War room (based on total air war and close combat)

[Time 0]

If you played these two games, you know what I'm talking about. In TAW there is a war campaign in Sudan vs. Eritreia-Etiopia. The war goes real time and different types of missions are created in a mission pool while the war goes on. You can do only the missions which you have clearance to (enough points). In this way not even two mission are completely the same, what I find it much better than playing the same missions all over again. In Close Combat 4 & 5, there is a turn-based interface before you go fight a battle. The CC5 is happening on the Cherobourg pennisula (Omaha beach) which is divided into 40 maps where you can battle with your forces. In this "pre-battle" you move your battalions over this 40 tiles and if the German forces meet you on the same tile as your, you play a realtime battle then.

What I would like to see in OFP2 is this. We are the Russians and we must occupy Everon for example. The (AI) general has limited forces and resources. Based on them, he decides, how to attack the island and to deploy his forces. And the war goes off. There would be a screen (like in TAW) of the whole island with all the forces running around and fighting all on symbolic level (win would be calculated on statistic info of factors which affect the units that are fighting). Depending on the current situation would the AI general make his decisions and give orders to the officers he commands, and these would deploy their squads as they know the best to fill out the orders they were given. And now the war would begin for the player, all what I've said till now wouldn't be viewed by player (he's a grunt, not the general).

And now, a more vivid example of how would this work. The AI general has a company surrounded in a valley and he tells the nearest commander to do a relief attempt. The commander organises a group of two tank platoons and three mechanised infantry platoons to do the job. You're in a mechanised inf. unit which is ordered to cover the right flank. And then finally th game begins in 3-dimensional mode and the symbolic pauses. After the battle ends, you go to the symbolic mode. The rest of the world was paused until now. The battle you fought is makes changes to the symbolic map, the game then runs only the time you were fighting, and then again all the map is run simultaneously.

[Col. Kurtz 0]

It sounds like a good system but I think there should be choice. There should be a campaign like in the original Flashpoint where the missions are made by a mapper and you just go along for the ride, maybe with a few veriations depending on your actions. Then there could be the more strategic version where you move your troops around and assign targets for bombers etc.

I would say theres a high chance that the strategic campaign system won't be made by BIS, but it could be a good mod.

[Time 0]

It sounds like a good system but I think there should be choice. There should be a campaign like in the original Flashpoint where the missions are made by a mapper and you just go along for the ride, maybe with a few veriations depending on your actions. Then there could be the more strategic version where you move your troops around and assign targets for bombers etc.

I would say theres a high chance that the strategic campaign system won't be made by BIS, but it could be a good mod.

I agree with you. Maybe the strategic campaign system would work better in multiplayer (with some modifications).

The BI probably already has a system figured out, and all our ideas make no real difference (but I think some of them should be patented, coz they're really good, and could have a neat price)

[Phleep 0]

BIS did state that the Africa campaign would be strategic so I think they would welcome innovative ideas as early as possible in the proceedings. We all know it was nearly possible in the original with CoC and people developing dynamic campaigns.

BIS appear to be trying to cater to everyone with an action campaign through VN and CE for when you don't want to bother worrying about logistics and the strategically orientated Africa campaign. If your above idea is used it would be incredibly good but if it isn't then with the promoted flexibility of the "engine to be" it will be made soon after.

[Time 0]

I think this "strategic campaign" system would be still better because they would get rid of the scripting but had to improve AI enormously if you want to make game run fluently (the things that were scripted before must now happen by the AI). So if you get captured with a couple of your buddys the next logical mission would be to try to escape. So there should be a kind of script or a procedure by which the AI would reckognise it is captured and tries to escape.

I belive that one major advantage of "strategic campaign" is that, for example in OFP1 there were linear missions you had to do or you couldn't start the next one. Here, you can always pull out even if you didn't manage to fill out the orders, but the failure will have an effect on the whole war theatre because you screwed up, and the AI general might send you one more time to take over a hill, which you didn't a day before, for example. And the story is really written by the player, instead of those linear missions in OFP1 where the player just rewrites the story in another way.

In the real world, there are different types of goals and other things important for the army to work (strategically important locations on the map, terrain and urban advantages/disadvantages <-could be premade by the mapper, logistic support, and other stuff...). The AI general would have kind of a list with these types of missions and use them according to the situation on the battlefield. The AI field commander would have a list of tactical situations (like recon, escort, patrol, assault, guard, checkpoint...). And the AI sqad leader would have his list of combat situations (I don't have any suggestions right now, think of some).

Example: AIGen (AI General) has to take over a strategically important village on the crossroads in order to cut of an enemy supply route. He gives orders to take over the village to the nearest AIFC (AI Field Commander). AIFC tells the AIGen he doesn't have any more units left which could fill out the orders. AIGen calls another AIFC who is also quite near to the village. This AIFC arranges a group of some tank squads and assault infantry platoon makes a plan using the info about the terrain and the intelligence which a recon unit gathered before. After all is set, the mission begins in 3D and you start to fight with your platoon. And there would be AISL (AI Squad Leader) who would make his decisions by his experience and his "list of combat situations". As you can see, all the scripting (waypoints, time schedules, units in combat,...) would be actually be done by the AI.