Turn based Strategy vs TB CRPG markets large discrepancy

[obediah]

Because the purpose of RT is continuous action. If you're going to be stopping regularly it defeats that purpose. Get it?

The purpose of real time is to eliminate the artifacts of traditional turn based systems ( i.e. your 04:01 - 04:02 happened before mine, but you killed me at 04:58, so 04:01-04:57 never happened for me ).

Any other silly baggage you've attached to it is your mistake. It's perfectly fine for a RT game to involve pausing and planning.

And actually most people can think without the game being stopped. You might not be able to think as deeply, but it's a different kind of activity.

Well yeah. As much as we make fun of Halo 3 being a button masher, you can't play it asleep.

And in practice a lot of turn based isn't exactly deep either.

Sure, but do try to stay on topic dear. You're not handling this one particularly well, and adding a second isn't going to help.

Obediah won't post in this thread any more. He's moved on to tittering at me in other threads.

Jeesh - this isn't fucking 4chan. I have other interests.

 

[GarfunkeL]

Well, in my mind, the difference between the realtime of Starcraft or Dune2 or any of those RTS's (never played Supreme Commander) and HoI is this:

HoI pits two stacks of divisions against each other, in straight vertical rows. They do not all fire at the same time against each other, rather they go in turns. The player cannot control this sequence, it is decided by the organization and formation of the stacks.

Now in Starcraft, units automatically shoot targets in-range, based on their firing rate without any turns or rounds.

HoI is a muddy issue because the difference between very slow and very fast is huge and because how the combat is resolved.

In the end, maybe I'm talking of a distinction that does not make any sense because in HoI the combat is resolved so quickly that player usually has no way to view the 'rounds' progressing inside that 1-hour turn.

 

[buccaroobonzai]

It's more that it isn't really feasible to do real-time for higher level strategy games. I assure you, if a developer found a way to accomplish that the publishers would be all over it.

This is an interesting issue to. At a tactical level, the game Close Combat has dealt with real time and tactical decsion making superbly. It is about the best implementation of rela time at a slow-as-pace-as-the-player-wants as you can do maintaining an enjoyable playing experience. The tactical decision making in Close Combat is one of the if not the best for any game made.

However when you move this to large scale strategy 4x type games real time seems to lose much in the way of strategy/tactics planning, micro/macro management, economy, diplomacy, espionage etc. The way Master of Orion does it seems to be perfect, turn based macro-management with real time combat. This combo makes the game the most enjoyable of the 4x games to play. While a pure turn based 4x is fun like GAlactic Civs 2, it is not as enjoyable a game as MOO 1 & 2. If you could get into a mindset/mood of playing GAlactic Civ 2 as a board game on the PC it might come close. Regardless I think MOO1 & 2 are the best strat/tacticaly implemented 4x games period.

 

[obediah]

Well, in my mind, the difference between the realtime of Starcraft or Dune2 or any of those RTS's (never played Supreme Commander) and HoI is this:

HoI pits two stacks of divisions against each other, in straight vertical rows. They do not all fire at the same time against each other, rather they go in turns. The player cannot control this sequence, it is decided by the organization and formation of the stacks.

Interesting - I had never bothered to look up how combat is resolved in a time slice in HoI. From your description, it sounds like an RT strategy game with TB combat resolution, sorta like X-Com.

It's more that it isn't really feasible to do real-time for higher level strategy games. I assure you, if a developer found a way to accomplish that the publishers would be all over it.

What about Highway to the Reich? I haven't played it, but it was well received by the grognards, and takes place at a higher level than Close Combat.

The way Master of Orion does it seems to be perfect, turn based macro-management with real time combat. This combo makes the game the most enjoyable of the 4x games to play. ...Regardless I think MOO1 & 2 are the best strat/tacticaly implemented 4x games period.

MOO2 had turn based combat ( It did rock though!). I want to say that MOO1 did as well, but it's been over 10 years so I can't remember with certainty.

 

[Panthera]

MOO2 had turn based combat ( It did rock though!). I want to say that MOO1 did as well, but it's been over 10 years so I can't remember with certainty.

Only MOO3 had real-time combat. I'm one of the few that actually liked that one. With heavy modding.

 

[sheek]

Because the purpose of RT is continuous action. If you're going to be stopping regularly it defeats that purpose. Get it?

The purpose of real time is to eliminate the artifacts of traditional turn based systems ( i.e. your 04:01 - 04:02 happened before mine, but you killed me at 04:58, so 04:01-04:57 never happened for me ).

You're not very bright, are you? All you've done is restate what I said, that RT is good for continuous action. If the game is designed in such a way that you have to pause it every few seconds then you may as well have very short turns. I contrasted pause with having variable RT speeds, which would make pause unnecessary, which you ignored to insist that pausing in a RT game is necessary for tactics.

 

[Panthera]

Because the purpose of RT is continuous action. If you're going to be stopping regularly it defeats that purpose. Get it?

The purpose of real time is to eliminate the artifacts of traditional turn based systems ( i.e. your 04:01 - 04:02 happened before mine, but you killed me at 04:58, so 04:01-04:57 never happened for me ).

You're not very bright, are you? All you've done is restate what I said, that RT is good for continuous action. If the game is designed in such a way that you have to pause it every few seconds then you may as well have very short turns. I contrasted pause with having variable RT speeds, which would make pause unnecessary, which you ignored to insist that pausing in a RT game is necessary for tactics.

You're not very bright are you? Everyone understands what you've written, we just think it's stupid.

 

[obediah]

Because the purpose of RT is continuous action. If you're going to be stopping regularly it defeats that purpose. Get it?

The purpose of real time is to eliminate the artifacts of traditional turn based systems ( i.e. your 04:01 - 04:02 happened before mine, but you killed me at 04:58, so 04:01-04:57 never happened for me ).

You're not very bright, are you? All you've done is restate what I said, that RT is good for continuous action.

Just because you can't discern the difference, doesn't mean it's not there.

Unless you can explain to me why creating loops in the flow of time is the key feature justifies the addition of pause to your game.

If the game is designed in such a way that you have to pause it every few seconds then you may as well have very short turns.

Very short turns still has the problem that your bullet hitting me at 02:02.222 means the bullet I intended to fire at 02:02.221 was never fired because I died at 02:02.222 .

From a different angle, all RT games already have very short turns. But actions take many turns, and most allow to queue actions.

I contrasted pause with having variable RT speeds, which would make pause unnecessary, which you ignored to insist that pausing in a RT game is necessary for tactics.

What is the big difference between pausing a game and setting it to 1/1000th speed? Why is one absolute fail, and the other great design.

Even if I'm not pausing to think about something, I will pause a game like HoI when I want to do something complicated. That way I can focus on interacting with the interface. How is that bad design? I guess the game should be dumbed down to the point where I can't possible mess up my commands?

 

[sheek]

Fine then, keep thinking that Starcraft is a deep strategy game.

 

[mondblut]

The way Master of Orion does it seems to be perfect, turn based macro-management with real time combat. ... Regardless I think MOO1 & 2 are the best strat/tacticaly implemented 4x games period.

Except that 1 and 2 both had turn-based combat.

 

[obediah]

Fine then, keep thinking that Starcraft is a deep strategy game.

Ah good, you stopped trying to make sense. It just weren't natural.

 

[sheek]

Because the purpose of RT is continuous action. If you're going to be stopping regularly it defeats that purpose. Get it?

The purpose of real time is to eliminate the artifacts of traditional turn based systems ( i.e. your 04:01 - 04:02 happened before mine, but you killed me at 04:58, so 04:01-04:57 never happened for me ).

You're not very bright, are you? All you've done is restate what I said, that RT is good for continuous action.

Just because you can't discern the difference, doesn't mean it's not there.

Unless you can explain to me why creating loops in the flow of time is the key feature justifies the addition of pause to your game.

When I say the purpose of RT is continuous (in practice) action it includes both game mechanic artefacts and a different game experience which you get by forcing the player to think/process information/decide under pressure. The different experience is what most people like about RT and why they would buy a RT games.

By the way there are ways around the game mechanics artefacts/exploits other than using RT. That's caused by fixed turn duration (all mechanics are scaled to a certain time frame), they're due to the concept of turns themselves. As you said RT is miniature fixed turns, you don't notice the artefacts in practice but they can still occur.

What is the big difference between pausing a game and setting it to 1/1000th speed? Why is one absolute fail, and the other great design.

Variable time gives a better gaming experience. If you look infinity engine games, you either have the standard speed which is too slow in small battles but way too fast in more complex battles or pause. You only get few battles in the intermediate range where the standard speed is optimal. For some reason there's nothing in between. If there was an option for 1/10th increments of the standard speed I think pause would be very rarely used.

Even if I'm not pausing to think about something, I will pause a game like HoI when I want to do something complicated. That way I can focus on interacting with the interface. How is that bad design? I guess the game should be dumbed down to the point where I can't possible mess up my commands?

For HoI which is marketed as a simulation I agree it's OK and there is variable time. For something that claims to be an RTS like Starcraft which has only one speed it's definitely fail.

 

[obediah]

When I say the purpose of RT is continuous (in practice) action it includes both game mechanic artefacts and a different game experience which you get by forcing the player to think/process information/decide under pressure. The different experience is what most people like about RT and why they would buy a RT games.

The action/thinking distinction is not the same as real time/turn based. They are related, which leads to confusion, but they are separate. RT is the natural choice for an action game ( an adrenaline pumping TB thrill ride would be quite the design achievement! ). The thinking game, however, became turn based out of necessity. It just wasn't possible to handle a complex simulation in real time. While our preconceptions say complex games are TB, given enough computational power they can be implemented in RT. I don't think we should shut down an active branch of gameplay evolution just because it confuses starcraft fans.

By the way there are ways around the game mechanics artefacts/exploits other than using RT.

Sure, but each then introduces it's own problems. For the most part they remove exploits by adding more artifacts. Which is a good tradeoff in my book. But that doesn't mean RT games can't attempt the same level of detail.

As you said RT is miniature fixed turns, you don't notice the artefacts in practice but they can still occur.

True, but they usually occur so rarely that there is no reason to even figure out how conflicts are handled. It's also much less of a issue not to be able to do anything for 4 milliseconds before you are killed, as opposed to 4 minutes before you are killed.

Variable time gives a better gaming experience. If you look infinity engine games, you either have the standard speed which is too slow in small battles but way too fast in more complex battles or pause. You only get few battles in the intermediate range where the standard speed is optimal. For some reason there's nothing in between. If there was an option for 1/10th increments of the standard speed I think pause would be very rarely used.

I think you've taken a valid complaint and jumped to the wrong conclusion. The problem isn't that the infinity engine had pause, but rather that it didn't have the speed increments. I agree completely that a RT game should be designed so that the speed can be adjusted without causing weird problems. But I think adding pause is a no-brainer as well.

For HoI which is marketed as a simulation I agree it's OK and there is variable time. For something that claims to be an RTS like Starcraft which has only one speed it's definitely fail.

A starcraft clone should certainly be able to get by without pausing.

I think your mistake is confusing the mechanism for action resolution as grounds for classifying a game. HoI is a strategy game, Starcraft is an RTS. As a whole, HoI is much closer to the turn based MOO than Starcraft.

 

[buccaroobonzai]

The way Master of Orion does it seems to be perfect, turn based macro-management with real time combat. ... Regardless I think MOO1 & 2 are the best strat/tacticaly implemented 4x games period.

Except that 1 and 2 both had turn-based combat.

Doh! You're right, was typing to fast. MOO is therefore the best TB 4x game on both a macro startegic and tactical scale. It also deals very efficiently with micromanagement of a large empire better then any other game I know of.

I gues a game that deals with both a TB startegic element and a RTS combat element well is Total War. If you get a little bored of board game like strategy on the global level, you jump into the real time battles to get excited again. The variety of the two styles complements each other very well and makes for such an enjoyable game.

However Real time battles are not a requirement, MOO shows that TB can be used just as well for a change of gameplay styles to keep you excited and keep the game feeling fresh.

Alternating between careful planning and scheming on one level, and exciting combat or a similar substitute is a great recipe for fun and interesting gameplay.
I would like to see the Civs, Galactic Civs, and AC implement more exciting combat.

 

[GarfunkeL]

Try Space Empires IV or V. They have tb strategic game like MoO's but the combat is AI controlled and RT, though I *think* that you can issue kill orders to your ships. Especially in SE V, I love watching the fleets circle around in formations and then blast the hell out of each other.

 

[obediah]

Try Space Empires IV or V. They have tb strategic game like MoO's but the combat is AI controlled and RT, though I *think* that you can issue kill orders to your ships. Especially in SE V, I love watching the fleets circle around in formations and then blast the hell out of each other.

Did V eventually get patched to a decent state? I have a copy I bought shortly after release, but I gave up on it pretty quickly. SE IV is probably my second favorite space 4X game - after MOO2. The extensive mods were awesome to play around with.

 

[King Crispy]

RTwP is something that I've learned to accept, especially if done intelligently as in Sins of a Solar Empire. The overall speed of the game can be sped up and slowed down, and paused, allowing all the tactical and strategic planning you'd like while still providing the flowing feeling that marks realtime combat. I'd even like to see more of this employed in CRPG's, given the absence of true turn-based.

Imagine combat in an RPG that occured in super slow-mo (when desired), everything happening at once. With the ability to pause and issue dynamic orders at will, you're still essentially experiencing TB, with the abstract assumption that the opponent is still acting during your turn - even though they're motionless - completely removed. Orders issued during a pause would instantly change the path or action of a character, and could be performed limitlessly, and in response to observations of what the enemy is doing/about to apparently do.

This kind of system would allow the flexibility to appease enthusiasts of both RT and TB gameplay, while at the same time sufficiently showing off next-gen hardware through its complex rendering. You appeal to as wide an audience as possible, thus ensuring the marketing viability even among the console crowd.

Drawbacks would include the inability to be effectively adapted to a multiplayer environment, but we don't care about that around here so forget it. It's also going to weed out slower PC's, since the majority of the engine requirement is going to be towards graphics, but would ideally be scalable.

Add in the feature of enabling auto-combat resolution in RT for weaker enemies and a great camera system to allow teh full cinematic expariance! and you'd have a winner, IMO. I just wish someone would get to it and make this kind of a game. Like Jagged Alliance 3, perhaps?

Lastly, I wonder how awkward the speed control of combat would be at first, since no one really wants to wait 10 seconds for a bullet to fly towards one's target or for an axe swing to land home? I suppose after enough gameplay and getting used to the system a nice equilibrium would be achieved, and that might actually add to the enjoyment.

 

[Zhirzzh]

obediah, what about simultaneous turns like Laser Squad?

 

[obediah]

obediah, what about simultaneous turns like Laser Squad?

I played at most 2-3 games of Laser Squad, and don't remember it well. But from it's wiki page, it sounds like a similar mechanic to Combat Mission.

If that's the case, it's an RT engine - events are resolved in chronological order. The "turns" are just a novel way of controlling how you can issue commands. This forces you to consider how enemy commands might interact with your own within a given "turn".

I think it is a good way around the problem of RtwP bogging down into a boring pause fest ( or playing the whole thing at 1/10th speed). It really changes the nature of the game through, so it's not a blanket solution for every RTwP game.

 

[Llyranor]

Those of you skeptical about RTwP wargames should give the Airborne Assault a try (Highway to the Reich, Conquest of the Aegean, soon Battles from the Bulge). I usually prefer turn-based over real-time, especially in a strategy/tactics game. However, I think AA manages to pull off 'simulation' of high-level command much more effectively than any TB game I've played, and with less abstraction.

It does this in 3 ways.

1) It gives you a complete chain of command for your units. You're the highest ranking HQ. You can assign orders to any units down the chain. Your AI brigade/regiment HQ (which will give their own orders down their own chain of command), or you can decide to go lower down the chain and order battalion or company units around. More on this later.

2) Very competent AI that doesn't require you to micromanage individual units if you don't need to. In a RTS, you can often find yourself micro'ing a single unit around to kite a tank or whatever; this isn't high-level strategy at all. Even in TB games, there is a lot of minutiae that you have to do (eg. ordering every single unit around). Which is fine, and can be great gameplay, but again, might not necessarily be what a commander would be focusing on on a higher-level. Instead, you learn to deleguate. It's not just a matter of just making AI do things and just sit back and watch. The AI performs your actual orders, yes, but they're completely based on your specifications. You give the details of the actual order itself - what you don't focus on is the execution; that's the job of your (AI) subordinates. Fortunately, AA has a very strong AI able to do this. This is an example of what kind of settings you can give to your orders on the left of the screen:

3) This is the most important point, and links back to the previous 2. Order delays. In a TB game, you give your order and the unit does its move instantly. Everyone does their own thing in a sequential order. One thing AA simulates is that when making plans involving hundreds or thousands of men, you need TIME to organize all that. When you give an order to a unit (say, a battalion HQ, which in turn gives its orders to its companies), it might take 30-60, or maybe 2-3 hrs to prepare themselves, get organized and then finally get in a position to carry out your orders. This means clicks-per-minute are useless as per your usual RTS. In fact, if you give out too many orders to the same units, it just ends up in them having to replan over and over, engendering even more order delays. This system gives a flexible way through which you can macro or micro *as appropriate*. You can give a global command to one big HQ, but then the time needed to organize and carry out those plans might be longer than if you organized a smaller unit/group. However, if you take too many units under your own command, it clogs up your capacity to command, and order delays are all over lengthened.

What's the actual implication of this? You can't just improve your moves on a turn-by-turn basis. You can't just counteract an enemy action at a whim. Given how long it takes you to carry out orders, you need to plan AHEAD, anticipate where the enemy MIGHT strike and organize your forces accordingly, keeping reserves where they might intervene faster, and have to think ahead for when you need to change your plans. It's less about carrying out your plan step by step, and more about planning things properly, while keeping an eye on when you NEED to make changes to your plan (rather than be OCD and changing things constantly, and actually make the plans harder and harder to execute).

Many of these can be done in a TB wargame and be awesome, but they're also a lot more abstracted. This system really needs real-time (with pause). Order delays just wouldn't work the same way otherwise.

 

[buccaroobonzai]

Those of you skeptical about RTwP wargames should give the Airborne Assault a try (Highway to the Reich, Conquest of the Aegean, soon Battles from the Bulge). I usually prefer turn-based over real-time, especially in a strategy/tactics game. However, I think AA manages to pull off 'simulation' of high-level command much more effectively than any TB game I've played, and with less abstraction.

.........

Many of these can be done in a TB wargame and be awesome, but they're also a lot more abstracted. This system really needs real-time (with pause). Order delays just wouldn't work the same way otherwise.

This game looks really cool, I'll have to pick this one up. Do the newer games have more features, better gameplay, is it even worth getting the first one?

These games remind me of Close Combat on a higher tactical, even strategic level in many ways.
Are there similarities in gameplay? Do you get cover bonuses for buildings/towns, forests, entrenchments, etc.
Can units take cover, can they ambush?
Is unit moral important?

This game would look amazing with even Close Combat graphics, though counters are fine.

 

[entertainer]

This game looks really cool, I'll have to pick this one up. Do the newer games have more features, better gameplay, is it even worth getting the first one?

Yes, the newer ones have more things and features added to them, so it's only worth if you like the scenario.

These games remind me of Close Combat on a higher tactical, even strategic level in many ways.
Are there similarities in gameplay? Do you get cover bonuses for buildings/towns, forests, entrenchments, etc.
Can units take cover, can they ambush?
Is unit moral important?

Yes everything is taken into account, you can see every detail(levels of organization, morale and so on) of the unit in very informative and easy way. It's really a great wargame once get the hang of it, very addicting.

You can check the mini-guide for the new Battle of the Bulge game here.

 

[Llyranor]

The new gameplay additions every new game are really nice. The devs focus on significant interface/gameplay improvements rather than graphical ones in progressing the series.

Morale, cohesion are all very important. Terrain is very important. If you hold defensive positions for a long time, your units will also dig in to simulate defensive preparations. Roads are extremely important, since movement of tanks and such over other types of terrain can be very slow.

I can't say it's too similar to Close Combat given the scope discrepancy, but I guess both series are very realistic at what they're aiming for. Bear in mind that the lowest level of units you might have here might be companies (or special platoons/whatever for special units), so the scope is completely different.

I'd recommend you go through the 2 PDF's in this page http://www.matrixgames.com/forums/tm.asp?m=977049