AGEOD Forums

The colored "lights" or "beads" on the base of the Units ... what do the colors [i.e. orange, green, yellow ...] represent. I know the number of them indicates strength. But what of the color? I'm thinking cohesion, perhaps?

It's an average representation of the unit's health... the closer to red, the less the strenght

On a sidenote: as far as I understand, the number of "lights" represent the number of units in the stack, and not actual strength (as in number of men, combat value or whatever), correct? If so, I think it would make more sense if this was changed - as it is now, a stack with 4 full infantry divisions will appear weaker (have fewer lights) than one with say 10 artillery units.

*hmm, all of a sudden I get even more unsure if I am right... gotta check again tomorrow and come back to this post...*

yes each bullet is 3 units, whatever they are. Use the tooltips for a more accurate description, the bullets are not meant to provide any details.

OK ... then the number of bulllets indicates how plentiful that unit is - not necessarily how powerful - while the color is a general indication of the unit's morale/cohesion/supply. Is that more or less correct?

(Way O/T)

Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead!
Adm. Farragut, before Mobile Bay.

What was referred as torpedoes in the Civil War were actually naval mines. So, Pocus, are these present in the game?

No, they are not.
The game is at too big a scale. That would be like having abatis across roads.

hmm....although, we may be able to mod them as a new unit.
possibly a naval unit with no movement points?
Anyone have ideas on this.

Test:

About the Torpedoes not being in the game...

We can build forts, which have abatis and similar things.

So, why can't we buy a few mines to 'fortify' river hexes thus giving a percent chance per mine density that an enemy naval unit entering a torpedoed hex might hit something?

For me, it would be nice to see mines/torpedoes a little later down the road.

Oh, they'd suffer from attrition too, so you would have to buy replacements for them as they drift off or deteriorate over time; or explode.

I suppose you can say they are already abstracted as is now with Forts at Rivers, and its already in there, like Abatis.

As for the beads; it seems odd we get a pretty accurate description of the relative state of health via color, but as to what dot counting will get you - 3 leaders or 3 divisions?

Why not set the dots to count elements, say, 9 or 10 elements per dot? As it is now, 1 unit could be a leader or 18 elements organized in a division; 1 soldier or 16050 soldiers.

While I am at it, I'll second request adding Element counts to Tab tooltips and unit tooltips - that could help greatly with assembling/optimizing divisions.

.

Wilhammer wrote:Why not set the dots to count elements, say, 9 or 10 elements per dot? As it is now, 1 unit could be a leader or 18 elements organized in a division; 1 soldier or 16050 soldiers.

Fog of War. Elegant design.
This is a game, not a spreadsheet.
There is already an ACW game out there that is more spreadsheet than game.

But, as Pocus says, we can get the dot info I am asking for with the tooltip - I just want the dots to jive with the tooltip, so I might not need to use the tooltip, so I can do a threat estimate just looking at the stack at a glance.

Now, if the tooltip was as equally vague, that would be different.

Fog of War was is one thing, but at a level where 3 guys look like 16050 of them, that seems a little out of synch.

As for spreadsheet game, this game has all the detail you need if you dig around to spreadsheet play it.

I completely agree with Wilhammer here. I pay absolutely no amount of attention to the amount of dots as it is completely missreprenting of their strength.

However, the tooltip gives absolute specifics as to the strength.

What I would like (although perhaps stealing from another game) is information on the enemy in that region based on my general and surrounding soldiers/spies etc ability. I feel a major part of the civil war atmosphere that is missing is the 'not really knowing what the enemy is up to'.

And please make the Union AI more agressive ( but not stupid)

Cheers.

Mines: we wanted to add them in the release version, but have not found time for them as of now. You can see there is a pseudo-NATO symbol for them in a graphics directory by the way. They would be abstracted somehow as Wilhammer says.

Bullets in cities: we can improve the count yes, this is more a question of time than anything else.

Hi! justa my 2 cents...

I think the bullets could be much more informative if they represented the stack's power instead of the number of units.
For example... 200 pwr points per bullet...
The pwr count is alredy presented on tooltips so part of the job is already done.
Of course, the bullets could be subjected to fog of war, don't giving the correct info if you don't have enough detction points on the enemy stack (just like the tooltip does).

About mines... well, it could be nice, but i can pass without them for the next two dozen of patches...

Cheers!

I think first priority is to clarify the display when many corps - army - divisions are present in some provinces.

In North Virginia a typical issue is that you are facing a "bee hive" of Union stacks ... I know this sounds amusing because it simulates the historical diffculties of screening the enemy. But it's really a clutter and just gives you the idea of ... "there something big, bad and ugly coming my may".

Another nuisance is the fact that mousing out some Union stacks will result in an overflow of the screen (in other words - you don't see all the units).

But alltogether I support any improvement in display or feedback to the player ...

Wilhammer wrote:But, as Pocus says, we can get the dot info I am asking for with the tooltip - I just want the dots to jive with the tooltip, so I might not need to use the tooltip, so I can do a threat estimate just looking at the stack at a glance.

Now, if the tooltip was as equally vague, that would be different.

Fog of War was is one thing, but at a level where 3 guys look like 16050 of them, that seems a little out of synch.

As for spreadsheet game, this game has all the detail you need if you dig around to spreadsheet play it.

Agree - this is what I was trying to say in my original post. On the level the game simulates, I think it makes more sense (and it is less spreadsheety IMO) to 'know' that the enemy stack contains say 20-30 elements (rgt's, batteries) - or 7-10k troops for that matter - than 10-12 counters. These are anyway highly abstracted - each could be representing 1 leader, 1 supply wagon, 1 division, 1 zuave rgt, 1 signal/medical unit and so on.

- "Sir, the enemy is approaching our position from the west - they seem to have between 18 and 21 leaders, divisions, rgt's or supply wagons!"
- "Aha! ...hrm. Either we should be very worried or very relaxed... Better prepare both the card table and the grave diggers!"

If a higher level of FOW is wanted, one could even add a random element to the actual # of elements in an enemy stack each turn (say +/-5 if each dot is 10).

Of course I understand the time constraints etc. of implementing such changes, but I think the FOW effect on the immersion level of the simulation is important enough to put it fairly high on at least my wish list. Finally, just to put things in the right perspective: AACW is still an excellent Civ War game (without doubt I think it is the best one around); this would simply make it even better.

I think that the "green bulbs" should relate to the total number of elements in the stack, rather than counting "containers".

The fact that a single artillery regiment and a division of 18 elements count the same in the current green bulb calculations is deceiving and, as mentioned above, adds a layer of FoW that favors the Union player.

I favor this solution too.

Cool!
Using elements would be a very big improvement over using units for the "bullets"!
Now, if you could use number of "real" men/guns instead... that would be sweet!!
Maybe for a future AACW Gold???
Cheers!

This is bad mojo.
Now we are changing things that do not need to be changed.

I thought the concept of this game was that the player does not have god-like control or information.

First we wanted to eliminate the naval aspect because some found it too tedious and time consuming,
then we wanted to be able to split, merge and micro-manage elements within brigades, although that was not the within the design concept or intent,
now we want exact, detailed, unit strength and power values displayed at a glance.

This all very frustrating for someone who wants to play the game as conceived and designed.
I am starting to lose interest in this ever changing game of supposed "good ideas".

tc237 wrote:This is bad mojo.
Now we are changing things that do not need to be changed.

I thought the concept of this game was that the player does not have god-like control or information.

First we wanted to eliminate the naval aspect because some found it too tedious and time consuming,
then we wanted to be able to split, merge and micro-manage elements within brigades, although that was not the within the design concept or intent,
now we want exact, detailed, unit strength and power values displayed at a glance.

This all very frustrating for someone who wants to play the game as conceived and designed.
I am starting to lose interest in this ever changing game of supposed "good ideas".

I think that it should at a glance give an indication of the aggregate SIZE of the force, not neccesarily the composition or condition of the army.

Currently, a Corps with three divisions will have the same number of "bullets" (or bulbs, lights, whatever) than a Corps with a militia, an artillery, and a wagon (54 elements vs 6) . I think that is the core issue that I believe should be changed.

The magnitude of your force in general terms would not be that much of a secret once spotted. The "bullets" at a glance should give you that. I do not see where that would lead to what you describe above.

I agree with General of the Army tc237. I believe we are starting to wander around in the wilderness here. AGEod staff needs to re-assume command and turn this into a finished product that at least resembles the original one that we bought.

"Fixing" is one thing. Redesigning on the fly is something else. It's getting rather frustrating to be this far down the road in trying to learn how to play this verschimmte thing and it keeps changing all the time.

And one more thing. If the "mod squad" takes over this game and AGEod future designs, this customer ain't likely to be coming back. Design a game, execute the design, and fix what you, the designer, decide needs fixing. Coding the thing with a design imperative that it be easily modifiable by end users destroys the integrity of the design by placing emphasis on making what ought to be immutable susceptible to change.

I buy games because I want them to place me in a specifically-designed command situation (primarily a historical one for me - just my preference in game types). Then, I play with the idea of taking what was available to my historical counterpart and seeing if I could do bettyer. Some variation within the reasonable possibilities of the historical situation is desirable, to be sure, but this needs to be built in by the designers after careful consideration.

I have no time for, "Gee, wouldn't it be neat if we could ..."

Forum feedback is great. But desgn by committee is a recipe for disaster. I think one of the the things that sets AGEOD apart from other game designers is that they have a firm vision of what they want to create and they stick to it. Refinements of the core concepts are fine. But bells and whistles just add noise.

I am in general agreement on the whole "good idea thing", but I would also point out that the currently discussed issue is really a minor correction of feature that functions as a sort of unitended FoW.

It hardly constitues a significant change to the game itself.

I would say that the discussion on the HQ removal was much more like you have described Pasternakski, where the game gets "redesigned by committee".

In this case, having to keep from trying to determine that the 9 bullet stack I am facing is really a big Corps with 5 divisions or a bunch of wagons, artillery, balloons, engineers, and extra leaders that have the combat power of a militia element. I simply suggest that the math that determines how many "bullets" are displayed is a function of elements rather than containers. Not a redesign by any means or does it provide any more information that is not already available through hovering the mouse over the stack.

I dislike making changes that are fundemental to the game that would in effect require testing of the effects and potentially "upset" the balance of the game. But I also beleive that Ideas that help refine different elements of the game (such as making the interface better and more "intuitive" for example) should not be discouraged. In the end it is up to the Ageod crew to make the determination if it is worth updating to improve the game and I trust that they will maintain the quality standards and not disappoint us in that regard.

tc237 wrote:This is bad mojo.
Now we are changing things that do not need to be changed.

I thought the concept of this game was that the player does not have god-like control or information.

First we wanted to eliminate the naval aspect because some found it too tedious and time consuming,
then we wanted to be able to split, merge and micro-manage elements within brigades, although that was not the within the design concept or intent,
now we want exact, detailed, unit strength and power values displayed at a glance.

This all very frustrating for someone who wants to play the game as conceived and designed.
I am starting to lose interest in this ever changing game of supposed "good ideas".

I don't know who is the "we" you speak about... but certainly i don´t feel included...
Don't mix different things...
Here nobody is asking to have "exact, detailed, unit strength and power values displayed at a glance" of enemy units on FoW, nor have god-like control.

But if some piece of info should be given to the player because it´s not affected by FOW, better have it "at a glance" that buried away.
I think AGEOds interface shines just in that. You have the info on the screen, not in submenus inside menus... but its not perfect and the way "bullet" info works now on AACW is really misleading.

On BoA, a "unit" (not counting leaders) could have a power value from 19 to 60 approximately. In AACW, with divisions, a unit can represent anything from 15 pwr to 700 hundred or more.
On BoA, units were much more homogeneous on "combat value", and thus, a good measure to bullets
On AACW they are not. Thats why some of us think elements or pwr would be
a better measure of bullets than units.
Its just a little interface tweak.
Not a change on the philosophy of the game.
And not "bad mojo"

Cheers!

arsan wrote:
On BoA, a "unit" (not counting leaders) could have a power value from 19 to 60 approximately. In AACW, with divisions, a unit can represent anything from 15 pwr to 700 hundred or more.

Fair point.

Well, I certainly didn't mean to open this can of worms!!!

I have to agree, though, that the game is splendidly designed and we ought to stick with the designer's vision.

pasternakski wrote:I agree with General of the Army tc237. I believe we are starting to wander around in the wilderness here. AGEod staff needs to re-assume command and turn this into a finished product that at least resembles the original one that we bought.

"Fixing" is one thing. Redesigning on the fly is something else. It's getting rather frustrating to be this far down the road in trying to learn how to play this verschimmte thing and it keeps changing all the time.

And one more thing. If the "mod squad" takes over this game and AGEod future designs, this customer ain't likely to be coming back. Design a game, execute the design, and fix what you, the designer, decide needs fixing. Coding the thing with a design imperative that it be easily modifiable by end users destroys the integrity of the design by placing emphasis on making what ought to be immutable susceptible to change.

I buy games because I want them to place me in a specifically-designed command situation (primarily a historical one for me - just my preference in game types). Then, I play with the idea of taking what was available to my historical counterpart and seeing if I could do bettyer. Some variation within the reasonable possibilities of the historical situation is desirable, to be sure, but this needs to be built in by the designers after careful consideration.

I have no time for, "Gee, wouldn't it be neat if we could ..."

I suppose its a good thing that nobody forces you to mod the game or play someone else's mod or even play the game with people who mod it. The beautiful thing about a free society is the ability to make choices. Make yours and be happy, but don't rain on the rest of our parades because you don't like that a company has made a game that is easy for its users to tweak based on what they find enjoyable.

My guess is that making the game moddable has not impacted on AGEOD's ability to code it or to put out a product that it wants and is happy with. Some of the most rewarding gaming experiences out there are based on a fan community's modding of a game.

If your threat to not buy another AGEOD game that is moddable is a real one, I'll personally buy an extra copy to make up for the loss of your business. Please, keep making these games moddable. Half the fun is getting under the engine and seeing how you can change it.

We are not changing things when we do not agree with the ideas, tc237, Pasternaskski et al. There is no point in being dramatic too!

We can changes things upon player requests, but only if we agree ourselves on the changes:

a) HQ. This is our idea. We wanted to streamline the design and help the AI. In the end we retain the Army HQ, but only because we wanted to add a relocate HQ at a time, and with this order we can circumvent the AI problem too.

b) less micro-managing for fleets: for us the game is fine, for some this is so tedious. We won't dumb down this part, we are happy with it. BUT we will propose a serie of checkboxes. By default, nothing will change. If you want to play with less micro-managing, you can by switching to an optional rule. Where is the problem with that, to propose an option that allows both the original design and an alternate one which is seen by us as an interesting idea?

c) bullets: What a fuss about a 'feature' which was coded hastily 2 years ago. At this time, I simply checked the number of units in the stacks of a region. With 30 mn more, I would have thought that number of elements was better. The bullets are used to show a quantitative info, not a qualitative one. We stick on the idea there: we won't do a bullet display tied to combat power, but we are fine (now that things slow down) to improve the code and do a more precise count. Here too we don't betray the original idea, and we accept the change only because we were ok from the start with it.

So... no we are not driven by a comittee-design, we have precise ideas, but sometime, either we fail to implement them completely, or we lack time, and improvements can be done. Then a player pop-up and speak of the improvement. We then agree with him, or not, and if we agree, we push a bit on the priority list the thing.

Hope it clear things up.

Pocus wrote: There is no point in being dramatic too!

Exactly !!