Some Campaign Game Suggestions for Dan V.

[Ludomeister]

First, enjoyed meeting you this morning (Oct. 9) and flying in our little 2 vs. 2 battle. I've got all 4 of the boxed games, and now this nifty computer conversion.

I have a suggestion for campaign play. Why not have a sort of uber-campaign that begins at the war's start and ends in '45. All players start out with newbie pilots and have to progress (and survive) throughout the war. To add to the fun, there could be virtual squadrons that you sign up for when you begin. In the manual (i.e. card) game this would be impractical, but with the computer version playing so quickly it could actually be done. Also, it would be much more fun if you could do the campaigns as 2 vs. 2 rather than just 1 vs. 1 ... the team play aspect adds another dimension to the game.

Finally, I miss the strategic options that the card game has ... any chance of these being re-instated in the computerized version of the game?

Cheers,

Ludo

[Sixxkiller]

Or you can join one of the 3 squadrons that already exist and shoot down Kuroi and his wingy!!!

-Ray

[kuroi neko]

LOL even I dont spend enough time online to satisfy all the potential bloodthirsty players playing with my poor little "smiling face" guy.

Seriously, a semi-random massively multiplayer campaign could be a LOT of fun.

Here again I'm drawing from the excellent IL2 flight simulation community: 2 or 3 years ago there was a system called Virtual Eastern Front (VEF) that allowed to play semi-historical IL2 games.

The game was open to any individual player, provided he had registered into a given squadron for a given country. It was possible to have 8 vs 8 missions with a mixed bag of squadron members, but of course people soon started to form "serious" squadrons flying together all the time.

The pace of the game was "simulated real time", i.e. about one game week for a real life day, which allowed to cover all WWII in about a year.

The war was broken down into separate campaign areas (famous eastern front battles like Moscow, Stalingrad, Kuban, etc.), each with a given set of available planes, ground targets and strategic objectives (i.e. tank busting for Kursk, air superiority over Stalingrad, transportation interdiction around Moscow, etc.).

To start a game, players gathered in a VEF dedicated section of the game lobby, and as soon as there was enough people to play, the host would go to a web page and generate a new mission (which is basically how the current DiF campaign system works, except that the DiF campaigns are limited to 1v1). The host would choose general type of mission: number of players, area of attack, main goal (air superiority, ground attack, etc.) and generate a scenario. The mission was then played and the results sent back to the VEF server.

The global situation was updated (slightly) after each game: global victory points, available planes, ground target locations, airfield status. Even the front line could move. Since the changes were very gradual, dozens of simultaneous games could be played without shifting the global situation too abruptly. Only after a while you would see the front moving or notice a change in the global choice of targets and mission types. For instance, you could find yourself forced to start from far away areas after all your front-line airfields had been repeatedly attacked, notice that a few flak bateries were gone from your usual flight path, etc.

The strategic situation would not change whatever the players achieved, but tactical successes or defeats could reshape the front line or change the pace of historical events for a while: you would not win the battle of Stalingrad by shooting down hundreds of Russian planes or destroying hundreds of Russian targets, but you could somewhat enlarge the pocket and delay the defeat by a couple of weeks (or hasten it if your Luftwaffe guys were regularly trashed by the VVS ).

I guess it would be possible to design something similar, adapted to the DiF campaign system. Just a few ideas that I found interresting at the time:

Even though DiF campaign system does divide a territory into fixed-size areas, maps with half a dozen zones could be enough to simulate front line: there could be friendly and enemy zones plus some "neutral" front line areas with a given percentage held by each side.

The current objective per zone system seems to fit very well into the picture: the choice of objectives would reflect the global situation evolution, and the result of each mission would in turn influence the available objectives. By choosing objectives the players could try to shift the situation toward a global goal (concentrating on a given type of objective across several missions). Or grab a tactical oportunity (a juicy truck convoy wandering near the front lines) Or simply pick one of the available objectives at random .

Starting airfield location (influenced by airfield attacks) could be simulated by the same range system as the current DiF campaigns, but in order to add flexibility the range could have an effect on pilot fatigue rather than be a simple limitation of reachable map areas: flying over far away zones would simply cause more fatigue.

The flak density could also have an impact on fatigue or planes wear and tear, thus adding another tactical parameter (some flak suppression missions could allow to clear a zone from some of its AAA defenses).

Squadrons could run out of a certain model of plane and be forced to switch to another type while waiting for replacements. The available planes could be limited not only by the number of shot down planes but also damaged ones or even the wear and tear tied to the number of sorties per day. People would have to be careful about getting smoked in a scenario with few planes available, or would have to make each mission a success to offset the attrition rate of their planes. For instance, at the start of the war, Luftwaffe usually had a smaller pool of available planes, but the VVS had vast quantities of second grade planes (I-15 and I-16) an a precious handful of modern fighters (LaGGs, MiG and Yak). In such a situation, Russian players would hope to get a mission with top notch fighters but would have to fly them carefully, while the usual ratas could be flown somewhat recklessly (provided the pilots got away with it!).

Fighter-bomber missions could be simulated with a slight extension of the current game system, like the possibility to carry various external armaments at the cost of reduced power and/or manoeuverability, plus a new "jettison all ordnance" button useable at the start of each turn .

2v1 escort missions would also fit very well into the current game system, the campaign would simply add limitations to the number and type of available bombers.

Pilots bailed out over enemy territory would get a chance to escape capture, or be held prisoner with a slight chance to escape over time, or be returned to duty if the front line shifted beyond the location they had been shot down over. In terms of game it means they would be prevented from joining games for the time of their "captivity" until the end of the campaign or their liberation/escape.

Well there is a lot of room for imagination there, but after all the "hornet leader" game has already been designed by a certain Dan Verssen, so I guess the idea could be worth a thought.

[ October 09, 2005, 03:58 AM: Message edited by: kuroi neko ]

[Sixxkiller]

Pierre, can I say a few words?

MY GOD MAN YOU MUST TYPE FASTER THAN A P-35 WOULD DIE TO A Fw190. :eek:

Hehe though ya that is a good idea. I can speculate just from my expertise in dealing with people, that if DV would try to accomidate this not only cause someone made the suggestion but also cause he had already thought about it with another game.

It would be cool in a sense if it had a flowing strategic map like WWII Online does. I havent played that game since I was a beta tester but the concept seems to fit. If I had a computer that would run it ATM I would be playing I can tell you that.

But I am not sure if this could be an easy thing to do for them and we may have to see just how much more they have to put in to the game itself with the add-ons and such.

-Ray

[Moon]

Ludo (and others)... DIF is a "living" game, meaning that we want to continue improving and upgrading and adding to it as time goes on. One of the reasons why campaigns are online-based is that we wabted to be able to expand on the whole campaign system (and by doing it online this gives us a lot more flexibility). And some of the ideas here with regard to massive multiplayer campaigns and a bigger strategic component are great.

We'll be releasing new stuff at least once a month. New planes, but also new rules and new campaigns, and I bet a lot of these great suggestions will make it in eventually.

Martin

[Dan Verssen]

Kuroi,

This is an excellent idea. A while back I put together a document titled "DIF War" that outlines a similar idea to have a 'living' WWII happening for players to join.

As you suggested, players would join, discuss strategic options and fly missions to shift the balance of the war's progress. Once victory was achieved by either side, the whole thing would reset for a new war.

One aspect that I looked at, that I think will be fun is a simple resource system that would be part of that game. Basically, a player would gain points for destroying enemy targets. The player could then spend these points to build his own facilities such as airfields, factorys, ships, etc. The good point is, these targets would give his aircraft some benefit and help win the war. The bad point is, they would then appear on enemy 'target' lists and could be bombed. As part of his points, the player could build AIs to defend his facilities from attack.

My plan is for DIF to expand in both small ways, such as new aircraft and campaigns, and also in large ways, like the system outlined above. I appreciate your excitment for the game!