Antares -First impressions

[Antares]

I played a couple of scenarios from the tutorial campaign, trying to approach this from a newcomer's perspective (though I'm quite familiar with the PG series):

Got a decisive victory in training scenarios 1 and 2 (6/10 and 8/14 turns respectively). An idea here might be to have a breakdown of the various thresholds for victory (e.g. decisive, tactical, marginal) presented to the player at the start of each battle (a la PGII). The counterargument, I guess, might be that by not knowing how many turns you have left for that coveted decisive victory adds to the suspense -but knowing that did not subtract from my experience either with PGII or Fantasy Wars/Elven Legacy, for example.

I do like the idea of having to pay prestige for bringing units back up to full strength: it adds weight to the decisions to launch costly/desperate attacks in the previous scenario. The mouseover tab for "regular" and "elite" replacements is a bit "messy" as it seems to include font tags (<b> </b> /font tags?) Explaining the drop in experience when opting for regular replacements is also a useful bit of info which I liked.

On a related note, is it possible to see a numerical representation of experience, or is that info available only in the form of stars?

In the second scenario, the (quite useful) briefing states that 2 core unit slots have been made available: yet, it is impossible to buy new units before placing your existing ones (purchase button is grayed out): I don't think it's clear whether this is because newly purchased units (should) become available only once the existing core units have been placed or because there weren't enough placement hexes during the initial deployment (there were 5, as many as the existing core units -I think it may be the former, but perhaps mousing over the purchase button could include that info).

Speaking of mousing over icons, when I moused over the "weather" and "forecast" icons, the windows would flicker, unlike the info windows when mousing over the other icons.

Also, I think it would be useful to include a marker for infantry/artillery/antitank units that have some form of transportation -as far as I can see, that info is only found indirectly in the unit info, when mousing over a unit (fuel value in infantry units other than 0, for example). A transportation icon would save time sorting out units, especially in larger armies and later scenarios.

In the second scenario, both the auxiliary recon unit and a second one I purchased for my core force would have their "undo move" button grayed out once I moved them, even in cases where no new enemy unit had been spotted. The "undo move" button worked properly for the other units (aux and core).

Playing in "normal" difficulty, I rushed a trucked unit north and was ambushed by a blue unit (half strength). The result of the ambush and the subsequent attack on the mounted unit in the AI turn was a loss of 3 strength points (1 for the ambush, 2 for the attack) which I felt was too lenient, even for that level of difficulty. Also, I felt that the artillery pieces were a bit underpowered, compared to the grenadier units (1 strength point projected damage against the entrenched enemy, compared to 5 for the grenadiers -again, it may be the difficulty level -I'll have to note more carefully the various unit stats to comment more precisely).

So, to recap and answer the questions accompanying the invitation email:

First impressions are good; the game engine seems solid, the graphics are crisp, game run without quite smoothly so far. No performance issues.

The UI is good, reminiscent of PG (of course that may affect my judgment as to the intuitiveness of the UI). Perhaps the "buy unit" and "toggle air/ground" could be made larger. Overall, the right-hand side of the screen sometimes felt a bit "empty" (perhaps there's too much "room" for the various buttons).

I like the strategic map, for a quick overview of the battlefield; I have some reservations about the minimap, seems too small. Also, perhaps the Axis units could have a sharper color depicting them on the minimap (the current shade of gray seems too dull). The "gold" border of the core units is not always clear to spot, perhaps a sharper shade would help there -but I'll try adjusting my screen brightness, see if that helps).

edit: it would seem that the "extra" letters in the replacement buttons are indeed font tags, I turned most of my post into bold fonts, sorry about that.

[IainMcNeil]

Thanks for the feedback. Some of these are already on the list but good to know what people are looking for.

[Antares]

A few more thoughts, this time from the 1939 campaign, on "tough" difficulty:

There is a marked improvement in the behavior of the AI; despite the fact that the Axis side is decidedly stronger, the Polish (AI) side used it's artillery pieces to some effect and tried to make the best of the rather average air units (both the bomber and the fighter). Also, the AI avoids suicidal attacks, which is also good.

The minimap seems clearer now (I still find it smallish, but I'm getting used to it), the buttons for performing the most common orders (resupply, reinforce etc.) are clear as well. The graphics are quite good and detailed (I was admiring the details on the early German tanks, beautiful), adds to the charm of the game -it feels like placing miniatures on a tabletop, which is definitely good in my book.

Now, I may be overly influenced by my memories of the original PG, but I think that the "jump" in complexity from Fall Weiss to Operation Weserübung is even more marked compared to the original. So it might be worth considering either splitting Poland into two scenarios, with the first one acting as an introduction to combined arms tactics (before introducing air units, heavier tanks, specialized infantry) or perhaps include a scenario from the Spanish civil war -something to "ease" new players into the game.

Right now I feel that there's too much equipment available right from the start (for example, regular infantry are obsolete from the word go, with mountain troops, pioneers and bridging pioneers up for grabs, same with artillery and anti-aircraft) which deducts, imo, from the sense of "progression" and "achievement" (in unlocking better equipment). Now, the better units are prohibitively expensive (at least if one would attempt to fill all 4 core unit slots -which, again, is too much for the first scenario of the earliest campaign). I have limited knowledge of the precise availability of the various equipment in early stages of the war, but it seems odd that in a scenario where your tanks are little more than peashooters, you'd get the option to field that monster 280mm k5 -in terms of gaming balance.

Also, it might be useful to have some way of showing that a unit has put up "rugged defense". When my infantry, despite a 3/4 prediction of losses, ended up suffering 1/6 (ouch) losses from the defenders, I knew what had happened from PG, but I think it would not be clear to a new player.

So, to recap: slightly smaller core force in early scenarios, introduction of a small scenario with fewer units as a mini-tutorial, more gradual introduction of equipment.

[Rudankort]

On a related note, is it possible to see a numerical representation of experience, or is that info available only in the form of stars?

Alt+click a unit, and you will get more details on it, including experience.

Playing in "normal" difficulty, I rushed a trucked unit north and was ambushed by a blue unit (half strength). The result of the ambush and the subsequent attack on the mounted unit in the AI turn was a loss of 3 strength points (1 for the ambush, 2 for the attack) which I felt was too lenient, even for that level of difficulty. Also, I felt that the artillery pieces were a bit underpowered, compared to the grenadier units (1 strength point projected damage against the entrenched enemy, compared to 5 for the grenadiers -again, it may be the difficulty level -I'll have to note more carefully the various unit stats to comment more precisely).

In PzC artillery units do not kill a lot, but they cause lasting suppression which means enemy unit is incapable to fight and becomes an easy target for your ground troops. As for small damage you get, this is not because of the difficulty level, but because it is a tutorial, and we did not want the player to be punished too hard. That's why we placed an ambush on the road, but reduced the strength of the enemy unit to make it less deadly.

The UI is good, reminiscent of PG (of course that may affect my judgment as to the intuitiveness of the UI). Perhaps the "buy unit" and "toggle air/ground" could be made larger. Overall, the right-hand side of the screen sometimes felt a bit "empty" (perhaps there's too much "room" for the various buttons).

What screen resolution do you have btw?

[Antares]

Thank you for the (alt+click) tip, that is useful. By the way, from what I've seen, the stars depicting experience do "fill" and show up when mousing over a unit, but they do not appear on the unit card during deployment, for example. I'm sure other testers will have mentioned it and you're well aware of that, just felt that I should point it out, since I've noticed it. The absence of stars and the flickering of the text windows when mousing over weather and forecast are the only "imperfections" I've noticed so far (tutorial campaign and 1939 campaign) and these are minor.

I've also noticed the effect of artillery (few kills, lots of suppression), I like the way it works, though I'm not sure whether the numbers add up when mousing over the targeted unit (after suppressing the defenders and attacking with grenadiers, for example, who inflict several kills, the suppression number doesn't seem to go down, but that observation is from memory, I'll have to take a screenshot before coming back to that).

As far as the "emptiness" of the UI, I was referring more to the lower half of the right hand side (basically, I fell I'm still not used to the minimap, that's what made me make that remark). I'm playing in 1280-1024, overall I'm very pleased with the graphics, so again it might have been more of an impression than actual criticism, but again I'll try taking a screenshot to be more specific next time.

[Rudankort]

Thank you for the (alt+click) tip, that is useful. By the way, from what I've seen, the stars depicting experience do "fill" and show up when mousing over a unit, but they do not appear on the unit card during deployment, for example. I'm sure other testers will have mentioned it and you're well aware of that, just felt that I should point it out, since I've noticed it. The absence of stars and the flickering of the text windows when mousing over weather and forecast are the only "imperfections" I've noticed so far (tutorial campaign and 1939 campaign) and these are minor.

Yeah, both issues confirmed and will be fixed.

I've also noticed the effect of artillery (few kills, lots of suppression), I like the way it works, though I'm not sure whether the numbers add up when mousing over the targeted unit (after suppressing the defenders and attacking with grenadiers, for example, who inflict several kills, the suppression number doesn't seem to go down, but that observation is from memory, I'll have to take a screenshot before coming back to that).

Your observation is correct, but this will likely change in the next update: accumulated lasting suppression will go away after a hand-to-hand attack.

As far as the "emptiness" of the UI, I was referring more to the lower half of the right hand side (basically, I fell I'm still not used to the minimap, that's what made me make that remark). I'm playing in 1280-1024, overall I'm very pleased with the graphics, so again it might have been more of an impression than actual criticism, but again I'll try taking a screenshot to be more specific next time.

I think I know what you mean by "emptiness", thx for feedback on this.