917 ... The Chinese army was almost non-existing, they sent WORKERS tto Russia ....
And Russia had a HUGE army ...

If we want to make this evene a little historically accurate, then we can NOT just make arbitraty OOB´s ...
amynase
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Re: sugg: Limiting unit production!

Post by amynase »

dax1 wrote:I dont' think this is the right way...
I think will be good to limit the units deployed in peacetime.
It's not nice to have hundreds of units on the map when there is peace.
I agree that limiting how many units the AI keeps active in peacetime will further help speed up the game, but the real fix for the underlying problem of too many units existing in the world can only be a hard cap on how many can be built.
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Re: sugg: Limiting unit production!

Post by BlackSoulReaper »

A lot of people are suggesting production be limited to GDP and such...which is fine... But something can also easily be accomplished by having units consume more manpower..increase their health/supplies so there won't be as many units in the first place. There will be smaller "armies" overall but fighting will be a bit slower due to pace. smaller nations will field less units. But honestly...this if the fundamental issue I have had with the Supreme Ruler genre as a whole. I have a good computer but I cannot play the game into the long term as intended because it becomes incredibly slow. Speed of the game has been 100% confirmed to be related to units. Game is crazy fast when you start with no units, and then gradually becomes unplayable. For a game that is suppose to start from WW2 and tech out well into the 2000s... The game should be playable from straight to finish. When you literally have to wait a 1-5 minutes for a month to change......that should be unacceptable. It is not unfair to ask for some kind of fix/compromise that will make things more bearable. Some sort of Limit production or unit optimization is required. Unfortunately with this game focused on the great war (only 4 years) ... I guess long term play doesn't matter so we likely won't see a resolution until a new engine/game is actually used.
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Balthagor
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Re: sugg: Limiting unit production!

Post by Balthagor »

BlackSoulReaper wrote:...having units consume more manpower...
That would reduce deployment, but not production. I think reduced production is what is being asked for here so total deployed + undeployed inventories are less.
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amynase
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Re: sugg: Limiting unit production!

Post by amynase »

Balthagor wrote: I think reduced production is what is being asked for here so total deployed + undeployed inventories are less.
Yes, very much this, since how much manpower one unit consumes has no impact on gamespeed, but the number of units ingame does!
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Re: sugg: Limiting unit production!

Post by golden.pole »

Well, there are many ways to speed up the late game when it comes to having large amounts of units on the map. One idea is going by DefCon levels. The simplest way is probably to come up with set numbers, for example:

Defcon 5 (peace) - deploy 300 units
defcon 4 - deploy 600 units
defcon 3 - 900
defcon 2 - 1200
defcon 1 (war) - deploy all healthy units.

Throughout the game, most countries are not at war, so lots of units could be kept in barracks. You could also divide the 300 units into 100 land, 100 naval and 100 air in the defcon 1 setting. Just something to think about. Set concrete numbers and test the game.
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amynase
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Re: sugg: Limiting unit production!

Post by amynase »

golden.pole wrote:Well, there are many ways to speed up the late game when it comes to having large amounts of units on the map. One idea is going by DefCon levels. The simplest way is probably to come up with set numbers, for example:

Defcon 5 (peace) - deploy 300 units
defcon 4 - deploy 600 units
defcon 3 - 900
defcon 2 - 1200
defcon 1 (war) - deploy all healthy units.

Throughout the game, most countries are not at war, so lots of units could be kept in barracks. You could also divide the 300 units into 100 land, 100 naval and 100 air in the defcon 1 setting. Just something to think about. Set concrete numbers and test the game.
1. That would introduce a whole new system just to limit unit numbers,
2. also small nations would be ale to have as many active units as big nations,
3. and if there would be an AI war that the player is not participating in, the game would again slow down significantly,
4. and 200+ nations with 500 units active on average would still be 100 000 which would slow the game down significantly

Imo the best approach to limiting unit numbers would just be to limit unit numbers. No super complicated formulas, no ways for the AI to break it, just a hard limit you cant go over.
DiegoEsteban
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Re: sugg: Limiting unit production!

Post by DiegoEsteban »

I know this is a SR GW thread, but I would like to know if there is any way to mod SR:2020 & ultimate Defcon Bonuses (I mean the military bonus efficiency). So far I couldnt find how. I would like to increase it even more for each Defcon level. (or even put a penalty for Defcon 5)



PD: Yes, sorry again for posting this here, but it will have more visibility than doing it in SR2020 modding subforum.
way2co0l
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Re: sugg: Limiting unit production!

Post by way2co0l »

Ok, so admittedly I haven't read everything in this thread, so it's possible someone else has mentioned it and I missed it while skimming.

I think a lot of what was said here is useful, but ultimately I think the biggest underlying factor should be a comparison of unit maintenance to your budget, weighed by government type. Basically what I mean is that every unit has a maintenance cost whether it's actively deployed or in reserve and that expense is obviously higher when it's actively deployed. Countries should be more eager to reserve units outside of war or high threat which allows them to keep a larger amount of equipment stored in case of war. But once you hit a threshold for total unit maintenance expense exceeding a percentage of your budget (again weighted by government type, with maybe technologies in place to effect those numbers) then they should begin looking at selling off older equipment while still trying to maintain certain ratios for unit types in reserve.

You could weigh the budget percentage a nation will keep units by their government type and possibly even nation specific weights as well, with technology bonuses altering that spending. So a true isolationist democracy such as the USA at the time would keep a small active/reserve force despite its strong economy, and the backwards Russian Empire would maintain a larger standing and reserve force of dated units despite its weaker economy.

I obviously haven't gotten into actual numbers, but I'm willing to if the discussion goes in that direction. But ultimately I think this is the best way to balance it. As a country's economy improves, they'd be willing to hold onto more and more equipment both active and reserved, while preventing them from growing their military to the point where it destroys their economy or lags the game too badly. Countries like Russia which historically continue fielding larger armies despite their backwards economies when compared to western powers would continue to hamper their economy more than those other powers, but continue to be a considerable military power at the same time despite that fact. As the century progressed, countries were willing to spend larger and larger budgetary percentages on armed forces, so techs should probably be in place to represent that. It would likely be fine to just tack that onto existing techs as an extra effect, so everyone continues to spend more as time goes on, but unit maintenance also increases to keep the actual unit count down to a reasonable number. Unless the entire world economy just goes off the charts, then the number of units shouldn't become excessive, and the player obviously isn't held to these same conditions unless he's using AI control. A player that does exceed those spending percentages should probably increase threat among their neighbors though, the amount of increased threat proportionate to their spending. Perhaps even tie approval ratings into it based on government type, so if a USA player wants to exceed the percentages dictated to them, they risk suffering a domestic approval hit, while spending less than that number should probably result in a MAR hit, and maybe even a DAR hit if it's too low and the people don't feel protected. But for a government like the Russians, they should suffer a heavier hit if their spending is too low, and bonuses when it's higher than it should be, but that obviously limits their ability to expand their economy.
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Balthagor
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Re: sugg: Limiting unit production!

Post by Balthagor »

way2co0l wrote:...I think the biggest underlying factor should be a comparison of unit maintenance to your budget, weighed by government type....
I like where you're going with this. Thanks for adding to the conversation.
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Re: sugg: Limiting unit production!

Post by Zuikaku »

I like the budget idea also. But I can see possible problem here. AI needs to know how to get ridd of the older unit types when newer become available - either by selling them, holding them in reserve or scrapping (scrappimg shoul'd be the last option). If AI don't do that, we'll end up with regions stuck with old unit types and not building new ones.
Please teach AI everything!
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Re: sugg: Limiting unit production!

Post by way2co0l »

Zuikaku wrote:I like the budget idea also. But I can see possible problem here. AI needs to know how to get ridd of the older unit types when newer become available - either by selling them, holding them in reserve or scrapping (scrappimg shoul'd be the last option). If AI don't do that, we'll end up with regions stuck with old unit types and not building new ones.
Agreed. Improved logic on what equipment to keep, and the process it should take to reduce stockpiles is a good thing.

I know sometimes it's difficult for the AI to know what it should and shouldn't keep due to it being difficult to determine what stats they should be weighting more heavily. I'd encourage date of the design to be a bigger weight, but I'd also encourage weights for them to maintain minimum percentages of different types (maybe that's already a thing and I'm just not aware) so even if their reserved recon units are terribly dated to their normal infantry, they'll still keep a certain percentage in reserve until they acquire something better to replace them.

But once an AI gets to the budget maintenance threshold where it needs to consider reducing its old inventory, then it should definitely look for buyers first. If they can't find any buyers then they should scrap them to bring their budget to the correct amount. This means the AI should almost always be producing units, which is already the way it is, but actively looking to get rid of old units. Perhaps the only check on production should be whether the AI is already at its budgetary limit, currently has its minimum ratios for all desired unit types, and doesn't have any active or reserved units that are worse than what it can produce. If those conditions are met, then it should stop producing altogether. While at this budgetary point they should probably be looking for sale opportunities which would allow them to resume production. In order to minimize stress on the system, these checks could be done monthly perhaps.

This creates a process where there are several larger arms producers and creates a trickle down effect where those arms producers make offers to those they have favorable opinions towards. Weaker nations still manage to get the equipment they need by buying older equipment from the major powers, and those major powers are constantly churning out the newest and best, without becoming burdened with the weight of maintaining the entire stockpile forever. Smaller nations which reach their maximums, will then try to sell their equipment, and so on until there are no more buyers left where that equipment remains an improvement for them to consider worth buying. At which point, the nation will scrap it. The major arms producers will rarely have to scrap equipment this way and will continue getting their money back for their continued military production expenses, and old equipment will only actually be removed from the map when everyone is at their budget maximums and the equipment is no longer an actual upgrade for anyone.

As an addendum. I've talked about government weights for the budget being tied to technologies, but I think it could also be applied to the ratios for different equipment types that I had been talking about before. For example, tanks at the time were a far cry from what they were eventually utilized as. They didn't gain much use until later in the war to try to break the deadlock, so the percentage of forces the AI should try to maintain for tanks should be very low until certain techs adjust those ratios around making them a bigger factor. Obviously transferred down the tech tree so that they can eventually become a prominent aspect of the armed forces that they eventually do. These weights can be hidden, because they would only effect the AI. The player will obviously be free to build whatever ratio he wants, so these weights would have absolutely no impact on them. But it will allow the AI to field reasonable military forces that suit the times they're in.

And one more addition to wrap all this up. If this gets implemented the way I see it, then there will eventually be a problem on the production side of things. If countries are restricted to their maintenance budgets, specific ratios for unit types, ect, and only sell off equipment once the proper conditions have been met, then you'll get to a point where the arms producers are filled out, and only producing the best equipment period, but this will distort the ratios the rest of the world has access to. Attempted production should try to follow the same unit type ratios that they follow otherwise. Even if they're maxed on everything, they should continue trying to build recon, even if that recon is older and inferior to the infantry they're also producing. This ensures that all units types are produced and continue to be distributed around the world.

Just further thoughts on the subject. :)

Edit: Thinking about it. Opinion should matter when attempting arms sales, but threat should as well. A country that is being threatened by a neighbor is unlikely to sell them equipment, no matter how good their opinion is. That country would be perfectly capable of supplying its own equipment.

Edit 2: Threat should possibly have an effect on budget thresholds for unit maintenance as well. The USA wouldn't be threatened by many people being so far from where the conflicts are, which would keep it's spending lower than other democracies, whereas nations in europe are all threatening each other and would encourage them to spend more than they would otherwise.

Edit 3: Should be the last one. lol. But you might want to consider making a game option which effects the budget threshold limits. Some players like to play long, relatively peaceful games, and allowing them to reduce that percentage would effectively reduce the number of units that are ever in the game and allow them to play longer with less lag. For players that don't care about long term economies and just want to fight and conquer, they can raise the limit so everyone is building as much as they can. That would obviously put more units on the map and would only be advised for those with the machines that can handle it, but even still it should result in fewer units in the long term than the AI currently builds so should still result in performance improvements in the long run, even using higher numbers. But it's something that will allow players to customize the experience they want, regardless of which era they choose to play in. So if you do that, then I'd encourage you to make it somewhat customization. Moddable yes, but also a start of game option. Preferably one that could be changed in game through the cheat menu as well.
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Re: sugg: Limiting unit production!

Post by SGTscuba »

I'd assume if they were at war, then the limits would disappear and Ai would use everything but then once they are back at peace they'd go back to limits?
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Re: sugg: Limiting unit production!

Post by way2co0l »

SGTscuba wrote:I'd assume if they were at war, then the limits would disappear and Ai would use everything but then once they are back at peace they'd go back to limits?
I definitely think it should increase their normal limits enabling them to try to win the war, but still maintain limits to prevent them from completely tanking their economy. As you said in your other thread where you bleed them dry. What good does it do them to build this massive force if they're no longer able to afford the military goods they need for it to fight? It should perhaps double their previous limit or increase it by whatever threshold, but they should have a budgetary limit all the time. Even when fighting a total war, there's more to winning a war than just the men and equipment you put into the field.
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Re: sugg: Limiting unit production!

Post by SGTscuba »

way2co0l wrote:
SGTscuba wrote:I'd assume if they were at war, then the limits would disappear and Ai would use everything but then once they are back at peace they'd go back to limits?
I definitely think it should increase their normal limits enabling them to try to win the war, but still maintain limits to prevent them from completely tanking their economy. As you said in your other thread where you bleed them dry. What good does it do them to build this massive force if they're no longer able to afford the military goods they need for it to fight? It should perhaps double their previous limit or increase it by whatever threshold, but they should have a budgetary limit all the time. Even when fighting a total war, there's more to winning a war than just the men and equipment you put into the field.
I agree with this. It would allow us go see depleted armies still that can only fight in certain places due to being stretched thin rather than just collapsing completely as they do at the moment.
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