A poll:human or AI opponents?

KG Erwin · Post by **KG Erwin** » Fri Jul 06, 2001 8:07 am

I want to know how many of you guys play against human opponents as opposed to playing against the AI? As for me, it's strictly vs the AI, for now.

[ July 06, 2001: Message edited by: KG Erwin ]

Stuart Millis · Post by **Stuart Millis** » Fri Jul 06, 2001 8:19 am

Online is best, followed by pbem, followed by the AI (a distant third)

KG Erwin · Post by **KG Erwin** » Fri Jul 06, 2001 8:23 am

Excuse me for saying, Stuart, but who has the time to engage in an online game? I'm not being facetious. I'm thinking about joining up.

Mark Ezra · Post by **Mark Ezra** » Fri Jul 06, 2001 8:24 am

Well if I really want to beat up on somebody I go for the AI. Otherwise it's PBEM. Haven't tried the on line feature.

Alby · Post by **Alby** » Fri Jul 06, 2001 8:26 am

Pbem and online best(well when online works right anyway)
never play the AI..

as Stuart said...its a distant third

[ July 06, 2001: Message edited by: Alby ]

KG Erwin · Post by **KG Erwin** » Fri Jul 06, 2001 8:31 am

Alright, then, who has tried the online feature, and how does it work?

Don · Post by **Don** » Fri Jul 06, 2001 9:16 am

I've played online 4 or 5 times, and it was such a pain it almost made me never try it again. Redleg and I would set up, go through the whole deployment phase, and then lose the connection. A good half-hour lost, then try it again and go through the same thing. When it works it is a real blast, but when it doesn't it is very frustrating and time-consuming.

Tomanbeg · Post by **Tomanbeg** » Fri Jul 06, 2001 9:18 am

Originally posted by KG Erwin:
Alright, then, who has tried the online feature, and how does it work?

You have to like toe to toe slug fests. I quit online because I couldn't find anyone willing to play 20 minute turns. 6 minutes to move 100+ units is a joke. 20 minutes is tough enough. I do PBEM all the way, I just use the AI for testing. But it depends on your playing style. Time yourself for the next 3 PBEM turns you do. Now play the AI, and set a timer for 3 minutes, and stop when the timer goes off and end your turn. If you find that exciting then on-line is for you. I won't play a PBEM game of less then 24 turns and I prefer 35 to 45. And I don't know if they changed it or not, but it used to be possible to suck up your opponents time by waiting to take your op fire. at 3 minutes a turn, a 12 turn game eats up 1 to 2 hours. at 6 minutes 2 to 3 hours. Half of which you spend waitng for a chance to op fire. I would love to find some players who would be willing to play 1 or 2 turns an evening at 20 to 30 minutes a turn, with the goal of finishing a gamein 2 weeks instead of a month. Real timers say the god mode is unrealistic, I say no major I ever heard of has to drive every tank in his battle group into position, or lead every squad around by the hand. I'm certain Matrix has the ability to to go to a "Rules of Engagement" type quasi role playing game where we get Capt. LTs., Sgt. etc to run our troops and we pick the characteristics (Aggression. Training, Courage. etc.) sort of like building a D&D character. But then you wind up in a Combat Missing type game where the Computer does all the fighting. Which means it boils down to time and style.
T.

Warrior · Post by **Warrior** » Fri Jul 06, 2001 9:56 am

I played the AI exclusively for nearly nine months. I wanted to know what I was doing before I tried a human opponent. I now have about 15 PBEM games under my belt, and they are more interesting - IF - they move fast enough. One turn every day or two takes the excitement out of it for me, but I still enjoy it. I've never tried an online game, have no idea how to go about getting one going, but would love to try one sometime. If you want to get started with PBEM, I volunteer to be an opponent.

Skotty · Post by **Skotty** » Fri Jul 06, 2001 11:01 am

I play multi on a lan, where we are both in the same room. It's great to razz your opponent when you smoke his Tiger with a bazooka and watch him turn red and pound the keyboard

I don't think I will try over the net yet, cuz online is a bit buggy. We play with 7 min turns with about 3400 to 3600 points. You can still move everything in that time and it only gets dicey when stong contact is made. The worst thing that happens is you have 3 sec left and you forget to plot your 105mm's.... doh!
When it works, online kicks butt!

KG Erwin · Post by **KG Erwin** » Fri Jul 06, 2001 11:25 am

I take it then that if want to play online, the key is to have very small point totals for the opposing forces--say a company-size matchup? Would that work better than two battalions slugging it out for God knows how long ? Anyone want to try that with me?

Mai Thai · Post by **Mai Thai** » Fri Jul 06, 2001 11:25 am

I play only against AI in designed scenarios and campaigns, if the designer is good and "wild" it is a challenge anyway
Now i received the MC cd but i have not tryed yet
bye

KG Erwin · Post by **KG Erwin** » Fri Jul 06, 2001 11:39 am

I can see from experimentig that online play is a fitful proposition at best. I'll come back and try it in the morning. Good night all.

ruxius · Post by **ruxius** » Fri Jul 06, 2001 2:30 pm

Two Cooperative human PBEM against two cooperative humans..but it's hard to do it
without fanatism

General Mayhem · Post by **General Mayhem** » Fri Jul 06, 2001 3:33 pm

Originally posted by Don:
I've played online 4 or 5 times, and it was such a pain it almost made me never try it again. Redleg and I would set up, go through the whole deployment phase, and then lose the connection. A good half-hour lost, then try it again and go through the same thing. When it works it is a real blast, but when it doesn't it is very frustrating and time-consuming.

Does it happen with all connection types?

Are we talking modems, ISDN, cables, DSL's or what?

Paul Vebber · Post by **Paul Vebber** » Fri Jul 06, 2001 7:09 pm

In teh testing we have done we have found that LAN connections do the best, you get about a 90% success rate. Failure being the game gets "corrupted" and you and your opponant are essentialy playing two different games to the point its uplayanble. Adding extra players compounds the problem

With high speed internet connections you get about 75% success rate, though size of the games has a lot to do with it. The more units you have, the greater the chances of screw up. Small gae definately work a LOT better and something like Steel Shield with hundreds of units per side is not likely to work out.

Dial ups are very iffy, and I'd say are about 25 or 33% of teh time workable - theough small games (<50 units per side or so) fair better.

For the most part its better than SP3 online was, but the peer to peer architechure is not very resiliant to errors leading to the games diverging over time and worse the biger they are. Saving every couple turns and emailing teh thesave to everybiody (making sure everybody saves it in the same slot!!)

IT surprising to hear teh problems with ver 5.3 and 6.0 but as we have come to expect, changing one thing often crops up in some other area where you least expect it.

Getting online play weapons cues functioning for the release Lost Victories version will be high on our list! But we have to balance that with Combat Leader development right now.

Was there a problem with 5.2??

[ July 06, 2001: Message edited by: Paul Vebber ]