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Grand Tactician: The Civil War

Nutria

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Strap Yourselves In
Trying to have a strategic layer to a game about the American Civil War is notoriously difficult. Sid Meier tried this and ran into the "Covert Action problem" where you would fight the battle but it would take so long that you'd forget about the rest of the war. So in the end he just focused on Gettysburg.

Almost everything beyond the level of a brigade commander was all about logistics: horses, wagons, riverboats, ships, trains. And there's no way to narrow that down and make a simple narrative out of it. Guys would just get moved around to whatever front they were needed on (at least on the Union side and fuck anyone who isn't on the Union side). So I really don't think there's any way to make a game about that war that has both tactical combat and anything larger.

The best thing I've played about the strategic level is still No Greater Glory from the early 1990s, which has a hell of a lot of flaws and I wouldn't call fun, but if you care about that war a lot, it's interesting and you might pick up some ideas from it.
 

Jugashvili

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Is UG:CW mostly a combat game, and lacks other gameplay layers like economic?

Yes, UG:CW is mostly about growing and equipping your forces between battles. Between battles you can purchase equipment, enlist recruits, train and promote officers, and generally outfit and organize your army as you see fit, but at the end of the day you are playing the role of a general so yes, you have to manage a number of resources such as materiel, money and political goodwill, but other than that there is no economic layer. If the above sounds appealing, keep in mind that the game has an annoying scaling system due to which no matter how large, experienced or well-equipped your forces are, the enemy's will always be bigger and better, which somewhat ruins the incentive to invest in certain things. The battles, however, play very smoothly and the system achieves a rare balance of being very playable and easy to enjoy while capturing something of the scale and grandeur of the battles of the period.
 

Burning Bridges

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UGCW has a army camp which I spent about half of my playtime time in. It is tedious but rewarding, forming brigades divisions etc, filling up losses, assigning commanders (Generals have a tendency to get injured or killed very often), issuing muskets and cannon.

This layer is a lot of fun however it does not really make up for the complete lack of strategic control. I also eventually learned that the choice of wepaons and commanders has only very little effect on the combat, often units with Farmer smootbores would fare comparably good as the ones with the latest and most expensive rifles. It killed my interest in preparing for battles.

It also suffers from the Panzer General effect that you end up with units with insane experience that require unreasonable cost for replacements while inexperienced units which are almost free would do the job almost the same way.

So the truth is that UGCW has a campaign layer but you can save a lot of time by mostly skipping it. Instead concentrate on the tactics and numbers you bring to key points, battles are won by mounting numbers on the points where the (scripted) attacks of the enemy happen.

Also this developer stopped work immediately after v1.0. They did not even replace the erroneous graphics for the Enfield rifles, which was merely a copy of the Missouri and would take a modder 5 minutes to fix (but is hidden in the Unity binary). So a big minus for being not developed post release and not moddable.

All in all a fluke by a developer who has shown his incompetence with Naval Action, This Land is my land and the successor to UGCE.
 
Last edited:

Baptismbyfire

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Don't like scaling. Guess I shall have to wait for Grand Tactician to be fully released. Thanks for your input!
 

Ol' Willy

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Don't like scaling. Guess I shall have to wait for Grand Tactician to be fully released. Thanks for your input!
The scaling in UGCW is kinda peculiar. Each side has its pool of "prestige" points for purchasing equipment and recruits; if you play good you can inflict very heavy losses and severely deplete enemy prestige and recruits. But at some times, to keep the war going, game just rewards enemy with free prestige and recruits, thus, after severely decimating the enemy you may find him back to being powerful in the very next battle. I remember mauling Yankees very badly before Fredericksburg so they had barely enough forces to keep their positions; I mauled them at Fredericksburg even harder using numbers superiority (for the entire battle I was waiting for the enemy main forces which they simply didn't have, lol). Next battle? Union is at full strength again.

There's nothing unusual in it, though: even in Panzer General AI is showered with free prestige to compensate for its tactical incompetence. Although, in case of UGCW, devs could have explained enemy bonuses somehow: let's say, after some severe defeats Union is running low on recruits and enabled new drafting laws thus gaining more recruits to keep the war going (as it actually happened at some points). This way it wouldn't have looked so out of place
 

Ol' Willy

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Also, equipment in UGCW does matter. I formed a couple of small sharpshooter units armed with Whitworth sniper rifles: they had best kill-to-loss ratio of all my units though the overall damage they dealt was negligible; still was fun
 

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Is this or Ultimate General Civil War the better game? Anyone?
This game has a lot of potential, but UG:CW is a finished product and therefore much more polished and playable. UG:CW's campaign mechanics are not that good, though, and the scaling is very irritating.

Is UG:CW mostly a combat game, and lacks other gameplay layers like economic?

Not mostly. It is 100% a combat game and the only campaign mechanic is reinforcing and buying new troops in between battles. There is no real campaign gameplay, it's all about the battles.
 

JarlFrank

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Don't like scaling. Guess I shall have to wait for Grand Tactician to be fully released. Thanks for your input!
The scaling in UGCW is kinda peculiar.

Some people did some experiments to see how it works.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=958167777

Causing heavy casualties to the enemy DOES reduce their overall manpower, but there's always a base amount of troops they are able to field in each battle, to prevent the player from reaching a victory avalanche where the later battles become pushovers due to the enemy having no recruits and weapons left. Wouldn't really be fun if you whittled down the Union army so much, Gettysburg is only defended by 2000 men while you field 20k.
 

Baptismbyfire

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Don't like scaling. Guess I shall have to wait for Grand Tactician to be fully released. Thanks for your input!
The scaling in UGCW is kinda peculiar.

Some people did some experiments to see how it works.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=958167777

Causing heavy casualties to the enemy DOES reduce their overall manpower, but there's always a base amount of troops they are able to field in each battle, to prevent the player from reaching a victory avalanche where the later battles become pushovers due to the enemy having no recruits and weapons left. Wouldn't really be fun if you whittled down the Union army so much, Gettysburg is only defended by 2000 men while you field 20k.

I guess that makes sense. I will wait for the next sale and decide.
 

Burning Bridges

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Baptismbyfire it's a very good game, if you just care for the battles even an outstanding game. You should just prepare for a linear campaign and that it will not get better because no mods and no development.

The scaling never bothered me though I only got to about 1/2 of the campaign so far. I play very slowly and it has a lot of playtime in it. But if often feels canned, the enemy always throws superior numbers at you even if you annihilated them before. This imo just adds to what I said before, that the best planning does not make a big difference, and I lost interest because of that. The enemy will outnumber you no matter what happened before. The whole problem is that the game has no strategic element, so they have to make up with that with numerical nonsense.
 

Burning Bridges

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And about Grand Tactician: The Civil War. If they should ever make a version that does not have motion blur activated on static screens, I may try it. But I really dont like games with such eye cancer.
 

JarlFrank

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Baptismbyfire it's a very good game, if you just care for the battles even an outstanding game. You should just prepare for a linear campaign and that it will not get better because no mods and no development.

The scaling never bothered me though I only got to about 1/2 of the campaign so far. I play very slowly and it has a lot of playtime in it. But if often feels canned, the enemy always throws superior numbers at you even if you annihilated them before. This imo just adds to what I said before, that the best planning does not make a big difference, and I lost interest because of that. The enemy will outnumber you no matter what happened before. The whole problem is that the game has no strategic element, so they have to make up with that with numerical nonsense.

Tbh I enjoyed playing individual historical battles with historical numbers even more fun than the campaign (which is just a connection of these historical battles anyway).
 

Burning Bridges

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Yes, unfortunately.

The game would be several times better with modding and strategy, but I agree that most fun is playing the battles.

It is what it is.
 

vota DC

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Is this or Ultimate General Civil War the better game? Anyone?
This game has a lot of potential, but UG:CW is a finished product and therefore much more polished and playable. UG:CW's campaign mechanics are not that good, though, and the scaling is very irritating.

Is UG:CW mostly a combat game, and lacks other gameplay layers like economic?

Not mostly. It is 100% a combat game and the only campaign mechanic is reinforcing and buying new troops in between battles. There is no real campaign gameplay, it's all about the battles.
But confederates lack factories, how they can do that?
 

Andnjord

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Is this or Ultimate General Civil War the better game? Anyone?
This game has a lot of potential, but UG:CW is a finished product and therefore much more polished and playable. UG:CW's campaign mechanics are not that good, though, and the scaling is very irritating.

Is UG:CW mostly a combat game, and lacks other gameplay layers like economic?

Not mostly. It is 100% a combat game and the only campaign mechanic is reinforcing and buying new troops in between battles. There is no real campaign gameplay, it's all about the battles.
But confederates lack factories, how they can do that?
In the confederate campaign most of your equipement will be captured from the yankees.
 

Burning Bridges

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But confederates lack factories, how they can do that?
In the confederate campaign most of your equipement will be captured from the yankees.

Yes, you pick up factory new rifles from the Union and there is also a modest supply from imports (Lorentz and Enfield) and some CSA production too (Richmond). I think they got that aspect quite right, there are not enough of the latest weapons but enough overall to give everyone a gun. In the game the old Farmers and Springfields are plentiful and not totally useless.

The modern firearms that the Union received were not decisive enough. You had a certain advantage in range and precision and some cavalry units with repeating rifles were devastating, but at the end of the day most kills came from volleys. In some respects the older equipment also had some merits, for example Lee's favorite cannon remained the ancient Napoleonic 12 pounder that was well suited for use with cannister.

Afaik in spite of the industrial disadvantage the CSA had no decisive shortage of weapons. The Lorentz is a good example, an outdated Austrian rifle that still did the job well.

But they had a much bigger problem with ammunition and supplies, food, even shoes and uniforms. The CSA supply was often so shoddy that for example soles fell off shoes and the supplier claimed that was because they had been designed for cavalry. That aspect imo is not modelled enough, and I always have enough money to buy as much ammunition as I need.
 

Jugashvili

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Lee's favorite cannon remained the ancient Napoleonic 12 pounder that was well suited for use with cannister.

The design of the 12 lb. Napoleon was hardly 10 years old when the war started. As a hybrid gun-howitzer it was a relatively modern concept, though the French retrofitted theirs with rifling in 1858 otoh.
 

Taka-Haradin puolipeikko

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Codex 2016 - The Age of Grimoire Make the Codex Great Again! Grab the Codex by the pussy Bubbles In Memoria
https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/654890/view/2876101777978300856
Grand Tactician version 1.0 Released!
d63b4a19a3e341a3d97b3804399cf3cd329b61ec.jpg


After over a year in Early Access, Grand Tactician: The Civil War (1861-1865) has been released!

We would like to take this opportunity to thank all of the Early Access players -- your help and encouragement has been invaluable!


Grand Tactician: The Civil War (1861-1865)

24 Sep, 2021
StrategyHistoricalGrand StrategyRTSWar
Take command of the Union or the Confederacy. Prepare your nation for war, recruit and organize great armies and fleets under legendary commanders like Grant, Lee, Jackson or Farragut, plan cunning maneuvers on an epic campaign map and defeat your enemies in real-time battles!
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44,99€
Add to Cart


While the game has now reached maturity and released -status, this does not mean the end of further development. Instead, we are planning on continuing to expand the game's features after the release. The first steps can be seen in our Post Release Road Map, which you can find here:

http://www.grandtactician.com/thecivilwar/blog/articles/a-post-release-road-map

You may also find the game's manual, fresh from print, in the game's install folder, Steam store and library pages, as well as behind this direct link:

https://store.steampowered.com/manual/654890/

We are, sir/ma'am, Your very ob't se'v'ts,

The Grand Tactician Team
http://www.grandtactician.com/thecivilwar/blog/articles/a-post-release-road-map
A Post-Release Road Map.
Posted Aug 21, 07:55 pm
Comments 17
Author iv
62.jpg

Gen’l,

While the Grand Tactician’s Early Access is coming to an end, and the game will be released in Full on September 24, 2021, the game’s development will not stop there. During the Early Access a lot of new feature ideas arose, and we want to improve the game further, adding many of these new features in the game, for free!

Once released in Full, we will of course continue supporting the game with steady flow of bug fixing patches. But in addition we have already decided to add new features in the game, that will further expand the game play experience. Here are the first planned features:

Rare Weapons.

The Civil War saw a number of innovative new weapon types entering service, though in limited numbers. While their use did not change the course of the war in any way, these rare weapon types paved the way for further innovations in weapons technology. The weapon types that will be added are Gatling and Coffee Mill Gun, which were early machineguns, and a small caliber, fast firing Confederate 1-pounder Williams Gun. A few other weapon types may be added to this list later.

Building Options.

Players will be allowed to construct their government subsidized buildings on the campaign map. This allows more control over the location of these industries. In addition new building types will become available, among these a hospital, which will allow better treatment of the wounded soldiers, decreasing mortality rates, and a Prisoners of War (POW) camp, which allows sending captured soldiers to be held prisoners instead of paroling them on the spot, with many returning to their former units to fight another day.

New Maps.

What can be said? There’s never enough new maps!

Avatar & Commander Update.

One of the most requested features has been the ability to add oneself in the game as a commander. We will create an avatar system, where players can add themselves as commanders in the game, using their own photo, and assigning the commander attributes of their choosing. This commander will then appear in the campaign game and can be managed just like any other commander, maybe gaining unheard of fame and achieving great victories, or maybe feuding with the superiors and getting killed in a desperate charge against the enemy’s works.

In addition, some further commander related features will be added, among these the ability to randomize commanders’ attributes at the start of the scenario. This way one will see different commanders than historically rise to fame and fortune.

Visual Improvements.

The game was never created with spectacular looks in mind, but there is a lot of room for improvements here. Especially in the way we handle the soldiers in battles. Improved visuals will increase immersion for sure, but we will also improve troop customization options further. For this reason further changes in the current customization system will not be added. Instead, we overhaul it. These upgrades may also bring performance improvements, like the new smoke engine did earlier.

We will release more information about each new feature when we start creating them in the game.

Most Respy,

Gen’l. Ilja Varha,
Chief Designer, &c.,
The Grand Tactician -Team
 

AwesomeButton

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PC RPG Website of the Year, 2015 Make the Codex Great Again! Grab the Codex by the pussy Insert Title Here RPG Wokedex Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Steve gets a Kidney but I don't even get a tag. Pathfinder: Wrath
I'm finally going to give it a try. During the Early Access I only started a couple of maps to check out the interface and graphics.
 

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