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Numdydar -> RE: No AI ? (10/26/2013 10:40:36 PM)
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quote:
ORIGINAL: brian brian
I used to play a lot of Squad Leader; more particularly a lot of Cross of Iron. I was simultaneously playing a lot of Third Reich, until I discovered World in Flames. And I actually think WiF ruined me for Squad Leader. Squad Leader is a great, great game, but in some ways a terrible simulation. WiF simulates high-level military decision making very well. Squad Leader does not simulate military decision making at all in my opinion. To have God-like control over small groups of men is just impossible. Still a very fun game to match ordnance and small groups of men vs the other side's ordnance and small groups of men.
Another game that ruined me for Squad Leader was SPI's Task Force, a game of 70s/80s hypothetical Cold War Naval Combat. It used a dual map hidden movement system, with grid call-outs reminiscent of AH Bismarck and Battleship! (as in, you sank my Battleship!). I thought it actually worked fine and I miss it. But it made me wish for a WWII company to battalion level game with umpired Hidden Movement, which would obviously be handled best by a computer, and also more of a simulation of what a company commander has to do in infantry combat, where you can't precisely order the fire & movement of a squad unless it is standing right next to you. Even moving down to platoon level, a platoon leader can not do this as perfectly as the player of Squad Leader can. By the time you reach the level of an actual squad leader, yes, the fine control is possible and you have almost reached the level of first-person shooter games I have no interest in playing. But at the level of squad leader, so many other events are going on nearby simultaneously, that have a huge impact on what happens to you (all the other squads on your side), you again need some outside system to model what the other friendly forces are doing.
So in approaching improved levels of realism I see huge possibilities in the use of computers and yes even AI. Someone mentioned on one of these many threads (I'm fine with derailing one away from World in Flames, there are scads of these that all say the same thing) that the best AI performance will happen out of a game system designed in advance for AI decision making.
And when we moved on into Cross of Iron and never left (I could play Hube's Pocket over and over again, but never punched the counters in GI:Anvil of Victory), we also burned out on I-go-You-Go tactical AFV combat eventually. Another place where video and computer assisted gaming will eventually satisfy what I want out of a game at this scale. And I think a good way to go is to have an AI run parts of your own forces. A tank company commander can tell another tank what to do, but not necessarily every minute decision that tank executes.
One of the best depictions of infantry combat command I have ever seen, is the Mel Gibson movie We Were Soldiers. A battalion level infantry battle is an intense thing, with simultaneous activity on a 360 degree horizon, performed by enemy units that can't be seen, not by enemy units all in known locations that patiently wait for your decisions, in even 60 second or 30 second intervals. No "turns", just continual real-time information input and decision making, with many results of your decisions beyond your control.
I would also like to see an operational American Civil War game run by a computer where information moves across the battlefield at the speed of a horse (which might not reach it's destination), and units are even more unlikely to do what the high-level commander tells them to do, while that commander can only sort out information based on his immediate vicinity and the no-radio time delay of all other incoming and outgoing information. Another case where AI could boost realism while only partially 'playing' the game.
I think there are probably computer games out there by now along these lines, though I don't go looking for them. Because I play World in Flames too much.
Just wondered if you had checked out Battle from The Bulge? A little higher level than ASL, but you give orders at a higher level and the troops under you try and carry them out. The AI is pretty good as well for both sides.
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