|
Shannon V. OKeets -> RE: What Do You Think Needs to be in World In Flames PC Game (6/8/2010 8:28:30 AM)
|
quote:
ORIGINAL: Simulation01
I'm not sure what to think now. I'm certainly disappointed with respect to invading the USA, however these impulses are not something I've heard of. I was expecting WIF to be like Axis and Allies on steroids....
I am used to turn based games like Civilization IV and Galactic Civilizations II. These "impulses" sound like turns within turns or "waves" of changes before actually hitting the turn button....I am certainly confused. I have steered away from games like War in the Pacific because of their tendency to be simple rehashes of old battles, while I prefer to control the entire war instead.[:(]
Maybe this will provide an overview of World in Flames. I wrote this to myself as the beginning of the specifications for the AI Opponent. I wanted to put down in writing the fundamental components of the game.
===
Background
1.1 MWIF Objectives
World in Flames is a game of conquest where the winner is determined based on victory hexes held at the end of the game. Indeed, the game ends early if one side controls a sufficient number of victory hexes. Since control of a hex is only achieved by having land units either traverse the hex or occupy the country’s capital, land units determine who wins.
1.2 Land Units
There are dozens of types of land units and they can be corps or division size. In order for land units to attack outside of their home country, they need to be able to trace a supply line back to a supply source, either in their home country or an occupied country. To do that, they need to be near a headquarters unit which can trace supply back to a primary or secondary supply source using rail lines. Because the only way to take enemy held victory cities and enemy capitals is by attacking in foreign lands, these lines of communication are crucial for making progress.
1.3 Naval Units
If the enemy is overseas, then supply/communication lines need to extend overseas. This is done by having convoys in contiguous sea areas stretching from the overseas location to the home supply source. To keep overseas units in supply, there must be at least one convoy per sea area, thereby forming a convoy pipeline. The convoys are extremely vulnerable to attack, so naval units are used to defend friendly and attack enemy convoy pipelines. If all supply lines could be land based, then the naval units would have very little value. This is why historically Germany and the USSR fought such a prolonged and bloody conflict with virtually no naval units involved.
1.4 Air Units
Air units enable a player to provide additional striking power at the point of attack. This can be done when attacking or defending, on land and at sea. Air units also have a limited ability to transport land units and supply. One unique role they perform is to attack enemy production through strategic bombing. In general though, air units are augmentations to land and naval forces, which respectively perform the primary tasks of taking territory and providing supply.
1.5 Transportation Lines
In addition to the rail lines and convoy pipelines providing supply, these same 2 transportation lines are used to transport resources to factories and reinforcements to the frontlines. The mechanism is so similar to those for maintaining supply, that for most purposes they can be thought of as the same. What has to be kept in mind is that the importance of the rail lines and convoy pipelines is multiple: (1) to provide supply, (2) to send reinforcements to the frontlines, and (3) to send resources to factories.
1.6 Production
Once resources have been delivered to a factory, production points are produced. Depending on the intensity of the war effort, production points are converted into a number of build points. Build points are used to create new land, naval, and air units. They can also be used for repairing naval units, generating supply depots, and creating new factories. Being unable to generate a substantial number of build points each turn means that a country is unable to replace losses to its army, navy, air force, and merchant marine, and eventually it is doomed to defeat.
|
|
|
|
