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RE: Regiments marching through each other - 7/18/2015 1:06:01 AM

nijis

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I don't care so much about depiction of the sprites, but you cannot cram multiple regiments into ahistorically small space, right? Sprites don't block each other but units do, no?

(in reply to PresbyterJohn)

Post #: 61

RE: Regiments marching through each other - 7/18/2015 8:52:41 PM

ETF

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quote:

ORIGINAL: Prester John

Oh I find the dancing lines very distracting. Very. Can't watch it in fact. I'd much prefer to see the troops in fixed blocks(bases), roughly two figures per company if fighting with battalions. If going up a level then four figures per base representing a battalion for multi corps battles but then you lose the details ie skirmishers. Now for the argument about realism ....

And I want dice.

lol
Miniatures and realism??....can't think of any rule set that even comes close to SOW."Pushing tin" can be fun but oh how abstracted it is :)

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(in reply to PresbyterJohn)

Post #: 62

RE: Regiments marching through each other - 7/18/2015 9:39:38 PM

ceb2

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I'm a longtime strategy gamer I find the graphics vs ai debate here interesting. I'll just state some simple facts from my own perspective. I've owned and played SOW Gettysburg with several of the modules. I just bought a new very powerful PC and thought let me give SOW Waterloo a try. So I purchased it thinking that the game would be an improvement on SOW Gettysburg. After playing the game for about a week I've uninstalled it. It's bad enough that in this day and age the SOW engine is still using sprites, but the troop movements with visual fluttering, walking through walls and conga line antics are for me personally immersion killers. Even Imperial Glory had better graphics that had a unique aspect of looking like classic art visuals. Too bad the artillery was way under ranged in the game and the troops were suicidal. I'm surprised no one ever attempted to mod the game. We can debate all day about how good this game is for armchair grognards but if you lose the simple playability and immersion factor it counts for nothing. And for me at 68 years of age who also just went from a 22" to a 27" monitor: graphics do matter in the gameplay! I will not bash the TW Games as my own experiences with them have been generally very good. Napoleon and Medieval II are the best in the series as far as overall quality IMHO. I've seen nothing wrong in Napoleon TW in recreating Boney's tactics as well as any other game I've played including past board games. I like the guys at Norbsoft but I think its' time to join the 21st century with their game engine. With the glaring visual errors of the troop movements in the game its' beyond me how the game gets such high ratings. Are you people seriously telling me that you've "learned to live with it?" Why? If you're like me you just paid $50 for a game that should be an improvement over SOW Gettysburg. I personally think it's one step backward in it's present state. Hopefully the devs will address these issues in upcoming patches but as of now I think SOW Gettysburg is the better game.

(in reply to ETF)

Post #: 63

RE: Regiments marching through each other - 7/18/2015 11:12:55 PM

PresbyterJohn

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quote:

ORIGINAL: ETF

quote:

ORIGINAL: Prester John

Oh I find the dancing lines very distracting. Very. Can't watch it in fact. I'd much prefer to see the troops in fixed blocks(bases), roughly two figures per company if fighting with battalions. If going up a level then four figures per base representing a battalion for multi corps battles but then you lose the details ie skirmishers. Now for the argument about realism ....

And I want dice.

lol
Miniatures and realism??....can't think of any rule set that even comes close to SOW."Pushing tin" can be fun but oh how abstracted it is :)

And there are no abstractions in this video game? Really? As I said realism is not all it's cracked up to be. But I'll certainly agree with you that the lead figures have a lot of fun factor, depending on the rule set. If you are that way inclined you're welcome to an argument about realism versus playability, eg: Empire versus Napoleon's Battles. You're sounding exactly like the advocates/detractors of various rules systems 35 years ago. It's all been said before, you're just echoing the past whether you realise it or not.

(in reply to ETF)

Post #: 64

RE: Regiments marching through each other - 7/19/2015 12:01:07 AM

pjsynnott

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quote:

ORIGINAL: ETF

lol
Miniatures and realism??....can't think of any rule set that even comes close to SOW."Pushing tin" can be fun but oh how abstracted it is :)

Abstraction doesn't preclude plausible outcomes, though, which is what really matters. Every game uses abstraction at some level, even SOW.

(in reply to ETF)

Post #: 65

RE: Regiments marching through each other - 7/19/2015 4:25:30 AM

76mm

Posts: 4688
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quote:

ORIGINAL: psynnott
Abstraction doesn't preclude plausible outcomes, though, which is what really matters.

Indeed, sometimes it is preferable to less abstracted approaches which just don't work.

(in reply to pjsynnott)

Post #: 66

RE: Regiments marching through each other - 5/8/2016 10:18:18 PM

Redmarkus5

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quote:

ORIGINAL: ceb

I'm a longtime strategy gamer I find the graphics vs ai debate here interesting. I'll just state some simple facts from my own perspective. I've owned and played SOW Gettysburg with several of the modules. I just bought a new very powerful PC and thought let me give SOW Waterloo a try. So I purchased it thinking that the game would be an improvement on SOW Gettysburg. After playing the game for about a week I've uninstalled it. It's bad enough that in this day and age the SOW engine is still using sprites, but the troop movements with visual fluttering, walking through walls and conga line antics are for me personally immersion killers. Even Imperial Glory had better graphics that had a unique aspect of looking like classic art visuals. Too bad the artillery was way under ranged in the game and the troops were suicidal. I'm surprised no one ever attempted to mod the game. We can debate all day about how good this game is for armchair grognards but if you lose the simple playability and immersion factor it counts for nothing. And for me at 68 years of age who also just went from a 22" to a 27" monitor: graphics do matter in the gameplay! I will not bash the TW Games as my own experiences with them have been generally very good. Napoleon and Medieval II are the best in the series as far as overall quality IMHO. I've seen nothing wrong in Napoleon TW in recreating Boney's tactics as well as any other game I've played including past board games. I like the guys at Norbsoft but I think its' time to join the 21st century with their game engine. With the glaring visual errors of the troop movements in the game its' beyond me how the game gets such high ratings. Are you people seriously telling me that you've "learned to live with it?" Why? If you're like me you just paid $50 for a game that should be an improvement over SOW Gettysburg. I personally think it's one step backward in it's present state. Hopefully the devs will address these issues in upcoming patches but as of now I think SOW Gettysburg is the better game.

Thanks Ceb for an enlightened and eloquent summary of the situation. You have expressed the problem far better than I.

I uninstalled the game and focused on other things for some months. I came back today (after re-watching the film Waterloo, as it happens) to see whether the issues that concerned me had been fixed, but it seems they have not. Sigh... I'll check back at the end of the year.

Meanwhile, I'll be doing the conga, doing the conga, doing the conga dance, oy!

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(in reply to ceb2)

Post #: 67

RE: Regiments marching through each other - 7/20/2016 8:06:27 PM

risorgimento59

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Sorry for necroposting, but I was looking at this lately.

"Congas" seems to happen when you set a destination location that exceeds the (-90�,+90�) range from the current unit facing.
Being the formation always aligned with the actual marching direction, rightmost slots cross through leftmost ones in order to keep their relative position in the grid.

Imaging an about-face "intermediate order" would be even more counter-productive both aesthetically and in terms of realism as I observe it working as follow:
One rank of the newly-rightmost formation edge is kept halted and the others "glid" across each other in standing animation.

Another situation that cannot pass unnoticed is the realignment behaviour (if any exists, I see no noticeable mark time or running to catch up) lasting so long sometimes that you'll get odd L-shaped lines moving across battlefield for minutes in the worst case.

I think these problems might be mitigated, albeit not solved, without implementing the whole set of drill commands (they'd require some sort of subunits logics, even rule-based only, in turn...).
Maybe a kind of horizontal slots transposition + realignment + pivot system could do the trick.

I apologise in advance for any mistake.

< Message edited by risorgimento59 -- 7/21/2016 10:42:19 AM >

(in reply to Redmarkus5)

Post #: 68

RE: Regiments marching through each other - 9/19/2016 1:47:58 PM

Redmarkus5

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Hi. That all sounds logical, but it's too complex for my poor brain.

I certainly don't recall telling my units to make any particularly odd moves, but I experience the conga line dance regularly in SOW.

I've owned almost every wargame ever developed over the years, but I have never seen this issue in any other game. My non-technical deduction is that it must be down to a design flaw.

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(in reply to risorgimento59)

Post #: 69

RE: Regiments marching through each other - 9/25/2016 6:13:21 PM

Mr Digby

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If you play from HITS level (10 yds fixed camera height) you simply don't see these problems. It helps to keep the immersion, though I know HITS isn't everyone's cup of tea.

It would help greatly if:

1) Units did not move while changing formation. No Napoleonic or ACW unit ever did, so why NSD thought it was a good idea to have both ACW and Nap regiments march forwards while trying to form a line I have no idea.

2) It should not be hard to have the game recognise the centre flag and the two furthest away front rank wing sprites so it knows its own frontage. The frontage should be inviolate and not merge with any friendly unit.

3) The meshing/merging of units in WL is the exact same as GB, BTW, in fact NSD did make some attempts to improve it. For me some of the worst silliness in Gettysburg has been fixed in WL, such as a unit running ALONG the frontage of an engaged battleline, which was insanely annoying.

What do you guys mean by the "conga line"? Not sure what this behaviour is... though I know formation changing and unit pathing in WL is a little... interesting.

(in reply to Redmarkus5)

Post #: 70

RE: Regiments marching through each other - 9/30/2016 3:23:33 PM

risorgimento59

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Some points were raised (with screenshots) in thread "Some practical suggestions to prevent unrealistic ai formation behavior!" too.

HITS is a brillant and unique style to play wargames for sure.
But it's certainly far from being realistic as by SOW.
Command & control during Napoleonic Wars was mostly ringing around avoiding confusion.
From my understanding, it was a priority officers put way before firepower, speed and any other consideration of sort.
It influenced the engagement doctrines horizontally and across all the levels of the hierarchy bottom-up (reason no. 1 to keep robust reserves at hand).
And this is not even considered by SOW gameplay mechanics...
My likings may wonder what's the sense of setting up the camera correctly and have the right channels of communications if...
You're still very far from simulating a comprenshive world and intelligence framework the player should take his decisions (partial/contradictory/dust/smoke/etc.) within.
The tactical implementation of your direct commands are unrealistic (no disorder state).
If you delegate the job to a subordinate he has absolutely no ability to plan and reach a goal with any degree of coherence or coordination.
No grand-tactical or strategical indipendence whatsoever.
It just looks like microtactical adjustments toward an order defined by behaviour trees (and scripting in HBs) all the way.
Unfortunately this cannot be altered from the AI dll code released with the SDK, because it exposes the decision-making part only.
No new mechanics possible but also no supporting structures (geometrical, collision detections, etc.) to interface the avoidance algorithms with...
Definitely not worth trying.
So I accept this shine much more in MP skirmishing and that I'm an uncommon big-SP-battles-oriented guy, yet it was rather disappointing for me.

The games evolved so little since TC2M and absolutely nothing from the Waterloo release.
It's a pity but I expected that honestly.
I wasn't interested by individual and arguable point of views about low FPS affecting or not the gaming experience at the time, but...
the big and unresolved issues with performances were an indicator of the fading interest/commitment of the developer to move the series structurally forward.
He could make the game run ok easily by simply not submitting each and every single sprite (vegetation too) one triangle at time, saturating the driver command queues.
This was an implementation of alpha-quads rendering unheard of (at least as standard technique as it is in SOW now).
Or by filtering out many LOS calculations (artillery fired almost always straight).
I'm not talking to move them to CUDA or fancy stuff that would scare any human being.
I'll stick to these facts and don't try to speculate further.
I put in myself shoes with growing difficulties, I can't judge the reasons behind decisions of others.
However I'd bet it was also a discouraging factor (one of the many perhaps) at the same time.
The PR engine is approaching unavoidably his EOL (in other sectors of the industry it'd reached it since 10 years), as clear as the sun.
Chances for any improvement to prove fruitless are worth to care about.
I'll pick Ligny DLC but future doesn't look bright to me.
Imho something could be saved, it's not on DX7 after all...

I'd be more than happy to be proved wrong, of course.

< Message edited by risorgimento59 -- 9/30/2016 3:26:38 PM >

(in reply to nijis)

Post #: 71

RE: Regiments marching through each other - 11/15/2016 7:11:58 PM

Redmarkus5

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quote:

ORIGINAL: RebBugler

quote:

ORIGINAL: redmarkus4

So I am still confused. What is it that the Total War devs CAN do, but which the SoW devs apparently CAN'T do that makes the TW units move much more realistically, without the SoW snaking and conga dancing?

Instead of being confused, perhaps you could help out some if you would like to see SOW improvements. Maybe compare files with games you like of the same genre and relay some specifics; i.e.: formations, engagement procedures, etc. Other folks in this thread are offering useful, thought out, options to improve the SOW system.

We at SOW are not in denial, we know the game isn't perfect. Short of converting to a modeling type engine, we are constantly seeking ways to improve upon what we do best, epic proportioned 'musket war' simulations.

Many of the things you kvetch about could be fixed immediately, if we slow the game down...halt, reform, move. However, then we open the door to a whole new batch of negative fodder by slowing down what is already a slow genre by nature - musket wars. This is why marketing these type games is always a gamble as they appeal more to a smaller base of intellectual, historically minded folks. You included, friend!

Sorry. I gave up in frustration and just read your post.

I have made many suggestions about how (bearing in mind my non-technical background) movement should be calculated, as well as making numerous comparisons to the way this is handled in other games. There are several constructive comments and diagrams/images in this and other Waterloo threads, and I have been trying to pursuade you guys to fix this issue for years in other forums.

Please don't try to assign responsibility for this obvious flaw to me. You are holding my money and I'm only holding a very flawed bit of software that I never use...

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RE: Regiments marching through each other - 12/6/2016 5:06:26 PM

Mr Digby

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Identifying the units "core location points" by the two front rank end sprites as well as by the flagbearer would go a long way to giving ways to write unit movements and wheels correctly with some simple rules such as:

1) No sprite can walk backwards
2) The left end front sprite will not cross the path of the right hand end front sprite, and vice versa.

(in reply to Redmarkus5)

Post #: 73

RE: Regiments marching through each other - 1/11/2017 12:22:05 PM

RHamper

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I have to agree with redmarkus4, oho and Prester John. The game is very good and has a lot going for it. Those of us of have studied Napoleonic warfare and gamed it on a table top understand the importance of unit spacing. Battalion commanders and their staff trained to maneuver their units keeping in mind the space they needed to shake out into line, wheel etc. It's gamers that pile the units too close together.

I'm sorry aaatoysandmore, I love the game, the AI is quite good, but to say just accept it and be thankful is a backwards looking approach. Nothing gets fixed or changed by accepting the status quo.

I'm not a programmer. I know it must be hard to get this right but surely there must be a collision mechanic or exclusion zone that could be created to straighten some of this out. It might even solve some of the fire through friendly units issues because, again, gamers move their lines too close together without regard for proper unit spacing. The musket had a notoriously short effective range, shooting through or over a unit ahead of you was asking for disaster.

(in reply to Redmarkus5)

Post #: 74

RE: Regiments marching through each other - 2/8/2017 3:18:55 PM

Redmarkus5

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I've been playing the open beta release of Ultimate General - Civil War recently. It's not perfect, but I really like the approach they've taken. While there are some unit stacking issues in that game too, you have the ability to plot the path of every unit and control its facing. Most 'conga line' issues don't occur and units change facing without any difficulty. Very nice maps too and a wonderful campaign model.

Attachment (1)

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RE: Regiments marching through each other - 10/3/2017 1:28:04 PM

*Lava*

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I've played Ultimate General: Civil War and won both the Union and Confederate campaigns playing at the Brigadier General (normal) level. I am now starting a Union campaign on Major General (hard) with addition help for the AI called Legendary.

If you like Scourage of War, and you haven't tried this game... well, you are really missing out on a great game.

Having said that and returning to topic, even in UGCW when large units 2500+ turn you will also notice the "S" shape when the unit tries to make too big of a facing change.

The reason you get the "S" shape is because everyone is moving forward. But that is not how you execute a greater than 90 degree change in alignment (which I believe is the problem). If we execute a left turn of greater than 90 degrees in place, the way it should work is that the folks on the far right march forward, while the folks on the far left, march backwards. Executed properly, a curve should never occur in the line. In true fact facing changes were drilled to be executed not with the center as the focus for alignment, but the side in which the turn would take place. So if you wanted to swing a regiment to the right, the right flank is the anchor or pivot point if you will and the whole regiment moves together and stays in line formation until it has achieved its new facing. If it is in place, the right moves backwards while the left moves forwards.

Therefore, both games use the pivot point of the regiment as the center and as such in large regiments you get a weird "S" shape.

That is easy to program since each regiment has a single point of reference... it's center. But in truth, especially in Napoleonic warfare each regiment has 3 point of reference: the center for marching in column and the left and right of the regiment for maneuvering in line formation.

< Message edited by Lava -- 10/3/2017 2:31:53 PM >

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RE: Regiments marching through each other - 10/4/2017 4:03:13 AM

Rosseau

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Conga line or not, the immersion factor of Ultimate Gettysburg does not match SOWG, although the former is a great game, great price and great dev with constant support. One of Steam's real "surprise" games of the year.

Now pardon this suggestion, as I own but not experienced with SOW series. Couldn't there be a way to simply cut back on the sprite count? Does every man or squad really need to be represented? At the extreme level, NATO counters could even work, although that would certainly kill immersion.

Also, forgive the user name. Technical difficulties with the Matrix/Slitherine "unified" log-in system.

(in reply to *Lava*)

Post #: 77

RE: Regiments marching through each other - 10/8/2017 4:44:19 PM

Redmarkus5

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Don't confuse Ultimate General Gettysburg with Ultimate General Civil War. The latter is a much broader game with a slew of army management requirements between battles; Gettysburg was more like a toe in the water by the devs.

There are issues with the game, but it has a lot of promise IMHO.

(in reply to Rosseau)

Post #: 78

RE: Regiments marching through each other - 10/12/2017 10:14:10 PM

Enigma6584

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Well for what it is worth I enjoy this game immensely and will continue to do so for years to come.

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Post #: 79

RE: Regiments marching through each other - 10/13/2017 12:46:41 AM

1annoyedgamer

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The Conga line issue has been largely gone since like April, at least in SOW Waterloo. The Grog toolbar defaults infantry movement to column by division as well as changes the look of that formation to look more closely like it did historically. In order to have an infantry unit move while in line now, you have to select "Line hold form"

If people are still seeing "Conga Lines" in SOW Waterloo, its most likely of their own doing because they don't know what they are doing.

(in reply to Enigma6584)

Post #: 80