Stray Observations and Thoughts...

[Random]

Have had WW1G for some seven months now with many hours of game time invested. Time to pass on a few unsolicited comments now that the honeymoon is over.

Dislikes:

- Drag and drop movement. I hate it with a passion and hate is not too strong a word.

- With four seperate boxes the Stack Management Window looks like it was designed to do more than it does. As is the interface is not very user friendly, at least for this user.

- You can freely plot moves that exceed your allowable movement and the colour shading that supposedly tells a player where one can move is subtle difficult to interpret. A move order in excess of allowable movement is not executed at all and this frequently causes problems with rail movement. It once took me 9-months to march the French VIII Army from Alexandria to Suez thanks to this nasty little characteristic of the game since for whatever reason, they flatly refused to cross the Nile delta tributaries.

- Port to port sea movement should never be weather dependant. During the winter of 1918 some quarter of a million US troops transited the North Atlantic in typical winter weather, something impossible in WW1G. No issues with weather-related invasion prohibitions however.

- As noted elsewhere, the detachment command routines are frustrating and I could not find the right-click select HQ menu nowhere in the game documentation. Until a Member here mentioned it I was almost ready to bin the game entirely as it continually created detachments for HQ's that didn't want them and couldn't use them. If this feature is in the manuals, please advise where to find it.

- Have described issues with the naval parts of the game elsewhere:

http://www.ageod-forum.com/showthread.php?t=18642

http://www.ageod-forum.com/showthread.php?t=18114

and will not repeat them here. However, I really do wish they would correct the many spelling errors in the British navy OOB and put the correct Russian ships into their respective historical fleets.

- Many aspects of the game are moddable but there does not appear to be any way for a modder to create and add new units. If there is a way, learning what it is has escaped all efforts to date.

- The way the game treats new technologies is interesting but the effect tends to produce some ahistorical situations at times. Eventually the vast majority of technologies were available to both sides equally, at least within the scale of the game.

- In the Combat Screen one can watch the enemy RP levels drift down to zero during major operations only to find their total magically acquire more RP's from somewhere. Where exactly is never made clear.

- There is no easy means to refer back to any of the massive number of announcements that sometimes appear at the start of a new turn. Some of these messages may be important but the manner that they are delivered make them almost impossible to use and once one is closed it is, for all practical purposes, lost forever.

- The inability of the AI to manage American forces renders the Four-Player campaign essentially unplayable because the Doughboys seldom seem to arrive in France and never actually fight when they do.

- On my rig (which greatly exceeds the requirements for the game) attempting to run three consecutive turns generally results in the game locking up. Therefore one has to exit and restart from scratch every two turns. I suppose this is specific to my machine but it has resisted all efforts to find a cause or allow a fix.

- The choices of British leaders is appalling. One could not find historical leaders less representitive of the British forces than Townsend for the Army, Milne and Troubridge for the RN. All three held the spotlight only briefly before being consigned to the dustbins of history and rightly so.

- The inability to PBEM for multiplayer.

With the exception the naval items and lock-ups, none of the above should be construed as "bugs" since they seem to be the result of things actually working as designed. Whether through conscious decisions to incorporate as much of the flavour of the original boardgame as possible or due to the core design philosophy, all of the above can make WW1G a very frustrating gaming experiance. The net result is a game that should be both fun and illuminating instead becomes something of a trial at times.

Likes:

- The event engine is great. Many of the events are subtle but can have major impacts on gameplay. Nicely done.

- I like the combat system and the way reserves are handled. Very suitable for the period. Also there is a nice balance in the way that the combat doctrines shift from manuever to positional and to mobile without resorting to artificial "trench" rules.

- WW1G possesses a vast amount of atmosphere and attention to details in many respects. The potential for replay is strong, particularly due to the method used to manage the selection of war plans both for the active player and the AI.

Overall and despite the shopping list of issues above, this poster thinks that there is far more right with WW1G than there is wrong. However, the devil IS in the details and the little things can add up, creating an experiance that is no fun at all.

What prompted this little rant was the loss of the fortress of Belfort in 1916 (during a two-player campaign) to a winter assault in snowy conditions where the attacking formation, the German VII Army, included, amongst other units, the SW Africa garrison, the East Africa garrison and the Kamarun garrison. No matter how you look at it, this is just plain wrong, not that Belfort fell, rather that the units that captured it could never have been in Europe in the first place.

[Palpat]

In concurr. A good game that I love playing, with a lot of potential, but some issues are patience-killing, like memory leaks making the game unplayable after a couple of turn, the movement thing, etc...
Sadly, game seems no more supported. I guess we'll have to live with these.

[Chris Ferrous]

I agree with most of your observations, Random.

I no longer get significant lock-ups though. I DID get one a few days back which was a real surprise as I'd now estimate it happens about once in 20-30 turns.

For me, the naval/colonial aspects need fixing most of all.

I'd also add the following:-

1. The AI's use of 'dummy' Corps is excessive and this either leads one to suspect the rules are not being followed or it disguises the fact that they're not followed!

2. The AI's ability to supply itself and withstand isolation 'seems' to be overly generous in comparison to the human player.

3. The GHQ can 'attack' and go wandering about behind enemy lines or float around in sea zones !?? (In one game the German Eastern GHQ made a beachhead in Latvia and sat there all alone until surrounded, and in another the western GHQ advanced to the frontline and was promptly surrounded and destroyed in the Argonne!)

My view now, which is unlikely to change after 4 months' experience, is that the game is entrallingly detailed, complex, and challenging, incorprating some incredible ideas (thanks to the original board game no doubt) but that ultimately the frustrations outweigh the fun, and I regret to say I don't think I'll ever complete a full campaign.

[Random]

I keep trying again and again though... But something generally happens that makes one want to punch through the monitor screen.

In my current game, 1915 Campaign as the Entente, I selected the British VII HQ as a reinforcement in the May 1916 Interphase and in June placed it in London since recent offensives on the Western Front have been effective and I want to reinforce success. Go to move the HQ to France and discover that it already contains two Arab camel corps and is commanded by (then Major) T.E. Lawrence! After three turns of totally unsuccessful naval movement to try and get it to Alexandria I just gave up and sent them to Ireland to quell the rebelion there. It makes the blood of the amatuer historian in me come to a full boil.

So now 80,000 Arabs on camel-back are patrolling the streets of Dublin while the Royal Navy cannot even escort convoys past Gibralter since drag-and-drop movement requires crossing neutral Spain and the hated red info text says that is not allowed.

Irritating little crap events like that makes me want to just bin the game but there is so much done well and so much to like. Still this experiance has made me gun-shy about buying another AGEOD product anytime soon.

Happy New Year to All.

[tagwyn]

Random: I have many of the same problems you do. Dont feel bad, I purchased the game twice!! I think I will must bin it as you say. I don't have much time left to waste on this product. AGEOD is great but not this game. t

[Chris Ferrous]

Random, try plotting sea zone to adjacent sea zone. That should work if you don't plot too many zones at once.

That is, only when the Camels have frightened the natives of Cork and Dublin into submission!