Costs/Benefits of razing cities
What are the pros and cons of raiding and razing cities and depots? What would it do to raze your own ahead of enemy in territory that you can not hold?
Hi TITANROTC and welcome to the Forum.
The key reason to destroy city structures and depots is to deny your opponent supply. Think of the chain of supply as coming from the network of enemy cities to the point where the enemy army resides. Know that a supply line only can be traced four regions from a supply source, think of breaking that chain. It is easiest to see this in Missouri from Jefferson City to Fort Smith in Arkansas as rail and other supply sources do not get in the way.
You can use the same tactic other places. Often in Kentucky and Tennessee a similar strategic use of razing can be helpful. But here as other places with major rivers, supply from the river might still keep the army in supply.
Because the Union can rebuild rail lines and depots fairly easily, the CSA does not benefit too much from destroying cities and depots as they retreat. However, if you have built up a city with new depots or built depot to easy a supply chain, these are well worth destroying.
The key reason to destroy city structures and depots is to deny your opponent supply. Think of the chain of supply as coming from the network of enemy cities to the point where the enemy army resides. Know that a supply line only can be traced four regions from a supply source, think of breaking that chain. It is easiest to see this in Missouri from Jefferson City to Fort Smith in Arkansas as rail and other supply sources do not get in the way.
You can use the same tactic other places. Often in Kentucky and Tennessee a similar strategic use of razing can be helpful. But here as other places with major rivers, supply from the river might still keep the army in supply.
Because the Union can rebuild rail lines and depots fairly easily, the CSA does not benefit too much from destroying cities and depots as they retreat. However, if you have built up a city with new depots or built depot to easy a supply chain, these are well worth destroying.
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Captain_Orso
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You cannot really intentionally destroy factories and such, only coincidentally, the same as destroying depots with raiders. I'm not sure of all the details, but I know if you send early war (maybe it was late war, but this happened a long time ago) cavalry through a region with < 49 friendly loyalty and am un-garrisoned city, you cannot capture it by passing through it, but a depot will be destroyed, and if there a factories, etc, there is a chance for each, that they may be destroyed.
But if you own it, there is no way. There are no factories etc in level1 cities, and you cannot raise any cities level2 and above.
Of course, you never abandon a depot to the enemy. Always attempt to destroy it while leaving the region.
More important than destroying abandoned depots, is finding bottleneck in the enemies supply line. The North depends heavily on rail lines, which is totally a-historical. Riverboats should be carrying 100x more than rail lines. But this is the CS player's advantage, especially in places like between Nashville and Chattanooga. Block that rail like, or destroy a depot on it and a Union Chattanooga will starve quickly.
Partisans and the such are what you want for this, and don't forget the Raid RGD.
But if you own it, there is no way. There are no factories etc in level1 cities, and you cannot raise any cities level2 and above.
Of course, you never abandon a depot to the enemy. Always attempt to destroy it while leaving the region.
More important than destroying abandoned depots, is finding bottleneck in the enemies supply line. The North depends heavily on rail lines, which is totally a-historical. Riverboats should be carrying 100x more than rail lines. But this is the CS player's advantage, especially in places like between Nashville and Chattanooga. Block that rail like, or destroy a depot on it and a Union Chattanooga will starve quickly.
Partisans and the such are what you want for this, and don't forget the Raid RGD.
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Captain_Orso
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If I turned in code that looked like this which was not self-documenting, I'd fail worse than I already do in Computer Science. There isn't anything that I can find to explain what that actually means. What is their "low watermark"? Where do I find that information?
Also, just for poop and snickers, what language is this written in? I'm assuming C or C++, but I feel like I don't recognize it (or it could be better written than it is).
Also, just for poop and snickers, what language is this written in? I'm assuming C or C++, but I feel like I don't recognize it (or it could be better written than it is).
Also, just for poop and snickers, what language is this written in?
The event file is not C/C++. It's something that gets passed to some kind of other (text?) processor, either in the engine or something called by the engine. The wiki contains descriptions of some of the commands used, but it's not complete.
I believe what you see in the event file is created by the CSV splitter from a separate CSV/Excel file. It's been my experience that if there is a description, it'll be in the CSV/Excel file. It also wouldn't surprise me to find the description in French, which I believe is the native language of the developers. The way things are presented to potential modders, the event, model, unit et al files used by the game are end results and not the files that are supposed to be edited directly, even though they are plain text and can be edited directly. There's no practical reason to include the description of the event in the file that gets processed by the game engine, so long as it's stored somewhere else.
I'm not trying to defend the architecture used, just explain what little I know of it from working with it to implement changes on my own.
The event file is not C/C++. It's something that gets passed to some kind of other (text?) processor, either in the engine or something called by the engine. The wiki contains descriptions of some of the commands used, but it's not complete.
I believe what you see in the event file is created by the CSV splitter from a separate CSV/Excel file. It's been my experience that if there is a description, it'll be in the CSV/Excel file. It also wouldn't surprise me to find the description in French, which I believe is the native language of the developers. The way things are presented to potential modders, the event, model, unit et al files used by the game are end results and not the files that are supposed to be edited directly, even though they are plain text and can be edited directly. There's no practical reason to include the description of the event in the file that gets processed by the game engine, so long as it's stored somewhere else.
I'm not trying to defend the architecture used, just explain what little I know of it from working with it to implement changes on my own.
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Captain_Orso
- Posts: 5766
- Joined: Tue Sep 01, 2009 5:02 pm
- Location: Stuttgart, Germany
The game engine has a proprietary scripting engine. The scripts are to the greatest extent self explanatory.
If anything is not self explanatory, check here AGE-Wiki: Category:Script commands
EG:
In the 'StartEvent' statement, 'CSA_RGDPartisansRaid' is the name of the event
999 is how often the event my fire before expiring, 999 means perpetual
0 is the message parameter, 0 means no message will be generated if the event is successful (none is generated anyway if it fails)
Conditions: all tests must be evaluated with Boolean true for the event to fire successfully
TurnIndex: a list of integers indicating the turn of the game year on which the event will be run, 0 is the first turn of the year, with 2 turns per month/24 turns per year, 23 is the highest valid value in CW2
EvalRgnDecisionDef = $rgdPartisansRaid;<;9 // if the CS player has < 9 Raid RGD's -> true
Action
ChgRgnDecisionFP = $rgdPartisansRaid;3 // if all conditions are 'true', CS player gains 3 additional Raid RGD's
If anything is not self explanatory, check here AGE-Wiki: Category:Script commands
EG:
Code: Select all
SelectFaction = CSA
SelectRegion = $Richmond_VA
SelectFaction = CSA
SelectRegion = $Richmond_VA
StartEvent = CSA_RGDPartisansRaid|999|0|NULL|NULL|$Richmond_VA|NULL
Conditions
TurnIndex = 0
EvalRgnDecisionDef = $rgdPartisansRaid;<;9
Actions
ChgRgnDecisionFP = $rgdPartisansRaid;3
EndEventIn the 'StartEvent' statement, 'CSA_RGDPartisansRaid' is the name of the event
999 is how often the event my fire before expiring, 999 means perpetual
0 is the message parameter, 0 means no message will be generated if the event is successful (none is generated anyway if it fails)
Conditions: all tests must be evaluated with Boolean true for the event to fire successfully
TurnIndex: a list of integers indicating the turn of the game year on which the event will be run, 0 is the first turn of the year, with 2 turns per month/24 turns per year, 23 is the highest valid value in CW2
EvalRgnDecisionDef = $rgdPartisansRaid;<;9 // if the CS player has < 9 Raid RGD's -> true
Action
ChgRgnDecisionFP = $rgdPartisansRaid;3 // if all conditions are 'true', CS player gains 3 additional Raid RGD's
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Straight Arrow
- General
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Some thoughts on burning for the CSA from a pyro:
ASAP build militia in Rollo, MO to rip up the rails and burn the depot.
Eliminate the Kansas highway. Use your Indians to destroy all those forts that lead from Leavenworth to Fayetteville. You want the Union to use the St Louis to Fayetteville highway.
If you minimize builds and effort in Far West; burn everything.
If you can’t hold Tucson, burn it. Unless the Union builds a stockade in the area, this will deny the North a cheap source of VPs.
The tool-tip for burning depots says it takes five days, this is wrong. It takes only a day. When a depot is removed, it will does not change the amount of supply in an area. But if the depot is removed, the stored supply is not held back and will be quickly siphoned off by other nearby depots and structures.
You can't burn a fort down if you are in it during a siege.
The main problem with the South burning coastal depots is that most of them cannot be burnt. Only size one depots can be destroyed. This restriction on 'destroying' a depot larger than size 1 can be circumvented or removed; it is possible to resize depots with the correct RGDs.
ASAP build militia in Rollo, MO to rip up the rails and burn the depot.
Eliminate the Kansas highway. Use your Indians to destroy all those forts that lead from Leavenworth to Fayetteville. You want the Union to use the St Louis to Fayetteville highway.
If you minimize builds and effort in Far West; burn everything.
If you can’t hold Tucson, burn it. Unless the Union builds a stockade in the area, this will deny the North a cheap source of VPs.
The tool-tip for burning depots says it takes five days, this is wrong. It takes only a day. When a depot is removed, it will does not change the amount of supply in an area. But if the depot is removed, the stored supply is not held back and will be quickly siphoned off by other nearby depots and structures.
You can't burn a fort down if you are in it during a siege.
The main problem with the South burning coastal depots is that most of them cannot be burnt. Only size one depots can be destroyed. This restriction on 'destroying' a depot larger than size 1 can be circumvented or removed; it is possible to resize depots with the correct RGDs.
Like arrows in the hand of a warrior are the children of one's youth.
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Captain_Orso
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- Joined: Tue Sep 01, 2009 5:02 pm
- Location: Stuttgart, Germany
Wraith wrote:So, all of those only show up annually? And in order to change that to quarterly, we'd need to have "0, 5, 10, 15"?
Correct.
Straight Arrow wrote:8<
The main problem with the South burning coastal depots is that most of them cannot be burnt. Only size one depots can be destroyed. This restriction on 'destroying' a depot larger than size 1 can be circumvented or removed; it is possible to resize depots with the correct RGDs.
This is one of the ambiguously ambiguous things in the game. If you own a depot of level 2+ you can do nothing but increase it's size.
The RGD's reduce the size of a depot by 1; if reduced to 0 it is removed. IIRC the current size is unimportant.
Question: What is the benefit of having a larger depot?
I have heard, in such a way as to believe it, of your recently saying that both the army and the government needed a dictator. Of course it was not for this, but in spite of it, that I have given you the command. Only those generals who gain success can be dictators. What I now ask of you is military success, and I will risk the dictatorship.
-Abraham Lincoln, 1863, in a letter to Major General Joseph Hooker.
-Abraham Lincoln, 1863, in a letter to Major General Joseph Hooker.
Depots serve primarily two purposes: a station on a pipeline of supply moving toward the front and an endpoint from which armies draw supplies.
No more supplies can transit forward than the smallest bottleneck. While this is usually not an issue because of the railroad, in non-rail areas or in areas where rails are frequently cut/destroyed a large depot can forward more supplies.
End point depots need to be of a sufficient size to resupply their army. Wagons draw supply from depots, so the larger the capacity of a depot, the more supply wagons can draw.
So you do not want to over-build depots because of the diversion of depots from more important tasks. But Springfield, Missouri, for instance, will be a pipeline bottleneck for both sides.
No more supplies can transit forward than the smallest bottleneck. While this is usually not an issue because of the railroad, in non-rail areas or in areas where rails are frequently cut/destroyed a large depot can forward more supplies.
End point depots need to be of a sufficient size to resupply their army. Wagons draw supply from depots, so the larger the capacity of a depot, the more supply wagons can draw.
So you do not want to over-build depots because of the diversion of depots from more important tasks. But Springfield, Missouri, for instance, will be a pipeline bottleneck for both sides.
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