Online campaign: preferred visibility system

[Magyar Khan]

in teh case we choose that everyone controls his own army with units in it.... considering visibility to teh enemy in a 2-3 sided campaign.

A) enemy armies are not visible at all. all movement is hidden, controlled by teh gamemaster until a region get invaded.
A scouting option/command allows a side to "look" into an enemy region.

B) enemy armies presence in (not its size) are visible in all adjacent regions (incl/exlu. sea regions).
Scouting gives u info about its size.

C) like B but now all units and valour/upgrades are visible in teh enemy adjacent region. all other armies are hidden.
scouting gives info in other, more away regions.

D) like C, but now all armies presence in NOT adjacent regions are visible but not its size.

E) everything is visible.

and must it show its general? and so on.

[Knight_Yellow]

I chose b as i feel that would be the most appropriat way of letting u know where an army is but not whats in it so that theres still a bit of surprise. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/smile.gif

[Nobunaga0611]

I was thinking A at first, because you could possibly scout and see the army. But B works because you can't see the actual units, just that theres an army there.

[Magyar Khan]

i had c but maybe its easiest to start with e first

[Nobunaga0611]

I was wondering about C through E.....how would you implement it? I mean scouting to me wouldn't reveal weapons upgrades in a MP campaign, unless the person that 'owned' (can't think of a better way to say it) the army reported on their own armies' stats. Would that be the way you would do it? Or would there be pre-defined armies that could be chosen by the player? This last question opens up a lot more questions, but if you could clarify those points it might help me, and others understand how the scouting/visibility would work.

[baz]

i voted C.

i guess that if you move an army next to the enemies border then you will post your army for them to see, but this causes problems as each faction would need a seperate private forum for each opponent, etc... this could get very complicated.. so maybe it is best to try E first.

what happened in the STW campaign? how did that turn out?

[Magyar Khan]

well in a 2 sided campaign u need 2 forums, here we can rely on ShadeHoney to do somework for us

[baz]

if its viable, then i dont see why any other option should be an option http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/pat.gif

[vexatious]

I chose b because, in my most uneducated opinion, it's the most realistic option. What about adding counter-spies or some method to avoid being scouted? Perhaps some way to actually provide your opponent with misinformation regarding the size of your army?

[Magyar Khan]

well adding new nice stuff aint the problem, keeping things more simple/less complex is harder.