I enjoy both, but this really is an Apples to Furniture comparison - at the very least, Medieval warfare and WWII are very different animals. If you like the strategy aspect of TW, something like Hearts of Iron would be the next step up in realism to give you a taste of the grand strategy of the era. If you like the tactical battles, a Close Combat or a Combat Mission title will give you the same sort of scale (keep in mind that a 10000 man army in M2TW would probably be equivalent to about a company in WWII in terms of destructive ability).
The thing I love most about the Panther games (CotA and HttR) are that there’s really nothing else like them, as far as I can tell. I remember reading in an old Computer Games Strategy Plus (remember that one?) about something that sounded similar focusing on the Eastern Front, Road to Moscow I think, but as far as I know that never materialized. I think Panther’s working on the Bulge next, moving into more well-worn territory than CotA. Personally I think they should keep the focus on the less known conflicts - I knew absolutely nothing about the Greek campaign before I played CotA, and would love that mix of fun/learning again.
New topic: how about the Distant Guns Russian-Japanese naval game? Another title that is basically in a class by itself. I definitely prefer this one to, say, a Harpoon title, but personally it takes a lot to get me interested in naval warfare in the first place. This one did it with its dead simple controls and nice, shiny graphics.
I haven’t played a wargame in years. Is there anything decent and free out there that I can give a go to find out whether I still have the patience for one?
Another post of COTA love. I think it is an elegant and interesting wargame. It is especially good in allowing “fighting withdrawals” and trade offs time/ space that hex/ counter systems struggle with. Plus the power of artillery… in HTTR the key to winning was to find and disrupt the arty units asap, in COTA they are less skittish
However, a truism in both management & war, is the higher you are, the fewer decisions you need to make in any given period. Because COTA is a division/ brigade level game, the decisions/ time are quite few. (i.e. this brigade will hold this line for six hours, then withdraw to the next position) This is realistic, but you do find yourself watching plans unfold/ fall apart at times, now and again tweaking it somewhat. Or a lot if your brigade is being flanked!
But! But if you make the victory condition something like “Hold out for 10 turns” or “Retain control of at least 50 resource points out of 500” or “Save at least 20% of your units” or something like that, as is commonly done, then it’s fine. You can win by losing less badly than expected.
Of course this silly tweaking of victory conditions doesn’t change the underlying scenario at all, so let us say Napoleon will still lose the Battle of the Nile every time – from his point of view – but maybe this time the L’Orient won’t explode and a couple more British ships will be wrecked before the French strike, so the French player will get another hundred victory points and win the game if not the battle…
People’s Tactics is quite nice. Small scale, quick and simple to get started, but with some interesting leadership mechanics to give it some depth once you’ve got an idea what you’re doing.
So I reckon I’m ready to do a COTA AAR. Anyone interested if I was to do such a thing? Preference for an attack or defend battle? The defends can be verrry interesting. Hmm. Let me know here if anyone is interested and I’ll get to work!
Righto! I’ll sort something out in the next few nights or so. Defensive will be an interesting challenge! Only fought one battle like that so far, but the principles should be simple enough hahaha.
Bumping this one back up for the new Close Combat. Anyone tried it yet? It’s a remake of the fourth one (Bulge), but I never played any of them when they came out, so that doesn’t mean much. I did spend a ton of time with CoI though, and apparently this one got the same treatment. I don’t know, though, I’ve been playing so much Combat Mission lately that I’m not sure I could go back to CC…
Word of warning - read the manual, because there is nothing in game to help you understand the most basic stuff. The tutorials are mostly unhelpful, too.
