ToranagaSama's Dream for Campaign Multiplay

[ToranagaSama]

ToranagaSama's Dream for Campaign Multiplay

Yes, I know C-MP may be an unlikely and possibly an unprobable thing, but I'D like to talke about it anyway.

Let's start off with some parameters for this thread FIRST.

I like to make this a "productive" thread, so if your just negative to the idea to begin with, please refrain from posting such comments. If you feel CA shouldn't "waste" resources on this effort, again please refrain from posting. For once, lets have a positive "can do" thread. THANK YOU

Let's talk about any and all ideas, issues and/or "dreams" regarding C-MP. We know at least one "beloved" Dev is listening.

Oh, one last thing, I like thinking Out of The Box, so let's forget about all "existing" Multiplay Strategy models, borrowing is cool, but lets create something new

Ok, let's go:

1) Time-Limit: GJS, has recently "divulged" (thank you for this tidbit ) that the Devs were working to implement this in the abandoned attempt at C-MP. There's been much previous discussion, in the old Dojo and in the new Guild, upon this as a way to move the Campaign along. I believe this is the way to go.

Any further thoughts upon this?

2) What about the issue of players dropping from Campaigns? One of the comments has been that not all who start a Campaign will stay with it. Presuming that a Campaign might last weeks (maybe longer). Personally, I'm thinking of a NEVER ending Campaign

Well, this will be my topic for the day. Though I know that my ideas will in many ways be too ambitious, I think them good ones. Anyway, this is a "dream" thread anyway. Below is ToranagaSama's mind spewing forth in a none too coherent manner. Beware you've been warned


TS's vague concept of a Total War World:

I think that sorta of a "World" s/b created. Of course, that "world" consisting of the Strat Map. The world would allow for players to enter and leave at will. For instance, say you have 6 players who initially start a Campaign. Say those 6 stay together and play for a week or so, but then one player drops out. What now?

Well, one option is to allow the AI to pickup for that player, so now you have 5 human players and 1 AI player. This I believe is cool, though perhaps there may be a disadvantage to this approach. Example, the human players bordering the dropped player's provinces might have somewhat of an advantage as now they have provinces bordering a "weak AI". Though, as long the AI has sea provinces, other players might have a chance at the AI provinces, but its not quite the same as bordering them.

An additional option would be to allow players to join an existing ongoing game. Taking the above example, the remaining 5 players could attempt to find a player to take the place of the dropped player. This is cool, but doing so might delay the game until another player is found to fill the game in.

Another option would be to allow the game to proceed with the 5 humans and 1 AI and have the option for a "new" player to enter the game and then take over for the AI. I like this alot

In this way players could come and go as they please, while the Campaign would continue.

Frankly, I'd like a large Strat Map/World, much larger than the present Strat Map, that might allow as many as 10 human and say 5 AI players (or more hehehe). In this world, players come and go as they please, yet there's always several "human" players at any given time, as well as multiple AI players. The Campaign is "fluid".

Of course, Total Domination, would be a goal, BUT a point/goal system would certainly have to be Devised and probably preferable.

Possibly, do away with the concept of "Total Domination", as well as posssibly the hard concept of the Strat Map as a "continental" land mass.

What I mean is, let's say players are allowed to enter and leave a game at will much like I've described above. Now, lets think about FPS where you "spawn" into a game/map whatever you want to call it. There are several "spawn" positions. How could this be applied to TW and the Strat Map?

This is interesting, let's keep the concept of "fluidity" in mind too.

Sooo, what we go here is no longer the Strat Map as we know it, but a Tribes like "World" made up of provinces. This world is fluid.

Soo, lets say this:

Each player is allowed say 4 provinces (or some number) plus certain resources.

Next is the World, which must have some "shape", but since its fluid, the shape cannot be static. Think varying geometric shapes. What shapes, well lets leave this to the mathematical genius developer on our team.

Thinking on this then there MUST be a minimum number of players to start a Campaign (maybe this is obvious...duhhh).

For discussion's sake lets say 4 players minimum.

So, 4 playes spawn into the game with 4 provinces plus resources. I believe the natural shape would be simply a Square with each player's block of 4 provinces consisting of the four corners of the square.

Hmmmm....ok, lets try to have a new player "spawn" into the game. Of course now, the Square World must morph into a new shape (one reason central servers will be necessary), something akin to Pentagonal. Now lets say a player drops, again the World morphs its shape (maybe).

Hmmmm....now how's all this "morphing" going to effect strategizing and gameplay? Good Question

How about this? Lets say there's a central "core" of provinces made up of the initial players provinces surrounded by a couple of layers of "non-point accumulating "neutral/rebel" provinces. New players spawn into a third layer province and must fight there way thru "neutral/rebel" provinces to get to the core players.

So if a "new" player spawns into the third layer, the immediate effect upon an existing player is nullified; and the direction a new player may take is at his discretion and is not predictable.

Hmmm....maybe ALL players should "spwan" into this starting "third" layer. LOTS of space in between so there is NO immediate contact, giving players an opportunity to build up resources and to tech-up before engaging. Hmmmmm.....

Of course, now, perhaps, the World is no longer "fluid" (thank goodness), but is a Static World, yet players can move in and out of the game fluidly with small effect.

Let's examine the effect of a core player dropping:

ehhhhh, thats enough for now, my brain hurts. Tommorrow, As The World Turns continues.....

Oh, btw, this game is a "Subscription" game

Well GilJaySmith, whaddaya think of that???

You asked for ideas didn't ya...hahahaha....

[Sir Crashalot]

Some nice ideas there.

I don`t know if this has been suggested before or if there will be any interest, but there is always the possibility of a play by email option.

It would be possible (if it was implemented) to play this kind of game by email, which would suit people who do not have so much time on their hands.

Basically, the game would be set up and the players selected/added, then the first person plays his turn and sends the save to the next person in line and so on.

The advantage of pbem is that you have time to play out your turn fully and engage the AI controlled armies in tactical combat, which may not be possible in a live online campaign game due to the amount of time it would take if five or more players fought battles on the same turn.

The big disadvantage of pbem games is the amount of time it takes for a turn to go round and the increasing size of the save file.

In pbem games, player versus player battles would have to be fought in fast combat for obvious reasons.

I don`t know how easily this could be implemented or even if there would be any demand for it, but it is another possible option for people who want Campaign multiplay.

Crash http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/tongue.gif

[Dionysus9]

1) Time limit: This would be essential for making strategic moves. To make it work everyone has to be stuck with the same time limit. BUT time limit should probably be based on the # of provinces under your control, so that huge empires have a bit more time to manage building and troops, and small empires, I guess, would get the benefit of this extra time. So the time limit should probably fluctuate throughout the game based on the # of provinces held by the largest empire.

2) Droppers: Why not make it an option when someone drops, vote-- AI takeover? Find a new player? Majority rules. Otherwise you could also just make their provinces rebel controlled (AI), and therefore "up for grabs" to remaining players.

3) Email: Well, you couldn't really use a play by email campaign and retaing battle-map battles (which is part of the whole point, I think), so I don't think that will work.

4) Static world vs. fluid world: I've never played Tribes so maybe I'm not properly prepared to "get it." But it seems to me that you would have to have a static world so you could plot your next move. If you say "....hmmm, I want to take over Arabia in 10 moves, so I better start building up my borders" and then WHAZZAM the world changes and Arabia is suddenly somewhere else, this could screw up your entire strategy. I think a static map would be best to begin with.

5) Map Size: TS is thinking Big Map. I'm thinking rinky dinky map to start off with. If you have only, say, 6 provinces in a 2 player game-- you might be able to finish the campaign in a nights gaming session-- or a few days at least. Now I'm thinking "option" again. If you have a dedicated group of CMP players then make it 50 provinces. If you are hosting a game and dont know who might join, make it 6 provinces.

6) Random maps: this might be cool. Just make strat map randomly produced. Enter # of provinces and resource level, terrain, climate, % water, etc.

TorranagaSama, you are thinking in a very massive scope--this is good, but we are just starting off. If we concentrate on smaller ideas we might convince the Devs its workable.

[ToranagaSama]

Quote[/b] (Dionysus9 @ Nov. 12 2002,17:48)]1) Time limit: This would be essential for making strategic moves. To make it work everyone has to be stuck with the same time limit. BUT time limit should probably be based on the # of provinces under your control, so that huge empires have a bit more time to manage building and troops, and small empires, I guess, would get the benefit of this extra time. So the time limit should probably fluctuate throughout the game based on the # of provinces held by the largest empire.

2) Droppers: Why not make it an option when someone drops, vote-- AI takeover? Find a new player? Majority rules. Otherwise you could also just make their provinces rebel controlled (AI), and therefore "up for grabs" to remaining players.

3) Email: Well, you couldn't really use a play by email campaign and retaing battle-map battles (which is part of the whole point, I think), so I don't think that will work.

4) Static world vs. fluid world: I've never played Tribes so maybe I'm not properly prepared to "get it." But it seems to me that you would have to have a static world so you could plot your next move. If you say "....hmmm, I want to take over Arabia in 10 moves, so I better start building up my borders" and then WHAZZAM the world changes and Arabia is suddenly somewhere else, this could screw up your entire strategy. I think a static map would be best to begin with.

5) Map Size: TS is thinking Big Map. I'm thinking rinky dinky map to start off with. If you have only, say, 6 provinces in a 2 player game-- you might be able to finish the campaign in a nights gaming session-- or a few days at least. Now I'm thinking "option" again. If you have a dedicated group of CMP players then make it 50 provinces. If you are hosting a game and dont know who might join, make it 6 provinces.

6) Random maps: this might be cool. Just make strat map randomly produced. Enter # of provinces and resource level, terrain, climate, % water, etc.

TorranagaSama, you are thinking in a very massive scope--this is good, but we are just starting off. If we concentrate on smaller ideas we might convince the Devs its workable.

Quote[/b] ]TorranagaSama, you are thinking in a very massive scope--this is good, but we are just starting off. If we concentrate on smaller ideas we might convince the Devs its workable.

I hear ya. Made numerous arguments for 1v1 type campaign utilizing one of the smaller islands from STW. Quite apparently, it was a no go with existing engines/tech.

So, any possible future C-MP will most likely be based on new engines/tech, so...ahhhh....why limit things?? Gonna build from the ground up, then build

Yes, I'm "personally" thinking big, but no reason the design principals I'm attempting to formulate won't scale, up or down. In fact, scalability s/b built in otherwise, who knows when they might create new engines/tech and we'll be locked in again.

Thanks for looking over my ramblings

Hehehehe.

[ToranagaSama]

Quote[/b] ]1) Time limit: This would be essential for making strategic moves. To make it work everyone has to be stuck with the same time limit. BUT time limit should probably be based on the # of provinces under your control, so that huge empires have a bit more time to manage building and troops, and small empires, I guess, would get the benefit of this extra time. So the time limit should probably fluctuate throughout the game based on the # of provinces held by the largest empire.


BTW, I never thought about how "empire size" would effect the time limit. Duh Good Thought

Ok, as you can see this post is edited twice, cause I went to the bathroom and thought about it. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/smile.gif

How about this, just for discussion of the time limit and not to imply anything else re the game.

First, thought is re MTW its time periods, early, late, and ???. Well, one possibility is that as the game progresses thru the time periods, so could the time limit be increased.

Another possibility, borrowing from Dionysus9, which I find rather interesting, is let's say the Strat Map is composed of 20 provinces; and tie the Time Limit to the Size of the largest empire.

Example, 1 to 5 provinces, Time Limit is X; 6 to 10 provinces, is 2X; 10 to 15 provinces, is 3X. What do you think? How about this too, let's say that empire begins to crumble, say the largest empire is 12 provinces, but then loses 3 provinces, leaving 9. Then the Time Limit should correspondingly be reduced as well

Anyone think this could be adapted to MTW as it is currently? CA, let's try it out on the current SP Campaign????

[Dionysus9]

Yeah, thats exactly what I'm saying--time limit should fluctuate as the largest empire builds or crumbles. This adds an interesting element of fluidity. Thats a good idea to try that in SP. That would be cool if we could make a StratMap time-limit mod

I see your point re: grandeur. Hell, we are dreaming, right? Might as well dream big

Something that has always bothered me about the Devs saying C-MP cant be done is this: The mechanics are already in place We have a campaign interface that allows a player to command his faction on the strat map. So, just take control away from AI and make another player interface. It shouldn't be hard.

I think they say its impossible because they dont want to spend the time and $$$ on somethign they dont think will payoff (because of drops, long games, etc).

Ok, something else to help with drops/long games (essentially the same issue, right?)--Autosave after every turn. This way if someone drops you can start where you left off. It wouldnt crash the whole campaign, you'd just have to restart from the last save.

[phobos010]

Many of these features are in the EU games, so the only real problem would be with the tactical side of MTW. This of course could be auto-calced, but then you would just have a more militaristic and less diplomatic version of EU

[ToranagaSama]

Auto-calc is ok, some will like that as an option, but I don't really want another EU/CIV. The tactical side is too great to be tossed aside.

Soo, the same ole problem. What do players do when others are battling?

First, say 2 players are engaged in battle, and another 2 players are also engaged in a separate battle. These battles should take place simultaneously.

Now, what do the other players do. Well, the obvious is simply to be able to view the battles. This would be quite advantageous as one could observe the other players in battle and note weaknesses.

Might be fun if the non-combatants could communicate with the combatants. Offering sideline advince and generally being a nuisance. This would be especially good in Team Campaigns

Obviously, battles s/h a Time Limit

One problem I foresee is with the "Warmonger" types. You know those who aren't interested in "strategizing" just battling. These types would probably attack on EVERY turn whether prudent to do so or not. Some would do it to just be a PITA. I guess this isn't such an issue, given the Host has the capability to drop players.

Question? Should a "3rd" player have the ability to jump into a battle thats already been engaged? Like, say your getting your butt womped, and you start screaming for help You ask for alliance, and offer florins, lands, sexual favors, whatever, for someone to come to the rescue. Haha, I could see this turning into a barroom brawl with all players eventually "jumping-in". Sounds ridiculous, but probably great fun.

With "simultaneous" battles, non-combatants should be allowed to chose which battles to observe.

Sooo, any other issues with simply watching?

This too could be play-tested, to a degree, with the existing SP Campaign, by allowing battles between AI players to be viewed. Hmmmm...now realizing that AI battles are currently "auto-resolved". So a bit of coding to do here, but what the hey. (CA types read this and think "yea right"&#33http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/wink.gif

Hahaha, you know what would be cool? To build AI's with differing characteristics. Rather than, as is, having a "single" AI control all non-human factions (albeit individually). Develop "several" AI's with characteristics unique to each AI This is a good idea wether for C-MP or just the next TW. Doing this and allowing for the AI battles to be observed would be a step towards C-MP. At least good for play-testing the concept of observable battles. So how bout it CA??

[Kraellin]

ok, i wasnt going to post this for a while, but since you've brought the subject up, i'm going to post my idea for the mp campaign. with all respect to toranaga, i can do this here or in a new thread. i warn you, it's pretty long. i've been working on this for a while, and i do not wish to step on your thread here, but it is for an mp campaign...one possible way to do it.

K.

[ShadesWolf]

I havent read all your thread, i will do that latter....

However, my thoughts on the subject are....

It is quite easy to make a multi-player campaign, There are quite a few hex based systems that allow for a map with counter to move around that map.

The only problem, that I can see is the fact, it would be a pure military game, ie no building, princes, ships etc....

If you want me to tell you more then please let me know.....
I am currently working on this idea, based on the hundred years war, I have a test site, that we are curently running to see if it works....

The major problem is though, you need a game master to make all the selects that the computer would do etc....

[Lord Romulous]

Quote[/b] ]3) Email: Well, you couldn't really use a play by email campaign and retaing battle-map battles (which is part of the whole point, I think), so I don't think that will work.

what could work is if you make it so each year takes 1 day real time. that way each player has one day to finish their turn and then email the turn instructions to the other players or centreal server etc. . players must also commit to being online for a set time 20 minute window each day to see if they have to fight any battles.

if they do then they have to fight them online right then or auto resolve although the player who selects the auto resolve option get a penalty to his odds of winning the battle. it going to suck a bit if u have 4 online battles to play in a night but hey thats life.

off course these campaigns would go on for months. and i think that is kinda cool http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif

the 20 minute window each day could be kind of like a medieval court. where all the monarchs would not only have to check to see if they have fight battles but also have the opportunity to chat to there fellow monarchs. u could have multiple room chat server. a central area where everyone mingles and then private rooms where monarchs could go off with allies and plan attacks or organise betrayals etc. we could turn this into a very cool rpg like experience.

[ToranagaSama]

Monarchs??

I'm talking about Damiyos, Samurai, you know S-H-0-G-U-N, hehehe....

Kraellin, go ahead.
Just don't step on TS toes.... http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/wink.gif
Curious, what do you think of my "world" idea?

Lord Romulous, not a bad idea and has been discussed before. But it has the same flaw, "committment" playes would have to stay committed to the Campaign. Of course, there would be the hardcore types who stick with it, but C-MP gotta have "broader" appeal.

I think players have to be able to drop out w/o a Campaign Game falling to pieces; and new players need to be able to join an existing campaign w/o the need to try to get a group together to start a new one. As well as, for those who dropped, for whatever reason, to re-join (of course this s/b optional).

I think the above is IMPERATIVE in order for C-MP to have BROAD appeal, and continuing success as a profitable and marketable game. JMO.

ShadesWolf, ALL ideas are welcome.

In addition, I'm really hoping for some feedback everyone on my proposals.

The MAIN purpose of this thread is for a Collective attack upon the issues and problems of C-MP. As well as, to exhibit the strong interest in creating it.

Thanks all, for the interest comments and posts. Also, for wading thru my ramblings http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/smile.gif Will post more as time allows.

Don't forget to participate in the "Subscriptions" thread

[Remember, THEY are silently listening]

TS

[ToranagaSama]

OK, I s/b doing something else, but....

TIME Not Time Limit, but Time
How do you get a group of players to CONSISTENTLY take time from their lives to play a game??

Let's face, people are flaky Not matter how strong the desire, Life Issues will get in the way, and folks WILL drop from the Campaign as time goes on. No way around this fact. Of course, certain HARDCORE players will eventually find themselves and have some really good Campaigns, BUT that just isn't good enough Hardcore players aren't going to sustain the game as a profitable enterprise.

So, this issue MUST be tackled I believe that this is probably THE most significant factor in CA abandoning the effort at C-MP. Really, look at the Strategy type games that have multiplay capability in some form. I don't think a single one is exactly filling the multiplay bandwidth. Consequently, CA notices this and rightly or wrongly determined that their just isn't enough interest to commit the resources necessary to bring C-MP about.

Obviously, to us, the crux of the matter is that no one has devised the right solution and implementation. So its OUR job to do so.

For discussion's sake I'm going to term this, "Fluidity". What's the solution? Of course, I like my "World" idea, but their MUST be other ideas. Tell us Also, please start critiquing the S out of MY World ramblings.

Toranaga is going to try to stop thinking about this for the rest of the day.... http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/smile.gif


Quote[/b] ]I think players have to be able to drop out w/o a Campaign Game falling to pieces; and new players need to be able to join an existing campaign w/o the need to try to get a group together to start a new one. As well as, for those who dropped, for whatever reason, to re-join (of course this s/b optional).

I think the above is IMPERATIVE in order for C-MP to have BROAD appeal, and continuing success as a profitable and marketable game. JMO.

[MizuKokami]

maybe when one faction is or becomes illiminated, they can become vassals of the player that conquered them. this could keep all the players in the game until the end of the campaign. the defeated players would, or could be governed by the conqueror, but granted some leway in the governing of the provinces. battleing only when their new king says to, and when the provinces he is governing are attacked. a new option of the distribution of funds between the kingdom and his vassals would be benificial here, and the conquering player would decide how much of his income to give his vassal for his budget. who knows, maybe this will be the way we can get heirs who escaped detection into multiplayer campaigns, as well as potential rebellions. after all, even vassals can be bribed:)

[Dionysus9]

I like Koka's idea, but it doesnt solve the problem of players flaking out of the game. What happens when the "King" craps out? I suppose a vassal takes over?

hmmmm.... maybe that is the way to handle the fluidity of players caused by "life issues." A truly Feudal hierarchichal system (akin to the Fear's campaign)

Feudal Roster System (?):

You have a roster of players who are ranked in some sort of hierarchical order. King, Chamberlain, Duke, etc. etc. At least one player from each faction would have to show up every day to fight tactical battles online. If the King didn't show, then the Chamberlain could assume his duties, and so on...down the roster.

This would also solve some other problems-- like lets say the Byzantines go on a crazy rampage and attack 10 provinces in one turn. If one person is playing the Byz then he has to fight 10 tactical battles, and it slows everyfaction down as they have to sit around and wait for KingByz to fight 9 other battles before he can tackle them. BUT, if KingByz fights only one or two battles himself and delegates the other battles to his vassals, ALL BATTLES COULD CONCIEVABLY take place simultaneously. If you put a 20 minute time limit on battles, and 5 Byz players show up to fight beside their King, you could resolve an entire days worth of campaigning in 40 minutes. Couple this with email strat-moves and we may just have a workable system.

So what we would really need is some type of interface, seperate from the MTW server but similar, that would show which battles were occuring and allow the respective faction leaders to delegate vassals to conduct each battle.

If this was meshed well with the email system, players would get an email message-- "Your King calls you to defend Aquitane, the battle shall occur at 14:45 tonight", etc. On days where no tactical combat occurs you get the email "All is quiet in the realm, relax until tomorrow."

Heheh, this would be AWESOME and it would be quiet flexible because you could lost 1/2 your roster to "life issues" and still carry on with the campaign. Just move everyone up a few ranks. If the King doesn't arrive on time, then the next highest ranked player makes all the decisions.

How does that sound? This would be quite workable, and is almost kinda being playtested currently with the clan campaigns (see Fearfulways website).

I think a faction-team feudal system might be the solution. Good idea Koka

[Kraellin]

hehe, ok, you asked for it...

for a while now i've expressed an interest in a multiplay campaign, as have others. CA has even engaged upon the project once or twice and pretty much had to give it up. Erado can also fill you in on some of the history of this, as i know he was involved with CA in trying to work out how this could be done. the simple fact of the matter is that it is a lot more complex than simply putting up a campaign map in multi...far more complex.

on and off for over two years now, i've turned my attention to this and pondered how it could be done without having to drain CA's resources into bankruptcy. i've also pondered it with zero regard for whether CA could devote the attention to it or not. recently, i came up with what i believe might be a workable solution, so i wrote to CA asking if they were interested in hearing this. i was politely received and given a short rundown on the history of this project within the CA offices and the upshot of it was that whereas there may still be a few within the CA offices that are interested, there are just as many who sort of sigh as one sighs about loves lost and things that might have been. sometimes we forget that game makers are as passionate about their product as we are, and in fact, often more so. basically, i got from this communication was that this is a dead issue within the offices. i believe we've also been pretty much informed of this here on the boards.

so, why dredge this up again. it's dead. it ain't gonna happen, so why keep beating a dead horse? well, the answer is really pretty simple, because i want an mp campaign :) and, because those 'sighs' at the CA office tell me one thing, the issue has dropped below hope, but 'below hope' is not an un-recoverable condition. and frankly, since i put all this time into trying to work out the mechanics of this thing, and even if it never comes to fruition, i still feel the need to at least communicate to someone the ideas i worked out.

now, those that know me around here, know that i've come up with a couple of good ideas from time to time. they also know that i can get pretty long-winded and this is not going to be an exception to that. so, stop reading now if you bore easily :)

ok, so here are the basics of this. first and foremost, the multiplayer environment is a real time environment, for the most part. yes, you can play turn-based games in multi, but they tend to be epic endurance marathons, and frankly, just give me a headache after the first 12 hours. thus, we do away with turns for the mp camp game. yup. no turns. everything is in real time...everything.

yup, agents, armies, communications, fog of war data, tactical battles, ships, trading, sea invasions...it's all done in real time. no 4 seasons per turn, no months per turn, no 1 turn equals 1 year. nothing. every move is clocked or has a span of time to get from point A to point B. if you wish to move your army from province A to province B, it's going to take X amount of time to get there. this is somewhat similar to the way armies move in Europa Universalis. the moving army has a route it follows between province A and province B. likewise, a unit from traveling from B to A also travels this same route. if they meet somewhere along this route, they determine the action to be taken right then and there. more about the actions taken later.

the second BIG change from the way we play now in single player is that you, as a player, are one person. you've always been one person and always will be. the game, in its current incarnation doesnt consider you that way. for one battle you are this general in charge of this army and if there is another battle to fight 6 provinces away, you are also that general in charge of that army, and so on throughout the game. you are always instantly put in charge of this or that army, no matter where it is. my idea changes this. you are one person. you can only be in one place at one time, no exceptions. that means someone else is controlling the other armies in the game, including the ones in your faction. yup. this can be another player or the ai.

and this brings us to the next concept. if you happen to be the overall commander in chief, king, emperor, or whatever title is used, you do not fight every battle for your faction yourself. you issue orders. if the ai is controlling one of your armies, it will simply do its best to carry out those orders. if it's a player in control of that army, you can hope he carries out your orders and deal with it or not if he doesnt. this makes real world clans MUCH more important to the game. and, more importantly, it allows players to come and go from the campaign game without ruining the game. the game can run continuously, much the same way that Air Warrior ran, or World War II Online runs. the game simply progresses regardless of who comes and goes, with the ai taking over for those that leave, and itself giving up its ownership if a player logs in to that faction. it's a continuous flow of coming and going and progression and so on within the campaign map.

this in turn leads to a more or less ranking system. what do you do when the king leaves for a faction and there is no one there to give orders for that faction. simple, it falls in line to the next available player with the next highest rank. if no real player exists within the game for a faction then the ai is in charge until a real player logs in.

what if a faction gets wiped out? real players simply join another faction, or take over one that only the ai is controlling.

what if that faction re-emerges? shld a faction re-emerge the simplest way is to simply let the ai control it until a player is willing to take over the leadership.

shld a re-emerging faction be offered to a former member of this faction first before any other real players could take control of it? this might be an option, but it does complicate things and is most likely best not to do, since later in the game it could lead to problems.

how do you handle the real time battles? we handle them just as they are handled in multi now, excpet the armies are already built, as are the factions and colors and so on, but since you are one person, commanding essentially one army personally, you simply fight your battles the same way as is done now. you go from the campaign map to the tactical map and fight. the results are then conveyed back to the campaign map at the fight's end, and you go on from there. if the party fighting is the king or current faction commander in charge, he obviously is too busy to issue orders to other armies, so those armies and units have to determine their own resolutions without the benefit of their faction leader's orders, advices and so on.

what if the ai army encounters an enemy and is drawn into battle? then it simply fights it out. the concept is one person can only control his or her own army wherever he/she is. the ai must handle its own battles, even if it's against a real player.

what about agents? agents are sent on missions. they go to their respective destinations in the same manner as the armies move. it takes real time to get where you're going. whomever is in charge of handling those agents could still issues the orders for them, recalling them, changing their missions, and so on, but the agents move in real time. no instant jumping from province to province.

mechanically, the servers still pretty much work the way they do now. you log into a main room, which is the main chat room. but instead of single tactical games, you would seem a listing of campaign games. but it's only a display list. this list would simply tell you in which sub-room that particular game was being played. you would then go to this room and join that game in progress. this would kick you to campaign game server and into a setup area from where you pick which faction you wish to join and can see a more or less current campaign map displayed. upon picking your faction you would then join the game in progress in whatever capacity was available. it would have to be an available army for that faction (though i suppose you could give players control of agents also...might be fun to play an assassin ). you are then taken to the game proper and given control of your army (or armies, if that's the case).

now, i've been using the term 'real time' to specify how units move, but in actual fact, it wouldnt be real time. we're not going to make you wait the week it would take to move a real army from florence to constantinople. so, what this timing is is realy 'ticks' or cycles or game loops. a unit would move X amount of distance per tick. the timing of all this would have to be done such that things can move along swiftly enough to not completely bog down the game, but slowly enough that orders can be issued and battles carried out.

ok, once you are in the game and on the campaign map, real time battles would then be conducted the same way they are now. one person is the host machine and the other person joins the host's game to fight out the battle. if the host is the ai, then battles would have to be carried out on a separate dedicated server.

crusades and jihads would work the same way they do now except that the ai might be controlling the movement of these, or a player could do it if one is logged into the game and decides to take it over.

ships, trade routes, and sea invasions get to be a bit trickier here. obviously in a game that is working to more realistically simulate time, we cant allow instant invasions as they are done currently. this would be just too unrealisitic and we're back to teleporting units. the whole shipping stuff can be done several ways. one could issues the orders for an army in egypt to invade wessex, given that a shipping route exists to do that. the ships would remain where they are as they do now to simulate the shiping lanes, but the invading army would 'move' from ship to ship along that route and display where it is currently. thus, it would take X number of ticks to go from sea zone to sea zone. if the route is broken, the army would either bog down where it is, or return to home, or await orders from the faction leader. if the return route home were broken as well, the traveling units would remain 'on' one of the ships. if that ship were then sunk, the units on it would sink also.

the other way to do transport by ship is to simply load the units on a given ships (or fleet) and have the ship move from zone to zone, transporting the units with them. this makes sea battles even more important as an enemy might get very interested in sinking an enemy fleet with an invading army onboard. agents and so forth would travel in the same manner.

now, there is a third way that might simulate the faster sea travel. if the trade route exists, you could simply move the army itself across the sea zones, much the same way they currently move in the campaign map, but this gets tricky with ship speeds and ticks.

i would also make it such that once an agent or army starts out on a sea trip, further orders cannot be issued to it until it hits land or unless the sea route gets interrupted between where the unit is and its destination.

to keep this as simple as possible, capturing provinces is still done in the same manner; you take all of it or none of it. you could divide the provinces up into smaller zones or counties or whatever and allow for capturing of just those, but it does complicate the coding by a major amount. a slicker way to do it is to capture pixel by pixel and forget the province borders, but again, this complicates coding by a tremendous amount.

now, there's a whole lot more that can be lain out in detail here, such as fog of war rules...who sees what on the campaign map, and a whole lot more. i'm also fairly sure folks are going to punch holes in my concepts or at least give it a try. that's fine, punch away. there are also possibilities in this game for a massive multiplayer map type pay per play type game, where the entire campaign map is duplicated in tactical maps, but all of that can come later. for now, i've covered the major concepts of my multi campaign game. take it for what it's worth and write up your own ideas.

as an addendum to some of the things covered above, it would also be possible to make for a much quicker campaign by simply eliminating all tactical battles and simply auto-calc everything. units would still move in real time across the campaign map, but the auto-calc would speed up a campaign considerably.

one might also need or want rules for how many times a given player could join a faction and then quit out and re-join in a different faction.

the overall campaign would progress through the years and you would still have the various eras we have now, with some tech tree events coming at random or specified times. remember here, that one tick might represent a real hour or a real day, but likely not much more than that. one might even be able to do a day and night designation, if that were desireable; one tick is a day and the next a night, or some such.

bear in mind that this system completely eliminates the problem of timing battles where one person is having to fight 6 different battles all at once and thus causing others to sit on their heels and wait. this simply removes that problem with the one person is one person aspect.

now, i've been writing this up the last couple of days, so i've missed a few things or am adding new as i go. one other way of doing the campaign, if the real time stuff is too complex to begin with, would be to keep it turn based, but, you do use the one person is one person concept with all of those rules intact. this shld mostly still be workable but might involve some timing difficulties at times. nonetheless, rules for those difficulties could be set up and used and it shldnt be too difficult.

the other nice thing about doing an mp campaign in real time (or even with turn based) is that you can have many more than 8 people playing in one campaign. the amount of movement and so forth on the camp map is a lot less than in a tactical battle, thus, it shld be able to accomadate quite a few more people in a single game. the tactical battles would still be limited to 8 as they are now, but because these are handed off to separate server they shldnt interfere with the camp map and what's going on there. i would think that you could easily get 128 or 256 players in one game; probably more if that was desirable.

one of the shortcomings of this style of campaign is that not everyone is going to be a faction leader and some may not enjoy being just a peon general. however, i can also see, within all this, some chance for intrigue and ranks and ciimbing the rank ladder and being given more responsibility for the faction, gaining the use of agents of your own, creating your own spy network within the faction, cutting deals with other factions that maybe your own faction leader doesnt know about. diplomacy, bribes, extortion, pacts of all sorts when done on a player to player basis, take on a whole new excitement in a game like this, and even the ai diplomatic corp could be beefed up to make things a bit more exciting. timed allied invasions would also be possible. the possibilities are quite extensive.

now, it might just be that this game would be more enjoyable for some if it were limited to 1 person per faction. that's fine. this could be done, especially if these games were set up using some one person as the host, and, if games could be saved and re-started. i see two main types of games here; one is a continuous game that simply runs all the time and folks can come and go as they please, and another with a specific host where the host sets up the parameters for how the game will be played and how many will be allowed in and so forth. these last types would come and go and have the option to save and re-start. it would also be necessary to allow the ai to take over for a given faction as some would not be able to come on certain days, and for all the reasons that folks come and go on the new and in various games. thus, you want some flexibility here, but you also want a host who is responsible for starting, saving, and restarting the game and who can say who and how many can join and so on. the other type is a dedicated server type and simply runs until some condition is met and then resets itself to the start of a new game.

as for the tech tree and the building of buildings, this could be done several different ways. this could be left up to the 'king' or, each province has a governor who pays taxes to the king, but, controls his own province and builds his own stuff as he sees fit or that builds his own stuff subject to the king's approval. it's a feudal system, so why not set it up that way. since we're playing in a simulated real time, buildings still take a while to build but this becomes based on the 'tick' system. if you keep the game as turn based, then you simply keeps building buildings at the rate they currently are done.

once these buildings are built then the province governor can build his new units, upgrade his old and improve his income as he sees fit. the king could even set the tax rates for his provinces. these taxes go into the king's treasury and at his disposal to do with as he sees fit.

the trade routes and ships would also need to be determined as to who controls the shipping and who gets the revenues from them. perhaps this is area that is controlled by the king as to what gets built and where, but the provinces get the revenues and the king then gets a tithe from the provinces. there are other ways to do this also, but that's prolly the simplest.

one of the nice things about this method of play too, is that rebellions become real. if a governor or general is totally fed up with the current leadership, he can simply declare himself a new nation and try to go his own way if that's what he/she wants.

there's just loads of possibilities here. the trick, the real trick is, can such a game, such an extensive re-working of the code and game be justified as to beans in - beans out. one puts so many beans into developing such a game and one has to get so many beans back out to have justified putting that many beans in in the first place. to me, this is the real barrier to an mp campaign game. it isnt the coding or game mechanics and so on, it's whether or not CA can justify the time and resources needed to produce such a game when the multiplayer crowd is indeed a very small percentage of its return on investment. and this, more than anything else, is the limiting factor to doing this. when i go online and see only 60 or 70 folks playing at a time, i suspect that this may never occur. in fact, we've pretty much been told that it wont. i will say this though, if such a game existed, i would willingly pay to play on a monthly subscription basis.

K.

[Dionysus9]

Krae,

HOLY CRAP YOU ARE A GENIUS OMFG that is brilliant Wow. I'm speachless, what a great idea. You've figured it out, I'm sure of it-- you have your finger on the pulse of CMP future.

I for one would pay a hefty monthly pay-to-play fee to play in a game like that if it was done well. I particularly like the inter-faction intrigue and potential for civilwars and betrayal offered by a feudal command structure. If you add a simple diplomacy interface where provincial leaders can bargain with other provincial leaders in a different faction you have the makings of an epic game of diplomacy.

Wow, I cant believe this wouldn't spark CA's interest

Great job. Bravo.

[sbreden]

This may be similar to a facet of Kraellin's ideas (great post by the way) or maybe a far throw from it. How about a concept of simply roleplaying an army that would declare alleigance to one of the several factions. You would create your account and then begin putting together your army and all that goes along with that. The mass interaction and battles betweeen these armies within the different provinces would yield the "lines" of the main world map. Different provinces could even be reserved for higher skill level players somehow (similar to the now defunct multiplayer battletech 3025). Players moving up the ranks would gain a greater scope of influence in controlling the overall political and economic policies of their respective factions. As they progressed they would gain greater titles, earn more florins, and have access to better troop types. Just some thoughts, thanks.

[ToranagaSama]

Kraellin

THANKS FOR THE POST

You now its going to take a little while to digest all that. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/eek.gif

One things is clear the "feudal" type system is a VERY go More to say about that later. Solves a big issue.

I think I see an issue or two still remaining, have to give the post another go over.

One thing though, the Real Time aspect is brilliant, BUT I'm not sure how I feel about that. I like the Turn-Based system very much. I'm going to focus upon this for the moment.

Real Time will certainly change the feel of Total War that's for sure.

Time Limit vs. Real Time, that is the question.

Both should be play-tested QUITE a bit inorder to determine which way to go.

Moving Armies and Agents, etc. EU style?

Hmmmm.....gotta think about that. One thing is for sure some people won't like it. The first issue, perhaps the only issue, is in a Time-Limited TBS, "feedback" (I'll term it this) is relatively instaneous upon End Turn.

With EU style Real-Time, "feedback" is delayed

Sounds like a small thing, but actually is quite a large thing. Obviously, this may be a personal style sorta thing, but play-testing should sort it out. I definitely want to try it out.

CA, this might be a tall order, but could this be implemented within the present SP game? I mean for "Play-Testing" purposes? Experimental?

Another thing, some people are JUST slower than others. There are some real and serious complaints about EU's "real time". Many like the game, but don't like that aspect.

Hmmm...A lot to take in.

One thing, regarding the format of your post. I think it might make it easier to discern if you could possibly go over it and insert some "Section Headers" highlighting particular "issues" different areas of your post addresses. I think it might make it easier for folks to digest. Right now, you kinda take it all in, in one big gulp I'm choking. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/wink.gif

Back to you later.

[Dionysus9]

I think the real-time (or "tick time") aspect of Krae's proposal is perfect for a realistic strategy/tactics wargame.

Tora, remember you were saying "maybe you could call for help from a neighbor from the battlemap and bribe them to come fight with you."? Well I thought that was unrealistic because their troops wont be anywhere near, but if we go to a real-time system it might be realistic.

"Hey, you army over there marching by What will it cost for you to change direction and come fight the Byz with me?"
"I'm headed for Spain, on important business, but 5,000 florins would work."
"Well, how fast can you get here because I cant hold for much longer."
"Lets see, it looks like 12 ticks-- thats 30 minutes of battlemap time"
"Ok, I will give you 5,000 florins, hurry up and get here. I have good spears and a high hill, I'll try to hold for that long."

That would be pretty darn cool. If he gets there late he might be able to crush the enemy anyway.

Realtime makes SO much sense for stratmap. If you send a ship off to England and you decide to call it back, how are you going to achieve that? How are you going to tell the ship captain "Hey turnaround, I changed my mind". Heheh...its too late, you sent him off already. Better send a faster ship and hope it catches up with him before your entire army gets sunk by the Armada you just learned about....

I think real time solves a lot of the problems. There is no waiting, no complaining--"you're taking too long, these turns are too long, this is lame, I quit."

I really like the idea.

[phobos010]

The only question I have about the "real-time" system is when a tactical battle has to take place, what does everyone that is not taking part in the battle do? When you have to fight a battle, does the strat map pause for the player while the battle is being resolved. If so then the other players must sit around and wait for the battle to end.

Maybe I missed something as the post was rather long. If so please correct me. All these ideas sound very interesting, but I still don't see how to integrate the strategic and tactical sides into one multi=player game. As far as I can see, this is key issue blocking a C-MP

[ToranagaSama]

Yes, Real-Time is VERY intriguing, solves some issues, BUT the question is WHAT issues does it ALSO open??

phobos010, brings up one? Maybe K. presents possibilities in his post. Gotta go over it again.

Kraellin, maybe you could focus on this issue for us.

Anyway, here comes a long post on the Fluidity, Feudal System issue.

[ToranagaSama]

Ok, I think it most advantageous to the utlimate goal of devising a system for C-MP to keep things "Issue" focused. Its important to solve things, issue by issue and to understand how each issue relates to another.

Also, I think it prudent to start creating a list of "Definitions" to define the all the differing concepts we're throwing about. This is too hold down any confusion when talking about specific issues. I'll try and put a list together tommorrow. If there are no objections and/or suggestions to the contrary.

One issue I highlighted above and term "Fluidity" s/b more aptly termed "Player Fuidity", players ability to enter, drop from and re-enter a Campaign. Thoughts?

On that issue, MizuKokami, I didn't quite comprehend your post, but Dionysus9 made it clear to me. It seems Kraellin is on the same page. It is a beautiful idea What should we term it? "Feudel Roster System" appears descriptive enough. Thoughts?

Ok, I'm going to continue on this focus, let me quote Kraellin:


Quote[/b] ]and this brings us to the next concept. if you happen to be the overall commander in chief, king, emperor, or whatever title is used, you do not fight every battle for your faction yourself. you issue orders. if the ai is controlling one of your armies, it will simply do its best to carry out those orders. if it's a player in control of that army, you can hope he carries out your orders and deal with it or not if he doesnt. this makes real world clans MUCH more important to the game. and, more importantly, it allows players to come and go from the campaign game without ruining the game. the game can run continuously, much the same way that Air Warrior ran, or World War II Online runs. the game simply progresses regardless of who comes and goes, with the ai taking over for those that leave, and itself giving up its ownership if a player logs in to that faction. it's a continuous flow of coming and going and progression and so on within the campaign map

this in turn leads to a more or less ranking system. what do you do when the king leaves for a faction and there is no one there to give orders for that faction. simple, it falls in line to the next available player with the next highest rank. if no real player exists within the game for a faction then the ai is in charge until a real player logs in.

what if a faction gets wiped out? real players simply join another faction, or take over one that only the ai is controlling.

what if that faction re-emerges? shld a faction re-emerge the simplest way is to simply let the ai control it until a player is willing to take over the leadership

One note:

"this makes real world clans MUCH more important to the game."

I don't think this is good for a variety of reasons, but the most important is that C-MP MUST have "broad" appeal. Which means that "Clanning" must NOT be central to making things work Player Fluidity must work absent the need for "Clanning". Most people AREN'T going to join a Clan.

Now, what we need to do is to play a mental game with the Feudal Roster System and see where the "bugs" are I think there are a couple we need to deal with.

So, for discussion's sake, I'll stick with the game I started way above. 6 players, 1 Campaign. (Good Example??) Actually, I think I'll change that to 4 players for simplicities sake.

So, 4 players, initiate a Campaign MP game. Each player will represent a Faction. Each Faction consists of 2 provinces and (for conceptulization) 10 resources. 1 Faction, 2 Provinces, 10 resources (whatever they may be??).

Since these 4 players (whom I'll term the "Core" Players), initiated the Campaign, they get to be the initial Kings.

Ok, since this is about Fluidity, lets start flowing:

Now, this campaign has progressed, its not important in what manner, just that now there's a "single" player who wants to enter the Campaign.

Keeping the "Feudal Roster System" in mind: How Should This Be Accomplished? What ramifications will result? Should the "new" player enter as a new Faction? Or, join an existing Faction? Any other questions to think about?

With regard to Factions, I think a "new" player should have the Option of either entering as a "new" faction or joining an existing faction.

How might this work?

Well, lets look at it. If the "new" player were to enter as a "new" Faction, that player would enter the game with, presumably, 2 Provinces and 10 Resources (there's going to a bit more re resources, provinces and balancing, but lets focus on the "mechanics" for now).

Keep in mind, that at ALL times, EACH player is playing the Campaign for HIS personal benefit This is NOT a "team" Campaign If a player choses to join a Faction, he would be doing so, because it would "ultimately" benefit HIMSELF [Think Mafia, trust and loyalty only go so far as "personal" interest.]

With that, lets assess: New Player has 2 Provinces and 10 Resources (for this disscussion all provinces within the Campaign are of Equal value re Resources/Income). What could entice a Player to join a Faction; and How would a Faction benefit from gaining a Player?

Without going into specifics, I think it fairly obvious how a Faction might benefit. Someone else can highlight it. I'll move on.

Btw, I've been using the term "join", strike that, "Ally" is a more apt term. Alliances can be broken

Just thinking on the "Feudal Roster System", I believe this system s/b be based on "Titles", just like on the present Strat Map, a King may bestow Titles and Offices. Some Titles (and Offices) will be more valuable than others

A Factions' King might attempt to entice a new player (this could work on an existing player as well), by offering him, Land(s), Title(s), and/or Florins.

Exampling how this might work, a player enters a "room" where he chooses a Campaign, upon his choice the player then is able to view the Strat Map and his potential Provinces, etc., but he is in a "Wait" state. At this point All Factions and their members are advised that there is a Player entering the game. Faction Kings and members can then view the new player's potential provinces, resources and whatever else he may bring to the table. Factions may then decide to vie for the new player or not. Those that choose to do so, may make offers to the new player to entice him to "Ally" with that Faction. The new player then enters the Campaign either as a New Faction with just his 2 Provinces and 10 Resources; or he Allies with a Faction, in which case the New Player enters with his 2 Provinces, 10 Resources and whatever the accepted "offer" consists of. Of course some rules will have to instilled to govern, this "bidding" process, but it should NOT take much time. In any event, the Campaign continues and does not stop while the "bidding" and/or negotiations take place. The New Player will be obligated for the duration of his Alliance to pay a portion of his income to the King and ONLY to the King (as do all Allies/Vassal). Probably the New Player would enter as a "Vassal" as opposed to an Ally.

I think there's great benefit to this, as a player has the option of Allying or being Independent, but Consequences exist for each choice. Considering that a New Player might be entering a Campaign that might be well progressed, he might have little chance at success entering with ONLY 2 Provinces and 10 resources. If its a fairly young campaign a new player might choose to chance it and go it alone.

Of course, Vassals want to be King, so when a Vassal grows strong enough, he might attack the King and take his crown and kingdom. He might make alliances with other Vassals and/or Factions and turn on the King, etc. I think you get the "intrigue" drift. MUCH FUN

Now, the IMPORTANT part, what happens when that player flakes out and drops?

Like as has been suggested, the "King" can choose to allow the AI to take over for the player. (good bit of coding, but relatively simply).

The HARD part, is what if the "King" flakes out???? Hmmm...this might also be the most fun part too.

Its been suggested that when the existing King drops, that the Crown should fall to the next highest ranking player in that Faction. This would seem to work except that, it shouldn't be quite so simple. For one, in out little TW world the King can't actually have Sons, and AI sons wouldn't work, so the King s/b able to designate other player(s) within the Faction (sorta like adoption) as Heir(s). Also, I think the King should "age" gamewise, like in MTW, otherwise the original King might be king forever For a Campaign that might last weeks or months, or possibly ongoing indefinitely, I think Other players should have a chance at being King w/o have to start a new campaign (not sure but its an idea).

Hmmm....I mentioned a "Point" system would be needed. The goal of a Campaign s/b Total Domination. If a Faction can manage to wipe out or takeover all the factions then the Campaign should end; BUT most likely a Campaign will last FOREVER, so a player should receive points for "Survival". Ok, being King is limited to say 60 game years; survive the whole term and receive points (additionally, of course, there'd be Glorious Achievement points to earn). Survivie for 50 years and receive fewer points, and so on. Same thing for other Titles and Offices: Age-Limited, player receives points for Survival and Glorious Achievements. (The higher the office the more Survival points.)

OK, another two questions: What happens when a King dies; and what happens when Titled players die; or Non-Titled playes die?
Two, What happens Once a King or Titled player reaches his Age Limit?

Anyway, not necessary to answer any and questions, JUST the ones that present "Mechanical" issues for the game. Well, the above was an attempt to address certain issues I saw and to flesh things out some.

Always Keep In Mind:


Quote[/b] ]I think players have to be able to drop out w/o a Campaign Game falling to pieces; and new players need to be able to join an existing campaign w/o the need to try to get a group together to start a new one. As well as, for those who dropped, for whatever reason, to re-join (of course this s/b optional).

I think the above is IMPERATIVE in order for C-MP to have BROAD appeal, and continuing success as a profitable and marketable game. JMO.

[falaffel]

Remember that the developers are intrested in your MP player campaing ideas. As posted in another thread by GilJay:


Quote[/b] ]
If you don't want to post a long opinion here, I've set up a Hotmail account at multiplayercampaign@hotmail.com. This will be read-only I'm afraid, so don't expect a reply to anything you send - but I promise I'll read it all. Please try to avoid sending general pleadings and longings for C-MP... but I'm very interested in specific feedback on how you think Civ3PTW works, and indeed on other C-MP games you've played, e.g. Emperor, EU2.


So mail him and you might never know what will happen.

/ Falaffel

[ToranagaSama]

That email address doesn't work

[Kraellin]

toranaga,

yes, it is quite long, but i warned you :) i also somewhat bypassed your original post and i will be going back over your original ideas.

i mentioned doing the real time moving a' la Europa for the simple reason that that's a known system and folks would recognize it and understand what i was talking about a bit better. frankly, i think this could be done better, but the principal is similar. you give an order to a unit and it takes time for the unit to implement, to arrive at where it's going. how you display this on the map is a simple enough interface thing. i'd prefer something like roads like that old amiga game of 'lords of the rising sun' did it. units traveled along pre-set paths in real time. if they met an enemy on that same road, they fought.

and yes, feedback is somewhat delayed on some things, but that fits with the time period when communications often took weeks or even months. one of the fun things one could do with the game fashioned in this method is purposely add in long delays to things like your agents. an emissary is sent to make peace with another faction. he is given certain orders and certain mission parameters and you send him off and maybe hear from him again in a month or two as to his success or failure. entering time into this game would give it more of the true feel of medieval times when one had to send messengers back and forth for orders and information and so on. do i attack the HRE or did my emissary manage to effect a treaty? can i afford to wait for the answer? was the emissary waylaid before he ever arrived to offer the treaty? these types of considerations are completely removed from the game as it is now. you DO get instant feedback. a lot of the fog of war stuff is also this way. move a unit and instant access to new information. with the time factor entered into the equation, you would get a trickle of new information as the unit moved rather than the whole ball of was at one shot. and yes, it's a matter of choice and consideration. some would like it, some would not.

but, if you noticed near the end of the my first post, i also mention that you could still keep the game turn based as long as you maintain the one person can only be one person in the game concept. it would still work, and would prolly be much easier to code to begin with.

as for the organization of my post, well, there was a lot there to get out and i preferred to get it out rather than get bogged down in the form of it all. my editor docs were similar. you write down things as they come to you, as fast as you can get them written and worry about the form later, maybe ;) if there's anything in there that doesnt make sense, let me know and i'll either edit it or attempt to clarify it.

dionysus,
thank you :)
and i agree about the intrigue and diplomacy aspects. i noticed in several posts here on the guild that one of things folks wanted more of was diplomatic actions and intrigue. i think there are a number of ways that this would aid that. the trick comes with dealing with the ai instead of a real person.

and as an aside to the above, this style of play would also work for single player campaigns and might liven it up a bit. so, it's not limited to just an mp campaign thing.

and yeah, with multiple leaderships within one faction and perhaps different players governing different provinces within the same faction, there might well be some black market stuff going on, secret deals, coups aided by other factions and i'm sure you can think of others.

phobos,
this is the beauty of this system. there is no waiting. you are only BEING one 'persona' in the game. you are only DIRECTLY operating one unit. if you go into battle with that unit, then you are off the strat map on another server while you do your battle thing, but the rest of the world carries on as usual. you dont have to worry about another battle with one of the other units in your faction because you are not DIRECTLY being that unit. it's more of an overall first person view of the entire game. read it again. i think it'll make sense.

shreden,
in a way, you are roleplaying. you can only ever BE one person in the game. you dont jump around and take control of every unit in the game, or every army, so you are roleplaying your one unit. and before you jump into the game map directly, you would already pick your faction and whatever available unit type you wished to command from a pre-entry map and interface type thing. what you did once you entered the campaign would be up to you as well. and yes, i included the concept of ranks and moving up in rank and power and influence. you might even start out as a single agent, an emissary or an assassin or spy and graduate to being a general and then a governor and perhaps even the king. yes, that's all included in my game. and to me is one of the great pluses of such a system. it also makes it possible to make a single campaign continuous, with folks coming and going from the same campaign and yet still manage to keep a certain coherency to the thing.

in addition to all this, one could also have smaller 'worlds' to play within. imagine making something like england the entire camapaign map and having it divided up into counties or shires or whatever the system is there. one could play as the king of england while another is playing as robin hood or something. and shreden's idea of zones of control is one i've also wanted to see in games as well. you capture pixel by pixel and own it rather than whole provinces at a time. the borders are fluid and ever changing and in a massive multiplayer world, you could even get down to the level of owning/controlling individual estates and so on. your income is then based on taxing individual estates rather than whole provinces or regions, but this is trickier to effect because of disputes and moving armies and so forth. i'll look into that system some more.

K.

[sbreden]

Quote[/b] ]
A Factions' King might attempt to entice a new player (this could work on an existing player as well), by offering him, Land(s), Title(s), and/or Florins.

Exampling how this might work, a player enters a "room" where he chooses a Campaign, upon his choice the player then is able to view the Strat Map and his potential Provinces, etc., but he is in a "Wait" state. At this point All Factions and their members are advised that there is a Player entering the game. Faction Kings and members can then view the new player's potential provinces, resources and whatever else he may bring to the table. Factions may then decide to vie for the new player or not. Those that choose to do so, may make offers to the new player to entice him to "Ally" with that Faction. The new player then enters the Campaign either as a New Faction with just his 2 Provinces and 10 Resources; or he Allies with a Faction, in which case the New Player enters with his 2 Provinces, 10 Resources and whatever the accepted "offer" consists of. Of course some rules will have to instilled to govern, this "bidding" process, but it should NOT take much time. In any event, the Campaign continues and does not stop while the "bidding" and/or negotiations take place. The New Player will be obligated for the duration of his Alliance to pay a portion of his income to the King and ONLY to the King (as do all Allies/Vassal). Probably the New Player would enter as a "Vassal" as opposed to an Ally.

I think there's great benefit to this, as a player has the option of Allying or being Independent, but Consequences exist for each choice. Considering that a New Player might be entering a Campaign that might be well progressed, he might have little chance at success entering with ONLY 2 Provinces and 10 resources. If its a fairly young campaign a new player might choose to chance it and go it alone.

Of course, Vassals want to be King, so when a Vassal grows strong enough, he might attack the King and take his crown and kingdom. He might make alliances with other Vassals and/or Factions and turn on the King, etc. I think you get the "intrigue" drift. MUCH FUN

I really like this idea, Toranaga. The concept of enticing the new player with options right off the bat will allow him to jump into the game and open diplomatic lines with the existing players. In many many online games the noob might feel a bit isolated from the current universe around him. The new player's "liege" might even "show the player the ropes". As long as this process does not interfere to much with the game action, this could be a great feature. Obviously, it might be prudent to limit the number of players per campaign game to a reasonable number to allow this to work.

It seems from reading these posts that a universal concept of focusing the scope of what the player actually controls as the key to ensuring the fluidity that has ben brought up. I like that a player would control initially a small area. I would like it even more if they controlled a relatively small unit of men. Perhaps when some sort of diplomatic sessions were opened the players in the "room" would be able to click on the players name and his holding and the number and types of his men would be displayed. It could read for example: Sir Toranaga

holdings: Aquitane,
Brittany
avail. forces: 120 spearmen
60 crossbowmen
60 hobilars

Obviously this could be as descriptive as the developers wanted it to be. It could be more descriptive if you are checking the "stats" of an ally or countrymen. Additionally, the players could earn vices and virtues as they progressed similar to the way that perks or skills are learned in rpgs. These would (as in sp) have a directy impact on troops in battle and maybe in diplomatic relations.

The ultimate in fluidity could be achieved by only contolling men and armies but not necessarily lands. This is debatable. You could log off at anytime and comeback later with your forces. The resources available to you may have changed however. It is because these resources would be determined by the ebb and flow of the various factions and the players that remained online while you were enjoying a conjugal or whatever. This set up could easily support a persistant universe.

[Dionysus9]

I had a thought the other night that really got me excited:

With the real-time movement of armies, you would have a lot more tactical opportunities than just StratMap or BattleMap. If you could zoom in and out of the strat map to different degrees and change the rout of your army (if you were in it, of course, commanding) then it would make for a level of strategy-tactics between the battlemap and stratmap. A level of maneuvering that existed in medieval warfare, but is not represented in MTW. In this way the defender could have more opportunities to select appropriate terrain, and the attacker would have more ability to flank-- All before moving to the battlemap (when the armies got geographically close enough).

Imagine a view of the mediteranean from space. Cant see much, but zoom in. Now the boot-heel of italy is clear...zoom in. Now you can see mountains and forests....zoom in...some roads...zoom in... an enemy army marching to Naples My army is just over the other side of that hill...if the enemy has no no scouts they haven't seen me yet Hmmm...I'll just take this little back-road and setup an ambush along their expected route....heheheh...

*meanwhile*

enemy army does have scouts and they know my position. They see me making the move to ambush and pretend not to notice....meanwhile they send a fast rider to their other army (that I dont know about because I dont have enough scouts or spies in the right positions) and tell that army to flank the ambush hill...

*later*

the enemy army comes marching down the road pretending not to notice anything. When they get in "battlemap" range I can click a button to move to the battlemap. But I want to wait until they are under my nose before I spring the attack...I wait...I wait....and when they get close enough for to spring the ambush I go to click "move to battlemap" but just before I can click, the enemy clicks it first. We all get moved to the battlemap (uh oh, they know&#33http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/wink.gif. What, whats this? 2 enemy armies? Oh no they flanked me Gah Call for reinforcements. "sorry sir, reinforcements are 10 ticks away" NOoooooo I've been had

-------

Ok, another idea:

Specialization: Some players could specialize in being generals. They would be in charge of an army and given command by the province leader or King. Armies could have several leaders (general, 2nd in command, 3rd in command, etc.) if only one leader was online when the army engaged, he would command. If two leaders were online, they could split the army into battle groups (like most armies). Meanwhile, you have the provincial (titled) leader back at the home front making economic decisions and issuing movement orders to armies (which may or may not be received [messenger gets killed by enemy spy/scout] and may or not be followed [general decides to go south instead of north). The orders would take awhile to get out to the army, and the reply would have to be sent by messenger back to the provincial leader.

If you want to talk about role-playing opportunities, this is IT. You ARE the General of the 5th Italian regiment. You have been ordered to take Naples from the Sicilians, but the money you spent on good scouts has paid off and you realize that you can vanquish the bulk of the enemy if you turn east (avoiding Naples but possibly winning the entire war)....you send a messenger back to the Duke asking him to bring the 4th regiment to your aid. Unfortunately and unbeknownst to you the 4th regiment leader is in league with the sicilians and alerts them to your plan....they are already closing in on your position...

heheh talk about addiction this could be a serious problem if it ever gets made into a game.

[Kraellin]

ok, to make this

Quote[/b] ]this would kick you to campaign game server and into a setup area from where you pick which faction you wish to join and can see a more or less current campaign map displayed. upon picking your faction you would then join the game in progress in whatever capacity was available. it would have to be an available army for that faction (though i suppose you could give players control of agents also...might be fun to play an assassin ). you are then taken to the game proper and given control of your army (or armies, if that's the case). a little more clear, when you enter the pre-game room, you would be able to see the various factions, rebels, armies and so forth in the game, or at least a list of available units and who owned them (the faction). these would be the ONLY units you could apply to take over. if it's a rebel army you dont need anyone's permission to join, you simply pick that unit/army and claim it and join the game AS it and whatever it owns. if you are wishing to join within a faction that is already controlled, you would need to send a message to that faction's current controlling player/ai and receive permission to join that faction. this would keep moles from disrupting a game too much. 'heirs' and who is currently in control of the faction is much the same as any military system; whoever is the current highest rank on the board takes command. if that person leaves then the next highest is in charge until someone higher shows up. presumably this game is going to run 24/7 so you'd need a smooth way to let others control things while the king (or whomever is away).

the way to keep score in the game doesnt need to be a points system. you simply use ranks, dread, valor, titles, v&v's and so on that the game already uses. if you die, you are dead and start over. well, that's one way to do it, anyways. if you didnt want to be quite so severe you could simply penalize some of those stats and start over. it shld be possible to carry at least some of the stats over to a new campaign. this adds to the roleplay value someone else already mentioned. and yes, this does give vets a bit of an advantage, but then they did earn it. so, that's another way.

i prefer using a fixed land-sea mass as the map. altering the land on a constant basis is going to cause many troubles and is really quite arbitrary. it also tends to prevent trade routes and proper shipping.

the statement that this isnt a 'clan game' is a bit contradictory to the later statement that you are enticing others to join your faction. a clan is simply a group of folks working together for a common goal or purpose. whether you have a formal clan outside the game or not is irrelevant. you are playing within a clan/faction. and no, it isnt necessary to have to join a formal clan in order to participate within a campaign as part of the game. my point there was that this would emphasize this aspect because the game would now be emphasizing it. one could still apply to join a faction and not be a formal clan member of the controlling members of that faction. or, if such were available, one could take over a faction that is only being controlled by the ai and had no human players within it.

the other thing here about joining a current faction, is that, perhaps that player in control doesnt want to have others joining his faction at all. that's his/her choice. they could deny any other real players from joining their faction and just run everything themselves. but, they then run the risk of when they are away that the ai is the only thing controlling their faction for them. and since the concept is you can only DIRECTLY control one unit/army yourself, the ai is going to be fighting ALL of your other battles for you.

it's a simple enough system and has a multitude of options. i believe it's workable.

K.

[GilJaysmith]

Quote[/b] (ToranagaSama @ Nov. 14 2002,09:37)]That email address doesn't work
multiplayercampaign@hotmail.com should work - I just checked the inbox, anyway :)

But some people have had problems mailing our Hotmail addresses, so Hotmail may have some occasional problems...

In the meantime I'm reading this thread...

Gil ~ CA

[cromwell]

I've read this thread and like what I hear so far, let me add to it.
I have a couple of ideas how this could be done. Of course the details are missing, just general ideas.

1. Web based for the strat map, similiar to the campaigns that have run in the past. Using activeX imbedded in the web page to launch the game straight to the map with the appropriate army's. This would require help from Gil and boys. We could do this right now but the party's involved would have to boot up MTW, login, host a game, finish it and come back to the web page.

As I sit here and write this I've come to the conclusion that If we did this without the developers help it will be a jagged transition from the strat map to the battle map. Similiar to what I said above. Even if we reproduce the complete stat map with all it's details, you still have to log onto GS and all that.



crom

[Kraellin]

hmmm, dionysus' last post got me thinking again (nice post, btw...yer getting the jist of it quite nicely :) if a player, while playing is being a certain unit commander in charge of a given army, what happens to that army when he logs out? in my first post on this matter i had assumed that that army remains his/hers whether the real player was logged into the game or not. if he's logged out it would simply be taken over temporarily by the ai, but would respond to commands by a superior ranking player. the ranking player isnt BEING that unit or army, but simply remotely issuing orders to it. that is a workable way to do it.

however, it could also be done that if you log out of a game, whatever you were controlling is now up for grabs by other players to run. i dont like this as much, but it is another way to go, especially as you start gaining rank and controlling more and more stuff under your command.

i had also envisioned having scouts, as dionysus has mentioned, and messengers, but one of the problems in games like these is that when you impose time delay features for things like the passing of information back and forth between units in the field and kings at home, you have players who are talking in real time on roger wilco and so forth, so the fog of war and time delays break down somewhat and become irrelevant. if i'm a general in the field with an army and scout out another army camped several miles away and my general orders do not allow for how to handle this other army and i therefore send a messenger back home for new orders, which take a 'week' of time delay, i've prolly already talked to king in real time through icq, aim, msn messenger, roger wilco, or some other instant messaging system, maybe even one within the game. so, the message delay becomes somewhat pointless. still, if it could be done, i think it would add something special to a game like this.

emissaries and spies also run into this message delay/fog of war thing in carrying out their duties. an emissary is given a task of bribing a certain rebel army over to your side. his orders might to bribe might include a certain amount of leeway in what he can spend as the maximum amount of money to bribe this army. however, on actually arriving at the rebel's camp he finds that the rebel army has doubled its size and territory since the original mission orders were given. he might open a discussion with the rebel army leader, but he knows he doesnt now have enough florins for the job. the conditions have changed. using the message delay system, he sends word back to his governor or king and notifies the leader of the change and requests new orders. meanwhile, another faction's emissary has arrived and is also attempting to sway the rebel army over to their camp, but this emissary is using roger wilco running in the background. he also finds he hasnt enough florins to effect a bribe, but can talk to his leader instantly and is given the ok for the extra florins....not good. one possible solution to this is that the emissary carries with him the amount of florins necessary for the bribe so that regardless of roger wilco, the 2nd competing emissary would still have to wait for the florins to arrive before he could make his bribe. this would also make for interesting possibilities in that maybe the rebel leader simply kills both emissaries and takes the gold from both, or that a given emissary is robbed and killed on the road or that the emissary waiting for the extra bribe money to arrive never receives it because the messenger carrying the extra florins gets robbed and killed.

now, switching tracks here a bit, i've been postulating all this based on the one man is one unit approach, which solves a lot of the timing problems an mp campaign brings. however, it might be possible to swap this around with a real time strat map. with a real time strat map with armies and emissaries moving around hither and yon on a timed basis, it could possibly be done that you go back to the way the current strat game works for battles in that one person could flop around and fight all the battles personally in real time himself, jumping from battle to battle in different areas of the map and NOT being himself just one unit. conceivably not too many armies and so forth are all going arrive at a battle point all at the same exact time, so you just fight each one as it occurs on the strat map and perhaps even if a number do all come due to fight you simply suspend time on the strat map while each of these is resolved or, you add timers to each of the tactical battles to keep things short and not delay too much the action on the strat map. i still find quite a bit more problematic and dont prefer this method, but it might be possible to make it work. and you could still have all the other intrigue in the game. but, there would have to be times when things just more or less stopped on the strat map, so i dont like this method nearly as much. the plus is that folks that want to fight every battle themselves, can. not sure that's a good thing, however, or very realistic.

one other important issue is how do you issue orders. you are a king sitting in your castle and you've got reports and money coming in and must issue orders and money for certain things. so, how is this done and what about the fog of war for individual players within a given faction, where some are over here and some over there and surely the king is getting information regularly about what's going on but the individual armies wouldnt necessarily be getting all this same information so why would their fog of war be the same as the king's or another generals who is six provinces away? it most likely wouldnt. if the idea of time delayed messenging could be implemented and that florins actually pass from hand to hand via messengers and couriers and orders must also be issued via couriers, this adds an incredibly hot aspect to the game. it allows for some bold tactics, surprises, mystery and un-predictability to things that would definitely spice things up. spies, scouts, emissaries and agents of all sorts become incredibly important. you've just committed your reserves to a certain campaign you've been undertaking and suddenly you find out another faction has been marching towards your homelands. you issue new orders to have the reserves turn around, but they're already a week out and it will take longer than that to get them back because the messenger has to get to the army and the army has to come back.

now, if this were a massive multiplayer game on dedicated servers with a massive map running all the time and on a pay per basis, you could actually show all these messengers running around. they wouldnt need to be real players, the ai could handle this, but they could be waylaid or evade such and move around in real time. for our purposes, i think you have to conceptualize these messengers. otherwise it's just going to get too messy on the strat map. but, you can leave in the delays

now, one of the complaints in the current single player game was the amount of buildings that got destroyed in an attack on a province. you never quite knew if the attacker was destroying these or the defender to try to keep these out of the hands of a conquering enemy. i believe in a good, real time strat game, the option would exist for each side to decide and attempt to destroy these things or not or to even protect them from being destroyed or not. again, time delays might apply here to either side and might also be based on things like province loyalty, how many men you have at your disposal to do this and still fight off an enemy and so on. rules would need to be worked out. you might only be able to knock out a few or none at all based on your garrison size or attacking force size. perhaps you issue orders to one unit of your army to 'destroy everything in sight'. they get detached from your main force and go to do the job. they may or may not encounter resistance from the oppposing side, who may or may not have detached his own units to 'protect everything in sight'. so, you might actually have sub-battles going on to determine a provinces final outcome.

castles suddenly take on an enormous importance in the game. and this may be the trickiest of all the features of the game to handle. the basic game options are assault, defend the castle from the outside, defend from the inside, garrison, lay siege, retreat from the castle and abandon the province, reinforce, sally out from the castle and attack the attacker and so on. each of these actions may or may not require one to be on the tactical map and that's why it gets to be quite tricky to manage.

let's say you have an attacker who is attacking a castle that can hold 240 men. the attacker has brought an army of 1000 men into the province. you have 500 men stationed there, but obviously not all are within the castle. ok, the game already accounts for this in real battles by allowing you to station some men within the castle and bring others on as re-inforcements from outside the castle. it does this quite nicely. so, let's say you fight this initial battle on the strat map and the defender loses most or all of his men that are outside the castle but retains most of his men that are within the castle. the attacker has lost 400 of his men so it's down to roughly 240 men in the castle and 600 men attacking. so, how, if the attacker wants to now siege the castle rather than assault it, do you determine when to go from the tactical map back to the strat map. you're not going to want to sit there on the tactical map for a long term siege. this would be up to the attacker mostly. if there are no defenders left outside the castle the attacker would now get a button to allow him to 'lay siege'. this would return everyone to the strat map and the wait/siege begins. if the defender wishes to sally or abandon the castle and thus the province the defender would have this option and everything returns to the tactical map for this action. if the defender gets re-inforcements into the province there are a couple of ways to do this. you might require that the re-inforcements must still make it to the castle on the strat map and not just make it into the province. or, you might just initiate a new tactical battle the instant they arrive in the province, placing everyone back on the tactical map in the attempt to lift the siege. likewise, the attacker may get re-inforcements, but he doesnt necessarily have to initiate an assault. if he chooses to, then it's everyone back onto the tactical and play out the assault. it also wouldnt matter if these re-inforcements are real players or not.

now, in the above example, if you did make it so that an arriving army into the province isnt instantly 'at the castle' and must travel within the province to get to the castle, you might get situations where the attacker breaks off part or all of his army away from the castle and attacks the re-inforcing army, but this wouldnt take place on the castle map, but it would allow the defender within the castle to sally out and follow the attacker. thus, the need for new armies to arrive on a tactical map AFTER the battle has already been joined there, must be allowed. so, like i said, this is a bit tricky.

alright, enough for now....

K.

[Lord Toranoga]

It's good to see C.A. interested in this thread.

[Dionysus9]

I'm really happy CA is listening. I think they've got an incredible opportunity to make the best game of all time (not just the best game yet, like MTW). The big difference between Total War and all other games is that it has the feeling of being built "from the ground up." In Civilazation, for example, you never see a tactical view of the military encounters--its all strategic (i.e. built from top down stopping short at tactical level). In AOE you see what could be a tactical view, but there are no real tactics involved in combat (some fast clicking, yes, but military tactics no--built from top down, stopping short at tactical level). There aren't any games out there that present the full range of military conflict that Total War does (or is approaching)-- unit level tactical engagement through strategic theatre of operations level decisionmaking. Total War really does approximate a total view/simulation of war, from the tactical level all the way up to the strategic level. So how can we capitalize on this inherent advantage that Total War has?

I think the time-delay of messages and orders is important to any non-arcade attempt to emulate (simulate is too strong a word) actual tactical/strategic command decisionmaking. Krae raises a really good point about roger-wilco (or calling on the phone for that matter). The easy "cheat" is a hurdle, but I'm sure we can overcome it. If we can come up with a time-delay system the level of intrigue and the importance of each decision (however minor) increases dramatically.

Another thing that increases intrigue dramatically is the fog-of-war + time-delay of messages. "Quick, send our fastest rider to the King with the message." King never gets the message. What happened to the rider? Bandits? Assassination? Treason? Most likely the King will never know what happened to the messenger. General says "I sent the message" King is not so sure....

heheh, boy it could get UGLY

I love it.

Real-distance = Real-time: If you are going to have a real-time system, you have to make sure there is a real-distance system too--otherwise the internal logic of the game wont hold up. If attackers can just "appear" at the castle because they crossed the border into Aquitaine, then the whole system seems screwy. I think the attacker has to move his troops within x distance of the castle before they can take part in the comabat (i.e. appear on a tactical map). There should be a threshold for when you can move to the tactical map (2 miles?)--but its not automatic. If two armies want to come within .5 mile of eachother and not fight, then they shouldn't be forced to the tactical map.

Time delay of messages, actual messengers who can be attacked by scouts/small units, and real-distance/real-time, must be part of the game, in my opinion. Otherwise we are losing the "ground up" feel. The game will become just another "top view" game like AOE or Civ. We need actual people moving around on the ground, doing the bidding of their King (or trying to betray him). This is where Total War excels, and I'd hate to see this special feature lost in subsequent releases.

If the time-delay issue is impossible to perfect, we can move the time-period to WWII, so we have radio communications and whatnot. This is not very acceptable, but its a last ditch solution.

I have to work, but will talk later.

[AMPage]

Keep the ideas coming guys. I enjoy reading this and hope to see a multiplayer campaign in the near future. This is something I had always wanted ever since stw. You guys blow away my scale of ideas that i've been thinking of. So don't stop and keep them coming. http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/cool.gif

[Dionysus9]

He Speaks Wow, you know its interesting when Amp uses one of his 17 posts to say so

[Dionysus9]

Since this has largely become a stream of consciousness type thread, I thought I'd post another thought or two before I forgot them (or they were fully developed)...

There are a ton of options for handling player Identities within a Realtime/Realdistance realm where you allow players to assume multiple command functions first.

(1) Single-Player Style-- One player, one king, one faction. The player fights every battle and therefore if it is a a real-time system we have the problem of having to let the AI fight simultaneous battles--or having some players wait around for their battle (this happens in a turn-based system too&#33http://www.totalwar.org/forum/non-cgi/emoticons/wink.gif. You could run the faction all by yourself and wouldn't need any other players. AI would take over when you werent online.

(2) New Multiplayer Style (think of something snappy)--

I am assuming that every command level position is up for grabs to players and that command positions are handled quite differently than in present MTW. In SP, one player controls every command level and position. In this new proposed system, you would have to assume the role of Sir Gregor of York if you wanted to command his troops in battle. If someone else was already Sir Gregor, you would have to find something else to do in the realm (i.e. assume another identity and make his command decisions). The problem with this system is that you probably have far too many players than you have important command positions. At any given time a good number of generals will be sitting in a garrison somewhere. Maybe 5 or 6 battles per turn are occurring, max. If you hav 10 faction members online, what are they all going to do? (one option is to increase army sizes and make players division/squad commanders). Anyway, a few options of how to handle this type of system:

A) Limited Single: Players are limited to one character--general, king, duke, etc. The drawback is people would probably get bored quickly. Imagine yourself as the gluttonous duke of some backwater province--forever stationed in charge of the peasant garrison. Gah. If nothing is going on in your neck of the woods you'd lose interest quick. You are helplessly linked to this character and if he dies so do you. Character building would be a main theme of this type of system. Of course you can restart as another character at anytime. You would need a network of players to keep the faction running.

B) Limited Multiple: Players are limited to x number of characters (maybe link this to $$$ pay-per-play or something). This would be a character building theme too. You can abandon a character (to the AI or another player) if you get bored of him, and start over with a new identity. This offers players some flexibility while still maintaining a role-playing feel and keeping complexity under control. You would still need a network of players to keep the faction running, but wouldnt need so many.

C) Unlimited Multiple Identities: This could work several ways. I envision a list of every command level position available, from king down to squad commander (4 units?). The faction Leader (however he is chosen [first come first served?]) would be able to open positions to different players (maybe this could be done with a ranking system, or just feudal titles). Maybe there can only be one king, or maybe the king can open his position to other (specified) players when he is not online. Anyway, players of the faction could jump around to any open position which they were authorized to assume. If using a ranking system, the higher rank could force a lower rank player to relinquish command (e.g. important battle w/newb player in command). So, if the faction had enough players you could have someone (or lots of people) online all the time to perform most command functions. As discussed above, you would probably have more players than meaningful command positions...some solutions I can think of, but this is getting long.

More later

[Kraellin]

hehe, i see i got ya thinkin, dionysus ;)

thanks amp, i'm really a game designer that works for blizzard and cant stand starcraft and am just jealous of mtw ;)

dionysus,
step back a bit and look at what we've got. there are how many factions in the game that are currently playable, 16 or so? and there are how many provinces in a game as it stands now, 40, 50, 60? i never bothered to count, but this allows folks quite a bit to do if for every faction you have a king (leader) and real players as all the different governors. one campaign could encompass nearly all the players we normally get online now and all could be building and running what they build. remember, a governor is producing units. he would be in control of those units, including any agents.

now, i could easily see that if folks needed permission to join a given faction, that this permission could be granted on several levels. it could be done by the king, or by the governors. i suppose that would be one of the kingly options, to allow governors to add new players to his province or not.

you did get me thinking about ranks as well and control with your last post. i would think that since we are using a rank system, and issuing orders from various levels of ranks, that if a person were not there in the game right then, that a higher rank could issue orders to the missing player's units and have them respond to these orders. the missing person might even be able to set parameters for how his units and province are controlled while he is away. i say this for while he is away, because folks arent going to like being the governor if all they do is sit there and give a few building commands but all the units they produce are being controlled by someone else.

you also have in the game a few other titles which are not governors or generalships or kings. what's that one in england? it's more of a regional title rather than a provincial one. this could even be extended to make more titles, like duke, marquis, lord, whatever and each of these might be in charge of several governors or other lords. it's a feudal system, so it's ranks by pyramid and all orders normally filter down through the pyramid to their ultimate destination. this would be fairly easy to do.

i do see one possible problem with being a governor. the king or regional ranking fellow might well require you to support his army with units. that means that units are not going to the governor's own army and this means that he might indeed be sitting there twiddling his thumbs and missing out on all the action.

there is a way to control this, however; in fact, prolly several ways, but one is simply limiting the number of players in any given game. or perhaps by allowing only new players to a faction that can afford to have another 'active' role. this might occur when your faction has captured more territory and needs some new titled folks to run things.

another way might be to simply allow roles to be swapped when a player leaves. someone else who has signed on to play in that campaign and within that faction might then simply pick up the mantle and carry on. this is not quite as satisfying to me, as i tend to like my orders and my causations to be carried out by myself and not someone else who might see things quite differently. but, it would work.

the simplest way is to let a governor control what he builds. in this respect he's actually being more than a governor, but it keeps it more interesting for individuals. but, the 'king' does also need his own armies, so where does he get them from? this might require some special features, or, the king simply takes the best province for himself and runs it, thus, producing his own units and personal agents.

and, if you look back in my posts, you'll see that i also mentioned another way of doing the campaigns, and that was to allow a player to host it, with the saved game feature. the player host could then put his own parameters on the game by limiting things like how many players and so forth. there's really no reason that if 4 friends wanted to played a closed campaign that they shldnt be able to. thus, the whole rank and who's controlling what and how just simmply doesnt exist.

as a start, CA might simply say, 1 player per faction, and that also ends all of this; this assuming that this will ever get off the ground to begin with :)

it shld also be possible for a single player to start a campaign all by himself. he simply picks a faction and goes ahead and starts. since the capability for joining a game in progress exists, this makes no difference whatsoever.

this is also assuming that any of this even makes any sense to CA. perhaps they like toranaga's system better. he's got some good stuff in there, and whereas i kind of poo-poo'ed his expanding world idea, it could work and could be quite fun and playable. (sorry, toranago, i did kind of step on your thread and toes back there...i didnt mean to drive you off)

at any rate, it's an interesting exercise, if nothing else.

K.

(btw, i dont really work for blizzard, but i do hate starcraft ;)

[phobos010]

This is posted in haste, so forgive any misunderstandings or mistakes

I do not believe a feudal system will be accepted by the majority of players. No one wants to be the on the bottem of the totem pole. Players like to have control, not take orders. Therefore, if I take Kraellin correctly, each player under the king doesn't make any decision on the strat map, only having an effect in the tactical battle. So, as I take Kraellin to mean, the individual players who take part in the battles do not disrupt the strat map because those players have no direct effect on the strat map. The only effect these players have is the result of the battle in which these players take place. I do not believe the majority of players would accept this. I still believe the main issue facing a Total War multi-player is the combination of the strat map and the tactical battles.

[Dionysus9]

phobos,

That is one possibility but I think you misunderstand. Under the system we were just talking about each player would probably control a province and all the units produced from that province. I tend to agree, though, that many players would not like the idea of playing under a rigid hierarchy (actually, put that way it sounds like a pain to me). But, hopefully, such players could just start a faction of their own. They could run it all by themselves or delegate duties to others.

Krae,

In feudal times the king got many of his troops from his landed governors. The governors were "seised" (they had seisen) in the land of the King. Seisen consists of a right to possession plus the obligation to perform incidences of feudal tenure (various feudal duties). One of the feudal duties of a landed governor was to provide x% of the produce of his lands (pay tax) and to maintain a certain number of men-at-arms who could be called to the kings service. These duties were part of the obligations owed to the king in exchange for having possession of the land. Incidentally, these arrangements are the foundation of western law and the justice system.

Soooo....in our little game, the king could set a # (or a percentage of units) per province of troops that would be controlled by the king. This would make some sense in historical terms and would mesh nicely with the "feudal" theme.

I also like the idea of limiting another's control of your troops to certain parameters. I'm afraid that most people would keep a tight leash on their troops--for their own reasons, which kind of makes this method less useful unless you implicity trust your factionplayers (suggests clans might use it).

All in all, I dont think CA is going to stray too far from the current one-player/one-faction format. They are saying CMP is a pipe dream, and we are talking about some fairly abstract concepts and game elements. Compared to our ideas, a standard campaign mutliplayer based on the familiar single player format would be a breeze.

So, lets see. We had to go "real time" to get away from the delay caused by multiple battles by a single faction. Everyone has got to sit around and wait for some over-aggressive expansionist to fight his 25 battles. Thats not much fun.

But with real-time come all sorts of complex issues (as we've been discussing). I don't think we can convince CA to go real-time on the strategy map--its just too darn complex compared to what we presently have and even compared to what the say is beyond hope (campaign multi).

So we are still up against a fairly significant barrier-- how do we keep the game running fast and smooth, with one player per faction? THIS IS THE FUNDAMENTAL PROBLEM I THINK.

The AI could resolve all but one battle per turn? That would work, but isnt all that appealing.

The only other thing that is coming to mind is to have something for the non-combatants to do (other than wait for the others' battles to finish, or possibly watch the battles [fog of war is a problem]).

Its a tough problem and I can see why CA would spend only so much time working at it before they moved on to easier to realize goals.

Anyone got any ideas?

[ToranagaSama]

Toranaga has not had time to review any new comments.

I'm going to be away for a couple weeks, so keep the ideas flowing.

later

[Kraellin]

dionysus,

ok, i suspect you're right about getting a bit too complex here for a C-MP. let's jump back a bit and set some parameters to work with. let's say there's 16 playable factions and let's say 1 player per faction possible, so 16 players max in any given game. everyone IS the king of their faction and there are no separate governors or other titled players, just the 16 possible.

the biggest problem i see with a straight porting of single player campaign to multiplayer is the timing of tactical battles. nobody indeed wants to sit around and wait while 20 real time battles get resolved, especially if you're not involved in any of them. the two solutions to this are: 1.) real time strat map, and 2.) one real player can only directly play as one unit.

now, if we eliminate the real time aspect from the strat map we can still make the game work with the one is one concept. if a real player is only represented in the game as one 'king' who can only directly control one unit (or even just one man if everyone else in the unit has died), then it's still a simple matter.

in the current single player game you have X number of armies. each time that army goes into battle you have the option of playing this battle yourself. in my system, you wouldnt. you could only directly play the battles that your 'king' unit was directly involved with. ALL other battles are either auto-resolved (if it's AI against AI), or are resolved without you being there (AI against another real player). this eliminates the having to wait to fight each battle aspect. it's really quite simple. you dont even need a simulated real time strat map for this, so no extra coding for all of that.

so, even if the game stays as a turn based game you would still have the 'resolution phase' of the game in which all battle resolutions are determined. since you are only one person and only directly control one unit/army and so is everyone else in the game, there might still be some waiting involved while a particular battle was resolved, but there wouldnt be 20 battles that each player had to resolve personally by being in them. and, this is where a battle timer might actually make sense now. if you limit every battle to X amount of time with a battle timer, then everyone knows just how long the possible wait may be and since they are already sitting on the strat map while the other battles are going on, they can be devising their next moves and making their building and agent moves and so on. this method would be a bit slower than a real time strat map method, but it would remove that one serious barrier to the mp camp game, or at least reduce it considerably.

the only other method of reducing this problem of having to resolve all these battles is to simply auto-calc all battles. poof done. move on to the next turn. that's the absolute simplest method, but many of the mp crowd wont like that because that IS one of the strong points of the TW series, but, if you get rid of the 'i am every general in my army' aspect, this is actually more realistic and makes for easier mechanics in the game, and allows those that enjoy the real time battles a chance to lead their men into battle by simply having their personal army always going into battle. simple.

now, what happens when you do something like these easier rules of playing is that you still have the problem of real world conflicts and players coming and going and the real world problems of players dropping and going out of sync. and the very real world problem of us all living in different time zones and so forth. so, how do you handle this. there are two basic approaches here; you can just have the game auto-save every time someone has to leave and the game then ends and must be restarted with everyone who was playing all link up again before anything can happen, or, you can allow the ai to take over for any missing players and then allow that same player to rejoin and take over again from the ai. there are many variations that can be done on this, but those are the two basic methods.

the ai in the current expert mode of the single player is now sufficiently competent that you could allow a game to run continously on a multi server and allow players to come and go. if i'm playing this way i also only want me to be able to play MY faction. if i leave and let the ai take over for me and i come back a few hours later or even the next day or a week later, i dont want someone else playing my faction and i want to pick it back up wherever it currently is in the game. and that brings its own set of new problems.

if a server with a game going is running 24/7 and no one is playing it, everyone has abandoned that game, what then? does the game just keep going forever until one ai faction wins? lol. that would be kind of silly. so, you'd also need some rules for that; something like, 'no real player has logged in to play this game in X amount of time....kill process'.

the other way to do it is to simply have saved games and a host who controls when the game is up or not. if the host leaves the game is saved again and everyone is booted out until the original host puts the thing back up again. in this wise, a player might actually be involved in multiple campaigns. joe comes in and re-hosts the game and you play until joe has to leave, so you go join bill's game until bill has to leave, then join sue's and so on and so forth. sure, at times there might be several games up where you've joined and you could only play in one at a time (unless you're using multiple computers and internet connections), but at least the ai is running things for you in those other games until you can get back to it.

so, i've proposed several different methods in all of these posts to make this thing work. for those that are totally confused now, hehe, it's the way i think and all i can offer you is my condolences in trying to understand what i've put forth :)

K.

[Dionysus9]

I think that is the best solution Krae-- allow the player to command battles only with his king. Only in important circumstances would the player risk his king against another human oponent, and therefore, most battles would be automatically resolved. But, if you want to go out and rampage with him (risking everything), you could command a battle every turn. This sure would streamline things for CMP--very workable.

W/respect to the problem of numerous drops....we are torn between the fluid/continuing game and the alternative, a segmented/save-game format (where the game stops everytime someone leaves). This is a bit of a problem too. If we can crack this one, I think we've overcome most of the barriers to making CMP theoretically workable.

Gamespy and CA are not going to want to pay for a server going for 24 hours to continue an 8 player game when nobody (or only one) person is playing--and why should they? It's reverted to SP by that point. Therefore, when below 1v1, you've gotta stop the game--save it at least. At the other end of the spectrum--where every drop results in a stoppage of play and a saved game--players could face extreme frustration. Imagine you play a 20 hour CMP game over three days, then due to "life issues" one player disappears off the face of the earth. So most players will want the game to continue until all (or at least a majority) of players agree its time to call it quits for the night.

Maybe it makes the most sense to make it an option for the host to select before the game starts. "auto-save on drop, all players must be present to resume"; "auto-save on drop, players may continue until agree to stop;"play continues on drop, dropped players may rejoin any time."

I dont know... the two extremes -- 1) always save, all players must be present to resum; 2) continue ad infinitum with AI control of factions-- are both unappealing.





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