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I don't have HTTR and have followed this forum on-n-off. Question I have is whether the game offers the capability of playing the entire campaign (XXX corps thru 1s Airborne) or is it strctly limited to individual mini-campaigns (not the entire link-up) ?

It's divided into three main theatres. The fighting in the south from Neerpelt to Uden. (101 sector) The fighting around Nijmegen (82 sector) and off course Arnhem (1 Airborne). Now when I first saw this I was slightly dissapointed, but when I started playing the game that soon changed. It really has the feel of you, the player, being in command and letting the subordinates (i.e. the AI) figure out how to execute the tasks you give them. Off course you can also micromanage the whole affair or take the middle of the road and fiddle about here and there. Artillery for instance can sometimes be put to better use by the player. There is talk of new features being implemented when the engine has been updated for Conquest of the Aegean, but if that includes the campaign mode I'm not sure.

I believe the campaign mode which is being mentioned would allow a series of linked scenarios, such that the outcome of A affects B and so on.

Which is fine for a linear, serial campaign - but won't truly work for Market garden, which was a parallel campaign.

For example, one might wish to leave more of XXX Corps "behind" to secure the road, especially if the 101st if having a hard time and the 82nd isn't. You wouldn't be able to make that decision more than once, because you wouldn't be able to send them 'back' once on the next scenario. Or, the German's couldn't attempt to cut the corridor with more units than historically, because the Eindhoven game would have finished too soon. Linear, serial linking provides a way to replay the historical campaign parameters, but not to significantly alter the operational/strategic plans. For that you'd need one big map, which is currently technologically unfeasible IIRC.

Actually, my questions goes to map scale. Is there a single, not link, campaign scenario that can be played where all the drop zones and XXX Corps are "on the map" at the same time ?

No. The maps in HTTR top out at about 30 x 40 km (the Eindhoven map I think) and are mostly around 30 x 30 km. In general there are usually a max of about three or four divisions on any one side, represented down to company and platoon level.

Regards
33

never mind... Golf33 was here first...

ORIGINAL: MadScot

I believe the campaign mode which is being mentioned would allow a series of linked scenarios, such that the outcome of A affects B and so on.

Which is fine for a linear, serial campaign - but won't truly work for Market garden, which was a parallel campaign.

For example, one might wish to leave more of XXX Corps "behind" to secure the road, especially if the 101st if having a hard time and the 82nd isn't. You wouldn't be able to make that decision more than once, because you wouldn't be able to send them 'back' once on the next scenario. Or, the German's couldn't attempt to cut the corridor with more units than historically, because the Eindhoven game would have finished too soon. Linear, serial linking provides a way to replay the historical campaign parameters, but not to significantly alter the operational/strategic plans. For that you'd need one big map, which is currently technologically unfeasible IIRC.

Point taken. As you suggest the best way to cover the entire operation would be on one map. but technically that is not feasible today, nor for the next few years at least. However, with the new campaign feature we should be able to develop a 30th Corps Drive up the Hwy campaign, where the faster they can exit each map the earlier they arrive in the next sector and hopefully the bigger impact they can make, with the ultimate goal of exiting north of Arnhem.[:)]

Point taken. As you suggest the best way to cover the entire operation would be on one map. but technically that is not feasible today, nor for the next few years at least.

Dave, I'm curious as to your statement about the feasibility of a single map, or lack thereof. I'm not challenging the statement, but rather don't understand what the limitation is ?????

Processor power is the limitation. With maps larger than about 30 x 40 and/or more than about 400 units on the map the amount of calculation required for things like developing routes, checking line of sight and so on, is large enough to cause the game to slow down on even the fastest processors. There is only so much optimisation that can be done to reduce this effect on current machines.

Regards
33

How about....

Increase the map grid to 1/4 km

Default unit size of battalion (coy and below only for "special" cases)

That reduces the number of units by a factor of roughly 3-4, and the number of map grid points by a factor of 4 linearly, and 16 overall.

Would that not permit a map physical size of 4 times the current 30*30 nominal - which would be enough to do 40*100 or so, which would cover most of the meaningful terrain?

I'd have thought you could retain almost all the existing routines and just rescale. I don't think *we* have access to the map grid, do we?

I realise there would be more formations on-map, which would offset the scale change a bit; but right now there's nothing stopping someone doing a scenario with every unit in the game on one map anyway, so it's already possible to "break" the game if you wanted to.

In RDOA a lot of the units were battalion strength. We found that the simulation was much better using coy strength units - there is a lot of code for combat resolution, movement, and other aspects of the game that just functioned much better with units of this size. This stuff would have to be re-written to produce a faithful simulation at a higher level. This would also necessarily involve a lot more abstraction. Not to say it couldn't be done but it would be a massive job requiring an extensive rewrite of some of the most basic parts of the engine.

The map size is limited in the MapMaker for this reason, to prevent users developing a map on which too long is required to calculate routes. There is no coded limit on the number of units on the map but users will quickly find out that when you approach 400 units or so (a division usually has ~100 units) the game will start to slow down, especially if these units are all crammed into a small area which increases the number of LOS checks. I don't think it's possible to 'break' the game but you can create a scenario in which every minute of game time requires several seconds of real time, which becomes a bit wearing for impatient types like me to play.

Regards
33

There is nothing wrong with the engine, its computers! [:)] We can wait year or two and computers will be faster after that. Meanwhile we can play HTTR and RDOA. We can wait few years to have very BIG battles.