Oh boy alot of questions

[Jam3]

It seems like its always an independant developer that goes and makes a great game like this and then completly deviates from the norm on core design in some way.

Chess, checkers, tic tac toe, etc etc etc all have the guess where I am going to move next style of game play BUT order is serialized!! (to account for iterative order with more than two players you can either create random order or an order of precedence for every nation) If they would have simply gotten rid of "simultaneuos" turns or made it serial, then alot of the movement would have made more sense. Heck I bet they could have even made it an option to have simultaneous or serial moves.

I wouldn't want to get into a realism debate about all this either after all its a strategic game and realism is best left to more tactically oriented games.

Why do i think serial would have been better? Because "corralling AI" so that we both move into the same province on the same turn is not my idea of strategy. Gimme chess type strategy any day, u move i respond, i move, u respond....

[Jam3]

HJ thats a good idea ill try it thanks!

[HJ]

Originally posted by Jam3:
HJ thats a good idea ill try it thanks!

Unfortunatelly, it's only a workaround, but it's worth trying out to see whether you like it better. I usually do.

Cheers,

[alexti]

Originally posted by Jam3:
It seems like its always an independant developer that goes and makes a great game like this and then completly deviates from the norm on core design in some way.

Chess, checkers, tic tac toe, etc etc etc all have the guess where I am going to move next style of game play BUT order is serialized!!

Have you tried to design a method to have simultaneous turns in a board game? I'm not surprised at all that chess, checkers etc are serialised. Not that it does them any good. Probably every such game suffers from this causing inequality between sides. Many of them try to resolve this problem in various ways, but it still doesn't produce true balance. In computer game, it's easy to implement simultaneous turns, so naturally developers decided not to invent problem they didn't need to

[Arryn]

Originally posted by Jam3:
I wouldn't want to get into a realism debate about all this either after all its a strategic game and realism is best left to more tactically oriented games.

Why do i think serial would have been better? Because "corralling AI" so that we both move into the same province on the same turn is not my idea of strategy.

Too late about the debate when you go and make nonsensical statements like what I've quoted above.

First, "realism" in no way is limited to just "tactically-oriented" games. It's just easier to do the smaller the unit scale you go. The problem with "realism" in operational/strategic games is that it's much harder to model such things as economies and politics and other social structures than it is to model combat. Dom 2 has an economic and political (aka religious) system that works well enough for what it's trying to do. It doesn't pretend to be "realistic", nor should it, nor does it need to.

As for simultaneous execution of moves, that's the most realistic system for modelling conflict. After all, it's the very rare (and stupid) opponent that will give his enemies a clue as to what he's going to do so they can react to it. The idea is to keep the other fellow guessing. Simultaneous movement accurately models things such as Rommel's desert "adventures". He kept moving so that every time the Brits pounced he wasn't where they expected. If real life were "I Go, You Go", then the Brits would have said "Oh, that's where he's gone, now we get to smash him before he can run away". The strategy is to out-guess your opponent. If you are not very good at trying to predict what your opponent might do, then you won't do well at this type of game. You also won't do well at chess, either, despite chess being non-simultaneous.

[Jam3]

Don't get me wrong I really like this game ALOT.

Though i think it would have been better from a pure gameplay standpoint to at least make the OPTION of choosing serial turn movement as opposed to simultaneous moves.

The simultaneuos move system, from what I understand, is mainly to accomadate faster gameplay in multiplayer. Every player can take their turn simultaneously as opposed to waiting for previous players to end their turn.

Insofar as realism is concerned I would think that armies perform recon and determine enemy movements and plan theirs accordingly. I disagree that armies somehow maintain a posistion, choose a destination, with no information except a "best guess" then march out, possibly missing opposing forces entirely.

Actually from a "realism" point of view, in a fantasy world, one would think divining spells would be specifically crafted to recon and spy on ones enemy, especially an offensive army in ones own territory.

This type of simultaneous move system requires the more tactical level of recon in order to be "realistically" modelled. That is why I would prefer serial turns as it is more accomadating in single player from a pure gameplay point of view.

[Arryn]

Okay. Now I better understand where you're coming from. I don't agree, but that's my own opinion. What you need to accept though is that Dom was designed first and foremost as a multiplayer game, and from what I can tell (again, IMO), single-player is more or less an afterthought. FWIW. Most of us think the game is fine as is (insofar as simultaneity). However, also bear in mind that to rewrite the code to accomodate sequential turns would not be a simple task at all. Trust me. I've been writing code for nearly 30 years. And IW has far better things to do with their time, IMO.

And now we return to our regularly-scheduled obliviousness ...

[Graeme Dice]

Originally posted by Jam3:
The simultaneuos move system, from what I understand, is mainly to accomadate faster gameplay in multiplayer. Every player can take their turn simultaneously as opposed to waiting for previous players to end their turn.

Sequential turns do not work when you have more than about three players in a PBEM game, and usually only are successful with two players. With 17, you'd be waiting close to three weeks for everyone to play their turns as most people only check once a day to see if it's ready.

Insofar as realism is concerned I would think that armies perform recon and determine enemy movements and plan theirs accordingly. I disagree that armies somehow maintain a posistion, choose a destination, with no information except a "best guess" then march out, possibly missing opposing forces entirely.

A "best guess" is exactly what an army works on. You know that your enemy is somewhere out there, but have no real idea where. This is especially true in a medieval world where Messages don't move any faster than a horse, and then only if you have a network of fresh horses for the messenger to switch to every hour or so.

[HJ]

Originally posted by Arryn:
What you need to accept though is that Dom was designed first and foremost as a multiplayer game, and from what I can tell (again, IMO), single-player is more or less an afterthought.

I think the number of times this (counter)argument was used in discussions here is definitely telling.

[ January 21, 2004, 06:50: Message edited by: HJ ]

[Arryn]

Originally posted by HJ:

quote:

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Originally posted by Arryn:
What you need to accept though is that Dom was designed first and foremost as a multiplayer game, and from what I can tell (again, IMO), single-player is more or less an afterthought.

I think the number of times this (counter)argument was used in discussions here is definitely telling.

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Perhaps. But what, exactly, is being told is, itself, open to debate.

(Sorry, couldn't resist. This thread needs a wee bit of levity, don't you agree?)