CM needs longer turns!

[Broken]

Although CMBB is a more accurate model of WWII combat, it is less exciting to play than CMBO, IMHO. Why?

Less happens in one turn. The more fragile infantry, longer command delays, EFOW, and ineffective artillery conspire together to make less happen in 60 seconds. Playing a 3000 pt attack/defend QB requires about 45 turns to give the attacker equal chances to the defender. Attacks take longer to set up, it takes more time to ID defender positions, infantry is slower (can't run like CMBO olympic athletes), and no amazingly cost-effective arty to clear the way.

There is a way to bring the CMBO-like excitement back without losing the realism: make the turns longer, say 90 to 120 seconds. Hey, the real fun part of the game is watching the movie. Getting more movie time for your command-phase investment would make CM a better game. More realistic too. What real-life commander could issue orders to all of his troops every sixty seconds?

I don't know how much the sixty second turn is hard-wired into the code. A question probably only Charles can answer. Would it be feasible to lengthen the turns for CM2 or CMAK?

[rune]

For CMAK, impossible.

Rune

[mPisi]

Just don't give orders every second turn... voila, 120-second turns...

[Michael Emrys]

Originally posted by Broken:

...make the turns longer, say 90 to 120 seconds.

IIRC, I made this suggestion four or five years ago...well, a while back anyway.

Michael

[GreenAsJade]

On one hand there's the issue of what does happen (it's being claimed "not as much"). On the other hand there's the problem of what _can_ happen.

It would be agony to see a gun pop out of nowhere 30 seconds through a turn, and have to wait another minute or more before the chance to issue corrective orders....

[lcm1947]

Well, I was all ready to voice my agreement with Broken but then I read Green's post so - never mind. Green's got a very good point. It's hard enough now waiting for your next move when something pops up unexpected and ruins your well layed plans. My heart couldn't take it if it was longer or at least my wife wouldn't tolerate me cursing that often. It sure sounded like a good idea. Oh well, that damn Green ruined everything.

[Redwolf]

TacOps, which default to one minute action, too, recently added options for longer combat turns.

It works well, but some extensions were neccessary, in special artillery now has an option "fire [x] rounds" to keep it from pouring the precious ICM for several minutes. CM is a more detailed game and doubtless would need a few more extensions of that kind.

I guess the primary issue for the CM engine is memory, you would need to store several times as many events. Also, the additional options make the interface more confusing which is a bad thing for a game targetted at big audiences.

[Broken]

Originally posted by mPisi:

Just don't give orders every second turn... voila, 120-second turns...

Not a bad idea. If BFC could allow the option of skipping every other orders phase, you would have 120 second turns.

As far as the "problem" of guns popping up early in the movie, so what? The Tac AI is pretty good at targetting armor threats on its own. In any case, I doubt if a real battalion commander could intervene in any real way in less than two minutes if an AT gun started taking potshots at his armor.

[flamingknives]

A company commander might, and that's the scale that CM is supposed to play at.

[jiggles]

Originally posted by Broken:

</font><blockquote>quote:</font><hr />Originally posted by mPisi:

Just don't give orders every second turn... voila, 120-second turns...

Not a bad idea. If BFC could allow the option of skipping every other orders phase, you would have 120 second turns. </font>

[Ph0r3vEr]

I played a lan TCP/IP game against a friend of mine who played the soviets in 1941. To simulate the sloggish chain of command and incompetent officers he gave orders for 2-4 turns in a row and only issued new movement orders when the former ones were completed by the troops. Needles to say it was a massacre but to think how Jerries managed to smash KVs and T-34s in 1941 it truly simulated the situation well. Russian vehicles lacked communication equipment and attempted breakthroughs sometimes leaving them pointlessly roaming behind enemy lines. IMHO the use of green troops as Soviet infy in 1941 should be replaced with 120 sec turn for the Russian and 60 sec turn for the German (who would thus give orders twice in one Russian turn). Those guys had balls but were often led by untrained fanatics who could spill only the blood of their own troops.

-4eva

[SaTyR]

I would just settle for longer turn limit, over 60 turns (hour). Then everybody who wanted to could just hit GO every other turn, but as an added plus we could have even 2 hour monster battles. I was tought in the Finnish army that a single platoon might have to spend an hour assaulting enemy positions, if artillery support was scarce. To my eyes, a whole lot of things happen (too) fast in CM and I seem to always be in a hurry. The turn limit could be raised, not the time per turn. Just food for thought

[ June 26, 2003, 06:25 AM: Message edited by: SaTyR ]

[MikeyD]

I've recently been doubling my usual number of turns per game and it takes a lot of heat off of having to rush from one end of the map in another unprepared. And yes, hitting 'Go' several times without bothering to reissue orders take a lot of the curse off the opening-moves tedium.

But the thing about multi-minute increments is when things finally do start to happen even the current one minute increment seems too long! If you've got your men on the march and a Panther unexpectedly appears in the road 6 seconds into the turn you're looking at a looooong 54 seconds of nail-biting terror before you can issue orders again.

[ June 26, 2003, 11:56 AM: Message edited by: MikeyD ]

[Redwolf]

In my previous post about the same thing in TacOps I forgot to mention one thing:

SOP (standard operating procedures), that means user-selectable reactions on events like "do I retreat of fight when somebody shoots at me", are totally essential, otherwise the actual fighting turns turn into an unrealistic joke.

[Jack Ryan]

cud just get rid of turns all together, then it wud be either winning (other side surrenders) draw (ceasefire) or one side disengages (leaves the field of battle, in which case victory wud go to the side still left)

what yer think?

[SFJaykey]

Early in games, especially those played on maps with moderate or heavy cover, I usually set long movement routes for my troops...usually "Move to Contact." Then the first turns just involve some minor tweaking and pressing "Go." If (or "when") things don't go according to plan, there's always the backspace key.

I'd rather stick with this arrangment and keep the flexibility of intervening at 1 minute intervals, rather than trusting the TacAI to handle unexpected developments. Otherwise it would be less like a competitive game and too much like watching a movie.

[Jack Ryan]

oh no l like the idea of turns i was more on about a turn limit.

that way the game wud be like a duarcell(sp?!) battery, it keeps going and going and going and goi....

[ June 26, 2003, 12:30 PM: Message edited by: Jack Ryan ]

[SFJaykey]

Originally posted by redwolf:

...SOP (standard operating procedures), that means user-selectable reactions on events like "do I retreat of fight when somebody shoots at me", are totally essential.....

I've made one suggestion that moves in this direction without adding too much complexity: when units "Moving to Contact," encounter the enemy, instead of just stopping, trigger the next order & waypoint. So we could have "Move to Contact then Advance," for example, which would be very useful for bringing troops up through long-range nuisance fire.

Also, I've proposed tweaking "Advance" and "Assault," which right now strike me as too similar. Perhaps "Assault" could be used for actually taking a position, while units under "Advance" would stop if enemies appeared within grenade range? Or stop in the first cover within grenade range?

[Hat Trick]

Another option would be to limit the number of orders a player could give each turn. A player could be limited to, say, ten orders/waypoints per headquarters unit, or a headquarters unit could give multiple/unlimited orders/waypoints but only to three units each, or some other combination of limits.

The advantage of doing this is that it would allow the length of a turn to be shortened dramatically, to say 10 or 15 seconds, without allowing an unrealistic or tedious amount of micromangement. As a player, I could give out orders for the most important/pressing actions, and be able to respond to action on the field in a more timely (and realistic?) way, without being able to coordinate the entire field of battle at too fine a level.

I think that this approach would more closely reflect reality, where commanders can focus on only a limited set of orders at a time, but do not have to wait 60 seconds between giving orders.

[ June 26, 2003, 02:11 PM: Message edited by: Hat Trick ]

[John D Salt]

Originally posted by Broken:

[snips]

There is a way to bring the CMBO-like excitement back without losing the realism: make the turns longer, say 90 to 120 seconds. Hey, the real fun part of the game is watching the movie. Getting more movie time for your command-phase investment would make CM a better game. More realistic too. What real-life commander could issue orders to all of his troops every sixty seconds?

What real life commander could issue orders to all of his troops every two minutes, for that matter?

Why stick with a fixed-length turn in any case?

Let each player prepare a plan and give his orders at the start of the game. This plan can include decision points that trigger different contingency plans, and can include triggers for beginning new phases.

The player can only issue new orders in response to a change of situation being reported. This trigger might be a subordinate unit reporting being unable to carry out its designated task, or being late crossing a report line, or reporting successful completion of a task.

The new orders should take time to issue and transmit. A morale penalty should be imposed on units that receive a rapid stream of new orders ("order, counter-order, disorder").

Of course, all this would require control measures such as report lines to be modelled, and would turn CM into a "command game". But I do not believe that any particular fixed time-increment can be supported on grounds of "realism".

All the best,

John.

[MikeyD]

I've said it before, there are two tendencies afoot - one to make CMBB more of a shooter game, and a second to make CMBB more of a grand strategy game. One wants to peer through the tank optics and have 10 seconds between commands. And the other wants to set up refuelling waypoints and resupply collumns, and limit the player's hands-on input at the 'point of the spear'. Both would probably make great games. Neither would be CM.

[ June 26, 2003, 02:57 PM: Message edited by: MikeyD ]

[Jack Ryan]

i said above just get rid of the turn limit

[Ph0r3vEr]

The interesting idea provided by mr. Salt was experienced during the pre-PC boardgaming era. The system (called Fog of War) was implemented on a series of napoleonic battle games.

Here the commander had to plan for action which the troops then executed. If they failed to do as ordered the leader of the unit "made a decision" (rolled from a table - best result was that you could give the unit new orders by yourself) which was modified by his personality ("aggressive", "cautious", "reckless" etc.). There was also loads of random events (troops were moved to a different location - due to misinterpretation of the orders or became idle due to no obvious reason for example) but people complained that the game "played itself" after the initial orders phase and the cumbersome mechanics only served to burden the players.

I think such a game engine would be a brilliant choice for a napoleonic game (or perhaps battles of the age of reason could be depicted by such as well) but the second world war squad leaders were sometimes very independent and able. To build such an AI that could react on his own (or to decide when a task has become impossible) is by far beyond being cost effective.

The tac AI of CM:BB should be one of the best designed yet it mostly reacts to enemy fire and to that alone. The "rush for the flags" or "concentrate power against known enemy" tac Engine is simply not good enough to work long periods on it's own. Today that is...

-4eva