Weather Effects?

[pixelpusher]

Question: Do you think the weather effects add to the game?

Talking about the rain, snow and fog on the main map and detailed battles. I'm considering adding more stuff like that to our mysterious next project, but I'd like to hear what the CoG community thinks about it. Thinking about having greater weather-affected gameplay effects, like slowing down movement on land and big storms that damage ships and things of that sort. Do you think it's worthwhile?

[Malagant]

The randomness it presents are a big factor in my decision making. I enjoy the weather.

[GreenDestiny]

ORIGINAL: pixelpusher

Question: Do you think the weather effects add to the game?

Yes it does. I like the weather effects.

[jchastain]

ORIGINAL: pixelpusher

Question: Do you think the weather effects add to the game?

Talking about the rain, snow and fog on the main map and detailed battles. I'm considering adding more stuff like that to our mysterious next project, but I'd like to hear what the CoG community thinks about it. Thinking about having greater weather-affected gameplay effects, like slowing down movement on land and big storms that damage ships and things of that sort. Do you think it's worthwhile?

I do think it adds to the game, but I would caution against taking a good thing too far. I don't want to have to play sim-meteorologist. But especially in areas such as winter in russia, where weather can really bog down an invading army I think it is a huge plus.

[pixelpusher]

ORIGINAL: jchastain
I do think it adds to the game, but I would caution against taking a good thing too far. I don't want to have to play sim-meteorologist. But especially in areas such as winter in russia, where weather can really bog down an invading army I think it is a huge plus.

Hopefully it won't go too far. What I'm thinking is more having more gradations of weather. Right now it's either all snow and frozen, or nothing. There's no 'partially frozen', for instance. I'd like that to be a smoother more gradual transition. Maybe 2-3 steps.

[Ralegh]

I think the weather handling - both in generation, game effects, and graphics is a real world leader in COG and a super strength of the product. Could we handle a 'drought' condition too?

However, that means I am not sure that this would be the best place for you to put effort, since it is already so good.

- How about an 'option' for partially colour blind people to be able to distinguish between units? I can't tell some units apart, and sometimes can't tell forces from different sides apart.
- I'd also love more naval graphics to go with a detailed combat version of naval warfare.
- We need to streamline the trade route graphics - if you turn them on when there are lots of routes, the screen is largely unreadable!

[jchastain]

ORIGINAL: pixelpusher

ORIGINAL: jchastain
I do think it adds to the game, but I would caution against taking a good thing too far. I don't want to have to play sim-meteorologist. But especially in areas such as winter in russia, where weather can really bog down an invading army I think it is a huge plus.

Hopefully it won't go too far. What I'm thinking is more having more gradations of weather. Right now it's either all snow and frozen, or nothing. There's no 'partially frozen', for instance. I'd like that to be a smoother more gradual transition. Maybe 2-3 steps.

Sounds fine to me BUT...

1. Don't allow the existance of 3 gradations of snow to make it snow more often "because you hardly ever see...."

2. Accept the fact that people (being the way that we are) will complain that you haven't told them enough about what the differences are, complain that you can't visually tell the difference between them, and argue about the frequency with which one level occurs versus another. [8D]

Frankly, I'd personally put this quite a ways down on the priority list as it is more of a "gee whiz" feature than a "wow! I need to buy this game" feature. But if it is what you are itching to do, then by all means - go for it!

[eMonticello]

How would the weather affect blockades? Would there be a chance that the blockading ships be "driven" away from the blockade if the weather was bad, thus allowing a ship in a blockade port to escape? Would a fleet of frigates have a better chance of remaining in a blockade than a fleet of ships/hvy ships? Would the Med generally have better weather than the Atlantic?

I've tested limited fleet operations as Turkey, primarily by creating a Squadron of Frigates (aka Fleet) to protect my merchant ships against privateers during the few years that I was actually at war. Otherwise, I tend to lend the Empire's Fleet to Britain.

[Naomi]

ORIGINAL: Ralegh

I think the weather handling - both in generation, game effects, and graphics is a real world leader in COG and a super strength of the product. Could we handle a 'drought' condition too?

However, that means I am not sure that this would be the best place for you to put effort, since it is already so good.

- How about an 'option' for partially colour blind people to be able to distinguish between units? I can't tell some units apart, and sometimes can't tell forces from different sides apart.
- I'd also love more naval graphics to go with a detailed combat version of naval warfare.
- We need to streamline the trade route graphics - if you turn them on when there are lots of routes, the screen is largely unreadable!

There are already proxies for drought, like rain, which sometimes affect adversely farm production. Fog or snow (I don't remember which), which is likely to magnify the kills, hints at the fact that pple may well be so fog-blinded or snow-blinded as to kill each other regardless of which side they are on.
As to naval warfare, I am totally agreed on more effort going to graphical design for detailed battles (since the current background for quick battles borders on monotonous naviety).

[goodwoodrw]

PP I like the weather effects both graphically and game wise, but I wish u could tone down the fog in the quick battles. It gives me motion sickness, an option to turn them off would be good.

[Reg Pither]

I like the weather effects, but wish there were more reports on them in the game. If a storm occurs in a sea zone in which I have shipping, I'd like a pop-up report or a listing in the Events to let me know. Similarly for extreme weather conditions in any land provinces in which I have troops. Or even just a weather status showing on the province report page somewhere.

[ericbabe]

Re fog and motion sickness: it should be an easy matter to MOD the graphic files to make the weather graphics appear fainter or to turn them off altogether. (The relevant files are located in Gfx/Hexwar and are called FullFog.pcx, FullRain.pcx, and FullSnow.pcx.)

This is also a fine idea for a game option and I will add it to my list.


Eric