Armageddon and what it means for the future of Panzer Corps

[rezaf]

So, Armageddon is out and having played it for a solid number of hours now, I find myself wondering what effect it's release will have on the future of Panzer Corps.
Rudankort has hinted at the possibility of a return to WW2 - no promise, of course, but it seems to be in the cards.
We'll see how that goes depending on the success of the Wh40k stuff and whether or not there are many addons which could suck up all of Flashback Games' development time.

Provided we see a return to WW2, what are the hopes/concerns those of you harbor when looking at Armageddons version of the Panzer Corps engine?

Here's my personal take on this issue:

Good stuff:
The basic map sure looks better. The viewport can be zoomed seamlessly. That's a great step forward from PzC.
Six unit perspectives. This will also complicate modding, but it sure looks much better.
Fluff. Due to the more personal level of Armageddon, stuff like briefings and even ingame messages have been greatly improved.
Different weapons. Caveat emptor: The actual implementation leaves something to be desired, imo, but it's a change with great potential.

Bad stuff:
*Almost no lessons learned from the complaints about Panzer Corps over the years. This applies to a variety of issues. A general trend is that if something was discussed as being sub-par in PzC, chances are it's now even worse or at best not improved at all. Examples would be hidden unit traits or core limited strictly by number of units as opposed to unit value or something.
*Obnoxious touch centric UI. Rudankort has stated this is actually great as things are better to read, but I don't need glasses yet and find it annoying. There's also a lack of tooltips, keyboard shortcuts and popup windows. Still, feel free to list this as a good thing in your own assessment.
*No more elite reinforcements. No more manual reinforcements. Wtf? I sure hope these would reappear in a new PzC game, but for now, they've been steamlined (in the "You're fired" sense).
*No ships. No true airforce. I hope these would make a return in a PzC sequel, but Rudankort omitted them when rewriting the engine. Make what you want of that.
*Multiple weapons in their current implementation do nothing but make it harder to see which unit is good and which not. Same about HP for individual equipment pieces / soldiers. It's the return of the RoF mechanic that was hard to understand already, only worse by several orders of magnitude.
*No more ammo.
*No entrenchment.
*Appearently no support for frames/animations. I can understand that it was much cheaper to create the art assets this way, but the rewrite of the engine would have been the time to make this change, even if all official graphics hadn't actually made use of it.
*Disimprovements to campaign scripting. I was hoping for improvements in this area, but everything seems even more limited than it was in PzC.
*Dumbed down scenario objectives and the return to "do it in 14 turns or less". No more major/minor victories.

I'll leave it at that for now, though maybe I'll edit this list as I play more (I'm still in act1). As you can see, my list of concerns is much longer than my list of hopes, which is kinda disturbing.
I hope on a return to WW2, resolving quite a few of those issues would be mandatory ... but you can never be sure.
In general (being a software developer myself), I find myself greatly at odds with Rudankort's approach not to implement anything he feels he doesn't absolutely need RIGHT NOW.
Firstly, this also prevents any modders from potentially making use of it (that goes without saying), and secondly, it's almost certain that implementing it in the future will cause a higher workload or have unforseen consequences - or at worst, it'll be impossible to implement it at all for some reason not thought of at the time of the general design.

Anyway, those of you that have played Warhammer Armageddon, what's your take? What are the hopes and concerns you take away from the experience, if any?
_____
rezaf

[fsx]

Hi rezaf!

Armageddon uses a complete different base (engine). PC was improved over the years and now its not perfect, but very good. I hope, that in 2 years the armageddon engine also will reach this level.
We should ask Alex (Rudankort): If a PC sequel will be made, will it use it the armageddon engine? Or a modified armageddon engine?

pro for Armageddon engine:
* "cut scenes" between scenarios
* more detailed fights (line of sight, armor piercing rate, accuracy - lowers for each hex range)
* ground levels
* more terrain types (cliff, slope..)
* improved scenario editor
* better structure of game elements (terrain hexes could made separately)
* visible traits in the UI and purchase screen


pro or con, I dont know it now
* weapon based battles
* UI (big, more details, unit graphics)
* morale instead of supression

con
* many useful features not implementes (yet)
battle log, unit window, ..
* many game mechanics not implemented (yet)
Some of the main PC features will not been used in WH40K. They not implementet now.
air/sea units, ammo use, elite replacements, sea transports..

I am sure, that I forgot many topics.
I am sure, if Alex uses the armageddon engine for a (I hope so) sequel of PC, he will improve the engine with (some / many of) these now missed PC-features.

Please, could you make a link to your post in viewtopic.php?f=121&t=54415
With this thread it would be easier for Alex to read the wishes and ideas of the community for a sequel.

[BiteNibbleChomp]

I reckon that if people think that Armageddon is an improvement, then a WW2 mod will appear in a few years (not by me though!). If they don't, the game will be left to wither away. A 40k mod for PzC seems unlikely however.

- BNC

[Rudankort]

A couple of comments and I leave this thread for good.

The term "engine" is misleading. SSI's 5-star series was made on one "engine", but it included games with different mechanics, like Panzer General, Fantasy General, Star General. PG2 was a different engine, but it was more close to Panzer General than Star General was to it.

Sure PzC2, if it is made after Armageddon, will reuse some of its code. This means low-level implementation of UI screens, map rendering etc. UI design will be what the designer makes it, it must not have anything in common with Armageddon. The rules are always adapted to the setting, so the rules of PzC2 will be very different to Armageddon. Take elite replacements for example, PG had them, FG didn't, then PG2 had them again, so what? Or naval units, PG had them, FG didn't, PG2 had them back. At this point, any attempt to guess what PzC2 rules could be by looking at Armageddon is a waste of time.

All I can say is, I consider sticking to traditions of the series very important. I think, my work on PGF and Panzer Corps was a good example. So, it is very unlikely that a lot of important stuff will be thrown out of the window. Armageddon is different because it does not attempt to copy any existing game or be "spiritual sequel" to anything.

OK, have fun guys. Over and out.

[Razz1]

Armageddon is a different type of game. That's why these features are not in it.

*No more elite reinforcements. No more manual reinforcements. Wtf? I sure hope these would reappear in a new PzC game, but for now, they've been steamlined (in the "You're fired" sense).
*No ships. No true airforce. I hope these would make a return in a PzC sequel, but Rudankort omitted them when rewriting the engine. Make what you want of that.
*Multiple weapons in their current implementation do nothing but make it harder to see which unit is good and which not. Same about HP for individual equipment pieces / soldiers. It's the return of the RoF mechanic that was hard to understand already, only worse by several orders of magnitude.
*No more ammo.
*No entrenchment.

[bebro]

Before we deal with a hypothetical PzC 2, I'm wondering what will come with Soviet Corps. As it's an add-on I don't expect it to introduce revolutionary changes that would rather appear in a completely new game indeed. However, all previous add-ons came with parallel patches that had bugfixes and at least certain improvements.

So this is what I'm hoping for in SovC too, aside from expected additions like unit types etc.

And if there's one wish I personally still have for PzC, it's a real moddir ability that allows modders to use all moddable files without resorting to GME. Dunno if that is too big of a change for SovC...

[hugh2711]

Although i have not played armageddon i have read the reviews that i could find ( good and bad) and also i have looked at some of the real gameplay videos on youtube as I was considering getting it. Now reading this thread where you are comparing PC with armageddon it feels and looks like to me exactly the same situation many yers ago with MAX 1 and 2. i.e. specifically the 'streamlining' of the actual play mechanics - which could be interpreted as dumbing down. The massive increase in 'eye candy' for a short period of time and lets face it now matter how refined we think we are we all like a bit of eye candy . I am sure it is excellent for being exactly what it is aimed for. It looks like it fits perfectly to the game and crowd that I used to walk past in the games workshop store and i am sure it is very faithfull to the board game.
Unfortunately when max 2 came out it did all the same things compared to max 1 as appear - IF - you are comparing PC to armageddon. The problem was was; 1 was incredibly popular (there is even still an open source version now) and most people still remember 1 and rave about it wheras most would describe 2 with 4 letter words!.
The company then interpreted and reacted this very negative response as lack of interest and abandoned the whole thing. The main AI designer then went on to do other popular games with other companies.

The question is how the company will react to a response that i am sure will be ok since warhammer is so popular BUT may only last a short period of time or is just not as enthusiastic as pc is/was (,I love playing the many excellent mods by many people).

[monkspider]

I really would want to get Armageddon to support Lordz and Slitherine, but I have always hated the Warhammer franchise. It always seemed so generic and cheesy. I would have been more likely to get it if it was just a new IP of some kind. However, I am still excited to see Soviet Corps in the near future!

[DrkCon]

Looking forward to Wh40k and still hoping for a FG spiritual remake.

I'm glad that Wh40k is not a copy of PzC with different icons. (Which is what it would basically be if all of the PzC rules were identically ported into Wh40k)

I'm sure I'll have a stronger opinion of Wh, once I get a few hundred hours into it.