Ocelo
General
Map Artist/Eastern Front enthusiast
Posts: 1,400
|
Post by Ocelo on Apr 8, 2011 19:43:16 GMT 1
My particular bee-in-the-bonnet is about defensive missions. With offensive missions, you have the initiative and can often rearrange your troops the way you want to, to improve your position. There have been some missions I have enjoyed where your troops are in groups that are well separated, sometimes by enemy. My first priority is to find the way to get them all in one location. Attacking the enemy's main position piece-meal is a rather silly thing to do. Getting them together is usually the hard part. Once they are assembled the mission usually becomes pretty simple. IMO the biggest factor here is what kind of scenario you wish to set up. There is an ideal and perfect balance in every mission between having the player play a scenario and giving him a free hand. The former includes not only the intricacy and realism of the map itself, but also the unit layout, balance (or lack thereof), and positioning. Giving the player a free hand is also very important. You don't generally want to make him feel a puppet of your mission. Very often, this is a result of a well-planned objectives list, which tend to lure the mapper into making a very linear scenario with few possible variations in gameplay. As such, he takes to making enemy and terrain blockages in areas of the map where he doesn't want him to go. Many times, this is wrong, but sometimes this forms a nice scenario; we don't (or at least I don't) make maps to let the player be the big dog that roams and destroys at will, I want to do my best at remaking the historical situation, with some input and influence from the player, but always sticking to the balance of the historical encounter. Giving 6 T-34s when a player has to take a town that was historically taken by a single infantry battalion is just wrong and IMO detrimental (one must keep in mind that BK does favor engagements on the company level and above. The larger the force, the more flexibility). I know from my own experience of map making and playing. Missions that annoy me are missions where you have incomplete or inadequate forces. If a commander is going to attack, does he scrape up 6 tanks and 3 squads and say, "Here, go wipe out that enemy division." No, if a WWII commander was going to attack an enemy division, he would assemble at least three of his own. (Standard tennent since Napoleon's time: you need a 3-to-1 ration if your attack is going to have a chance to succeed. 10-to-1 if the enemy's position is heavily fortified.) I personally [usually] dislike missions that give the player superior forces without a challenge. Either some part of the history was left out, or the encounter is just not significant enough to be replicated. I like to play battle scenarios which are close to being historically accurate; otherwise we just as well may map with Panther IIs and T-44s in 1941... No doubt, the nature of BK means it is generally easier to make units which are accurate by BK standards [resolution] than historically accurate maps. Hence, we have a pretty specific taste for units, but maps on the other hand have a comparably lower standard in terms of historical accuracy. Not because BK mappers are lazy, but because it is challenging to portray historical battles accurately. Meanwhile, units are accessories (albeit crucial one) which enhance the historical accuracy. However, if a map attempting to achieve historical accuracy represents Minsk or Kiev with a town of 20 buildings, the Soviet/German players may as well be using Shermans on both sides.
|
|
|
Post by danzig70 on Apr 8, 2011 19:52:25 GMT 1
Thanks for the link but I didnt find the effective range listed. I think I have what I need though.
Thanks for the input everyone. Hopefully I will design some challenging missions.
|
|
|
Post by Major Pain on Apr 8, 2011 21:03:40 GMT 1
@danzig
I looked for some additonal info but didn't really find anything useful. The gun was very effective inside and that range, and still had a significant punch at the longest range. Research indicates it was used for direct and indirect fire with good results.
|
|
|
Post by LouisXIV on Apr 9, 2011 12:58:08 GMT 1
Ocelo, I'm not saying the mission-maker should give the player three times the amount of men and equipment that the defence has. That would make for a poor mission. The defence has to remain static, with the exception of certain counter-attack reserves and some mobile reinforcements. Since the player can usually attack the defences a portion at a time, he doesn't need a big over-all superiority.
What I'm annoyed at is when the player is given the absolute bare minimum or less to do the job, and doesn't even have superiority at the single point of attack.
Most single player missions I have tried out have very little or no reactive ability on the part of the defence, so the attacker can really take on the defences a bit at a time. This is very unrealistic. Most armies tend to react violently to their opponents trying to break their line. The Germans were particularly good at this, the western Allies less so. We need more of that in all missions, but it is time-consuming to set up and script.
|
|
Ocelo
General
Map Artist/Eastern Front enthusiast
Posts: 1,400
|
Post by Ocelo on Apr 10, 2011 8:14:13 GMT 1
@louis: I agree completely. Trying to make a mission hard by not giving the correct amount of units is generally incompetence. The key is to engineer a ruthless enemy, which admittedly usually requires a fair amount of scripting, which many try to avoid. And they like to forget that tanks aren't the only way to wage war. Concentrated artillery and infantry can make a powerful cocktail, albeit not always in vanilla BK.
In fact, I think the best missions could involve the front line itself, where you don't have a numerical superiority overall, but can concentrate one on the point of attack. However, then you are responsible for defending the thinned front line as well, which the enemy may likely attack.
Anyways, the key is to, while maintaining historical accuracy in most respects as much as possible, to make the player work and be challenged to attain victory, not to make him suffer ridiculous odds.
|
|
|
Post by LouisXIV on Apr 10, 2011 12:30:29 GMT 1
Exactly!
|
|
|
Post by LouisXIV on Apr 10, 2011 13:43:37 GMT 1
And a professsional BK player, I would add, you know tips and trips and tactics very well. Maybe I do, but I'm also here to just enjoy the game. Often I am mentally lazy and just make head-on attacks. Also I don't often have enough time to do a mission properly. I should be reconnoitring the whole front as best I can and finding the best way to attack, but that takes a lot of time, and often I don't have that time.
Besides, as I think I've commented before, BK tends to penalize you for "thinking outside the box." More than once I've found the way to get on the enemy's flank and attack. Then what happens? My supply trucks automatically head diagonally back to my main supply base and get blown up by the enemy or a minefield I couldn't clear.
The automatic resupply provision of BK can be a joy ... and a pain.
|
|
|
Post by Major Pain on Apr 10, 2011 14:02:02 GMT 1
Louis... I think we might be at opposite ends of the spectrum on this.
I enjoy a good AI that responds to my moves.
I also like to probe and test the water before commiting the force.
So missions that require a little fact-finding get my vote.
A mission that takes some time to get through is preferable to the quickie tank rush.
|
|
|
Post by LouisXIV on Apr 10, 2011 14:59:59 GMT 1
Louis... I think we might be at opposite ends of the spectrum on this. Huh?
@mp, I said I do it, not that I prefer it. Yes, I'd like to take my time with a mission and do it properly. However, I don't always have the time and energy to do so. I would like to spend some time with my wife and son now and then.
Besides, it's sometimes hard to find a mission that is worth taking your time on.
Or did I misunderstand you?
|
|
|
Post by Jagged Steel on Apr 10, 2011 15:27:10 GMT 1
My "preference" in missions is not listed. My preference is far and away for Multiplayer missions. I am a Gamer first and a WW2 buff second. To me, even the most elaborate and wisely programmed single player missions are still just puzzles to be solved. To actually get immersed in the action , there is nothing that compares to a human opponent, even a bad one. A computer will never try encirclement or flanking maneuvers - etc. . At the end of a Multiplayer game I am usually soaked with sweat due to the intense stress involved in facing the "most dangerous game" (a human opponent). Also, "beating" a programmed scenario just doesn't hold the same satisfaction of knowing that you have met another man on the field of battle and bested him. To me, single player missions are something like an "electronic diorama" with a puzzle relating to it that needs to be solved. I still play Online regularly, but it is a rare rainy day in the desert when I get in the right mood to solve single player mission puzzles.
|
|
Ocelo
General
Map Artist/Eastern Front enthusiast
Posts: 1,400
|
Post by Ocelo on Apr 10, 2011 17:23:06 GMT 1
@js: I agree on all those points, but personally I'm quite intimidated of playing against such an opponent with no Pause, with so little time to think.
|
|
|
Post by Jagged Steel on Apr 10, 2011 18:04:51 GMT 1
@js: I agree on all those points, but personally I'm quite intimidated of playing against such an opponent with no Pause, with so little time to think. Yes, it is quite intimidating, and having no pause( you actually can pause in Multi but it is frowned upon ) makes it all action rather than a puzzle. I just played a 1vs1 Online (my favorite map- Desert Road) and I was a wee bit rusty- haven't played in a couple of weeks. I was also getting breakfast going, and my opponent was fairly good and he nearly handed me my @$$. I hunkered down with the remnants left after I flipped the bacon (during which time he decided to make a major attack) and silenced his main Artillery, picked off a couple of his major units and 2 minutes later he quit.
|
|
Ocelo
General
Map Artist/Eastern Front enthusiast
Posts: 1,400
|
Post by Ocelo on Apr 10, 2011 19:07:05 GMT 1
Well BK is hard/intense in multiplayer like that because everything is scaled down; an attack that in reality would take about an hour to execute, in the game takes a minute or two. The other major hindrance is that the units aren't all that intelligent, and you have to HQ staff or lower-level officers to assist. So I guess form very small-scale encounters (ie: a 6x6 map) its good, but for others its quite intense.
I'm sure its, as you've mentioned, a very exciting and occasionally rewarding (depending on your skill level- not high for me) though.
|
|
|
Post by danzig70 on Apr 11, 2011 17:11:34 GMT 1
I am a chronic pauser. Though I am hoping to redeem myself so I can play MP again. I just hate it when one of my tanks starts attacking infantry when there is an enemy tank near by.
|
|