The strategic goal

[Fred98]

I have been a great fan of the Close Combat series.

As each of the 5 games came out, I avidly devoured it and looked forward to the next game in the series. I was a “hard core fan”.

Each game had a new feature added. And yet same players said each game was “more of the same. I my view that was the great strength!

As to HTTR, I am an occasional fan. But I am sure there are hard core fans around. I want to discuss the issue of “more of the same”

I look forward to COTA but Bulge must be the most over gamed battle in history.

Instead, how about “less of the same”. In another thread a poster had the idea to drop the game to squad level. Or even to individual man level. I have tried this in the editor and failed.

But such a game would grab me no matter where it might be set.

[Rooster]

Hi Joe - I'm a big CC fan too. Like you, I greeted each iteration with enthusiasm, and would probably by CC VI if it were ever made. The one thing I really wished, was that that somebody would do a Crete mod, or that a future version would have been released based on Crete.

Lo and behold, Airborne Assault, is going to Crete in its third version. That's something that I think is truly fantastic. Not to mention the enhancements...

As for taking the game to the squad or individual level, I would definitely be interested too, but I wouldn't want Panther to stop improving the current system to work on a tactical level game.

Your ideas reminded me of the Saving Pvt. Ryan mod that Mick xe5 made for CC2. He stripped the units down to individual men and you had to keep one guy (Pvt. Ryan) alive to win. What a hoot that was... It inspired me to make an Enemy at the Gates sniper duel scenario in CC5.

[Arjuna]

ORIGINAL: Joe 98
As to HTTR, I am an occasional fan. But I am sure there are hard core fans around. I want to discuss the issue of “more of the same”

I look forward to COTA but Bulge must be the most over gamed battle in history.

Yeh but not with our engine. I appreciate that people want to see different battles covered and hey I think we are doing that with COTA. However, it is hard to go past the Bulge for a great scenario for wargaming. If you ignore the strategic context, then operationally it was on a knife's edge for quite a while. Both sides get to attack. It's a race against time and it pits the elites of both sides against each other.

Anyway we are already committed to it. Nearly all the maps are done ( and there are heaps and they look great ).We have done most of the research needed to complete the OBs. So it hopefully won't take us that long to crank out BFTB. That will mean that we can then turn attention to another battle. One we have already looked into is the Battles along the Siegfried line in late 44/early 45. This is going under the working title of "Dragon's Teeth". Another option, it to go south to North Afrika or East to Russia. If I could clone myself perhaps we could do both [;)]. We're open to suggestions.

Instead, how about “less of the same”. In another thread a poster had the idea to drop the game to squad level. Or even to individual man level. I have tried this in the editor and failed.

But such a game would grab me no matter where it might be set.

Understood. However, we cannot afford to invest in the extra time required to "downsize" the scale at the moment. We really need to capitalise on our current investment. If sales of COTA and subsequent games are really good, then who knows we may be able to undertake such a project.

[Mark Weston]

The thing abour going down to the squad level, is that it's already been done. I can see that if you really like Close Combat, it's hard to resist demanding more of the same. But if I was going to make wishes, I'd be asking for Panther to move up the scale to Army and Army Grouup/Front size battles. Operational-level games on computer are almost entirely boardgames-on-a-screen, and the whole genre is just crying out for some of the innovation that's been demonstrated in RDOA and HTTR [&o] (and a couple of other games like Decisive Action).

Barring entire rewrites of the engine though ([;)]), I would really like to see the Eastern Front, though there may be a problem of scale. If a Corps-size battle is a major undertaking in HTTR (and it is for me, at least), all the interesting East-Front battles might too big to game. (And please, don't do Stalingrad. The idea of an entire map looking like Arnhem town centre on a saturday night - horrific attrition and no movement - gives me the heebie-geebies.)

How about Sicily '43? Difficult terrain, manageable forces, mobile warfare, and even simultaneous para-drops by both sides! (Not so good from the marketing point of view though).

[Isacco]

I think a good scenario for a future title is Kasserine '43. What do you think?

Regards,

Isacco

[Banquet]

I must admit Arnhem isn't one of my favourite battle subjects and neither is the Bulge, or even Africa particulary. CotA sounds very interesting though. I'd buy the games wherever they're set because I love the system so much.

My vote for further games beyond that would be Normandy, France 1940, maybe East front.

The system is so good that you could scale it up to corp level or down to squad/single man level. It'd work brilliantly for anything.. Arjuna just needs to hire a huge team and do it all! [:D]

[Willard]

ORIGINAL: Arjuna

One we have already looked into is the Battles along the Siegfried line in late 44/early 45. This is going under the working title of "Dragon's Teeth". Another option, it to go south to North Afrika or East to Russia. If I could clone myself perhaps we could do both [;)]. We're open to suggestions.

NORTH AFRIKA!!!!!!!! This game engine is by far the best suited system to deal with the war of movement in the desert. I think that is why hex games fall short in this area, because they cannot *seem* to get it right.

Banquet's suggestion of France '40 would also be pretty cool...I guess this could incorporate the Netherlands/Belgium lowlands invasion and the paradrops used by the Germans.

[BAL]

One we have already looked into is the Battles along the Siegfried line in late 44/early 45. This is going under the working title of "Dragon's Teeth".

I think that's a good idea. I would like to see that done.

[RedMike]

My vote is North Africa, Russia, France 40 in that order.

RedMike OUT

[Arjuna]

Re: Upscaling. This too would require a rewrite of the lower level movement and combat routines ( what we call the base mechanics ). So it would require a fair investment of time - do-able but costly.

Arjuna just needs to hire a huge team and do it all!

Yeh...and someone to pay the payroll.

[Banquet]

If I ever win the lottery, I'll be in touch [:)]

[benpark]

One plus of adding the Bulge to the system is the OOB for US, Br, and Germans. Pretty much allows scenario makers to explore many of the West Front(&Africa with a few concessions) from '44 on.

My vote would certainly be for a shift to the Eastern Front, yhough.

[Banquet]

I've been reading up on the Pacific Theatre and replaying WitP (awaiting their 1.5 patch) and was thinking, maybe some Pacific campaigns? A lost of Pacific battles featured fairly small amounts of men (i.e less than 2 divisions) so it would perfectly suit the games current system.. how about the Singapore, Philippines, or Guadalcanal campaigns?

[Mark Weston]

I thought about suggesting the Pacific when I wrote my earlier post, but my bet is that encoding Japanese behaviour/doctrine would also involve major engine re-writes.

[Willard]

ORIGINAL: Arjuna

Re: Upscaling. This too would require a rewrite of the lower level movement and combat routines ( what we call the base mechanics ). So it would require a fair investment of time - do-able but costly.

Arjuna just needs to hire a huge team and do it all!

Yeh...and someone to pay the payroll.

That is the way to go though.
Think about using this system with Schwerpunkts RGW or upcoming AGW???

-No hexes / chain of command system
-utilizing Army Group/Army/Corps/Divisions/Brigades

Totally awesome...it would blow away traditional hex/boardgames as we know.
You guys are this close to doing it with HTTR anyway!!!

[Rooster]

I like Banquet's idea: France 1940

[Grognard]

I would do illegal and/or immoral things to see the HTTR/COTA/??? engine do Operation Avalanche......

Nobody ever mentions it! I gotta wonder why? The scale is just about perfect, especially at Company level, Brits and Amis, Rangers and Commandos, a couple of paradrops (AFTER D-Day), air parity, naval support, pretty much all terrain types, an important airfield and other must have objectives, etc, etc, etc. And play balance? Clark thought about evacuating the beaches on D+3. If it wasn't for the navy........ There would be fodder for many scenarios - attack and defense for both sides.
And how unique would it be? The only computer treatment I've ever seen was the Italy '43 scenario for TOAW but the scale was too large. I have a dream...

[CriticalMass]

ORIGINAL: Willard

ORIGINAL: Arjuna

One we have already looked into is the Battles along the Siegfried line in late 44/early 45. This is going under the working title of "Dragon's Teeth". Another option, it to go south to North Afrika or East to Russia. If I could clone myself perhaps we could do both [;)]. We're open to suggestions.

NORTH AFRIKA!!!!!!!! This game engine is by far the best suited system to deal with the war of movement in the desert. I think that is why hex games fall short in this area, because they cannot *seem* to get it right.

Banquet's suggestion of France '40 would also be pretty cool...I guess this could incorporate the Netherlands/Belgium lowlands invasion and the paradrops used by the Germans.

GO WILLARD GOOOOO!!!!!!!

(please re-post the Operation Crusader screenshot )

[Isacco]

And what about Korea 1950-51? [:)]

Too many dreams .... [:D]

Regards,

Isacco

[Agema]

How about SE Asia during WW2? It's barely ever been covered by a game (possibly not surprising considering it is called 'The Forgotten War') but it should provide some good material from the Japanese invasions of Malaysia and Bruma through the battles of the Arakan and the eventual Commonwealth victories.

It's a constant regret of mine that several battles or wars receive massive attention by game designers whilst many others are almost wholly overlooked. For instance, there are countless versions of Waterloo and Austerlitz, but I don't think there's even one of Wagram or Leipzig; or compare the attention paid to the US civil war compared to the UK civil war. A rational part of me accepts the marketing sense, that it is easy to tap into ready-present interests and famous conflicts, but I'd rather see some other fascinating struggles brought to simulation. (Extra marks to Panther for covering the Greek and Cretan battles of WW2, therefore!)

If anyone does think about a change of scale, I'd favour a change of up to battalion (even brigade?) level rather than down to platoon or squad.