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The Total War games aren't defined by the RTS combat being fought by blocks of infantry. They're defined by the blending of a turn based overworld and a real time combat system.

While yes, current Total War games use infantry blocks for the real time component, that's just because the time periods they've chosen use them.

There's nothing stopping Creative Assembly doing a WW1, 2, for even futuristic warfare Total War game with fluid, modern combat, because it's entirely possible to do that kind of combat on a large scale (a good example was World In Conflict, though that wasn't quite the same scale as Total War).

So saying 'Total War won't work becuase it uses infantry blocks' is a bit disengenuous, since the reason it uses infantry blocks is because the game settings themselves have dictated the use of infantry blocks.

If I look at the battles objectively, there is far more hand to hand fighting in the average 40K game than in the battles I fight in Napoleon Totar War.

If SEGA marketing teamed up with GW marketing, we'd have games that nobody would even know existed until five years after they were released.

 -Loki- wrote:
The Total War games aren't defined by the RTS combat being fought by blocks of infantry. They're defined by the blending of a turn based overworld and a real time combat system.

While yes, current Total War games use infantry blocks for the real time component, that's just because the time periods they've chosen use them.

There's nothing stopping Creative Assembly doing a WW1, 2, for even futuristic warfare Total War game with fluid, modern combat, because it's entirely possible to do that kind of combat on a large scale (a good example was World In Conflict, though that wasn't quite the same scale as Total War).

So saying 'Total War won't work becuase it uses infantry blocks' is a bit disengenuous, since the reason it uses infantry blocks is because the game settings themselves have dictated the use of infantry blocks.

Actually every engine that they've used have all had blocks of units be integral to the coding itself, and when the pathfinding mucks up you get all kind of strange behaviours from units. They really couldn't do a WW2 game with the current engines they have, it would need an entirely new one. Plus, the combat scale isn't anywhere near big enough to really encapsulate the feel of WW2 if they kept the large landmass overlay and city attacks and such things. I don't really want a grand strategy WW2 game where the armies top out at about 10000 men each, considering that some of the battles resulted in hundreds of thousands of casualties.

 Dawnbringer wrote:
If I look at the battles objectively, there is far more hand to hand fighting in the average 40K game than in the battles I fight in Napoleon Totar War.

You must not be playing Napoleon right. It's all about the bayo charges dood.

I have to figure that with the way GW and SEGA operate, they are most likely re-discussing a deal for the W40K license. As a properly announced partnership between the two would most likely do wonders for their stock prices.

 TedNugent wrote:

 Dawnbringer wrote:
If I look at the battles objectively, there is far more hand to hand fighting in the average 40K game than in the battles I fight in Napoleon Totar War.

You must not be playing Napoleon right. It's all about the bayo charges dood.

I would still agree with him. Bayonet charges are flanking finishers, not straight up head to head combat unless you want to die. They're good for insighting mass routes, not necessarily a firefight replacement.

Inferior troops tend to mass rout on bayonet charge and also skirmishers tend to be superior at shooting, so those are two good targets even for frontal charge.

Also, standing in front of an artillery piece shooting grapeshot and trying to trade musket volleys is a bad idea.

There are places for the bayonets.

 TedNugent wrote:
Inferior troops tend to mass rout on bayonet charge and also skirmishers tend to be superior at shooting, so those are two good targets even for frontal charge.

Also, standing in front of an artillery piece shooting grapeshot and trying to trade musket volleys is a bad idea.

There are places for the bayonets.

Yes, just like a bunch of assault marines should not try win a firefight with tau... My point was, on average alot more range shooting goes on in (my, not necessarily everyones, as I tend to go arty heavy) Nap total war battles than what I have seen from 40K fights. It is helped by the fact that the AI does seem reluctant to engage in h2h with anything other than cavalry.

 Ratbarf wrote:
Actually every engine that they've used have all had blocks of units be integral to the coding itself, and when the pathfinding mucks up you get all kind of strange behaviours from units. They really couldn't do a WW2 game with the current engines they have, it would need an entirely new one. Plus, the combat scale isn't anywhere near big enough to really encapsulate the feel of WW2 if they kept the large landmass overlay and city attacks and such things. I don't really want a grand strategy WW2 game where the armies top out at about 10000 men each, considering that some of the battles resulted in hundreds of thousands of casualties.

Of course. They're designing a game around settings where blocks of infantry are used - they're not going to optimise the engine for anything else, because it's a waste of time. And yes, the engine would need an overhaul to do it. And yeah, the numbers in the World Wars were quite staggering.

None of that is a reason a fluid, mass modern combat setting couldn't be done. Engine overhauls are commonplace in the industry today, Creative Assemblys programmers just would need to earn their paychecks. Population counts in battles could be kept down - no one is asking for a 1:1 representation of World War 2, but a game in a modern or beyond setting.

 -Loki- wrote:

 Ratbarf wrote:
Actually every engine that they've used have all had blocks of units be integral to the coding itself, and when the pathfinding mucks up you get all kind of strange behaviours from units. They really couldn't do a WW2 game with the current engines they have, it would need an entirely new one. Plus, the combat scale isn't anywhere near big enough to really encapsulate the feel of WW2 if they kept the large landmass overlay and city attacks and such things. I don't really want a grand strategy WW2 game where the armies top out at about 10000 men each, considering that some of the battles resulted in hundreds of thousands of casualties.

Of course. They're designing a game around settings where blocks of infantry are used - they're not going to optimise the engine for anything else, because it's a waste of time. And yes, the engine would need an overhaul to do it. And yeah, the numbers in the World Wars were quite staggering.

None of that is a reason a fluid, mass modern combat setting couldn't be done. Engine overhauls are commonplace in the industry today, Creative Assemblys programmers just would need to earn their paychecks. Population counts in battles could be kept down - no one is asking for a 1:1 representation of World War 2, but a game in a modern or beyond setting.

Well given the actual numbers of troops involved per a given square kilometer (or mile if that is your thing) never got higher than the Napoleonic wars (IIRC, looking forward at least), I don't see how the numbers of troops involved matters much at all.

Note: Not pointing at you Loki, just thought I should quote that bit of the conversation.

 EnragedTemplar wrote:
I have to figure that with the way GW and SEGA operate, they are most likely re-discussing a deal for the W40K license. As a properly announced partnership between the two would most likely do wonders for their stock prices.

Prepare for Legio Sonica? He's already blue

 -Loki- wrote:

None of that is a reason a fluid, mass modern combat setting couldn't be done.

Of course it could be done, but CA would need to completely redesign the tactical portion of the game and I can't see that happening. In fact the tactical game would need to turn into a strategic game in its own right in order to properly represent modern/futuristic combat at anything above the company level.

The big advantage of the blocks used in every TW game to date is that they can easily be representative, that unit of 100 men could just as easily be 1000. This won't work for the combined arms units that would be seen in WW2 and beyond.

World in Conflict was on a comparatively small scale with only a couple of dozen (if that) vehicles and infantry squads, no where near enough.

Apparently Sega just landed the 40k license.

While they didn't grab the Dawn of War or Space Marine licences, Relic could very definitely be doing more 40k games.

 -Loki- wrote:
Apparently Sega just landed the 40k license.

I can't find anything that confirms that Sega now holds the 40k license. The have the rights to the 40k related games that Relic have already made but I haven't seen anything that confirms that Sega will be able to make new 40k games. Its quite likely to happen though.

Palindrome wrote:

 -Loki- wrote:
Apparently Sega just landed the 40k license.

I can't find anything that confirms that Sega now holds the 40k license. The have the rights to the 40k related games that Relic have already made but I haven't seen anything that confirms that Sega will be able to make new 40k games. Its quite likely to happen though.

Actually it was a false alarm from BolS. One of their writers assumed the transfer of Relic included the 40k license and wrote an article about it.

Sorry if I got anyone excited.

-Loki- wrote:

 Ratbarf wrote:
Actually every engine that they've used have all had blocks of units be integral to the coding itself, and when the pathfinding mucks up you get all kind of strange behaviours from units. They really couldn't do a WW2 game with the current engines they have, it would need an entirely new one. Plus, the combat scale isn't anywhere near big enough to really encapsulate the feel of WW2 if they kept the large landmass overlay and city attacks and such things. I don't really want a grand strategy WW2 game where the armies top out at about 10000 men each, considering that some of the battles resulted in hundreds of thousands of casualties.

Of course. They're designing a game around settings where blocks of infantry are used - they're not going to optimise the engine for anything else, because it's a waste of time. And yes, the engine would need an overhaul to do it. And yeah, the numbers in the World Wars were quite staggering.

None of that is a reason a fluid, mass modern combat setting couldn't be done. Engine overhauls are commonplace in the industry today, Creative Assemblys programmers just would need to earn their paychecks. Population counts in battles could be kept down - no one is asking for a 1:1 representation of World War 2, but a game in a modern or beyond setting.

You see if I was told that they would be doing WW2 Total War I would expect a 1:1 representation of WW2. Every total war game so far has had the ability to present battles with a roughly correct number of men in them. At the very least if I couldn't get all of the men on screen the first time I could still have a mass of armies in a given area and fight several battles with smaller troop numbers to get the results of having fought a massive one. However for anything past WW1 that system falls apart, as you start getting battles that weren't seiges (or at least classic seiges with cities and stuff) that lasted for months or even years, and churned out hundreds of thousands of casualties. I personally don't want to sit through an entire week playing through one stalingrad match, or even a series of stalingrad matches until I hit the correct participant count. At the same time I want a total war game to have the ability to affect my armies tactics at the company/squadron level, while at the same time getting that feeling that this is a pretty good approximation for numbers and aesthetics. Really, the Total War series will never go farther than the Franco-Prussian war without a change so drastic as to make it unrecognizable from the rest of the series.

Dawnbringer wrote:Well given the actual numbers of troops involved per a given square kilometer (or mile if that is your thing) never got higher than the Napoleonic wars (IIRC, looking forward at least), I don't see how the numbers of troops involved matters much at all.

Note: Not pointing at you Loki, just thought I should quote that bit of the conversation.

The time frame and logistics required for those battles were much smaller however. Exempting sieges, I don't recall Napoleonic battles lasting more than a few days, with most lasting less.