thekev506

My take on those five: 1. Historical Battlefield Simulator - simulator is the key word, if you're going to simulate a battle it's going to be in minute detail. Scourge of War is a Historical Battlefield Simulator. 2. Wargame - high detail, often turn-based and close to a simulator, usually come from some form of military training. 3. RTS - Total war games, to keep it simple. There are plenty of others, of course. 4. Arcade - Fast-paced and more tactical than strategic. Starcraft, Rise of Nations. 5. Indy - self explanatory. UGG is blending things from 1 and 3. It doesn't recreate the complete ORBAT of each side or supply trains like Scourge of War, but it's got a little more to it than a typical battle in Empire Total War. I'd be a fan of having visualised order delay (and limited supplies) available as an on/off feature, it'd help the player find that blend of 1 and 3 that they like.

Many good wargames. That's the problem: is UGG a wargame or an RTS game? I think it's somewhere between the two, so you have to cater for both audiences. It'd actually be pretty interesting to run a poll seeing whether people want a wargame or an RTS game.

Cheating!

Not a speed thing - I think the game's pacing is right in the sweet spot now, I'm actually referring to my own clumsiness and being slow planning movements because I'm a bit crappy at RTS games sometimes Staging wouldn't be particularly helped by this, you're right, I just think being able to prepare an order and have it ready to go on your mark could offer the tactical flexibility a quicker player may have without having to change the speed of the game.

Scourge of War does something similar, you can choose to have your orders relayed by horseback courier. It's a novel idea and adds an extra layer of challenge, especially as the couriers can be killed, but it can also bog the game down badly. It'd need some form of visualisation to not be frustrating (use the cavalry sprites as couriers maybe?), and it would need to be optional, but I'm not completely against the idea!

I think this was a graphics thing if I remember right. Nick said they took the heavier smoke seen in the pre-release pics out to improve performance for now, and it might go back in later.

Hey all, Quite a simple one but something I think could be useful for people who like to play UGG a little on the slow side (like me.) It would be nice to be able to synchronise manoeuvres more complex than group-formation stuff - I might want to organise a large attack whilst my cavalry relocates to a vantage point at the same time, and sometimes I'm not quite nimble enough with my mouse to do this properly. Here's my fix: a 'plan' order and a 'execute' button. Holding down a key - let's say alt - when putting a movement down makes it a 'planned' move, with the movement arrow staying on the map. On pressing a key - say 'X' for now - the unit(s) act on their 'planned' movements. This could have a bunch of applications, such as pre-arranged fallback points, coordinated flanking moves with a direct attack, or being able to keep your reserve out of harm's way but available to call up without taking your eyes off the action. What do you think?

To play devil's advocate: why should the devs be looking to add things to the game? They'll have a design document produced and a direction/features in mind, surely their time is better spent refining those rather than constantly adding new things. You're never going to please everyone and a lot of early access games have gotten bogged down because of that (project zomboid springs to mind.)

The issues I've had with artillery are: -The morale-condition link. Poor condition draining morale and an inability to stop the cannons firing if they can see enemies means unless you hide your guns in defilade somewhere they will inevitably have horrible morale. -LOS and 'cannon charges'. It's difficult to tell when my guns have a clear shot on a target and they tend to target units not involved in the most immediate engagement, leaving my infantry with no support. When I specifically direct my artillery to attack a closer unit they 'charge' them, walking in front of my line infantry and up to the enemy. They'll follow a unit that retreats/goes into defilade also, which has cost me a lot of guns. A SIMPLE FIX Separate movement and attack for artillery! Only a move command should make the cannons move - if they're unable to shoot at a target due to LOS have a 'blocked' message pop up quickly (having a separate one to show when your infantry is blocking would be even more useful.)

I'm guessing it's at 1:1 now for performance reasons, Canerosso, but it would be pretty amazing!

Making the movement lines transparent would be nice, the map can get very cluttered when you start moving a lot of units at once.

Considering the dev's history I'd be very surprised if being mod-friendly wasn't a part of the game's design. Hopefully a modding scene takes off - we've got way too many people asking for completely different things right now and there's no way the team can implement everything and please everyone.

I can deal with the morale/condition stuff and their love of charging across terrain; we're still in early access after all, but for me the artillery really need some line-of-sight tweaking. I find time and again that despite putting my units in defilade they come under cannon fire, or that my guns can't fire across a valley to a marginally higher hilltop where the enemy is clearly visible.

I'd rather this game follow the 'Scourge of War' model and have standalone DLC of other ACW battles. Manassas would be a good start because you essentially get twice as much bang for your buck with two historic battles happening there. Antietam would be really great, too.

One of the things I've enjoyed about UG (probably because I'm not too great at strategy games) is trying something out, saying 'ok, let's see where this went wrong and how I could do things differently' and applying that. A wide-open saving system would allow that even more

Bingo, Cerebus. The whole idea behind this thread was visual/polish ideas for the game that wouldn't be essential, people are getting a little too carried away.

Hi all, A lot of people feel that the skirmisher and cavalry units are a little OP in the game, and I tend to agree. I like having light infantry as separate units along with videttes, as it does encourage creative play, but right now they pack too much of a punch and can take too much of a beating compared to line infantry, and as they typically go for the artillery I find it difficult to keep my guns in any useful shape for long. Here's my idea for a fix that would be easy to implement and test: make those units half as big. Still as useful and versatile, but much more fragile and not as powerful. Thoughts?

Option 2's nice and clean, and gives a bit more flavour than the others

Something general-related that struck me earlier today: should the aura of influence a general has be bigger on higher ground (and maybe smaller in woods?) In my mind I imagine the general dispatching couriers and micro-managing the situation rather than 'inspiring' units when he's near them, and being on high ground would make such a job much easier.

Agreed, but seeing as one of the nice things about a historically-based game is that you can change history, shouldn't the opportunity for such a thing to happen be in there?

I'd agree with the need for height to be more important, especially for artillery. If you go to Cemetery Hill in real life although much of the ground which would've been open is now forest you can still see just how commanding a view of the area it provides, and how sheer a slope it would be to attack. Little Round Top's another such place, though McPherson's ridge is quite minor. I think distinguishing between 'major' and 'minor' hills would be a good idea.

I thought the 20th Maine ran out at Little Round Top, and that forced their hand to fix bayonets and charge? There's every chance I'm wrong of course, just specifically remember that detail from somewhere.

Expanding on Elicas' morale bar idea, I'd make it simpler by just having a low morale warning icon above units. Same could go for condition!

Hi all, I thought it might be a good idea to have a thread to put ideas forward that are entirely 'cosmetic' - things that don't directly affect gameplay but add a nice layer of polish and flavour. Here's my suggestion anyway Fife and drum - There are already some bugle calls for charging and the like, but I'd love to hear some genuine marching music in-game. Nothing loud, as it could get horribly messy, but it's something I love to hear in games set in this era and it adds plenty of flavour to the setting.

Ideas 2 and 3 seem the best fit to the problem, 3 in particular.