Re: Solo vs. multiplayer, campaigns, and difficulty

[Jens Granseuer <jensgr@gmx.net>]

On 09.03.2004 06:51, Dave Fancella wrote:
> On Tuesday 09 March 2004 01:18 pm, Patrick Forhan wrote:
> > Quoting Dave Fancella <david.fancella@comcast.net>:
> > > On Monday 08 March 2004 06:10 pm, Jens Granseuer wrote:
> It also just occured to me that maybe the solution isn't to try to apply 
> different difficulty levels to each map, maybe it would be better to just 
> categorize the map as easy, medium, and hard?  FOr both sides, because a map 
> that's easy for the FNA should probably be at least medium or hard for the 
> EoK, and vice versa.  That would neatly solve all problems, except then we 
> have a sudden shortage of maps.  :)

Then we're back to the beginning when some people said Revelation was
too difficult. It sure would be easy, though.

> > I would think if you want a radically different experience, perhaps it
> > should be a different map.  If you just want to make AntHill a bit easier
> > or harder, it should be a similar experience to Normal mode.  And I would
> > make everything relative -- Normal for one side in a map may be easier or
> > harder than normal for the other side.  That's just up to the mapmaker.
> >
> > I think the trickiest thing here is not completely unbalancing the game. 
> > For example, if advantage for a side means the other side has only five
> > units in a full contingent (rather than six), it would make a difference,
> > but it may be too much to be fun.  I guess playtesting to find that point
> > would help here.

The point I tried to emphasize with my example was that reducing a
contingent to 5 may be perfectly fine for one map but much to excessive
for another. That's why I think the mapper needs to have full control
over what is changed.

> Speaking of whiches, do the current save games store the entire history of the 
> game?  So, if some as-yet-nonexistant player appeared that could play an 
> entire scenario from start to finish from a save game, then we could actually 
> watch old games, and each other's games, and stuff.  Like watching TV, but 
> better.  Actually useful.

No, just the last turn.

> > > I'm in favor of this, too, actually.  ;)  I've also been thinking that it
> > > would be cool if there were some way to score the entire game based on
> > > campaigns won and give the players at the end a score, like Marginal
> > > victory
> >
> > At the very least, perhaps a scorecard could be presented, with things like
> > kills, loses, top-ranked units, number of turns, etc.
> 
> Probably a scorecard would be best at first, to get an idea of what kind of 
> scores are actually being earned, and then to project that into how big the 
> game should be.

Agreed.

Jens