STW default

[kai]

So I finally got around to playing the game. Great in all aspects, a warfare game seems like to me. The only thing I don't like is the set up of strategy map. IT's always the same. Starting positions, armies and other default things.

This reminds me of my younger days when AOE was the game to play. Everyone would play shang in multi, since they had villagers cost of 35, giving them advantage in the game. Things got mundane and bloody old after a while and I had to give away the cd.

I'm not comparing two games, just the fact that things are set up the same way. I'd hope that WE campaigns would be random in what resources the lands have, variations of armies. STW:WE will come with strategic map online play. I guess things will turn out the same always same set up. If two good players get to play a game, one which chooses a superior location will win. Yes, I know that it's the beauty of the game in the war and tactics of battlefield. Strategy and diplomacy was more of an after thought.

I'd love for the WE to be a bit random, prosperity, income of provinces should change and be more balanced between clans. There's no chance of that happening is there?

[Anjin-san]

I agree with you, but I still play almost every week. Even though the clans stay the same, you still have 7 to choose from. I hope with the release of the new game or even the patch will make them more enjoyable, etc alliance and such.

As for the online campaign, they are not releasing it with the game. They say they are still having problems with it and it won't be released for a few more months. I really doubt that they well EVER release it.

As for random starting spots, I don't think this will be in the game. Too bad.

[Maltz]

I guess fans can be roughly categorized into two: the Historians and the Gamers(relatively speaking).

Historians are not satisfied with the current STW settings - so many things messed up. To make historians happy, there should be some historically accurate campaigns. Year 1530, Oda only has Owari, Shimazu only has Satzuma, Mori only has Aki, adding lots of clans, etc.

To increase playability for the geeky historians, there needs to be more time stages. For example, year 1547 Oda Nobunaga matures, year 1561 the Okahazama and the 4th Kawanakajima, year 1570 the Anti-Nobunaga Alliance, year 1582 Akechi Mitsuhide's betrayal of Honno temple, year 1600 West meats East... http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/biggrin.gif

On the other hand, all gamers care is to have fun - they don't even want to know how to spell the name of the purple or green. To make gamers happy, we need to provide truly random and variable settings, make imaginary maps, imaginary units, have random locations of units, generals, turning on and off tech tree for game balance, etc.

The two conflict each other, but by providing more choices everybody will be happy. Before the campaign editor function comes out maybe we could just wait... http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/frown.gif

[This message has been edited by Maltz (edited 07-08-2001).]

[KumaRatta Yamamoto]

In the ex-pack you will have the possibility to choose from three different starting dates in the SP sengoku period campaign.

Thus giving you the choice of 3 starting positions.

[radan]

Kai,if only they could provide a Strategy
Map Editor with lot of customization on each
province then maybe they can satisfy the
GAMERS like us.

[Kraellin]

maltz,

i absolutely agree. i fall into the gamer class; the historians have already hung me in effigy several times, even when i try and throw them a bone. but i just send krast at them to take their heads and they leave me alone for a while. course krast also wants my head, so it usually backfires anyways.

options, options, options....that is the key. i actually like having the baseline parameters set fairly accurately. a katana shld work like a katana. a musket like a musket and so on. but after that, expand it all out. yes, allow for maps other than japan or diff parameters in the provinces. go ahead and add in dragons and demons and let those who want to play that way, play that way. this also makes it more possible for the historians to set up their starting conditions as well. if they dont agree that guns would work a certain way, then allow for tweaking the parameters.

one thing i'd also like to see is being able to play multi games against an entire ai set of armies. prolly have to tweak the ai a bit to do it, but why not. why not have it possible to take 4 armies in against the ai, particularly against castle and bridge maps, which most players steer away from in multi. and allow for differing starting conditions in multi. why just allow 5k to each side? why not have it so you could have one guy in a castle defending with 3k and the attacker have 5k to compensate for having to take a castle?

there are tons of options possible with this game. one of the things we found in the map editor, the demo game editor, is that you can actually put a bridge or a building or a wall on the map and make it bigger or smaller. and i dont just mean in one dimension. you can put a bridge over a river and make the bridge wider, not just longer. you can put single walls up all by themselves, simulating a rock wall effect, without having to make it into a castle wall. the only trouble is, you cant save them into the map! duh! well, we cant find a way to save them into the map anyways.

i could make some pretty interesting maps with more options like that. water is done only on a very base level. this needs work. the options list is for this game is very large, which is good. it at least provides the hope that things will advance further. i can easily see this game going into many more than just 3 sequel games, which is usually about the max any game will go.

i just hope CA will continue developing the game engine and keep us all entertained for years to come.

K.

[Maltz]

I guess I did some over-generalization in the previous post. Hopefully I didn't provoke any hatred or barrier among the community http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/biggrin.gif

However, it will certainly help if we can have more options. http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/smile.gif Before before that I wish to see some more bugs fixed http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/mad.gif

In "Romance of 3 Kingdoms" series (made by a Japanese company KOEI), the game play was actually divided into "historical" and "imaginery". If you choose imaginery, everything will be random. While historical will give you the supposedly correct (but not really http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/tongue.gif) information.

If really talking of being historically correct, probably the majority of the army will be ashigaru (gotta lower the cost of the peasants, or raise the price of others) - but the game will be quite boring compared to present. http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/smile.gif

[Koga No Goshi]

And if you made it strictly gameplay, the ashigaru would run around with machine guns, there'd be an "ashigaru medic", and there'd be a "Mutant Cavalry" unit that spits green acid.




------------------
Koga no Goshi

"Insolent Horses!!!!"

[Kraellin]

koga,

you've obviously never seen my phosphorescent green monks. i call em nuke monks

K.

[Koga No Goshi]

Hehehe Kraellin. Also, for expansion, the Battlefield Ninja's ability to hide should just be renamed "cloak" and he should be able to target taishos with a nuke. Hehehe.




------------------
Koga no Goshi

"Insolent Horses!!!!"

[Kraellin]

well, for that, koga, i thought i'd just give the kensai some thunder bombers. let them light their little grenades and then the kensai would throw the thunder bomber at the taisho, grenade and all.

K.

[kai]

No matter what I do, I can never win the tutorial level with the archer vs yari unit, is it even possible? I get 4,5 kills on yari but get killed when they fight in close.

In campaign I had some fun with battles. Sometimes I notice that my unit runs away as soon as they come in contact with enemy unit. Is that cause of lower honor? Are there any other things I should keep in mind?

[Maltz]

Kai:

Maybe you can stretch out your archers to about 2 men thin, so they have a better vision.

Also, you can try to move them to the higher ground and tell them to hold position. When the enemy comes, simply charge down with engage at will on.

There are really a lot of possibilites making your men running away from the face of your enemy. Honor is one possibility, the other is your men feel outnumbered - because they are not well supported by friendly units. Or it is just because the unit has taken a heavy loss.

[radan]

Quote Originally posted by kai:
No matter what I do, I can never win the tutorial level with the archer vs yari unit, is it even possible? I get 4,5 kills on yari but get killed when they fight in close.

[/QUOTE]

At first it was a problem for me too. I guess
I restarted that tutorial about 4 times before I finally defeated the Yari Sams. The trick for me is luckily killing more that 8 yari sams before they started attacking me. Your archers should not be in skirmish mode and instead on Engage at will, then when the yari sams attack, charge down too... and then hope that the enemy taisho is killed first instead of yours http://www.totalwar.org/ubb/biggrin.gif

I think when your unit is tired/exhausted, it
has a big impact on their morale and can run
easily when they start to fight an enemy unit. Or if they have been initially defeated by the unit they are about to fight (e.g they
were routed and you rallied them)or they
are buddhist and about to fight a warrior
monk unit, etc.

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--RADAN(RONIN ashigaru)--
A member of CLAN..what no CLAN??

[This message has been edited by radan (edited 07-13-2001).]