A plea from the heart

[tremy]

designers delight in throwing every possible complication at us gamers right from the start.It often takes hours to learn the interface and how to start playing.They seem to ignore the example of classic games, such as the Civ.series,which start simple and build gradually.This ,not only helps give that one more turn feeling,but enables players other than Grognards to come to grips with the detail.
It has always seemed to me,that the civil war is a perfect vehicle for such an approach.Col.Stone on being appointed Inspector general found 10 militia companies,an Artillery battery and some marines in Washington.(About i brigade).General Beauregard reported 6000 thousand troops available when he took command on the Alexandria line.(2 brigades)
I beg you to create a scenario that starts early( not nov.) and with few troops available, so that we may take on the roles of Lincoln and Davis who did not do every thing on day\turn one but clearly had to muddle through,making decisions bit by bit.

[jelay14]

This isn't Forge of Freedom. I believe this game starts in spring 1861.

[saintsup]

designers delight in throwing every possible complication at us gamers right from the start.It often takes hours to learn the interface and how to start playing.

And more often than not the AI never learn it. I
MHO, its one of the major problem in overly complicated designs. BOA was not in this case. I hope the new game won't.

[Pocus]

there is an april campaign yes.

[Florent]

Like BOA there will be plenty of small scenarios to try before the grand campaign so i'm not anxious about the learning curve.

[Korrigan]

Pocus and the Beta team are working on the tutorials. There will be several ones to explain the mains concepts of the game.

[Hoser]

Yes I thought the BoA tutorial was a little...lacking.

[Pocus]

we agree with you

We would really like to expand it, but the lack of time has always prevented this. A volunteer can also help us flesh it if he want to provide some more additional text.

[jelay14]

The demo taught me most of the basics for BoA. I'm sure learning this one won't be hard.

[bschulte]

The demo taught me most of the basics for BoA. I'm sure learning this one won't be hard.

Same here. I had BoA down after about a day or so. I loved the simplicity, and the fact that it actually covers the French and Indian War!

[tremy]

I think that I probably failed to make my original point properly.Put it down to seniltiy(I'm 65). I have enjoyed wargaming for over 40 years and do not fear complicated games.I think that AGEOD deserve to be appreciated by a wider audience and believe that for many gamers ,spending 20 minutes setting up units.20 ,sorting out an economy,more time on supply and training,even more on working out the interface, all in the first turn means they are likely to put a game aside unless they have grognard tendencies.I used the Civilisation series as perhaps the classic example of a deep game which builds slowly.I have watched many so called non gamers get hooked because they find it easy to comprehend manipulating one unit and after playing for an hour or two suddenly realising that they had learned how to run an empire.
In the civil war, with two weekly turns taking sumter would occur turn one,the first troops arrived in Washington on turn two.Lincolns call for 75000 militia turn 3 and Bull run a political neccessity by about turn 7,Wilsons Creek about turn11.
and so on. So my plea ,was to allow a scenario where things were attended to gradually over many turns so that questions of troop mustering,arming,supplying and all the many other details could be attended to bit by bit as happened and not thrown at the player immediately.
Phil Thib sent me an e-mail with information about BOA.before release and I was so impressed by a designer bothering that the game was downloaded by me within an hour of being available.Pocus also shows so much enthusiasm always responding to our questions in a friendly and interesting way . Thank you ,both. I am convinced that your site is the best and will of course grab the new game the instant it is available and promise to continue to spread the gospel of the two Phil's to the world.
I will now get off my soap box and return to my wheel chair!

[miller41]

Tremy, you are quite right. I am 48, long time wargamer and I also don't have the time, patience or eyesight to try and learn a game system that makes it harder instead of easier to pick up the basics. BOA was so refreshing in how simple it was to learn but took a while to get good at. I believe that the Civil War title will be the same, you can learn the basics fairly easy and then get your arse handed to you once you thin you know enough If they program the AI to even be just decent that will work, as PBEM would be fun as well.