Contention is anything but historical

[TawGrey3AR]

The out come of the new game modes is that they essentially have become something like social engineering which encourages the most divergent thing from a historical American Civil War setting in regard to what the player base does and 'has to' do.

That is, many of us refer to Contention - or Conquest - as a"running simulation." I think Contention is more so - I would say that mode has become a 'sprinting simulation.'

I think this is a 'given' as to how this is.

The intent and the direction this puts WoR towards, I suppose is not a terribly bad one. I imagine the DEVs had something else in mind other than what 'we the players' have turned it into.

Perhaps, some fundamental change can be made?

Off hand, I do not know what that would be. For one, I think everyone loves all the bigger maps.

There is more I would say - but I should create however many more discussions.

One of the guys in our SR team loves WoR. But, from his perspective - after studying war history for 50+ years on his own - how the players behave is not very near to how actual ACW soldiers did things.

[Hening]

"after studying war history for 50+ years on his own - how the players behave is not very near to how actual ACW soldiers did things."
And how does he know how actual ACW soldiers would behave if they sat at a computer and played WOR? As someone who has studied history, teaches history, I'm guessing the chat messages would be far more interesting, there would be a lot more complaints about melee, and they would enjoy the Barbie Song.

[Preacher]

Originally posted by Hening:

"after studying war history for 50+ years on his own - how the players behave is not very near to how actual ACW soldiers did things."
And how does he know how actual ACW soldiers would behave if they sat at a computer and played WOR? As someone who has studied history, teaches history, I'm guessing the chat messages would be far more interesting, there would be a lot more complaints about melee, and they would enjoy the Barbie Song.

irrelevant and useless comment

[Zinnel]

Even during major battles like Antietam or Gettysburg, the majority regiments spent most of their time marching around the battlefield and/or sitting and holding positions or waiting for orders. Combat time for a regiment was often a very brief period of terror in the longer scheme of major battle. Sedgwick's Division in the West Woods, for example, were engaged for a shorter length of time than most WOR skirmishes (after starting from Keedysville at the time the East Woods fighting started). Marching, maneuvering, holding positions, waiting in reserve, etc. would be extremely historical.

Personally, I like contention, (although I don't think it is as good with low populations). I believe it promotes and rewards stronger strategy and coordination. If one side has all four companies coordinated and the other has one or two companies off doing their own thing, the coordinated force is more likely to win. I don't mind the marching and holding in reserve during contention if it is part of a coordinated strategy. With random points of contention, it also promotes and rewards adaptive strategy and tactics more than skirmish mode, in my opinion.

[WildCat]

Not a big fan of Contention myself - IF - we're only taking historical context into account. But this is 21st century game and even a game that is almost like a simulation cannot determine or control how players will play the game with any given mechanics. My main issue atm is the high number of rambos and the complete lack of realism that private soldiers would randomly run off from the officers, or even officers themselves, could get behind enemy lines and start popping people at random before being killed - they literally spoil low-pop games for their the sake of jacking their own ego. This needs to be dealt with in some logical manner but it seems a difficult issue to handle correctly. Whereas having different game modes is probably a necessary thing for any online game to allow server admins to change things around every so often as normal map rotations can quickly become very routine, very predictable and that gradually puts people off playing because routine is often boring.

[[1stDE(D)]FlyingSaucer99]

Tbh, I´m not a fan of Contention. Some may say this mode rewards the strategic side the most - hummmm, well i don't think so.

For me, this mode boils down to two things: if u reach the pole before the other team, 70% of the times you are going to win. And even though the game says that the posts are chosen generically, it seems that sometimes they are scripted. Certain maps are impossible to win with one side or the other (example, some of South Mountain maps, which are totally in favor of the CSA). So, it's more about being lucky in the sequence of the posts, than the strategy itself (which is always the same - rasing the flag and making a defensive line around it, waiting for a charge).

The historical side doesn't have to be mixed here, because they are two completely different things. The game does its best by mixing simulation with something enjoyable to play. As already mentioned, if we were to follow the letter, the game would be extremely boring. For example, it was more common for soldiers to use rifles as bats than bayonets in hand-to-hand combat in ACW (because some soldiers considered it unfair and brutal to stab each other); just compare that with what we see in WoR and the amount of bayonet charges.

[Lordcel]

Skirmish is literally the same thing every time. There's been charts made to accurately guess what team will win on what map because of the ticket differences inherent when the game starts. If you wanna play a 1-1 recreation battle where the guys who historically won won, you can do so at a real historical reenactment event.

As for it being a walking simulator, this game is generally if your ♥♥♥♥ and contention does not mean walking around more. I die 5-10 times a match with a solid 2-3 kdr and ive been able to switch regs and spawn in under 30 seconds every time. When the team is wiped and EVERYONE is walking sure, but thats not suppose to happen and is a good punishment to being ♥♥♥♥ on a team-wide level, or having bad flags.

Originally posted by 1stDE(D)FlyingSaucer99:

Tbh, I´m not a fan of Contention. Some may say this mode rewards the strategic side the most - hummmm, well i don't think so.

Contention has some bias but its nowhere near skirmish and you know it.

Originally posted by 1stDE(D)FlyingSaucer99:

The historical side doesn't have to be mixed here, because they are two completely different things. The game does its best by mixing simulation with something enjoyable to play. As already mentioned, if we were to follow the letter, the game would be extremely boring.

This is true. If anything, it's already too simulator-y as the only people who play this game are people invested into the time period including myself. They really need to fix the broken melee system and im sure ppl who wanna play games to play games and not to be robert e neet or stonewall jackson from their undies at the PC will pick it up.

[Rawlins]

I think Contention does reword formations that are close knit and have regiments/companies that are able to deploy in efficient formations oriented correctly. I know when you're on the losing side of that equation you're cursing your team for not working together properly or for not playing it historically, but that often means the other side is doing it right. In short, I do think a good portion of individual companies just don't support or play with their other companies in this manner, so the result 'feels' less historical to a large degree than in skirmish where we are forced by Out of bounds to be in the same area more or less.

There's additional things that the developer's could do on a mechanics level that would incentivize company commanders on a more fundamental level to stay together. Remove the secondary company commander, make increased buffs for when companies are together, increase debuffs when they are apart. I think it's more fundamental problem of larger maps in general than the baseline contention itself.

[Necramonium™]

Complaining about the mode not being realistic and than complaining there is too much running, do you even know what you are talking about? Soldiers marched more than they fought! And i really like Contention, as it creates line formations fighting each other on a field out of nowhere, just like it did in the real battles.