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Post by MateDow on Jan 29, 2019 23:47:11 GMT -6
I think that a balance of the two would be nice.
There were periods when there were high intensity operations (Guadalcanal, Java Sea, Dover Raids, etc) and then there were periods where things settled into a quiet period. If there was a way to have this cyclical nature of operations modeled, that would be nice. Early in a war when trying to clear raiders from the sea lanes, preparation for invasion, or critical supply pushes would have the possibility of more battles. In situations where one side doesn't necessarily want to challenge the other, like Germany late in WW1, then you'd have months where there were no battles.
This would lead to situations where depth of force in an area to sustain operations could be the turning point for a campaign.
Maybe linked with a toggle to determine level of operational intensity with attendant monetary cost penalties and potential for additional losses due to mines and submarines?
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Post by dizzy on Jan 30, 2019 5:36:38 GMT -6
One naval battle per month will give you far more battles in an RTW war than were ever fought historically, even in WW2. If anything, the rate of battles is too high in RTW compared to reality. That's false. This is not an historical sim. If it were, the scenarios offered would be the Battle of Tsushima, Battle of Coronel, Battle of the Falkland Islands, Battle of Heligoland Bight (1914), Battle of Jutland, Battle of the Denmark Strait, Naval Battle of Guadalcanal, Battle of Leyte Gulf, to name a precious few. Yet not ONE of those listed is represented. There are less than 3 of fivescore naval battles I could quickly count off hand that were from 2 short world wars and a few engagements scattered in between and not a single one of them are represented. This game is historical insofar as much as it is 'revisionist' history where none of the above battles ever happen. That being said, this sim covers the entirety of possible naval warfare from 1900-1950, and is incapable of handling the problem I brought to your attention in my OP. RTW, one battle per month, cannot handle all the naval battles one would expect when at war with 4 or more nations at a rate of just one battle per turn. Let me re-explain this so you can comprehend exactly what it is I'm getting at so there's no confusion, because your response presupposes a false narrative. Contrary to your statement, I've had wars start and come to conclusion which offered no real fighting, and you didn't address my issue in my OP. Not only is your argument non sequitur, it's dismissive and comparative to something this game is not. This sim allows you to: - Build massive fleets. Which I did.
- Occupy 6 areas of the game with your fleets. Which I did
- Get into a war with 4 nations whose principle areas where in those afore mentioned 6 areas. Which I did.
- At a rate of one battle per month, this sim chokes, sputters and dies on it's inability to handle this type of situation.
It is this I'm concerned you address in RTW2. I'd expect more from a game whose purpose seems to encourage the type of situation I found myself in, but clearly it fails to do so. I'm hoping my criticism is well received, because it is my intention that RTW2 be the best game it can be, and you seem to be a game company that responds well to the comments made by your players community, and so it is my hope, that while my words are critical and curt, that they are viewed as being constructive. I've no intention of being mean or jerky, I'm simply trying to drive home my point that RTw has a major flaw and am doing my best to point it out so your follow up game doesn't have the same problem. Thank you. Edit: spelling
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Post by archelaos on Jan 30, 2019 7:17:06 GMT -6
While I agree the ratio of 1 battle/month is common enough, it could be interesting if the limit to one battle per month could be lifted in some occasions - for example ongoing invasion could generate multiple battles, like in initial Japanese attack on Philippines and DEI. Of course those additional clashes would be DD/cruiser engagements not fleet battles.
Also maybe if both sides have bigger amount of ships in overseas stations there could be additional clash in overseas station? In fact, maybe just increase chances for overseas battle as initial one in turn to make them slightly more common? Though this may be just a perception as I mostly played European based powers.
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Post by akosjaccik on Jan 30, 2019 8:07:54 GMT -6
Personally, I do not put much emphasis on this issue; as this is a turn-based game, lowering the research rate gives kind of the same result by giving more battles in the same technological frame. If anything, I'd like more variety in the missions, especially now that the date will go as far as to 1950/70; protecting landing troops, conducting airstrike against inland targets, reconnaissance missions, replenishing bases, whatever kind of ideas.
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Post by noshurviverse on Jan 30, 2019 8:37:33 GMT -6
This is not an historical sim. If it were, the scenarios offered would be the Battle of Tsushima, Battle of Coronel, Battle of the Falkland Islands, Battle of Heligoland Bight (1914), Battle of Jutland, Battle of the Denmark Strait, Naval Battle of Guadalcanal, Battle of Leyte Gulf, to name a precious few. Yet not ONE of those listed is represented. There are less than 3 of fivescore naval battles I could quickly count off hand that were from 2 short world wars and a few engagements scattered in between and not a single one of them are represented. This game is historical insofar as much as it is 'revisionist' history where none of the above battles ever happen. Most of the WWI scenarios you listed are present within Steam and Iron, which has a somewhat more historical recreation focus. As rimbecano put it " RTW is about all the different ways that fleets could have been built in the early 20th century, and all the conflicts that could have happened." You could make the case that "all the conflicts that could have happened" should include the possibility of continuous large-scale combat as was expected by many designers and officers, but I feel that someone could argue that such a change would undermine the historical authenticity (in the general sense) of the game. In any case, battles that closely resemble those conflicts do occur, in fact it's probably the basis many of the battle scenarios are built off of.
Of course, all that applies primarily to RtW1, which originally had a hard cutoff date of 1925. The extension to 1950 was added later as a popular request and generally isn't considered "true" RtW, as much of the balancing of the game begins to break at that point. As we go into the WW2-era, however, I do see an issue beginning to rear it's head, which is that naval combat often was stretched out over a longer period of time and distance. Leyte Gulf took place over several days and multiple fleet groups, which I don't see as being easy to properly represent in game. Perhaps certain engagement types could consist of several linked battles taking place either simultaneously or in quick succession? This would basically turn some battles, such as army landings into mini-campaigns, which I think might be a bit much to expect on launch.
I find this fairly interesting, because as I play in almost the polar opposite of your style. I like to play as smaller nations such as Spain and Italy, then follow the Japanese doctrine of "quality over quantity". This leads me to a style of being rather picky with my shipbuilding, always attempting to squeeze the absolute most bang for my buck out of any ship design. Generally this leads to me having a strong force of Battlecruisers, heavily armed and faster than any of their competitors. Backing them up will be an extensive armada of Destroyers heavily laden with torpedoes. It's then I turn my sights to the 'big' nations, and resolve to bring those behemoths down with my comparatively paltry forces. As a result of all this, I play with extreme selectiveness to the engagements that I take. I'd easily say that at least 2/3rds of the engagements I accept I immediately withdraw from after seeing time of day and weather, since I refuse to show my fleet to the enemy unless conditions heavily favor me.
And finally, this leads me to running into an entirely different issue with RtW. My style has led to me understanding the AI to a point where I feel that I can practically control it. What more, the available battle scenarios begin to seem somewhat restrictive, since I'll be declining or rushing through during a withdrawal for so many of them.
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Post by akosjaccik on Jan 30, 2019 8:49:41 GMT -6
(...)I like to play as smaller nations (...) Generally this leads to me having a strong force of Battlecruisers, heavily armed and faster than any of their competitors. Backing them up will be an extensive armada of Destroyers heavily laden with torpedoes. Never thought I am going to find my soulmate here. ( )
Completely and - most importantly - only random encounters is one of my biggest pain (apart from the virtual lack of logistics), as (though maybe from a different angle) I also(?) feel like building, playing and battling against the system, not for the war. This is exactly the same reason why I was, and still am vehemently arguing against the random distribution of different aircraft types across the various platforms. The game has such a huge potential and I found myself extremely passionate about it, but it feels like lets you build your own toys, then take them and throw it into the Grinder of Random. ...while at the same time the player still retaining control over the system in an arguably very gamey and "exploit the AI"-manner.
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Post by dorn on Jan 30, 2019 9:43:22 GMT -6
I think that you forget one important point in comparison between real history and RTW. RTW engagements are much more lethal that in was history. As example I have fought as A-H UK. Ať some time Italy joined UK. After 2 months I had fleet engagement destroying all Italian battlecruisers and some battleships thus eliminating Italian navy in just one battle. I have sunk UK more capital ships than Italy after 2 years of war however UK had so huge fleet that even with these losses they have still more than 2 times capital ships than me. In real history this would not happen. Increasing number of battles per month would put game more off balance.
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Post by ursamaior on Jan 30, 2019 11:08:07 GMT -6
(...)I like to play as smaller nations (...) Generally this leads to me having a strong force of Battlecruisers, heavily armed and faster than any of their competitors. Backing them up will be an extensive armada of Destroyers heavily laden with torpedoes. Never thought I am going to find my soulmate here. ( ) Completely and - most importantly - only random encounters is one of my biggest pain (apart from the virtual lack of logistics), as (though maybe from a different angle) I also(?) feel like building, playing and battling against the system, not for the war. This is exactly the same reason why I was, and still am vehemently arguing against the random distribution of different aircraft types across the various platforms. The game has such a huge potential and I found myself extremely passionate about it, but it feels like lets you build your own toys, then take them and throw it into the Grinder of Random. ...while at the same time the player still retaining control over the system in an arguably very gamey and "exploit the AI"-manner.
In a certain sense you have right, but please dont forget that life stubbornly resists all attempts to divide it into neat compartments. Coincidence luck name as you like will always be there. And yes (military) organizations always have internal friction, that is reluctance to move. Nowhere can you have full control.
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Post by akosjaccik on Jan 30, 2019 11:37:01 GMT -6
In a certain sense you have right, but please dont forget that life stubbornly resists all attempts to divide it into neat compartments. Coincidence luck name as you like will always be there. And yes (military) organizations always have internal friction, that is reluctance to move. Nowhere can you have full control. Good points - however, I am absolutely not against the idea of simulating the uncertain and the not foreseen; I stated this earlier and of course, stand by it. I am against the disparity of having one element with practically "limitless" control - designing and building the fleet and individual ships -, then stepping into another with almost "none" (operational or organizational level). Considering that the "random generator" has to work with an arguably limited set of options as well, the end result feels more artifical than "historical". Purely a personal taste, as such, I do not think that my opinion is "right" and others are "wrong" (or that I am entitled to any of my proposals), but I do feel that pulling the "but historically you couldn't" card a bit too much while ignoring the "but historically you could" hinders the game to show it's full colours.
In this spirit did I argue for a more varied mission pool above for example (which can't be achieved otherwise) instead of more battles per turn (which would in my book not add to the game as a game whatsoever and can be somewhat mitigated with the research rate). ...funnily enough, in this particular case I asked for more random.
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Post by jwsmith26 on Jan 30, 2019 12:20:28 GMT -6
One naval battle per month will give you far more battles in an RTW war than were ever fought historically, even in WW2. If anything, the rate of battles is too high in RTW compared to reality. That's false. This is not an historical sim. If it were, the scenarios offered would be the Battle of Tsushima, Battle of Coronel, Battle of the Falkland Islands, Battle of Heligoland Bight (1914), Battle of Jutland, Battle of the Denmark Strait, Naval Battle of Guadalcanal, Battle of Leyte Gulf, to name a precious few. Yet not ONE of those listed is represented. There are less than 3 of fivescore naval battles I could quickly count off hand that were from 2 short world wars and a few engagements scattered in between and not a single one of them are represented. This game is historical insofar as much as it is 'revisionist' history where none of the above battles ever happen. That being said, this sim covers the entirety of possible naval warfare from 1900-1950, and is incapable of handling the problem I brought to your attention in my OP. RTW, one battle per month, cannot handle all the naval battles one would expect when at war with 4 or more nations at a rate of just one battle per turn. Let me re-explain this so you can comprehend exactly what it is I'm getting at so there's no confusion, because your response presupposes a false narrative. Contrary to your statement, I've had wars start and come to conclusion which offered no real fighting, and you didn't address my issue in my OP. Not only is your argument non sequitur, it's dismissive and comparative to something this game is not. This sim allows you to: - Build massive fleets. Which I did.
- Occupy 6 areas of the game with your fleets. Which I did
- Get into a war with 4 nations whose principle areas where in those afore mentioned 6 areas. Which I did.
- At a rate of one battle per month, this sim chokes, sputters and dies on it's inability to handle this type of situation.
It is this I'm concerned you address in RTW2. I'd expect more from a game whose purpose seems to encourage the type of situation I found myself in, but clearly it fails to do so. I'm hoping my criticism is well received, because it is my intention that RTW2 be the best game it can be, and you seem to be a game company that responds well to the comments made by your players community, and so it is my hope, that while my words are critical and curt, that they are viewed as being constructive. I've no intention of being mean or jerky, I'm simply trying to drive home my point that RTw has a major flaw and am doing my best to point it out so your follow up game doesn't have the same problem. Thank you. Edit: spelling How did Fredrik not address your issue? You claim Fredrik's remark is false because the game is not a historical simulation and then you argue that it doesn't do a good enough job as a sim. If you want to present a historical reason for more battles per turn then please do so. Perhaps you'd like to present a gameplay issue that would argue for more battles per turn. Your comment that the game chokes when attempting to simulate a large war is a conclusion not an argument. Show us how it chokes. So far I have not seen you present an argument that would show that more battles per turn would make the game more historically accurate or improve gameplay. As far as I can see your entire argument is that the game should provide more battles because _you_ want to fight more battles.
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Post by Deleted on Jan 30, 2019 15:07:20 GMT -6
IMHO 1 battle per turn is ok, if there were more AI would probably decline it anyway. Even when I play RTW 1, it always goes one of two ways - the first one when I play as a minor navy (Netherlands, Au-Hu, Italy etc) I dont want more battles, I want quite the opposite - a time for my capital ships to get repaired and for my subs to sink more merchants. More battles would mean more VPs to the enemy because I would need to decline it anyway. The second way is when I play as a major naval superpower (USA, GB, Germany, maybe France) the enemy tends avoid battles and declines as much as possibly can, so more battles would mean just more declined battles and as far as I know (I played from 1900 to past 1940 more than 30 times), VPs for declined battles have negligible impact on the war outcome.
I would be much more satisfied if the players decision on if to end to war, or force the war to continue had bigger impact on the final decision, thus forcing the enemy to fight until revolution.
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Post by axe99 on Jan 30, 2019 15:29:07 GMT -6
One naval battle per month will give you far more battles in an RTW war than were ever fought historically, even in WW2. If anything, the rate of battles is too high in RTW compared to reality. That's false. This is not an historical sim. If it were, the scenarios offered would be the Battle of Tsushima, Battle of Coronel, Battle of the Falkland Islands, Battle of Heligoland Bight (1914), Battle of Jutland, Battle of the Denmark Strait, Naval Battle of Guadalcanal, Battle of Leyte Gulf, to name a precious few. Yet not ONE of those listed is represented. There are less than 3 of fivescore naval battles I could quickly count off hand that were from 2 short world wars and a few engagements scattered in between and not a single one of them are represented. This game is historical insofar as much as it is 'revisionist' history where none of the above battles ever happen. That being said, this sim covers the entirety of possible naval warfare from 1900-1950, and is incapable of handling the problem I brought to your attention in my OP. RTW, one battle per month, cannot handle all the naval battles one would expect when at war with 4 or more nations at a rate of just one battle per turn. Let me re-explain this so you can comprehend exactly what it is I'm getting at so there's no confusion, because your response presupposes a false narrative. Contrary to your statement, I've had wars start and come to conclusion which offered no real fighting, and you didn't address my issue in my OP. Not only is your argument non sequitur, it's dismissive and comparative to something this game is not. This sim allows you to: - Build massive fleets. Which I did.
- Occupy 6 areas of the game with your fleets. Which I did
- Get into a war with 4 nations whose principle areas where in those afore mentioned 6 areas. Which I did.
- At a rate of one battle per month, this sim chokes, sputters and dies on it's inability to handle this type of situation.
It is this I'm concerned you address in RTW2. I'd expect more from a game whose purpose seems to encourage the type of situation I found myself in, but clearly it fails to do so. I'm hoping my criticism is well received, because it is my intention that RTW2 be the best game it can be, and you seem to be a game company that responds well to the comments made by your players community, and so it is my hope, that while my words are critical and curt, that they are viewed as being constructive. I've no intention of being mean or jerky, I'm simply trying to drive home my point that RTw has a major flaw and am doing my best to point it out so your follow up game doesn't have the same problem. Thank you. Edit: spelling I'm a little confused here - you claim Fredrik's statement is false and then provide no data or evidence to substantiate your claim (beyond listing a number of specific battles and saying those battles were not in the game - but Fredrik's statement never claimed they were, making the evidence you provide to back up your statement of false as irrelevant from a logical perspective - and if you want criticism to be taken as constructive it helps for it to be logical and make sense). It seems to me, more than 1 battle/turn, you're more concerned about the lack of 'any serious fighting' (from your OP). To this I'd ask the question "how many games (ie, playthroughs of RtW1) have you played". In my experience, most wars of 1-2 years involve 1-2 fleet actions (ie, a Tsushima/Jutland type line-up) and I've had some pretty large coastal raids that have been similar to the Battle of Calabria in terms of fleets deployed. There are situations where wars end without much fighting, but these tend to be pretty unusual (like, one game in 20 unusual). Also - and take this from someone who's played non-extended games with 5-10 large fleet battles in them - the game can be ahistorically battle-friendly even with 1 battle/turn - ie, again, I don't think it's battle frequency that's causing your lack of action. One quick question - are you putting your fleets where the enemy fleets are? I would expect so, but it's important to check this (there's a mapmode where you can compare fleet sizes by area which is good for this). You'll only get big fleet battles if your big fleets are bumping up against the enemies.
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Post by dizzy on Jan 30, 2019 15:37:33 GMT -6
How did Fredrik not address your issue? You claim Fredrik's remark is false because the game is not a historical simulation and then you argue that it doesn't do a good enough job as a sim. If you want to present a historical reason for more battles per turn then please do so. Perhaps you'd like to present a gameplay issue that would argue for more battles per turn. Your comment that the game chokes when attempting to simulate a large war is a conclusion not an argument. Show us how it chokes. So far I have not seen you present an argument that would show that more battles per turn would make the game more historically accurate or improve gameplay. As far as I can see your entire argument is that the game should provide more battles because _you_ want to fight more battles. Fredrik's remark: Is false because I played a campaign where I thought I'd get more budget by developing my possession bases, which don't help your budget by building the bases up, btw. After four wars, and maybe 30 battles in that campaign, I've no interest in saying anything further about how wrong Fredrik is, and his argument he is making is a side show anyway. The main problem in a nutshell is this. But before I explain it thrice for you, since you guys created the game, perhaps ask someone else with a different perspective to understand the issue if you again fail to see it. Your game has one battle per month. That's fine on a scale where your nation is at war with another nation. That's all fine and dandy, no issue. But when you are at war with 4 nations, or more, RTW still adheres to one battle a month. That's a problem! Why? Over the course of a 4+ nation war, despite occupying areas of nations you're in conflict with, you'll still get one battle a month and the entire war may conclude without ever having engaged in battle with one of the nations you're fighting. That's a problem. Especially since in one of my games, I sent a BB fleet into an area where I had no port where an enemy BB fleet was. Instead, I got battles with other nations for convoy raids, coastal defense, etc., and my fleet ran out of supplies and I had to send them back to base. Rinse and repeat and you get the same thing. The game clearly cannot understand priority and how to manage large scale conflict. You coded the game in such a way to where it fails when you're at war with multiple nations. I could go on and on about how enemy fleets occupy the same area as my fleets and never see battles there because of your one battle per month code. I dont know how much simpler I can make my argument, other than 'asking' nicely, since you guys engage with your player community, which I think is awesome, that it would be sparkly stellar of you guys if you could toss around the idea that maybe when you're at war with multiple nations that perhaps it might make sense to have an occasional extra battle per month when multiple enemy fleets are occupying the same area for months on end while they each in turn hold up a sign that says, 'Sorry, no battles this month, one already happened somewhere else'...
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Post by garrisonchisholm on Jan 30, 2019 15:55:09 GMT -6
I appreciate that you are valiantly articulating your point, but let us consider WW1. You had 4 and eventually 5 major naval powers engaged with 3 naval powers (for the point of argument we will say that the Ottomans could have used Goeben in an interesting way to a gamer.) In a war lasting 4+ years, 51 "turns", the world saw Far Less than 51 'significant' naval engagements.
Sometimes you may build a remarkable fleet, and the dice say that the battle line never gets to fire its guns in anger.
This community has dozens, dare I say scores, of historically minded people who have never in the 2+ years I have been involved here expressed the opinion that 1 battle/turn is unsatisfying. The opinion *was* expressed (as I recall the conversation) that perhaps the player could "ramp up the difficulty" by having an options setting to increase the number of randomized battles per turn, but that was to my understanding a difficulty argument, not a failure of the game to be accurate.
We are under quite a crunch here to provide a product on a schedule so I of course cannot guarantee that such a difficulty setting will make it to the final product, but I think we can all agree that Fredrik's design provides more than the historical number of battles as is than one would have in reality. If you could decline engagements each turn and count, you would probably be offered 150+ battles in that 51 months, as each turn you are seemingly offered 0-5.
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Post by Deleted on Jan 30, 2019 16:33:39 GMT -6
In that case (war with multiple nations) there should be some priority sorter which would count individual parameters of each fleet on each area and temporarily save it, as well as the record of the last proposed battle. So the effect would be that if you send your fleet somewhere, where you dont have ports, the system would see that and would force some battle with some of these ships involved (AI should be able to retreat to its ports if it doesnt feel like the battle will go in its way, but should not be able to decline it). But more important effect would be that the system would count the chance of enemy A and enemy B to appear in the battle. For example: enemy A has much bigger fleet than B, and slightly bigger fleet than the player, B´s fleet is smaller than the player´s. Enemy A would then have, lets say, 70% chance to be involved in the first battle of the war. If it appear in the battle, then the chance would decrease to lets say 50% for the second battle (if the battle is declined by the player, the chance doesnt change at all), but if the dice says that there should be enemy B (even with its only 30% chance to appear), then the chance for enemy A to appear in the second battle of the war would rise to a cca 90%. The same would apply for the rest of the battles of the war...
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