Whats your favorite Campaign style?

[Locarnus]

Hello,

I m curious whats your favorite Campaign style.

1. The current (vanilla) campaign is very dynamic, but also relatively short if you get decisive victories.

2. In the matrix forum the suggestion was made, to add a historical campaign path.
So no matter how good you are, the historical WWII is replayed. You would see the historical battles, while ahistorical ones (Sealion, US) would be left out.

3. Then there is the Panzer General like campaign.
In the original you were able to do Sealion and US, while still fighting a long campaign.
I created a campaign path where something similar is done for Panzercorps.
You find the thread in the matrix modding forum and DOWNLOAD the campaign path from there as well:
http://www.matrixgames.com/forums/tm.asp?m=2865453

If you have another idea of campaign style, please post and explain it as well.

What pros and cons do you see for the campaign styles? Please elaborate.

edit: hm, seems like the matrix forum was down, so I ll insert the PanzerGeneral like campaign path here as well:

[Kerensky]

Can you add a poll option for 'other (please explain)'?

[Locarnus]

Sorry, I tried, but it seams like this board does not support editing polls.

I can only edit my post content.

[Kerensky]

I guess you can only edit poll options if there are no poll votes already in place.
No problem then.

[AgentX]

@Locarnus, I like the idea of a longer campaign and being able to play more of the maps. However, I noticed one problem with your Campaign Tree. If you knock out Britain in Sealion '42, how are the Americans able to launch the Overlord offensive? Where would their base of operations be? Maybe, you should have the Sealion map shifted to '44 and undertake it after Overlord. Then, after the defeat of the British on Sealion '44, then the campaign would continue with the US maps.

[Locarnus]

Yes, sorry.
The matrix site was down, there I wrote an explanation:

Of course to make sense, the story has to be adjusted.
Like when you take Moscow and perform Sealion, then somewhere it should say eg "although your operation was succesfull, the navy was unable to hold off the Royal Navy and US Navy, supply lines are breaking down, so we had to retreat to avoid being trapped there."

The same would hold for Moscow, that you get pushed out again while spending resources for Sealion or achieving only a marginal victory at Moscow.
But as of now, I just edited the campaign path.
I doubt that I will try to find out all the prestige balancing and write the story correctly all by myself since I rather just restrict myself with the prestige and I know the story anyways, so contributions are very welcome.
There has also to be a Sealion after Overlord, before US, but I just dont have the time to modify the scenario accordingly, so "you" were just ill at that time and a fellow general took over for you ...

edit: Also I considered branching off earlier (eg Sealion 40), but that would have complicated the campaign tree a lot and my first goal was to include nearly all the scenarios and make it somehow playable.
At the moment the first real decision is at Kursk, as you can see it gets complicated from there on...

Note that you can play nearly all scenarios with 2 runs.
One decisive run (all the left ones including US) and one losing run (all scenarios on the right) - just restrict yourself to marginal victories all the way except for Italy and Overlord. So you only miss 2 different constellations of Germany under attack.

[texican]

I like semi-historical branching campaigns. So the suggestion works for me, especially since Bagration can lead directly to Ardennes.

I also would like "END" to be removed and replaced with you being pulled out of command for a few years (like Guderian was), then pulled back in during 1945 or something.

[Locarnus]

I like semi-historical branching campaigns. So the suggestion works for me, especially since Bagration can lead directly to Ardennes.

I also would like "END" to be removed and replaced with you being pulled out of command for a few years (like Guderian was), then pulled back in during 1945 or something.

As with the early Sealion and attack on Moscow it would lead to too much branching early on, resulting in lots of work.

By the way, its more than a suggestion, its actually a "playable" campaign, just follow the link and download the alternate campaign file (14KB)

edit: Also the 3 "Victory" endpoints in the campaign tree are actually "END"s right now, I just named them differently in the graphic to demonstrate that you did not lose when reaching such a point.

[Rudankort]

Frankly I still miss the point of this poll. You contrast PzC campaign to PG campaign.

But what you say about PzC campaign - "dynamic, but also very short if you get decisive victories" - is true for PG as well (Sea Lion - Early Moscow - Washington, major victories quickly bring the campaign to its end). In fact, in this case campaign path will be very similar in PG and PzC, but PzC still has 2 extra scenarios in USA.

And what you say about PG campaign - "In the original you were able to do Sealion and US, while still fighting a long campaign" - holds true for PzC too. In PG you still had to grab Moscow and GB by 43 in order to go to Washington, and the longest path you could take is about 16 scenarios long. In PzC it is 14 scenarios long.

So what this poll is about? PG and PzC use very similar approach to the basic campaign design. The only real difference between PG and PzC campaign is that PG has more scenarios and so more branches and overall more complex campaign structure.

[Locarnus]

Very short is untrue, you are totally right, I corrected it in the first post.

With PG I meant not only the first part, but the later iterations as well.
Eg in PanzerGeneral2 you could play ~13 scenarios if you get decisives (including 2 US scenarios).

The poll is mainly about to find out how many people are interested in different campaign structures.
I put some time in thinking about an alternative campaign structure and some further time to mod the campaign structure accordingly.
Someone might consider modding a historical campaign path.
For us this is/might be valuable information:
Are we doing this just for ourselfs?
Is it worthwhile to make changes that you yourself do not need?
Is it worth the effort to publish your changes at all?
and so on...

This is not to diminish your effort, it is to determine how much effort I/we as modders spend on it.

So a historical campaign would feature 16 scenarios and you would not have to use cheats if you fail or wait if you get decisive or look up a campaign tree to play them in this order you like.

In the campaign path I modded you can have eg 17 scenarios if you win some key scenarios decisively, which is important for me.

So everyone can decide what style she likes the most and play it that way.

[Rudankort]

The poll is mainly about to find out how many people are interested in different campaign structures.

Well, the reason I asked is because I did not see the difference between options 1 and 3. If you meant PG2 campaigns here, this probably explains it, I don't remember PG2 campaigns well enough.

[SAS]

I would like a longer campaign but I like the Panzer Corps way of choosing a campaign path, not one based strictly off of wins or losses.

[Kerensky]

I would like a longer campaign but I like the Panzer Corps way of choosing a campaign path, not one based strictly off of wins or losses.

You may be in luck, soon enough.

[billmv44]

I vote for longer campaigns too. More battles in Russia in 1943 and 1944 (before Bagration). Market Garden and Nordwind in the west too.

[Locarnus]

A new version 0.32 has just been uploaded.
You will always go to Norway in the recent version and some more fitting debriefing texts will be shown.
Otherwise no changes to prestige awards or similar.
Link is in my signature:

[BriteLite]

Voted PG like but wish to qualify. For me the longer the campaign the better. I would like to see a campaign that allows me to play all the scenarios available in all theaters following a correct as possible chronology.

[impar]

Voted PG like but wish to qualify. For me the longer the campaign the better. I would like to see a campaign that allows me to play all the scenarios available in all theaters following a correct as possible chronology.

Me too.
I remember on PG delaying Sealion and Moscow scenarios to play as many scenarios as possible.

[Locarnus]

New version 0.34 of my campaign mod.

Bugfixes (bugs preventing you from going to Bagration)
and additional zip download format including backup and campaign tree, thanks to Dragoon.

Download here:

http://www.matrixgames.com/forums/tm.asp?m=2865453

[Carius]

The best Campaign I played was when a person combined the campaigns from PG3d AA and PG3d SE into one giant campaign. In that campaign you had to take Moscow, Stalingrad and Lennigrad to defeat the Russians and it didnt matter which order you had to take them.

[VPaulus]

Locarnus, I've moved this to the Scenario Design part of the forum. I think it's more appropriate here.
Also could you add it to the SP sticky thread, please?
viewtopic.php?t=26808
Thanks.