So, I was wondering... What's next?

[veji1]

15 hours ago, Col_Kelly said:

Regardless of that I'm pretty sure the team will capitalize on musket/rifle warfare otherwise it'd be too big of a leap. I agree that it'd be cool to have swords and shields but all the effort they'd have to invest in rebuilding the combat system could not be used on the addition of extra features. 

Exactly. They have an engine that works perftectly for games from 1700 to 1870/1880. You might as well use it for that before going medieval where battles are vastly different. With this tactical engine (campaign and camp/weapon shop fun issues aside) you can have a blast playing through great battles from Blenheim and Malpaquet to Arcole, Austerlitz and Waterloo through Fontenoy, Sadowa, Gravelotte and such... Really there is much to be done here before playing with Byzantine cataphracts and such which call for a completely different engine.

And lastly, to some extent this game exist because the Total War franchise just could'nt really emulate in a fun way Musket warfare, whereas it worked great for Roman/Medieval warfare and gave the player great fun in those. Why go to Total War's forte and risk having minimal added value when you can carve your own territory ?!

In terms of Musket/Rifle tactical games, the land is barren with either old hex based John Tiller style / Robert Lee general style games (20 to 25 years old in terms of conception !) or real time dissatisfactions like Napoleon total war or excessive complexity like scourge of war. There is a massive field to be exploited there + Once a map editing/battle planner tool becomes available to modders, a massive catalog will arise.

[The Soldier]

4 hours ago, veji1 said:

There is a massive field to be exploited there + Once a map editing/battle planner tool becomes available to modders, a massive catalog will arise.

Don't count on that.  Darth didn't show much approval for modding in general when I asked him during the Stones River livestream, much to my dissapointment. :/ Maybe if modding was already here, I'd have beaten them to making the Battles of Washington and Richmond, heh.

Edited March 28, 2017 by The Soldier

[veji1]

2 minutes ago, The Soldier said:

Don't count on that.  Darth didn't show much approval for modding in general when I asked him during the Stones River livestream, much to my dissapointment. :/ Maybe if modding was already here, I'd have beaten them to making the Battles of Washington and Richmond, heh.

Well it's a matter of controle, which is legitimate. The developper wants to be able to work and get paid for it, now the engine is there and working pretty well, releasing an editor to make maps or plan battles would be shooting himself in both knees. No I meant in the future, we have to be patient here, let him produce a few games and make money out of it and then we will see.

[The Soldier]

Yea, I understand that wholly, but when I said that, I meant that Darth didn't seem to show interest in letting UG:CW get modded at all, from the tone of his text (if that makes sense).  Also; UG:G didn't allow modding at all, so I don't expect anything more from UG:CW.

Also; modding does not impinge the development process.  Why?  It's not taking any work away from the developers.  Take that from someone who has experience with both.  No shooting in knees required.

[veji1]

I see your point, but to me modding would come down the road once the developper has done his job (and gotten his money) from a napoleonic game, an 18th century warfare game, etc.. right now modding doesn't need to even be in the frame for the devs.

[The Soldier]

21 minutes ago, veji1 said:

(and gotten his money)

If there's no DLC, modding literally has no effect on the income of developers for that game.  I have no idea why you keep bringing that up.  And even if they do plan on doing whatever other time period of war and a modder beats them to it in a previous game, the developers will always be able to make a better version of it than a modder will because they can make virtually anything they want within the limits of the engine, rather than the limits of modding set by them.

Like I said twice before, Darth didn't show any interest in adding modding, period.  Not now, and not in the future.

Edited March 28, 2017 by The Soldier

[veji1]

3 minutes ago, The Soldier said:

If there's no DLC, modding literally has no effect on the income of developers.  I have no idea why you keep bringing that up.

Like I said twice before, Darth didn't show any interest in adding modding, period.  Not now, and not in the future.

hum because this game, if it works out well, isn't destined to being alone ? In all logic he should use his engine and data (map making, etc) to do similar games for at least the Napoleonic period (big marke) and potentially other periods as well ? Therefore if he was to open up this game to modding now on map and data, you might have modders making a napoleonic mod or other similar ones now, instead of the dev getting to keep on working on his games ?

[The Soldier]

I don't think you're actually reading my posts.  I think I'll reiterate myself in case you're not just trying to troll me:

Modding has no appreciable effect on income (with the exception of DLC as stated above - CoH2 for example intentionally blocks most modding so SEGA can milk it's community out of everything, so people can't make a mod that would otherwise invalidate a DLC, like the USF).  Entirely new games dedicated to a certain period, even if covered by a mod in a previous game, is going to change precisely nothing.  I will also reiterate my reasoning - an entirely new game is always going to be better than a mod because of the tools developers have access to compared to modders, if the developers have even the faintest idea of what to do.  Please, make this a proper discussion instead of you repeating the same baseless point over and over.

Edited March 28, 2017 by The Soldier

[veji1]

Look no need to be aggressive. My point is that if I was the developper, at this stage of developpment of my first big game based on the smaller game that UG/G was, I wouldn't either release tools for modding because I would want to keep control of where I am going, of how I can finish the current game and What I want to do after that with the tools and experiences and data I have accumulated doing the current game. Releasing tools for modding is not a priority. That's why it makes sense for Darth to say that it's not on the agenda. Doesn't mean it won't ever by. I might be wrong but that would be from his perspective a sensible logic. Do you get what I am trying to say, even if you disagree ?

[The Soldier]

ever anywhere did I say I wanted modding tools before everything else, and I also said right up front that I understood his position on why he's not having modding - I begrudge it, but I already understood it from the moment he told me god-knows-how-many-months-ago.  I'm aggressive because I'm rather annoyed at your inability to read and understand my posts where I clearly answered your questions, yet you keep on asking the same damn things.

Also; like I said twice before, and I'm going to say for a third time, Darth didn't seem interested in adding modding, period.  Not now, not later, not ever.  He said "we'll see" at the Stones River stream if I remember correctly, and the  "we'll see" answer to anything is almost always a no, because something as big as modding is either planned or not, and if it's not, it's never getting added.  If modding had been planned, he would not have hesitated to say yes.  Unless he comes here and says otherwise, that's going to how I see it.  Granted, the question of the modability of a game may not be in his hands as the publishers have a large say in that, but that doesn't change anything until I know.

Edited March 28, 2017 by The Soldier

[veji1]

But I never said you wanted modding tools before anything else ! No need to get frustrated, Ok he hasn't planned on there being modding, fair enough. I just gave my opinion as to why I can see modding not being a good thing too early but what do I know, I am not in the dev's head !

[Andre Bolkonsky]

The problem is not loss of future income, it is the lack of current resources. 

This is a very small shop which does very high quality work. Personally, I'm amazed at the quality of their games given the level of their own resources, which is essentially their own brains and creativity.

Any further development beyond the base game -- multiplayer, developer kits for modding, etc. -- require time and resources which almost assuredly would be better spent elsewhere. . 

For example, let's say it takes about a year to fully implement a quality multiplayer experience. That is a full year lost on development of the next project for something that can't be justified because it won't drive sales. Very, very few people would actually play the mulitplayer. Modding the game would fall into the same category. 

The way I would look at it is Gettysburg is version 1.0; Civil War is 2.0. Huge leaps were made between 1 and 2. I can't wait to see where 3.0 puts us. But spending a couple  of years adding mulitplayer and modding tools might just kill 3.0. I would hate to see that happen. 

[Wandering1]

Other things that I would point out depending on the scope of the mods:

If it is basically just a map editor using current resources, that's a lot less work to make the Unity Engine work. 

If we're trying to tweak underlying formulas (like cover formulas), allow units to use out-of-context guns (like, for example, cavalry being equipped with infantry rifles to use when dismounted), or allowing guns to be used in melee (i.e. implement revolvers while meleeing), that's a pretty big amount of work; the Unity Engine is not really designed very well to allow data model changes. 

[vren55]

Another possible conflict would be the 30 Years War or any of the European Religious conflicts, which feature primarily mercenary units fighting each other, allowing for excellent customization options, choosing melee, musketry or cavalry.

The problem is nobody knows about those wars 

A Napoleonic game honestly might be better... following let's say Napoleon's or Wellington's career. Less customization of weapons options, but enough customization of army to keep things very interesting. In fact, you could even add the option to choose the men and horse in your army, eg. Sepoys versus Europeans. Do you bring over your experienced indian soldiers or use europeans?

Edited March 29, 2017 by vren55

[Col_Kelly]

Napoleonic era seems like the perfect choice (not biased I swear ). Huge choice of campaigns/battles, relatively similar doctrins and easy for the player to identify with, both in Europe and the Americas. 

Line infantry would have a poor weapon choice yes but lights could still be equipped with prototype rifles and carbines, not to mention the epic blunderbuss for cav ! Arty already offered a wide range of options as well. Most of all people would stop whining about melee charges being a-historical XD. 

[A. P. Hill]

And let's not forget those who whine for more colorful uniforms!

Edited March 30, 2017 by A. P. Hill

[Andre Bolkonsky]

11 minutes ago, A. P. Hill said:

 

[veji1]

2 hours ago, A. P. Hill said:

And let's no forget those who whine for more colorful uniforms!

For sure there would have to be some work on that for a Napoleonic game !

[A. P. Hill]

Not sure I follow you Andre ...

[Andre Bolkonsky]

11 hours ago, A. P. Hill said:

Not sure I follow you Andre ...

File it under 'we need to be able to delete posts'. 

[Bigjku]

The one issue with a pre-rifled musket era is going to be that you need a command to form square, line and column.  In the civil war era it wasn't as big of a deal.  But in the prior era it was very important and doesn't appear to be featured in the engine as it currently exist.

[veji1]

24 minutes ago, Bigjku said:

The one issue with a pre-rifled musket era is going to be that you need a command to form square, line and column.  In the civil war era it wasn't as big of a deal.  But in the prior era it was very important and doesn't appear to be featured in the engine as it currently exist.

Sure, but I am sure it's doable.

[Bobby Fiasco]

On 3/27/2017 at 11:05 AM, The Soldier said:

I feel that medieval battles would be much more interesting - you have a plethora of different units, from mounted and dismounted knights, archers with crossbows or bows, horse archers, pike infantry, sword infantry, siege artillery and maybe (depending on how far they allow the game to go) basic firearms like arquebuses.  You can even still consolidate the types of soldier into basic types like UG:CW currently has them.  You might even be able to add in things like the type of armor your units wear, from just a gambeson to chainmail to plate armor and have that affect performance in different ways.

And hell, if you want to widen the coverage of battles, just make the player the leader of a band of mercenaries to be hired to fight, on either side at that - and the player can then choose what battle they want to participate in and on what side, if that's available, for example.  Although with that setup, you'd have to set up AI-led armies on both sides and have the player support their friendly forces.

I don't like medieval stuff as much as the musketry age/tactics but that campaign idea in particular sounds like an excellent and natural idea.

[Bobby Fiasco]

On 3/29/2017 at 2:09 AM, Col_Kelly said:

Napoleonic era seems like the perfect choice (not biased I swear ). Huge choice of campaigns/battles, relatively similar doctrins and easy for the player to identify with, both in Europe and the Americas. 

Line infantry would have a poor weapon choice yes but lights could still be equipped with prototype rifles and carbines, not to mention the epic blunderbuss for cav ! Arty already offered a wide range of options as well. Most of all people would stop whining about melee charges being a-historical XD. 

Yes to all! Napoleonic era please with more cavalry on the battlefield and infantry rally squares

Edited March 30, 2017 by Bobby Fiasco

[AJ McCully]

From what I've seen of the Ultimate General series so far, the developer(s) have a real passion for the ACW and the battles reflect that through the attention to detail in almost every aspect. They benefit from that fact that the battles of the ACW are pretty well documented for the time period. I wouldnt be surprised if they stick with this iteration of the game for quite some time in an attempt to get every detail precise, perhaps only straying to cover very similar conflicts related to the main game (like the Mexican-American War).

If they do decide to utilise the engine in a new way, I can see it going one of two ways. Developing the skirmishing and artillery mechanics to better portray conflicts from the late 19th or early 20th century, or developing the cavalry and massed infantry mechanics to better portray pre-ACW conflicts like the Napoleonic wars.

In my opinion, the latter option has more to work with but may have issues with accuracy. It would be harder to approach place names, commanders names and exact geography/locations and time-of-day events than it would be with the ACW. While it's easier to be accurate with modern conflicts, I dont think the engine is appropriate for taking on 20th century battles and would probably lose the mechanics we like most in trying to do so.