Documentation comments

Battles In Normandy is the third game in the Decisive Battles game series. Battles in Normandy recreates all aspects of the Normandy campaign, from the landings on the first day to the final climax of the campaign at Falaise. Strategic Studies Group rewrote the Decisive Battles game engine for Battles in Normandy with a host of new special rules for amphibious and airborne operations, plus a huge number of other enhancements.

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DonStone
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Joined: Sat Aug 09, 2003 8:31 pm
Location: Chapel Hill, NC

Documentation comments

Post by DonStone »

Thoughts on the documentation as I read through this weekend.

- the tutorial is *superb* -- well worth all the effort that went into it -- as I hope is obvious, my queries/comments here are *way* down in the noise -- I already have a much deeper understanding of the game than I have of comparable games after much playing (appreciated by an old board wargamer).

- I didn't understand the purpose of the "Supply Trace Display" in the truck example. The manual was clearer, but I still don't understand the map display -- what are the holes that sometimes appear between the "green" areas and the "orange" areas?

- A list of keyboard shortcuts would be nice -- or a "one-screen" online help.

- A table of contents for the manual would be nice -- ideally, an index as well.

- the "B" and "F" on the scenario screen are never explained. I still don't know what they mean, although the navigation through the screens is straightforward.

- I don't think the light-blue "divisional integrity" radius is ever explained? (I might have missed it?) I eventually figured it out, but was confused for a while.

- I'm still a little confused by the amphibious example in the tutorial -- the implication is that you can do things, like crush enemy strongpoints/units/etc, to result in less rolls -- can you affect the roll needed? (i.e., was the "4" in the "bad" example a fixed number, or would it go down if you crushed many of the strongpoints?)
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Rainbow7
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Location: Ottawa

RE: Documentation comments

Post by Rainbow7 »

The B refers to a battle scenario, and the F refers to a folder (to navigate through).
Troubles overcome are good to tell. -Yiddish saying
JSS
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Joined: Wed Oct 15, 2003 3:24 pm

RE: Documentation comments

Post by JSS »

ORIGINAL: DonStone

- I didn't understand the purpose of the "Supply Trace Display" in the truck example. The manual was clearer, but I still don't understand the map display -- what are the holes that sometimes appear between the "green" areas and the "orange" areas?

If I understand your question correctly the unshaded "holes" or areas are unsupplied hexes. This could be because of terrain movement costs (or even illegal terrain) [:-] or something's there to prevent supply delivery[:D]

- I'm still a little confused by the amphibious example in the tutorial -- the implication is that you can do things, like crush enemy strongpoints/units/etc, to result in less rolls -- can you affect the roll needed? (i.e., was the "4" in the "bad" example a fixed number, or would it go down if you crushed many of the strongpoints?)

You can affect the number of dice thrown by reducing steps near the beach landing site. Nothing you can do about the lethality of each die (its set by the scenario designer).

JSS
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