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Old 04-03-2018, 02:14 PM   #9
GranitePenguin
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Join Date: Sep 2006
Location: Plainfield, IL
Default Re: Survey: Top Priorities for Ogre VG Improvement

Quote:
Originally Posted by ianargent View Post
GranitePenguin nuked the nail on the head.

Make the basics work right.
Quote:
Originally Posted by jfleisher View Post
Another vote for GranitePenguin’s list. I agree with everything he mentioned.

It’s like he was reading my mind...
Thanks. Great minds, something something... :-)

I'll drop a list of more "nice to haves" to prime the pump, too. It doesn't hurt to have things "on paper" so they don't get lost. The standard "only after the basics are fixed" applies.

* min/max scenarios - this is actually one that’s pretty important (to me, anyway). I’d like to see the ability to start a scenario with less than the maximum AU. I should be able to select _up to_ the maximum force, not be forced to use all my AUs. This was really annoying while making my tutorial videos, and it would be a great way to allow for handicaps (the classic example being a mark III attacking with only 10 AU defending instead of 12 AU for an “experienced” player).

* The ability to play/share/edit posted scenarios - Right now, the Scenario Editor is only useful for local play. This is a huge failing because the whole point is to share the scenarios. If you can’t download a published scenario and:
  1. customize it for yourself to make a derivative of it
  2. play online against another person that also has it downloaded
you are missing the point. The _only_ thing you can currently do is download a published scenarios and play by yourself against the AI. That’s a very limited use of it that does not breed acceptance or a willingness to play it.

* better AI - The current AI is not good. It has significant issues understanding what’s important during a game, making _very_ poor decisions when choosing between “win the objective” and “squash this gnat.” The AI needs some real work. At the very least, make it settable to give it more brute force time to decide what to do. I’d like to see a revamp of it that allows for serious players to have a challenge if they want one.

* Hotkey customization - all the hotkeys are currently fixed. I’d like to see the ability to set them however you want.

* Better chat system - Relying on the Steam chat system is rough (even Jake at Auroch has complained about it to/with me while playing). It requires you to be friends in order for it to work, but there is _no way_ to identify the person you are playing in a random game to even send a friend request to them. It makes playing random match games very impersonal. You can’t even send a simple “good game” to them. It would really help to grow the community if people could actually talk/chat while in-game without having to spend time hunting them down in Steam’s crappy interface.

* Get all the “Official” scenarios - We are missing a lot of scenario content. Heck, we are missing scenario MAPs. The current official content is pretty light, and due to the already-mentioned limitations in the scenario editor, we can’t even make them on our own.

* better scenario victory conditions - The current conditions are very limiting. they assume the only way to have a win is based on VP counts. It doesn’t allow for hitting objectives, secondary objectives, etc.

* multi-map scenarios - With the size being limited to 40x40 (or less), we can’t even have a basic G.E.V+Shockwave map.

* More than two players - A 3 or 4 player game would be really cool (admittedly, this one is out there a bit) Obviously, this is related to access to more of the Original scenarios (body blow, etc)

* Reskinning/painting armies - Everyone is all about colors and factions. Having more than just the Red and Blue available, and ideally faction logos (pink ARF, anyone?) would be cool.

* Mods - Being able to mod games is apparently “a thing.” Just being a variation of reskinning units to look like WWII units wouldn’t be interesting to me at all, and being able to introduce custom rules would be weird, too, but a LOT of people seem to think it’s a requirement for a “good” game to be allowed to hack it up. I don’t follow this, but I’m not the target audience for mods anymore. I like my Ogre Black, thank you very much.

That said, having classic (or ODE) counters as an option would be really neat, and would look a lot better in a stack than the current weird hex shape thingy.
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