State of Play?

[Rico2016]

Hi all.

I'm new to the forums here but own CIVIL WAR 2 and consider it a fine game, immersive and challenging. Reading all of the posts on this one, it seems very much a "Work in Progress" rather than a polished game. Initially it seemed to have many "show stopper" isssues.

What is the general verdict (no BS please) as to where this game is at right now? I know there still appear to be annoying issues, but is it playable? In the opinion of the game's biggest critics, what remains to be fixed, and how severe are the remaining bugs?

[vicberg]

Single player is fine. There's still a few issues but they are getting further into the game and they are fixing downstream events.

Multi-player, not so much.

[zooter]

I've played thru all the beta patches and still get frustrated, so I stopped playing. I am waiting until the next official patch. Someone said it will be out in March. Or when vicberg's mod is done, it sounds very interesting.

[vicberg]

You are always welcome to play test I've got 10 people now play testing. The more the merrier.

[zooter]

Thank you for the invite, but I am just a gamer. I don't analyze things like others. I just like to play war games. So I don't think I would make a good beta tester.

[csiemers]

I'd be happy to play test. I have 2 systems where I can try it on, a laptop and a 2 monitor desktop if that at all helps.

[fred zeppelin]

What is the general verdict (no BS please) as to where this game is at right now? I know there still appear to be annoying issues, but is it playable? In the opinion of the game's biggest critics, what remains to be fixed, and how severe are the remaining bugs?

I still don't find the game to be playable in the sense that I can sit down and enjoy a game that plays in a way that the designers intended and that makes sense. CTDs are mostly fixed, but important things like diplomacy and alliances, and some of the events, are still broken.

Probably depends on your patience and tolerance for odd results. Some folks seem to be able to see weird results and just accept them and move on. But I just don't have the patience. My time is too limited to invest hours into a game only to run into fundamental things that just don't make sense - things that everyone seems to recognize as bugs. I'm not looking to be a beta tester.

I know they're working hard, but I still don't think this game is ready for prime time.

[vicberg]

I'd be happy to play test. I have 2 systems where I can try it on, a laptop and a 2 monitor desktop if that at all helps.

Send me your email address to vicberg@comcast.net

[veji1]

I still don't find the game to be playable in the sense that I can sit down and enjoy a game that plays in a way that the designers intended and that makes sense. CTDs are mostly fixed, but important things like diplomacy and alliances, and some of the events, are still broken.

Probably depends on your patience and tolerance for odd results. Some folks seem to be able to see weird results and just accept them and move on. But I just don't have the patience. My time is too limited to invest hours into a game only to run into fundamental things that just don't make sense - things that everyone seems to recognize as bugs. I'm not looking to be a beta tester.

I know they're working hard, but I still don't think this game is ready for prime time.

For me in terms of crashes, I only remember a couple so all in all the game is very stable (I probably have played 500 turns in all).

The military aspect works quite well. There are issues on making sure supply can flow well enough through allies and such, but now that I consistently build specific cavalry brigades to flip provinces and spam supply depots around when campaigning, I haven't had problems. The ability to build supply depots in allies really helps.

The main issues right now are twofold :
- Diplomacy is a mess because the engine seems to lose its bearings dealing with minors, alliance members, peace treaties, etc where you have lots of silly situations where if you play France, Prussia dows Bavaria but it doesn't lead to war with you so you have do dow prussia yourself to defend your ally but then after beating Prussia it sues for peace with Bavaria giving shitloads of territory to Bavaria while still staying at war with you and even realeasing the Duchy of Warsaw like that on its own... The diplomatic system needs drastic simplification to work well.
- The whole event system with its different tightly imbricated chains that can be long and complex (see Spain) is still way too complex and prone to misshaps, see the Saxony switches side event effectively making it neutral and expelling french troops rather than making it a passive ally allowing passage of troops and supply.

These are my main grippes. Rest would be chrome and marginal improvements.

So it should eventually be a very solid game and fun to play, but the 2 big areas of concern remaining are the most complex ones, tightly bound to how the whole game engine works and does require extensive and complicated work to make it work.

imho of course.

[Pocus]

Your analysis is indeed quite valid Veji, diplomacy system and events system are the two most complexes things that still needs attention. Events get fixed or improved on each new patch but it seems there is always a loophole somewhere. Same can be said for diplomacy. I know your position on this aspect, but this is only wishful thinking to believe we will now change it to the EAW system (well it can be done with a mod in theory!)

[veji1]

Your analysis is indeed quite valid Veji, diplomacy system and events system are the two most complexes things that still needs attention. Events get fixed or improved on each new patch but it seems there is always a loophole somewhere. Same can be said for diplomacy. I know your position on this aspect, but this is only wishful thinking to believe we will now change it to the EAW system (well it can be done with a mod in theory!)

I know. I am sure you will make the diplomatic system work eventually and close most loopholes, but it will be time consuming and painstaking, whereas a simpler system would have avoided that. But i trust you will make it work, it's just that you'll suffer doing so !

[Baris]

In my current PBEM play as Ottomans (Likely it will have leader ratings lowered) , Russia and Austria have a defensive treaty both have avoided from coalition wars signing pace treaty with France. France took Prussia as target, Russia declared war on Egypt. Egypt AI ask for force expeditory force. Maybe diplomacy could get NM penalties and VP cost for nations going unhistorical.