Despite what I wrote in my last post, I do enjoy the games - both BG & HPS - but I'm also aware of their faults and sometimes get rather frustrated that I can't program in the changes I'd like to see that would improve the game engine.
I have some "real time" games like Sid Meier's Gettysburg and the Waterloo that uses the same engine, as well as the three Total War titles, but I rarely play these. The "real time" system's just too awkward to handle more than a handful of units at a time.
What I'd really like to see is HPS moving over to some kind of plot & move system, where both players plot all their movement in advance and then the computer resolves that 15 or 20 minute turn. This would still be very similar in certain respects to the current system - the players would still <i>move</i> all their units, although they'd probably need to assign fire & melee orders in advance - except that the two player turns are combined, so neither player will know what his opponent will do that turn, and what the opponent decides to do will have a good chance of messing up your own <i>planned in advance </i>move. I suppose there'd have to be a system where the players would need to order each unit in advance whether to start firing as soon as they spot the enemy or come into range, or whether to hold their fire until closer (Age or Rifles can do something like this). Movement and fire would need to be linked in an "action point" system (like East Front, etc), so that the more a unit moved the less times it would be able to fire that turn. Using up the full movement allowance would count as forced marching and would result in fatigue (it's in AoR, but surprisingly absent from the BG/HPS games). There'd also need to be a system where units can get pinned down under fire mid turn or even routed, perhaps taking nearby units with them, while - more relevant for Nappy than ACW - mounted cavalry might get impatient and charge without orders. (Again, this is in AoR, although that's also a turn based game) Melees would occur when units of opposing sides attempted to enter the same hex and neither side chickened out - again there'd also need to be a "melee" button that a player would need to press in advance, otherwise the troops would just halt in the adjacent hex and then fire. But the BG/HPS typical reliance on ZOC melees will be a rarity - units won't usually stick around long enough to allow themselves to get isolated and captured, while with a We-plot, We-go simultaneous movement system, players won't find it anything like so easy to co-ordinate their various units' movement each turn in a very chess-like manner to be able to achieve a series of ZOC melee eliminations.
We already have a "replay" feature to view the opponent's turn, as well as the "command control" system where players assign orders that the A/I then carries out, so maybe a simultaneous plot & move system could be developed from that - perhaps still as an optional system so that players can still chose to play the traditional I-go, You-go turn based (either single or multiphased) method if they prefer.
Col. Rich White
3 Brig. Phantom Cav Div
III Corps ANV
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