UGG engine and WW1

[Paul von Lettow-Vorbeck]

Is UUG engine capable of realistically recreating war in the period 1914-18? I thought it would be nice to see a game about some huge ww1 battles - like Marne, East Prussian campagin of 1914 or the Brusilov Offensive.

[Mr. Mercanto]

That would be neat! There is actually already a thread dedicated to ideas for where/when the next Ultimate General game should take place (my vote is Antietam )

[Paul von Lettow-Vorbeck]

Yep. But I wanted a topic specifically about WW1 - the nature of warfare of that period already necessitates recreating entire campaigns. Developers would also need to remove line formations and leave only skirmishers (all armies switched to loose order formation after the introduction of machine guns), probably with larger mapp sizes.

[PrezesOi]

WW1 means indirect arty fire and trench warfare. Not really something i would like to see in next Ultimate General... . 

[CSA Watkins]

PrezesOi----I agree trench warfare would be boring as a game of this type.

But,

Neither of these Battles mentioned were trench warfare fights/battles.

 

@ Lettow-Vorbeck..............Marne, East Prussian campaign of 1914??

Did you mean The Tannenberg Campaign in East Prussia 1914?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_invasion_of_East_Prussia_(1914)#/media/File:BattleOfTannenberg1.jpg

---

In North Eastern France:

The First Battle of the Marne was fought from 5–12 September 1914. The battle was composed of three major actions:

The Battle of the Ourcq, 5–9 September; 6–9 September; the Battle of the Two Morins, 6–11 September; and the Battle of the Saint-Gond Marshes,

as well as numerous ancillary engagements.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Battle_of_the_Marne

*********

The Eastern Front for the most part was 1600 km long.

The battle lines on the Eastern Front were much more fluid and trenches never truly developed. 

This was because of the greater length of the front.

The Brusilov Offensive of June 1916:

The Austrians lost a staggering 1.5 million men (including 400,000 taken prisoner) and ceded some 25,000 square kilometers of ground.

http://www.firstworldwar.com/source/brusilovoffensive_brusilov.htm

[Paul von Lettow-Vorbeck]

@up

I think the entire East Prussian offensive of 1914 may be more interesting - as altering the course of battles of Stallupolen and Gumbinen may alter the course of Tannenberg and Masurian Lakes.

 

THough I'm worried that recreating such a massive campaign may be too much for the developers so they may as wel stick to Tannenberg, the most deccisive part of the campaign.

[admin]

In the long term we plan to recreate interesting battles from all time periods. 

We are currently working on improving the engine and visuals for the next generation of strategy games. Next game will definitely feature a series of battles as your financial support allows us to expand a scope for the game. 

 

Thank you for the suggestions by the way. 

[Paul von Lettow-Vorbeck]

Hmm...

 

From all periods? Do you also plan to recreate ww2 and modern battles?

 

BTW: Is there a way to make a donation to support your efforts?

[Koro]

I just really don't see this in WW1 . Battles seem much more extended and with hundreds of thousands of troops. On top of that there are machine guns, barbed wire, and trenches to somehow manage in to the game. Maybe it's just me.

I am excited to hear about the next battle and can't wait until they release more info about it. 

[David Fair]

It would be interesting to see how the Game Labs team would address cavalry on the WWI battlefield.

 

Currently in UGG the cavalry is more like armored knights or Napoleonic Heavy cavalry than ACW cavalry.  

 

WWI was even more of an infantry affair than the ACW.  The tactics of that war don't really line up very well with the current implementation of brigade-level linear tactics.  

 

To get a game even approximating WWI would be an interesting game design challenge.  You'd need to address off-screen artillery which contributed about 75% of all casualties during the conflict.  

 

Interestingly about 35 years ago the U.S. Army had a team that was playing war games against local clubs.  They were on a recruiting tour looking for officer candidates.  The winners were awarded a trip to Ft. Leavenworth to play a game on their static set up - staggeringly impressive.  

 

The feedback regarding all of the amateur wargamers from the U.S. Army team was that we really didn't have a clue how to use artillery in modern warfare.  You'd need to get some serious guidance to even get a WWI game in the ballpark...or just strap on a blindfold and throw some darts at an implementation that has little to do with the actual combat arms.

 

WWI fire and control mechanics for artillery are not for faint hearted game designers - and they are likely the most critical element of a WWI game.

[Paul von Lettow-Vorbeck]

A question to developers:

 

How do you plan to recreate ww2 or modern conflicts? The number of soldiers per 1km of frontage tended to drop sharply in late 19th and 20th centuries - from about 3500 soldiers per 1km of frontage during the ACW to about 1500 during WW1, 500 during WW2 and about 150 today - so the only solutions are to either create ridiculously large maps (10-15 times larger than UGG ones) or decreasing unit sizes... which is not good

 

How do you plan to solve this.

[michaelsmithern]

That would be neat! There is actually already a thread dedicated to ideas for where/when the next Ultimate General game should take place (my vote is Antietam )

are you talking about my thread perhaps, it would make me so happy if you were