New World War One Gold tutorial series by/for utter newbs

[JasonPratt]

Just a quick note that I have finally begun designing and posting up (relatively) simple tutorial entries for the Matrix/Ageod game World War One Gold, down in our AAR section.

My theory on tutorial design, and on trying to learn the game myself, is to start with the fundamental units of the game (the chits) and slowly work outward to develop an understanding of how the portions of the game fit and work together. The official WW1G tutorials which come with the game sort-of attempt something similar, but front-load it with a ton of information scattershot all over the place because they thought they ought to provide some idea of what the map buttons and details meant first. I've tried to learn the game several times over the years and have just been overwhelmed and distracted by everything-else-going-on in the instructions and the official tutorials.

So, if anyone actually has (positive and competent ;) ) experience playing the game, please feel free to add comments and corrections to the tutorial as I go along! Our member Kushan (who also wants to re-learn how to play the game) has volunteered to help this way already, but I have no problem with anyone else pitching in: just understand I'm trying to focus down as much as possible and then slowly widen out as we come to topics.

[Rayfer]

I don't own the game so I won't be using your tutorial but I commend you for doing this.  I own other Ageod titles (i.e. American Civil War) that I just have never been able to grasp and play intelligently. 

[-budd-]

I have the same feeling as above poster. I've looked at and tried ageod games but never really got the system. I'll be tuning in to your aar maybe something will click. Thanks for doing it.

[Gusington]

^Me too. Thanks Jason, I will check out your stuff.

[Tuna]

Thanks, Jason I will be looking forward to this as well!

[JasonPratt]

My impression, incidentally, is that WW1G plays quite differently from other AGEOD games, and doesn't even use the AGE engine per se.

However, some kind of effort was made to translate the rules of the board game on which this was based to an engine designed to be kind of like the AGE engine.

Which is one reason why this game has had so many patches (including a near ground-up rebuild for the Gold edition): it wasn't really an AGE engine game.

Anyway, there are similarities (or so I understand) but I don't know that I can recommend this as a tutorial for playing most AGEOD titles. So I don't want to accidentally mislead people.

If this format works out well, though, I am definitely interested in setting up a tutorial along the same lines for, say, Birth of America 2, which really is an AGE engine game (and which I own and would like to learn to play). In other words, start small with the basic playable unit information and slowly expand out to learn how to use the units.

(Although if someone beats me to that, I won't complain!  :D )

Be sure to leave feedback in the tutorial thread, to let me know if I'm going too fast or if I'm not being clear enough as I go, or if there are other problems. (Or, alternately, if my approach is working and you feel like you're getting a grasp on things as I go.)

[Gusington]

How would you compare WWI Gold to Commander: The Great War? It's the only game I am currently playing that may be comparable.

[Tuna]

How would you compare WWI Gold to Commander: The Great War? It's the only game I am currently playing that may be comparable.

I hadn't really dived into it yet Gus, but I think it is way more complicated than Comander.. I hear a lot of high praise for this game for the people who 'do' get into it! I have also heard it is not really like the other AGEOD games, probably why I haven't attempted it yet.. But any help out there that cuts down the amount of time breaking that learning curve is welcome!.. As every one always says, we have soooo many games and so little time!!!.. That's why some times the tough ones are hard to devote the time to. But in the end quite a few of those are really rewarding once you start to 'understand' them.

[sandman2575]

Just a quick note that I have finally begun designing and posting up (relatively) simple tutorial entries for the Matrix/Ageod game World War One Gold, down in our AAR section.

Very nice & many thanks.  WW1 Gold is a bloody brilliant game.  It's also still the most complex game I've ever encountered, so kudos and gracias for taking the time to put a tutorial together. 

[Nefaro]

How would you compare WWI Gold to Commander: The Great War? It's the only game I am currently playing that may be comparable.

WWI Gold is a good deal more difficult to learn but it's also portrayed on a larger scale. 

The real issue with WWIG is the learning curve, which probably scares most away.  Also.. while it has big tooltips for most everything in the interface, much of the pop-ups are dedicated to flavor text instead of actual game-related mechanics so that was something that would've eased the learning curve if it had been done properly.

Fortunately the "Big" Manual is pretty detailed and.. well.. big.  So if you're not averse to reading them, it's a passable primer compared to in-game info.

I think it's wonderful that Jason is going to the trouble of making tutorials for this monster of a game.  It's great once you finger it out, and vid tutorials are something that it greatly needs!  I'll happily watch these, too!  8)

[JasonPratt]

How would you compare WWI Gold to Commander: The Great War? It's the only game I am currently playing that may be comparable.

Listen to Nefaro, btw. Nefaro is wise...

I haven't played Com:Great yet, so I can't directly compare it, but based on AARs and other information I'd say Com:Great is much easier to learn and to play but lacks some of the detail and color of WW1G.

Putting it another way, Com:Great and Strategic Command's WW1 are computer games from inception, designed that way and intended to be played that way. WW1G is (in effect) an adaptation of a monstrous boardgame, using an engine that sort of resembles the AGE engine but is also significantly different. This makes things unwieldy (kind of like the attempt to convert Empires At Arms to computer, also a Matrix project though not AGEOD), but I get a much stronger boardgame vibe thereby. The basic unit is the chit, for example, and you aren't really expected to keep track of manpower for the corps: the chits are either damaged or undamaged, and get flipped over accordingly.

How the game handles stacks of chits is the topic of Part 3, which I'm about to post, and Part 4 next time. It adds more complexity than, for example, how Guns of August, an older Matrix WW1 game, handles its chits, but that older game is also very boardgamey -- and might be a conversion, I forget -- so the two compare more directly than either does to the newer StratCom and Com:Great games.

Putting it another way, Com:Great (and to some extent StratComWW1) is a large scale Panzer General game at the strategic level. WW1Gold is very much not. It isn't like... oh, War in the East, or War in the Pacific (Admirals Edition or original either one) -- I mean it doesn't play like them at all -- but it has the same feel of information overload as those games do (despite being somewhat simpler than them).

I don't know I would get the feeling from StratCom or Com:Great that I was managing a side in World War 1, but I feel like I'd get that feeling from WW1G. It's hard to explain.  ??? You have the option of rotating the map and playing it thus the way actual generals and national leaders looked at the map in WW1, with Russia to the top and France at the bottom and the Med to the right. That was widely complained about (because the game FORCED YOU TO PLAY THAT WAY originally), but it's also brilliant in a crazy sort of you-have-never-played-a-game-like-this way.

Okay, check out this screenshot from the opening of the (quite limited) Tannenburg scenario, with Russia about to launch a preliminary invasion of German's northeast corner to distract it from helping Austria-Hungary or dealing with France.

(I've also posted a larger version below, courtesy of imageshack.)

[Nefaro]

I prefer using the NATO symbol 'standees' option, regarding army unit graphics.  It makes the units stand out from the WWIG map background more, which is very helpful in the big scenarios.

The pictures look nice, but those little white-washed backgrounds behind them still doesn't help them pop.

[JasonPratt]

Nefaro, true, but I'm going for the feel of the game right now. The way the game handles stacks is unusual; in effect you (usually unless the option Nef mentioned is activated) move statuettes around the map, and the statuettes represent piles of chits you have off map.

Here it is again from imageshack, assuming I've done this right.



Thank God, finally got it...

That's just a small part of the map. There are five Russian stacks on the map, with little statuettes backlit in white a bit by the game to make them easier to see -- if one is chosen then it's redlit.

I'm not even going to begin explaining what the map shows. But that's what I mean by information saturation. Every tooltip explains something about the game board, and while it might be something like what infantry or cavalry is (duh), usually it's something like that important little county (or whatever it is) of Wilna. (The lighter areas of the map show what isn't fog of war, although the darker areas in some cases are portions outside the scenario, like pretty much all the east of what's shown.)

Have I mentioned that under some circumstances portions of the map slowly glow and recede back and forth? ;)

This is why I am ABSOLUTELY NOT STARTING WITH THE MAP or any of its related controls, in my tutorials.

Because, damn.

Attached below are pngs showing a closeup of the farthest northern stack in three different available forms: as a statuette (the default form, and what's shown on the map above); as a flag; and as a chit sort-of. I say "sort-of" because it doesn't look like the other chits in the game -- the flag is closer.

[JasonPratt]

Nefaro, yes if I could figure out how to send signals from my TV to record on my computer, I'd set up a YT tutorial series, too. I have a Hauppage unit, but... oy, trying to get it to work is like playing this game, and while there are somewhat simpler units that have been developed since the one I bought, I feel like I paid good money for this dang thing and I don't want to rebuy to accomplish what I ought to be able to do with it.

Which is kind of irrational I know.

[Gusington]

Interesting stuff above Jason. It's kinda making my brain hurt, though.