Comparison to SPWAW

John Tiller's Campaign Series exemplifies tactical war-gaming at its finest by bringing you the entire collection of TalonSoft's award-winning campaign series. Containing TalonSoft's West Front, East Front, and Rising Sun platoon-level combat series, as well as all of the official add-ons and expansion packs, the Matrix Edition allows players to dictate the events of World War II from the tumultuous beginning to its climatic conclusion. We are working together with original programmer John Tiller to bring you this updated edition.

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1925frank
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Comparison to SPWAW

Post by 1925frank »

I've got both SPWAW and the TalonSoft games. I got the TalonSoft games first. I bought the SPWAW game precisely because the TalonSoft games no longer ran well on contemporary computers. With SPWAW, I was never able to adapt to the top-down look of the game. It always seems to interfere with my enjoyment of the game. With SPWAW, I did not want to play without comand and control because keeping the integrity of your units should be a factor. With command and control, SPWAW seemed clumsy. It also seemed most of the scenarios were designed without command and control.
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Jason Petho
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RE: Comparison to SPWAW

Post by Jason Petho »

ORIGINAL: 1925frank

I've got both SPWAW and the TalonSoft games. I got the TalonSoft games first. I bought the SPWAW game precisely because the TalonSoft games no longer ran well on contemporary computers. With SPWAW, I was never able to adapt to the top-down look of the game. It always seems to interfere with my enjoyment of the game. With SPWAW, I did not want to play without comand and control because keeping the integrity of your units should be a factor. With command and control, SPWAW seemed clumsy. It also seemed most of the scenarios were designed without command and control.

I owned Steel Panthers and was happily addicted to the Linked Campaigns and designing maps and scenarios. Then East Front came out.. uninstalled Steel Panthers and haven't looked back since.

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pawelwj
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RE: Comparison to SPWAW

Post by pawelwj »

I had SP and SP2. Loved them as they represented a vast improvement over anything available at the time. When East Front came out I must admit I was a bis scheptical at the first but a friend bought it and after one play I was hooked. It is amaising that after all these years and all these new games with flashy graphics no other game achieved a happy medium of fun with serious wargaming.
Two questins for Jason:
1) If memory serves in the original EF pressing the shift button showed types of wrecks in their location. Any chance of having that back?
2) is the new max map size the same as with originals? Could it be increased in the future?

Thanks and keep up the good work.
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Jason Petho
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RE: Comparison to SPWAW

Post by Jason Petho »

ORIGINAL: pawelj
Two questins for Jason:
1) If memory serves in the original EF pressing the shift button showed types of wrecks in their location. Any chance of having that back?

Good question, I can look into it for you.

ORIGINAL: pawelj

2) is the new max map size the same as with originals? Could it be increased in the future?

For now, the map size is the same. I would like to see larger map sizes in the future as well!

Hope you're well
Take care and good luck
Jason Petho

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berto
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RE: Comparison to SPWAW

Post by berto »

It is amaising that after all these years and all these new games with flashy graphics no other game achieved a happy medium of fun with serious wargaming.

Agreed.  Of all the computer wargames I know, the Campaign Series games come closest to perfection, to getting nearly everything right.

That's not to say there's no room for improvement, though, particularly the AI.
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Zap
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RE: Comparison to SPWAW

Post by Zap »

I like the top down look of SpWAW. What makes East Front better, For someone like me?
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JJKettunen
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RE: Comparison to SPWAW

Post by JJKettunen »

ORIGINAL: Zap

I like the top down look of SpWAW. What makes East Front better, For someone like me?

Bigger battles.
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1925frank
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RE: Comparison to SPWAW

Post by 1925frank »

There must be a lot of players who like the top-down look, because it seems a lot of games are designed that way. What I like about SPWAW is the encyclopia and all the additional countries. I haven't played SPWAW as much as the Campaign Series, so I'm not as familiar with SPWAW. It's obvious SPWAW has a tremendous following and fan base. That was another reason I purchased SPWAW. SPWAW also has greater flexibiity in victory hexes. I've gathered that more from the manual than from game play.
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RE: Comparison to SPWAW

Post by KGrob »

I think it was East Front and West Front so correct me if I'm mistaken...
 
But, I used to love the scenarios where you got to keep your core units all the way through the entire campaign.  I like having my same army with me, getting used to all the stuff I have, managing it...it seems a lot more personal that way.
 
I actually don't care too much for those campaigns that merely link a few scenarios and where your army is never the same two scenarios in a row...those do nothing for me.  I want my own army.
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Jason Petho
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RE: Comparison to SPWAW

Post by Jason Petho »

ORIGINAL: KGrob

I think it was East Front and West Front so correct me if I'm mistaken...

But, I used to love the scenarios where you got to keep your core units all the way through the entire campaign.  I like having my same army with me, getting used to all the stuff I have, managing it...it seems a lot more personal that way.

I actually don't care too much for those campaigns that merely link a few scenarios and where your army is never the same two scenarios in a row...those do nothing for me.  I want my own army.

The Linked Campaigns included with the Campaign Series all follow the same principle of SPWAW. You have a core unit, be it a battalion or whatever, that is with you the entire campaign. If you take losses, those losses will be with you in the coming scenarios. There is the ability to add reiforcements to your lost forces.

Regardless, the core is the same throughout the campaign.

I prefer the Linked Campaigns over the Dynamic Campaigns as they are far more challenging as each of the scenarios in a Linked Campaign usually represents an actual battle which has required a lot of thought and design. Dynamic Campaigns, being randomly generated, are ok, but I find them tedious and uneventful.

Take care and good luck
Jason Petho

1925frank
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RE: Comparison to SPWAW

Post by 1925frank »

The minimum scale of the games is different. SPWAW has individual units and sections. The Campaign Series is platoon level. The reference to bigger battles may be to this. I think the scale is 50 meters per hex in SPWAW and 250 meters per hex in the Campaign Series. At the same time, I don't think the Campaign Series is at the operational level either, but it's a step further in that direction than SPWAW.

I don't have the patience or time to handle large scenarios, that is, scenarios with a lot of units. That's probably one of the reasons I don't play the Operational Art of War as much as the Campaign Series or SPWAW. Most of the scenarios in the Operational Art of War encompass a boatload of units. I can create small scenarios with the Campaign Series, and, with a little practice, I'm fairly sure I could in SPWAW too. With SPWAW though, even the smallest map is fairly large in the editor.

For whatever reasons, I've always felt the look of the Campaign Series pulled me into the game and the time period extremely well.
osiris_slith
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RE: Comparison to SPWAW

Post by osiris_slith »

My biggest issues with SPwaw is the screen. Its too bloody small and the top down view sucks.[:@] If somebody would change this I would probably be addicted to SPWAW![8D]
1925frank
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RE: Comparison to SPWAW

Post by 1925frank »

Out of respect for Dumnorix, I'll move my discussion here.
 
Regarding morale, I always equated morale with training.  Paratrooper and mountain troops tended to have higher morale ratings.  The Divided Ground settings tended to be very high (eights and nines), but the training, especially in 1949, would not have been superior to German troops, so I concluded Divided Ground set morale based upon something else -- perhaps the willingness to die for a cause.  Still, my impression was training and experience have far more to do with the ability to fight effectively than fanaticism.  More times than not, untrained troops would break.   Except for Italian Blackshirts, the morale settings in the Campaign Series rarely went below 5.  I think partisans would fall into the group that should have low morale settings because they are not trained to duke it out.  They have to hit and run precisely because they don't have the staying power of regular troops.  Before Valley Forge, Washington had the same problem with his troops. 
 
If you're designing scenarios, how are you determining morale?
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Jason Petho
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RE: Comparison to SPWAW

Post by Jason Petho »

ORIGINAL: 1925frank

Out of respect for Dumnorix, I'll move my discussion here.

As you wish.

ORIGINAL: 1925frank
Regarding morale, I always equated morale with training.  Paratrooper and mountain troops tended to have higher morale ratings.  The Divided Ground settings tended to be very high (eights and nines), but the training, especially in 1949, would not have been superior to German troops, so I concluded Divided Ground set morale based upon something else -- perhaps the willingness to die for a cause. 

One of the additions I would like to see is a field that defines experience. I have been contemplating a mod that would do this by altering weapon factors for certain units, but that is a ways to go yet.

Personally, I wouldn't use Divided Ground as a base for concluding anything. It seemed to me to be a rush job. There are MODs for it though that make it a rather enjoyable game.


ORIGINAL: 1925frank
Still, my impression was training and experience have far more to do with the ability to fight effectively than fanaticism.  More times than not, untrained troops would break.  

No disagreement there.

ORIGINAL: 1925frank
Except for Italian Blackshirts, the morale settings in the Campaign Series rarely went below 5.  I think partisans would fall into the group that should have low morale settings because they are not trained to duke it out. 

I would imagine partisan forces would have varying degrees of Morale based on their experience, or lack there of. For example, a partisan platoon consisting of armed civilians would typically have a lower morale than a partisan platoon consisting of regular soldiers that have been cut off from the front lines ... typical of the partisan units in Belarus.
ORIGINAL: 1925frank
They have to hit and run precisely because they don't have the staying power of regular troops.  Before Valley Forge, Washington had the same problem with his troops. 

If you're designing scenarios, how are you determining morale?

Researching the units as much as I can to determine how they historically performed in combat. Was the unit a veteran unit? How often does it receive replacements? What are the quality of the replacements? How were the weapons maintained? Etc etc. Collecting as much information as possible and then generalizing that information into a value between 1 and 10.

Take care and good luck
Jason Petho

1925frank
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RE: Comparison to SPWAW

Post by 1925frank »

Thanks for the link to the article on assault basics (found on "Demo CS meets PG3D ready to play!").
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Jason Petho
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RE: Comparison to SPWAW

Post by Jason Petho »

ORIGINAL: 1925frank

Thanks for the link to the article on assault basics (found on "Demo CS meets PG3D ready to play!").

No problem, I hope it helps. The PDF there covers most cases of assaulting.

Take care and good luck
Jason Petho

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