borsook

Hi, I've so far only had SC2:Blitzkrieg, but now I plan to buy an expation... But which one? Will Patton work without Waw? Also what improvements does it bring when compared to Waw? I am not interested in the fictional east vs west scenarios, just "normal" ww2... I'd be grateful for any tips you can give.

I am very sorry to say this, but there are quite a lot of obvious mistakes in the comparison, esp when it comes to CEAW (btw CEAW is the officially used abbreviation not CEW). Allow me to mention a few: 1. "This game has an editor and scripting while CEW just has scripts." - Untrue, CEAW has an editor too, you just have to download it, like a patch. 2. CEAW is not a "Matrix’s game". Matrix is just one of quite a few publishers, perhaps using the name of the developer would be better? 3. "[CEW] Zoomed out, units appear as NATO symbols; such symbols are toggleable in the other game. " In CEAW you can have units displayed as Nato symbols in all zoom levels too. 4. You fail to mention that SC2 has semi-random research system, while in CEAW you can choose between semi-random and non-random one. This has a huge impact on how the games are played. 5.You omit the fact that SC2 tries to emulate manpower via limits, though CEAW simulates not only amount of manpower but also its quality. 6."CEW’s land forces are abstract with infantry and mechanized units labeled as corps and armor apparently depicted as divisions" Untrue, armour units are corps too. 7. You mention HQs in SC2 but not Commanders in CEAW. Generally I am under impression that you had a bigger knowledge of SC2 than CEAW when writing this (e.g. you describe how subs work in SC2 ("Submarines can move silently but can only attack in “Hunt” mode." but fail to describe how sub hiding works in CEAW).

My first run of 1939 campaign, and I see that German Tac bomber has higher Air Attack than Air fleet (fighter now?). What is the reasoning behind this?

IIRC it was done because of technical reason for the AI not because tiles are superior. I miss hexes too (esp when doing encirclements) but once you get used to tiles you stop minding them.

As a long time HOI fan I must say that what appealed to me in SC2 is the fact that this is a game with an AI that can be really challenging. True as far as detail and realism go it cannot come nowhere near to HOI series but in HOI cannot cope with a lot of features, hence it uses a different rule set than the player and still it is not very challenging. SC2 can provide that challenge, and AI is capable of using all its features and many diverse tactics. For me the challenge equals fun, plus the game has about ten times less bugs than HOI, so the player avoids a lot of frustration. That said I have to disagree with the claim that SC2 AI is the best in turn based strategies, that's surely GalCiv2.

Good to hear that you're at least considering that possibility, so maybe SC3 (the one with hexes)? System diversity should not stretch the development time much provided it is there from the start. Thanx for the answer anyway.

I'm sorry if this has been asked before but are you considering porting SC2 to Linux (as native app not via Wine etc) at any point in the future?

Speaking of small but welcome additions - how about allowing us to adjust the volume of sounds not just turn them on/off? That would be very beneficial for those who play with music in the background

Ok, good point. Though this is an extremely abstract way to simulate retreating (though hospital recovery fits better into this abstraction). So the engine does see the point of encirclement, but still does not provide adequate means of achieving it.

Does the title mean it won't work with 1.06? Why it's for 1.05a?

I am not saying it was an easy battle for German part (after all significant amount of troops from group army Center had to be send in) I just mean that currently this big a pocket is impossible in SC2 with the historical force ratio. Especially as the movement/supply for the surrounded units should be blocked for more than one turn. HOI1/2 models this quite correctly too - surrounded units slowly lose STR and are destroyed (i.e. surrender) when forced to retreat. BTW this is the main problem, and why I say SC2 seem to model WW1 better than WW2 - units of corps/army size are constantly destroyed in combat in SC2, in real life the only situation when this was possible was surrounding them... By the by - maybe this all means that it would be good to do a WW1 mod for SC2?

It may very well be that one remembers better the cases where something went wrong, but I remember quite a few games in which I put maximum chits in an area I especially wanted to develop but instead researched those that I put 1 chit into, the former staying dead for half a game. This is for me the main problem with random tech system, I want to suffer the consequences of my bad decisions not luck or lack of it.

The speed is not an issue, it is, in my opinion, rightly modeled. The problem is that even 2:1 force ratio is not enough Not having to fight them? Have a look at 1941 Russia campaign, in the Kursk battle alone Germany captured 665,000 prisoners. That's equivalent of 10 game's units being surrounded and giving up. I can not how the current system comes close to modeling this. Not to mention that will they be out of supply on their next turn? And unable to move out?

Well, he isn't. But point taken. Though I find it strange considering how long cold war was...

I can very well agree with 2, but then I do not see much difference between Hitler's and Stalin's image (other than that where I come from Stalin seem to be more hated), it's too bad if indeed his image in US is so much better than Adolf's...

Still with two players of similar skill getting lucky with techs may be the decisive factor. Not to mention that watching your research progress from turn to turn can be a great fun, and it gives you the sense of being in control. Currently it happens that I put 3 chits in one field and every other tech progresses except for this one, that I want to put emphasis on...

After playing quite a few games, I must say that these are the two things that have a really lacking representation in the game. This is especially apparent when one plays a Barbarossa, typically units fight until their strength drops to 0, instead of giving up, and making a successful encirclement (i.e. one that the enemy cannot move out of) requires tremendous amounts of troops (this is partially because of tiles not hexes being used). And even if one manages to create such a pocket still capitulation of the forces within it is not to be expected. All this makes the SC2 combat (while very fun) resemble WW1 more than WW2. Comments will be appreciated.

This is of no consequence, but I am a curious person - hence let me ask - why Patton not Roosevelt & Rommel not Hitler? Or why Churchill not Montgomery and Stalin not Zhukov? Or to put the matter more simply why the mixture of political and military leaders, instead of 4 of the same "category"?

But can I emulate slow but sure progression, were e.g. each turn brings you 10% closer to completion? Unless I am missing something, modding alone cannot substitute a point-buy system. Speaking of modding - I'm currently doing a Battle of Crete scenario and hence a question - will the conversion to the exp. require much manual work? (I do not mean implementing new exp features in the scenario, just getting it to work).

Yes, on the other hand, that solution has one drawback - it can make tech progress really fast, which is even worse than what we have now.

I guess I did not explain myself very well. I am trying to reduce randomness without eliminating it completely. I am suggesting that there should be some degree of randomnes, but as time progress, the degree of randomness should fall. When you start working on a research project, there is a very small chance you may hit on the right answer on your first try. But, most likely, not everything will work out quite right at first. So you start looking at what went wrong, try to fix it, or to look for alternative. Of course, you learn through the process, so failure actually brings you closer to success... at the very least you know what does not work, so you won't try it again. There are many algorithms I can think of to model how time elpased in a research project increases the probability of success. Some of them my look to John as the big hairy thing he drew last night. But, still the general idea is fairly straigth forward: the odds of success should increase as time researching a given subject passes on. [/QB]</font>

IMMENSELY! </font>

One more question (and I'm sorry if it has been answered) - will the "smaller" scenarios (like Kursk or Africa) benefit in any way from the expansion additions?

A semi random would be best... what I mean by semi random is that as time goes on since research started, the probability of success should increase. There are several ways to do this: One way is for the program to remember the date when research started and then the probabilistic formula should take into account time elapsed since that date research started. Another way is what I call the bucket approach. Imagine you have to fill a bucket. Each turn you have a probability of adding one cup of water to the bucket. This probability of adding water to the bucket depends on # reseach chits allocated, intelligence, and anything else Hubert cares to throw in. As the bucket fills up you get closer to completing research. Say each bucket holds 10 cups. The probability of adding one single cup may be quite high (say 80%), but it still would take at least 10 turns to fill the bucket. On average it would take about 12 turns to fill the bucket. If you have bad luck it may take a few more turns... so you get some ramdomness, but not quite as much as you currently have. </font>

The change proposed by me and others has always been meant to be an option, of course the current system should be the default one.