ROFLMAO Can't Hep it!

[SeaMonkey]

I smell "bargain-bin".

Sorry DD I won't be grovelling with you until we get to single digits(<$10)........but

Maybe the sequel.

[targul]

I have played Commander for a couple days now and I have to agree the AI is really substandard. SC2 is significantly better.

I am trying some multiplayer email games they might just make that game really good. There is no reason I can see to play ahistorical like in SC2. If then game will still need weather.

I don't play multiplayer email on SC2 since the games are so strange only fantasy can be what they are. The strange running around and capturing every nation instead of some historical balance is just insane.

Jim

[Blashy]

Originally posted by targul:

I don't play multiplayer email on SC2 since the games are so strange only fantasy can be what they are. The strange running around and capturing every nation instead of some historical balance is just insane.

Jim

Yep, it is an issue.

[borsook]

Originally posted by Desert Dave:

Geeeeeeeez,

What an INexpert, UNfinished,

Copy-cat (... no you duplicitous dudes over

to Smithereens/Matrix, it ain't LIKE

"PG," it's been sorta

"accidentally borrowed" - mostly from

'round hereabouts, IMO... and - as

I always say - who

else's - should I have? )

Piece of OVERpriced slab of UNDERcooked

Pizza Pie! In the sky! LOL!

Well,

I ain't gotta ELABORATE all the reasons

Why - do I?

$60.00!! :eek:

For - essentially, the SAME thang

Hubert put out for - 25 bucks?

OK,

Let's see... maybe,

A couple years,

10-20 patches or so,

Another iteration or 2?

THEN they can yak up the smack.

[... BTW: hmmmm, hard for me to imagine

another Geezer what wheezes so awful

supercilious as that fat-lip

Canadian Cat - LestheSarge... nope,

canno think of nary a one!]

Yeah yah yah yah!

I am been with Hubert for 5 years now

And I am a mite sympatico.

So what, that don't change nuthin'

IMHO.

I think that you should sell the rights to this post to dictionary makers, who would quote it next to the definition of the world "babbling"

[targul]

Well, I have play Commander long enough to see its advantages and disadvantages. The AI in the game is asleep. I think you can actually hear it snore during the computers turn.

Suggest not buying until after the patch maybe someone there will shake it awake.

Jim

[Iron Ranger]

Without saying you need to mod SC2 to what you want Targul, what do you feel needs to be changed to make it 'feel' more histoical vs fantsy? What scripts or options need to be changed on the std game?

[Timskorn]

I imagine Targul is talking about Axis and Allies regularly taking over countries they didn't attack historically, such as Germany hitting Spain, Vichy France and Switzerland.

There will always be debate about that. On one hand you can heavily punish countries diplomatically by doing too much too soon, but after a certain point it's really total war. Who cares if I take over Spain and Vichy France in 1942 when the US and Russia are already at war with me?

[Guest Mike]

And indeed that's US attitudes feature majorly in German attitudes towards Vichy - the US prefered to treat with Vichy rather than hte Free French, but once they weer at war anyway US sensibilities re Vichy were no longer of any concern to Germany

[Blashy]

Originally posted by Timskorn:

I imagine Targul is talking about Axis and Allies regularly taking over countries they didn't attack historically, such as Germany hitting Spain, Vichy France and Switzerland.

There will always be debate about that. On one hand you can heavily punish countries diplomatically by doing too much too soon, but after a certain point it's really total war. Who cares if I take over Spain and Vichy France in 1942 when the US and Russia are already at war with me?

I hope that can be rectified to some extent. You don't want to stop it, seeing as Germany could have invade other countries but their has to be reactions by neighbors, especially if Germany invades Axis leaning countries. Same goes for Allies, the "good guys" start to go on the war path well the world might turn against you.

Basically no one outside of the majors should just sit by and do nothing.

[targul]

Problem with SC2 is only in Human vs Human play so I simply do not play Humans in this game. I do in many others but the design is for people to attack every country so they can gain a little coin that they can use to attack the next irrelevant country.

This is beyound ahistorical but true fantasy.

Allies running off and attacking everything they see would have oonvinced the US not to enter since there would be no way to distinguish Allies from Axis.

Axis attacking its allies again makes no sense. Sweden why? They were already providing the Iron Ore. Best you could hope for with that is to lower the amount of ore you would receive.

Switzerland is attacked because it is there. Portugal on and on.

I prefer a game where there are some sort of controls that make the game quasi historical. When you play the AI it does play historical and this is a great game but players only care about some fantasy victory since they are not following any historical reality.

To sum it up this is a great AI game but NEVER will I play players with its present design.

BTW AI is horrible in Commander but Human play great because there is no advantage to go anywhere outside of what is historical victory conditions.

So if they wanted to make this a Human friendly WWII game they would simply remove the looting from all the countries that were not attacked historically. So other then the city points week to week there would be no benefit and most players would not go anywhere but where needed.

[Guest Mike]

but he allies DID attack every country they could - often with US help - Iran, Iraq, Syria, French Nth Africa = Vichy, Norway only jut missed out - the plan was in place!

So in game terms the allies attacked or planned to attack everything they could reach except the Iberian countries and Turkey.

[Blashy]

True Stalin's Organist. But, their neighbor's should react more diplomatically, not necessarily joining the other side, but enough of a join % that the other side might see an opportunity to try and bring them on their side via diplomacy.

Other issues: Iberia is neutral and Allies invade Portugal. The writing would be on the wall for Spain. Spain should automatically join Axis, this way it has a chance at defending itself and it is not a simple enter the big door (Portugal) and no one in the room notices or does anything about it.

Had the allies been the first to take Norway, Sweden would have been very unpleased and again without joining Axis, their leaning towards the Axis would have increased significantly.

[Guest Mike]

You're right about Iberia, and since the purpose of Britain invading Norway was to stop Swedish Iron reaching Germany via Narvik they should probably join hte Axis for exactly the same reasons - remember the Brits had this idea of helping the Finns too....100,000 troops....but only 6000 of them for Finland, the rest were to "protect" the Swedish iron mines & railways...inside Sweden......with or without their permission.......

[Hubert Cater]

Targul, I understand your concerns and it really comes down to a tricky balance wrt what happened historically, what could have happened and balancing all of that out with the appropriate penalties so as to not skew the game in the other extreme. For example if we make it to restrictive in penalties then it will eliminate much of the what-ifs and dynamic strategies that multiplayers so much seem to enjoy.

Now all that being said I won't suggest that the current system is perfect and in fact I am open to suggestions on any key problem areas anyone would like to discuss before we finalize SC2 WaW.

[Ottosmops]

To counteract too much unhistorical play one could force the players to keep some occupation forces in the conquered countries.

Depending on the size of the occupied country, i. e. the number of its cities, the invader has to leave a certain number of troops there.

If he don't do this, then the occupied country could have a certain probability to start a revolution and switch back to neutral or to the other side.

The idea behind this is, to leave the player the choice which way to go, what countries to attack, but to prevent him to do more than what historically could have been done.

[Timskorn]

I enjoy having open strategies that aren't historical. It's the key to long-term MP gaming. Too many restrictions and it no longer becomes viable to try different strategies as it narrows down your options.

I feel SC2 has come a long way to balancing the risk/rewards associated with "minor-grabbing" by both Axis and Allies. There's just a lot of good players out there now who have refined their play so well as to make it seem like a problem.

We then don't want to tread into the territory of balancing the game towards the elite players. You know, anytime it seems like someone is beating you with a certain strategy or play style consistently, something is added to "nerf" it so it's not as effective.

Sure, there are always things that can be balanced and changed, but I think there comes a point when the benefits become negligible or even make things worse. There are real problems and then there are perceived problems. Need to be careful to differentiate the two.

[targul]

I too enjoy open strategy but I want the game to motivate the player to play historical. I agree with invade Portugal Spain joins the opposition. Allies invade Norway Sweden joins Axis.

I do not care who goes to Iraq, Iran Syria they were and are unimportant. I have the same care for Vichy France. What I do say is remove the loot from them. I just do not see any true loot gathering in these poor nations at that time.

You will receive the money from there cities, oil and mines. For some this maybe enough to attack but most would not because the cost reward would not be there. I believe most of these were not invaded simply because of the cost reward.

Eachtime you invade someone there should be clicks up and down on the diplomacy giving diplomacy the chance to react. Example Spain joins Axis if they reach 100 but are normally at 40. Give them a 50 point jump if the Allies invade. The Allies would think twice about invading but still might make it without war verses Spain.

Possibly these options could be placed when you choose the scenario you choose historical game or freeflow.

That would allow both sides of the argument to be happy. Those who dont want to be controlled by history can play ignoring it and those like me who demand history can play there game.

[Blashy]

Removing plunder would have NIL effect. You don't invade those minors for plunder, you invade them for the long term mpps gained. A city like Tunisia will give out 8mpps, that is over 80 per year. Well worth the taking. If you hold it for 2.5 years that is around 200mpps.

You don't want a game to motivate players to play historical, I think what you are trying to say is if they play unhistorical the proper consequences should occur which at the moment they do not. But I certainly want the possibility to invade everywhere, but don't expect to have every minor sit and wait for its turn to be invaded.

[Timskorn]

I think as long as there are proper cost/benefit rations for whatever kinds of decisions you make, mostly a-historical ones, they can be worked out. Everything can't simply be balanced through code and script though, either. It comes down a lot to player skill as well.

For example, you can't just keep adding scripts where the US suddenly gets a big fleet if Axis takes over Turkey early on. As players we need to be aware of the disadvantages that Axis player would be in at the time he invades Turkey, and take advantage of that. It seems Terif is currently the master at understanding this and exploiting it the most.

Not everyone is able to do that, of course, but a lot of the time I think it's a matter of you yourself making the other player pay a price for doing something like that, rather than throwing in more scripts.

[targul]

"Not everyone is able to do that, of course, but a lot of the time I think it's a matter of you yourself making the other player pay a price for doing something like that, rather than throwing in more scripts."

So your response is for the other player to play fantasy instead of attempting to make the game more historical. I say fine but at least give me the option to play a historical game.

Simply because the game allows ahistorical play doesnt make it correct. There must be consequences that were concievable at the time. Not well Joe did so I did it too.

I desire to win within the guidelines of what was possible during WWII not by some fantasy of invading all the world expecting the remainder of the world not to react.

Germany nor England invaded simply to capture another city to plunder. There needs to be reasons other then theft to motivate a nation. These may not be accurate but they must be conceivable.

Germany considered invading Switzerland but didnt because Switzerland made both a economic comprimise and it was not cost effective.

Had Norway been invaded by the Allies I do not doubt the Axis would have invaded Sweden to protect there ore shipments. But without a threat I can see no reason the Axis would invade Sweden.

I just want a small amount of common sense not random running to capture the flags.

I do not want them to curtail all possiblities I would just like to have the option to play historical and within that option rules that make playing historical reasonable.

Almost all these type of games are played as fantasy without any thought to WWII this one is the best simply because the AI does play historical. The players do not.

I find it strange that the complaints about AI are normally it doesnt do everything but this one operates very well with historical play. When you evade history the game AI isnt as compatible.

Most of the problems could be solved by house rules but there should be a historical option so players actually know the house rules.

[Iron Ranger]

HC most of the problem with the 'big' neutrals is they are too easy to take. Sweden mainly, spain slightly and Turkey to a much lesser extent. All other minors (except swiss/Irland) were DOWed by somebody.

But with this is the style of play most people choise; they all have a 'fall back' play in PvP fearing to come to any combat unless they must. In other words as axis if the allies are going to bail out of Egypt with little combat, and give me the front 6 citys in Russia for nearly free... hell I might as well invade all the other Minors once USA joins.... I"M NOT BEING CHALLAGED. If allies fight (wisely) for every inch of soil, the axis are not going to have the units or time to pull a full combat group out to take out minors.

Partisans would be another problem I think. These three 'big' minors should have more active partisans, making you think about invading AND holding them

Suggestions:

Minor OOB: Make Spain, Turkey, Sweden.. and perhaps Swiss have better OOD/Tech/Entrenchemts. Unless its a one hit wounder invading most minors are something that is normally avoided.

Partisans: Force garisons troops in at least the capital on the main three. Otherwise partisan units will pop up. I'd also suggest a roll back on the French Partisans, and perhaps some of the Greek ones.

Accept the fact that if the allies want to only invest in tech and deny combat the the axis till 42 or 43 then they will have to live with the fact that the axis have taken all of eroupe. In fact this is more realist then it seams, it just wouldnt be by DOW. If UK had abandoned Egypt with little fighting, and Russia had compleately abandoned White Russia and Ukriane.. how many minor in Eroupe (or the people of these areas) have said.. lets join the Winner because the other guys are not willing to even fight for themselfs.

FYI: One reason for these pull backs is Mass'd air fleets are just too powerfull. Its too bad you cant adjust it so that a HQ can only support one Air Fleet at a time. Any others near by will need another HQ or be supportless. Added in is the effect on moral should be adjusted from the readness of the air fleet, not its strenght.

[ June 22, 2007, 06:33 PM: Message edited by: Iron Ranger ]

[borsook]

Originally posted by targul:

Switzerland is attacked because it is there. Portugal on and on.

Actually Germany had plans for attacking Switzerland. They were never put to life, but still.

[jon_j_rambo]

@borsook --- Dude, what's with your sig? You some kind of New World Order Commie? If Shaw & you can realize that taken pride in one's country...ah, may have a reason? (See Freedom)

[n0kn0k]

Patriotism is one straw away from Nationalism, and we all know how that ends

[borsook]

Originally posted by jon_j_rambo:

@borsook --- Dude, what's with your sig? You some kind of New World Order Commie? If Shaw & you can realize that taken pride in one's country...ah, may have a reason? (See Freedom)

The sig is an attempt to come up with the only rational reason behind a person's "patriotism". Nothing in the history of this world, maybe with the exception of religion, is responsible for so much death and suffering as patriotism.