Time limits, option to turn it OFF.

[Perkon]

It needs to be gone. To whoever wants to have a couple minutes longs skirmishes, add option to turn it either ON, OFF, so they can keep on playing these mini wars, bang, bang, and its done. I want to have very long, or even unlimited battles, just like I always had in Total War series, after first game launch, I always check "battle time limit OFF". There is no worse option to exist in a game, than time limit.

Im aware that battles are scripted, the game is scripted, and a time is there to make things happen, but that has to change, somehow, because option ON/OFF is just one thing, there are more changes needed.

I think in 0.66 it worked better, than it does work now 0.71. Back then, I could at least try and prolongue some battles, then click finish, now... the game knows better. "Ok, thats it, enought of playing for now, battle is over." I see the info, that I can continue, and then press finish to quit, but seconds after that pops up, its over, no need to click, or do anything, battle ends in the middle, just like that... Really? I want to annihiliate the enemies, to the last man.

Same applies to the main battles. There is just no time for any tactics, or maneuvers, time ends before a single gun shot is heard, then Im being teleported to the other part of the map where same things happen. I dont want to brainlessly send a wave of troops to die. Its not a Soviet commander simulator, or is it? Soviets in disguise?

[Jamesk2]

Why is time limit a problem for you? I'm as much a perfectionist as you could find in this game (I've played the first UGG mission hundreds of time to find the most optimal way, and just last night I played the deployment phase of Malvern Hills no less than 10 times to get it correct), but I've never think that time limit is a problem. I've always found ample time to maneuver into opponents' weak points and crush them by slowly advancing my brigades forward. Yes I did not always killed them to the last man, but every battles end with my opponents ceased to remain as a functional army,.

[Perkon]

Its just dumb, I want to finish the battle when I feel like, not let the game decide, when it ends, especially not in a middle of the battle, where both armies have units ready to fight.

I play, and I want to decide, what and when to do.

Im a perfectionist as well, and as one I cannot accept a feature, that disturbs me, and makes me be someone else, a typical clicker. I have seen so many gameplays on YT, and here, that makes my eyes bleed. I want to fight to the last men, kill all that can be killed. I managed to get up to 1st Battle of Bull Run if I remember correctly, playing on medium, as Confederates. Inflicted 51.268 casulties, while sustaining 10.445, I have all the info in my .doc file, battles, dates, casulties, then my units, type, their creation date, battles they fought it, casulties inflicted, and sustained + more. I have been playing every single map, for hours, trying different tactics, maneuvers, etc., but very often there is not enought time for all that, especially when you are close to the end, as I wrote in the main post, and you get that message which tells you, its done, you won, you can click finish now. I can, but I dont want to, In earlier versions, I pressed finish only after the map was empty, no enemies where there anymore, after I encircled everyone, and shot them all.

Also, on the 1st Bull Run, first part no shots fired, not enough time for anything, then teleport to the next part, a little bit better, but still short on time, then back to other flank. Its bad, its very poor game design, its a serious flaw.

Time linit takes all the fun out of the game. Since they made 4th difficulty level, I guess they could fix the time limits, as for me, thats the most important thing right now.

Edited December 27, 2016 by Perkon

[RobWheat61]

I can't relate to this time issue either. Even on smaller battles with a shorter time span like for example Cramptons Gap, I've spend about an hour with maneuvering, the last time I played it and had still plenty of time left to fight off the Confederate troops.Furthermore the possibility to annihiliate the AI army so completely as can be done in the game as of now is only possible because the AI doesn't have the ability yet to retreat from a battle when it would be appropriate (too many casualties suffered etc.). Historically such things would have almost always been prevented by an effective rearguard of the retreating army, darkness, exhaustion, lack of a fresh reserve force, lack of supplies and ammunition, bad weather, human error or (mis)judgement and other factors.

Edited December 27, 2016 by RobWheat61

[Perkon]

Then maybe it was a bug on this one battle, but I still think the time limit is too short in general. This forum here has hardly any posts, or topics about it, the Steam one has more complaints.

 

Im very happy with the fact they cant retreat .

[Koro]

In my faq guide linked in the tips for new players thread I answer this question a bit more in depth as well. 

Mostly you should be able to continue for a while with the option to finish when you want. If the battle ends right after the button shows up anyway you can report it with f11 as it's most likely a bug. 

[michaelsmithern]

When i started this would have been nice, but now i've gotten better as rushing forwards and taking spots(with casualties of course), and the only real location that gave me trouble was Shiloh with the hornets nest. as for Fredericksburg i'd love to have crushed to Union Army(even more so) or at Antietam i'm glad the timer ran out since my troops up by the western woods were almost all dead and my guys in the south were barely holding on to the Heights

[waldopbarnstormer]

some of the small battles like secure river and kettle run in the union campaign have quite tight time limits which force me to throw troops in to a desperate attack to capture the objective before time runs out so I would like a bit more time to allow different tactics to be used. 

I think the grand battles should run on until nightfall or until the ai is clearly beaten then finish. I had an epic fight at Gaines mill where boatswains hill changed hands 3-4 times and I managed to recapture it with 0.01 on the count down clock by hurling 3 half strength brigades and one of my reserve brigades up the hill in a last gasp charge. I could not wait to see the victory screen come up because I am sure the ai had the strength to recapture it from me.

I don't like to see the ai be annihilated because it can't withdraw from battles but their should be a mechanism for the ai to do a strength check and if it fails because it is vastly out numbered then the game should end so long as no units remain within a set distance of a vp.

[Chi777]

I second the motion to lengthen the time limits.  I personally like loooooooooong battles.  The longer the better.  

What my dream is for this game is to be able to turn the casualty rate down and turn the timer down.  I would like to able to take a more methodical approach on occasion.  I think it would give more options for different strategies for the same battles.  

[A. P. Hill]

BUT!  I had 10 opponents left on the field and the game timed out!   I couldn't kill all of them!