Discussion: Tactical Battle Simulator

I have been thinking alot about why I don't really like R:TW (and most likely M2:TW) and I think it is mostly because R:TW is not simulating battles, at least not to the extent that I can see in R:TW what I read in history books.

With this post I hope to get a little discussion about wether a battle simulator would be interesting, which compromises need to be made to keep gameplay interesting and wether a battle simulator is even sensible game to create.

In this discussion I talk about pre-modern warfare (ancient to Napoleonic)

Scale
Of course you could say that technical limitations limit the scale of armies, but I think more is at hand.

In real life armies ranged from a couple of thousands on each side to one hundred thousand and more during the Napoleonic period. With such huge armies you will need huge battlefields. Couple that with realistic movement speeds and kill rate you will get battles that can have a movement phase lasting several hours.
Forming square of a Napoleonic batallion was done in around a minute. The execution of that single order is considered fast if you know that hundreds of men were involved, but it is considered slow when you compare it to the battle phase of a typical R:TW game, which tend to be decided in just a few minutes.

With 1:1 scale you get the problem of needing to spread your attention across a battlefield that can be several kilometres deep and wide. You would need to zoom quite alot to get some overview of what is happening.
I have made renderings of 10,000 soldiers and it just becomes a big mass. The focus on detail would then shift from the soldiers to the battlefield as zooming in is not essential if you need to control formations that are several hundred metres wide.

Casualities
During the battle of Towton in 1461 the melee lasted for several hours, with the casuality rate no where near that of a TW game. During Waterloo 200,000 thousand men fought and someone calculated that on average 1,5 soldiers died every second. Implement that casuality rate in TW and gamers will complain about the dull combats.

Unit cohesion
Despite that you can use army/group formations, there is no true cohesion between units. In medieval times there were usually just 3 battles (groups) with perhaps a cavalry force detached for flanking. "Units" would form up into larger groups and act and move as a single unit. A battleline would deform as a whole and not fragmented as the case is with TW's system of handling units.

Tactics
Playing a TW game and reading a historical report of a battle is quite different. Battles were won by tactical decision making on a larger level. If you look for the deciding events or factor that decided the outcome of a battle you will rarely come across ones that you use or see in TW.

(Running out of time, so I'll just summarise and go on later, especially on command and control. Hopefully this has sparked enough interest for some replies)

In short, I would like to see a battle simulator in which I can see interactively why battles were won in real life and how it could have happened differently. Scale is a big problem as battles did occasionally last for hours on end (especially as the armies grew larger) and it is difficult to see how such a game could be interesting if seen as being of the same family of games were battles are played in 1 hour. It needs to be seen from a different perspective. Take Command (American Civil War) is doing that, but it still uses a 1:10 scale. The same with the upcoming Napoleonic HistWar.

And really short: Could a battle simulator with a 1:1 scale and historically correct rates of movement and casualities still provide the player with interesting and challenging gameplay from deployment to routing?

Cheers,
Duke John

I don't really need all the units to be rendered, just give me the statistics. I never got enough of the unit descriptions in Medieval, the plain presentation in the battle never bothered me at all just because of that. If a truely realistic game could be fun, I dont know. Battles were just the finale, in the end it would become a game of getting your supplies where you want them in time. Not that much strategy involved in the actual battles, just superior numbers.

From a book I've read on warfare... one proposal as to how these things were fought implies that much of the combat was decided in the first few moments of getting to grips with the enemy, one side or the other would generally break very quickly and run - even the TW games, with all their morale systems in place still essentially have men fighting in 'desperate last stand' mode, where really they'd see a much larger force and either refuse to fight, run immediately, or switch sides.

Wouldn't make for a fun game, the focus would shift to logistics and campaign strategy - tactics (the fun bit) are only a small part of warfare - the rest is, as Fragony says, getting the right men to the right place in sufficient numbers and well supplied.

Actually controlling logistics and supplying an Army whilst maneuvering my main force, sending out scout parties, skirmishes... etc, I would love that. I am a patient man, and at least half the fun for me would be the process leading up to that battle, rather than... perhaps the battle itself. In RTW, I get rather burned out quickly, because I like building up my empire, and not having to fight ten battles in one turn. It gets rather anti-climatic after awhile.

Funny that all of you start talking about a strategic simulator. Does this mean that when it comes to simulating pre-modern warfare you are far more interested in the operational level than the battle?

I can foresee a few issues if the simulation would be truly historical (i.e. historical events can but do not need to happen ingame). For example, you control the French army during the Hundred Years Wars game leading to the battle of Poitiers. The French King pursued the English who could not join up with the Duke of Lancaster while the French are able to achieve that. The English are starved as their supply lines are cut. As a player you would then assume that victory is in your pocket but in real life it proved to be a disaster for the French army.

During the Wars of the Roses, forces were largely identical in composition. A game covering that period wouldn't provide you with any stats (I wouldn't like to see that anyway) so what would indicate the odds of winning? Numerical superiority didn't say a lot as plenty of battles were won by the smaller army.

So when fortune needs to be fickle if you want to simulate history, would it annoy you that you cannot control the outcome, just nudge it a bit?

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Originally Posted by Duke John

And really short: Could a battle simulator with a 1:1 scale and historically correct rates of movement and casualities still provide the player with interesting and challenging gameplay from deployment to routing?

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If Les Grognards will be fun then doing it 1:1 scale will be fun too. That game is supposed to use time compression of 10:1 at least in the beginning when armies are just maneuvering and then go down to 1:1 time. And AFAIK will be the closest thing to a Napoleonic simulator we have seen so far. A similar approach could be used in your 1:1 scale battle simulator.

Of course the simple linear warfare of ancient/medieval warfare is very different than Napoleonic warfare and would give the player less ability to command and control the army.

You mention: "I have made renderings of 10,000 soldiers and it just becomes a big mass." What do you mean by that? You have a simple but working battle engine?

From a gamers point of view the main difference between the Total War engine and a more realistic engine would be command and control, and how units actually could and did maneuver. Also there would no longer be this convenient birds eye view that enables the player to know the numbers and depth of enemy units and/or reserves.

Even using the not so realistic combat mechanics of the Total War engine you could get a long way by just implementing the lack of information and more limited manuvering and control.


CBR

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You mention: "I have made renderings of 10,000 soldiers and it just becomes a big mass." What do you mean by that? You have a simple but working battle engine?

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I have so many ideas and considering that the mods that I have worked on are almost all featured in gaming magazines, I figured that I must be doing something right. :tongue2: So I am now indeed learning how to program and take the leap into developing a game (as a hobby). I do not have a game engine yet (read, not for the coming months), although I am now learning C# after fooling around with Director and Python.

The renderings are mock-ups made with 3ds max and Paint Shop. When zoomed out enough to be able to see enough troops (1,000 to 10,000) the individual soldiers become just a few pixels and all the details are lost. Combine that with my fascination with coloured blocks as used in the Osprey books I have experimented how that would look.

Now I came up with a concept to combine a terrain like from flight simulator and coloured blocks moving over them for either a Napoleonic or Pike and Shot game. Imagine 100 batallions composed of 6-10 company blocks and you will learn to appreciate the true of scale of Napoleonic warfare. I am not fully convinced wether a 1:1 translation of command and control would benefit gameplay. I think game mechanics can be introduced to still allow the player to control all units but also keep the chain-of-command.

Another concept is a strategic Sengoku Jidai game where the player needs to manage loyalty, supply lines, resources (not RTS like, but like how Shingen expanded towards the sea for its salt), fight for territority by controlling castles, etc. Or a strategic Wars of the Roses game.

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Could a battle simulator with a 1:1 scale and historically correct rates of movement and casualities still provide the player with interesting and challenging gameplay from deployment to routing?

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Interesting question, probably one that game devs around the world have pondered throughout the history of gaming. In a strictly traditional TW-style real-time format I'd say no - the scale is simply too large, battles too long, with comparatively few events affecting the outcome. But, with an engine properly tailored to such gameplay, I think it could be done.

Such a game would probably be best done in a simultaneously-executed phase-based format, similar to the Combat Mission series. The large scale would demand some kind of time-compression method, and a time-compression method similar to the Total War series is likely not viable because of the scope of calculations required for an accurate simulation; you'd have to take statistical shortcuts instead of modeling every soldier individually.

Combining statistical and individual-level combat resolution is one possibility. You could have the battle engine render a part of the battle with a more accurate resolution system, while calculating more remote parts of the battle statistically. I believe such an engine, even one with 3D presentation with all the bells and whistles, is doable now or at least in the near future - though it alone is probably not enough to help with the time-compression problem.

Individual-level combat resolution on a realistic scale in real time is probably not possible with current hardware. The battle would have to be broken into separately rendered segments. For a historically accurate battle this should probably be some kind of event-based system instead of fixed-length "turns." An event-based system could solve both the time-compression and command & control issues as well - the engine could keep rendering the battle until something "interesting" happens, or until player input is required for new orders, changes of the battle plan etc.

This kind of battle engine could fit without problem into a TW-style strategic system. I don't know how much mainstream appeal such a game would have, or even hardcore-wargamer appeal... but a lot of this would depend on the strategic portion and presentation of the game.

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I think game mechanics can be introduced to still allow the player to control all units but also keep the chain-of-command.

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Steel Panthers: World at War has a C&C system you might be interested in checking out. The Combat Mission games are useful study material too, pretty much textbook examples of the simultaneously-executed phase-based combat resolution system.

Long post, I'd better stop this rambling now... :laugh4:

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Now I came up with a concept to combine a terrain like from flight simulator and coloured blocks moving over them for either a Napoleonic or Pike and Shot game. Imagine 100 batallions composed of 6-10 company blocks and you will learn to appreciate the true of scale of Napoleonic warfare. I am not fully convinced wether a 1:1 translation of command and control would benefit gameplay. I think game mechanics can be introduced to still allow the player to control all units but also keep the chain-of-command.

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You could have individual soldiers rendered, and then the whole unit would turn into a block when the camera was far enough away. Able to represent unit formation and cohesiveness well closeup, while keeping it simple from far away.

To me, performance comes before graphics, and since I have a old computer (runs MTW well, but RTW not-very-well), the soldiers, if individuals, would have to be blocky. Simple 3 sided red or blue pyramids (or sprites) representing soldiers would be better to me than unappealing soldiers (ie not as good as RTW units).

To me, a lot of the fun from a large scale simulation such as this would come before any fighting; if the game had limited line of sight and no flying camera - being able to see only what your troops could and from their perspective - and the initial position of enemy forces was unknown, you'd have to send out scouts over hills and through forests to find the enemy, and keep your troops organized so that you wouldn't be flanked or spread out.

Crazed Rabbit

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if the game had limited line of sight and no flying camera

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I would need to have a flying camera as I don't have the false hope that I will be able to make an engine that can render thousands of men. Plus a close up view means that all the art must be detailed and that is a real drain of resources timewise. However, that does not mean that you would see everything, there can still be fog of war or line of sight.

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For a historically accurate battle this should probably be some kind of event-based system instead of fixed-length "turns." An event-based system could solve both the time-compression and command & control issues as well - the engine could keep rendering the battle until something "interesting" happens

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I agree, that is also what I was thinking about as an alternative. And I do like it. Although I would fast forward instantly to the next interesting event, while displaying all the action and movement that happens between events in Osprey style; coloured arrows and comment boxes. Small events would automatically be handled by a doctrine or settings on how to deal with certain situations.

Hm no ancient stuff planned? Would be perfect for the use of realistic maneuvers done by columns ~:)


CBR

No sorry :wink:, ancient warfare isn't really my passion. I guess if the engine was finished it could re-used/tweaked for different periods, but that is so far in the future...

Sorry if this is an old thread, but have a look at Take Command 2nd Manassas by Mad Miute games.

It is what you are looking for I reckon. Its American Civila War, and a mod for the American Revolutionary war has just been released to the Community.

It is more for grognards. Have a look at my other post in this section of the forum about the game or go to the website and have a look at some screenies.

http://www.madminutegames.com/MadMinuteBB/index.php

Its a truly great tactical game, and looks to only get better and better.

Cheers,

Nice to see this Duke John.

A battle simulator could use a working command chain and decent unitcommanders who can carry out complex battleplans and adjust (different commanders have different skills).

I recall that the PC game Takeda (~2001?) did (tried?) this. The daimyo did the grand scheme (and has some men under personal command). Generals took care of the wings.

The chief general (is the player) doesn't need to see and know all. Real generals can't take control of units a la minute either, nor see what all are doing.

It's interesting, really hardcore (?), to have rearguards fighting miles away and the player only getting to know by distant noise or delayed messages.

Make another step that has been made in some minds already: make this MP.
And why not make the player 'FPS' in one of the characters? How about a MMORPG where each battle(sub)unit is FPS commanded by one/more players? Co-Op vs AI or another army controlled by humans.

Next station: Holodeck compatibility :dream: