Is it all about the survival of the fittest?

[redsolo]

I have been reading a few WWII books during the summer, and one thing struck me when I play was games about the era. There is never an objective to get your guys NOT killed. Its either, move there, kill that many enemies, etc. I miss an objective that would be "If you have more than 50% of your force still alive, then you get 10 points". Perhaps, this is a problem more for a bigger war game (not COTA), because the higher commanders/politicians must at times think about the home land opinion, and how they will react to "bad" numbers.

In most games, a "good" commander is to do all objectives, and ignore how much soldiers you have left when the scenario stops. But didnt the big commanders think of the next day? It always feels like there is no tomorrow after the scenario. I really like some of COTAs scenarios, where the obj is not to move in and kill the other army but they need to defend and deny the enemy land.

Or am I just to warm and fuzzy, it is still a war game that Im playing

[Terminus]

You're too fuzzy... The only situation where the preservation of your troops should count would be one where you're withdrawing from the enemy.

[simovitch]

Terminous is right; I designed a Combat Mission scenario where a major portion of your force had to withdraw under a gauntlet of fire and exit off of the freindly edge. Low casualties meant more VP's. It was called Fighting Withdrawal.

There is, I believe, a COTA scenario where this same situation occurs as well.

[MarkShot]

Actually, COTA has lots of scenarios with exit objectives. Additionally, RDOA/HTTR/COTA all feature destroy the enemy objectives. Thus, the OPFOR AI may well have a destroy the enemy objective. Thus, failure to preserve enough of your force can result your ultimate victory being downgraded or an outright loss.

[Arjuna]

Well I think redsolo is right in that in RL any good commander would have one eye on preserving his force. Not too many soldiers will continue over time to follow a leader who is careless about their lives. So maybe we should look at something along the lines of an objective where you get points for preserving x% of your force. It wouldn't be appropriate in every scenario and you wouldn't want to be too heavy handed with it.
 
The real difficulty lies in getting the AI to take it into account. Does it mean it always has a low casualty threshhold for its tasks. This is probably not good initially but maybe so after overall casualties start to rise. Anyway it's food for thought. Thanks. [:)]

[redsolo]

ORIGINAL: Terminus
You're too fuzzy... The only situation where the preservation of your troops should count would be one where you're withdrawing from the enemy.

Exactly! As Ive understood many of the allies scenarios in COTA are to withdraw or deny the enemy, so I guess it could be appriopiate in those scenarios.

[sapper_astro]

When this series gets a linked campaign (or two) then this will really start to shine. Imagine: You are the Commonwealth leader. Each of those battles you will have to fight (the withdrawals through Greece, with the odd counterattack), imagine throwing away men willie nillie? no way.

Hence why I want a campaign. It makes it much more realistic and makes sure that your men are not expendable. That has always been the big problem with single scenarios in my opinion: they exist in a vacuum where there is no tommorow.

The idea of saving X amount of men for points is a nice bandaid and measure for the end game of a campaign, but nothing will substitute for a campaign itself where the player will feel the results of his 'no tommorow' gameplay in the next battle.

Edit: The political hit is also a great idea. Everyone that knows a little history are aware of the problems the loss of so many men in Greece and Crete led to, not to mention the loss of Malaya/Singapore....

Not sure this game, even with a campaign, can really take advantage of this system though. Its probably too small in scope. This kind of thing should be mandatory in larger scale games like GGWAW and HOI2 for sure. The only game on the PC i can remember making use of this was Pacific General as the Americans.

[Bonxa]

Isn't the "destroy enemy" objective enough? Both sides seem to have it in all scenarios I have played. Upping the points values of those will give it greater importance if that's what you want. Giving points to yourself or subtracting them from the enemy is the same thing really.

[JeF]

I agree with Bonxa. Now that we have Exit objectives as well : you have to preserve your forces to be able to exit sufficiently. I don't think there is the need to add something more.

If the scenario designer maximizes the points in the Destroy and Exit objectives, the emphasis is then more on preserving your forces than occupying some locations. Have a look at "First Clean Break" for example.

JeF.

[Banquet]

I think the exit tasks are a great way to encourage you to preserve your force.


Some of the scenario's have re-inforcement options that you can set to assume more or less forces were able to exit from another scenario. So you can almost play them like a mini campaign where, if you're able to exit more or less men than required, you can now play the other scenario and set your re-inforcement levels to higher or lower as appropriate.

[redsolo]

ORIGINAL: Banquet
I think the exit tasks are a great way to encourage you to preserve your force.

You are all right, since Ive not played that many scenarios, I had missed that exit objs had "number of men/arms exited". So literaly, COTA has such functionality. This game grows on me

[Pergite!]

ORIGINAL: Arjuna

Well I think redsolo is right in that in RL any good commander would have one eye on preserving his force. Not too many soldiers will continue over time to follow a leader who is careless about their lives. So maybe we should look at something along the lines of an objective where you get points for preserving x% of your force. It wouldn't be appropriate in every scenario and you wouldn't want to be too heavy handed with it.

The real difficulty lies in getting the AI to take it into account. Does it mean it always has a low casualty threshhold for its tasks. This is probably not good initially but maybe so after overall casualties start to rise. Anyway it's food for thought. Thanks. [:)]

That is why I like campaigns.
Going "all in" will probably win you a victory and complete your current objective, but then what? To what use are your decimated units to any further actions?

Phyrric victories should never count as a succes IMHO.