Petition for MP Campaign

[Vann7]

Am i the only one who would love to play the full strategic campaign not againts the silly AI ,but againts a real people ?

The arguments of CA after being requested for are shortsighted , they say it couldnt be done because the campaign "takes too long" for online (days or weeks to finish) to be played ,but thats argument is silly because it implies that you want to finish the game in the same day. and others RTS games already support this feature..

There is a feature that they only need to add called [SAVE online game] that will do the trick. THe posibilities to increase a lot the fun and challenge in the game are endless ,since no matter how much improved is the campaign AI it is ,it will never be as good as real people. you could play the game online for a few hours in several days or weeks (just exactly like you do with offline campaing..you never finish the game in the same day.. thats the purpose of the SAVE option...doh) and return later to the last time you played. It will be you vs the computer vs human. even more fun could be to allow several human players or to fill every faction slots with a human player to play at the same time online,but i think that is too much to ask . i will be happy to play with just one .

So you will have the option to make alliances with the factions in the game controlled by the AI ,(or with other people) to destroy your friend faction. This feature alone can increase the gameplay a whole new level like never before. TOurnaments could be done with the ability to play the full campaign online or in a lan party with your friends.

This can be done ,since other RTS games already support this.

another feature that will also be awesome is the ability to record any battle in the campaing. i cannot count the times i played and amazing battles in the campaign that will have loved to show to my friends . That will be very usefull as a learning tool to study your tactics.

[drak10687]

Um, that would be great, only your argument comparing the TW series to other RTS games is quite silly. Because first of all, TW is not an RTS. Only the battle part is, and that is the part which causes the most problems. If you have only 2 players, it can work out. But what if you have 10, ok, lets decrease that to 5. And say on average, each player has 2 battles per turn (which is not unrealistic) And each battle takes about 20 min (which is also not unrealistic, in fact, its probably an underestimation) Thats 5 x 2 x 20 = 3h 20 min of battle time, 2h 40min of which you are not part of, not counting the campaign map movement. If you are playing with your buds in the basement and having some beers, that may be worth it... but otherwise, well, you decide.

As far as you second point, that has been allready discussed, and aperantly there were coding issues that came up when they tried to implement this feature.

[The Mongol]

1. It's not going to happen, the game is coming out in two weeks

2. Internet petitions? Ha!

3. I would love an MP campaign as well but it's not realistic to ask for one at this stage, maybe the next TW installment

[Vann7]

And say on average, each player has 2 battles per turn (which is not unrealistic) And each battle takes about 20 min (which is also not unrealistic, in fact, its probably an underestimation) Thats 5 x 2 x 20 = 3h 20 min of battle time, 2h 40min of which you are not part of, not counting the campaign map movement. If you are playing with your buds in the basement and having some beers, that may be worth it... but otherwise, well, you decide.

Whats the diference ?

WHen you play the campaign offline you need to wait.. 1 , 2 ,3 hours playing the game. you save the game and continue playing later. Every battle is part of every battle . you dont need to play directly againts your friends (when the campaing start) they could be in the other side in the ocean,still their game *will have an impact* in your progress because (one or more) people will make alliances with other factions. So just like in real world ,the wars that happens in the other side of the world ,sooner or later will have an impact in your side. They could cut your naval incomes by making alliances with the riches factions first.

The game will be far from longer online ,at worst case it will take the same time ,thats why we use the [SAVE GAME ]option ,in fact using real people (with experience) in the campaing the game will be the hell of a lot more faster ,could end the game (for you) in just a few turns.. because it will be a race to see who is the first to conquer the richest lands and build the most power army first . and nothing stop them to going with all what they have againts you as soon the game start..

Againts real oponents with experience you will not have time to prepare and secure your lands ,no time to make a nice army. you will never feel save in the campaign once you know there are at least a real oponent somewhere. RUles can be made that if a player dont make a move in less than a minute the AI will choose for you.

it will be also cool if you arent told which faction is controlled by a real human.so anything is possible .Any single event in the game could be your last.you coul be atacked by a horde controlled by people with no land in the first Turn of the game . You could be betrayed by an allied faction (you though was the computer AI ),but it wasnt. He/she just wait until you make a wrong move to invade your land.. THe posibilities are endless ,it will be a new game .. indeed.


from the gamers point of view, I dont see any diference between online/offline campaing other that againts real human AI the game could be 100xtimes more challenging . the time it takes to play a campain battle offline doesnt have to be diferent to the time it will take to play online. PEople have no problems continue playing later their full campaing using the SAVE GAME option. it doesnt need to be diferent for online. a "mini campaign" for online will be enough. If you play offline is not long but if you play online is too long? whats the diference .All its needed is that you find people that agreed to play the same days the same game .They dont need to play at all times, if a human player disconects the computer AI can take the place ,still you can continue playing the campaing like if nothing happened. just like you will do it offline ,and when he/she returns another day continue playing where the AI left the game ,still the game will be a lot more challenging since real people helped the AI .

i really think the only problem is when people thinks it cant be done. i really doubt that only a few people will want to play the game againts a very powerfull AI. it can be done in a way that is completely transparent to your game ,where you dont know the diference between online/offline campaign gameplay ,except in the greater difuculty .

[Shazbot]

Kind of late... the game comes out in a few weeks. And I agree with CA about a campaign taking way too long to play.

[Revan The Great]

You could have it similar to a message board. One person takes their turn, then the next logs on at their leisure, an hour/day/week/whatever later. You could play a campaign over a whole summer doing that, and hopefully you know your oppenants well enough so you can keep them playing instead of not taking turns for weeks at a time. You could also add an option to watch people's battles if you'd like.

[Doli Capax]

It looks good on paper, but it's highly impractical. Kind of like communism.
For many of the reasons stated above.

[XSlingerX]

This topic has been brought up many times with RTW already. It could be done but it is extremely impractible. It's a fact that has to be accepted. It is not going to happen in M2TW, and will never happen in the style that you want it, its just too unrealistic.

The amount of users that would be willing to do an online campaign would be small because of the massive amount of time it will take and the programmers don't want to program something that maybe 1/10th of the TW population might try. Not to mention multiplayer programming is hard and messy. They want to program features that appeal to a wide audience.

I know the truth hurts (for some people at least)....but it's just the way it is. Period.

[drak10687]

Whats the diference ?

well, first of all, what ^^he^^ just said
second of all, I dont think you understood. Its completely different from a singleplayer campaign. In SP you wait 1,2,3 hours TOTAL playing the game while the AI makes its turns. In MP, you would have to wait 1-2 hours PER TURN. You cannot play while 2 people are having a battle which you are not a part of. Which means you WAIT and DO NOTHING. IN any other RTS or turned based strategy game, you either wait a relatively short time, or you can continue to play while others are. The real time battles take away this element, because once again, if you are not part of the battle, you cant play. So I'm not sure how you dont see a difference between online and offline campaign play unless you regularly take one hour coffe breaks while playing RTW.

[CrazedClown]

There is no money in it for them to devlop this feature. Those of us who want it already own the game, they would gain no new buyers. This is why it would be waste of time for the developer, not because it is "too hard" or impractical. I have seen way to many of these silly arguments on this board, use the search feature next time please.

[Vann7]

You cannot play while 2 people are having a battle which you are not a part of. Which means you WAIT and DO NOTHING.

and WHy not ?

NEver have you played in the campaign againts an army ,where later reinforcements to either side arrive. ? :hmmm:


THe game could allow you the option to be an observer in the battle or participate only if there an enemy or an allied faction in the battle. This force you to use wisely diplomacy. if the developers are lazy enough at least to allow the option to auto-resolve the battles. ,the stronger army wins ,so no waiting folk. IT can be done.. as i said. and in many diferent ways . All that it takes its just a little of imagination and determination to do it. This is not rocket science ,since already the things we need are already in the game .it just that they are controlled by the computer AI. .what im asking is the the feature to allow real people (at least one player) to control the job that was previously done by the computer AI. im sure the RTW Community could do it ,if CA where more open with the community to allow those modifications to their game. after all Things that were labelled as impossible previously are now possible in many mods.

I know the game is already finished but i have my hopes to future expansions packs by CA or future Mods to help with this. Im sure every single gamer outhere will not complain to try their tactical abilities in the map againts REAL PEOPLE . A mini-campaign with smaller goals will do the job , for a couple of hours againts real humans. but a a full campaign will be better.

[iplk]

I think it woudl be good having mini online campaings were there are only 2 players and a smaller map would rock
An eample of this would be the 100 year war between england and france?
Im shure there are a few others in medievil history.

[drak10687]

and WHy not ?

NEver have you played in the campaing againts an army ,where later reinforcements to either side arrive. ?

yes I have. But how many times does that happen? And out of those, how many times do the reinforcements happen to be that of another faction? Sure it would happen alot more often with human palyers. But if you have a campaing with 20 factions, there will always be some one who is not part of the battle. I fail to see how you cannot understand this simple fact, so I will try to give you a demostration with 4 human players:

#1 is france, #2 is HRE, #3 is Rus, #4 is Byziantium.

Turn one:
france attacks HRE, rus and byzantines wait,
HRE attacks France, rus and byzantines wait,
HRE is attacked by the Danish(AI), rus, france and byzantines wait,
rus attacks rebels(ai), france, HRE, byzantines wait,
rus is attacked by the cumans (AI), france and HRE wait, byzantines QUIT because they've been waiting for about an hour!

[Vann7]

yes I have. But how many times does that happen? And out of those, how many times do the reinforcements happen to be that of another faction? Sure it would happen alot more often with human palyers. But if you have a campaing with 20 factions, there will always be some one who is not part of the battle. I fail to see how you cannot understand this simple fact, so I will try to give you a demostration with 4 human players:

#1 is france, #2 is HRE, #3 is Rus, #4 is Byziantium.

Turn one:
france attacks HRE, rus and byzantines wait,
HRE attacks France, rus and byzantines wait,
HRE is attacked by the Danish(AI), rus, france and byzantines wait,
rus attacks rebels(ai), france, HRE, byzantines wait,
rus is attacked by the cumans (AI), france and HRE wait, byzantines QUIT because they've been waiting for about an hour!

I fail to see why you think three (or more) factions cannot be in the same place fighting.. why they need to wait and not enter in a battle that already began. the greatest fun in the campaing i had is when 4 diferent armies are in the same place. reinforcements in each side . lol. after that great battle at least one army will be destroyed. so we have again two. unless there arent survivors..anywhere.. hehe . Just rememeber that the game limits to only 20 slots the units you can control at a time anyway. so the size of the real battle will be the same in practice as if there where only two sides. as soon as you lose units replacements fill the slots.

still is very unlikelly that more than 3 factions will be in the same place. as big as the tactical map is. this is more possible to happen if there were more than 2 human players in the campaign fighting to conquer an important land and suddenly the computer AI wants the same.. FInally ,if there is something im failing to see ,or game engine limit somewhere , autoresolve battles option could also be used , in less than a second you will know the results, it will not be as fun as a real battle but still allows to continue the flowing of the strategy in the game.

Obviously this petition is more for future expansions or perhaps Mods. it requires modifications to the game. but im really sure it can be done. and i have no doubts that this will be a hell of fun for the game.

[4BiddenKnight]

I fail to see why you think three (or more) factions cannot be in the same place fighting.. why they need to wait and not enter in a battle that already began. the greatest fun in the campaing i had is when 4 diferent armies are in the same place. reinforcements in each side . lol. after that great battle at least one army will be destroyed. so we have again two. unless there arent survivors..anywhere.. hehe . Just rememeber that the game limits to only 20 slots the units you can control at a time anyway. so the size of the real battle will be the same in practice as if there where only two sides. as soon as you lose units replacements fill the slots.

still is very unlikelly that more than 3 factions will be in the same place. as big as the tactical map is. this is more possible to happen if there were more than 2 human players in the campaign fighting to conquer an important land and suddenly the computer AI wants the same.. FInally ,if there is something im failing to see ,or game engine limit somewhere , autoresolve battles option could also be used , in less than a second you will know the results, it will not be as fun as a real battle but still allows to continue the flowing of the strategy in the game.

Obviously this petition is more for future expansions or perhaps Mods. it requires modifications to the game. but im really sure it can be done. and i have no doubts that this will be a hell of fun for the game.

Again, you are beating around the bushes. Stop being a haggard and begging us to sign a petition that's only gonna waste our developer's time.

[4BiddenKnight]

and WHy not ?

NEver have you played in the campaign againts an army ,where later reinforcements to either side arrive. ? :hmmm:


THe game could allow you the option to be an observer in the battle or participate only if there an enemy or an allied faction in the battle. This force you to use wisely diplomacy. if the developers are lazy enough at least to allow the option to auto-resolve the battles. ,the stronger army wins ,so no waiting folk. IT can be done.. as i said. and in many diferent ways . All that it takes its just a little of imagination and determination to do it. This is not rocket science ,since already the things we need are already in the game .it just that they are controlled by the computer AI. .what im asking is the the feature to allow real people (at least one player) to control the job that was previously done by the computer AI. im sure the RTW Community could do it ,if CA where more open with the community to allow those modifications to their game. after all Things that were labelled as impossible previously are now possible in many mods.

I know the game is already finished but i have my hopes to future expansions packs by CA or future Mods to help with this. Im sure every single gamer outhere will not complain to try their tactical abilities in the map againts REAL PEOPLE . A mini-campaign with smaller goals will do the job , for a couple of hours againts real humans. but a a full campaign will be better.

You're still beating around the bushes and haven't pinpointed anything that's legitimate enough for us to start believing in multiplayer campaign.

You still haven't explained to us how our waiting time isn't affected.

All you have been doing is telling us to dream and pray that somewhere along the line, this feature will work perfectly. Not happening.

Imagination can only go as far as you can get before it becomes dillusional and unrealistic.

And no we should never, ever get ourselves a multiplayer campaign. Waiting time is already enough for us to call it off.

I fail to see why you think three (or more) factions cannot be in the same place fighting.. why they need to wait and not enter in a battle that already began. the greatest fun in the campaing i had is when 4 diferent armies are in the same place. reinforcements in each side . lol. after that great battle at least one army will be destroyed. so we have again two. unless there arent survivors..anywhere.. hehe . Just rememeber that the game limits to only 20 slots the units you can control at a time anyway. so the size of the real battle will be the same in practice as if there where only two sides. as soon as you lose units replacements fill the slots.

still is very unlikelly that more than 3 factions will be in the same place. as big as the tactical map is. this is more possible to happen if there were more than 2 human players in the campaign fighting to conquer an important land and suddenly the computer AI wants the same.. FInally ,if there is something im failing to see ,or game engine limit somewhere , autoresolve battles option could also be used , in less than a second you will know the results, it will not be as fun as a real battle but still allows to continue the flowing of the strategy in the game.

Obviously this petition is more for future expansions or perhaps Mods. it requires modifications to the game. but im really sure it can be done. and i have no doubts that this will be a hell of fun for the game.

Again, you are beating around the bushes. Stop being a haggard and begging us to sign a petition that's only gonna waste our developer's time.

[General Sun]

There is a multiplayer campaign for RTW if you didn't know.

Might be interesting for you.

http://generalscollective.com/forums...php?board=73.0

[CrazedClown]

I like how everyone conventionality ignores my comment about how stupid and pointless this whole conversation is.

[Niles Crane]

Oh please, even if CA wanted to do it, it's just not feasible.

[DougyM]

Oh please, even if CA wanted to do it, it's just not feasible.

Quoted for truth.

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A MP campaign is just plainly not going to happen any time soon, the game does not lend itself well to a persistant MP experience.

Sure you would get a few people who would sell their kidneys to be able to play a totaly MP version of the campaign.... but thats not enough incentive for CA to do it.

It would require basicly the resources of an entire games development team to get it to work.
It wouldnt be of the same complexity of the SP campaign.
People would get bored waiting hours on end to have 5 minutes of game time.
You just cant expect a group of 4 random people to paly a campaign for what could be weeks on end... especialy if one of them gets beaten a lot or if he grows tired of his choice of faction etc....

So for the time and costs of creating a brand new TW game only to have a few thousand at the absolute best play the game... you think that would be worth it?

CA are a proffessional games company with years of experience and the awards and sales to show for it... if they say a MP campaign isnt possible then im more inclined to believe them than a random guy on a forum who thinks he knows how to make a game.