First Tournament

[Shards]

Side question, how do you "pronounce" your username 13obo?

It's "Bobo" in my head (as 13 looks like a capital B).

[13obo]

It is Bobo indeed, but that gets taken too quickly in public spaces hence the improvisation of 13 = B. Thanks for the correction and no offence taken!

[kurios_slith]

Round 3 Finally started? Better start taking turns.

[conboy]

I always mentally pronounced it "thirteen or best offer"

conboy

[13obo]

Lol!

[KarisFraMauro]

Hmm... There's an excellent old anime and manga called Bobobo-bobo-bo (or something to that effect). They don't seem to let you post youtube clips in the comments here which is a pity, the intro song in particular is unusually funky. Most anime music these days is algorithmically-generated pop that makes me want to jump off a cliff

In terms of post-match analysis, I think the best thing I could do to improve is have a bit more experience on certain maps. I believe I've played all of them at least once, but it doesn't hurt by a long shot to have more than that under ones belt.

[13obo]

Practice makes perfect! Personally, I am not a fan of the map as it is too big, but I guess it is ok if it is just 1 out of 3 rounds. I am going to give my full feedback when we finish.

[conboy]

Karis,

bit more experience on certain maps.

I was pretty familiar with the first two maps, but this last one kicked my butt. I only did one playthrough on the hotseat. I thought it would be larger version of Dubno, but it is quite different. I certainly didn't expect my opponent to start spewing out heavy infantry from the target hexes. Also, I depend on fighter air support to harass artillery and keep tanks suppressed. With only 3 planes and a lot more units to work on, that's a non-starter. My style would have required 7 fighters, not 3.
Should have gone with a heavier mix on the Soviet side to more quickly dig opponents out of victory hexes, and watched my rear area a little closer on the German side. That cost me a sudden loss!

We'll see how the rest goes on this last map, but I'm not optimistic.

coulda woulda shoulda

conboy

[Shards]

>> I certainly didn't expect my opponent to start spewing out heavy infantry from the target hexes

TBH, I should change this so that these hexes are decorative towns rather than real towns, being able to reinforce the literal front line isn't good design.

The map was very much designed to encourage a strong armour mix though, it's generous with the CP and RP with relatively narrow engagement fronts which I'd hoped would encourage people to use armoured spearheads to break the lines.

We're currently now in the big ol' war of attrition stage in my German game, the last big reserves are spent and it's gone a bit WW1 in places...

I have plans for reducing the risk of decapitation strikes on the HQ as game enders (whilst still rewarding the aggressive player that achieves it) and also for diversifying the VP gains so that someone who's not on the target points still has ways to increase their score through good aggressive play.

FWIW though, you're making me fight for every damn yard

[LynxCom]

>> I certainly didn't expect my opponent to start spewing out heavy infantry from the target hexes

TBH, I should change this so that these hexes are decorative towns rather than real towns, being able to reinforce the literal front line isn't good design.

This.

It´s too much gamey and totally unrealistic. An oponent starts spawning heavy infantry or heavy tanks just in front of enemy forces. Reinforcements should come from very rear. Maybe only basic infantry units would be able to be deployed in some towns.

[Shards]

>> I certainly didn't expect my opponent to start spewing out heavy infantry from the target hexes

TBH, I should change this so that these hexes are decorative towns rather than real towns, being able to reinforce the literal front line isn't good design.

This.

It´s too much gamey and totally unrealistic. An oponent starts spawning heavy infantry or heavy tanks just in front of enemy forces. Reinforcements should come from very rear. Maybe only basic infantry units would be able to be deployed in some towns.

Some of this is just down to the mechanics of OOB, "I cannae change the laws of physics, Jim". But I'll certainly look at at least restricting the flow directly on the points themselves

[KarisFraMauro]

I think I made the right choice selecting fighters instead of bombers, but unfortunately it was the wrong kind of fighters. Ground attack rather than dogfighters. Live and learn.

[13obo]

Good games, Karis! The last rounds of the second game was quite the slog indeed as seen in the replay.

1st Test Tournament - Round 3.zip

(13.83 KiB) Downloaded 71 times

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There's two things that you could utilise better on the map to succeed, Karis. One is to always keep in mind what your objectives are- any move and especially attack you make should be considered. Is this bringing you closer to a main objective (capturing HQ or victory point) or am I just wasting time? If the answer is the latter, then you probably should re-think the move. You had several different attack directions, which kept me on my toes, but it was obvious that they would not succeed given I redeployed forces, so you should move your resources elsewhere.

The second thing is that you can disband units and redeploy them to other places. For example, if you have a unit on very low efficiency and strength and it is cut out of supply, better disband it, and buy and deploy another unit (even if it is of lesser value) somewhere else where it is needed. During our game, I cut off so many of your units, which you could've disbanded and redeployed somewhere else to stall my advances or make some of your own. I think in general your playstyle was very good otherwise and it is only the lack of experience that kept you back.

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Feedback about the map:
- The RP per turn and overall was waaaaaaay too much in my view- I could disband units and re-deploy as fresh almost indefinitely (bar the last few rounds when the slogfest started).
- Allowing to deploy units on the front line is indeed too much (I admit I abused this mechanic heavily).
- Should be harder to capture the HQ flags. For example place some bunkers there that cannot be moved, but protect from sudden backdoor attacks?
- As I mentioned, the map is too big, but actually with all the RP available, it ends up being too small due to the choke points Shards mentioned. I get the idea, but it makes each turn annoyingly long in my view. Again, this is kind of offset by having smaller maps in earlier rounds , so not that big of a deal.

[KarisFraMauro]

I don't think I've ever explored the disbanding mechanic much. Hmm. In a naval context the amount of resources I get back are basically zilch, so it feels difficult to justify in most contexts. Most, but not all. While I'm fond of long range artillery for the Germans in retrospect this map was a little too cozy for them to really be appropriate. But thanks for the feedback and it was an honour challenging you!

[GabeKnight]

Sorry, but a small question: are you able to disband units in multiplayer while cut-off supply?

[13obo]

I think so? Might be mistaken and disbanded them when in supply and low efficiency, but pretty sure I had no issues provided the unit hasn't acted yet.

[Shards]

You can, yes.

IMHO, disbanding is far too generous a mechanic in MP. But it's obvs not a feature that we can really prioritise developer time on.

Personally, I'd be entirely happy with disbanding being completely restricted in multiplayer. (Players have to use an exit point or have their unit die in combat to get their CP back).

[13obo]

Agreed- disbanding and deploying new units midfight breaks immersion too much.

[Erik2]

Disbanding is too generous.
On a related matter, I woould like to be able to change air unit with a different type while in a hangar.
That is, you need to already have the replacement type in place.
You can already do this with off-map AFs.

[conboy]

Maybe I took that too far.
Dubno is my favorite pick up game and I do it all the time. And in order to make it work you have to conserve your Charlie Pappas in order to have them available when you need it. Which means you were fighting on limited combat power and still achieved the objective. So you should be rewarded for your foresight by being able to place a replacement Where You Are allowed to.

I'm just smarting because I didn't see it coming. And I could have fixed that issue with a couple of well-placed t-34s and some artillery to dig the usurpers out of the town. Instead I opted for a strategy of fighting armor by wearing it down and keeping it suppress with Fighters. It certainly doesn't work when you're dealing with 10 tanks and only three Fighters! And and if you don't kick them out of the town as soon as they take-it you are in a world of hurt if you can't make them pay for their strategy.

In fairness I must say that the only thing that I would beg to change would be allow for 23 air Charlie Pappas.

And I heartily agree with Erik suggestion about being able to change out airplanes in the hangar! I have often thought that would be useful and I can think of no military reason why it would not be feasible. One can certainly fly backup airplanes to the front as long as one has the wherewithal to buy them.

What then is the point of having to fight relentlessly for air superiority when in order to take advantage of it you have to crash your Fighters in order to free up the Charlie Pappas 4 bombers. Sorry for the weird punctuation on talking into my telephone.

Also, I think I disbanded some out of Supply units. That should be a no no no no!

And I suppose that changing the objectives to decorative spaces would indeed fix the issue and I would be in favor of that. That would be a nice enhancement

Please don't reduce the Romeo Papa's! It makes for a real Smash Up scenario.
conboy