PFrancis
Posts: 20
Joined: 3/22/2009 Status: offline
|
I've been reading about toaw on this forum and other places and can't decide wether to go for it. The main point is that after playing some hex based wargames, I've noticed that generic wargames can have scenarios playing all alike with features like local terrain topography having very little influence over the battle. I want to know about TOAW. How differently will scenarios play, if considered such things as terrain variety, strategic approaches, climate, time period etc? I've read some AARs and I've got the impression that OOB and balance more or less define the results. Things like "On turn ?? you should be near ??, since you'll be forced to retreat after reinforcements arrive..." give me the impression that results are locked to more or less expected (historically accurate?) configurations based on scenario balance and OOB. Will a good player make any difference at all, or a mediocre player (once he knows the scenario)can hold the ground forcing the results dictated by balance? How differently will a game play based on player approach and style (considering he has a solid knowledge of the game engine)? Do I have to expect that the same scenario will play and finish exactly in the same way if played by the same two opponents? The reasons I ask those questions is that even if TOAW can make a good job reproducing historical results (I suppose it can, based on what I've read), I like games that play like... well... games. It's all about competition. I don't like to only administrate counters towards a predictable result. Btw, I've seen that people play monster scenarios with thousands of units. At the same time, TOAW reproduces units details to individual squads. Considering it would be an gigantic task to administrate thousands of units paying attention to their individual configurations, I've asked myself if the details are merely illustrative or if they make any difference in game play. That is: when playing monster scenarios, do players take any advantage from paying attention to the composition of their units or just looking at the counter values is enough, so that knowledge of game mechanics will prevail over knowledge of particularities your army? Is it all reduced to a mere distribution of strength values over the map? All this is to know if one can expect to use a great variety of approaches based on individual scenarios or should stick with two or three principles, using what one has at hands (in this case, after mastering those principles, players would be leveled). Considering the first hyphotesis is true, what would make a good TOAW player? Knowledge of game mechanics? Historical background? Analythical skills? Knowledge of the particular scenario? Reasoning capacity? Creativity? Please pardon me for all those questions, but since I have little time to dedicate to learning wargames, I'm on a kind of a search for the definitive (for me, at least) operational scale wargame and, more than historical precision or number of scenarios available (on this point I know TOAW is almost unbeatable), I search a game in which experimentation and variety comes into play; in which I can try to beat my adversary using a new strategical approach, not only repeating actions based on a couple of principles. Thanks for reading through it.
< Message edited by PFrancis -- 3/23/2009 6:28:33 PM >
|