1. This site uses cookies. By continuing to use this site, you are agreeing to our use of cookies. Learn More.

The Tragically Obligatory "What We'd Like To Change/See Next Time" Thread

Discussion in 'OOC' started by Del S, Jul 25, 2018.

?

So... Where do you think we're fighting next year?

  1. Paradiso

    4 vote(s)
    4.9%
  2. Aconticemento

    6 vote(s)
    7.4%
  3. NeoTerra

    1 vote(s)
    1.2%
  4. Svalarheima/Huangdi

    24 vote(s)
    29.6%
  5. A Brand New Planet No One Has Any Vested Interest In

    6 vote(s)
    7.4%
  6. Concillium

    1 vote(s)
    1.2%
  7. Dawn Again

    2 vote(s)
    2.5%
  8. Space Again

    4 vote(s)
    4.9%
  9. Human Edge

    7 vote(s)
    8.6%
  10. Bourak

    1 vote(s)
    1.2%
  11. YuTang

    0 vote(s)
    0.0%
  12. ShenTang

    0 vote(s)
    0.0%
  13. Both YuJing Planets

    1 vote(s)
    1.2%
  14. Wales (It's Probably Not Wales)

    20 vote(s)
    24.7%
  15. Varuna

    4 vote(s)
    4.9%
  1. Del S

    Del S Tunguskaball

    Joined:
    Dec 11, 2017
    Messages:
    1,178
    Likes Received:
    2,585
    The campaign is over, so it's time for us to build our hopes up for next year so CB can gleefully dismantle them before our very eyes in 2019! I already made this exact thread in the Nomad room on Kurage, but there doesn't seem to be a general one yet.

    Campaign Structure
    -Have multiple missions per theatre rather than just one. Given that the “custom mission winner picks location” method has been declared unsporting, more variation in theatres will IMO boost interest when theatre must be pre-determined. This also allows for more flexibility with the “restricted” locations like the JSA confusion: Each faction has one mission where they must be the “defender”.

    -As an alternative/supplement, maybe have "Mutators": the option to put different modifiers into the scenario, have it so weather effects can be random, etc.

    -Adjust the points scoring quicker. NA2 scoring 4 points at a time was a bit crazy given they were a larger faction than anticipated, so that could have been adjusted very early on. As it was, they remained scoring four at a time, and may have been driven over-confident and as a result, lost their ground.

    -Quicker use of FAQs/Erratas. Confusion over the JSA-exclusive zone was rife, there are many an error in mission profiles, and other issues rose up.

    -A preview of the PDFs at least a day in advance for the community to proofread, maybe even a “warm up” week as part of it. (Note:

    -A week’s break between phases, to make plans, to have a rest, to let people build new units and so on.

    -Have no-mans-land/unclaimed objectives. Empty zones to fight over rather than have each area with a defender.

    -Perhaps they could act as buffer zones for the main theatre they link to: If you take/defend that, some kind of bonus is in play like extra point scored for wins at the main theatre.

    -Encourage narrative play with boosts to doing certain things. XP boosts for ALEPH following orders, for instance.

    Objectives/Alliances
    -Have some! Not every faction is about taking ground in the fluff, after all.

    -Alliances as a more formal thing would be nice, even if just a declared “buddying up” like we tried with Phase One.

    -Have the Missions PDFs downloadable as single missions/theatres (see below) rather than only a big fluff/missions PDF.

    -Don’t blob NA2 together as one faction next time. I understand why it happened this time, but maybe the mercs playing as mercs and selling their services would be more fluffy. Merc players being able to “sell” their services for XP boosts or whatever, conducting their own mini-campaign/contest for their faction to earn the most credits during the war.

    -Some mid-campaign rewards might be fun too. Like, post-phase stuff for successes, or midphase boosts for holding certain points (Like you get +1SWC if you defend an armoury zone, boost to hackers if you held a comms array, boost to AD by holding an airfield, etc) but those may work a lot better in a smaller narrative campaign….

    Reports
    -Maybe remove the star system. In real terms, it’s practically a two-star system, as people either vote high for their faction, or low because No Pictures/No Text/”Report to Come” and so on.

    -Display the voting by faction: NOT from people, but show if some factions are engaging in downvoting/upvoting of reports. AFAIK this may exist for mods and staff only already, though.

    -Requirement to have at least made a post in the briefing room to vote on a report

    -Ability to rescind an accidental publish of a report/preview the report before publishing to prevent mistaken publishing.

    -Better guide on making reports, as new players seem especially confused by it all.

    -Templates for making reports. Nothing fancy, just a pre-set thing like
    Turn One
    Text
    Pics Here

    -More encouragement to report losses. XP boost, 1pt loss 2pts draw 3pts win, something to make it worthwhile.

    -Don’t use the same directory and let people choose/rename filenames as they upload. Rename uploads to prevent duplicates: Two people with the same Sony camera end up seeing each others photos when uploading.

    -An offline editor for batreps would be nice, and maybe easier with templates as suggested above

    -Alert a player if they're posting a blue-on-blue result, as it won't count in the end, and will distort figures.


    Stats
    -Improve them a little to show the number of players who actually have posted a report, or spoken in the briefing rooms. IE, not just registered players but show the number of players for a faction who have posted at least one battle, and have posted in the briefing rooms, to give a better idea of activity (numbers of registered players are not exactly a good metric of a faction's power). The two can be tracked manually, but they involve digging through the relevant acheivements.

    -Show more percentages rather than raw numbers, to prevent faction sizes distorting the real figures.



    And finally, the poll is the WILD SPECULATION OF WHERE WE'LL BE FIGHTING NEXT YEAR! :D
     
  2. hortanium

    hortanium Major Thomas Williams, USAriadna Marine Corps

    Joined:
    Jul 2, 2018
    Messages:
    68
    Likes Received:
    79
    Personally, I like the ideas you posted. In particular, the idea of having neutral zones to battle over for control. I think this could lead to very interesting tactical decisions, especially if they give your faction a bonus.
     
    Hecaton likes this.
  3. Hecaton

    Hecaton EI Anger Translator

    Joined:
    Nov 23, 2017
    Messages:
    7,205
    Likes Received:
    6,535
    That's why I'd like to see a neutral planet or have Combined Army just dunk Concilium.
     
    DaRedOne and theGricks like this.
  4. Brother Smoke

    Brother Smoke Bureau Trimurti Representative

    Joined:
    Dec 19, 2017
    Messages:
    956
    Likes Received:
    1,465
    Oh yes please let mercs be mercs!

    I understand why it didn't happen this time around, but it's something I feel would be really cool
     
    Ben Kenobi and Shiwen like this.
  5. Hecaton

    Hecaton EI Anger Translator

    Joined:
    Nov 23, 2017
    Messages:
    7,205
    Likes Received:
    6,535
    Yeah, I think individual Merc players should be able to choose a faction to side with. Just make 'em wildcards.
     
    Ben Kenobi, Balewolf and Shiwen like this.
  6. Gargs454

    Gargs454 Member

    Joined:
    Dec 6, 2017
    Messages:
    14
    Likes Received:
    11
    All of these are great ideas. I especially like the idea of "neutral" zones as I think that can also liven up the campaign. In Phase 2 this year it relatively quickly became a two zone battle with all the others pretty much locked up. Two other zones we're contested for a bit the first week of the phase but they were pretty quickly made comfortable. To be fair, I think the decisions of the individual factions actually made a lot of sense thematically, which is why I think some neutral zones would help liven things up.

    In addition to being able to pull a report after a mistaken publish, I would also like to see the ability to re-rate a report if it is improved on, etc.
     
    Hecaton likes this.
  7. cazboab

    cazboab Definitely not Cazboaz.

    Joined:
    Nov 30, 2017
    Messages:
    1,083
    Likes Received:
    1,462
    The first thing I want to suggest is before the campaign starts publish an explanation of how we're expected to play ahead of the campaign. It doesn't have to (indeed should not) include the specific requirements of how a report can score points, but a reaffirmed statement of what we're supposed to be doing is apparently necessary, EG when the games should be played, how and when to decide what theatre to report in...

    Get rid of the numbers on the theatres, replace them with percentages displayed as whole percentage only.
    This will make it harder to get useful and predictable outcomes, eg being 2% behind or ahead tells you you need more points, but not the specific number of wins that you need to take a theatre. Total faction points should be available as a number still, that way it's still possible to guesstimate the points you need to earn or have in the lead, but you can't be sure.

    The asymmetric scoring system where smaller factions could be expanded and refined.
    The first refinement is that each *player* should be earning 3 points per win, and the bonus points for smallest factions, playing the correct mission, holding the right zone or whatever should be applied to the total in batches of a set time or number of reports, again this makes it possible to estimate but you won't have a hard and fast answer to how everyone is scoring within hours, and it also means that the bonus points can be adjusted if a smaller faction becomes more average sized over the coarse of the campaign.

    I'll have more later, but a few of my ideas are too half baked right now to be useful...
     
  8. Shiwen

    Shiwen Commissar, Yu Jing Political Work Department

    Joined:
    Dec 31, 2017
    Messages:
    404
    Likes Received:
    1,159
    A lot of good suggestions already, but I'll repeat one I think is key: when it comes to number of theatres, there's no trick to it, less is not in fact more. More is more.

    The idea of a central base for big factions isn't bad, but scattering a lot of different alternate points on the map would be incredibly useful. It would give smaller factions areas they could coordinate to conquer while those with larger playerbases are spread more thinly, it would allow a wider variety of 'official' theatre missions, it would divide the attention of major factions who would need to do the calculus of defending themselves vs attacking one point vs attacking several, it would counter the Phase Two stagnancy problem by ensuring every faction will enter the phase contesting something. By seeding the various minor locations with a point or two from different factions at the outset, you could drive rivalries from the get-go as those involved want to 'keep' hold of 'their' territories. By assigning minor bonuses you can create tactical decisions about which ones to prioritize for high commands and players generally (ex: the Highway 34 Theatre is the main supply route to New Daioyu Fortress, Yu Jing's central base. The Faction holding the Highway at Phase end will gain a bonus of 15 points at New Daioyu and occupy an important strategic position near the Fortress... if a Faction wants the Fortress, do they push to also control the Highway/disregard it and build up points directly? Once the battle has heated, even if New Daioyu seems already decided, is the narrative significance of holding the Highway worth fighting for?)

    Plus, the Warconsole is loaded with a whole slew of achievements for taking a territory from another faction/defending it against being taken. Right now, those appear only rarely, since Theatres aren't changing hands that often. More Theatres means more players get the excitement and bragging rights of achieving them.
     
    theGricks, DaRedOne, Gargs454 and 2 others like this.
  9. Del S

    Del S Tunguskaball

    Joined:
    Dec 11, 2017
    Messages:
    1,178
    Likes Received:
    2,585
    Ooh, mad idea, actually: Have theatres that either never actually change hands at all, or are "held" by the last player to win a (linked) game there (obviously winning a different achievement from held the line/took the base ones). Representing small camps, ambush points, random encounters, brief occupations, etc.

    Three points for a win there to the overall total, faction scores an "occupation point" each time it's held, faction that held most OPs in a checkpoint/chokepoint region gains a small boost of some sort at the end of the phase.

    If they're just never held and are merely areas of combat, they give 2 points for a non-theatre win (assuming current system)

    Probably way too complicated but hey.
     
    Gargs454 likes this.
  10. Shiwen

    Shiwen Commissar, Yu Jing Political Work Department

    Joined:
    Dec 31, 2017
    Messages:
    404
    Likes Received:
    1,159
    I think in general the competing buildup of the theatres serves a good purpose, but what you're describing... I'm going to take your 'maybe too complex' and dial up to 'definitely too complex', but could you even have an alternate map using that sort of system, parallel to geography, something like a web of corporate VIPs and research labs. You need to fight many battles and win a majority to hold Pico da Bandeira, but control of the Mototronica CEO belongs to the last player to win the mission that blackmails her. One is controlling dirt and resources, another is controlling technological innovations and market performance, very different sorts of victories but both very valuable.
     
    Gargs454 likes this.
  11. cazboab

    cazboab Definitely not Cazboaz.

    Joined:
    Nov 30, 2017
    Messages:
    1,083
    Likes Received:
    1,462
    Or what about small camps or main supply routes that bleed points out over time? The points count for the faction totals till the end, but only say 24 hours worth count for occupation, and occupation feeds bonus points into certain theatres, representing the logistics advantages of controlling movement.

    This would discourage report hoarding since you'd want a steady rate to hold them, and its also a good place to encourage people to post their 150 point missions instead of on main theatres where they may not count for as much as larger missions...
     
    theGricks, Gargs454 and Del S like this.
  12. cazboab

    cazboab Definitely not Cazboaz.

    Joined:
    Nov 30, 2017
    Messages:
    1,083
    Likes Received:
    1,462
    The alternative map could use an alternative score possibly as a sort of currency... Say for example you earn diplomatic points for giving 7+ rating and commendation to the other factions, then each player can spend their points to influence the media personalities, O12 diplomats, minor nation representatives or submondo kingpins...
     
    Gargs454 and Del S like this.
  13. Del S

    Del S Tunguskaball

    Joined:
    Dec 11, 2017
    Messages:
    1,178
    Likes Received:
    2,585
    A little more of a behind-the-scenes game could be very fun - Not everyone can find the time (or space) to get more than one or two games in, so a little more incentive to be a support player by having more of an impact outside commenting and cheerleading would be pretty good. I don't know how it went for other factions but I saw many a Nomad lament they couldn't quite get as many games in as they hoped, even when many of those saying that had been very active in the briefing rooms and comments sections of reports. That aspect does seem a little undervalued given that morale DOES impact these campaigns even if it's all just a game.

    Could also tie into the possibility of Merc factions playing as Mercs too, earning a "currency" for their company as their own sub-campaign to beat each other?
     
    Shiwen and cazboab like this.
  14. cazboab

    cazboab Definitely not Cazboaz.

    Joined:
    Nov 30, 2017
    Messages:
    1,083
    Likes Received:
    1,462
    I feel like the mercs should have targets and agendas rather than a simple earn-more-cash game, it should be perfectly possible for starco to achieve its goals of earning money and getting Raoul some sweet sensory snuff videos for his 'benefactor' while the Druze pull off a prizon break and set up an assassination...
     
  15. Hecaton

    Hecaton EI Anger Translator

    Joined:
    Nov 23, 2017
    Messages:
    7,205
    Likes Received:
    6,535
    While obviously I think that the report requirements should be explicit, besides that everything you're saying here is great and would only help the campaign.

    Unfortunately with the numbers in some theaters being so small, canny players with good math skills *will* be able to figure out the number of wins necessary if they can see percentages. I see this as just making information harder to access, which is a bad thing.

    Yes.
     
  16. prophet of doom

    prophet of doom Well-Known Member

    Joined:
    Nov 30, 2017
    Messages:
    486
    Likes Received:
    438
    I strongly support the ideas of having neutral areas for everybody to fight over. I felt the Dawn campaign was suffering somewhat from the need of factions to defend their own bases.

    There should definitely be an incentive to post losses. A simple idea would be to award 1 point for a win, 2 for a draw and 3 for a win. Of course it would have to get more complicated like that, but that is a base you could start with.

    Area-specific missions should stay, but also the ability to play alternative missions. Otherwise people may be stuck playing the same scenario over and over again. To keep the campaign flavour and also balance out the factions more, the extra rules (such as YJ gets 25 pts more, +1 SWC for everyone, blizzard, etc.) should have to be included into whatever scenario you play.

    The objectives and points to be earned by claiming areas should be transparent. Most players just play the missions, the high command players play the strategical game, with the other players chipping in their opinions. This strategical game should be a clear one. Eg. it could be announced that a faction holding an area at the end of a phase gets x points on top of their total points for winning games.

    I would love to see special rules and shifting alliances for the mercenary armies, but I guess this will not be possible. One reason is that the BoW engine only allows for a specific type of campaign. Furthermore, player numbers have to be taken into account and the limited ability of cb to react to events during the campaign. We have to understand that worldwide campaigns have their limitations.
     
    Del S and Shiwen like this.
  17. Shiwen

    Shiwen Commissar, Yu Jing Political Work Department

    Joined:
    Dec 31, 2017
    Messages:
    404
    Likes Received:
    1,159
    I'll agree that BoW's warconsole can be critiqued on a number of levels, but even within its existing framework we've seen some attempts at very different campaigns, such as the episodic approach for the Beyond the Gates of Antares Xilos campaign. You can wring more out of the default system, if you try, and CB could try... but perhaps more importantly the more varied campaign types the warconsole can support, the more Beasts of War can sell the service to a wider array of miniatures games (perhaps even expanding into RPGs), so they've got an incentive to add new potential features to their system.
     
  18. cazboab

    cazboab Definitely not Cazboaz.

    Joined:
    Nov 30, 2017
    Messages:
    1,083
    Likes Received:
    1,462
    Can't happen. This year has proved it more than any other, there are people who just don't play fair and would abuse the trust required to release that information.
     
  19. Hecaton

    Hecaton EI Anger Translator

    Joined:
    Nov 23, 2017
    Messages:
    7,205
    Likes Received:
    6,535
    What, you're saying they'd put out reports of minimum quality for games that did happen or falsify reports for games that didn't?
     
  20. cazboab

    cazboab Definitely not Cazboaz.

    Joined:
    Nov 30, 2017
    Messages:
    1,083
    Likes Received:
    1,462
    Both happened this time, revealing the criteria would make it more prevalent to the point where we'd no longer be competing to see who can play/win more games, but who's better at and more determined to make propaganda. There has been an extensive and sustained attack on the integrity of the campaign this year, @psychoticstorm has asked us not name the person or persons involved, and explaining in detail would require that, so until CB decides what to do you'll have to take my word for it...
     
    #20 cazboab, Jul 26, 2018
    Last edited: Jul 26, 2018
  • About Us

    We are a company founded in 2001 in Cangas (Spain), and devoted to design and manufacture games and figures. Our main product, Infinity the Game, was born with the ambition to satisfy the most demanding audience, offering the best quality.

     

    Why are we here?

     

    Because we are, first and foremost, players.

  • Quick Navigation

    Open the Quick Navigation