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An battle takes place ...

GG engine produces a lot of data, but leaves out almost all the rules, and doesn't really teach you anything from the F11 reports.

BTW, this is from the Slitherine title, Field of Glory II (Richard Scott). Highly recommended. There is also almost an identical new release covering the low and high medieval period.

Both amazing titles, although WitE2 may be slightly overrated, and FoG II certainly underrated. [;)]

The AI on the latter game is also wicked tough, to the point I felt it was cheating, which it wasn't.

(WARNING: the following post contains critique and praise ... if you fanboy flame easily, then move along)

Have you tried "Rise of the AI 3.1" mod?

It is far more aggressive than RBS' stock AI. Also, the stock AI will let you camp. The mod will not, since it will only skirmish if you camp. But you must break 40% minimally to get a win. This means you are forced to come out and mix it up. I like it. So, besides being more aggressive; it is anti-exploit.

Also, the game is very different in play style from GG for TBS. You can play very fast if you want with the right options set. GG just is not fast even with all aids. I guess my problem with GG is that it is a one man war which I know most here love. I have been with PG for 20 years and operational games, and I love the concept of intelligent agents. GG's detail is amazing, the docs are the best I have ever seen, and the UI rates commercial/professional of the best quality. But the play style is one man war. With PG I can simply give fairly complex orders to a few subordinates and they are carried out. It's hard to ever imagine playing the Grand Campaign which is often 100X more demanding than the scenarios.

So, why did I get WITW/WITE2? I was a not a BG gamer as a kid. I wanted to better understand the roots of my hobby, and I understand GG is one of the best of the classic style. I learned a great deal. I had always pitched PG as an "automatic transmission", but never drove a "standard". I decided to find out what it means to drive a "standard". One of the biggest complaints we get from players considering becoming PG customers is too much automation. The game plays itself. (This can be true if you let it.)

Finally, I spent 9 months right before this on HOI4+DLC(all). I was terribly disappointed. As an engineer the cut & paste programming was such an obvious money grab to milk customers. One primary example I could give is air and sea warfare that use zones which are clearly the same underlying political state zones. Thus, they are full of bizarre and unrealistic bounds conditions. But it was the easiest way to say "we have air and sea" and ask for cash.

GG truly have an extremely well modeled air war which no one even thinks of when they casually hear these titles mentioned.

I did write a report as a PG beta, and got the party line I usually promote about TBS. But what I did not realize and few do in the PG community. GG is not strictly TBS. There are many combat factors which are hybrid WEGO especially in the air war; but you see it with RESERVE and SU in the ground war as well.

So, for these who feel fun is in the details, there are no better products than GG's titles. After this experience, I would list GG as one of the great designers of our hobby (and the entire team and project as example of dedication to concept and quality.)

If you look at the detailed reports it does give you quite a bit of data, but yes it does hide the die rolls. I think it would be excessive to show everything but I have wanted to see the die rolls for morale/support checks. I know the battle log shows the total impact of these (via the starting CV to ending CV) but it would be cool to see the full log (albeit probably summarized), as well.