Burden of Command - WW2 tactical leadership RPG - coming Q1 2025

[Parsimonious cook]

I am not sure whether Burden of Command is tactically credible, but the devs should pay more attention to what credibility they have when it comes to actually getting this game released.

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

I am not sure whether Burden of Command is tactically credible, but the devs should pay more attention to what credibility they have when it comes to actually getting this game released.

If you do know about credible competitor for this title, please do tell.

edit
Just after I posted this I remembered that there's All Quiet In the Trenches with available demo, ongoing early access and codex thread posted by me.

 

[Infinitron]

From eminent historian John McManus advising to sending archivists to gather original pictures, after action reports, and more about the historical Cottonbalers we follow (7th Regiment, 3rd US Infantry Division.) We go the extra mile to give YOU a credible historical leadership RPG.

 

[Infinitron]

Coming "December to February":

 

[Parsimonious cook]

Here is the newsletter. The demo will be coming.

Out with it! What is the release window?​

Burden will be released in the window from December to February. For why see below.


Also in this Newsletter:

• Will there be a public demo? When?
• Why not a release date as opposed to a window? Why not Sooner?
• The Calendar (Steam Festivals!)
• Is Burden for you?

Will there be a public demo? When?

We plan to have a public demo in the fall. The demo will consist of most of the 'Bootcamp' scenarios so you can learn how the game works. It will also include two historically based scenarios that are short and sweet but give you more of a taste of the full emotionally authentic Burden experience, unlike the bootcamp, which necessarily focuses more on teaching.


Why Not a Release Date as Opposed to a Window? Why not Sooner?

• Short version - for marketing, not development reasons.
• Longer version - in the spirit of open development/marketing: our original plan was to go public with streamers etc, in the Summer and then release in the Fall. However, the marketing advice we got for various reasons was to wait to go public in the fall. This would push the actual release date to November/December. Unfortunately, this is when the AAAs tend to hog the spotlight. Which pushed us potentially into Jan/Feb 2025. However, we decided that if wishlisting etc goes well in the fall, we should keep the door open for a December release. Hence a release window rather than a specific date.

The Calendar
We plan to begin showing the game in September and follow that with participation in festivals and, as mentioned, a public demo.

Is Burden for You?

We've had more than 150 playtesters learn Burden. What it has taught is two things:

• Burden has a learning curve - an emotionally authentic tactical leadership RPG is a new kind of beast. Some things have to be unlearned (like "Bang, Bang, Bang You're dead" vs "the 4Fs"). This will mean inevitable moments of confusion and even frustration. But if you persist...
• Burden can be a "memorable" experience - From an Active Duty US Army Battalion Commander "Just finished the campaign... I loved the game, nothing else out there like it." For more quotes see this 1 minute video.
• But is it right for you? - Burden is not for everyone. Our evidence is that it will primarily appeal to those interested in tactics and strategy games. But you decide! Below we have so far released 3 'Buyer's Guides" to help you see if you want to go through that learning curve ;-)

 

[Infinitron]

A successful tactical leader focuses on and shapes battlefield Morale.

 

[Iluvcheezcake]

Wow this has a release date? Almost forgot about it

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

 

[Turn_BASED]

I appreciate that a ton of effort went into this but it looks like something that you’d find in a children’s museum on a tablet at an interactive WW2 exhibit

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

 

[luj1]

MCA is on this game

 

[The Nameless One]

So far the only interesting thing about the game is... Chris Avellone is part of it?

 

[luj1]

You must be blind

regardless of whether one likes the game or not, there are quite obvious interesting things about it

- WW2 setting
- grog gameplay
- mature 2D art
- based on historical data (you command actual people who existed)

in fact, the fact MCA is part of it, is actually the least interesting thing about it...

 

[luj1]

 

[The Nameless One]

Brother if my autism levels were high enough to play a tactical hex game, I'd be playing panzer general. Or better yet, an actual tabletop.

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

https://tallyhocorner.com/2024/09/the-burden-of-command-demo-is-just-days-away/

...
While the four part tutorial tested my patience and dented my confidence, by the end of it I was reasonably au fait with the game’s reassuringly deep and plausible combat mechanics.

I’m pleased to say BoC’s fresh and engaging interactive fiction and RPG elements stand upon rock solid wargaming foundations. Naturally, morale, cover, LoS, and firepower, are influential during firefights. What takes more getting used to is the way individual platoon leaders drive and direct the action.

Turns consist of alternating friendly and enemy rounds. At the start of each friendly round the player chooses a specific ‘unspent’ platoon leader to activate, and this decision determines which squads get to expend APs during that round. The captain, a powerful figure who can, APs permitting, activate any unit on the map, provides a bit of extra flexibility, but tactical wargamers used to less restrictive systems will probably need time to adjust to the BoC way....

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

 

[Parsimonious cook]

Downloading.

 

[Parsimonious cook]

Well, the loading times seem to be p. long (I thought the game froze on me a few times), hope the devs will work on that before release. Currently playing through the tutorials, which drag on a bit.

There are some fairly interesting ideas - commanders play central role as you can activate only one per round and squads can be only commanded by their LTs (the captain being a wild card that can command any squad in the company). This will take some getting used to, but I see potential in this system. We will see, I have no doubts plenty of people will find it frustrating, at least at the start.

Writting and atmosphere are p. gud. I would actually say that this and Never Second in Rome are sort of doing the same thing, except Burden of Command is more focussed on the CYOA/human side of things, while NSR goes deeper into the management and combat stuff.

Anyway, back to tutorials now, want to finish them today.

 

[Taka-Haradin puolipeikko]

There are some fairly interesting ideas - commanders play central role as they you can activate only one per round and squads can be only commanded by their LTs (the captain being a wild card that can command any squad in the company). This will take some getting used to, but I see potential in this system. We will see, I have no doubts plenty of people will find it frustrating, at least at the start.

How does this system compare with Great Battles of Alexander/Hannibal/Caesar? Besides game guild tripping for the losses.

 

[Parsimonious cook]

Fuck... the last I played the Great Battles of Alexander was as a kid like 25 years ago or so. Well, the system in BoC is rather different. Basically, each officer has a number of orders (basically Action Points) which he can use to move/use abilities or to activate squads (ie everything that happens in the game happens because an officer made it so), which can feel very restrictive in comparison to a "normal" TBS where each unit can be order around once a turn. In this system, you can easily have a squad left behind, because their LT simply cant spare orders for them. GBoA wasnt nearly as strict in this regard from what I remember.

The system in BoC adds somewhat puzzle-like dimension to the combat, since you have to be constantly aware of how many orders you have in order to get this done and not paying attention to this (or not understanding the system properly, which is bound to be the case for lots of people at the start) can quickly lead to your advance breaking up. This of course simulates the actual difficulties of commanding multiple units in WW2 era quite well (its a different take on the issue from what lets say Armored Brigade does with the delays between you issueing orders and units responding to them), but I am sure people will bitch about it.

 

[Parsimonious cook]

OK, finished all the demo content - its kinda funny that the tutorials take forever but the actuall combat scenarios can be played for only a few turns and cut off when the shit gets reall. In any case I am slowly getting the hang of the game systems and I would say they are solid. The biggest problem is the technical state of the game (the loading times I mentioned, I had the game crash once during a specific part of the mission, which was reported by multiple people on the Steam) - as long as the devs can polish this shit for release it should be good.

The general gameplay loop in tactical missions is all about inflicting suppression on enemy units (can be done by rifle squads, but it is best to use mortars/off map arty or machine gun teams), then closing in with rifle squads (idealy by flanking as well) and assaulting the suppressed units, which will usually make them surrender or run away. Units can creep (move stealthily) for distance of one hex, which usually (especially in difficult terrain) prevents the enemy from spotting them even if they enter enemy LoS, which can then be used to get ambush bonus for attacks.

As I mentioned previously, the game is all about officers though. They are separate units which can move around (and be targeted as well), LTs usually have to be attached to a squad to be able to have an effect on them (though they can activate any of their squads), Captain can influence squads at range and can also activate squads belonging to the platoons of individual LTs (ie that way a squad can be activated by both the Captain and the LT). In general, officers can rally suppressed squads, boost their stats temporarily, and press them to take one more action over their limit (units can be pressed only once per a few turns and get a stat malus afterwards). Officers are also the only ones who can spot for indirect fire.

BoC is an intersting mix of heavy story faggotry and decidedly non-casual TB tactics. What remains to be seen is how much people are going to be in the cross section of this particular Venn diagram.

 

[holla_cabezas_de_mierda]

OK, finished all the demo content - its kinda funny that the tutorials take forever but the actuall combat scenarios can be played for only a few turns and cut off when the shit gets reall. In any case I am slowly getting the hang of the game systems and I would say they are solid. The biggest problem is the technical state of the game (the loading times I mentioned, I had the game crash once during a specific part of the mission, which was reported by multiple people on the Steam) - as long as the devs can polish this shit for release it should be good.

The general gameplay loop in tactical missions is all about inflicting suppression on enemy units (can be done by rifle squads, but it is best to use mortars/off map arty or machine gun teams), then closing in with rifle squads (idealy by flanking as well) and assaulting the suppressed units, which will usually make them surrender or run away. Units can creep (move stealthily) for distance of one hex, which usually (especially in difficult terrain) prevents the enemy from spotting them even if they enter enemy LoS, which can then be used to get ambush bonus for attacks.

As I mentioned previously, the game is all about officers though. They are separate units which can move around (and be targeted as well), LTs usually have to be attached to a squad to be able to have an effect on them (though they can activate any of their squads), Captain can influence squads at range and can also activate squads belonging to the platoons of individual LTs (ie that way a squad can be activated by both the Captain and the LT). In general, officers can rally suppressed squads, boost their stats temporarily, and press them to take one more action over their limit (units can be pressed only once per a few turns and get a stat malus afterwards). Officers are also the only ones who can spot for indirect fire.

BoC is an intersting mix of heavy story faggotry and decidedly non-casual TB tactics. What remains to be seen is how much people are going to be in the cross section of this particular Venn diagram.

good write up, I have not finished the tutorial yet, it is long, but it seems to me it is replicating what you might find in some of the more complicated tactical board wargames like Advanced Squad Leader but with more modern activation rules that are popular now in many board war games and then adding deep story/RPG layer over the top. The activation rules etc are not really that complicated, just unfamiliar to many, so I figure that is why the tutorial is so long. This game looks like it could be pretty good, they certainly put a lot of effort into it, and the historical little paragraphs added to the pictures from books and original sources is appreciated and pretty cool.

 

[Harthwain]

What about logistics? Is there any such thing in this game (akin to Unity of Command, or even Panzer General)?

 

[Parsimonious cook]

In combat it plays no role (other than off map arty having a limited amount of fire missions it can do), units otherwise dont run out of ammo or anything like that. There is a system for developing squads in between missions where you can work with some resources (its chiefly awarding XP to units, but there are other resources as well, I guess you might be able to get replacements for lost soldiers at least), though it is not very fleshed out in the demo, so it yet remains to be seen how exactly that works.

Other than this there doesnt seem to be anything, certainly not on the UoC level.