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Let’s talk about the options in a bit more detail…

First, let me say that the options in this game are very well thought out. At the bottom of the page, you can select the basic, intermediate, or advanced games and to configure all of the detailed options to preset definitions. But you can then change those predefined defaults to tweak the settings to your liking. And perhaps best of all, the game remembers your settings and when you load the game it presets them to whatever you selected last time. So once you find a configuration you really like, you can just leave the settings alone and go straight into the game exactly as you like it.

Below is the defaults for the basic game. Because you have removed most of the things you normally would have to pay for, the default for the basic game is to use a Poorer Economy, which reduces resource production by 15%. The reality is that you still have more than enough resources.

In fact, one of the things I really like about Forge of Freedom is that the options don’t just reduce the complexity; they actually change the feel and the focus of the game. The basic game is the most simple, but that also means it is much more focused on the military situation. Don’t get me wrong – you still manage your economy and there are still plenty of things you can buy. But after a while you’ll find that your army in the basic game is limited by manpower rather than resources and therefore while you can build your economy further, doing so isn’t really necessary as the strategic value is minimal. That gives the basic game a very different feel than more advanced games – it is almost as if you are playing a different game - and I find there are times when I actually prefer just playing a basic game so I can really focus on moving the units around the map and directing the war effort.

Since Use Generals is not selected, the fewer generals selection doesn’t much matter. It is just preset so that if you do decide to enable generals in the basic game, you won’t have so many. Let’s face it, in the basic game you really don’t want to be choosing commanders for each fort or each brigade within the army you just want the main commanders and you’ll have more than enough even with fewer generals selected.

The always quick combat option keeps the game strategic. Near Start, Victory Conditions and Attacker Time Limits are all easier selections for detailed combat in case you decide to enable it. And Faster Sieges make the game faster. Since the USA is generally the aggressor, this tends to be a real advantage for whoever plays the north.

Bout time you showed up !

[&o]

Thanks for the report. It's interesting to hear that the basic game may be worth playing. I'll experiment with the various options when I get the game.

The Intermediate game is where the economy really comes into play.

Upkeep costs require you to dedicate resource to supporting your existing armies and navies. The vast majority of the support required is money to pay their salaries and with this option turned on, cash becomes your most important resource. No other single option changes the feel of the strategic game as much as this one. Early in the beta, I suggested scaling the income when this was turned off so you wouldn’t reduce expense and leave income in place. But over time, I found that I really liked leaving income alone as it did provide for a different gaming experience and the game design is pretty smart in that it really does allow you to spend those extra resource (though as discussed above, you really derive marginal strategic value from doing so – in my mind, that’s a really good design).

Research Upgrades turn on research and your ability to learn new warfare tactics. One of the interesting aspects of this feature is that you pay a research “maintenance” cost for each advance you obtain. As you progress, it reduces your level of forward research. So even though you start with some research facilities, that will only take you so far. Eventually research will stop progressing (maintenance would consume all the research points) unless you build more facilities or have governors supporting your research endeavors. So, once enabled, research does require some attention and investment. And research facilities cost significant amounts of cash and as discussed above, cash soon becomes a very critical resource.

Let’s discuss resources a bit more for a moment because when I say that money is the most important I don’t want to give the impression that the others do not matter because they do. In my mind, cash does become the most important. It is used in high amounts when paying your soldiers (upkeep), when increasing your supply levels (which is a whole ‘nuther topic worth discussing but for now let’s just confirm that doing so can be pretty important), when expanding cities, and when “purchasing” new units (unless you muster/conscript – which still drains your manpower but produces lower quality units – see the strategic tradeoffs you are constantly having to make in this game). Cash is important. Labor is used for many things, but especially for constructing the majority of the new buildings (Gil posted a screenshot of the building cost list if you want to review it). One of the economic decisions is whether to produce cash or labor in each province. Generally speaking, you want to produce whatever you get the most of. But there are times you are desperate for cash and willing to produce less overall just to get your hands on that scarce resource.

Iron and horses go largely to artillery and cavalry. But another of the brilliant design features is that you can build mints to create more money. Mints take lots of iron to build (along with some labor). So, if you want to relieve your biggest resource issue you can invest in building mints. But to do so, you are “spending” your iron. So you can’t build much artillery if your iron is going to mints instead. And, oh by the way, you also need some labor to build your mint so that potentially will draw production from money to produce that labor instead (though doing so is especially efficient when you are so low on money that you are producing cash instead of iron at a bad ratio in some cities to make up the cash deficiency). At the end of the day, there are two key results. The first is that you can invest in the future but that there is a very real cost to what you are able to produce in the near term. You can build mints to relieve the money shortage, but that means you get less artillery now. And since the second choice is whether to produce iron or horses, you very well might find yourself having to shift production from horses to iron to compensate so that you’ll be building fewer cavalry as well. You also have to spend labor to build your economy so that you’ll have less money now in order to produce more money later. You really are having to make a very real investment – and if you are having to cut your supply levels and not build CAV and ART (which are very rare at the start of the war), your army will be pretty vulnerable. The second result is that the money/labor and iron/horses silos are linked. You have to spend resources from the first silo to expand capacity in the second and vice versa. So unlike some games where you are short on one thing but have huge excesses in others and can’t do anything about it, this game naturally absorbs excesses because you can spend what you have the most of to help produce excess capacity in the things you are short of.

One last thought on the economy – like the real civil war economy, it doesn’t change fast. I once tried a game where I focused almost solely on building out the economy thinking that I would build up my base and then use that strength to steamroll – a strategy that serves me well in most 4X titles. I am happy to report that it failed miserably here. Building your economy relieves some pressures and you do need to make some investments – but at its heart this game is about the war itself.

OK, back to the options… European diplomacy is a bit of a chess match. Essentially, you can invest at various levels in diplomacy with Britain, France, or continental Europe. As one might expect, that investment drains your most important resource – cash. With that investment they may decide they like you more or that they like your opponent less. Your opponent is likely investing as well. For the CSA, they can get material assistance from any of the European powers but they likely don’t have the resources to approach all of them. For the USA, they need to invest primarily as a defensive maneuver. If a European power gets too friendly with the CSA, they will donate resource, technology, and eventually troops if you let things get too far out of hand. So what you have is a grand game of Where’s Waldo. The south is attempting to see if they can get any traction with one or more powers. The North is either trying to prevent that across the board or more likely is watching for the south to get traction and hoping that they can counter in time. Unless someone is really asleep at the wheel, European involvement will occur at or near historical levels with them providing some assistance to the south but not getting involved in a material way.

Unit options obviously focus on the troops themselves. Staff ratings turn on the support staff for armies, corps and divisions, which impacts their performance in various ways. The South starts with better support officers, so this option really benefits the boys in grey.

Special Abilities allow units to learn and use… well… special abilities. It just allows units such as the Iron Brigade to have abilities that make them stand out so that on the battlefield, some units really are special.

Unit Disposition is a quasi form of morale that will impact the performance of your troops and make your general’s leadership more important.

Fog of War hides information about enemies until they are close to you. It applies to both the strategic map and detailed combat.

Initiative Checks use your general’s initiative to determine the pace at which they follow orders. This is one of those options that make the generals and their stats more important to the game.

Slow Winter Movement makes it very difficult to move during the winter, except by rail which in unaffected by this. While it takes some getting used to (in the winter – units largely just ignore your movement orders) it adds a strategic element to the game in that winter becomes the time to regroup. You can also lower supply levels in the knowledge that attacks are unlikely – as long as you remember to get them back up in time.

Detailed Combat is the default for large battles in the intermediate game, but Hard Sarge is discussing combat in detail and this is already long enough so I won’t go into those options here. But ask him about the “out of command” rule. It does have an impact. [;)]




EDIT: Minor edits to clean up some language errors.

Jchastain,
 
Very helpful. Thank you. I am getting more and more excited all the time...[:)]
 
 

Question on the research. If you turn off the option, do upgrades happen "historically" or are you stuck at 1861 technology?

Hmmm
I think you are just stuck at the beginning levels or at what ever levels are set for the beginning

like upgrade weapons, you do not get the better or be able to reseach and get better weapons, but you start with standard weapons

(it is a option for a easier game)

(for me and how I play, I can not see playing with either turned off, but, that is how I like to play the game)

Hmm, my history is sketchy to be sure but wouldn't that mean no ironclads for example or good repeating rifles? I don't know if they were there at the beginning or not but it wouldn't be fun if they didn't make it in somehow.

ORIGINAL: Joram

Hmm, my history is sketchy to be sure but wouldn't that mean no ironclads for example or good repeating rifles? I don't know if they were there at the beginning or not but it wouldn't be fun if they didn't make it in somehow.

Then play with the research option turned on. It's actually pretty simple. (Just to clarify, the distinctions between "basic," "intermediate" and "advanced" game options are not always clear-cut. Essentially, the "basic" game lets one worry about the least as you go about fighting the war, but that doesn't mean that the "intermediate" and "advanced" options are all complex. The "basic" game, in other words, is very streamlined, but some of the non-basic options can be understood by someone without an elementary school degree -- they just require more attention. I'd consider the research area of the game to be like this, since it's very simple but does require doing a little extra work.)

As for ironclads, those are in the game under all scenarios, though if one doesn't have research one can't get an iron-clad-related upgrade.

ORIGINAL: Joram

Hmm, my history is sketchy to be sure but wouldn't that mean no ironclads for example or good repeating rifles? I don't know if they were there at the beginning or not but it wouldn't be fun if they didn't make it in somehow.

In the basic game, you are simply focusing on the strategic situation and not micromanaging the level of detail such as weapons. You do have iron clads. In fact, you have infantry, cavalty, and artillery on land and standard wooden ships, coastal/river gunboats, and ironclads at sea. Troops still have a quality attribute and improve with seasoning over the course of the war. So to call it "basic" is, as Gil said, a slight misnomer. The basic game is really a strategy civil war game that focuses on the truly strategic level of play and maneuver. I suspect some players will enjoy a more basic game and will find they typically play ensure that there is a properly proportional balance of weapons within each division - because if you give advanced rifles to every brigade within a division, you'll soon find that division cannot be properly supplied and will actually be less effective. All of this adds elements of complexity that some will enjoy mastering. But some will just want to fight the war without dealing with all of that. And the beauty of this design is that both types of players can be satisfied.

The other obvious advantage of the various play levels is that it allow players to gradually immerse themselves into the complexity. For those who played Crown of Glory, you had the ability to choose a smaller power initially while learning the game. With a Civil War game, there is no such option. And so, while learning the game, it is nice to be able to start without all of the complexity. And then, as players begin to master the basics of the game, they can choose the pace at which they want to add additional complexity.

So, both in terms of allowing players to configure the game to their own tastes and in terms of providing an avenue to allow players to learn the game without being immediately overwhealmed with complexity, I believe the breadth of options in this game are outstanding and I hope more developers will follow their lead.

And now… the advanced options. Again, you can change any of the options individually but the default advanced game definitions are as shown below.

The Advanced Supply option actually helps to channel major military advances down historical avenues because it forces players to address some of the historical logistics challenges. With advanced supply, armies can receive supply via any combination of river, rail, land, or sea. Units use supply in movement and combat (with the battle’s loser consuming more supply than the winner to model the losses during retreat). Because river and rail provides far better supply than across land or sea, it is difficult to maintain an offensive away from those major transport mechanisms. The logistics rating of the division (staff officers) can improve or reduce the base level of resupply and then supply is averaged somewhat between the brigades within the division. That averaging is largely invisible but is important since supply priority is managed at the divisional level while brigades draw different levels of supply (primarily due to the fact that advanced weapons consume additional levels of supply).

Your supply level is one of the most important factors affecting battle performance and players can choose to “buy” additional levels of supply by modifying the “supply priority” of their units. Doing so is expensive, but the systems works well to properly model the additional cost of mounting an offensive. Moving and attacking uses a lot of supply so that either a player must channel a lot of resources to a unit or must allow it to rest between battles and resupply. A nice little touch is that the supply priority also impacts the priorities for replacement troops. So if you are channeling resources to a given army, they will also absorb the majority of the replacements on the assumption that you are building them up in preparation for something.

The governor option enables the State Governors. The states were important in the American Civil War and this option attempts to model some of those politics. Those expecting this to be sim-politics will be disappointed because the focus of the game remains on the war, but it does add another interesting dimension. With this option enabled, the game tracks the political strength of the governor of each state, their temperament, as well as their support for you as the nation’s leader. Governors will occasionally request things – they may want additional troops stationed nearby or perhaps they will want new construction. You must decide whether or not to devote the troops and/or resources necessary to satisfy them. Based on your reactions to their requests and your record of impressing troops and resources, their popularity and their attitude towards you will rise and fall. Governors can impact your war effort in many ways. They can enhance or cut your production of resources within their state. They can dabble in diplomacy and help or hurt your efforts with foreign states. They can assist or detract from ongoing research. What makes the system so interesting is that there are multiple approaches to dealing with a troublesome governor. You may choose to appease him by giving him what he wants but you might instead choose to ignore his requests and let his popularity sink in the hopes he will be defeated in the next election. Governors were elected much more frequently than in modern days with many of them standing for election annually, and the makers of the game researched all of this fairly meticulously and the governors, their opponents, and the election schedules are all based on actual history.

Population Modifiers is a rather vague description for a very interesting game option. What this selection does is reduce the economic output of a province based on population reductions. So if you raise troops in an area, it’s economic output diminishes. This introduces a couple of interesting strategic considerations. You can’t just build troops indiscriminately because it will reduce your economy (and your ability to support and provide for the troops raised). Furthermore, where you raise your troops becomes even more important. You might choose to produce key resources in certain areas and not recruit from there while not investing in other areas and raising lots of troops. Of course, in so doing you might be sacrificing your relationship with that governor, but those are the types of tradeoffs the game requires.

The Advanced Buildings option enables and disables many of the more esoteric and subtle building types. Disabling them primarily just simplifies the game. While advanced players will undoubtedly build at least some of these, in my opinion this option refines some strategic options but doesn’t change the entire complexion of the game like some of the others.

Impressment allows players to “liberate” badly liberated resources from their current owners. It impacts the popularity of the governor overseeing the liberation and has a risk of creating unrest – which will temporarily disrupt all production from the local province.

Unit Attrition has already gotten some discussion but is worthy of more. This option enables both the movement attrition and the disease attrition. While some will be tempted to turn this off, in my opinion both of these attrition rules make it a better game. Disease provides a risk to counterbalance the natural tendency to build “super-stacks”. With extreme concentrations of troops, you increase the risk of extreme numbers of casualties. Movement attrition better simulates the losses suffered outside of combat and helps the game feel more like the American Civil War instead of WWII with its blitzkrieg campaigns. With movement attrition, it is necessary for an army to occasionally pause and regroup. Furthermore, you will see troop levels more in line with what you might expect. A few years into the war, it was uncommon to see a unit at full strength. Most of those losses were not from combat. While I noted some seemed somewhat uncomfortable with these losses, after playing the game I believe this option helps replicate that and models all the “unsexy” losses. In my mind, this option just helps capture the feel of the war. For those planning to play the advanced game but thinking you’ll turn this off, I’d suggest at least trying it (and I’ll say it again - the great thing is that if you disagree with me, you CAN turn it off!)

Upgrading of weapons is exactly that. I think everyone understands that option pretty well so there’s no need to go into it in detail here. Likewise, I this the randomize and hidden stats for generals are well understood. If I am wrong about that and you have some questions, feel free to post them.

Anyway, I believe that covers the concepts behind the various options. I believe this game is pretty powerful in allowing the player to control their gaming experience.

ORIGINAL: jchastain
So, both in terms of allowing players to configure the game to their own tastes and in terms of providing an avenue to allow players to learn the game without being immediately overwhealmed with complexity, I believe the breadth of options in this game are outstanding and I hope more developers will follow their lead.

As one with a financial stake in this game, all I have to say is, "Shhh. Don't tell the other developers!"

ORIGINAL: jchastain
So, both in terms of allowing players to configure the game to their own tastes and in terms of providing an avenue to allow players to learn the game without being immediately overwhealmed with complexity, I believe the breadth of options in this game are outstanding and I hope more developers will follow their lead.

I agree, the amount of choice available looks excellent and sets a good example. Especially if the simpler levels of the game are really designed to be played and enjoyed, and not just thrown in as a learning experience on the way to the 'real' (advanced-level) game.

Different players like different levels of complexity and detail in a game, and it's great if you can make everyone happy.

If the “Always Quick Combat” option is checked or unchecked can a player still individually pick and choose after the start of the game those battles one desires to tactically play? For example, I may want to “quick” battle small skirmishes while tactically playing large battles. Is such playability possible?

No -- just keep that toggle off, and choose battle type each time.

ORIGINAL: dh76513

If the “Always Quick Combat” option is checked or unchecked can a player still individually pick and choose after the start of the game those battles one desires to tactically play? For example, I may want to “quick” battle small skirmishes while tactically playing large battles. Is such playability possible?

Just for completeness...

If the Always Quick Combat is checked... The player will always go straight to quick combat and no option will be shown.

If Always Detail Option is checked... The player will be given the choice of quick or detailed battle for each and every battle

If neither Always Quick nor Always Detail Option is checked (default)... The player will be given the choice of quick combat or a detailed battle for large encounters and will go directly to quick combat for smaller encounters.

If both Always Quick Combat and Always Detailed Combat are checked... an error is displayed and one must be unchecked prior to starting the game.