Player vs Designer Control of Reinforcements

[Mike D]

Steve,

I hope you don't mind but I'm going to pull this out of the "Questions for Steve" thread to a separate one because I'm interested in what Martin and Fionn think about this matter since they've had the benefit of actually playing the game just as you and Charles have. In doing so I've quoted most of your and others comments in regards to my original post so that they can see what is going on. Furthermore, since my orginal post was soooooooooooo loooooooog (this one is probably even worse by the way ) I'm not going to repeat any of it here. So to very briefly summerize the question of my original post for Fionn's and Martin's sake let me just say that it boils down to whether, or not, CM's current reinforcement system allows for a realistic deployment of the battlefield commanders local, and perhaps higher level, reserves. And, whether, or not, it would make sense to add some capability to have reinforcements appear in between the individual battles of a campaign game representing the commitment of these reserves based on actaul events taking place (instead of the scenario designer just simply determining when they should/might come into play) in the game which may, or may not, appear based on these conditions.

Note that all comments below in quotes are Steve's unless otherwise indicated.

BTW, Steve, please don't get mad at me here. I'll grant you that I can be a harsh critic at times, but I'm really just trying to have a friendly debate w/ you here so don't take anything the wrong way even though I might sound like I'm bashing your concept of reinforcements/reserves. Also, as you'll see in my next post I'm leading up to why I think players should have control of their reserves and reinforcements in the game vs. the scenario designer and how I think that might be possible to do in the game.

But for now, on with the debate…………………………….

_________________________

"You don't even know that it is going to be 6 battles, for example, nor do you know what terrain the battle is going to be fought on. So the "problem" is bigger than you realize."

Steve, actually I realize all of this. I was trying only to look at one aspect of what is a very large "issue".

______________________

"Say I am on the attack and beat the snot out of you in battle one (could happen CM then decides to move the map back to a spot where you havean excellent defensive position. ……….You still hold that defensive line, but this time you get reinforcements. Now you are stronger. I get some reinforcements, but was punished too much, so I basically sit out a battle and nothing much happens. Next battle I get something and you get something, I attack with my brains fully engaged and kick you out of your positions..."

A couple of comments and then some questions and thoughts. First, let me say thanks for this example because it gives me and I would imagine many others here that have not had the benefit of playing the game a lot better idea of how CM campaigns work (i.e. the moving up and down the map over the various battles based on the results of the battle, etc.). Second, this ebb and flow to a battle sounds good to me since this is more or less how I'd expect a battle to unfold in real life.

Now for the questions which of course have to do w/ the nagging issue of the reinforcements. How does the scenario designer determine in a given situation when, where, how many, and perhaps most importantly IF reinforcements should be given to either side and do so in a realistic manner? Well, let'see.

If I were designing a scenario based on a purely historical battle situation and I had accurate data of what forces both sides would receive, where, and when; then there would be no question has to how they should be handled in the game. Have them come in on the map where they did in real life at the time they came in. Throw in a little random variation by giving say only a 70-80% chance that they will appear on the first historical turn that they did in the battle and let this go on for 3-4 turns just in case they don't make it in on the first try just to add a little variety to the game and you're done. Clean, simple, easy and CM's reinforcement system already handles this quite well, so no problems. And there is no issue w/ the realisim of how the reinforcements are handled since their arrival time, numbers, etc., are based on what happened in real life.

Next case. Let's say we don't have accurate data on the type of reinforcements or when they arrived etc., or that we are creating a fictional scenario (something which I plan on doing a lot of by the way since I don't necessarily have the time to go all over researching battles). Now I think we have some additional things to think about if we are going to realistically deploy reinforcements. First there is no historical context in which to determine the arrival of the reinforcements so we are in a bit of a pickle already as the scenario designer. So what are our options. Well, we can do what you did in creating the scenario that Fionn and Martin are playing right now. We can makeup a scenario, put in starting forces, objectives, etc. and even make a guess at what reinforcements we might want to throw in and then go and play test it. After we play it we might adjust the starting forces, add/take away some of the reinforcements, put a hill in the middle of the map to make it easier for the defender, or maybe just tweak the percentage chance or number of turns that certain reinforcement groups might appear. We then go back play the game again (at least to a certain point like you did) and see what happens. We keep doing this until we come up with a "fun" and "balanced" scenario. Great! No problem. Everyone wants to play a fun and relatively balanced game. That's a large part of why we play wargames in the first place.

However,…………………..

Is the fact that I basically played "God" as the scenario designer in terms of where, when, how many, and even if, reinforcements should appear really realistic??? Well in terms of coming up w/ a good well balanced scenario to play it really doesn't matter, right? But the question still remains is it realistic? As you might have gathered my feelings are that it is not. Why do I think this? Well, where can you give me one example of an actual real live WWII battle where God himself predetermined how events were going to unfold; especially in terms of where, when, how many and most importantly IF reinforcements would appear. Did they appear on minute 10 (turn 10) of the battle marching up along the road next to the farm house just because God willed them to do so and/or maybe that was when he thought they should appear just to make things interesting?? I don't think so. They appeared for a reason, or reasons, not just because God decided for them to come out of nowhere and start fighting. So in trying to determine what reinforcements should realistically appear in this situation I believe we've first got to answer another question and that is what are the reasons that reinforcements showed up in real life in a given battle, or in between battles, in the first place?????????

Hmmm, not necessarily an easy question to answer is it? Well, I think I can boil it down to a few simple cases for the sake of discussion (in reality I know it is not this simple). However, I most definitely welcome any and all thoughts of others here too since I'm trying to learn the real whys and wherefores of when and how reserves would be committed as reinforcements in real life by bringing this up as much as I'm trying to argue my point:

1) Reinforcements during individual battles: They were ordered to the battle area by the commander at some point before the battle, but for whatever reason didn't show up by the start of the battle so they enter the current battle after it has already started. Alternatively maybe they were nearby and moved the short distance to the area to check out what was going on and take part in the fight. Either way, CM's reinforcement model and capabilities as they stand today would seem to handle these guys quite well. In my mind this pretty much takes care of many / most cases for reinforcements that would appear during a given 60-120 min. battle during a campaign. Like you've stated before to have any reinforcements show up from higher level reserves (and probably even local one's too) as a result of the commanders decsion to call them in during such a short span of time as modeled in a typical CM battle is not really very realistic. So onwards to campaigns.

2) Reinforcements during campaign games: In terms of any reinforcements showing up during a given battle of a campaign we've got that covered in (1) above so let's concentrate on the reinforcements showing up between the battles of the campaign. In my view the main reason reinforcements might show up in between battles in what CM treats as a "campaign" is that the local commander and/or his superior, has assessed the situation in the area after the end of the previous battle(s) and determined that it is the appropriate or needed time to commit local and perhaps even higher level reserves based on factors such as how is the battle going in general, how many casualties have been taken (i.e. can the defense in this area be maintained, or can the attack be further sustained without committing more units at this time), what are the tactical and strategic ramifications of advancing/being pushed back in this area, availability of both local and higher level reserve units, etc., etc., etc. This of course assumes that they (reserves) are close enough to the battlefield to get there in time before the next battle starts. Local reserves are just that so getting them to the battlefield within an hour or two between battles of a campaign should be absolutely no problem. Higher level reserves (say regiment/division reserve units) may or may not make it in such cases and probably could only appear overnight and/or after several battles after being called up to the area. I.e. maybe higher level reserves are deemed to be necessary after battle 1, but they can't get there till battle 4 because it will take them that long just to travel to the battlefield.

Note, however, that there is absolutely no way CM's current reinforcement system can even begin to do this since all reinforcements must be completely predetermined (except for those units given only a percentage chance of entry) by the scenario designer which in my view is totally unrealistic. The point here is that in real life reinforcements between "battles" appeared for a reason. They did not appear because "God" told them to any more so than an omiscient scenario designer can or should predetermine where and how reserves should be deployed. Just because we are used to having the scenario designer do this in just about every wargame we've ever played that had reinforcements does not mean that it is a realistic treatment of how they should be handled, nor does it necessarily make this all too common methodology "right".

___________________

"See, who knows what will happen. The point here is that we don't want either side to get reinforcements based on losses simply to balance the game."

Doug Beman: "Way back when sometime, BTS said "we will not have campaigns that the player's incompetence, or even sheer bad luck, with additional forces." I don't remember offhand all the reasons they gave, but I agreed with their decision, because it forces players to make good decisions (and good decisions can often form a bulwark against bad luck) I'm fully aware that I am constantly going to curse this decision as I play campaigns, since I'm not the best commander in the virtual army, but knowing that I gotta do it right the first time will, hopefully, make me better".

"Mike,

I understand the two big reasons you want a system of condition-triggered reinforcements: (1) improves game balance, and (2) potentially reflects real world reinforcement decisions. Such a system would be nice to use once in a while, but I don't think should be the norm.

First, it punishes success. If you kick my tail in battle 1 and battle 2, why should you be robbed of your victory because of my incompetence (which is the net effect of giving me big reinforcements to offset my losses)? Second, you posit that this is a sector gone bad for the army with the unexpectedly large losses. When I play these squad level games, I generally posit that the results in my sector are emblematic of the entire engagement. (It's not much fun to kick the snot out of your opponent, only to find out that your army was creamed on the rest of the battlefield, and therefore ordered to withdraw; your accomplishments therefore counting for naught.) Thus, if you put it to me in the first two battles, I globalize that to your army putting it to my army in the overall battle. Thus, my HQ is strapped across all sectors and has no additional reserves to give to me.

The fact of the matter is that your army's mission changes with critical battlefield successes or losses. In your example, if the Yanks put it to the attackers in battles 1 and 2, then the German mission in battles 3-6 likely changes from capturing the key cross-roads/town, to defend against the Yank counter-attack.

I would write a little more, but I have an incomplete view of how victory are earned, so I'll just leave it at that. In conclusion, I understand what you are trying to accomplish with a system of conditional reinforcements and I think it would be fun to play the game that way occasionally, but I would oppose using that system as the norm (or at all in tournament play).

Zackary"

"Zackary, thanks! Yes, we think that things should be more interesting this. Martin and Fionn both have commented LOTS on the fact that their battle has gone back and forth many times. Each one has thought for sure that all was lost at least twice now. Yet they both think they can win still. And this is with "fixed" reinforcements."

Guys, first let me say that I think I probably confused everyone in how I brought this up in my original post. In fact I debated whether I should bring it up at all since I knew it was going to add controversy to what I was proposing, but I knew if I didn't at least mention it that I would be guaranteed that someone else would. So just let me say that I don't want either side to receive reinforcements based soley on losses either! Now the game balancing affect of this is a very nasty question. And I certainly wouldn't want conditional reinforcements to cause such a problem. But they don't necessarily have to depending on how they are handled. In any event I was just trying to give one example of why reinforements would be committed by the area commander in a realistic manner. There are at least several, if not many, others that could be considered as well and it should probably be a mixture of these factors that determine what reinforcements are committed to the campaign in between battles, not just one factor like losses.

____________________

"If you screw up and can't make good on your mistake, you will lose. Therefore our reinforcement system makes sense."

Steve and Doug,

I could just as easily argue here that it does make sense to put in conditional reinforcements based on losses. In my view it doesn't matter that I'm playing a CM campaign against you and as the defender say I bungle a few things up so bad during the first battle that the game determines that some of my reserves that I otherwise would have gotten should be given to me before the next battle as reinforcements. Why? Well, suppose that I was a bungling commander in real life and screwed up just as badly what do you think my superiors would do? Well for starters if I had screwed up a lot before they might can me and get a new commander. But whether they did this, or not, they would give serious consideration to whether reinforcements were needed in the area and if they were available and could be deployed in time would probably very likely commit some reserves to do just that before the next battle to help contain your advance.

____________________

"Either your higher ups allocate reinforcements or they don't."

Yes Steve you are exactly right here, but you left out the part that their decision to do so, or not, would be based on what was really going on at the time during the actual battles in the area and the availability of such reserves.

_____________________

"In real war the importance of the battle has little to do with reserves some times. Poor saps defending Remagan Bridge found this out "the Americans are coming over the bridge!! What should we do?!?" "Hold them of course" "With what, we need reinforcements" "Der Fuhrer is confident you can make do with what you have" Reinforcements did come, but only after the bridge was firmly in US hands and significant forces were on the other side. Germans lost, plain and simple."

I'll grant you that this is true, but the operative word here is "sometimes". In my view "most of the time" reinforcements / reserves were committed if the situation was deemed to require them and they were available. If we were building a scenario to model the battle that you have described above reserves / reinforcements are not even an issue (at least of the German side) because they didn't exist.

_____________________

"The Campaign designer should simply keep an eye on the total number of points being racked up by the units being purchased. If he thinks it is going to be a tough defensive battle, then give the attacker a higher percentage over the defender. Is this a good indication of fairness? Considdering the attacker could loose ALL its armor on the first turn of the first battle, or hold onto the same armor for 4 or 5 battles, it is as good as can be expected."

This is great in terms of designing a well balanced and fun campaign game for all to enjoy. However, it speaks nothing as to whether God/Scenario Designer predetermining the quantity, type, number, location, and arrival time of reinforcements represents a realistic deployment of local and higher level reserves as the campaign progresses through its various battles.

______________________

"BTW, a CM Campaign will likely not go for more than about a day and a half's worth of fighting. I doubt you will ever see a game that goes through two night turns. So multiple day issues aren't."

Are you saying that CM won't allow a campaign to go on for any longer than a day to day and a half? Is there going to be some hard limit built into the campaign editor to prevent us from doing so??? Trust me, if there isn't, there are going to be all kinds of people building up campaigns that stretch over days, if not weeks. I mean just look at some of the postings you see here on the board. You've got folks that want to fight out the entire Market Garden operation in 60min increments! (god only knows why though, cause I sure wouldn't want to do this, but to each his own). However I can easily see how I might want to simulate a campaign battle up to 3-5 days I length w/ two to three 60-90 minutes battles per day. In that case I think the tools available in CM are somewhat lacking in allocating reinforcements over such a period of time in a realistic manner.

"Still, nobody has beta tested a campaign yet, so the Jury is still out on our design. Right now we see no need to change it as the same system is in the single scenarios right now (i.e. each side gets stuff or doesn't, with no regard to progress or status) and works very well"

Yes, I would agree that it works fine in terms of being able to create fun well-balanced games. However, with all due respect to say that it "works very well" doesn't necessarily mean that it is realistic, or for that matter that it is "correct". It is your guy's game though so you are free to do what you want and will undoubtedly do what you believe is best for the game and I certainly cannot argue with that. However, is it realistic? Well I don't think so, but then I'm just one person here on the board so I certainly hope others will voice their opinions. In the meantime I've got an idea for you and everyone else to consider that I'll post below separately.

___________________________

Oops, Here are some other posts on the subject that I missed above

There have been a couple of other posts between Doug Beman and Steve also discussing the matter of reinforcements that I've decided to leave out because they contain some info that Martin and Fionn shouldn't see. Here is one of the later exchanges between Steve and Kwazydog though……

-____________________

"We don't want people to exercise control over their reinfrocements." -

Steve

Maybe an idea Steve is to make the chance that it was to arrive the first time reduced for the next turn after you reject it. For example, a Sherman has a 70% chance on turn 5, if you reject it 60% on turn 6 and so on. This would probably reflect the possability of reinforcements being reassigned to other areas if not accepted by the CO, and would make the player think twice about doing it Just a thought...

"But your point about the reserves coming in JUST at the right point is a

good one to make in this debate. " - Steve

Ive noticed that everything had pretty much arrived as necessary. I think

you did really well in predicting the outcome Hopefully for Moon, the air

support and some armour will come through though, as of turn 12, those

Gerry Panzers are looking rather a ominous site

Kwazydog

____________________

And here's another post form Henri:

"A problem with conditional reinforcements is that a player who knows about it could purposely slow down his advance in order to get more reinforcements to improve his chances later. One would end up playing the system instead of the battle. A better idea might be conditional reinforcements with probabilities low enough so that it wouldn't pay to do the above."

That's it for all of the other posts as far as I know.

Regards,

Mike D

Aka Mikester

[Mike D]

Steve,

Now to what I'm going to propose.

Not too many people seem to want to have conditional reinforcements or think they are a good idea. After hearing some of the reasons why I guess I'd have to partially agree with them. But this still deosn't solve the "problem" of realistic deployment of reserves as reinforcements during a battle and especially in between battles during a campaign. As a result of all of this I have thought about this "problem" at some length. While I was orginally going to push for the computer to determine when these reinforcements should arrive (if at all) based on the discussion in (2) above, the more I thought about it the more I didn't like the idea. Worst of all it would cause poor old Steve and Charles to do a lot of programming to determine all the logic behind the computer making these decisions. Time that I'm sure could be put to better use elsewhere in the game. But then I got to thinking about letting the players control their reinforcements as others have also mentioned in the above posts and the more I think about this idea the more I like it! I know there are dozens of you saying we don't want that including Steve from the sounds of it, but just here me out, OK? Unfortunately this is going to require some programming resources as well, but if enough people think it is a good idea maybe it is worth it. I think it is, but then of course I'm biased and probably havn't thought about all of the ramifications of doing such a thing. Anyway, here goes……….

Suppose the scenario designer has 3 reserve pools that can be setup as he sees fit. He can place units in all of them, some of them, or none of them as he chooses to simulate the situation at hand. The first of these pools would be a local reserve pool (hereafter referred to as local, or battalion, reserves) under the direct command of the area commander (i.e. the game player). The second one would represent reserves that were in or relativelely near to the local battle area but not under the local commander/players direct operational control (hereafter referred to as regimental reserves). The last one would represent higher level reserves (brigade/divisional reserves) a moderate distance away from the battlefield, but still able to reach it in ½ a day to one day (hereafter referred to as divisional reserves). These would also not be under the local commanders/players control. More on what I mean by local area commanders control in a minute.

This next part wouldn't necessarily need to be in the game, but it would add some variety so I'm throwing it in to see what people think. In addition to putting the basic reserve units into the above pools the scenario designer can stipulate that certain units will later appear in the regimental or divisional pools after such and such battle of the campaign (possibly stipulating only a percentage chance of this occuring as well) He can also stipulate that certain units in the regimental/divisional pools might disappear after a given battle of the campaign is completed to simulate units that were taken away to other areas unexpectedly (again, this might be on some percentage basis). For example he might give the German player a platoon of Tiger I tanks in the regimental or divisional pools, but they will not show up in the pool until between the second and third battles of the campaign and even then there might only be a 50% chance of their arriving at all. Or he might put a dive bomber mission into the original divisional reserve allocations, but stipulate that there is a 33% chance that after battle 2 and on that it will be removed from the pool. Note that the players local reserve pool that is under his command cannot be touched in this manner, only the reginmental and divisional pools that are out of his control can benefit/suffer from these actions.

So the scenario designer doesn't determine when any reinforcements would arrive, where, how many, etc. He only sets up the reserve pools to simulate the forces that are potentially available to the 2 commanders. Note that by doing this he is no longer playing God, he simply builds a map, sets objectives, and then determines starting and reserve forces for both sides. Also note that the realism of how and when reserves/reinforcements will be employed is attained because it is, you, the battlefield commander, that is determining when they should be requested and employed based on whether they are needed or not given the current situation.

Next, the game begins.

(1) During the first battle (or any subsequent battle for that matter) either player can, if they choose to do so and believe it is necessary, call upon up to 1/4 of their local reserves (as measured in unit point values) any time starting on turn 5 of the battle or later. Once called upon there will be a minimum 10 minute/turn delay before they arrive. Starting 10 minutes after they are summoned there is a 33% chance on that turn and each of the remaining turns in the battle that they will show up during that particular turn. If they don't show up at all before the end of the current battle they simply return to the players local reserve pool. Note that the player can only call upon and deploy infantry uints in platoon groups w/ their HQ unit. Next issue is where do they show up. There are quite a number of issues here that I don't want to get bogged down in so for now let's just say they can only show up along map edge behind the player that called them up and leave it at that. In terms of battalion and regimental reserves the players can never call these units into play during a battle itself, but rather only in between battles of the campaign game as described below.

Battle 1 of the 6 battles ends.

In between battles the players can do the following with their reserve forces in the 3 pools. Note that these steps must be done in order to preserve the chain of command and time limitations of requesting and deploying the various reserves.

(2) Battalion / Local Reserves: Up to half of the players local reserves (again as measured in unit point values) can be deployed for the upcoming battle by the commander from his local reserve pool if he so chooses. If this is the last battle of the campaign he can call upon upto 2/3 of his remaining local reserve force at this point in time. These units can be deployed anywhere in friendly controlled territory (I think I'm remembering correctly here that there will be a "no-mans-land" zone between the two opposing forces between each of the battles that neither one of them can set units up in so this should be OK). Note that the player can only call upon and deploy infantry units in platoon groups w/ their HQ unit.

(3) Regimental Reserves: In between battles the player/commander can appeal to regimental command for additional reinforcements. He can only do this between battles and after he has chosen his local reserves to be committed to the battle as noted in (2) above. Up to 1/3 (measured in unit point values once again) of the available regimental reserves can be called upon between any two given battles of the campaign if the player chooses to do so. Once these units have been requested the computer determines on an individual "unit" by "unit" basis (in case of infantry units he can only call upon them in full platoon increments w/ HQ "unit" groups so the entire platoon either comes in, or it doesn't) which units will be granted to the player. Each "unit" has a 50% chance of becoming availble to represent higher commands agreement with your need for the reserve unit vs. needing to keep them in reserve. All units that are granted to the player by regimental command are then placed in his local reserve pool. All units requested that are not granted remain in the regimental reserve pool. Also, units just placed into the local reserve pool from regimental reserves cannot be deployed per (2) above until after the next battle. They can, however, be called up during next the battle as previously described in (1) above. The final kicker and one that will hopefully keep players from abusing the use of regimental reserves is that the player will pay a victory point (VP) penalty equal to say 15% (or other suitable percentage) of each units point value for each and every unit moved into his local reserve pool from the battalion reserve pool which will added to the opposing players score! So if a player requests say 250 points worth of units from the battalion reserve and the computer determines that 200 points worth will be granted and moved to the players local reserve pool he would pay a .15*(200) = 30 VP penalty for doing so. To keep the players reserve movements information away from the opposing player these VP's wouldn't show up in the opposing players VP total until the end of the game along w/ a notation in the VP summary of how many VP's the other player gave up due to calling regimental and or divisional reserves up.

(4) Divisional Reserves: In between battles the player/commander can appeal to divisional command for additional reinforcements. Note that this really is meant to portray regimental command appealing for more forces from the higher level command structure and not necessarily units requested by the player the affect of which we will see below. He can only do this between battles. Up to 1/4 (measured in unit point values once again) of the available divisional reserves can be called upon between any two given battles of the campaign if the player choose to do so. Note that these reserves, if granted, will only be moved to the regimental reserve pool and will not appear there until after the next battle has ended. Once these units have been requested the computer determines on an individual "unit" by "unit" basis (in case of infantry units he can only call upon them in full platoon w/ HQ "unit" groups so the entire platoon either comes in, or it doesn't) which units will be moved to the regimental reserve pool. Each "unit" requested has a 33% chance of becoming availble to represent higher commands agreement with your need for the reserve unit to be moved to the regimental reserve pool vs. needing to keep them in divisional reserve. All units that are granted to the player by divisional command are then placed in the regimental reserve pool and will be available there to be requested per (3) above after the next battle. All units requested that are not granted remain in the divisional reserve pool. Again the kicker here and thing that will hopefully keep players from abusing the use of these divisional reserves is that the player will pay a victory point (VP) penalty equal to say 20% (or other suitable percentage) of each units value for each and every unit moved into his regimental reserve pool from the divisional reserve pool which again will added to the opposing players score! As in 3 above the opposing player would not be made aware of this until the end of the game to help preserve FOW.

Also, keep in mind that if a divisional reserve a unit is subsequently called into the local reserve pool from the regimental reserve another 15% penalty is imposed as noted in (3) above. So to get a unit from from the divisional reserves all the way down to the local reserve pool would take a couple of battles of elapsed time at a minimum (assusming you got lucky and the unit actually did get moved the first time it was requested to move from one pool to the next) and would also end up costing the player 35% of the value of the unit in VP penalty. This will 1) prevent players from abusing the system and 2) provide for play balance to be maintained. I.e. a player attempts to call in all sorts of reserves, gets lucky and has most/all of them granted over the course of the game, and proceeds to wipe out the other player potentially (or at least try to do so), will most likely lose the game due to the fact that he had to pay a considerable VP penalty to get those units and that penalty (if the percentages are set right above relative to the actual VP location values, values for losses inflicted, etc.) did not "buy" him enough in terms of gaining other VP's on the board, etc., to offset the penalty of getting the units in the first place. This also takes care of the cases noted above where people are worried about "losing their victory" etc. due to incompetency of one of the players. If a player is incompetent and screws up and then has to call in reserves he can only call in his local reserves (which in my mind should be set to be approximely the same forces that the scenarios designer would have called in under the current reinforcement rules) without incurring penalties. So he doesn't get off without paying for his mistakes!

Lastly, the scenario designer doesn't have to play "God" in determining when, where, how many, and if reinforcements should be deployed. He simply sets up the map, objectives, starting forces and the reserve pools and let's the players have at it which in my mind is all that he should do. The reinforcement and reserve commitment decsions are left up to the commanders which is where these decisions quite frankly belong since in a real life battle that is exactly where they would be made and not by the "god like" scenario designer attempting to predetermine these things for them.

This is just an idea. But it is an idea that I thnk has some merit to at least be considered vs. the current reinforcement system in the game. I welcome any and all feedback that you guys have on this idea. I think it is a great idea. I fully understand that it is more complicated than the current systems and will take some doing to get such a thing coded. But I think the potential benefits that it offers to the game and to us as players are worth it. However, I can hear Steve and Charles groaning now since it will require some coding and interface screens to accomplish. However, I don't think it would be too terribly difficult to do and quite frankly I believe it would add a great deal of depth and realism to the game. God didn't decide what happened with reserves and reinforcements on the battlefield in real life, right? The commanders on the scene did. That being the case, why should the scenario designer be making decisions in regards to these matters that should rightfully be made by, us, the players of the game???

Regards,

Mike D

Aka Mikester

[Guest KwazyDog]

Phew, I need a beer after reading that one Well, hehe, Im not going to attempt to put anything forward here, because I think Steve is the only one whom will be able to provide you with the answers you seek.

I just wanted to say that I do beleive that as Steve said it will be something that really needs to be looked at in beta by many (however many there are ) different people whom will all have different opinions. I think any issues will really become prevelant here. Very in depth post Mike.

[This message has been edited by KwazyDog (edited 09-01-99).]

[Moon]

Wow... this post should be printed and published as part of the manual or something As KwazyDog said - very in depth.

I'd like to write something of similar proportions, but unfortunately I have to go to work very soon, so I'll just drop a couple of quick points:

- one thing that IMO would suffer when CM would use Mike's system is the thrill of actually not knowing when the reinforcements are going to arrive. Since turn ten (ah, actually since I lost the three tanks) I keep looking around the map desperately to see if I got any reinforcements. It's really thrilling - will they be there or not? If I could call up "some" reinforcements, that thrill would have been gone.

- I am not sure if the system you describe is that much more realistic. My feeling is that you are overrating the control that the battlefield commander had on calling up reinforcements, even over the course of a day or more of fighting. It's not that there are reserves waiting out the just off the map that you can draw on as you see fit. For such a "small" battle as will be represented in CM, it might take a week before your call for reinforcements is answered. In the current game, for example, the reinforcements so far are units that fought their way through the town. They never were in a regimental reserve pool.

So while Mike's system is, IMO, not that much more realistic, it is much more complicated.

Still, Mike - what you wrote shows your enthusiasm for the game and the fact that you're sticking with it although most people don't seem to agree shows character, too.

Martin

[Bamse]

Mike D a very good post !

I want that system, if you cant make it in CM

please make it in CM2

Cant be that hard ! The problem must be the interface, the rest is simple programing

BUT YOU MUST BE ABLE TOO TURN IT OF SO IT DONT END UPP BEING CC3. = Defender is compensated with huge amounts of pionts so he

rout the attcker out from the entire operation.

AND i want a strategic layer too were i can send the reinforcments too the differnt battalions AND i want too be an airfleet commander too AND i want too have Battleships......

Am I out of scope ??????? Nahhhh......

[Doug Beman]

Ahem. Mike, go get some BandAids--you typed your fingers into bloody stumps!

Here's what I think:

(1) About the "local pool." IMHO, at the "player's command" level of CM, quite often the units the player has at the start are all the units he has direct control over. There are no more units in his own command that he could call from a local pool; any attempt to get further units would mean going to a higher command. In this case, I don't think the "local pool" would even exist. I think the lowest level he would be able to call up would be "regimental pool." (was that understandable?)

(2) I really don't think there were many instances in WW2 when a local (say batallion) commander wrote up a wants list, gave it to regimental/divisional command, and those bigbrass looked at it and actually followed the list. Instead, I think it was more of a local commander calling for specific units ("I need TDs!!) and the higher-ups deciding that maybe the medium tank company that is in laager over the hill would do nicely. Sorta like sending somebody to the grocery store with a specific list (say you gotta make a cake and stuff for a party) and having them come back with a trunkful of stuff that is useless for making a cake. Just 'cause a local commander calls for specific units doesn't mean the higher ups are going to use his request as a checklist ("Let's see, we got the 105mm guns, the engineer platoon, all we need is the TDs....Aisle 8")

(3) In your system, if I understand it correctly, let me talk out something:

a) A commander makes a call on the divisional reserves. The game engine gives those calls a X% chance of being heeded, and some (say Y%) units are moved to regimental pool.

The commander then calls those units from regimental pool down to local. The game gives a A% chance of any of them moving, and B% do move down a notch.

c) The commander then calls those troops from the local pool. The game says C% chance of any of them moving, and D% do move.

Does that look right? If not, my next point is invalid, so disregard it:

You're still reducing the reserve movement to % chances, which is what CM does already. You have a [(X% times A% times C%)=E%] chance that any of the units you originally called for will ever be at your disposal, and only [(Y% times B% times D%)=F%] of those originally called units will make the move.

(4) I don't think a VP point penalty would work. Let me say why:

If a local commander is given orders to take/hold an area, chances are that the bigbrass giving the orders (i.e. Steve) have already decided what reserves are available; further screams for help from that commander will only annoy those bigbrass. If the area is really important, and has to be taken/held, the bigbrass have already allocated hefty reserves and won't be too miffed if the local commander uses them all. This is the all-out, hell-bent-for-leather assault or the stand-and-die defense. If the bigbrass decide that the area is not important enough to warrant a large-scale reserves shuffle, then they allocate few/no reserves, and maybe the local commander doesn't take/hold the objective. This is the limited attack, or the holding attack, or

delaying action.

Let's look at a situation which is still pretty fresh in my mind, since I just read the book a couple months ago: Bastogne.

On both sides, local commanders knew the importance of this town, and called for reinforcements. Going back to Point (1), both commandes had already exhausted their "local pools." Further reserves HAD to come from regimental or higher levels. After the higher-ups realized the importance also, they sent some reserves. Going back to Point (2), what the local commanders got was not what they asked for. The "U.S. player" called for a LOT of reserves; he asked for TDs, heavy arty, air support (and the kitchen sink). He got the 101st without substantial heavy weaps and elements of (I think) 10th Armored. The call on those reserves was a real commitment for the U.S. bigbrass (the 101st was supposed to be restin' and the units of 10th? Armored were badly needed elsewhere) The "U.S. player" managed to hold Bastogne. Did it make a big negative mark (i.e. VP penalty) that he used a crudload of reserves to do it? No; what mattered was holding Bastogne, that was all important. The "German player" also called a lot of reserves (the shopping list escapes my memory) and yet did not take the town. If he had taken Bastogne, would there have been a big negative mark (i.e. VP penalty) because he used reserves? Hard to say, but I think not. Taking Bastogne was all-important. Also, the original failure to grab Bastogne when the grabbin' was good had already made a black mark in some commanders' books.

If you simulate calling reserves from higher up, and want the callups to have an impact on the "bigpicture" (i.e. VP) you can't do that without a complete "bigpicture." It's impossible to determine what negative effect (VP penalty) any callup will have unless you have the "bigpicture" in a frame on the wall of your divisional command post. For local command simulations (which is what CM is, I think. Is that right?) it's all about taking one specific objective, and using whatever forces the divisional commands (Steve, again) gave.

In short, reserves can only be done really well if we have a human player looking at a complete bigpicture and deciding, "well, you can have that extra company of TDs, but it'll be a black mark in your record." Or else, "because you called Unit X from reserves, it wasn't there to meet the enemy's attack at Point Y, and the whole front collapsed." A computer has to have, at some point, a "yes/no"; an abstraction; a hard&fast percentage to work with. In wargame terms, they're (not yet) smart enough to do what divisional commanders do when deciding to release reserves; or to factor the actions of one local commander into a bigpicture. Until we get the HAL series online, there's going to be an abstraction eventually, and I say we let CM make it at the level it's making it, and hope for the future.

DjB

ps "Open the podbay doors."

[Doug Beman]

One more thing, since my post isn't there yet to edit.

Hope you're not miffed at my response, Mike. I, too, would like to be able to get on a fieldphone and plead for reserves to a divisional staff officer who is sitting in a warm schoolhouse command post while enemy shells are exploding meters from my roofless farmhouse CP. Maybe someday we'll see the birth of the "computer role-playing-war game."

DjB

[ChrisPick]

All,

I am at least half-way toward agreement with Mike D, though I have yet to see a clear statement of how campaigns will work in the Beta, so I reserve the right to completely change my mind... =)

To be heretical for a moment, one of the great joys of playing a Historical ASL game (HASL) verses a regular scenario, is the ability to choose forces via a purchase mechanism, from a limited pool of historical units. i.e. there may be X platoons of engineers in the pool for the whole campaign, and if I want to assault a village during this battle, I may buy a couple with some of my limited points. Air power, and artillery missions are also limited to purchases from the pool. The fun part of this is the flexability (within historical/situational limits) to "customise" your force to match your plan. It greatly adds to the replay value of any campaign game, as while the map and objectives are the same, you only have a general idea of what the enemies forces may be, and you may change your own to try out different strategies (without resorting to an editor, "hmm... If I just give myself two more Jagdpanthers over here..." =)

What does everyone think? And BTS guys, how does the pre-/inter-battle unit purchase work now?

Cheers,

Chris

------------------

Chris Pick

chris@chris-and-donna.com

[Mike D]

***** Per Ken Talley's suggestion that he e-mailed me earlier today I've cleansed this post of all references to the current battle between Moon and Fionn which might have given Fionn any data. Sorry about that guys, I wasn't thinking too clearly as the loss of blood due to typing my fingers to bloody stumps combined w/ the couple of beers I'd had clouded my judgement. I hope there was little/no harm done. Anyway, it should be "clean" now for Fionn's eyes. The areas of text that have been removed are donated by ****** This text has been removed *********

Guess I should have warned everybody that these suckers were looooooooooonnnng. From now on at the top of such posts I'll put the following warning:

**** Danger *******

This is another extremely long and verbose post from Mikester. Please be sure to have beer in hand (and a couple more nearby in reserve ) before attempting to read in one sitting!

*******************

Thanks to everybody so far for your thoughts and comments. I think it is very interesting to know what all of you think on this subject.

Kwazydog:

I certainly do hope this gets disucussed during the beta test, and for that matter, by everyone else as well after the game comes out and they get a chance to play it. I for one think that CM could be a better game with such a system, but that' just my opinion. CM being the ground breaking game that it is I thought these guys might be willing to consider such a thing vs. the "just doing it the way most every other wargame out there has done before" type of mentality. And in one of Steve's posts it sounds like they've already been thinking about this question of whether the players should have some degree of control over their reinforcements so it sounds like BTS is already giving some consideration to this. I'm just trying to push the issue along is all.

__________________________

Moon:

As far as losing the "thrill" 'of not knowing when the reinforcements would arrive I guess I can't disagree w/ you there. As I imagine it does have a certain exhilaration to it when the calvary comes charging to save your butt and you didn't know when they would get there exactly. I only see one problem here and its that once I've played the scenario ONE TIME I now pretty much know exactly when and where my reinforcements (whichever side I played) are going to show up. Furthermore, I even have a very good idea of when the opposing sides reinforcements are going to show up as well. So even if I play the scenario a second time and play the other side to try and get that, unique thrill, much of it is now gone. Now the fact that BTS has allowed the scenario designer to choose to only have a certain percentage chance of a given group of reinforcing units show up over a given number of turns during the battle, starting on turn X, does help compensate for this, but only to an extent. Again, even with this feature once you've played the scenario a couple of times most of the thrill will still be gone.

Next a question for you. ********** I've removed this entire paragraph at Ken Tally's suggestion so that Fionn won't see any of the info that might have been divulge here. While I think they are far enough into the game that it wouldn't have mattered, just to be safe it is now gone ***********

I guess Idon't see that this is really that much less thrilling than what you were told by the scenario designer in the pre-game briefing in the game. For example you and Fionn both saw somehting like:

"Reinforcements (En route, ETA xx-yy minutes)

Some infantry units

Etc.

Etc.

So, you already pretty much knew what was coming and approximately what turns they might show up anyway. Since it is such a long span of time it sounds like Steve set it up where there is only something like a 5-10% chance from turns xx thru yy that any of these guys will show up. I imagine he has broken them up into 2 or 3 of the 5 available reinforcement time slots just to make things more interesting. **** AGain, had to remove this info ******** Again, I think it becomes a question of giving control to the battlefield commander (i.e. the player) which in my view is the more realitic approach vs. letting the scenario designer "play God" and predetermine for me when, where, and how many of my reinforcements will show up.

"I am not sure if the system you describe is that much more realistic. My feeling is that you are overrating the control that the battlefield commander had on calling up reinforcements, even over the course of a day or more of fighting. It's not that there are reserves waiting out the just off the map that you can draw on as you see fit. For such a "small" battle as will be represented in CM, it might take a week before your call for reinforcements is answered."

In my view the current reinforcement model in CM is unrealistic. I won't belabor this point any further other than to say, at best, the current system is pretty much an abstraction of what I feel the true reality is on the actual battlefield in terms of how and when reinforcements would be deployed. As far as overating the battlefield commanders control over the reinforcement/reserves situation I can only partially agree with you here. I'll grant you that in some instances reinforcements showed up on the battlefield that the commander on the scene didn't know were coming and probably certainly not when they would come. However, reinforcements for the most part didn't just show up for the hell of it without being given some direction to do so by somebody, right? Especially between battle segments of what CM calls a campaign I wouldn't think that this is the case. Somebody had to make a decision to bring in the reinforcements between the battles. And if it isn't the local battlefield commander deciding to do this then who is it? It's got to be some higher level command above him, so just let the we the players play this role as well. I still think this is better than letting the scenario designer make all of the decisions for the players and it isn't any more unrealistic than the omiscient nature of his command over the battlefield and control of each and every unit on it that's already in the game. In my view the player is already playing all the roles of individual squad leader up through battalion commander on the battlefield, so why not let him also play the roles that the battalion and higher level command in deciding when and where reinforcements should be deployed?

If one wishes to argue (and I'm not saying that you are) that battlefield commanders didn't have any control whatsoever over what reinforcements would show up during a given battle then I'd challenge them to prove to me that this was the case in most battles during WWII. Again, somebody, somewhere, decided to send those guys into the fight. They didn't just come a marching along into the battle without someone ordering them to do so for no good reason. I'm certain that regimental and divisional commanders didn't just sit around all day deciding willy-nilly to just throw units in here or there to go in and start fighting. They commited them for very good reasons like to help stop a major offensive thrust in an area where the local situation (the battle we are playing) was becoming critical for whatever reason, etc.

The bottom line is in my view we play wargames in order to put ourselves into the shoes of the battlefield commander and have the opportunity to make the same decsisons that they had to face and make in real life. And right now how CM handles reinforcements in a predetermined manner with the scenario desinger making these choices for us is "robbing" me from what I feel would be a great gaming experience.

____________________________________

"I want that system, if you cant make it in CM please make it in CM2"

Finally, at least one supporter of thinking about doing things a little differently. Thanks Bamse.

"BUT YOU MUST BE ABLE TOO TURN IT OF SO IT DONT END UPP BEING CC3. = Defender is compensated with huge amounts of pionts so he rout the attcker out from the entire operation."

Bamse,

This is another of the many downfalls of the CC game system. They've unfortunately programmed the campaigns in this game so that this occurs. I don't think this would happen in the system I'm proposing. For one thing, it is still the scenario designers responsibility to set up the starting forces and reserve pools so that some degree of play balance is maintained. And for the most part the forces that I'm saying he should put into the beginning local reserve pool are exactly the same forces that he would normally bring into the game under the current system of reinforcements. It's just that the player can decide if and when to commit them vs. the scenario designer making these decisiosn for him. Also, there are some pretty significant penalties to calling in higher level reserves from the other two pools. Not to mention the fact that you can only call up a certain amount of them at any given time and even then you only have a chance of higher level command giving them to you. Also, the scenario designer has to use some descretion on what he makes available in these other two reserve pools to help maintain game balance. Given all of this I don't think that any player is going to be able to call up huge reinforcements and then blow the other player out of the game. The player only has immediate control over the local reserve pool and even that is limited in terms of how many reinforcements he can call up at any given time. Furthermore he has even less control over whether, or not, he will get any units moved down from the higher level pools into the local reserve pool where they can be called up and even if he does manage to do this is does so paying a VP penalty. So even if he tries to call in large forces from the higher level reserves chances are they are not going to show up in his local reserve pool until at least one to two battles later and he will also pay a proportionally large VP penalty to his opponenet, so he would most likely lose the game anyway.

_____________________________________

One final note. After I got to thinking about this some more this morning I thought it might be a good idea to also reward those players that play skillfully and don't need to call up any of their local reserves. So I've ammended my proposal above to actually give the playeres, say a 5-10% VP point bonus, for all of those units orginally given to them in their local reserve pools that they didn't need to use. This would help keep people from just calling in all of their reinforcements just for the hell of it and reward the player that does well in the game and doesn't need to even call his reinforcements into play.

Regards,

Mike D

Aka Mikester

[This message has been edited by Mike D (edited 09-01-99).]

[This message has been edited by Mike D (edited 09-01-99).]

[This message has been edited by Mike D (edited 09-01-99).]

[fatherof4]

I'm on the "no control" side of this debate.

Forgive me if I'm wrong but it's my impression that CM is a tactical wargame. The level of control you are asking for seems to me to be more appropriate to an operational or strategic wargame (e.g. TOAW).

Just my $0.02 worth,

fo4

p.s. OTOH, I really enjoy SM's Gettysburg and in that, you sometimes have the option of getting reinforcements early if you were willing to pay the victory point cost.

[Doug Beman]

"I only see one problem here and its that once I've played the scenario ONE TIME I now pretty much know exactly when and where my reinforcements (whichever side I played) are going to show up. Furthermore, I even have a very good idea of when the opposing sides reinforcements are going to show up as well. So even if I play the scenario a second time and play the other side to try and get that, unique thrill, much of it is now gone."

You know SOME of the reinforcements that MIGHT come on one particular turn. Are there other reinforcement slots that just didn't show up? What if those reinforcements had shown up 2 turns later? (this sorta thing would have made a big difference in the test battle) What if none of the reinforcements had shown up? Each one of these variables creates a totally new game, new options, new priorities, new fears, etc. etc.

"Well if you were the commander on the real battlefield don't you think you'd be calling back to HQ screaming that you need tanks since you are now staring down the muzzle of a Stug, a Panther, and some Pz IV's to boot (and who knows what else might show up before your reinforcements show up) vs. one operational Sherman and the other that is immobilized? If you did call in for them would they show up in time? Well, who knows."

EXACTLY! Most times, the bigbrass have already decided what troops they will, and what troops they will not, send into a particular operational area. No amount of calling will make those troops appear any faster, and almost nothing on the CM local command scale is going to be major enough for a divisional commander to break out major reserves (if this attack were that important, those reserves would be on the way already)

"I won't belabor this point any further other than to say, at best, the current system is pretty much an abstraction of what I feel the true reality is on the actual battlefield in terms of how and when reinforcements would be deployed."

There has to be an abstraction somewhere, and I would much rather CM make the reinforcements abstraction where it already is, and concentrate programming resources on additional tactics (mouseholing) or tweaking the behaviour of infantry under close assault etc.etc.

Also, I still hold to my point that local commanders could not call up division staff and issue a shopping list of reserves, and expect it to be followed. Usually they were told "you're going to get what's already on the way, maybe."

"Somebody had to make a decision to bring in the reinforcements between the battles. And if it isn't the local battlefield commander deciding to do this then who is it? It's got to be some higher level command above him, so just let the we the players play this role as well..."

A) That's the definition of local commander; i.e. he doesn't decide what reinforcements will be sent, and the player in CM is the local commander...

and

That's what CM is, a game about local command. Player control over reserves makes this an operational/strategic game. CM is a game about what happens when a batallion commander is told "take this or hold that; reserves of this approximate structure might arrive in X minutes." It is not about player control over divisional reserves, or deciding what units to break out of rear areas when.

"I still think this is better than letting the scenario designer make all of the decisions for the players"

This is what divisional command (played in CM by the scenario designer) does. He decides what units are going to be moved, and when, and where they should try to arrive.

"In my view the player is already playing all the roles of individual squad leader up through battalion commander on the battlefield, so why not let him also play the roles that the battalion and higher level command in deciding when and where reinforcements should be deployed?"

Because CM is about commanding a batallion, not about ordering division movements.

"I'd challenge them to prove to me that this was the case in most battles during WWII"

Bastogne: both sides screamed for reserves, and were told "you'll get what we send."

North Africa: (here we're into slightly higher levels of command) Rommel esp. called for reinforcements and got what OKW decided he should get (namely, not enough of anything)

The Italian amphib assaults: In my memory of reading, the commanders called for reinforcements for themselves and got separate landings that they then had to coordinate with.

Hurtgen Forest: the U.S. local commanders there kept saying "we're too weak to do this" and the bigbrass kept saying "you're just not trying hard enough."

"Again, somebody, somewhere, decided to send those guys into the fight."

That somebody was a brasshat much farther up the command scale than CM's players will be. Batallion commanders were not in charge of regimental/division reserves; since CM's players are batallion commanders, they should not be in charge, either.

I also ditto what Henri said about the dangers of players "playing the system." I foresee players saying, "screw the VP loss," and calling for everything, and then just sitting around waiting for the reserves to arrive. Such a commander in real life would quickly be replaced by somebody who would do the job with the forces initially allocated. That sorta thing happened to LOTS of Union generals in the CivWar, and happened to one of the Brits in North Africa (Cunningham?) and some say should have happened to Monty.

In short, I reiterate that CM has set itself up as one particular style of game, i.e. a simulation of batallions doing their worst, and that allowing the player to order reserves around violates this command tenet.

DjB

[This message has been edited by Doug Beman (edited 09-01-99).]

[tss]

Huh. I managed to use my whole break time just to read this thread. Well, I'll add my (short) opinion.

I think that it would be a nice feature if a player had some sort of "call for help" command. The effect of calling help would be that the player's reinforcements might come to play earlier. For example, if the scenario designer had allocated some reserves to appear between the second and the third battle, then calling help might cause them to appear in the middle of second battle.

-Tommi

[Guest Big Time Software]

Well, I am CERTAINLY not going to respond point for point here In fact, to be honest, I can't even read all the follow ups all the way through. I have already had to reduce my sleep to 6hrs a day this week, so I'd rather use the time to take a nap

Seriously, there is a case to be mode for the campaigns, but none for the individual scenario. Expect ZERO change from the reinforcement system for the scenarios. As for the campaigns... we have had some ideas similar to a "Call for Help", but shelved them months ago. At the moment we aren't sure we will either need to dust these off or have time to put them in even if we thought it were a good thing (and we aren't convinced that it is yet). But I can PROMISE you one thing, if we do have some sort of variable reinforcement feature...

IT WILL NOT BE IN THE CONTROL OF THE HUMAN PLAYER

We absolutely do not want to have the player knowing what he is getting, or being able to determine what he gets, or to some extent when it arrives. We might have some degree of player knowledge, but it would not be anything even close to what has been kicked around here.

The above is consistant with the other stuff in CM. Anything that is external to the battlefield is removed from player control. Right now you can't control when and where your reinforcements come into play. You also can't control air attacks. This is all good for gameplay, not to mention realism.

Steve

[Doug Beman]

Steve, for God's sake man, get some sleep. We can't have you catching a "first of fall" cold now.

Best,

DjB

[Los]

Well,

First off, Mike D, hows about adopting a strategy of BREVITY in your communications? Yeesh.

The second post gets down to the meat of your proposal. First off, I like the general idea of your three reserve pools. I don't necessarily agree with your notion that my success should translate to success for the entire war or battle since that's not how it always goes (Ask the Germans themselves) Though obviously that's a gameplay issue.

Re: Local reserves,. the times and percentages work but will probably need tweaking (as you say) to see if they work. Personally I'd try and limit the control a player has over requesting reserves within the scenario being palyed at the time since usually the commander himself usually does not request his own reserves. He transmits the SITREP up the chain of command, that info is put together with his peer commanders SITREPs and the overall situation and then the overall commmander tells you whether you are getting reserves. Also most engagemnets you're fighting are not the end of the world type operations where you are the focal point of the attack or defense. SO your cries for help, may go unheeded. (Which BTW, as far as local reserves go, you would know what's more or less available in the task organization before you jump off). The world does not revolve around you as the company or bn commander as much as you would hope. But then again the percentage of release simulates those fudge factors to some extent.

These factors could also be porgrammed in at your scenario designer reserve pool screen. Some programs (I'm thinking Interplay's "Descent Freespace" mission designer for example) create a number of arguments in the scenario design to set up conditions for reinforcements.

So once the designer creates the scenario he designates performance meassures (i.e casualty or VP locations/conditions) which may trigger or influence the release of reserves pools (if requested?). Example:

Bridge X is the designer's location he has specified as critical to the campaign. It is the overall commander's intent that this bridge be preserved for whatever reason. (Now keep in mind that local comnmanders, particularly allied commanders, at he time often were not given a commander's intent as part of their mission statement. This was something subsequently adopted by the US and others from Germany long after the war.) So your mission in say Game 2 is to hold onto a hillmass a few klicks in front of this terrain feature. If you are pushed off and the scenario ends, the system makes a check:

If enemy is within 1000 meters of bridge X, then release 25% of division reserve for inclusion in the local reserve. (OR just allow the user to tap into it.) Heck IF THEN ELSEmight even decide to preempt teh standard scenario flow and launch a counter attack scenario against that bridge right away. The point is that from a scenario designer point of view the addition of Boolean(?) if-then-else statements could allow a campaign to be crafted with a little more control of hpw you want the campaign to be because after all the scenarion designer is god. However since he's not there to be god once the campiagn begins then he needs the AI to do the job for him, with guidance.

BTW a nice feature would be for a password portect campaign design which allows a ongoing moderated game. The campaign designer could get into the guts of his campaign ONCE IT IS UNDERWAY, and make changes based on the tactical situation. Hence these "moderated" campaigns would not be locked in place once they start.

Cheers...

Los

RE: Divisional resevres, perhaps it should take a lag time of one whole GAME to get them. So if I request them in between Game 1&2, then I may see them between 3&4 something like that.

[Moon]

Mike - here some BRIEF answers:

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Now the fact that BTS has allowed the scenario designer to choose to only have a certain percentage chance of a given group of reinforcing units show up over a given number of turns during the battle, starting on turn X, does help compensate for this, but only to an extent. Again, even with this feature once you've played the scenario a couple of times most of the thrill will still be gone.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Depends - you can set the probability of reinforcements to arrive very low, like 5% or even lower. This basically means that the reinforcements can easily arrive between, say, turn 5 and turn 15. And the fact that you have several reinforcement slots (I think it's 6 per side) adds a LOT of uncertainty, even if you looked at the scenario in the editor before playing. TBH - I've never seen such a strong and variable reinforcement feature before.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>That's why I proposed a minimum 10 minute delay after calling them up from your local reserves to simulate the time delay of getting them up to the front lines and into the battle.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

10 minutes? No way! If I had reinforcements sitting 10 minutes away, I'd be using them from the beginning of the battle for sure!

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>You as the commander on the scene can try to call reinforcements up into the current battle vs. having the scenario designer predetermine for you when they should arrive, 2) Much/most of the "thrill" that you speak of is still maintained since you really still don't know exactly when, or even if, those reinforcements will make it into the game. <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

But the scenario designer does not predetermine the exact time when reinforcements are going to arrive. He CAN, but he doesn't have to. Depends on how much the guy making the scenario cares about replayability... Besides, the scenario designer would still - in your version - predetermine reinforcements in a away: he still determines which forces are available for which pool.

Please don't misunderstand me - I think your idea is good enough to be discussed and provides a really interesting approach to the reinforcement issue. But currently I have the feeling that switching to the system you propose doesn't gain much, but certainly makes it much more complicated and "could" cause some serious game balance issues.

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>In my view the current reinforcement model in CM is unrealistic. I won't belabor this point any further other than to say, at best, the current system is pretty much an abstraction of what I feel the true reality is on the actual battlefield in terms of how and when reinforcements would be deployed.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

True, it's an abstraction. One that, IMO, fits within CM's scale, causes no problems with game balance, allows the scenario designer a very good control over the game to be played (best example is the current game) and still makes every scenario easily replayable. Not indefinitely, for sure, but that's what the random scenarios and the editor are for. The system you propose is, however, also just an abstraction. It uses a different approach, but one that I don't currently see as being necessarily "better".

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>And right now how CM handles reinforcements in a predetermined manner with the scenario desinger making these choices for us is "robbing" me from what I feel would be a great gaming experience.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

I think that CM's great gaming experience comes from what's happening on the battlefield. That's the scale it has been designed to. Reinforcements add a nice touch to it and sort of show you that it's all still a part of a bigger picture. A MUCH bigger picture, in fact - so big, that I seriously doubt if the actions of a battalion commander have such a big impact on them. And I am quite sure that the desperate cry for reinforcements from a battalion might not even REACH a Division HQ at all...

I for my part am happy with how CM handles reinforcements. I haven't seen a campaign yet, so that part still remains open. But for scenarios, having worked with editors from SP and WF/EF and others, CM offers me the most features I have seen so far.

[Ben Galanti]

Quick question on reinforcements that I'm not clear on. I know that you can set a percentage chance that the reinforcements will arrive on a given turn (and they'll have the same chance every turn after that). But, can you also only have a random amount of them show up?

For an example, can I have some reinforcements that will show up on turn 10 100% of the time, but might be 2 Sherman 75's one game, a Jumbo the next game, and 4 76's the next game? I know you could use several slots and lower the percentages, but then if a player got lucky he could get all 7 tanks (in my example) or for that mater, none at all.

I think it would add to replayablity if the scenario designer could assign 3 or 4 different force mixes to each slot, and CM would randomly pick between them (or even have those percentages set, ie 60% for the 2 75's, 30% for the Jumbo, and 10% for the 76's) This way there would be some variety of both the units received and when they are received, without worrying about too many (or too few) reinforcements showing up.

If this is how it already works, that's even cooler

[cannon]

Well, I'm certainly no Grog. Nor am I that well informed about WWII combat, but I am going to throw in some suggestions I think might be useful to the current discussion. I think talking about these issues in general terms is not very productive. I believe it would be more useful to actually diagram out a historical campaign and see what kind of reinforcement system you would need to support it. In the current scenario, the existing reinforcement system seems to work very well. Maybe you can come up with an historical example where something different might be more appropriate. It does occur to me though, that for a quick 1 hour battle the local commander would have 0 influence over the reserve situation. However, discussing a historical CAMPAIGN might show the need for something different. I think the discussions up till now have been too "gamey" I need to see the proposed system in relation to a historical battle. Also, I believe that the details of the campaign system have not been completely worked out. Maybe trying to set up some historical battles now will aid that process too by pointing out things needed to support the battles that people are going to design.

Robert

[Pixman]

I'm with BTS on "no human control". These battles -- even the campaigns -- take place on a postage stamp relative to the front as a whole. The time frame is the twinkling of an eye -- even Market Garden, which is a bad example to begin with because those commanders could have called for help all they wanted -- no dice.

Just as Fionn and Martin look at the situations on the various sections of their battle and determine where to send troops, a higher authority is, in an abstracted sense, looking at their little postage stamp and assessing its situation relative to other stamps. I have to believe that every little stamp is screaming for more assets -- I know I would be. "Hello sir. What? 5 more Shermans? Appreciate the offer sir, but I just talked it over with the men and we figured we'd just press on ahead without them. Go ahead and give them to 6th batallion, I hear they are in quite a pickle." Are you kidding me?

The point penalty thing does not hold water for me either. Someone brought up the Sid's Getty analogy. While I too like that feature of SMG, it is very different from this game. The FOW in SMG is very minimal compared to CM. You can see the size and location of the troops you are deciding to activate or not. You can also select the precise moment you want to activate them. No way this would happen in CM. My main concern about the point penalty is that it simulates a higher level command decision, i.e. the point penalty abstractly represents the opportunity cost of the units you call in because now they are not available to another sector that may need them. This trade off decision would not be made by the commander of the CM battle.

Nope, the commander in CM has specific orders and objectives. He needs to achieve them with the forces made available to him, when they are made available, by his superior officers. Those officers would be making those decisions whether it is a one hour skirmish or a 5 day campaign. However, I do believe that CM could use some fuzzy logic to occasionally reinforce between battles based on the results of the previous battle, i.e. simulate a high level decision that this particular postage stamp is of extreme relative importance, but not every time the campaign is fought.

The more realistic relationship between the higher ups and the commander of a CM battle is just the opposite from that proposed by Mike. Instead of the higher ups being influenced by the commander's pleas for help, the commander might get from his boss some soft, mid-battle information on reinforcement arrivals and adjust his tactics and battle plan accordingly. This seems much more realistic. It would also take some of the less realistic surprise element out of the arrivals -- like Martin's "edge of the earth" arrivals in the south woods. There is no reason why, a turn or two before, Martin should not know that there might be friendlies arriving through those woods. It is certainly realistic for him to know before Fionn does. SMG does a good job with this. It gives you soft info on when and where troops might reinforce you. This helps you manage the battle at hand more realistically in my opinion.

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The enchanter may confuse the outcome, but the effort remains sublime.

[Doug Beman]

Well said, Pix.

That's all I had to say. Nothing new from me.

Maybe later.

DjB

[Guest Big Time Software]

Problem with Mike's system, in our minds, is that it isn't realistic at CM's scale AND CM isn't about managing any sort of strategic aspect of the war. You are a Battalion commander at MOST, tasked with a specific goal, assigned to you by someone with a lot more metal on their shoulders than you. Therefore, your ability to control what goes on outside of the map is minimal at best. And this is the way it will remain.

As LOS and Pixman stated, a Battalion commander is a pretty low man on the pole. The world does not revolve around your success or failure (even when it should sometimes, like Remagen). If you are playing a Company commander campaign, you are one step up from unimportant (so far as the big picture goes). All commanders, from platoon up to Field Marshall, want as many forces as possible for their battles. But there are always too many needs, for too many forces, too many times during any given day, in too many different places. So even Generals have to beg, borrow, and steal (Guderian was good at the latter ) extra forces.

So why is it unrealistic to have the designer decide what you do and do not get? It really isn't. At CM's scale SOMEONE other than your simulated command position would make reinforcement decisions for you. In real war it would likely be the Regimental or Divisional commander (and on occasion Corps commander for central assets like TD and artillery support) who decides what you do and do not get, as well as roughly when. Realistic conditions can also enter into this too (air attacks on rear forces, sudden breakthroughs, gas shortages, etc) so even they only have a degree of controll. That is what the scenario designer is there to do. Role play the higher ups and make the decisions that you shouldn't be allowed to make.

As I stated somewhere above, we are kicking around the idea of having a Call for Help during campaign games. Not sure it is needed, but we are at least keeping our minds open (again, this is something we had in mind almost a year ago). However, individual scenarios are not going to be changed from the way they are now. The system we have now is very realistic and works QUITE well (see Fionn and Martin's game).

As for replayablity... there is only so many times you should play the same scenario. Personally, I think you can play the same thing, from one side, about 5 times before it would get old. That is for a good scenario. At least 2-3 for a so-so one. There are few games that I would replay a scenario even twice, so this should make people stop a sec and wonder if we might have something different here. I think people REALLY underestimate how unique a game can be simply by setting up your forces and getting different casualties. And with likely hundreds of scenarios to choose from (eventually) and MILLIONS of possible random games, replayability is not something we are losing any sleep over

Steve

[Guest Big Time Software]

After reading some of the posts above again, I decided to really, really make this point perfectly clear...

CM is a wargame about tactical warfare at the scale of Company to Battalion level. It is NOT a game about strategic concerns or of any issues even remotely larger than a Battalion level simulation. This is our purpose and goal, so anything that doesn't fit with our mission, not to mention historical reality, is NOT going to be catered to.

Let me make clear what a historically correct scenario and campaign are like...

Scenario - you have been allocated forces to do one of two things; attack or defend a given location and/or enemy force. You have already been allocated any and all forces to do this with. Time of battle is measured in minutes, not hours (and certainly not days). There is NO time in a scenario for calling in help. It is either already there or on the way (predetermined). So what you have is what you have, and it shouldn't ever be any different.

Campaign - you have been tasked with some small piece of the larger whole. You are NOT single handedly defeating Germany or saving the Reich. You are just doing your bit to help out. In general you will be given a task that lasts no longer than one 24 hour period with about six, one hour long battles. Your objectives are very modest and will be ONE of the following: take this hill, clear out that village, secure this road, advance to relieve friendlies, counter attack bridgehead, attack a small slice of a major enemy force, hold village, etc. NONE OF THESE THINGS ARE IMPORTANT to the strategic picture. Therefore, your ability to have a say in the strategic picture is next to nothing. You are just a cog in the military wheel of command, and you are to do what you are ordered to do. That is all.

In RARE cases you will find yourself in some crucial battle, like Arnhem or Remagan. HOWEVER, even then you are only playing out a PART of whatever was going on. You will NOT be in charge of taking and holding Arnhem for a week or two, for example. Instead you will find yourself already in the battle, or just entering it, and only having influence over a small slice of the action. And after a couple of hours fighting, your part will be done.

Anything that detracts from this or attempts to make CM into something it isn't (i.e. strategic layer of any sort what-so-ever) might as well be forgotten. There is probably about 3 years worth of gameplay in CM RIGHT NOW IN ALPHA, so adding a whole nother bit of anything is really overkill. Plus, playing the God role AND playing the micro role is NOT realistic.

Just wanted to make sure people understand the core issues here. CM is tactical, and that is that.

Steve

[jim crowley]

FWIW just my few thoughts on this topic.

No to player control ; Pixman pretty well said it all; wrong scale,un-historic an un-realistic.

Yes to variable reinforcements; IMo will add immeasurably to re-playability (more on this in a bit)

Yes to player having at least some knowledge of what he might get and especially where it will appear (but not what percentage chance)

In the current TGN game the players must represent a GOC of Colonel or above. There is no way that a leader of that rank would have no idea as to what other elements are participating in the overall operation and of their geographical relationship to his own position. Without being told that "x number of platoons, arriving turn X (% chance ?), in the area of X" how on earth could Martin have known that the US were attacking from the other side of town, although that is how Steve envisaged it. What he wouldn't and shouldn't know is exactly what and when he will get them.

Yes to my own notion of variable (optional) set-up forces (which together with the already-in optional setup locations and variable re-inforcements, should ensure vast replayabilty.

Why do I think replayabilty is important?

Well, despite the fact that Steve suggests that there will be loads of scenarios flying around, I think that we will all have our favourites, for whatever reason and will want to spend our time playing and replaying what, as individuals, we deem to be quality scenarios.

The problem with this, is that CM's core revolves around FOW. As it stands (as far as I understand anyway) once you have played a scenario once, from either side, the Fow Is pretty much gone and with it the fun and excitement that CM is all about.

" I know he (the enemy) only has three tanks and as I've just taken out his third one - well, that means he has none left!" etc. etc.

IMHO variables in reinforcements and set-up units as well as set up locations would give constant FOW to replayed scenarios ad infinitum ( and yes, it may alter play balance, but they should be optional, so you dont have to use them)

Cheers

Jim Crowley

[Fionn]

Guys,

I can understand where everyone is coming from with all these fancy ideas for making user-requestable reinforcement zones etc etc BUT I think that this would be the wrong thing to do from a GAME standpoint (as well as history standpoint obviously).

1. In real life, during a 60 minute battle commanders simply did NOT have the ability to ask for, be given and transport to the field of battle another company of another platoon of tanks etc.. This simply didn't happen.

2. Not knowing what you will get or when is crucial to CM's sense of tension. I recognise these requests as emanating from the way Close Combat and to a lesser extent Steel Panthers have done things but, in CM's scale it would detract from the gameplay.

3. Trust the designers. The reinforcement systems is FAR more flexible and simple to utilise than what is present in other wargames. You're getting more than might be apparent to you right now and I know Steve and Charles have chosen the system they feel is best for CM's scale.

I happen to agree with them. Simply having units on call would result in awfully predictable 1st turn calls for re-inforcements most of the time. (If you happen to think it wouldn't happen then just wait until you get into a PBEM tourney or some similar thing and you'll see it become SOP.) I've seen this happen before.

4. Allowing players to choose between various reinforcement pools ends up removing an important part of FOW. When a player is planning for the battle but is weak in tanks he will dEFINITELY call for more tanks immediately. perhaps the Designer doesn't want this to happen though. Perhaps the whole point of the scenario is to get you to learn to deal with tanks without having sufficient tanks of your own.

A lot of the "forcing you to cope" which is SO important to good wargames would be lost by this system.

I've seen games with systems close to what you are asking for and the game suffered for having those systems.

5. Also, a lot of you are talking about things which would only really occur at higher level HQs. I don't think I've made a secret of my desire to use CM's tactical engine to model the battalion-sized clashes which go to make up a large-scale (divisional+ ) battle...

What you are talking about can be done in THAT context under the "out of game" administration of GMs but it really doesn't belong inside the code of Combat Mission.

What you're talking about is, in some ways, a creep towards including meta-campaign functionality which simply is NOT what CM is intended for.

For right now I think the absolutely best thing that could be done would be for everyone to trust in Steve and Charles and IF you really want to be able to pass requests up a chain of command etc then contact me when CM is released and you get it and I will establish a meta campaign with GMs etc at TGN with the whole roleplaying element and emailing in-character requests and discussions ( e.g requests for re-inforcements etc).

I've GM'ed PBEM meta-campaigns before on the net and it can be done IF sufficient people are interested and enough volunteers come forward to GM it etc.

Basically, my point is that CM's reinforcement system IS the right one for a tactical level wargame of its size. All those other things you are talking about are better modelled using pen and paper during the context of a meta campaign in which CM is used to resolve tactical battles.

It's like some things which I argued with Steve and Charles about before . I was convinced their way of doing a couple of things was poor and wasn't allowing CM to reach its "full potential" BUT when I actually got to play CM I shut up very quickly since I saw their way worked and worked better than my way ever would have..

I think this is pretty much the same kind of situation guys ... I've seen their way in operation and it works well.

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___________

Fionn Kelly

Manager of Historical Research,

The Gamers Net - Gaming for Gamers

[Guest Big Time Software]

I'm closing up this thread. It is too big and, as you will see in a sec, not really on topic anymore

Steve