How would a Real Time Tactical game on a 1:1 scale play?

[Duke John]

1:1 meaning that each soldier ingame represents 1 actual soldier (as opposed to 1:10 or smaller by most RTT games).

S:TW, M:TW, R:TW and Imperial Glory are all RTT games that feature hundreds or even a couple of thousand soldiers. That seems impressive but most of the famous battles were between armies several thousands strong and some even ten thousands. While playing said games I can't help wondering why the tactics that I use very rarely resemble the ones used in the historical battles. Red Harvest once pointed out that since the lines aren't as wide as they were in real life it becomes more easy to flank an opponent. If you tried playing a 5000 vs 5000 battle with R:TW you would start to notice that the flanks become less important and you will become more concerned with wether a hole doesn't appear in the middle of your line. Since you cannot quickly collapse the enemy line because of it's length reserves become more valuable as those holes need to be plugged. And having that said the game suddenly becomes more like the battles you read about.

CA and Pyro, or for that matter almost every developer, value getting up close higher than having the scale right. Both 1:1 scale and zooming right into the battle is with the current hardware not yet possible. However since I do like to play a 1:1 game I am currently developing my own medieval game engine which does have that feature. Now I would like to ask you what influence a 1:1 scale would have on the gameplay. Would certain tactics become obsolete? Would it introduce new tactics? Controlling fifty 100-men units would be a nightmare so do you an idea how to make controlling them easier?

Cheers,
Duke John

[Just A Girl]

well on a 1:1 scale on a 16 inch monitor....
You would see a foot of 1 unit.

The display area is no where near capable of displaying 1:1 ratio humans.

So the influence it would have would be to make the game un playable.

You just cant squeese 6 feet in to 16 inches...

Unless of course you use a smaller ratio...
1:10 would mean 72inches now become 7.2 inches.
And you can then squeese the little man in to your screen.

Or are you talking about the ratio of men per unit?

I always play with the largest unit size.
People wont play STW mp like that though (cos "it affects flanking")
Personally i like Large units so id be happy if thats what you mean

[Geoffrey S]

It'd be nice, but entirely unfeasible with the usual RTS controls, or those of the TW series for that matter. If such a scale were to be achieved there'd have to be some kind of ordering system akin to what can be found in games such as Spartan or Legion Arena, where control is for the largest part indirect: armies would be set up before the battle, whilst each unit gets orders (for instance to wait until another specific unit moves, then to march forward) before the battle, and any further orders after the planning phase take longer to be followed depending on the distance of the general and some kind of 'command points' meter. More complex orders in the middle of a battle, or orders requiring more discipline (such as ordering cavalry to flank the enemy or ordering a false retreat) would cost more of such command points than simply ordering certain units to advance, or to fire at will.

Edit: perhaps a TW style control system for smaller skirmishes, and the above system for when troops exceed a certain number? After all, not all battles were fought with huge numbers, probably not even a majority.

[Duke John]

Shambles

well on a 1:1 scale on a 16 inch monitor....
You would see a foot of 1 unit.
No, not that! :laugh4: A 100-men unit in R:TW could represent 1000-men in real life. The game Battle for Bull Run by MadMinute Games has the feature: "Real-time tactical combat with a 10:1 soldier to sprite ratio."

People wont play STW mp like that though (cos "it affects flanking")
Well, some people do not like change, but this discussion is not aimed at them anyway. Single man units in standard RTS games also have a different gameplay then RTT games. As far as I know there is no game that has tried to display armies on a 1:1 scale so I don't know how the gameplay is, but I think it would be an interesting experiment to see how it would change. (Although R:TW comes close if you have a computer with the newest bells and whistles.)

Geoffrey
Legion Arena has indeed an interesting system where you are given points that can be used to issue orders and those points slowly regenerate. IMO it quite reflects realism much better than being able to click 10 times in 1 second.
Although not worked out, I do have a possible solution on how to make movement easier; units can be linked on their flanks forming a bigger unit. This would make it possible to create one large unit of 50 10-men units or 5 100-men units. You can move around a single linked unit but it would affect the others; moving it forward would mean that it would bulge out of the line, a bit like half a sinus graph. If the unit would be pushed back in melee it would take its neighbouring friendly units with it and not unlike R:TW where groups mean little more than being in formation.
So while you can form the linked unit however you like (with some restrictions in how much it can bend) it remains one body. You can then give it orders and it will move as a whole. It would make sense to link if you had a limited amount of orders like in Legion Arena since bigger units mean that you can still control your whole army.

After all, not all battles were fought with huge numbers, probably not even a majority.
Since I plan to first make the game about the Wars of the Roses, here is a run down of some battles during those wars (numbers may vary between sources):
1st Battle of St. Albans: 2000 vs 3000
Blore Heath: 3000 vs 6000
Wakefield: 15000 vs 6000
Mortimer's Cross: 8000 vs 10000
2nd Battle of St. Albans: 9000 vs 12000
Towton: 30000 vs 40000
Barnet: 12000 vs 15000
Tewkesbury: 6000 vs 6000
During those wars there were some skirmishers of course, but the wars were decided by the large battles.

[Geoffrey S]

The group idea sounds good. So, it'd mean that if one unit in the larger group moves, it'd affect the rest but with a slight delay; if one unit of the whole is making headway in the enemy formation it moves surrounding units further forward too (thus pushing the enemy back further), but if a unit is pushed back it drags the rest back a little too (potentially causing larger problems).

If you're doing selected battles the system would work. I was assuming there'd be a strategical section too, which would mean there would be smaller scale battles, but if there isn't there's no reason this system shouldn't work.

More unit cohesion than something like the TW series is a must; armies should roughly remain in a line, not scatter around as various sections are needed. A lot of my TW battles degenerate into loose unit battles, rather than armies fighting as a whole. Possibly this is also due to the smaller troop amounts.

[Fragony]

It would be more focussed on the strategic map, moving troops around in a more intelligent way. MTW could have been better, cavalry should travel faster then foot soldiers, that sort of stuff. More organisation, with the actual battle the climax of numerous evasive moves on the strategic map. It would be awesome to attack a province from 3 different provinces, and actually having that happen on the battlefield. Reduce the graphics to little purple boxes clashing for all I care, I would love a 'bigger' game.

[Duke John]

Geoffrey

So, it'd mean that if one unit in the larger group moves, it'd affect the rest but with a slight delay;
A bit different. Imagine the units being people who hold hands. If one man moves 3 metres forward his neighbours would go 2.7 metres, their neighbours 2.5 and so on with the man at the end of the line noticing nothing of that man moving forward as the movement is "absorbed" by the many people between the two.


I was assuming there'd be a strategical section too
Possible, but I will first concetrate on making the tactical game which will be enough work for the coming year.

Fragony

Reduce the graphics to little purple boxes clashing for all I care, I would love a 'bigger' game.
I was thinking of that initially too, a bit like the Osprey battle maps (if you know them). It would make the engine a hell of a lot quicker to finish, but the loss of seeing the soldiers might be too big to still feel immersed in the game. Or not?

[Geoffrey S]

A bit different. Imagine the units being people who hold hands. If one man moves 3 metres forward his neighbours would go 2.7 metres, their neighbours 2.5 and so on with the man at the end of the line noticing nothing of that man moving forward as the movement is "absorbed" by the many people between the two.
Sounds good. So it'd also be a matter of making sure a part of the line doesn't move too far ahead, since it'd mean your line would break or at least expose flanks to the enemy.

I was thinking of that initially too, a bit like the Osprey battle maps (if you know them). It would make the engine a hell of a lot quicker to finish, but the loss of seeing the soldiers might be too big to still feel immersed in the game. Or not?
It might be an idea to start off this way, to at least get the AI sorted whilst keeping work on the graphics engine to a minimum; keeping things abstract in that way would ensure gameplay and decent tactics are kept as a priority. Once the AI can handle the battles a move to full representation of the battlefield would be in order.

[Fragony]

I was thinking of that initially too, a bit like the Osprey battle maps (if you know them). It would make the engine a hell of a lot quicker to finish, but the loss of seeing the soldiers might be too big to still feel immersed in the game. Or not?

Maybe too much to sale it en-masse, but a game like civilization(the most uncomfortable word to spell ever) never needed it. If the game is complex(and realistic), and the unit descriptions are well done, I don't think it will make a difference, it would be a game for hardcore strategists anyway. I really like the idea, there is so much I wanted to do with Total war but couldn't. Me and a lot of other total war players are sure to welcome your take on wargaming as if it were the messias.

[Duke John]

Hmm, I am starting to really like this more simplistic approach :grin: It definitely has its benefits.

[Geoffrey S]

And hey, it can always be updated as time goes by. A solid tactical foundation is the most important thing. Like Fragony said, expansive textual descriptions could work wonders.

[Crazed Rabbit]

I'd love it. Even if the graphics were crap, I wouldn't care.

As for unit organization: I think, similar to your idea, that you could have a base unit of say 100 men, and you could hitch them together with other units to form a larger unit that still look like 3 different units standing shoulder to shoulder, but move as one.

I'd also love it if your movements on the campaign map affected deplyment, and if you didn't start out seeing your opponent right away, but would only know the general direction he lies in.

Ideally, there'd be no map boundary, though I don't know how technically feasible that is.

I also think that'd it, as you said, would make battles much more realistic when the battle line is 30 men deep, not 3, and actually show why reserves were important. Hopefully, it'd also allow for mass attacking one flank of an enemy that doesn't know where you are, who has the rest of his force a ways away.

Best of luck to you!

Crazed Rabbit

[Efrem]

Just to a Combat Mission style control system, I can't see anything else working with that big numbers.

[Duke John]

Would you rather see turn-based or realtime gameplay? The advantages of turn-based are quite something; more time for the AI to think and the ability to play hot-seat and PBEM games. A mix like the system of Baldurs Gate, where you can choose turn-based or continuous but still based on a turn-based system, could also possible in the future.

Efrem

Combat Mission style control system
Could you tell me how that works? Or how you think it would apply to a medieval wargame?

Crazed Rabbit

I think, similar to your idea, that you could have a base unit of say 100 men
A base unit is not really necessary, you can have small units or big units, it doesn't really matter. You'll have to link the smaller units as they are more easily pushed back and consequently broken then larger units.

[Quietus]

1:1 meaning that each soldier ingame represents 1 actual soldier (as opposed to 1:10 or smaller by most RTT games).

S:TW, M:TW, R:TW and Imperial Glory are all RTT games that feature hundreds or even a couple of thousand soldiers. That seems impressive but most of the famous battles were between armies several thousands strong and some even ten thousands. While playing said games I can't help wondering why the tactics that I use very rarely resemble the ones used in the historical battles. Red Harvest once pointed out that since the lines aren't as wide as they were in real life it becomes more easy to flank an opponent. If you tried playing a 5000 vs 5000 battle with R:TW you would start to notice that the flanks become less important and you will become more concerned with wether a hole doesn't appear in the middle of your line. Since you cannot quickly collapse the enemy line because of it's length reserves become more valuable as those holes need to be plugged. And having that said the game suddenly becomes more like the battles you read about.

CA and Pyro, or for that matter almost every developer, value getting up close higher than having the scale right. Both 1:1 scale and zooming right into the battle is with the current hardware not yet possible. However since I do like to play a 1:1 game I am currently developing my own medieval game engine which does have that feature. Now I would like to ask you what influence a 1:1 scale would have on the gameplay. Would certain tactics become obsolete? Would it introduce new tactics? Controlling fifty 100-men units would be a nightmare so do you an idea how to make controlling them easier?

Cheers,
Duke John Have you never tried Mount & Blade, DJ? You can only fully control one soldier but you can order other troops to follow you or stay put.

[Somebody Else]

Have you never tried Mount & Blade, DJ? You can only fully control one soldier but you can order other troops to follow you or stay put.

Hardly any more than skirmishes in it though, and the battles do tend to descend into large brawls (or small ones depending on the settings).

Although, I did contemplate what it'd be like multiplayer once... a line of shieldsmen with polearmed troops behind to attack over their heads would be quite hard to break through, or damage - with those shields continually up... Anyway, my point is it'd likely require human interaction for any semblence of battlefield tactics. Or an extraordinarily sophisticated AI... (Actually, a vaguely competent human would be handy - some people, after all, are morons.)

[Papewaio]

Interesting idea.

Given Moore' Law. PC's should be able to handle 100,000 men RTW style in just 5 years... assuming that it is a linear computational requirement of 10x. If it is a square, then to get to 100x computational power will be in 10 years time.

Would I like to see massive battles? Yes.

But I would like to avoid micromanagement and avoid the absolute control aspect that makes games quite so gamey.

Although it would be good to play the larger battle on a board representing the greater battle outside and then resolve the turn... so a bit like TW except you do a turn on a battlefield strategy map of say 10 minutes (rather then half a year) and then the battle plays out based on your orders to the pieces... cake and eat it approach... could be totally AI or you have control of a few units.

[Samurai Waki]

Perhaps a more intuitive system should be put into place, where it could still have that TW feel. Like switching between a birds-eye view map of the area, with blocks representing the units, from this view you could issue orders and formations, as well as get your battlefield information (geographical information as well as troop movements... where it would have blocks representing seen enemy units which would have to be of a different colour than your's to avoid confusion) after you issue all of your orders, you can go back to real time, either using the traditional TW panasonic view of the battle, or being able to switch between the individual units, which would focus in as a 1st person view of the Unit's Commander, from there you could see what that commander is capable of seeing and assess the situation. Also whilst in Realtime, other AI commanders could give reports on their current status, like having a commander from the opposite end of the battle line saying "A Unit of Cavalry is moving to Flank Us!" From that information you could pause, switch over to see what that commander sees, assess the situation, go into you're tactical birds-eye view map, change change orders, and continue.

[Duke John]

Have you never tried Mount & Blade, DJ?
I have, but I do not plan or wish to use such a system.


But I would like to avoid micromanagement and avoid the absolute control aspect that makes games quite so gamey.
I agree, although deciding how much influence a player gets while still keeping the game enjoyable is a difficult choice to make.


Although it would be good to play the larger battle on a board representing the greater battle outside and then resolve the turn
I do have some plans to have a map that lies between the TW campaign map and the battlemaps. A map where only whole armies can be controlled and not the individual units. This will create great situations where an army must try to outmanuevre the other army and if succeeding prohibiting the enemy from joining with its other armies or reaching a city. A turn should then of course represent a smaller time period (half a day or so).

Combat mathematics
I have been thinking about how to simulate the following situations that occured during the Wars of the Roses:
- Army A pushing back the whole of Army B (Battle of Wakefield)
- Both lines rotating as each line is winning on its right flank (Battle of Barnet/Towton)
- Making a dent in the line and being pushed back again (Battle of Bosworth)
I came up with the following theory:

http://files.upl.silentwhisper.net/upload6/combat_math_1.jpg
Casualties during melee wasn't usually that high. And with units being represented by blocks there is no little visual indication of how the units are doing. My solution focuses on how lines gave ground as during the battle of Towton where the Yorkists were in the danger of being pushed over the hill only to be timely rescued by the arriving duke of Norfolk. During this battle the line also pivoted as the Lancastrians attacked the Yorkist left flank with ambushing cavalry.
I want to use these visual changes of the battlelines to show where the player's units are winning and where they are being losing. To calculate this I use add up several factors of which the sum represents the force with which the line is pushing against the opposing line. The player can influence the magnitude of these factors by concentrating elite units, by bombarding the enemy with archers and cannons before the lines clash, by having deeper ranks or by occupying higher grounds.

http://files.upl.silentwhisper.net/upload6/combat_math_2.jpg

http://files.upl.silentwhisper.net/upload6/combat_math_3.jpg
With the sum of the forces it is calculated how the line deforms. As you can see above it is quite clear that red is losing on the left flank and winning on the right. This will cause a rotation of the lines. If red keeps losing and winning on respectively the left and right flank the lines will keep rotating.

http://files.upl.silentwhisper.net/upload6/combat_math_4.jpg
You can see that blue has made a big dent in the left flank and this may stretch and thus thin reds line so much that its left flank detaches from the center. As these units are no longer strengthened by the closeness of the other units they will be pushed even further which will most probably result in a rout. However if blue was told to hold ground and the captains can keep in control of their soldiers then the blue line will not push further and red's left flank would have either routed or fold back towards the center further rotating the line.

Tactical map
The tactical map will be 3D. The player can rotate and change height and angle (within certain limits). It will be very much like the maps of Osprey, you can zoom in further though:
http://files.upl.silentwhisper.net/upload6/osprey_map.jpg
Terrain textures are tiled and only certain pieces can be joined (like with M:TW and unlike R:TW which has texture splattering). The battlemap will be large enough to allow some movement before battle and detailed enough to be able to take advantage of small hills. Terrain will affect combat and you should be able to place terrain fortifications if you have the time, although visually not very detailed.

Visualisation of units
Below is a possible visualisation of units. It will be visible how large indivudual units are and they will be given enough geometry to be able to follow the Bezier curves. You can see that four units have linked to form a bigger unit and clicking on a flag will allow you to perform certain actions; breaking up, linking with other units, advance, change facing/formation, etc.
http://files.upl.silentwhisper.net/upload6/concept_units_2.jpg

I'm looking forward to read what you think about the above system.

:medievalcheers: Cheers,
Duke John

[Just A Girl]

I tried to read everything but theres a lot of txt and i must go do something soon,

I wish to know what kind of sprites will you be using?
2d sprites in the style of stw or mtw Would be The most logical As renderd 3d sprites would undoubtedly Lag the game up,
Im a belever that games should be made to encompass as many computers as possible.
I.e
There able to run on the most basic to the best availabel.

I have also always beleved RTW should have had a 2d option.
Where it could revert back from the new RTW gfx to the Physicaly better For the game MTW or STW gfx,
"well i beleve theyd be better for the game and allow more to play it"

Maby you are thinking of something like that.
i already understand That that would be A LOT of work,
But prehaps it would be a valuable addition to the game which would entice Not only the true Game play Players.
but also the GFX junkies.

As for the battle style,

I like the TW controll system, I dont like the Preset group formations though I think they suck.

If your going for realism in the unit numbers.
then i spose you need to be quite realistic with your command system aswell.

As some 1 sudgested Prehaps A delay when commands are issued,
Or even better.
You would need to have a unit close enough to your general for it to hear his command.
if hes not close enough,
But a nother unit is, And the 1st unit is close enough to them,
The message gets passed on, With a slight delay obviously.
And a multiplyer to this effect could be created,

So if your general tells a distant unit to do soem thing
The more units that haft to pass the message on The biger the delay,
also it could be fun to Include "Common hearing mistakes"

like you tell your muskets who are a mile of to Hold there fire.
But by the time the message gets there. They miss hear the command and think theyve been told to fire,
This could be set up with a % variabble and also be attached to the Multiplyer of the command delay, So the longer the delay the higer the % that they will mess hear the command..

This should increase the realism

[Duke John]

I tried to read everything but theres a lot of txt and i must go do something soon
But I even included images for the

GFX junkies
:wink:


I wish to know what kind of sprites will you be using?
I won't. While I did wanted to initially, it would add alot of complexity and the workload to create all those sprites while not adding that much to gameplay. Others have already encouraged me to take the more abstract route of using blocks to represent troops. It doesn't make the game tactically less interesting but it does cut greatly on development time.

Im a belever that games should be made to encompass as many computers as possible.
The game will be developed with MacroMedia's Director (a 30-day trial, which I use, is freely available for the ones wishing to aid me in programming). The program will be a ShockWave "movie" and should consequently be compatible with any computer that has ShockWave installed. I doubt that it will require a high-end computer to run.


As some 1 sudgested Prehaps A delay when commands are issued,

Issueing commands will be differently from TW. Delay in execution, misinterpreting orders, orders not arriving at all or units taking action on their own are all methods to make the game more realistic. But they should be used carefully as they can easily frustate the player, although that is not entirely unrealistic either as when the battle of Tewkesbury was lost the duke of Somerset killed Lord Wenlock for not supporting him.

[Ser Clegane]

Just noticed this thread - your plans sound extremely interesting, Duke John :thumbsup:


Would you rather see turn-based or realtime gameplay? The advantages of turn-based are quite something; more time for the AI to think and the ability to play hot-seat and PBEM games. A mix like the system of Baldurs Gate, where you can choose turn-based or continuous but still based on a turn-based system, could also possible in the future.

Personally, I would prefer turn-based for such a game - the BG-system sounds very intriguing, though.


but the loss of seeing the soldiers might be too big to still feel immersed in the game. Or not?

I would agree with Fragony here - good unit desriptions, perhaps with a nice picture of the unit (like on the MTW unit scrolls), together with e.g., stats and portraits of a unit leader/general (for a more personalized touch of the unit) can already add a lot to immersion and can help you to visualize what is going on on the battlefield.

Best luck for further developing your idea :bow:

[Randarkmaan]

I think that one thing that should be included in such a game would be subordinate commanders. For an example; you control the main-battle, an AI subordinate commander controls the fore-battle and another one controls the rear-battle. Before the battle you, the commander-in-chief, would "discuss" the strategy with your subordinate commanders and advisors, for an example, when I raise and lower the red standard two times you charge into the enemy with the heavy cavalry. How your subordinate commaders follow these orders would depend on their tactical ability, self-control(maybe merge self control and tactical ability?) and loyalty. Take the same example, the subordinate commader has low self-control and charges the enemy long before your sign, this causes the entire situation to unfold differently and forces you to improvise. If he has a really low loyalty he may simply abandon you or refuse the order. Or if he has a high or low tactical abilty he may either do something else, either for better or for worse.
Within your own force you should have a sort of "area-of-command", all troops of your force within this area can be controlled say just like in Rome, though this area propably should not be too big and should usually be used only if you use your general to lead a charge or something like that. Troops outside the area, should be controlled roughly the same way as the subordinate commanders, except maybe only self-controll should play a part.

What do you think of this "system"?

[Duke John]

Personally, I would prefer turn-based for such a game - the BG-system sounds very intriguing, though.
Using a turn-based system raises the question in how many turns should a typically battle be completed? Players have all the time they want and some might even spend ten minutes on 1 turn. If a battle would be finished in 6 turns (as most miniature wargames) you would lose finesse and have a more crude system in which a melee can end in just one turn. 40 turns could be absurd, but it might not be. In BG you usually finished your turns fairly quickly as the interface was easy to use and the options were easy to oversee and reach.
The BG-system should be seen as an extra that allows the game to show the changes of the battleline in realtime. There won't be the need for frantically clicking buttons as the amount of orders you can make is probably limited.

And thanks for the encouragement! :medievalcheers:


I think that one thing that should be included in such a game would be subordinate commanders.
These features are certainly something I want to put into the game. But one must watch out for taking too much control out of the player's hands.

Before the battle you, the commander-in-chief, would "discuss" the strategy with your subordinate commanders and advisors
Planning the tactics before the battle can be interesting and is certainly more realistic, but could also take too much from the actual battle as it results in the player looking at a movie with little interaction.

How your subordinate commaders follow these orders would depend on their tactical ability, self-control(maybe merge self control and tactical ability?) and loyalty.
The tactical ability will certainly not be translated into a bonus on combat stats. It should translate into how the commander is able to handle different situations. For example during the battle of Towton, Lord Fauconberg (high tactical ability) ordered his archers to loose one volley and then take a few steps back. The Lancastrian Commander (low tactical ability) responded and let his archers loose their volley but as the wind and snow was blowing into their direction their arrows fell short and hit nothing. The commander did not realize this and all arrows were spent. The yorkists stepped forward to shoot their and the lancastrians arrows resulting in the Lancastrians moving forward abandoning their prepared positions. Writing an AI to simulate this will definitely be a challenge, but so is accepting the state of R:TW's AI :wink:

Within your own force you should have a sort of "area-of-command"[...] What do you think of this "system"?
I will need to think about this. As I said in the beginning this could result in taking too much out of the player's hands.

[Ser Clegane]

Using a turn-based system raises the question in how many turns should a typically battle be completed? Players have all the time they want and some might even spend ten minutes on 1 turn. If a battle would be finished in 6 turns (as most miniature wargames) you would lose finesse and have a more crude system in which a melee can end in just one turn. 40 turns could be absurd, but it might not be.

Yep - 6 turns would probably be way to short and not allow for much tactics. 40 actually sounds more realistic - could become cumbersome if you have many battles, but IMHO the TW games tend to have too many battles (personally, I would have loved RTW to have a significantly lower number of battles, with the individual battles being more important and epic).
So, as long as there are fewer battles, it might not be as much of a problem if the individual battles take longer to fight.

If you have something like a battle that takes e.g. 20-40 rounds, each unit could receive e ceratin number of "action" points per round that could be used for e.g. movement, change of formation, reloading (casualties and effects on morale in e.g. melees could also be calculated per round in a manner that it could take several rounds to resolve a melee between units).

Note, that I have no clue about programming such things and that I am just throwing some thoughts around ~:), but in principle in think that turn-based battles have a lot of potential...

[English assassin]

IMHO turn based has quite a bit to recommend it in terms of game play.

As far as I can tell from reading historical accounts, an army commander doesn't actually make all that many decisions in battle anyway. It simply wasn't possible to exercise that sort of command across the battlefield, and of course in real life the general doesn't have to worry himself with micromanagement of issues like "hang on, those idiots are getting ahead of the line, they are going to be cut off and massacred, slow down you fools". (Well, he may well worry, but he can't do anythign about it)

Of course a player does need enough decisions and involvement in the action to make the game fun, so simply setting up the initial deployment and some overall orders and more or less letting things evolve from there wouldn't be viable, even if it might be reasonably accurate.

IMHO the suggestion of something a bit like combat mission was a good one. So, you have a "paused" orders phase where you can instruct each unit as you wish. Then when you hit go, first, there is a delay while the orders make their way to the units, (or you can build in a delay to get all units starting to move at the same time) then the units all move according to the orders AND THERE IS NOTHING YOU CAN DO UNTIL THAT GAME PERIOD ENDS (in CM it was a minute at a time IIRC, here it might be, say 10 minutes, so a two hour battle would give 12 turns. I would guess you could make that variable reasonably easily, so the player who wanted 12 turns an hour or 24 turns an hour or whatever could just adjust it themselves?)

Units aren't stupid, of course, they do respond fairly sensibly to the situation around them as it changes rather than just marching blindly forward because that's what your orders were, while the hidden machine gunner takes them all out. And of course you can order a depleted unit to advance at the charge up a steep hill towards a fresh dug in unit, but it doesn't mean they will.

Then you have another order phase and it starts again (you can order units todo things that take more than one period to complete in which case you don't need to repeat the orders of course)

Duke John if you can pick up a copy of CM cheap (it should be remaindered by now) it would be worth having a go or two to see how it worked. The clincher was the range and subtlety of the commands you could give, so you really could try to pull off some pretty sensible infantry tactics.

[Big King Sanctaphrax]

MHO the suggestion of something a bit like combat mission was a good one.

The new Combat Mission engine is taking a 1:1 approach. It looks great.

Unfortunately, the first game they're releasing with it is a hypothetical US Vs Libyans scenario, which sounds decidedly dull. I think I'll hold off until the WWII game.

[Efrem]

Well someones described the combat mission system for me. I loved the system but I hated the game with a vengance. Was a total waste with the horrible scale and terrible graphics.

[English assassin]

Well someones described the combat mission system for me. I loved the system but I hated the game with a vengance. Was a total waste with the horrible scale and terrible graphics.

Yeah, I didn't want to put DJ off but I must admit I didn't like the game that much. I think the trouble was it was actually too good a simulation of how difficult that sort of small unit tactics is. Also possibly the scale of the game was a bit small, after all, I'm all for ordering my armour to pull back from a village and sending in the Black Watch to clear the houses hand to hand, but actually having to manage each squad as they did it was too much work. And trying to work your Sherman round from hull down position to hull down position might have given you a really good tank commander level insight into the difficulty of fighting armour, but it was more like work than fun.

The principle of how the system worked was very good, but you'd need to strike a balance that involved a bit less ordering small squads of men to crawl forward under fire a minute at a time and a bit more ordering large groups of cavalry to smash into each other.

Yeah, I know, I'm shallow.

[Crazed Rabbit]

I must throw my support to the real time, and not turn based battles.

I believe real time makes it much more realistic. In real war, of course, there were no stops for turns during which the commanders could take their time deciding what to do. It would be much more fluid than a series of stop and go decisions.

I think that that fluidness is important to the 'suspension of disbelief'. Yes, you can make an accurate game using a turn based system, but a real time game allows much greater power and control over when to respond. With a certain amount of delay in orders, this could force players to not micromanage units too much.

As to graphics, I think it might be beneficial to have soldiers be made up of 3d boxes or simple red or blue sprites instead of whole units being a solid box. You'd be able to represent sparse formations to minimize artillery causulties, units going from good order (straight lines and whatnot) to disorganized masses, to fleeing routers running everywhere, and not just a box running away. And I don't think it'd be too much more work (compared to making good looking sprites), but I don't know much about that.

As to your combat mathematics; they seem somewhat like just lining up the lines in medieval total war and having them slug it out, but lines being pushed back or forward depending on who's winning. It seems very good to me, as long as its not too abstract (I worry unnecessarily most likely, due to the fancy lines respresenting the battle in those pictures).

As to orders, I think it'd remove most of the point of the game if you only allowed people to set up the armies and do little as the battle unfolded (which you don't seem to be leaning towards). I think we should be able to order units about as in Medieval, if with a chance of time delay, etc. But I think that allowing the player to command some cavalry to go and flank the enemy by moving them point by point around the enemy's lines should be allowed, and that your final orders to charge into the flank should not be hindered because the game has calculated your general is too far away to give effective orders.

Why? Because this ability would represent prebattle plans to do something like that based on a signal, or complex orders given at one time durig the battle.


Issueing commands will be differently from TW. Delay in execution, misinterpreting orders, orders not arriving at all or units taking action on their own are all methods to make the game more realistic. But they should be used carefully as they can easily frustate the player, although that is not entirely unrealistic either as when the battle of Tewkesbury was lost the duke of Somerset killed Lord Wenlock for not supporting him.

I wouldn't mind a little bit of the above, but it should, as you said, be used delicately. And we should have at least a chance to call back an impetous charging unit. And I want to be able to execute commanders I don't like. If your doing an attribute system like the TW games, you could have a 'Kills impetous or disobediant subordinates' trait which would lower the chance of subordinate captains charging off.

Crazed Rabbit

[Papewaio]

I think the idea of turns is to stop the instant communication problems... to create the delay between intent, action and resolution.

[Alexander the Pretty Good]

That's one thing I don't like about Legion Arena - let me issue orders to all units! Have some kind of delay, but don't limit the number I can issue orders to. :inquisitive:

[English assassin]

The thing with real time is its not real time, unless you are happy for the battles to take 2-3 hours to play. Once you speed up the passage of time IMHO pauses to allow the player to consider his tactics or just interact with the interface and issue his orders are OK.

Its true a real battle doesn't have a pause button but equally its not over in 15 minutes.

[Geoffrey S]

The thing with real time is its not real time, unless you are happy for the battles to take 2-3 hours to play. Once you speed up the passage of time IMHO pauses to allow the player to consider his tactics or just interact with the interface and issue his orders are OK.

Its true a real battle doesn't have a pause button but equally its not over in 15 minutes.
This is perhaps a consequence of a smaller unit scale leading to flanking being far more important and frequent than in real life.

[Duke John]

40 actually sounds more realistic - could become cumbersome if you have many battles, but IMHO the TW games tend to have too many battles
I agree, if I ever get to making the strategic part, then the goal is to have less but important battles.


Note, that I have no clue about programming such things and that I am just throwing some thoughts around
Programming is first of all about knowing what tools you have; graphics, sound, file management, etc. The second part is knowing what you want to achieve and being able to explain it in detailed steps. The third part is translating it to the programming language with the tools that you have. People can certainly help me with that second step especially when I arrive at the point of writing a computer opponent. And I am looking forward to having discussions about how to translate a wargamer's mind into code.
So if you explain things in steps then I will take care off wether it's possible with the tools that I have. Your proposal of action points is not a problem at all as it is merely checking and changing variable.



So, you have a "paused" orders phase where you can instruct each unit as you wish. Then when you hit go, first, there is a delay while the orders make their way to the units
Sounds good to me. Perhaps some kind of visual indication of how long it will takes for the order to arrive. It will also result in more compact armies as you cannot effectively control units that are 1 km away as the situation may have already changed once the order arrives.


I believe real time makes it much more realistic. In real war, of course, there were no stops for turns during which the commanders could take their time deciding what to do. It would be much more fluid than a series of stop and go decisions.
I agree, but that doesn't mean that the underlying system can be turn-based. In Baldur's Gate or Icewind Dale the character could execute an action once every turn. The game could auto-pause after each turn meaning that you would give orders to each character, then watch the action before giving orders for the second round.
You could turn auto-pause off and that resulted in realtime combat where characters could still only execute an action once every 4 seconds or so. The result was a more chaotic battle as characters didn't start actions all at once as orders were given at different times.
I will leave it up to the player whether to leave auto-pause on. Basing it on a turn-based system has several big advantages, a file can be written after each turn allowing a battle to be played by PBEM. Storage of movement and other factions in a replay file can be used to have automatically generated battle reports complete with arrows and comment boxes, displaying all the actions in 1 or more turns.


As to graphics, I think it might be beneficial to have soldiers be made up of 3d boxes or simple red or blue sprites instead of whole units being a solid box. You'd be able to represent sparse formations to minimize artillery causulties, units going from good order (straight lines and whatnot) to disorganized masses, to fleeing routers running everywhere, and not just a box running away.
I would have used the M:TW system of using sprites which means 2 faces per soldier. With 20,000 it would mean 40,000 faces and on top of that 10,000 or so for terrain and then extra faces for missiles, banners, etc. While I can run 50,000 faces smoothly on my computer, Shockwave has a 3D engine from the year 2000 and I have heard limits of 20,0000 to 50,000 faces. In my tests it can do more but I do not want to end up having to cut on AI routines if it proves that the 3D renderings already takes too many processor time. I did some quick calculations yesterday and even when using big boxes resulted in thousands of faces.

So I made the decision to make the game in an isometric perspective (like Starcraft or AoE2) with the boxes being drawn with vector shapes. This greatly reduces the time the computer needs to draw the world and that gives me more freedom to run a whole load of AI routines. To some that may look boring, but it will be enough for me as I have always enjoyed looking at Warhammer battlereports that had boxes or the 3D maps from Osprey.

Fleeing troops will be made visible by little cilinders as shown in some Osprey maps. Once an unit starts to waver you will see a few of those breaking off which will lower the morale of the unit even more and will end in a rout in most cases.


But I think that allowing the player to command some cavalry to go and flank the enemy by moving them point by point around the enemy's lines should be allowed, and that your final orders to charge into the flank should not be hindered because the game has calculated your general is too far away to give effective orders.

It depends. If the game can be interesting enough without total control over all your units then I will rather have it that way. Including waypoints in a single move order will give you plenty of control already and leaving the rest to the tactical abilities of the AI controlled commander will add some surprises.
A possible system: you order a cavalry unit to move around the forest to get behind the enemy. The tactic is to mow down the archers but if not possible to attack an unit of billmen in the rear. The archers have been given a high target priority and the billmen low priority. A few turns later the cavalry arrive and the situation has changed with archers being moved behind stakes and as a result the billmen are the most interesting target despite having low priority. The archers could have been given the highest target priority meaning that the cavalry would have charged regardless.

[Big King Sanctaphrax]

a bit less ordering small squads of men to crawl forward under fire a minute at a time and a bit more ordering large groups of cavalry to smash into each other.

Perhaps you'd like this (http://www.battlefront.com/products/les_grog/index.html), then. The chaps making it are affilliated with the Combat Mission lads, and it promises to include a similar level of realism.

[Alexander the Pretty Good]

Hot darn, that looks good. Editing regimental behavior? Heck yeah.

[Efrem]

I dunno I expect I'd be bored to tears but that just as I was Combat Mission.

Cossacks 2 has me sated for napoleonic stuff anyways.

[Just A Girl]

GAH!

I need to check on this thread more often,
Was LOTS to read AGAIN!

I agree that Units would probably be better deveided in to smaller block's,
I mean... 1:1 scale is not 1 Big red box = 1000 soldiers :)
Although It may occupy the same space. Its not 1000 anything's.
its Just 1 All-be-it Large box.

I Also would like to lean towards the real time game play,
(I would not like Pause to think "IMHO thats CHEATING!)

With real time, My previous sudgestions of an order delay over distance could be implimented,

With the need for there to be Units inbetween The units your ordering and your general for the orders to be yelled down the line..

(like they really did.... you know what i mean...
Genereal Yells "ARCHERS TO THE FRONT"
then you hear....
ARCHERS TO THE FRONT. ARCHERS TO THE FRONT. ARCHERS TO THE FRONT, ARCHERS TO THE FRONT....
And then the archers start mooving)

and As i also sudgested previously.
Prehaps A variable for Miss interperating orders could be added.

Where the father away from your general the unit is,
the more likley that a break down in comunication will occur and the orders wont be Quite the same as when they left you side.

"if thers a strategy map part and a Build your Buildings to train your units system, Then prehaps they could Upgrade to a Mounted letter Carrier. Who travels with the orders to Guarantee they are not miss heard"

[Samurai Waki]

I believe miscommunication was quite rare as larger armies tended to use flags to direct orders rather than shouting really loud.

[Just A Girl]

I believe miscommunication was quite rare as larger armies tended to use flags to direct orders rather than shouting really loud.


AFAIK,
Romans invented Semefor. (or whatever Flag language is called,)
So It has been around a long time.
Althoug Ive never heard of any documented eidence of them Actualy using them for comunication in battle.
"have you been watching the last samurai :) ?"

ANY if were discussing comuication methods..

the romans also had a Time based system
Where there were 2 groups
"could be more but we can say 2 groups"

each group is quite A Distance away.

Both groups have Bowls and on the sides of the bowls are roman Numerals,
(these bowls have small holes on the bottom of them Blocked by a cork. The bowls are full of water)

When a message needs to be sent, 1 group removes the cork from there bowl and ignites a torch.

When the second group saw an ignited tourch, they also removed the cork from their bowl.

remember the roman numerals on the sides?
They corespond to Diferent Preset messages. that are documented by both groups.

When the water reaches the relivant Numeral for the 1st group. It extinguises its torch.

When the second group saw that they would Make note of the water level in ther bowl.

Then they would check in there little book. (wax tablet)
What exactly the message was.

Then they would ignite a torch them selfs to Signal they had receved the message.

"to my knowlage" neither of these methods have been documented as being used in a battle.
And honestly The second method was used for EXTREMLY long distances...

And it takes longer to send a flaged or Signal fire message than to yell it. Also.
How Can You Flag your men to Fall back If there in battle?
Are they suposed to Turn around and look for flags mid battle?

Having pointed out the subtle Yet extreme flaws in co ordinating a batle using signal's and having said Ive never heard of documented evidence that Any method of this sort was used for in battle communication
The Royal navy does.... use Semifore.

[English assassin]

Perhaps you'd like this (http://www.battlefront.com/products/les_grog/index.html), then. The chaps making it are affilliated with the Combat Mission lads, and it promises to include a similar level of realism.

That looks good. Albuera and the 57th foot here I come.

[Crazed Rabbit]

You could turn auto-pause off and that resulted in realtime combat where characters could still only execute an action once every 4 seconds or so. The result was a more chaotic battle as characters didn't start actions all at once as orders were given at different times.

I will leave it up to the player whether to leave auto-pause on. Basing it on a turn-based system has several big advantages, a file can be written after each turn allowing a battle to be played by PBEM. Storage of movement and other factions in a replay file can be used to have automatically generated battle reports complete with arrows and comment boxes, displaying all the actions in 1 or more turns.

Hmm, that would indeed have advantages. Consider me swayed. Will be be able to play real time online/lan battles as well?
EDIT: I was just thinking of how people were talking about only having a set number of turns a battle. Why not just let the battle run until one side wins?


I would have used the M:TW system of using sprites which means 2 faces per soldier. With 20,000 it would mean 40,000 faces and on top of that 10,000 or so for terrain and then extra faces for missiles, banners, etc. While I can run 50,000 faces smoothly on my computer, Shockwave has a 3D engine from the year 2000 and I have heard limits of 20,0000 to 50,000 faces. In my tests it can do more but I do not want to end up having to cut on AI routines if it proves that the 3D renderings already takes too many processor time. I did some quick calculations yesterday and even when using big boxes resulted in thousands of faces.

Ah, I see. Whatever works. Perhaps you could make depleted units a lighter color (if you didn't just make the box smaller) or have flashing gfx on whatever side of the box that was engaged in battle.


So I made the decision to make the game in an isometric perspective (like Starcraft or AoE2) with the boxes being drawn with vector shapes. This greatly reduces the time the computer needs to draw the world and that gives me more freedom to run a whole load of AI routines. To some that may look boring, but it will be enough for me as I have always enjoyed looking at Warhammer battlereports that had boxes or the 3D maps from Osprey.

Will it be semi-rotatable, or in a fixed perspective?


Fleeing troops will be made visible by little cilinders as shown in some Osprey maps. Once an unit starts to waver you will see a few of those breaking off which will lower the morale of the unit even more and will end in a rout in most cases.
Cool!


It depends. If the game can be interesting enough without total control over all your units then I will rather have it that way.
...
The archers could have been given the highest target priority meaning that the cavalry would have charged regardless.
If you can make it work that way, it'd be great.

Crazed Rabbit