Forge of Freedom Screenshots

[Gil R.]

I somehow forgot to post screenshots from Quick Combat. Here's the message announcing a battle in Lexington, which I foolishly thought I could fight in QC rather than detailed battle and prevail. I'm the CSA and am fighting the Union in Lexington, which it controls. This means that the Union gets to play defense.

[Gil R.]

Here's how things look before I've set up my forces. I look sort of outnumbered, so...

[Gil R.]

...I see if there are any reinforcements to call in. They'll show up in the "routed" area, but enter battle soon enough.

[Gil R.]

As I set up my guys, I can click on them to get their vital stats.

[Gil R.]

Here are the results. For weird Windows reasons, I can't take screenshots while combat is going on. This battle, to my amazement, took more than five minutes, and many times it was down to one or two units, but then more units would rally and get back into it. Ultimately, the Union won because of that defensive bonus from playing on home turf.

[Gil R.]

And here are the final tallies. As you can see, I fought a major battle (involving much the same forces) in Frankfort during the same turn. If I have time, I'll post some shots from that too.

[Jonathan Palfrey]

Thanks for the new screenshots!

"Quick Battle/Detailed Battle/Instant Battle"

I don't think I've heard of "Instant Battle" before. I'm also surprised to find that "Quick Battle" can take as much as five minutes and apparently involves the player in some tactical decisions. Perhaps "Instant Battle" is what I expected "Quick Battle" to be...

[Gil R.]

Instant battle chooses a winner instantly. Eric will explain the math at some point, but I know enough to know that it's more based on the sum total quality of each force, whereas quick combat is more based on the qualities of individual units. Usually it's over in less than a minute, but if you have two evenly matched forces and tens of thousands of them, it will take a few minutes.

In my opinion, it's like watching a sporting event when that happens, so I don't find it a problem at all. It can actually be quite dramatic, as one side and then another seems to be on the verge of winning.

[Jonathan Palfrey]

Thanks for the reply. I'm still a bit confused, but no doubt the manual will explain all, once I get the game (real soon now?).

When we play by e-mail, what kind of battle are we using?

Personally, I'm a strategy-game player, and ideally I'd prefer to have no input into the tactical process at all: my business is to send forces into battle and await the result. The conduct of the battle I delegate to my generals.

[Gil R.]

Sounds like you'll always be using instant resolve, though you could also do quick combat and choose "AUTO," which means that the AI plays your side as well as its own. PBEM always uses instant resolve.

[Jonathan Palfrey]

Thanks again. Although my own preference is for instant battles (the simplest to implement), I'm sure that other players will appreciate the wide range of alternative options for resolving battles.

[Gil R.]

You know, I wasn't thinking: the speed of quick combat can be adjusted, so the longer battles need not take 5+ minutes.

[Gil R.]

For literally hundreds of additional screenshots, visit the two PBEM AAR threads posted here, as well as the other AAR threads posted by Hard Sarge. And, I expect, there are many more AAR threads to come...