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This game is designed for competitive and not for casual play. Since the AI can never be as good as a competitve human opponent, there are inherent limits to what any single player mode can achieve.
First reply is close to the typical fanboy defending the game with cute words but not much substance.
Cute words, no substance. A nice sentence that anyone can say in just about any context. This sentence alone doesn't contribute anything to the discussion.
I am not that well acquainted with the devs mindset / goals. If what you say is true, then it's interesting and I've got no problem with that. Although, I don't feel like this game is very competitive. Haven't seen any of the usual indicators. SC2 was made as a competitive game from the bottom up and this sure ain't feeling like it.
It's sad that you can spew such nonsense. Have you even tried to think about it ? The best chess players in the worlds have been defeated by AI. A little history lesson for you, it happened for the first time in 1997 by Deep Blue. Ever since, AI has been unbeatable. We, humans, simply can't compare. So yeah, there's limitations and conditions to every AIs until the very scary day we'll eventually create the first self learning AI. Still, that doesn't excuse a game having such piss poor AI. If you can't be bothered to configure a good AI then simply don't add any solo game mode versus AI. That or use the usual coping method of heavily scripting everything in order to make us feels like we're facing a challenge. Sure, it'll get boring faster but at least the first time it'll be thrilling. You either do it right or you don't do it at all. What's the point of having a half assed AI ? Starcraft 1 released in 1998 18th of december has better AI than this game.
Let me repeat this because I want it to sink in :
We had better AI in 1998.
As far as I know, technology is going ever ahead. I haven't received the memo that we all forgot how to make good AI since we learned how back in 1998.
Please, next time, bring real actual arguments instead of vapid words void of truth.
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Fortunately for us all, the next two replies actually contribute and make sense.
I'm glad to see I'm not the only one who see this game for what it is. Still, I can't help but feel a little sad that I've hit the bottom of the barrel. I had hoped this game would entertain me a little longer.
Ah, no matters, it is what it is. Despite the flaws, I still had some fun.
I believe they switched enemy units spawning randomly to mix up the otherwise just moving all units forward for the first two turns before engaging & in an attempt to provide less predictability to each start. You can counter this however by not moving your units, setting all to over watch & then once direction of attack understood, reposition accordingly to mitigate.
Will be interesting to see dimension the new daemonic incursion mode will bring when this lands (appears planned for either this month or next).
Valid challenge on the AI front & appears for a selection of recent games, take TWW3 for example, units are more difficult to take down/more opponents as oppose to being 'smarter' on higher difficulty levels. I suspect easier said than to implement, ideally each unit having defined roles rather than typically targeting closest unit. I always felt xcom 2 nailed this dynamics, each enemy unit type operated like an elaborate chess piece & when combined with different multiple unit types, created the feel of more dynamic combat. Probably why battlesector, outside enjoyable single player campaign, shines most brightly in multiplayer.
Agree with many on these forums that new single player campaigns & coop would be warmly welcomed & hopeful these can materialise in the future. Maybe short term allow the new sister of battle units/tech tree to be selected/used instead of blood angles to introduce further increased replayability especially for these which do not dip their toes into online pvp multiplayer.
As for Ai, yes it's not a walk in the park to code. Yes, it takes time and efforts. And yes, we're able to code good Ai. It's all a matter of determination. As I previously said, if you can't be bothered to do it right there's alternative like heavily scripting your campaign to make it feels like a good Ai. The only downside is you sacrifice replayability since scripts can't adapt or play differently. Still, it's better to have one great experience than go agains't dumb as hell Ai that simply rushes you with obvious advantages like spawning it's unit anywhere in the fog of war to catch you off guard.
Anyway, I've given up on this title. Not bad, not great. Pretty damn average sadly.
ANY game system is a compromise. It focuses on some things and has to deemphasize some others. It is simply not possible to have S-tier skirmishes and S-tier campaign play in one and the same game.
The best campaign in pc history is probably the original Fantasy General (the 1996 game). But they had to somewhat simplify the individual scenarios, which would not be outstanding outside of the campaign context. Pvp would also not be outstanding I think, though I never tried that.
There's absolutely nothing that says it should.
It is entirely possible to balance a game singleplayer one way and it's multiplayer another way. Actually, it's an ideology that's gaining a lot of traction in recent years as more and more players realize it's become absolutely necessary. Especially since the gaming industry shift toward Competitive games.
Every company wants to own the next big eSport game. StarCraft 2 is a sad example of this. They've balanced the entire game with eSport in mind thus drastically affecting the difficulty curve and making the game quite hard to enjoy for the vast majority of gamers, those called casuals, by the more competitively oriented ones. Ultimately, they've followed what you're suggesting above and the game suffered for it.
They could've balanced the main game, it's solo / campaign mode to be fun and accessible to most gamers. They could've even balanced the multiplayer that way too. All of that is possible without even ditching the eSport idea. The simplest way to do so is to add a new section to the multiplayer called eSport or Competitive or whatever and balance that part of the game differently. It could even come with a disclamer explaining that for eSport reasons this game mode will often be tweaked and players should consider this game mode the hardest the game has to offer AKA the more competitive option. Just to add to the point, League of Legends is another beautiful example of the dangers and pitfalls of eSports tunnelvisions.
Instead of constantly forcing rules made for the top 3% of the playerbase onto 100% of the players they should simply tweak the game for those who are willingly participating into those quite demanding game modes. Realistically speaking, most eSport strategies are so advanced and difficult, they require so much skill and dedication, that 80% of players will never ever even have hope of achieving those during their gaming sessions. Following that fact, logic dictate that it's utter absurdity to force balancing changes and rules onto those player for things that will never concern them. On the other hand, the top 3% of very competitive players needs those rules because they're performing at that very difficult level. Because they're the ones breaking the game and creating those new strategies and never seen before "moves". It's in the nature of eSport itself to require constant balancing and rules updates. Both to keep a fair playing field and the gameplay interesting to watch. Ultimately, it's not logical to balance the game from the perspective of the very best players and then force those changes downward onto everyone else. It often remove fun parts of those game that will never feel broken for the normal average player. It's often a very heavy handed approach for the majority of players. One that isn't logical nor needed.
In conclusion, yes I've thought about game design perspective. As I've just explained above, it's entirely possible to balance games in a better way without forcing unnecessary rules / changes / balancing onto players that doesn't require it. All it takes is a simple, very simple, sectioning of game modes. When devs create the game, they balance it with beta testers for general purposes (read average players) and then they merely need to create an eSport specific game mode (or whatever name you prefer) in which they'll be able to constantly add, modify and adjusts the settings in order to satisfy the needs of such a game mode. There's no reason why it should affect the rest of the game. If there's a broken mechanic or a bug they can fix it in both part of the game but I there's no reason why they should force eSport balancing onto the normal game itself. Let the majority have their fun while also letting the competitive players compete to their heart content.
Also just for the kicks :
No, it isn't. A game is something created from scratch. You are the god of that world. You can do anything. There's no need to compromise.
The only viable argument on that perspective is the argument of time.... which is to say money because time is money.
Devs have limited time to finalize their project (pumps out a finished product, the game) so you could argue that they can't produce a perfect product. The issue here is that I've never spoken about a perfect product. If I were to define my expectations i'd say they have to meet minimum standards of quality instead. The minimum amount of quality, of work, to consider a product "ready for distribution". To consider it worthy of being sold. While we could argue the finer points of said definition forever it is nevertheless plain to see for anybody nowadays that the gaming industry standard are in the gutter. Battlefield 2142, Anthem, Cyberpunk 2077, Battlefield 5, Aliens: Colonial Marines, Fallout 76, Metal Gear Survive, Marvel’s Avengers, No Man’s Sky .......... ETC ?! I can keep going for a long time. A whole lot of recent titles that released a broken mess and made huge splashes amongst gamers.
Basically, they're just trying to do the least amount of work to avoid a lawsuit while still being able to sell a product that they will call "a game". You should read on the subject of the "MVP - Minimum viable product". A neat little new gaming industry concept that followed after the invention of the famous LSG (Live Service Game or otherwise known as a GaaS - Games as a Service). It goes a long way to explain the current state of affairs and why most games are now released in a sorry state with empty promises of fixes as time goes on. Unfortunately, most games are abandoned way before they're fixed as the company decide to cut ties and move on when they see that their crappy game isn't returning the fantastic sale expectations they set for themselves.
So again, as much as wonderful tools like Stylus has now become the norm for Artists as they allow them to draw so much faster and better while being extremely easy to use things like compartmentalising the gameplay balance of your game in regard to game modes should be the norm. Gameplay difficulty like easy, normal and hard is the exact same thing. The only difference is that these classical gameplay difficulty choices are applied to the entire game instead of just a part of it or some specific game mode. There's just no excuses other than laziness. It isn't hard. It's just that they don't even want to bother with it.
Just for the fun of it I'll throw in a coding example. Most people won't understand but those who do will profoundly agree with me here :
- Same with code, with there's still people in 2022 that enter hardcoded data into their code instead of simply adding a variable that points to the value they want to use ?
---> Laziness
There's no other explanation. Creating a variable instead of hardcoding a value is such a minuscule amount of added work that it's comparable to writing one more word in a sentence. There's just no reason not to especially when you consider the amount of value added by using variables instead of hardcoding stuff into your code.
Some people has no work ethic.
Some people are lazy.
There's a lot to say on those subjects.... but basically, if you do good work you won't hardcode stuff into your code same as you won't balance your game for eSport and then force those parameters on non eSport players.
It's the same reason why most sport have casual rules that are lighter versions than the official tournaments rules. It's because there's no need to bother with all the little nickpicks and details when you go play to have a good time and exercise a bit. It makes the match much more enjoyable when people don't go crazy because you might've taken a quarter step outside some boundary.
Common sense ffs.
I remember the story behind it. Players complained that they want an epic campaign like in dark crusade or so. Devs said its a "nice idea" and started to advertise this mode like it is.
Result: after more then half a year we had few 3D models with NO GAMPLAY BEHIND. They literally spent half a year for making 12 necrons models and 16 (or so) HEXAGONS for that "global map". After this they wrote its in the "early stage" and will be improved. This "improvement" is taking about half a year again already.
What are they doing now? 12 new 3D models. No campaign etc. And epic tournaments for ~30 people playing online. Because they have their "sandbox" supremacy mode to sell more unit packs.
Reality: A better gameplay mechanics for this mode could be developed in one evening by someone who played Xcom or HOMM etc. at least once. No reasonable explanation exists of that gamedesigner impotence..
It is ABSOLUTELY shallow: no point to advance, no resource management, no army supply management, NO PLOT, absolutely NO reason to capture another Hex instead of crashing the capital. AI CANNOT Comeback after a single loss. This is hardcoded in basic rules of this mode.. And many more. This is basically a series of boring skirmish games.
Just one example of how a singlepayer can be interesting without any plot: Sins of a Solar Empire: Rebellion...
So, as a result another proof that they focused ONLY on selling nice 3D models. Do not expect much from them. And also "balancing" for the "top charts" 30-50 people multiplayer.
there are not 30 players, but rather 50 ;)
I know, not very many, but the community is very friendly and open-minded, everyone helps everyone
just recently there was a stream in cooperation with slitherine
(thanks to espressokiller)
it needs more streamers and positive people like him for the community to grow in general (in all areas)
i see it that way, i used to play warhammer tabletop regularly in a group of 5 people, which was already a large group
if the global "group" has 50 players, i think that's totally fine, as long as it expands rather than decreases
as long as the game is not dead, always think positive ;)