Next Ultimate General Game, What would you like to see?

[Yarev]

I'd like to see a small campaign map ( turn-based) or big campaign map (turn-based)

 

Either of these two will make me happy

[Zelekendel]

Actually, after a long search, I didn't really find many campaign / operative  games with built in tactical / grand tactical fighting systems at all. Yes, of course there's Total War, but Total War has nothing to do with the realities of running an army on campaign. 

 

If there is a grand strategic campaign, I want it stripped down and focused purely on the military and possibly political / diplomatic sides of running things. Absolutely no building towns and barracks etc, rather deal with real issues of mustering troops and the logistics of it in an approachable, relatively easy to learn system.

[tariusan]

Few thoughts.

 

Stay away from making it into a Total War game. What works amazingly in UGG is tactical combat and AI. Building and balancing large scale game would mess with that in a big way.

 

Need battles with a lot of What if, where location is well known and is well documented.

 

1. Austerlitz

2. Borodino

3. Collection of battles from Indian Mutiny

4. Crimean War and different episodes of siege of Sevastopol

[Zelekendel]

Tariusan, I agree on the no Total War front - still, it'd be cool to see a game where you're leading the ANV on its campaign from Richmond to Washington, or the Grande Armee across Europe, with a focus on the tactical but still stakes on the campaign level.

[fumagalli]

For the gameplay : I understand that full-scale wars and year-long campaigns can be difficult to implement. Then why not adding instead a bigger map where we can move our regiments, divisions, on a larger scale (days & tens of km) as the map that currently shows the mission briefing ? This would help personalize the battle a step further. Then, when they clash, we zoom-in to the current battle scale (hours & km). "Kind of" total war, but still for one battle only.

 

For the era : The wars of the league of Cambrai & Cognac : a melting pot between Milan, Florence, Venice, the Papal States, Spain, the HRE and France fighting for the wealth of Northern Italy.

And, obviously, the battle of Ligny, Qattre-bras and eventually Waterloo. It would fit this game perfectly.

Every Napoleonic battle would be great actually, Austerlitz, Dresden, etc... each of them being a DLC ? 

 

EDIT : this link is a goldmine should the developers decide to do the Waterloo 4 days campaign !
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Order_of_battle_of_the_Waterloo_Campaign

[Ludo]

I would love to see some sort of strategic level added to this game.  It is an absolutely brilliant tactical battle simulator but how battles are fought, or where they are fought, or when they are fought are all as a result of strategic decisions.   The lack of Confederate cavalry at Gettysburg was because of a strategic decision, and Waterloo would not have been Waterloo without the strategic maneuvering that led to Ligny and Quatre Bras.

 

I think the battle engine itself is good enough to be easily adapted to any scenarios of the horse and musket era, and even beyond, so I'm not too bothered about which continent or time period it moves on to.  But having a campaign level strategic map where opponents can maneuver at army, corps or divisional level would add a whole new dimension and put this excellent battle engine into the context it deserves.

 

I'm not suggesting that it should go in for the sort of Total War micro management of towns, buildings and units.  The great strength of the current design is that the gameplay has been well thought out and cut down to key essentials.  Similarly, any strategic level should be kept simple but should at least include terrain effects on movement speed, and also some recognition of the need for sources of supply.  As with the current game, simple but smart is the key.

 

Of course, having a strategic level means that you would not necessarily end up with the same battles as actually happened historically.  In design terms, I suppose it is all about whether you want to stick to playing historical battle re-enactments (which you can still do) or whether you prefer a more sand box approach.

 

[Mr. Mercanto]

Antietam

[Kontreadmiral]

How about a battle from the Great Northern War? Gadebusch might be a good choice.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Gadebusch

 

Edited May 20, 2015 by Kontreadmiral

[Soupcanman]

Two major battles I would like to see. Both are the first "Major" battles east and west. First, Bull Run. Such a fun risk taking battle that could land you any which way. Second is Wilsons Creek. This would be fought on a regimental level but you could play it as it was or alternate ways such as Siegel attacks with Lyon, or Lyon brings all extra 1200 troops from Springfield. Short and sweet.

 

[JaM]

definitely Napoleonic battle, or preferably entire campaign... like.. having command during Italian campaign of 1796, orAustrerlitz campaign or similar.

[mechagran]

The ones I would like to see in this order

 

1. Waterloo

2. Defence of Moscow 1941 - or indeed the entire Operation Typhoon campaign

3. Sevastopol  - or indeed an entire Crimean War campaign

4. Blenheim

5. Antietam

6. Waterloo (because I want it so bad)

 

[mhowell12]

First off, this is one of the best games out there.  As a civil war skirmisher (www.n-ssa.org) and a history buff, I love the authenticity this brings.

 

My suggestion for the next installment is a true sandbox mode but with the capability of publishing the maps to the public for download.  I think this would allow fans and buffs like myself to take on the challenge of modeling different battles from the developers.  I think there is much more potential here in the civil war genre without expansion into other areas (however, if other areas are as well done as this one, it should be quite profitable).

 

Great job with this game.

[NBForrest]

I think you guys should stick to the ACW period. There are very few enjoyable civil war games out there and this topped it for me. Some have mentioned even WWII battles which is a bad route. There are many good WWI games out there. I believe this period is where you can really nail it and already have with this game. I would like to see maybe shiloh, bull run, spotsylvania or chickamauga.  People are suggesting you do battles from different time periods like Napoleon which would look great down the road but I think you guys should do some more acw battles first. This game is unique and so is the civil war. 

Edited March 25, 2015 by NBForrest

[shauneyboy]

I would absolutely die if Game-Labs took the UGG engine/system and created a "Guns of August" game... So many possibilities with the first month of WWI!  You could do both east front with the Battle of Tannenberg and west front with the campaign in Belgium and NW France up to the "miracle on the Marne" and the onset of the trench stalemate.

 

Please oh please oh please do this!  French soldiers in their red pants vs. the huns! 

[Jack Freedom]

They could always try Ancient battles?

 

One can dream

 

Hell why not stick to the American Civil war and create a campaign map

Edited April 8, 2015 by Jack Freedom

[Lumpy]

They could always try Ancient battles?

 

One can dream

 

Hell why not stick to the American Civil war and create a campaign map

 

I think another Civil War game with a campaign map would be best. They already got the engine and the gfx for this setting. I'd say build upon that.

[David Fair]

The game engine is actually tuned for the wars of Frederick the Great - much more than Fredericksburg.

Powerful cavalry and really slow artillery! Just change the battlefield map and the uniform colors and you should be good to go.

If you are going to do more in the American Civil War with this game then you need to take care of two primary issues:

First, cut back on the power of the cavalry. Cavalry during the ACW avoided infantry like the plague. Cavalry was great at raiding/riding around an army/fighting other cavalry - but it did not take on infantry effectively. There were times when cavalry was effective at screening infantry which Buford did at Gettysburg - losing only 100 men from his command.

Second: Increase the mobility of the artillery and the impact artillery has on morale. Additionally you need to decrease the lethal effects of artillery. This is after all, a game about black powder artillery. Gibbon's "Artillerist Manual" states that artillery effect was "primarily moral rather than physical." The medical records show that 6% of wounds were caused by artillery. The ordnance records show that artillery projectiles made up less than 10% of projectiles fired during battles - so unless artillery was scaring people to death the current game has artillery that is much too effective. Hunt, Halleck, Alexander, Tidball, and others use the metric that an artillery battery firing canister was as effective as a 200 man regiment. In UGG the effects are 5X this metric. The quickest way to fix UGG is to consolidate the artillery into brigades which would reduce the number of batteries and put the artillery roughly in its proper ACW role.

Right now the cowardly blue infantry is cowardly because you are trying to balance overly effective artillery to get the game balance playable. Tune the artillery - align the infantry with the historical record, and you'll have a much better game.

A campaign game would be great.

[jekct1212]

I would love to see anything American revolution, something like a southern campaign or northern campaign game though since the battle were mostly one, two day affairs, if they plan on rivaling total war, they could really do it with a revolutionary war campaign game. 

[Banana_Joe]

I dont want a strategic meta-game above it.

Just keep adding famous battles from the ACW or if you want to expand it past the ACW, Napoleonic era ( Austerlitz, Waterloo, Leipzig) or maybe even the german/french war from the 19th century.

[Grognard_JC]

Napoleonic Wars battled.

 

Definitely. And please, not just Waterloo.

Edited May 19, 2015 by Grognard_JC

[daztek]

Koniggratz!!

 

It is one of the few battles where the combatants had very different firearms.

 

Very interesting battle. Large, slow but concentrated Austro-Saxon army with modern breech loading artillery and muzzle loading long range rifles, lightly entrenched on a long ridge, faces a smaller Prussian army with muzzle loading, shorter range artillery and fast firing short range breech loading rifles, but with another Prussian army half a days march away to their left.

 

In the morning, the Austrians from cover hammer the Prussians from the ridge with their long range Lorenz rifles and artillery, decisively repulsing several Prussian attacks. However, on the right, in defiance of their orders, the local Austrian corps commanders let their infantry get sucked into a forest where their longer range fire advantage is negated and the fast firing Prussian needle gun is brutally decisive, and multiplied by the better doctrine and training of the Prussian officers.

 

At midday Austrian staff officers beg the CinC, Benedek, to order a general offensive from the ridge as the Prussians in the open in front had taken heavy casualties and were shaken from hours of artillery and rifle fire. This was the big what-if of the battle, but Benedek, cautious due to the Prussian army somewhere to his right, demurred.

 

By early afternoon the second Prussian army arrives and starts feeding fresh troops into the hinge on the right where the 2 Austrian corps had been mauled in the forest. The Austrians were driven back all along their right, forcing them to eventually abandon the ridge as well. Against overwhelming odds, bloody rear guard actions by the right wing Austrian infantry and artillery enabled the centre to withdraw; but by evening the Austrians and Saxons are in general retreat, covered by their reserve artillery and charges by their heavy cavalry reserve, which successfully brought the Prussians to a halt.

 

Overnight the Austrians crossed the Elbe to their rear, covered by the guns of the Koniggratz fortress. But Austrian political will had collapsed, they sued for peace and Bismarck takes the first step to uniting (klein) Deutschland under the Prussian crown. Conversely, the Austrians could have acted like an American army and simply entrenched on the other side of the Elbe with all the advantages of their guns and rifles.

 

It is an interesting tactical puzzle for both sides; the Prussians have to work their way forward avoiding Austrian firepower and get into close range with their needle guns; the Austrians have to keep the Prussians at range, while resisting their out dated infantry doctrine of close column assault, a fatal tactic against the needle gun.

 

Operationally, if an campaign shell is ever considered, it would be an interesting contest between a more competent and mobile Prussian force, but widely divided into two armies, before a slowly concentrating Austrian foe with the central position, with the Prussians having to cross mountains and rivers against Saxon and Austrian corps sized detachments, and unite on the battlefield.

 

Another what-if is Franz Josef appointing Habsburg Archduke Albrecht to command the northern theatre; Albrecht had been in command prior to the war and knew the country; he was widely regarded as the best Austrian general. He did win decisively in Italy against the Piedmontese. Franz Josef withdrew him because he was afraid a defeat would weaken the dynasty, which happened anyway. Albrecht couldn't have been worse than Benedek, previously the Italian army commander, who for a variety of reasons failed to give any meaningful direction to the campaign or the battle.

[kc87]

Peninsula Campaign and Jackson's Valley Campaign would be awesome. 

[Lincolns Mullet]

A campaign game that doesn't require a 3 inch manual to figure out would be great.  It seems Nick is trying to tailor his game around the mobile "app" market, so it would have to be something feasible to play on tablets too.  One of the great achievements of UGG is how much detail is represented in the game, but without the player having to read a manual to figure it out.  Trees provide cover, fighting uphill is hard, crossing rivers is slow, shooting your opponent from behind is good, etc.  Certain aspects aren't as apparent until you see the effects in-game (1 star units not being as effective as 3 star units, etc).

 

So for a campaign game, I can see a similarly streamlined experience that's easy to grasp, but has layers of complexity hidden within.  This is an entirely different ball game we're talking about here though, and much more difficult especially if the idea is to experience real-time battles with the armies you create and manage in the campaign game.  What kind of maps will be used?  How are divisions handled, timing of reinforcements, etc?  UGG handles all of those elements by using historical reference points, but a campaign game would create mostly ahistorical battles and locations.

 

A smaller request (maybe lol) would allow for the branching campaign in UGG to be played out in multiplayer.  The downside to this is, what's the market?  As cool as it would be, will Nick really sell a lot more copies by developing that feature?  Typically single-player elements sell better than multi-player.

 

I heard the next game might be Antietam?  Seems logical, and most people who bought and enjoyed UGG will buy Antietam.  I know once Firaxis released "Antietam" after SMG, I immediately bought it.  Then we'd have two great Civil War games available, and hopefully Nick has made enough $$ after that to go even bigger and better for his 3rd title.

[Lincolns Mullet]

Alright, here's my bright idea for a campaign.  It's a pretty long-term commitment on the part of the dev team, but it wouldn't require making a entirely new game AND it would fit with the mobile app market.  And at the end we'd have a bunch of great Civil War battles to play.

 

Nick and crew would have to find a way to design a good number of the major Civil War battles (Shiloh, Chancellorsville, The Wilderness, Antietam, etc).  These would be separate entities like UGG currently is, and Antietam will be.  The campaign map would be a geographic map of the US, primarily where these major battles would occur.  When you start a new campaign as Union or Confederate, only the first battle is available to you (First Manasses?).  When you "win" the battle, it unlocks the next on the grand map and follows the historical timelines of the battles.

 

If, for example, the initial battle is First Manasses, then there would have to be specific conditions to "winning" that scenario for either side since it was a historically terrible battle for the Union.  Or, the major battles could be contained only to the ones where historically, either side could've won.

 

Your overall "score" at the end of the campaign is the combined casualty rates you inflicted throughout all of the battles.  Unit losses, etc wouldn't carry over from battle to battle.  Each battle would be self-contained in terms of what units were fighting there, so losses at Antietam wouldn't affect who shows up at Gettysburg.

 

Victory Points wouldn't be a cumulative score for the campaign, and only beneficial to calculating a specific scenario's victor.  The overall goal is to win battles, but ultimately destroy your enemy by the end of the campaign.  So you could lose Shiloh and Chancellorsville, but win Antietam and Gettysburg and still have a chance for a positive victory score like UGG currently works at the end of the battle (Minor, Major, Epic, Triumphant).

 

Of course, we'd need Nick and his team to basically make all of these battles separately and then combine them into a grand campaign linking them together.  Then add a multiplayer component.  Bam.  Done deal. lol.  Not asking for much am I?

.  

[Koro]

I think a cool feature in a campaign map would be public opinion.

Granted that it would be almost impossible to defeat the yankees because of numbers and artillery, the goal would then be for the South to sway the northern public opinion so much that it would demand a peace treaty.

This could be done by invading northern territory, sacking cities perhaps and obviously defeating Union armies with added bonuses if it's on Union soil