[Freeciv-Dev] Re: (PR#13410) War & Peace

["Benoit Hudson" <bh@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

<URL: http://bugs.freeciv.org/Ticket/Display.html?id=13410 >

On Tue, Jul 05, 2005 at 05:10:49AM -0700, Per I. Mathisen wrote:
>  1. Fortress cause borders, like cities. Maximum border range is reduced.
> This makes fortresses very useful, and allows largepox players to have
> effective borders too.

Definitely.

>  3. Cities and fortress cause borders only so far (in range) as the least
> of maximum range and the distance to the first non-allied unit. So if
> maximum border range is 5, and a non-allied unit is 3 squares away, it
> will only extend borders by 2 squares.

Flaws: 
(1) if I set up a fortress right next to an enemy unit, I don't get to
    claim the territory behind me.  
(2) this way I get to have claims wars with allies: an ally can put units
    up to try and establish a de facto border, but I can usurp that claim
    if I build first.
(3) an enemy can keep me from claiming territory indefinitely even after I
    kill the unit.  I'd have to build another fortress to claim it.

To fix (3), we can just say that unclaimed territory reverts to the
nearest, oldest fortress / city in range.

To fix (2), just nix the "non-allied" in what you said.

To fix (1), I'm not sure what's best.  I was thinking: you claim all
territory that is closer to the fortress than to the unit, which fixes the
particular problem I pointed out, but not all problems.  For instance, if
you have a vertical line of units spaced two apart to establish ZOC, you
should get to claim that as your official border when you put up a fortress
-- but my rule wouldn't take account of this line of control.  Any rule
that does, however, doesn't take account that it's not a line of control if
there are enemy units within your line.  So I'm not discovering a rule that
makes me totally happy.

>  5. Ceasefire works as before, but ends up back in 'war'. You can only
>  6. New treaty 'armistice', which disallows you from entering new units

I propose instead there be no automatic disbanding, but rather a GUI
element to help you find infringers (perhaps in the diplomacy screen).
Ceasefire leads to peace if there are no infringing units for some small
number of turns (maybe 3) or at the end of the ceasefire, and war if there
are still infringing units at the end of the ceasefire time.

> The above should eliminate the 'units accidentially falling inside
> expanding borders' problem and the 'what to do with units inside borders
> when treaty formed or broken' problem, for both borders and alliances,
> without resorting to cheesy and abusable teleportation.

If we can eliminate teleportation the world will be a better place.

        -- Benoît