Sandbox battles

[pcelt]

I commented on this topic near the beginning of the game availability---I have now played many sandbox games and feel more sure re my wish.
My criticism at the moment is that all these battles are carefully orchestrated to provide fairly equal sides.Now ,though there is a "fair test" argument in its favour I find that it becomes very repititious and to an extent boring, in knowing in advance that you and your opponent will always be matched. Similar tactics and considerations are called for. I would very much prefer the unknown enemy and encounter where you sometimes find yourself with the more powerful army or unit and need to exploit this to its full --and other occasions where you hold a weaker force and need to find ways of holding out as long as possible or doing as much damage as possible--or even winning against all the odds.And of course there would be some evenly matched encounters.
I would argue that this approach would offer much more variety of action and offer the game much more longevity
I would like to see all the historic corps,divs and brigades in an open and historic sandbox where you might select and meet any of the historic formations (exclude pure arty divs from div battles).
If you wished you could satisfy both needs--have a "matched force" Sandbox (as now)but add an "open historic" sandbox featuring all the historic units for choice and possible opponent.
Would you please consider this development which I think would add more variety of engagement and provide greater game longevity.
Thanks

[norb]

I have to laugh because on TC2M people were always upset that the battle could be so unfair

Try changing the difficulty. Go into the options and choose custom and up the reg strength and other factors and you'll get a tougher battle.

[Cruiser]

I also play numerous sand box games. My experience is that more variety can be injected into the game by using different units and different maps. Choosing different types of battles with respect to attack/defend, use of objectives, etc also injects some differences.

If I crank up the AI's force a bit, things get very tough, indeed. I am still experimenting with alterting the aggressiveness of the AI force.

[pcelt]

Of course you can change some of the variables but you are still predetermining artificially the level of task you will have . There is none of the initial uncertainty of the level of challenge you are going to face and the sort of battle you are going to be in for.This removes much of the early excitement and nervousness of the initial contact.It is I think also historically informative to use and face and brigades and Divs etc that accurately reflect their historic strength at Gettysburg.Battles are not games of chess where equality is inbuilt but messy uncertain situations where you have to try and determine strengths and weaknesses and exploit what you can.I must say that in my view the current sandbox battles are too contrived and are thereby less exciting and gripping than the TCM2 Open Play were and where you did not pre-determine the level of difficulty but had to face an enemy of unknown strength and develop on the hoof tactics to try and cope.
And as I suggested earlier it is not necessarily a matter of either....or- but both formats could presumably be provided so both types of preference could be met.

[Marching Thru Georgia]

Norb:

I think what people are saying here and at TC2M is that it would be nice if it wasn't always one way or always the other. Mix it up. A normal distribution, (in the statistical sense),of the number of opposing forces shouldn't be too hard to implement.

[norb]

Yeah, but if I do that the people that like balanced battles will start complaining. I do what I can, but it's impossible to please everyone. On this game I designed a few things differently that people complained about in 2M, but now other's like it the old way better. That's just the way it is, everyone likes to play differently.

[MrSpkr]

You mean you can't make everyone happy, norb? Whatever will you do?

<snicker>

In all seriousness, you've got a great product here. I enjoy it much more than TC2M (as much because of subject matter and graphics as gameplay), and think you should be proud of your product.

Steve

[Davinci]

Well, I guess that I’m in the minority here because I like the fact that the forces are roughly even. This allows one to concentrate on getting to the best ground possible, and inflicting as many casualties to have the upper hand!

I have yet to win a battle in the Sand Box Thing , so I’m either a very general, or the computer is very good at cheating , I’m hoping that it is the latter!

davinci

[norb]

I assure you there is no cheating. Both sides even get the advantage of the same AI.

[Davinci]

norb wrote:

I assure you there is no cheating. Both sides even get the advantage of the same AI.

Yeah, I know that the game is not cheating, you have always stated that, but it is sort of hard to admit that I'm a very bad general!

When you can't blame yourself - you must blame the computer !

Or at least that works for me, but only for a little while!!!

davinci