Re: How to hide this formula?

From: mebonar@sn01.sncc.lsu.edu (MsciDave)

Date: Thu, 24 Jun 1993 11:24:11 +0000

In article <20bs50INN25p@coli-gate.coli.uni-sb.de>, ulim@coli.uni-sb.de (Ulrich Mayring) writes...

>Suppose you have a strategy/conquest game with, say, 24 players, and it is
>a complex simulation of the world 200 AD. In this game we have 152
>different types of troops. They differ in many respects, like:
>
>1. Cost in money to recruit and support them.
>2. Cost in weapons and armour to outfit them. (You can't recruit a battle-
..

>This example taken from an actual game gives you 16 pieces of data for one
>unit. If you give it all away, you simply list them in a table. Do this for
>all 152 types of troops and that still leaves you with an impressive
>knowledge base that takes very, very long to master, even for veteran
>players. And that although the data is all there.
>
>How would you now hide this data? Would you say:
>The Roman Legion Infantry is quite expensive as troops generally go, but for a
>Roman troop it is rather cheap, whereas they want to have lots of weapons
>compared with most other Roman troops. They are pretty steadfast for an
>infantry and their morale is exceptionally high. They have an impressive close
>combat, but only on relatively open terrain. They cannot fight from a
>distance (no shooting arrows or catapults). They can be trained pretty well.

No, of course not.

I'd give out the information that is needed.  Perhaps something like
this;

Roman Legion Infantry
Cost to recruit
cost to arm
cost to support
movement
shooting distance

The other values; attack and defense values, morale and so on, can
be given as ranges.  Perhaps a legion has morale of excellent.  This won't
be exactly the same value as a different unit with an excellent rating
but it will be close.

You player doesn't need to know the fine details that the commander
of a legion wouldn't know (in my opinion).  Obviously you would have to
put in comments about some of the effects of terrain on units (although
I expect that these could be applied to classes of units not to each
unit individually).  But there is no need to know that your attack factor
is cut in half in the open fields.  Just knowing that you go from
great to average would be plenty.

Yes, a player who has spent a lot of time and effort experimenting
might start to get a feel for the exact values (or at least some orderings
within the ranges).  But I don't think it would be serious.  A smart
newebie should still be better then a dumb experienced player.  And if
the modifiers are done well a newbie who knows (or at least has read
up on) the history, weaponry and tactics of the period should be able
to have about the same advantage as the experienced player who has done
loads of experimenting.

Dave
__________
Dave Bonar
mebonar@lsuvax.sncc.lsu.edu
__________

References

How to hide this formula?
ulim@coli.uni-sb.de (Ulrich Mayring)
Thu, 24 Jun 1993 09:29:04 +0000

Referenced By

How to hide this formula?
ulim@coli.uni-sb.de (Ulrich Mayring)
Thu, 24 Jun 1993 09:29:04 +0000