Do you prefer Battle or Campaign Games?

[IainMcNeil]

All of our games up to now have been a combination of a battle engine and a campaign engine. Putting aside the fact we're creating two games which doubles the work load what are your thoughts on games that do this?

I guess anyone on these forums is probably a fan of this type of game, or you wouldn't be here, so its probably not the best place to ask

Lets give it a try anyway. Do you prefer games that cover only battles, only campaigns or mix the two.

E.g. a battle only game would be Legion Arena or Civil War Bull Run
A campaign only game would be Civilization or Europa Universalis
A combined game would be Spartan or Total War

The advantage the combined game has is that it is a bigger experience. The advantage of the specialist games is that they are more focussed (some people dont like battles, or the strategy layer, or they don't like the style of one aspect of the game).

We'd be interested in hearing your thoughts & counting your votes! Don't forget we're talking styles of games & not about these specific games.

[anguille]

I voted both. I do enjoy all thee types however but the combination makes it more complete.

Battle only: there are some game where there is only battle that i enjoy (Celtic Kings, Legion Arena). I especially like to do historical battles...rewritte history. Sometimes however these games are too fast for me. I like it when i have enough time to plan like in Legion Arena.

Strategy only: These are great (EU2, HOI or CK) as they allow to give the "big picture". I don't like CIV3 or GalCiv too much however as i don't feel i have enough control on my battles...seems too much like random. If i lose i want it to be my fault.

Both: I like to rewrite history so the big picture is important and like to control the battles. (Spartan, Knights of Honor or Master of Orion)

[efthimios]

I voted for both, however my choice depends on the game itself. I live Civ very much but I wouldn't like it with battles like Spartan. I like very much GalCiv, but also Star Trek Birth of the Federation. The latter has battles that you can choose to fight. Actually the way that the battles in BOTF are fought is my favourite way though none else is doing it

Perhaps if you (anyone) wants to make a game where the focus is the grand strategy, you could do it similarly to Reach for the stars (the 1999 not the 80s game) , and not as detailed as in Spartan. If nothing else it takes far more time if you have lots of battles. There are of course times when fighting battles is just not right for a game.

[IainMcNeil]

Sorry - I dont know how battles are handled in any of those games so you'll have to let us know what you mean!

[therlun]

i would like battles (alone and in combined games), IF someone managed to program a decent AI that is able to be an opponent.

Rome TW is said to be soooo great, but the AI is a nightmare, making the battles a joke.
what fun is there spanking the comp with a army a three times smaller then his, over and over AND OVER again?

spartan and legion benefit from a relatively simple system, which does not need much of an AI to be fun.
however this also limits the options of the player...

[efthimios]

In BOTF, when there is a battle you receive a question if you want to fight it yourself or automate it (or open hailing frequences). If you choose to fight it you get the screen with both the fleets. Or more than 2 actualy. If one of the sides has only cloaked ships, and they are cloaked, then they can shoot first without risk of getting hit before they do so. Let's say that is not the case. Every admiral (ie you, and the AI) gives orders to his fleet, either by choosing a type of ships (like Strike cruisers) or individual ships, and then choosing target and way to attack or move or retreat or open hailing frequencies or etc. If for whatever reason you don't feel like giving orders (don't know why since it can be done so quickly!) you can just either click turn, or click on auto in both cases the AI will handle the remaining or all of your forces that have no orders from you. Anyhow, when you are ready you click end turn. The battle starts, for about 8-15 sec or so the ships fight/move/etc according to your orders in real time. Then they stop, and you can give further orders. It goes on till the end of the battle, which rarely lasts more than 5 or so turns. It is like Combat Mission (though created first of course..I think) but it doesn't suck as CM does. (personal opinion)

The way that Reach For The Stars works (BTW I strongly suggest to try the demo for it which can be easily found) is this.
When you have a battle you can see both fleets at a distance. Zoom level depending on their distance. You get options change the formation of the whole fleet. Echelon, Line etc. You can also give orders to what distance to the enemy they should try to be, close, medium, far. Or you can give orders to withdraw (try that is) or withdraw with leaving your destroyers covering the rest of the fleet. That is it. The thing is that though it is very simple the way orders are given (each turn can be from 2 to 4 clicks away including the end turn button and the orders to your fleet) the battles are not paper sciscors (sp?) rock but quite complex. It is fun and quick and a possible source of ideas. I strongly suggest to try the demo if you are interested, or even buy a copy for 10 GBP (download) from the Matrixgames site who apparently have bought the rights of the game and also updated it with a new patch. Oooor, do that and buy me a copy because I can't find mine anywhere. OK, the last is a bit too much, but I strongly suggest trying the demo .

I think a Spartan-like game could use a similar system to have quick battles with depth and manage to have the player focus on the grand strategy more.
Now, I shut up.

[Redpossum]

Huh!

And here my one significant complaint with Spartan/GoT is the lack of tactical control!

I want to be able to control my units in more detail, and during the course of the battle, not just at the start

How on earth do you cover one of Hannibal's tactical surprises with the current system? You know what I mean; he would hide that Numidian cavalry of his somewhere on the battlefield, then have them spring out and surprise the Romans when a signal was given...

[ste]

I like stuff where that is story driven like Legion Arena is and there are battles you need to complete in order to progress. Also I like the option to have one off random battles, its always fun if your stuck @ a point in the campaign or you just want to piss about

[anguille]

I've been thinking again about this during the weekend:

A good campaign only game:

I came to the conclusion (this is what would suit me best) that a campaign only game is best in RTS (slow). Why? because of the battles.

CIV 3 or GalCiv for instance: these turn-based games are great however, due to the turn-based aspect and the fact that there is not a "battle engine" battles are just a matter of dices -> you move your piece and you win or lose. At least i would like to create armies like in Spartan where i can form the army and adapt it.

If i play Spartan campaign only, while i can create my armies and place them wherever i want, once i launch the battle (automatic) i either lose the entire army or the AI.

The way it's handled in EU2 of Knights of Honor (which i recommend to try the demo) is much better. Two armies meet and you can see how the battle is going on. In the end you can decide to retreat. What's great about KoH is also the fact that the Generals gain in experience and you can give them special qualities (very much like in Arena). So you can have an army led by a general specialized in Defense, another in Offense....

It would be great in a campaign only game also to have choke-points. Places where you can order your army to build a fortress which you would then have to send food or so. This army could control a pass or so and would then have to be defeated so that the enemy army could enter your territory. Also the creation of roads and the like. Generally, a campaign only game would need to be slighlty more complex. Also a deeper Diplomacy...

just some thoughs.

My rank of preferences:

1. Combination (Spartan, KoH, MOO2..)
2. Campaign only (EU2)
3. Battles only (also due to the fact that these game request much higher profiles from the computer to run smoothly)
4. Campaign only with "dice" battles (CIV3 or GalCiv ...which are still very fun)

[duncan]

My vote goes for the mixed game


1.) Combination of the 2 (RTW, Spartan, Lords Of The Realm II)
2.) "Slow" RTS (EU2 like, KoH, though I didn't like it very much it had good ideas...)
3.) Turn Based (Civ, Alpha Centauri, age of Wonders)
4.) Tactical Battles (Legion Arena ?????)

...


254.) RTSs (Age of Empires, BFME,...)


For no special reasons

[honvedseg]

My answer is yes, I like them.

Actually, the combination of a strategic TB game, with a tactical module to resolve battles, is probably my favorite combination (CoW/Spartan or MOO2). The reverse combo, where the campaign is merely used to generate battles, can also be decent if properly implemented. Having a set of battles tied together by a storyline which has little actual effect on the battles usually annoys me by insulting my intelligence, because I probably would have gone out of my way to avoid just such a situation. A pure TB strategy game can be very good, but isn't all that exciting (Civ), while a battle-only game is either TB (like Panzer General), or RTS (Warcraft, etc.), either type of which I can play a few times, but quickly get tired of.

My biggest gripe with most purely TB strategic/tactical games is that they resolve most encounters in an all-or-nothing manner, either you win or you lose your entire force/unit. I have never had good results with purely random outcomes in any form, as the other members of the Reading Area Wargamers group (Reading, PA, USA) can attest to from my less-than-stellar die-rolling. GoT/Spartan/CoW has the same all-or-nothing drawback, but at least you can control the circumstances.

I despise the generic mouse-race RTS games where the programmers make up for the lack of acceptable AI by having everything happen on oposite ends of the map, forcing you to scroll back and forth. While you could handle either situation with pathetic ease, you need to spend 75% of your time chasing around the map instead of dealing with the threats.

[malthaussen]

Battles should have a context, which is why I (and so many others, presumably) prefer the combination form. A purely strategic game, with more-or-less abstract (and more-or-less random) battle results, can get frustrating, while pure tactical simulations eventually leave me asking "what's the point?" And the amount of work that usually goes into creating a specific battle with an editor is not often repaid by playing the result.

One way to get around the long development time (and add to revenues) would be to create each component as a separate, stand-alone game that can be linked with others. So we'd have a strategic game, a land tactical game, and a naval game. Provided all three were designed with compatibility in mind, such a process might work okay -- and one could always choose only those parts of the whole he wants, if he doesn't have the cash to buy all of them.

-- Mal

[Redpossum]

I'd say that poll produced some damned unequivocal results!

93%, holy vox populi, Batman!

[dhanegan]

Actually, my favorite combined strategy + battle computer games have had turn based tactical battles with units moving around on hex or square grids. Oddly, the two best examples of this genre that I have run across have been fantasy games: Sword of Aragon and Master of Magic. I would like to see more of this sort of game developed for historical settings.

I am an old school gamer, I have never really been able to appreciate the modern trend of real-time games. I like to take the time to plan and optimize before moving my units around. Grid based games seem to allow for more elegant optimization than gridless ones. Gridless real time games with limited command control, which pretty much describes the whole slitherine line, always seem to result in big confused brawls in the middle of the map. This may be a historically accurate portrayal of ancient battles, but it feels messy and repetitive.

Sword of Aragon is particulary cool because once you recruit men into a unit you actually get to build them with any combination of weapons, armor, shields, and mounts you please. None of this being stuck with what the graphics team thought would look cool thrown together with their favorite spiffy uniform design. The matrix Aragon's game engine uses to decide which weapons and shields are usable together, and how the damage from multiple melee weopons stack, is really quite clever. You can recruit as many or few men into a unit as you want, to a maximum of what will fill a single hex's stacking limit. There are seperate "hero" type leaders, who use the same system to equip themselves with whatever combination of equipment they like.

Sword of Aragon may sound wonderfuly sophisticated, and it is in its own way, but it is actually a DOS game designed for 8 bit computers, nearly 20 years old and unfortunately very difficult to obtain. This was a game from the glory days of computer gaming, when the primitive machines supported pitiful graphic displays, so game developers concentrated on developing actual logic and gameplay features rather than spending the vast bulk of their resources developing spiffy graphics that look really cool for the 10 minutes it takes to become bored with them and add nothing to a game's strategic decision making...

grumble, grumble, grumble, jeez I'm really beginning to show my age

[honvedseg]

As for TB tactical games, Panzer General (also DOS-based) was a fine example. It allowed you to recruit units to suit your own style of play and carry them forward to the next battle, and even upgrade them within the same unit functional category (Infantry, armor, artillery, etc.) as new technology was introduced. The unrealistic aspect was that every scenario had a turn limit to capture certain objectives, forcing you onto the offensive in every last scenario, even when you were in a purely defensive situation: "hold the besieged city hex at all costs, but also capture those other three hexes way back in enemy territory in 16 turns or less, or you lose". The scenario objectives didn't conform to the historical situation.

Civ, on the other hand, had you build up an empire and develop technological "breakthroughs" which suddenly gave you access to totally new military units. Your old units quickly became useless, and were either disbanded or thrown into a battle as cannon-fodder to dispose of them. Units fought in single-file, with the top unit of your battle group facing off in a random roll-off against the top unit in the opposing stack. Not even remotely realistic, and absolutely no control over the combat.

The best attempt I had seen up until the Slitherine games was "Caesar II", which was a city sim, not an empire builder, but included a larger regional map for troop movements and roads, etc., plus a tactical module which was at least acceptable. Problem is, there were only a couple of battles in each of the city scenarios, so you spent hours building up your city and army just for one quick battle.

[dhanegan]

Panzer General was a gem. I played the daylights out of it and eventually bought 6 different sequels.