Division-scale based Command Ops?

[joeyeti]

Has anyone entertained the idea of upping up the scale of the game, as opposed to the planned platoon-level Legends of the Blitzkrieg?

Say making the smallest unit be a regiment/brigade and operate with divisions as the "regular" units? I myself could very well see this executed and having some 100x300km battles it would be fun to dabble into the whole european theatre, or the eastern or african for that matter!

Would the game function well and foremost - would it be fun to play?

Please note I am not that well versed in the wargame scales myelf, so these examples and sizes ar just my rough estimates...

[wodin]

Could work, I doubt it would work as some sort of mod to the CO engine..but I'm sure a game playing similar to CO would work fine. Though it's a bigger scale again to what your asking about hearts of iron works using continuous time and it seems very popular.

I very much doubt though a game covering the whole east front at regiment level using an engine similar to CO would finish off the most powerful of PC's;)

Personally I think a simultaneousness turn system for say regiment and above would be better maybe using an engine like Flashpoint Campaigns.

[joeyeti]

I guess computing would roughly equal the current CO larger scenarios... As said, it would not be the whole eastern theatre or something, but rather those 100x300km perhaps at a largest.

But true there are games from other publishers, as HOI which you mentioned, that scratch this itch.

[BletchleyGeek]

ORIGINAL: joeyeti

I guess computing would roughly equal the current CO larger scenarios... As said, it would not be the whole eastern theatre or something, but rather those 100x300km perhaps at a largest.

But true there are games from other publishers, as HOI which you mentioned, that scratch this itch.

Dave, for one, has been thinking about this particular setting. You might or not know, that Dave made, a long time ago, in a galaxy far away, a boardgame covering the whole Eastern Front called Trial of Strength (look it up).

It is indeed possible, yet it would need a very significant bit of programming work, to make sure that everything makes sense at such a scale and decreasing fidelity in the models so the whole thing can be run on a desktop computer. Bil's requires substantial work, in the form of new features, rather than re-designing parts of the engine.

Re: larger scenarios. Paul Van Doren is working on something you might like quite a bit. It's totally like your favourite Bulge monster wargame - in terms of scale - yet playable, which is a big difference [:)]

[joeyeti]

ORIGINAL: Bletchley_Geek

ORIGINAL: joeyeti

I guess computing would roughly equal the current CO larger scenarios... As said, it would not be the whole eastern theatre or something, but rather those 100x300km perhaps at a largest.

But true there are games from other publishers, as HOI which you mentioned, that scratch this itch.

Dave, for one, has been thinking about this particular setting. You might or not know, that Dave made, a long time ago, in a galaxy far away, a boardgame covering the whole Eastern Front called Trial of Strength (look it up).

It is indeed possible, yet it would need a very significant bit of programming work, to make sure that everything makes sense at such a scale and decreasing fidelity in the models so the whole thing can be run on a desktop computer. Bil's requires substantial work, in the form of new features, rather than re-designing parts of the engine.

Re: larger scenarios. Paul Van Doren is working on something you might like quite a bit. It's totally like your favourite Bulge monster wargame - in terms of scale - yet playable, which is a big difference [:)]

Thx!

Checked Trial of Strength, nice - but too large a scale for me perhaps

What is that Paul van Doren game you speak about?

[wodin]

It may be a scenario for the BFTB expansion back Knocking on door or something it's called. I'm sure I heard mention it will have large scenarios.

[Arjuna]

Yep Knock on all Doors (KOAD) is a hypothetical based on the original German staff plan proposed to Hitler but rejected for his Whacht am Rhine operation. This will involve much bigger battles and on much bigger maps. It will give more of an operational feel as you will be able shift emphasis and commit your reserves where you want to place the emphasis. Paul Van Doren has finished the scenarios and where going to test these shortly once we get the new build out. So it's not that far off. Probably early next year.

[wodin]

Thanks for the info.

[joeyeti]

Nice! Looking forward to it!

[altipueri]

Hearts of Iron 2 and 3 both have a Battle of the Bulge scenario. Division and Brigade/Regiment level. Continuous (effectively 1 hour turns) play.
The Operational Art of War does too - 2.5km per hex, battalion and regiment level. Half day turns. Detailed TOE.

Blimey, you could spend the rest of your life trying to take Bastogne.

[joeyeti]

ORIGINAL: altipueri

Hearts of Iron 2 and 3 both have a Battle of the Bulge scenario. Division and Brigade/Regiment level. Continuous (effectively 1 hour turns) play.
The Operational Art of War does too - 2.5km per hex, battalion and regiment level. Half day turns. Detailed TOE.

Blimey, you could spend the rest of your life trying to take Bastogne.

Yep, there is a plethora of Bulge games for instance.
I was mainly intrigued by combinbing the CO engine with higher-scale battles.

[skarp]

Knock on all Doors (KOAD) looks fantastic thanks Paul Van Doren for making it and Dave for mentioning it here. I was disappointed with the lack of 'complete' operations for both BFTB and HTTR but assumed this was due to technical limitations with the game engine. Could the game engine support a full Market Garden - Joe's Bridge to Arnhem? I've been thinking of trying to make a map and a scenario for a long while. I've been a bit obsessed with MG since playing this as a teenager

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arnhem_%28video_game%29

[Arjuna]

Technically yes. The engine is very scaleable. However, the hardware required to make it run at a reasonable speed maybe another issue. On your average PC such a large scale scenario would run pretty slow IMO. We are exploring at the moment ways of getting around this such utilising multiple threads for the AI. Once that is complte it may be quite feasible. But we have to wait and see first before I make a guarantee.

[joeyeti]

Would that not be achieved by simply raising the "smallest unit-vs-unit calculation level"?
Of course I do not know how the internal game calculations are performed and if at this level the individual armament (etc.) per unit would still be as detailed and such...

ORIGINAL: Arjuna

Technically yes. The engine is very scaleable. However, the hardware required to make it run at a reasonable speed maybe another issue. On your average PC such a large scale scenario would run pretty slow IMO. We are exploring at the moment ways of getting around this such utilising multiple threads for the AI. Once that is complte it may be quite feasible. But we have to wait and see first before I make a guarantee.

[skarp]

Thanks Dave. I've run phoenix's maas rijn double drop with 2 additional AB divs without difficulty on my 2 year old laptop i5 except a short stall when calculating supply routes at 1800 hrs. So in troop numbers alone that's comparable to the 101st AB against about the same number of Axis. The killer may be the extra space. I suppose I'd better go look at the map editor. [:D]

[skarp]

Well I had a look around and calculated that the whole MG Op would occupy a map about 75km wide and 100km tall. Then I went into mapmaker and tried to expand the maas rhein map to the necessary size. Unfortunately it looks like the biggest map possible is 50km x 50km. Nevermind.

[Arjuna]

We can change that limit. I put it in there to avoid gamers creating maps that were too large to run the game at a reasonable rate. That is the rub for me.

[skarp]

Cool. let us know if you do

[BletchleyGeek]

ORIGINAL: Arjuna

We can change that limit. I put it in there to avoid gamers creating maps that were too large to run the game at a reasonable rate. That is the rub for me.

Hmmm, that's surprising, as I have a map - of a location which I cannot disclose - which measures 180 per 120 kilometers.

[Arjuna]

Yes but you've been using the debug version which has the limit removed. [:)]