I’m assuming most of you have already read Brad/Frogboy’s excellent GalCiv2 post: A Case Against Multiplayer. If you haven’t read it, I suggest you do as there is no point repeating what has already been said.
I would like to extend the concepts of that post beyond multiplayer to include real-time gameplay too. Much of the rationale behind no multiplayer also directly supports no real-time play. Multiplayer and real-time are directly related. The whole difficulty in making a turn-based game multiplayer is precisely that: the timing. How to synchonize people working at a different pace without making them wait? One of the best solutions is to make time a constant. Enter real-time games.
Not only does real-time solve multiplayer problems, but the constant flow of time means animation works fluidly too! Huzzah! Along with multiplayer, we can now also indulge is awesome eye-candy like an interactive movie! There is a reason that RTS has become so popular…
The problem with real-time games is that the depth of strategic and/or tactial play suffers considerably. Once again, rather than re-iterating, please read the aformentioned post to get some examples as to why – there are many.
But, depth of play is precisely where turn-based game shine! They not only promote smart thinking over fast thinking – they also allow us the time to really savour our decisions and accomplishments! This to me is a big part of the “just one more turn” addiction phenomenon.
As I, and many others, have said before: Real-time with pause is not the same as turn-based. By accomodating multiplayer and cinematic animations, I believe real-time gameplay elements are likely to be involved in the equasion. If this is true, then I fear that the net result may be that we’ll be forced to play closer to the shallow end of the pool.
I know we’re only talking about the tactical component of the game here. But, personally I want the game to be as tactially deep as it is strategically. That's my beef with the Total War series. Tactially, it feels like trying to herd cats and hoping for the best. I'd argue it's not the best of both worlds, it's precisely the opposite - a watered down middle ground. There are better RTS games our there and better TBS ones too.
If there were as many good TBS games on the market as RTS games I probably wouldn’t be so concerned. But Stardock is one of the last few still at it – and they’re really good at it! While I’m quite confident that they’ll be good at making a hybrid game too, my worry is not the quality of the outcome, it’s the style.
Now this may be a totally moot post as we haven't yet seen what they are up to. If they can innovate and push TBS forward or even create a hybrid without succuming to the traditional pitfalls of RTS then that's fantastic! But, because I have such high hopes for this game, I can't help but get a tad nervous when I hear things like "from “turns” to real time" as it conjures up images of Total War for me (even if that's not at all what they really have in mind).
So Stardock FWIW, as one of the last trustees of TBS, please don’t be too tempted away from depth of play in the pursuit of workable multiplayer and cinematic eye candy.
Thanks for the ear! There… I feel better now Cheers, -J.
Damn, wish I'd seen that before I posted. Could have saved myself some typing
its ok. Typing is good for you (well, actually it isn't. it stresses your hands and other things. There are better methods of communication. Switching to the dvorak keyboard helps)
There is a flaw in your case. Games are not about what is better, only what is fun. Argueing for TBS over RTS is like argueing for black and white over colour.
As someone who has never played The Corporate Machine, "continuous turns" sounds a bit oxymoronic. Care to enlightem me?
Yup, you're right. But I wasn't arguing that one was better than the other. I agree, they are just different. I was arguing that I prefer one over the other and stating why.
I'm glad you didn't because I'm hoping for someone to explain to me how this "continuous turns" stuff is not just some euphemism for 'RTS click fits stuffed into a TBS turn.' Can you tell us why the "ala The Corporate Machine" reference assuaged your general worry about RTS design values polluting the Elemental project?
Assuming they're using what I've seen before, it works thus. You have a turn timer, excluding pause, your game will continue playing with or without your action, leading to your demise if you're too slow for whatever setting the timer is on. Continuous, almost surely simultaneous.
From what they've said, turns can be queued up, perhaps they even have unit ai that automatically fights when in contact with enemies. The basic principle is that your turn is not unlimited, it can be set up to mimic real time play by moving units at a steady pace so as to finish their movement in the allotted time. It is still a turn based game.
Well you can download the political machine express version free on impulse and see exactly what Brad is talking about. I have to admit I’m a bit disappointed if the tactical battle in Elemental equates to what I just played. I personally couldn’t tell the difference between say Galciv2 and the political machine’s not so continuous “continuous turn” perhaps the nuance of it was lost on me. Either way I would advise picking a more appropriate adjective for this system if that is indeed accurate something along the lines of time-limited turns. Although even on the fastest setting I found the pace in the political machine very slow.
Realtime is like listening to a podcast, you listen to speech as it is played. You are allowed to stop, rewind and pause whenever you want unless someone else is also listening. Turn based is like reading a book. You have all the time in the world to read and digest each page, and you decide when to move on.
Continuous turn based is like reading a book, but having someone else flip the pages every 30 seconds or so. If 30 seconds isn't enough to read and digest that page, then its too late. On to the next page, and so forth.
Continuous turn based IS realtime only your ability to perform actions automatically gets paused at different intervals. In essense you have a time machine that allows you to command from the future. Interval NOW is used to plan out what your units will be doing in interval NEXT and in the mean time your units are busy performing the actions you queued up in interval PREVIOUS.
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The real confusion comes in the details. For example, imagine if two units of swordsmen are standing beside each other. You order your unit to attack, the other player orders his soldiers to move back 10 feet. What then happens when the turn "starts"? Will the first unit follow the other or will it sit and attack thin air? If you implement CTB strict to its definition then this is what will happen. Imagine combat in MoM except both sides each get to move a unit at the same time.
But then if you are allowed to watch the second unit retreat and order your units to follow them, isn't that real time control? Where then do the "turns" fit into all this.
If done right continous turns dont' have to be a RTS click-fest. Games like Baldur's Gate, Neverwinter Nights (at least the first one - don't know about NWN 2), X-COM: Apocalypse, UFO Aftermath/Aftershock/Afterlight, Fallout Tactics: Brotherhood of Steel made use of this system with varied success. If the ability to pause and issue orders at any time and automatic pauses on certain events (enemy sighting, getting into range, units idle, enemy casting spells, etc.) are in there is really no need to have fixed turns where the sides alternately move/attack with all their units.
Continous turns in fact can enhance depth of tactical combat because it enables the player to react to actions of the opposing side. I don't know if this is in the game but you could make combat spells have different casting times - eg. powerful spells taking longer - so you could interrupt with another spell or unit action of your own to kill the enemy caster before his spell is completed.
A simpler way of using continous turns is to have the sequence of unit action lined up based on their initiative and pausing to issue orders to active unit when it's their turn. So instead of having unit 1, 2, 3 of Player A, followed by unit 1, 2, 3 of player B you get for example:
Beginning of turn 1 - U1A, U3B, U2B, U2A, U1A (assuming it can act twice a turn), U1B, U3A - imaginary end of turn 1 which you won't neccessarily notice - U1A, U3B, U2B, U2A, U1A, U1B, U3A - and so on. The old screenshot of tactical combat even hint at a system like that - but since it's outdated that's a bit of speculation on my part.
So before I make any judgement whether I like the continous turn combat I really need to get more info from the developement team.
Sounds exactly like real-time, except there are arbitrary time units.
UPDATE: Posts were a split-second apart, and if it works like Wahngrok says, then I rescind my previous statement.
Essentially yes. The scope of your control is narrowed down into set intervals, "arbitrary time limits", turns, whatever you want to call them. Instead of being "can you click faster than the other guy", its more like "do you know what you want to do next?".
The real difficulty with anything to do with "turns" is deciding who gets to go first. If two identical units both get one action point and the first unit uses that point to get rid of the other unit, then how is that fair? This isn't a matter of whos sword hits the other first, the problem is that one unit gets to act while the other one sits around and does nothing when they should be acting at the same time.
I'm hoping it works this way because it's a good way to let single-player and multi-player battles behave the same way (and be managable in an acceptable time-frame). I don't mind a Total War like tactical combat system for single player because I can pause at anytime and think about what to do next. But multiplayer is completely different there because you suddenly can't either play at your own pace anymore or combat comes to a complete halt because both players pause the game all the time to react to something the other player just did.
If you have your units lined up and issue orders in a turn based fashion the player who is not active can think about the order to the unit next-in-line of his side so the waiting won't be too long as the other player acts. In true turn-based combat there is almost alway too much waiting on one side because you can't really start to plan your next move until you see what the other player has done on his move.
Time limited refers to consecutive, not simultaneous turns. Elemental is, I believe, going to have them simultaneously. I've seen continuous turns used for quite a few games that were set up with timed, simultaneous turns. It's fairly well established.
I hope instead of the preset time limits like in the political machine you can actually set your own then you can have real time combat or infinitely long turn based combat either way you can pick your poison.
But that's even more an issue with turn-based combat. One reason calculated results and player controlled battle is often so far off is because you can act with all your units at once and thereby minimize losses by concentrating your spells/attacks so that the opponent has fewer offensive capabilities on his turn (by just finishing off a unit or moving just out of range etc.). The AI isn't really good at this kind of planning (MoM and MOO2 come to mind).
I saw the dev post about turns being like in "the Corporate Machine" and then I have seen several people talk about downloading and playing "the Political Machine". did the dev mis-speak, are they two games that use the same "continuous turn" style, or are you guys citing examples from the wrong game, possibly drawing faulty conclusions?
Stardock made both the political and corporate machine games and I would guess they use the same systems. I haven't played the corporate machine but the political machine which you can download on Impulse has almost the exact same system described above with turns that have some predefined time limit to them. Therefore I assume the political machine has a similar if not the exact same "continuous" turn based system that might show up in Elemental.
Quoting Psiborg, reply 1... Damn, wish I'd seen that before I posted. Could have saved myself some typing ...
Well there seems to be some confusion about how exactly continuous turns (CTB) works (myself included as I have not played the Corporate Machine either).
I assumed it was like what Wahngrok stated where all units of both sides get initiative checks and are then placed in a queue. This means that actions are still done in discrete "turns" except rather than one side moving ALL their units and then the other side moving ALL of theirs, the sequence is decided per unit based on initiative, irrespective of which player owns the unit.
The reason I thought this was a good solution and assuaged my fears is because:
So, if this is indeed how E:WoM is going to work on a tactical level, I think that's great. This to me is a great way to address the need for time elements and to be more multiplayer friendly while still sticking firmly to a turn-based system.
BUT...
...if as some others have suggested this is NOT how it works and in fact the turns are regular turns (where a player moves ALL his unts) which are timed (regardless of the interval) then I'm not as jazzed.
I guess until we get some official clarification we won't really know.
Cheers, -J.
Psiborg... there was one RTS game which did the Real Time battles correctly. Take a look at the original Stronghold from Firefly Studios which allows the adjustable game speed. When playing make sure its not Stronghold:Crusader so make sure it's the original Stronghold.
Here you could adjust the game speed to super super slow, allowing you to give unique individual orders to 300+ units without having to rush or sacrifice strategic decisions. The adjustable game speed allowed for the gameplay to move quickly when there's nothing to do.... to the very very slow for critical moments... or anything in between. The biggest flaw with Stronghold was the limited map size 400X400.
Personally I don't like the RTS games... but this one is worth keeping.
P.S. ~ Stronghold:Crusader also has the adjustable game speed but they don't let you slow down the game as much as the original. A bad decision for this game.
I was wondering something similar. If I cast a fireball at a unit and they move at the same time... I am worried I will loose many spells like that. In MOM I could cast my spells and I always knew where it was going. Now if it's all at the same time, the ennemy unit could move out of the way. Makes for a new way of fighting.
I agree with the general idea that realtime is overrated. Think about formations, synchronized attacks at 2 points, using terrain to your advantage etc. When was the last time you've seen something like that in Warcraft3 ? War3 doesn't even pretend to have formations of any kind. And it's deliberately designed to encourage single strong army rather than splitting your forces. (easy to use Scroll of Town Portal, heroes etc).
As for multiplayer, it can be done right. Many people agree that Dominions 3 is not so great in single player (although flavour part of it is simply glorious... it's clear it's a labour of love). But it really shines in multiplayer. Simultaneous turns enable even 50 people to play together and you only wait as long as the difference between your turn and the slowest player's turn. Which brings me to another point:
Multiplayer is unpopular in many TBS games for a good reason: A-B-A-B style turns scale terribly with player counts. With two players, it's barely playable. For that reason some people play 2 separate matches at the same time. With more than 2 players the time you wait for your turn gets ridiculously long, people start dropping and disconnecting, and it's rare for any game to actually finish !
Dominions3 did it right. Simultaneous turns have their limitations, but for multiplayer they're awesome. It's the best of both worlds - you barely have to wait, but you also have the time to think your actions through.
Thanks NTJedi. I'm not a big RTS fan either and get my real-time fix via FPS Still, I may look into Stronghold for interest's sake. I didn't see them on Impulse but believe GOG carries them. Cheers, -J.
If you have ever played LOTR It could be based off of that, In in it you basically have the movement phase, shooting phase and fighting phase. In each phase te player with priority gets to move all his units first then followed by the other player. the player without priority can call things like herioc charges to upset the priority.
The problem with purely turnbased games is that sometimes they're simply boring! It's all about the when, where and how. Like in Heroes II you have to decide which mine to clear out first and when that's done which way to branch out into the world. And in a battle which unit will attack which one.
Or an hour ago in Puzzle Quest....look for 4-of-a-kinds, then skulls and then manatypes. There's no action in those games....
In realtime games if my scout sees the enemy army I can run away a bit but still keep track of what hes doing.
Feels a bit useless to argue about this but I guess I like hybrids best. Realtime with deep, tactical gameplay.
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