for the people who want a historcal test

[Mike Scholl]

Eric If you will read it again, you will find that that is not what I said. I said "hotdog's" arguement seems to be "I'm happy with what the game has given me. And as I'm happy, everyone else should stop asking for what they would like to see in the game."

I was merely pointing out the extreme selfishness of his position. "Fried worms on toast" was an attempt at using levity to make him see this. Apparently it went right over his head. Though I do get a bit tired of having the views of all those who dissagree with someone referred to as "whining"..., especally by someone who can't spell "whining"...

[Erik Rutins]

Ok, understood Mike. FWIW, I believe "whinging" is how folks from the UK say "whining".

Regards,

- Erik

[Berkut]

I get tired of the automatic attacks on people who simply find something they don't like or take issue with in a game. This is hardly unique to FoF of course - all game forums seem to have their loyal fans ready to punce upon anyone expressing criticism of "their" game.

Seriously, if we didn't like the game, we would not be here. I like very few games, and I don't post on the forums of games I don't like, I simply ignore them and do something else.

[Marc von Martial]

ORIGINAL: Mike Scholl

Eric If you will read it again, you will find that that is not what I said. I said "hotdog's" arguement seems to be "I'm happy with what the game has given me. And as I'm happy, everyone else should stop asking for what they would like to see in the game."

I was merely pointing out the extreme selfishness of his position. "Fried worms on toast" was an attempt at using levity to make him see this. Apparently it went right over his head. Though I do get a bit tired of having the views of all those who dissagree with someone referred to as "whining"..., especally by someone who can't spell "whining"...

Mike, really. Before you critic how people spell the words in their language, which he did correctly btw. (just think of the fact that there is British English spelling too), you should probably have a look at all the typos in your post above [;)]. With my limited "non native speaker" knowledge of American English I found already 3 of them.

[Erik Rutins]

Berkut,

ORIGINAL: Berkut
I get tired of the automatic attacks on people who simply find something they don't like or take issue with in a game. This is hardly unique to FoF of course - all game forums seem to have their loyal fans ready to punce upon anyone expressing criticism of "their" game.
Seriously, if we didn't like the game, we would not be here. I like very few games, and I don't post on the forums of games I don't like, I simply ignore them and do something else.

Take a look at Hotdog's original post at the start of this thread. I thought he actually made a good point - if you value historicity, how far do you really go in your own game to make a historical test valid? Do you promote historical generals over more capable ones, ignoring the benefit of hindsight? Do you pursue a less than ideal strategy because it reflects historical ones? Those are good points regarding why most historical tests end up ahistorical as soon as hindsight is involved.

It did devolve from there, but I did not see his initial post as hostile or an attack. I saw frustration in the immediate responses, which seemed a bit odd to me, but I didn't involve myself until I felt like Hot Dog was really being ganged up on a bit. This forum is open to all viewpoints and we are involved as developers and publishers as well.

We accept criticism, but we'll let you know if we don't agree with it. That doesn't mean stop posting and we don't want any sycophants suppressing discussion. However, we reserve the right to agree to disagree. As much as we love our customers, you guys are not _always_ right (just most of the time). [8D]

Regards,

- Erik

[Berkut]

ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins

Berkut,

ORIGINAL: Berkut
I get tired of the automatic attacks on people who simply find something they don't like or take issue with in a game. This is hardly unique to FoF of course - all game forums seem to have their loyal fans ready to punce upon anyone expressing criticism of "their" game.
Seriously, if we didn't like the game, we would not be here. I like very few games, and I don't post on the forums of games I don't like, I simply ignore them and do something else.

Take a look at Hotdog's original post at the start of this thread. I thought he actually made a good point - if you value historicity, how far do you really go in your own game to make a historical test valid? Do you promote historical generals over more capable ones, ignoring the benefit of hindsight? Do you pursue a less than ideal strategy because it reflects historical ones? Those are good points regarding why most historical tests end up ahistorical as soon as hindsight is involved.
Regards,

- Erik

Nah, his original point, to be blunt, was poorly thought out.

I value historical accuracy of options. I want the table to be set with the historical setting, and then see where it takes me. Sometimes the lack of ability to make different decisions is part of that, but the idea that unless you make the same decisions as those made historically you have no standing to complain about the historical setup is fallacious.

It did devolve from there, but I did not see his initial post as hostile or an attack. I saw frustration in the immediate responses, which seemed a bit odd to me, but I didn't involve myself until I felt like Hot Dog was really being ganged up on a bit. This forum is open to all viewpoints and we are involved as developers and publishers as well.

I thought it was most certainly an attack. It was a new thread responding to issues raised in other threads, pretty clearly with the intent to create strawmen to attack. It added nothing ot the discussion, and the result was frankly inevitable.

It is not the case that those who object to the South, for example, starting with a fleet they never had, should perforce also insist that the player make the same decisions their historical counterparts made. That is a clearly silly argument.

We accept criticism, but we'll let you know if we don't agree with it. That doesn't mean stop posting and we don't want any sycophants suppressing discussion. However, we reserve the right to agree to disagree. As much as we love our customers, you guys are not _always_ right (just most of the time). [8D]

Pfft, most customers are wrong most of the time. And my only objection to this thread is that it just lowers the signal to noise ratio of the forum. The original post was jsut a petty little attack on one side, and the respsnses were petty little attacks in response. Somewhat inevitable for a forum of this nature though.

[Berkut]

ORIGINAL: hotdog433

so you want a historical test?

Why yes, yes I do.

do you have joe johnston in charge of the east?

Dunno, why? While he was in charge hsitorically, that doesn't mean I have to put him in charge for the game to be historical. In fact, if a game at this level forced me to put him in charge, that would be a-historical since the eprson I am reperesenting had a choice.

do you have 20000 men being captured in fort donelson in the west?

You are confusing what happened with what COULD happen. Lots of things COULD happen but did not - a historical test is one in which the things that COULD happen are properly simulated, not one in which the things that COULD happen MUST happen - indeed, that would not be historical at all, since historically the outcome was not pre-ordained.

Indeed, this is actually the opposite of your intent - you are using your knowledge of what did happen to constrict the historical test to really just a historical textbook.

do you have mclellan vaccilating at every chance he gets?

Well, he has a very poor intiative rating, so yeah, I guess in context of the game we do.

I prefer to play with hidden, random general ratings to better simulate the lack of knowledge about the capabilities of generals.

So there is certainly the chance that some general who I am hoping will be my saviour will in fact turn out to be McClellan. Is that what you mean?

how many of you people promote lee at the start of the game when if you wnt to accurate you should be promoting joe johnston as he was in charge as everyone knows

Like I said, I don't promote Lee, because I don't really know that he is The Man.

[regularbird]

Outstanding job Berkut, my sentiments exactly.  Especially the random generals, I can not imagine playing any other way.

[Jonathan Palfrey]

ORIGINAL: Erik Rutins
Ok, understood Mike. FWIW, I believe "whinging" is how folks from the UK say "whining".

No, "whine" and "whinge" are two different verbs, and the American Heritage Dictionary (for instance) lists both of them separately, although it describes "whinge" as chiefly British.

It defines "whine" as (among other meanings) "to complain or protest in a childish fashion", and "whinge" as "to complain or protest, especially in an annoying or persistent manner".

So, apparently, whinging is what whiners do when they grow up.

[Jonathan Palfrey]

ORIGINAL: regularbird
Outstanding job Berkut, my sentiments exactly. Especially the random generals, I can not imagine playing any other way.

Yes, well said, Berkut. The idea of playing a historical game is to make our own decisions within the historical constraints of what was possible.

[Queeg]

ORIGINAL: Mike Scholl

The reason for making the scenario start as historically accurate as possible is to present the player with the same choices his historical counterparts faced..., not to force them to make the exact same choices. Making a different choice of how to use your assets is a valid course of action (wouldn't be much point in playing otherwise). Starting with assets your side never had --- or starting without assets your side did have --- that's the problem. Under those conditions ALL player choices are baloney..., because the scenario itself is a bunch of baloney.

I agree with you...up to a point. Depends on what you mean by "assets." While the North clearly had the advantage on paper, there was no human being alive in 1861 who could have actually utilized more than a fraction of them. For example, in mid-1862, the CSA had more than 12% of its white, male population in arms; the North had less than 6%. And Lincoln had virtually zero chance of changing that - he faced too many political, economic and cultural obstacles. So while I agree with you that an historical game should present the player with the same choices his historical counterpart faced, I would disagree with any suggestion that giving the player God-like powers is, in any sense, either realistic or historical.

(Edited per chris' post below.)

[chris0827]

ORIGINAL: Queeg

ORIGINAL: Mike Scholl

The reason for making the scenario start as historically accurate as possible is to present the player with the same choices his historical counterparts faced..., not to force them to make the exact same choices. Making a different choice of how to use your assets is a valid course of action (wouldn't be much point in playing otherwise). Starting with assets your side never had --- or starting without assets your side did have --- that's the problem. Under those conditions ALL player choices are baloney..., because the scenario itself is a bunch of baloney.

I agree with you...up to a point. Depends on what you mean by "assets." While the North clearly had the advantage on paper, there was no human being alive in 1861 who could have actually utilized more than a fraction of them. For example, in mid-1861, the CSA had more than 12% of its white, male population in arms; the North had less than 2%. And Lincoln had virtually zero chance of changing that - he faced too many political, economic and cultural obstacles. So while I agree with you that an historical game should present the player with the same choices his historical counterpart faced, I would disagree with any suggestion that giving the player God-like powers is, in any sense, either realistic or historical.

That's not right. I made a typo in te strengths thread. The CSA had the 12% under arms in mid 1862, not mid 1861.

[Queeg]

ORIGINAL: chris0827

That's not right. I made a typo in te strengths thread. The CSA had the 12% under arms in mid 1862, not mid 1861.

Thanks. I corrected my post above. The fact that the CSA commitment, as a percentage of available manpower, was more than twice that of the Union, even in 1862, makes my point. Should the North have more assets than the South? Of course. But not nearly to the extent that the mere paper numbers would suggest.

[chris0827]

ORIGINAL: Queeg

ORIGINAL: chris0827

That's not right. I made a typo in te strengths thread. The CSA had the 12% under arms in mid 1862, not mid 1861.

Thanks. I corrected my post above. The fact that the CSA commitment, as a percentage of available manpower, was more than twice that of the Union, even in 1862, makes my point. Should the North have more assets than the South? Of course. But not nearly to the extent that the mere paper numbers would suggest.

I haven't seen anyone suggest that the north receive a 4 to 1 advantage in troops since they had a 4 to 1 advantage in population but currently the game gives the union a 1.17 to 1 advantage at the start with a 2 to 1 advantage in manpower to recruit more men. That's way short of the historical 2.75 to 1 advantage the union had.

[Jonathan Palfrey]

A game should allow you to make your own decisions within the historical contraints of what was possible. These constraints could well be political, economic, or even cultural.

Ideally, the game should give you both the historical assets and whatever historical constraints there were on using them.

In some cases I can understand the argument for simplifying the game by cutting the assets in order to omit some tedious constraints. Simplifying the game is a worthwhile objective. The trouble is that the justification for cutting the assets may not be readily apparent to players, some of whom are inclined to whinge about such things.

It is actually fairly simple to say, look, you have these assets, but you can use only x% of them per year (or something of the sort). I think this is easier for people to accept than to deny that the assets existed.

[Queeg]

ORIGINAL: chris0827

I haven't seen anyone suggest that the north receive a 4 to 1 advantage in troops since they had a 4 to 1 advantage in population but currently the game gives the union a 1.17 to 1 advantage at the start with a 2 to 1 advantage in manpower to recruit more men. That's way short of the historical 2.75 to 1 advantage the union had.

I'm not sure I've seen anyone suggest anything specific, either way. Mostly just cries for the game to be "historical" without any real definition of what, exactly, that means. Though there have been plenty of posts that seem to resort to number-crunching as a surrogate for historical fidelity. I'm just a persistent critic of that simplistic approach.

[Queeg]

ORIGINAL: Jonathan Palfrey

A game should allow you to make your own decisions within the historical contraints of what was possible. These constraints could well be political, economic, or even cultural.

Ideally, the game should give you both the historical assets and whatever historical constraints there were on using them.

Agreed. But that, of course, is the ideal. And largely unattainable since most of the historical constraints were due to the fog of uncertainty and self-absorption that afflicts most mortals during their tenure on this planet. A fog that's near-impossible to recreate in a game. Indeed, one reason Lincoln is so revered to this day is that it is difficult to imagine any other man of his age marshaling the Union effort even half as well as he did.

In some cases I can understand the argument for simplifying the game by cutting the assets in order to omit some tedious constraints. Simplifying the game is a worthwhile objective. The trouble is that the justification for cutting the assets may not be readily apparent to players, some of whom are inclined to whinge about such things.

Then perhaps this discussion will encourage greater flexibility in their historical thinking. The constraints were real and immutable. Best to recognize them for what they were.

It is actually fairly simple to say, look, you have these assets, but you can use only x% of them per year (or something of the sort). I think this is easier for people to accept than to deny that the assets existed.

Perhaps. Or just employ some abstract reasoning.

I don't mean to be flip. The fact is that "realism" demands some concession to the inability of mortals to achieve perfection. And debate will always exist as to where that line should be drawn to achieve "historical" results. Probably the best we can ever hope for is plausibility, which requires some flexibility of thinking.

[hotdog433]

i was not trying to be hostile but i dont think my post was selfish either as i think there are enough options in the game to give you just about any challenge you would like.
 
as for not being accurate enough for some people what do they want do they just want the same economy as the south or tha same disposition of forces or manpower differences???
 
if you had these things in your game it might be historical but with hindsight you would off course do alot of things differently as you already know how it ends so would off course try and change it
 
would you try and build up the souths economy or change the disposition of forces from east to west???
 
what would you do differently that you dont do in the game now
 
 
 
i hope this makes sense as i have not slept for 2 days