What is the difference between strategy and tactic ?

[Eelusion]

Everbody seems to have a different definition. Are there two words for the same thing or is the general on the hill setting the strategy and the lieutenant on the battlefield is giving out the tactics ? Someone with knowledge ?

 

[Walks with the Snails]

Yeah, the general-lieutenant part is basically right. The standard definition is, tactics is knowing how to take the bridge. Strategy is knowing which bridge to take.

 

[Quigs]

I always thought diffrent of the two. One is more intellegent, the other is more wise.

Tactics are broad covering, like conserving ammo, taking cover, Knowing the weak points of an enemey.

Strategy is more about a particular battle, and who does what, when.

 

[trystero]

Have a look at the wiki entry. The explanation is a decent one.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_strategy

-trystero

 

[Eelusion]

" tactics, the execution of plans and manoeuvering of forces in battle " ( from Wikipedia )

Does that mean big parts of real time strategy games are actually real time tactics games, especially with the trend to reduce the base-building-phase ?

 

[Hajo]

Indeed. But "real time tactics" doesn't sound as good as "real time strategy" so the games are marketed as strategy games.

 

[Elwro]

I thought that the difference lay in scale. If you have 10 people in your squad and that's all who you are going to give orders to - it's tactics. If you command whole armies - it's strategy.

 

[Otaku_Hanzo]

Nah. Walks said is best. Tactics is the art of taking out a target, while strategy is the art of knowing what target to take out.

 

[fnordcircle]

I thought that the difference lay in scale. If you have 10 people in your squad and that's all who you are going to give orders to - it's tactics. If you command whole armies - it's strategy.

Laying down suppressing fire is a tactic.
Flanking the enemy is a strategy.

 

[Sol Invictus]

Real time strategy is a misnomer as most, if not all real time strategy games are real time tactics games, though even turn-based tactics games are a lot more tactical than real time ones, due to the lack of 'gosu style' gameplay.

If there are exceptions to be made it would be the Europa Universalis series of games, which are truly real time strategy, and not real time tactics. Games like the Total War series on the other hand are divided into turn based strategy on the campaign map, and real time tactics on the battlefield.

Hope this answers your question.

 

[Cimmerian Nights]

I always associate time and scope with this.

Strategy is long term planning, focusing on the big picture, without getting bogged down in micromanagement.
Tactics are immediate, smaller in scale, and focused on detailed direction.

e.g. in the short run Pearl Harbor was a brilliant tactical victory. But in retrospect, when pulling back to look at things overall, and what it set in motion, it was a shortsighted blunder.

 

[POOPERSCOOPER]

I think tactics is like micro your units, like putting them in different positions when in battle. Its more of a small scale thing while strategy is like your overall goal and shit

 

[Astromarine]

it's not scale, it's timing. Strategy is what happens before the battle starts. Good strategy minimizes the requirement for good tactics on the battlefield. Manouvering a 3-man squad to where they are in position to kill Hitler is good strategy, not good tactics. As soon as they're there, though, all the strategists can do is pray.

 

[triCritical]

I have been reading many books on war and battle from Clausewitz to Keegan, and I have sort of made my own definition. I like the idea of strategy as a very broad and malleable plan to achieve a particular goal. Tactics is the execution of the plan. However, the maneauver in pre-modern pitched battles, and night time fighting are indeed good examples of tactics, where as Napoleans (sp?) desire to continue the fight after attaining a rout; along with the directorates orders on how to rid lombardy of Austrian soldiers.

However, in the long run many military historians agree that it is just semantics. Most noteably John Keegan, who admits while there is a difference, for the most part its really just not important, especially if all participants in the discussion know what we're talking about.

2 cents.

 

[triCritical]

it's not scale, it's timing. Strategy is what happens before the battle starts. Good strategy minimizes the requirement for good tactics on the battlefield. Manouvering a 3-man squad to where they are in position to kill Hitler is good strategy, not good tactics. As soon as they're there, though, all the strategists can do is pray.

Not necessarily. Take the battle of Agencourt, where the french attempted to use one the most successful tactics/strategies known to medieval warfare, SHOCK! Upon penetrating deep with greater numbers into the english man at arms line, they found that they were grouped waaaaaay to close together to use their weapons together. It is in situations like this, that I agree with the experts that it becomes way to cumbersome to try to disect, where the ~good~ strategy failed, or where the tried and tested tactics did not prevail.

I realize you said minimize the use of good tactics, but I consider the maneauver as tactics, so I lthink this sort of, at least to me, vagues the distinction, at least in battle, of strategy and tactics.

 

[triCritical]

I always associate time and scope with this.

Strategy is long term planning, focusing on the big picture, without getting bogged down in micromanagement.
Tactics are immediate, smaller in scale, and focused on detailed direction.

e.g. in the short run Pearl Harbor was a brilliant tactical victory. But in retrospect, when pulling back to look at things overall, and what it set in motion, it was a shortsighted blunder.

Starting a war you can't win sounds like the blunder. However, if you choose to go that path, I think the strategy of bombing pearl harbor, was a fairly valiid one in that it attempted to cripple the pacific navy, in a theatre that would rely heavily on the navy. Sort of like when the Luftwafte (sp?) was having success against the RAF by bombing RAF instiallations. It wasn't until Hitler changed his plan of going after hard targets to soft targets that his strategy seemed to fally apart. In this sense I would say the tactics are left to the formations of air squadrans and how you go about attacking your desired targets. I do agree however, that tactical combat is much more immediate and on a much smaller time scale.

 

[triCritical]

Real time strategy is a misnomer as most, if not all real time strategy games are real time tactics games, though even turn-based tactics games are a lot more tactical than real time ones, due to the lack of 'gosu style' gameplay.

If there are exceptions to be made it would be the Europa Universalis series of games, which are truly real time strategy, and not real time tactics. Games like the Total War series on the other hand are divided into turn based strategy on the campaign map, and real time tactics on the battlefield.

Hope this answers your question.

I completely agree with he EU and R:TW. However, I do think that companies like Blizzard and possibly Westwood believe their games are RTS, because of all the NOT FUN resource management and building you have to do. Whille I agree that the micro level combat is definately tactical, I think that the story driven nature of at least the Blizzards titles removes the ability to formulate any sort of balttle plan or strategy. The worst part of it all is how the lack of fine control, or resolution ( or whatever ) of your units placements and formations, that the tactics turn out to be quite the dud too.

My favorite example of l33tness ruining tactics in gameplay is NWN. In this game all positional elements of 3E combat, which should be tantamount in a DnD game were removed in favor of the l33t animations which continually made facade moves, and had you moving around in a half circle arc. This to me is one of the biggest blunders in game design.

 

[tnanh]

I think RTS is not quite a misnomer. In those games you can decide what unit to creat, which way to develope your army, where/when to attack... that's strategy. Sure, you don't have that "art of war" feeling, conquering nations, moving divisions around but still it's strategy in a smaller scoope.
The tactical part is what people call "microing" or whatever manner you use in battle.

 

[kris]

I said this in another thread, that the word strategy is maybe even mroe misused than the "RPG" one in gaming. While RPG is used for every game with some kind of character progress Strategy is used in any game with any form of planning. Be it a football manager simulation, the sims or RTS. to make it even more fun with have the strategy/RPG hybrids that fail to be neither but pretends to be both.

 

[triCritical]

I think RTS is not quite a misnomer. In those games you can decide what unit to creat, which way to develope your army, where/when to attack... that's strategy. Sure, you don't have that "art of war" feeling, conquering nations, moving divisions around but still it's strategy in a smaller scoope.

Yeah this is sort of what I called the general category of resource management and building. Sure you can have a strategy, but is it really any fun if there is always almost of preferred build order, and the scripted nature of most RTS games means that there is also a preferred strategy? This is mostly my knock on the Warcraft and Warcraft clones of the world. Although I believe MP is a different beast then SP, I still think the winner is the person who master the best build order and has the quickest six fingered hand. Its not like you can put one of the best strategic minds to work playing that game and expect him to have any sort of advantage, because in a military sense, his expertise would be completely useless.