DC3 Barbarossa, Bart vs Jason, aftermath discussion thread

[JasonPratt]

(Note to self: set up game, or check to see if Barth has set it up, after work.)

(Note to self 2: learn how to play DC1 soon-ish.  ::)    :hide:)

Readers should be aware that there will necessarily be some delay between the start of hostilities and the start of AARs. I have trouble foreseeing an AAR entry by me this weekend even if we play a turn or two. Partly because I will be trying a new AAR format design.

[Barthheart]

I need to go see what the updates bring as well... it's been a while... :D

[Sir Slash]

No, No, NO! We demand instant gratification!

[Crossroads]

No, No, NO! We demand instant gratification!

You mean there's other types of gratification as well? But we can wait. At least for a few minutes more.

[JasonPratt]

You can be working on finishing the Lybia fight, CR. ;)

Also, we mustn't distract Barth from finishing out his other more modern war on terror.

[JasonPratt]

Hrm... As Germany I'll have to start the campaign, and I see how to do that for mp, but what I don't see is how to connect with PBEM ++...

[JasonPratt]

Ah. 

On further research, PBEM ++ isn't supported, and not much chance of its functionality ever being added to the code.

This isn't necessarily a problem. Except that the manual is SINGULARLY UNHELPFUL about how exactly to run a mp game; ditto the in-game texts. We may have to experiment.

(Ditto the Matrix forums.)

[JasonPratt]

Ditto Youtube.

Ditto Google generally.

Ditto VR Systems' website.

Tried starting a mp game and ending a turn -- went straight to hotseat! Closed out (without looking around, no spoilers), went to see if there was a file generated to send for loading, and there wasn't.

Tried starting a mp game and ending a turn with autosave on. Same difference, except it generated an autosave for me as the Germans before turn-end. So loading that loads my turn, not Barth's.

:pullhair:

It looks a lot like only hotseat is supported... ??????????????????????????????????/

[Sir Slash]

OK then. Guess we'll have to lock you two in a room for about 6 months. Motel 6?  ;D

[-budd-]

Ditto Youtube.

Ditto Google generally.

Ditto VR Systems' website.

Tried starting a mp game and ending a turn -- went straight to hotseat! Closed out (without looking around, no spoilers), went to see if there was a file generated to send for loading, and there wasn't.

Tried starting a mp game and ending a turn with autosave on. Same difference, except it generated an autosave for me as the Germans before turn-end. So loading that loads my turn, not Barth's.

:pullhair:

It looks a lot like only hotseat is supported... ??????????????????????????????????/

From the product page
Team play options to allow up to 9 people to PBEM it out against each other or the AI

the unwashed masses want our AAR entertainment..AAR,AAR,AAR,AAR :clap:

[JasonPratt]

Oh, I can quote even better than that (with some paraphrasing): the manual goes so far as to explain how many human players can play co-op against the AI -- and it's different for different factions!

It just remotely begins to start explaining HOW to do this -- with exactly one piece of information (the leader of a side uses an HQ power to assign different "regimes" by HQ to different players) that sounds like it's useful until you realize there's no way for other players to get into the game, or if so it gives you less than no idea how.  :pullhair:

[-budd-]

Barthheart should be able to help out he did a PBEM AAR awhile ago.

[JasonPratt]

More experimentation reveals some non-useful clarity.

1.) Starting one of the three scenarios opens up the option for a human to play the Allies against AI Germany. This is not an option in the campaign.

2.) It also opens up options for multiple German and Polish players in that scenario, and up to ELEVEN human players in the French scenario. (Haven't looked at Sealion.) The Allied players can be assigned directly to human or AI at the France setup; the German players, and Allied players in the Poland setup, can only be assigned in-game. From the evidence (haven't tested this yet, but in-game and the book both point this way strongly), choosing the proper checkmarks will unlock one of a set of otherwise similar starts (plus chosen historical variances, plus some random minor variances) with different fixed numbers of "slots". At that point the leader of each side uses HQ powers to set any slots on his side to human, otherwise they default to AI and behave as normally integrated. None of this can be done in the campaign: one human controls all Axis, one human (in mp) controls all Allied.

3.) None of this matters unless you have up to eleven players hotseating. Because the game still doesn't save an turn-ended file anywhere for the start of the next player to load up. I know, I tested it: from what I can find so far, the only mp option is hotseat, even on the separate scenarios.

Well... strictly the only mp option I can find so far, is to send a save or autosave file at the end of a turn, which the next player can totally look at as much as he wants before ending the previous player's turn.

So I go first, I save the game or I hit end-turn to generate an autosave (doesn't matter), then I quit with the X mark in the upper right corner. If I generated the autosave by ending my turn, I could go on and click through to check out all of Barth's dispositions, although I couldn't make any changes that would stick.

Then I email the save (pre-end or autosave either way doesn't really matter) to Barth. He loads it up, and is looking at the end of my turn when I saved it, or before I hit end-turn. He can check out anything he wants. Then he ends my turn, hotseats over to his turn, makes all his choices and moves (except that there are supposed to be pre-game strategic card choices for him and there aren't in the campaign -- I tried out of curiosity), and then repeats the process back: he can end his turn, and check my positions, or he can save (or do both) and then email me the save, I load up at the end of his turn and either scope out as much as I want or try to ignore any data on the screen while clicking his button to end his turn. (I think it loads up in the same map position each time, which unfortunately happens to be near an evacuation zone so parking the camera on an unimportant map place won't shield anything. I haven't tested that with a manual save, tho, yet.)

[JasonPratt]

Hm, nope. When I load up a manual save, after putting my map down bottom left in Czech off-map (all black), it loads as close as it can get to OKH in center map. Granted, OKH is kind of useless in this game. (???) And where it's sitting if I leave it there will quickly become unimportant. Otherwise if I ever decide to move it around, my guess is that the load-camera will follow it.


Also, on further consideration I'm going to infer that if we check a historical start, then all his potential cards, and most of my starting cards, are useless anyway. I can still burn political points for all of mine even though they're mostly useless, but all of his would be useless so there's no point even giving him the option. (Why the game would even give me an option to burn points on cards that are worse than useless for a no-variant start, I have no idea, but then the game start button itself is a strategy card, so...)


Edited to add: I'm not actually worried about Barth intentionally looking up things before switching out the turn-ends, and I know I would choose not to intentionally look. But it could be hard not to see some map dispositions in passing that might be important. It's an equal risk anyway.  O:-)

[Barthheart]

Ummm... wow ... dude....  :o

It's been a while since I played an MP game of this but it was no where near as hard as you seem to be making it.... ???

I'm pretty sure there is a simple way for us to just use regular email to send files back and forth. Let me fist get rid of this hangover then I'll test it out.
PM me the email you want me to use for this.