Poor Scenario Design

[Aragorn2002]

Originally posted by JasonC:

Don't give me 48 kinds of rare and largely useless vehicles and mixed guns. Learn a little history and use realistic force composition, with plenty of one type only. A few of another type is occasionally realistic, more than that and you are in Hollywood, not on the eastern front.

Yes, I normally remove scenarios like that immediately, unless the map is well made and can be re-used. To my experience scenarios like that are usually unplayable and unbalanced. I like big battles like George MC's Blowtorch-series, but also smaller ones like Panther Commanders KC-series. I also prefer scenarios with a historical accurate subject and details, not some crazy fantasy, like attacking a Gestapo HQ full of Nazi officials or other nonsense. Scenarios with a short or superficial briefing are also something I don't like. I also hate scenarios where the different units are mixed in a way that overview is nearly impossible.

I do like big, well-made maps, because I can use them to make my own battle, using lots of units, just for the sake of seeing it. It gives me a certain sense of being there. I know it isn't entirely fair on the scenario makers, but of course I wouldn't dream of doing something else with them than using them for my own pleasure/study. For gaming they are less suited sometimes (there are exceptions like George MC's masterpieces and recently Federoff's Wilkowitschken). For fast and intense gaming battles like Panther Commanders KC Lt Neumeyer are my favorite. But lots of talented scenario makers are around and make these games so special.

[Bigduke6]

Jeez Jason, it's just a game, and it's Christmas eve fer cryin' out loud. I agree pretty much with what you say, but the guy is actively designing scenarios. Why not encourage him to change and improve, rather than damning him for all (of your valuable) time?

In the spirit of the season, your Soviet training series is brilliant and power to you on your good work.

As for me, I'll keep the list specific, as like I said, Jason pretty much said it for me on the big picture stuff. Little picture:

1. Don't put Soviet infantry in halftracks, they didn't use them that way. Soviet recon rode in armored cars, but halftracks were used as command vehicles and artillery movers. I am always a bit irked when a designer hands me a batch of halftrack-mounted Red infantry. I'd rather have the points in trucks and tanks, thank you very much.

2. I wish people would make more vs. A/I scenarios playable as Allies; although for practical purposes I've never designed any scenario myself, so I'm not really in a position to complain.

3. I would prefer to see much more attention to terrain. Kingfish is pretty much the standard here; I'll download one of his scenarios just to look at the ground, never mind to play it. Not many parts of world war two were rolling hills covered with spots of woods about 80 m. x 80m., for instance. The ground needs to be believable and the stuff the humans built - the villages and roads and so forth - need to make sense.So I would say to designers: use topographical maps more, and plop down features for "cool" meeting engagements less.

4. Fer Kringle's sake, lay off the Tigers and the Panthers! Those were exceptional and relatively rare vehicles during the courseo of WW2, but you wouldn't know it from I would say the majority of scenarios. What's the matter with MkIIIs and MkIVs? This is not so much I hate ueber-tanks as I just don't want them to be a dime a dozen. As it is when I come up against a MKIV/III I am pleasantly suprised. Ideally, if I hit a Panther I should be suprised and close to panic, and if I hit a Tiger I should crap in my trousers and just panic. In other words, make those vehicles a lot rarer, pls.

Also in the spirit of being positive, I would suggest any one designing take a look at Wild Bill's scenarios; that guy's consistency at making good games that are absolutely credible from a historical view is amazing. There are plenty of excellent designers out there - besides Kingfish I am a Richie fan - but still Wild Bill I think is the mark to shoot for.

I'll add that I am playing the Tournament of Jousts campaign right now and it is just unbelievable how true-to-life that thing is. I don't recall who designed that off hand, whoever you are, you did an incredible job.

Hope this hasn't offended any one, scenarios are after all a creative work, and it's not easy to criticise something like that without ruffling feathers.

I'd love to hear other people's opinion of the truly great scenarios, although perhaps that's another thread.

[GreenAsJade]

Originally posted by JasonC:

Thanks for the warning. I'll never play a scenario you design. And I'll never give you or anyone like you a break, either. I'd rather you crawled away under a rock and stopped polluting the scenario sites. I think you are wasting your time, and I am quite sure if I gave you the chance you'd waste mine. No doubt you will respond by thinking "well it is what I like and lots of other people probably like them too." I deny it. It is a control freak imposition; you might as well spit on us. But I don't suppose such "feedback" will ever stop you or those like you. More's the pity.

Jason, you're a goose. I wonder if you even visited the random reinforcement site to see what it is that this is all about. It's a specialty. It's not a control freak thing. It's not polution. Geez - they're on his own site, not someone else's. They are completely and fully described. They don't waste your time pretending to be something they are not.

There are plenty of poor designers out there to pour scorn on. Choose your targets more carefully.

GaJ

[JasonC]

Yes I'm a goose, and everybody is the greatest thing since sliced bread. But get out of my freaking chair and let the players decide on the flow of the game instead of deciding it for them, already.

[John_d]

Trucks. Too many trucks in too many scenarios. They have their 5 mins of glory as they move a squad from A to B, then they sit around until a plane or an arty barrage gets them. I only like trucks when they are absolutely necessary. They clog up roads too and I end up being the omnipotent traffic controller again

And if your gonna give me infantry- please give me at least a company's worth. Anything less is just an expensive way of decorating the field with corpses (as JasonC's training scenarios demonstrated). And I'd like them all at once too please, unless there's a very good reason for it, rather than arriving platoon by platoon

It seems that the issues here seem either to do with historical inaccuracy or playability. Interesting to the the grog/enthusiatic amateur split

[GreenAsJade]

But get out of my freaking chair and let the players decide on the flow of the game instead of deciding it for them, already.

Sure. And doesn't this key frustration of yours indicate how poorly aimed your criticism was. How on earth can someone who makes *RANDOM REINFORCEMENT* scenarios be accused of script writing!?

I'm all for saying what you don't like. Just don't open fire on people who are 'doing good'. Especially when it reveals your ignorance about what they're doing.

GaJ

[ December 26, 2005, 03:56 PM: Message edited by: GreenAsJade ]

[johnstone185]

Hey Jason C,

It is just a game. Take a chill pill and listen up. You aren't the only one who has read a book or two on WW2. I am Carl's primary test opponent for his random scenarios. If you don't like them, don't play them. Simple as that. No need to flame him for trying to have a bit of FUN. So what if once in a while a Souma finds itself out of place geographically. BFD. Carls designs are FUN and action packed from the get-go. Occasionally he makes mistakes such as placing reinforcements in a wrong place, they get blown up and we both have a laugh and fix it. It is FUN. Do you really need to play Anzio or Kursk with the exact historical amount of tanks every single time? Is it really that big of a deal to you that someone else likes to have a bit of ahistorical FUN once in a while?

One more thing - I have been mostly a reader on this forum, and not a writer, but for the most part your posts and replies are snotty and condescending. Step away from the laptop for a night or two and go out and have a drink. It's on me.

[gangofmao]

i agree with johnstone 185,i find the tone of

Jason C's posts very condescending,it is just a game after all,and no one has a right to tell another how to play.last i heard,no one making you play a scenario you not like...so ease up

[Kanonier Reichmann]

So Jason...tell us what you really think! :eek:

Personally, if Carl Puppchen wants to design scenario's that way then I say, let him. It's a free world & I'm sure he wouldn't continue doing so if all the feedback he ever received was negative. To sum up...I may not agree with what Carl is tring to achieve but I will defend his right to continue doing so.

Regards

Jim R.

[RockinHarry]

Originally posted by JasonC:

Here are some more peeves I have with poor scenario designs -

Everybody weakened in deep mud with steep hills isn't a strategy game, it is a torture device in which the scenario author goes "na na na-naan aaa" and the player curses his soul to hades. Don't stress broken internal subsystems of the underlying game engine. Weakened *or* normal mud would be quite sufficient. If you don't enjoy playtesting it for hours, don't wish it upon the world.

Don't make punching bag scenarios designed to only be playable by one side, or to show off supposedly impressive items. It combines all the evils of scripting with a new one, the players not mattering a tuppenny damn. A strategy game is one in which the outcome depends on the interacting decisions of the players. If it depends on you, instead, you've done it wrong.

Most obviously directed at me! ...hehe

#1 Deep Mud + Steep Hills + Weakened units. Beside that it was the true terrain and unit conditions during a particular battle, this was also set up to balance out the particularly weak high pines terrain in CMAK. If you want to recreate certain terrain conditions typically found during certain NWETO battles, then you need to try beeing a little more creative! Can´t change the difficulty level of high pines terrain in CMAK, so the only available choice to model the "effect" on troops is...limiting their physical abilities by changing the fitness level. Fact is the huertgen forest battle conditions is anything but perfect maneuver ground for standard movement schemes and such. I´ve seen scenarios labeled "huertgen.." this or that, but resemble little to nothing what the huertgen forest battles really were. Why should I go the same way and throw away all my available research material and accurate terrain data? I could rather create a "human assisted Quick battle" and call it "historical" or "semi historical" scenario as some scenario designers do. Now do it 3-5 times a month and you can call yourself a top notch scenario designer.

#2 Playable only by one side + supposedly impressive items. Lets see if I got that right. If it was just for the "impressive items", I would have released the mods 1 year ago, as these were already finished at that time. Well, I needed that stuff to check if one could recreate a particular NWETO battle in CMAK with appropiate looks and "effects"! Thus the Mods were made to support the scenario and not vice versa! There´s very very few rocks terrain to be found on NWE battlefields and thus this terrain type is more or less useless. I´ve seen a lot of scenarios where scenario makers placed lots of rocks terrain in their CMAK NWE scenarios. Suffice to mention, none of these scenario makers live anywhere in europe. Instead of wasting an otherwise very useful terrain type, one can mod it to something different, even if usefulness still is quite limited. Same for the sandbag stuff in the Beta scenario. Don´t think a minute a concrete pillbox position of the Siegfried line looks anything like this (modded sandbags)! Since we don´t have pillboxes that can be entered/occupied with infantry in CM, one at least can model (or fake) the "effect" of such a "position" by combining multiple game units and terrain types into one that "works" and "looks right". Large parts of the huertgen forest battle included these features (pillboxes, devastated forests ect.) and without trying to model the stuff in a halfway credible manner, the "you are there" illusion would be destroyed instantly, with the overall playing experience not much more than a QB (set generated map with lots of hills, forests, battle damage and pull that off). That´s NOT my personal goal for the oncoming "huertgen forest battle series".

RE playable by one side only. Yep, as "the why" is explained in the briefing. A scenario maker has the option to make multiple optimized versions for play versus either side. A "one fits all" scenario is hardly possible to make in CM, the more if a special battle situation is to be recreated. Play vs the AI needs most care in this regard. H2H battles need different considerations. So the scenario makers options would be either to focus on a particular battle setup and get it working as good as possible, or if the same battle "theoretically" offers an interesting view from the opposing side, optimize this one as well, but release it as a seperate scenario version. If a scenario can´t get to work for a particular side playing the AI, then just scrap it and tell it in the briefing! If anybody tries anyway, well then don´t blame the scenario maker if it´s not fun! As said, I´m speaking of more complex scenario situations that can hardly get to work for the AI player. There is certainly scenarios that can be played vs the AI from either side and as well offer fun for H2H play.

RE John_D´s list above: Some comments from my experience of playing a large number of user made scenarios:

RE #1: That is a realism vs. playability thing IMO. Sometimes (??) there where those battle conditions with mentioned ground conditions in effect and fact is that neither deep mud nor deep snow prevented battles not to occur in every case. If a scenario maker wants to portray just those sorts of battles, well then so be it. A warning note in the briefing should tell players about particular scenario settings in effect so a player can decide himself to give it a try or not.

RE #2: Actually agree, if the maps size only purpose is beeing just large. IMO a reasonable purpose would be If a scenario maker wants to give some room to make at least the most necessary battle reconnaissance, in particular for battles with mechanized forces. If the scenario has non mechanized forces, then the extra space might be used to portray outpost lines that were put to some distance in front of the actual main line of resistance when appropiate. I can not remember many scenarios that made use of, or give appropiate room to place outpost lines, nor can that kind of info be found in many scenario briefings. If a defending player is free to place his units, then extra space in front of what the scenario maker thinks would be the best MLR should be given, so the player could decide himself to give his defense some depth or not. Most scenarios I know pit the players main forces against the enemies main forces with nothing in between.

RE #3: Time. If a scenario maker plays his scenario through at least 2-3 times at a given time limit, he should add at least another 10-20 minutes to reflect that he knows where all enemy units/obstacles are located. If proper pre battle recconaissance is given little consideration in the briefing, then give more time to let the player do the most necessary battle reconnaissance himself. If a particular historical battle is known for improperly applied reccon (for whatever reason) or none at all, one could at least mention the fact in the briefing. Beside that IMO time limts work better for H2H games and less for play vs. the AI, which needs usually more, in particular when on the attack.

RE #4: Things like that shouldn´t happen if the scenario maker plays his own scenario through at least once. Beside that a scenario maker should tell the player in the briefing about the whereabouts of the so called reinforcements. It is the rule that at the modeled level of command in CM (Btl. and Rgt. or below) the force commander knows quite exactly what the reinforcements are and where they would come from! Usually it´s the commander himself (the player) who decided for a particular unit to be held back as reinforcement and under what circumstances it is to be deployed. Reinforcements from higher commands (divisional or corps level) aren´t that mysthically pulled out of the bag units either, unless the commanders name is "Copperfield"! A force commander usually knows BEFORE the battle what he could expect from his superior, when he could expect it and where! That´s called a battle plan and a Btl/BG. or Rgt. commander is just one of the small components to execute it! A briefing thus should include the estimated arrival time as well as map entry point, unless the reinforcements in fact is units from units not belonging to the same parent unit as the player ones and communications are assumed to be compeletely broken! Off course that happens, but the majority of battles will have reinforcements coming from the same parent unit as the player ones. Assuming you´re the commander of a Rgt. with attack mission. You start the battle with 2 Btl. up front and know that the 3rd Btl (assuming triangular unit organisation) is held in reserve. This Btl. or parts of it would usually be the so called "reinforcements" and this info should be included in the briefing. If not it looks like the Rgt. commander has amnesia and simply does not recall where he ordered the 3rd Btl. before the battle. No matter what the final "reinforcements" are in detail, the commander (the player) knows what is available and when it could be committed. As said I speak of the rule and not the many exceptions that existed as well. The key point is to give the player realistic info in the briefing and not let him totally in the dark about otherwise known facts!

RE history seminars in briefings: IMO those stuff should be packaged into external documents of a format that supports larger fonts, as well as pics and other stuff. The internal CM briefing simply offers to little comfort to serve for this purpose. Not all of us scenario makers are good writers and oftenly it is better to link to a good website dealing with the scenario topic instead.

Enemy intel in briefings: If one aims for a more historical style scenario, then IMHO better give too much than too little, even if the info is faulty! Assault/Attack style scenarios surely should contain the most info, no matter if accurate or not and even meeting engagements is not always forces bumping into each other completely unexpected. If not for any other reason, ample enemy intel adds to the historical flavor of a scenario. "no armor is expected" like messages. Not expected maybe, but usually "heard" at longer distances, before the battle starts. Maybe the corps commander sitting 20 miles behind the front lines does not expect enemy armor, but you the frontline commander usually knows better! Depends also on size of battle and map, combined with particular weather settings. Armor surely could pop up unexpectedly when the weather is rain or fog, when noise is dampened more. Prolonged artillery preparations might mask armor engine/track noises as well, but then the map should contain some battle damage...which brings me to another point:

Battle Damage on maps: I´ve seen "historic" rated scenario maps that look like golf courses, perfectly clean, not a single crater or damaged building in sight...ALTHOUGH...even from the briefing is known that the battleground was already contested before! Surely is fun to create his own devastation, but...

Artillery: Learn about the various "command levels" and assign appropiate amounts to the players force! For nations that have both "radio" and "wire" options, as a rule of thumb assign mostly (if not even exclusively) radio equipped FO´s to an attacking player and mostly wire equipped to defending ones! FO´s that stay mostly stationary on a good observation point from the start of the game can be of the wire type mostly (can be attacking OR defending player). From my experience little known fact is that parts of the available german 75 and 150mm FO´s in fact is the indirect firing guns from the infantry gun company, that is part of the german infantry regiment and other units (recon Btl.) A pair of 75mm should always be available to a german commander commanding an infantry Btl. or larger force. The "Schwerpunkt" (main effort) Btl. oftenly could even rely on the available pair of 150mm IG33. Unlike popular belief the german infantry guns were mostly deployed in indirect fire role. CM offers both options (either onbord/direct or offboard/FO) with the indirect setup beeing the most common case.

Infantry AT weapons: Don´t overload attacking infantry with them! Germans always had the grenade bundle to their avail, but usually not more than 1 or 2 a squad! Rifle grenades were common from 1942 onwards and ammo should always be ample (historically 5 AT and 10 HE were carried per squad, while CM only allows 4 overall) Attacking infantry should rarely carry any molotov cocktails IMO! That surely is more of a defense weapon, unless you want to simulate a riot in the Gaza sector. In particular germans running around with them at late war looks very odd. Panzerfausts were ample at that time.

TRP´s: At least every attack/defend scenario should have "some" as it can be assumed that there was sufficient time to at least register 1 or 2 per available Battery FO. With some thought and research one can always decide for a credible amount for each individual scenario. The more "hasty" an attack is, the less TRP´s would probably be available, ect. Even a defender that has lots of time to prepare his defenses, but has little artillery to his avail, could historically have many TRP´s registered! TRP´s usually represent ALL heavy weapons (HMG, mortars, infantry guns) of a Btl. size unit registered on particular points in the to be defended terrain. That´s called the "defensive fire plan". Added to it is any available artillery.

All IMO!

Hopefully I can remember all this when I get back to my own scenario designs.. Hehe :eek:

Happy holidays

[The_Enigma]

Like to say some very good points highlighted in this thread.

But one id quickly like to ask about,

PnzIV's and Panthers.

Why are people complaining about there are too many panthers in scenarios ...

Its not like only 50 were built ... around 6000 were made (thats from a quick look on the net for figures)

Panzer ivs built form 42 onwards number around 9000.

So you cant say its a rarity issue ... as they were quite common.

Sure in 1943 scenarios there shouldnt be too many of them but by early 44 there just as common as Mark IV's and the games reflect this.

finally, to the ones who are making the most points on how designers should do things ... do you peeps leave feedback for designers on sites like TPG's?

[ December 27, 2005, 08:09 AM: Message edited by: the_enigma ]

[SgtMuhammed]

No, there were over 30,000+ PzIVs built. I'm at work so I don't have my books.

The big cats were very rare compared to the more vanilla Panzers. Now you can say that when encountered they tend to be in company strength, at least early in the war. Later they tend to be scattered about just as the other armored vehicles were.

[JasonC]

30,000 IVs? I think not. Shermans, T-34s sure, but not IVs. That is more like the German turreted tank total, whole war all models. IVs were only marginally more common than Panthers. StuGs were somewhat more numerous again, though backloaded in time. In late war, a third of the German AFV fleet had armor sufficient to stop a US 75mm AP round. In CM scenarios, it is typically more like 95%.

[The_Enigma]

sgtgoody, from everything ive seen that cant be right

By the end of the war nearly 9000 had been built.

in refereance to the pnzIV, and this is backed up by several other sources whom all give the same sort of figure or around there.

[JasonC]

Rockin Harry - no it wasn't about you in particular and I was speaking of ubertanks more than fortifications, and I don't mind specialist mods at all. The only one of your scenarios I've tried, however, suffered deeply from the scripting problem. Want some honest feedback for a change instead of all the "we all just w'ove eberfing our bwessed scenario designers do for us"?

I love the Hurtgen period. I recall from the US army green books the exact passage your scenario is closest to. I am interested in forest tactics. I was somewhat interested in the force mix I found on setting up as the US vs. the AI (blind of course), and I liked the terrain. The relief was particularly impressive. I decided to write a long AAR about my experiences in your battle and wrote a diary of the game as it went along.

And after turn 14, I realized you had scripted the entire battle so much that I was supposed to do whatever I was told, and nothing else mattered, and I got so bored with the whole thing I chucked it. And I won't play it again. And if all I get is excuses and self justification, I won't bother to look at another one you make either, including the rest of the Hurtgen series. I might steal your maps, because they are good, that is about it.

Wrap your head around it for pity's sake. Nobody wants to see your movie director version of fighting in the Hurtgen or anywhere else. People want their own decisions to determine outcomes, not your stage management and playtested script-writing. I ignored your blessed rube goldberg roadblock positions. And I took the four little flags on the actual hills. And I was bored out of my mind as soon as I realized there weren't any defenders, and instead I was supposed to drop lots of shells and mortars on the TRPs you set up, to kill the guns, to let in the tanks, to shoot the pillboxes, to take the big flags. Yawn. Play it yourself, you don't need me, I'm not a rat in a maze.

[The_Enigma]

i havnt played that scenario (and probably wouldnt due to my own perferances) but how exacttly are you 'scripted' into doind what the designers what you to do? :confused:

[JasonC]

There are 600 points of flags on 2 locations of German pillbox complexes. There is no road net, one road that "T"s, along which a Sherman platoon arrives early in the game. There are roadblocks across this in various places, with tiny passages around them allowed, blocked in turn by daisy chain AT mines. Some of the mines must be removed to allow the tanks LOS to any of the pillbox areas. The US gets a couple platoons of engineers along with two companies of infantry etc. The pillboxes are covered from tanks by colocated puppchens (and HMGs, and infantry, all in trenches behind sandbags next to multiple concrete MG pillboxes etc). TRPs are provided, padlocked right on these two locations, with 2 others free set up. The US gets a 155, 3 105, an 81mm FO at set up, and 3 more 105 FOs a few turns in. LOS is about 30m if these aren't fired at the TRPs. The briefing is not entirely specific about the additional 105 FOs, but basically tells you to fire the initial arty at the TRPs, prep.

Thus, the scripted sequence is - fire loads of arty at a poor target for it, the pillbox areas, in order to suppress the accompanying puppchens etc. Suppliment with HQ sighted on map 60mm mortars as desired. Crawl combat engineers close enough to remove the daisy chain ATs to free up the only tank route. Crawl tank into LOS of a bunker, fire until firing slit penetration achieved. Linse, rather, repeat until all such positions KOed.

Meanwhile, actual joys of the map are to maneuver the pair of companies away from all the built up defenders to take the high ground behind them. And potentially work in engineers etc from behind. There are only a few scattered weak forces in the way of this, which are a walkover for traveling companies using all the proper drills etc. I smoked all of those. But guess what? The only way to make further progress and actually win, is to go back to the script, clear everyone out of the barrage footprint, drop arty until the puppchen dies etc. And everything else is irrelevant. He can play it himself.

[John_d]

Ok, I've just observed the most retarded piece of scenario design ever. So bad in fact that needs to be named and shamed. TFK- Mission 5. Can't remember who its by. Basically, has all the makings of an excellent scenario. Big train station thingy and lots of trenches defending it. Except that the German re-enforcements in the second turn arrive magically INSIDE the Russian defensive ring. Utterly unforgiveable design. Ruined the entire battle and I quit immediately afterwards. A great shame given that the rest of the TFK series have been very enjoyable

[Mad Russian]

One thing that I do to cut down on the scripted effect, is to playtest my scenarios using more than one avenue of attack. A designer has to remember that a playtest is not a game. As the designer you need to know how the scenario will respond, whether it's vs the AI, or H2H.

You can playtest your own vs AI scenarios but you need a good playtester to help you do the H2H versions. That you can't do by yourself. If you need help go to The Proving Grounds. It's what they do.

As the designer there are alot of things that you need to learn from playtesting the scenario. Only one of them is if the scenario can be beaten, IMO an absolute must, just as important is the scoring of the scenario, the length, the excitement level, the competitiveness, and for me personally - the historical content.

[JasonC]

PCs playtest recommendations are good and I second them. I simply reiterate the extra criteria I am talking about when I speak of scripting. The players should have multiple basic options open to them, different ways they might choose to tackle the tactical problem. You the designer should not decide the outcome of those various possible approaches at the design stage. Leave it to the players.

Strategy game equals player decisions determine the outcome, not the situation or a story-line. If that is still too obscure, I'd rather play chess against a weak begining player than the most immersive-intensive-wowzo-action-packed-historically-accurate WWII recreation in history, in which my decisions don't matter a tuppenny damn. I'd rather watch paint dry.

[Mad Russian]

Originally posted by JasonC:

If that is still too obscure, I'd rather play chess against a weak begining player than the most immersive-intensive-wowzo-action-packed-historically-accurate WWII recreation in history, in which my decisions don't matter a tuppenny damn. I'd rather watch paint dry.

Depends on what the objective of the scenario is. While I try to give the player as many options as possible there can only be so many options I can put into a scenario that has the map, OOB and initial setup that are as historically accurate as I can make them.

We are now, once again, to the point where I tell you to find a designer(s) that you like and play his(their) scenarios.

Lots of things enter into whether a gamer likes a particular scenario. One of the most obvious to me is the experience levels of the gamer AND the designer.

If you are an experienced gamer and you are trying to play a scenario made by a novice designer you more than likely won't appreciate the scenario too well. The reverse is true a novice gamer trying to play a scenario made by an experienced designer may find himself at a loss as to how the scenario can be beaten.

I'll use myself as an example so I don't step on anybody else's toes...and Jason I do make my scenarios for me - I do like them - I really don't care if anyone else does or not...the rest of you can use them for examples if you like, I have thick skin.

It's not hard to make the OOB historically accurate, often times I have it in very detailed form. Not everybody in the world has the research material at their fingertips that I have and I don't count against the designer for that. How many designers would we have if they all had to have $5,000+ worth of material in the den? I have seen where designers, reviewers and CRITICS (those who don't write reviews but do take the time to be critical on a forum...you know who you are)get into the, "my source says your source is wrong", mode. I don't get into that. If you researched it at all I'm okay with that. If it's pointed out that the scenario could be more accurate then that's okay too. But it's not okay to toast a guy for trying to make scenarios, often by those that are clueless themselves how to even start to make one.

For the most part, 99.99% of the time I make historically based scenarios, I don't put those down that make fictional ones just because that's not what I make.

I think if you don't like a particular type of scenario then stay away from them.

Once again using myself as the example, I have scenarios that range from having an OOB that consist of a single tank all the way to an operation that has an entire German Infantry Regiment. In that range I have seen reviews that toasted my work , and reviews that toasted my work! I have been on the Best Scenarios To Play lists and I have been on the Worst Scenarios to Play lists.

With more than 100 scenarios to choose from it is a foregone conclussion that I cannot make scenarios that are going to be well recieved by EVERYBODY in the CM community, all the time! Just not going to happen. To make it even more certain that somebody won't like my work I often try situations that are very hard to model. Sometimes I pull it off, sometimes I don't.

My scenarios are rarely long. 35 turns is long for me. I once made a scenario that was 4 turns long. I have only made three operations. More than half are medium or smaller. They are all historically based. (99.99%) The action starts within the first 5 turns or 25% of the total game turns.

That's just me. I make what I like. That formula seems to have a following. BUT there are guys, some in this thread, that don't care for my work. That isn't a problem for me. I actually learn more from an AAR, that is critical of my work, than one that tells me what a wonderful designer I am, and how great my work is. Those are nice to get though. Everybody likes to be told that they do a good job now and again.

I'm lucky in a couple of regards as well. I have a good working relationship with all the major scenarios designers and groups. We exchange information and sometimes playtesting. I am associated with The Proving Grounds, there I can get as much support as I can use for my scenarios. I started and have maintained one of the most talented group of scenario designers, researchers and playtesters in the CM Community with HSG.

Any...ANY, scenario designer can get help at The Proving Grounds!!

I say again, ANY, scenario designer can get help at The Proving Grounds!! There is no need to try to do this on your own. If you are new to scenario design get over there and get some help. If you are an old hand get over there and help a new guy learn the ropes.

The personal preferences of each of us is so varied because CMx1 is that versatile. While I think it's okay to voice your preferences I think we all need to understand that there are entire groups of gamers playing scenarios that we would never try.

That is what makes CMx1 such a great series of games.

[Kingfish]

Originally posted by Bigduke6:

3. I would prefer to see much more attention to terrain. Kingfish is pretty much the standard here; I'll download one of his scenarios just to look at the ground, never mind to play it.

Arrgghhh!!!!

I'm the Twistys.com of scenario designers! :mad: :mad: :mad:

There are plenty of excellent designers out there - besides Kingfish I am a Richie fan - but still Wild Bill I think is the mark to shoot for.

Thank you for the kind words, but I don't think I rate up there with the top dogs. The guys I draw inspiration from sadly no longer design scenarios for CM. Wild Bill, Andreas & the Desert Fox are still in my book the best out there. DF's maps, especially his Operation Perch series are IMO the most realistic Normandy maps ever created.

[RockinHarry]

Originally posted by JasonC:

There are 600 points of flags on 2 locations of German pillbox complexes. There is no road net, one road that "T"s, along which a Sherman platoon arrives early in the game. There are roadblocks across this in various places, with tiny passages around them allowed, blocked in turn by daisy chain AT mines. Some of the mines must be removed to allow the tanks LOS to any of the pillbox areas. The US gets a couple platoons of engineers along with two companies of infantry etc. The pillboxes are covered from tanks by colocated puppchens (and HMGs, and infantry, all in trenches behind sandbags next to multiple concrete MG pillboxes etc). TRPs are provided, padlocked right on these two locations, with 2 others free set up. The US gets a 155, 3 105, an 81mm FO at set up, and 3 more 105 FOs a few turns in. LOS is about 30m if these aren't fired at the TRPs. The briefing is not entirely specific about the additional 105 FOs, but basically tells you to fire the initial arty at the TRPs, prep.

Thus, the scripted sequence is - fire loads of arty at a poor target for it, the pillbox areas, in order to suppress the accompanying puppchens etc. Suppliment with HQ sighted on map 60mm mortars as desired. Crawl combat engineers close enough to remove the daisy chain ATs to free up the only tank route. Crawl tank into LOS of a bunker, fire until firing slit penetration achieved. Linse, rather, repeat until all such positions KOed.

Meanwhile, actual joys of the map are to maneuver the pair of companies away from all the built up defenders to take the high ground behind them. And potentially work in engineers etc from behind. There are only a few scattered weak forces in the way of this, which are a walkover for traveling companies using all the proper drills etc. I smoked all of those. But guess what? The only way to make further progress and actually win, is to go back to the script, clear everyone out of the barrage footprint, drop arty until the puppchen dies etc. And everything else is irrelevant. He can play it himself.

Well thanks Jason. You just delivered some intereseting stuff for a related topic: "What makes a good or not so good scenario playtester."

#1. Post your opinions/reports at the appropiate thread. I would rather have appreciated any your detailed comments concerning the huertgen forest BETA scenario "scripting" here: http://www.battlefront.com/cgi-bin/bbs/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic&f=30&t=004411&p=2

Taken out of the context and with that increasingly personal tone, your "report" is now rather useless unfortunately. See #2

#2. Warn of spoilers when reporting. Self explanatory.

The additional side effect is that you claim to have found the one and only way to test play the BETA scenario, with the result that other possible test players are now discouraged to try existing alternative solutions. No wonder feedback for the BETA scenario has stopped entirely. Thank you very much!

#3. Scenario designer asking about particular testing results with regard to a particular historical background.

I asked just about that! I don´t need page long "how I won" style AAR´s, when some short notes AND sending the end game save file already would help most sufficiently. I also added a screenshot of the map to the ZIP containing the scenario file. Its intended purpose is to give test players a simple tool to mark some of their actions (arrows, icons ect.), instead to require them to make prolonged descriptions in AAR´s. Test players who like to write detailed AAR´s will do anyway and they´re as well highly welcome.

Since this is the wrong thread, I won´t give any "excuses" or "self justifications" for what you think is too strictly applied scenario scripting or why I did setup the BETA scenario the way it is at the moment (regarding mines, RB, TRP, victory flags, briefing and other matters). Just something about what the term BETA means, with a very special regard to the Huertgen forests BETA:

Various small but vital concepts are compressed into this little BETA scenario that I would have liked to receive feedback about from test players who have a particular interest in the Huertgen Forest battle. Build upon this feedback I could better evaluate whether it´s possible to build larger historical battles within the frame of what can be modelled with the CMAK game engine. How does the terrain work with regard to what you read about the battle? How´s the OOB? Do the terrain mods add to the mood sufficiently? How did the AI react and when? Did the AI use its artillery and when? Does the briefing provide credible information and how did you use it? ect. Things like that help scenario designers to make things work better for the final scenario versions.

As much as I appreciate your expertise when dealing with tactical problems in the game, you did not help to improve something in any way as none of the stuff that interests me is answered. I think I understand what makes an entertaining and challenging scenario for you, but as said we speak of a scenario in BETA stage (RANT stage would fit nicely as well) and is not directly aimed at your personal playing preference (didn´t in fact know before at all). You´re interested in the Huertgen forest battle? Just let me (and others) know how you´d setup a scenario with that special topic, preferably here: http://www.battlefront.com/cgi-bin/bbs/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic&f=30&t=004411&p=2

or at TPG.

I´m willing to discuss every little detail you want, a practice that I already did follow during scenario design stages for other wargames the past years. Unfortunately any such offer is very seldomly received by many testers. I had excellent experiences during my time with Wild Bills Arsenal Raiders, as scenario testing within the team was pretty much standardized and appropiate feedback was always guaranteed. Not even TPG can offer this comfort (not a fault of TPG though).

Wish you all a happy new year

[painfbat]

I feel sorry for Jason C, but I guess he doesn't know why and he don't care.

And that's why I feel sorry.

Cheers and a happy new year

[JasonC]

How does the terrain work with regard to what you read about the battle?

Hilltops aren't bare enough to reflect most of the field, though there were places like this. Observation was much easier from one high point to another. Here, neither being the defender nor possession of the high ground give any real observation benefits, historically one of the most important aspects of the battle. A human might do a bit better though.

How´s the OOB?

Germans don't work, US is OK though there isn't much point to the tanks, and presenting the tactical problem as tank-freeing is inaccurate.

On the Germans, snipers aren't useful in 30m LOS conditions. They use only their sidearms, which are not dangerous. They are harder to find that other small teams, but so ineffective finding them is not all that important. I had no difficulty with them.

The wooden bunkers are realistic but were poorly supported, making them very easy to take out. Nobody walks over the rough patches they site over. To be useful, they need to be integrated into a defense system, supported by AP mines, by squads, by wire, etc. One of them pinned one squad, they hit no one. The scattered small team LPs were realistic but ineffective.

More generally, the defense system was only integrated on one axis and was conceived as stationary along that axis. This is largely an effect of the terrain, and observation limits. The thin stuff doesn't hold more than a few minutes. I understand they were meant as arty trigger LPs. Not for the AI.

The StuGs are unhistorical. German armor was occasionally a problem in the open high areas, because US infantry had reached those locations without armor along. They are also ineffective in AI hands - it does not know how to fight armor along restricted roads, to wait for infantry cover along the sides, etc.

Do the terrain mods add to the mood sufficiently?

Don't care, wrong guy to ask. Not an eye candy person.

How did the AI react and when?

It didn't. One unit ran out of the overstacked first pillbox. Mostly they sat there, lacking LOS and possessing flags.

Did the AI use its artillery and when?

Nope. The small team tripwires are meant to result in TRP arty calls. They didn't. I was on or near a few of them maybe twice, with more than a single squad. One LMG across the road on my left probably had LOS to Americans under a TRP, once, before being smoked. No fire mission resulted.

Does the briefing provide credible information and how did you use it?

It provided the information that the pillboxes were strongly held, and implied they were better protected against arty than they were. I used that information to avoid them. I fired one 105mm FO at the main center hill prep (delayed a few minutes), target wide, to create treeburst threat in the German "backfield". There was nobody within half a click. Others fired at TRPs during. But I did not use more than a quarter of the overall shell supply.

The information on arrival of US tanks was credible. I used it by directing one column across the road right of the pillbox area, which kill the few Germans on that side and cleared the mines around the roadblock and just past it, easily enough. I did not plan on relying on the tanks however since infantry off road is much more effective in this terrain.

As for an end of game screen, after investing several hours in it over 3 sittings, I quit on turn 14, because you were sitting in my chair and the rest was die rolling.