Exel

Luck and strategy are not mutually exclusive. Of course luck shouldn't be the decisive factor that defines who loses and who wins, but in any case it should play a rather significant role - be it in combat calculations, partisans or research. I just don't get it why you people object to having things not totally under your control. Things weren't like that in real life either. Of course you can be a wise ass afterwards and say "why didn't you develop that and that instead of this", but things just don't go like that in reality. Do I need to retype my flak 88 example?

Les: Yes I remember you suggesting something similar somewhere. And once again I agree with everything you posted. Dragonheart: Majority of the hardcore tournament gamers maybe, but the majority of all players? I doubt it. All I've been playing with have been pretty happy with the SC research system. Maybe we should have a poll about it? Of course this aint a democracy, and Hubert makes the game just like he wants it, but I'm sure he too is interested in what the players think. But like Les, I sure don't want my game to be a number-crunching optimization manager, but a serious and realistic grand strategy. Being able to dictate the results of research to every detail is surely not realistic, as I tried to point out in the flak 88 example. Nor is it fun with such an abstracted tech tree (unlike in HoI). Surely you don't want to remove the random element in battles, so why remove it from research? Or would you prefer to have a linear combat system as well?

Well in my opinion the luck factor should be increased. You could still decide to research that and that, but there would a chance of getting something completely different than what you have aimed at. As I said before, that is the way it was/is in real life and that is the way it should be in the game. Just think about it. The Germans developed the famous 88mm flak for destroying heavy high-flying bombers, but ended up having the most kick-ass anti-tank weapon of the war.

If everything was to be done for just tournament play, the SC would no longer be SC. You just have to face it, luck is always an integral part of warfare, and in a war game it is part of realism. If you can purchase precisely the tech you want when you want without any randomness, the research and the whole game will become pure number crunching, and the victor will be defined by the optimal maths. I wouldn't call that very fun or realistic. Of course your decisions regarding research must have significant effect, but imho a certain level of uncertainty and randomness must be retained. HoI has a working tech system that lets you research exactly what you want, but it is not as nearly as abstracted as SCs tech tree.

They have stated numerous times that it is possible to put in unit limits with the editor. Don't know if there will be such limits in the standard campaign though, they probably haven't decided about it yet.

I loved the way the research worked in SC1. The random element should be retained in SC2 too. It's not like you get new tech by saying "take this pile of cash and give me that" in real life either. In fact, I'd like the research to be randomized even further. You would only assign MPPs into a main research fund, and then could order an emphasis to certain branch which would make gaining advances there more likely, but you could not direct the resources to only developing that certain tech. For example, you give 500 MPP to research and say that the emphasis goes to developing heavy tanks. So now the chances for the MPPs to actually going to tank research are little higher than it is to going somewhere else, but you'd have no way of being sure. So instead of getting tanks, you might just as well get anti-tank weapons or mechanization and only afterwards heavy tanks. That is the way it goes irl, that's the way it imho should go in the game as well. Also, it'd be cool if there would be a certain (low) chance of getting at least lvl 1 advances without any efforts. By allocating MPPs and ordering concentration to certain branches you could just make certain things more likely to happen.

True, but on the other hand the game might reach a larger audience by retail sales, and thus the overall profit might just become bigger than by safe but limited direct online sales. Paradox is another small publisher, and it has taken the retail route and done remarkably well considering the rather niche target group of their games. Direct sales may produce more prefit per copy, but they wont attract potential buyers beyond those who are already aware of Battlefront.com or read quality gaming mags / sites. Retail sales can reach those all-important "random" buyers.

I would recommend the Starfire mod instead. It puts the emphasis on historical accuracy and reworks the combat system in a truly outstanding way! :eek: CORE is a big ahistorical mess... [/offtopic]

I think the Soviet-Finnish wars proved this simple math wrong.

As John DiFool stated, the diagonal movement penalty of 2 is too high. Whereas diagonal movement without any increased movement cost would be advantageous, a doubled movement cost makes it highly disadvantageous. Diagonal movement should take (~) 1.5 times the movement points that ordinary movement does in order for them to be equal. Or then you could just go to hexes.

Hehe. Funny you should mention it. Haven't you ever run into some "Exel" guy on those forums? I used to do a whole lot of modding for the game, and was even in the Beta dev team for a while doing the 1.06 patch.

Offers wide appeal? Hardly. Even HoI had a very limited target audience if compared to really major releases, and no matter how much I like SC, I can't picture it to reach quite as large an audience as HoI did.

Liam: I didn't say air units should be able to kill ground units - I think they shouldn't! In fact I think the damage done by aerial attacks should be capped at strenght of 3 or so. I was just pointing out that you shouldn't nerf the air units too much. That "little Finnish save" I was talking about was the biggest battle ever in the Nordic region, and one of the biggest in World War 2. And for the love of God, the nick is Exel! I aint no cheap Micro$oft product.

Christmas sales really aren't the Holy Grail of gaming industry as most (even game devs and publishers) seem to think. True, there's a lot of money going around that time of the year, but there's helluva lot of competition as well. For big releases Christmas is a gold mine, but smaller releases - which SC2 certainly is - tend to go down with the mass. Random Christmas shopper will buy the high-profile multi-million marketed EA product that has meters and meters of shelf space. Small releases have better chances for making profit in the other times of the year. That's the fact.

Exactly the reason why the price tag should not be too high. $50€ will scare away most of the non-SC-fan potential buyers. The relative success of SC was explainable by it's low price tag that made the threshold of buying the game low. If the game costs $50€ instead of $35€, people will think twice before buying it, and there will be less random buyers. ($ and € are essentially the same)

I agree with the damage limit - maybe a limit of 3 strenght would be good? Beyond that the air attacks would only reduce entrenchment, readiness and supply (air attacks really should affect unit's supply). But I don't agree on extending that to naval units. Aircraft were definitely able to sink ships as they were the most powerful ship-destroying weapons system in WWII, effectively ending the supremacy of battleships.

I'm with you on the isometric view thing. I don't know, maybe it just reminds too much about all those RTS clicking fests, but I would prefer a straight 90-degree top-down view rather than any form of isometric one.

Yeah, let's all remember it's still a WIP. Sure some of the unit gfx look rather crude and unfinished, but that's probably because they still are. SC2 wont be coming out before September this year, so there's plenty of time for improvements and stuff.

I sure hope so. It would allow real amphibious invasions.

Maybe rockets could just be the final development step in artillery tech? You start with developing field guns and howitzers, end up with Nebelwerfers and Katyushas.

Yes. Hexes allow equal movement to all directions. With square tiles moving diagonal is advantageous.

There's a reason why air supremacy was often so crucial. If you had it, you could bomb the enemy into pieces. Air power played a major role in the Tali-Ihantala battle where the Soviet grand offensive against Finland was halted. Most historians agree that the German Detachment Kuhlmey (mainly Focke-Wulfs and Stukas) played a crucial role in the battle, and without it the Finns might not have been able to stop the Soviet onslaught. I agree that air power in SC1 had too much emphasis and it needs to be limited some what, but the air power should still remain a very important factor, and gaining air supremacy should be a potential war-winner.

How about real amphibious invasions, if they're not in yet. Ie you could land into an occupied hex..err tile and fight for it. This would of course require a special kind of combat system, where for example the losing side (determined by some obscene formula ) automatically withdraws to the next free tile - or in the case of the invader, is destroyed or withdrawn back to the transports at much reduced strenght. Also, add beaches! The land-anywhere rule sucks, as unanimously agreed by all those I have played against. There's a reason why the Allies landed on a relatively narrow beached in Normandy...

The only reason North America is there in the first place, I believe, is purely a game mechanical one. Ie. the Americans must get their MPPs from somewhere and need a base to put their newly "built" units to before shipping abroad.