Leader deaths

[James D Burns]

Can we please have an option to disable random leader deaths in game?

I restarted a game as US under the new beta patch (loving it thanks AGEOD!), and it’s now March of 1851. To date I’ve had either 3 or 4 leader’s die of disease and no replacement leaders have spawned. These guys were simply sitting in bivouac behind fortifications, no moving or fighting was occurring. I can imagine had I been in battle the number of dead leaders would be twice what it is now.

At this rate I’ll be totally out of leaders within the first 5 years of the game. I would have no problem with leader deaths in game, if the dead leaders were replaced by a randomly spawned one star leader. But with no replacement leaders apparently spawning, any kind of leader casualties in game are a bad thing from a game design standpoint.

There are few enough leaders in game already, so keeping them from dying except by historical event deaths is probably the way to go. That or create a leader minimum for each country and randomly spawn replacement leaders when the number on map falls below the minimum number.

Jim

[PhilThib]

Will check that point. Normally, the leader pool should give you enough to cover for one or two unexpected deaths, but as it stands now, the death rate percentages are so low it should not happen... Investigating

[briny_norman]

Would be great to have leader deaths as a toggle in the options.
I REALLY don't like when leaders randomly die - I know it's a question of personal preference, but a toggle in the options would solve the problem:

Leader random death rate: Realistic (high); medium; low; very low; none.

[goodwood]

Nar where your sense of adventure, it gives the game variety. I think lots of soldiers died, privates and general in the 19th century through disease, an unhygienic time in those days.

[willgamer]

To me, the problem isn't the death or even the rate of death, it's the no replacements.

Someone should always be coming up through the ranks (with some random positive/negative traits to give him personality).

[kayapo]

I also add my vote for an option to disable random deaths.

[cobraII]

Yeah as sardinia-piedmont i have had 3 generals plus one naval officer die of disease by october of 1852 but i have had replacements spawn, but one of them was the general who lead the army of 1000 or what ever, during Italian unification.

[WallysWorld]

Each to his own, but I like the fact that leaders can die anytime just like in real life. It forces you to anticipate the unexpected and react to it. Letting leaders live until their historic deaths makes the game more scripted and predictable.

[Ironchancellor]

Well i havent heard of many dying by natural means i.e illness. Those that do get killed has been on the battlefield. So i would turn off that random killing of leaders myself. The only other way to remove them somehow is because of incompetence or insubordination to orders somehow in this game.

[caranorn]

I have no problem with current leader casualties. I guess if enough data (playing hours) can demonstrate a shortness, or maybe too few casualties, it shouldn't be too hard to fix that issue. But removing leader death through battle/disease is an absolute no for me...

[James D Burns]

Well my game is into July 1851 now, and I've now had 5 of the starting 15 or so die of disease. So in another 3-4 years all of them will be dead, so there is an issue here that needs addressing.

Personally I would prefer a respawn feature that spawned random replacements, but barring that, I think it needs to be disabled for now until you can make it so somehow the few leaders a country has remains constant.

Jim

[McNaughton]

The percentage is probably just too high at the moment, realistically, a 1% chance of death means that after 100 turns (about 4 years), a general will be dead of disease (basicaly you will roll 1 on a 100 sided die at least 1 time in 100 rolls, most likely you will get this happening before 100).

[cobraII]

I noticed as s-p about 2 dieing on average each year, except for the current year knock on wood 1854. I agree that maybe the modify for causing them to die of disease might be a little high.

[von Sachsen]

Does the game even take none integers? Could the chance be .25% for example?

[James D Burns]

Does the game even take none integers? Could the chance be .25% for example?

If not, then perhaps simply make it so a second roll is made if the first 1% hits. So for example assume leader x rolls a 1. Simply require him to roll another die and get a 1 (or any number you choose here) to be killed. Anything else and just treat him as wounded/sick and have him inactive for x number of turns.

Jim

[Stryder99]

I am playing the US right now and it is late Dec 1852 and I have no leader above 1 star. And those were the ones recieved in the first turn leader give away.

All of my pre-game leaders have died while doing nothing beyond sitting in garrison. I do not mind random deaths, but this is far too high of an attrition rate for leaders not in combat. Heck, I lost Scott and Perry within 2 months of each other!

I hate to see what the leader attrition rate will be for the ACW at this rate!

[razorbackjac]

To me, the problem isn't the death or even the rate of death, it's the no replacements.

Someone should always be coming up through the ranks (with some random positive/negative traits to give him personality).

Same here, I agree.

[Mr Bill]

Does the game even take none integers? Could the chance be .25% for example?

If I've done my math correctly, making two 5% checks (ie, roll a 1-5 on a 100 sided die(as in dice) two times consecutively) would be the same as one .025% check.

[Mr Bill]

Does the game even take none integers? Could the chance be .25% for example?

If I've done my math correctly, passing two 5% checks (ie, roll a 1 on a 20 sided die(as in dice) two times consecutively) would be the same as one .25% check.

To save on calculations, maybe the second 5% check could only be performed if the first is passed.

[McNaughton]

The issue about never ending leaders is that the database would be huge, and the number of images unending. There are already 4000 individual historic leaders in the game, I could not imagine increasing this number too much!

One thing I am planning to do is to increase the possible start date by generals by 1 or 2 years, meaning that if too many die, too early, those historically promoted may be promoted earlier than historically were. This along with the 2 or so extra generals that are already in the game in case of extra deaths will hopefully (along with a reduction in sickness) reduce the casualties.

[James D Burns]

The issue about never ending leaders is that the database would be huge, and the number of images unending. There are already 4000 individual historic leaders in the game, I could not imagine increasing this number too much!

One thing I am planning to do is to increase the possible start date by generals by 1 or 2 years, meaning that if too many die, too early, those historically promoted may be promoted earlier than historically were. This along with the 2 or so extra generals that are already in the game in case of extra deaths will hopefully (along with a reduction in sickness) reduce the casualties.

For a game like AACW where you had lots of leaders, leader deaths were not a big issue from a game play standpoint. But for a game like this where just a tiny fraction of a nations historic leaders ever enter play, leader deaths can cripple game play.

I think a game like this should view a nation’s leaders as simply a reflection of the historical personality of a nation’s army. Killing off a leader a year or so before or after their historic death/retirement would be fine, as I’m sure their historic replacement leaders are scheduled to appear shortly. But killing a leader off 10-20 years early can be crippling if there isn’t some kind of system that generates a replacement automatically.

An ideal solution would be to have a random leader generator that creates a replacement leader to replace the just killed off commander. Their stats would be minimal with a tiny chance of rolling a good one now and then.

But barring that kind of a fix, I personally think random deaths need to be turned off.

Jim

Edit:

The issue about never ending leaders is that the database would be huge, and the number of images unending.

Another possible solution would be to take a lesson from some board games of old. Lots of board games used to flip leader counters over to a replacement side. Why not re-use your 4,000 leader units but draw a red line through them if they die and rename them to leader x’s replacement?

Then if the replacement leader itself dies, you lose points and simply respawn the same replacement unit after a few months.

Jim

[Stryder99]

Or they could use a generic leader piece of art, and not a specific leader for a replacement leader spawning due to death.

[McNaughton]

We actually have that in place, but currently with just 2-3 extra leaders (land and naval 2*) per era (i.e., every 5 years you get a new 'shadow general' who can come into play in case of extreme casualties).