What if....France Became Neutral

[Edwin P.]

Excellent point - isolated units in North Africa desert hexes should experience double or triple the normal reduction in readiness when not in a city tile or adjacent to a rive; ie the Nile.

[Edwin P.]

Option 2: This addition is balanced, in which case it has no significant impact on the game.

A balanced addition is a good one if it changes the strategies of the players involved. You might select one option if you favor a stronger naval game or the alternative if you favor a land based campaign.

Example: Attacking Russia soon after France falls is a balanced option when compared to attacking Russia when its war readiness is high, but it totally changes how the game plays out.

Example: Convincing France to become a German ally gives you a Germany that is weaker than the Vichy French option, but also gives the Axis control of the French Fleet and makes for a much stronger Naval game.

Its also a great way for the AI to change how the game is played by changing how; as the Axis player, a defeated France is handled (Vichy, Total Conquest, or Axis Ally) or by deciding; as the Allied player, if the USA imposes an oil embargo on Japan. The game is still balanced but the strategies required to win change for both players.

[Lars]

Originally posted by Edwin P.:

The game is still balanced but the strategies required to win change for both players.

That is also a very good point.

As the opposing player, if you don't recognize the shift in the strategic options as a result, you're screwed.

Which is why we play wargames.

[John C]

Originally posted by Edwin P.:

A balanced addition is a good one if it changes the strategies of the players involved. You might select one option if you favor a stronger naval game or the alternative if you favor a land based campaign.

Excellent point and I must concede you are right there. While I still believe it would be more effective to focus the limited time and resources on more universal items, it appears that either this item has a base of support or this board is populated by people who "want it all". I suspect it is the latter but either way, while this isn't something that interests me I just don't care enough to dedicate a lot of effort to fighting against it.

[Edwin P.]

I agree that time and resources should be focused on the more important items first, but perhaps this idea can be made more universal. How? By adding a script routine that allows players to make a choice. Then players can write their own routines to achieve the same result.

Either way, my guess is that HC is now focusing most of his efforts on developing an AI superior to the one that was in SC1.

Besides, the points you raised are well taken, and you only want to add featues that truely add to the games playability and unpredictability. Feature Creep is the bane of all software projects and is something to be avoided. First get the core software operating and then add the chrome.

[ May 09, 2005, 05:14 PM: Message edited by: Edwin P. ]

[John C]

Now that has some merit. Have specific scripts for each of the majors and then one that covers all of the minors and have them invoked whenever the country is conquered. That works well because it provides a lot to the ability to customize the game. In fact, if you allow the nations and units to be named and defined in configuration files, the engine might be able to model several different European conflicts.

[Edwin P.]

In fact, even if HC does not add some of the ideas presented above some of them can be represented in SC2 using the existing script commands, although players will not be able to select which strategy to follow.

Example:

Dec 1941:

IF USA is Neutral

10% (1 in 10 games)

Popup: Japan announces withdrawal of all forces from from China and French Indochina. America lifts embargo on sale of oil to Japan.

Effect:

USA War Readiness -20%

USA gains 2 Carrier Fleets, 1 Bomber and McArthur HQ Unit.

This reflects the reduced chance for war and the transfer of the Pacific Fleet to the Atlantic if Japan agrees to US demands and withdraws from China.

This option give Germany more time to subdue Russia, but the USA enters the war with a much stronger force that can quickly invade Europe.

Naturally, you would also want to add an informational pop-up that occurs a few turn after France falls to indicate Japanese seizure of French Indochina.

[ May 10, 2005, 07:36 AM: Message edited by: Edwin P. ]

[Shaka of Carthage]

John C

You're correct.

The current "vocal minority" are throwing out whatever idea pops into thier head. While some of the ideas have some merit, the majority are basically "chrome" and don't add any real value to SC2. While initially, some have tried to point out the problems with the suggestions, most simply don't bother anymore.

And for those of us who have been around for a few years here, we're discussing some of the same ideas that were brought up in the past.

Hence the lurker mode for most of us.

[Retributar]

Here it comes again and again and again and again...same old diaherra!...from the narrowminded.

[JerseyJohn]

Thanks Shaka, That was very enlightening.

God Bless the Lurkers, they really contribute to this thing.

Fine, I'll lurk from now on.

[John C]

Originally posted by JerseyJohn:

Thanks Shaka, That was very enlightening.

God Bless the Lurkers, they really contribute to this thing.

Fine, I'll lurk from now on.

Come on JJ, don't pout. What Shaka said was really right on target for most boards. Ideas, good and bad, get tossed around and then fade away quietly only to appear again when another wave of people come passing through. We should not now take that simple fact personally any more than Shaka did when someone surely said essentially the same thing to him way back when.

If you enjoy tossing ideas around, then by all means do so. But let's face it, this board will not change the world. It won't even change wargaming as we know it. It is just a place for people with a shared interest to spend a little time shooting the breeze, paid for by a company that hopes to build a community and get a little publicity for an upcoming game.

[JerseyJohn]

John C.,

By Jove, you've done it, you've yanked me out of my pouting period and have also ended my three hour career as a lurker.

I agree with you on all points.

Appreciated.

The problem is we're talking about this idea as being specific to France and specific to the 1939 and 1940 scenarios. I'm going to start a new Thread with this as a more general idea tied in with the Game editor.

Please See, Countries That Switch Sides posted elsewhere in this Forum.

[Lars]

John C, if you flip back a couple of pages, you'll see I had the same concerns as you did about it unbalancing the game.

But, after hashing it out with Edwin, it does look like a guy could balance it as an option if he wanted too. And if it's do-able under the current scripting editor, why the heck not? Variants like War in Siberia, Free French, and Partisans add to the game. At the very least, it's an interesting third party mod.

And if nothing else, we got an bone on how the Free French might be handled in SC2.

[Wake]

Originally posted by jon_j_rambo:

I don't get it, the population of France was probably the same as Germany

Nope. In 1939, Germany : 70M, France : 41M