Player vs Designer Control of Reinforcements

[Mike D]

Sorry Steve, I slipped in after you closed her down. I'm puzzled though about your comment of the thread not being on topic anymore and seeing something in a sec. What are we supposed to see????

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WOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Well, believe it or not I'll try to keep this very short.

Well, OK, let's just say short .

Errrr, well, maybe you'd better get yourself at least 1 beer. I'd probably say a whole lot more but my "bloody stumps" are still healing from the last couple of posts, so I'll try to exercise some of that "Brevity" stuff (just kidding LOS and Doug) :;

Thanks for all the great discussion. I will have to freely admit that I didn't fully understand how much control a battalion commander had over his reinforcements, so this has been a good learning experience. And, while I still don't totally agree with the reinforcement system (i.e. the battlion commander had to have some influence on such matters IMHO), I can accept that the game in its own abstract way does do a fairly good job of handling reinforcements.

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Doug,

YES, I'M TERRIBLY MAD AT YOU!!!! Actually, no, I am in no way miffed. This is an open forum and I was expecting to get quite a variety of responses both pro and con. You also brought up some good points that needed to be made. As did Pixman, LOS, Martin, Fionn, and pretty much everyone else too.

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Ben,

I like this a lot. I hope Steve and Charles will consider adding some more variability to the game along these lines. I was going to ask them for the abililty to vary the percentage chance of the units showing up for each of the turns that they were designated to possbily come into play, but you beat me to the punch as it were.

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LOS,

Some good thoughts. The idea of allowing a moderator to determine reinforcements between two opponents based on what he sees happening is an interesting idea. But I could see that this might give him way too much "God like" power. So while I kind of like the sound of it, I actually think I'd rather play the game with the current system.

As far as there being some AI that the scenario could tie in to to help control the reinforcements during the game that was kind of pretty much my original idea. And it's an idea that I still like quite a bit because it achieves one of the main things that I think the current system is lacking in that it ties the control of reinforcements to what is going on in the game instead of just having them pop up out of nowhere.

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Everyone that brought up the subject regarding players should have some better knowledge of where and when reinforcements should show up,

I'd say I have to agree with this to a point. Take the current Martin/Fionn game. Sure it was highly dramatic that Martins reinforcements suddenly popped up on the west edge of the map behind Fionn and helped deal the death blow to the Germans hold on the town. But in my view it was totally and utterly unrealistic. I say this because I think I read that the premise behind this was that they had fought their way through from the other side of the town to come on map. Well, I'd have to think that doing so would have created one heck of a lot of noise, etc., so the Germans pretty much would have had to know that they were very near to coming on map, or at least that there was a threat in their rear that might get far enogh to do so. But that's not what we saw. We saw Fionn in total surprise and dismay suddenly surrounded from the fourth side and doomed. This might make for great game play and drama, but is totally unrealistic in my view.

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Steve,

First of all thanks for all the feedback. Especially for your last post as I think it helps all of us to understand the whys and wherefores of your design intent for CM.

I think your one comment/explanation regarding the scale of the game and what you think should and shouldn't be in the game based on that scale is very enlightening. It goes a long way to answering a lot of my questions. While I'd still like to see some form of system like what I proposed where the player also play the part of higher level commander and would have some control over the reinforcements to a certain degree I can perfectly understand now why you guys don't want such a thing in the game.

Next,

"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."

One the thing that orignally bothered me about this and still does is the abstraction of the scenario designer predetermining where, when and how many reinforcements would show up, or if any should show up at all. I realize that the percentage chance of entry feaure helps reduce this do some degree, but it still bothers me (I know, I know, I should just get over it already).

But I guess to get over this hump it would be very helpful if you, or someone out there, could answer a question. Namely, what do the reinforcements that are being modeled in CM really represent? Are they some type of local reserves, simply other units that were nearby, or what? For an attacker I can see that they might very likely be forces that just didn't make it to their jump-off positions in time for the start of the battle. Or maybe the regimental commander above the battalion commander decided to send some more forces, or something. For the defender maybe they are units that are not too far off the map that were ordered to move in to help stop the attack, or maybe they were ordered in by regimental command. In a meeting engagement situation I can't see that there would necessarily be any reinforcements. Guess there could be a few nearby units just off map that would move over and join into the fight once the two sides clashed. But for the most part I'd think you would possibly see fewer reinforcements in this kind of a battle.

Also, in the case of a defender and your statement of "it is either already there or on the way" something doesn't quite seem right (I'm probably missing something here, but not sure what). How could a defender know to already have forces "on the way" when in many (most?) cases they probably didn't even know that the attack was going to occur in the first place. By the time the defenders command structure learned of the attack, assessed the situation, and then reacted the game/battle would probably already be nearly over since we are only talking 60-90 minutes of fighting, right? I guess I could see that maybe a few of those nearby units might hear of the fight and move in, but in terms of any real reinforcements being ordered in by someone I'd have to think they would show up pretty late in the game, if at all, in a true attack/defend situation.

As far as the attacker goes I'd think that most of the forces that were going to be there at the start of the attack would be there. So, once again, except for the reasons I gave above, I can't see much reason for the attacker to get much in the way of reinforcements either.

In terms of the meeting engagement, again, doesn't really seem to be that it makes much sense for either side to get any reinforcements if everything I've been hearing here is more or less true. That being the case I'd expect the scenario designer not to put much in in the way of reinforcements in a game modeling such an engagement.

Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmm, I don't know, given this, and after hearing everyones comments and all, I'm almost left wondering if reinforcements belong in a game at CM's level of simulation at all…………… :;

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Martin,

One thing that bothers me for some reason is one of your comments (don't take this the wrong way, I'm just puzzled is all). In remarking on the system that I'd proposed you said that if you had forces only 10 minutes away from the battlefield that you would have had them called up and ready for the start of the game in real life. Martin, if that is the case then what do the reinforcements that are showing up 5, 10, and 15 minutes after the start of a CM game showing up for under the current reinforcement system doing there???? I don't see the difference here between what the game already does and what I had proposed in this regard????? If you were the attacker I can see where this might be true, but if you were the defender, how would you have known ahead of time to have these units up there ready to go at the start of the fight?

Otherwise, some very good comments. Your experience with the game lends a lot of credance to BTS's approach to how reinforcements are being handled in the game.

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Fionn,

Good comments. Again, it helps immensely to hear more from those that have played the game.

"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."

I and I'd imagine many others will be very interested in looking into how the meta-campaign thing would work. I think taking CM to this next level might offer some great fun and excitement so I look forward to seeing how it would work, etc. Will there be more info on this at www.thegamers.net, or elsewhere once the game comes out?

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Thanks again everyone. This has been a very interesting discussion up to this point. And finally thanks to you Steve and Charles. I know that you probably don't necessarily appreciate having your game design "torn into" for lack of better words by the less knowledgeable like myself, but I do enjoy discussing such things in this forum and the fact that you guys do listen to what we think, etc. if very much noted as a plus for BTS vs. many of the other game companies out there. Trust me when I say that doing this has gone a long way toward increasing my, and probably many others, interest in the game. And I imagine a lot of my questions, fears, etc. will be answered once I get to experience the game for myself. So until then I'll just have to wait………….

Regards,

Mike D

Aka Mikester

[This message has been edited by Mike D (edited 09-02-99).]