Fuel Enhancements

[Hepps]

@redrum 1all you have to do is look up!

[redrum]

@hepps I see. A more generic version for any unit pairing. Guess the question is can we imagine any scenarios outside of transports and carriers that could impact fuel consumption?

[wc_sumpton]

@redrum Trains?

[Hepps]

@redrum Yah I can think of a few different scenarios outside of just movement.

Food
Supplies
energy

I suppose there are quite a few different scenarios where this type of attachment could also benefit from a action qualifier.

[General_Zod]

@redrum

If your gonna pair the air and carriers up like mech inf. I suggest only allow the pairing during the NCM. I think it should not be allowed to pair up during the CM. So it prevents the air from getting a free ride into combat.

[General_Zod]

Also what happens if lets say, the air uses all its movement to get to the combat. And an acc is 1 territory away from that combat. Can the acc move 1 space during NCM to pick up the air and then move its remaining movements with the air as cargo during NCM?

I would ask the same question if only in respect to fuel as well.

[Hepps]

@general_zod That is function of movement... not fuel.

[General_Zod]

@hepps Its linked imo. So the air isn't really cargo. Its just a patch for fuel is what your saying. Sounds confusing already.

[Frostion]

@general_zod
Yes. If fighters do not deplete some of their movement during a ride with a carrier, it will surely mess with a lot of maps. I don't think any current maps would want to have aircraft combat or noncombat moving their aircraft as "carrier's movement" + "own movement". A carried aircraft should deplete movement. It could logically symbolize that time is spent. And for this reason, carried offensive aircraft should normally have higher movement stats than the carriers.

I do think however that they should not spend fuel while moving and / or fighting in the same territory as their carrier, as the fighters fuel consumption could be characterized as limited compared to an offensive use of aircraft. So in that sense they should freeride if with a carrier.

I think this would make sense both in a World War map setting as well as a SCI FI setting, like if a space mothership flew through space, ended up at a planet and then launched its fighters down into the atmosphere of the planet as a part of a planet invasion. The fighters were carried fuel free, but when they move out and away from the capital ship as a part of an offensive operation, then the start consuming fuel. Same as a WW invasion fleet with fighters.

[vicvictory]

@frostion I fully agree. Same should be in use for transports by train.

[Cernel]

It's amusing that after the years people think that fuel cost charged on loading only must have been the result of some actual reasoning behind it.
Actually, it was not.
It was made it that way only because Veqryn found that was the easiest way to code it (it worked on unloading, before then, or rather I should say it was supposed to, but there were bugs related to unloading from hostile sea zones).
The only other alternative was fuel being removed as a whole.
Veqryn would have preferred fuel costs being charged both upon loading and upon unloading. I was and am surely strongly against that, and would have preferred it charged on unloading only, but charged on loading only is acceptable too, as long as it is not both. Ultimately, what was made was just what was the easiest.

Fuel is a very important element of TripleA for future development of maps, that has been discussed a bit, but with little ever coming out of it. I'll review this topic and try to make a complete evaluation of the matter.

[Hepps]

@general_zod I think the idea of changing the functions & abilities of the ACC & fighters really has to be considered as a completely independent feature request.

As @Frostion mentions... the idea of fundamentally changing the behavior has huge impacts on pretty much every single existing map. If I had to guess... it would really need to be added as a new Global property in order to allow us to maintain the existing repository while also making it available to map makers.

[General_Zod]

@hepps True they are separate features, but they also overlap and should be evaluated together to avoid future roadblocks. The road blocks we seem to have now because backward compatibility is a priority. And we want to keep what in many respects is inferior functionality (because it was likely the easy method then).

@cernel I wasn't there but it seems that the decisions to take the easiest methods then. Is gonna impact TripleA for a very long time. In form of stifling potential progress, into the more ideal directions.

That being said, I respect those decisions too. Its a lot of hard work and we are volunteers. But maybe, we can find a new way, and not settle.

Or maybe, I'm just being too idealistic.

[redrum]

@general_zod While changing carrier/fighter movement rules is related, that would be too large a change at this point and better in a separate feature request thread.

Overall, seems like we are mostly in agreement on things. I'm going to update the first post to what I think should actually be changed for fuel to see if we have agreement.

[General_Zod]

So your ok with aircraft making a CM, for fuel free, as long as the aircraft are with an acc, during said CM.

Its understandable, as a stand alone feature, I can get on board with this logic.

But to me, it just seems to conflict with the logic of any future acc improvements. The kind that would allow aircraft to be true cargo.

But I guess this is likely not gonna happen due to backward compatibility concerns and restrictions. And especially not, if the new fuel rules will contradict the logic of such improvements.

[redrum]

@general_zod I think from a gameplay perspective its simpler to allow fighters/ACC to move fuel free even into battle. If we have a majority of people think otherwise then I'm ok with the alternative that fuel free movement for fighter/carriers is only available during non-combat move.

[General_Zod]

@redrum That's fair. Thanks

[redrum]

@Hepps @General_Zod @Frostion I've updated the first post to outline proposed changes to get fuel to a point where it would be a solid game system and try to minimize changes to existing implementation. A few of them are more difficult than others especially land transporting, air landing fuel validation, and AI logic.

[Frostion]

@redrum
In regards to 1 and 2. Would this "fuel you have" and "fuel you gonna get" be displayed in the bottom bar of the screen, under the actual map window?

I vaguely remember a discussion about this bar once, and that this bar could at one point display different resources via small resource icons. I also recall going through a lot of maps' file structures (some years ago), discovering a single specific map that had a directory called "resources" (as I recall) containing a bunch of mini icons of different resources, like coins, science etc. Maybe @redrum @Cernel @Hepps @prastle or other oldies know what map I am talking about. I just wonder if what I saw was an early test in regards to visually displaying resources, or files meant for a testing of this in that bottom bar?

Also, in regards to resource income predictions, how would the engine calculate this. The engine is obviously able to predict territory income, like it does with the PUs, but is the engine able to see the the coming income generated by units? (My personal opinion is that seeing the next predicted income is not that important)

Also, something I did not see in the first post: Will air units consum/reserve their maximum move in fuel when taking off, thereby being sure to be able to get home, maybe returning with some fuel to put back in the bank, but also maybe getting killed while attacking with fuel in the fuel tanks, meaning losing unspent fuel?

[redrum]

@frostion
Fuel Display - Haven't decided exactly where fuel reserves/income is going to be displayed. But ideally something like Civ6 resource bar on the top: http://i.imgur.com/SywhlsV.jpg

Fuel Income - It would essentially use the same logic as the end of turn report. Count up incomes from territory/units/NOs/etc based on what is currently owned (this could obviously change as the players turn progresses and gains/loses territories).

Air Fuel Tanks - Good question. Haven't really thought about that yet. Interested in what people think about this in terms of both air unit fuel validation and whether if they get killed in battle if they should lose what's remaining. This is a difficult question and opens other things like if the air unit only flies to attack 1 space away but has 4 max movement should it validate/lose just 2 fuel or 4 fuel? I want to create a system that is fairly straightforward but also makes sense.

Here is a air fuel proposal from the old SF article:
The minimum of the move into combat and the rest moves for maximum range is taken for fuel reserve:
e.g. bomber 6 max range

• 1 move into combat, 5 move for max range left. the MIN(1:5) is 1.
  so only fuel for 1 move has to be reserved.
• 3 move into combat, 3 move for max range left. the MIN(3:3) is 3.
  so only fuel for 3 move has to be reserved.
• 4 move into combat, 2 move for max range left. the MIN(4:2) is 2.
  so only fuel for 2 move has to be reserved.