Introducing Wargame Design Studios

[PzKw43]

I stopped playing Tiller games when I got a higher resolution monitor and have been waiting for support for higher resolutions. The fake zoom should have been a short term fix. The games are well researched and the IGOUGO game has evolved but the map graphics have not. 4k monitors are coming down in price. It's overdue for an upgrade to the various zoom levels.

I hope WDS gets the code to FWW.

But is it the graphics or the style of the maps? What I mean by that is, there is a reason that the maps are assembled in the way they are - the hex-centric, layered approach, as opposed to one big map image - and that is directly due to file size.

I think that in the Civil War Battles, Antietam title, what with what Frank Mullins' group did with that shows that you can do it (ok I guess technically the Battleground series also had to work the same way) -but those maps are big file sizes, arguably too big, where the really large maps are impractical to do as a single image file.

The layered approach allows for far greater flexibility, or at least that is the technical, and non-aesthetic side of the decision.

Now that being said, yes I agree with the magnified zoom level being less than the ideal solution; yes I have to make that argument myself to the powers that be - that being, I can and will make it happen. It is not a problem. I don't know what the answer will be -but that being said- I am actually in the role there that I would be the guy who has to do it.

How do you show it? I guess the only way would be to take the graphics from one of the series other than PzB and plug it into PzB (since it is the only series that currently is using this approach), and then making the presentation that it is not an inordinate amount of artwork (adaptation basically ) to be done, so as to have additional native graphics levels and not rely on magnification. 

Short answer- yes it can be done, and it is something that I am going to make the pitch to do (and then dumbly on my part- probably get made to do it). :)

I guess the (rhetorical) question becomes- the point is that it is still using layers -is that really going to be enough?

I can't and won't pretend to answer for David as to where they want to go with things; I imagine though they still have to work with optimal file sizes.

What is needed is larger hex sizes for people with high resolution monitors. With larger hexes more information could be displayed on a unit on the map. I think the map graphics in PzB and FWW are fine.

[BigDuke66]

Although I welcome code changes one thing must be clear, and that counts for all Tiller games, the player has to say goodbye to the illusion that a certain action or results depicts only that.
- Firing the enemy was never a single salvo or burst, it was just the conduction of a fire fight.
- A Disrupted/Disordered unit did never just mean it was only disrupted/disordered, the unit was made less combat capable for a wide range of possible reasons.
- Casualties never only meant dead soldiers, they were always the lowering of the combat effectiveness of the unit depicted by shrinking men count, men that were lost for a wide range of reasons.
- An Assault/Melee never meant just a single action of that kind, it meant that the units closely engaged depicting firefight and/or bayonet attack from the Napoleonic era to classic mission-type tactics of WW2.

PB shows a more detailed "resolution" of the battlefield but squad battles is even more detailed and still uses the same terminology it most cases.

That is just for those that still desperately hold onto certain terms and that don't realize that these are just meant to depict a wide range of different things within the game.
If anything should be done from the start it could be the attempt to change the terminology so this constant misinterpretation that haunts all the different game series of Tiller stops.

[wiggum]

Im sure we all know these games are highly abstracted...

[-72-]

I stopped playing Tiller games when I got a higher resolution monitor and have been waiting for support for higher resolutions. The fake zoom should have been a short term fix. The games are well researched and the IGOUGO game has evolved but the map graphics have not. 4k monitors are coming down in price. It's overdue for an upgrade to the various zoom levels.

I hope WDS gets the code to FWW.

But is it the graphics or the style of the maps? What I mean by that is, there is a reason that the maps are assembled in the way they are - the hex-centric, layered approach, as opposed to one big map image - and that is directly due to file size.

I think that in the Civil War Battles, Antietam title, what with what Frank Mullins' group did with that shows that you can do it (ok I guess technically the Battleground series also had to work the same way) -but those maps are big file sizes, arguably too big, where the really large maps are impractical to do as a single image file.

The layered approach allows for far greater flexibility, or at least that is the technical, and non-aesthetic side of the decision.

Now that being said, yes I agree with the magnified zoom level being less than the ideal solution; yes I have to make that argument myself to the powers that be - that being, I can and will make it happen. It is not a problem. I don't know what the answer will be -but that being said- I am actually in the role there that I would be the guy who has to do it.

How do you show it? I guess the only way would be to take the graphics from one of the series other than PzB and plug it into PzB (since it is the only series that currently is using this approach), and then making the presentation that it is not an inordinate amount of artwork (adaptation basically ) to be done, so as to have additional native graphics levels and not rely on magnification. 

Short answer- yes it can be done, and it is something that I am going to make the pitch to do (and then dumbly on my part- probably get made to do it). :)

I guess the (rhetorical) question becomes- the point is that it is still using layers -is that really going to be enough?

I can't and won't pretend to answer for David as to where they want to go with things; I imagine though they still have to work with optimal file sizes.

What is needed is larger hex sizes for people with high resolution monitors. With larger hexes more information could be displayed on a unit on the map. I think the map graphics in PzB and FWW are fine.

Then your post was not about the graphics, but rather the programming, which is ok - but just requires a different solution.

Afaik Ed remains working under JTS directly with FWWC.

[Xaver]

Well, yes, i find last day the new article about icons... the web is a little.... like fight in the jungle  hehehe

All games are abstracted but lower the level bigger the detail needed, more than dislike engine is that in certain situations you feel like something is missing in the "experience", PzB is very enjoyable in general but if obvious that in future new features are going to be needed... is like when you install Smolensk 1.0 and compare it with a patched version... all things need time to be better.

I want to see more PzC-MC-FWWI titles and even new series but i think that now PzB with the "liberation" of code and the creation of a full dedicated team to serie is going to receive a big push that could affect to other series.

Another little question... you plan release demo like Mius demo with OOB+scen editor??? because if you are going to do this i have a little suggestion for you.. the idea is release a custom OOB that include all Axis and all Allied OOBs from the diferent actions covered in Demo to give players the option to play with editors creating something like Soviets VS Japanese, UK-Commonwealth VS Japan, France VS Japan... in general i allways want an easy to use tool to merge diferent OOBs to have a way to create that kind of franken scens in the moment Tiller games OOB system is based in historical info.

thanks.

[wiggum]

Pleae WDS remove the awful "Compass" that appears when you press shift.
You know that thing that says N-E-W-S-NE...

I think every adult person knows where north and south are on maps.

[berto]

@ all:

What was originally meant to be a WDS announcement thread is now a grab-bag to discuss all manner of things.  It will be difficult to look up and reference some of this stuff in future.

We already have here a Features request thread.

And probably it would be better to discuss things like game design, parameter tweaks, bugs, suggested game topics, Steam : (although discussing the WDS business model is entirely appropriate here) etc. in separate threads devoted to those specific purposes.

The input is great.  Let's please just organize it better.

[BigDuke66]

Im sure we all know these games are highly abstracted...

Yea sure, and that is why we always get the usual whine threads about "My unit disrupted with one casualty wtf?".
You would wonder how many people are out there that played these games for ages and still don't get how they work.
Sad, sad but true.

Pleae WDS remove the awful "Compass" that appears when you press shift.
You know that thing that says N-E-W-S-NE...

I think every adult person knows where north and south are on maps.

The "adult person" would only know north/south if he would hold the map correctly.
But for that the scenario designer would have to have made the map like that.
Now there are examples within the Tiller series where the designer on purpose shifted the map so the north isn't simply at the top. What does the "adult person" do now?
The compass has to be kept, but maybe it could just be locked into a corner of the map.

[wiggum]

The "adult person" would only know north/south if he would hold the map correctly.
But for that the scenario designer would have to have made the map like that.
Now there are examples within the Tiller series where the designer on purpose shifted the map so the north isn't simply at the top. What does the "adult person" do now?
The compass has to be kept, but maybe it could just be locked into a corner of the map.

Those must be rare examples and no PzB title has such a awkward map.
+ i highly doubt future PzB titles will have such awkward maps so yeah we should get rid of the compass or at least downsize it considerably.

[-72-]

duh- for my getting involved in a feature discussion when it isn't part of the thread. :/  Oh well it's early here (and there is no delete). Meaning the compass thing when Berto was asking that not to happen (and I missed it).