Why can't we have AI controlled HQs?

[Nuklearius]

One of my biggest problems with the War of the East series is the lack of automation. I truly enjoy the granularity of the combat simulation and the simulation of every single unit that existed but I do not want to personally move them all every single turn.
The Soviets in this game would make for a very interesting experience in singleplayer, but being forced to move 700 counters around per turn, in particular when it's obvious 2:1 head on attacks against a weakened enemy during blizzard is quite boring. With the Axis it's the same but they don't have to deal with the useless rifle brigades.
Not only is it often boring, it's also immersion breaking and lowers the difficulty. Real high command only ever gave orders to Army-Groups/Fronts down to Corps. But the game forces me to micro manage every single division/brigade.
I very much liked the approach Hearts of Iron 3 took, you could play that game microing single brigades, but you could also automate everything from Corps to High Command (drawing on the map to gave them orders/objectives), and the AI was fairly competent.
So other games had that functionality in 2009, but in War in the East 2 even though commanders and their capabilities are accurately tracked, I'm not allowed to give their HQs any autonomy in decision making.
And that forced micro can be quite exhausting, I'd argue in singleplayer most games are abandoned before 1943 not because they are too difficult, but simply because it's too exhausting and time consuming to see them through after the hot phases of 1941 and 1942 are done.

As for difficulty, one of my favorite ways to increase difficulty in games like Strategic Command is to let the AI run most countries while you decide to only play as Britain, or only as Japan. Similarily I'd think it were great if you could only play as Army Group South or only as a single Panzer Army, trying to help the overall front develop. Not only makes this for a much more challenging gameplay without giving the AI silly boni, it also ensures that games will go on for longer and won't be decided by 1943.

[Wiedrock]

With the Axis it's the same but they don't have to deal with the useless rifle brigades.

You can convert Brigades into SUs.
You also can automate SU management, if not done already.

but being forced to move 700 counters around per turn,

You can move the 3 Units in a Hex simultaneously. When order is given, press spacebar to stop movement-simulation.

The Soviets in this game would make for a very interesting experience in singleplayer, but being forced to move 700 counters around per turn

The Devs have decided to make the later Soviet corps into one unit to be moved around. They will contain 3 Rifle Divisions each (for each Rifle Corps).

Not only is it often boring, it's also immersion breaking and lowers the difficulty. Real high command only ever gave orders to Army-Groups/Fronts down to Corps. But the game forces me to micro manage every single division/brigade.

Soviet immersion is to not look at CVs in the tooltips.

You can not only buff the enemy AI, you can also nerf yourself in the game options.

[MarkShot]

I suspect many of you are not junior gamers as this niche tends to be an older demographic.

So, I will ask do you guys remember going back to early to mid 90s? The best you could get for games like flight simulators were fast frame buffer cards (at that time displays, CRTs, tended to be less resolution locked or refresh locked).

And then, 3D add-in cards where introduced which accelerated some graphics, but mainly FXAA. They generally could improve any game as they worked by intercepting the video signal and improving the output.

We are will soon be there not for just WITE2, but all PC games. Human level adversaries in games that support some form of MP or hot seating. The major innovation that DeepSeek just brought to the AI field is RL (reinforcement learning) where there is a precise win:loss evaluation and reward. When this type of logic is applied to AI it learns to reason as an emergent property (at relatively low cost versus what US big tech has spent).

Also, to be aware of is new computer agents which can operate your PC as you do via vision, sound, mouse, and keyboard.

So what does this mean for us as gamers?

* Real AI that can manifest either assistant or adversary in games that was never build for such AI (like games which were never built to be anti-aliased). But these AIs can learn via play via reinforcement learning.

* Modalities. AI already can understand image and sound, and operate keyboards and mice. Thus, an AI could be that Army HQ you give an order to.

* You may say that many games which don't hot seat, pbem, MP will not be able to offer "true" AI opponents. At the same time as the above is happening, AI is writing very good computer code. Once upon a time, patching a program did not mean replacing game files, it meant changing the machine instructions in the executable. AIs which can code can reverse engineer and add backdoors for themselves to power game logic which was never intended to call out to an external entity.

So, my prediction: We are 3-5 years away where many of the classic games we have loved can become enable with truly advanced AI opponents and AI assistants that will revolutionize legacy gaming like never before. And you may say who wants to play RT1 (Railroad Tycoon 1) in CGA (320x200 graphics)? Well, upscaling and AI rendering is already becoming common. So, there is no reason that the classic games from Sid Meier of the mid 90s need to look hideous.

Thus, we may one day witness a renaissance in retro PC gaming that easily gives AAA Studios a run for their money.

PS: My apologies if I looked a little beyond WITE2 HQs and micro. Man, if I wasn't old and burned out would I love building a small device you attach via USB or ethernet which upgrades your retro games to post-modern visuals and play.

[RKhan]

I’ll speak up for the older crowd.

Anyone remember Squad Leader and War in Flames? The hard core among us always got into the details and had learn tomes full of rules besides. Which led to fierce arguments about those rules.

I like WITE2 because I can get the detail and control without the rule arguments and the setup and tear down are so much easier ( though the fully set up War in Flames was a sight to behold)

There is a whole genre of RTS and simplified tactical games out there. WITE 2 is a niche game for the a different market. I’m glad they didn’t try to simplify it too much. There are 40 other games in my Steam library when I want that.

Respectfully

RKhan

[Zovs]

One of my biggest problems with the War of the East series is the lack of automation. I truly enjoy the granularity of the combat simulation and the simulation of every single unit that existed but I do not want to personally move them all every single turn.
The Soviets in this game would make for a very interesting experience in singleplayer, but being forced to move 700 counters around per turn, in particular when it's obvious 2:1 head on attacks against a weakened enemy during blizzard is quite boring. With the Axis it's the same but they don't have to deal with the useless rifle brigades.
Not only is it often boring, it's also immersion breaking and lowers the difficulty. Real high command only ever gave orders to Army-Groups/Fronts down to Corps. But the game forces me to micro manage every single division/brigade.
I very much liked the approach Hearts of Iron 3 took, you could play that game microing single brigades, but you could also automate everything from Corps to High Command (drawing on the map to gave them orders/objectives), and the AI was fairly competent.
So other games had that functionality in 2009, but in War in the East 2 even though commanders and their capabilities are accurately tracked, I'm not allowed to give their HQs any autonomy in decision making.
And that forced micro can be quite exhausting, I'd argue in singleplayer most games are abandoned before 1943 not because they are too difficult, but simply because it's too exhausting and time consuming to see them through after the hot phases of 1941 and 1942 are done.

As for difficulty, one of my favorite ways to increase difficulty in games like Strategic Command is to let the AI run most countries while you decide to only play as Britain, or only as Japan. Similarily I'd think it were great if you could only play as Army Group South or only as a single Panzer Army, trying to help the overall front develop. Not only makes this for a much more challenging gameplay without giving the AI silly boni, it also ensures that games will go on for longer and won't be decided by 1943.

Sorry I take the complete opposite view, I don't want nor need any automation help from the AI in this game and I don't mind moving 1000 counters per turn and micromanaging all the support units its part of the game I love. Don't need nor want automation here.

[HansBolter]

I'm with Zovs on this one.

The more micromanagement the better.

The OP would run away screaming if he ever encountered a game of Fire in the East/Scorched Earth.

[Zovs]

I'm with Zovs on this one.

The more micromanagement the better.

The OP would run away screaming if he ever encountered a game of Fire in the East/Scorched Earth.

Now that is funny!

Here is a screenshot of one of the vassal modules:

[HansBolter]

I gave Vassal try well over a decade ago and had such a horrible experience I just gave up and never went back.

I downloaded Avalon Hill's Air Assault on Crete with the Malta bonus game. The Malta mini game was one of my all time favorites.

The Vassal version of the game came with absolutely no instructions on how to deploy units to the map for the game start, no instructions on how to move units or execute attacks.

All I could do with it was stare at the map on the screen.

Maybe I'll pay another visit to that site and see if things operate better there than they did a decade ago.

[Zovs]

I gave Vassal try well over a decade ago and had such a horrible experience I just gave up and never went back.

I downloaded Avalon Hill's Air Assault on Crete with the Malta bonus game. The Malta mini game was one of my all time favorites.

The Vassal version of the game came with absolutely no instructions on how to deploy units to the map for the game start, no instructions on how to move units or execute attacks.

All I could do with it was stare at the map on the screen.

Maybe I'll pay another visit to that site and see if things operate better there than they did a decade ago.

VASSAL is basically a blank canvas, the designer puts in a map and counters and a few other items, but its up to the player (or players) to implement the rules of a game and move the pieces and conduct any of the particular games function.

It does take some getting used to, if your used to a PC enforcing the games rules and mechanics. VASSAL is just like a board wargame but instead of you placing the map on a table and punching out the counters and reading the rules, you just read the rules, and use VASSAL to open the map and then you place the counters exactly where you want them to go, and then you move them or fight with them much like if you were playing a face to face table top game.

VASSAL is just a record keeping device if you will.

There should be some tutorials and or videos on how to use them. I suggest a small easy game (something like SPI's Napoleon at Waterloo, or AH's Afrika Korps) to get use to how to use VASSAL.

Just my suggestions. I have been using VASSAL for 25+ years.

[HansBolter]

So are you saying it's up to the player to write the computer code that will make the units deploy, move and attack?

My problem was that there was no way to figure out what mouse clicks, or keystrokes or combination thereof would cause a unit in a deployment pool to deploy to the map, or a unit on the map to execute a move or execute an attack.

I realize you are not implying that the player has to write code, but how else is the player supposed to make things happen in the game when the game comes with no explanation of how to do any if these things?

[Zovs]

So are you saying it's up to the player to write the computer code that will make the units deploy, move and attack?

My problem was that there was no way to figure out what mouse clicks, or keystrokes or combination thereof would cause a unit in a deployment pool to deploy to the map, or a unit on the map to execute a move or execute an attack.

I realize you are not implying that the player has to write code, but how else is the player supposed to make things happen in the game when the game comes with no explanation of how to do any if these things?

No, someone creates a VASSAL module, they generally add a png/or jpg map and either use the built in counter creator or use images to create the counters. VASSAL does not interpret any rules of any game. That is up to the players playing the game much like if they opened up a physical box of a game, laid out the map, and punched out the counters and read the rules and setup the game and started playing it.

VASSAL allows this same functionality, expect your using VASSAL in lieu of the physical components. The "mouse" clicks are pretty straight forward. In fact there are a few modules that have "tutorials" built into them, so you can "page" through the log file.

If your really interested in learning VASSAL you have my email and I could go into more details or point you to some good resources.

Don